Authors: Gary D. Schmidt
"That doesn't look like much of a bird," I said.
"Not yet it doesn't."
"It looks more like I'm showing what isn't the bird."
Mr. Powell put his hand over mine and stopped it. I looked up at him, and he had this smile. It
wasn't like my mother's smile, but it was okay.
"That's right, Mr. Swieteck," he said. "That's exactly what you're doing. Most young artists take a
long time to understand that. Let's try it again. Turn the sheet over. This time, let's go a little faster
with the lines. And as you start—that's it, right there—as you start, think about how the line is sending
out information about the bird. How is the air moving over the feathers? How are the feathers
stirring? How fast is the bird traveling?"
"Fast," I said.
"Keep that in mind as you bring the line down."
I brought the line down.
"Stop," Mr. Powell whispered. "You're about to come to the front edge of the wing, right?"
I nodded.
"Think about how the air is hitting that edge."
Okay, you're probably not going to believe this, but when I did think about it, I really could feel the
air right on my shoulders. I'm not lying.
"Press down harder on your pencil to show how it feels." I did.
"Harder. You won't break the point."
Harder.
"The right side, same thing."
I did it again.
Mr. Powell nodded. "Now, Mr. Swieteck, let's bring in the neck and the head and beak. We'll let
this white space here between the wing lines be the body. So imagine the neck extending out of that
space. Put your pencil where you're going to begin. Very good. Now, bring your line down. A little
faster. Audubon worked with curves on this bird, so that's what you're going to want to work with. Let
it come around—yes, just so. Now bring your pencil to where you're going to start on the right side.
No, look at the picture. You see how Audubon started this wing down a little lower? Why do you
think he did that?"
"Because if the wings were at the same height, he'd look like he was hanging stuffed in a museum
somewhere."
Mr. Powell smiled again. "You're talking about something called composition. But let's not get
ahead of ourselves. Draw the right line. A little faster."
We filled all three sheets of paper, front and back. And I think we could have filled a whole bunch
more if Mrs. Merriam hadn't come up and reminded Mr. Powell that there were other patrons of the
Marysville Free Public Library, not to mention all the cataloging for those new books from Houghton
Mifflin, and she couldn't do that by herself and check books in and out also, could she?
"Of course not," said Mr. Powell, even though she probably could if she just put her looped glasses
on and got to it.
"End of your first lesson," said Mr. Powell. He looked over the drawings. "Take this one home," he
said. "Here's something a little advanced for you, but I'm curious. See if you can figure out how to
draw in the feathers. Think of it as a problem to be solved." He rolled the paper up into a scroll and
handed it to me. "Take the pencils. I'll clean the rest up later. Right now, I've got to go catalog."
When I came down into the cool of the library that afternoon, it was only three thirty and no one
else was in the whole place as far as I could see, so I don't know what Mrs. Everything-Has-to-Be-
Cataloged-This-Second Merriam was all fussed up about. Along the line of my thumb there was a
dark streak from the pencil. I decided I wouldn't wash my hands for a while to see if I could make it
last.
By the way, in case you weren't paying attention or something, did you catch what Mr. Powell
called me? "Young artist." I bet you missed that.
That night, I worked on the feathers before my brother came up to bed, which wasn't easy, because I
didn't have a desk so I had to use the floor. And I didn't have much time, because my brother could
come up any second—like, during some Marlboro commercial—and he'd find me on the floor and
he'd say, "What do you think you're doing?" and it wouldn't matter what I said because he'd tear the
paper into shreds and they'd be outside in some gutter like Joe Pepitone's hat. So I had to work fast.
I started on the left wing, and I figured out that I could get these thin lines by angling the pencil tip. I
tried to remember the rows on the tern, how the feathers on the wings got larger as they moved down,
how they slanted a little bit into the body, how they kind of jumbled together above the long tail
feathers. How the feathers were different—rounder—before they suddenly speared into the tail. How
the wing feathers were long and sharp, but the feathers on the body were like whispers.
You think it's easy trying to remember all that?
You think it's easy trying to draw all that? It isn't.
I messed up the whole left wing. I think I got the rows right, but I got all the feather lines too close
or something, and so when I curved them around they looked like a kid in kindergarten practicing his
sixes. You couldn't imagine them brushing against the air.
I tried the feathers on the body, and I think I got those okay. You had to use the lightest stroke, the
very lightest. But even though it looked good from far away, the closer in you got, the worse it was.
I started on the right wing, and the whole thing looked messed up again. Until I finally figured it
out: You can't draw every feather! You can't! I bet you hadn't thought of that either.
So for the bottom rows of the bigger feathers, I drew just a few lines and curved them in, and I
think it was right! You could imagine these feathers moving in the air. You really could.
I looked at the feathers, and rolled the paper up to hide it beneath my bed, and unrolled it to look at
the feathers again, and finally rolled it up and hid it beneath the bed. Then I turned out the light and lay
down with my hands—with the pencil smudge on my thumb—back behind my head and I looked out
the window. There was still a little bit of light left in the summer sky, and the birds were having a riot
before turning in. A few stars starting up.
I couldn't keep myself from smiling. I couldn't. Maybe this happens to you every day, but I think it
was the first time I could hardly wait to show something that I'd done to someone who would care
besides my mother. You know how that feels?
So that's why I went to the Marysville Free Public Library every Saturday for the rest of August
and on into September.
Not to read a book or anything.
September.
Washington Irving Junior High School.
The first Monday of September was The Night for All the New Kids Coming to Washington Irving
Junior High School to Get Acquainted—which meant a whole bunch of seventh-graders who had
probably lived in stupid Marysville their whole lives and one eighth-grader who had moved to town
that summer.
Me.
Terrific.
I went with my mother, who got all dressed up like she was heading for Mass and who held my
hand until we got close, when people might see. Washington Irving Junior High School looked like the
same people who built the Marysville Free Public Library, built it. Six steps—again—and columns
on each side of the door and then marble floors once you got inside, which made everything cold and
echoey. We all headed into the auditorium and everyone seemed to know everyone else, probably
because they had all been in the same elementary school since first grade. Even the mothers, who
were all wearing these dresses that looked a whole lot cooler than what my mother was wearing,
acted like they had all known one another since forever.
We sat pretty much by ourselves. Didn't talk. My mother took off her hat and held it in her hands.
She took off her gloves too.
At seven o'clock, the principal got up and welcomed us all to an exciting new year of growth and
opportunity at Washington Irving Junior High School. His name was Principal Peattie—I'm not lying
—and Principal Peattie was there to keep us all in line, he said. (We were supposed to laugh politely
at that, and all the mothers did. Even mine, after she saw she was supposed to.) Principal Peattie
would like to introduce the teachers, he said, so the whole front row of them stood and turned toward
us. There were only a couple of teachers who looked happy to be introduced. The rest looked like
they knew they still had a few days of summer freedom coming and they sure didn't want to start
thinking about school any more than we did. After they sat down, Principal Peattie announced the
school theme for the year—Washington Irving JH! Catch the Spirit! and then he called on a bunch of
ninth-graders who were all wearing the same orange T-shirt with the school theme on the back—
Washington Irving JH! Catch the Spirit!—and they handed out a stack of dittos, and for the next thirty
minutes, Principal Peattie stood on the stage and read them to us. The heat trapped inside the
auditorium during the whole stupid summer turned up a degree or two with each new ditto.
After that, when even the ninth-graders who had Caught the Stupid Spirit were pretty much
drooping, Principal Peattie announced that parents were to stay in the auditorium for an informational
session on school expectations as well as a discussion of what supplies they were to provide in a
year of austerity budgets. Students, meanwhile, were to go to other classrooms for small group
sessions that Principal Peattie and Mr. Ferris would be leading in just a few moments.
I leaned close to my mother. "Let's go," I said.
She smiled. "We should stay for the whole thing," she said. "I'll see you afterward."
So I went out of the auditorium, and one of the Spirit-filled ninth-graders asked me what my last
name was, and then she pointed to the room I was supposed to go to, and I went in and sat down with
a bunch of seventh-graders whose last names started with M to Z.
They all knew one another.
Terrific.
We waited at our scrubbed-clean desks. Guess who had no one to talk to? We waited, and I looked
around for a pen so the desk wouldn't be so scrubbed-clean. But finally Principal Peattie came in. He
had this huge smile taped across his face, like seeing us was making him the happiest man in the
world.
"This will just take a few minutes," he said. He handed out another ditto. "Principal Peattie wants
to go over a few rules with you all so we can get started on the right foot. Principal Peattie thinks that
he recognizes most of you from our Looking Forward to Junior High Day last May. But some of you
may be new to town, and some of you may come from different school systems." He looked around.
"Or at least one of you may."
Guess who.
"We all need to know what to expect of each other so that in a couple of weeks no one says to
Principal Peattie, 'Principal Peattie, I didn't know.'"
He found a kid in the second row. "Tell Principal Peattie your name," he said.
"Lee," he said.
"Your entire name."
"Lee Rostrum."
"John's brother?"
Lee Rostrum nodded happily.
"Principal Peattie is sure we'll get along fine, then. Lee, why don't you read the first rule on the
sheet?"
Lee Rostrum smoothed his ditto out on the desk. "'School begins with homeroom each morning,
starting at eight ten, when each student should be in his seat and ready for the day.'"
"Thank you, Lee," said Principal Peattie. "And eight ten means eight ten, not eight eleven or eight
twelve or eight thirteen." His eye roamed around the room. "Your name?" he asked.
"Lester Shannon."
"Lester, would you read the next rule?"
That's how it went. There were rules about the time between classes, and about lockers, and about
the combination locks and not giving your combination to anyone except to Principal Peattie if
Principal Peattie asks for it, and about lunch, and about making sure your shirt was tucked into your
pants for boys and skirts no more than a handbreadth above the knee for girls, and about always
wearing socks, and about how long a boy's hair could be—Principal Peattie looked at me when this
got read aloud—and about how we were to address teachers, and even about how many times we
could go to the bathroom in one day. I'm not lying.
After the bathroom rules, Principal Peattie roamed his eye around again and then called on me.
"What's your name?" he said.
"Doug Swieteck."
"Douglas, would you read the next rule?"
"Doug Swieteck has a question," I said. I know: sounding like Lucas being the biggest jerk he could
be.
Principal Peattie frowned. I guess he didn't like questions.
"Suppose Doug Swieteck has to go to the bathroom more than three times?"
Principal Peattie set his ditto down on the desk in front of him. "Then Doug Swieteck would need
to see the nurse," said Principal Peattie.