Blast from the Past #319: Flame sword

These two drawings were very likely done back in the late 1970's or early 1980's, when part of my meager income was derived from illustrations I created for various fanzines. I am not certain that either was ever published (actually, I AM certain that the unfinished inked one wasn't).

Although I have done it a few times, I was never that into doing multiple versions of a drawing -- I guess I just got too bored. But for some reason, I did it with this one. I don't have a clear memory of why, but I suspect this was the first version, drawn in pencil and then partially inked:



For whatever reason, I declined to finish inking this piece. It's likely that as I was inking it, I saw that it might benefit from the more easily obtainable lighting effects possible with a different media, specifically the coquille board I was experimenting with around that time. So out came my trusty homemade light table, and I transferred the basic image to a piece of the coquille board and finished it thusly. -- PL

Things Change Part Five: "Festina Lente"

"Make haste slowly."

While thinking about a title for this blog entry, I remembered this English phrase, and when I Googled it, I got a number of hits, many relating to the Roman Emperor Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus, as well as the Latin version of the phrase, "Festina Lente". The meaning of the phrase is basically that things in life should be done "with a proper balance of urgency and diligence", to quote Wikipedia.

I've been giving a lot of thought to this concept recently, and trying to stick to it. With the major changes in my life begun by the realizations described in "Things Change" Part One, I have been re-evaluating many aspects of my life, and trying to keep the good ones, ditch the bad ones, and forge a new way forward that will be better for me and for my loved ones, especially my wife.

I have this great sense of urgency to do the right things, while also trying to make up for my past errors. It is a useful motivating force, and I am glad it is there, but I am finding that it is leading me to become a bit too impatient with seeing those necessary changes made, and their effects to be felt. What I am discovering is that there are things that can be changed within days (and I have done some of those), some within weeks (and I've done a few of those too), but some of these changes will take months and maybe even years. I need to relax and take things at the proper pace. It's difficult, and occasionally painful and frustrating, but I really do want -- and need -- to do this right. -- PL

Profile of Emily

I was out in the old studio for a little while today, continuing the long and hopefully not-too-arduous process of clearing out all unnecessary and unwanted stuff -- in today's case, a big stack of "Cycle News" that I had saved for some reason (said reason not being at all clear to me now), and which are now a step closer to the local recycling center.

While walking into the old studio, I saw something which made me smile. It always does, when I notice it. Here's a photo I snapped of the cap on the newel post on the stairs leading up to the studio proper.



Back when this studio space was being built, I asked the carpenters to take a silhouette I'd made of my young (I think she was about two at the time) daughter Emily's profile and use it as the template when they created the newel post caps on a lathe. I think it worked well -- glanced at, the cap looks simply like a pleasing abstract design, but when closely examined you can see the profile on either side. -- PL

"Things Change…" Part Four: Out of the woods

Change continues.

Over the last couple of days, with the helpful and timely encouragement of my wife, I have gone through my clothes closet, which -- for many years now -- has been another of my "disaster area" rooms. Jumbles of shirts on hangers… piles of used and new clothes on the floor, waiting in vain for an organizing hand… hats purchased years ago with an eye toward a more "sophisticated" look, and abandoned when I realized I didn't like the way they felt on my head… lumpy heaps of TMNT t-shirt samples from various licensees… shoes worn once, perhaps twice… and so on.

I have a lot of "spring cleaning" of this sort to do in the house and in my old studio, and Jeannine wisely suggested I start here. It made sense -- it's the smallest room, and she saw that it would be quite possibly the easiest, for at least one big reason -- anything I decided to divest myself of could simply be tossed into a bag and brought to the local Goodwill Industries drop box.

So I tore into it, with somewhat ruthless -- but practical -- abandon. About half of the stuff I put into bags for Goodwill was brand new, never been worn… some of it never even out of plastic bags or off the original hangars. For example, I have over the last ten years bought many a four-pocket shirt -- guayaberas they're called, and also known as the "Mexican wedding shirt". Jeannine bought me my first one about ten years or so ago, in Portsmouth, NH. She'd seen it in a funky little clothing shop and -- knowing my fondness for pockets -- thought I might like it.

And she was right.

Little did she know that she was starting a fashion trend for me which would last up until about a month ago. Really, with the exception of a few formal occasions, I'm pretty sure that for the last decade I have worn four-pocket shirts exclusively -- light cotton ones in the summer, heavier linen or hemp ones in the winter. And they were extremely practical, as I tend to carry around a bunch of stuff with me that conveniently fit into those four pockets. They also didn't need to be tucked in, which -- given the weight I'd put on over those years -- was another plus.

But the four-pocket shirts are now fading from my life. I'm keeping a few -- they're comfortable, and I've discovered that with a few of them at least they actually look okay when tucked in. (You can't use the lower tier of two pockets, but that's okay). However, I suspect that over the next year or so those will disappear as well. They're just not me anymore.

And that's because in so many ways, I'm not me anymore. At least, not the me from before my "epiphany". Yes, I do retain much of my previous self, my long-established personality quirks, good and bad, my basic nature… but so much has changed. I am seeing life in such a fresh way. It's not entirely easy, although I see it as being very nearly entirely good -- I'm struggling with a lot of emotions that have been bottled up, throttled down, covered in dust for a long time. I've told Jeannine a few times that I feel like some kind of animal which has molted, abandoning its old, worn, dead shell for a new one, one which is raw and new and open to lots of feelings, both good and bad.

The new shell will toughen up over time, and this phase will go away. But my goal -- and I have pledged to Jeannine that I will stick to it (I mean, yesterday I literally got down on one knee, took her hands, and made this pledge) -- is that I will never let that shell get between us again.

My therapist (who I wish I had started seeing a long time ago, as he has helped me a great deal over the last two years) cautions me that these kinds of evolutions are not linear, that they can be more of a spiral path, and that I may from time to time come close to or even temporarily enter that foggy realm from which I have escaped. I believe he's right, and I will be on the lookout for those missteps. It's possible that I will make them.

But I now have great motivation to avoid them… and that, I think, will help me a lot.

So back to the clothes closet… into more than a dozen thirteen-gallon plastic drawstring bags went piles of shirts, pants, shoes, hats, and t-shirts. I even tossed in all except one of the "Signature Series" TMNT shirts that had been produced using artwork I'd done specifically for them. I did keep a few of the old glow-in-the-dark TMNT t-shirts from the early years, though I suspect they may not stay too long.

And the sense of freedom after completing this task was wonderful. I still have a long way to go -- there's a lot more stuff to go through and get rid of. But this was a great start, and I thank Jeannine once again for gently pushing me to do it. -- PL

P.S. The "Out of the Woods" title for this blog entry comes from two sources -- one, my great sense of relief that I have somehow managed to stumble "out of the woods" of depression and unhappiness; and two, for the beautiful creature in the photo I took yesterday while Jeannine and I were bicycling on our new favorite bike path. Jeannine spotted the deer, and alerted me to its presence… and the deer was nice enough to stay in one spot while I unlimbered my camera and got a couple of shots with the zoom lens.

The bitter and the sweet

This is another comment that I thought deserved more than just a response in the "Comments" section. In a comment on my "Step Toads" post, ‪Dane E5R‬ said...

"So, Peter. This has nothing to with your current post, but I've been wondering this since I've been following this blog and seeing how much it appears you seem to be enjoying yourself these days.

Do you still believe that life is, at best, bittersweet?"

The short answer is "Yes, I do."

But I feel that deserves a little clarification. My interpretation of that quote from Jack Kirby's character Darkseid in Kirby's last issue of "Mister Miracle" is not (as some people take it) that life at its absolute best moments is bittersweet, but that life taken as a whole is. In other words, life is a sometimes ragged, sometimes smooth, blend of experiences and emotions ranging from bitter to sweet. And given the nature of human existence, that's the best we can expect.

I am discovering that perhaps the most important thing is how you deal with, how you accept with grace, the bitter parts (the sweet parts are pretty easy to deal with, after all). And even though I am finding much more joy in my life recently (and hope to continue to do so), there is still sadness. But I think I am doing better -- and hope to do better still -- at finding the right balance between the two. -- PL

Step Toads

We did some cleaning of our entryway floor mats a couple of days ago -- they can get kind of funky after a while, what with the dirt and stuff that comes off the bottoms of our shoes, plus the depredations that pets can inflict (I don't think I need to go into the gory, grimy details). So we hauled them out onto and draped them over the front steps, let the rain fall on them, sprayed them with a soapy cleanser, hosed them down two or three times, then let them dry in the fresh air and sun.

So after this procedure, they were ready to be brought back into the house, and I picked one of them up, to find these two critters sheltering underneath:



I guess they may have seen the space where the mat was draped over the steps like a little protective cave or something. I felt a bit bad about taking away their refuge, but I'm sure they'll find another. I did manage to get a pretty nice closeup of one of them before they both hopped on their way. -- PL

Pool cue

No, I'm not going to talk about eight-ball or billiards here, but that title just occurred to me, and I thought it was clever. Well, a little bit, anyway.

This past week, when my wife and I went to Portsmouth, we swam in the hotel pool one day. Unlike Jeannine, I'm not a great swimmer, but I like to splash around a bit, and I find swimming on my back relaxing.

Until, that is, I bonked my head on the edge of the pool, because I had misjudged where it was and how quickly I was approaching it. As I winced and rubbed the bump on my head, I started thinking that it would be very helpful if there were guidelines painted on the ceiling -- basically just an outline of the pool itself, lined up directly over the pool. That way, when someone was swimming on their back, they could just look up and quickly get a "cue" as to how close they were to the edge of the pool, thus potentially staving off a painful bump.

There could even be a "warning" line, perhaps in red or yellow, set inside the pool's outline some distance away, maybe five feet, so as to give a preliminary proximity warning. Here's a quick illustration of the kind of ceiling graphic I'm thinking of:



Now, not having spent a lot of time in hotel pools, I concede that this may in fact be something that is already done. But in the few hotel pools I have been in, I've not seen it. -- PL