When I was a kid, I loved to color. I would imagine that I am not alone in that feeling. It ranked right up there with collecting scratch and sniff stickers and playing with my Cabbage Patch Doll. I was not very good at drawing (unless you wanted a scene with mountains, trees, and a quarter of a sun in the upper right hand corner) so I relied heavily on coloring books to fulfill my need to color (within the lines, of course).
I never really cared what my coloring books were (or at least I don't remember caring) but there was one thing that I cared a lot about...the box of crayons. Every fall, when we would buy school supplies, I would get an extra box of new crayons to keep at home. Every fall, the teacher asked for the 24 pack to be sent to school and every year that is what I got, like everybody else. I loved my new boxes of crayons and took better care of them than anyone I knew.
I brought my school supplies to school, with my new school box (cardboard back then) and I would organize and reorganize my school supplies to find the most logical way to store them all. Then, one year, someone brought the big box of crayons to school. You know the kind, it was SO much bigger than the box of 24, and while that was cool, it wasn't the coolest part. The coolest part was that it had a crayon sharpener built into the back of the box. Once I saw it, I wanted it. I could hardly even imagine it...a sharp tipped crayon every time...it was brilliant.
But like many things, that brilliance came at a cost. The box was bigger and better and of course it cost more. Suddenly, my new box of 24 crayons, didn't seem very fun anymore. And to make things worse, those kids that had the box of 64 crayons with the sharpener in the back took horrible care of them. They didn't keep them in any order and jammed up the sharpener all the time. Didn't they know what they had?
My mom, being my mom, saw no sense in buying me the bigger box of crayons. I had been coloring just fine with what I had and now all of the sudden, it wasn't good enough anymore? Nope, I wasn't getting it. I remember the jealously I felt and how embarrassed I was that I only had the box of 24.
So, today, when I was at store killing time before picking up the pizza that wasn't on this week's menu plan, I stopped to pick up the coloring book that is on my list to complete. And, I certainly couldn't get a new coloring book without getting a new box of crayons. I decided on my way to the school supply section that today was the day that I was going to get my box of 64 crayons with the sharpener in the back. But what I didn't expect, was that there was going to be a box of 96 crayons or a carousel of 150 crayons...and a mega box of 225. Really, I thought to myself?!? Who needs a box of 225 crayons?!? Wait...what?
In case anyone is wondering, the next thing I am going to do after this blog post, is sitting down with my new coloring book, a cup of orange spice tea, and my new box of 64 crayons with the sharpener in the back. And I am pretty darn excited about it. Shhhh...don't tell my mom.
Jodie
ReplyDeleteI know how you feel - I loved that box of crayons but I could never color inside the lines. The lines always seemed to constricting, too defined, too I don't know - safe and I wanted adventure, freedom and danger. So dare to color outside the lines with your new box of crayons.....you might like it.