Some ingredients have changed through the years, but the truth is, I’ve always been making balm.
I don’t know how I knew I needed it, but it was the first thing I begged for at Olson’s Super Market. Not candy, or sugared cereal. No, I stood in front of the book section just past the corral of carts. They were at eye level for me, which meant the bottom rung. Coloring books. Page after page of possibility. I didn’t have the words for it then, but here in this store of nutrients, I knew for certain this was the only thing that could feed me.
I wasn’t a beggar by nature. I suppose it was my grandfather who showed me the power of using less words to emphasize their meaning. So I simply stood in front of the rack. Looked back and forth at my mother. She knew me. She nodded her head. I put the coloring book in the front of the cart. And I was saved.
The balm of crayons on paper has now become paint on paper, on canvas, on panel, words on pages, words on paintings. Creations of every kind. This is the magic that weakens the worry, and lengthens the joy. I’ve known it since I was five, coloring on the floor of my bedroom.
I think we’re all given a recipe. Yours, of course is different than mine. And only you know it. Be it music or baking, gardening or running. The list is endless. The magic is ever. Writing this daily blog is but an open crack of my childhood bedroom door. Not to show you what to do, (only you can decide that), but to show you that it can be done — this joyful making of balm.
