Weirdbook No.29

253. Black ink and black color pencil on 11 x 14 size coquille board. The idea for this drawing came from the night before, when I watched "The Phantom of the Opera," on TV. At the beginning of my career I was somewhat worried about being able to come up with ideas for the pictures I would have to draw and paint, day after day, week after week, year after year, it seemed like a huge mountain to climb. But whenever I'm up against any kind of challenge my mind always returns to that indoctrination speech I was given at Basic Training, when I joined the U.S. Air Force back in 1949; I sat on the floor of an airplane hangar with a hundred or so other recruits and listened to an  officer saying, among other things, "You are going to face challenges here that you will think to yourself, "I can't do that!" But you are about to learn otherwise,