Color My World

"My childhood smells like a box of Crayola crayons. " ~Jessi Lane Adams
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Creativity.
To me, it's that muffled voice that whispers while I'm folding laundry or scrubbing the toilet. It's that sweet shadow that follows me from room to room. It's that tremor in my hands that wants to paint and draw and play. Creativity is pouring my heart out into a hundred puddles of color.
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"To draw you must close your eyes and sing." Pablo Picasso
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I realized a long time ago that you don't have to be a Picasso or Ansel Adams or Armani or Stephen King in order to be creative. Creativity can be subtle, quiet, and even ordinary. It can be the simple lining up of cosmetics on your vanity- the smooth, round balls of clean socks in your drawer, the memo board with thick black words and tiny yellow tacks.
Creativity. We all have it. Yet, few pursue it.
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"Lying in bed would be an altogether perfect and supreme experience if only one had a colored pencil long enough to draw on the ceiling. "~G.K. Chesterton
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The problem I have had lately is that the dirty dishes and dusting and mundane chores have grown a louder voice than my creativity. How can I possibly think of dipping my brush into a palette of wet paint, when my dog needs bathing? How can I concentrate on words and poetry, when the bills drag me down with numbers and sums and brain-numbing balances? Am I supposed to be able to create a mural when the canvas of my life reeks of trash day and dirty toilets and floors that need mopped?
The secret is balance. Or the talent to hush the voices you do not wish to hear, and welcome the ones that you do.
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"If you hear a voice within you say "you cannot paint," then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced." Vincent Van Gogh
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Most of what I create are simply experiments. Trials that turned into errors, wasted paper, ink, and paint, time spent moving, arranging, leveling and organizing objects.
The result of my efforts is not always a masterpiece, but it quiets the voices for awhile and gives me relief. It feeds the child in me that knows no boundaries- no rules- no limits.
The only voices that discourages me are those who don't understand me. My husband hates the fact that I must change the color of my walls so often. To me, it is like wearing soiled clothes. The freshness is gone, the vibrancy has fled, it no longer fits -and bores me to distraction.
I could not live with all white walls. It would be like surrounding myself with dry fish, constantly gasping for air because they have never gotten to breathe.
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"Art is when you hear a knocking from your soul - and you answer. " ~Star Richés
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Creativity is alive in everyone. We just have to be silent long enough to hear it, strong enough to trust it, and fearless enough to follow it. I truly believe that.
My sister Tina thinks she has no talent- no creativity. But yet, she would not leave the house without an ironed shirt and a shoe-matches-belt mentality. That is a type of creativity. Of order. Of knowing that she has arranged herself in a pleasing manner.
And makeup. What woman is not an artist that colors herself to be more attractive?
She is an artist of her own skin. She is creative with eye shadows and lipsticks and
blushes.
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"Inspiration exists, but it has to find us working." Pablo Picasso
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One great thing about taking your creativity out in your wall paint, is that it can be repainted.
Too orange? Not red enough? Another coat will fix that. A series of experiments will lead to success.
Don't be afraid. It won't bite.
If you're unsure of your choices, select cheap paint. But what is fifteen dollars for a
thousand days of pleasure?
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"Art is the only way to run away without leaving home. " ~Twyla Tharp
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When I was young, I dreamed of having an art set. There was something extremely satisfying to own my own tubes of paint, to touch the thin handles of camel-hair
brushes, to write across new canvas in words of color.
But when I finally owned my own tools, I was frugal with them. I was afraid to waste the paint, ruin the canvas, dirty the brushes.
They sat. And sat. And waited till I was sure of my inspiration.
It was a mistake I have learned to live with.
Your paint will dry up.
Your inspiration of pink petals and green meadows and indigo skies- will fade into dust on the television, lint on the carpet, and crumbs on the counter. You will eventually stop seeing with your heart.
And you will finally silence those voices forever.
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"When my daughter was about seven years old, she asked me one day what I did at work. I told her I worked at the college - that my job was to teach people how to draw. She stared at me, incredulous, and said, "You mean they forget?" "~Howard Ikemoto
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My goal is to take at least one day a week to pour out my creative spirit. To let the housework go for 24 hours. To indulge myself with childhood thoughts and fantasy.
To build and paste and form and mold and draw and trace and lose myself in another world.
A world where nothing is wrong, everything is right,
and no one cares about either.
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"In spite of everything I shall rise again: I will take up my pencil, which I have forsaken in my great discouragement, and I will go on with my drawing." Vincent Van Gogh

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Today's Five Grateful Things:
1. Online banking
2, Mittens
3. Tide
4. Velcro
5. Sweaters