The Last Fling

"Winter Rain"

Memorial Day is always a bitter-sweet holiday for me. In my last post, I went all sappy and maudlin talking about it so this post is about the sweet part!

Because Memorial Day is also the unofficial end of the “season” in Palm Springs. There are lots of visitors for the long weekend; it’s the last party before snow birds fly from the heat of the desert. Sweet! The pace slows down. The roads are free from traffic (such as it is in Palm Springs). CostCo is no longer mobbed every weekend.

On this last party weekend, the freeways into Palm Springs (there aren’t many) were packed Friday with visitors streaming into town. The revelers descend in mass. Hotels are fully booked. Restaurant reservations are impossible to get and the local watering holes (OK, bars) are packed. Everyone we know with vacation homes in Palm Springs had called to let us know they were in town. So we throw a pool party every year for Memorial Day – on Sunday. Other friends have their parties on Saturday and Monday. We have Sunday.

On Fridays, we go to our favorite Watering Hole where many of our friends tend to begin their weekend. The place was packed! No one in their right mind would order anything in a martini glass. You simply can’t maneuver the crowd carrying one. It looks elegant but you spill the darned thing all over the place! I cannot count the number of martini’s others have dumped on me. Oops! Excuse me! Damn!

At The Watering Hole, we ran into friends from Los Angeles in for the long weekend.

I’ve not seen Jim & Josh for months. It was good to catch up. Josh is from Scotland. Even though he’s lived in the US for decades, he still has a thick Scottish brogue. I love to hear him talk and he is a talker. He can keep you entertained for hours just by asking him, “What’s new?” So I did. “Josh! What’s new?” and he was off and running! Josh always has something that relates to you. He was telling me about two paintings he & Jim had just purchased. He described them in such detail; I could picture them in my mind.

At one point he said, “They remind me of your paintings. You know I love your work.”

Well now!

Four or five months ago, I would have let a comment like that pass without comment.

No more. I asked him, “Why haven’t you bought one of MY paintings?” Ballsy thing for me to say. Without missing a beat, Josh said, “we can’t afford you.”

What???? I told him he could and we should talk.

“We will” he said.

Then he was off and running in a different direction, but I was caught up in that moment. That moment I realized I’d actually put myself out there and spoke up. This was a milestone for me .

I am an artist: I want people to appreciate my work. I want people to buy my work!

So if you or anyone you know is in the market for either color fields or my ‘green’ woven work, please visit: www.JerryLHanson.com or contact me at JerryL@JerryLHanson.com or telephone my studio at 760.992.3157.

Thank you for listening!

Jerry L. Hanson