Just two days ago I was speaking with someone and randomly-but-not-at-all remembered this memory of me reading a short story I had written in my journal, eager to share my newly formed creative words. I may have been about 9 or so at the time. She– my mother– was on the toilet. And I was seated on the top stair just outside of the bathroom door that was barely cracked open. Just enough to give her privacy, barely enough to make me feel heard.
She heard my words but hated the intrusion. I remember the feeling of openly sharing and the tension of my words falling flat at her feet.
I know now that she didn’t have the capacity to simply say “Tell me later, Jo.” Or perhaps she did but I didn’t listen or hear her because I was too eager. But that was her responsibility to convey, not mine to understand.
I love creative writing. I love writing. I love words. I was– we were!– after all, created to create! I know that now more than ever.
And before you can create you have to be. You have to know. You have to know who you are, what you want to do. At the very least, you have to be willing to create when a blank canvas stares at you bold and unassuming.
And nobody knows how to simply be better than a child. They are, after all, the closest thing to God. They come into the world, absolutely perfect and unbothered, communicating their needs the only way they know how– through cries and squeals and tears and wales. For babies to survive, they have to be who they were created to be, regardless of what any adult– tired, bitter, angry, lonely or otherwise– has to say about it. For a baby to live and be attended to, they must communicate in their own way, of course, a wet nappy (that’s British for diaper), an empty belly, a lodged burp, the need to be held in someone’s loving arms.
They have to communicate their needs. Babies who can’t are neglected. And neglected babies don’t thrive, they just barely surevive.
Children only know how to be led by their inner guide. When their inner guide leads, they follow. They do. They say. They laugh. They love. They hurt and they say so.
We as adults are the ones who tell kids to hush. “Be less childlike,” we say. We don’t actually say that but we do say “Give your uncle a hug!” or “That’s not nice, you can’t say that!” Or “do this, not that!” Or “You must eat everything on that plate!” Or when they don’t want to share we insist that they do. (For the record, I wasn’t that person. When my 2 year old nephew didn’t want to share the toys he was playing with, I told him to tell other kids “no thank you please!”. I’d offer kind and loving language that he couldn’t because he didn’t have the words. It’s okay, Cagey, Auntie Joval got you.) We tell kids to be less like themselves and more like adults– as if we’ve gotten it right. Tuh! We teach kids to ignore their own body’s cues and follow ours. We teach them they’re not enough or too much. We show them how to be different as if they’re not good enough.
Children’s Church
Today, I was leading preschoolers in Children’s Church. Two sweet chocolate drops aka Black girls in my care. They were coloring and after a short while, I noticed the other leader and I were being the painfully boring adults watching them color while interrogating them about their work. How pathetic! Thankfully I realized it quickly and decided to join in the fun. Who cared what their favorite color is or what they’re drawing? I decided to let my inner child out to have some fun, and I invited the other adult in the room to join us, too.
I grabbed some paper, picked up a crayon, and soon remembered why I don’t like crayons. I never did. I hate how they shed when you use them and stick to the paper and your fingers and the feeling of them on my skin.
I drew the first thing that came to mind– the sun. I used to draw the sun like this as a child– in the corner of the page with rays beaming down. Flowers came next because why not? I don’t know how to draw! I draw but I’m no artist. I drew a rudimentary flower. Not surprisingly the same way I drew flowers in my youth. Start with a circle in the middle and draw connecting circles overlapping behind it. Stems, too, of course.
What next? There’s so much paper left. I stared at J., a sweet milk chocolate drop, skin as smooth, creamy, perfect and shiny as the finest and richest milk chocolate. I was enamored by her. I could see the wheels of her mind turning as the synapses fired. When I asked her what she was drawing, she hit me with the “Sis, leave me alone. When Michelangelo is at work creating, you don’t interrupt.” energy. So I didn’t. I watched her, intently and carefully and boldly and without caution draw circles on her page. Inspired by this mini Michelangelo, I created a similar pattern just to see.
I began doing with a crayon what I do when I’m on my yoga mat or weight training or studying or reading when I allow myself an opportunity to grow. I simply ask myself “What would happen if I…?” and then, not knowing the outcome, I do. I allow myself to be. To try. To experiment. Soon those circles turned into another flower and more stems followed.
Still more space on the paper remained, and it needed to be filled. “What would happen if I…? Another flower reminiscent of a large lollipop emerged. More stems. Do all flowers have stems? Welp, the ones in my pictures do!
Grass. With a sun as big and hot, grass was appropriate. Not tufts like I anticipated, but a well manicured lawn. I returned to the first flower and filled it the background to create a circular halo. It reminded me of the dandelions I picked and blew as a child. A cloud of white and whimsy. Deep inhale. Exhale. Blow!
I serve at Children’s Church to get more plugged in. I often forget whenever I volunteer my time as service that I’ll get back so much more in return. Today, I was gifted the opportunity to be a kid again. Today, I colored with crayons (next time Imma use markers though!) and let these sweet, genius kiddos remind– no, teach!– me how to be a kid again.
Funny, isn’t it? At some point in my later childhood, I rushed to become an adult. And as an adults I seek to become a kid again, hoping to restore and return to the innocence and purity that was stolen or lost. One crayon, one drawing, one funny joke, one breath at a time.
