I'm back September 21, 2014

At the time of my last entry, I hadn’t quite decided whether to terminate this blog or to keep pressing forward until I felt that I was securely on a new path.  My resolution was further stalled by a family difficulty that needed my full attention and sucked all of the joy and much of the momentum out of my life.  I dropped out of the West Marin Players summer show, terminated my weekly vocal coaching sessions, and opted against auditioning for the next West Bay Opera production.  But because I needed to learn to draw, I latched onto a lifeboat in the form of an intensive summer course in drawing and composition at College of Marin.  Those four and half hours of daily immersion in graphite, charcoal, and water color wash were the rudder that focused my attention and provided a direction to weather my personal storm.

Now that a patch of calm has opened up, I have decided to take up the blog again and continue to chronicle my passaggio.

I seem to be hurtling more and more toward architecture, design, or art in some form or other as my next big adventure.  My summer drawing course certainly pointed out my abundant weaknesses, but they also demonstrated that persistence and practice can pay off.  For example, our teacher demanded 14 self-portraits from us as two weekends’ homework; I began by cringing at the wrinkles and the bags, but ended up making peace with my mug and came up with one or two drawings that at least were recognizable to myself as me.  And despite how difficult I found the black water-color washes, I ended up loving their zen-like unpredictability and simplicity.

This fall I am again a student at College of Marin.  After a bit of a stumble as I tested out painting, sculpture, and beginning architectural design, I finally settled on two art classes, digital architectural drawing and color theory, as well as two performance groups, Marin Oratorio and Chamber Singers.  In theory, my “major” is visual and performance art, but I’m not sure there is an actual degree in that combo, not that I really need one.  More about these courses in future blog posts seems likely.

But for the moment, I’ll just say that I see myself heading toward an application to California College of the Arts for next fall, likely for an M Arch, but possibly for and MFA in Design.  A destination is starting be in sight.