Kris's Dragon I drew this dragon for my coworker Kris last year. It's a birthday card. I put that quote about dragons and ketchup on there too. She liked it. She likes dragons, and I do too. I used to do so much fantasy art, more often than not back when. It seems I've moved away from that on the most part now. Gone for more 'innocent' things...
I did a lot art on the computer when I figured out how awesome photo-editing software was. I can't say I'm especially good at it, I'm not. I never had formal training, I've always learned software simply by using it. I started with Aldus Photostyler... which is like the predecessor to Photoshop and was very much like Photoshop is today; with many of the same tools and capabilities. It was amazing software for its time. Aldus also made PageMaker back then too; but Adobe bought it and eventually turned it into InDesign. I love graphic software. I'm addicted to it. I've been putting the upgrades on my birthday/Christmas list for the past three years, but I'm afraid nobody is picking those for me. ::sniff::.
These images are pretty old. The destrier is from 1995; one of my first images that went from an original drawing, to be scanned and turned into digital art. I wonder if I still have to original somewhere. It was coloured pencil and pencil. I remember drawing it at my Aunt's house in Puerto Rico on a quiet afternoon after a session of lizard-chasing. I remember I was sweltering and my paper puckered from the moisture on my arm. I was visiting my closest and adorable cousin Tom in PR. He died of ALS (Lou Gherig's Disease) in December of 2002; only a week after I'd arrived in Oregon where he now lived. What an awful time. I always think of his sweet face and his massive boat-feet when I look at my Destrier. I remember he was really impressed that I'd drawn that freehand. He then passed out on the sofa in his shorts. That same night we went and made a bonfire on the beach, and floated in the warm ocean for hours. He lost his keys in the caribbean and we had to ride in the back of a pickup home at dawn.
He admired me for never treating him differently when he became ill and subsequently deteriorated. I wrote a little mini-story about him and it got published.
Normalcy
(retitled Normality by our British friends who published it)
People exchange poignant glances around him. They bite back their tears with trembling lips, and they speak softly to him. Their tones are as if they are speaking to a child, catering to him, patronizing him. They are creating a carpet of eggshells.
He sits in his sofa; his hands atrophied and curled up against his chest, his large, ungainly feet motionless. His unassuming brown eyes take it all in with incredible tolerance. His muscles may be dying, but his brain is as sharp as it was before the sickness took hold of him.
He makes a crack at my braids, calling me "Heidi", yodelling badly. I threaten to shave curse words into his hair if he doesn't knock it off. I take advantage of his immobility to give him a good poke in the ribs. He grins clumsily, eyes glistening. I've never seen anyone happy to be bullied before.
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