Never give a young, budding homosexual an art class in pottery.
There are a thousand reasons why one should not do this. There are just some forms of creative
expression you do not give a child, especially with the restriction that,
whatever it is, cannot be used or resemble - in any way shape or form - an
ashtray. Even the kids of non-smokers were bewildered as to where to start.
Looking back I always come to the same thought: What kind of art teacher
puts that kind of pressure on a kid? Such a thing was especially dangerous
to do to one who was trying to get along with the bizarre undercurrent of mixed
sexual signals emerging in the prehistoric days of the early 80's. Giving a
child that kind of freedom with no useful purpose is a formula for danger. It
was the equivalent of giving an arsonist a book of matches and a house and
telling him, in no certain terms, that the house needed redecoration but the
result couldn't resemble a house in any way.
Mr. Dody, the art teacher, encouraged us to be creative and suggested ideas
for small sculptured animals and, perhaps, coffee mugs. Incense burners were
discouraged as well as anything in the shape of wide, flat bowls. These passed
before his upturned nose as unsatisfactory because they could easily translate
into ashtrays. Other things that were discouraged: anything that could be
construed as bowl-like, shot glasses, anything that remotely resembled a penis
and of course, Satanic symbols.
With those restrictions we realized that we were removing one of the most
valuable aspects from any pottery we would make - usefulness. We knew,
going into the project, anything we would possibly make would end up in the
trash heap, our grandmother's mantle, or used to scoop out pet food or cat
litter. Others in my class felt a sudden deep depression, the kind that today is
treated with several prescription drugs. He had led his little class into a
hopeless endeavor. Each and every member of my 8th grade art class knew
his or her masterpiece would be equivalent of a B- report card, not bad enough to
warrant a beating but humiliating enough to never see the light of day or hang from the
refrigerator door.
Once you throw the Gay Gene into an ambiguous 8th grade art project you might
as well just expect the result to be hidden under a couch for years to
come. Somehow, even after this, my brief stint in gymnastics, acting in the
theater, and then my true appreciation for the music of Duran Duran, my parents
still thought that I would turn out straight.
I knew exactly what I would do and, as usual, no one stopped me. Go
figure
My vision had been of a grand, elaborate candle holder. The main part would be a triangular
base with flattened corners, bent gently upwards to crest just above the center
of the base. I created support beams to hold up the form and made a circular
ring base that sat center, inside the three pillars in which one could place a
wide pillar candle. This monstrosity took the full week to complete. I let it
dry and prepared for the painting and glazing.
I had limited choices in paint. Since my school had a small budget we were
forced to choose simple primary colors and were not allowed to mix any color
with our paint except for white. I was determined to outshine
everyone else - to make them hate me for my creative vision and genius. Already they gave envious glances towards my ambitious design, my grand scale, my intricate engineering. My god, they were envious of my talent.
I knew it was the largest and most ambitious piece in my class and I
was determined to have it stand out even further. I painted it the most repugnant shade of sky blue and then finished it off by covering it with tiny white polka dots. It looked like a half-opened
alien blue flower- one created with the intent of scaring off any bee or
insect that might stray near it.
I couldn't have been more proud. I let it dry, glazed it and threw it into the kiln.
Unfortunately it didn't burn up. It shrank a little causing one of the delicate support
beams to fall over during the firing process. This beam became irrevocably fused
to the circular basin and stuck far enough into the center ring as to keep it from
accepting any candle larger than a tea candle- which would sit cock-eyed in the
center bowl. When it was complete it could be used for nothing.
In effect, I had created A Thing with No Recognizable Purpose.
It was beautiful!
When revealed to the students and parents at the open house the following
week several guesses were made as to its function and eventually my art teacher wrote my original artisitc intent on a card to sit beside my name and grade.
I got an A, of course. What was he going to grade me on, looks?
Usefulness? I'm not certain if I got the A for creativity, originality or simply
pity.
The open house that followed was one of many that my parents never attended.
They never made a serious attempt to be involved in my schooling and for this I
was sometimes grateful and sometimes a little bitter. .
My mom, for example, came to school infrequently enough to make it easy for
me to pass her off to my friends as an eccentric aunt who was only related by
marriage. While she never truly learned to appreciate the weird contraptions
that would clutter her closet, mantle, and space under her bed, she at least
never made me throw them away myself.
My father was less tactful. The most common words my father ever said to me
was "What in the hell" followed closely by the words: "...have you done?",
"...are you doing?", "...is that?", "...have you put in there?", "...did you do
to it?" and "...have you done with the rest of it?" He gave up on me after they
enrolled me into speech therapy to get rid of the lisp. My dad would have been
more interested in standing next to a flashing sign with the word "Cocksucker"
written neatly with neon red tubes than acknowledge most of the perplexing
things that I would fluff into reality.
They had generally learned their lesson so they made my sister accompany me
to this one. She was old enough to be a convincing guardian and young enough to
fuck with the other parents by convincing them she got pregnant at age 12 and
gave birth to me in the back of a U-Haul on the way to Paducah, KY.
As for the art exhibit, the other parents walked past this piece as if it
was Gay incarnate: bright, cheery, loud, hideously twisted, unrecognizable and
absolutely alien to them. Most people just avoided getting too close. They
seemed to fear that somehow the tri-folded piece would open up like an alien pod and spray gay, polka-dot bullets at anyone foolish enough to put
their face above the top.
I could hear my art teacher explaining to almost every confused parent his
strict policy against ashtrays when they stood looking, bewildered, at the
confusing pieces their children had created. Granted, mine wasn't the
only bad work of art... mine was just the worst.
I gave it first to my dad, thinking he could take it to work and use in his
office. He made an effort to appreciate it by turning it over a few times in his
hands and grunted. "Did you mean for it to look like this?" He passed off the
fallen support pillar as shoddy workmanship and asked incredulously if I had
actually gotten an A or if I was lying. I showed him the card and the grade - he still didn't believe me. He informed me that it wasn't legal
for him to burn candles in his office and that my mother would appreciate it
more.
So I presented it to my mother with the kind of pomp and flourish one would
expect from a prince holding a glass slipper on a pillow. "Look what I made for
you!" I left out the part where I gave it to my dad and the subsequent rejection. She was
understandably confused and at first turned it upside down - thinking that
somehow it was me who didn't know what it was.
I explained its purpose, as a candleholder, and then pointed out the fallen
pillar and how it kept it from actually being used as a candle holder.
She was brave, I have to give her that. The problem was that tea candles were
lost in the size of it and wouldn't sit perfectly straight, votives simply
melted into a puddle, large pillar candles never fit within the base due to the
diminished capacity (thanks to the fallen support beam) and tapered candles
simply fell over because there was nothing to actually hold those.
At long last she gave up.
I came home from school a week later and went to my mother's room so we could
watch General Hospital together. I sat quietly in the waterbed as she got up to
use the bathroom. I looked over and saw it on her nightstand. The inside ring of
the candle holder, the space for the pillar candle, was filled with ashes and
cigarette butts and the fallen beam supported a long, smoldering Benson &
Hedges.
I beamed and sat back proudly on the pillow while the curl of smoke
trailed delicately upwards through the three, hideous blue peaks.