I've asked myself these questions each time I wake up from an artist trance after a work is finished. My paintings are not pre-planned so they must be coming from somewhere.

The only thing I can imagine is that my paintings reflect the fact that I was born, reared and still live in southeast Louisiana.

No, we don't have hollers because we don't have hills. We don't have valleys because we don't have mountains. In fact, we don't even have rocks any bigger than a golf ball. Why?

Because southeast Louisiana is the land of swamps, water, moss and year-round green. Flowers are plentiful and magnolia huge, and when I look at the moon and sky, I peer through a canopy of trees. Open plains are called pastures and are as big as a couple of country back yards.

And birds...oh the birds...birds whose words I try to mimic with an awkward whistle.

Louisiana is full of nature so I guess my paintings must fill with nature.

We have humidity...oh gosh...we definitely have humidity, but the rainforest feel of our atmosphere fills our lives with color and thus must be transferring to my paintings. 

The people? Our words slurred together long before texting abbreviated the English language. Why? because we have so much to tell each other. We have SO many friends and SO many open emotions! 

And we party and we drink. We fill our weekends with festivals, parties, and fundraisers. Did I mention parties?

Yep, there are many of them, but I'm not sure how that fits my paintings...unless it's because of our new now with Covid.

We can't party! We can't hug! We can't kiss! Our grins show only through the wrinkles on the corners of our eyes.

I'm not sure how Covid will reflect in my paintings unless they become more layered than they already are...but so layered that I have to peel away each to be able to analyze myself. Or maybe I'll just let the rest of the world do that and give my solitude the consent to paint.