Pictures Of Another Time-8

Years ago...Jimmy Simon...a fine Native painter...from the Wikwemikong Reserve...on
Manitoulin Island...in Lake Huron...offered me a gift of one of his paintings. I told
him I couldn't take something that he had put so much work into...to turn it into an
excellent picture. I have regretted declining his generous offer ever since. What is
it in us that makes us decline a gift?...is it good old ego at work again?...or a host
of other misplaced reasons...that disrupt the flow of good energy when a gift is offered...and refused?...Since that era...I myself became a maker of pictures...and I
know when I offer one as a gift to someone...it is sincerely meant. So far...everyone
I've made such an offer to...has accepted my pictures. Perhaps...they are more liberated...than I was...in that distant era...when...in my "un-knowing-ness"...I
disrupted a beautiful human transaction...a mistake I don't think...I'm likely to
make again. Jimmy is the taller of the two gentlemen in today's picture...........Quester.