Inside my Dresser Drawers

When I took photos of the inside of my dresser drawers to work and showed them around, new comments went around quickly.

"Have you seen the inside of her drawers?"

"Her drawers should be hanging on a wall!"

When Dad saw the inside of my dresser drawers he said. "Are you going to put clothes in these?"

"Of course, Dad, that's, what they're for." I answered.

"There ought to be a law against that." He commented.

When I first moved down to Seattle, my step brother gave me an old white dresser for my clothes. The drawers didn't fit right anymore - all of the slides were broken or gone. The white paint was yellowed with age. Cobwebs and dust and dirt clung to the inside of the structure. It was far from what I would have salvaged a few years before, but now I needed it.

I swept the cob webs away and scrubbed and cleaned and disinfected the wood, lined the drawers with tissue paper and placed my clothes in. But as soon as they came out, they smelled of cigarette smoke so I scrubbed and cleaned and scented anew. Nothing worked. When I finally moved into my own apartment, the first thing I did was go to the hardware store to buy paint. I came home, spread out newspapers, set the first drawer down and went to work. Half way done I  stopped to survey my work.

"Now who wants to look at a boring old white drawer every time they open it?" I wondered. So I mixed a little blue in and started over. I got a bit further with the project this time - I like blue after all. But I soon stopped and looked at it with a keen eye.

"Now who wants to look at a boring old blue drawer every time they open it?" I wondered. So I studied the whole project and thought about it for a while. I set out a large piece of tin foil and began mixing paints with no real image or idea in mind other than something other than a plain color. I already had the blue going so I added shades and then began to define a range of mountains and before long I had a fully painted dresser drawer - with a winter scene. I discovered when I set it up, that I had surprised myself. The shades, combined with lighting, gave a greater depth to the picture than I had realized that I was creating and I was pleased with the affect.

I didn't know what to do with the other drawers, but I wanted to experiment - styles I had never tried before. What difference did it make if they were bad or semi good? I was the only one who would see the outcome.

The second drawer started out as a sunset - like the ones I had watched many times off Alki Point in West Seattle. That one, too surprised me. Those who saw photos of the painting wanted to know where I had taken that photo of Alki from.

The third drawer took a turn away from my traditional style. The trees I put into it were my rendition of the madrona trees in the area. A bit of nostalgia with the remains of an old wooden fence and stone gate supports - the grounds looking out over the water with mountains in the distance.

The fourth and final drawer was slow to materialize. I wasn't sure what I wanted, but typically I don't really plan my paintings - they just sort of come out as they please so I figured that in a few days this one would as well. The background took shape easily - distant mountains, closer forested hills and water. The foreground continued to allude me for a few days. I played with a couple of ideas that just didn't feel right, so I left the project for a week end. When I sat down with determination to get the job over and done, it came slowly - a garden with lots of rocks and a rock pool - old trees with twisted trunks, old fashioned flowers, bench, bird bath and old wrought iron chair just seemed to fit, but it was still missing something. A couple of more days passed and I sat down again and the angel appeared praying in the garden at the foot of one of the big trees.

These paintings will never hang on any gallery wall, but they give me a smile and a bit of pleasure when I move items of clothing and they appear piece by piece. And sometimes, all of those items get dumped unceremoniously on the floor so someone can see the bottom of my dresser drawers.

I eventually put new slats across a couple of the drawers and used pieces of white plastic to create stability and the drawers work not so bad these days. The outside could certainly use a new paint job and one of the round orange knobs got lost in a recent move. But I am in no hurry to put the dresser out on the trash heap.