Lonely Left Brain Interlude

I haven't posted in a ridiculously long time, largely because I haven't had much to post.  Somehow I've spent long stretches lately without painting or photographing much.  

I am an interesting mix of analytical and artist, and can, when I have to, turn off my right brain for stretches to do what needs to be done in life.  I do a lot of analytical and scientific thinking in my job.  But what happens, inevitably, is my soul feels like a withered dry husk after a time living without being an artist.  While I like and am proud of my analytical mind, it's the creative part of me that is my essence.

I had been struggling with life during late spring and early summer, spending long hours helping various friends in need instead of doing things for myself.  Then, after a particularly trying and busy stretch of doing a tremendous amount for other people, I lost one of my dearest friends, who died suddenly and unexpectedly at the age of 36.  She was also an artist, and a sister to my soul.  I shall miss Cat every day of the rest of my life, and I am struggling not to feel like emotional tumbleweed without her to anchor my sanity.

Since losing Cat, life hasn't let up much to let me grieve, let alone create.

But, I think (hope!) things are looking up, as I am slowly shifting back toward feeling more like myself.  In late July, my father, his friend S, my sister, brother-in-law, niece, husband and I all went back up to Chase Lake in the Adirondacks for a little family get together, which we had done the same time last year.  To say the least, the time in the woods was long overdue for me.   

Anyway, here are the first few shots I took as I started to crawl out of my art-less world.  It turns out that after going a long time without taking photos or painting, I had to take a LOT of photos to feel like I was at all back in the groove.  I'm not thrilled with any of them, but post them here because a) I finally took some bleeping pictures which was the first step to letting loose my pent-up creative inner beast, b) Cat would be furious with me for not making time to create and share whatever the fruits of my labors were and she was generally right about most things, and c) these photos were the start of my recognizing an interesting new theme or style in my photography.  There will be more photos to follow shortly, after I edit the (*gasp*) 800+ photos I took a few weeks after these in Maine. 

Oh, and my sweet, patient husband gets 100% of the credit for the hummingbird shots.  I consistently gave up on sitting still about 3 seconds before they arrived for a photo op.

 Look!  I actually took a sunny lake photo of a lake without under exposing it!  Hooray!

 These fellas fledged the last day we were there.  Too cute.

 Ok, I admit I like this one of the spider web and morning mist.