Written by Karen D. Swim
When I was 10 my mother took me to the art store. I was not exactly artsy; I could not even draw a straight line. Therefore, it never occurred to me that this trip was anything more than another outing with my mom.
We traveled through the aisles and my eyes could not drink in the array of artistic tools fast enough. Paper, easels, brushes and paints seemed to dance and dazzle before my eyes. The blood rushed to my head as I excitedly took in the adventure. We finished shopping and I stood at the checkout counter as the kaleidoscope of images flashed through my mind. When I finally came down from my art candy rush, we were home and I was the proud owner of a paint-by-numbers set.
I stared at the box and read the description. I put it on my desk and stared at the picture of what my final masterpiece would resemble. For several weeks, the box sat unopened, ripe with possibilities. I peered at it sometimes with a mixture of anger as it taunted me to go ahead and mess it up. Some days, I even wore my beret and spoke in French around it to capture the mood of true artiste. Mom patiently encouraged me in her sweet way until I finally mustered the courage to open the box.
I laid out my materials and imagined that I was in a French countryside. I began to follow the numbering system to bring my sailboats alive on the canvass. I dipped my brush in the watercolors, tongue firmly planted to one side of my mouth to steady my hand. I checked my progress against the picture on the box unconvinced that I could pull it off but refusing to give up. After a day of blue paint here, grey paint there I began to drift from the “rules.” The waves had so many colors and I tired of the tedious and constricting process so I painted on my own, swirling paints in my best Monet impression. I went back and forth between the rules and my own way until the painting was completed.
I signed it at the bottom carefully making cursive letters with and showed my mom. There were spots where bits of paint had gathered in a little clump creating bumpy places on the smooth canvas. Mom seemed not to notice and beamed as if I had painted the Sistine Chapel. She framed it and proudly hung it on the wall. Every visitor to our home was taken to my “wall” where mother would proudly point and exclaim, “K painted that.” Each would dutifully smile and mutter an appropriate platitude as I hid from view completely mortified.
I should have known then that I would somehow always have a love-hate relationship with structure. I felt guilty for abandoning the numbering system and cheating the rules. Would the paint-by-numbers people come after me and label me a fraud? Was it really a painting if I didn’t do it their way?
Yet, I also felt constricted by boundaries that seemed only to fit for a little while. I liked order but found myself equally drawn to disorder. Perhaps it was a mirror of my own doubt about my capabilities. Could a girl who could not draw a straight line and frequently bumped into things really possess talent?
I continued to bounce in and out of the lines somehow finding my way. I never broke real rules but frequently used guidelines as a base from which I created my own course. As an adult, I have come to realize that those boundaries may have been like the training wheels on my big girls bike. I only needed them until I did not.
Karen Swim says
Hi Matthews, I am glad you found me and really appreciate you reading along and commenting!
Mathews Bows says
A week or two ago I wandered across your site and have been reading along steadily. I decided I could write my first comment. I dont know what to write but that Ive really loved perusing. Nice site. I intend to continue coming to this site now and again. I have also taken the rss feed for any updates.
Karen Swim says
Barbara, wow! Your story is such a cool inspiration to give in to that sense of adventure. It definitely comes out in your writing and you are one of the people I watch and love because you have a very strong sense of “you.” Are there any photos of your work in Stained Glass? It’s such a beautiful media. You really are a woman of many talents!
Karen Swim says
Janice, thank you for tossing your beret in the ring! See Friar, see! LOL! And Janice is a real artiste! :-0
Karen Swim says
Jeanne, thank you so much for that! I am sure my poor maman had papa had many moments of stifled laughter. It was my mother that truly was the amazing woman, wish you all could have met her!
Karen Swim says
Lillie, I am so glad you enjoyed it as it was equally fun to remember and share with all of you. I bet my “creativity” often left my parents scratching their heads but they allowed me to exercise my oddities. 🙂
Barbara Ling, Virtual Coach says
Loved reading your encounter with paint – back when I was 26, I first walked into stained glass store and was captivated by the different arrays of color that shown out at me. It launched me on a 3 year love relationship with the media – I ended up making several panels and lamp shades and even got published in the National Stained Glass news.
It’s funny how an instant POW! to your senses can spark something so massive in one’s life.
Regarding structure, I too have a love/hate relationship with it – whenever I’m writing for others, I can structure beautifully and with great ease. But when I’m working myself, wow, I code/write/hack by the seat of my pants. Kinda sorta like the way I cook, too. 🙂
.-= Barbara Ling, Virtual Coach´s last blog ..The Stark Truth Behind How To Get 47,397 Followers On Twitter – FREE BONUS report =-.
Janice Cartier says
LOL!!!!
“artistic tension” between order and chaos…..
So. Definitely. You.
Templates , maps, numbers …are suggestions….. in the hands of a strong spirit.
😀
I see that beret and will toss my childhood blue velvet one right into the ring with yours…what fun. And so fabulous your Maman framed it and made a fuss…
.-= Janice Cartier´s last blog ..Mistakes Were Made =-.
Jeanne Male says
Karen, the story was so rich with visual imagery that I could see the “mini you” replete with beret and big eyes! Sweet to be a fly on the wall as your maman (hee) was raising an amazing woman.
ScreenwritingforHollywood says
Oh… no brother and no bother… now I am confused. 😉
.-= ScreenwritingforHollywood´s last blog ..Interview with Screenwriter David Johnson =-.
Lillie Ammann says
Karen,
I love your story, and I was just waiting for you to quit following the rules. You’re not a paint-by-number kind of person—you’re too creative and original for that!
.-= Lillie Ammann´s last blog ..Show and Tell =-.
Karen Swim says
Friar, lol, he did and I’ve got a stack of Archie Comics on my book shelf to prove it. Oh my gosh too funny, so what you’re really saying is that I was a jughead!
Karen Swim says
Jaden, lol, so even as a youngster the filmmaker was alive and well in you! I love the image of you and that coloring project. Isn’t it funny how our childhood “peculiarities”are our budding passions and talents? Amazing!
Hey thanks for finding that typo! Talk about Freudian, I was an only child! I met my biological family just a few short years ago. When the storm hit and blew out the power that must have been the spot and I completely missed it again today! ROFL!
Karen Swim says
Ha! I don’t follow recipes either Debbie! The rebel spirit lives! (sort of) 🙂
Friar says
In art class at Riverdale High, Jughead ALWAYS painted with an artist’s beret (plus smock and lame-ass bow-tie).
.-= Friar´s last blog ..Other Wishes I’d ask a Genie to Grant Me. =-.
ScreenwritingforHollywood says
What an intellectual child you were! I liked those kinds of drawings you describe where kids created something on top of the given image.
I think my favorite kid coloring project was coloring a piece of paper in a variety of colors with crayons, and then coloring it black, and scraping out an image.
(You wrote “bother” instead of “brother”… hahah Freudian slip?)
.-= ScreenwritingforHollywood´s last blog ..Interview with Screenwriter David Johnson =-.
Debbie Yost says
That sounds like how I use a recipe! I consider it more of a guideline than a rule. But I have to admit, I followed the rules on the paint by number religiously. 🙂
.-= Debbie Yost´s last blog ..Kitchen Cleaning 101 =-.
Karen Swim says
ROFL! Hey I was 10! Well Archie comics and old American movies. 🙂
Friar says
Okay…who here has ACTUALLY seen a painter wear a beret?
That’s stuff you only find in Archie comics.
.-= Friar´s last blog ..Other Wishes I’d ask a Genie to Grant Me. =-.
Karen Swim says
Roland and Joanna, I’m so glad you were able to share the laugh with me! I was such a funny little kid but at the time did not realize it. As an adult I now know why my mom often had those funny expressions on her face. For a time I even insisted on calling her maman!
Roland, I love your poetic summation!
Joanna, I think I have reached the same conclusion, I am forever on this see-saw and that’s okay. At least it keeps life interesting! 🙂
Joanna Young says
Karen, I loved the bit about the beret too. You are so much fun 🙂
More seriously though, I know exactly what you mean – I have the same see-sawing relationship with structure myself, in my career, writing, creativity, life…
I guess I’m getting to the point where I no longer think there is a solution to this one… just a getting used to the tension, and the points where it seems to have gone too far in one direction or the other
.-= Joanna Young´s last blog ..The Art of Paying Attention =-.
Roland Hesz says
“Some days, I even wore my beret and spoke in French around it to capture the mood of true artiste. ”
That made me laugh so hard – in the good way 🙂 -, as I imagined little Karen walking around, all serious, and acting the proper artist.
I just wonder if you had a real french artist moustache too? 🙂
Guidelines are like the mystical walls to the gardens of Fairy Land – do you dare to cross us, and enter the land of unknown?
We should dare more often I think.
.-= Roland Hesz´s last blog ..On the Cheap =-.