{"id":82,"date":"2005-12-28T19:41:59","date_gmt":"2005-12-28T23:41:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.silkentent.com\/History\/2005\/12\/28\/winter-count-%e2%80%94-november\/"},"modified":"2008-12-28T21:54:38","modified_gmt":"2008-12-29T01:54:38","slug":"winter-count-%e2%80%94-november","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.silkentent.com\/History\/?p=82","title":{"rendered":"Winter Count \u00e2\u20ac\u201d November"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"HolidailiesDecember 28, 2005
\nWednesday<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Wcnov\"<\/a>I love trees. One volume of The Silken Tent<\/em> was called “The Gestures of Trees.” I took the name from the work of Loren Cruden, a naturalist and herbal healer who studies Native American and Celtic spirituality. In The Spirit of Place<\/em> she writes, “Life moves most gracefully in the gestures of trees \u00e2\u20ac\u201d resilient, responsive, unafraid.”<\/p>\n

In the summer of 2002 I took a series of lessons at a local art school called “Drawing for Everyone.” Although my primary medium of artistic expression is words, I long to be able to draw, to create with pictures rather than essays. Under the direction of a talented teacher that summer, I made progress. In Massachusetts I bought a little book called Sketchbooking<\/em> by Barbara Stecher. Although she works in watercolors (even while traveling), I was able to adapt her ideas and techniques to the ink and colored pencils I’m most comfortable with.<\/p>\n

Something in me keeps wanting to go back to drawing. On November 4, 2005, I gathered up all the art materials I could find \u00e2\u20ac\u201d some very old stuff from 1995, the first time I tried art lessons, the drawings from my classwork in 2002, and the sketchbook I’d carried in New England that summer and continued to use when I came back. The last drawing was labeled “A Tree Grows in Harrisburg,” and was of the tree pictured above. It stands in a corner of the Emerald Street playground, one block north of where I lived from the time I was seven until I was fifteen. The drawing was dated “November 4, 2002.”<\/p>\n

I took my camera and drove up to the playground. The weather was similar to that of the day I did the drawing. And the tree looked almost the same. I took a picture of it, seen above, and promised myself that this year I get all those pencils and papers and notebooks and ideas out and try again.<\/p>\n

To be included on the notify list, e-mail me:
\nmargaretdeangelis [at] gmail [dot] com (replace the brackets with @ and a period)<\/em><\/p>\n


\n