17 words in a moment of chaos

The first time I contemplated embracing the life of an artist, I was standing by a disorderly pile of books and poster paper and a teaching partner whose anger was escalating. The school year had just ended, the kids were at home or at day camp and the two of us were still in the school tying up loose ends and preparing for the following year.

I was helping this colleague move classrooms, something she resented. She was tired from the year behind her, as was I, and I had learned from experience over the years that she struggled with change. The day was nearly at an end and yet her new classroom was in complete disarray. Realizing she would have to return to the school the next day, my teaching partner began to curse her decision to become a teacher. In the middle of her rant, she turned to me. “Sometimes,” she said, “I want to give this all up and write children’s books.”

I remember standing a moment quietly among her chaos. Aware of her swift unraveling just feet from me, I was consumed by the words she had just spoken. Could she really just give up her career as a teacher and write children’s books? And if she could, could I?

Books and reading were a big part of my upbringing, but access to the life of writers-or artists of any kind—was not. As a child, I viewed those that wrote or painted or danced or sculpted as ethereal. These were people who lived Elsewhere-in Europe or New York. They wrote and created from afar and I enjoyed their work from my classroom or my home. It was a separation so vast that the idea of following in the footsteps of a writer or an artist was unimaginable. So I never did imagine.

Instead, I studied to be a teacher of children with special needs. In university I had to choose from three methodology classes to study: physical education, music and art. I took the first two, not stepping outside of who I thought I was-or who I felt I was not. I had not taken an art course since the age of ten and I am quite positive that I never used the adjective ‘creative’ in reference to who I was, not even privately. It didn’t matter too much to me then, as I was content in where I was heading and who I was becoming. My outlook on the artistic process and those that engaged in it hadn’t changed. In fact, I had never given it much thought at all. Until that day. And then I couldn’t stop thinking about it.

My teaching partner and I parted ways shortly after and yet her words remained with me. Like a young child, they forever poked at me and demanded my attention. Caught up in the busyness of life though, I heeded the words lightly and carried on my way.

A year later and expecting our first child I left teaching temporarily and moved to England with my husband. No longer employed and still pregnant I was faced with the prospect of free-time, something I hadn’t had in years since before beginning university. Still viewing the world largely through teacher eyes, I decided to use this gift of time to develop the two areas of my teaching day that I had the least experience in: the writing process and the instruction of art.

I began to explore both disciplines initially with the teacher-intent to understand how my students felt going through the creative process themselves, but soon I found that I began to write and learn for myself. Those ever present words that had been nagging me burst forth and demanded my attention in a new and intense way. Could writing be something legitimate for me?

I found those twelve words were no longer those of an old colleague’s that I thought about on occasion. Those words had become my own mantra. I shed my teacher hat and began writing as, well, a writer. I loved seeking out time and making it my writing time. Soon, I found that my day was not complete, that my mood was not congenial until I found the time to work on my writing.

During that same period, Waterloo Station in London was just a 40-minute train ride away. And in London there was the Tate Gallery, the National Gallery, The Portrait Gallery and the Courtauld Institute of Art. And in each of those fantastic places was the art of Monet, Dali, Leonardo and Van Gogh and thousands of other artists waiting for me to discover. What an opportunity.

I was transformed. I knew I not only wanted to, but needed to develop the creative side of me.
I run to keep healthy, but I don’t experience the high that many runners do. But the intense need to hit the pathways that my running friends describe is not unlike the intense need I feel now about engaging in creative activities. And like them, going too long without, I begin to feel sluggish and slow and absolutely irritated.

I am surrounded by children much of the time either in the classroom or at home with my two boys. As an artist I crave silence, but as a teacher and a mom I create noise. There needs to be noise in learning; the dialogue and the discovery of ideas is not a quiet affair. But over time this noise slowly seeps into my head, clouding my thoughts and creating in me a desire to escape and seek solitude.

I can now recognize what the agitation in my soul is. It is the need to create. If I’m particularly worn out from my interactions with children I know I can walk into my studio and shut myself away from life if only for an hour or two. But in my small sanctuary that I carved out for myself in our home I can play with words and images, dream, create and be stirred by the words and works of others. When I reemerge and tuck my children into bed, I can do so with a clear mind and a renewed sense of energy to enjoy every new moment with them.

Time will tell whether that important day, the day that twelve words were uttered in a moment of chaos, will transpire into a success in a commercial success. But the value in the discovery that I am creative is boundless.

I know nothing about my former colleague’s whereabouts today, but I often think of her. I’m grateful to her, of course, for in the inadvertent nudge she gave me to explore my creative side. But I also wonder what became of her. She was a dedicated teacher who knew the curriculum well and taught it with expertise, but she was so very unhappy. She struck me, in hindsight, as someone who was looking for an outlet to bring her satisfaction, but hadn’t yet discovered it. How many people are in the same situation?

I hope she followed her heart and tried her hand at writing because I understand her turmoil. Like her, I love teaching, I really do. I love the opportunity to share the possibilities of literature and the puzzling nature of math. And I enjoy the stories my students tell me as they reveal a bit about who they are and where they come from. But for me, full-time in a classroom doesn’t leave time to contemplate and think and dream and create for purely selfish reasons. And without that in my life, I now know I could easily be the one melting down in the middle of my classroom—or my home—and wondering why.