Mary P Williams

A humid, muggy, afternoon in the depths of September and the drawing class milled restlessly waiting for the model to arrive and start posing. Time passed, as it always does, and still no model. I approached the instructor and asked “What is the holdup?” Angel Berrios smiled faintly and replied, “The model has not come. I’m trying to decide if I should dismiss the class.”

Normally I would sigh to myself and wander back to my car but I have driven thirty miles to attend this figure drawing class. I want to draw! “How about I get my husband to pose for the class?” Now, I am not sure I can persuade Doyle to pose but desperation leads me on to say “I’ll go get him. He is reading in the car.”

Angel looks surprised, but agreeable, and off I go to the parking lot to try to cajole Doyle into modeling. He refuses, looking scandalized, but I persist telling him he can keep his shorts on and just take off his shirt. Finally he agrees, saying, “Why would the artists want to draw a seventy year old man?” “We don’t care! We don’t care if you are old. In fact, it would be interesting to have a model that is not young and buffed,” I assure him.

Away we go back to the classroom and he sits on a stool that spins and we all draw the lovely shirtless guy with the gray hair. Here are some of the drawings I have kept and enjoy looking at every so often. The variety is wonderful. We all looked at the same person. Here are the drawings.

And here is the real guy:

The Real Doyle Lavern

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