I joined other residents for five nights at the Spruceton Inn, a gift of time and a new experience of an extraordinarily beautiful place. I hiked every day on nearby trails, drew views of trees and mountains, gathered around a campfire in the evenings, and inked pages of my book-in-progress.

Inking is one stage in several towards creating this graphic novel. I’ve drawn the whole book in pencil already, and this is when I distill the line. I’ll add the text and color later, after these pages are scanned. Now I’m working on the chapter where my Aegean artists begin painting a fresco at a palace in Egypt and meet Canaanite musicians who will change the course of our young heroine’s life.

So as at the Inn, we met and heard each other’s stories, and the world is a bit brighter, even as we lose the daylight.