While painting this piece I think of our trips to some of the Gulf Islands—the way the sand stretches wide, warm underfoot, with just a hint of the tide lingering at the edges. It’s more about that feeling than any one place, all soft textures and shifting light, like those afternoons when we’d lose track of time, just wandering. You know how the islands always feel close but just out of reach, like they’re waiting to be explored? That’s in there too—hazy shapes on the horizon, a quiet pull to keep going, to see what’s on the other side.