Accidents with Permanence

Sharpies are permanent, but what people forget is that crayons are, too. Sure, they might get scratched and smear paper and get into your nails and melt under the hot hot heat, but the fact that its permanence creates consequences other than scent consumption (like Sharpies do) makes me appreciate crayons. Now, we use wite-out or start over when writing with an instrument of a permanent medium in our hands, of which color is already contained (that basically means that paint brushes don't count because you have to dip the actual implement in it color to produce it on canvas).

As a child, I remember, it was impossible to erase crayon marks-- they'd simply just smudge the paper and make a greater mess outside the lines. We didn't wite-out. We really.. whited out. We always tried to color white over everything beyond that line, realizing that it works... sometimes. Thinking back on it, I had some sort of senseless hope, a hope that it will work and my paper would be just fine and dandy again, but in the end, it was all just wishful thinking. I hoped that no one will notice that I crossed that boundary, that line that separates red from blue, but you can't help but know and notice that someone else will see that faint discolored mark where it doesn't belong.

For anyone, chances are you were coloring too fast, or you didn't really consider the width of the crayon tip so you thought it ended right before the line when in actuality it didn't. That whited out mark that you just made, everyone noticed it, trust me. You'd still see that hint of yellow that shouldn't have been the sunshine, but the sky. That color orange crossing over the orange and onto the grapes. That piece of skin that's on what was supposed to be part of the brick wall behind these people. They were mistakes, these alien marks, things you didn't plan to happen. You tried to fix them by coloring over them as hard as you could, wearing out the damn thing 'til you could only keep hold of it with two fingers, only to find that that mark.. will still be seen.

I have a lot to say about these things. Crayons, also, have texture. Sure, you can create texture with paint, but the thing about crayons is that.. crayons are not ink. They're wax. I think that's what's special about crayons. They have so many characteristics, so many different colors, and they are unique. I will admit, though, that the part that makes crayons so special to all of us is probably the fact that we once used them for everything as a child until that one day when someone told you colored pencils were better--smoother and neater. They were easier to erase, easier to seem flawless though it is flawed.

Maybe I'm overthinking things, but I've always enjoyed that memory of me struggling to white out a red crayon mark. I'd get so frustrated at the fact that it was pink and I'd give up and start over again. Even today I'll admit I went a few centimeters over the line. Sometimes.. it's bound to happen, stepping over. Taking two steps forward instead of one. Sometimes you try your hardest to fix it, to try to make things authentic and the same as ever all over again, but one day, you stop and you realize.. you can't. All you have left is really to continue 'til you're done and this time, you're going to be extra cautious about coloring. You're going to be careful about those lines. And even when your work's done, there's still that noticeable blemish from that time you stepped out and did something different.

And maybe then, you'll start coloring outside the lines. You'll try to make that blemish into a background, a pattern, something that works.
And that's when you'll make real art.