The Orchid Journal

My mother, Jennifer Grace Watt, painted this picture and sold it at an art auction benefitting the UofA art museum. Dad, Brendan, Mom and I walked around the art museum across from the Center for Creative Photography. We ate the catered Mexican food and admired the beautiful, the eccentric, the downright ugly artwork that hung on the walls. One piece sold for over $1,000. It was half the size of most paintings and was a wash of two different greens...that is all. Only green on canvas, something I could have done with my eyes closed, holding a ridiculously long paintbrush with my teeth and painting from across the room. How ridiculous! The art world bemuses me at times. There was one piece, a painting of a water lily flower or gardenia, painted with oils, still glistening with fresh paint that held me captivated. It almost looked alive, as if moved by the wind and shining in the sun's rays with vibrant colors and depth. I wanted to buy it, but it sold for $200 or so. Many p...

Last night I went to bed extremely tired and discouraged. The thought of facing another week having to look for jobs, with hardly any money left and just feeling bummed about things in general was weighing on me as I climbed into bed. This past weekend was so encouraging- I saw some friends, went to an amazingly beautiful wedding, went to a party, went up to Mount Lemmon Sunday morning to spend some time in nature with God and in QUIET, had a lovely, blessed time at church that evening, but for some reason, by Sunday night bedtime, I found myself hoping I would just not wake up in the morning. Part of me just wanted to keep sleeping through all of the "unknowns" in my life. Then I remembered the verses in lamentations 3 that say, "Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness." I determined to put aside my dreary thoughts and believe that the verse was true so I ...

My Shakespeare professor was showing the class a drawing of the inside of The Swan theatre in England. He said, "This is the only existing representation of the inside of an Elizabethan theatre. It is a prized rendition, drawn by a theatre-goer named Johannes de Witt. He drew it in 1596, then sent it to his friend back in his home country. The only reason why we have a an inkling as to what the theatres of the day looked like on the inside is because of this one drawing that was found in a dusty library in another country." Hearing this information, I was suddenly struck by an idea. Here this guy Johannes probably went on vacation to London one day, and being a doodler, decided to draw the scene in the theatre while he watched a play. Maybe he was bored, or maybe he was drawing it for the sake of his friend, Arend van Buchell, who had wanted to join him on the trip. Maybe Arend became ill or didn't have enough money for the trip, or his wife's baby was due and ...

Today is only the second day of 2010 and already my life feels different. Normally, the New Year has little affect on my state of mind except to make me look forward to new things and be thankful for the past year, but this year feels different already. Most likely this overwhelming sense of newness has to do with, not the changed calendar year, but the fact that I am now a college graduate, I have no job at the moment, I am healing from my fall off the horse, and I am making plans to leave the country by the middle of this coming year. My two major goals for this year are 1. to visit my cousins in South Korea and 2. to move to SPain to teach English Everything I am doing from now until the summer, such as getting a job and a going through a TEFL certification program, is working towards those two goals. Besides that, these are the three "resolutions" I have for spiritual, physical and mental purposes: 1. Read my Bible every day, at least open it and read a few verses, if...