My plan to go outside and paint this morning fell apart when I couldn’t keep my eyes open. The bed called, and I answered.

It’s not as hot and awful outside this afternoon, so I have put on clothing I don’t mind getting messy in and will be gathering my painting stuff together shortly. As soon as I finish my glass of Dr Pepper, outside I go to paint. I’m taking two canvases with me. One is the modern-style landscape I never finished because I got sick of looking at it, and the other is a plain blank white one. As far as tools go, I am taking my spray bottle of water, my paints, a plate for mixing, a garbage bag to protect the grass, a bucket of water, and at most three large brushes … and my hands.

The rules are going to be I cannot come in to get any other tools and I will not be upset if some color from other tubes gets on the openings or bodies of differently colored tubes. I have always been anal about this. If I showed you my paints, you would be amazed with how clean they are. Aside from having been obviously squeezed to get paint out, there is no paint of any color on the outside of any tube. Have you ever seen other painter’s tubes of paint? Such cleanliness is unnatural. I need to loosen up with the paint.

I have decided recently that I either need to go at my art with full gusto or I need to give it up entirely. This piddling around with it, controlling it, and not letting GO has to stop if I am going to move forward. So in another twenty or so minutes, I am going to step out into the back yard and regress to being four years old and being given my first tubes of paint. I was never messy as a child, and now I am going to let myself do it, as well as attempting to drop some of my perceptions of what is and is not art. Or I will be sitting out in the back yard sweating my ass off and being grumpy. The only way to find out which of those two options will happen is to just go do it, right?

I’m going to set up the camera on the tripod and take some baggies for my messy hands, just in case the urge to snap a few photos of myself at “work” arises. Ought to be entertaining and make the neighbors wonder what I am up to.