Creativity Does Not Run in My Family

Does anyone else constantly wish that they had some kind of creative talent?

I feel as though I have the capacity to be creative.  I can be pretty moody.  I appreciate beautiful sunsets.  Sometimes I stare out the window thinking deep thoughts.  You would think that all of these things would equal the ability to do something creative.

But no.

I have seen a lot of really beautiful things in my life.  The inlets in British Columbia, the reservoir in the Canyon, the mountains of Colorado, the big blue sky in Wyoming, the stars at the top of the hill on Muddy Road, people spread in the grass in Central Park, the Columbia River Gorge, the steps of Sacre Coeur, the sun setting on the Missouri River, an empty old leaf covered park in a tiny town in Spain, the desert, the woods, lakes, the forests.  

Standing in all of these spots, I had the same thought.

I wish I could capture this.

I'll run through my options in my head.

I take a picture.  I look at it on my tiny camera screen and become frustrated because it looks small and not that impressive.  The lighting's wrong and it's probably a little blurry because I don't have the steadiest of hands.

I think about how awesome what I'm looking at would be as a painting.  You could get the light right and the something intangible that somehow can translate when it's not an exact rendering.  But then I remember my unsteady hand that so negatively affected my picture.  Painting's not going to work.

So maybe I'll write a poem about it.  I open my journal and go to work.  I use the words beauty and pretty and then I'm out of adjectives.  I stick with the general A-B-A-B rhyme pattern.  I get frustrated again when I realize that the poem reads like something that would be found in an elementary school newspaper.

I try turning the poem into a song.  I realize that I'm completely ripping off a Kelly Clarkson melody that's been stuck in my head and move on.

I try prose.  Maybe I can just write about it.  Maybe I can find the words that will somehow paint a picture of this place for anyone who comes across them.  I grasp for something, anything that could describe it.  I fail.

I give up.  I admit defeat.  I have no creativity in my entire body.  But then I realize I'm extremely lucky to see what I see.  And maybe I can't share it with anybody else, but I'm going to enjoy it.  And remember it in a blog.  That'll be enough.

But really, there are some people who sing, play, draw, paint, and publish all at the same time.  Can't I just do one of those things?  Without having to practice or learn anything?  I don't think that's too much to ask.

Song of the Day: Everything I Do by Whiskeytown (I have to make these into videos to put them on the blog, so this is accompanied by a picture of one of my favorite places on the planet... I assure you it doesn't do it the slightest bit of justice.)