Da Vinci Was a Deadbeat

Time marched on like a knee-walking duck. Eventually, a new idea for the perfect career struck me like a football sock in a change-room, and made me recall an earlier event that I should have recalled sooner. Ever since I ate the coloured pastilles out of my sister's water-colour set I had considered that painting was in my blood. If that seems a little romantic I can assure you that the stuff was in my system for quite a while; long after I finished peeing in technicolour. And it was still there, years later, urging me to admit to a creative streak and express myself through painting (apart from pissing on walls).

I can now see that the idea I was hatching about painting as a form of expression and an interesting career was fluffed up by my reading some pretentious eastern suburbs newspaper in which every wanker mentioned was an artist, writer or new world healer. But at the time, bolstered by my upwardly-mobile desires, it seemed right - and socially acceptable - to take up painting.  Hitler did a bit of painting and look how far it got him. If I could have got half as good as he was I would have occupied Queensland, or Victoria or even a foreign country like Tasmania. My father suggested I should occupy the space between my ears first but then, he never understood my possession of a drive for artistic expression that was totally alien to the rest of my family.

I wasn't too sure about how to get started as a painter but, with this newly-emerging passion surging through my multi-coloured veins, I rang a painter out of the phone book and asked if I could sit in for some free experience. He jumped at the mention of “free”, which puzzled me at the time, but not for long enough to make me think about it. All I could think of was that a few free lessons, tips and pointers and hints would see me, in time, up with some other great painters of the world.

The address I had to report at was not too far from where I lived. I dragged on my best paint-splattered overalls, hung a paint rag out of my back pocket and hopped on my bike. I couldn't find a beret to wear like a real artist so I turned a beanie inside out to hide the tassel, rolled up the edges and presto — rack off Rembrandt; Dali, go buy a deli; I was going to make the classics look like paint-by-numbers smudges. With my talent and aptitude I could make Da Vinci look like a deadbeat who scribbled on walls.

The address turned out to be a large two-storey house under renovation. I started to get a sniff of a little problem but consoled myself with the reasoning that the painters had probably been commissioned to paint one of those “muriels” on a wall.  I was, as usual in many of these things, dead wrong.

The place was crawling with tradesmen but it wasn't hard to find the painters. The first ladder I bumped into had a bad-tempered one up at the top of it, but not for long. You'd think a painter would be used to falling off a ladder but, then, it was only the apprentice, Eric, and it was his first time dropping from the top rung down to the deck.
I then met Charlie, the bloke I’d spoken with over the phone, and found, much to my surprise, that this was a crew of house  painters. Not wishing to appear like a complete dill, and figuring that when I'd learned all about painting houses it would be a snap to paint something as small as a piece of canvas on a frame, I pretended I knew all about it and got put straight to work. I told myself it was all good experience.

And it was. You know, it's amazing the things you learn working in a trade. Things like: how to run errands for everybody, from morning teas to lunches to hardware. I got to know more about the local shopping centre than how to create a masterpiece.  However, I managed to get the “Hey, Razz, run down to the deli, willya?” scheme knocked on the head fairly early. Mustard pickle in the pies, squashed sandwiches, cold sausage rolls, hot cold drinks and incorrect change put a stop to that lark, but then they got me on the hardware run.

Another thing that surprised me was the sort of sales staff hardware shops hire. In one place I visited I was confronted by the spectre of my old adversary, Piggy Sullivan, serving behind the counter. He cracked a grin enough to split a 44-gallon drum in half when he spotted me. He said he was only too pleased too help me.  I could smell a rat or two, but I could only see the big one at the time.

I also discovered that hardware shops don’t stock many tools and products vital to the busy tradesman. Piggy’s shop had no left-handed screw-drivers, noise-less hammers, striped paint or welding sparks in stock. It took him ages to try to find a long weight and then he tried to tell me that I already had one — the liar!
The plumber had asked me to get him a chalk-line for a plumb-bob. What a fuss! Piggy drew one on the bench and scraped it off into an envelope for me but I couldn't get it back in a straight line when I tipped it out at the house.

I didn't do so well with the plumber all round. While I was scraping the ceiling in the toilet I dropped my beanie in the bowl. I tried to fish it out with the scraper but I lost that down there as well. By the time the plumber caught up with me I'd also lost two coat hangers, a length of rope and a fishing line down the dunny which was, by then,  full to overflowing — I’d tried to flush away the evidence more than a couple of times. The plumber was pretty wild. He took a swipe at me but he slipped on the water on the floor and fell down, dragging the door off its hinges. I shot through and left him to sort out the plumbing problems for himself.
The next day I found young Eric was still a bit grumpy with me about the falling-off-the-ladder business and we had a bit of bother deciding who should paint the window shutters. I said a job like that suited my artistic talents while Eric should paint the guttering (and get covered in red paint), and didn't Eric give me a snaky look when the foreman agreed!

So there I was up on the second floor scaffolding when I got a bit muddled up with the brush and whatever. The point is I somehow managed to drop the tin of white paint.  How was I to know that the plumber was trying to drag my beanie out of a drain that was right under the scaffold? The paint tin cracked him on the skull and he dropped like a paralysed pigeon. As the white paint oozed over his slightly unconscious head my mind worked furiously: I couldn't risk another run-in with the plumber...  brain wave!   I darted down the ladder, retrieved the tin and what paint I could save, and quickly scrambled round the scaffold to where Eric was painting the guttering.

‘I'm having a bit of a problem with the windows, Eric. Could you show me what to do?’ I asked humbly.
‘I'll do them,’ snapped Eric, snatching the white paint and brush from my hand. ‘You do the gutters.’
And I did them gladly, because judging from the general noise of curses, screams, protestations and exclamations, thumps and bumps, bangs and whacks, I gather the plumber woke up and went looking for whoever had the tin of white paint, and found Eric applying it to the shutters.

Afternoon tea that day was a very tense affair with the pied plumber's hair and clothes stiffening from the drying paint and Eric nursing a black eye, a fat lip and a bad case of the sulks.   I made sure I kept out of Eric's way for the rest of the week and was only mildly relieved when Charlie sent me to the hardware shop again. But...  I thought it was another prank and promptly forgot the name of the oil he asked me to get for mixing with the paint.  I was still scratching my head when Piggy asked me to get the lead out.
‘Ok. Ten litres of...um...ten speed oil, I think..’  said I. Piggy's enigmatic smile remained in front of me, motionless.  ‘Maybe it was high speed oil?’ I suggested.

‘The stuff we've got here is pretty quick. There goes some now. Too late — you missed it. Anyway, will multi-grade do?’.

‘I suppose so. As long as it's the best,’ I replied and happily went back to work and stirred the oil into the drums of paint. I noticed that it didn't want to mix in very easily and when I checked some of the other empty drums in the back of Charlie's ute I realised my mistake — I was supposed to get linseed oil!

I hid my empty oil tin and stirred the paint like mad until it looked useable but it was an awful hard job to get the stuff to stick to the walls. Everyone was complaining, so I tossed in a few loud whinges as well, to allay any suspicion that might be cast in my direction, and put up with the slippery paint.

It took ages to get the paint to stay on the walls and I was very relieved when, late on the last day, Charlie declared the job done. As they packed the ute I decided to take a final look at our handiwork and peeked in through the front door. The oily paint seemed to be holding up so I happily left, slamming the door behind me.

I hesitated on the front step because I thought I heard a noise like the slithering of a giant snake coming from inside the house. Curious as to what it might be, I opened the door and looked inside to see that the slam had caused all the paint to slip off the walls and it was lying on the floor in great wrinkled piles like thin, pastel drop sheets.

The back of my head must have been giving the game away because Charlie called out to me, ‘Everything OK’
‘Yes,’ I lied, ‘It looks ..... amazing.’

‘Good.  I think I'll have a last look at it myself,’ said Charlie. ‘That paint was a bit of a mystery.’
In an act of cowardice and self-preservation I leapt on my pushbike and burned rubber out of there before the calamity was discovered.  When I was at least a couple of kilometres away from the disaster area I relaxed and sat back on my bike.

It was then I discovered how nasty “Eric the Revenger” could be. And as I hit a pothole, in my pain and confusion, I understood the meaning of the note taped to my handlebars..."May your journey home be a bumpy one, signed, Eric."

The rotten turd had swiped my bicycle seat.

o-0-o

To Chapter 5 - A chance meeting