Ocean, Forest

Me, in Oregon last week

Home from Oregon

It was full-on springtime in Oregon ^ and it's still winter here, but I'm happy to be home, energized by the reminder that there's a whole world out there––and ready to get to work looking for work.

(I put watercolor paint on bits of real, live moss, fern, and fallen camellias to make the above postcard.) 

Peacock Feather

When I was five, my mother set up peacock feathers in a clay jar, and because I thought they were so beautiful, she encouraged me to sit at the table and draw one. I remember her telling me to look at it closely.

 

I found it among her things after she died––one of the few pieces of childhood art she'd saved.

Last Tuesday

Last Tuesday, the day before my birthday, I was going to sketch a cartoon panel hourly to catch the day. I got too distracted to complete that, but here are the best of the lot, which I finally inked-in this morning.

(We did not have a glass salt grinder.)

Waters of March

Marz and I were humming the "Waters of March" as we leapt across the ponds  that formed on sidewalks and street curbs in the 50 ºF temps today.

Assignment to self:
freeze-frame and sketch Elis Regina singing "Águas de Março" (Waters of March).



Watching her sing this with Antonio Carlos (Tom) Jobim, who wrote the song, always makes me happy.

American jazz singer Stacey Kent sings it in French:
 "Les eaux de Mars". 

Today I was working on sketching the moves I'm learning in TRX class. I like TRX a lot because it's elegant physics: my body is the weight & changing the angle of the ropes makes the moves easier or harder. Not that I look elegant doing it!

"For Later" (for the Crow)

"For Later"

The crows sensed the girl in the raincoat 

might benefit from  their paisley-storage service.

_____________ 

For Crow. I made this with your art supplies.

53 in 2014 = 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

It's my birthday today! and it pleases me the way the numbers line up  this year. Well, not line up, you have to untangle them, but then they number 0–5.

At this age, I've finally given up on looking like a postwar Eastern European Godard-derivative member of the intelligentsia and am embracing my essential frivolousness:
You see what I bought for myself as a birthday present yesterday at the Thrift Store? 
A swirly purple shirt (four dollars), and a rubber toy of Babar's wife––what's her name? Celeste? Celestine?––with baby elephant (a piglet?) tucked in her purse. Fifty cents!

(I just washed my hair, it's not really this stringy.)

It's Ash Wednesday, which I like:
 Lent is a time to CLEAR THE CLUTTER. 
This doesn't mean throwing out my toys, heavens no! Rather, it's a call to lighten up! and make open space for goodness and grace, amidst all the hard stuff.

And... Dr. H's 3 Things

Dr. H's cartoons about archeological bits and pieces were part of what inspired this prompt,  
"capture 3 things of yours that are important to you". 

The other inspiration was Penelope Lively's memoir, Ammonites and Leaping Fish: in the final section, she writes that she has "picked out six of the things that articulate something of who I am."

I've already posted mine and bink's responses ---here are Dr. H's.

bink's "Three Important Things"

bink's response to this prompt:
Capture 3 of your things that are important to you. 
She drew this on her Wacom tablet (I think that's its name).

My "3 Things," No. 3: Pilgrim Shell Necklace

By me, for the Three Things prompt: 
Draw, cartoon, or otherwise capture 3 of your things important to you.

My "3 Things," No. 2: my Bruce Springsteen "Born to Run" LP

***Does it cause any problems (like, make it super slow to load) if I post pix "original size" like this?

Later...
I guess it's OK, but it felt overwhelming, so I've put it back to "xtra-lg".
CLICK to embiggen, if you want.

____________________

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By me, for the Three Things prompt: Draw, cartoon, or otherwise capture 3 things in your home that are important to you.

My "3 Things," No. 1: Running Desk

This is the first of my drawings (watercolor cartoon?) in response to the prompt to capture "three of my things that are somehow important to me."
 
Crow and Poodle said my Syrian desk looked like it could dance. 
I decided to try something a little bit simpler---running.

March 1st

 It's -3°F / -19°C this Saturday morning, the first of March.
Oh, well. The wonderful thing is, the light is springtime light: long and bright! 
And it's my birthday this week. 

I'm usually pretty much in a good mood around my birthday. 
I think I was happy to be born––my mother always said we were  happy to see each other right away. 
Happiness, of course, is not a stable state, but I wonder if that beginning gave me the sense that at least it's possible?

Speaking of stablity, this video, via Zhoen, made me laugh out loud. 


The goats remind me of the Core Fit class Team Terrier has been taking at the Y (Team Terrier, that's me & bink): 
besides attempting endless variations of sit ups, we balance on these wobbly half-inflated blobs while waving various limbs in the air.

I keep falling off and scrambling back on, like a baby goat.

Or like Tigger. I  grew up before the Disneyfication of Pooh, so I didn't know this song until Mz sang it to me. She says it's me.

The Tigger Song
A Tigger's a wonderful thing. / Their tops are made out of rubber, / their bottoms are made out of spring. / They're bouncy, bouncy, bouncy, bouncy...

And Mz is Piglet.
This is a Christmas illustration, but it looks like March outside my window.