On Watercolor Pencils

Play is a process involving risk. We become so vulnerable when we play. We step beyond the limits of our persona masks. Anything could happen.

Play teaches us. It frees the mind from the limits of the ordinary into deep creative currents.

I have been playing with my new watercolor pencils. I got them with a gift certificate from a friend to whom I will be forever grateful. A little gift certificate to the local art store can be like a free pass on a ride through the Magic Kingdom. Shelf upon shelf laden with glorious things -- creamy papers, richly pigmented paints, soft brushes, fascinating gadgets, markers that blossom in their bins like flowers, rainbows of pencils, stacks of intriguing boxes, pallettes of all varieties and light boxes and easils -- await the caress of eye and hand.

I wandered through the aisles exploring each thing, delighted that one of them would be mine to keep. After the joy of touching and trying, I would get to choose something, something gloriously impractical. Playfulness would extend into the days and weeks ahead.

I chose the watercolor pencils. I liked the idea of drawing with paint. I was also reminded of the watercolor coloring books I had as a kid -- the magic of transforming little dots on a page into a wash of color.

I took them home and arranged them like a bouquet in a mason jar. Then came the time when I could use them. I drew soft lines of pigment along the bumpy surface of watercolor paper, trying different colors side by side and on top of one another. I wound up with a colored pencil drawing. I brushed water over it, and the magic began. A vibrant painting emerged. I did another drawing, fooled around, seeing what mixed well. I tried a few blottings with tissues and cotton. I tried another painting by soaking a sheet of paper in water and then drawing on it. This time thick lines of color appeared. Brush blending and tissue blotting produced all sorts of cool effects.

A few days later I took the pencils for a drive. Stopping here and there, I found myself rendering drawings of scenes around me: intense pinks and oranges became a sunrise with green sky below, a wash of purple with yellow highlights became a field of snow, blue melting into grey-green became sky and distant hillsides. I drew grasses -- more purple and yellow -- and trees -- reds and greens -- and lichen covered boulders -- oranges, blues, pinks.

The desire to render gave way to the urge to language. THIS exuberance of brush explodes at the base of THIS tree, which carries the fireworks, puff, puff, puff, in the lines of groupings of pine needles. The eye leaps from limb to limb, celebrating each burst, until it lands in the soft expanse of sky. A thought, a suggestion, I filed it away like a sentence scribbled on a notecard.

My inner little kid is happy as a lark. My crusty old ego is relaxed and a little more welcoming. Who knows what will come our way now that we are opened to seeing it. All of my internal people look forward together to the next time we can play with the pencils.