Sketching

Anxious adjective \ˈaŋ(k)-shəs\: afraid or nervous especially about what may happen:  feeling anxiety:  causing or showing fear or nervousness.  ~ Merriam-Webster

Anxious.  This word seems suitable for my lack of progress in sketching.  I've wanted to sketch for years but I find I'm apprehensive about beginning.  My concern that I could fail shows up in a multitude of excuses -- too busy heading the list.   I know how irrational this is but I've been trapped in this unreasonable self evaluation for some time now.

This summer the Whidbey Island Sketchers came to our home to sketch.  I watched; I envied.  Here are some examples of the Fredley home sketches, as done by local Whidbey Island talent.

by
Judi Nyerges

Fredley Home
by Phyllis Ray

Garden & Greenhouse
by Kathy Lull

Orange Lily in Bud
by Sue Van Etten

These rough drawings are quick, fun and capture the moment.  Sketches become a swift way to tell a story and are often more expressive than a photograph.  Here Sue Van Etten shows a great talent at quickly capturing poultry in action.

by Sue Van Etten

by Sue Van Etten

As Walt Stanchfield says,  “We all have 10,000 bad drawings in us. The sooner we get them out the better.”   I'm posting this early sketch as the first of my 10,000 bad drawings.  9,999 to go before I'll post another sketch.

Oregon Coast Camping Neighbor
by Fran Abel

~~~

"Now relax, think positively and begin -- the smile of success awaits you."

 ~ Claudia Nice, First Steps Drawing in Pen & Ink

What's My Brain Tossing At Me Now?

On our travels Ed and I play with interesting topics, like brains.  How they work, or not, and why.  Topics like this travel with us for hours.

 

“Rabbit's clever," said Pooh thoughtfully.

"Yes," said Piglet, "Rabbit's clever."

"And he has Brain."

"Yes," said Piglet, "Rabbit has Brain."

There was a long silence.

"I suppose," said Pooh, 

"that that's why he never understands anything.” 

 A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh

My brain runs amuck.   I've needed to engage in corrective behavior from time-to-time.  For example, I hate it when my very own brain makes me feel guilty or afraid.  The trick though is catching it in its misdeed.  The brain insists it's on track, as it crazily zigzags through life, tossing junk at us.  Overcoming its own truth is not the brain's forte.  

On our travels, a few weeks ago  it rained all night.  My brain, however, was still in  drought mode.  It instructed me to not waste Benton's stale water, but to instead pour it on a shrub outside.  I watered a rain drenched shrub.

Bang!  Both Ed and I jumped.  Was that dynamite?   Wow, where?  We were on a  deserted beach on a sunny day.    Bang!  Again.  We saw it this time.  A wave hitting the rocks, Bang!   Bang again!     Brains don't always get it right.  

I often need to tell my brain to shut up, especially at 3:00 a.m. My loved ones are safe in their beds, but, that  brain of mine has me fretting about one imminent disaster after another. If it can't fool me about disasters it will pester me with minutiae. 

My brain sends me other messages I need to stomp out.  Thoughts like desire instead of restraint; anger instead of calm; jealousy rather than reason. My brain can't  always get it right and I need to correct it's wayward path.  I need to assert reason into crazy random thoughts.  Fingers crossed I keep my mouth shut until reason is found again.

And what is it about retrieval?  I know the word I want, but where is it?    I turn to Ed for help. "What's that word I'm searching for?  You know, the one that has to do with space travel."   "Rocket, Saturn, moon?" He suggests.  "No!" I say.  If he can't help me, I get peeved.  It's  Ed after all who says "we have a distributed memory system."    If I can't remember, he must.   It's his job, right?

Then hours later, my brain, working all the while, throws the word at me.  Ed and I will be  talking about the weather or some such, when I suddenly say, "Sputnik".  "What?" he says.   "Remember that word I couldn't think of?"  I say.  "Oh yeah." he says.  

Like the bumper sticker says, "Don't Believe Everything You Think."

~~~

“It is a question of cubic capacity," said he; "a man with so large a brain must have something in it.” 

~ Arthur Conan Doyle, Sherlock Holmes

Where are my boots?

=

S N O W ! !

When sorting through things I might or might not need on our travels, boots were put into the "off with their head" category.  Who would need boots in Mexico, California or Florida?  But with new snow to play in, I needed boots.  After a moment of panic, thinking my boots had already gone to the thrift store, Ed located them.   Ok, boots will stay in storage.  After all, once we begin traveling, we will be back for Thanksgiving or Christmas and it just might snow.

The day became all about sun, snow, play, happiness, laughing, silly stuff, delight...

Snow down the neck

Brad, Yessi, Ed, Fran & Benton

Yessi & Brad

Ed, Fran & Benton

~~~

"The first fall of snow is not only an event, it is a magical event. 
 You go to bed in one kind of a world and wake up in another quite different, 
and if this is not enchantment then where is it to be found?"

~JB Priestley

Shark Reef

For a classic Lopez Island walk,  despite a looming storm, we headed to Shark Reef, a nature preserve and walking paradise.   The sky was dynamic with clouds crazily blowing every which way.  The water, mean-looking, swirled wildly with the changing tides.  Looking down from the rocky cliffs we could see the seals frolicking in the surf.  We would have surely died in this wild sea yet these seals were buoyant in their seal world.  A little seal head would appear, like a beach ball floating on the surface, peer at us, dive, just to pop up nearby, to peer at us again.  And masses of birds.   There were large  flocks of migrating ducks; hundreds of squawking gulls; lone blue heron sentries; and the occasional eagle giving us an evil eye.   One little duck, a Bufflehead perhaps, was playing the seal game.   Floating quietly on wild waves, diving, resurfacing, diving again.

~~~

"The sea is emotion incarnate.  It loves, hates, and weeps.  It defies all attempts to capture it with words and rejects all shackles.  No matter what you say about it, there is always that which you can't."

~ Christopher Paolini

Thanksgiving Lopez Style

Living on Whidbey Island, I understand the relaxing sigh of getting on the ferry -- that, awwww of leaving the rat race of the other side.  When boarding the ferry departing for Lopez Island, the sigh is longer and deeper.  The crossing is lengthier putting more time and more peace between the island and the mainland.   Lopez Island has fewer cars, people, houses, lights.  More open space, quiet.  There are friendly little roads with hi there waves from the other drivers.

If I were to relocate to another island it would no doubt be Lopez Island, if not an even more remote island.  An island more like Whidbey Island was 30 years ago when we first moved here.  Lopez is still wonderfully rural, with the charming Lopez Village offering services, social encounters and cultural events to fulfill needs and desires, even if in small doses.  We enjoyed expresso at Isabel's, shopped for organic groceries at Blossom, lunch at the Vortex and hanging out in the library.

Fran at Vortex Restaurat -- we couldn't resist a color-coordinated photo.

Lopez Library

We went to Lopez for an early Thanksgiving celebration with friends.   We learned long ago not to commute between two islands on a holiday, so we simply changed the date.  Now we usually have two Thanksgivings which is perfect as Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday.

Happy Thanksgiving! 

We parked Thistle in the drive of friends for three nights and at the Greene Partners studio in the village, Walmart-style, a couple of other nights.  One evening we invited our hosts, Joe and Nancy, to dinner in Thistle, serving a cabbage soup, with blue cheese and hard crusted bread.  For dessert we finished off with sliced pears and chocolate.  Eating Thistle-style is definitely not a hardship.

Greene Partners RV parking

A lovely five days, with rain, but lovely nevertheless...

~~~

"The best thing one can do when it's raining is to let it rain."

~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Gadget Bluster

Blam!  Both Benton and I were enjoying a  beautiful, peaceful walk down Edgecliff Drive this morning when we were startled by a strange loud noise.  Next we were being showered by little white feathers.  I thought, good grief bird, watch where you're going as there was a telephone pole with lots of cross bars and equipment overhead.  Then the true story unfolded a few paces further along.  A hawk, with his prey in his talons, sat by the edge of the road.

Continuing our walk I stopped to take these photos to prove the beautiful walk part of my story.  No way was I quick enough to prove the hawk part.

                                      

                               

Now here's my true confession.  This posting is practice.  Photos and blog posting have been done entirely on my i-phone.  Whoopee!  I did it.

     

~~~

"It ain't bragging if you can do it."       

      

~ Dizzy Dean

Treasures

America's public lands are this country's shining bright jewels.  The access we have to these scenic treasures makes  me almost giddy.  Great canyons, deserts, rivers, lakes, oceans, and mountains are our playgrounds as well as our cathedrals.  These lands are our physical and mental health clubs.  Not only does the grandeur of their geography unfold but the story of time is told.  Flora, fauna, stone and water explode cinema-like before us.

Following is a list of the campgrounds we stayed at this summer.  Despite some problems associated with pressing government financial constraints, we were still awed.  California's financial woes were the most evident but, sadly, services are being cut and fees going up in all state parks as well as in our national parks.  I'm pondering ways to give a helping hand.  Something more profound than pulling ivy or sending a check to Sierra Club, although those are greatly needed.  Ideas, anyone?

Dalles National Forest Campground, Greenwater, WA

Icewater Creek National Forest Campground, Cle Elum, WA

Ft. Casey State Park, Whidbey Island, WA

Seal Rock National Forest Campground, Hood Canal, WA

Nehalen State Park, Nehalen, OR

South Beach State Park, Newport, OR

Harris Beach State Park, Brookings, OR

Albee State Park, Humboldt Redwoods, CA

Clear Lake State Park, CA

Schoolhouse Campground,  Bullard's Bar, CA

Mt. Diablo State Park,  CA

Russian Gulch State Park, Mendocino, CA

Burlington State Park, Humboldt Redwoods, CA

Cape Blanco Point State Park, OR

Jessie M. Honeyman Memorial State Park, Florence, OR

Beverly Beach State Park,  Otter Rock, OR

Cape Lookout State Park, Three Capes Scenic Route, OR

~~~

"Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where Nature may heal and cheer and give strength to body and soul alike." 

~ John Muir