By Favor Khaoya
I met someone last evening. Someone new, random, and unique! Someone who got me to see the world in more than just black and white.
It was about 6.30 pm. My entire body was exhausted and my limbs were begging for mercy. I boarded that matatu intending to sleep the whole distance to my house; after all, I was alighting at the last stop. I sat right behind the driver and placed the painting I had just bought on my lap, ready to arch my back and give in to my body’s plea to rest.
A gentleman got in and sat next to me. He stared at my painting, and the intrigue in his eyes was obvious. His fascination was not at the zebra feeding on the corner of the painting, or at the lion that was trying to eye one of the zebras. It was in how intriguing the multifaceted hues were on the canvas, and he said as much. He admired the brush strokes over the canvas. He looked at the greyscale strokes of nothingness between the zebras and the lion.
“This is my favourite part of the painting,” he said.
“Why? When it’s all aimless strokes and nothingness?” I inquired.
He was surprised by what I said, or how I said it. Several hours later, I was still trying to determine which was which, but back then, he shook his head and gave the painting one more intimate look before facing me again.
“It’s not nothingness or aimless strokes. It is abstract art. It’s art but random. Instead of the obvious things that most people would notice and appreciate immediately, it depicts things that take a minute to recognise and take note of. Its random nature is like our lives; it may not be entirely predictable; and its beauty can sometimes be hidden in plain sight. It takes a detailed eye to appreciate life for what it is, and for what it’s worth. That nothingness is the effect of the lion’s breath. Deep long breaths taken while hunting to avoid being noticed. The lion brushed against the grass. That is what the painter was trying to illustrate with the abstract. Everything has beauty and meaning if you look hard enough for it,” He said before alighting and leaving me lost in my thoughts.
His words lingered on my mind. For a fleeting moment, I stared at the painting. My version of the painting was so ingrained in my memory, so carved into the fabric of who I was; I tried hard to see what the stranger perceived. He saw something different, appreciated it, and tried to share that beauty with me.
In that moment, I realised that there was meaning in the abstract part of my painting which I discredited as a flaw on the painter’s part; it appeared as a haze of colours and aimless brush strokes. But what was imperfect, in my opinion, was perfect to the stranger next to me. It brightened his eyes and made him smile.
We all need to find what is special about the things we love, and embrace them without being held back by other people’s opinions. In addition, whenever others find perfection and beauty in things we think are imperfect, we should hold the door for them. We may never have walked a mile in their shoes, but we know deep down if we were in the same shoes, we would love for them to do the same. Accepting self and others is vital to webbing a peaceful and loving society that finds meaning and purpose in everything that matters. Every abstract painting deserves an owner who finds it remarkable. What beauty in life do you behold today, and how can you focus the eye of the world around you to see it?
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