Have you ever needed the toilet to the point where there were tears in your eyes?
This happened to me a few weeks ago.
My new job has me driving quite a lot these days, and I’ve actually become rather good at being organised. I know roughly how much coffee I can drink before setting off and know where the reliable service stations are or how long I can usually last before things become uncomfortable.
Unfortunately, all of that is much easier to judge on country roads than on the motorway to Munich. Here, traffic jams seem to appear out of nowhere. Rather like the giant anaconda lurking beneath the murky waters of the Amazon in the film we watched the other night. (The Jack Black version. Not exactly a wildlife documentary, but apparently memorable enough to influence my metaphors.)
The feeling of being trapped is similar. And just because the traffic wasn’t moving didn’t mean my morning coffee had stopped its journey.
It continued relentlessly.
By the time I finally escaped and spotted a service station, there were genuine tears in my eyes.
I pulled into a parking space as close to the entrance as possible and marched purposefully towards the toilets. Relief was finally in sight - or so I thought. I had totally forgotten about the coin that one needed!
Not a card.
Not a begging smile.
A coin.
Normally this wouldn’t have been a problem, except that my wallet was sitting on the kitchen table at home and it appeared that my daughter had raided the car already.
This I discovered as I searched every pocket and compartment, finding storage options I had never noticed before.
Nothing.
Ok, shopping and praying for cash-back was the only option. I normally don’t support the wayside robbery that petrol stations along the motorway force on you, but needs must.
Disaster was narrowly avoided.
As I walked back to the car, still clutching my completely unnecessary and overprized emergency chocolate bar, a thought popped into my head.
I should make a coin purse that attaches to my keys.
Which might seem like an odd thought to have immediately after a near-catastrophic motorway toilet experience.
Most people would probably have been reflecting on their life choices, especially when the job that brought them on that motorway wasn’t what they really wanted to do in the first place.
But my brain had already moved on to solving the coin problem at hand.
And that’s when I realised something. Those, huge in the moment, irritations are often my motivation for making things.
We all seem to be driven by different things creatively.
My dad, for example, he paints a lot, always did. Even more now that he’s retired.
Whenever he finishes a piece, he’ll proudly call you over to have a look. And the two of us would stand there, shoulder to shoulder and stare at the canvas. I know better now to start the conversation and just wait patiently until he starts.
But what always strikes me is that he rarely starts by talking about the composition, the colours or the subject of the painting, what it tries to tell you.
Instead, he explains the technique. How difficult a particular effect was and how many attempts it took to get right until he ends up at the details that turned out particularly well because he used a certain paint brush.
The message of the painting is secondary, it’s purpose is to showcase a technique he had learned. As I understood this, the apparent randomness of the landscapes, portraits and still lives he pumped out in close succession made all sense now.
What excites him is mastering the technique.
For years I never really understood that. Until my brief stint in a tattoo studio.
Back then, I had grand aspirations of becoming a proper artist. So naturally, I spent a lot of time learning techniques and understanding why certain effects happened—both the ones you wanted and the ones you definitely didn’t.
What fascinated me most, though, wasn’t the tattooing itself. It was watching someone arrive with a story and leave with an image that somehow captured it. Unfortunately I discovered that the one-day-rich, next-day-poor lifestyle of an artist wasn’t really for me before I ever got to see whether I would have been good at that.
It turns out I enjoy a good meal on a regular base and knowing where next month’s rent is coming from a bit more than a creative challenge.
Still, the experience left me with a new appreciation for what my dad had been trying to explain all those years.
The joy wasn’t always in the finished piece. Sometimes it was in the process of figuring it out.
The difference between Dad and me, however, is where we start.
Dad starts with the technique that he needs to create an image.
I start with a problem I need a cute, crafty, creative solution for.
A little irritation that quietly follows me around until I can no longer ignore it. Only then do I start making things. The sewing, drawing, designing and crafting come afterwards. They’re simply the tools I use to find a solution. Which, when I think about it, explains quite a lot.
It explains why I’ve drifted between so many different crafts over the years. Why I’ve never been particularly loyal to any single one. And why I often struggle to make something unless there’s a reason for it to exist. Without a brief, I lose interest surprisingly quickly.
So perhaps the real revelation wasn’t that I needed a coin purse. It was understanding why my mind immediately went there.
Standing outside a motorway toilet, with tears in my eyes and dignity hanging by a thread, my first thought wasn’t:
“I really must remember to carry coins.”
It was:
“I should make a coin purse.”
And, honestly, that explains far more about me than I realised. And perhaps that’s why I collect crafts the way some people collect fridge magnets.
The craft itself isn’t usually what captures my attention.
It’s the problem.
A missing coin.
A bag that doesn’t quite work.
A tool that could be improved.
An idea that needs turning into something tangible.
The making comes afterwards.
It’s simply the method I use to solve the irritation.
Which explains why, standing outside a motorway toilet with tears in my eyes and dignity hanging by a thread, my first thought wasn’t:
“I must remember to carry coins.”
It was:
“I should make a coin purse.”