Flight

I may fiddle with this a little, but it's mostly finished. I've had much of the day to work on it. Daughter drove Dearest to church. Dearest had been asked to sing with the first sopranos, and had practiced today's anthem all week, so she was determined to get there. But she was just as determined to have me paint all morning. So they had their first drive together (I've been teaching Daughter to drive) out of our little town. Church is in the larger little city of Chapel Hill.

Since so much was done to ensure I could paint, I concentrated on it - not moving from in front of this painting for the three hours they were gone. I was a bit stiff when they got home...

This comes closer than I have before. I guess this idea will keep coming up. Click the image for a larger view.

>>>> Appendix de Grenouille <<<<

Some things cannot be returned to the bottle. When once I had sampled a mayfly I was forever ruined for midges. After the first kiss of a mademoiselle grenouille, I will forever want more.

Etienne says the ladies did him the same way, when he was five. And since then he is fascinated with the femmes, and he was looking for his Dearest. Though years passed, he was not able to forget the looking. And now that he has her he still feels he cannot ever have enough of her; the desire cannot be returned to the bottle. He would not wish it any other way.

And the painting is the same for him now - it is all the way out of the bottle. Inside the vessel is only a trace of the perfume of the arts - the rest is all in the air around his head, and in his nose and on his tongue. It goes with him everywhere, he is not ever rid of it. This feels well and it feels strange, like having the scent of wintergreen or balsam fir mixed into everything else. Wine with eucalyptus. Cinnamon toast with camphor. All the daily pleasures and daily scenes are overlaid with this incense of the fantastic.

What is out of the bottle for you? What surrounds you like a perfume and when was it released?

Au revoir,

Grenouille