Chapter Five

pokeberries, coffee, tea and me

I suppose it was early summer in 1952. I had wrapped up my first scholastic year and was eager for the summer to begin in earnest. The penguins ran a tight ship in kindergarten. Order, discipline and a healthy dose of catechism sprinkled in with the lessons. They exposed me to color theory (how else would you describe reciting the three primary colors during art class each week). To be clear, art was a component of every Catholic schools curriculum from kindergarten to grade eight. At the tender age of 5 or 6 once a week we were taught about a famous piece of art. Lots of Michelangelo and others up through Millet were featured. 

At the end of the school year, we were armed with exacto knives and given the opportunity to turn a bar of soap into a Mexican adobe hut. What could go wrong? I suppose lots could go wrong, but we were under the “Eye of the Penguin”. We quietly and patiently carved out little bar of dial soap into something that did resemble the model.

Then, school was out. And here I was prowling the backyard in Adams Morgan. I came across this wonderful bush with dark purple berries. I picked some. I sniffed them. I squeezed them. I knew that I could use them. I filled my pockets and headed to my spot under the back porch. Once there, I filled a mason jar with the berries. My fingers were stained, my pants were stained but my mind was in full clear gear.

I went inside and gathered a coffee cup, one of my mother’s makeup brushes and a stack of newsprint my father had brought home from work. Back under that porch, I mixed my first pigment concoction. A little berry juice and some tap water produced a pale purple. Use more berry juice and the color became darker. Voila, I discovered value and didn’t even know it’s name. Another lesson? Newsprint sucks when applying water based colors. I learned less is more. I painted. I painted a picture of a cat and a picture of a rat. Then I did a bat. Feeling happy, I painted an elephant. I added some leftover coffee to my palette. The orangish brown complemented the purple in an interesting way. That morning, almost 70 years ago remains vivid. 

Just as a baby is delighted when they become biped mobile without understanding how that skill would impact a lifetime, I loved turning a blank piece of paper into an image (even if only I knew what it was supposed to be). The artist in me was born. I didn’t know a damn thing. I just liked making pictures.

Pokeberries, coffee, tea and me. More than a journey was started, a joy not found anyplace else took up residence in my heart. 

As I type this, it is early summer and pokeberries are ripening on the vine. Every bush I see in bloom takes me back to that early morning discovery on Lanier Place. No classroom, no instructor, just me and my imagination pushing pigment on paper. I have to say, the penguins opened the door and I ran through it never looking back. A lifetime of creation has followed.

Chapter Three

Crayons and a coffee can . . .

It was a warm Spring afternoon. My brother and I had been out playing behind our building. He was the sheriff and I was the outlaw. We had cap guns and handcuffs. I captured the sheriff and handcuffed him to a laundry line pole. He was stuck in the mud. I took his handcuffs. He was crying that he was getting dirty and could not undo the handcuffs. I climbed up the cinder block retaining wall and said
“It’s easy, watch me do it from up here.” I snapped one handcuff on and leaned out over the clothesline and snapped the other. Then I slipped. I was hanging from the clothesline and he was trapped in mud.

This was not a good place to be.

He was crying and I was ciphering how to extradite my little 3 year old butt from the situation. Stumped. Apparently, my brother’s wailing reached someone that went and got my sister. She came around the corner, took in the sight and ran over to get me down. I had to finagle sitting on her shoulders while she reached up and released one of the handcuffs. She then went over and released my brother, who immediately hightailed it for home. I followed my sister.

My mother already had my brother in the bathtub when we got inside. She paused and handed me some newsprint and my coffee can full of crayons. I was marched into the bathroom and placed on the toilet seat. I had a couple crayons and the newsprint in my hand. She set the coffee can on the floor next to the the toilet.

She began scrubbing mud off my brother. I began to doodle and color. I needed a blue crayon that was not in my hand. I spied it in the coffee can. I leaned to get it. Almost, and then I was falling. My leg hit the can at the joint where my kneecap would have been. Sliced through my leg, ligaments and whatever else was in there. Blood was everywhere.

My sister raced next door and got our neighbor. He was a yellow cab driver and was home. He rushed over and used his belt to create a tourniquet for my leg. He then scooped me up in his arms and ran out to his cab. He rushed me and my mother to Children’s Hospital on 13th Street.

I don’t remember much beyond the blood and him carrying me out. The staff at Children’s Hospital re-attached my leg which was hanging by some connective tissue. My leg was then put in a cast, bent at the knee and after a day in the hospital, I was sent home.

I could not walk (probably a blessing in disguise for the family). I was taken around in a blue stroller that felt way to small and confining. My sister would push me up to the swing set, lift me to a swing and I would sit and watch the world go by on Porter Street. I have never purchased a Maxwell House can of coffee, ever. I still have a fear of open cans. Oh, and I still find a place for blue in my work.

Chapter Two

Plein air is borne, well maybe a spark.

My brother had just begun walking. My guess is that I was 3 and he was a little tag-a-long 15 month old. It was a summer morning. My mother walked us around back to play. She went inside to rest and spend time with my sister. Quickly bored, I led my brother on a journey around the back of the building. I spied an open door to the workmans storage room. Of course, that became my destination. We went into the room and there were shelves full on assorted “stuff” and a workbench. Under the work bench, I saw a few cans of paint and a few large brushes soaking in solvent.

Eureka!!!! Now we had something to do. I had my brother lug a can full of paint and I grabbed the largest brush I could hold. Off we went to paint.

Even at 3, I had figured out it was better to work hidden than out in the open. The buildings had some crawl spaces beneath them. We crawled in, supplies in hand. Opened the can of paint and discovered it was a lovely cadmium orange color. I dipped that big old brush in the can and began to apply a nice even coat to the inside of the basement windows. One after another became an opaque orange square as we moved along.

I think it was between buildings two and three that we encountered a perplexed resident. We must have been a sight. Two little guys in white (now stained orange here and there) t-shirts, blue shorts and worn out black U.S. Keds looking for all the world to see like lost waifs. Apparently, the neighbor became a rat and summoned the maintenance man.

He was not perplexed. He was damn angry. He fumed and fussed and threatened. He stomped his feet and snatched the paintbrush from my hand and the near empty paint bucket from my brother. We could have run, but flight or fight skills had not been acquired yet. So we just stood there absorbing the chastisement.

He then marched us back home to face the familial music. My mother, Old German beer in hand, greeted us on the front steps. She told the maintenance man she would handle it and sent him on his way. It was 1949 and during the day, white women ruled the world.

Don’t recall the punishment. I do remember the absolute joy of applying pigment and changing the way light came through those windows. At 3, I had the pigment passion.