Sometimes traveling to a new place leads to great transformation.

Four artists gathered Wednesday to plan a journey. Each of us  there knew at least ONE other person, but of the four, only Pat and I have travelled together, so it was really more about getting acquainted than planning.

In (exactly!) three weeks time, the four of us, Pat, Lori, Darleen, and I, will climb into a pair of overloaded Escapes and escape, caravan style, to North Carolina, where we hope to find warm weather, inspiration, knowledge, new skills, and lots of new artist friends.  This is, of course, Kanuga Season. 

Pat and I, having experienced this twice already and heading for our third repeat, are filled with one kind of excitement. We already know our way there and in many ways what we will find.  Pat especially knows what she will find, as she has signed up for Marilynn Derwenskus’ workshop there. Pat has already had – three? – workshops with Marilynn, and loves how she teaches (well, I guess that’s apparent).  I will have an adventure, I’m sure, in my class with M.E.(Mike) Bailey: the workshop is entitled  Watercolor Beyond the Obvious.  The materials list emphasizes NO SOURCE PHOTOS. And requires a 2 inch brush, plus a stick at least 3 feet long.   Adventure here I come!

Lori and Darleen, new to Kanuga AND to each other, are of course full of a different excitement, tinged with anticipation of the unknown.  Lori is signed up for Marilynn’s class along with Pat, and Darleen is signed up for Lana Grow’s.  Needless to say, all four of us are extremely “geeked”. 

And it only made it so much better when our lunch at a Chinese restaurant concluded with fortune cookies.  Lori’s was  “Don't be afraid to take that big step”. And mine was, you may have guessed, the title of this post:  “Sometimes traveling to a new place leads to great transformation”. We can hope!