Adjustments rattle multiple souls in this family, and this shift from spring break to school days is still sending shockwaves.

On the way to the studio, I lean on Gregorian Chants to still myself after the morning’s reverberations. Listen and breathe, listen and breathe. A solitary sanctuary opens up on my drive: “It is all as it should be.”

A plan comes—scaffolding to hold us up until the shaking stops. I adjust the evening for this support.

In the studio, today’s dreamy rainy day hides the light I need. I adjust my goals and prep another workspace. And for the first time in my history as an artist, I swipe my water pail. In a breath it pours out and over my
table
tubes
brushes
everything.

I freeze. This isn’t happening.

But the dripdripdripping pulls me into a reality of water streaming off the table and onto new canvases.

I am shaken out of the residual calm of the commute, and adjust again—wipe away what I wish wasn’t, what I don’t want to be, but what is.

And I breathe.

“We cannot expect things to be any more than what they are.” This rolls through my mind somewhere between soaked towels. I repeat and repeat and breathe again.

And I paint.

(Less expecting. More accepting. There is no other way to live.)