a thank you to all my readers

it was nice to see recent visits to thelostkerryman from a wide variety of places…like Oman, Sweden, Ukraine, Mongolia, Belarus, Finland, and Norway. it is amazing that in some way, my writing can touch someone so far away…

but i want to take the time to thank all of my readers, those who have been faithful, and those who are new to thelostkerryman. i am not the star here on wordpress, but i have the heart of a writer. it does make me happy to pour out a new piece, no matter how sober, silly, or unique it may be. as you may have learned, i am a serious/giddy writer with eccentric tastes- for some of you they are- but really simply a loving heart beneath it all.

wordpress is indeed a godsend; i am grateful that those who manage the system have been able to do a fine job- most of the time- despite an explosion in blogging, and an unusual clientele.

may all the blessings of God be with you…

Slan go foill- so long for now

“The 200,” or “Your favorite posts from thelostkerryman”

This is my 200th blog post on the lostkerryman. It is certainly not my last, and I suspect that you and I will have much to say to each other over the course of the next few years. Without you, my audience, I am the sound of one step creaking in an empty house- one chickadee flying alone in a windstorm- one spark plug discarded along the road side.

Perhaps it is time for a little reflection. I was musing over my top twelve favorite posts, and quite frankly, as an author, I am entirely too biased- they’re all great (after all, I deleted the idiotic ones). That is why I am inviting every reader to travel back in time as you have read my posts and nominate your favorites. I will consider reposting the most requested one or two. Please participate. I look forward to your insightful comments…

Anybody actually reading this?

Meeting my favorite artist

I didn’t have it on my “bucket list.” I had no idea he would be there. But when I walked into the art gallery this evening, my favorite living artist stood near my favorite painting in the whole wide world. What are the chances of that?

He wanted to talk baseball, I wanted to talk artistic process.

“Who are the Pirates playing? Are they playing tonight? What happened to them last night?”

And splattered out in all their glory, the most amazing paintings in the world stood before me. I longed to touch the mudding-like texture, the thick glaze of rhododendron and laurel leaf, layered pink petals smashed onto the canvas, the passion of the thin and the thick, the trowel-icing slashes.

Then he told me his story- how he experimented with the trowel and opened a door to a career as an innovative contemporary painter. His journey reminded me of the point when, after four years of not writing any fiction, I discovered my own particular experimental fiction style. But he is a professional making a living from it, while I  struggle to pay the bills, with most pay from “my other skills.”

Perhaps one day, this kindred spirit and I shall both look back and see where each discovery took us. For now, I will enjoy his paintings, and pray someday my own experimental works will see publication and an audience will be touched by the passion of that word imagery.

I am blessed to have been in the presence of greatness, and to remember that the spark within my own works of poetic fiction may touch the heart of someone someday. For as the faithful, we are all called. What gift we are given comes from God. I cannot, I will not, withhold the words or images of that gift any more.

Go to http://www.coopergallery.com/LynnBoggess/LynnBoggessPage.asp for more information, including some photos of the paintings at Cooper Gallery.