July 06th, 2019

My apologies for being MIA the past couple months.  After the medical issues I experienced in spring, friends and family were also dealing with personal crises.  Dad is winding down and getting harder and harder to understand.  Mike’s uncle had two strokes.  A friend has been in and out of the hospital with no answers as to what might be the issue.  In fact, I got a text to update me on her situation as I sit and compose this.  One thing after another and after a while I’ve just lost heart for writing.

But I have been working on painting and photography.  Images work when words fail.  At least they do for me.  The painting is mostly abstract work.  On Mondays I volunteer at an urban coffee house where coffee and bagels are free and the cafe is a safe place for people in the neighborhood to create community.  I was talking with one of the guys over coffee asking me what my paintings were about.  I told him it was about the mystery of prayer.  That the paintings were black on black with metallics thrown in to represent what prayer is like - a spiritual quest to represent prayer in paint.  Up to that point the conversation had been pretty superficial.  He stopped eating and looked me in the eye.  “That’s really powerful,” he said.  “I like the way you think.”  That took me by surprise.  Can’t say I’ve heard that very often.

Images work when words fail.  I find in prayer I am often at a loss for words, but that’s where I can trust that God can read my heart.  My tears are my prayers.  My anguish and feelings are my prayers.  My paintings are my prayers.  And God, being good and gracious, hears and understands those prayers.

I’ll leave you with this triptych. It’s called Mystery, Questions, Wonder.