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8-31-03
Painted  today at Stadium High School for a few hours. The light is changing dramatically as we move from summer to fall. I tend to work on these paintings every other weekend, and with the shadows lengthening each week it becomes challenging to fix their position. This was my second painting session with this horizontal courtyard version, for a total of around 6 hours, with another six needed. People are getting used to me being there. The school security workers have all met me now, and I think I met the principle today.
This inner courtyard view is a little intrusive on my part, but so far I've not been kicked out. The principle even invited me back when the kidswere there on Wednesday, saying that they would like to see me work. I thanked him for the invitation, but told him I try not to paint in front of large crowds as it interrupts my concentration. I once had my trailside painting viewpoint taken over by a huge ranger guided walking tour of about 30 people. During that memorable session, I became so distracted that I let my sleeve brush off a 6 inch square of paint.
Lisa, Sue and I had a couple fun days in Leavenworth over Labor day weekend, which happened to be our 24th anniversary. Lisa enjoyed the easy 5.4 at Mad Meadows where also I taught her to rappel. I climbed the 5.8 above and had fun, but Sue hated it, saying she was through with climbing forever...again.
Lisa likes climbing the moderate routes, and I think she could easily become quite a good climber with her patient nature and zest for adventure. I'd like to take her up to Castle rock and climb the multi-pitch 5.3's up there, but Sue is terrified of heights and won't come along. She has lost her nerve for the sport, and nothing I do seems to help. Part of the problem is there aren't many climbs anymore that are easy enough for her to start out on.
It is true that 50 year old climbing women are very rare. An aversion to danger could be natural for older women. Still, I've not given up hope.
The next morning we hiked up to a new 5.7 at the mouth of Tumwater canyon called February buttress. I've looked at this chunk of granite for years, thinking there should be a route on it, and now there is, thanks to Victor Kramer and his new guidebook. It was a mossy 5.7, with some severe route finding issues that scared the bejeezus out of me. Still, it is the climb on which I look back the most fondly.
It was semi run out on gear, and my gear is all old and in need of replacement. Some of my chock runners are 7 years old, and nylon doesn't age well. In a couple different places, I was 15 feet above marginal gear on holds where retreat was not an option. I could see resting holds and protection cracks above, but the climbing in between was mossy friction, with marginal handholds for several moves.
Thinking it probably wasn't as dangerous as it seemed, I committed to the sequence of moves, then felt a surge of raw panic when I realized the handholds were worse than I'd thought. I sensed my feet beginning to slip, and with no handholds to pull on, I placed my palm on the rock and pressed downward enough to move a foot up, praying nothing would break loose.
On the drive home Sunday night (Sue was freaked out about school and wouldn't spend a full 3 days), I kept replaying the moves in my head. Each time I replayed it I remembered a little more about the climb until I was almost up there again, feeling the terror, the anticipation, the pure joy on climbing through the difficult sections and grabbing the jug at the top, near a bomber protection crack and looking 100 feet below to where Sue and Lisa stood, swatting at yellow jackets and baking in the 90 degree heat.
Something about being out there at the edge of what you think is possible. The term: "living on the edge" has been overused, but I'll wager it originated with rock climbing, the king of sports. Live dangerously, but keep a back up plan.
8-28-03
School is out for almost a month. Several of the students who graduated this quarter were among the smartest ever from our program. To keep me busy during the break, I have 86 pages of html changes to one of my clients web sites, which is waiting for me as soon as I finish writing here.
As soon as the 86 pages of "cut, paste, proofread and post" are complete, I have a new client who wants a web site built from scratch. But before I can start that I have to spend a little more time in Photoshop getting my interface skills back. If I allow myself to look ahead at all the projects I have lined up, both freelance and teaching (4 classes next quarter), my life looks frighteningly complicated.
However, as I was telling Sue on a bike ride yesterday, it's all stuff I've done before, and if I take it one day or one task at a time I'll do fine. It's only the big picture that's scary.
Lisa dropped out of high school soccer try-outs. She said her friends weren't trying out this year, and there were a lot of new ninth graders trying out who were hard core soccer players. Both kids put a priority on spending time with their friends and it makes sense to us.
I spent last Sunday finishing the initial drawing on my third painting of Stadium High School. It's a quiet little brick lined alcove in the central courtyard of the school and quite out of the way, considering it's downtown in a big city. Most people walk by and don't even see me behind the high bushes lining the alcove.
The black and white drawing is almost complete, and I expect I could start on the color at any time, but when that will be I have no idea. It could be weeks. I rode the mountain bike down the dirt road behind our development last night in the twilight. I'm in excellent shape aerobic wise...although I need to loose 8 pounds and tone up. Still, considering I'm almost fifty and sit at a computer all day, I'm not doing too bad.
I bought some mattress covers that are supposed to keep my allergies down. When we pulled the old ones off the mattress and box springs, we found them to be destroyed by mildew. Prices for new beds ranged from 300 to several thousand. Somehow Sue managed to find one for $200, undoubtedly made my starving peasants in India who work for pennies a week...sigh. What can you do?
8-24-03
Sue, Lisa and I climbed up at Exit 38 on Snoqualmie Pass yesterday. It was Lisa's first day of really enjoying the sport. She climbed all the way up a fairly high 5.6 route, with me at the top and Sue at the bottom giving encouragement. She seemed to enjoy herself, not surprising since she loves riding the roller coasters at Wild Waves. I asked her later if she felt safer on the roller coasters and she said she did.
The proximity of Exit 38 to Seattle (35 minutes) attracts a lot of raw beginners, many of whom bring their bad manners to the cliffs. About 3 in the afternoon we saw a party of three beginners on a route that looked fun. Two of them had already climbed the route, so I asked politely if they had just one more person going up, thinking that we could jump on the route when they were done.
He replied that they were each going to do several more laps on the route for practice, and that they would be quite a while. We climbed another route nearby and watched, with growing amazement, as they climbed the route once more, then let the rope hang unattended for an hour while they set up a full scale barbecue.
Never mind that they were 20 minutes up a steep climbers trail where people normally eat bag lunches or protein bars. These people had packed up the real deal complete with portable picnic table, twenty pound barbecue grill with briquettes, table cloth, bowls of lettuce, sliced tomatoes, onions and full sized bottles of ketchup, mayonnaise, mustard and barbecue sauce.
I probably don't need to mention that two of them were quite out of shape, with the woman carrying about 80 pounds of extra weight. When someone leaves a rope hanging on a route, no one else can climb the route because the rope hangs from the rappel anchor, which is the only way back to the ground.
Rude people like these are becoming almost the norm at Exit 38 and I've learned to simply ignore them. I've gone the other route in the past, i.e.: major confrontation, lecturing that deteriorates into shouting and swearing...think road rage without the violence. It seems to be the price one pays for climbing in a beginner area close to the big city. There was also a guided party at the cliff, consisting of 8 pre-teens, one father and the guide. The guide would set up a rope on a climb, then leave his clients to top rope while he set up another rope on another climb.
But again, we knew what we were getting into when we saw the Guide Service van in the parking lot at the trail head. Unfortunately, this guide had an arrogant streak, demonstrated when he climbed a route on the lower cliff, then left the rope hanging for an hour and a half until his party finished climbing up above. Still, despite all the rude people, we had fun climbing as a family, and I even managed to climb the scary 5.9 route, surprising myself after a month of no climbing.
School's out for a month, except for a day of grading and I am buried under a ton of freelance work. I have two people who want web sites...one is the mayor of a city. I have to bone up quickly on Photoshop so I can build some interfaces. My intermediate Illustrator class consistently produces some amazing work. The program brings out the artist in some of the most unlikely people, and the precision built into the program allows the students to create some stunning artwork.
Three people have left the college recently. Gulten, our full time lab assistant, left to return to Turkey. Jim, the video instructor is moving to Arizona and S. quit or had her contract dropped, but at any rate is gone suddenly. Her office was an oasis of sanity and friendship in a relatively hectic and confusing environment. She was the person who put me in contact with several of my freelance clients. S. was also one of my first teachers four years ago when I entered this field and has continued to be a mentor as I worked at freelancing and teaching.
8-18-03
Painted Mt. Rainier from the Skyline Trail yesterday. I've not been up there this year since cross country ski season. Sue and I left at 10 in the morning, having argued for an hour about whether we were going climbing or hiking/painting. She feels that I am overly driven to "accomplish" something everyday.
Whether it is bagging a hard climbing route or a good painting, I do like to get something done on the weekends. Not that I don't enjoy a good veg weekend around the house doing chores and reading books, but we did that last weekend.
The mountain was crowded as usual for a hot August weekend. I painted 15 feet off the main trail, which streamed with huge parties of 20 or more mountaineers coming down off the summit, 7 miles away. Because of our late start, I had less than 3 hours to work, which simply increased my focus; I enjoy working under pressure.
It was fun watching the steady stream of passersby go from ignoring me at the beginning, to stopping in large groups and staring in wonder toward the end of the painting. I get in a zone when a painting is going well, and the tourists become nothing more than background noise. They have every right to be there, and I try to be gracious when they ask if I can pose with the work. Still, I do resent the time away as they laboriously focus their cameras, which have a tough time auto focusing on me, the painting and the mountain 7 miles away.
I'm not at all sure if it's sellable, but that's really not the point. I enjoyed the heck out of the experience, and that's enough for me. About a dozen people told me it was excellent...usually a good sign. The light up there (6500') is simply incredible. Toward evening, as we hiked back to the car, the immediate ridges around us were golden browns and greens, the meadows lush with the summers growth. Beyond them, the land receded into the infinite blue distance, merging with the sky about 90 miles away.
8-16-03
Since my last entry I've talked to my old boss at the print shop, but they are slow during the hot weather and don't need any extra help. They have however made money these last two years and bought a new Heidelberg press. Contrast this with the 4 web shops that have closed their doors during the last 2 years, just in the Tacoma area.
I played guitar at the farewell party at school (some teachers are leaving) with a couple students who also play. For not having played in front of a crowd in twenty years, I didn't do too badly: lost my concentration once and played the wrong chord but just laughed and kept playing. I did my best work when the other guitarist played a three chord blues progression and I was able to jam on the harmonica. Harp has always been my best instrument and the hoots from the crowd told me they agreed.
We are in finals week so I am able to concentrate on projects other than teaching. I have a couple irons in the fire that may lead to money, although they require all my free time, but no surprise there. I went bike riding with a friend from school Thursday around North Tacoma after work. My knees were strong then, but a bike ride today (Saturday) hurt my knees. I'm thinking about climbing or painting tomorrow, haven't decided which yet.
Both of my entries were accepted in the Puyallup fair. Because I spent 9 hours painting the piece that is in the fair, I hesitate to head right back to work on another one. Still, I tend to work in series and at least it's close, quiet and likely to sell when it's finished. I've spent about 8 hours on an Illustrator version of one of my pencil drawings. I'm pretty happy with it and will post it here when it's done. Unlike a pencil on paper drawing, one can work endlessly on digital art. The paper doesn't get worn down.
8-11-03
Just when I was beginning to remember Flash well enough to think creatively, two of my freelance clients have asked me to do interface design. Why, sure, I'll just fire up Photoshop and create brilliant interfaces...ah, on the other hand, maybe I'd better hit the books for a few days. My first day back in Photoshop reminded me of trying to learn Flash again a few weeks ago. It's the old "if you don't use it you loose it" routine.
This business is horrible that way. A web designer has to be good at 4 different major software programs, and I'm not counting any of the programming languages like asp or php. Photoshop, Flash, Illustrator and Dreamweaver are the 4 big bullies on my play field. My life, or at least my career as a teacher, revolves around learning one really well at the expense of the other three, then switching gears to focus on another.
Dreamweaver never gets too rusty due to constant use on this web site and the maintenance tasks I do for the school site. Speaking of which, I heard today that I have a huge pile of work coming on that...simple work: cutting and pasting, but work all the same, and it pays well.
I've a growing sense of resentment at the constant studying I have to do to stay current with this software. I'm current enough to teach it at the basic levels required at the school, but to use it creatively in my freelance business, well that is another matter entirely. I have to get out the books and study all day, late into the night and weekends too. If I want to actually learn something new, for example: php; I have to completely walk away from the things I love, like painting and climbing.
This has been my life since the summer of 1999: a constant struggle to learn new tricks at the computer. Where has it got me? I'm poorer than I've ever been since I started working 28 years ago. In a normal career, effort of this magnitude would have resulted in raises and promotions. But all this frantic reaching for new knowledge has resulted in a dead end job with an employer who is determined to keep me at part time hours with no benefits until the cow come home.
Think I'll go talk to some friends in printing. In this economy they may be laying people off too, but it can't hurt to do some scouting.
8-5-03
Between framing paintings, photographing paintings, doctor checkups and picking up rich people at the airport, I've not had a speck of time to pursue my objective of relearning my web design skills. I suppose one could argue that this is a personal choice, due to my general loss of faith in the possibility of a career in high tech. On the other hand, it might just be a busy week.
The Puyallup fair happens once a year, and I've won prize money before, even when paintings don't sell so getting some paintings ready seemed like a good investment of time. If they do sell, however, I wanted to have 4x5 transparencies of them for future use as limited edition prints. Unfortunately, taking 4x5's is a time intensive process, especially since I only use the fifty year old camera about once a year. Just loading the film takes me twenty minutes (working in total darkness, once sheet at a time).
Focusing the old beast is another nightmare: picture tape measures, carpenters levels, working under a black cloth hood in hot photography lights and a magnifying loupe on a ground glass and you'll get the general idea. I do it because each 4x5 costs me eight dollars, versus paying a pro' forty to sixty each.
I also shoot ordinary 35 millimeter prints and slides of each painting and the slides have to be matted with black velvet so only the image shows up on screen. There is no possibility of fixing problems with Photoshop in a slide. You either shoot a perfectly framed and exposed image, or you toss it and try again.
The rich people I picked up at Seatac yesterday were my parents and my daughter. Dad gave Lisa the money for a one month tour of Europe ending at the family reunion in England. She traveled most of the time with my sister and her family, but flew home with dad and mom. We missed her with an ache that got bigger each day of the thirty days she was gone.
Standing at the exit area at American Airlines watching all the people walk off was a mixture of ecstasy and despair. Their flight was 45 minutes late, so we had plenty of time to watch tearful reunion after reunion; ad infinitum. Mom's hip acted up, so they were the last ones off, finally appearing in a small group, with an attendant pushing mom in a wheelchair. Lisa looked tan and healthy, holding up well to the jet lag from London.
It's so nice to have my little girl back. She's never been gone more than 4 days before this month long trip with my sister. More later...now I have to rush off to a my yearly allergy doctor exam before heading out to the garage to frame another painting...hopefully the last.
8-2-03
My fingers are raw from playing the guitar two days in a row after a lapse of a week. We are having a farewell party at school for some departing staff, and a call went out for musicians to provide some entertainment. We (one of the students and I) had a casual rehearsal/jam session after school yesterday in the drawing room. I haven't jammed with anyone in a couple years, and had forgotten how beautiful two guitars sound when played together.
The full bodied sound of my 26 year old Martin overpowered his cheaper guitar to the point where I could barely hear his playing. Because I didn't have a soft pick, we traded guitars for a while and it was lovely to hear the strings picked together. He doesn't sing, or at least hasn't yet, and I felt a little awkward being the only voice. We'll have another rehearsal next week, same place, same time but will add another guitarist, possibly a base player, for a threesome. Should be fun.
I've posted a few new paintings here. These are paintings that I've done in the last few months, but hadn't managed to photograph until this week when I borrowed a digital camera from a friend at school. I'm not sure I'm finished with the Stadium painting. I think the perspective is wrong on the left tower.
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