Back in April, one of my co-workers found out that I dabble in calligraphy, and he asked me to do “Dance like nobody’s watching” in calligraphy on a small sheet of paper, so he could give it to his wife. I assured him that I am no good as a calligrapher, but told him that I could probably convince my mom to do the piece, as she is an excellent scribe.
I never caught her in the right moment; however, so I resolved to do it myself. I did 4 or 5 pieces that I was very dissatisfied with. Then I decided to do it on watercolor paper on top of a nice watercolor wash. I finally completed one that I was fairly happy with only to realize that I had written “Dance like nobody’s wathing.” According to the Urban Dictionary, wathing is “Stalkerishly watching someone or something bathe.” I think the most disturbing part of that definition is the part about watching “something” bathe in a stalkerish manner. Shiver.
Anyway, missing the “C” changed the meaning of the phrase resolutely. So I had to start over. Again.
I was working on painting an ocean scene, so my palette was already loaded with purples, greens, and blues, so I got the paper soaking wet and washed those colors over it. I then peppered the paper with kosher salt. When it was all dry, it had a neat, almost tie-dyed, effect. I drew guidelines on and went at it with a teal calligraphy pen.
Man, I really need to start taking better pictures of my stuff. Anyway, it’s not awesome, and the calligraphy needs a lot of work, but I gave it to my friend yesterday, and he was really happy with it. As long as the (non-paying) customer is happy, I am happy. It only took me 6 months to complete it! Now I just need to finish my Mom (from Futurama) painting, and I’ll have a totally clean slate.
To get me off on the right foot, this morning I spent half-an-hour typing up an inventory of all our (“our” being Mom and me) watercolor paints. It seems that for every class I take, I have to spend $40 on paints, even though I already have 3 baggies full of them. Somehow I never have the exact right shade of cadmium yellow (the teacher requires deep and I have light, etc.). To save time, I created a spreadsheet with columns for Main Color, Color Name, and Brand. Now I can easily sort to see all the various reds or greens that I have. It’s pretty awesome. I kinda want to sign up for a class right this minute, so I can tell in 60 seconds whether I already have the appropriate colors in stock. Ah, blessed spreadsheets…
On that note, Go Hawks! Weeeuuwww!
