Paintbrush
I watched my father create my world. “What’s that Daddy?” I asked, pointing at nothing and everything. He smiled knowing my game. He swept his brush back and forth, blue overlapping blue, greens, grays and whites. I loved my world. It was enough for me then.
“Dad, I’d like a friend.”
“Perhaps it is time to make your own.”
“But what should I draw?”
“What ever your heart desires and your dreams can create.”
I sat at the edge of my world staring across the horizon. I closed my eyes and lifted my brush letting it guide me through the colours and lines of my imagination. Sounds and smells filled my senses. The skies pulsed and the seas bubbled. From desert to snowy peak my world filled with life.
“What beautiful creatures,” my father said. “But have you made a friend?”
“Not yet.”
“Perhaps something you have already created?”
I attempted to make friends with my animals. A frog allowed me to stroke it’s back but leapt into the water and out of site. A vampire bat would chase sticks I’d throw but in the daylight he could not be found. For a time a cat kept me company but he grew tired and meandered away for other distractions. I began to draw anew.
Feet and legs; a belly, a torso, arms, hands with short fingers, brown eyes, turned up nose, a shock of dark hair all emerged from the tip of my brush.
“Hello!” He said when I finished. “Who am I?”
“Your name is Manny.”
“And yours?”
“Son, but you may call me friend.”
Manny and I would run through meadows and climb trees but as I grew older I had to help my father more with his work and Manny became lonely. “Friend, would you make me a friend?”
I did not have time to make so I gave him my brush.
Later I found my friend, holding the hand of another. “Who is this?”
“This is Ava. What do you think of her?”
“She’s beautiful.” I could not lie. Her golden hair, pale skin and azure eyes were beyond what my dreams could have created. Jealously I asked for my brush.
Hurt, I did not return for many days. My father saw my pensiveness. “Father, should I return?” He merely smiled, knowing I must make up my own mind.
It was easy to find Manny and Ava. They had built a cottage at the edge of the meadow.
Manny greeted me warmly. “Hello Friend, there is someone I would like you to meet.” He welcomed me inside. Gently cradled in Ava’s arms was a child.
I did not understand. “But you no longer have my brush.”
“I do not need it. Love also creates life.”
I could not leave the warmth of their home. Perhaps tomorrow I shall draw myself an Ava. Perhaps tomorrow I shall leave the creation of the Everything to my father and settle down to create with the colours of love.
Alphabet Wine 