Heather, Vase & Window by Michael Hooper
You might say Michael Reid is obsessed with Prussian Blue. Ever since he saw The Starry Night by Vincent van Gogh, Michael has been fascinated by this color, Prussian Blue, which was made by accident in Berlin in 1704. A chemist was rushing to create a batch of cochineal red (made from insects); the chemist accidentally used potash contaminated by the iron in animal blood. All this turned the mixture a deep blue – Prussian blue.
Prussian blue is found in all kinds of products, clothing and art, even blue jeans. For Michael, it expresses his sadness. Why is he so blue? Loneliness, anguish, regret. World news deepens the pain. There are two wars, with the potential for nuclear genocide. All this contributes to his despair. Somehow documenting this feeling has a therapeutic affect, he may be mentally thinking about all of these terrifying issues, but when he paints, he doesn’t think anymore, he only feels, and the deeper he feels, the richer the colors.
Carl Jung says green is for sensation, yellow is for intuition, red for feeling and blue for thinking.
There is a thinking person's sadness in "Kind of Blue" by Miles Davis.
An art teacher once said every good color deserves a complement. Michael uses Prussian blue in every painting. He finds a complement, perhaps orange-red or bright yellow orange.
Lately, he’s been searching for and listening to the saddest songs ever recorded, and he seems most moved by Barber’s Adagio, theme from Platoon. He sees flashes of his son and daughter, as little children, jumping off the boat into the lake in pure joy, a moment that he will never experience again. The kids grew up and moved away.
A symphony of sadness in the string section climbs and falls with rhythmic magnitude, everybody in the orchestra is wearing black.
Michael walks. He walks to the dog park where he remembers his beloved Willy dog, a Boston terrier, who was so full of life, who could run like the wind and chase down a squirrel and shake it dead. But he died five years ago and is buried in the backyard. All these dogs behind the fence at the dog park are strangers.
Nostalgia filled with vivid memories plague his mind. He probably would go mad if not for his art. He is able to shut down his bully talking-left-brain by drawing and painting. Prussian blue enters the sphere, somehow he has got to get that in the painting, maybe it’s the entire painting.
Michael reads an article that says social interaction is the key to a healthy life, perhaps more valuable than diet or exercise. Maybe that is why his grandfather lived so long, he had a dozen hobbies, collecting stamps, books, cartoons and Civil War books. Grandpa used to cut bluegrass as a child growing up in Maitland, Mo. The old man conversed with distinguished scholars of the Civil War in Kansas City. He ran a farm and sold real estate. Grandpa loved to write and send letters and postcards. Michael always wrote back.
Sometimes Michael finds himself reading old letters from friends and family, especially in the 1980s and 1990s before the Internet killed letter writing. Jeanne Bourne wrote some evocative letters from Greece, and Paul Krause wrote about his budding career at Amazon in Seattle in the 1990s. Jeanne sent a postcard in 1989 showing an empty park bench on a lovely beach in Greece, she wrote, "What is missing from this picture?" "Me," Michael thought. He went there a year later, spending two months in Greece. Blue and white houses populate the towns and cities. He remembers going to the train station in Athens early in the morning to pick up tourists and bring them back to his hotel. By 8:30 a.m., after three or four hours work, he was done for the day. He would play backgammon with John Pierre. They would walk to his flat where they would smoke a spliff and listen to the Doors, Riders on the Storm.
These memories go on and on, sometimes he forces himself to snap back into reality, into the now. The current moment includes two aging men competing to run the government.
In the morning, while scrolling on his phone, he plays Gloria by Laura Branigan, "...all the voices in your head, calling Gloria." Immediately his wife Heather starts singing along, they both sing along. As she is walking out the door, she says, "Gee, thanks for playing that song, now I've got it stuck in my head."
She goes to work, he works from home. He would work obsessively painting if his muscles would allow it, but the reality is he can only handle about two to four hours of painting per day. The rest of the time, he waits for paint to dry, reads books and magazines, does yoga, writes poetry, watches sports, attends his book clubs and cooks French and Italian cuisine for his wife.
He goes to the same coffee group every Saturday, these people are just so gorgeous and lovely -- kind and full of life, mostly old hippies. Richard hung out with the rock stars in Haight-Ashbury in San Francisco in 1968-69, he saw Jimi Hendrix, Jefferson Airplane, he knew Harvey Milk, Richard has so many wonderful stories, yet here he is now talking about the latest Bob Marley movie, he loves it so much he has seen it twice. He's always going to the theater and the orchestra. He surrounds himself with lovely women, Rosemary, Alice and Helen. They often go together to these artistic events.
When Michael walks into the coffee shop, his friends wave and call out his name. He smiles and says, "Hello everybody, it's time for me to socialize. I've been a hermit all week."
After 90 minutes, Michael says goodbye to his friends and retreats to his art studio.
He is painting a blonde with alizarin crimson dress, vase of flowers, window and orange wood floors, blue and red rug with a Prussian Blue background.
"I just love the way these colors sparkle," Michael says.
Prussian Blue, along with red, gold and green, sing in a balanced fashion.
"Looking at the painting," he says out loud, "I must admit, life is not entirely blue."
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