During the past two weeks with a houseful of friends and family,during quiet moments I would sit down and read a bit of the Frances Hodges Burnett biography. She is the author who wrote The Secret Garden. Of course that was a favorite of mine when I was a child as it was for many children. Burnett was an extremely successful writer and made a good amount of money for a women back in her day. I loved this quote of hers....As long as one has a garden, one has a future and as long as one has a future one is alive. I feel like rewriting that with the same message. As long as one works in the arts one has a future and with a future one is alive. It has been a fabulous week with everyone here in a celebratory mood. And good old summertime weather as well. We picked gobs of beans and peas and ran to the grocery store every day. Swimming was good in the pond and the cat and the dog got along. During the reception at the award ceremony, I met Ernest Hebert the local writer. His wife was also a recipient. She is a painter who decided to use the ubiquitous plaid of New England in many of her paintings. It's quite wonderful. I talked with Ernest a bit and told him how much I had loved his first book where his main character climbs ontop of the infamous Basketville sign in protest. VT was the first state to make it illegal to put billboards on highways so that company placed an enormous sign in a field far from the highway but it was so enormous you could not miss it. It's gone now as is the store Basketville. I am back in the studio now that everyone is gone. Trying to finish up a rather small triptych with panels whose surfaces are very rough and stonelike and inserted in the boxes are small, white, smooth stones. I like the contrast of the rough surfaced panels and the smooth, almost porcelain like, stones. After all this amazing intensity and largeness, it's pleasing to focus inward. There is an intimacy that is rewarding right now working in a small scale.. In this newest triptych, I am trying to catch the grey silver of granite rock with a touch of the green moss growing over parts of it.