Wrinkles! What Wrinkles?

This morning I considered whether to run in the open air, to brace the cold and the wind, or to take the alternative and head to the gym in the warmth of the car. At they gym I could run in shorts and running vest in the warmth of the place. Outside I would have to wear thicker heavier running gear.

As I ran I found my heart uplifted almost mile by mile. First I watched the soaring buzzard as it scanned the fields below looking for its breakfast. Then I startled two deer, they stopped to watch me as I ran off in the other direction, no danger to them. Of more danger was the fox that ran alongside me sheltered by the bushes . 

Then sitting on the fencepost I saw the little Red Kite , it seemed maybe he had already had success in the hunting stakes. He looked at peace with the world, and did not flinch a muscle as I ran past. 

Next I watched the fresh pieces of wood drop from the tree and had to stop for a moment to look up and watch the Lesser Speckled Woodpecker at work high in the boughs.

Six and a half miles and I was home, warm from my exertion and ready to face my day.

The alternative, had I chosen to go to the gym would have been to run the same miles , but all I would see was my own face in the mirror in front of me as I pounded out the miles going nowhere. 

The mirror is never a pretty sight at the best of times.  The older we get the more we become conscious of age catching up.  

While out running, I am that 18 year old who loved playing music and dancing. I am the 25 year old minister who was told one day by his dear old organist that he was the boy who would never grow old. I am the  older man who stood at the top of the mountain and rejoiced in managing to run the whole way there without stopping. 

In the mirror I see the wrinkles of age, the pattern I have woven over the years with the life I have lived. 

Now had I ran on the treadmill I might now have been thinking about going for a haircut. Having run outside I am still that young man and I am going off to paint. 

I am what life has made me. I am not at all ashamed of the pattern I have woven. I have not allowed the blind tattooist to set his agenda. I have not let accident shape me or mould me . The wrinkles I see tell there story. 

The artist paints. We either paint a thing of beauty or we start again. The pattern of our life we are equally in control of, we do not paint without thought, we should not go through life thoughtlessly , letting accident dictate. No matter our age we are still in control. Whether we produce a an ugly thing or are a joy to be with is our sole responsibility. 

Wrinkles!!!! What wrinkles I no wrinkles. Do you??????

This is the very initial stages of what I hope will be a Pen and Ink of  Mont St Michele  in France. This is a place I love.  This is a complex subject and I may yet have to abandon but I give you this the first stage. 

Today I hope to go over the pencil marks and begin to add some shading. I am already aware that I have a few errors to sort, but having started in pencil I can do that. 

I hope my friends who read this have a lovely day. This is the day I spend time with my friends in the afternoon. We call ourselves, “The Last of the Summer Wine.” Those who live in the UK will know exactly what that means. 

Mistakes and Putting Them to Use

I suppose the tale I am about to tell in today’s open and free culture may seem tame but when it happened this was far from the case. I came out of a church building fairly late one evening. Standing at the bus stop opposite was a middle aged couple much under the influence of alcohol. They were in fact waiting for a bus that was never going to come, the last one had long gone. At this time I was giving serious consideration to putting my head down and trying to get myself into college as and was always eager and willing to help others. If I was going to be a minister then I had better start practising. I got the couple into the car, not mine might I add, but a friend. We got them round to the address the man had given us. On arrival he asked if I would help him get her into the house. I did that but then he wanted me to help get her into bed. Well I did this with as much decorum as was possible. He got in beside her I put out the lights and locked his door and put the keys back through his letter box.


The next day I popped round to see if all was okay with them. They did not know each other. They had in fact only met a short time before I came out of the church building.

Was this a mistake? Who knows I never hung around long enough to ever find out.

I read a letter in an art magazine where somebody was reflecting on his art master and his insistence on drawing and getting it right. He stated, “Nobody was allowed to touch paint until they could draw.” For those who could draw, wonderful they got to move on to paint for others art for the rest of their life was a dead thing. I had an art teacher who made the same mistake and so it is only recently I came back to art.

We all make mistakes and the artist is no different from anybody else. The wrong colour, the wrong mix, the perspective is all wrong, one kind of gaffe or another. For so many starting out in art these mistakes can be seen as a disaster, they see it as a conformation that they are no good at art. The true artist accepts it as a part of what happens to the artist and learns from the mistake. They note it away and make sure they do not make the same mistake again. If it does happen again then they feel that the lesson has not yet been learned and they start again.

Everyday for the artist is a learning experience. It should be shared with others. I have set myself the task that in the coming year I will open the door to art for at least three people who say to me, “I would love to be able to be an artist, but I am just hopeless.” I will do not to become a tutor or as another source of income but simply to inspire.

As you can see from the painting at the start of this blog,I still cannot draw. That does not mean I did not get a great deal of pleasure in the production of this "picture". I am also aware that it has brought pleasure to many others. Would it be a mistake to show others the error of my ways?