Plein Air: Laundry in the Sun

I love sunshine, It might be the invisible hand which had pushed me from Pennsylvania, through Kentucky, South Carolina, and Georgia, all the way down to settle in Florida. Eventually I retired here as a Floridian resident. Consciously I knew I had been obsessed with sunshine all my life. It is probably because I was born and grew up in the concrete forest of Shanghai. Remember when I was a child, my mother was so thrilled if sunlight found its way through the cracks between buildings and finally showed up in our rooms. To this day,  the sensation still stays in my memory how the sun impacted me as a child when my parents took me in spring to my beautiful ancestral hometown Hangzhou which is a scenic tourist hot spot. Since then, I became a one-in-a-million square peg in a round hole in Shanghai because most majority of people in Shanghai were so proud of the city.

When movie star Joan Chen, who starred Tai Pan and The Last Emperor, was asked what she missed most in China, once on a TV interview, to most people's surprise, her response was "the smell of sunshine from the quilt after being aired outside in the sun." It might not be my greatest craving about China, but I fully understood what she meant. I miss the smell, too, now that our laundry date doesn't have to rely on the weather any more in this country. Besides, I am a conservationist and believe everyone should do what he/she can to preserve the environment, reduce the global warming, and save energy. About two years ago, I finally decided and bought laundry line and pegs. Whenever possible, I air my laundry outside in the backyard. Fortunately, no one has ever come to complain about my laundry. As a matter of fact, I did see some others do the same. I don't need any posts in the yard, but simply tie the line to two threes in the yard. 

I don't know if you have ever noticed that, aired laundry is one of the best objects for painting sunshine. Very expressive! So today, after I finished hanging out my laundry behind my house, I made this painting. Hope you like it.