Learning to Watercolor

Walking on the edge of night. I'm not usually out this late. Just enough remaining light enables me to see a buck running across the field, then another. Each one leaps across the path before me. Night sounds begin to emerge from the woods around me. I refuse to turn around until I get to the gate. 

The surge of energy that pushed me over the creative hump must play itself out before I can stop walking.

I had been stuck. This morning I remembered a writer that had encouraged other writers to just keep writing every single day--even when you don't feel like it. I thought: And that applies to art. I'll go down to the studio and just keep painting even thought I don't know where I'm going with this.

I added more color. By mid-afternoon it occurs to me that I'm tying myself down too much to the sketch. Surely I had  studied and absorbed the scene enough so that I could just paint how it felt. I left to let the last wash dry.

When I returned in the late afternoon I had agreed with myself to just let the feelings flow onto the paper. I painted, washed away, painted again and then--to my surprise-- I began scratching into the surface to retrieve some whites. Hard. I felt as if a midwife was urging me, "Push, push, now, now!" Then, it felt birthed. Stop, I told myself, stop. Go for a walk--although it is late. When you return you'll know what you think of it.

Oh, this is not at all what I had envisioned when I began; but it feels exactly right. Is this acceptable as watercoloring--including this violence done onto the paper? Am I failing as a watercolorist? Those beautiful scenes I have seen done by others. Graceful, pretty. This is not it at all! That lovely scene that I had in my head in the beginning has twisted in upon itself and become something else more . . . truthful.

Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, how dare you conclude the story in such agony!