PICTURE IMPERFECT Life is an unfinished painting, a work in progress: You put a brushstroke here, a shadow or highlight there, paint over that part because it doesn't work, start again, etc. It's never going to be perfect and if it were, what would be the point anyway? What would I learn from that? The beginning of any painting is the idea. So there I was, fall 1996, my first, and only, day in Art 2. Around me, arranged in a rectangle, sat the real "artists," wearing the required clothes, piercings, and looks of anger and disdain for the mundane. "What am I doing here?" I wondered, and my doubts were soon confirmed by a girl wearing all black clothing, except for her blue bandana and silver eyebrow ring. She answered a question posed by the art teacher, how art had grabbed our attention, "Well, I picked up a pencil when I was 2, and I haven't stopped since." So much for that idea. I symbolically dropped the pencil I was holding, and I dropped the class--that day. I decided the subject of my life's painting lay another direction--history. For history, I already had the paints, the paintbrushes and the palette. I was curious, analytical, good at writing and reasoning. I wanted to teach the world about its past wrongs and how the good guys could combat evil. So I threw myself into the world of history in the fall of my second year. Sure, I hated writing history papers, but I would not be discouraged from a life that I was sure would result in a masterpiece. By the beginning of my third year, with the paintbrush in my hand, I was ready to lay the color down on the canvas. Then I realized, painfully, that the picture I was about to paint and the inspiration behind it weren't mine. The idea, and the sketch it spawned, belonged to someone else, designed to appeal to everyone's taste. I was being asked to paint by numbers, without any regard to balance, shadows or highlights. I realized that I had chosen this life painting because I was always good at history--good with dates and writing. I enjoyed it, yes, but I couldn't find a reason to finish the painting. The papers, the lectures, the probing historical questions--those were all too easy for me. So I went back to art, a born-again studio art major. This time, I had no materials--no canvas, no paintbrushes, no paint, no palette, nothing--just an idea. History taught me that the easiest route wasn't necessarily the best one, that feeling foolish isn't the same as being a fool. My very first painting for Art 3 was trashed--not critiqued, not analyzed, but trashed. The professor saw right through my lack of effort, and he humiliated me in front of the class. I didn't drop the course, though; I was too determined to learn something new. And I did. Fortunately, for my ego's sake, my subsequent paintings received less scathing reviews. By the midterm, for which we were asked to exactly recreate a famous painting, I felt more confident in my creative ability. Now I'm sharpening my pencil for more. Risks are scary and their consequences are unpredictable, but they make art and life more interesting. And I admit that I sometimes still fear appearing foolish, but I'm in no rush to complete my life painting. I've only started. The paint has to dry before I apply the next color to the canvas. I don't want them to run together; I don't want confusion. So, the future of my life and its potential painting are just mysteries waiting to unfold. I can only keep going. I just think that there's something so nice in saying, "It's a work in progress." -- Jeanelle Pittman '01