Painting in My Head

I look out the window at Jake’s as senseless chatter falls around me.  Another car backs in between the white lines dictating the orders of where to be. Ready for a quick exit, its grill stares back at me. A point of interest finds my ear bringing me back inside, only to lose my false interest as words pile up in my brain without any true meaning. Shadows mix with the glaring sunlight as people move about. It's that time, the morning sun charging through the East windows, turning everyone to silhouettes of colorless figures. Lost to this sight that demands my interest, I'm alone now, painting in my head.

Chatter, again, gets lost in a fog of noise as the blinding glare on the floor forms a pattern of intrigue. Figures mix with the floor becoming one shape, a black abstract. A touch of color holds fast in the paper flowers decorating each window. Bodies blend together. Whose legs are whose? Like a moving puzzle I try to fix arms and legs to heads I see. Finding a way forward, my mind begins mapping out a painting and seeking bits of color.

Figures exit Jake's, gaining back their colors as they do. Watching subjects leave, my painting fades a bit. Those white lines return to emptiness as the chatter grows louder and words take on meanings again. What was discussed is a blur, but etched in my head is an idea for a panel still in abstract form. Goodbyes are said and  I find myself standing, pushing against the door. Holding onto the images planted in my head I walk with purpose to my car, fearing a stumble might jar the rough start I'm seeing loose and send it tumbling to the white lines holding my car. 

Concepts are fragile. A word, a sight, a bird call, can shatter them. Sitting in my car a small, loose sketch will  lock this concept in place, with scribbles and sure, dark marks to hold it safe, I nod to my friends heading to their cars. It can grow into a color study, and be nurtured into a major paintings with a bit of care and dreaming. Some wither in sketchbooks and lay forgotten for years. Rekindled, when skills match the call or simply when the excitement of a forgotten time returns. Sketching ferociously, the morning images hold true as I believe them to be. Now, safe as can be too, I put down my pencil and head to the studio with thoughts of possible colors adding, to my excitement.     

Sketching in Parks

A couple dozen sharpened Prisma Color pencils, Tara Rosa, my favorite. Two Utrecht sketchbooks with a plywood board to rest on the steering wheel serve as my drawing board. A Diet Coke in the cup holder and a 25 lb bag of peanuts in the shell to feed the squirrels and ducks that came to my van begging. 8 AM was my starting time. Getting a good parking spot is most important. I like the shady spots where I can get a view of the bike path and the climbing tree (a tree that grows sideways). Kids are always giving their climbing skills a test with the tree, even a few adults occasionally give it a go. 

First to arrive at the park on Mondays is the golfer in his old land yacht of a car. He always backs his yacht of a car into a parking space at the far end of the lot. With a basket of golf balls he sets about driving them over the trees into the river. I want to ask him where he got all his golf balls from, but sketching him was good enough. A rough sketch of the golfer is my warm up. Driving off, he glanced my way.  I stay in my van dropping peanuts out the window, waiting for my next subject. Ducks waddle up from the river, racing to get the peanuts. A favorite squirrel fills his cheeks with nuts and scampers up the tree in front of me. 

Joggers fill a few pages and a failed attempt at a bicyclist, a couple more pages. Ten o'clock and a track team comes charging across the footbridge. All bare chested, all lean as can be, too fast for sketching but I try anyway. Good gesture sketches. Following behind the track team comes a lady jogger struggling along, giving me a bit more time to draw her. Two tan Mercedes show up, one a family car, the other a sporty type. A young, shapely blond gets out of the sporty one and joins the elderly man in the other one. Serious hugs take place there. Always something keeping me interested. When a friend's sister shows up with a mailman, and he isn't her husband, its time for me to move… 

A new spot offers new subjects. A couple old friends sharing stories while keeping an eye on the grandchildren. I switch to a half sheet of watercolor paper when a young girl catches me drawing her and takes to walking on a fallen telephone pole , walking it over and over. She knows I am drawing her and so I switch to watercolor paper with the idea I will fill in the color back in the studio. Sketching in the parks is how I begin my days, filling sketchbooks with possible ideas for future paintings.