February Frost to First Bloom

The monthly newsletter from the studio desk, the world outside moving towards spring, cats hunting, chickens scratching, dogs chasing, the redbud "will probably be blooming in a little while,"

February 28th 3:14 pm -

Down the old highway I said we’ll be late, they’ll be out of trees, Arbor Day depends on the county out here, it’s early in Mississippi because this is the time to plant them, 7:37 am at the USDA office in the county and gone home with treasures counted like Christmas presents, indigo bushes? bald cypress, black walnut, crepe myrtles. She exclaimed when she saw us, we exclaimed when we saw her, friends everywhere we go. Thinking about waving at friends when you see them driving, sort of a Vonnegut thing “I have community here! I am not alone in this world! I am so glad to see you!”

Learning how to plant trees with a sharpshooter shovel, she called her buckshot dirt papered, it was so absolutely buckshot. Watered in, flagged, something like twenty one trees, the fig I bought last spring, babied all year, thinking of the future day of honeyed sun-warmed sweet figs, walking up the little hill, it seemed like the infinity met me, in twenty years, the blue shade and a different landscape, a cathedral of trees if we’re lucky, in an already lucky land.

The green onions she gave us last winter came back,

Sitting at the table talking about horseradish,

I believe I am happy just because the basil dug from the summer garden survived through the winter. Tilling is next, planting is next, the rustling like a little wild animal waiting for the new season.

Walking in the woods, what a blessing on it’s own, especially these, he had the chance to take them out of cropland production and turn it back into the woods, he did. And just like magic, plus so many decades, woods! Walking up to the pine trees that the borers did not kill, their smell brings me in, and the sky is so blue. They are mostly strangely shaped, from the wind, from the earth, but they’re green and clear, breath in.

He calls them future-relics, all of the still life objects he won’t ever paint. The dragonfly vase that appeared unbroken, when I lifted it off of the shelf to save it, it fell apart. Future relic, at the feet of the trees, at the feet of my favorite pine, live on. An opalescent tea cup with irises on it, a golden statue, a moonshine jug,

The beavers are working all along the bayou, the deer cross on the thickest muddy part, the birds are astonishing in the trees, a bouquet of birds, in the morning to let the dogs out, I always think upon hearing them - this is worth waking up for, worth waking up early for.

Walking the dogs out in the woods thinking it’s my own, but afraid to chase the deer and rabbits and birds off, it’s theirs,

Geese infrequently, still traveling north, I sometimes miss the close buzzing of the geese at the farm, landing in their pond.

One afternoon with the dogs, thinking, go hunt the pond, go hunt the pond. And it seemed strange and out of the blue, the dogs running the little levee between the pond and the bayou, and suddenly a little creature swimming strongly in the water. Not a beaver, but a nutria or muskrat, sitting on the porch watching it work - the pond is not ours but his, his home up under the banks and alongside the reeds, alongside the swamp lilies we dug up last spring,

Out into the distant woods, past the cemeteries, twenty seven deer, down into the ditch and the mud and my boot sticks sinkingly (so many times this month I have stopped to take a photo and the herculean strength to pull my boot out of the deep hard sucking mud,) back up out of the ditch laughing, old home places, forgotten bulbs growing, blooming for the wildlife, for the pollinators, for the sun, the rain. Trying to track, vaguely, all of these lovingly planted forgotten, to witness alongside the wildlife, pollinators, sun, rain. A possum playing dead in the setting light, bright and silver, hissing as I move my phone a little too close -

Earlier, a raccoon in the woods then the pond, Wilbur chasing wildly, fearlessly, even into the water and up to the point of confrontation. When he’s against something, he’s all the way against it, his every sensation focused in, hollering at him won’t help. Out into the little pond, clear water for once, the one they flooded for duck season, cold - and it seemed walking into the clearwater was as good to solve the problem as tangling in the brambles, Wilbur! Sandii! Come on! Get! Come on! Chased out into the water and the raccoon still placid, waiting - a nature born thing it seems, playing dead or believing invisibility, wait, wait, wait, this too shall pass, deer outside of hunting season, be careful, move right,

Surprised in these creatures, with the looming spring and summer of cottonmouths, the stories of raccoons tearing up dogs, but they are all peaceful - can they tell their lives are not in real danger with two goofy dogs and their photographer?

Out into the Big woods, some say the enslaved people named it for their home, some say the wife was from Dahomey, and was homesick, and he named it for her, the stories change delicately and seriously, this hidden giant tract of land,

The trail was underwater, but that was fine - the winter showed me the value of dressing warmly, prepared - rainboots - and me and the dogs splashed down the trail. At the end of the trail the dogs ran into the woods barking, alive - and two piglets and three hogs ran off into the woods - he had come to supper talking about he shot a deer in bowhunting season, when he got to his deer it was half eaten by a big black boarhog - it ran towards him but changed it’s mind and ran off, he was lucky because all he had was arrows and that wouldn’t fend off a hog,

Armed with the exaggerated stories of a southerner, I knew my dogs were definitely - definitively - done for. I grabbed up a big old stick and began hollering, like you are supposed to do with bear. And hollered and told them to go, the two piglets disappeared into the camouflage of leaves and forgotten by the dogs - their parents gone west but my dogs came back to me,

Only shortly off of the end of the trail, the sunken trail, it seemed too obvious to lose it, ever. Running, stick in hand, shouting, knowing what I might soon see,

Walking back, lost. All of the woods in winter look the same, the sunken trail obscured, the place where there was a stream, well I’ll find it, I should have, I should have, I should have, make the dogs like a horse will just pull me back home, lost,

My phone at 30% and that was also it’s own blessing, sometimes out walking with 11%, following my photos down, the trailhead had two names, but made it -

Is it human error born in the bones? Is it modern human error, distracted - not like the geese or the horses or dogs, always now and always knowing, safety, practicality, how to get home.

Grateful for the peace-makers, the natural world, it’s natural to them, I guess.

The boars, the raccoons, the possums, the snakes, they live and let live - unless you do something to them first, almost always. It’s 4:37 and it’s February 28th, and we have another hour and a half before the sun really sets, and there is this oak tree, man, it catches the sunset and sets fire to itself every evening right now,

Lovingly, peacefully, now,

After the walk, I remembered - the woods all open for such a short time between deer season and poison ivy’s return, it seems so long and stretching, but this evening - almost up,

He came out to blow up the beaver dam and that was a month ago, but I forgot, didn’t take account, he said, yes she’s ninety two and she keeps her garden, I brought a trailer load of gin trash back to her house, and went to rest, I’d unload it for her how she wanted later. Later, she had moved it all, bucketful by bucketful, to her garden. She did as much as she could carry, to her limit. And I didn’t realize at that morning hour, a cold and windy day filled with friends and stories and good food, that it’s a pretty good note to take along in life, do as much as you are capable of - no more where it’s hurting you and the work suffers, and especially no less. Like the right amount of clothes when you’re out walking in the winter, or mud boots when you’re faced with rain and deep water. There’s a value to your limit - and a value to working within it.

I had the joy creating this poster for Piney River Brewing Company! They sent us some delicious beer to try, too! They make a Missouri Mule IPA which you know I loved. It was especially wonderful because Joleen wrote this really wonderful post about all things mule and their work - I’m so touched!

https://pineyriverbrewing.com/the-mule-jumped-over-the-moon/

Thank y’all for a wonderful run of a show at Lowe Mill! Every time i get to show there, i make a show a little closer to how i always dreamed to in their beautiful space. Thank you for sharing that with me, for taking the time to visit and see and share the work. Really loved getting to have king cake with everyone, too. Thank you.

Up next! Bozarts Gallery in Water Valley, Mississippi! This show runs April 5th - May 31st, with the opening reception on Saturday, April 5th from 6 to 9 pm. I hope we get to see you there, it’s gonna be colorful and fun!

Also i’m so happy to have work in Paper Fools 2025 at the Gail Keenan Art Center - celebrating Alice in Wonderland - and the opening reception is March 28th from 5- 7 pm, with a closing reception in May. https://coastepiscopalschool.org/mc/event/8533/

Unfortunately, we had to cancel our residency opportunity in North Carolina at Elf School of the Arts. I hope if you’re a person that has the flexibility to do residencies that you’ll check it out. It looks spectacular and i’m sorry to miss the chance to experience this part of the state.

https://www.elfschoolofthearts.org/

Many, many, thanks to everyone who checked out the gallery release with Revelry Fine Arts in Nashville! There are a few pieces available online here: https://revelryfinearts.com/artist/church-goin-mule

There are three pieces available at The Little Green Store in Huntsville, too!

https://thelittlegreenstore.net/collections/vendors?q=Church%20Goin%20Mule

ok i’m sharing because this photo of Bill cracks me UP - he’s the proprietor of the legendary Shack Up Inn in Clarksdale, Mississippi, where i have blues postcards for sale. If you’re ever passing by on the 61, stop in!

Some would call it escapism, it’s fine, but i have this idea that involving your imagination makes you think differently - of course - and that helps solve problems. so i have three sugar sweet songs for you - one is Perry Como crooning “every day for breakfast, there's a dish of scrambled stars,” and the second is Randy Newman, and the third is some bugs, i guess the last two were written for the movie James and the Giant Peach, which is a good little strange dream to another world and there is this scene with bugs singing about love and good news. “love is the strangest thing, love does exactly what it wants to do,”