“Art is not a thing, it is a way.”
—Elbert Hubbard
Age 6, Christmas: I received a Paint by Number art kit. I was experienced with crayons, and I colored outside the lines sometimes. But Paint by Number presented a more serious challenge, and I made an extra effort to respect the lines—after all, this was big time art. I did my best, but it was tedious and trying.
Age 8, the Smithsonian: I learned that lots of great art doesn’t have clearly defined lines. It was an epiphany, and within a few years I was questioning everything. Some musicians, as it turned out, didn’t always play the music as written. Teachers didn’t always follow the textbook. My mother often took liberties with recipes. Though I was not yet consciously aware of it, crossing and blurring the lines had become a metaphor for everything in my life, a new way of experiencing the world.
Age 12, Church: I’d never doubted what I had been taught to believe by the Methodist church, but a young new preacher with a Ph.D. changed that. He didn’t interpret the Bible in literal terms, and in Youth Fellowship he actually asked questions of us. Soon my belief system took a drastic shift: I was unsure of what I believed, but certain about what I could no longer accept. I still wanted to believe—I just couldn’t find a way to do so.
College: A Philosophy and Religion major, I learned the particulars of how to question and doubt. The entire world became an open forum. I was free. Words, like lines, I now realized, could do as much to limit and restrict as to illuminate and clarify.
Today: I try to appreciate people as works of art, not defined by words and lines and boxes others have placed them in, but as individual expressions of uniqueness. Discovering my path through life is an ongoing and rewarding journey: a way of questioning, a way of seeking truth beyond a face value as defined by the lines drawn by others. The freedom to seek, discover, and accept others’ truths is indeed a sweet path to follow. Blessedly, I share in a faith community who value and appreciate the same sweetness of truth of individual expression.
Prayer
Great spirit of love and acceptance, help us to appreciate the world and all those in it as they genuinely want to express themselves. Let not our understanding be obscured or limited by the lines and words and brushes others have used to paint them. Blessed be all.