"What do you want to be when you grow up?" Part 1

OK, this blog post is a blast from the past. I was inspired this morning when I was on the phone with my very good friend, Bert Fonseca (shameless plug time - of After Hours DJ Entertainment). Bert has become a Parsons Photo junkie...LOL! He told me that I amuse him with my posts and my writing. First thing out of my mouth was "I wanted to be a writer when I was little". We chatted about other things, but that stuck in my mind.

As some of you may know, I am spending the summer at my family's home in Old Lyme - this cottage has been in my family for many years: my grandparent bought it when my father was young so he spent every summer here, my brother and I spent every summer here, and now my children will spend every summer here. Being down here brings back floods of memories of when I was younger.

Today, as I walked around the neighborhood, I reflected on when I really wanted to be a writer: grammar school. I was convinced that I was going to write stories and illustrate the stories with combinations of my own art work and my photographs (I figured, why should I pay someone when I could do it myself - not kidding! I was enterprising at a very young age!).

The turning point in my morning walks is always Brighton Beach...as a child, that was my escape place. I would go there to paint, draw, photograph, think. It still has the same calming effect on me, but this time it was different. I went back to the house and started searching for stuff and came up with:

When I was in 8th grade, I had my first art work published! It was in the Captain Nathan Hale Middle School Yearbook, but it was something! This was a pen and ink drawing of a racoon - my art teacher, Scott Rhodes, still shows this to students (I used to work at the school as an adult as well)! Must be from around 1984 or 85.

Then came my Patrick Nagle phase. This next one was an acrylic paintnt that was my finl art project in 8th grade - 1985. It's my version of the Duran Duran album, Rio. This was drawn freehand with pencils the painted.

I was so intrigued with Nagle's art - most people were wondering what a preteen was doing with half naked phoos but I was obsessed with the lines of the features and was wasn't there, rather than what was there. I imitated many of his paintings to be my own. This next colored pencil drawing was from 1985 - my mother had most of my series framed!

I think this next painting was the precursor to my Photoshop manipulations to come! I have always loved sunsets (what girl doesn't?) and I loved painting sunsets; however, here, the sun sets over the water. It makes for a spectacular photo , but not a great watercolor! So I took my favorite view of Griswold Field and combined it with the sunset. This one is dated 1986...and yes, I thought it more artsy to go by "Di" instead of "Diane" so everything was signed "Di".

So, upon digging through my old room (which my kids now occupy), I came across this. I don't remember it but I won a certificate of merit for designing an ad for the Courant...I'm sure it was a "thank you for submitting", but it still looks cool, right? LOL!

And this was the first (and sorry to say the last) time I received honor role - middle school!

My kids brought the next drawing down here to decorate their room. It's a pastel drawing of my cat, Tabby. They never met Tabby (she passed in 1998) but they are so intrigued by this little white fuzz ball! This drawing must have been from 1990.

Unfortunatly, I don't have any of my spectacular writing samples to post down here. I'll save that and my early photographer years as another post. Hope you enjoyed this trip down memory lane as much as I did! :) Makes me want to head to Coventry and start digging through some other projects!