Tuesday Meditation - Trip to the Rose City, Art Show, and Teaching

“In a world filled with hate, we must still dare to hope. In a world filled with anger, we must still dare to comfort. In a world filled with despair, we must still dare to dream. And in a world filled with distrust, we must still dare to believe.” Michael Jackson
Trip to Rose City
We're back from an exhilerating trip to Portland. That biker in the picture above is my husband who did all 200 miles in one day as I drove down. The STP (Seattle to Portland) bike ride draws over 10,000 riders from all over the country and the vast majority do the ride in 2 days with a stop overnight along the way... So you see, he's in rare company, those that dream and actually accomplish difficult physical challenges... 14.5 hours sitting on a bike seat, oh my gosh! And he's done it at least 18 times over the years! He's my role model for getting in shape, but, definitely not to that level.

We relaxed the next day after his bike ride, by visiting the Portland Rose Garden in the morning - great overlooks of the city and the most wonderful large rose garden I have seen. We enjoyed the afternoon at the Portland Art Museum. There was an interesting Escher exhibit who was a master at detailed drawings, also exhibit on tattoos, and, of course, I love their permanent collection of impressionist paintings, all worthy of a stop there.

Art Show
I have very busy making new art for an upcoming show, and happy to say, I'll succeed in my goal of putting together a show in a different media for me, acrylic. I have also created a selection of mini art as part of my display, here's a peek at 3 of them in the picture below. In addition, the show has a "miniature paintings" section too. "Artsplash" begins July 16 and runs through July 19 in Edmonds, for those reading who are local. Over 50 artists will be in this show, including me, so do stop in and take a look and chat with the artists. The best time to come is either Thursday evening (4-8pm) during the Edmonds Art Walk so you can visit other galleries as well.... or even better, come on Friday evening (6-8pm) when most of the artists will be there. I will also be there on Sunday afternoon from 2-5 doing an art demo. Teaching!
In the sidebar of my blog I have added a listing of workshops I will be teaching at Everett Artist's Supply and Framing: Zen Drawing, Mini-Booklet and Pamphlet, and Journaling the Journey. I'm excited about presenting these fun, easy art sessions. Teaching is something I have done a bit of here and there, and it is satisfying seeing people absorb information and the directions they take with their own art.

Tuesday Meditation
I found a beautiful quote from Michael Jackson today. I have to say, I was absorbed by some of the media frenzy and talking heads the last couple of weeks after his death (isn't there just tooo much celebrity "news" these days on CNN, is it still "news" if it's repeated over and over for weeks, or if it's really just endless speculation?)? And though I never thought of myself as an MJ fan, I realized there were quite a few songs along the way that I now remember I really enjoyed. And, definitely, I thought he was an extraordinary dancer - some moves look like Elvis, some like Fred Astaire, James Brown, Charlie Chaplin, and rap all rolled into one. Very gifted man who I learned also gave back more to charity than any other pop star. So here's a You Tube video of an early performance by a younger MJ of one of my fav's, copyright the artist. There are probably many lessons that his life presents for us, not the least of which, are, to look past the external into the soul and essence of a person and to "dare to hope, comfort, dream, and believe".