An artist survives

There is art behind everything that we do, be it filling up a canvas with brush strokes, choosing clothes during sale season, talking to your boss or making food. I remember as a child I used to love colours and my teachers knew it. So even when other kids in my kindergarten class used to write with pencils, I got the privilege to write with coloured pencils and crayons. I remember how I used to write 1, 2 and 3 with red, blue and green and used to crayon the tree red. But now, times are different. Even though I pursued a short-lived a career of a part-time art teacher for little kids before my 12th board exams, I haven’t painted in a long time. But when I say there is art behind everything, I’m right. Like yesterday, when I decided that I would make rotis, as I was beginning to forget what they tasted like with my mother away for a long holiday. I took out all of my mother’s weapons and started on my mission. The flour, the water, my palms and then again the flour and then again the water… I felt like, “Damn! I’m never gonna make the right dough.” From two cups of flour I reached four and yet it was not looking like it should.
And then I made that frantic call. “Maa, how do you do it everyday, non-stop?” I shrieked. She smiled and said, “Since I never taught you how to cook, I thought just like the curries you might have inherited how to make rotis, too, from me.” “Maa, there is art behind making fingerlicking curries and I know that… But how do I deal with this mess?” She said, “There is art behind this too, you only need to practice.” That’s it? That was the valuable piece of advice? I was doomed. I began again and managed to make wild shapes and when that was baked, it turned into papads. I failed. But the fighter in me urged me to give it a try one more time this morning, and the mission was accomplished. My mother was right after all. The advice was indeed valuable and I’m happy the artist inside me is still alive.