Chapter Two: IMPROVING YOUR HOME AND YOUR LIFE WITH PAINTINGS

Copyright 2004 by Carol Pomeroy

How sad it is to hear the words, "She is keeping the room just as it was." Why? You know without being told that she has suffered a loss. We are happy when we learn the wallpaper is being replaced and draperies changed to a bright color? Why? Now we know she has opened her mind to change, is moving on with life.

That is true in home improvement. Even moving the furniture, adding a new blue teapot to the window sill or pillow to the sofa is a renewal. It satisfies the soul.

I remember my friend Crystal. She was in anguish over a terrible loss of a family member--her grandmother--and a crushing divorce. She leaned back to watch soaps, thin, pale, listless, not caring, depressed. One day she went out and bought a hideous piece of art. It was a scene of a burned out sailing ship, dark, foreboding, masts ripped and torn, three charred supports, a trinity of painful wreckage, sinking. Crystal's friends, seeing it over the fireplace, gasped and a puzzled look. Why did Crystal feel that "this was painted just for her?" Because she identified with the wreck. She was feeling, "That is me at twenty-two" But one day, she reminded herself that she could and would change. Step by step, she did this. Needless to say, the canvas was put out of her life, and new ones added to her collection.

Nina was under such pressure that her eye continually blinked. Her blood pressure was dangerously high. One day she acquired three exquisite yellow roses, some with green backgrounds. Then a lovely gold-framed oval of a "Peace" rose. Next, a spray of pale green roses, then a seascape with deep blue water, and a landscape in the style of the old masters. Nina lifted her eyes to these often. Eventually, she called them her magic pills...

Then there was Anne, a happy and positive person. Anne surrounded herself with paintings by an impressionist who painted scenes of Paris, Carmel-by-the-Sea, San Francisco. Every spring Anne changed her paintings to suit her mood; in winter she brought the outdoors to the inside of her home by the use of paintings.

The point: Be open to change in your surroundings. Like the seasons, refresh yourself. Nothing can do that as well as a new oil original. This will reflect you as you change from one phase of your life, passing on to another. This is the way to collect a variety of lovely and meaningful art treasures that you can change from here to there over the years.

Bryon: "The sky is changed! And what a CHANGE!" BRING THE SKY INDOORS AND CHANGE YOUR SURROUNDINGS WITH FINE ART AS YOU CHANGE!