Satire/Memoir - My Daughter, the 'Artist'

[camfield]

Something for one of my workshop classes.  This is my satirical piece, because while not completely true it is my oh so worst nightmare.  :)

The house is quiet.  TOO quiet.  Anyone with a child under the age of twenty five knows that silent is never a good thing to have.  So many things can happen under the cover of peace that peace turns out not to be peace at all but a terrifying maelstrom of feelings and thoughts.

‘Is she alright?’

‘I hope nothing is broken.’

‘I should check the toilet again.’ 

‘OH MY GOD WHERE DID THE FISH GO!’

I stand up from my book, cautiously edging around each corner as I brace myself for whatever has happened.  Nothing, I’m starting to get anxious.

And then I see it.  One uncapped purple marker.

My heart rate jumps from slightly rapid into overdrive.  I feel like I’m going to stop breathing, like I can’t get enough air into my systems and I’m going to overheat and faint and no one will ever find me.  In the midst of my hyperventilating I see a second uncapped marker.

I break.

With the piercing shriek of an Amazon warrior I leap into action.  Bounding up the stairs two at a time, horror filling my soul as I see the rest of the marker set uncapped and strewn haphazardly over the stairs and hall.  I can hear happy songs and sounds coming from the far door and I cringe as I slow into a creep, one foot in front of the other landing in hard tempo to my heavy breathing and racing heart.

I open the door just enough to peek inside, to make sure what I think is happening is really happening.

It isn’t.  It’s worse.

What I had prayed and thought was going to be only wall cleanup was just the tip of this monstrous iceberg.  She was liberally covered with multicolored PERMANENT marker.  Skittles couldn’t hold a candle to the rainbow delight I now called my daughter.

Blues, purple, greens, yellow, red, orange, fuchsia, goddamed TEAL AND NEON PINK covered her from head to toe.  At some point she had deigned to take off all her clothing, which was sitting in a rather unnervingly clean heap by the wall, and her diaper to continue her ‘coloring’ unhindered by material afflictions.

The carpet bore smudge stains from her now green and red bottom, there were purple hand prints on the furniture and walls and I’m entirely certain that she had drawn what was supposed to be our cat Coffee on her foot.

She was currently working on the last visible skin over her arm, and I stepped in quickly in my haste to at least have SOME natural color left.  I shouted, she screamed, and the marker flew through the air to leave a striped across my bed sheets.

With a growl I scooped her up and took us both down the stairs hollering and yelling.  The bathtub was quickly inundated with hot soapy water and I rolled up my sleeves for what was sure to be the fight of my life. 

I scrubbed, rubbed and snarled while she screamed, cried and slid around the slick porcelain.  It was a battle of more than epic proportions. My wit and fervor often seemed of no match to her volume and sheer intensity.

Finally, I rinsed her and the tub only to sit back and despair.  She had gone from Skittles rainbow brilliant to ‘I clearly have been beaten’ dull.  The colors still vaguely visible, but dimmed down just enough that they looked like bruises and aberrations.

I wanted to scream.  We had music class!  Play dates!  How could I take her looking like she’d been beaten to within an inch of her life?  I’d be shunned!  The police would be called and I as a failure of a mother wouldn’t be able to convince them that it was simply permanent marker.  The blue, purple and yellow were especially damming, leaving truly bruise worthy stains that covered so much surface area on such a tiny body.

I shut my eyes, willing the problem to magically wick away when I felt a hand pat my arm and a tiny voice ask,

“Can I color again Mama?”

Comments

[chi-shiro.livejournal.com]

Lovely and every parents' worst nightmare all in one go.

Then again, Denis Leary tells a story about his daughter drawing on his brand new vehicle with a rock when she was younger. It can always be worse, I suppose.

Clearly your headcanon daughter aspires to reach conehead levels. *snickers*

[camfield.livejournal.com]

SO TRUE! The thing is that this is only slightly exaggerated. As in, the only thing that didn't really happen is the entire body re coloration. Because I have indeed found her partially covered in permanent marker, naked, in the bedroom.

I've also found her trying to PAINT HER MOUTH. With actual paint. AUGH! I don't keep anything in the house anymore. ANYTHING.

Lol! I should BASE the coneheads off my daughter! So... many... ideas...

[chi-shiro.livejournal.com]

You should! Yes you should. Kids will screw you over six ways to Sunday if you let them and I'm sure the Coneheads only wish they could be as troublesome as human spawn.