Daisy has a brain the size of a baby pea and, unfortunately for me, a bladder to match. Which is why I’ve been up since 1:30a.

I used to think the early morning forays into the dark were Bree’s fault, but now believe the blame rests solely on Daisy. Bree is simply her interpreter, as Tess was Zoe’s. And when a girl has to go, a girl has to… well, go.
After six years it’s become habit to be awakened abruptly in the wee hours, and I don’t really mind. Really. Except for the dark. And there are giant raccoons about. I’ve not seen them, but Mike claims almost mythical Rottweiler stature for the things… and he’s not usually given to fits of hyperbole. Not a fisherman who will hold his arms at impossible lengths to claim the biggest catch, he’ll actually tell you if he hooked a sardine.

So, there are the rabid gargoyles with glowing eyes as well as the two-legged predators out there. Just not my favorite time to be watching a dog pee.

After going back to bed and thrashing around for half an hour, I gave up and retreated to the computer at roughly 2:00a. My fall-back position.

And looked at art, of all things. Specifically, Andrew Wyeth. Everyone knows Christina’s World:

Andrew Wyeth Christina’s World 1948

I remember being made to study it in school. Most of the kids thought it sad but though it obviously depicts struggle, I found nothing sad in it. Lonely, perhaps. I could see the obvious struggle, but my focus was really on the colors and setting, things of that nature. It’s good to look at it again, because even now there’s something more to see, feel. Again what stands out for me are mainly the colors; the soft, feminine peachy pink of her dress, the yellows and golds of the vast field before her. “And miles to go before I sleep…”

From this lovely site:

Chistina Olson (1893-1968) was of major significance in Wyeth’s life, both personally and artistically. He met Christina and his future wife Betsy James on the same day, his 22nd birthday on July 12, 1939. Wyeth was introduced to Betsy first, who then took him to see Christina. “I don’t know what made me take him there,” Betsy remembered in an interview years later. For the next three decades, Wyeth would paint not only Christina but the Olson house as well where he often spent the summers. Wyeth once said that “Christina’s World is more than just her portrait. It really was her whole life and that is what she liked in it.”

Christina Olson was disabled and probably suffered from polio. Wyeth saw her one late afternoon from the third floor window, “pulling herself slowly back toward the house” after picking some vegetables. However, Christina posed for the arms and hands, while Betsy was the model for the rest of the body.

I always thought her posture a metaphor of her life. Or only a metaphor.

I love doors and windows, so this piece really speaks to me…

Andrew Wyeth Wind from the Sea 1947

Ah, the pretty chases the ugly away, doesn’t it? And all because I looked for an old painting of a red-haired woman leaning over a pond… think it was a pond, anyway… that I never found! Now… I must finish my cream of wheat.