Civil War Day

The next time you hear someone crying about how hard art is, try shoveling rock.

Yes, while OSU and Oregon have been duking it out I have been shoveling rock. Now it is true the road needed it. See in its infinite wisdom, Coos County stopped maintain my street. In the year and a half since they decide not to play, my little street turned into the dark side of the moon. I mean the Sea of Tranqulity has nothing on Evergreen Lane when it comes to craters.

Yes, Crater Lake is bigger, but only a little. When we started filling in the holes we found two Volkswagens, a dromedary and three missionaries.

What does this have to do with art? Nice of you to ask, art is a gift, it requires dedication, practice and hard work, but don’t for a minute think that doing art is labor. It isn’t, shoveling rock is labor and hard labor at that. This would discourage me from a life of crime.

See artists like to think what they do is harder than just about anything and don’t get me wrong it is pretty hard. Gene Fowler said it best, “Writing is easy. All you do is sit staring at a blank sheet of paper until beads of blood form on your forehead.” Visual art is very like writing only the beads of blood form on the roots of the hair you’ve ripped from your scalp.

But it is not labor, at least not if you are doing it right. Art is like love, all consuming, passionate and divine. Does that sound like labor to you? (If you don’t understand labor ask any woman the second hour of labor.) Art isn’t that rough. Men do it, isn’t that proof enough?

We all believe that we are creating the greatest art of all time and that that process is like dying but having to come back the next day and start again. And when the vision stops we throw up our hands and scream “I’m blocked!” Yes, it does happen to artists who don’t write.

Well don’t you believe it. You may be stumped for an idea of what to do next, or lost about how to fix a project that’s gone just a little off course, but you aren’t blocked. You wouldn’t put up with plumber’s block or rock shoveler’s block so don’t lean on artist’s block when you run dry for a week or two.

And yes, I whine as much, maybe more as any other guy, so the next time you hear me grousing or moaning or winging, remind me about the pile of …rock I spent Civil War day shoveling. Can’t tell you how warm and comfy my computer room with all of my processing toys or my sketch pad with all of my lousy, distorted bearded ladies looks after a day in the cold.