Painting with Kids

I don't know about you, but the visual imagery that phrase gives me.... well, it might be construed as child abuse.

I picture these poor little kids being held by these big old burly men. They're dipping the little girls head in a bucket of bright yellow paint. It's covering her whole face. Can she breathe? Oh, look, their painting a bright yellow stripe on a brick wall with her head! What? There's another guy. He's got a poor little boy with short spiky hair. This kid's been dipped in green paint. They're making polka dots with him.

I don't know why this strikes me the way it does. But maybe the author (or editor at that) should be a little more aware of what they're conveying when they title their books. I honestly didn't think, at first, that it was going to be a book about teaching kids to paint. It seriously sounded like they wanted you to use the poor kids as the instruments in which to paint with.


Now, you're beginning to see what makes me tick. Scary isn't it?