Turns out the last blog entry - Serendipitous Detours - was only part one of this theme. Who knew? No me. Until I was in the basement this morning, carrying buckets of rocks back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. Let me explain.

BP (Before Pandemic), Fran and I were gym rats. Serious gym rats. When the gym was open, we were there. When it was closed, we used our handy dandy key card to access a small section of the gym that was open 24-hours a day. See? Major hardcore gym rats.

So Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday (break to rest my fingers... whew, all that typing!), Thursday, Friday, and, yes, you guessed it, Saturday, we would hop up before the sun and head for the gym at either Peterson Air Force Base or Fort Carson. There we would lift heavy things until it was time to stop lifting heavy things, get cleaned up, and either go to work, go back home, go to church… whatever.

Obviously, a few things have changed.

AP (After Pandemic), the gym is closed. For that matter, work is closed. Working remote went to looking for a job remote and, thankfully, doing interviews remote. (More on that later with, hopefully, a good news report.) Goodbye routine. Goodbye gym. Goodbye muscles and fitness.

But being gym rats, we didn’t throw in the towel so easily. Though we lack equipment here at home, we decided to get creative. That translated into lots of body weight exercises supplemented with the dumbbells my dad found in his barn, elastic bands we discovered in the furnace room, saw horses, broom handles, and Pace salsa containers filled with water. Yeah, it’s prison-style.

One of our clever little innovations was to gather bricks and rocks from our sideyard and toss them into Lowe’s buckets. These are now being utilized to build the old trapezius muscles via shrugs and farmer’s carries. If you aren’t familiar with farmer’s carries, they are exactly what they sound like: carrying stuff around like a farmer does, except without the benefit of a farm.

I’ll admit it sounds a little silly. And if you saw me pacing back and forth in the basement with those buckets, you might think I had gone stir-crazy. Let’s just say that’s a given.

This morning, however, while farmering with my handy buckets, I noticed something. We have a bunch of art down there, hung on the walls, stacked in the corners, piled on a table. (When Fran is being kind, she refers to my storage style as “indiscriminate stuffing.”)

Anyway... this morning I saw one of my newest pieces. It’s a watercolor/acrylic on watercolor paper of the view from Green Mountain Falls, painted from a photo we took while hiking there last weekend. I was shooting for something James Hoyle-ish, missed completely (as usual), but came out the other side with something that I’m relatively happy with. I’m satisfied with the colors and shapes. And it has given me ideas for improvement on the next outing.

What struck me this morning about that painting, as I strained and staggered with my buckets, was that I never would have mixed watercolor and acrylic, and never would have done so on watercolor paper, if I hadn’t recently gotten laid off.

Enter serendipity.

Since I was working remote when things went sideways, my former employer shipped the contents of my cubicle to me. I had several books, a few decorative items, photos of Fran, our dogs, one of me and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson... Important stuff. But when the box arrived here, I discovered something else: a huge pad of watercolor paper. I remember it being in my cubicle when I was hired, wedged between the filing cabinet and the wall. It apparently belonged to the last schnook who occupied that workspace. The important thing is that it was gifted to me. (Insert smiley face here - it doesn’t take much to make me happy!)

I never would have mixed watercolor and acrylic, and never would have done so on watercolor paper, if I hadn’t recently gotten laid off.

So a couple of Saturdays ago, I borrowed Fran’s watercolors and started a painting, not really at all sure where it was going. After sketching it out and doing the basic shapes in watercolor - and getting that cool effect watercolor produces - I added acrylic highlights. It was a long process and as I said, not completely successful. But the end result is interesting and holds promise for future projects.

I still have several pages left in the pad of paper, so I’ll definitely be playing around with the watercolor/acrylic mix again.

Maybe that technique, medium and style won’t last. It might just be a fun transitory experiment. Or maybe not. Imagine if I really embrace that and it turns out to be my best work! Either way, it’s different and represents a detour I would not have considered or taken, without the layoff shove.

That’s my most recent serendipitous detour. But I’m about to be whooshed away on another. It will be more significant, more life-altering, involving a new job at a new organization with a new group of people. New to me, anyway. What that’s all about? Not sure yet. We’ll see.

What I’m learning through all the good and bad changes, all the unexpected events, and all of the associated uncertainty, is this: don’t be afraid to go with the detours. I’m also learning: Lowe’s makes some seriously strong buckets!