I woke up this morning at 5 am. Actually, it was about 10 minutes before the hour but I sat in bed and looked inside my spirit for a few minutes before checking the clock. I knew I didn’t have any lessons in the morning so I was free to go painting if I wanted.
The weather had been promising yesterday but the forecast said rain, so I wasn’t sure about the conditions. I got up and looked at the sky. It was a pinkish-violet colour but I saw some stars so I decided to prepare for a painting session. I had no idea where to go.
When I had decided where to go, I got in the car and started driving towards the centre of the city. There is a new bridge over the ancient Tibur River and I thought it might be novel to be the first painter to utilize the new views the bridge could offer.
I parked the car and walked over the bridge while the sky was still dark. I could make out the forms of the river banks and some of the skyline in the distance. I finally decided to set up about half way over the bridge looking southeast.
After an hour of painting, I stepped back from my work and looked it over from a distance. Gazing at the surrounding hills in back of me, I could see that a haze was covering the hilltops. Looking back at my view in the opposite direction, I noticed that the fog was creeping into the distant skyline. In about 5 minutes, a pretty dense fog made it difficult to recognize what I was painting.
I continued. In about 30 minutes the fog had lifted and the glorious sun was sending it’s powerful rays into the atmosphere. In a short time, I realized that I had made a mistake in choosing the direction of my view. I was looking directly at the sun with little possibility of distinguishing the colours of the cityscape.
No problem. I stopped painting, packed up and drove home. I can’t complain about anything. Just the idea of being in the middle of the city with the birds and everything else waking up to the new light is worthwhile. Happy first day of spring!
