Drawing the Line
As the calendar flicks over to its third month, I start an annual sweat about achieving my yearly goals. Some years I only get around to writing them at this point but this time I’m ahead, I’ve actually started. My aspiration this time is to capture my world on paper.
When I was at university, one of my tutors once told me I had an incredible eye for drawing. He told me that if I were to practise sketching for half an hour every day, I could be one of the greatest illustrators of my generation.
I don’t say this to toot my own horn, what I’m saying is I knew at that very moment exactly what I was not going to be doing. There was no way that I, a plucky 20 year old who had recently discovered drinking, had the fortitude to sit down and draw for thirty minutes every single day.
Skip forward fifteen years and I’ve stayed true to my lazy pledge that afternoon. While I trot out my skill with a pencil occasionally, I often find myself lamenting that I did not follow that tutor’s sage advice. With no small amount of chagrin, I realised I had done a grand total of one single painting in all of 2023. Not great for a self proclaimed artist.
So my goal this year is a simple one, to draw, paint and doodle as much as humanly possible for a parent raising a young child. I even made a mental footnote to allow my son to scribble over my work if he chooses to do so, this was mainly to prepare myself for what he would inevitably do to my drawings given half a chance.
The goal started in the best way a goal could, by going stationary shopping. I got myself a lovely pan of watercolours, a few fancy waterproof ink pens and two small sketchbooks. After spending well over my budget on a small handful of items, I was ready to paint. Choosing what to paint was the easy part, I have a lovable headstrong son to illustrate, a good looking husband and more than a few charming little animals lying around the place. I also have a flower garden which is currently in full bloom so for the first few pages I drew nothing but flowers. Throughout January I hungrily captured my small family and my back yard on paper with brush and pen.
After the dopamine hit of spending all my money on art supplies wore off, I slowed down my doodling output but I’m still fairly pleased with my continued efforts. I will never be the greatest illustrator of our time, but so far I’m happy.
I sat down last night to finish a sketch that I’ve been working on, full of hubris. This one was to be a drawing of my husband and son sitting together on the couch and it was going to be beautiful. I was working from a photo I had taken, Anthony’s adorable legs in a frog-like position as he watched his Dad play whatever video game. Both sitting side by side, staring at a screen. Perhaps not the most idyllic image of a family but I am the mother of an energetic two year old boy and usually my phone can only catch him, a smiling blur, as he races happily around the yard.
I finished my sketch, added a splash of colour and passed it proudly to my husband for perusal. Isaac’s eyes lit up when he saw our amphibious son, and did the opposite of lighting up when he saw how I’d drawn himself. In my excitement to capture my little toad boy, I had neglected my wifely duties. Isaac’s visage was mostly a face, a distended brow reaching towards the left of the page. His figure was slumped, attached to a flaccid body too weak to hold up the mass atop it. His forehead managed to look large enough, not to suggest intelligence, but rather to show off a receding hairline. The face, I rounded off with a chin too feeble to fold a piece of paper. Below the swollen head I managed to capture every fat roll, every stray whisker and every wrinkle, exaggerated further by the contrast of the young boy sitting at his side. As he studied the image, I saw his self-regard wilt like my garden in June. “Oh,” he said and then quickly lied, “it’s good!”
Perhaps I should stick to painting flowers but where is the challenge in that? I think I’ll try to capture his visage again on a more auspicious evening. At the very least, I’ve married a man who knows when best to tell one small fiction.
