Answer: At some point in my life, they have both made me cry.
Yes, you read that correctly. Now, please allow me to elaborate...
When I was little, going to a fast food "restaurant", and I use that term VERY loosely, was a big deal. Fast food was not something my family did on a regular basis. In fact, I don't believe it was something ANY of my friends families did on a regular basis. Back then, it just wasn't a dietary staple as it is today. So, when Mom occasionally suggested that we go to McDonalds for dinner, it was BEYOND exciting for me! And, oh boy, oh boy, actually eating there was even BETTER! (These days you would literally have to prod me with a red hot poker to even get me through the doors...but I digress.)
It was on one such occasion that I asked to order my very first Big Mac. Up until then, I had always been a cheeseburger/fillet-o-fish kind of gal. However, on that particular day, I felt grown-up enough to finally conquer a Big Mac. Or, perhaps I had fallen victim to the "two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, blah, blah, blah..." commercial that ran in a continuous loop on television back in the mid-1970's. Whatever the reason, I was absolutely sure I was making the right decision. Even when my Mom hinted, ever so gently, that perhaps a Big Mac was not for me. Like, 10 times. I can still hear her saying, "Kate, it's messy. A Big Mac is very, very, VERY messy." And what did I do? Just what any kid would do. I ignored her. I...ignored...her. Good Lord, why did I ignore her? Because what transpired next would not only provide endless hours of "story-retelling-entertainment" for my Mother, but would also give a pretty accurate portrayal of what I would become as an adult.
As I tried to wrap my little hands around what appeared to be the most GINORMOUS burger I had ever come in close contact with, and as I opened my little mouth as wide as it could possibly go without dislocating my jaw...it began. The disintegration of those two all-beef patties, followed by five pounds of special sauce, and an entire head of lettuce, all of it splattering, gushing, and dripping down my face, both hands, and both arms, until it came to rest in a messy, massive heap, in the styrofoam box it was originally housed in. After what was a minute or so of stunned silence...I HOWLED. That's right, I cried my eyes out. Screamed them out, actually. That fabulous burger of my dreams featured in those commercials, with its lettuce and sauce trained to stay neatly on its buns, had forsaken me. It was a fraud. A sham, if you will. And I was incensed! Mom, of course, tried to remedy the situation by offering to cut it into quarters, but I was too far gone. And cutting it into quarters was not going to erase the fact that it was messy, messy, messy. I wanted to go home. And I'm willing to bet that Mom wanted to, more.
Which brings us back to my owl illustration. 30+ years after the Big Mac incident of the 1970's, and I am STILL having a difficult time dealing with messiness. About a month ago, after erasing, redrawing, erasing, and redrawing the same cluster of flowers over, and over again, I burst into tears. Yep, a grown woman, bursting into tears over something as silly, and inconsequential, as a few flowers...just because they weren't perfect. The layers of ink and watercolor had rendered them messy and blob-like, and I was about to throw the whole thing away. And then I realized that, because the board I was working on had a clay coating, I could probably sand the top layer off with fine sandpaper, and it would look as good as new. And, get this, I was right! Disaster averted. Sobbing, ceased.
As for my occasional outbursts of emotion, I swear to you it's really not a common thing. I'm not that little girl that has a meltdown when she dribbles something down the front of her shirt, anymore. I don't expect perfection in others, and I understand that messiness is just a part of life. I mean, I have a dog, ya know? I've come to realize that the world is my Big Mac. It's gonna be sloppy, and it will never be perfect, and I will never have enough napkins to clean it up. But it sure would be nice if we could all just sand the top layer off, once in a while.
Hope you all have a fabulous weekend, and I'll talk at ya soon!!!
xoxoxoDeirdre
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