Inktober

While intentions were good to try and sketch throughout the month, like so many others I fell off the bandwagon. But October (and this past summer) brought changes, new experiences and additions to my life, and for those who are interested I’ll introduce to you the two kittens who joined my family, the beginnings of my growing interest in mountain biking and the backyard bike trail that’s being built in the home we moved into a month ago, and of course I’ll share some arty stuff I did and talk a little about my world as of late.

October marked a move into a home after living in a crappy, small apartment with my partner for nearly 5 years, tolerating very noisy neighbours, lazy landlords and two bouts of bed bug treatments that left us emotionally scarred. While the home is just a rental, it provides us with a feeling of independence and gives us what we need in terms of space for our hobbies and general sanity. It also seems deeply appreciated by the two young cats who came into our lives as kittens back in June, named Stan and Princess. Originally we were only planning on taking one kitten home (Princess, whom I wasn’t allowed to name ‘Chette {short for Fourchette}), but Jessy’s aunt had a lot of kittens, and being born in such a busy household I felt it would be better to take home two so I chose Stan who seemed fond of me. They aren’t biologically brother and sister but they get along just the same, and they are quite well-behaved and very friendly.

Unfortunately a couple months before June, Jessy’s father was diagnosed with terminal cancer and didn’t survive much longer while attempting treatment. As someone who hasn’t had a close family dynamic, it was an experience to see my partner go through that and try to deal with all the loose ends as his father lived alone and unemployed due to other health issues, and his brother hasn’t been particularly sober for the last few years and couldn’t be of much help. Jessy was close to his dad and I’m sure it still hurts. Moving into the home he lived and passed away in probably serves up many reminders and I commend and envy him for being so strong.

During the summer, we both got into mountain biking quite heavily and spent a lot of hours in the saddle. I got into biking about five years ago, but it began as solo and casual exploration on a paved path that extends many kilometers to nearby cities along a local canal. My first bike was a very old, unmaintained big box bike that had been handed down from my brother. There were maybe 2 usable grip shift gears, and the chain was basically rust. I never grew up being active and was never into sports. It wasn’t until about six years ago that I first entered a gym and began body building workouts, which was by far the most activity I had ever done. But even before that, I had rode that crappy bike on a few rides with my brother and cousin, and always had an interest in getting out there and exploring.

In 2015 I got an entry-level hardtail second hand from a kid (I’m 5’2″ and a bit over 100 pounds) basically new, still had little rubber hairs on the tires that came stock with the bike. It was enjoyed a lot on that same paved trail and confidence in basic stability was achieved, but I always wanted to go offroad. There are some basic short walking trails in some areas of that paved path that allowed me to get a feel of gravel and bumpy terrain under me, and after feeling a little more comfortable in the bush Jessy took me out to a real trail once he too purchased a second hand bike a couple years ago.

I was terrified of every root, rock, slight dip or drop, every log, every tight spot and every slightly skinny bridge. I walked my bike a lot, but still had fun and eventually got better. Jessy bought a new bike for this past season and my bike saw many upgrades which made me much more confident and skilled as a rider and I made a lot of progress. I even hold a handful of QOMs on Strava and am in many top ten leaderboard positions (a lot are top 5 or better) on the trail segments we frequent. I still need to work on some fundamentals but I’m pretty quick and good at tight technical stuff. I didn’t expect to be at that level when I first began using the app a few months ago. Biking has given me back some confidence in myself and joy that’s been greatly lacking lately. All of those obstacles I began terrified of or couldn’t do I can tackle pretty easily now. I hope to conquer some proper jumps and gaps soon.

The backyard of the home we rent is large enough that we can build a small bike trail with features we can practice on. We wanted to include enough variation that allows both of us to improve. Jessy has past experience with dirtbiking that’s probably allowed him to be a lot more confident and skilled than myself or others completely new to trail riding (or any risk-taking sport), so the features are already intimidating enough for me. I’ll share a video walkthrough in the future.

So this entry is called “Inktober” after all, so here’s the art. There wasn’t much. I did get an idea for a piece out of it, but I really haven’t done much in a number of years, and don’t particularly feel inspired enough to put a ton of hours into something anymore. This past month I managed a couple doodles, but I thought I’d also share the pumpkins I carved, some of my Halloween nail art (I got really into nail polish a year ago), and a couple paintings I have done in the last couple years that haven’t been posted online, including my first ever fully abstract piece.

These next two paintings were done within the last two years, the abstract piece sometime in 2017 and the snail was done right at the beginning of 2018, inspired by a slug painting I did back in 2012 (last photo). All of them are 50cm by 100cm.

I only did a couple actual doodles during October, mollusk inspired of course. The third idea didn’t quite come together on paper after a few attempts, but it’s something that deserves revisiting in the future.

While I don’t feel particularly drawn to painting or drawing like my old self, I have felt inspired by a few floating ideas and newly discovered techniques that deserve testing out. Some of my old doodles are interesting concepts that could be adapted into new paintings as well. Maybe this winter I’ll work on some things and get them online too.