A gift to me

I was happily home alone on a steamy July morning sitting in front of the fan, when the doorbell unexpectedly rang. I answered the door to John Daniels, who was kind enough to deliver my newly framed paintings on my birthday.

A week earlier, I gave John five paintings to be framed. I asked him to use his years of experience and sense of design to pre-select a few frames and matts for each painting. I would make a final choice after we looked at the different options. This was my first experience talking to a master framer about framing paintings.

My late mother painted furiously in her last 20 years. If she agreed with my father that a painting was good (and he thought they were all great), he would measure and cut the matt, glass and ½ inch moulding, paint the moulding and frame her paintings.  Without his frames, her canvases would lie stacked around their home rather than on the walls.

The day my favorite painting fell off my hallway wall and crashed to the floor, I said to myself, “it’s time to reframe a few of her paintings.” 

I brought John two canvases I had rescued from under my mother's bed, before I sold their house, and three others my father had framed.

John took off the wrapping paper from each painting. One at a time he set each on the side table and leaned them against the wall for my approval. I stood a few feet back.

Great emotion bubbled up as I looked upon my mother's work with new eyes. “These are masterpieces, real works of art," I said to John.

“I believe my mother would be secretly delighted to know I had these professionally framed. At least I hope so," I said.  "On the other hand, she might be reprimanding me for spending so much money when they were good enough with my father's frames."

I felt the twins of joy and sorrow beat at my heart:

• for all her paintings that hadn’t had the benefit of such beautiful frames;
• for my father's championing of my mother's paintings and the love and care he put into framing;
• for replacing my father's frames;
• for finally framing these paintings; and
• for having received them on my birthday.

Keep you posted,

Coach Minda