The Twin Ashes (oil on canvas 5 x 7 in.) SOLD!
After a scorching day of 34C, the evening is warmer than yesterday, and the very earth seems relieved, exhaling the warm scents of tender growing leaves and spring flowers. I paused with brush raised, soaking in this scene as the nearly full moon rises into a sky just beginning to blush behind the woods.
The dragonflies course back and forth like miniature helicopters, tails slightly tilted and wings ablur. I can see them dart and swoop, though I can't quite see what they're catching. I suspect they are hunting mosquitoes.
A deer fly followed me here, but lost interest in bopping about the brim of my hat once I settled to paint and became still.
All is peaceful, but eventually the mosquitoes find me, sitting here behind a low spreading Juniper bush, and in short order the dragonflies gather, 7 or 8 of them swooping very close - then no more mosquitoes for a while. About 15 minutes later I am distracted from my painting again by whining stabbers intent on blood, and back come the dragonflies in force. I feel one hit me in the back as it picks off its prey.
Revelling in the rich luminosity of the evening light on the woods behind the Ash trees, and the ethereal ascent of the moon, I am flooded with a tremendous sense of wellbeing, and I imagine that the lilting, darting dragonflies must be joyful too. Some time after 20:00 a Whitethroat sings "Sweet Canada Canada Canada before retiring. Suddenly it's dusk and the mosquitoes attack with confidence, no dragonflies in sight, and I pack up, my painting finished.
Aleta, isn't that one of the funniest human traits? To think that the whole wide world around us (including dragonflies) must be sharing our mood? I map myself onto others in the same way all the time. Sometimes I pinch myself in order to remind myself that others might be feeling differently. In fact, they most likely are. Still, one's mood, good or bad, can undeniably affect another being. One reason why it's so difficult living with anyone else.
ReplyDeleteWhat is it with moods anyway? Why the switch?
Thoroughly enjoyed your description of those mosquito varmints!
Cindy
I love the colors Aleta and the child's moon is perfect in its mistiness.
ReplyDeleteMK
Have just found my way to your blog, and look forward to following you on your journey!
ReplyDeleteOver the past few years the Emerald Ash Borers killed the Twin Ashes, and today we felled them, and sledded the dry wood home. On each tree we left one of the epicormic sprouts - about 2.5 m tall - that the Borers had induced, and hope they can regrow in an environment in which the Borers are controlled by biocontrol parisitoid Wasps.
ReplyDelete