Crayola Crayons

Today I am grateful for Crayola Crayons.  Yes, I’m very specific about my crayons.  They have to be Crayola and preferably the box of 64!  I know what I’m talking about here because I often get the child coloring book and that four-count box of colored Shrek earwax at restaurants.  Yes, even now.  Even when there is not a grandchild in site.  Come on. . .I know I’m not the only one.  Out yourself.  It’s invigorating.  Then admit that restaurant crayons don’t measure up.

Crayola Crayons do.  Can you smell them?  I bet you can.  Nothing smells like crayons.  Just searching for a picture of them had me smelling their waxy perfection.  I remember as a kid, how thrilled I was when I got a new box for the first day of school.  I can’t remember how big the box was, but probably 24.  For sure it wasn’t 64 because they were too expensive. 

I doubt my mom ever knew how important this box of crayons was for me.  We had an old cookie tin full of busted up crayons that looked like a cross between stale candy and the bottom of a pretzel bag without the salt.  I love color.  I love TO color.  But with most of the papers missing from the bits and pieces, I could never find the color I wanted in that blasted tin.  I’d want black and get purple.  I’d want red and get magenta.  I’d want dark green and get black.  That tin was a kaleidoscope of misrepresentation.

I kept a sheet of paper close by to mark with the questionable colors.  By the time I was done with one picture, there were so many colors of the rainbow on that page that it looked like I was preparing a gay rights poster.  When I got a new box of crayons, I’d pull each one out, smell them and read the color names.  Then I’d carefully put them all back in the box, which was not easy because they didn’t like to be re-confined once they were free.  I think that’s why so many jumped into the tin.

Nothing relaxes, or frees me like coloring.  If I want a purple cow, then I color the cow purple.  I make each picture my own, just like they do with songs on American Idol, except I don’t have to struggle to stay in tune. . . or in the lines.

Good corporations all over the world try to find ways to cut the stress and get greater productivity out of their employees.  People sit at glossy, hockey-rink-sized conference tables, in endless meetings either looking for an opportunity to contribute, or finding a way to disappear, hoping no one calls-on them.  The business world is not that far off from elementary school!  Except it’s a different dress code.  Not necessarily better.

I think that management should get a few dozen coloring books and some 64 count boxes of Crayola Crayons.  They should smatter them around and encourage their employees to color whenever they want to.  It’s relaxing, personally rewarding and stress-reducing.  You can think better, when you’re not trying to think.  It’s like brainstorming with yourself.

So today I’m grateful for Crayola Crayons. . .and thank you, LeAnn, for putting the idea in my head when you invited me to spend time being a kid again, in your blanket-fort, with our crayons!  I’m ready when you are.