Alan Blackman created this calligraphy on my first class at Fort Mason in 2002 (Roman Caps Revisited). He was demoing brush with color and he said, "Give me a name of a saint". I shouted, "Elizabeth." Let it be written. So it was done.

"Let's start at the very beginning. A very good place to start, " Julie Andrews sings the Rodgers & Hammerstein’s song in the Sound of Music. As the Imagineer of this site, I invite you to the sounds of pen nibs and ink dancing on the page. Awaken your beginner's mind. Shunryu Suzuki in “Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind” states, "In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert's there are few.”

I wrote a poetic question:

has a beginner's mind
not in the middle,
not in the end............................
but in the beginning:
as it was in the beginning :
good?

I've read Suzuki before but Christine Colasurdo reinforced the concept in her classes.

Julisa Voinche an ice skating dance instructor said, "Calligraphy is dancing on ice; the blade is the pen nib leaving its marks." That is one of the freshest descriptions of what calligraphy is and it's coming from one of our beginning students. She added, "It's a playground for adults. It's an honor to belong to such a vibrant group."

The Fort Mason calligraphy students are a delicious array of fascinating people. Though most of the students are beginners, they are knowledgeable in other fields. Georgette Freeman, a Federal agent who took Beginning Formal Italic is a teacher of Bookbinding at the San Francisco Book Center. She and the teacher Sherrie Lovler collaborated on a book collection that was exhibited at the Legacies Conference in Texas.

Helen Fung, Susie Taylor, Joanna Burchfiel, Vicky Lee, Sandy Sanches are veterans who exemplify the beginner’s mind. Though they already know calligraphy they still enroll in beginning classes to practice, still looking for new ways to do lettering.

Why create a calligraphy site dedicated for beginners? First, let me shout to the world. I’m a shoshin, a beginner in calligraphy. For several years I bought 10 beginning calligraphy kits that were placed under the bed or inside the closet. My first calligraphy book was by Emma Butterworth. After attending the free calligraphy demos at Kalligraphia 2000, I started taking "real" lessons in 2002. My goal is not to become a master calligrapher but to write my prayers, songs, poems, stories, plays using my handwriting for the fun and joy of it. Calligraphy is the medium to bring me to 'kairos' zone where creation takes place. I also like to design my own digital font so when I print my poems or stories, they are printed in my own designed fonts. Calligraphy is the starting point for designing fonts.

You maybe an Einstein in Physics, a Mozart in Music, a Joyce in Literature, a Cezanne in Painting but in another field you are a palooka or a doofus or a beginner. I wonder if Brody Neuenschwander of the Pillow Book & Prospero's Book fame can fix my car when it has engine troubles?

Suzuki says, “The secret of the arts is a beginner’s mind”

It takes a lot of time to be a genius, you have to sit around so much doing nothing, really doing nothing.
Gertrude
Stein

"Wheresoever you go, go with all your heart."
Confucius

You can learn new things at any time in your life if you're willing to be a beginner. If you actually learn to like being a beginner, the whole world opens up to you. .
Barbara Sher

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