So I’m on the train with my sketchbook. And I’m listening to these three guys talking about the time they’ve done in prison. They are three young tough looking guys, a bit of a thug look to them. They are loud and sit near me but not close enough to really annoy me. I listen as they talk about the trouble of sneaking cigarettes into the prison. The tallest, best looking of them gets up and sits across from me.


We make brief eye contact and I smile, because I don’t any trouble, and they look bored and restless. Things can get weird on a train. But he smiles back and asks me politely if that’s a sketchbook?

I answer yes it is.

And here’s where it gets funny. He asks if he can look through it. Now I don’t know if any of you have ever asked me if you can look through one of my sketchbooks before but typically I grow fangs hiss at you and threaten to bite you. Or I carefully sit next to you and flip past personal notes and pages. I don’t just hand them over.


But this sketchbook is different. This sketchbook is the one that I instituted a no fail policy on. What? Yeah, I went a little crazy and decided that any page I put pencil to, I would finish the drawing, and ink it before I moved on to the next page. It’s hard. It’s intimidating as all hell. It’s now the best sketchbook I’ve ever had. I don’t love every drawing. Some of them do fail as compositions. But I don’t fail in follow through and it’s a huge accomplishment for me. It also contains no words. So I feel free to hand it around. But to hand it to this thug, my drawings are usually so sweet, I couldn’t imagine that he would be interested in it.


I asked him if really wanted to see it and he said yes and I handed it over, and watched him look at them. Tough thug, sweet drawings. Who better to review you're portfolio on a train?


One of the other guys glanced at the sketchbook and said "He's looking for the dirty pictures"


I laughed. "Good luck, you won't find any in there."

He looked me up and down and announced with some confidence "You don't draw dirty pictures."

With a smirk I told him "I have a different sketchbook for the dirty pictures."


The third friend laughed "My kind of girl!"

And we all laughed. The thug looking at the sketchbook pauses for the first time at this image.

"This one is about to get dirty" he said.







This one is the all liked. My dirty martini. They like the olives, they say.

That amuses me.



He had be flipping though with polite interest. But this one caught his eye. It's my crocodile welcome. He looks excited to his buddy, who looks bored.
I think he liked the impending doom of the fishes. The contrast of sweet and violent.

He tells me it's really good.

I'm pleased, my ego likes to be pet.





The next one he stops at is one of my favorites.

It's my flying squirrel. It's simple, but I have trouble with perspective, and drawing this from slightly underneath was a challenge for me.

And he appreciated something about it. He asked if I drew it free hand.

I did. I always do.

This one caught their interest too. The whole group again. Sex sells.

He told me the girl in the bathroom is the girlfriend. And the blond is her best friend, cheating with the boyfriend.

I told him that was exactly it. Because it worked, and it doesn't really matter what my story for it is.

My favorite though was the swift breath he took in for this one.

He sighed "Marilyn..."

She's still got it.

I drew this to illustrate "Legendary" and his sigh made me feel like I succeeded.

We parted ways at the next stop. Shaking hands and smiling, exchanging names. And I felt better than I have in a while. It left me feeling glad that I had something to share.