The world changes every day, so why shouldn't my art and my creativity change....

~eljayrae

"Just as our eyes need light in order to see, our minds need ideas in order to create."

~ Nicole Malebranche

"I want to touch people with my art. I want them to say 'she feels deeply, she feels tenderly.' "

~eljay (originally Vincent Van Gogh)

when i miss her, it makes my heart ache... i think of when we laughed so hard, at the dumbest things.... when we didn't agree... when she gave me good advice that i didn't take... when she did something i didn't understand at the time, but understand it now.... talking on the phone with her, and knowing i would not always have her on the other end.....

friends told me, after she was gone, that i would feel her with me, and i didn't.... but maybe this is what they meant... the remembering...

Sometimes I wake in the morning with art on my mind.... a great project to create or a place to travel to for a photo... an angle or background for a portrait or a new window display for work. It's as if it comes to me in a dream.. I guess my mind never rests far from art.

A few of my favorite artist quotes:

"Art washes from the soul the dust of everyday life." ~ Pablo Picasso

"Art is not what you see, but what you make others see." ~ Edgar Degas

"An artist is not paid for his labor but for his vision." ~ James McNeill Whistler

"One must from time to time attempt things that are beyond one's capacity."

~ Auguste Renoir .... and that is why, once in a while, I try to paint.. eljayrae

People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we do not even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child -- our own two eyes. All is a miracle.

Well... I am winding down to the "Big 6-0" as they say.... isn't it funny how 60 doesn't seem as old now.

One of the signs of passing youth is the birth of a sense of fellowship with other human beings as we take our place among them.

~ Virginia Woolf

And in the end, it's not the years in your life that count.

It's the life in your years.

~Abe Lincoln

And as for ART:In his later years Pablo Picasso was not allowed to roam an art gallery unattended, for he had previously been discovered in the act of trying to improve on one of his old masterpieces.

leaving work the afternoon before thanksgiving... i had to stop and pause to take a photo of the mill...it was calling to me... after drizzling all day the stone was water-soaked... giving a darker cast.... the sky was sullen with a bit of sun peering through the clouds... the birds doing their evening circle from the bridge to the smokestack and back.... so peaceful with the water still and the reflection like glass... could there be a more quaint site to take pause..

~eljayrae

Every American deserves to live in freedom, to have his or her privacy respected and a chance to go as far as their ability and effort will take them - regardless of race, gender, ethnicity or economic circumstances.

~Christopher Dodd

The emotional, sexual, and psychological stereotyping of females begins when the doctor says, "It's a girl."

~Shirley Chisholm

Be who you are... live your life as you feel internally... do not hurt anyone intentionally... give without expecting anything in return... and do the best you can every day... and as a parent.. love unconditionally...

~eljayrae

looking for my lost shakere of salt...

Nibblin' on sponge cake Watchin' the sun bake

All of those tourists covered with oil

Strummin' my six-string On my front porch swing

Smell those shrimp they're beginnin' to boil

I know the reason I stayed here all season

Nothin' to show but this brand new tattoo

But it's a real beauty A Mexican cutie

How it got here I haven't a clue

Wastin' away again in Margaritaville

Searchin' for my lost shaker of salt

Some people claim that there's a woman to blame

Now I think

Hell, it could be my fault

I blew out my flip-flop... Stepped on a pop-top

Cut my heel had to cruise on back home

But there's booze in the blender

And soon it will render

That frozen concoction that helps me hang on

Wastin' away again in Margaritaville

Searching for my lost shaker of salt

Some people claim that there's a woman to blame

But I know it's my own damn fault

Yes and some people claim that there's a woman to blame

And I know it's my own damn fault

Well... it's never a dull moment with my daughter...(in a good way, that is). The other night..she's out with friends and gives me a call. I met these really cool hippies and you need to come take a photo of them. Being from the "hippie" generation, I had to check this out. A couple with 2 dogs and backpacks and dreads... really nice kids. She has been to all but 4 states, hitching, hopping on trains and panhandling..to survive. Not the life I would like, or would like for my daughter... but if make them happy... so be it.

"While we try to teach our children all about life,

our children teach us what life is all about."

“A cloud does not know why it moves in just such a direction and at such a speed...It feels an impulsion...this is the place to go now. But the sky knows the reasons and the patterns behind all clouds, and you will know, too, when you lift yourself high enough to see beyond horizons.”

Richard Bach quotes (American Writer, author of 'Jonathan Livingston Seagull', b.1936)

Bows and flows of angel hair and ice cream castles in the air

And feather canyons everywhere, i've looked at cloud that way.

But now they only block the sun, they rain and snow on everyone.

So many things i would have done but clouds got in my way.

I've looked at clouds from both sides now, from up and down, and still somehow

It's cloud illusions i recall. I really don't know clouds at all. ~ joni mitchell

I see as far as the mind can see and more. UP to the solar systems - down into my heart. Across the world - right next to me. The reflection is sharp and clear. I can see through the earth to China.

~eljayrae

Second time around, but he insisted… “please wear white for me. In my heart – you are my first… last and only…”.

~eljayrae