XXXVII

T

ragedy, the Philosopher tells us, requires that the tragic hero begin in a state of nobility and greatness. Then, through hamartia, the hero falls from the great height to suffer in excess of his due. This would elicit, among the audience, pity and fear. Conversely, the comic hero first steps stumbling upon the stage, low of birth and with misplaced morals.

It seems quite clear, therefore, that if I were to adopt Anne's principles of a life lived as narrative, it was imperative that the adventure become a certain comedy. As the curtain goes down, I ought be bowing upon the stage with my small ensemble of characters clasping hands and grinning broadly. We'll want a toe-tapping song to leave the audience with a tune on their tongue for the transport home.

Change is harder than an apology.

Redemption is harder than forgiveness.

Comedy is harder than tragedy.

So when I had been expelled from the medical facilities, shorn of hair and bereft of tumour, I applied myself to the mission of manufacturing a happy ending for what remained.

Beatrice would be on the stage but she and Phaedra would each be in their respective lovers' arms, repeating their own merry counterpoint to the chorus. Anne too is with her husband (who thus far is only a hazy notion) and so it becomes a boisterous septet; a difficult thing to orchestrate as the best of times. Center stage, among these three pairings, stands our comedic lead, alone and yet grinning about the happy resolution that has been achieved.

I should have introduced the doctor. Every good comedy has a busybody doctor to prattle on about quack remedies while conspiring to concoct elaborate opportunities for farce. The chorus is also too sparse. They have not yet been given any good moments, except perhaps for the wildly popular Naïve Art Students song.

In Beatrice, at least, I have, necessarily, my case of mistaken identity. Through all the length of performance, the hero has been pursuing one thing while imagining the other and many belly laughs are gained as this results in embarrassment and failure. Ho ho.

Here in the Third Act, the twist is revealed and the costumes are once more changed. Riotous humour follows after the discovery that, in fact it has all along been Anne that was our protagonist's true quarry. While he stomped across the echoing stage boards from one to the other elusive Dame, it was all along Anne that had set his soul aflame for art and culture. She was, we find, really no wizened matchmaker but the young-spirited pranciful Popagana.

She had been my guide when the journey has first begun and I had left her in Elysium.

It was with Anne that I had attended concerts and galleries. We could tug at each other's sleeve and exclaim, "Come see this!" and know that the other would be equally as excited. With Anne, and only with Anne and sometimes with Madelaine, that I could run into one esoteric shoppe or another and gleefully hold aloft some quaint curio as though it were a torch lighting the way to truth. With Her, I could discuss Frank Lloyd Wright and recite the Lake Poets. We ran, more than once, because we could, through the streets of towns that were, in our time, a celebrating chorus. Anne and I were each bewitched by the magic of humanity, and, in the Museum of Civilization, we ignited and fuelled a youthful enthusiasm. When once I laid out a year's worth of drawings on her summerlit hardwood floor, my friend would grin, take the time to consider each half-finished torso or over-studied ankle and offer earnest appraisal. She would enthuse not for the work but the potentials hidden on the page and Anne, Bless Her, would call out my art for its faults. I would have wanted her, above all others,  for my John Ruskin. 

No, she could be my Anne.

Anne Shirley maybe.

Just Anne.

Even Ann.

Perhaps I had too long studied the splendid flesh of hands of the Masters, with their artful languid lines and well-constructed flowing fingers that outstretched toward possibilities, marvelling at the energy and beauty of the craftsmanship, when I ought simply, sometimes, looked to where such indicators pointed. Something is not made splendid by the tugging of a sleeve.

I ran, yes ran, because I could, to purchase a book: "How to Paint in Oils". The cover was bright and bold with several pristine brushes in the foreground. A perfect line of perfectly coloured purest paint demarked the tip of every tool. In the background, between encouraging text boxes, was the painted picture of two cats at play.

Within hours I was weighted down by plastic bags that contained everything the book told me to buy. Sure, I had paints and various mangled brushes but this time, today, I was going to start fresh.  Adam could not point me to my renaissance.

Under one arm was an empty canvas and I fought to prevent my imagination from blocking in forms or themes. I would paint precisely what the book told me to do because this was to be about paint strokes, colours, , hues and tones. After near to a lifetime of trying to chase beauty, I was determined to learn to crawl. Indeed, despite my bundles I carried off a boisterous swagger.

The first assignment that I set to after throwing down a canvas on my carpeted apartment floor, was to simply put coloured strokes upon the canvas. For the first time, I blended with a fan brush and fairly gasped at the utility of it. Finally, initially, I saw the difference between the power of a filbert and an angled brush. I had, all these many years, been using only a round brush to make all of my paint strokes, just as I used only a single standard pencil to mark out my drawings. Here there were tools and there were tricks and I had never trusted them or tried them.

That, perhaps, is what defined my early passion. There was a trust, a faith, that there was wonder in the world and that one had but seek for treasures for them to be found. The thrill of discovery is not dashed by critical thought but to not undertake expeditions because one has no faith in achievement, no hope for wonderment, to barricade oneself among the known because he dismisses the unknown as unworthy is the sure way to drain the passion dry.

I had been drawing with paint brushes, even erring so far as to hold them in the same manner. This had been defiant ignorance. Finally I learn the difference between solvent and thinner, turpentine and linseed oil. I apply beeswax and watch the effect as the paint spreads more evenly and with greater transparency.

So my canvas is filled with naught but painted marks and I write, in stuttering pencil, beside the lines to describe the brush used and agents applied. There are also words painted on the surface as I test various brushes for achieving such finesse.

And so were set down the first faltering footsteps of Childe Beauty.

XXXVIII