TheBanyanTree: Cut and Paste

Sat Jul 26 06:22:39 PDT 2003

About a month ago, I reduced the chaos on my scrapbook work table.  I had
stuff piled everywhere, pictures, CDs with pictures, papers, envelopes,
magazines, and other junk.  I spent a Friday evening organizing all this
stuff and got my table focused and ready to go on my major project, the 2002
cruise.

I bought the album, die cuts, paper, and pens in 2002 right after we got
back from the cruise.  My intentions were good!  And the stuff has sat there
since then.  And since then, we’ve been on another cruise.  I’m way, way
behind now!

My scrapbook bug is finally awakening out of hibernation.  My son’s
girlfriend and I went to a little scrapbook class at a local store in June.
We saw the latest and coolest scrapbook products.  We made a  page using a
few of our photographs.  We bonded with some of the women there.

My coworkers have been talking about their scrapbooks.  I’m fascinated with
Creative Memories.  I’ve been reading The Creative Memories Way and I’ve
subscribed to a scrapbook magazine and I also am on the mailing list for a
couple of online zines, too.

I thought about attending some scrapbooking classes either through Creative
Memories or at the store, but then I would have to haul all my stuff there.
Maybe I would have to bond with other women even if I didn’t feel like it.
And a lot of times the classes are held on Friday nights, and by Friday, I’m
tired from getting up at 3:00 am every morning, and I just want to sit on
the couch and vegetate.  The last thing I feel on a Friday night is being
creative with paper.

Then I thought, “Why do I need to take a class to cut and paste anyway?  I
think I know to do that!”

My table was now organized.  Then I did the nitty gritty organization.  I
organized all the pictures and related cruise stuff in big envelopes based
on date.  I typed my handwritten journal onto Word and then printed it out
with a fancy font and on colored paper.  I printed all 180 of Ray’s digital
pictures of our cruise.  I want to scatter his pictures in with mine (taken
with a point and shoot camera, but now I have a SLR camera and my pictures
from the 2003 cruise are fantastic!).

I at the point where I could start scrapbooking.  And I was scared.  Because
it’s crafty and uses hands and eyes and fine motor coordination.  I’ve never
been good at that stuff.  My mother tried to teach me how to embroider and
ended up screaming at me because my stitches were uneven and I didn’t follow
the lines.  My yarn fell off my knitting needles.  Sewing stretched my
spatial relationships ability to the limit and my limit for spatial
reasoning is almost non-existent.

I can’t use a saw, a hammer, or a screwdriver.  I can usually figure out
what to do or why something isn’t working (in home repair), but I don’t have
the physical and mental abilities to fix it myself.

That’s why I love working on the computer.  I can make web pages, photo
albums, brochures, cards, and newsletters.  It’s a virtual world, and for
me, everything fits together in an intuitive way.  If I make a mistake,
well, I can just zap it and start over.  I don’t waste materials, because
the world I enjoy working in so much is like my imagination, an eternal
blank piece of paper for me to color and paint and make into something
beautiful and unique.

And the virtual world is FAST.  I don’t have to spend hours laboring over a
craft project to see the results.  Computer crafting is immediate with all
the gratification that goes with seeing my creations right away.

But scrapbooking is real.  It’s paper and pens and scissors.  If I screw up,
then I wasted materials.  If I don’t measure something correctly, then it
looks stupid.  I have to force myself to be patient.  I’m not going to
finish this project in a day.  Just take little steps.
Each step is an accomplishment and contributes to the whole, I tell myself.

After marveling at the incredible pages in a travel scrapbook magazine, I
decided on my layout.  The book’s organization fell into my head and I began
to design my cover page.  I had Yo Yo Ma playing Bach in the background.  No
one was home.  The dogs and cats were napping.  I picked out my paper,
traced the letters, and my shaking hands began to cut.

I flashed back to when I was a little girl again, sitting at my desk or at
the dining room table with paper and pens and color crayons spread out all
over the place drawing pictures of horses and houses and people and writing
little stories about them.  I’d hang them up in my bedroom and marvel at my
talent.

This little girl finished two pages yesterday and is working on the third.
She’s reliving her cruise, basking in the sun, swimming at Honeymoon Beach,
and savoring wonderful cuisine.

Margaret R. Kramer
margaretkramer at earthlink.net

http://www.polarispublications.com
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