Art and Life

Even though I've been working on the same components, this has been a great few days of work. I'm learning so much, even if I don't have it all yet. This is a picture of my sketchbook from August. On the upper left is a list of the components that I thought made up a dulcimer from then. The list below that one is one I did last night, and it has over twice as many components than my August list. And I did the drawing, too. In the drawing I left out two components. And I know I left off some components. So I cannot wait until next month's drawings!

Last night I had such a struggle. I got home and settled a bit later then my usual time, and I wanted to draw. So I had to decide between blogging and drawing. I chose the list and drawing that I did on the August sketchbook page. And I started another drawing. Granted these are less lyrical than my normal drawings, and they are a lot less emotional--or are they?

I drew this after I gave an exercise to my drawing class. The exercise was to put a longish object next to two vertical objects. Then there had to be a forced perspective. I loved to use these stuffed animals in my drawing class because they were mine and I'd drawn them a lot. So one day I got home and threw them on my studio table. I came back later and they looked like they were going to fight. So I put my shotgun between them and drew what I saw in charcoal and pastel. The ghosty marks are my continuous effort to get the shotgun laying down into space as I saw it and not as I thought is should be. My kids loved it when I showed them how hard I had to work to get it right.

And I love to make drawings that are somewhere between the two drawings above, where I can combine the real with the imagined, which is really just a different kind of real, right. I've never been a guy who can create in a vacuum. I found out that this goes for the work that I'm doing now.

Today I had to draw out the lines to cut the tongue on the peghead. I had to find a place to begin because the end of the wood was not square with my base or reference sides. I sat there for some time before I figured out how to start that part. But I'm really happy that I came up with the idea to start on my own. And then when I shared that with Dwain he said that he did the same thing. I'm glad that I'm thinking at a higher level with some of this stuff because I'm feeling like a baby with other parts.

I spent quite a while on this today, but now that I'm starting the third machine I plan on being meticulous with my notes and drawings. Then I'm going to combine all of the different notes, my drawings, blog material, and more together to make a compendium of building dulcimers.

I have no idea when it will end because there will be information to add as I experience different circumstances with building, like with the finger board, where I messed up and had to cover that with the zircote laminate. Now I have another thing to add to me list--laminate finger board.

Tonight we went out to a hotdog joint to celebrate Dwain's birthday. Gretchen met us there with a cake, and we had dinner and dessert and gifts. It was really nice to celebrate with these guys because today was our anniversary--Val and me, I mean. As I was soft-stalking Dwain to make sure that me studying with him was right I found out that his birthday is on our anniversary. We took that as some sort of cosmic sign.

We've been together since '08 and married for two of those years. I cannot share enough how great my time with Val has been. I've grown so much in these years with her support. I do love that woman. Who else gets a hand-made shirt for their anniversary?