Waterfall of Mother Earth’s Core
Sometimes the paintings that mean the most begin on the hardest days. I created this piece while
trying to quiet my mind and simply let color and movement guide me.
14 May 2026
Last night I was having a difficult day for reasons I will not go into. I stepped away from the situation and decided to paint, which almost always helps me quiet my mind and reconnect with myself for a while.
I found an old canvas I knew I wanted to paint over and began experimenting with layers of rainbow color. I started with deep reds and warm oranges, followed by bright yellows, emerald greens, and finally a flowing turquoise blue layered over the surface. Using a palette knife, I scraped each color into the next, allowing them to blend, break apart, and reveal themselves again through the movement of the paint.
As the layers developed, the painting began to feel both earthy and enchanting to me.
The cooler turquoise layers above felt fluid and ethereal, almost like rain cascading down glass. Beneath them, the warm glowing colors reminded me of distant city lights blurred through a rain-streaked window, or that magical moment when you stand behind a waterfall and look outward at a sunlit landscape shimmering beyond the falling water.
The drips and vertical movement gave the entire piece the feeling of water flowing through light itself.
What surprised me most was that this was one of the first times I truly felt a painting was finished. Of course, I still sat with it for a day and questioned myself a little, but this piece felt resolved in a way that was quieter and more instinctive than usual.
As always, my son named the painting. Last night he called it Waterfall Falls, but this morning he changed it to Mother Earth’s Waterfall because he said it looked like the Earth’s core with a waterfall pouring down over it. Later, after thinking about it even more, he renamed it once again: Waterfall of Mother Earth’s Core because, as he explained, it was “more realistic.”
I loved that.
Listening to his interpretations and imagination has become one of my favorite parts of sharing my art. It feels less like naming a painting and more like discovering another layer of the story through his eyes.
He captured some of the same feeling I had while creating it, even though neither of us would describe it exactly the same way.
I find myself drawn to this piece for many reasons, but mostly because something beautiful emerged from a difficult moment. It reminded me once again that light and darkness are rarely separate things. Sometimes the brightest and most healing moments are created precisely because we move through the harder ones.