Circles

Today I’m practicing circles. My calligraphy study group’s assignment for this month was “something with a brush using the power within.” The brush is not my natural tool. But today was a day to sit down and just practice. In Japanese Zen this is called enso, which means circle. It seemed a good place to start.

I had more fun when I started overlapping my circles. It made me think of all the circles I am part of in my life, and how they sometimes overlap; how we learned to sit in circle in kindergarden; how I relearned how to sit in circle as an adult; how it’s harder to have hierarchy in a circle.

Then I found an old practice paper, practicing O O O O O on grid paper, trying to draw a perfect O. Putting dots to give my hand something to aim for.

I make better circles when I slow down, but then you can see the shakiness in my hand. There is no such thing as a perfect circle made by a human hand. There is only the practice.