Before I share my tale of utter humiliation, I have to mention something that
Melynda brought to my attention. I haven't been around Blogland lately so I hadn't heard about this amazing event with lots of free books and prizes!! Head over to Elisa's post
HERE to check it out; it will only be on for the next 2 days. I had Branden download about 5 books last night to my kindle! Wahoo! Melynda's books are there, Elisa's books are there, Elisa's brother's book is there, and there is a book of short stories called
Open Doors which has stories from lots of people including
Joshua and
Janie! So go check it out, enter the contest and get some free books!
Now, onto my embarrassing story:
I am not someone that I would consider to be 'artistic'. I could hardly draw a stick figure to save my life but lately I have been wanting to get back into watercolors. My skill and knowledge of watercolor painting is probably actually less than my my knowledge of drawing stick figures, but I was determined to play around and see what I could learn and create a couple of days ago. With Branden studying on the bed, I took over the desk and began dripping colors, running paints, and creating a lovely mess. Liking the colors but feeling it needed something more, I let it dry and then added a bit of quirkiness. It's definitely basic but I like it.
Feeling that I was on a roll, I began to dig up any bit of artsy tidbits I could use to create something more mind boggling artistic. You know, the art pieces that make you think (because when it's only your 4th ever watercolor, you obviously are ready to go pro). I spied a box of crayons and my mind began to create ideas. Grabbing the white crayon, I drew an umbrella outline with the intent of 'raining' different shades of blue around it. The white wax borders would be invisible but would cause the pouring color to go around it, acting like a real umbrella would! I was an artistic genius.
So I set about dropping big soupy blues on top of my umbrella and watching how it bled and blended around the shape. I did get slightly bored and began to add some green and red splashes, but then I refocused and turned my focus onto the umbrella itself. I wanted to make the umbrella stand out more so I used some bright yellow with orange touches to swirl the paint inside of the umbrella hood. but then you still couldn't see the umbrella handle since the hood had kept the blue from touching it, so it still didn't quite look like an umbrella. Scrambling for my best artistic thinking cap (I should get a refund) I decided to do a similar rain pouring of red under the umbrella hood to display the handle and be different from the rain, still showing that the umbrella kept the rain away.
When I was done, I proudly looked at my super artsy watercolor and asked Branden to come look at it. I didn't tell him what it was because I wanted his mind to think, explore, and be blown away basically. He stared with an odd look on his face and a slight smirk in the corners of his mouth. Not able to take it anymore, I asked him if he saw it. He replied with a slight chuckle on his breath, "What is it?" to which I, with a slightly bruised ego said, "It's an umbrella but it's like invisible with the white crayon borders but the rain is still going around it." That man actually giggled and then informed me, while still giggling, "It looks like a penis".
I was stunned at his words, my eyes popped out of my head, my jaw fell, I looked over at my artistic umbrella watercolor that was supposed to boggle the mind, and saw a colorful penis! At first I couldn't make a sound, but then I just started crying with laughter because he was right! My ego was not only bruised, but now it had been fully beaten and officially pronounced dead. I could not believe that I had spent 30 minutes on an artistic masterpiece that turned out to look like an 8 year old boy's crayon graffiti! I told one of the housemates and then showed him the painting to which he laughed and said that Branden was right. He also said that I shouldn't show anyone. Yeah right, like I would deny you all the privilege to laugh at my questionable art practices?!
So here it is. I think I will title it, "Death of an Art Career" or "Washed out Ego".