A flu jab and then two hours drawing in a café. A good morning’s work, I felt. The rain was relentless and the cafés door being open meant that the flow of customers was constant. I make him sit downstairs (he is my companion in all things these days) where it is cold and stark but for me, at least fruitful. I like the buzz of having to draw quickly, to make snap decisions – though I have yet to use all the drawing materials I spread out on the table. Most people don’t notice, though yesterday, a woman did come over and say something. I’d drawn her and her husband (he was a joy to sketch, she not so). She had one of those rather washed-through faces, without any real feature. A gentle, benign face, framed with soft, careful, blue-rinsed grey curls. Can I just say? she asked with a purring Welsh lilt. I looked up. Can I just say that you clearly have a talent for drawing people? I thanked her, wondering how she could’ve seen from where she was sitting whether I had talent or not. Then she went on to tell me about a girl she knew who used to draw in Chapel. She turned to her husband, you remember Sian, and how she used to take a pencil and paper into Chapel? She said this in English so that I might understand, though they were both Welsh speakers. I was touched. It seemed a big deal for her to come over and say that. We said goodbye when she left. I’m beginning to recognise some of the people I now habitually draw. This is a small town and people in small towns nurture routine. I want to get better, to find other ways of representing them, capturing them, listening to them, showing compassion through line. Can I do it?
Town was busy this morning as I walked (on the first dry morning for an age). The clubs had just ejected the young, and they flooded the pavements like un-shepherded cattle, coatless and wild and shouting. I find it hard to adjust to from being quietly in my head. Sometimes I think the wind (it was strong this morning) can make them so (I’ve seen it in horses). Though most were coatless, it was the spindly-legged girls in high heels, their thin summer dresses or scanty shorts offering little cover against the blasts of cold wind, that shivered and skittered like new-born foals. A middle-aged woman (tiny she was) stood at the bottom of Terrace Road, shrieking at a cluster of young men outside the 24hr SPAR. LUKE! she shouted. LUKE! I’M TAKING A FUCKING TAXI! No, response from any of them. Was Luke there? LUKE! she shouted again. LUKE, I’M GOING HOME ON MY FUCKING OWN!
