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Drawing Dragons

My Year of Drawing Dragons

I can’t draw.

I’m really not kidding. I always joke that if you ask me to draw a tree, it will look like a Sasquatch, and if you ask me to draw a taco, it will look like the Apocalypse.

I’ve never been invested in fixing the problem, either…until two things happened.

The first was I went to Wordstock, and had the most amazing event with Jeffrey Brown and Ben Clanton. The workshop was amazing because not only are they really cool, fun guys, they can also draw.

They drew the funniest, weirdest, most imaginative stuff, and I thought: man, this is awesome. I wish I could even remotely draw a mammoth (not to mention a mammoth in a tennis shoe…mine would probably look like a taco).

Image of me and Ben Clanton and Jeffrey Brown sitting in thrones
Photo of me and Jeffrey Brown and Ben Clanton captured by Gail Pasternack. I’m the giddy one in the middle.

So, that was rolling around in my brain, and then Tina Connolly posted this comic, along with seven other friends of mine:

Sarah Andersen comic
Find more of Sarah Andersen’s awesome work here: http://www.gocomics.com/sarahs-scribbles

Okay, Sarah Andersen, I get it already.  Practice.

I’ve never practiced drawing, so I am going to. All year long. Every day.

And to make it fun for myself, I’m drawing dragons. Because I would really like to be able to draw a dragon that doesn’t look like a furry donkey.

So, that’s how we find ourselves here:

Writing in book: My Year of Drawing Dragons

I began simply; I drew a dragon. Without looking at a picture, or asking for help.

I wanted to draw Bob a dragon for his birthday. You know, with it’s tail coiled around a present? But then, well, the dragon kind of SAT on the present. And then I ran out of room for the wings. And the head was too big. And the lines of the dragon were too dark. So I added scales. Too make it look less weird.

I’m not really sure that helped.

Green dragon with purple present

What I learned about myself today, and will be the challenge throughout the year — when things start to go wrong, I want to stop. That dragon was looking dumb, and in any other scenario, I would have given up and mocked it. But I finished it, scales and all.

That’s my goal for this year. Just keep drawing dragons.

I’ll keep posting them for you too.

Happy New Year, friends!

Happy writing (and happy drawing too)!

Kate