Close encounter

Today’s watercolour

Yesterday at lunch time, I was completing my post machine use cleaning routine after preparing the last coffees of the day. Standing at the sink, my mind was goodness knows where whilst drying the group head with a pink cleaning sponge.

Hubby appeared at the screen door to my left. Something lightly shot across the top of my thong clad left foot. In a split second, I dropped the group head into the sink, shrieked as I leapt backwards, the sponge falling to the floor, at the sight of a four foot long eastern brown disappearing underneath the washing machine, at the same time my husband came in closing the screen door behind him.

I explained there was an asp like creature in the house. Our white fluffy dog, Stan lay on the floor watching our conniptions. Was it a look of complete disinterest he was giving us?

Hubby grabbed the floor pad handle and exclaimed upon seeing the viper in the window reveal. He attempted to open the screen door with the pole as the slithering reptile dropped into the sink. We guessed we all wanted the same thing; a speedy exit from this dramatic situation. My husband opened the screen door, joined me in the living room from where we could view the area as the snake jumped out of the sink onto the floor and out across the patio to the nearest garden border.

This is the first time in almost twenty six years of living here we have encountered a serpent. I was advised it was the second deadliest snake on Earth and one of the most venomous in Australia.

After reading up on our intruder, I was marginally relieved to learn they are generally timid only becoming aggressive when threatened.

Sun sea sand

I was unsurprised this morning when we awoke to a gloomy sky soon to be followed by rain. The forecasters advise this is a wet patch in the otherwise dryish El Nino weather pattern. As South East Queensland is subtropical, we catch a bit of Far North Queensland’s wet season around February anyway.

Faced with continued inclement weather, I decided to paint an abstract watercolour picture to brighten our day. Overall I’m pleased with the intensity of colours and the way the washes ran into each other.

The photograph is more blue than the turquoise of the actual picture even after adjusting the colour balance.

2023 going out with a bang

Abstract crepe myrtle with sky

Happy 2024 to all of my readers!

This is the last watercolour picture painted today and the following poem from the storm the day before.

Summer storm
Outside, deep air filled rumbles
Echoed by pre-breakfast stomach gurgles
Rapidly fading morning light rays’
Impeded by gloom grey clouds

Tinkle ping crash flash overhead
Panes rattle in frames
Storm’s expected to last for an hour
Stan pants, shaking on my lap
I type this on my phone with an index finger

Internet’s gone off, using mobile data
Light rain increasing to very heavy in thirty three minutes
The worst is yet to come

Drops pelt
Hammering heavily on the tin roof
High pitched whooshing increases ear pressure
Tinnitus swells

Stan lies rigidly vibrating
Momentarily stops awaiting the next sound
On it goes seldom slows

Then silence

Now distant grumbles

Crepe myrtle


I am pretty certain I read about crepe myrtle in Anne Rice novels, set in New Orleans, Louisiana. The first time I saw crepe myrtle trees in red, pink, purple, lilac, and white was when we moved from New South Wales to Queensland in 2018. Since then I have been fascinated by the council planted trees along the streets of Morningside.

I was heartened to see our next door neighbour has a hot pink one in the corner of their garden. It proudly displays its dark green deciduous foliage and cerise blooms above the dividing slatted timber fence.

With my watercolour painting, I am attempting to find my groove. I appear to be in an ovoid phase. Given I am at the start of a journey, an egg shape is perhaps apt.

The picture at the top of the post has seven elements signifying research analysis and deeper understanding. I cannot see the point for myself to paint reality as I can take a photograph. I wanted to paint a representation of next door’s myrtle tree. Working on the basis of the approximate proportional amounts of each of the colours, I light touch painted three ovals in pink, three tear drops in dark green and a surrounding oval merging the three colours.

The next step is to try a painting including the pale blue of the sky.

Deconstructed riverside view

Constrained version, abstract version below

Back in the eighties, I was gifted a set of Daley Rowney Georgian tubes of watercolour; I still have them. At the time, I was inspired to paint a hotel doorway in Whitby, UK and the view from riding pillion. I will post pictures of them when they resurface.

Over the decades that followed, I dabbled with watercolour painting. Lacking confidence because of my self doubt and fears of failure, of not being any good, and of looking stupid, I have hidden and stifled my art enthralled inner child.

Sixtieth birthday gifts included, Mont Marte A3 paper blocks and a compact Winsor and Newton Cotman watercolour set.

On the day of our thirtieth anniversary, on the way to lunch by ferry, we narrowly missed a heavy downpour on the Noosa River. The first picture is a representation of the malevolent view from our table at Lucio’s Mariner, Tewantin.

With a need to suspend my self disbelief, to allow my inner child to stretch their arms and reconnect with its creativity, I have opted to have a go at abstract painting.

The second painting is a section of my inner vision of the occasion, an abstract sky. Freed from the heavy constraints of assumption and expectation, it represents a lightness of hearts and a hope-filled future. My mind sees other shapes there too.

This conceptional style of painting allows me to experiment with the properties of the watercolour medium and normalises the reduced dexterity brought on by aging. It accommodates less than nimble and unintended jerky movements.

The third painting reflects a vegetation lined riverbank.

I don’t feel comfortable with the whole abstract image. My inner critic believes there is a disconnect between the ‘sky’ and the ‘earth’.

Here it is for your review.