nanke's stuff

I've read about a project involving doing 100 portraits.  I'm so impressed by the very idea, but I have to say, I find the thought of it quite daunting.  I've been pondering the whole thing for quite some time, and this is what I've come up with.  I've decided to commit to doing 5 portraits.   Then I'll try 5 more.   Is it cowardice?  Fear of commitment?  Fear of failure?  Lack of stamina?  ...... I don't know.  Probably a bit of all of that, and depending on the day, more of 1 thing than another.   But right now, that approach feels much more doable.

So, today I started.  I did this one in ink in my 5.5 x 8.5 sketchbook.  That's the book I rely on when I'm feeling less than secure about what I'm doing.  I decided to use ink, even though I dearly love graphite for portraits, because with ink what you put down stays.  For me that inevitably leads to less than perfect images (as though I've ever achieved perfection in anything I've done, regardless of the medium) which is both a challenge and a comfort.  The challenge is obvious, but the comfort for me is that the expectation I have of myself is a tad lower than if I'm using pencil.

Even though the sketchbook is small, the sketch itself is even smaller (about 2.5 x 4).  I expect that as I get more confident the sketches will get larger ... or not.  So, here he is.....

 Well, I'm still trying to draw something everyday, but I'm finding that it's so far Most days at best..  I have spent this weekend shredding.  No, not Shedding, Shredding ... as in papers.   About 12 years ago we were involved in a lawsuit dealing with insurance fraud.  In the capacity of Powers of Attorney for my parents, my sweetie and I bought a home here in Michigan for them while they made all the arrangements to move back here from Nevada.  The broker offered credit life insurance as part of the deal - my parents wanted it, so we went ahead and bought it.  To make a long story short, it was a scam.  The broker took the money in a lump sum for the insurance, never filed the paperwork with the insurance company, and when my stepfather died a few months later, they wanted to refund the premium money rather than honor the policy (no surprise, since there wasn't a policy).  A lawsuit ensued which the "enemy" lost, ending in a much larger payout than if they had just paid the face value of the policy in the first place.

Fast forward to this weekend.  As a result of having to have a new furnace installed, I had to clean out the furnace room.  There are many boxes filled with who knows what, but a prominent one contained all the paperwork from the lawsuit.  I shredded that paper all day Friday while the furnace guys were here.  I shredded most of the day yesterday.  I shredded a good part of the day today.  I filled 13 large trash bags with the shredded paper!  My sweetie walked by me yesterday while I was shredding (using a terrible shredder that kept jamming in the process) and remarked that it was like a prison sentence.  That made me feel a lot better about it.

Anyhow, a moment ago I took up my ballpoint pen, looked down and there was Abby - she's an old, faithful Springer Spaniel who only wants to be loved on and petted.  Well, she also wants cookies, but other than that, she makes no demands. And yes, she sees herself as the Queen of the Domain ... which she is.   I took a wee bit of paper (2 x 2) and did this quick sketch of her face.  It's not much, but it's what I have today.  I figure at least it's something.

Today my sweetie had an appointment with his doctor, so we went to Ann Arbor.  While he was in with the doc, I sat in the waiting room and did a couple of quick sketches of others who were waiting.  I also had a book with me (an anniversary present from my sweetie, and I've been savoring it - it's called Clare and Mr. Tiffany  [yes, of Tiffany glass]) so I also spent some of my waiting time reading.  Then, after we got home, because tomorrow is the day our new furnace is going to be installed, I went right to work on clearing space in the furnace/storage room in the basement.

Now, I don't know about your storage area, but ours tends to get a tad cluttered over the years.  Since our younger son and his wife and our grandchildren live in Tennessee, I find myself hoarding boxes that I can use to mail things.  I think I had enough boxes down there to pack the children's things when they go off to college (1 of them is an infant, and the other one is 3).   In addition, there were/are all sorts of things that seemed necessary to keep once, but in light of actually having to move them for work to be done, their importance quickly diminished greatly.  That said, I couldn't exactly bring myself to toss them since many of them are perfectly good, so I ended up moving them into the "library" in order to pack them up and take them to the Salvation Army.   In writing this, I also realized that the boxes I could use to transport the things to the S. Army are now neatly collapsed and in the trunk of my car so that I can take them to the recycle center. ...... Sigh.... 

So, without further adieu, here are the modest sketches I did today.