About a year ago, a hallway full of artists were taking down their beautiful paintings and drawings. The art that we spent months creating was tucked away into huge folders. Our once lively art pod, J-Pod, was now empty of color. As we packed away our prize possessions, we nervously talked about what the upcoming months would look like. Some of us were graduating and heading off to college in August, while others were entering senior year. Leaving art was hard, but what was even harder was saying goodbye to the art kids who have entirely changed my life.
After spending early mornings and late nights patiently making art in J-Pod, J7 became our second home. All of our belongings lived there, including past years' work, source materials, and our favorite snacks. Our second mom was there too with kind words and support through all of life and art's problems. Mrs. Keefer was a guru at spreading positivity and lending a helping hand. She is the backbone to J-Pod and without her we would have never built such a strong community of talented artist.
In J7, there was always great company and hella good music. The room was never empty because there was always a good friend frantically trying to finish a project in the corner. I can still smell the oil paint filling the room. I can also hear the bursting laughter that always came from the room that eventually caused surrounding teachers to yell at us. The thing about the art fam is that we didn't just hang out in J7 during class. We would literally skip lunches and leave bland, unnecessary classes early to paint a little extra as well as live it up senior year in J7.
That art room holds so many memories. Each of us had our favorites, but as a whole the positivity and VERVE that existed is everlasting. Few were quiet and when they came into the conversation their words were always sweet and wise. There were a bunch of us that were loud and were usually the ones who goofed off and were always sobbing of laughter. We were the art kids. Without a doubt, we were the loudest and closest group of artists that will walk the halls of North Penn High school. The memories we made in art class will always make me smile and wish I was still painting away with my favorite friends.
Every day there was different music playing which was always fun to paint to. We would play all types of music ranging from Jack Johnson to "The Lion King." When the Circle of Life came on it usually ended up in table dancing and reenactments of the movie with our paintings in the place of Simba.
We used to have bagel parties, too. Mrs. Keefer would bring in a huge tray of bagels and cream cheese with juice and donuts and we would feast. A rare occasion however because we usually only did this when we handed in our art work on time (ha).
Let's not forget about VERVE. Our word to describe outstanding art that was better than beautiful and deserved more than a gold star. To us VERVE meant "energy and enthusiasm in the expression of ideas especially artistic composition." VERVE meant a lot to us and to this day we still describe super awesome art with it.
There will never be a better feeling than sitting in J7 painting the day away with my favorite people by my side. Whenever I'm having a bad day, I can look back at the laughs and art that made being an Art kid great and it turns my entire day around.
I miss you all so much, let's "art" together soon.
