Tag Archives: painting

Daub

Daub: (v) to spread plaster, mud, etc. on or over something

Shortcuts lead to long-suffering.

That’s been my finding.

Some time ago, I had my speakers set up in an auditorium and the brutality of road travel had left them a bit chipped, needing to be painted.

I had the bright idea of buying a can of black spray paint and touching them up so their age would not show unless you were standing right in front of them, staring.

It seemed like a great idea.

I will not lie to you—since the speakers were up on stands, I did actually consider that it would be better to take them down to the ground to spray them. But I quickly rejected that—because I lease a room to laziness in my brain, and since he pays most of the rent, I decided to stand on a chair, as close as I could get, and spray the worn places.

Let me tell you:

There is a reason they call it a spray can.

It sprays.

The mist floats through the air and on this particular occasion, it landed on a perfectly white wall directly behind the speaker.

To be honest, the speakers were not ugly enough to be noticed.

But the spray on the white wall was a definite attention-getter.

I had a problem.

Do I tell someone, who owns the auditorium, that I blackened his wall? Or do I try to fix it?

I chose the latter.

I bought a can of paint that was as close to the wall color as possible. But no matter how I tried to blend the whites, you could still tell two things:

There was some blackened shadow underneath, and where I stopped painting was an obvious line of demarcation.

I didn’t know what to do.

A young lady who was traveling with me suggested that it would be better, instead of using a paint brush or a roller, to daub on the white paint with a sponge, letting it dry, until every single portion of the black was covered.

I wanted to reject the idea.

I wanted her to be wrong so we could be wrong together.

But my greater desire was to get this horrible mistake into my past.

So I daubed.

With the artistic style of a Van Gogh or Reubens, I carefully covered up the black splat.

I stepped back three feet, five feet, and stood on a chair—peering right at it.

I could not see it.

I was overjoyed that my daubing had eliminated my sobbing.

That evening when the owner of the building showed up, he walked up to me and said, “What’s wrong with the wall?”

I looked up, aghast.

“I didn’t notice,” I lied.

He flicked his hand in the air, and as he walked away he said, “I’ll just have ’em paint it.”

 

Dali, Salavador

Dali, Salvador: A twentieth-century Spanish surrealist painter

I’m always baffled by the word “surrealist.”

Probably if I shared my life and journey with you, you might find it surreal. So surrealism is a judgement rather than an actual thing.

Salvador Dali painted landscapes which were infused with melting clocks. For his efforts, we categorize him as surreal.

But perhaps his message was that time does not fly, time does not slip away, but instead, time, by its very nature, melts down into an image of the effort we have expended.

Much of my life has been the slow elimination of days, months and years.

But I don’t remember the clock.

I don’t recall the tick or the tock.

Instead, my time is marked by events, creations and even the children of my pursuits.

Time melts down into whatever we want it to be.

This is not surreal.

It is surreal to think that we can do nothing, ignore our gifts, sit back, wait—and that our time will still be meaningful.

I’m not saying that Dali was looking that deeply into it. Maybe there was just a sale on blue, green and yellow paint at the local store.

But I will tell you–whether it was a message from his heart or an accidental revelation, there is a beautiful warning to one and all:

Make sure your human clock melts in a meaningful way.

 

Da Vinci, Leonardo

Da Vinci, Leonardo: (Prop N) a famous artist, engineer and scientist during the Renaissance.

I guess if you paint well enough, no one remembers that you came up with an early design for a helicopter.

There’s a danger in being multi-talented.

You personally may want to be remembered for your designing or scientific mind, but since you emerged from the Dark Ages and were one of the first Renaissance Men, it may be a little difficult for people not to go ahead and put a name tag on you and assign you a permanent position.

Then there are those who found out that Leonardo was a gay man. Yet, for some reason, they didn’t take down the print of “The Last Supper” from the front of their church. I guess it’s okay to be gay as long as you paint well and you’re already dead.

It upset some other people when a conjecture was brought forth that the “Mona Lisa” was Leonardo painting himself in drag, yet that was survived.

After all, pretty is pretty.

So universal is our acceptance of Mr. da Vinci that we theorize that he had a “Code,” which turned into an action-filled book. Also, he was honored by being one of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

I don’t think we’ll ever get over touting Leo as a great painter.

But fortunately, he was a good enough painter that history gives him a footnote for his helicopter design.

Celebrate

Celebrate: (v) to acknowledge a significant or happy day or event with a social gathering

The reason needs to be larger than the plan.

I have often attended celebrations where the actual organization of the event overshadowed the purpose for us gathering.

I sometimes feel that way when I go to church. We forget that the real significance of clumping is to strengthen one another, build up our
confidence and share a common testimony of faith. Yet by the time we get done with candles, musicians, sound systems, bulletins, announcements and special music, the beauty of the conclave seems to get swallowed up.

What is it I’m celebrating?

I would agree with Kool and the Gang that I can celebrate good times.

Celebrate another day of living.

I love to celebrate that evil viciously appears to be dominant until it’s suddenly snuffed by its own greed.

I like to celebrate that something can be non-existent and because I’m alive, the creativity I’ve been granted can make freshness appear.

What are we celebrating?

Some of the holidays that hang around baffle me. I’m certainly grateful for the Armed Forces, but how many times are we going to salute them every year? And does every celebration in America have to be accompanied with a protracted exercise in gluttony?

I celebrate that even as I write this, all across the world there are people I will never know who read it–and out of their English grammar propriety, feel completely licensed to rip it apart.

What a wonderful world.

That’s what we can celebrate–with all its madness, diversity and pending doom and gloom, life still manages to give us a daily clean canvas, available for beautiful painting.

Donate Button

Afar

Words from Dic(tionary)

dictionary with letter AAfar: (adv.) at or to a distance: e.g. our hero traveled afar

Here is a word that exists just so we can truly appreciate the value of being near. After all, anything we would really want “afar” is not really worthy of being discussed, is it? And if we’re actually going to travel, clarifying it by using a medieval term like “afar” seems a bit pretentious, if not culturally gross.

Yes, it’s another one of those words which, if we actually utter it, when it comes out of our mouth, it sounds like we’re posing for a painting, hopefully being admired by onlookers for our continental use of the King’s speak.

I feel sorry for “afar.”

Maybe it deserves better. Maybe it should be admired for having four letters and balancing two vowels and two consonants. (Yet how often would such an award of appreciation be available?)

I’m afraid “afar” suffers from what most of us do: it is too old and when it tries to insert itself into contemporary situations, looks a trifle ridiculous.

So here’s to the word “afar,” which quite honestly, from this point on … will need to follow its own obvious advice.