LJ Idol, Season 11 - Week 1
Title: A Necessary Distraction
Topic: Resolution
There were definitely things to love about spending a month at an artists' colony, Roisin thought, but they currently weren't helping her work. The studio she'd been assigned was bright and airy and had more than enough space for her work - she made linoblock prints, and she preferred a lot of room and good light in which to carve the blocks and make test prints - it was an improvement over the space she shared in New York, and her meals were taken care of, even being delivered to the studio if she wanted, and the colony had been established in a very pretty, very relaxing location, and her bed was comfortable enough, but all the same, almost two weeks in and she had little to show for her time here.
It seemed a cruel joke that her studio was called Resolution. There were others named Perseverance, Fortitude, Determination. Strong, encouraging concepts to help the artists along, but right now, completely useless to Roisin.
She paged idly through the manuscript she was supposed to be working on, a collection of Greek myths for which she had a signed contract and, most importantly, a deadline. She'd been corresponding with the author and thought it might help for the two of them to meet in person and talk about the work, but the colony frowned on visitors.
Part of the problem was that Roisin missed her friends, and she missed the city. Aside from her work, or the walks around the grounds that she took every day, or the occasional demonstrations from other artists, there wasn’t much to do. Her friends back home could be distracting, but they were entertaining, and there were dancers to see, and movies, and baseball games (her gran had developed a love for the game in her old age, and Roisin would send her little drawings of the players along with reports of how well the Dodgers were doing), and concerts, and exhibitions. There were floor shows at the Cotton Club and any one of a thousand tiny cramped speakeasies where she could drink her body volume in awful gin and dance with good-looking friends and strangers.
And right now, with her time in the colony half over, she missed being able to go to the Metropolitan Museum for inspiration. If nothing else, she could admire the little blue Egyptian hippopatomus. It wasn't the time period or the style or even the medium she worked in, but it was small and cute and never failed to cheer her up.
She sighed again, and ran her finger down the list of potential illustrations. She wished she had her Victrola, but it was her own fault for not bringing it with her. Well, nothing for it but to keep working. It really was unfair, though - she'd been so excited to get this particular job, and now she'd hit such a wall that she couldn't finish it.
There was a knock on the door. One of the poets at the colony kept coming over uninvited to inflict her half-written poems on Roisin whether Roisin wanted her to or not, and Roisin was frustrated enough with her own work that she even hoped it might be her.
It wasn't. It was a man, for one thing, tall and red-haired, his shirt wrinkled and a white bakery box in his hand.
“Reynard!” Roisin cried, throwing her arms around his neck. He laughed. His real name was Edwin, but Roisin had never called him that, because of his fox-colored hair. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to visit,” he said, as if it were obvious. He held out the box. “I brought you cookies from that bakery you like so much.”
She opened the box and squeaked involuntarily. It was full of Russian tea cookies from a bakery near her apartment. She'd missed those too.
“How did you get here?” Roisin peered around him to see if his car was parked outside her studio, even though there was no way that could be possible. The trails weaving through the colony grounds were wide enough for two people, but not a vehicle. “I'm sorry, come in.”
“I drove, of course.” He grinned and followed her inside. “It's clean! What have you been doing up here?”
“Nothing. I can't work. I cleaned the place yesterday, hoping that might help. I even swept, but no luck. It's too quiet and I miss everyone.”
She’d written to him a few days ago, when she still thought she might break through her artist's block - “RESOLVED: That I shall finish the damn book with time to spare.” She’d included a sketch of her studio, “RESOLUTION” written under it in capital letters to drive her point home.
“Well, now I'm here, so you can stop missing me.” He kissed her on the forehead. “I'm sorry the studio hasn't impressed itself upon you since your last letter. Will it help if you show me what you've done?”
Roisin showed him her few finished illustrations, her test prints, her many sketches. Reynard made approving noises. He wasn't an artist at all - he taught Greek and Latin at a Brooklyn high school - but he had a fine appreciation for the arts.
“Could it be the style you chose?” he asked. “It's very modern. What if you tried something more classical?”
Roisin snorted. “Modern is why the publisher chose me. He said it's because I work in a new style with an older medium. I do miss the Greek gallery at the Metropolitan, though.”
“I can take you home with me, take you to the museum tomorrow, and bring you back.” He grinned. His bed wasn't any more comfortable than the beds here, but both times she'd slept in it, Roisin had slept well.
But he should know she was here to work, and a two-day trip to the city and back would defeat the purpose of the artists' colony.
“I appreciate it, but I can't be gone for two days. I should be working.”
“You should, but as you so amply demonstrated, you're not. So show me around! Introduce me to your compatriots! Let me take you to dinner!”
“All my meals are included.” She couldn't help but smile at his exuberance. He was nothing if not a distraction, but maybe that was what she needed right now.
“There's a town not too far away. They have at least one restaurant, and I know because I drove past it.”
“Then we have to find a place for you to sleep. You're not supposed to sleep with me, and I won't let you sleep in your car.”
There were no guest rooms in the main house, and the rules were strict when it came to overnight visitors. No spouses, no partners, no “friends”, no one from outside the colony. Roisin was a professional when it came to the rules, but she couldn't send Reynard home in the dark. She could only hope an overnight guest in her studio would be beneath notice.
There was a sofa in the studio, left by a previous inhabitant, and while it was too short for Reynard it was better than his car. It even had a blanket thrown over it.
“We can talk about my sleeping arrangements later,” he said. “I want to see the place that's taken you away from me and all your other friends.”
So Roisin took him around, showing him the other studios, the garden, the main house, the outbuildings. She introduced him to the few fellow residents they saw. Silvia, the pushy poet, was only too happy to have a new audience for her works-in-progress. Reynard made impressed-sounding noises at everything, and by the end of the tour Roisin felt better about the colony and the space it gave her to do her work in peace.
She left word that she wouldn't be eating in the dining room that night, changed her clothes, and let Reynard drive her into town for dinner. He told her about his students. She told him about the other colony residents. He told her about a translation he was working on. She told him about some ideas she had for new work.
“See,” he said, “you just needed a change of scene to get your creative juices flowing again.”
“Oh, these are old ideas,” she told him. “But I see your point.”
Reynard parked his car by the main house, where there was a gravel clearing for delivery vans, and they walked back to Roisin's studio hand in hand in the moonlight.
“I wish you didn't have to go back tomorrow,” she said. “You could sit in my studio and work on your translation while I worked on my prints. I think I just need to be around other people more than I am. Everyone here is doing their own work in their own studios, and we only gather for meals and sometimes at night before bed.”
“I should have picked a weekend with a holiday at one end,” he said agreeably. “But I'm here now, for you to take advange of in whatever way pleases you best.”
It pleased her best to sit on the sofa in her studio and kiss him for a while. He recited Latin poetry from memory, which only made her want to kiss him harder, and then he recited some Greek, which was even better.
It turned out that Reynard was just the distraction she needed, because a day after he drove back home, she found herself eager to get to her studio in the morning and reluctant to leave it for meals, because she was working so hard. And if her stylized drawings of Apollo were tall and presumably red-haired, well, she thought it was only fair to draw the Greek god of art in the image of the friend who'd gotten her to produce it again.
Topic: Resolution
There were definitely things to love about spending a month at an artists' colony, Roisin thought, but they currently weren't helping her work. The studio she'd been assigned was bright and airy and had more than enough space for her work - she made linoblock prints, and she preferred a lot of room and good light in which to carve the blocks and make test prints - it was an improvement over the space she shared in New York, and her meals were taken care of, even being delivered to the studio if she wanted, and the colony had been established in a very pretty, very relaxing location, and her bed was comfortable enough, but all the same, almost two weeks in and she had little to show for her time here.
It seemed a cruel joke that her studio was called Resolution. There were others named Perseverance, Fortitude, Determination. Strong, encouraging concepts to help the artists along, but right now, completely useless to Roisin.
She paged idly through the manuscript she was supposed to be working on, a collection of Greek myths for which she had a signed contract and, most importantly, a deadline. She'd been corresponding with the author and thought it might help for the two of them to meet in person and talk about the work, but the colony frowned on visitors.
Part of the problem was that Roisin missed her friends, and she missed the city. Aside from her work, or the walks around the grounds that she took every day, or the occasional demonstrations from other artists, there wasn’t much to do. Her friends back home could be distracting, but they were entertaining, and there were dancers to see, and movies, and baseball games (her gran had developed a love for the game in her old age, and Roisin would send her little drawings of the players along with reports of how well the Dodgers were doing), and concerts, and exhibitions. There were floor shows at the Cotton Club and any one of a thousand tiny cramped speakeasies where she could drink her body volume in awful gin and dance with good-looking friends and strangers.
And right now, with her time in the colony half over, she missed being able to go to the Metropolitan Museum for inspiration. If nothing else, she could admire the little blue Egyptian hippopatomus. It wasn't the time period or the style or even the medium she worked in, but it was small and cute and never failed to cheer her up.
She sighed again, and ran her finger down the list of potential illustrations. She wished she had her Victrola, but it was her own fault for not bringing it with her. Well, nothing for it but to keep working. It really was unfair, though - she'd been so excited to get this particular job, and now she'd hit such a wall that she couldn't finish it.
There was a knock on the door. One of the poets at the colony kept coming over uninvited to inflict her half-written poems on Roisin whether Roisin wanted her to or not, and Roisin was frustrated enough with her own work that she even hoped it might be her.
It wasn't. It was a man, for one thing, tall and red-haired, his shirt wrinkled and a white bakery box in his hand.
“Reynard!” Roisin cried, throwing her arms around his neck. He laughed. His real name was Edwin, but Roisin had never called him that, because of his fox-colored hair. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to visit,” he said, as if it were obvious. He held out the box. “I brought you cookies from that bakery you like so much.”
She opened the box and squeaked involuntarily. It was full of Russian tea cookies from a bakery near her apartment. She'd missed those too.
“How did you get here?” Roisin peered around him to see if his car was parked outside her studio, even though there was no way that could be possible. The trails weaving through the colony grounds were wide enough for two people, but not a vehicle. “I'm sorry, come in.”
“I drove, of course.” He grinned and followed her inside. “It's clean! What have you been doing up here?”
“Nothing. I can't work. I cleaned the place yesterday, hoping that might help. I even swept, but no luck. It's too quiet and I miss everyone.”
She’d written to him a few days ago, when she still thought she might break through her artist's block - “RESOLVED: That I shall finish the damn book with time to spare.” She’d included a sketch of her studio, “RESOLUTION” written under it in capital letters to drive her point home.
“Well, now I'm here, so you can stop missing me.” He kissed her on the forehead. “I'm sorry the studio hasn't impressed itself upon you since your last letter. Will it help if you show me what you've done?”
Roisin showed him her few finished illustrations, her test prints, her many sketches. Reynard made approving noises. He wasn't an artist at all - he taught Greek and Latin at a Brooklyn high school - but he had a fine appreciation for the arts.
“Could it be the style you chose?” he asked. “It's very modern. What if you tried something more classical?”
Roisin snorted. “Modern is why the publisher chose me. He said it's because I work in a new style with an older medium. I do miss the Greek gallery at the Metropolitan, though.”
“I can take you home with me, take you to the museum tomorrow, and bring you back.” He grinned. His bed wasn't any more comfortable than the beds here, but both times she'd slept in it, Roisin had slept well.
But he should know she was here to work, and a two-day trip to the city and back would defeat the purpose of the artists' colony.
“I appreciate it, but I can't be gone for two days. I should be working.”
“You should, but as you so amply demonstrated, you're not. So show me around! Introduce me to your compatriots! Let me take you to dinner!”
“All my meals are included.” She couldn't help but smile at his exuberance. He was nothing if not a distraction, but maybe that was what she needed right now.
“There's a town not too far away. They have at least one restaurant, and I know because I drove past it.”
“Then we have to find a place for you to sleep. You're not supposed to sleep with me, and I won't let you sleep in your car.”
There were no guest rooms in the main house, and the rules were strict when it came to overnight visitors. No spouses, no partners, no “friends”, no one from outside the colony. Roisin was a professional when it came to the rules, but she couldn't send Reynard home in the dark. She could only hope an overnight guest in her studio would be beneath notice.
There was a sofa in the studio, left by a previous inhabitant, and while it was too short for Reynard it was better than his car. It even had a blanket thrown over it.
“We can talk about my sleeping arrangements later,” he said. “I want to see the place that's taken you away from me and all your other friends.”
So Roisin took him around, showing him the other studios, the garden, the main house, the outbuildings. She introduced him to the few fellow residents they saw. Silvia, the pushy poet, was only too happy to have a new audience for her works-in-progress. Reynard made impressed-sounding noises at everything, and by the end of the tour Roisin felt better about the colony and the space it gave her to do her work in peace.
She left word that she wouldn't be eating in the dining room that night, changed her clothes, and let Reynard drive her into town for dinner. He told her about his students. She told him about the other colony residents. He told her about a translation he was working on. She told him about some ideas she had for new work.
“See,” he said, “you just needed a change of scene to get your creative juices flowing again.”
“Oh, these are old ideas,” she told him. “But I see your point.”
Reynard parked his car by the main house, where there was a gravel clearing for delivery vans, and they walked back to Roisin's studio hand in hand in the moonlight.
“I wish you didn't have to go back tomorrow,” she said. “You could sit in my studio and work on your translation while I worked on my prints. I think I just need to be around other people more than I am. Everyone here is doing their own work in their own studios, and we only gather for meals and sometimes at night before bed.”
“I should have picked a weekend with a holiday at one end,” he said agreeably. “But I'm here now, for you to take advange of in whatever way pleases you best.”
It pleased her best to sit on the sofa in her studio and kiss him for a while. He recited Latin poetry from memory, which only made her want to kiss him harder, and then he recited some Greek, which was even better.
It turned out that Reynard was just the distraction she needed, because a day after he drove back home, she found herself eager to get to her studio in the morning and reluctant to leave it for meals, because she was working so hard. And if her stylized drawings of Apollo were tall and presumably red-haired, well, she thought it was only fair to draw the Greek god of art in the image of the friend who'd gotten her to produce it again.