Today this starts...

Search ‘gum flower’ on my photo reel, and pages and pages of reds, pinks and yellows fly by with each swipe. I really don’t know what draws me to them – you know what they say about what the heart wants. I know the trees that flower in our neighbourhood, I spot them on my walks and doing errands or ubering the kid (only one left without a license!).

Case in point, a few days ago on a trip to a soccer match we drove past a beautiful tree with pale lemon-yellow gum flowers blooming between the dark green leaves. At the time, said teenager was in too much of a hurry to indulge my whim to pull over and grab a few shots. Now I feel like Pooh with his honey pots … those blooms just keep calling me back!

But I can’t quite justify driving back to an outer suburban street for a photo of gum flowers, or can I? Anyway, to cut a long story short…gum flowers featured in one of my first paintings I felt at ease with, both in the process and the finished product.

There seems to have been a long period of time (interspersed periodically with short-lived creative endeavours) between doing art as a subject in high school, winning second prize in the school exhibition, thinking that it maybe something I could perhaps pursue (why not, great uncle George was an artist!), suffering a traumatic event ( yes #MeToo), dropping out of school at 16 and dropping myself into a place where feeling worthless felt natural and drugs and alcohol went hand in hand with the environment and experience. To rediscover my love of art during COVID, when we were ever so lucky to have windows where I could stand and stare at gum trees.