Do Not Go Where the Path May Lead
My parents used to think I was a really good artist, and not just because they are my parents. More because, at what I have since dubbed the high point of my eight-year-old life, I discovered that if I put a blank sheet of paper over a picture then put it against the window, I could trace the original perfectly. Ask me now and I'll admit that it was wrong, but I'll also say that tracing isn't always such a bad thing. Retracing steps, for example, is a sure-fire way to find that misplaced phone or to remember your course of actions through the day.
As I've grown older, my knack for tracing hasn't left me. Just last summer I found myself running through the streets of Paris in search of a patisserie I had patronized the week prior. While others may think to diversify their experiences, I'm more the type who finds something I really love and sticks with it. Maybe because I develop a routine and feel incomplete otherwise, maybe because risk comes with potential disappointment and a trade off with something deeply comfortable.
Somewhere between a freak baguette-to-forehead incident and it starting to rain, I realized that spending so much time looking for the patisserie had only rendered my current "experience" a complete bust. Yes, yes I know. There is a patisserie at ever street corner in Paris. Why I wanted that specific one, is a question that even I cannot answer.
Even if I had stumbled upon said patisserie, it is almost certain that my experience would not have been the same (French bakers aren't really into baking the same thing twice). The fact is that no matter how much we try to recreate that meal, vacation, or conversation, it's simply not possible.
Looking at the overwhelming number of "lasts" in my life that will indubitably spark wondrous "firsts," it's evident that no matter how much I wish it were, it's simply not going to be the same. Once in a while we can almost recreate "that time," but most of the time, it's actually impossible -- and that's what is most difficult to accept.
So many times in the last couple weeks I've said to myself, "I wish I could go back to..." or "I wish that next - will be the same as last -." But as I write this, I'm realizing that, like my normal vision, my hindsight is tainted. Tainted by the rose-colored glass through which we peer into the past. We remember the best part. And nothing else. We repress the hard times because it's easier that way. And in reminding myself of this fact, I see (with 20/20 vision) that I'm actually not interested in clone experiences.
Tracing artwork won't get you anywhere and plagiarizing will land you in the Office of Student Conduct. In these situations when neither path looks especially enticing, it looks like we're left with no choice but to go instead where there is no path...and to leave no trail.
As I've grown older, my knack for tracing hasn't left me. Just last summer I found myself running through the streets of Paris in search of a patisserie I had patronized the week prior. While others may think to diversify their experiences, I'm more the type who finds something I really love and sticks with it. Maybe because I develop a routine and feel incomplete otherwise, maybe because risk comes with potential disappointment and a trade off with something deeply comfortable.
Somewhere between a freak baguette-to-forehead incident and it starting to rain, I realized that spending so much time looking for the patisserie had only rendered my current "experience" a complete bust. Yes, yes I know. There is a patisserie at ever street corner in Paris. Why I wanted that specific one, is a question that even I cannot answer.
Even if I had stumbled upon said patisserie, it is almost certain that my experience would not have been the same (French bakers aren't really into baking the same thing twice). The fact is that no matter how much we try to recreate that meal, vacation, or conversation, it's simply not possible.
Looking at the overwhelming number of "lasts" in my life that will indubitably spark wondrous "firsts," it's evident that no matter how much I wish it were, it's simply not going to be the same. Once in a while we can almost recreate "that time," but most of the time, it's actually impossible -- and that's what is most difficult to accept.
So many times in the last couple weeks I've said to myself, "I wish I could go back to..." or "I wish that next - will be the same as last -." But as I write this, I'm realizing that, like my normal vision, my hindsight is tainted. Tainted by the rose-colored glass through which we peer into the past. We remember the best part. And nothing else. We repress the hard times because it's easier that way. And in reminding myself of this fact, I see (with 20/20 vision) that I'm actually not interested in clone experiences.
Tracing artwork won't get you anywhere and plagiarizing will land you in the Office of Student Conduct. In these situations when neither path looks especially enticing, it looks like we're left with no choice but to go instead where there is no path...and to leave no trail.
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