Being crafty just a work in progress

This morning I put a newspaper clipping about my daughter in the family scrapbook. Actually, scrapbook is a pretty glorified title for what we have. It’s really just a binder that contains any piece of newsprint with the name of one of the Glazers on it. It has always been my intention to someday organize it into volumes dedicated to each family member.

Our older daughter Molly’s book will be filled with programs from her high school plays bordered by red and white gingham ribbon and cutouts of trumpeting Red Elephants. Ensuing pages will feature the Gamma Phi Beta crescent moon and pictures of Uga VI, rest his soul.

Rachel’s volume will have green and white stripes and head shots of an intrepid Trojan warrior. Wait a minute. Didn’t the Trojans lose that war? Yeah that’s right. They chose not to listen to Laocoon when he said, "Do not trust the horse, Trojans! Whatever it is, I fear the Greeks, even bringing gifts." But after all, who can turn down free presents? Oh, well, I guess it’s too late to change the team’s name to The Greeks.

I’ll make a scrapbook for myself, surrounding clippings of my eight years of community columns with appropriate images. I’ve come to realize all of my columns generally fall into one of four categories: First, there’s my long-suffering family. Bless their hearts, they never know when their latest adventure is going to turn up on the Times’ editorial page.

Next there are the animal columns. I write about our critters, mostly, but also possums and rent-a-dog programs, too.
Third is mankind’s vast capacity for stupidity. I almost wrote this week’s column about the guy who traded naming rights to his unborn child for a $100.00 gas card.

Last, there’s that ambiguous category known as "other." "Other" ranges from the Hurricane Katrina relief debacle to garage sale etiquette and Dr. Seuss. Everything’s fair game. What fun I could have choosing clip art for that scrapbook.

My husband’s book will feature all of his computer columns (published twice monthly here in The Times) with little pieces of old motherboards and other geeky flotsam and jetsam cleverly pasted around the edges.

Yeah, that’s gonna happen.

I wish I could be crafty like that. I aspire to it. I try, I really do. It just never turns out like I envision it. The garage holds box after box of half-finished projects. Recently I sifted through them with almost anthropological detachment.

Here were the supplies from my Crochet Period (circa 1984) when, pregnant with my first child, I decided to make a baby blanket. I bought enough yarn to create a boat cover and ended up with a piece the size of a tea towel ... if tea towels were shaped like trapezoids.

Next came the Quilt Age (1986-1988) when I created dozens of lopsided patchwork squares but lost interest before I actually sewed them together. I’m leaving that task for my heirs.

The Grouting Busted Pieces of China Dishes to Clay Pots to Make Really Ugly Mosaics Era was thankfully short-lived (1989).

Next came the Dark Ages dating from 1990 to, well, now. I tried my hand at hair bow making. Every picture of poor Molly in her elementary school days features a ghastly clump of ribbons clipped to her head. There was bread baking, cross stitch, bead work, calligraphy. Nothing clicked.

I’ve had to finally face the sad fact that no one’s ever going to accuse me of being right-brained.
It doesn’t help that I’m married to a man who can wander off into his workshop and emerge a few hours later with a stained and leaded glass sidelight for the front door or triple matted and framed photos of all of the major waterfalls in North Georgia.

So I’ve decided to let the scrapbooks become perpetual works in progress. I figure as long as I don’t actually complete them, I haven’t failed completely.

(Originally published in the Gainesville Times, July 25, 2008)