Some background...

I guess the best place to start is the beginning.

I remember the moment when my small part of the world realized that I had a talent. I was 8 years old and bored with toys. I took out my Childcraft, Nature's Children Book and I turned to the page with the kitten in the pussy willows. I took out my notebook and pencil and started to draw. I drew what I saw. When I was done, I showed my mom. I can still remember the look on her face when she saw it. Not that...oh honey what a cute picture you drew look. She had this look of absolute surprise on her face. There was someone else there but I don't remember who. I remember her saying something about it being really good but let's face it, I had the attention span of a Grade 2 student so that's about where my attention wandered. But I still remember the feeling of accomplishment and suprise myself..after all it was just a drawing.

If I still had that picture, I'd put a scan of it right here but I don't so you'll just have to take my word for it, it was pretty good for an 8 year old kid. Why don't I have it? That comes later on...it's not because it wasn't treasured and preserved, I'll tell you that much.

So on through the years it goes...my grampa, who was a great watercolor artist (in my eyes at least) tried to help me paint...unfortunately that was not quite so successful. I did continue drawing here and there, to varying degrees of success and failure until about Grade 7 (I think..it's been a while). I don't remember exactly when I got my first sketchbook, I think it was around that time.

My first human subject was Axl Rose. 3 times I drew him...again I'd post them but...well. My art teacher this time was the one to be surprised enough to award me a 90% mark on my 3rd attempt. I did the dog off the comic, "For Better or Worse" in Pontallism for an assignment as well, wittly named "Spot".

So on...through my teenage years, drawing became, instead of a shock to those around me, a release of the emotions and thoughts in my head. I drew mostly people, the odd request by a classmate, whatever struck my fancy at the time. But mostly, people. Especially, rock stars. Most of the members of Guns N' Roses; my grampa helped me finish a picture of Matt Sorum--he thought we were drawing a woman mind you..., 2/4 plus one of Metallica (2 of James Hetfield, Jason Newstead and Cliff Burton), Vince Neil, so on and so on and so on...plus one of my favorites: Whitfield Crane (Ugly Kid Joe) which I happen to have a really ultra crappy digital pic of:

I was so happy, yet startled when this picture was done. It was simple, really, just shadow and light and everything below the neck was so simple it was almost unfinshed...all the detail was in the face and even though you can't really see it here...it was so lifelike. ( I did say it was an ultra crappy digital pic...it was taken with an ultra cheap digital camera in bad lighting.)

To be honest this was my best portrait ever. Nothing I had done previous and none that I did after had the same...oomph as this one.

In about grade 10, I did some ink work. It didn't start out that way, it was just supposed to be a simple sketch, and it started with one small doodle.

It turned into something I could be truly proud of. I suprised myself, I didn't know I had it in me but there was that similar feeling of accomplishment. It really meant something to me, silly as it is, I loved Transformers as a kid. They're all in there..Megatron, Optimus, Hot Rod, Ironhide, Laserbeak..I think there's even a piece or two of Starscream.

I think the part that bothers me the most about this one being lost is that I know my son would love it. I had classmates offer me money for this and I hung on to it but I would have happily framed it and hung it in Eric's room just to see him give me that smile of his that makes you feel like you have given him the world.

This was one of those rare requests, by a girl in Grade 10 in my Grade 12 year. It was something she wanted a tattoo of but somehow never ended up giving it to her. Funny isn't it, I'd do things for free but wouldn't sell my artworks.

I think this was the first thing I ever did with color...yet again surprising myself with what I could do.

I don't actually know exactly when I painted this. I might have still been in high school, or possibly shortly after graduation. I'd been fooling with paint for a while but this was the first thing I painted that seemed more than childish. I don't think I could do it again especially if I tried. Scary, maybe but if you saw the real thing it's pretty striking.

And the last of the crappy digital pics that are all I have left:

This was a piece commissioned by my aunt for the cover of her book, Laughter and Tears. I don't even have the stinking book anymore...my mom might have a copy. If I can find my sketchbook, I might even still have the origional. I did more illustrations for the book but I'm not sure where those are..they might be in the missing sketchbook.

So what is all of this for?

It's for me. It's because in the last few days, my thoughts have turned to my portfolio: a grey folder that contains almost every drawing I have ever done. It's been missing for 2+ years, since my husband, me and the kids moved. I guess losing things is just part and parcel of the moving process but I don't think I've ever lost anything so precious and important to me.

Just drawings and paintings, I'm sure you're saying right now. Maybe. But they are more than that to me. There was so much more than paper or ink or paint in that folder. On every piece of paper, in every line or blob of paint, there was a little bit of me. A piece of my heart and soul. A memory, an emotion, a second in time frozen forever.

I guess maybe it's taken me a long time to come to this point. Two and a half years ago since we packed up everything we owned and moved 4 hours away, and then again 2 months later into the city. It was over a year ago I realized that, once all of our boxes were out of storage that that precious folder that I was so sure I had packed from place to place was gone. I think for a while I just hoped it would turn up. I'm not sure why, in the last few days, it has just so fully hit me that it's really gone, that the chances of it turning up are few. I just know that it's hit me finally and so now I mourn that loss. Call me silly if you want, but I'm past bottling things up and worrying about being silly.

I've gone over in my mind a thousand times, where the last place I saw it was...when the last time I looked at it was. Unfortunately those places are not available to me so it's not so simple as going back working my way forward in a physical sense. I like to think that someone out there knows where it is or has it in their hands or wonders where it belongs...but maybe doesn't know what it means. But, it's not in my hands and so, lost to me. If only I can accept that and then, move on, then over time the sting of it will fade.

So..in the end, what's the point? Am I going to just go on and mourn and that's all this is for? No...that's only the beginning. You have to start somewhere. This is what's lost. There are things that are found. And maybe sometime, there will be things that are new.