My children love to draw. They always set up shop at the kitchen table. Dominating the places we eat for their own artistic creations.
Some days it feels like the floor is constantly cluttered with colored pencils and markers. Every night when the whole family cleans the house after dinner, we're bound to find something left over.
The other day, my son accidentally hit his sister in the face while playing outside. She cried pretty hard. He's such a good kid, he didn't mean it that way.
An orange pencil under the piano. A green crayon at the bottom of the laundry. A blue marker in the bathroom. How on earth did Marker get into the toilet? Oh, someone painted on the wall.
beast
Children are drawing various things. Cars, trucks, animals, people, and our families. They also try to paint scary pictures. They draw monsters. Draw a beast with large claws. But I can't draw scary faces. They don't upset me. It won't send shivers down your spine or make you want to look away. They make me smile very sadly.
Children cannot draw scary faces. Why is that? They can't do it no matter how hard they try. A vampire with small fangs sticking out of its mouth. The other side of his lips curls up in a slight smile. His eyes are a little misshapen and asymmetrical. His face is soft and funny. Kind and cute. It was the scariest thing my son could draw, but it wasn't scary at all.
He excitedly showed us his drawings and we pretended to be scared. “Oooh, that's scary! It's a vampire!” But we're not afraid. I feel a lump in my throat. All these confusing emotions come at me all at once, none of which I can explain. And to tell you the truth, I don't want to either. This boiling hot emotion makes me feel very good and very uncomfortable. I'm very happy and very sad.
for a very long time
Children cannot draw scary faces because they have never seen scary things. They have never seen a terrifying world. they are innocent. they are pure. They live in a world that we have created for them. we protect them. We don't teach them scary things or show them scary movies. When we are asked when we will die, we reply that we won't be dead for that long and we don't need to worry about it.
Their world is sweet and gentle. Simple. Even if they are angry, they don't know how angry you really are. The knob goes up to 10, but they think it only goes up to 3.
“Even when I get old”
The other day, my son accidentally hit his sister in the face while playing outside. She cried pretty hard. He's such a good kid, he didn't mean it that way. He said he would never forget it. “Even when I'm old, I won't forget that,” he said.
They read old books and old fairy tales. There are also scary pictures of witches and giants. My son is currently obsessed with dragons. He has a red toy dragon that he loves. It seems quite ferocious. It has a split tongue that protrudes from razor-sharp teeth.
But still he cannot translate it on paper. He can't draw scary faces. It's always cute. they are always happy. The world he perceives betrays what he was trying to portray.
We cannot be someone we are not. We cannot feel what we do not know. I can't draw scary faces because I don't know them. they don't feel them. they are not them. they are innocent. It's small. It's sweet.
On the other hand, we are defiled. we are fallen. We're doing a conspiracy. We are ugly and hateful beings. We are liars and cheaters. Children remind us that we are not actually good. Drawing scary faces is easy. Please give me a pencil.
layer upon layer
We display all their pictures around the kitchen. String lights line the walls from wall to wall. I'll hang it there. Oh my god, there are so many clothespins hanging out there, barely holding on with the weak pressure of the tiny micro clothespins. We continue to add to our collection every day. They keep bringing it to us. Add layers one after another.
The world is tragic. Things aren't going well. Why do they have to go so far down the wrong path? I don't know. But when I look at that little picture, somewhere in my heart I smile. Their little hands painted their little faces. They try hard to be scary. But I can't do that and it's adorable and I love them.
I look at them and think about how different I am from them. How bad am I? And of course they can't stay innocent forever, which makes me very sad. They will eventually grow up to see a scary world and know how to draw scary faces.
