Nighttime at the Loveless Cafe, 8x6 Oil on Canvas Board

I feel very good about finally getting something out of the evening I spent at the Loveless Cafe, trying to get a table. It just wasn't going to happen, as we realized when a busload of people was unloaded and paraded in before us. We gave up for the night and had breakfast there the next morning. We can't leave Nashville without our Loveless Cafe ritual. The place has been there since the 50s, and is attached to a funky old motel that now has shops in its rooms. The Loveless is known for its biscuits and jams. Yum.

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Bourbon Street, 11x14 Oil on Canvas Board

After Nashville, we drove down the Natchez Trace Parkway, and what a glorious road that is. Little traffic, gorgeous scenery, and historic sites along the way. Meriwether Lewis died on the Trace (there is controversy about murder or suicide), and he is buried there. There was a cypress swamp that I will paint someday. We stopped in Tupelo, saw the birthplace of Elvis (two rooms, no bathroom or electricity), and   then we went on to New Orleans.
What a place. Where else can you ride in a streetcar and a man with a silver face and a Confederate uniform gets on? Then you see a large, pot-bellied man wearing a cowboy hat, a bra, and shorts. The music being played on the street was amazing, and the beignets were my particular guilty pleasure.

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Nashville Cats, 8x6

After the Pieces of 8 art retreat in the Smokies, my husband picked me up and we drove across Tennessee to Nashville, where we visited with my granddaughter who is attending Vanderbilt, my niece and her family, and my songwriter friend Bobby Braddock and his family. Bobby wrote the country hits "He Stopped Loving Her Today, Time Marches On, and more recently, "People Are Crazy," as well as many others.

On the way to Nashville we stopped to see friends who told this story: their daughter was teaching a Sunday School class of little tots and she asked if anyone wanted to lead the prayer. A little boy volunteered. He bowed his head and reverently prayed: "God is great, beer is good, people are crazy."

I enjoyed sharing that with the writer of the song. 

This painting is of Broadway in Nashville, with historic Tootsie's Orchid Lounge prominently featured. You have to love a city where guys walk around with guitars and music is everywhere. This one didn't qualify as a "daily painting," it was too complicated and took two days to complete.

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