A Weekend Fighting Budget

Leisurely Swim Past the Dinghy Blossoms 2024. Acrylic on cardboard, 16 x 16"

Went to the Everson Museum in Syracuse on Friday with my friend Mike. I knew this was going to cost me and cut deep into my accounting of Poor Ronnie’s Anti-ethnic Cleansing Almanac. Gas, entrance fee, a stop at the Art Store on Erie Blvd, a beer for lunch... We rode about town before it opened, stopping at Lombardis Italian Imports for sharp Romano cheese and Proscuitto ham (for Rose. I must abstain). I took a photo of the mural Mike and I painted above its entryway two years ago. They paid us in charcuterie.

We stopped at the Art Store and I picked up much needed supplies. Always lacking in titanium white and stretcher bars. Dangerous to have a bank card in my pocket. These purchases were going to put me over budget.
Oh well. Onward Artist soldiers!

Then we drove to the other side of town to take a picture of the house my Great Grandfather built it in 1916. Aged well, I think.

My main objective at the Everson was to see their one and only Philip Guston. Always instructive to view a famous modern painter’s work up close. I love the paintings Guston made in the last decade of his life. That’s when he was his freest. It gives me hope to see with my own eyes how painting can keep going, right up until your last days. I was able to get under the unframed painting. He didn’t stretch canvases well—about 100 more staples than necessary. Otherwise, rough, loose and free, like a child. Wonderful!
When I die maybe the Everson will purchase a Throop, so Guston and me can talk shop in the storage room.

Philip Guston: I forgot the title. 1978. Oil on canvas

Then off for a beer and god forbid, a side order of beans!

On Saturday Rose and I drove to Rochester to visit our daughter and table my art at a coffee shop. I was hoping for under-the-table sales to offset Friday’s spending spree. I sold 2 paintings for a total of $40. My share of the car ride was $20, and vending entrance fee was $15. So for a day’s work I made $5 to subtract from the previous day’s hedonism.

Yet I figured the expenses for the week, and came up nearly $10 under budget.

Hooray!

Total: $290.33

Big news. Necessary art supplies brings fuel to continue. A weekend full of memorable experiences, and still able to keep my eyes on the prize. That is, complete divestment from a government committing genocide.
Ceasefire now and justice to the slain!

P.S. I want to recognize the community here at Ecency. Someone who is aware of my “poverty” project via the posts on this platform, sent me an unsolicited Hive tip, which was the exact amount that kept me under the poverty threshold. Honored and humbled. Thank you!