patterns.

ever notice how sometimes, after you put cream in your cup of coffee and it has been sitting around for a little while, a shape will emerge on the surface? the cream rising to the top, as it were. today mine looks exactly like the Grinch. i swear! it even has that weird onion-top hairdo business. in fact, it looks like an enhanced-evil model of the Grinch, with madly pointier eyes. oh, well-
one sip, and he's gone. i truly have the power.

so, kindergarten.
kindergarten art class! although, i suppose the bulk of kindergarten was an art class... bright, primary-colored Fingerpaint; thick Construction Paper and blunted Scissors; tasty salty Play-doh; the crisp, mysterious smell of Paste in a tub.

The project i remember the most (as in often, and vividly) was a rainy day when we had to spend all our time indoors. Mrs. Frost had us line up at the sink, and one by one we pulled a brown, folded paper towel down out of the dispenser, got it thoroughly wet, and carried it back, dripping, to our tiny desks. i remember sitting there, waiting while the rest of my classmates got their "canvases". the rain outside tumbled jaggedly down the windowpanes, and our desks dripped fat drops of water onto the green floor. the paper towel smelled like how i now believe a paper mill probably smells- all pulpy and sharp. it was hard to lay it down completely flat on the desk, resulting in air bubbles that were poked and prodded all around the room.
Finally, Mrs. Frost came smiling around the room, passing out chalk. packs of multi-colored, skinny chalkboard chalk.
And we drew.

Now, if you have never experienced this particular tactile sensation (does anybody even remember those paper towels i'm talking about? those cheap, brown, grainy ones that seemed to exact a perfect one-two-punch on your tiny hands, along with the crappy granulated soap that would fall out of the soap dispensers, refusing to suds up and tickling the hell out of your palms?), perhaps this will be hard to explain. but i'm telling you- something about the feel of the chalk running smoothly across the wet brown paper was absolutely miraculous... i'm pretty sure i could have sat there for hours, perfectly content to draw bright blue curlicues and hard green jaggedy lines and blazing yellow suns.

The funny thing was, when the paper dried, the magic was completely gone. Mrs. Frost dutifully hung up our creations with laundry pins, but when they came back to you the chalk would simply drift lazily away into dust from off of the paper, and it was sort of horrifying. But then you would remember the absolute joy of the way the chalk felt when it was disintegrating onto the paper towel with a swift stroke of your hand to create those huge, pinker-than pink flowers, and it was all okay. especially because now it was time to play House, which meant one thing and one thing only- Play Food!

I have no idea whose bright idea it was to let us children draw on wet paper towels that day, but whoever it was- thank you. and seriously, sometimes i actually want to do it these days, when i am traveling around, say, and i find myself in a certain gas-station bathroom in a small town and after i wash my hands i look above the sink, and there they are.

next time: neighbors, and apartments.