Learning to Paint: Finding Freedom in Structure

As a child, I recall turning the dials on the TV and adjusting the bunny ear antennas to watch Bob Ross paint. I remember I would copy him with my play set of paints, and imagined myself quite the accomplished artist. I remember it as almost magical. Life went on, though: school, marriage, work, where did that small child go? Occasionally I still wake up with a desire to paint something. I might give it a try for a few minutes, but nothing comes of it. The paint and brush just don’t seem to want to be my friends the way they did when I was a child. I get so frustrated that the image formed on the canvas is not the image in my mind. It looks like a mess and is not what I planned at all. I toss it all away and decide, once again, this is not for me. Last weekend, I saw this small painting tutorial on YouTube, not a “how to paint” but a “paint with me” kind of thing, like Bob Ross used to do. When I see these, I typically flick past them as I hear a voice say, “I don’t want to just…