My favorite sketching-on-the-spot subjects, which I return to again and again, are what I call heart homes. These heart homes are places I love, places I have sketched in all types of weather and all seasons. I never seem to tire of them, and I often return to them when I’m feeling wiped out or stressed.
Cooley Lake is one of these places. You’ll have seen other images from this same place, between remaining pools of this old oxbow of the Missouri River. It’s endlessly fascinating, full of history and wildlife. The sky is huge there in the river bottoms, and the bluffs nearby hem in the land and the lake. Here are three seasons: spring, fall and winter.
Give yourself a few moments of quiet to think. What speaks to you? Where do you feel most at home? What calls to you again and again? What engages you on a soul level? Go there and sketch. Then do it again, in a few days, weeks or each season—whenever you feel that call.
Consider another viewpoint of your favorite heart home. This was done at the top of a windy observation tower far above Cooley Lake on an autumn day.
The final picture includes one of my “gratitude lists” as well as evidence that I go there when I need healing. My eldest godchild had just passed away, and being out in that big landscape helped me to cope.