Inspiration

My pointer Weet. He served as the raison d'être for the contribution I made to the book I have coming out, "Scrambled Ink"(see my other blog).

I love words and have no reluctance to use them whenever possible, but for the Scrambled Ink story I wound up cutting nearly all of the text. Initially I'd planned something much more like "Eloise". Not comparing myself in any way against the brilliant Hilary Knight or Kay Thompson, mind you--I just enjoy the sorts of stories that are all too rare nowadays-ones that are a little bit more text than pictures but the pictures are many.

In the event the story I did is all pictures; I now look at it as a kind of private conversation/reminiscence between Pete and me, who had been to Paris for the first and only time not long before.

NOT my drawing, but...

...it is my horse, and I love what Dave did--so I'm bending my sketchbook posting rules and putting one of his on-the-scene sketches here for you to enjoy. There's more at Dave's page.


Anyway, here's my "Osk"(it means "wish" in icelandic)--a mare from Iceland(really--she flew Icelandair to get here). Icelandics are sturdy, pony-sized horses that carry adults in Iceland, as they're the only breed that's been on that island for over 1000 years. These are the descendents of the viking horses, believe it or not. They are smallish--that's what happens evolution-wise when an animal reverts to a wild common denominator. Dogs, horses, cats, etc. all revert to "wolf", "pony" and "tabby" types naturally(especially in 1000 years). But the icelandics are now bred very carefully and shown all over europe; they're quite feisty and fast, and do a gait called the tölt, a running walk that doesn't bounce and is a blast to ride.
Here she is in full color--one view, anyway:

Here she's trying to climb in the back of our car.

Dave P. and David Derrick and I visited the horses at lunch a month ago and all did drawings; Dave D.'s are also terrific. Mine? Well, I do have a lot of random horse sketches, so maybe I'll put something up eventually when I can scan them. I'm just glad Dave P. did.
Happy trails!