I love my kid. He is a fun, energetic little ball of curiosity. He gives me some of the funnest days that I can remember. He does have a pretty significant drawback, though. He is bad at art. Really bad. Think Jackson Pollock if he was blind and had no arms and legs. Each time I see copies of his latest “project” I put on the happy face and say, “wow, did you do that?” In reality, I think to myself, “how much more of this stuff do I gotta put up with. My kid can’t draw for shit!”
I realize how poor my reaction is. A better parent would spend more time with their kid on art projects to develop their skills along to the point where they don’t inspire cringing. The problem is, I am even worse than him! If I had an artistic bone in my body, then I broke it years ago and it never fully healed. We played drunken charades last weekend and all I got for my clues were blank stares and head scratches. Maybe my irritation is that Malcolm can already draw better than me and he is four. It is precisely that reason that Malcolm and I never do art projects around the house (that is clearly Amy’s job.) I have utterly nothing to offer him in the artistic development department, and he is falling behind.
Ordinarily, this wouldn’t present much of an issue, Malcolm is terrible at a lot of different things. He doesn’t know how to properly cook a steak, his Spanish sounds like gibberish, and he couldn’t shoot a squirrel to save his life. The unique problem with the art, is that we have so much of it lying around the house. Between his art class at preschool and Amy’s occasional afternoon paint fests, Malcolm has already generated a substantial body of work. Our house shows it too, as evidence of his prolificness occupy every nook and cranny in our home. We got pottery on the counter that looks like cat poo, pictures reminiscent of baseball diamonds on the floor of his room, paintings of giant blobs, some of which having arm and legs, hanging from every square inch of wall space, and collages looking like nothing special and containing every known waste item known to humanity sitting around everywhere.
I realized today that cleaning up the clutter around this place is so difficult because it always involves the same question, “Does throwing this away make me a bad person?” Sure, I’d like to keep all of it, but that would require the use of a rented storage unit, which is simply not going to happen. I don’t want Malcolm to think that I don’t appreciate his effort, but does it really make sense to keep all of it? We have our favorite paintings (Pablo Sandoballs, Funny Looking House and Odd Rainbow) all hanging up on specially designed picture hangers, but what to do with the rest. So far, I have just been throwing the rest into the back of his closet, but one day that pile of near trash is going to come down, and if it contains the wrong collage, it may take Malcolm with it. Is there a better way?
Tags: messiness
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well—-save it all, tape it together and use it to wrap presents—–
I plan to save the favorites and photograph and archive the rest. I figure they will make an interesting digital slide show some day.
paul,
I found myself lmao on the bart reading this post, people look at you very strange. I sneak the bad stuff
Wow, what great ideas! Thanks peeps. Bob, glad you like the blog, i am assuming you went through a BART tunnel and got cut off. If not, you should stop sneaking the bad stuff.
For the record, Malcolm freaked out at the idea of using his art as wrapping paper. On the other hand, he loved creating wrapping paper. So it turned into a whole art project of it’s own. Thanks for seeding the idea, Nana!
I just found your blog…and I think it is HILARIOUS! I love that people can post what shit is really like behind closed doors!
I recently saw an idea that might solve your problem. Take pictures of the art…then turn it into book (via snapfish or shutterfly or walmart or target or a million other places).
Good luck!
Welcome to the game Erica! I am usually good to waste a few minutes of your day.
[...] Erica: I just found your blog…and I think it is HILARIOUS! I love that people can post what shit is really like… Top Commentators [...]
Oh how I can relate, I like the idea of taking the picture but I have added many a project to the fire, somehow giving it the viking funeral seems more noble.
I throw away my kids’ projects and they always find them in the trash can and ask me why I threw them away. I have to pretend it was an accident and remember to take out the trash sooner next time.
I like that Viking Funeral idea, that way, there is no finding them in the trash can.
I tried to get Malcolm to agree to using some of his paintings as wrapping paper, but he freaked out and said no.