Jennifer's Family Portrait

Jennifer and my tastes in many things - be it art, furniture or the color of our walls, is often quite divergent. A local artist that we both like is Maria Lyle. We have admired her paintings when they were on the walls of a local cafe. As it turns out, Maria lives in the neighborhood and we run into her occasionally in the park with her dogs. I had been thinking about getting one of her paintings for Jennifer, but had never actually done that.

Jennifer, on the other hand, had a brilliant idea. As her wedding gift to me, she decided to commission Maria to paint our "family". It was a well kept secret, although the first time we ran into Maria after Jennifer initially called her, she made some comments that could have given it away, if I had not been so clue less. Jennifer also had a Polaroid of the painting in our wedding binder, but I luckily managed to stay away from that organizer. Also, everyone at her work knew about it and the painting spent some time sitting wrapped in her office but I never noticed it.

Jennifer didn't actually hand over the painting to me. Instead, she set it up in the Bed and Breakfast room that we were staying in. When we walked in after the reception, tired, sweaty and exhausted I looked around at the safari decor and then noticed the paining leaning against a table. "Hey, that looks like one of Maria's paintings" I said, and then the it dawned on me: man, woman, dog!

I really love this painting. This type of chalk piece is my favorite of Maria's styles. The best thing about it is that it's the perfect snapshot of where Jennifer and I are at this point in our lives. It's me and her and Homer - our little family. Years down the road we'll hopefully have children and there will be a time without Homer or with other pets, but this painting will always remind us of how our lives were when we were getting married.