the dust of everyday life

Picasso was talking to a group of elementary school kids.

He approached the blackboard and scribbled something on it.

None of the children could figure out what it was.

It looked like an elephant with a ram’s horn attached to its trunk.

One of the tikes whispered loud enough for Picasso to overhear, “That elephant has a penis where its trunk is supposed to be!”

Picasso twisted around and screamed, “Believe in the world of the unseen…for only then will you be prepared to confront the tragedy of your own reality…”

The teacher, a prim, sexy little thing with a mole on her chin, forced a smile and a slight chuckle. “I think what Mr. Picasso is trying to say, boys and girls, is that within every cloud, there is a silver lining…”

Picasso’s face contorted. His eyes bugged out like somebody with a thyroid condition. The veins in his neck looked like blue worms squirming beneath his skin, and he was frothing in his mouth. “You b***h! You ignorant, pathetic little b***h!” 

He was now jumping up and down like a really pissed-off chimpanzee. “That is not what I meant at all! You have

totally misrepresented everything I stand for! How you can stand before these children and present yourself as a teacher is amazing!” He pointed wildly at the blackboard. “Tell me! Tell me what you see!”

The teacher fidgeted nervously. “Well,” she said. “I-I-I-I…I see a-a-a rather…large…object, which…to me, appears to be a uhh…microbe, of sorts, perhaps…or some sort of…tissue or organism, or-or- division of cells? Perhaps in the final stages of either meiosis or mitosis…?”

She braced for another round of Picasso’s wrath, but all she heard was the whirring, wobbling sound of a ceiling fan needing repair.

Picasso stared strangely at the frightened educator. Something within him seemed to soften. And then, finally, he spoke. “You really think so?” hesaid.

The teacher nodded cautiously. “Mmm hmm,” she said.

Picasso turned to face his drawing again and studied it carefully. “Hmm, meiosis, mitosis…” He scratched the stubble on his chin with three of his fingers. “I’ve been drawing so many wrestlers lately that I…” He trailed off, then turned back to face the teacher, whose eyes were busy avoiding him. “Look at me,” he said.

She looked at his Adam’s apple.

“Look into my eyes,” he said.

Oh, God, they feel like lead right now, she thought. But somehow she managed to lift her eyes and rest them on what looked to her like two tiny lumps of bituminous coal inside the face of a deranged snowman.

“What is your name?” Picasso said.

“Nancy,” she said.

“I want to draw you…I want to paint you…”

“I’m flattered, Mr. Picasso,” she said. Then, with surprising courage, she added, “But I’ve seen what you’ve done to the faces of other women you’ve painted…”

“What have I done to them? What about what they have done to mine?”

Picasso paused and lit another cigarette. He began to sweat as he looked out into the befuddled faces of the children. He seemed to be asking them for something…Forgiveness? Their understanding? “You would all like me to draw a picture of your teacher, no?”

One of the girls in the back row raised her hand. “Is she gonna look like that?” she said, pointing to the drawing on the blackboard.

The children laughed.

Picasso smiled and looked at his drawing one more time. “I cannot promise she will look that good, but we will see…”

Reviews

[Philip Gaber]

Gracias lindo amigo, Emma.

[emmajoygreen]

Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, out of the mouth of sucklings - or, whoever owns that famous third eye. Guess Picasso had two!

Tongue in cheek humour, Philip style - start to finish and back again - the great man would have approved!