Figure Drawing 101
The studio is dark and quiet.
Portia comes out of the supply closet in a short kimono robe carrying a small cassette player. She places the tape player on the platform and unceremoniously, the robe drops to the ground. The instructor quietly directs her to sit or stand or lay--trying to make sure she's comfortable--while we rummage through our cases for charcoal and paper behind our easels.
She's completely at ease. Composed and relaxed in whatever pose she holds. It's as if she's oblivious to the small circle of complete strangers who are trying their best to capture her on paper.
I know she's got to be freezing. Her nipples are erect with the cold on this January morning. I wonder if she realizes how attractive she is. I know how hard it is to hold a pose. We've all done it--the whole class has had an opportunity to pose (albeit, clothed). The first time the instructor put me on the platform I made the fatal mistake of locking my knees and got dizzy after five minutes. How does she do it? I can tell every muscle in her body is relaxed.
Although beauty isn't a requirement of the job, she has it. She's long and lean--her limbs just as expressive as her face. The tape playing is some anonymous electronica--recorded off of Echos on NPR the night before. She is lost in the music. The way we're supposed to be lost in our work.
I try to focus on the subject, not the person. I cock my head behind my easel and just stare. I want so badly to capture the shadow of a rib below her breast and the shorn hair on the nape of her neck. The stub of charcoal is loose between my stained fingers. I smudge a shadow and try to copy the lines my eyes see.
Oooh, Cash, I like that one. Very evocative of the mood.
Haven't done a drabble in a bit, so:
Turn left, twist your right hip into the wall. Tuck your right foot up behind; can you reach it? Yeah, okay.
Now you're in position. Your left hand aches, the way you've got it crimped around that sharp edge. No time like the present. Raise your right hand skyward, drive off the ball of your left foot, push hard as the muscles in your right foot begin to cramp.
You can't even see the hold, but you know it's there, you saw it three seconds ago, but now your head's tucked under the overhang and all you can do is slap the wall with your right hand, fumbling around for that vital, life-saving, tiny little pocket.
It's not there; and you push just a little harder off that poor, over-extended left foot. Your right hand flails, and the tip of one finger touches something--is that it? are you there?--and the right foot, forgotten and vindictive about it, slips.
Down you come, swinging wide from the wall--thank god for the route-setters who know where to place the bolts. "Fuck!" You dangle, pants rucked up under your harness, hair caught in your sunglasses.
"You had it," says your belayer; but she's dubious. And you're losing the daylight.
This is what climbers mean when they say a route is interesting.
Damn, 'suela. Is that about a particular route, autobiographical?
Nah, I made it up, although I've certainly been in that position more than once. I don't lead all that much, though. But that's how getting over an overhang can feel, sometimes.
Hubby and I stopped by a rock climbing facility a few days ago, and I was in awe of the people who clambered up and down that wall and over the over hangs. Hubby rightly noted that part of my enjoyment came from very healthy young men showing off their muscles.
Yes indeed, Connie. The healthy young men (and women!) at my gym are very nice to watch. The last time I was there I was running on the treadmill and I watched a young man hanging from a pull-up bar. And then he would lift his straight legs and swing them in a circle, pulling them up until his feet were pointing towards the ceiling, and then over and around and down, and then back up. It was such an exhibition of abdominal strength that I've never seen. Wow.
I found this in kind of a random websearch yesterday and thought it might be of interest to other would-be(or actual) murder scribes here.
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