the spotlight, Monotype of the Day #456

456.jpg

Day 90 of Year 2 (Actually Day 91)

This was tough to make tonight. I had an opening and when I got home, I literally could not keep my eyes open. It took about an hour of battling my eyelids until I was able to drag myself into the studio. Then miraculously, and as is always the case, somehow enough energy came to do a print. As I am typing I feel that energy slowly draining away.

This puts me in mind of the renown cellist and amazing exemplar, Pablo Casals. Casals was famously asked at age 93 why he continued to practice. “Because,” he replied, “I think I’m making progress.” I once read that in later years, he woke up as a stiff old man, but as he practiced each day, his body would straighten up and his energy return. When he finished, he would slowly deflate like a balloon until bed and wake up the next morning to start again. On the day he died, he had already practiced for several hours. The renewing force of creativity gives bountiful gifts to those who partake.