“The Graham Crossing”
This is the fifth painting of the series that I am doing of the North Fork of the Guadalupe River. The scene is on the downriver-side of the Graham low-water crossing. As I am painting this scene, I am having trouble concentrating on the painting because there is a sheet of paper, a document, that has a place for my signature, lying just to the side of the painting on the drawing board. Since I don’t have a good story about the painting, I do have a story about why I am having trouble signing that document.
The document is addressed to “The Texas Board of Architectural Examiners.” There are a lot of words on the document. However, the key sentence, just above the line for my signature, says in bold letters: “I hereby voluntarily surrender my architect registration.” I am having a difficult time accepting the fact that it is time for me to end this phase of my life. I worked so hard and for so long to get this coveted registration, how can I just quietly sign the document and no longer be able to say, “I am an architect”?
After graduating from high school in 1951, it would take me fifteen years to do all of the necessary things to get to the point where I would be eligible to take the dreaded 44 hour architectural registration examination. I can remember the euphoria in the summer of 1966 when I received the notification that I had passed the exam and was now a registered architect.
To celebrate, my wife, Corinne, and I loaded up a borrowed tent and a brand new catalog-bought Styrofoam sailboard on the top of our new (used) Oldsmobile 88 and headed to Port Aransas to spend the weekend sailing.
Since I was now a registered architect, and therefore really smart, I didn’t need to spend much time studying the instructions on how to sail the sailboard. We got there early in the afternoon and set the tent up on the beach. Early the next morning, we took the new sailboard down to the ship channel near the ferry crossing. Corinne got on the sailboard with the Igloo cooler that had our drinks and lunch. I pushed off and got on. I pulled in the rope to the sail and we started moving—fast.
Soon we were rapidly approaching the other side of the ship channel and we needed to change directions. I was trying to remember how the instruction booklet said to change directions (which it called “tacking”). Very quickly, things went bad. We capsized, Corinne and I fell over the side, the Igloo cooler drifted off, and suddenly there were fins coming toward us which I thought must be sharks. (They turned out to be dolphins.)
Every time we got back on and I would pull in the rope to the sail, we would capsize again. The incoming tide carried this commotion to where we were in the path of the ferry which was now loudly honking at us. People were getting out of their cars on the ferry and coming to the railing to watch this interesting event. Eventually, by swimming and pulling, I got the sailboard and Corinne to the bank of the ship channel. A whole lot more happened to us on this interesting trip which will have to be told in another story.
I guess it is OK to go on and sign that document. Even though I won’t be a registered architect, I can paint now and I will always have my memories.
Cheers,
Acree
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