The Thing About Practice

If you were a musician you would know what I mean by scales. Not the balancing ones of justice or the dividing ones in the kitchen but the diatonic ones from C to C up 3 octaves and back down again. Some are harder than others but the point is to teach your muscles what doing it right feels like. 

I am sure, and have even read, that it's the same with art - and I am determined to do this every day till my hand knows what it's supposed to do when my eye sees a shape. The thing about practicing is that, as long as it's something you want to do - it's not work - it's play. I am reminded of a conversation I had with a friend when I had a large elaborate garden. We were walking down the paths and he asked me how many hours I worked in the garden every week. 

"Oh - about 2 hours" I told him and he gave me a disgusted look and said no more. But that look haunted me for months till one day I realized that I think of work as "werk" ... that stuff you don't want to do, but have to. The next time I saw A I told him "You know - I do only werk in the garden 2 hours a week but I PLAY in the garden another 18."

So. I am actually playing - but it's play with a purpose. I want to learn the muscle memory to make the shapes I want to make - so that I can draw the pictures I want to draw.