Crayon Smiles
by KJ Hannah Greenberg

 

 

Emily Shilo loved crayons best. Book Club held no interest; she had taught Freshman Literature as well as the graduate course, Seventeenth Century English Literature (which she privately alluded to as Dead Men and their Peculiarities) for more than four decades. Likewise, she could not care less about Bridge Club, Knitting Circle, or Film Society. The latter activities hadn’t called to her in her youth or in her midlife and, similarly, did not beckon in her golden years.

 

On the one hand, Garden Club should have successfully filled some hours. However, after attending a few meetings, Emily parted ways with its members. Under no circumstance could she condone using pesticides or paying a plant center for greenery that could easily be grown from seeds or cuttings. She was, after all, an herbalist. Hers were the most natural ways to propagate flora. Although she was currently impotent to sway her doctors away from invasive procedures, at least, she could control whether she participated in destroying insect ecosystems and funneling money to big businesses.

 

That left Arts & Crafts. The tables holding materials were set at heights appropriate for wheelchair users. What’s more, both salaried red coats and adolescent volunteers were on hand to help when scissors became unwieldy or when it was difficult to discern between purple and deep blue.

 

As a child, Emily had toyed with construction paper, markers, and colored pencils. When she was a teen, she had moved on to oil paint, macrame, and the “bleeding” of many-hued tissue paper. Thereafter, at university, she had explored Indian inks, acrylics, and various types of pastels. Later, as a professor, she could be found in hotel lobbies, between conference sessions, sketching with markers.

 

Emily had met many rockstars in her field when they had come over to her chair or sofa to observe her  “doodles.” In fact, many of those prestigious folks had asked her to sign the art with which she had gifted them. While her research never became well-liked, her drawings adorned many important scholars’ offices.

 

Later, when her sons and daughters were growing, she learned basket weaving. She had even taught rudimentary basket skills to a local farm’s employees. Emily had arranged to visit that acreage to collect medicinal “weeds,” but, instead, had used her time to enrich the hired hands’ afternoon with old-fashioned creativity.

 

In due course, Emily’s brood moved out. She took up ceramics. Her teacher insisted that she leave the wheel alone and focus on hand building since her work was “uniquely spirited.” During that time, Emily also harvested flowers and leaves from her garden to, respectively, make arrangements and more baskets.

 

She became more facile with the Internet, hence, Emily put aside her beloved acrylics and began to style digital paintings. Additionally, she bought a point and shoot camera capable of downloading images. Over time, she learned to crop and to adjust color via a simple app.

 

More years passed. Her descendants gave her grandchildren. Eventually, she retired. Oddly, she didn’t miss department meetings or sharing research at international symposia. She missed only her student-teacher interactions. Consequently, she donated Mondays and Wednesdays to her former university’s writing lab.

 

The stroke occurred there. Fortunately, one of her tutees was an EMT. He noticed how half of her face had suddenly drooped and how there had been a rapid onset of slurring in her speech. His quick efforts saved her.

 

Emily’s sons and daughters didn’t want her to return home after she had completed her hospital stay. Being doctors, lawyers, and corporate chiefs, they readily funded a residence for her at a posh senior village, where medical care was available 24/7. Their mother’s intermittent memory loss and difficulty using her left leg troubled them.

 

To ease her transition, they bought practically a greenhouse’s worth of medicinal herbs and edible forbs for her new, accessible apartment albeit they had paid for facility-sourced daily meals and snacks.  Additionally, they had ordered a weekly rotation of organic vegetables to be delivered to her for her to use in her private kitchenette. Still, they rarely visited.

 

Emily’s newest friends became the red coats’ families. Those youngsters sat “quietly” in the main building’s lobby when they had no school but their parents had to work. Upon noticing one such lass, Emily, had scooped up some toddler crayons (they were more comfortable to handle than regular ones) and had outlined all manner of animals on a large art pad. The little girl, her siblings, and their many friends were fascinated.

 

Soon, older kids brought younger ones to watch Emily draw. Established visitors brought newer ones. It didn’t hurt that Emily was a reasonable storyteller, too.

 

Sometimes, a visiting tween would play a recorder or guitar. Although management insisted that such concerts be taken outside, Emily’s motorized wheelchair effortlessly glided over irregular sidewalks and grass. Emily became increasingly popular with the children.

 

Sadly, other changes concurrently happened. Over time, she forgot her young friends’ names and then failed to recall her own. What’s more, her lines became more and more crooked and her once pleasing color palettes were now jarring. More and more, a red coat or high school-aged volunteer had to help Emily hold her visual journal or pick out sets of crayons.

 

Nonetheless, the boys and girls continued bringing her cookies and continued wheeling her outside to hear their songs. Where Emily had once drawn their favorite animals, they drew hers. Her door was thick with pictures of giraffes and hippos.

 

Even so, her plants died. Her refrigerator became overrun with unused greens and alliums. Her beloved books became progressively dusty.

 

It’s said that Emily died in her sleep. Allegedly, her final conversations with other residents did not focus on her offspring, her academic accolades, or the galleries that had shown her work. Rather, her last exchanges had consisted of words of gratitude. She had articulated sincere appreciation for being able to endow a new generation with smiles via humble crayons.

 

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