The Drawing Story

I can't draw.
I really don't know why I even try.
Wait, yes I do.

When I was a child, I had no interest in being a writer. I loved to read, but it never came into my head that I could write my own books.
No, when I was a child, I wanted to be an artist. I wanted to draw the best pictures. A picture was worth a thousand words, and all that.
So, I would color, and draw, and make a picture of a tree into something that stood for the whole story involving a tree.
When I would finish a picture I would take it to my Mother. I would show her the picture. She would say it is nice, and continue with what she was doing.
But, it being nice wasn't good enough for me. I wanted her to understand all about the picture. That the tree had been there for how many years, and the branches bent this certain way because someone sat on them and tied things to them, or broke them, and the squirrel that I drew on the branch had an entire life story that I was certain my mother needed to hear all about.
My mother tried to be kind. She really did. But a little girl bringing your multiple pictures a day, then demanding to tell you every imagined detail about them would be tiring for anyone.
I would ask my sister what I should draw, and she would suggest something, but warn me not to draw people, because I couldn't draw people well. (I only drew humans for like three months after that comment.)
Finally, after a particularly long story explaining a drawing, one day, Mother turned to me and said that instead of drawing a picture to tell her a story, I should just write the story down, with all the information.
This was more than I could handle. That a picture wasn't good enough was awful, but the idea that I could write down whatever I wanted, and get all the important parts down without having to draw things I didn't know what looked like, was amazing. And that Mother said she would read my stories sparked something in me.
She wouldn't just glance at a picture and tell me it was nice, then listen to me (even at that age I knew her listening wasn't fully attentive) tell her all about it. She would have to stop what she was doing and read my story.

That was the turning point from artist to writer.

The writing part of this story I will save for another time.

Though I started writing stories immediately, I never fully fell away from drawing.

But I let that talent slide. At once point as a young teenager I remember some women looking at my art and saying that I was really good and should go to school for it and get more training. But at that time I was angry, because I had also put some short stories on that table with my art, and no one was reading them. I knew that art was an easily presented talent, and my writing would never get the same attention unless I could convince them to take some time a read it. This incident was at a sort of talent show, though.

I still like to dabble in art, though I have certainly focused my creativity at writing.

I sew, and cook, and paint (usually rocks) too. But writing will always be my passion.

I usually draw when I am supposed to be focusing and have to keep that side of my brain busy. I will draw people at church and in meetings, just to exercise that talent so it doesn't completely fall away.
Usually, my drawing will be for practice that no one sees, to show someone that they are beautiful, or just to illustrate a joke that doesn't translate well to the written word.

You know how when any writer doesn't have an answer to a plot hole or inconsistency, they will just wave a hand and say 'magic!'? Well, this happens a lot in any writing group I have ever had where I mention a problem. The other day I was hanging out with my science minded husband and some friends, and it got onto the topic of how space and other things work. The friend said it was probably radiation. This strikes me as the science version of "Magic!", where if someone can't explain how something changed or was created, they just blame it on radiation. We then made it our joke, so I later created the little Radiation Scientist above and sent it to our friend in order for him to be able to explain away any incongruity in the data later in his degree. He loved it. I made it in Paint program, and oldie but a goody, and I am very proud of it.

I understand that this drawing is bad.
Most of my art these days are bad.
But I love my bad art.

I am not an artist, I am a Writer.

I can tell you a story.


Smile Always.