I suppose you could track everything back. Starting with sketches in my bedside Big Chief notebook. To Mr. Opsahl’s art class in Washington Elementary. But to be honest. I didn’t have grandiose plans for it all. I was just trying to stave off a Sunday night homework worry. Or brighten a school day afternoon. But that’s the thing about steps, the smallest of ones, even when you’re not aware, they’re still lifting you.

This little pink bird was the first in my sketchbook. I had no idea how many it would lead to. How they would transform into something larger. But the intent was there — Noting here I can’t rise above. And somewhere, within this attempt to rise, I was gracefully being lifted.

And that little pink bird crescendoed into this 5’ portrait of a woman ready, willing, to take flight. And I’d like to think, if this tiny little bird could do that, that maybe I, we, could do the same. I guess it all comes down to taking that first step.