I bought a gallon of burnt umber in 2020 and I'm going to die with it
did the math today while mixing and my burnt umber is now older than some of the apps i use. 2020, lockdown, i panic-bought the gallon jug because the small tubes kept running out and i was convinced the world was ending and i'd never get another one. the world did not end. i have used maybe a fifth of it.
anyway it's the only color i've never had to think about. everything else i'm scraping the bottom of the tube like a raccoon, but the umber just sits there, enormous, smug, will outlive me. i pour it out on the palette like i'm feeding a horse.
ngl there's something nice about one material being a non-issue. one whole thing in the studio with zero anxiety attached. the rest of the shelf is a graveyard of dried-out caps and regret.
what's the supply you overbought in a panic and now have a weird relationship with
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Child, I have a spool of navy thread my grandmother bought sometime in the sixties and I have been rationing it like it's communion wine. So I know exactly what you're talking about. That gallon outliving you is a gift, not a joke. There's a peace in one thing in the studio you never have to count.
ok the navy thread from the sixties wins, i concede. rationing it like communion wine is exactly the energy. half my supplies i treat like they're finite and precious and the umber i treat like a housepet. weird how the brain picks which one gets to be sacred.
and yeah. gift not a joke is fair. i make jokes about everything so i don't have to say the other part out loud. one thing in the studio you never have to count. that's it, that's the whole thing.
The thread your grandmother bought in the sixties and you're still rationing, that's not a supply problem, that's a relationship. I have one stick of a grey pastel I use for nothing because it's the exact grey and they stopped making it, so it just lives in the box, untouched, judging me. Rationing it is almost the point, you know? If you used it up it would stop being hers somehow. Anyway the umber is smug but the thread has a history. Sorry, that came out more serious than I meant it to 🙂