Enduring Creation and random thoughts

Temperance
6B pencil on A4 paper
10 September 2006

My friend M and I used to play this game when we were bored—we would ask each other “If you were a ___________, what would you be?” The questions would be popped in the weirdest of places and the most inopportune of moments. “If you were a pencil…” was asked at 4AM, whilst smoking, sitting on a bench, opposite the Metro stop, waiting for the sign to come alive. My favorite so far was this: “If you were a disease, what would you be?” I am almost always Manic Depressive. We asked this question in the middle of a storm, standing outside a closed pastry shop, under a tattered green awning, at 5PM, with our stomachs growling.

This is a drawing I did in under an hour. I stopped working on her face when I realized she was starting to look like me. She’s slightly askew. I hate that she came out so clean. She will probably become a part of something bigger.

Temperance, the Fourteenth of the Major Arcana in a regular Tarot deck, generally means “Mature adaptation to whatever life offers; individualized existence.” Reversed: Unfortunate combinations.

Pain. Old French peine; Italian pena. The root taps down to Latin: poena.

According to Random House Webster’s Dictionary, Temperance means, 1. “moderation or self-restraint. 2. total abstinence from alcoholic liquors."

It’s time to eat another bag of Boy Bawang (that’s yummy, garlicky roasted corn kernels).