Leslie, the violinist, weighed in on the subject of titles, having recognized herself and sweet Melody the yellow lab in the invitation I sent her.  She suggested “Sweet Melody,”  which is perfect, of course.

The painting is trudging along.  I hope to finish it before I die.

Leslie now is holding a partially finished bow but I am still unhappy with her violin and her nose (in no particular order).  The background is too light to use rim light effectively so it looks as if the tip of her nose has been excised.  It is Monday, however, so today I am talking to you, all the while sneaking looks at the painting, which gazes at me reproachfully from the easel a few feet away.  I am actually torn between two lovers, a stressful situation for personality types like me.  So says the book I’m compulsively reading.

It’s titled Quiet.    Susan Cain is interested in what she calls the two basic personality types — the introvert and the extrovert.  Historically  a  “Culture of Character” dominated Western culture until Dale Carnegie, an American,  popularized the idea of a “Culture of Personality.  While introverts previously flourished and enjoyed wide respect,  in the last century especially in the English-speaking world, their quiet and dependable demeanours have been displaced by high-energy loud talkers - salesmen like Tony Robbins and even preachers of certain stripes.   It has gotten to the point that massive social pressure to develop  extroverted personalities is being applied in all levels of the education system (the Harvard Business School being the most egregious example) to the point where those who are quiet and studious are now characterized as anti-social ineffective losers — essentially in need of repair.  Asian students are at a particular disadvantage, as their general culture still favours character over personality.

In this scholarly but very accessible analysis, Cain considers the biological basis for the two types and concludes that their brains are fundamentally different.  Apparently some infants are born with an “especially excitable amygdala,” which had a 40 to 50% likelihood of having been inherited and which renders them “high-reactive” to new sights, sounds and smells.    This environmental “alert attention” of introverts makes them “seem to see and feel things more.”  Cain also references an Atlantic article about rhesus monkeys (who share 95% DNA with humans);  those with “short alleles” of the gene which helps regulate seratonin processing are noticeably both highly reactive and introverted.  

Now I had to think about this.  Earlier in the book Cain had offered an informal quiz.  Most of it had to do with choices hinging on one’s more or less need of things like a quiet environment, independence, time alone to think.  I scored 16/16 and put a gold star on my forehead:   bona fide 100% introvert.  But to read that introversion probably meant that my alleles are on the short side and my amygdala is jumpy didn't seem like great news.    

I've never seen any if my serotonin alleles but I doesn't surprise me that my amygla is twitchy:  I remember what a shy person I was right into my twenties and how quiet a home and life I have crafted for myself.  I also realize that social events drain me quickly;  the more I enjoy them, the more down time I need  to recharge the batteries.  So while I may appear to have shed my skin and become an extrovert, I am a fake.  Apparently I have simply acquired enough coping skills to enjoy being in, though not of, society.  Added to this is my observation that virtually all of my friends are introverts, though sometimes practising pseudo-extraverts.

It brings a certain comfort to know that heredity is not necessarily destiny.  Cain goes on to survey the scientific literature regarding nature/nurture, concluding that:  “Maybe the mystery of what percent of personality is nature and what percent nurture is less important than the question of how your inborn temperament interacts with the environment and with your own free will.”   So while high-reactive children (and rhesus monkeys) arrive with risk factors like the capability for depression, anxiety and shyness,  “the sensitivities and the strengths are a package deal.  High-reactive kids who enjoy good parenting, child care, and a stable home environment tend to have fewer emotional problems and more social skills than their lower-reactive peers”, studies show,  because they are “more strongly affected by all experience, both positive and negative.”  In other words, “high-reactive types…are…like orchids:  they wilt easily, but under the right conditions can grow strong and magnificent.”  They do so by choosing creative vocations like science and art;  long-term happiness is predicated on there being true passion for whatever life path is chosen.  No surprise there.

Quiet is a thoroughly interesting and thought-provoking book and I recommend it.  Sure hope not too many born-and-bred extroverts read today’s post, though — there is always the small worry that with the way politics has been unfolding, I would be in the first truckload to be sent to a re-education camp somewhere off in the country.  Remind me to take my earplugs.

Now I'm sure it’s spring.  After several weeks of hanging out on our window ledge, warbling three-note love calls and, practice-nesting, the mourning doves have finally committed to the course. (Mind you, I wouldn’t have even started cooing until about now and definitely would be waiting for better temperatures before I laid an egg, but that’s just me.)  Still,  they seem to know what they are doing, and this morning when I opened the bedroom blind, s/he was snuggled down, feathers fluffed;  I caught sight of one egg during the changing of the guard yesterday so the second will probably be laid today.  Glad tidings.

It must be either last year’s pair or their offspring because s/he barely acknowledged me.  There might have been a tiny civil nod but it looks like Jon and I are now officially part of the scenery.  Perfect.  Of course, it also means that the window will not get a decent cleaning until June at best (remembering they can have up to nine batches of twins), but a small price to pay for the privilege of front-row seats.  I wonder if the robins who raised their kids a few feet down and over in the old euonymus vine have also returned.  Even the coyote who cuts through daily is starting to look nesty.    It must be worrisome, like opening a cottage, hoping that everything is where you left it the year before.

I don’t remember seeing any nests in the Manitopa maple which was finally removed this week.  Yes, there are times  when having grown a forest in the back yard becomes expensive, but this is countered by the knowledge that our property now supports far more life.  Mind you, there are more beings to worry about.  The ancient butternut that we almost lost two summers ago seems fine so far but we hear that these “white walnut” trees are increasingly rare.  I’ve found a number of saplings and hope that their parent is a resistant specimen but volunteers aren’t particularly cooperative or long-sighted in terms of location choice.  Now that we have an new open space of about 20 x 20 , the big decision is  what to plant. I kept a butternut in the freezer so I might try germinating it.  If that’s a no-go, then it will be another native tree like a tulip tree or a redbud.

In the meantime, we are surrounded by birdsong.  We can hear the red-breasted woodpeckers, though have had no luck spotting them yet.  They may be searching for better real estate as our (their) honey locust is on its last legs.  We did see our first 1919 robin, who was glumly checking to see if the earth was soft enough to tempt the earthworms up (it isn’t);  s/he was wearing a “Shoot, I guess it’s shrivelled crabapples again tonight” look.  The forecast actually looks promising but that particular robin was indifferent to upbeat optimism, knowing better than to believe every forecast you read.  I however am once again a believer that a world without ice underfoot is possible.  Tra la.

P.S.  The painting of violinist and dog is at the final glazes stage though  lots of detailing remains to be done.  I had almost given up hope it might be finished by our show in April at Riverwood.  I have just posted updates in “Works in Progress” on my gallery website.  The right title still hasn’t presented itself, unless I choose "The Recital."  Whatever I call it, the title should evoke a sense of the two of them and their mutual adoration.  

Having narrowly survived this winter and this virus, I am fixing my gaze on spring.  The 14 day forecast is not heartening, but I have it on good authority that it will be unseasonably (isn’t that the word, these days)  warm.  If that means hot, then I will pass, thanks.  But there have been a few encouraging spring notes lately, however.

Last year the first clue that mourning doves were feeling amorous was the two-note wake-up call issued at full blast from the deep stone ledge outside our bedroom window.  So when I heard it this morning, my winter-frozen heart melted a little.  It is probably the female nagging the male to bring her nesting materials (at this stage, there are clear and separate gender responsibilities).  She will build the nest if he will do the runaround back and forth to Home Depot.  Even if a mourning dove’s nests is renowned for its flimsiness, it does the job so I must keep watch.   Last year the prospect of a protected and sturdy nest-site overrode their caution around people.  One can hardly blame them;  it is estimated that 20 million mourning doves are killed annually in North America.

I fail to see the point of this slaughter, especially given the tiny amount of edible flesh.  Not only are they harmless vegetarians whose diet is 99% seeds, but mourning doves are unspeakably beautiful.  When I painted them last year, the soft grace notes of pale turquoise and pink caught my breath.  I am still agonizing over the background, which would have logically been the garden reflecting on the window, but I am drawn to the soft pinks of the toned panel, which reinforce the parents’ own gentle palette. 

​This wee robin, on the other hand, has been given a background which will allow me a bit of wordplay in the title “Robin’s Egg.”  It strikes me now that the colour of a robin egg contains more white. Easily amended.

If I were well it would be a good time to move forward on “The Recital,”  but I am just emerging from my typical viral blur/cough/gasp/snort and the whole concept of the painting continues to be a challenge.  In the meantime at least I can transfer the bones of the background - the huge stained window -  onto the canvas and try to make sure that the lines of leading won’t argue with the rest of the composition.

Everything still feels like work these days and nothing gets accomplished, unless it’s sitting up in a chair and chewing my food.  I’m not quite consumed with bitterness yet.  Wait a week.