A Beginner’s guide to painting

Hi! I’m Zack. And like my friend Maxine, I’ve got quite a few stories to tell you. Last time, I believe she told you a story about me, and how I baked a cake for her on her birthday. I also remember her using the word ‘doofus’ about me. Well let me tell you, she’s not that coordinated herself. This story is what happened when she took homework a bit too seriously. Ugh! My clothes are still stained in paint. Remind me to wash my clothes after this story.

“Zack, what do I do for the creative display next week,” Maxine asked me for what felt like the fiftieth time. “Maxine, I’m telling you, you should join the dance committee. That’s what you’re good at.” “But everyone knows that I can dance. I wanna do something which will surprise them.” ‘The surprise element’, as Maxine loved to call it, was the most irritating part of this display. We had to come up with something creative for a display this Saturday. I was making a scenery of a valley entirely out of bits of magazine paper. Maxine, on the other hand, just couldn’t make up her mind. She tried pottery the other day. Her parents had to get her bedroom redecorated because everything (including Maxine) was coated in a thick layer of clay. Yesterday, she tried to papier Mache. She made the clay alright, but when I came to check if she needed any help with her project, I found out she was the project. I wonder what would happen today. The fact that was doubly terrifying was that she called me to help her ‘brainstorm’ for her project. I wonder what disaster would happen today.

 “I know,” she exclaimed suddenly. “I’ll paint a picture. What should I do?” Oh no! Painting. The one thing she was worst at, was the one thing she had chosen to do. In my mind, I said, “Please, please, please don’t paint. Anything but that!” Aloud I said, “Great idea. Why don’t you paint a picture of a waterfall?” Mercifully, she agreed to it. I mean, how much disaster can painting a waterfall cause? It turns out, a lot.

We got everything set up and began. “Now the first thing to do is wet the page,” I instructed, and gently wet my page. She dipped her brush into the water and ended up knocking the entire tumbler of water down. “Oh great,” I groaned. We cleaned up the mess and started afresh. After the wash, I showed her how to dilute paint and where to apply it. The sky, being just one dot of blue in the center of the page, didn’t cause a lot of disaster. The only thing that happened was that she spilled some blue on her sweater, and splashed a bit on me.

Next was the leaves of the tree. And this is exactly where disaster took its rightful place: Maxine’s paintbrush-wielding hand. We began to dabble at the page with paint-soaked brushes. Suddenly, Ivana, Maxine’s purebred Pomeranian, came bounding into the room and knocked down the container of green paint. “Ugh! Ivana. What did you do? You stained us, and the new carpet with green,” Maxine wailed. Ivana just barked, and walked away, leaving paw prints on the floor. “I told you to spread newspapers on the floor! But do you listen to me? NO!” I was starting to lose it.

We spread our newspapers under the paints and paper, put Ivana in Maxine’s room, and sat down to continue. I was silently praying that no other disaster would take place. “Now we start with the main thing: the falls.” I showed her how to make the rocks from which the water would bounce off. This time, I also didn’t let her make the paint in the container. I made it on a palette, hoping it would cause less disaster. But then again, I’ve gotta remember who I’m painting with. I took a bit of paint and showed her how to stroke the paper with brown. She vigorously painted a stroke, and got the paint all over her jeans then she said, “I need some more paint. Is there any left in the palette?” she took the palette and tilted it. Immediately, all the paint gushed out and splattered all over us. Don’t ask me how, but I even got some in my mouth! At this point, I didn’t even bother to clean up. I knew there was more disaster on its way.

Now, all we had left was the falls and the lake. For the waterfall, all we had to do was paint a few downward strokes of blue in between the rocks. My prayers seemed to have been answered. The falls actually came out good, with no disaster. Maxine didn’t even get paint on her fingers! Unbelievable, right? But I have a habit of speaking too soon. We still had to paint half a page with the lake.

 I seriously wonder what had happened to me at that point of time. I asked her to make the hue for the water! “So you take one squirt of blue, two of green and a dab of yellow,” I instructed. She took a tube of blue and squeezed it. Nothing came out. She tried again. Nothing. “Zack, the tube is out of paint.” She lifted it and squeezed it. Instantly, the blockage cleared, and the paint came all over me. “It worked,” she said, tentatively. I frowned. ”You think?” Well, at least there was some paint left. I made the mixture and showed her how to make the water. Well technically, I steered her hand over the paper. I wasn’t going to let her paint anything else on her own! When we finally managed to complete the painting, I felt so relieved. No major disaster happened. Well, unless you call Ivana escaping Maxine’s bedroom and rolling over her painting, and then on the floor a disaster. Oh god, you should have seen Maxine. She looked like she was about to erupt. All her effort had been wasted on her dog’s fur. Until she saw her shirt. It was all white, and the paint splattered on it looked like marbling. So in the end, we managed to provide here with something to show at the display. Guess what? She won first place.

And I’ve just completed my story. So now you know: Maxine isn’t that coordinated herself. And she’s been telling you stories about my clumsiness. Well, I guess she just doesn’t know that I remember so much. Oh ok who am I kidding, I barely remember anything. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go take a bath and wash my clothes. Bye!