Paths of Destruction

Last weekend was quite an exciting one at our house! Shortly before 3:00am Sunday morning the phone rang. It was an Antrim County Sheriff’s deputy in our driveway asking us to come outside because there was a car in our yard and “a lot of destruction to the property”. Hastily throwing on clothes and turning on lights, we headed outside to see what was going on. To our shock, we found a strange car wedged between our dog pen and the side fence; a space just wide enough for a car! Just as puzzling was the fact that the driver was nowhere to be found! Further examination with flash lights revealed that the driver had gone through our fence in not one but three places!

In due time a wrecker arrived and hauled off the car, but we were naturally too wired up to go back to bed. When daylight arrived, we headed outside with our cameras to record the path of destruction and figure out just what happened. Here’s the scenario as near as we can figure out. A neighbor’s daughter (or some other driver of her car) came around the corner too fast, hit our neighbor’s mailbox on the right and then oversteered, crossed the road and went through our chain link fence.


From there she proceeded across our lawn, plowed into the large lilac bush and the fence along the side of the yard and ended up against two pine trees in the other neighbor’s yard.




She then, apparently, threw the car into reverse and turned it to the left, intending to head back onto the road. Instead, she went through our fence on the other side of the lilac and somehow managed to end up between the dog pen and the fence, hitting the corner post of the pen and getting hung up on my compost pile. (evil grin) She was stuck. Since there wasn’t room to open the doors, she climbed out the driver’s window and disappeared. We figure she called a friend to come get her and didn’t want to face her father or the police. It’s highly probable that she’d been drinking.


Apparently, she wasn’t hurt too badly, fortunately, and the deputy told me a few days ago that she has so far not returned calls from the Sheriff’s department. Without knowing for sure who was driving, the police can’t do much more. I will refrain from any comments on people taking responsibility for their actions although I have plenty in this case.





As soon as our homeowners insurance adjuster had documented the destruction first hand, I was able to clean up the lawn mess and assess the flower beds better. The casualty list includes a honeysuckle bush, a small lilac bush that I’d been nursing along, the large old-fashioned lilac bush, the sweet peas which were torn out of the ground, and my cone flowers whose tops were shredded. I trimmed back the cone flowers as I mourned the fact that they were about to bloom. It remains to be seen if they will recover. With brute force, I was able to wrangle the top rail of the fence back up onto the remaining posts along the road which looks much better and allows the lawn to be mowed while we wait for the fence to be fixed.

All in all, it could have been much worse, for the plants and the girl/driver. Did you notice that large maple tree next to the dog pen? If the car had hit that, the driver would have been in a world of hurt. I’m thankful that the accident wasn’t worse. As a parent, I wouldn’t want to be the one to get that 3:00 am phone call from the police letting me know that my child had been in an accident. I’m thankful that this girl and her parents were lucky - THIS time! I hope she learned a lesson that will stay with her for a very long time.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to call my children and let them know how much we love them.

HSBB Part 2; Thrills and Chills in the Grand Prix Ring!

Meanwhile, down in the Grand Prix ring at Horse Shows By The Bay, I sat down on one of the new bleachers that have been added this year for spectators. Just in time to catch the leadline class of little tykes on their ponies, I soon realized that I was on the wrong side of the ring. Not only was the sun behind the ponies, but the little ones were all looking away toward the “judge” and show mascot. I still managed to get a few good shots which will be useful for backlit subjects in paintings. Below is one of the contestants. By the way, it was a tie for first place between all the entrants who got ribbons and a goody bag; just like at the Oscars!



After the leadline class, there was a demonstration by a local company which trains personal protection dogs and scent dogs for law enforcement and search and rescue. They brought a handsome black German Shepherd who showed the crowd how he could find drugs and defend his owner against an agressive stranger. It was pretty impressive!

The grand finale of the afternoon was the Spy Coast Farm Grand Prix of show jumping. After a few jumpers had gone, I switched to the sunny side of the ring and got some better photos. This is the event in which all the top riders at the show compete for big prize money.



I didn’t stay to watch all the riders since it was getting late and I was tired. On the way back to the car, I encountered these Jack Russell terriers and couldn’t resist getting some final shots for my horse show dog series.



If you want to see more of my photos, I put quite a few in an album on my Facebook page and made it so that anyone can view them. Just follow the link to my Facebook album.

Going to the show was an extra pleasure this year because of the cool weather we’ve been having. Not only was the day sunny, but it was pleasantly cool with a nice breeze blowing. I just hope this weather hangs around for another couple of weeks until I get back to take in the dressage and maybe the polo.

In the meantime, I’m going to pick out one of my photos and get started on a new painting or drawing. Hmmm, which one will it be? Such a tough decision since there are so many good ones!

I Just LOVE This Show!

The highlight of my summers has become visiting Horse Shows By The Bay near Traverse City, Michigan every July and August. This year the show has expanded to four weeks of hunters, jumpers, ponies, dressage and a polo match on the final weekend. Top riders from around the country now come here to compete including Peter Pletcher, Tammy Provost, Patricia Griffith and Scott Lenkart, along with junior riders Caitlin Ziegler and Victoria Birdsall. HSBB is now considered one of the best shows in the midwest under the exceptional management of Dean and Alexandra Rheinheimer.

Last weekend I spent the afternoon at the show and enjoyed every minute of it! Every year more improvements are made to the grounds, and this year was no exception. A new pathway for visitors from the parking lot all the way to the Grand Prix ring at the far end has shortened walks and given better access to all four of the rings for those of us who like to wander around and catch whatever action is going on in the various rings.

For a change, I was not disappointed in my photos. I don’t know if my expectations have been lowered or if I’m shooting better; whichever it is, I see many good paintings amongst them.

This year I remembered to put the long lens on the camera which greatly increased my chances of getting good jump shots. That was a good thing when I got to the Grand Prix ring which is the largest of all and has limited access for spectators.

Last year I posted the photos on my website, but I found that very few people bothered to follow the link to them, so this year I’m posting them right in the blog. Here are just a few of the photos for your enjoyment.

The first photo shows a lovely iron gray hunter horse in a warmup ring. I couldn’t resist him.



This photo shows a groom holding a pony and is very typical of this level of showing. Unlike most of us who do our own grooming, saddling, bathing, etc., the show barns have grooms to do this work. When the horse is ready, the rider hops on and is off to the rings. When the class is done, the rider hops off and hands the reins to the groom. I even saw one groom picking out the feet of a hunter while the mounted rider was waiting for her class! These unsung heroes of the horse show circuit make it possible for riders to compete in several classes in a day without wearing themselves out caring for their horses. Some riders ride more than one horse which makes the grooms doubly indispensible.



I took this shot while the show photographer was shooting this winner and his rider. The proud mom and groom are standing by, but no amount of coaxing could get this pony to look at the camera and perk his ears. He was totally bored by the whole thing.



This next shot I caught in a warmup ring. The two older riders seemed to be mentoring this little girl on her cute white pony, and giving her encouragement. It’s a great idea for a painting and just goes to show that the best action is not always in the rings during a class. You can catch many good candid photos in the warmup rings if you’re alert for them.



Since not much was going on in the pony ring, I wandered off from there to the Grand Prix ring. More in the next post.

Good News Abounds!

If anything, today’s weather is worse than yesterday’s. It’s cloudy, a stiff wind is blowing, a drizzly rain is falling, and the temperature is a chilly 56 degrees F as opposed to yesterday’s high of 66! Even so, I prefer this weather to last week’s heat and high humidity. It’s a good chance to catch up on indoor chores without the misery of constant sweating and clammy floors and furniture.

At the height of last week’s heat, I was visited by a newly found saddle fitter who evaluated my saddle and my horse and declared that he could take my saddle apart, narrow the tree and restuff it to fit my horse better. Since it’s a quality saddle in good condition and needs only these minor adjustments, I won’t have to go saddle shopping again! The long and short of it is that this culminated a long-time goal of mine to “do something” about a saddle that I knew was a little too wide for my horse but that is comfortable for me and that I love. Thanks to a Chronicle of The Horse online forum, I was able to find a saddle fitter in Michigan who was highly recommended by other dressage riders. If the fit turns out well, I’ll share his name.

The other thing I accomplished over the past week was to finish weeding the flower beds, plant the wax begonias and install edging blocks along the front of the old garage flower bed. That made a huge improvement in its looks and helps to hold the water in, since one end of the bed is higher than lawn level. All of my new perennials that survived the winter are doing spectacularly, and the foxgloves are now blooming in lovely hues of magenta and cream. I’m going to wait until next year to move plants around after evaluating their different growing characteristics and bloom times. This year I’ll install more edging blocks along the long fence bed and dig out more sections between shrubs which will make mowing the lawn easier for my husband.

In about ten days, Horse Shows By The Bay will begin its expanded three week series of shows in Acme, and I’m hoping to get over there to shoot at least a couple of times. There will be an all-afternoon series of polo matches that are must-sees as well.

In honor of HSBB, I’m thinking of starting a new painting or drawing using one of my images from past shows. There are so many good ones to choose from that it will be difficult to make a choice! Should it be hunters, jumpers, dressage, ponies or a general horse show scene? Or, perhaps I’ll start my planned series of horse show dogs.

There is more good news that Mural Mosaic’s The Horse Gift will be displayed at this year’s Calgary Stampede. That’s the mural I did a panel for last year, so if you’re up that way and going to take in the Stampede, be sure to search out the mural. You can’t miss it; it’s 22 feet high! So far, the mural has been shown at Spruce Meadows, Quarter Horse Congress and the National Finals Rodeo; all top horse venues with lots of visitors. Reports are that visitors are just blown away by it! You can buy your own poster of it, too, or buy a book and put together your own life sized horse poster of the mural. I have books, if anyone is interested.

At the top are my foxgloves blooming. And below is my panel for The Horse Gift.

One Chapter Closes, Another Opens

Last week we took a trip to Alexandria, VA to attend a memorial service and burial for my mother at Arlington National Cemetery. Our daughter, Tina, accompanied us, along with a chair that my sister wanted but couldn't take home with her on the plane back in March. We fit everything in my Subaru wagon with a few inches to spare and saved a lot on gas versus driving the SUV such a long distance. Tina had a lot more room on the way home, needless to say.

It's been quite a few years since we took a vacation of any sort, much less travelled east to the DC area where my sister lives, so it was a real treat to get away even if only for a few days. DC/Alexandria is one of my favorite places in the world, and I would love to live there if it weren't for the heat, humidity, congestion and traffic! It's a far cry from northern Michigan in all respects, but is so loaded with the history of our great country that there is tons to see at every turn.

I was quite disappointed that I didn't take my camera because the flash cards were acting up, so I had to depend on my husband to take photos and thus didn't get a lot of shots I would have taken if I'd had my camera. So, there were no photos of the mountains in Pennsylvania or Maryland or all the interesting barns we saw along the way. And, not many photos of family once we reached my sister's house in Alexandria.

My sister has an ideal location just off the George Washington Parkway north of Alexandria proper. She's also a few miles south of Mt Vernon which we visit almost every time we go. There is a wonderful biking/hiking/running path that goes along the parkway which my biking/running daughter took advantage of a couple of times while lamenting that Ann Arbor, where she lives, doesn't have anything nearly as nice. There is just a small strip of woods that separates the parkway from the Potomac at this point also, which makes the area very beautiful. To top it off, Alexandria is a city that oozes with the charm of colonial style architecture and buildings dating to the early days of our Republic.

The weekend's events included a mini family get together as well as the ceremony at Arlington where my father had already been laid to rest. My oldest sister and her daughter joined us from S. Carolina and Georgia, and my niece and her husband came from England. My nephew and his wife also live in Alexandria, so we had some good times visiting at my sister's house and having great food and fun conversation.

The weather cooperated, and the ceremony at Arlington couldn't have been nicer! My sister did a wonderful job of planning it, and all who wanted to spoke a few words about my remarkable mother. Afterwards, we had a delicious luncheon at the Army/Navy officer's club (thanks to my retired Army brother-in-law's connections) and then went home and took a nap. We were all pretty exhausted by that time.

The next day the three of us took in the wonderful new museum at Mt. Vernon and learned much about the Father of our Country. If you have a chance, be sure to take it in the next time you visit Mt. Vernon. That night Tina was invited by her cousins to join them at a concert of The Gipsy Kings at Wolf Trap. She had a wonderful time.

On Sunday we said our goodbyes and headed for home with me feeling a sense of peace, both for myself and for my mother. With this chapter of my life closed at long last, perhaps now I'll have the time and emotional energy once again to devote to my art; my life's work.

Lilac Season

The lilacs above are an old fashioned variety that were here when we bought the property over thirty years ago. They had probably been here for many decades before that since this property was once a farmstead along the banks of the lake, going back to the nineteenth century when the area was cleared and homesteaded. Hard as it is to believe today, northwest Michigan was still very much a wilderness until late in the 1800's. Some southern Michiganders still think it is!

Our lilacs are now in bloom, and their sweet fragrance fills the air when I do my daily tour of the flower beds. Unfortunately, we can’t see them from the house, but there are small lilacs planted along the road fence which will be visible from the house once they’re big enough to put on a real display. I was told they need lots of manure to bloom well, so I must remember to bring some home from the barn each time I go. Last year they got a dose of Moo Doo, but it didn’t spur any blooms this Spring, much to my disappointment.

Last weekend I drove all over in search of the annuals that I wanted for the flower beds; wax begonias with green leaves and pink and white flowers. By experimentation, these are the colors that work the best in the beds along the driveway and house and the round bed that hides the well pipe. These are partially shaded areas, and the begonias do better than any other plants I’ve tried, plus they bloom profusely well into autumn. I just love them!

I also bought a flat of pansies, another favorite, and will plant them in the road fence beds as border plants where ever there is a need. Several years ago these happy little plants bloomed so well that they could be seen from the house and even managed to over winter and bloom again. I lost the remaining ones when they dried up one summer before I could get them mulched. I don’t know what it is about that bed along the fence; whether it’s a thick layer of insulating snow that the plows deposit or what. My snap dragons come back every year, too, and are now about five years old.

On Sunday I weeded the driveway flower bed and planted some of the begonias; by far the earliest I’ve ever planted before! Usually, June is ending before I get around to this chore, and wouldn’t you know it; there was a freeze warning for Sunday night! We missed the freeze, and the plants looked healthy the next morning and happy to be out of their confining little boxes.

For the time being, I’m contenting myself with this form of creativity while winding up other urgent projects around the house and figuring out how I can fit in significant blocks of time for artwork. I suspect that means curtailing computer time to an hour a day instead of the several that is the current routine. Goodbye Facebook and other mindless wanderings around the internet.

Just as I had hoped, my last blog post about the licensing agent has exorcised this unpleasant experience once and for all and has allowed me to move on. As negative as it was, it had a very positive and beneficial effect. Such people are just not worth stewing over!

The Licensing Agent; A Cautionary Tale

"Sweetie" 11"x14" pastel painting

I’m giving you fair warning now that this is going to be a long post. I’m writing it because this incident has been haunting me for almost two years, and I’d like to let it go and move on.

A couple of years ago, I was contacted by a licensing agent who was looking for an equine artist to represent in a new venture into licensing horse images for her corporate clients. She was very enthusiastic about my art and very flattering in her comments. She told me that my art had the WOW! factor and that she wanted to “brand” me with a big marketing campaign and thought that I could become another Chris Cummings in the licensing world. Pretty heady stuff, right?

The problem was that I already had a licensing agent/dealer, but, I hadn’t had much luck with her for several years. I told the new agent (I’ll call her Cindy) that I would consider her offer. We chatted on the phone, and she built herself up by saying that she had a background in marketing and worked with many big companies which licensed images for their products and that she had a very good reputation in the industry. Then I contacted two of her artists, a husband and wife team, who gave her an enthusiastic endorsement. Next, I checked the contract I had with the current licensing agent and found that I could cancel it by giving her 60 days’ notice.

After doing this due diligence, I felt safe in accepting the new offer from Cindy who was willing to wait the 60 days. I told her right up front that the only images I had available for licensing were on my website, and she didn’t express any concern about that. I notified my current agent, and Cindy sent me a contract to sign that would be effective at the end of the 60 days. She also requested that I send her images so that she could put together a marketing sheet to show to her clients. I asked her which of my current images she wanted for this purpose.

That’s when the trouble began. I never got a direct answer. Instead she emailed me a list of ideas for paintings based on requests that she’d gotten from her contacts. I asked her several times more which images to send. Her response was always to tell me that certain ones would be better in color or with a different background or with the horse facing the other way or this or that. I asked her what sorts of images to work on first. Her response was to just send me the same list of ideas that she’d gotten from her clients which was a long one.

Without any guidance from Cindy, I had no choice but to do my own research. I reviewed all of my sales records and came up with a list of best sellers and worst sellers in prints and note cards. I presented that to her and got no response. I looked through all of my horsey gift catalogs and horse catalogs to see what sorts of images are on the market to give me ideas for what works best. Based on those findings, I finally gathered ten of my best sellling images on a CD and mailed it to her. Her response was that they were “a good starting point”.

Two weeks later, the contract went into effect, and I emailed her to find out what was going on. I didn’t hear from her for two days. Then she emailed to say that I didn’t have an “extensive” enough portfolio of current work and that she was talking to another equine artist who had a “large” portfolio. She explained that she needed a “minimum of 20 strong images” in order to launch a marketing campaign which was something she had never mentioned before. She was still willing to represent me with my limited portfolio, though, if I was willing to continue.

Naturally, this came as a shock since she hadn’t given me a clue before that there was any problem from her point of view. So, I went through my images again and sent her 16 more possibilities by email that I’d originally eliminated for one reason or another and asked her to let me know if any of them were suitable. By this time, I was getting very uneasy about the whole situation and Cindy’s lack of communication and candor.

Over a week went by, and I heard nothing from Cindy. So, I sent her another email asking if she had gotten the images. I heard nothing for another two weeks and emailed her again, asking for advice as to what to paint first. There was still no response, so I phoned her. She told me that she couldn’t talk now because she had a business client coming for the weekend but would phone me on Monday. That was on Friday. On Sunday night I got an email from her saying that she had found another “incredible established artist” with “a large portfolio” to represent and would not be able to represent me after all. She went on to twist the knife deeper by saying that it would take many years before I would reach “profitability”for her in licensing due to my limited portfolio and lack of dedication to regular painting.

I wrote her back and agreed that I wasn’t the right artist for her and hadn’t been happy about the way things had been going. I also expressed puzzlement over why she had contacted me in the first place and why I hadn’t been told in the beginning that I would need X number of images and why she hadn’t given me more guidance in what to paint for her.

The funny thing is that no new artist appeared on her website, and a year later she contacted one of my best artist friends and other artists as well. So, what became of that “incredible” artist I wonder?

I’ve since come to the conclusion that Cindy knew nothing about the equine art licensing market and that she expected “her” artists to produce paintings quickly. I also suspect that her view is that the artists work for her rather than the other way around.

This whole incident was a huge blow to my ego; one that I’m still struggling to overcome. I’m hoping that this post will help to put the unpleasantness behind me once and for all. My biggest regret is that I let go my former licensing agent. She helped to establish my career early on, was always supportive and helpful and was familiar with the world of equine art. I’ve found her advice far more helpful than the little bits that I received from Cindy. I regret that by hastily cancelling that contract, I also lost a friend.

Perhaps that’s what’s bothering me the most.