The Shooting Arrow: LMU Acceptance

 

Just as I expected, I received my acceptance letter from LMU to begin my Masters Program as an Art Therapist. I knew it. For almost 3 years I worked on my pre-requisite coursework on a part time basis at Los Angeles City College. I worked very consistently to get the best grades possible. I wanted my transcript from LACC to have straight A’s. I almost succeeded … I messed up when I couldn’t finish my Spring semester bc of my father’s passing.

When my father’s life came to a halt, so did my goals and plans for school. Everything stopped…for several months. I decided to continue pursuing my educational and career goals one day before the final class to complete my coursework began. And so I started up again 6 months after my father’s passing. Two part time jobs, one psychology class left, an entrance exam, and a 15 page autobiography were needed to complete my application for grad school. 

Everything was turned in! I met the deadline, checked every item off. I had a complete application and I knew I would get priority. Many students apply without having all the coursework completed. That’s because you need 12 units of Psych and 18 units of art coursework, this translates to 10 college classes. And so i waited.

While waiting, several people asked me, “well what happens if I dont get it”. To which I always replied, “Nah, I’m getting in, I did all the work”. I think it was Gurri or someone who said, “So you are shooting  with just one arrow and hitting the target”. YUP!

Finally I had my interview. I prepared myself and walked in with a lot of confidence. I had more questions for the interviewer than he had for me. He told me they would only accept 19 people into the program. Yikes! But i still walked out of the interview owning it. I had been very intentional through and through. Going to ceremony and sweat lodge and always putting that prayer forward. I am so grateful for my spiritual community that has grounded me in so many ways.

I am very grateful to the people who took the time to write me a letter of recommendation: Jeanne S., Camille A., and my art professor Robin Adsit. It was so hard to ask for a letter but it was my last opportunity to apply for grad school. This was it. Afterwards I continued to work on my autobiography. Again, I’m very thankful to my friends who went through each page and read my story. I know it was a lot to do for me, thank you for your feedback and encouragement: Maria Teresa, Maria R., Renaldo and Diana, Liliana, Sarita, Brenda Y., and  Barnica. To Sonji, Vanessa, and Xaris, thank you for being patient with me, we had a beautiful wedding to plan and I needed a bit of time to jump into gear with you ladies. Also my partner Jose, who simply continued to support me, lending me his apartment so that I could finish my application without any distractions. One more mention, when I was an undergraduate at UCSC, I participated in a program where peers and mentors supported me to have the courage to apply to graduate school. I wanted to keep my promise to myself and to the program that one day I would earn a graduate degree, it took  almost 7 years to believe in this dream again, but it was always deep inside. Thank you to the FMP 2004/2005 cohort, to EOP, and my mentors Paul Ortiz, Rosie Cabrera, & Gloria Chacon for inspiring that dream. Oh my goodness, and if I have to go even farther back … There have been countless people that have supported my journey into higher education. Period. This brown womyn needed all the encouragement possible!!! 

SO that’s it. That’s the big update. I sent my commitment letter in the mail today. I start grad school in the Fall …

My father, a passenger in my car, my cumbia dance partner

“By writing I put order in the world, give it a handle so I can grasp it. I write because life does not appease my appetites and anger… To become more intimate with myself and you. To discover myself, to preserve myself, to make myself, to achieve self-autonomy.” – Gloria Anzaldua

Writing has increasingly become the manner in which I self-medicate. In a world where we seek to be seen and validated, writing holds the space I need to unfold, hang, and air my pensive sensitivities. I share stories that need telling. And most importantly, I rest my mind and my heart because I’ve acknowledged myself. It’s a completely selfish act.

As I process the grief that continuously reappears in my life, I discover triggers that deeply affect my state of being. Seemingly unimportant experiences that remind me of my father, reminding me of his death, weave in unexpectedly. I understand now, this is how my grief appears.

My father went to Trade Technical College and became a certified diesel engine specialist. He was a mechanic on Bandini Blvd. between the 710 Freeway and Soto Blvd. I recently began working at a middle school in East Compton and use the 710 to get to and from work. Going South on the freeway is perfectly fine, but driving North begins to distract my mind from traffic. I head in the direction of the memories in which I would meet my father at his place of work. The 710 was the most accessible way to get to him, exiting on Bandini West, driving past the smelly slaughterhouse, and driving into a large diesel truck service station. My father would be underneath a big rig motor and he would crawl out in his navy blue mechanic uniform with a giant wrench in his hand. Always thirsty from the heat, he would give me a half-hug because he was sweaty and filled with engine grease on his hands and arms. This was the way he worked for almost 3 decades. This is the way I remember him.

Driving home today on the 710 really push my feelings in a heavy way. I sensed the memory through my body and shook it off. I don’t want to drive on the 710 North again. It triggers my grief. Sadness becomes my passenger as a search for the next highway home.

To end this piece in a good way, I have to write about dancing. My father LOVED to dance. L-O-V-E-D. He would laugh and carry a huge smile when he moved around on a dance floor. He enjoyed live music, Peruvian dishes, and a cold drink. He would invite the ladies to dance, panuelo waving in his hand, fancy white shoes shuffling and spinning. Only once did I have the chance to ask my father to dance with me. Mirrors of each other, in that moment I discovered that my love for dancing was a genetic bond I share with him.

I went out dancing on Saturday night, my left leg still feels the cramps from the lack of stretching and inconsistent exercise. Whatever. I dance like I mean it and I will sweat, jump, spin, groove, and rock to the music. My cumbia is my dad’s cumbia, and I remember him this way. He is my dancing partner on the dance floor.

There are other triggers that take me to the memories of my father. When they show, I just pray that I “handle it” with grace and patience, never with shame. 

Freedom looks different to each person

“Freedom is a pretty strange thing. Once you’ve experienced it, it remains in your heart and no one can take it away.” – Chinese Artist Ai Wei Wei

Across the world there is a multitude of confines that place limitations on our bodies and our expression bc of political, patriarchal, and/or corrupt reasons. I simply don’t want to talk about that right now. It is my responsibility to acknowledge that it exists. It is your responsibility to understand the many ways in which it happens everyday, almost everywhere.

I relate to Ai Wei Wei’s expression, not in a political sense, but in a spiritual sense. The first thing that came to mind when I heard this was the way in which i have felt the most free when I am out in nature. If you have the opportunity to leave the city and visit a forest, a mountain, a river, or a cliff overlooking the ocean, then you know that the fresh air you breath satisfies more than your lungs. There is calmness in the mind from a walk into a damp forest that crosses a creek whose running water makes that mellow melody of water over rocks and pebbles. That moment when you decide to take off your shoes and let your feet touch the cold water is freedom.

I have been fortunate to travel, backpack, snorkel, hike volcanoes, and make my own fires for warmth. I have tasted sweet, clear running water from rivers that fill as the sun melts the snow on the mountain i can point to. I’ve been tumbled and lifted, cradled and cleansed by ocean waves that make me feel weightless. I have felt powerful in my arrival to lost lakes and morning dawns after the pain and struggle of mile long uphill terrains. I have felt freedom this way.

Having found freedom in nature is the reason why my spirit always feels a sense of deprivation when my body resides in the city. I was born and raised in Los Angeles. When I was in high school i wouldn’t ditch to go smoke or drink at some kick back, i would jump fences and go boogie boarding at the beach. I would go swimming or visit the Friendship Bell in San Pedro and look out to Catalina Island. This innate necessity for freedom is probably what led me to go to college in Santa Cruz. I escaped South Central at 18 to fall in love with a redwood forest.

I’m going to leave this city… again and again. I really will. Im always planning my escape. When I finish grad school I am going to live some place tucked between hills and ocean. I will have trails and bike paths that cross rivers and hot springs. I am going to find my piece of freedom outside of this city.

Until then… I suppose i will “vacation” in far away lands, “retreat” to local mountain sides, and keep on hiking the local trails of Eaton Canyon and smog filled Griffith Park.

Who does she think she is?

I believe.

In myself

To do the things that no one else had time to do, that no one else could do.

Because surviving was more important than this writing

I was born into a different mode of continuance

Dependent on the need to express my complexities.

And it’s this entangled reality that is scary to even formulate into words, to draw and exhibit, to dance and let go of.

I do it anyways.

If I couldn’t write, if I couldn’t paint, if I didn’t dance, surely, I would cease to be.

To exist in these ways is intimidating.

But who am I to stop, all that must be generated.

To be let free, the ancestors before me stretch the walls of my skin.

They pound and they scratch, so I listen, carefully, to find a way to give them voice.

To let their pain be heard, to let their struggle continue, to let their hopes live on.

Through me

I acknowledge our inheritance and change what we make of it.

To laugh to what we once cried about, to love when we were once bruised and humiliated.

To birth when they ventured to extinguish us. And to rise when they expected to defeat us.

Every thought conveyed to words, every brush stroke that is shaped, every step that I spin, it isn’t even me.

I’m just a vessel of ancient wants and needs that are fighting to be.

It isn’t me. It is everyone before me.

I believe in myself.

Otherwise, I risk the dangers of our children, following a repentance that simply doesn’t belong | to them |anymore. 

This piece was inspired after reading “An Open Letter to Women Writers of Color”, by Gloria Anzaldua. Bt it was posted because i was told by my friend (who use to pick on me in middle school /who now follows my blog) , “you should at least write something once a month”. Done. 

Letting go of 2013, one day, one moment at at time…

Its 3 days before 2014.

30 days ago I freaked out when I realized the year was coming to an end.

3 weeks ago I asked my partner, what do you have planned for New Years Eve? And I began to cry.

Grief hits in the most unexpected ways.

3 days ago I took the graduate school entrance exam for the school im applying to. I passed the exam, drove home excited, and then the tears rolled out.

My successes also bring about my grief.

In the past, I am always ready to let go of the year and bring in the new. This year will be hard to let go of.  2013 will be the year when I lost my father. It is the year that I buried him.

To let go of this year, means to continue letting go of him in this physical realm of time and space. The spirit world has different boundaries.

Last night I was listening to “El Condor Pasa”, one of my dad’s favorite songs, from his favorite genre of music, traditional Andean music. We had conversations about one day traveling out to Peru together. And in 2014, we were going to drive from Guate to Oaxaca in his truck. We were going to travel up the mountain and stay in Oaxaca for several days.

It’s not that I miss the trips that will never happen. It’s that I miss the conversations, the arguments, the understanding, and the friendship we were building as adults. I spent my childhood and adolescence with resentment towards the man my father had been towards my mother. I had witnessed and felt things that children are not supposed to see their parents go through. And once I was mature enough to understand the complexity of his victimization and suffering as a young man, I forgave him for eventually becoming a perpetrator.

My father had changed in many ways. Having seen those changes through the years manifested in him when I visited him a year ago. It made me proud of him. And I told him. I was at the airport, returning to L.A., and I called him para despedir me, and I said, “Dad, estoy orgullosa de ti.” Those words meant a different chapter for us in our relationship.

The months leading up to my father’s passing, we were in conversation about me going to grad school and my new job. We were going to meet up in Costa Rica in June, and instead I had to drop off his murder investigation files at the embassy.

2013 was the year I had the courage to finally apply to graduate school. It was the year I lived in Costa Rica. It was the year I turned my career into what I wanted it to look like, a teaching artist with organizations that use art as healing. It was the year that my nephews were old enough to recognize me as their Tia and listen to the lessons I have begun to teach them about patience, compassion, and anger. I have a home. I have food. I have health. I have friends. And I have a lot of love inside of me. It’s been a year I will continue to build and grow from because it taught me lessons of forgiveness, faith, and love.

Im writing this because im letting go… of what specifically, im not sure… but im acknowledging the pain in letting this year go.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxVMNQo4HAM

Forget your turkey, eat this!

I just finished watching this film. Its a good film and a sad story about Native children who were kidnapped and forced to live in boarding schools. The truth is still the truth. Enjoy your turkey all you want, but remember that part of what you may be thankful for, came at the cost of life and the sacrifice of others.

 

Don’t let me go

Dear dad,

i remember… When I arrived to your home last december. it was hot and humid and I couldn’t wait to take off the corduroy pants I wore… You opened the door and welcomed me in. You embraced me with a big heart, a big hug, and a big smile…

“Bienvenida a tu casa…”

it was good to see you. it was good to walk into your home and into my room.

i changed into shorts and took off my shoes. I walked around barefoot on the cool, clean tile floor…

we would argue for the next 4 days about how I should wear shoes “y no Andes descalsa”… But honestly, my feet were perfectly happy walking on the cool, clean floors.

i wish I could remember more hugs. Bt now I will have to make them Up…

As I embrace you in my heart… Please feel what I feel…

It is warm between us. You wrap your arms around me. And I rest my face on your button shirt…

dont let me go … Just keep holding me …

While everyone is happy

When depressed, its hard to see other’s so damn happy.

I really dont like Halloween.

My grandmother past away at the end of October in 2002. I flew to Guatemala to bury her. Her death changed a deep part of me. One that did not allow me to drop out of college. The month she past was the month i meant to drop out of college.

I never went to a Halloween party again since her passing. While i mourned yearly, everyone got dressed up, dressed happy, went to party, dance and drink, and i stayed in. alone.

Some years ive gone out, but i always feel out of it.

I followed up with Dia de Los Muertos and appreciated that date because at least i could remember her in a good way, in an intentional way. Ive appreciated and been part of making altares since 2002.

Since moving back to LA, I have attended the event at Hollywood Forever a few times. But every single time i went i was surrounded by hundreds of people and i felt completely alone. I would always end up walking away and sitting by myself in the darkness somewhere. Alone and ignored in my thoughts.

This year, the feeling is no different.

All of a sudden everyone and their mother has an altar or a dia de los muertos party.

I dont want to celebrate muertos.

This year, my father’s life was unjustly taken away and now i wake up every morning knowing that he’s dead.  I am not happy that he has gone on to the spirit world. That maybe he can see me. That he is now an ancestor.

One holiday celebrates and make believes. Costumes include blood, death, ghosts, and racist insensitive ass holes.

The other holiday makes death trendy.

What the fuck?!

For anyone whose ever dealt with murder in their life, i cant imagine Halloween not being a triggering day. And for anyone that simply wants to mourn and grieve in a good way that feels healthy or genuine, hearing about how much people want to party up with dia de los muertos is at the minimum, annoying.

So while everyone is happy tnight and for the rest of the weekend, i have no where to go where i wont feel alone.

From preschool to healing

I find my self continuously analyzing myself  because I am currently enrolled in three psychology courses. During lectures I  diagnose my moods and my family members “disorders” … its kind of silly. In my developmental psych class i have been reading and reflecting on attachment. In the context of newborns and parents, attachment is important for the child’s positive development.  A new born begins to feel a sense of safety and assurance if the parents are consistently and continuously attentive to the baby’s wants and needs.  Such attentiveness does not spoil the child, rather it helps them trust the world they are growing up in. This positive reassurance transforms to a sense of security, self worth, and self esteem for the child.

In my case, it was kinda the opposite.  In my very early years, i was growing up with violence in the home. There was verbal and emotional abuse and probably some depression thrown in there. We moved homes a lot when i was a kid, and my fathers aggression and abuse was internalized. I feared him and had nightmares of him. I have learned that indeed my parents tried their best, they have their own traumas and they acted the only way they knew how.

I was confronted with isolation when I went to pre-school. I was deeply saddened and afraid when i was left alone at school. I was the kid that cried endlessly when getting dropped off. According to my mother and older sister… it went on for weeks. I also have memory of this. There was a huge window that faced the street and i would run to it after i was forced to stay. I would watch my mother get into her green car and drive away to work. My mom has told me how much it would break her heart to see me go through this pain.

Eventually i adapted to this thing called school. I learned to swing, tie my shoes, count apples, identify shapes and my pinkie… Children can surpass baby traumas, there is still an opportunity for resilience to develop. I spent most of my childhood alone when I was at school. I was a pretty independent child. I entertained myself and still played handball or foursquare. I just wasnt part of a group of friends. I didnt bother to make any friends. Maybe it was too much effort, maybe i was afraid of rejection. Maybe i accepted my isolation, but i didnt feel alone. I felt like a normal child… except I told other children to leave me alone. True story, i had a friend in high school tell me of her first impression of me. She came up to me while i was in line for foursquare.  She mentioned she was in my class and told me her name. Apparently i didn’t care, and i told her to leave me alone. That was in the 4th grade.

I did eventually make friends of course. Sometime around 6th grade i began to make friends. Today I have many beautiful friends in my life. In my journey called life, I have found different ways to heal from my past. Some of those ways have been through conversations with friends. Traditional ceremonies that have survived such as Temezcali/sweat lodge and Teepee ceremonies have been incredibly healing and powerful to my spirit and my heart. My ancestors and my willingness to be a better person have been my guide. I am so grateful for the communities that invite me to heal through meditation, counsel, art making, dancing…

A few months ago I was in my room cleaning and i heard a couple fighting outside my window. The guy was calling his gf a “hoe”. He was shaming her and making her feel worthless. He called her a bitch and a hoe and told her he was not ashamed to call her that. When i heard the verbal abuse i looked out the window. The couple was a high school boy and girl. She still had her backpack on and she was crying. He was pulling her hair and calling her names. I walked outside and tried to intervene. I was filled with anger, and i tried asking the girl if she needed any help. He didnt let me talk to her and told me to leave them alone, he didnt get into my business, so i had no right getting in their business. Apparently he was “old enough” to know what he was doing… Yes, he was old enough to be an abuser. It was that week that I began to train at Peace over Violence. An organization that provides services to victims of violence. I am now a volunteer as a Violent Prevention Specialist (still in practice) and had my first presentation at a middle school last week. I wrote down the address and took off to find the middle school.

In my presentation we were going to talk about teen dating violence and learn to identify the cycle of abuse. It was also important for me to talk about what healthy relationships look like, so I had an activity in mind for them. , and have activities that engaged a group of twenty 8th grade girls to have a conversation about what healthy relationships look like and how to identify teen dating violence.

The school was in Gardena, the town i went to school in when i wasnt moving around. When i arrived at the address, I couldnt believe my eyes and my gut. I parked in front of what use to be my old preschool. I starred at the building and the huge window was no longer there.  The swings were taken out. And a bunch of middle school kids were hanging out behind the school gate talking and playing around. My preschool was remodeled and turned into a charter middle school. It had only opened a few weeks prior to my arrival.

I accepted the moment and went inside. I met about 20 girls who seemed shy at first. I asked them to write down words on a piece of paper identifying what they would want a healthy relationship to look like and they scribbled words like trust, open mindedness, and kindness. We had positives to work with, and then we identified power and control. We finished by writing down “the relationship bill of rights”. One of my favorite rights someone shared was, “I have the right to make mistakes and its ok”. 

I finished the presentation, walked out, got in my car, and drove away. I cried. I gave thanks. I felt blessed. It was magical to have the universe tell me i was exactly where i was suppose to be. A journey almost 3 decades long that took me in so many different directions and brought me to a place i had begun. A place where I replaced my trauma with a new memory for hope. I am thankful. And i pray. I pray for the power of young men and womyn to practive healthy, mature, beautiful ways of loving and living.

The Longest Dream (12.30.09)

Part One: Lost

I was lost in the wilderness,

Attempting to escape claws and tangling ravines.

A wilderness that held my true colors and passions,

But my colors faded away into everything else.

I needed to stand out,

I had to stand alone,

By myself.

 

Lost in transitions,

I ran in multiple directions.

My own path was windy,

Filled with distractions,

Filled with guilt,

Filled with curiosity,

Filled with doubt.

 

Part Two: I Want To Be Art

An October day offered me new colors. It placed a brush and pallet in my hands.

I was gifted a magical wall and the love flowed out of me.

My colors blended into the concrete, becoming one.

And I became a little girl again.

Nothing mattered, except the present;

You didn’t matter.

He didn’t matter.

And neither did she.

It was just me and the colors of life.

Colors of creation.

With Mountains and Oceans,

The Lightning and Fire,

The Rain Drops and Snow Flakes,

The Clouds and the four Winds,

The Rainbow and the Seashells,

The Flowers and Trees,

I danced cumbias with them all.

 

Somehow it made sense,

This is what everyday should look like…

This is what life should be…

Creation and Art.

 

A wish, a want, a need was born!

I wish to paint like the wind does, all across the sky.

I want to be movement the way the mountains rise.

I need to reach my dreams and the passing clouds.

I want to create.

I want to be Art.

 

Part Three: Doubt

But I doubted myself,

I doubted my destiny.

Unknowing where to begin or continue,

Love laughed at me,

Love made me feel ashamed,

Love made me want to disappear,

And yet I held onto love with all my strength.

I doubted who I needed to become.

A daughter who could be responsible,

A writer who could be infinite with words,

A painter who could paint walls around the world,

A friend who could listen, give time and compassion.

A woman of wisdom who flies with the owls and speaks only when needed.

A woman to share love with all who are worthy.

I was drenched in confusion,

Distracted without a core.

I could not be there for myself,

I prayed for my solitude.

I yelled at the past,

I made a mess of the present,

I denied the future,

I denied myself.

 

Part Four: The Need To Know

I needed to leave.

All these questions and doubts needed an answer.

I needed to know what my destiny would become.

So I flew off,  over pink mountains, past superstitious roads, and crawled up a mountain of Turtles.

I arrived and I prayed,

For everyone.

Myself,

I could not forget myself.

I thanked the ancestors,

I thanked the Hawk, the Crows, and the Ladybugs that joined me on my journey.

The Rock held me up,

The Sun began to set amongst the most expansive Sky I ever saw,

Dusk lasted a lifetime.

And the Cold moved in amongst the heat of the Fires.

 

I descended into the Arroyo,

The smell and dampness allowed me to remember.

I walked into my dream,

The Eagle and the Bat were one in the same

It was me, it was I

 

I was in the middle of my spiral,

my own transformation.

I felt lost searching for a place to call home by midnight.

Then a stranger showed me the way,

A stranger like an angel.

He shared love stories with me,

I shared my stories as well.

“There are no guarantees.”

“Stop being afraid,

Let love be love”, he said.

 

It made me nervous so i walked away.

 

Outside the cold went thru my spine,

I shook it off and starred at the tree.

Completely leafless,

But filled with spirits,

We looked up into the branches.

Two little love birds gave each other warmth.

The Tree did not protect them from the weather,

They just had each other.

This is all they needed,

Love.

 

Part Five: The Longest Dream

I dreamt the longest dream,

I met the older me.

She held my hand and answered my questions;

You are a painter.

You are a writer.

You are a daughter.

You are a dreamer.

You are a lover.

You are magic.

 

In my dream I had wings,

I glided with the Clouds,

The Road below was umber,

The Hawk was my guardian,

The Sky above was every yellow, orange and blue that ever existed.

I Woke up with the sun and chased it all the way to the ocean’s side

The west side, the wild-west, the concrete jungle that waits…

 

As the sun set I realized I was ready

Ready to love, forgive, be challenged, be blessed…

I am ready grandmother.

I am ready grandfather.

I laughed and cried with the wind.

I am ready.

The greatest me has arrived.

Into the city of angels,

I return to join you.

I am not waking up yet, I am living my dream…

 

Letting go of “things”

Letters, phone calls, and hang out time are the original forms of communication. If you want you can add telepathy. This week I left facebook and it already feels like one of the best choices i could have made for myself this year. Its a website with an overload of information that has crowded my thoughts and blinded me from insights. I feel much lighter already and ill keep celebrating this weight loss.

I want to thank my friends who have reached out to share their love through phone calls, emails, and text messages. I genuinely feel people’s good vibe, energy, and words that are being shared with me in ways that existed before infocrak (fbook).

This summer I have given up a number of material possessions such as clothes, books, shoes, unused art supplies, kitchen ware, everything and anything that has not had a function in my life except to crowd space. It was not easy at first, i really feared letting go of things I thought had a deeper meaning or value. Now that I have begun this process, its become easier and easier to continue letting go of things. Its been a surprising process that has rewarded me by making me feel more free. Im learning that as i let go of these material things, i make room for my emotional and spiritual growth. We are attached to “things” because we feel they give us some sort of certainty of our existence. Things provide a memory, e.g., a pair of shoes can remind you of the time you trekked across an unknown city and discovered delicious food, amazing musicians, and dancing floors. I thought that if i threw something out, i was throwing out the memory and meaning of things. But memory is ultimately within. It still exists. And that’s all it needs to be.

I have gifted things too. And this has been the most special. Because once i threw out meaningless things, ive been left with more meaningful items. And giving those up have open my mind and spirit. One, i get to share something beautiful with someone else and this feels good bc there is intention and even prayers within these items. Two, these special items get to go on an adventure and have a new life. And three, it creates possibilities about who I can continue to become. Im realizing that keeping things is maintaining a stagnation of being. Like chi, energy, water, wind, everything has to keep moving and flowing. Like fire and earth i can keep transforming myself to a better me.

Yes, this is good. Let go. Release. Detach.

Gone with the Breeze, color pencil sketch 9.7.12

Sharks that Climb

9.3.12 color pencil illustration thumbnails: spicy shark climbing gently (random words picked from a hat)

Bare Bones

8.29.12: skeleton, pencil sketch 1