Use What You Have and Share What You No Longer Need

Today I've been thinking of a friend of mine who is an artist in Santa Fe. She has been very good at stretching her resources and making do with what little she has. In order to be able to support herself she works in the evenings two days a week. She started out working in pastels. She did absolutely gorgeous cloud paintings in pastel. Then one day she went to a yard sale. An artist was moving out of the area and she was selling canvas and acrylic paints. My friend bought those supplies and changed her medium from pastel to acrylics. One of my last visits back to Santa Fe I noticed that her paintings were getting less colorful. She was painting using lots of browns and oranges and the scenes were more muted. Right before I packed up my things and moved from New Mexico I called my struggling artist friend and gave her all my canvas and acrylics I had there. I had plenty of art supplies in California and did not need these art supplies. She was so excited. I use a lot of bright cheerful colors normally in my paintings. So now my friend can paint away and not have to limit herself to the few remaining paints she had. She has lots of canvas and paint to last her for many, many months. It was a good feeling. My canvas and paint were not wasted. They went to a friend who really works hard and appreciates the gift.