Dining Alone

To some people the very concept of dining alone is intolerable. Meals are meant to be shared events—intimate dinners for two, boisterous family gatherings surrounding major life events or holidays, daily meals carved out of the day-to-day fray in order to catch up with your immediate family, lunch with co-workers just to get out of the office for a bit.

But then there are those of us who eat most of our meals on our own, and we rarely give thought to the fact. Don't get me wrong, I love gathering with family and/or friends to share a meal, but dining alone isn't a tragedy. Most of the time, eating alone will simply mean ingesting a meal for nourishment and then getting back into my day, but occasionally I will make a Meal (with an intentional cap M) for one. I'll spend quantities of time planning, shopping, cooking, savoring the fragrance, tasting and consuming a Meal all by myself. It would be lovely to share it, but I won't deny myself the experience of dining just because I sit down to the table alone.

This morning's breakfast was one of those Meals. I'd stopped by the grocery store yesterday, and discovered the rare but delicious Ranier cherry in stock. There were only four bags, and I greedily snatched one up. I brought them home, decanted them into a bowl and rinsed them carefully—not letting a single one drop out of the bowl when I poured out the water. I positioned the bowl containing the rare treasure in the center of an otherwise empty island in the kitchen and spent the day nibbling now and then.

This morning, I put on a fresh pot of hazelnut coffee, pulled a small plate out of the cabinet and placed the last lemon poppy seed muffin on it with A WHOLE HANDFUL of Ranier cherries. This was a Meal worthy of attention and savor, so instead of catching the morning news on the tv while shoving food in my pie hole, I sat down at the dining room table with the day's paper and lingered over each bite of the Meal.

It was because I'd slowed down time and become very mindful of the moment that I was dazzled by, and inspired to draw, the sunny oak in the front yard.

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Ridin' Along...

...minding his own business, and he ends up being sketched. Imagine the absurdity!



I'm thinking he graduated from college fairly recently. Don't know what gave me that impression...hmmm. We'll just call it a hunch.

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The Dregs

Woefully behind on so many parts of my life at the moment, but ahead of the game on the parts that put bread on the table, so I can't complain/apologize/agonize too much.



I couldn't tell you exactly the day or hour I drew this gentleman, but I could tell you the morning light was warm coming in from the left side of the train. I could tell you there was something about him that reminded me very much of my maternal grandfather. I could tell you that he really wasn't as old as he ended up in the drawing—less is more, and my pencil got away from me, so he ended up looking older than he should.



Ah doodles...who doesn't love a good doodle session. On the train again, and you might not believe it but those two heavy black dots were a couple of puddles. It had rained that day, and the pavement was drying. The squiggly line is the border between the wet and dry pavement and there were these two puddles, you see. Speaking of seeing, the knot in a particular piece of wood ended up as an eye. Need I go on? It's a doodle. It's the stream of consciousness of the artist. I couldn't tell you when they were put on paper, but I remember each moment they were put there because of the poignancy of the moment.



An Illo Friday gone to neglect. It seemed like the idea at the time, but is a bit macabre upon review. Still true though, just because it's a bit dark doesn't make it any less true. You know that moment of anxiety, when you look yourself in the mirror and have to shock yourself into a different frame of mind with the cold dash. This is that, just the nth degree.

Anyhoo, this is kind of the dregs of what has been coming out of the pencil and pen lately (not that there is a lot more), but there is something coming. Don't get you hopes up, but it'll be a little different.

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Stippled

My aunt, in the form of DCPeg paid me a marvelous compliment today. She called me an inspiration. I guess we're caught in a little love loop, then, because she's an inspiration to me too. Give her blog a read, and you'll see the reasons why.

Today, she mentioned that she defaults into a comfort zone of drawing. It's the mindless drawing that we do—no over planning goes into it, and there aren't any first sketches that get refined and then penned. It's the stuff that comes out whenever we mindlessly put pen or pencil to paper. This is stippling for me. I could stipple for hours, which is a good thing since it takes hours to create something recognizable using the method.

A pencil sketch is a good place to return to if you want something after the first step, stippling is a good place to return if you want to leave your brain in neutral.

EDM 26 & 162

I really wanted to draw the new rug I ordered for my dining room, so I had to scour the list of EDMs to come up with a "draw anything you want", because you know, I need permission to draw things. Wait, that's not right. I'll have to think about that some more, and get back to you. It's all the fault of the paint that the rug looks so orange. Really, it is.



The not-so-breakfast-of-champions.

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Illo Friday "Garden" & EDM 161

The quote: "I have a rock garden. Last week three of them died." —Richard Diran

Don't know about you, but "rock garden" screams desert to me.





Had to fire up the super duper closer upper micro examiner thingamabob to do stupidity's portrait. It's not easy, I'm tellin' ya.

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Current Events and Everyday Matters

This trophy was awarded to me for showing up to a particular annual event five years in a row. It won't ever have its own shelf, but it tickles me every time I see it.

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All Things Lunar

The quote (since it gets a bit lost in the gutter): "Beauty is a form of genius—is higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. It is of the great facts in the world like sunlight, or springtime, or the reflection in dark water of that silver shell we call the moon." —Oscar Wilde

Why a shell? What are the properties of a shell that the moon shares? A pearlescent glow upon viewing? Or is the reference more to an apparent fragility like the egg shell?

Probably the latter since beauty in some forms is fragile. True beauty continues its pearlescent glow no matter what time elapses. In fact, an egg shell is very strong if force is exerted in a certain direction, and the blemishes on the moon of colliding heavenly bodies implies strength since the moon continues to exist in the hostility of space.

Not a bad metaphor after all.

But back to the main point, "Beauty is a form of genius." This aspect of beauty suggests a character trait—the nature of beauty. Or it is the outward manifestation of the genius of creation. The former an aggressive form that we bring to our lives and the lives of others. And the latter a passive form that is bestowed upon us by the probable arrangement of particles based on genetic disposition.

So we continue, "It is of the great facts in the world like sunlight, or springtime, or the reflection of that silver shell we call the moon." All of these great facts are passive probable arrangements of particles. As beauty is one of these great facts, so it is the passive and out of our hands.

Adequate for those who see a beautiful reflection in the mirror. Inadequate for those who don't use the mirror's reflection to find the presence of beauty in their lives. Adequate for all if the mainstream "vision" of beauty holds no sway, and in the mirror's reflection is found the genius of creation's beauty in all its varied manifestations.

The last point assumes facts not in evidence in the original quote, but it's a warm fuzzy, so I'll go with it.

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Illustration Friday: Theory

This Illustration Friday assignment is a week old. The blank frame stared at me for a full week, and the only theory I had was that if I didn't fill the frame, I would forever be stuck on that page.



And then I theorized that as long as I was making progress via birds, and eagle would suit President's day just fine.

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Taxes

I've got that tired feeling, but it could just be that it's night and past my bedtime. Don't want to rule out the obvious. Nevertheless, I'll have to do some deep soul searching every time I feel sleepy now—that's some pretty serious navel gazing. Ok, maybe I won't.

Drawn from Memory

Since I infrequently wear jewelry or a watch, this had to be a memory drawing assignment. These earrings are distinctive enough that even I could remember what they looked like. I couldn't swear that the lizard was polka dotted, though. I might have taken a liberty there.

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From the "You Got Chocolate in My Peanut Butter" File

Tee hee.

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6 More Weeks!?!?

How's this for old news?



Speaking for myself, Phil's shadow (or lack thereof) barely registers as a blip on the radar. Yet an entire town dresses up for the occasion—proof positive that winter can drive you a little batty. Anywho, I had put the frame on the page well in advance of the date, and I simply followed the command of "Groundhog Day".

Phil might say 6 more weeks. It feels like it's been 6 long months. I'm looking forward to spring. I'm going to go to the garden shop and see if there are any seed packets available yet. My orange juice cravings are through the roof, and the sunlight this afternoon was a shock to my eye.

Winter is very beautiful, but I think Christmas comes a little early. Maybe we should switch it to February simply to have something to anticipate in these long, cold months. Maybe I should just move closer to the Equator and keep my suggestions to myself as I invest in a grass skirt and discover the subtleties of a waggle and a wave. Maybe I just need to build a snowman and be grateful for the opportunities I have. So many options...

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The "Eyes" Have It

This is a man's eye. Really it is. A couple of lines wrong and the whole thing goes girlie.

Ach, is it an eye? Aye, aye. I guess the ayes have it. I'd keep an eye on them if I were...ok, I'll stop now.

Illo Friday "Tales & Legends"

Balance

Progress without responsibility can lead to conspicuous consumption among other things. Balancing a realistic view of limited natural resources and mankind's true needs can lead to healthy progress for all—progress and invention along sustainable lines.

Great ideas from the past can be quoted and revered, but they shouldn't have so much sanctity that they loose the flexibility of been judged by current standards. Creation for the sake of creation by unreasonable men has led to some truly wonderful things, but also to some really horrifying things. Creation with forward thinking is closer to an ideal—still not ideal, but closer.

Your thoughts?

Last Week's Illo Friday: Plain

I know, it's awesome...ahem.

Home

This Everyday Matters assignment appealed to me.

Places evoke feelings. Sometimes those feelings are brash because huge things happened there. More often, in my own experience, the feeling is subtle. The feeling doesn't belong to any of the five senses, but to a deeper part. My home is still new enough that I haven't developed that feeling yet. I don't feel uncomfortable in my home, but I don't know it yet. I still haven't seen it in the spring or at the height of summer.

When I reach the house at the end of a day of work or returning from running errands, I say the word "home" out loud as if I somehow need to convince myself it's true.

The feeling will come, it always does.

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Warning...Do NOT Try This at Home

I have a perverse sense of humor, and I've come to accept it over the years. If you're reading this even after all you've seen on this blog, you've accepted it too—thanks!

My cat, Gimli, is attempting that which he is being told not to do. He's attempting to occupy the same space my computer currently does on my lap. The computer on my lap is a cat magnet. Perhaps Gimli senses that the computer is warm and will preheat his spot. Perhaps he is jealous of my attentions to a computer. Perhaps he's just a furry nudge...yep, that's it...he's a furry nudge. And I wouldn't have it any other way.

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Can't Argue With This...

...but then I like walking, so I probably wouldn't argue anyway.

I didn't place the quote properly, so the whole thing got a little too close to the right-hand edge of the page.

I had a lovely walk to the train station this morning, and my evening walk home was decorated with fresh snowfall—slower going, but really pretty. It's a shame we can't switch of winter and switch on the fresh greenery of spring. Not that I'm advocating an early end to winter—don't want to upset that apple cart. Just expressing the opinion that the early spring browns and grays are really not all that wonderful. Spring is awesome, it's just that little dead zone between the end of winter and the beginning of spring that is visually repugnant. Not every season change can be the bell of the ball, and it's got to follow on the heels of one of the best decorated holiday seasons (Thanksgiving, of course...ahem). Still, you'd think the opener to spring could have a little flair.

Oh, I know, you say, "But Nan, what about the crocus?"

Sure the crocus is very nice, but come on...one tiny flower to undo that vast expanse of brown lawn you've got spread out before you!?!? That's a little David and Goliath, no? Unless you can really focus on the crocus, you don't stand a chance. I think I'll end on that little charmer.

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