" T H E R E  I S
N E I T H E R  P A I N T I N G,
N O R  S C U L P T U R E,
N O R  M U S I C,
N O R  P O E T R Y.
T H E  O N L Y  T R U T H
I S  C R E A T I O N "
Umberto Boccioni

" H E L P E D   A R E  T H O S E
W H O  C R E A T E
A N Y T H I N G  A T  A L L,
F O R  T H E Y  S H A L L
R E L I V E  T H E  T H R I L L
O F  T H E I R  O W N
C O N C E P T I O N "
Alice Walker

" C R E A T I V I T Y  I S
T H E  M A R R I A G E
H U M A N I T Y  M A K E S
W I T H  E T E R N I T Y "
Eric Maisel

" I  A F F I R M - S I M P L Y,
S U R E L Y,
A N D  U N E Q U I V O C A L L Y -
T H A T
 I
 A M
  A
C R E A T I V E
P E R S O N "
Eric Maisel

I like this quote and its implications. Namely, creativity is natural to all of us. It is a normal aspect of being human rather than a special ability of creative people. Creative people distinguish themselves from others by doing something with this normal aspect of their nature. Others deny it and are not creative.

Creativity can easily be confused with the methods and materials used to express it. I thought I would like painting with watercolours until I discovered I was not able to put anything on paper other than smeared watercolours. I gave up, thinking that I must not be very creative.

I also tried calligraphy. I liked the fluidity of movement particularly when working with the cursive Italic lettering. Apparently, I was a little too fluid and free in my style for my teacher. She wanted perfection, not creativity, and thought my calligraphy left a good deal to be desired. The fun was gone and so was I.

I had taken guitar lessons years earlier and quit because I let perfection get in the way. I became obsessed with learning 'Dust in the Wind'. I played it over and over, hoping to master the complex finger picking patterns. And when I didn't, the song became the requiem for the passing of my guitar playing.

My calligraphy teacher reminded me of my Grade 7 music teacher, a gray haired, blue rinsed, mean spirited old witch. She tested our voices by requiring us to stand up before the class and sing the scales. I have a one-note range so I sounded like I was reciting them. My music teacher told the class that I was responsible for her hair colour. Even the blue rinse, I wondered? I lip-sinc at birthdays to this day.

I studied drawing and lost interest as I labored through the technical aspects of shading, perspective, and dimension. Drawing seemed like a medium of tedium. I just wanted to draw interesting pictures.

My less than satisfying efforts at calligraphy, guitar and drawing confirmed my initial assessment after painting that I must not be very creative. Singing was clearly not going to change my mind.

I confessed this personal limitation to Mary who is a textile artist and knows about creativity. She was quick to disagree. As we talked, I realized that I might have been looking for creativity in all the wrong places. I began looking at my daily life for evidence of my creativity rather than pursuing my quest for an artistic medium that would work for me.

I like food preparation. I took a cooking course once from a local chef to expand my cooking skills. I was struck by his definition of gourmet cooking. He said it was simple food well presented. I did not consider a course of food preparation to be a course on finding my creativity. I have learned since that I enjoy food presentation as much as food preparation.

Take salads. A salad is simple to prepare. It is also much more than a vegetable serving. A salad is composed on a number of ingredients varying in colour and texture. It should be served on a large round platter with the red of the pepper, the off-white of the artichoke hearts and the deep brown of the pecans sautéed in butter, garlic and Worcestershire sauce arranged against the background of a bed of lettuce of different shadings of green. It then becomes a collage, or a mandala, to be savoured visually before it is consumed.

Tossed salad in a bowl, on the other hand, is like a child's toy box. All the fun things end up on the bottom and you have to dig down to find them. A bowl that looks like it is full of lettuce is not all that attractive, either. A bowl contains a salad, a platter displays it.

I realized that my attraction to cooking was not all about the food. I found a quote that helped to me understand more about creativity. Louise Bourgeois said "You do not make sculpture because you like wood. You make sculpture because the wood allows you to express something that other materials do not.".

Where else had I been expressive? I remembered my Grade 7 English teacher. She was a kind and supportive woman. She assigned the class the task of writing a fictional story. I still remember my story, entitled 'Kidnapped'. It recounted the experience of a young boy who was kidnapped by pirates and how he came to be rescued. It was the only story the teacher read aloud to the class. It was my first experience in creative writing and it was a success.

For years, I wrote uncreative nonfiction. It is otherwise known as academic writing. I wrote because it was expected of me, and I wrote what was expected of me, in terms of editorial standards for professional publications. I did not write because I liked it nor did I write because it allowed me to express myself. My experience of writing significantly limited my experience in writing.

My writing experience in Grade 7 contrasted sharply with what happened just across the hall in the music room. I regret that I have let the latter experience distract me from what I now see as a very important event in my young life.

I have picked up creative writing again where I left off so many years ago. I am writing because I like it, and I like it because I am learning more about myself in what I express through writing.

I write everyday, and take writing courses. What I am learning about developing my creativity is how important it is to keep stepping up to the plate, to use a baseball expression. My childhood baseball hero was a slugger named Harmon Killebrew. People who knew him said that he was the same person whether he hit three home runs in a game or struck out three times. He hit many home runs in his career and he struck out many times. He just kept stepping up to the plate never knowing what the outcome would be. What he knew was that both were equally possible and whichever it was, he would be stepping up to the plate again.