I work at a camp. One
of the classes offered is...tiedye. As
an instructor I taught my fair share of this magical and colorful class and
now, as health officer, I have taken on the task of untying them, sending them
down to laundry, and sorting them once they come back. This latter task is new for me and
interesting...because now I see the shirts both before...and after.
I’ll admit...the “before” picture is always a little
intimidating. T-shirts in bag still
dripping in dye of a brownish-orange-green with clearly arbitrary spots of blue
and red speckled through in spiral formation...
My gloved hands attempt to squeeze out some of the pooling mess and I
think (and sometimes verbalize) a statement of “Really? Really???
Did you even try at all??” A
couple weeks ago I looked at blotchy, runny, wadded shirt and, as I pulled off
the rubber band and tossed it into the bag to go to laundry I, out loud,
proclaimed “I’m sorry all of the other kids are going to make fun of you
because you have a terribly ugly shirt!”
I looked for that shirt as I sorted them into their
appropriate cabins a couple days later.
I couldn’t find it. That always
happens. And in so lies the mystery of
tiedye...
Sure, when the campers walk around with their shirts on
Thursday night, you can see that some are better than others. Some bolder, some
with the colors blended better, some impressively executed. But you can never tell which ones started out
the ugliest. In fact, some of the best...start
off as some of the worst. I know this...as
once I untied a disgusting looking shirt that was a complete hot mess and decide
to open it completely to examine before placing it inside the bag to be
washed. Some incredible blend of purples
and greens and blues and even some remaining yellow left in an impressive
spiral design. Beautiful in terms of
tiedye in fact. Or, the dripping red
intestinal looking (before unbinding) bull’s-eye pattern which came out with an
awesome purple bursting design with red and pink-white rings. Who would of thought? Not me.
It frustrates me...which I realize is silly. But it’s just these 5th and 6th
grade little monsters aren’t even really trying and look at the outcome! I think about my own tiedye shirts I have
made and wear as part of staff. I think
of how meticulously I planned the design and colors. How carefully I applied the dye and mixed shades. How adequate but unimpressive my shirts look
in the end. Why did I try so hard?? Once
last week I pulled open a t-shirt and fantasized about giving a blank, white
shirt to a 6th grader and letting them go to town to create for me
one of their disastrous masterpieces. The irony of it all!
And some part of me can’t help but think this is real
life. A disastrous masterpiece. And because the “connector” in me loves to
see parallels, there are some bits of truth in this tiedye mystery...
1. Planning doesn’t necessarily dictate outcome. Don’t get me wrong...you can always tell the
kids that put in a lot of time and effort and tried hard. Their shirts often look great. But just because it looked great wound up,
won’t mean it ends up looking awesome.
It, in fact, doesn’t even guarantee that it will look better than one that
started off as a hot mess. And, perhaps
more importantly, just because it looks like a hot mess doesn’t mean it’s
destined to be forever ridiculed as ugly.
This can be frustrating. Everyone
knows someone who “does nothing” but whose life seems to be so flawlessly
perfect or everything goes their way while those who try and sweat and plan
wonder what’s going wrong. As one who
needs control I want to be able to do something with intention and expect a
given result. But not all of life is in
my control. Even if I want it. Life is still about surrender...
2. “Don’t judge a book(/shirt) by its cover(/prewashed wad)”
gets proven yet again. Beautiful things
come from incredibly disastrous things.
I shouldn’t need to be reminded of this.
Much of my life is a testimony to the fact God works in and through the
ugly to provide something of incredible splendor...even if I’m slow to realize
it. Sometimes one has to wait and see
how things come out in the wash. Literally.
Sometimes stains and scars are the best witness to God’s grace and faithfulness
in the midst of life and its storms.
3. Beauty is the eye of the beholder. I can smile and nod at the green/brown
blotchy result as I tell a student their t-shirt is very unique when they ask
me excitedly what I think....all the while trying to hide an inside cringe...
And yet he is pumped and proclaiming “this is exactly what I was hoping it
would look like!” ‘A bowel movement?’ I
want to question (but don’t of course). I
don’t make others’ shirts for them. And
I don’t live lives for others either.
Although sometimes I want to do both!
But in the end, it’s probably a good thing. I’m not them. I would botch
their design. Every shirt will be unique
as the student who designed it; no two shirts will ever be the same... Diversity
is beautiful.
4. You might be surprised by what you find in the
folds. Just this week someone made what
was really an innocent comment. I smiled
and nodded and thought “you never would have said that if you really knew me...” What looks like an exceptional dyed shirt
could be merely so-so or less than such...or beautiful on the surface and white
underneath – shallow. And, on the same
token, an otherwise ugly shirt can surprise everyone with deep hues and bold
designs. It just depends...on what is
revealed when the shirt is unfolded.
People are like that. And
everyone has folds, layers. Piece hidden
beneath the surface. Everyone
encountered has a story. Some of them
will be harder to stomach than one’s own.
5. If you’re completely clean, you probably did it
wrong. The instructors on our staff who
create the best tiedye and arguably the best instructors of it, rarely leave
unscathed. Their hands are
dyed...despite gloves. There are
speckles on their face and a blotch on their jeans. (One coworker once
proclaimed that she no longer owned a pair of jeans without a hint
of tiedye). Tiedying can be done “respectfully”
(as we tell our students) but it is messy!
Intrinsically messy. The more
involved you get, the messier you get.
And you’re going to end up stained.
But it’s almost always worth it. Life's messy. And those who "do life" well are often marked by the journey. There is something said to be living life to it’s fullest...
And there is something to be said for every disastrous
masterpiece...
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