The Porch

I went to Maine to paint. The house had other ideas.

It started simply enough. A few clapboards had come loose on the porch and I thought, I’ll just nail them back up. Except when I went to nail them, there was nothing to nail them to. The wood behind them had rotted and carpenter ants had done some damage too. So I pulled a little more off to find good wood, and then a little more, and then more after that. The rot kept going. I kept digging. By the time I understood what I was dealing with, I had removed a significant portion of the exterior wall and was staring at a rebuild I had neither the tools nor the second set of hands to finish.

A contractor pulled up in his truck while I was standing there in the wreckage of my own ambition. He got out, looked at the situation, handed me his card, and said to call if I needed help. It turned out his son is married to the daughter of one of my college professors. The Pennsylvania - Maine connection is strong.

I called him the next day.

The rest of the week had a shape I did not expect. Each evening before he left, he would give me a list: have this done before I get there at 8:30. So I was up at 5am every morning, trying to get ahead of the day. He’d arrive, assess, and we’d go. Him, his assistant, and me — rebuilding the wall, installing a new door, getting the exterior tied back. When he left around 4 in the afternoon, I kept going, using the tools he’d left behind. My hands were a disaster by the end of the week. Cuts and blisters. I dropped wood on myself with some regularity. I want an impact driver now.

I opened a can of worms and got in over my head.

I left Thursday at 2pm, and got back to Philadelphia at 1am Friday to be prepped and on time for a Winsor & Newton job Saturday morning. I am writing this at 3am Sunday.

I did not paint as much as I wanted to in Maine. I did not hike as much as I wanted to. I did not do a lot of things I wanted to do because the house needed me and I said yes, and then kept saying yes until there was no time left for anything else.

This is the thing about working for yourself: there is no one to protect your time. Life will always have a competing agenda, and the results of art-making are so slow — weeks, months, sometimes years before you can see what you’ve built, that it is very easy to let the other urgent things win. The porch is urgent. The painting feels like it is not.

The contractor, at the end of the week, offered me a job. He said I had common sense, I just didn’t have the right tools yet. I said the bar must be pretty low. He said: “around here, all you need to do is show up on time and not be an alcoholic.”

A friend once told me I was chaos. I was sort of offended as I think of myself as steady and reliable. Standing in the partial wreckage of a porch and exterior wall I had voluntarily dismantled, I think he was right. However, in my defense, the Greek god of chaos is also the god of artistic inspiration. Maybe I have been thinking about this wrong. Show up on time, bring the chaos, make something out of it.

Take An Art Class With Me This Summer.

Wallingford Community Arts Center

These two classes can be taken independently or in sequence.

Light First: Intro to Oils in Black & White Are you overwhelmed by color and not sure where to start? Light First begins with the one thing that makes every great painting work — light and shadow. In this four-week class you’ll build a real foundation in oil painting by working exclusively in black and white, painting from still life arrangements in the studio. You’ll learn to mix consistent tones, see light and shadow as shapes, control your edges, and organize a painting before color ever enters the picture. Calm, structured, and beginner-friendly. No experience necessary. Mondays, June 22–July 13 | 6–9 PM Register here

Color and Light: Building Your Painting Color doesn’t have to be overwhelming. This four-week class is built around color temperature and a limited palette. Working from still life in the studio, you’ll learn how warm and cool relationships create the illusion of light, how to mix clean, consistent color, and how to build a painting with a limited set of pigments. Practical, hands-on, step-by-step from day one. Mondays, July 20–August 10 | 6–9 PM Register here

Main Line Art Center

Watercolor: No Experience Necessary! If you’ve ever wanted to try watercolor, walked into an art supply store, felt completely overwhelmed, and walked back out — this class is for you. This seven-week course is designed for anyone who wants to learn watercolor and doesn’t know where to begin. We’ll start with the basics, how the paint actually works, and build from there through simple, guided exercises. Each week adds a new skill, so by the end you’ll have a real foundation and the confidence to keep going on your own. Tuesdays, June 30–August 11 | 6–9 PM Register here.

Gouache: The Medium You Didn’t Know You Needed! Beloved by illustrators, designers, and painters who know its secret — and overlooked by everyone else. Gouache has the ease of watercolor but dries to a rich, velvety matte finish, layers opaquely, and behaves like oil, acrylic, or watercolor all in one. Once you try it, you’ll wonder why it took you so long. In this class we’ll explore layering, blending, and color mixing, and learn to build images from simple shapes — working both light to dark and dark to light. Whether your interests lean toward fine art, illustration, or just a paint you can take anywhere, gouache may be exactly the medium you didn’t know you were looking for. Thursdays, July 2–August 13 | 6–9 PM Register here.

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