Go. Home. Roots. Wings. Are you planted or soaring? Or if you are like me (Enneagram 7 https://www.enneagraminstitute.com/) you want it all. Pulling up a chair to the buffet of life, loading my plate with dreamy plans is my second favorite activity. Yes, painting is my first love but give me an itinerary, a map, wheels or a boarding pass, and I am locked and loaded. FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) while not life threatening exhausts me more often than I would like to admit. And I just had a big run on a dose of that. A beautiful busy, slow, fast tramp through Washington, Alaska and Oregon. Just enough time to mark places that will keep me aching for more.

Are you born with wanderlust? Or afflicted? Is this itchy feet virus too small to see invading cells without notice? Honestly, I am not sure when I came down with my terminal attachment to wandering. I lived a very small life, growing up in a suburb of Denver attending public school K-16. Yep, my undergraduate from Boulder, 1 1/2 hours from home. Boulder was a wonderfully shocking expansive place, but at 22 I still had never been east of Nebraska, and had only seen the ocean twice. College friends came from everywhere. Maybe they infected me. Lord knows there was time and foolishness enough to come down with lots of things during those years. I know I came away with a deep desire to try everywhere on, see if it fit.

Flashes of my recent trip are posted on social media, far prettier to look at than this blog. Try #kimbarrickstudio on Instagram and FB Kim Barrick Studio. Some gorgeous moments to check out. But honestly, I did not post the best spots, the best moments because it is just not possible. Because, the moments that wrap themselves around your heart sweep technology needs from your busy intrusive thought producing mind. Dahl porpoise pod with 10 or more individuals swirling just over the ship’s railing, feeding or playing? Seeing seals, sea lion, sea otters in the sea. Salmon running, (running?) so thick it looked staged until a local stopped at our spot on a side street in Ketchikan offering to sell us what looked like a bat with a hook to clobber our dinner. Nice engraving on the side of the hunting weapon but we passed. Passing sign after sign indicating the reach of the Mendenhall Glacier in past times over a brutal 2 1/2 hour scramble on the barely marked west side trail. The effect of global warming indisputable and indescribable unless you took the time to hike it.

And Oregon, won a piece of my heart. A friend kept commenting about how undeveloped it was as if she had just discovered this magical place before the developers could ruin it like her home state of Florida. I mentioned Oregon’s history of protecting beaches which began in 1911 under Governor West. And the battle to continue protection again won in 1967. Conservation efforts, fought by citizens who care has been a long standing tradition in Oregon. It still baffles me that protecting our home-nest our air, water land is not an effort supported by everyone whatever political leanings they have. Go Oregon.

I’m home now. Mmmmm. My wanderlust is a quiet purr satiated for this moment. So many great things coming on right now here where I rest and feel planted, my wings tucked away. Workshops, new gallery, shows coming up. Thank you for following my journeys and supporting my visions in paint that come from the life force I’m lucky enough to swim in. May my good fortune be inspiration for your dreams. Pull up a chair and join me in the abundance.

Breckinridge Gallery Showing New Wildlife Paintings!

Go stop by and meet Alex and Tina in downtown Breckinridge Gallery opened since 1968. Truly the finest gallery in Summit County. These amazing owners’ beautiful gallery is filled with incredible art. Not surprisingly they have already sold a painting, so I am busily painting more for them.

Breckinridge Gallery
https://breckenridgegallery.com/
124 South Main Street
Breckinridge, CO 80424