I said this was easy but it is not.

I said that when I was on painting 10 out of 100.

Once a boat captain said to me: after 10 dives you think you know everything. Then you realize that maybe you don't and you start to be a lot more careful. Then around 100 dives you think, well, ok, I am actually getting pretty good at this. And then - after many many dives - you start to realize you barely know anything at all.

It's all the same: diving, life, painting. I anticipate ease to trick myself so some work can begin, but this week was busy. On Sunday I was three behind and felt the lack-of-painting anxiety and I remembered what I wrote: sometimes the painting makes the anxiety go away and I went with that. I didn't feel it. I just remembered writing it and vaguely remembered it being true for me at some point and I didn't have much time and I had to paint three and so I started. And an old one that looked terrible caught my attention and I added a layer and started a different one in a different way and remembered that I have lots of ideas and the paint moved and pieces grew and I was right: it does make the anxiety go away. Sometimes. But it is definitely not easy.