Patty Larkin "Do Not Disturb"

"It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child." -- Pablo Picasso

Take a second and look at the three pictures above.  Do you know what the hand-written signs say?

That Picasso quote at the top of the post is oft recited in my house. It comes up because my wife is an elementary school art teacher.

She uses the quote with her students, as encouragement, explaining to them that they have a certain talent that even Picasso struggled to compete with.

And she uses the quote on those occasions when she if offering instruction to adults, particularly the ones who say "I can't draw" or "I haven't done art since I was a kid."

Tapping in to your inner-kid-ness is a talent.

And as a parent, it can be a necessity.

Our daughter is completing her first year of public school.  Kindergarten.  Her knowledge and her skills grow every day.  One day she's sounding out the word "red."  And what seems like a few days later, she's reading aloud, slowly but surely, through "One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish."

Then she leapt into spelling.  She is labeling pictures.  Writing stories.  And posting signs with important information for our family about our new kittens.

I always struggle to read these signs, and usually I have to ask my wife for help.

"Just read the letters," she tells me.

In other words, don't sound it out.  Just say each consonant and vowel, as is.  Our daughter isn't really blending letters, or writing the silent letters, or using the "soft" versions of letters.

Read it, as is.  As it sounds.

The above pictures say:

"Bubble soap" (which was a potential name for one of our new kittens)

"Smelly Section" (note the corner of the house where we keep the trash barrel and the cat litter box)

"A couple of days ago I got two new kittens.  They are fun.  One is Kiki and the other one is Jasper."  And at the top of the page it says "Toilet Paper."

On the same day I saw my daughter post this sign where she was trying to make a cat bed, I also heard the Patty Larkin track on MVY.  That song makes me happy because it mentions Paul Klee, who is my wife's favorite artist (after our kids, of course)  And yeah, I can hear how "disturb" could easily be sounded out by a 6 year old as "distubv."

As of this posting, my favorite art teacher has not updated her site about her planned 2014 Summer classes, but you can keep checking this link.

Hear the song on Youtube.

Van Halen "Hot For Teacher"

While I know that there are certainly people who regularly read this blog, I don't get too many posts or comments about it online.  Which is why the comments that are made, stand out.

My friend Scott and I have this running joke, where, if I blog about a song he will comment about it.  And it comment generally ends with ". . . and the girl in the band is HOT!"  Or, if there is no video, his evaluation of the song is qualified, with "Is she hot?"

Last week, Scott did my wife a kind favor.  He posted on his Facebook page, and his work's Facebook page, about my wife's new Art Workshops.

Of course, it was hugely appreciated.  But he couldn't resist baiting me . . .

Hey everyone, a friend of mine is giving private art lessons out of her recently renovated garage this summer (is the paint even dry?). She's super cool, wicked nice, extremely talented...and one other thing, what was it?...(help me out PJ Finn!) Check it out! http://www.facebook.com/theartshed

Okay, so how do you respond?

He's posting this to all his friends.  Most of whom, I don't know.

Do I sound like a douche, if I take the bait and say, "She's Hot!  My wife is Hot!"?

Then, thinking like a businessman, I wondered, if we're trying to promote Art Lessons would potential parents be turned off by the fact that we were promoting the teacher's hotness as a selling point?  It seemed unprofessional, and unseemly.

And then, my Father mode kicked in.  Did I really want to even think about the idea of pre-pubescent boys, oogling their art teacher, my wife?  Do I really want to encourage a "Stacy's Mom" thing?

Because here's the thing, I do think my wife is hot.  After all these years, and the kids, and the daily grind, I can still look at her and think that she's totally beautiful.  And I'm sure I always will.

(My very wise Aunt Peg told me that she and Uncle Joe still find each other attractive after 40-plus years of marriage, because their eyesight has failed in equal proportion.)

I thought about going for broke and responding to Scott by posting the "Hot For Teacher" video, and the thought of it made me laugh.

When this song came out 25 years ago, the Hot Teacher fantasy did run wild in my pre-pubescent brain.  And here I am all these years later, living with a totally hot teacher!

I kept looking at the thread below Scott's post, on and off for a good hour, before I finally settled on a comment that wasn't unprofessional, provocative, douche-y, and didn't miss the opportunity to tweak Scott back:

Does your wife read your posts?

Hear the song on Youtube.

Daft Punk "Around The World"

Here's another Weekend Post: 

I was sitting here, working on my blog.

My wife was sitting at her computer, doing some research on Frida Kahlo, because she is going to be doing a Frida-related lesson for her first workshop at our in-home Art Studio, The Art Shed.

"What does Daft Punk mean?" she asked.

"It's a band.  Where did you pull that name from?"

"Frida Kahlo is wearing a t-shirt that says 'Daft Punk.'"

Yeah, I don't think Daft Punk was around when she was, but it did give me an idea for today's Weekend Post . . .



Hear the song on Youtube.

Weekend posts are a chance to revisit songs that have happy memories, not of anything in particular, other than just hearing the tunes.

Many of these songs were tracks that I played during my 90s stint as an Alternative/Modern Rock radio show.  They're tunes that I hardly hear these days, but are wonderful to revisit.

Click on the "Weekend Posts" label below, to see other posts like this.

AC/DC "Jailbreak"

Here's how it went:  I would slip silently through the halls, doing my best to remain invisible.  I'd appear in her doorway, looking for sanctuary.  She would grab a loose piece of paper, from somewhere within her reach.  It might be from a roll.  It might be newsprint.  It might be a corner ripped off some instructions.  In pencil, she'd quickly scrawl an unintelligible line and say, "Come right back."

I'd present the piece of paper.  Which again, could be a tiny corner, or a sheet the size of a full newspaper.  Either way, her signature was only took up two inches of real estate.

"What is this?" the Study Hall teacher would ask.

"Mrs. Laganas says I can come to the Art Room for Study Hall."

"Can't she use a permission slip like everyone else?" the Study Hall teacher would ask, rhetorically.

This piece of paper didn't just grant me access to the Art Room.  Equally importantly, it granted me freedom from Study Hall.

Depending on who the Study Hall teacher was, Study Hall at my school was either a detention-like 45 minutes held in complete silence, or, perhaps worse, it was a kind of unrestricted social time, where the goal was to just basically keep the kids corralled for the period.  The latter was actually harder for me, as a teen, because I was horribly uncomfortable in all but the most familiar social situations.  I was fine among my few best friends.  But having to make conversation with anyone beyond that was an excruciating experience during my teenage years (which, if you've only known me as an adult who's profession is public speaking, you must find hilariously ironic).

So any opportunity to avoid social scrutiny, was welcome.

And Mrs. Laganas was welcoming.

If you had a free period, and she liked you well enough (ie. she knew that you weren't going to show that permission slip to your Study Hall teacher, then go to McDonalds), she'd let you come hang out in the Art Room.

So I went there at every free opportunity, found a corner to work in, and put my head into a drawing.  If Mrs. Laganas had a big class in session, she'd let me hide in the supply closet and do my work.

Sometimes, she'd have projects/assignments for me.  Perspective.  Figure drawing.  Oil painting.

But most of the time, I was on my own, drawing.

"You have an eye," she used to say.

I could draw.  Actually, I could illustrate.  I had this natural ability to look at a photograph or picture, and draw it exactly.

I wasn't all that imaginative.  I didn't paint from my mind.  I didn't even really draw from real life.

I drew album covers.  And Rolling Stone magazine pictures.  And Sports Illustrated photos.  Athletes and Rock Stars and Models and such.

For 45 minutes my head would be down near the table, my eyes darting back and forth between the photo and the white piece of paper.  And when the period ended, I'd pop my work back in the magazine, and head off to the next class.

At home that night, I'd be back in the Art Room---this time, my bedroom---head back in the picture, AC/DC on the boombox (which was, ridiculously, set at the absolute lowest setting possible so as not to alert anyone that I was still awake at this late hour, drawing when I should be in bed).

I'd be in a world where I drew the lines and I didn't have to say a word to anyone.

It was a sanctuary and a coping mechanism that got me though the long awkward stretch of youth.


Postscript:  How cool is it that I married an Art Teacher?  And that my house is about to become an Art Room?  My friend Mike Palmer (with minimal help from me) spent last weekend renovating our garage, to make a studio space, and my wife is offering day camps for kids and evening classes for adults, right out of The Art Shed (the site is live, but not finished . . .).


Hear the song on Youtube.