practice makes wet

(5x7)

I should know (myself) better than to complete a drawing and not jump right in with the painting. Having finished my two 11x15 sketches Monday afternoon, and put them aside to think it over after a bad start on one, I'm afraid to paint them!
I did the study above to trick myself into not being scared.
Actually, it was fun ... I let the paper get very wet and just kept working it: when the blue ran into her chest, I flooded it with water and lifted; when the shirt ran into the leg, I left it.
I was also trying to work some neutrals in, and maybe you'll be surprised if I say I think I did!

I've always enjoyed e.e. cummings's poems; they feel so good to say, like, "anyone lived in a pretty how town/with up so floating many bells down"--say it; it's pure pleasure, like wet paints.

Here's a poem I happened on recently; seems to fit this post. (Poor Molly!)

maggie and milly and molly and may
by E. E. Cummings

maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach (to play one day)
and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn't remember her troubles,and

milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;
and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and

may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.
For whatever we lose (like a you or a me)
it's always ourselves we find in the sea