The painters broke the blinds in our guest room. We still haven’t replaced them.

The window faces east, and at dawn, the searing Arizonan sun laserbeams into the room. This is only an issue when we have guests, especially ones who’d rather not start sunbathing at 5:27 a.m.

When Suzanne visited from New York last month, I used some clamps to hang a ratty old blanket over the window as a temporary measure. Jenny is in no rush to spend the money to replace it with something more permanent, but I call it “janky blanky.”

I hate it.

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I don’t mind a little chaos when I’m making art. Nothing like Francis Bacon’s studio, but a few too many worn-out brushes, unwashed palettes, pencil shavings — those are just signs of activity.

I’ve learned it’s worth tidying up at day’s end, if only to walk into calm the next morning.

I find that if I put away my supplies in bins with labels, I don’t end up with dozens of duplicate boxes of pen refills. And when I know what I have, I’m that much more apt to use that tube of metallic gold gouache or the sepia ink.
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I don’t mind paint spots on my pants, coffee stains on my shirt, or paint under my fingernails. But there are certain situations that make me feel like the world is crumbling.

Dead lightbulbs. Wet paper napkins. Dishes in the sink. Trash in the car.

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My grandmother was quite fastidious. Her mother was even more so. A German hausfrau, she would check on her maid by writing ‘Schwein’ in any dust she found on the lid of the piano or the top of the credenza. Maybe I got it from her.

Or maybe it’s OCD. Though I doubt I’d suffer from anything called a ‘disorder.’

Or maybe it’s just a need for a little predictability and calm in a world that always seems roiled by chaos. A little protection against entropy, that inexorable slide toward collapse.

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My imagination is always on, sometimes working to make beautiful things, at other times waking me up in the middle of the night, worrying that what starts with janky blanky will lead to broken windows, cracks in the plaster, rats in the attic, wolves at the door.

But walking into the calm of my tidy studio — the cables neatly coiled, the keyboard aligned with the monitor, the pens tightly capped, the water jars freshly filled, a pure white sketchbook page patiently waiting — provides me with a measure of serenity and control, the blinds drawn tight against the glaring, janky world beyond.

Your pal,

Danny