Acrylic Paints and A Palate Knife : Day 13

            Watching the news about coronavirus every day, it’s depressing and disappointed with the guidance of the White House because it is so poor. The Bishop of the SNI US Missionary Headquarters called the special emergency meeting of the SNI ministers in the U.S. on March 3 to discuss how to deal with the coronavirus, there were only 2 persons confirmed positive for the virus in New York. Since then, almost every day the number of people who tested and confirmed positive has increased.
            I immediately emailed to our Japanese leaders because we had planned the Japanese Seminar on March 8. We discussed the seminar on whether or not we should postpone it. We concluded that we had the seminar but stopped promoting it to the public. We did whatever we could such as sanitizing doorknobs and tables as well as chairs, giving up providing refreshments to the participants, opening the windows while putting the heater on during the seminar, etc. We also broadcasted our seminar to those who wanted to participant online. We encouraged members to join the seminar online. We did everything that we could but watching the federal government actions, I was flabbergasted and disappointed. That disappointment still continues until today, I won’t discuss it today. I will write about a different thing.

            My brother texted me that my mom’s dementia became worse and it was difficult for his family to take care of her. My sister-in-law became so tired of taking care of our mother and became depressed. So my brother asked the siblings to help him and his wife. I want to do everything I can but am not sure what I can do because I do not live in Japan. It is difficult for me to take even a week's vacation right now due to the lack of full-time employees in the SNI NY Center. Great ideas will come to me at the most appropriate time in order to help my mom and my brother’s family.

            Now, what I do for my mom is to paint on an envelope every week and write to her with this envelope. Today I used a palette knife to paint. To paint with a palette knife on the envelope is not easy because it is too small to paint on the envelope with a palette knife. But I did because I wanted to send something different to my mom. Last month I called her on her birthday, she said she forgot many people even her own children and asked them who they were. She also said that she enjoyed my weekly letter but she did not read it but just enjoyed painting. That’s the reason that I want to do something different.

            I started using acrylic paint a couple of months ago because I had plenty of leftover craft smart paints that were used to use at Sunday school. I bought many Craft Smart Paints for the Sunday school students to paint together with them, but our Sunday school ended 4 years ago. I didn’t want to waste them, so I started using them. This acrylic paint is liquid, so it is good for painting with brushes, but if you use expensive acrylic paints, it has texture and more fun. Today, I add baking soda to these acrylic paints and painted with a palette knife. This was the first trial. I need to practice a lot to make an impressive paint envelope, but I enjoyed it. I hope my mom also likes it.