Day 61 - Painter Story

Painter Story

Matthew Ryan Fischer

Thomas was a thirty-two year old painter that worked as a landscaper in order to make a living.  He was part of a team of men that maintained the grounds of country estates in southeastern Pennsylvania.  What Thomas truly excelled at was the shrubberies.  That was where his penchant for art really shone through.  Most of the work was simple planting or trimming or weeding or pruning or maintenance.  The shrubbery allowed a chance to create something special.  Most of the estate owners didn’t care what shape their shrubbery came in, as long as it was orderly and well maintained. Most of them allowed Thomas to experiment and try to turn them in to something more.

Thomas enjoyed his job, but he enjoyed his hobby more.  Thomas drew inspiration from the countryside he traversed for work.  He sketched and drew and painted lush landscapes with cottages and lavish sunsets.  He had the ability to create an image that was greater than the reality, a place that once you saw it you wanted to live there.  Thomas would paint the homes he worked at and give the owners the paintings as gifts.  They were always grateful.  The paintings made the world seem a little bit better and a little bit grander than the truth.  It was unconsciously flattering for the homeowner, who would then hang the painting in the home, as if to brag to guests, and would truly believe that the painting was an accurate reflection of the reality.  Somehow it always came to pass that a person chose to believe that Thomas’s paintings were truth.

Then, Thomas was inspired to create something new.

“There is something in the way you look that makes me think you love me. “

Thomas was standing in front of his easel, gazing at a sketch he had been working on.  The woman was young and fair, had introspective eyes and a calm demeanor that denoted she knew more that she was letting on.

Thomas had never spoken to another of his pictures before, but he spoke to this one.  The first time he had done so, he felt the fool.  But her eyes, her gaze, they pulled him in and captivated him.  He didn’t know where this image had come from.  It was not his standard.  He didn’t draw profiles and portraits.  One day he just had to draw her and so he did.

“I know you don’t even know me.  But your eyes – that gaze tells a different story.”

Thomas continued his work, but he found ways to cut corners and spent less and less time creating special and unique masterpieces on the fronts of owner’s lawns.  He invested more and more time at home, with her.

“I understand you and you me.”

Thomas was smitten by the thought of her.  He should have been working but instead he drew her over and over and over again.  He spoke to her more often and to his friends less and less.  She was there for him.  She was there to listen to him.  She understood him for what he was and never judged him in return.

One night, Thomas prepared a candlelight dinner for the two of them.  After dinner they danced the night away together.  At the end of the night he drank wine by the fireplace and held her.  She listened to his hopes and his dreams that night.  He knew he was in love with her and that she loved him.

  “We are one, if just for a moment.  My dreams and hopes and desires are put on display and only you are able to see through them and reach my inner core.”

Thomas was found half-starved, half-naked, lying on the living room floor, cradling a painting of her.  He hadn’t been to work in a week.  No one had seen or heard from him.  Finally a friend had come to his apartment to make sure he was okay.  Thomas was far from okay.

No one understood their special connection, he thought.  No one believed him when he told them that she loved him and that they were to be wed.  They took her from him.  They stole her, or so he thought.  It was painful, it was hell, it was worse than death must feel. 

They were fools, Thomas thought.  They didn’t understand.  They fed him and clothed him and thought they saved him.  But he had her.  He would always have her – in his heart and in his mind; in his spirit and in his soul; in his fingers and in his imagination.  They couldn’t take that away from him.  He could always recreate that.  They had no idea what he was capable of.