16x20 confetti angel glitter party. Seafoam green Beachwood frame. Ready to hang.

During the pandemic, a yoga studio owner, Stephanie,  at our home yoga studio on Coronado worked tirelessly through all of the stress and unknown to keep her business alive.  It was the stress of the virus, the stress of the bills, the stress of high maintenance students taking their stress out on her. So far, her studio has persevered. There was a point where I started calling her Stephanie St. Angel. Shortly after that, I made up the Angel St. Angel family. 

It's silly and a little blind how we think that angels are some far-off entity with wings and glitter that we can't see. In 2010 I almost relapsed. It was 9/11. I was too depressed to get off the couch so I watched the plane into the trade center footage for 9 hours straight. I decided that day that I was going to go back to using and all that came along with it, because what was the point, being this miserable? I was in Las Vegas. The meetings were weird and the people scared me. I made a phone call to tell my mentor about how I was feeling. She asked me to please just go to one more meeting, that day. So I did. 

When I got there that meeting was in a kids' kindergarten classroom. It was one of those beautifully put-together classrooms. With all of the planets hanging from the ceiling, dinosaurs on the walls. There were blocks and the alphabet in every color.  I never met that teacher. I never went to her class, or even know if she is her. But whoever made that classroom that way saved my life that day. I felt safe there, sitting in a tiny chair. Safe enough to go back. Safe enough to talk to some people a few weeks later, and build a foundation for my recovery in the desert.  That teacher is one of the most important angels in my life. Another one I've never seen, she's only been in a different room from me my whole existence. One of my largest paintings, The Angel - lives with my dear friend Melanie, who I met in that classroom. 

This painting is just like that child-like safety of color and grace. I don't say a whole lot of prayers except one, every day. It is "Thank you for my willingness to align." I can fall into an unwillingness to see all of the angels, the beauty, the salvation around me every minute.

I can take the angels that I can see for granted, and always wonder why I can't the angels. My level of alignment is my choice and it is perpetuated by sight and gratitude for that sight.

This painting is a prism and a rainbow. The hope, the surrender, the freedom.