The two little girls at the house where I was delivering a painting some
time ago, the elder five and the younger three years old, kept stabbing the
air with their little fingers, barely missing the painting, with their
mother repeatedly trying to persuade her daughters that this was not allowed
as it would "hurt" the painting. I find small children quite endearing and
so I started explaining to the mother that as most kids produce paintings on
a daily basis, to them this particular work of art would be as touchable as
their own creations, which called for a clever ruse so as to prevent them
getting overly physical with it.
I like to encourage little children into doing what other adults tend to
declare out of bounds. When my elder daughter was still alive, she was my
favourite guinea-pig. I remember thinking hard one day, just as she was
getting ready to start poking around in a painstakingly arranged bouquet of
flowers, and saying to her, feel how soft they are, gently. She caressed the
petals with infinite tenderness. I was lucky, a single petal came off, which
gave me the opportunity to sum up the essence of life in a few words: That's
the way it goes, sweetie.
Isn't this the ultimate victory of didactics? First you prevent something
going wrong, then you hope something will happen which you have just
prevented in such a way as to make it not the child's fault, and all future
bouquets are safe forever.
But then the painting had of course already been sold …
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