Daily musings #572 - Tuesday, 16 August 2022

This weekend there was a break in the routine flow of events. My nephew had come down to visit from Toronto and my daughter had organized a paint party. Someone had to take an effort to break the monotony and it was her who took the initiative. She had bought the paint supplies and made the necessary preparations.

In the end, we spent a couple of hours painting and it was a fun break from our usual patterns. Talent, skills, and competencies varied - there was some competitive spirit and we followed someone along in a YouTube video who taught us how to paint.

After the painting activity, we followed it up with a family Whatsapp group chat where the family voted anonymously about what the top paintings were. The results were obvious and if you spot the least appealing one, it would probably end up being mine. I have my own skills and competencies and painting is not one of them, especially with my focus and learning issues. Though I attempted to be a sporty participant.

Later on, these pictures hit my daughter’s Instagram circles with further voting with a larger circle of friends picking the top two. Surprising the results were similar to the family votes. Skills and competencies need to be certainly appreciated and I am happy to say that my wife and my little daughter topped the lists in that order.

In my defense, my belief is that all paintings are abstractions and my approaches are more reductionist than realistic. I am possibly using this to defend my lack of skills but Picasso might be proud. Or perhaps not. That is why he is long dead before my presence on this planet.