She Wrote a Long Letter on a Short Page

Long letters are easier to write than short ones.  Long letters allow me to ramble on and on – choosing topics as I go, and never ever running out of ideas to include.

But I have only a short piece of paper on which to condense what I learned that year as an apprentice in the artist studio - I who knew nothing about what to call different shades of purple, blue or green, whether textured paper was more appropriate for water colors or acrylics, or whether the biggest secret to a good oil painting was to let one layer of paint dry before applying the next.

 All I know is that the apprenticeship taught me more about Ife, more about balance and harmony, about doing and waiting, about seeing the spaces between the leaves and branches of the eucalyptus tree. 

 So perhaps my short letter is that each of us, in our own way, is artist of our own “canvas” of life as we transform the secrets of painting into developing the picture we are becoming.