Stop, Just STOP!

Alright, so I admit I'm terribly poor. However, I want to give back this holiday season. And for the record for me the holiday is Christmas. Don't celebrate it? That's fine to each their own. Now, I can't afford to donate, because I'm having a hard time getting money together for a winter coat of all things. So gift or care packages are out of the questions as well. BUT I'm an artist! So I learned that you can send cards to soldiers over seas or even to soldiers recovering in hospitals here in the states.

So here's my master plan. Most years I draw out a Christmas card design on a 9x12 inch piece of paper and then color it with color pencils. Then I take a photo of it and put it into Photoshop. From there I shrink the image down to card size add my words and then print them out. Then I told and then I take the time to write out loving messages to my friends and family. I then I cut out and fold my own envelopes for the cards and seal them up.

I figure I can afford to print out a few more and write some nice things to some soldiers who are serving are country and are away from home and family. They deserve to know that there are people out there that believe that they are worth a thank you. And that we think about them. So that's the Grand Plan.

So why the title? Everyone around me has these strange ideas about how, when, and what I should be doing. I want to do this my way. I can do cards. There are places that I can send the cards and then they send them off to the soldiers. I think that's wonderful. It has to be cards, I can't do anything else. I'm poor. Let me say that again. I'm POOR! In fact I am so poor, I'm not too sure I could afford the last two letters of the word poor. So there you go.

That leaves me with When. Yeah, everyone likes to tell me that I can draw anytime I want. They have no idea what my head is like. They don't know my Evil Drawing Muse or anything like that. The lighting that I need or other things that need to be done in the day.

I'm not just an artist but I also like to write. And I am so close to being caught up with my story that I can continue writing it. And does anyone know how hard it is to draw something happy when your feeling sad or depressed? How about when your anxiety is so high you can't really think about what you're drawing? The Muse does not like these times and tends to go away and wait.

I find it hard to draw when there is something else that I planned to do at a certain time. For instance, I want to write in the afternoon so I don't feel that drawing in the afternoon is a good idea. And the lighting is all wrong for evening drawing.

So please stop telling me I can draw whenever. It's just not true. I can only draw when the Evil Drawing Muse says I can. That is the way of the artist. We draw when the muse says so, we stop when they go away. Or when we drop or the pain is too much. You get the picture.