Painting is the one place where my mind finally goes quiet.

In the rest of my life, things can feel loud and nonstop — work, family, the usual whirlwind. But when I pick up a brush, everything slows down. The world narrows into color. Even the sky feels different when you're really looking at it.

I’ve been doing art for as long as I can remember. My mom must have seen something in me, because she never questioned it — she just let me create. Over the years, I tried everything: photography, drawing, ceramics. But painting is where I found a calmness I didn’t know I needed.

Now it’s even more special because my son paints with me. He has his own tiny easel, and we set up together in the backyard or on the porch. The cows wander around behind us, the dogs stretch out on the boards, and we just pause. No talking. No distractions. Just color and quiet.

He’s usually a wild, talkative kid, but when we paint, he settles right into the stillness with me. It feels like sharing a part of myself I never knew how to put into words.

A lot of my pieces carry emotions I don’t always say out loud. One of my favorites is a painting I made after my dog, who had been with me for 19 years, passed away. I used the colors from his collar and the blanket I buried him with: peach and lime green. They shouldn’t work together, but somehow they do. I’ll never sell that one. Some things are too close to the heart.

Painting gives me space to breathe, feel and just be myself.

Jessa Murphy Barcomb is a laboratory assistant at Champlain Valley Physicians Hospital, where she has worked for eight years.