Life, Art, and Wonko the Sane

Wonko the Sane is a character in the 4th book of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series, So Long and Thanks for All the Fish. He is a marine biologist who is waiting for the end of the world. Wonko is his childhood nickname. He still goes by it because he says a scientist must be like a child, if he sees something he must say he sees it, whether it is what he expects to see or not.

I often tell myself an artist (I use the term loosely) must do the same, especially when something isn't turning out as planned, we must see what is there, not what we expected to be there. As I'm experimenting with a new medium, there is alot of things not quite turning out as planned lately. I got out to paint the trees across the street and what comes off the brush looks nothing like the subject tree...but it's still a tree.

Or rather it's an impression of a tree. It's not a perfect reproduction of the tree across the street, but it is the shape and color of a tree. Yet if I were only looking for what I was expecting to be there I might never realize it. It may not meet my exact expectations, but the spirit of the idea is still there.

Seems to me that may be a good lesson to apply to daily life, too. I had some very specific plans for June. They didn't quite work out, so I had a plan B. Well, plan B isn't quite working either, but with a few simple modifications plan B.2 is off and running. This plan isn't the original "picture" I planned on creating, but it's the same idea and the same spirit, same goals accomplished...it just doesn't look the way I originally expected.

And sometimes that's okay.