Drapes are hard. They've been the root cause of a land war between the Grand Duchy of Mom and the Golden Dad Fiefdom in recent weeks. And if you've never felt petty in your arguments before, then you've never died on this particular hill, skirmishing over primary colors versus animal prints, lions and giraffes versus birds and trees, bold stripes versus polka dots. For now, mind the border disputes with your dependency upon -- and the looming threat of -- that ever-present umbilical cord.
Artwork is hard. In the beginning, your room's walls were to be hung with poster-sized children's-book cover art. The Berenstein Bears. The Giving Tree. The Velveteen Rabbit. But your dad took those covers, made them abstract in his own style, and decidedly manufactured something "scarier" than intended. Then your mom and dad bought oversized decals. More lions. More giraffes. Perhaps birds on a wire. But the heavy wall textures proved too formidable, the adhesive decals' topography warped.
Painting is hard. Your mom and dad bought a beginner's kit for Chinese brush painting and a hundred sheets of rice paper. They started with Chinese characters. They wrote "Spring" and "Good Fortune." "Thousand" and "Yellow." The culmination of the lesson wished everyone a "Happy New Year." Your mom and dad were pleased with the brush strokes, even felt confident in progressing to bamboo. The snickers at the misshapen bamboo turned to out-loud laughter as they painted Siamese cats. Then the out-loud laughter turned to shrugs and sighs as they painted Amaryllis flowers. The afternoon ended before they could spar with Morning Glory and a butterfly.
Your mom is at the sewing machine. Your drapes will be alternating widths of animal caricatures and bands of white, the walls still baren, the war undecided.
