Painting by Susan L.

  I have a vision. It's a view from a balcony that is airplane high in the sky overlooking pastoral fields. A start was made yesterday but I am not happy with it. It needs to be bigger. The sky needs more room because it is vast and blue and beautiful. The fields fade into the horizon. They are multi-coloured like in July where some plants are in full and glorious bloom like sunshine yellow canola, lavender blue flax and acres of sunflowers. The fields far in the distance fade into pastel colours. They butt up against golden grains, lush hay meadows, apple orchards and plantings of immature corn.
  There's no fences but where the fields meet it's wild. Long grasses dotted with flowers provide shelter for unseen life. In some places, a row of trees lines the field edges. There's no houses in this vision of idyllic, rural expanse.
  This painting is going to stretch my patience because it's far more detailed than my normal slap 'n dash race-to-get-it-done. It's a strange way to work. Because it's in acrylics, I need to paint fast to take it slow. A spritzer bottle of water helps the paint remain viable longer. Paint extender would help but that isn't in my supplies.
  The image in my mind is so vivid I can feel the breeze wafting across my face and blowing my hair across my eyes. The fragrances of warm earth, blossoms, and ripening grain fill my nostrils.
  Help me, Lord, capture this wonderful and magical place. Help me with patience. Help me be less critical. In Jesus' Name I pray.
  Off to the drafting table that doubles as my easel.
  "Who has divided a channel for the overflowing water, or a path for the thunderbolt, to cause it to rain on a land where there is no one, a wilderness in which there is no man; to satisfy the desolate waste and cause to spring forth the growth of tender grass?" Job 38:25-27