A sketchbook week, late April-early May 2020

A long time since I've posted here, thinking I'd have a new website built by now. Not there yet. In the meantime, entries in my sketchbook this last week. Studies of small moments. Reminding myself that seeing beauty requires no more than adopting a positive attitude.

From the dogwood tree in front of the house, these in a vase on the dining room table.On a sunlight dappled morning, where I walk down over the railroad tracks to the Northwest River Trail.A battered silver maple near the riverside trail.Realizing how I distorted the foreshortening in the previous day's drawing, another try from the same poison ivy infested spot, with two thirds of the canopy rising beyond the bounds of the page.Told that I should draw everyday objects for a change instead of just trees that all look the same (I don't think so but ...), this mundane scene at the kitchen table after rhubarb pie.

A third sketch of the same tree, pen and ink, trying to get it all on the page.Garlic mustard. Described by invasive species botanists as a noxious weed, an infestation, non-native to our soils, aggressive, destructive, a serious concern to American forests. Extremely difficult to control. I think of viral outbreaks, pandemics, of Covid 19. But on a walk along the flooded river trail, nonetheless beautiful in the early morning sunlightRescuing Tarik from the side of Rte 83 northbound after the gearbox gave out in Ina's 21 year old Chevy S-10. Waiting next to the highway for AAA tow truck to arrive. This is why I carry a sketchbook most of the time, for those otherwise idle moments when I'm on a "waste no time" campaign.Perhaps a hundred yards off a curving dip on Anderson Ferry Road, a giant sycamore grows next to Donegal Creek. In every season, it stands out in the landscape, irresistably drawing my gaze. Each of the countless times I've passed it on the road these twenty years that I've been a resident of Marietta, I've thought I need to attempt a portrait. Finally, a view from the road where it crosses the creek.Fresh air beside a country road, sitting in the weeds, not a single car passed.