Cherry O

Cherry O

That leaf followed us here. Right deserving that the tip broke off.

Did we do it? Well all I have to say is.....I plead the fifth...

Cherry O

Oil on 6x6 gallery wrapped canvas.

$50

For sale via Paypal at my DPW gallery

Riding the Waves

Some days it takes a very concerted effort not to completely unfold. It can be just plain exhausting working to tame the beast that is my emotions being toyed with by hormone injection and depletion by steroids. My brain becomes disconnected with reality and the highs get very high and the lows very low.

I am a live wire and I don’t know myself when I will lash out or who or what will take the brunt. The man clothes piled on top of, rather than in, the hamper? The RNC? The husband’s crusted cereal bowl that never made it the extra foot into the dishwasher? The sound of too many electronics going at once? The nail polish that smudges with fingerprints because of my lack of patience for drying?

It takes a tremendous amount of focused effort to keep myself stable as I ease off these steroids, handle the chemo drugs, and continue to process the trauma I’ve been through and the realties of the unknown ahead.

Most days I feel balanced and whole with only forward momentum. But some mornings bring with them a heavy weight, an incessant ringing in my ears of frustrations and questions, worries about the big things (my sister is driving across the country and my brother is getting married in two weeks, oh, and that cancer thing), worries about the stupid things (what necklace will I wear, organizing the pantry, fruit flies, which vitamin brand to take).

On the tough days, a blanket of angst shrouds and suffocates me so much that it can literally be hard to see through my eyes, which are so blearily exhausted from taking it all in.

Sometimes I just can’t shut it off and it makes me want to writhe and scream.

Instead, I do my best to breathe, let go, ride the wave and hope to hell that once I can push myself back out to the break point, the next wave will be a gentler ride in. 

Playing with Shadows

Bumpy. Unavailable

Bumpy

Why couldn't I be like all the other pumpkins? They are smooth while I am bumpy.

I think smooth is better however I could be glass like just an old every day cookie jar. 

I guess I would rather be Bumpy.

6x6 oil on gallery wrapped canvas

For sale or auction on my DPW gallery. Just follow the link to pay via PayPal. 

Just Around The Corner

Just Around The Corner

I know it is still hot outside but soon it will be fall. Autumn is just around the corner.

6x6 oil on gallery wrapped canvas

This painting is for sale or auction at my DPW gallery.Just follow the link to purchase via PayPal.

Seize The Day

Seize The Day

A rose painted for 

www.paintanddrawtogether.blogspot.com

6x6 oil on gallery wrapped canvas

Unavailable

August Status Update

With my amazing group of high school girlfriends 

at Lisa's wedding in late July, now nearly all of us 30 and 

growing even closer together with each passing year. Mer

gets married this weekend and Thea in one month!

Peripheral neuropathy has started to set in. This is an expected side effect of the SGN-35. The hope is that it doesn’t progress, as I know patients who have been on it that had to come off due to debilitating neuropathy pain. For me currently, I don’t have any pain, only numbness. I’ve had no feeling in the pads of all 10 fingertips for the past week. So far it hasn’t affected any of my abilities; it is just a strange sensation like when your fingers get cold in the winter and you can’t warm them up only it’s just a small section on each finger pad that has completely lost feeling no matter how much I rub them.

I also occasionally lose feeling or get painful tingling in my feet, especially after walking for some distance. The pressure on the pavement seems to get it going. The numbness will creep up my legs some, but so far it always resolves itself after a short period of time.

I do not want this to be the reason that I have to come off this drug, which so far has been successful for me. Tomorrow I am seeing an acupuncturist to start treatments to combat this and my doctor also recommended starting up on Vitiman B-Complex. I’ll do anything to keep the feeling in my limbs.

The Prednisone steroid taper continues. On each dose reduction day I most certainly feel the lurch even though I’m only dropping by 5mg every 5 days. I am now at 20mg (down from my original 60mg started on July 12 to treat my lung inflammation). Once I hit 10mg I have to drop even slower – by 2.5mg at a time – as there is a big risk of dependency and withdrawal symptoms if the body comes off the meds too quickly.

So, that means the bloated feelings, insatiable appetite and the ridiculously swollen moon face continue. Others “say” they don’t notice, but I don’t recognize my own face in the mirror as it’s completely changed shape with the steroid swelling. I want to eat all the time. Period. I’m doing my best to make big healthy meals so there is always something good to snack on. I’ve eaten orchards worth of fruit. I could eat anyone under the table in a contest, I promise. This pit is bot.tom.less.

As I come off the steroid I’ve been feeling some achiness in my hips and joints, but it is tough to know what is causing that. My pulmonologist tells me patients tapering off of Prednisone very commonly experience that achiness. However, it’s very hard not to get paranoid that the lymphoma is again flaring in my hips. I’m also more fatigued, but overall I really can’t complain at all.

I’ve been busy with lots of non-cancer related things like freelance writing and e-communications work, gearing up to be in one of my best friend’s weddings this weekend, spending time with Craig before he’s back full-time in the classroom tomorrow (or rather nursing him after he had an epic Superman over-the-handlebars mountain biking accident last weekend), enjoying this late summer weather celebrating, relaxing and adventuring with great friends, reading, walking, yogaing and playing with Sammy.

I will get my sixth infusion of SGN-35 on Sept. 10, just less than two weeks from now, so will be enjoying what is hopefully continued recovery from my most recent infusion until then. The good part is that Hartford Hospital is now administering the drug as it has been FDA approved, so I’ll be able to receive the infusion just 30 minutes away, rather than 3 hours away. Wonderful!

Then, I have a PET Scan scheduled for Oct. 1, marking seven months on SGN-35. Pending what the results show that day at Sloan-Kettering, I’ll either receive my seventh infusion right afterward or look at a new plan. If things are looking real good and the environment seems right, we may take the steps to move toward a DLI with some more of my sister’s natural killer cells. But let’s not get ahead of things … .

Right now I’m content, nurtured and happy and looking forward to what will surely be a beautiful weekend watching one of my favorite couples start their married life together beside the beauty of the Long Island Sound. Just hope that bridesmaid dress zips up for me.

Out Front

Out Front

No matter how many chickens are in the yard I am the one out front.

I lead them all. I struggle daily with all who try to take over. What oh what shall I do.

6x6 oil on gallery wrapped canvas.

$50

This painting for sale or auction at my DPW gallery. Just follow the

link to purchase via PayPal

Tipped Over (reworked)

Tipped Over

One year ago today I painted this but have always been a little bugged about it as

It's place of residence was on my studio wall. Today I decided it was time to touch it 

up a little shall we say. The first version was acrylic and since I have read that we can paint

oil over acrylic that is exactly what I did. This is a 12x12 gallery wrapped canvas.

To purchase visit my DPW gallery 

where this painting is available for sale or auction using PayPal.

Salty Good

Salty good

We are wonderful. We are plump and firm just like you would want us to be.

We start out green and firm then someone pokes a hole in us and fills us with that red

delicious filling, Pimento I think it is called. Which is better? I think it is the olive. No I know

it is. We are better because Green is always better than red...right?

Anyway we are not just good....We are Salty Good.

This painting is for sale or auction at my DPW gallery. Just follow the link to purchase via PayPal

Roses Are

Roses Are

A vase of roses...some kind words or an old fashioned card sent

via snail mail. It doesn't take a lot to make someone's day even better.

6x6 oil on gallery wrapped canvas.

Unavailable

Masked Encounters

Outside a kitschy Little Italy bakery 

For 100 days I could not step into the world without slipping my hands into protective latex blue gloves and strapping a paper mask across my mouth and nose, attached uncomfortably around my ears with unforgiving elastic that would leave deep indentations in my skin.

I got used to children staring, gawking and pointing and to their parents awkwardly fumbling with how to handle the situation. Kids seemed to be the only ones who notice their surroundings. Most others either didn’t even notice me or went out of their way to avoid looking at me for fear that I would vex them or because it made them way too uncomfortable. This was the best part about recovering in Manhattan. There is so much stimulation that my little freak show was just a drop in the melting pot. Had I had to walk around like that in my rural Connecticut town where the most exciting things we see are bears knocking over garbage cans and the annual fire truck parade I imagine my experience would have been different.

Most of the time I just blended in with the crowd. I wasn’t much to look at when compared to the man who dressed in a suit made of old newspapers or the lady walking around with a pet rat on her shoulder doling out flyers touting her savior or the group of teenagers in barely-covering cut-off shorts, inside pockets peeking out paired with tube tops just thick enough to cover their breasts and nothing else.

Washington Square Park

As much as I was afraid of people and looked at them as walking disease carriers, I also wanted to be around people, desperately missing that human interaction. I was alone in a very small room for a month, unable to leave, unable to interact with anyone but the medical professionals, cleaning people and the few family and friends that dared enter my isolation, having to wear their own set of mask and gloves in reverse precaution.

It’s hard to find a place in Manhattan where there aren’t hundreds of others seeking the same grassy knoll as you, people walking on your heels, bouncing off of your elbows and breathing down your neck. My release into the real world was a harsh transition. It’s hard to imagine a more extreme dichotomy than hospital isolation and midtown Manhattan.

Though most often I remained anonymous and attracted no more than stares, there were those few encounters when people couldn’t help but take notice and approach me. I can’t blame them, and though it was exhausting to tell my story and these people encroaching on my personal space sometimes shocked me, I believe their questioning came from a place of concern for my well being rather than sheer nosiness.

  

She Got It

It was very hot and humid outside. The paper mask across my nose and mouth felt especially constricting in the oppressive air. I sat on a hard bench in Central Park just outside the wildlife sanctuary area, not far from the busyness of 5^th Ave near the Apple Store and FAO Schwartz madness. Though it was ill-advised to be in crowds I craved the sanctuary of the park’s trees and hedged my bets to be able to be outside each and every day.

I was uncomfortable everywhere. I was so thin that my bones protruded from my bottom. With no cushioning, the unforgiving wood of park benches made it difficult to sit and rest and forced me to carry a sweater to roll under my sacrum or sit with legs folded underneath me in protection.

Bryant Park

As the hours got closer to lunchtime the park filled with more and more people walking past my bench. Though I sat to the far side, close to the garbage can, no one dared sit next to me on my bench for fear of what disease this masked woman with the latex blue gloves could be carrying.

Under the veil of my rimmed cap, dark sunglasses and mask that covered two-thirds of my face, I watched people in their business suits licking ice cream cones on a break from the office. I watched tourists with large-lensed Nokia cameras snap shots of the bridge made famous in so many movies. I watched mothers and nannies give their children chips and hot dog rolls to throw into the pond and feed the ducks right beside the sign that said: “Don’t feed the wildlife.” I listened to roaming musicians as they set out their instrument cases for money collection and blew on their saxophone or banged their bongo drums.

Most did not notice me at all, blissfully unaware of the newly reborn woman struggling to stay upright in the heat and longing to be as svelte and fast as them, longing to have the occupied expressions they wore on their faces – fingers flying across their Blackberry keyboards or neon Nikes tied up for a run. They had a purpose, a mission, a job, a task. I, on the other hand, was merely doing my best to get through the day using the minimal energy I had for a few hours in the sunshine of a park under the cover of shade, slathers of sunscreen with nothing but my eyes to reveal my emotions to the outside world. Zombie-esque.

I couldn’t show my smile to these people. The mask prevented me from being able to prove I was friendly. I couldn’t engage. I felt alone, ugly, scared, jealous and defeated.

A woman and her husband came around the bend of the park path. She looked to be in her late 50s, relatively athletic, walking with ease and confidence with seemingly nowhere to be but a sure direction nonetheless. She and her husband, a peppered gray-haired man were holding hands as they strolled at a leisurely pace approaching my bench.

Rather than quickly looking away when she saw me — as most everyone else would do — this woman locked eyes with me. She then raised her hand toward me and gave me a thumbs-up. There were no words exchanged, just this universal sign of encouragement. It was obvious she knew exactly why I was wearing that mask and all that it symbolized.

Her opposite hand became outstretched as he gently pulled her back to his pace, oblivious to the interaction that had just happened as she smiled and turned back away from me continuing to admire the pond and the birds and the nature path they walked on ahead.

Fanatic Concern

I was on the corner waiting for a cab. I felt I was always on the corner waiting for a cab. Germ-infested public transportation was not an option for me. I had walked as far uptown as I could stripping down from sweater to long sleeve amid the sundress wearing ladies around me. My body could not regulate its own temperature and without hair and fat I was chilled on the inside, sweaty on the outside most all the time.

It was another very hot and sticky day making it especially hard to breathe behind my constricting facemask and especially hard to stand the feel of sweat building up between the blue latex of my protective gloves and the shriveled prunes that were my fingertips. I wanted to rip and strip them all off – but I couldn’t. They were protecting me from airborne viruses and surface bacteria. They were protecting me from inhaling toxins, cigarette smoke, fumes, construction dust, and allergens.

Taxi cab backseat holding requisite just-in-case barf bag

Without their protection I could inhale a mold spore or pick up the flu virus off a door handle and without the immune system to combat either, they would surely send me to my demise. This was all hard to avoid while living in one of the most densely trafficked sections of one of the highest populated cities in the world: midtown Manhattan, a stone’s through from Penn Station and the Empire State Building and Macy’s – the largest department store in the world. Walking to and from anywhere from my Hope Lodge home was as if entering a bee swarm. 

My friend, Lisa, was with me that day and she was the one sticking her arm out trying to hail a cab to take us the rest of the way to the Sloan-Kettering clinic for my appointment. I hovered to the side under the shade of a bodega awning so as to not scare off the cab drivers and to get a much-needed break from the oppressive sun, which was adding to the wooziness I already felt from low blood counts and high medication doses.

The store owner burst out of the door and ran over to me as if he – or maybe I, unknowingly – was on fire. He was tall and olive skinned wearing a white apron striped with meat blood and sauce stains. His eyes and hair were dark, wild and untamed.

“What happened to you?” He nearly shouted at me in aggressive concern. “What happened to you that you have to wear that mask?”

I jumped back startled by his forwardness. He looked at me with an expression of deep worry and sadness. His eyes softened and were welled with tears of empathy as he saw how young and fragile I was and his curiosity about my condition couldn’t be sated.

I explained that I was a cancer patient, that I had undergone a procedure to replace my entire immune system, that my body couldn’t fight infections so the mask had to be worn to protect myself.

I don’t know that my answer satisfied him. He was very angry and he wanted me out of the mask. He did not want to think of me suffering.

“Are you okay? But why … ?” He implored further.  

I had to cut him off as I heard Lisa call to me and saw a yellow taxi pulled over for us. I walked away from him as he mumbled generic phrases like “May God be with you” and “I will pray for you.”

My hidden facial features perfectly expressed my numbness.

Lisa asked what the ordeal was all about. I just shrugged and sank into the cool leather of the air-conditioned cab, careful to avoid the sticky remnants on the armrest from the last rider’s iced coffee spill.

An Unexpected Walking Partner

It was a warm, summer evening. The rush of commuters had subsided and the sidewalks were again passable. I needed to be alone and begged and pleaded with Craig that I was stable enough to do so. After much argument and promises that I wouldn’t collapse, he finally decided to let me go for a walk on my own.

44-foot tall "Echo" sculpture by Spanish 

artist Jaume Plensa in Madison Square Park

I headed down 7^th Avenue toward the Flatiron District with no particular destination in mind except to move away from the shopping crowds of mid-town and Times Square. I enjoyed cutting down to Madison Avenue where the sidewalks were wider and tree-lined and I loved the days when I had enough strength to make it to Madison Square Park to marvel at the tranquil piece of public art at its center.

But tonight was one of my first outings alone with no one there to hold my arm if I got weak, so I decided to cut it short and began to take the turn to cut back to 6^th and head “home.”

Suddenly I felt someone creeping up at my heels. I gripped my sling back backpack tighter and picked up the pace a bit, assured that my cell phone rested in my front pocket but realizing my vulnerability as an obvious weak target for an aggressor. I hadn’t considered that at all. I was never scared walking the streets of New York.

I felt his breathing then a few steps later he was at my side.

“I used to be like you,” he said to me as he got into my space.  

I turned to my left and found a man in his forties with some facial stubble and a tan. He was wearing Merrell sandals and a button up short sleeve with khaki cargo shorts. He seemed harmless. A heavy New York accent told me he was a native.

“Where’d you get treated? At Sloan? Me too. I remember having to wear those same damn mask and gloves,” he told me.

We synced into step and once I got my bearings and understood that this was not a rapist or a pickpocket but instead a fellow transplant cam padre I let my guard down and was relieved at the circumstance and overjoyed to be able to walk and talk with someone who’d been where I was now.

He looked so well and healthy and strong. He was more than 10 years out from his transplant and assured me that I’d get there, too.

Home base

We walked together for several blocks as the sun set behind the skyscrapers and gave the sky a purple haze. He told me about his inpatient experiences, and we compared horror stories about symptoms and frustrations. He shared with me what it’s like to be on the other side. We were instant companions sharing an unfathomable common experience.

He was heading uptown for his real home, while I had to turn back downtown toward Hope Lodge where I lived among the cancer patients. He put his hand on my shoulder in a sign of reassurance and encouragement. I thanked him for stopping me on the sidewalk and opening his life to me.

We parted ways and once I got back to Craig and the Lodge I crawled onto the bed flipping to my back and putting my legs up the wall to drain all of the swelling. My muscles were tired and my joints achy from the walk, but my heart was filled by the prospect this stranger instilled that one day this pain would be over and I would be on the other side, too.

I suppose I didn’t need to be alone that night. I needed to find a stranger who had also lived behind a mask and just happened to be walking the same route as me.

When I Grow Up

 When I Grow Up

Ever since I was a Tommie Toe tomato my mom told me to set my goals high so 

when I grow up I want to go into that delicious Heinz 57....

Who doesn't like that. So rich and the essence of what a tomato should be.

That is for sure What I Wanna Be When I Grow Up

For sale or auction at my DPW gallery. Just follow the link to pay via PayPal.

I Love To Cook

I Love To Cook

I love to cook. I don't really care what because you can be assured that anything

I prepare will be wonderful. I am a master at my craft. Want some.

6x6 oil on gallery wrapped canvas. 

Available for purchase or sale thru my DPW gallery. Just follow the link to pay via PayPal

More Milk Please

Milk Please

I am a lttle orange flower just enjoying a little milk. I don't know why someone

would place me here but I sure am liking it.

More Milk Please

6x6 oil on gallery wrapped canvas

For sale or auction thru my DPW gallery. Follow the link to pay via PayPal

Truckin'

Five infusions of SGN-35 down. All went fine. I feel pretty damn good for one day post-chemo. I don't know how long this will last and that is a difficult reality to wrap my brain around. Dealing with this continued treatment is a constant balance between hope and despair when looking at my "future" and whatever that means. There are no guarantees except that nothing is certain and nothing is forever – the good or the bad. 

Tonight, I'll let the Grateful Dead speak it for me. This song has been coming up an awful lot in my playlist and I like it. A long, strange trip it's been for sure, but what can I do but keep on truckin'? I know no other way. 

Truckin got my chips cashed in. Keep truckin, like the do-dah man
Together, more or less in line, just keep truckin on.

Arrows of neon and flashing marquees out on Main Street.
Chicago, New York, Detroit and it's all on the same street.
Your typical city involved in a typical daydream
Hang it up and see what tomorrow brings.

Dallas, got a soft machine; Houston, too close to New Orleans;
New York's got the ways and means; but just wont let you be, oh no.

Most of the cast that you meet on the streets speak of true love,
Most of the time they're sittin and cryin' at home.
One of these days they know they better get goin'
Out of the door and down on the streets all alone.

Truckin', like the do-dah man. Once told me you've got to play your hand
Sometimes your cards a'int worth a dime, if you dont lay 'em down,

Sometimes the lights all shinin' on me;
Other times I can barely see.
Lately it occurs to me what a long, strange trip it's been.

What in the world ever became of sweet jane? 
She lost her sparkle, you know she isn't the same
Livin' on reds, vitamin c, and cocaine,
All a friend can say is ain't it a shame? 

Truckin, up to Buffalo. Been thinkin, you got to mellow slow
Takes time, you pick a place to go, and just keep truckin' on.

Sittin' and starin' out of the hotel window.
Got a tip they're gonna kick the door in again
I'd like to get some sleep before I travel,
But if you got a warrant, I guess you're gonna come in.

Busted, down on Bourbon street, set up, like a bowlin' pin.
Knocked down, it gets to wearin' thin. They just wont let you be, oh no.

You're sick of hangin' around and you'd like to travel;
Get tired of travelin' and you want to settle down.
I guess they can't revoke your soul for tryin',
Get out of the door and light out and look all around.

Sometimes the lights all shinin' on me;
Other times I can barely see.
Lately it occurs to me what a long, strange trip it's been.

Truckin', I'm a goin home. Whoa whoa baby, back where I belong,
Back home, sit down and patch my bones, and get back truckin on.
Hey now get back truckin home.

A Rare Find

A Rare Find

A teapot I found on Ebay recently.

Love it. 

6x6 oil on gallery wrapped canvas  

For sale or auction at my DPW gallery. Follow the link to pay via PayPal.

Shrimping

Shrimping

Shrimp boats are so majestic and old looking. When I think of them I think of something old

and creaking with each roll of the tide. I know I am wrong but my thoughts are along the gulf coast.

A place where seagulls fill the sky and the smell of salt is heavy in the air.

6x6 oil on gallery wrapped canvas

For sale or auction at my DPW gallery. Follow the link to pay via PayPal

Sunshine In A Vase

Sunshine In A Vase

We are bright. There is none like us in the whole garden. You can plant

us in a garden, a field, or along a fence row. We brighten up any day. 

What we are is a whole bunch of Sunshine In A Vase.

6x6 oil on gallery wrapped canvas.

Sold

Partly Cloudy

Partly Cloudy

Right now the sun is shining and the world is bright but wait...

In a few minutes the sun will fade if only for a minute. It is partly cloudy...

20x16 oil on gallery wrapped canvas. 

For sale or auction at my DPW gallery. Just follow the link to pay via PayPal

This is Summer. Part 2.

Captain Jack reeling in the catch on the Lulu.

From the vantage point of the Lulu lobster boat, we saw both gray and harbor seals basking on a rocky island and their little baby pups with whiskered noses splashing in the ocean waves, three bald eagles perched above, and slews of indigenous sea birds. We asked dozens of questions of Captain Jack as he educated about the Maine lobstering industry, reeled in a trap of these fascinating crustaceans and taught us about their anatomy, mating habits, incredible regeneration abilities, and Maine’s conservation efforts.

We walked with Sam Dog to Bar Island, accessible by a sweeping sandbar that is only revealed at low tide. Miss the tide change, you don’t make it back. 

Taking a biking break on the Carriage Trails.

After very active mornings of outdoor adventures, huge mid-day naps were taken sprawled across the couch or bed of the adorable downtown Bar Harbor apartment we stayed in.

We found a great dive bar with “awesome hour” where we relaxed and played Finger Ringer and Rummy 500 while snacking on shoestring French fries served in a metal dog bowl.

Our bikes took us along the miles of carriage roads that wind through Acadia, making a big loop through the mystical scenery of Witch Hole.

Our Jordan Pond table view.

We discovered Acadia hiking trails that took us along boardwalks above marshes, through knotty pines, and along cobblestone seashores, finding perfect nooks for picnic spots to eat our home-packed lunches along the way.

After one bike ride we snuggled onto an outdoor table bench at the Jordan Pond House where we indulged in their famed hot popovers with homemade strawberry jam, decadent sandwiches, and fresh squeezed lemonade and blueberry herbal iced tea while taking in the beauty of the pond, Bubble mountains and surrounding forests.

The crisp, fresh water of Echo Lake reflecting the astounding green covered mountains that hug it turned a tootsie dip to test the water into a swim in my clothes I just couldn’t resist. I dried by the wind and the sun of the topless Jeep while we explored surrounding harbor villages.

An unplanned, irresistible dip in Echo Lake.

I abandoned all my anti-inflammatory, no sugar, no dairy diet restrictions for the week and indulged in wild Maine blueberry pie and more ice cream. The second ice cream night was shared scoops of the flavor “I Haven’t Decided Yet …” from CJ’s Scoop Shop made with Reese’s peanut butter cups, Oreos, cookie dough, chocolate chips, chocolate swirl, ya know, everything but the kitchen sink. I went all in.

One solid rainy day met a patio breakfast of berry muffins and crab and cheese omelet with our feet in a flood puddle but our heads dry from the rain. With full bellies the rest of the day was spent reading, writing, and napping inside to the soundtrack of the raindrops and thunder. We capped the night with pizza and a showing of the new Ferrell/Galifianakas flick The Campaign in the historic, though musty, Criterion Theatre.

Boardwalk trail near Sieur de Monts Springs.

I tried to catch another sunrise, leaving Sammy and Craig to sleep as I ventured out to Cadillac Mountain at 4:30 a.m. However, the dense fog made it impossible to see much of anything at all. The higher I drove, the denser it got, so instead I took a walk around the summit through misty clouds and whipping wind with the hundreds of others who had come out in hopes of seeing the sun rise from ocean to sky. Though there was no spectacular sun display, on the drive I did spy a family of deer – a buck with a full set of antlers and his posse peering at me through the forest.

Our bags are packed and early tomorrow we will be on our way home to Connecticut. First will be a stop at Sammy’s now favorite Maine spot: Little Long Pond where she can run free, off-leash bounding through this little piece of doggy heaven where there’s forest and water and mud and lots of other dog butts to sniff hello at.

Happy explorers.

To break up the 8-hour trip, we’ll stop half-way to reminisce around the old stomping grounds of my (and Craig’s honorary) alma mater: the University of New Hampshire in Durham. Kittery, ME and neighboring Porstmouth, NH are on the itinerary.

This summer getaway has been no less than perfect, a far cry from where we were last summer. What’s even more wonderful is that we’re eager to return home to a place that we love just as much and to the people that we miss. What a fortunate situation to be in. We’ve been humbled by the beauty, relaxed by the ocean air, and sated by all the exploration.

Monday brings us back to New York City for another SGN-35 infusion. I’m not exactly looking forward to that, but if it’s that drug that is allowing me to be this active and making me feel this amazing then it’s worth the few days of crumminess it will cause.

To balance the treatment trip, Craig and I are both looking forward to delivering the heaping amounts of donated goods we collected from our generous community of loved ones into the hands of those who need them at American Cancer Society’s Hope Lodge NYC – last year’s summer vacation spot. 

Our "Downtown Dog Friendly" apartment on the second floor of the Acadia Veterinary Hospital.  Random, but ideal!             

Looking back from Bar Island to downtown Bar Harbor across the sandbar. 

“Live in the sunshine. Swim the sea. Drink the wild air.” 

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

In The Bowl. Unavailable

In The Bowl

Some of us are in while there just was not room for us all.

We voted and decided to leave the big guy out. That is just 

the way it goes. He was out numbered. Maybe next time pal...

6x6 oil on gallery wrapped canvas

For sale or auction through my DPW auction. Follow the link to pay via PayPal.

"Alice Down the Rabbit Hole!"

Come along with me to create a charming 3 dimensional piece of artwork that I call "Following Alice Down the Rabbit Hole"!
This piece is created to be hung on the wall.
You will learn exactly how to form, build and shape the shadow box in which Alice tumbles.
And that's just the first step.
From there, with hundreds of photographs and detailed instructions, we will sculpt head, hands legs and feet, paint and dress Alice.
You will also learn how to attach her into the shadow box and finally how to apply magical finishing touches.
The class is separated into 4 weeks to allow you to enjoy creating in a step by step process.

This is a very fun class, with great whimsical detail and design.
$55 for the class which begins on Sept 18, 2012
Offered by
Marilyn Radzat    Niada artist
Register here:   http://www.aforartistic.com/Alice-Down-Rabbit-Hole.html

Register here:   http://www.aforartistic.com/Alice-Down-Rabbit-Hole.html

Warm Milk

Warm Milk

When I was young my parents was friends with a family who had a small farm.

We would visit and the lady would churn her own butter and they had fresh buttermilk.

I think they made cheese also but then again I was young and more worried about

playing than nutrition....

6x6 oil on gallery wrapped canvas

For sale or auction thur my DPW gallery. Just follow the link to pay via PayPal.