A Painter's Guide to Life...

Presently, I am in the process of painting out all of the wood in my bathroom. I have chosen the colour white. Why, ruin all the beautiful wood in my bathroom, you may ask?… well, you see, there were no less than 6, yes 6, different colours of wood in my bathroom alone. I have lived in my apartment for over a year and a half now, and my obsessive-compulsive love of all things uniform and symmetrical (except children, that’s just creepy), has finally trumped my astounding laziness and love of ‘the nap’. I couldn’t take it anymore.

A bathroom, in my humble opinion should be pristine and bright. This firm-held belief all goes back to my least favourite word… “moist” – bad things grow in moist places (no matter where that place may be) – think about it people. Plus, my medicine cabinet, lovingly crafted by hand (not by me) is big enough to house all of Tom Cruise’s crazy pills along with Mike Ditka’s hair products (I mean, I know he is in the business of American Football, but does he have to look like he is wearing a helmet at all times?). Anyway, basically I am saying the thing is GARGANTUAN, the goal was to make it a little less imposing…

As I was sitting on the floor of my bathroom, covered in paint, getting very creative with my combination of expletives, all of a sudden it occurred to me: Everything you need to learn about life you can learn from painting. Here are some of the better paint-fume induced pearls of wisdom I came up with:

Sometimes it is better to take advice

I have painted a hundred times before. I have always refused to use primer, viewing it as unnecessary and time consuming. Crap, just slap up the paint and be done with it. This time, however, seeing as I am waiting for my new job to start and I have time, I thought I would do things right. I was a good boy. I went down to the Paint Depot at Queen and Logan. I love them! They were so helpful. They told me what primer and paint I would need and actually took three products out of my hands and replaced them with cheaper items that would do the same thing! (Shameless plug). The paint lady told me that although it seemed a hassle, priming the wood would make things much easier in the long run… she was right!



Sometimes it is best to be man enough to take advice and admit you don’t always know everything and that your way may not necessarily be the best way. It is better in the long run to take advice when needed…. Unless it is advice from the paint department of the home depot on Wilson – they will tell you that you should paint your room “steel grey” and that it will be an awesome colour… what they fail to tell you is that “steel grey” should actually be named “purple paradise”.

This leads me into my second lesson…

The right tools make everything easier

Brandishing my Primer, paint and necessary equipment, I attacked my bathroom. Sure it was a hassle and all, but good lord that primer and extra wide painter’s tape really worked. It is, in fact, always better to prime before truly beginning. It will be faster and save you money in the end… just like priming before you go out to a bar. It makes the whole night easier and you will save money… there are so many parallels people.




Sometimes If you just walk away, you will realize it is not as bad as you thought

After I primed the wood and waited the advised 1 day to paint, I then applied the first coat – it went on beautifully and was not sucked needlessly into the wood… but it looked a little patchy as some parts dried and others were still wet.

In life, like in painting, even when things look bad after taking a first go at something, sometimes if you just walk away and leave the proverbial ‘paint to dry’, when you come back you will often see that everything worked out and it wasn’t as bad is it seemed.

In my case it still looked like crap. It needed two more coats. But I would not have known that if I did not walk away right… Isn’t another lesson try and try again? Whadda ya want? It’s not always gonna go your way.

You always need a kick-ass soundtrack

Painting aint fun. For those of you who think it is, feel free to come check out my medicine cabinet. Music however, always helps. Never hinders. My choice selection was all up beat a la The Rolling Stones and a little Sympathy for the Devil, some Prodigy, and then the Motown classics of course – heck ya, I was a pip on the midnight train with Gladys!
Point is, it kept me going. Kept my feet tapping and as I lost myself in the music I forgot how much I despised painting. Trust me, sometimes life aint fun. But if you always have a kick-ass soundtrack (and perhaps your friends singing backup), you always find a way to keep on dancin’. Hmm that would be a killer CD – the hardest one to make of course – the soundtrack to my life… What would yours be?

It all depends on Perspective

So I decided that I would not paint the underside of the MANY shelves that make up my medicine cabinet (if you can call something suitable for Shopper’s Drugmart a medicine cabinet). Let’s face it, I am short, so if I couldn’t see that they weren’t painted then nobody else would (unless I threw a cast party for ‘Little people, big world”). Also, my girly arms were tired, I had at least two more coats to do and anything to make this process shorter was welcome! I was so pleased with myself. That was a load off…Then I sat on the crapper. How things changed.  

Sitting on the crapper I realized that the underside of ALL of the shelves were visible and seeing as I am generally full of shit, this is a vantage point I would have often. I immediately painted the underside of all of the shelves.
It’s like life – it is all a matter of perspective. You will shock yourself if you take the time to approach something from a different angle. Always look at questions, situations, problems and obstacles from several angles before you settle on a course of action – you never know, Frodo and Sam may be paying you a visit some day.

You have to be flexible

I swear you have to be part circus freak to be a great painter. As I found myself contorted into ungodly positions - balancing precariously on sinks, toilets, shower curtains, lying on my back on the floor, craning my torso attempting to channel Gumby - all to make sure every bit of wood was covered, I realized, good lord – you need to be one flexible mo fo.



Same goes for life kids. If you want to get things done, sometimes you just have to be flexible.

It’s hard work, but hopefully it’s worth it in the end

Ok. I have already said it, but I will say it again. I f’n hate painting. It’s boring, a pain, and at times, it down right hurts. But I must admit, as I collapsed and sat down on my toilet once it was done, the second coat, I was proud of how it was turning out. I have one sexy bathroom in the making – complete with a gargantuan WHITE medicine cabinet,… it has made all the difference. Life’s tough, but if you put in the work and take pride in what you do, it may just be worth it in the end.  Sometimes all you need is a coat of paint and a little willpower and suddenly everything looks fresh and new.

Perhaps the biggest lesson that I really learned from all of this was that you can learn a lot while sitting on the crapper..... or, I'm just full of shit.  Take your pick.