Catching Up

Artwork by January Hensley

In my life I have been late to just about every milestone. I get to these milestones in my own timely manner. Late didn’t matter though as I had a clear concise goal. Then in my last year of college I had to take two electives and I was at a loss. My goals were clear until this point. As some may figure I thought this would be an easy choice. Little did I know how that one move would impact my goals? The first choice was easy. I went with creative writing since I had written poetry since I was twelve. The second choice was Art history, and my major was archaeology so this seemed to fit. That one class changed everything in my world and the pull I felt to art I cannot explain. Though the pull was great I still stayed on my goal.

I graduated and then my husband and I lost everything due to our jobs downsizing because of the economy issues at the time. Here we were two college graduates with two children and not a dime to our name. Archaeology jobs are much like construction in the fact that they are temporary and seasonal. I don’t know if it was the fact that we were sinking and floundering but with no money and not a lot of entertainment, I found myself learning and reading any art books that I could get my hand on. I continued reading and studying for two years when my husband was telling me I should actually try to learn to draw instead of just drooling over the books and videos. He was right. We were slowly getting financially secure but I really had nothing left to lose since we were at the bottom. I took the chance and started to learn and actually apply the concepts. Amazingly I found I could do that better than I thought, but of course not expertly. Now shift to a couple of years later and we are secure as long as we live on a tight budget. My drawings are at the point where I want to learn how to do it without taking forever because I know there is crucial information I don’t have.

As I muddle through my drawings or paintings now I do not want to do just one thing such as portraits or flowers. I want to be able to sit at the table and draw whatever I see in my head. I don’t want to be a copy machine, but with our limited budget I cannot currently afford to take your class. I’m attaching the first drawing that I did at the table without using a reference for the face. The drawing took me about twelve weeks. This showed me it was possible to get where I want to be, but I need something crucial that I’m missing.