Thanksgiving has come and gone, Christmas looms on the near horizon. My Art teaching career has been driving me like a runaway train across the frozen Antarctic lands where only penguins go-which means I am so busy i barely take a breath between 530 in the morning and 330 in the afternoon. This teaching gig keeps me --stretched--and pulled in 20 or more different directions by art students craving HELP on their projects! I cannot get to them all in a day, but i try...i try like a Mad Wizard with magic hands and flying pencils and brushes across stark snow-white canvas!
I still feel like this will be my best year of teaching and my wonderful students are producing artwork they can be proud of for the rest of their lives! My ambition and passion for throwing so much work and imagination, inspiration and creativity demands upon them has also been the cause of my extreme workload. My own ART work time has suffered but it is worth it for my kids.
This year has been a wild and amazing ride. From last January-when i held my SOLO show, Painted Jungles, featuring over 80 of my Wildlife Paintings, to my students winning an amazing 23 GOLD Medals at V.A.S.E., to the selection to be a featured Wimberley Boot Artist in the Texas Hill Country and to be a part of such a great group of Artists painting those giant Boots and to see mine installed in front of the Wimberley Visitor Center this past September, and the surprising honor, qualifying for the National Show for 5 years in a row, to get the Gold Medal and become a Signature Member of the National Society of Artists and use the N.S.A. behind my name, and a special day as the invited Featured Speaker at College of the Mainland this past October, explaining my wildlife jungle travels around the planet and the writing journeys of my books. What a year and only one month to go!
I could not have done any of this without my fantastic beautiful supportive wife, Gayln. She has read every page of every book in progress, has walked with me every step of the way-following Jaguars in Brazil, watching the bubble-net feeding of Humpback Whales in Alaska, stepping over Galapagos Marine Iguanas, being charged by elephants in Kenya and so many other adventures-she was once even attacked right here in Texas by an alligator! We play soccer on three teams together and have for so many years! Our lives are full and sometimes overwhelming but we are living life as full as we can, filling up each day with love and sharing, art and reading, writing, and hiking, birding and watching the sunset by the water.
I keep producing 100 to 300 pieces of art each year and trying to keep track of my son working in New York City for Frederator, making Adventure Time Cartoons, hosting 2 shows, Hungover with Cade and Toy Pizza, and now the Stupendous News, my daughter, Heather, is going to have a baby! Gayln and I will take a new step in life and become the wild crazy Grandparents who love art and animals!
