Lately, I've been doing a lot of self-examination, thinking about the hairpin turns suddenly thrown in our direction, thinking about how life's events can be simultaneously positive and negative and looking for a lesson in it all.

When I get like this, which is too often to admit, I turn to things that are familiar to me, our animals, good music and books and the art that has become a part of our family, typically passed down from other members of our family.

I'll start with something simple but magical to me.  This is Stormy, a Chesapeake Bay Retriever.  My father showed him at Westminster as a Junior Handler and won first prize.  An unknown artist known only as Terry sketched Stormy for my father and his work has hung first in my grandmother's house, then my parents', and now ours.  It serves as a reminder of my dad and our shared love of animals.

 This is the first piece of original art I ever purchased, entitled "Treehouses" by now-famous/then-unknown artist Michael Atkinson.  At the nubile age of 16, I paid $400 of my savings for it at the Houston State Fair.  It's been through my wild times and needs restoration but it represents a maturation point for me and I love it.

This is an Atkinson as well, albeit painted many years later.  My parents and I had met Michael for the first time at that state fair when he was the typical starving artist and we kept in touch.  Although out of my price league, my parents were able to collect many of his pieces and last year my mother gifted us with this one, suitably entitled Sheepherders (if you look closely, they are at the base of the low blue mesa).  This is my favorite art piece, only surpassed by my father's high school stamp map, which is neither painted nor high art but means the world to me.

 My photography is not what I'd like (I need Barry lessons) but this is another of my favorites.  I can feel the woman's sadness through the frame, the decimation to her people, and the hope of peace represented by the dove on her head.  Someday, this will go to the teenagress and I will miss it greatly but a deal's a deal.

My other native American favorite, a lone Indian in the snow, so stark, so lovely, so alone, but peaceful all the same.  I have to admit I begged my mother for this one and each time she visits she quips, "I don't know why I let you talk me into giving you that painting."

Incongruous compared to the rest, my parents bought this in the Phillipines.  Its detail is amazing, from the truck tires to the canvas and bed sheets that cover the women selling and making their wares.  This was a housewarming gift from my mom and I appreciate it to this day.

Finally, to what few roots I have in rural North Carolina and a way of coming full circle from Daddy's Stormy, an unknown artist, a watercolor purchased at an open air market.  When I was growing up, tobacco shacks dotted the landscape.  I don't know if they still do but here's one last one just in case they're gone.  I hope you've enjoyed a bit of Pretend Farmer's Art History.  It gives peace to my troubled soul.