I drew this portrait of my husband eight months before I met him. I just took out my drawing pad and chalk pastels one cold January night and sketched and colored and this face emerged. Eight months later, by the Penn Station information booth, there he was.
That was 30 years ago now. When I made the portrait I had just returned from visiting my parents for Christmas in Antigua, and in retrospect I think I had seen my future husband going up to the altar for communion with his mother and brother at midnight carol service on Christmas eve.
I had also dreamed him years before, when I was a teen still living in my parents home at 37 Paddington Terrace in Jamaica. I had dreamed myself in a bridal gown, veil blowing in the wind atop a hill, and I had looked up at the man beside me, his face at a great height from mine, and years later, I realized it was his face that I dreamed.
I had also dreamed him years before, when I was a teen still living in my parents home at 37 Paddington Terrace in Jamaica. I had dreamed myself in a bridal gown, veil blowing in the wind atop a hill, and I had looked up at the man beside me, his face at a great height from mine, and years later, I realized it was his face that I dreamed.
At our actual wedding in August 1986, my friend Annie P. saw him for the first time and she said to me, "It's not so startling that you drew him eight months before you met him. You've been drawing that face all through high school."
I look at the chalk pastel portrait now and wonder why I made him so fierce looking. In reality, his eyes were soft when I met him, his lips teasing, his whole demeanor gentle and amused with a quick dancing wit.
I am thinking this morning how much we can know of the future even when we don't know it consciously. I love this man, this good and devoted father to my children, more today that I did when I married him. I believe I was always destined to love him. Almost twenty-eight years later, I choose it still.
This is so astounding to me. Just, wow.
ReplyDeleteAngella! You can draw something fierce! Wow. I love this. I used to believe I'd fall in love with a cowboy when I was in high school. I knew I was going to Montana and what else do you find there? Little did I know. What's funny though is through all my traveling/family camping, I went through pat's town a few times and wondered, like I did in every new town, if the man I would love lived there. It was bound to happen in at least one of them right? We travelled A LOT! =) What I do know is no matter how far out we get, we'll always come back to each other. I love this.
ReplyDeleteThe portrait is an amazing likeness, right down to the shape of the eyebrows and the nose. How fortunate that you met and have had this full life together. May it continue to be so. x0 N2
ReplyDeleteI believe strongly in this sort of love magic. I do.
ReplyDeletethis whole story is so wildly romantic and wondrous. i got shivers reading it. you are so clearly a special person, angella. and it sure seems like your husband is from that same rarified planet.
ReplyDeleteI have chills. Oh my God. You are so talented, but also wow, you drew your husband perfectly without meeting him! Insane. And I think he looks determined in the drawing.
ReplyDeleteWow. Amazing.
ReplyDeleteChills. This gave me chills.
ReplyDeleteThe first thing that hit me was how amazing that you right and left sides of your brain seem equally talented. That is rare. The portrait is beautiful and the likeness unbelievably similar. I am glad you found this man you love so much. You seem well suited for each other. Sweet Jo
ReplyDeleteNow that right there? Pretty darn awesome!
ReplyDeleteWOW. it was meant to be.
ReplyDeleteamazing and beautiful. I believe you are so right about our knowing about our futures. It's like the sign posts are here but written in a language we can't yet understand.
ReplyDeleteI have a story like this about Scott. I didn't "see" it someone else did though. I'll have to share it some time when I'm not so sleepy.
love and hugs to you Angella.
You give me hope.
ReplyDeleteUtter magic. I am stunned by your goddess wisdom and how fiercely talented you are. This would be a lovely story to mythologize in fiction. It's like something from an Isabel Allende novel, but true.
ReplyDeleteThat is fascinating! And what a great portrait! I had no idea you were a visual artist as well as a verbal one. (Well, obviously I knew you were a photographer -- but drawing is a whole new dimension!)
ReplyDeleteAll I can say is Wow! God had a plan for the two of you for sure. Amazing story.
ReplyDeleteOK, this story needs to go on one of those shows where the unexplained happen. Awesome!
ReplyDeleteI so appreciate all your comments here. The crazy thing is, this happened, and it was almost prosaic. Art is my road not taken.I started out as a studio art major in college, then switched to writing, because while I could reproduce what I saw quite faithfully, I didn't feel as if I had a true original vision as an artist. I still love to draw, and I love trying to capture the world around me in photographs, and especially the people I love. But I too, sometimes marvel that I saw this man I would marry in my imagination before I met him. I, too, sometimes get chills when I remember it. But it happened. And here we are.
ReplyDelete