There are others among us who make bird cages out of coat hangers, end tables out of tree stumps and bracelets from toothbrushes.
I am not in this category. When I was a Brownie I made a jewelry box out of Popsicle sticks. It was distinguished from the other craft projects by its remarkable resemblance to a waffle iron abandoned by my mother in 1960. Once I tried to crochet. I finally mastered the chain stitch and in fact, made a chain that could wrap twice around the Washington Monument. I never could figure out how to do the second row.
But all that changed a few years ago when I decided it was time I had to overcome my fear of creating something with my own two hands. And what better place to do that than at one of those do it yourself frame places? Understand we're talking about more than agile fingers. We're discussing self confidence.
Have you ever been to one of those frame stores? They are only for tenured architects or perhaps tag team wrestlers. Everyone there knows what to do. They get their supplies from the drillmasters who are in charge of making sure you build your frame correctly. Then, in fact, they build their frames right.
And then there is me. First of all, I had no sense of color, and truth be known, no sense of taste. The young man ordered to help the likes of me winced as I held a white backing against my poster, Another guy rolled his eyes in despair when I picked up a blue piece, and yet a third person looked as though he wanted to find a bathroom fast when I admired the mauve. They all breathed a collective sigh of relief when I settled on basic black.
At my work station I was handed four sticks of wood. I started to rub them together, kind of like a frame maker genie releaser. My taskmaster gently slapped my hand.
"Put the long stick on the left side of the vise and the short stick on the right side of the vise" he ordered. "Then glue the sticks together. Put the short nails in first, then the long nail in the middle, Use this other tool to bury the nails in the wood after you've hammered them in, once you've made the drill holes a quarter inch apart."
I tried. Heaven knows I tried. I hammered the two short sticks together and did it backwards. My long stick had a nail coming out the side. I glued my shirt to my skirt and misplaced the drill.
It took two and one half hours to do the frame skeleton, I believe a world record. "How much will it cost to have you do these for me?" I asked the staff. They all shook their heads and led me back to my stall.
I thought about the frame and I thought about all the years of being afraid I would do something wrong. I thought about all the years of worrying that people, actually even strangers, would think badly of me if I wasn't the most wonderful worker on a project. I thought of being scared of being imperfect.
"I'll be back next week," I said. Seven days later I showed up. My team worked with me. They handed me paper, razors, wires and nails. It took hours, but I knew it was more than a frame I was building.
In time I was finished and we ceremoniously put a sticker on the back of the project. It has the inscription, "this was framed by Cheryl." It's a nice touch and a nice affirmation that I kept on trying.
I need to remember that.
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Cheryl Kravitz, President of CRK Communications, is respected nationally for her expertise in community relations, motivational speaking, crisis communications, media relations, media training, feature writing, diversity training, fund development and issues management. You can contact her at:
Crk725@aol.com
