I wonder how your brain decides which memories to keep and which ones to discard, because some of the most useless facts and events have been cemented in my mind while milestones have been lost.
I guess that’s because trivial events can shape us in ways that we don’t even realize.
I don’t remember the time my family drove to Red Lake, nor can I remember my grandparent’s funerals. Â I will, however, always remember the Green Paint Incident.
I was four at the time, maybe a little younger, and we were living in Laval, Quebec.  Having been raised by an Anglophone family in a French-speaking province, my parents started enrolling me into extra circular activites at a very early age, hoping I’d pick up some French.
It didn’t work. I would always find the one other English speaking kid in the class and we would stubbornly stick together, like the way rice would always stick to my mother’s good cooking pot.
The Green Paint Incident occurred on my first day of art class, which took place on the floor of a school gym.  Children were sprawled out on their bellies covering the ground completely, surrounded by bright pieces of construction paper, non-toxic paint, sparkly glue and dry macaroni bits.
I was sitting in the corner trying to make myself invisible when one of the instructors came up to me.
She said something to me in French.  I stared at her blankly.Â
“What do you like more than anything else?” she asked, switching to English.
“Dogs,” I replied.
“Well then. Why don’t  you paint a picture of a dog running through the grass.”
That sounded perfectly fine to me.
I decided that I was going to draw a picture of Skippy, my Aunt’s fat Golden Retriever, sleeping under a tree.  Skippy was far too fat to chase birds or run around so he spent most of his time dozing in the backyard.  Skippy was my very first friend and far more personable than a lot of the people I’ve met.
I decided to start with the tree.  There was a baby food jar filled with green paint in the centre of a group of kids.  I sat down beside one of them and picked up the jar.
The lid was stuck.
I turned the jar this way and that. Â The lid finally came loose with a large pop and sent paint splattering everywhere. Â Most of it got on me but a large glob landed right in the centre of a girl’s work in progress.
She was furious. Â Her face turned red and she walked right up to me, hollering in a language I didn’t understand. Â She pushed me. She screamed some more. Â I said that I was sorry and I started to cry.
The Green Paint Incident left me feeling tremendously guilty. Growing up, I would beat myself up mercilessly every time I made an innocent mistake. It affected my social skills and my self esteem. I stopped trying new things and I loathed my failures.
But everybody makes mistakes. I’ve come to realize that it’s ridiculous to feel guilty about my follies, because mine are no worse than anybody else’s.Â
Some people are far too angry to exist in this world. Â They can’t handle the idiosyncrasies of others and they walk around in a constant state of rage, waiting for someone to screw up. Â They yell at people because yelling makes them feel in control when in reality, they are hopelessly unequipped to deal with most things.
I no longer apologize when people try to make me feel guilty for simply exisiting. Â
Now, I feel sorry for them.Â
Their journey will be far more difficult and unfulfilling than mine.
