Sometimes the world is so gorgeous it makes my eyeballs hurt. Driving from Alameda to San Rafael the other day, the east bay skies were a dark, cold gray. But as I drove up I-80 through Berkeley I could see Mt Tam and the greening Marin hills across the bay, covered in a sunny mosaic and it made me appreciate the delightful surprises that photo-bomb my days. When I returned back home, it was a beauty sandwich — the entire bay had become quite cloudy, but again from the Berkeley freeway a stunning orange-peach sunset developed on the other side of the Golden Gate bridge — like someone used an exacto knife, slicing the clouds to let the beauty spill out.

This is quite a journey. And I am proud of myself, and I hope not in a smug way, of showing up for this colorful, painful, baffling, aggravating, glorious, heart-searing, soul-healing, psychedelic passage.

So about this artwork — Jake was great fun to paint. Jake’s daddy is Michael, my brother’s best friend since 3rd grade. Michael has had wrenching physical challenges for months now, and I thought since I’ve done a few pet painting commissions I’d do Jake as a get-well present. When Michael returned home from one of his many surgeries, Jake was nervous about the walker his dad was using. The photo he sent me really captured Jake’s uncertainty.

10″ x 10″ ink, watercolor, acrylic on paper