st. joseph halle : fredericksburg tx : at night

it has been an odd week. i have felt so displaced and disconnected. but i have worked hard - finishing To Total Completion over 2 dozen pieces. some were in progress, or "finished but not ready". now they are varnished, signed, titled and framed and ready to go out the door. ok wait. i still need to photograph and inventory them. i will, before they are stored away again. i really felt compelled to have a cohesive bit of work together in case there were an opportunity to show. since i have been here, i have seen so many invitations for artists, at various venues, and wished i had work ready. now i do. my next task is to have a display ready, for a booth show. uh. but wait. where will i store *that*??

when i have felt too imprisoned, i went out for a bit. i went to visit the llamas, made some plants for my bleak entrance, herbs and pansies. for the last two nights i had to put sheets on them, but mostly they can stay out for a long time. i had a date with little Kathy for the farmer's market, then pizza, ice cream and a movie - Howls' Moving Castle - which was quite enchanting. then i caught up with American Horror Story with Kurtis.

then this evening. well. hmmm.

i went to an art opening in town. first i did a walkaround with my cammie, which i needed. i have been taking my realCam out, but have been sadly disappointed with the images, compared to that dumb little beloved iPod. but i realize that my realCam sometimes feels like a companion, which i need desperately lately, so i take her. the show was at St. Joseph Halle (not a typo), a group of local painters, Die Kunstler (yes, shut up, everything *is* in German here!) and it was quite a turnout. there was lots of work. and yes, as i suspected, mostly gentle landscapes. there were no artists using trashy chinese newspaper, ipod photos and magazine pitchers. there was one, yes, ONE, abstract artist. i rather liked her work. then i saw her standing alone with her name tag and suspected she was an alien like me. i wanted to ask her how it felt to be the singular abstract artist of her group, but she was austere and appeared somewhat stern and i did not have enough of the red wine to do so, or even to say hey nice work. otherwise, it was all so tame. (but friendly) and omigod. i have never in my life seen so many SNACKS at an opening. i am not kidding. there were more snacks than art. and there was a lot of art. so it was interesting, but i felt terribly lonely. even more so, walking home in the dark in a town where the only people walking are a few mexican high school students (and the tourists on main street, during daylight hours only, of course). i keep wondering if this was a good idea. if my family weren't here, i might well be thinking of A. gobbling pills or B. stealing money and leaving again. but then, if they were not here, i would not have come anyway.

i'm just not sure what to ... do ... next.