Childhood Dreams

 

Squirt from Finding Dory (water color on paper; May 2018)

 

Today´s prompt for the May 2018 Art Challenge: Smile Makers! is “Turtles” which immediately made me think of those huge turtles living on the Galapagos Islands.

So I thought I might paint a water color of these giants but then noticed that I would also have to paint a person to give it a scale by which you could compare it. However that seemed too much trouble for me at the moment, and since this challenge´s motto is smile makers, I kind of doubted that a gigantic turtle that could crash a 5 year old easily beneath itself, if it were so inclined, not very amusing.

So instead I opted for the cutest turtle ever, which as it happens is really tiny: Squirt, who made his appearance in “Finding Dory”, the sequel to “Finding Nemo”, both of which I absolutely loved.

And this brings me also to this post´s title – childhood dreams. When I was a kid I had about a dozen dreams of what I would become when I grew up. For instance an astronaut, a ballerina or a queen.

I admit that all of them were a tad unrealistic – I get carsick really fast so sitting in a space shuttle didn´t seem to be very desirable once I´ve learned that they don´t come with artificial gravity like the ships in Star Wars or Star Trek do.

So the next dream – a ballerina – was tackled but because my father found the training hours were far too pricey I was put into a gymnastics class instead, which luckily was also fun but alas! it lacked a lovely tutu and the shoes.

And what, do you wonder, became of my dream of being a queen one day? Well, HRH Catherine, the Duchess of Cambridge beat me to it. 😉

But there was another childhood dream of mine, a really big one –

I dreamed to work one day for a very famous Mouse and earn my living by drawing and painting cartoons. Numerous sketchpads were filled with Micky Mouse, Goofy and Donald Duck drawings in those years, only to be later replaced by Arielle the Mermaid, Pocahontas and many others.

Like all the other dreams this one obviously didn´t come true, at least not in the sense that I´m earning money with drawing and painting. But at least I get to have lots of fun doing it and so, in a sense, this childhood dream is still very much alive.

 

What were your childhood dreams?