Color and Charcoal

July 24, 2026. One by one we leave our ghosts in the places we inhabit. And who am I to think I can color this world of mystery with pens and brushes and photos? My brother died suddenly on this day, 9 years ago. Fingers of grief still cling to my heart as I walk my dog, taking in the scent of rotting leaves on asphalt, other dogs, car exhaust. My brother’s loss is one thing I am feeling today. Under the surface disturbances of ordinary life, the sense that we are losing what we thought were our safe and wild places, rivers and ecosystems brings me to the dark winter orchards of my mind. I lose color and shape and particularity in the orange haze beyond their black outlines. And I know that the immediate, the peculiar, the whimsical, is the where this mind can rest sometimes. But I cannot rest on any of these now.

The clouds move like willful animals. We wait for rain—long for it, as the sky fills with smoke again. Flood and fire adapted landscapes move beyond their coping mechanisms. The sea readies herself to expel a great breath of heat this year, even as a record amount of dead and dying whales wash ashore on the West Coast. It’s hard to think of making art.

And Nan Shepherd’s beloved Cairngorms are burning. This hits me in the deepest part of my psyche. To bear witness to this particular part of the burning world is something that must penetrate through to the art work, somehow—the time for pretty pictures and birds is fading, and charcoal and smoke dust are pushing up through the veil of the canvas….but that’s a subject for later.