February 6, 1938 (Sunday)
     Being in - or keeping in - a rich creative mood is not so much a question of being in fine physical trim, or of being free from extraneous mental worries, but rather a matter of being mentally alive, and constantly thinking of your work - no matter what interruptions there are, or worries to be settled, you do that with your external mind only, and once it is done, you spring back into your real creative mood. This can only be done by a conscious struggle. It is not easily attained. But unless you do, you are lost, for never is there really a propitious time to paint, you have to make it so.
      PM. To Buffalo Creek at Bailey to get impressions for the “Seneca St. House” painting-
                                                                        February 7, 1938-
     Last night when I went to bed and lay indulging in what is perhaps my worst habit – that of carrying on imaginary arguments with various people on such subjects as art, religion, etc., etc - and when it wasn’t that I would conjure up the most dreadful things happening to my wife or children. In vain did I try to recall myself to sanity by saying “you ass, you fool, you are wasting your