Art Lessons

"I just want to tap into my creative potential," I said to Caroline when I called to ask about joing her adult art class. "I want to experiment with color, motion, the energy of creation. I just want a place and time to flow, to pour myself out on paper."
"Well," she said. "Your children are certainly creative. I've enjoyed teaching them, I guess they get their talent from you."
"Oh, I don't know about that," I chuckled modestly. "My husband is more creative than I am. I've never thought of myself as an artist, but I'd like the chance to see what's inside waiting to be expressed."
I arrived at the first class, self-conscious, hoping that the room was big enough so that I could sit far enough from my fellow students so they couldn't see my work clearly. There were four other women in the class, three of them artists and one, like myself, there to try her hand for the first time. I carefully placed myself as as far as I could from the artists.
"Okay," said Caroline as she approached my chair. "Let's see some of that creativity in action." She placed paper, pencil, several tubes of water color paint, a palette and a fine-bristled brush on the table in front of me. "This is just to play with. Have fun!" She turned to the others and began to question them about what they would like to do with their time. I sat with a pleasant edge of expectation, waiting for creativity to arrive.
And sat. And sat. After half an hour, creativity nowhere in sight, I sighed with an air of melancholy, picked up the pencil and placed its lead tip on the center of the drawing paper whose massive white expanse taunted me quietly. The other students chatted and laughed around me, talking about their families, their previous art experiences, their lives, as women do when gathered together.
'Okay,' I thought. 'I'll draw a flower. Flowers are pretty. I can do that.' My pencil tip remained on the center of the paper. "How are you doing?" Caroline asked as she leaned over my paper. "Oh, dear. I guess you're having a little trouble getting started. What would you like to try?"
"A flower," I said, speaking with conviction, hoping I would be better at drawing flowers than I was at keeping them alive. How hard could it be to draw a flower?
"Alright!!" she said. She snatched the pencil from my hand and with a few broad strokes a flower appeared on the paper in front of me. "Good start! You take it from there." She handed me the pencil.
I sat. And sat.....and sat. The flower she had drawn looked so pretty I hated to ruin it. 'That was pretty easy to draw, though,' I thought. 'I should be able to do that.' I placed pencil to paper and began to move my hand, aiming for her bold confidence, achieving instead several shaky lines. I erased them, tried again. My hand didn't appear to be working very well. My flower looked more like a dead animal than a creative expression. I quickly glanced around the room to see how my fellow students were faring. One had nearly finished a small farmhouse in miniature, the other was working on an elaborate bouquet of flowers that looked like it belonged in the Louvre. A third was sketching in ink, her paper covered with small likeness of the people in our class. It even appeared the creative muse had visited the only other non-artist in the group as she spread pastel watercolored clouds across her white page. I hunched over my drawing, pulling my shoulders in to cover my flower animal.
Magically, Caroline appeared at my elbow. "How are you doing?" she asked again. "Oops, I'm having a little trouble seeing your work." She leaned forward to see around my shoulder, which was having a little spasm as I hunched it up further to block her view.
'I hope she gets a crick in her neck," I thought as I again glanced at the colors appearing on paper around the room. 'Serve her right for torturing me like this. This place is too hot...it's interfering with my creative flow.' I pulled at the collar of my turtleneck.
"Well," she said. "I can see you're still having a little trouble getting started. We have a few minutes before the end of the class. Let's forget about drawing and play with color." She whipped the tops off the paint tubes, splashed gobs of color onto a plastic Dixie plate, and plunked a glass full of water on the table. "You wet your brush," she said as she stirred the brush through the water. "The color will only run in the wet areas on the paper. Like this." She splashed and splotched with water and paint, and a multi-hued flower magically appeared. It was beautiful. I started having an asthma attack. I don't have asthma.
The idea that I might return home empty-handed spurred me to action, however, and I began to paint with grim determination. One small, grudging flower after another appeared on my paper. They were small and tight, but they were flowers! I left class with my soul singing. "I can paint. I can draw. I can do art!" Later that evening I proudly presented my creations to my husband. "Oh, wow," he said. "Those are great. I don't think I've ever seen mushrooms in so many different colors, or so skillfully drawn. Nice job!"