Hello friends! Long time no chat; how have you been?
I have been trying to pull this newsletter together for several months now. It started life as an idea for an illustrated essay, but then I got carried away when I started taking notes and writing, and it took on a life of its own and ended up being way too long for the newsletter. I also wanted to include some tables that the Substack platform does not support yet. Then I was going to record it as a podcast experiment, and finally, I got hit with a case of the blergs about it altogether, and it was all just too hard. So … I have put it aside and will publish it in a little while as a blog post when I can stomach looking at it again. I think it will fit better over there when the time is right.
In the meantime, please take this as a quick catch-up to let you know I am still alive and how I am adapting to a slower and softer pace of life.
Since I last sent you one of these newsletters, I took some time off work to welcome my lovely husband home after an extended business trip and let us settle back into our regular routines. It was so good to relax and reconnect face-to-face once again. My youngest son has almost finished university and has already started his new post-degree job part-time, and the older one hosted us all at his new home for dinner the other week and did a fabulous job of cooking for us. Evidence of life rolling on and my sons growing into independent, lovely young men. My heart is full!
My day job has been busier than average lately, too. There are swings and roundabouts there, as always. Life changes a lot from moment to moment, and being able to roll with the punches is genuinely helped by the slower pace of general life. I get to adjust course without too much flapping about and getting stressed. There’s more than enough heaviness in the world at the moment, right? I don’t need to put additional pressure on myself.
Also … since I am back in the office for work one day a week, the regular Winter round of germs caught up with me in a big way for the first time since the pandemic began. Ugh. I was flat on my back for a week and running on a single cylinder for another few weeks. At least it was not THAT virus, and it provided fodder for a sketchbook page! All is well now, though.
I am so grateful that you have subscribed to my newsletter! Being allowed to land in your inboxes with my words is a privilege I do not wish to abuse, so I shall look to continuing to improve as we progress.
How consistently will I get these notes out to you in the short term, dear friends? I cannot tell you! I may also play with the format to see what feels right. I am still figuring this newsletter thing out. I may need to be more concise and stop rambling! And stop overthinking things. I am not writing a novel with these pixels, after all!
I shall leave you this time with a couple of my favourite sketchbook pages from the last couple of months and a couple of fun links that may tickle your fancy.
Love
M
PS: Late update! This past weekend, I finished an urban sketching project that I set for myself ... I will serialise the story of the pics over the next couple of editions. You will be the first to see it before it is transferred to my art blog for posterity.
🎨 My favourite recent sketchbook pages
I have become a bird watcher, and record my backyard visitors in my nature journal. Fairy Wrens are my favourite bird! I am SO happy we have them in our yard.
This one evolved as I played with an idea that came to me as I stuggled to go back to sleep in the wee small hours of the morning. I may develop this one further sometime, it was fun to do!
My first time attempting a curvilinear perspective while sketching on location with my local Urban Sketchers group. It took a lot of concentration, but it was also a LOT of fun. I will be doing more of these!
👀 Curious things that caught my attention this month
How Many Dinosaurs Remain Undiscovered? | Science| Smithsonian Magazine
Antworks and Other Art Made in Collaboration With Ants (kottke.org)
10 of the World’s Quirkiest Creatures - Atlas Obscura
A black and empty future – Diaries of Note
The Chernobyl Disaster Created an Unexpected Predator Paradise - Atlas Obscura