Playing Catch-Up

Three forward, one toe back,

Trailing scribbled lines across the snow,

Footsteps dance around the scattered birdseed.

In spite of neglecting this blog shamefully, I have been sticking to the resolve. Each day I HAVE been working on some creative act. (Well, with the possible exception of the last Steelers' game day. I do believe I was a waste, eating chicken wings and jumping up and down and screaming so as to wear myself out.) Not only a poem called "Winter Chickens", but also an Aser story "Sidelong", and two other short stories, one called "Fire" and the other "Wasting Time."

I think the poem and "Sidelong" are done. The other stories I'm still snarling over.

Then there is the pastel project I've been working on in the studio. Some days lately have been too cold and wet for working out there, and I have come to really hate the project, which is a practice lesson. Bernie observed my frustration, read the book I was working from, and pronounced that it was like Kliban's cartoon on how to draw a cat. He had drawn three circles in the first figure, added ears and whiskers and a tail in the second, and in the third, shown a lovely, realistic pen and ink of a sitting cat.

At this point, I agree with Bernie. The step-by-step photos look like the instructor started over on his sketch several times. Maybe he did. Maybe that's what we're supposed to do. Still, he could have said so. Shithead.

Excerpt from "Wasting Time:"

"Every day was the same, and that was good. Every day was the same, and that made me wish for anything different." She sat up on the ledge of the bath and looked at her reflection in the water. Pulling at her dripping hair, she turned her face from side to side, considering what she saw. "I hate my hair like this," she announced.

"Be patient," Margot muttered. "It'll grow out."

"I don't mean that! I mean it's already down to my shoulders in back and my nose in front and it takes an hour to dry! I look like a haystack with eyeballs."

And from "Fire:"

Kish opted to take two flat rocks and a stick, and roll three glowing embers onto one rock, covering it with the other. No one sleeping along the walls moved or noticed; he was free to stand, drape his blanket fur over his shoulders (making sure the edges did not drag on the ground and make a noise), and pad noiselessly on bare feet away from the fire.

To her, the dark-eyed one, who pleaded for fire. "Donai," she called it. He named her in the moonlight, "Ka-be-Donai" -- "Who Pleads For Donai."

He backtracked his own steps under the shine of the moon, glad that snow had stayed in the sky for so long

and not dropped to the ground to make his trail visible.

And from "Sidelong:"

Melody had to learn that however great her changes in her life had been, they didn't give her the right to quarrel with her company. And the Life That Guides the World knows that there are times in one's life when no amount of explanation is ever going to be enough. You could be the greatest orator on the crust of the world, but if you've somehow managed to fall afoul of your colleagues, you might as well just write the whole thing off and take your show on the road; either that or grow an alligator's hide and settle in to outlive them, hoping they don't have a penchant for reptile handbags.

Exercise!

Seeing this picture on the cover of Via, I was, as always, entranced by the combination of purple and orange.

I decided that today's project would be to play with the image in Photoshop.

With the magazine in front of me, I drew the lines of the elements of the picture with my mouse. (When economic times get better, I've GOT to get one of those pen styluses instead of trying to use the talent of my right hand with a mouse, which my right hand almost never uses any more. It's like trying to draw an eyelash with a brick.)

I scanned the cover photo so that I could try to see what the colors actually are. Photoshop did not agree with me about what colors were present, but I pressed on.

After an hour and a half or so, I saved the file and made lunch. After lunch I pressed on, getting some good reddish colors and textures on the near hill. A half hour later, the power went out, and erased everything I'd done since lasagna casserole. I didn't even swear; I should have known better; I do know better than to not save every couple minutes. Dammit.

I liked the sky in the finished product, but as usual, was far from satisfied with it.

After the power outage, I must confess, I was deeply annoyed and quit probably before I should have.

And since I was lazy enough to work in only two layers, it came out better than it might have.

Idle Hands

On Wednesdays, I take my granddaughter to her religion class, and while she does whatever religious studies first grade kids do, I have an hour to keep myself occupied.

This time I grabbed my sketch book, and once her class had begun, I decided to set a task -- to sketch 10 hands, just for practice, because I don't practice any where nearly as much as I should.

I tried to imagine basic shapes upon which to build and model a hand. And because I'm so damn timid about this sort of thing, I left the pencil alone and used a pen.

By the time I had scribbled the ninth hand, it was time to pick Lil up at her classroom.

However, I do include a stick figure carrying a shopping bag, and the foot, which started bare, grew a sock, and ended up with its toes on backwards.

And one too few of them, I might add.

Catching Up and Catching Disease

This is the illustration I did for Tyler Willson's story "Mercenary."

That would have been on December 29th, and that was the last time I was able to keep to my Resolution.

New Year's seemed to take so much out of me in preparations ... I wondered about that, but didn't realize at the time that I was coming down with a bad cold. I was a little hoarse on the 4th, but then with a loud cartoon Kapowee! I was out for the count.

So I'm way behind on Resolution projects. Most of what I've done since then is sit still and wait for enough of the illness to pass so that I could sleep.

Last night, amid grotesque nightmares and anxieties, coughing fits and wheezes, I was able to doze for an hour at a time. One lovely nap lasted an hour and 15 minutes!

I'll be back to posting here again soon, I hope.