Remembering

 January 11th, 2019

It’s not something I’m proud of, but for about 5 years from 2013-2018, I pretty much stopped doing any sort of art all together. Beyond little adventures with friends such as paint nights, I stopped drawing. I stopped doing doodles on notes or colored pencil pieces or inking. All of it vanished during a time where most of my life revolved around being a PhD student, and the hobby that I had done since I was big enough to life a pencil…died. It was probably the darkest time in my life, even if, at the time, I was so mired in it that I couldn’t see what it was doing to me. When I eventually left that world for a job, I didn’t pick art back up; I don’t know why. I guess I just forgot about how it used to make me feel.

It wasn’t until I took a trip to London with some friends that everything changed for me. We were there for two weeks, and the first week was spent sightseeing and exploring as much as we could. The second was considered our relaxation week, where we split up to do whatever we wanted to do now that the rabid need for visiting every monument had faded.

Something tickled the back of my mind, and knowing that I was planning on visiting a few museums that week, I decided to stop by a nearby art store close to my destination and see what they had. It was like a breath of fresh air: rows of beautifully lined pencils and pens, stacked up quality paper of every size that could be imagined, and shelves of art supplies I had never even interacted with before as a kid. I felt as giddy as a kid in a candy shop, and I ended up spending way more than intended, with my most expensive prize being a Faber-Castell Polychromos Pencil Set with a 120 pencils of assorted colors. To be honest, I worried I was making a mistake in spending money on such a large set. I wasn’t sure I deserved to buy something like that, when I hadn’t touched my very small regular set of colored pencils in years. But it called to me in way I hadn’t felt in a very long time. So I bought it.

I ended up not bringing that set to any of the museums (it would have been incredibly stressful to try and lay out my colored pencils). Instead I brought a few graphite pencils, a gum eraser, and a sketchbook. I didn’t really know what I was looking for, but I felt more like myself than I had in years, carrying finely sharp weapons of mass destruction (to paper). There was a special exhibit that month in the museum; one that was normally located in Scotland. I didn’t know anything about it, or its creator, but when I went into the room specifically laid out for this piece alone, I was struck by its gentle beauty and power.

The Monarch of the Glen was unlike anything I had ever seen before. There was something in it that captivated me, and though I wandered other parts of the museum, my mind kept longing to return to that corner of the building. Eventually, I gave in.

I sat on a cold, stone bench for over 5 hours, sketching madly to try and capture even the smallest bit of majesty in that stag’s visage. People came and went, but I sat, back hunched and probably in need of a stretch, until my need to draw faded. When I was done, I looked at what I had drawn and felt both happy and ashamed. Happy that I could remember the passion that I felt when an art mood took over me. Shame that I had abandoned it, and left it behind for so long when I could have spent years working on becoming better and growing.

I will always remember that trip with fondness and gratefulness. That painting is the sole reason I found my voice in art once again and I hope that I never lose that spark. I bought a small printed version of The Monarch of the Glen, and it hangs framed near my desk, to remind me of that day and to remind me to never let go of something that makes me so happy.