Every morning last week was the same madness.

I’d go into my son’s room at 7:00 am. With a flip of the light switch, I’d tell him good morning. He’d grumble from under the covers, his overgrown curly hair just poking out from the top of the comforter. If I didn’t know who was under there, I might have thought him a teenager and not my baby of six. I’d tell him his allotted ten minute “snooze” period had begun and leave him to his waking up. He wouldn’t. When I’d go back in his room, he’d refuse to get up.

I’m too tired. I can’t. I don’t want to go to school.

So all that week, I physically removed him from the bed. I put his school shirt over his body. I placed socks on his feet. I had flashbacks to what it was like to have a toddler.

I know him. I know if he’d just push through the initial resistance, he’d become my well-rested, hyper, and chatty boy who has so much to say on the way to the bathroom to brush his teeth that he often forgets to brush at all. But coming off a full week of spring break paired with a bonus day of school closing due to bad weather, he just couldn’t. The tired felt too big. His desire to not get up overwhelming.

Buddy, I’ve been there.

I’ve been there when the easel stares at me, and I look back at it not with excitement but with agony. Leave me alone, I tell it with my eyes. The thought of engaging with you is too much. I just don’t wanna.

Sometimes that resistance wins because I’m a grown woman in an empty studio– no one to take my hand and gingerly place it around the palette knife. No one to give me those hard truths (You have to. I don’t care if you’re tired) because while my son simply cannot stay in bed all day, I can avoid my easel. I can say no, not today.

What I realized today is this: painting, and any creative enterprise for that matter, is not a singular, contained act unrelated to what came before or will come after it. Painting is the incarnation of ideas that have interacted and developed over time

Today’s work is about more than just today. Opting out doesn’t just affect what I might produce today, but what I might produce in the weeks and years to come. I’m building something intricate here. Something with branches that shoot off from one another, intermingle, and grow.

I believe in rest. Recharging. Like my body after a good run, my creative mind needs recovery. But that’s different than opting out. Giving up. Staying in bed when a bright day will greet you two minutes after you shake the sleep from your eyes.

If only my son knew what I know– that the heavy weight of resistance he feels so intensely will vanish entirely the moment he compels his little body from the comfort of his bed and into the world. If only I always practiced what I know– that my easel doesn’t antagonize me as much as it invites me to create today what may or not be good in and of itself but what will be part of a broader, more intricate conversation, one that needs today’s little effort as it marches towards something bigger.

I’m not a huge fan of before and afters. When people finish a new exercise or diet program and post a split screen, I find myself yelling into the computer: you were also good and beautiful in the “before!” So when I share some before and afters of this month, please know that the “before” is not an illustration of my unworthy self and the “after,” me perfected. It’s more an invitation to look at what an imperfect person can accomplish with one tiny, daily devotion that adds up to something big. Let us not forget it’s the “before” person who did the work. 

Before this month I was a good oil painter with a messy, hardly bearable studio. After this month, I am a good oil painter who has added watercolor to her repertoire in a space that is far more enjoyable to work.

My last little bird of the month is based on a photograph a friend sent me quite a while back– his son had been in Australia and shared a picture of the Australian Kookaburra bird, which he correctly assumed I would enjoy.

There are many things I file into the “later” folder, but sometimes, rarely, I do eventually open it up.

I’ve been “latering” my studio reorganization for over a year now. It took me half of January just to build up the nerve, but eventually, little task by little task, I found my inertia– A person in the doing mode wants to remain a doer.

Every 31 in 31 I take on provides unique challenges and unique rewards. This time around I was gifted insight into a new medium all together, one that surprised and delighted me. I tried something new even as I worked within the very familiar. I faced disappointment in the form of a pile of rejected paintings and a Superbowl dream that died with a flag that never emerged from the shadows.

Into the background of today’s last painting of this 31 in 31, I’ve written reminders of this month’s insights, many of which are contradictions. “Try new things” appears more than once, but so does “paint what you know and love.” “Tidy up” has a counterpart of “be okay with messes.”

Among the other reminders– take up space, lose control, and disappointment paves the way for joy.

Once again, I have thoroughly enjoyed the work of all my fellow 31ers– poets, artists, musicians, writers, peace-seekers. Together, we have exercised that most human impulse to create and connect. I can’t speak for you, but I suspect what is true for me might be for you also: this month I have felt just a bit more alive.

All my watercolor paintings from the month (and a few bonuses) will be available soon on my site. Be sure to subscribe to my mailing list to be the first to know when.

If you’ve been following along for 31 days (or even just one or two), thank you. If you think you might want to take on a 31 day challenge in the future, you’ve got just under a year to get ready. The next one starts January 1, 2020. I hope you’ll think about it. 

True confession: when I started this watercolor project on day 1, I was not expecting to actually like watercolor. I was just looking for a way to clean out my painting studio at the same time that I kept painting. I could paint watercolors at the coffee table or in the kitchen– unobtrusive, innocuous. But I’ve learned to appreciate their quieter power– the way they can softly suggest light hitting a braid. 

This is what has transpired: I have completely cleared out and reorganized my studio. It’s now a place I want to work. I’ll post some before and after shots tomorrow. When all the clutter was gone, I was left with just enough space for a new addition– a watercolor station.

You just never know. I’m going to tell my son this lesson of watercolors the next time he tells me he just doesn’t like broccoli. 

I’m working hard to get all the paintings from this month ready to find new homes. I discovered an alternative to framing that I’m pretty excited about. Below are a couple of the watercolors I’ve prepped so far. And for my fellow artists, here’s the video that explains how to do it. 

I’ve been really inspired by some fellow 31ers doing figurative work this month. I haven’t been able to get to a figure drawing group lately, so I’ve opted for some photographic resources online. Working from photographs isn’t nearly as good as from life, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that doing the work in less-than-perfect circumstances is better than not doing it at all or, worse, waiting (eternally) for the circumstances to become perfect.  This painting is tiny– I’ll probably crop it to 4x4 inches, but I’m thinking about creating a second version– much larger and with palette knife/oil paint. What do you think?