On Choosing an Art Form
Sunday, June 26, 2016
Chopped lettuce scattered in a bowl and nothing else. Sometimes I am really bad at finishing things. Sometimes, I never finish at all.
There are so very many thing I want to do, you know. I want to write a book, or even a short story. I would love to return to acting and I've been dying to try my hand at music, but I feel like these tiny fingertips would only produce tears. Another art form tried and abandoned.
But does one really need to try their hand at every art? I'm still not sure. I used to draw and then transitioned to painting, but between an overbearing homeschool education and dedicating every Tuesday (yes, the entire day) to drawing and painting, I quickly fizzled out into a tiny stub of a wick crisp and delicate from excessive wear. One day I just stopped and that was that. I felt the chapter ending so I closed the book. I have not picked up a brush or pencil since, except for to paint with words. In fact, the only art form I have kept flowing through my fountain consistently is dance - ballet and modern will be always be a part of my life. How I chose to keep dance in the rotation, even after it necessitated a surgery, I will never know.
It just happened. I had to choose one art form to keep.
How is it that those of us more artistically inclined choose a final art form? How do we choose that which will dominate our lives and that which will slip away like grains of sand retreating back into the ocean? Do we just see what we do not want to quit? Perhaps our lives are divided into little stages, as if to say ,"You needed to draw all those years to learn that you can create art, but you don't need it anymore, so it is being taken away and replaced with something else." If this is the case, it is rather frightening to see loves wax and wane, don't you think? I hope my love of a lens or the assembly of letters never leaves me, but everything comes in stages.
Someday, my knees will crack and my back will ache and my legs will no longer listen to the notes of a piano. Instead they will cry and ache with a plea to stop. What will replace a pair of ballet slippers and delicate, soft pink tights? I've never had a backup plan. Maybe I will try music someday, after all.
What do you think? Is it better to be choose one art form to polish like a silver spoon, or is it better to have a few different paths to happiness? I'm really asking, as I have asked a whole lot of questions in this post today, and I have answers to none of them.
Stay Beautiful,
XOXO Liz
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