“Our truest response to the irrationality of the world is to paint or sing or write, for only in such response do we find truth.”
A few years ago I read one of L’Engle’s books (A Circle of Quiet, I think) where she says over and over that it is the nature of love to create. At the time I was hopelessly infatuated with a boy I knew, and could testify that if what I was feeling was love, then the nature of love was absolutely to create. After an hour phone conversation I threw myself on the floor and said “I want to sing him a million songs and paint him a million pictures!” Something about love – or infatuation, or butterflies in the stomach – makes me want to create.
I never write songs when I am happy. There are plenty of other things I do out of happiness – make collages, dance, read, write words – but I never write songs out of happiness. This is incredibly unfortunate because of all the arts I have lessoned and learned, the piano is the most comfortable one for me to turn to. I turn to the piano only in response to anger, hurt, sadness, loneliness, confusion.. because I cannot cope any other way. It is really my only response to irrationality. I write a song only enough to be brought from darkness into light. Once I have healed, the creation of song is done.
My little collection of songs are not uplifting, but at their core they are an accurate showcase of the things that I do not understand, and they are ways for me to heal. We are all made to be creators. We are not called or expected to make masterpieces, but we are all called – especially when dealing with the hurts of life – to birth something that can walk alongside us and give us hope. Girls bake a lot, so I think that’s one way. Often I get caught up in the pressure to create a masterpiece, but the beauty of art in response to trial is not in its final product, but in the process that soothes and calms us.
ps. in other news, I get to cross something off of my 101 in 1001 list. I ate a tomato! It was a little one, but Lauren said it counted.
