Photo by Tetiana SHYSHKINA on Unsplash

Happy trees make for happy lives. At least that is what I got from Bob Ross when I had to perform a satirical take on him for a whole summer. Unfortunately, that is a story for another day. One thing my mom and I have in common is that we love to do crafting and DIY projects in our free time. I don’t get much time to myself these days, but you will often find me at home working on an art project with a true-crime documentary playing in the background.

Art, which is a very generous word for it, has been an outlet for me in many avenues of my life. I was a pretty average student at best and doing any display piece, designing, or anything artistic felt like it was my time to shine. Art has been a coping mechanism, a hobby, a repetitive task at times, but most importantly it has become a regular practice in my life.

Like I said, I love to craft do things that require some creativity. I want to learn how to make things my own and be proud of what I created with my own hands. That is what led me to agree to try a beginner’s painting class my freshman year of college. I actually paid someone to tell me how bad of a painter I was. They were 100% correct, but that is neither here nor there.

Painting was never something I have ever been nor will ever be good at. It is something that I have accepted. There is no way that I was ever going to be the next Van Gogh or Bob Ross or Claude Monet. That is simply never going to happen. I knew that going into this class with my art major roommate, three tequila shots, and an edible in.

I already had low expectations on my final product, and I was correct in doing so. Although I did fail miserably it didn’t keep me from creating a great memory while creating a really bad painting. The thing about art is that it can be subjective. And in my case very subjective. Even though my painting skills are worse than most kindergarteners’, it does not discourage me to participate in any other painting classes in the future- especially if there is wine involved.