The April 8, 2024 total solar eclipse happened at just the right time and in just the right place. For me, anyway. Early April in Wisconsin, USA is bleak and brown. So parking on a lonely country road somewhere west of St. Louis the evening of April 7th, to take my dog for a walk, was magical. I felt like Dorothy stepping out of her monochrome farmhouse and into the fabled land of Technicolor.
Everything was SO GREEN. It was as if I hadn’t seen green leaves in 5 years. And it wasn’t just green. It was spring green. Even now, end of April, here in Wisco, the grass is coming along and the trees are greening up just a little…but it’s not the same green.
The whole drive through Missouri had been gorgeous. We don’t really have much in the line of flowering trees here in the frozen tundra, so they are lovely to see in southern climes. The following day, the drip from western St. Louis to Cape Girardeau in the early morning was amazing. (That the eclipse was amazing goes without saying.) Stopped in Evansville, Indiana for the night of the 8th and wended my way through southern Indiana the following morning…GREEN GREEN GREEN.
Literally, the grass is greener. The spring trees are greener. It was hugely depressing getting up north of Fort Wayne on my way back; I literally just wanted to turn around. I’m in a position this year to try to figure out what part of the country I want to move to next, and I’m seriously considering locations much farther south than I ever would have considered before.
So, to make a long story a little longer, I needed to paint something green and springy upon returning north. Didn’t put a lot of effort into photorealistic bird poses and whatnot; trying to be a little less OCD in those regards. Thought it turned out OK.