Coloring

I have always loved coloring books: the thick outlines of simple images just ready to be colored. Waiting. Asking for it. It passes time and calms the soul. Nothing sounds quite like Crayolas moving across the slightly brownish paper. Jumbo activity books or simple ones that tell a story about your favorite cartoon character. Simple, and sometimes educational.

And the crayons... the box of 96 of Crayola's finest. The one with the built-in sharpener that didn't really sharpen anything, but made that horrible wax mess inside the box. Getting a new box was just amazing. Opening up the box for the first time and seeing all the crayons lined up perfectly according to color. I never understood why the gold and black crayons were together. What did they have to do with each other? Maybe that was the point. Or maybe that was the minibox for the colors that didn't really have a place: the misfits.

I had a Precious Moments coloring book when I was little. I loved it. I got it from a KOA campground where we stayed on the way back from visiting my Granny. I would spend so long on each picture, because everything had to be just perfect. Just so. Every picture reminded me of the log cabin we stayed in. The cabin, and the small convenience store that the book came from: the one with the straws of honey that I had never seen before and the pixie stix.

I don't remember what happened to the book. At times like this, I wish I had it, though. Something familiar. Something different. Something... anything.

Even now, when Dina or Sammy are laying down on the floor or sitting at a table with a coloring book and crayons or colored pencils or markers all spread out in front of them, I feel the urge to go sit down with them and color my worries away. To just focus on nothing but the image in front of me; be it an elephant at the zoo or a toucan in a tree.

The sun is coming up.

How can things be going so horribly wrong?

Good night indeed.