How do you build a new
self from the ground up? Is the
foundation intact, or is even that subject to revision?
Several years ago, in a
moment of boredom, I picked up a pencil and started sketching: a chunk of rock in a kids' book: swirls of purple and
blue and white, with multiple facets, gradations of light.
To my own surprise, I kept on drawing. A cherry, a tree, an eye, a shoe. I taught myself from an online art class. I was playing, not expecting perfection, not taking the whole adventure seriously. I found myself honing in on people’s faces, despite warnings about the insane difficulty of portraiture, and have never wavered—I, who can barely decide on a couch or a paint color.
I had taught myself how
to draw as a child from a mail order art course, copied photos of people from
magazines. Offhandedly sketched a face
here and there. I forgot all that. Yet here it is, returning, a pure, cold
spring. A self I
neither nurtured nor dreamed of becoming--a gift, wholly unearned.
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