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| Sketch of a commercial building somewhere in Binghamton, NY, done from a diner window. Sadly, I could never find it again, and they had really good pie. |
Yesterday I was flipping through a used-up sketchbook, and came across this little watercolor done many years ago. It’s another roadside scene en route to New York City; however, this one wasn’t memorized across the steering wheel.
I spent several years driving back and forth to the Art Students League from Rochester. I had a little bolt-hole near the Cathedral of St. John the Divine and a Ford Windstar wagon. (Gas was cheaper then.) I drove that route through snowstorms, ice, and flooding , which in the Susquehanna River watershed is the most terrifying of driving conditions. When I was too bleary to drive, I would pull off in a rest stop and sleep in the back of my van.
One early Spring evening, the Windstar died with a colossal bang in that no-man’s-land between Binghamton, NY and Scranton, PA. The tow-truck driver set me down at a diner where I sat with my sketchbook and pondered the situation. All’s well that ends well: I got a cheap hotel room, sold the carcass to the tow-truck operator for $600, and went to New Jersey to test drive one of them new-fangled Priuses.
The trip to Maine is more interesting driving than the Rochester-Manhattan loop. If you’re interested in joining us for a fantastic time in mid-Coast Maine this summer, check here for more information. There’s still room in my workshops.