Is it just me, or has April flown by?  I have blinked, and we’re almost in May.  I’m looking forward to May, though.  While summer has never been my favorite season, I am excited about opening the pool and spending more time outside before it gets too hot.  I’m also loving the longer days.

Here are my four things for this week: what art teaches us, a high-tech visit to the past, aging and taking risks, and bouncing from one thing to another.

what I’m reading

When I saw the title Van Gogh Has a Broken Heart: What Art Teaches Us About the Wonder and Struggle of Being Alive, I knew it was my kind of book, and it is.  The book fits into an odd niche of art history mixed with some Biblical/faith-based teaching, but it all seems to flow.  I’ve realized over the years, as I’ve talked and written about creativity and art, that those things are so deeply tied into who we are as humans.  It’s really hard to have a conversation about creativity without tripping and falling into deep topics like wounding, self-worth, longing, hope, and what makes our souls come alive.

I’ve been digesting the book at a rate of about one or two chapters each day, and I’ve loved listening to the stories about artists and famous works, some of which I am hearing for the first time.  I find myself looking forward to listening to the next chapter.  I only have an hour left in the book, and that almost makes me sad.

what I’m watching

I flipped over to National Geographic to see if any new interesting documentaries had been added.  If you haven’t picked up on it, I really enjoy documentaries and shows about exploration and adventure.  I spotted Titanic: Digital Resurrection and decided to put it on to see if it was good or if it was another gimmicky documentary about the Titanic.  I was fascinated, and when Jeff came into the room, he sat and watched it with me.  Just checking it out turned into watching the entire thing.

The documentary looks at the wreckage in a way it hasn’t seen before, a digital, pieced-together 3-D image of the ship on the ocean floor.  It really is an amazing site.  The experts analyze the details of the wreckage while also sharing stories of individuals who both survived and died in the tragedy.  It is well done and worth watching.

what I’m loving

“You are as old as the risks you take.  In many ways, aging is not the process of growing old, but rather the slow death of becoming overly protective, scared, and worried about losing what you have.  Youth is found in the energy of going for it, taking the risk, and trusting you’ll figure it out along the way.”  – James Clear

what I’m working on

I shared earlier this week that I was feeling a tad overwhelmed at the amount of yard work that needed to be done.  Instead of looking at the undone work and allowing it to weigh on me, I decided to do some of it.  I put my overalls on, grabbed a few tools and yard waste bags, and started cleaning leaves out of beds, weeding, and trimming things back from the previous fall.  I worked for about an hour and got almost all the beds done in the backyard.  I had already weeded the front and garage side of the house, so I was making pretty good headway.

What I felt was a huge task really wasn’t much at all.  As I sometimes do, I blew it up in my mind and avoided it because I thought it would take an entire day.  It gave me a fresh perspective, a reminder of what I already knew.  I could just chip away at the yard, an hour here, an evening there, and all of the big jobs will be done.

In addition to Spring gardening chores, I’ve been making progress on writing my next book, working on some paintings, and continuing with my organizing efforts.  It’s been the kind of week I enjoy, bouncing from one seemingly unrelated task to another, allowing the momentum in one task to carry over into the next…