Dear Reader:

It never ceases to amaze me how one quote can send me merrily off into the land of memory stories…my own memories…my own stories.

Yesterday started out so beautifully….with rain! Wonderful, cooling, luscious rain! It was unexpected which made it even better. I wasn’t going to have to fight the flying insect world first thing in the morning while watering the garden. I rolled back over with the sound of distant thunder booming in the background. When I woke up again it was almost nine o-clock and I felt so refreshed!

I dressed and ran lots of errands, ate a delicious vegetable lunch, and finally came home to plop in my favorite lounge chair. That is all I remember until I heard the theme song from ‘A Chef’s Life’ coming on at 4:00 on PBS. I couldn’t believe I had slept for two more hours…but once again I felt so relaxed and refreshed with more gray clouds lingering and distant sounds of thunder rolling.

I could tell, immediately, this was an older episode because Ben and Vivian Knight’s twins were still toddlers and they still hadn’t gotten into their house yet. They had rebuilt their restaurant from the fire but the stress it had taken was still palpable between them…

But then the cameras switched to Ben’s art studio and this rather, stoic, sometimes stern-acting restaurant owner, husband and father revealed a softer, gentler side of him. I had just turned up the volume when I heard Ben say…(about his abstract works of art)…“the more I feel my strokes against the palette…the more comfortable I become in my own skin.”  

This was a rarely seen side of Ben Knight…soft-spoken, content, and “comfortable in his own skin.” I enjoyed watching this side of the power couple restaurant owners. He confessed his disappointment that the restaurant  fire (among other things) had cost him his week off to exhibit in an art show. It was frustrating not to have time to do what he truly loved…to be able to balance both parts of his life.

• This following article gave more insight into Ben’s other life.

“The couple’s restaurant, Chef and The Farmer, put little Kinston, NC (the closest “city” to Deep Run) on the national culinary map, but it wasn’t easy.

“This is an especially labor-intensive business,” Ben said. “And we were trying it in a community that had little resources to support this. For the first couple of years, I was fairly resentful.”

Success, it seems, is a double-edged sword.

Knight had even less free time when the couple became the stars (Knight, somewhat reluctantly) of their own award-winning PBS series, “A Chef’s Life” which gives viewers a transparent look into their lives.

Now that the restaurant is a veritable institution and the couple’s twins, Theo and Florence, are a little older, Knight finally has the free time to paint more.

“I’ve found a better sense of balance,” he said, adding that he’s “very fortunate” to be able to express himself creatively on two fronts – in his art and at the restaurant.

The hectic pace of running a famous restaurant has infiltrated his art – in an unexpected way.

“Our large employee base requires patience,” he said. “I’ve had to learn (that skill), and I think my newer palette reflects patience. The work was much more chaotic before. It’s softer now.”

So, the busier Chef & The Farmer gets, the calmer Knight has to become.”  ( Source: Ben Knight, Contemporary Art; Page Leggett)

I am most comfortable “in my own skin” these days while writing this blog. Like Ben Knight, I never had the time to spend on my creative passion… writing on the level I have now… when the children were small. No doubt there was a lot of pent-up frustration at times over this. All of us have to fight hard and pray the time comes when our creative side is given our full permission to bloom.

I am living out my dreams now….a garden, a blog, creative friends, supportive family…I am blessed beyond measure.

So until tomorrow…As creative children of God…let us remember to live in gratitude for the creativity we have been given. John Milton summed it up quite well when he described the life of grateful, creative people:

 “Gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us to encounter everyday epiphanies, those transcendent moments of awe that change forever how we experience life and the world.”

 *I love this cartoon (Winnie the Pooh) quote because I have come to realize that ‘over-thinking’ is a terrible human condition. It bogs us down mentally, emotionally and intellectually. When we are being creative…at our very best…we have to leave thinking behind and rely on feelings.,,a leap of faith.

“Today is my favorite day”  Winnie the Pooh

Can you believe it? Here comes July! I am scared to say anything like… it surely can’t get any hotter than June…because I don’t want to put any bad thoughts out into the universe (for it to happen)….and besides this IS the first day of the month….so say “Rabbit” and have a glorious one!

Since we had fun this past week with personal amazing days and not-so amazing days…Carol sent me this “amazingmovement” website.