The Curious Case of the Missing Bumbershoot
I have been member of the Helena Art Center for a few years now. Last winter the local museum, Holter Museum of Art worked with the Helena Art Center to put on a local art show for the public. It was themed as something like “unusual/uncommon words.” I majored in English in college, if there is one thing I love more than painting, it’s words. This was going to be my jam.
Then, my brain started going through unusual words – alot of them were technical and I couldn’t wrap my mind around how to paint some of those words. Then I tripped on it. I saw it written down somewhere, “bumbershoot”, and the memories came flooding back. How could I forget!?
My grandpa was born in the 1920s in Massachusetts. He always seemed like one of those very refined folks. When my mom was 18, she moved out west and met my dad some years later, so my western upbringing always had me feeling like I was in some foreign land when we went back east to visit. My gramps had all kinds of weird words for everything, and “bumbershoot” was one of those words.
It was a rainy day in Virginia, I was about six or seven, and he told me to get my “bumbershoot” before we went outside. I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. In fact, I thought it was a word he made up to trick me. It was a little game for me and he was kind of chuckling as I was supposed to figure out what a “bumbershoot” was. I told him “that’s not even a real word” and “quit making up words.” He finally relented and told me what it was – an UMBRELLA! Now I really thought he was making up words!
Then as I started to read more, got older, I read the word many times and realized he was in fact not making that word up – it was real. So, when I tripped over this word for the art exhibit, I knew that’s what I had to paint. But how could I make it interesting? Well, I love to paint water. I love to paint ethereal places, and I love the color pthalo green. I also love Bob Ross. And I love to read mysteries. So, over the course of a couple weeks, the idea started to take shape in my brain. I went about it a few different ways, but ultimately landed on this beauty:
The Curious Case of the Missing Bumbershoot!
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