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Coast Live Oaks are full of character. This one has survived drought and fire. It stands on a mountaintop high above the blue Pacific. A young couple bought the property in the 1930's and raised their family there. That family is there still.

Leaving the coolness of the coast redwoods one follows a winding road up through a mixed forest of fir, pine, various oak and madrone. The land opens to the sky several miles up, with huge grassy expanses and glimpses of the ocean way below. I was invited to come there to paint an oak that was an important part of my friend's childhood.

While she was growing up on the coast, I was growing up in the Sierra. The particular scent of the woods; sounds, shifting visions in mist, sun, snowstorms; all are part of my reality as they are hers. So we have an affinity for trees. 

Successful work requires a connection, and there are varying degrees. If I were asked to paint a forest landscape, there would be an automatic relationship. If a forest landscape in California were specified, it would be deeper, and deeper still if the request were for a forest landscape in Yosemite.

There are other kinds of connections too. My Dad commissioned an artwork of Bakhita, a brave girl from the Sudan, who was stolen and sold into slavery as a child. She overcame tremendous adversity and became someone who deeply influenced everyone around her. The portrait of her, "In His Hands", was gifted to the order of Canossian Sisters of which Bakhita was a member. View "In His Hands" at moiradonohoe.com.  Her story inspired me, and my feeling for my father deepened that connection.

Everyone has intricate webs of connections that touch and overlap in myriad ways. It is stunning to contemplate the interwoven relationships just one aspect of my life, art, has brought me. What about you? What passion, pursuit or vocation have connected you?

While mulling over what I have done this week to give me insight on what to write about, inchoate thoughts broke surface but disappeared before I was able to grasp them. Raking leaves. What can I say about that? What about hiking, doing dishes, or worrying about my trees? Is there a pattern here? Do these seemingly unconnected activities and meanderings serve a purpose, or are they simply detritus that needs disposal like the live oak leaf piles that are a fire hazard.

I have been working on a commission for a wonderful couple who live in Texas. They are very generous and treat me with the utmost respect. We have exchanged emails this week and I kidded that I was going to write a humorous blog about clients and commissions. In truth, most commissions have been positive experiences. It really is an honor for someone to ask me to paint a special picture for them. They are saying they believe in me and my work and their support allows me to continue to pursue my passion. It is also a reminder of how important it is to do good work, follow through with commitments, and support others in any way that I can.

Gandhi said that “Interdependence is and ought to be as much the ideal of man as self-sufficiency. Man is a social being.” We need each other. It is in relationship that this comes into focus. Getting back to hiking, often it is more fun and uplifting to share an experience with simpatico friends than to go it alone. If I don’t know that flower, my sister does. If I can’t remember the identifying features of a particular tree species, my brother-in-law can. This coming week I camp in the high country to hike and be with friends whose children and mine are friends. Now young adults, they are pursuing new adventures just as we are creating new ones. It is these interconnecting circles and experiences that give life such poignancy and joy. I just learned that one friend can’t make the camping trip because her son was in an accident and he needs her help. Difficult as that is, everyone will do their best to help, in whatever capacity is possible for them.

Last night I had a phone conversation with my sister. I was very sad about the ponderosa pines that are expiring from drought and pine beetle on our property and California in general. Although she did not solve the drought or beetle problem, just talking to her made me feel a lot better.

I think that the things of the everyday are not detritus. They are a framework that allows the workings of a human soul to go about its' business under the surface, and much is done in relationship, like the play groups we had while our children grew up together.

 “Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much” Helen Keller