It’s 11:28 at night, and I’ve been dicking around for over two hours–fixing my parents screen door, running the virus scanner on my laptop, scrolling through Facebook ad nauseam–doing anything I can to avoid writing. I just don’t feel like it. Stupid blog. Ugh–whose idea was this every-day writing nonsense?

Oh, that’s right–it was mine.

This afternoon I did some handyman things for some friends and got absolutely eaten up by mosquitoes in the process because I refused to use the bug spray I keep in my car. I can be so stubborn sometimes. But I was in relatively nice clothes and just didn’t want to smell like Deet for the rest of the day. Honestly, what’s a girl to do when presented with two unpleasant options?

To itch or to stink, that is the question. Obviously, my answer today was to itch, although I’ve chosen to stink plenty of other times in the past.

I can’t believe I’m talking about mosquitoes.

Move on, Marcus.

This evening I went downtown in Fort Smith to check out The Unexpected. The Unexpected is a mural-painting project that happens annually here, and–I think–is one of the coolest things this city has ever done ever. The project goes through this Sunday, October 28. Anyway, every year the organizers put out a new map that lists all the artists and where their respective murals are or will be located, so tonight after parking my car at a local coffee shop and with my map in hand, I hit the streets (oh-la-la) to look for the latest artwork. Oh my gosh, y’all, what a cool thing, to walk up on an old building you’ve driven past hundreds of times and see it being brought back to life. Even at 8:00 this evening, there were a number of artists out working on their projects.

Here’s a picture of one of the murals in progress on Towson Avenue. The artist is Alexis Diaz.

This one is also on Towson Avenue and is by PREF. (A lot of muralists don’t go by their god-given names. Apparently it’s a thing.) Personally, I’m really excited to see how this mural turns out. I assume it will say, “The very best is yet to come,” but since there are three blank spaces left and “to come” would only fill up two of them, who knows? It could be anything. That’s the great thing about a blank “canvas.” You can do with it what you want.

This one is on Garrison Avenue (the main drag in downtown) and is by Ana Maria. She did another mural in the same spot for the first Unexpected (in 2015), but obviously had to paint over it in order to create this new piece.

This one is on North A, one block off Garrison Avenue and is being painted by local high school students. How cool is that?

Although there are a few other new murals this year (by BUFFALO, ADD FUEL, and Cody Hudson), I didn’t take pictures of them tonight. I did, however, take this picture, which is one of the murals done for the first Unexpected; it was painted by local university students. I took it because the guy in the mural looks like he’s pointing to the full moon. I love that.

Now it’s after midnight, and I’m ready to go to bed. I NEED to go to bed. Last night I didn’t fall asleep until after four, since blogging took forever and I still had to shower after that. Anyway, it feels as if I’m going through the motions here. Personally, I’m not particularly impressed with what’s landed on the page tonight, and now I don’t have anything “profound” to say. Whatever, this is the way art works. You show up. You do the thing. Sometimes it’s fabulous, sometimes it’s flopulous. (I just made that word up. As in a fabulous flop, Mom.)

Sometimes you want a re-do.
That’s okay.
You can paint over yesterday.
Tomorrow’s a blank canvas.
Tomorrow’s a blank page.
It holds endless possibilities.
The very best is yet _________.