Who goes there? Please leave comments so (An Aries Knows)!
Back in early April, the creator of one of my favorite webcomics, Life of Sharks, invited readers to submit their illustrations of the ever popular Barry, the problematic shark. I couldn’t resist the opportunity to go to my tiny sketch book and create Barry’s Mondrian period…now with a little shimmer.
I wish you soft green grass to lie on
Thunder-free skies with rainbows
Unlimited vistas to contemplate
Six friends to run with you
Bark with you
Curl up with you
Let you nanny them
Herd them
Love them
As they love you
As we all do
Always
Run free, sweet Penny Dear Lambert. Give our love to Rex, Margot, Guinness, Harley, Paco, and Sugar. They must be so happy to be with you again.
From left, Tim’s Penny and Pixie, and our Guinness and Margot. There are water coolers at both houses, but all the dogs love the water bucket we keep on the front porch. Maybe it has a special flavor because the lizards use it for floating.
Prompt from FMS Photo A Day.
Tuesday Tom came in from work and told me a story. On one of the busy roads he drives, a car ahead of him was going excessively slow, so he finally passed it. When he did, he glanced over and saw that the driver was looking ahead, toward the road, but she was also holding up her phone in front of her face so that she could text.
People texting and driving has become as commonplace a sight in our neighborhood as sidewalks buckled by decades-old Live Oaks, people walking their dogs, and near-jungles of bougainvillea. Guess which one doesn’t belong?
I hadn’t done one of these in a while, so inspired by Tom, here’s a new one. The perils of texting have been on my mind lately because of two works I helped edit.
Put the phone down, people, and watch where you’re going, whether you’re in a car, on a bike, or on foot.
“The ache for home lives in all of us. The safe place where we can go as we are and not be questioned.”
–Maya Angelou
I’ve thought so hard about how I could respond to a post ‘Nathan published yesterday. Finally I realized that all the words I could use, could arrange as artfully and persuasively and reasonably as my abilities would allow, already exist succinctly in the above quote. Who knows if she really said it; the Internet is full of trickery. Even if she didn’t, the words are no less true to me.
I was happy to welcome ‘Nathan and Dan into my home in 2010. I lost most of the photos I took during their visit in my computer meltdown, but a few that had already made it to my blog and to Flickr remain. I used one of them to draw this in my Fat ‘Lil Sketch Book–my first drawing of 2012. I love that they are looking at Barnett Newman’s Broken Obelisk outside Rothko Chapel. The sculpture found a home there after it was rejected by the city as a tribute to Martin Luther King Jr. following his assassination.
Sometimes the right thing is a long time coming. Sometimes there are people who block and circumvent and disparage the right thing. But when Tim and I were talking about this in a different context yesterday, I said it’s good to remember that every step toward justice and freedom and fairness is also taken by people. There will always be those among us who will march to the beat of what is best in us. Or maybe, in a less contentious image, will dance to the rhythm of what is best in us.
‘Nathan and Dan are my friends and will always be welcome and safe in my home. I want them to feel that way in theirs, and I want their home to expand to include…everywhere.
Because I love them.
Because it’s right.
This month’s theme from 30 Minutes of Creativity is “Glitter.” We don’t have much of that around The Compound! 😉
If you want to create something in thirty minutes once a month, check out Create Stuff’s Twitter feed to get a theme and get the guidelines here. Enjoy!
A little late with Sunday’s submission, but since I shared a couple of drawings last year for 30 Days here and here, thought I’d attempt one of Penny, Tim’s Foster Dog, also known as Miss Funnypenny, Princess Penelope, Bess, Ethel, and Rhoda. This is from the “Fat Lil’ Sketch Book,” which is roughly 5.5×4 inches.
Penny’s sketch gets a little more detail because this is a first version. The more comfortable I get with the shapes that are uniquely hers, the better able I become to put only a few details and leave out all the rest.
This is a ball no other dog has any interest in, but Penny likes it and often “hides” it to play with later.
