Without even a glance I know what the object of the painting is, but I invite you to make your own suggestions to yourself. What on earth is it with the little blue patch and other bits? Added to play little minds games with the eye. Those little doodles will be difficult to ignore and may even play a little part in your overall idea of what this little abstract is all about.
When my son was very young and just new to school he all of a sudden wanted to play at pirates with an eye patch. It took a little time for it to dawn on us and realise what was going on. He was being bullied by name-calling at school. He had been born with a birthmark that affected not only his forehead but also his eye which he later had to have replaced with a false one. But children being as they can be were calling him all sorts of names and he felt a patch might help.
My heart went out to him, in his own way and in his own time he overcame this.
Charles William Eliot, former president of Harvard University, had a birthmark on his face that bothered him greatly. As a young man, he was told that surgeons could do nothing to remove it. Someone described that moment as "the dark hour of his soul."
His mother gave him this helpful advice: "My son, it is not possible for you to get rid of that hardship...But it is possible for you, to grow a mind and inner strength so big that people will forget to look at your face.
This I think is exactly what my son managed to do. Speaking to friends of his recently they all to a person stated that his birthmark and glass eye was something they never noticed.
Beauty is indeed in the eye of the beholder.
My friend was grading a science test that he had given to his elementary-school class and was reading some of the results to me. The subject was "The Human Body," and the first question was: "Name one of the major functions of the skin."
One student wrote: "To keep people who look at you from throwing up." We were left in no doubt about where he thought beauty lay.
On the other hand, we also know where the farmer who placed the following advertisement thought beauty lay, it read, "Farmer wants to marry woman, 35, with a tractor. Send picture of tractor."
I remember attending a meeting where missionaries were telling of their experiences. They were saying that in that culture the larger the women were the more beautiful they were thought to be.
In fact, a young missionary who had a small, trim wife said that the Nationals had told him she was a bad reflection on him, he obviously was not providing well enough for her.
A proverb in that part of Africa says that if your wife is on a camel and the camel cannot stand up, your wife is truly beautiful.
One last little true tale.
A well known Quaker preacher was preaching of the importance of having a radiant countenance.
After his address, a woman "with an almost unbelievably plain face" came up and asked him what he would do if he had a face like hers.
He replied, "While I have troubles of my own of that kind, I've discovered that if you light it up from within, any old face you have is good enough."
It seems that real beauty may indeed be more than the superficial we so often measure it as. So back to the little painting above, what is it all about? It is really very simple. It is a piece of twisted heather root I saw on the track in front of me. I just could not resist lifting it and bringing it home. If you have seen anything in it it will probably differ from the beauty I see and feel each time I look at it.
Beauty is indeed with the beholder. Shine you little inner light and let your beauty shine forth.
Have a great day.
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