The Paintbrush

Some things refuse to be explained. Some things push at the very boundaries of our understanding of the universe. When we notice these occurrences, we often find ourselves yelling about rules and regulations. We yell about the way things ought to be. We stamp our feet and shout and cry and tear out our hair and do all the things that we think will make the universe bend to our whims and wants.

Such noise amounts to little.

Such noise is nothing.

But lucky for us, the universe is an awfully big space.

And the things that should not be often go unnoticed.

But for those that notice.

For those lucky or unlucky few.

They are forever changed.

*****

There was an oppressive heaviness to the air that hung damply within the factory walls. On the opposite side of those thin concrete walls was the almost fresh air of the city, and the noontime sun shining down on the sprawling metropolis. If there had been windows in the factory walls, maybe the men would have looked out and dreamed of their homes, both old and new. But there were no windows in the factory. And so they stared ahead at their work, and thought of little else.

The men who filled this place, who spent so much of their lives in it that they knew their workbench better than their own bed, never spoke to one another. It is not that they did not want to, but more practically, they lacked the necessary knowledge on how to do so. It would be assumed that in a room filled with one hundred men that chance alone would make it so that at least someone spoke the same language as the man sitting next to him. If chance had been allowed to take its course, then maybe it would have been so. But the Foreman, who was a good man, on orders from the Boss, who often was not a good man, did not allow chance into the workplace.

The Boss had long-windedly explained to the Foreman, who had sat silently and listened without saying a word that, Conversation does not breed productivity, and without productivity, what use was there for the factory? The Foreman did not like it, but in the end what could the Foreman do but comply? What could he do? He had asked himself that question many times and had not yet come up with a satisfactory answer.

Isaac sat at his crowded desk, brush in hand, and in painstaking detail filled in the colors of the preset design that lay before him. On this day, he used his favorite paintbrush. What made that particular paintbrush different than any of the hundreds that surrounded him in the cavernous factory? Nothing. One day, he had simply chosen it as his favorite. That was that. And it was with his favorite paintbrush that he always seemed to do his very best work. Yet, the work he did was not the type of work that he had left Odessa for. He had left Odessa, he had come to America, so that he could become a great artist.

As it turned out, America seemed less interested in Isaac’s wants and ambitions and talents than he had hoped for.

The art schools Isaac first applied to, the ones whose names got you into all the right parties and all the right art shows, let only one Jew in a year. It was that precious spot that seemed to always be taken by someone richer than Isaac. Such treatment would have been enough to crush a weaker man, but to Isaac, it was what he expected. The Gentile world was simply not ready for him, and he knew, all things considered, it was their loss.

Isaac next set his sights on entrance into the Jewish art schools, the places that reminded him of home. Well, Isaac was at least sure that these art schools reminded someone of a house they perhaps once saw. These places were nothing like the home, the warmth and kindness, that he had left behind for the promise of a new land. And while those schools liked his work, praised it even, they deemed him too secular. He took this in stride. It was all he could do.

It was then that Isaac ventured forward and took his chance with the secular Jewish art schools, but they, in turn, thought he was too religious. At least, that is what they said. Isaac thought his rejection was for a different reason. He saw the look of scorn these new-worlders gave him. These people who had never known real pain. He saw the way they looked at him and his long beard and well-worn clothes. He realized too late that he reminded them of the old world, the world that he had left, and the world these people had never known. But by then it was too late. He hadn’t known early enough to hide his tallis and shave his beard.

But even if you had known Isaac, he told himself each day as he stared at the pre-set canvas before him, even if you had, you wouldn’t have changed a thing. All this time later, he still wore his tallis and still kept his beard. They were all he had of home besides himself. He was sure that if he lost one, then he would lose the other. And that fear kept him faithful.

*****

Beth had never been to the art museum before, even though she only lived two blocks away. When she had bought this brownstone for a price she was too embarrassed to admit, the realtor had gone on and on about all of the great cultural centers that were only a walk away from where they stood at that very moment. Beth had listened and nodded appreciatively as the woman spoke, but it was all a show. Such things did not interest Beth, because Beth simply never had the time for them. Her work had always kept her busy. And work was her life.

It hadn’t always been that way. Once, she had had parties to attend. Friends. Even a husband, well, she still had a husband, but time with him, like everything else, had slipped away over the years. It was unfortunate, but that was just the way of her world. And for what it was worth, Beth liked it that way. She liked her work. Liked her job. Liked the respect. Liked the power. Liked the money. And to have those things, you had to sacrifice others.

And it was a hard life in many ways but at least she felt valuable, and that was so much more than thousands of others could say.

And then…

And then…

And then her job, like so many other jobs, disappeared. Gone. Just like that. She had learned, rather abruptly, that she was not essential. And it was on this day, the day she learned that terrible fact about herself, that she stared at her laptop, the laptop that she could not bring herself to turn on, the laptop that had become her life. She now, very suddenly, had found out that she had time on her hands. She found out that she had enough time to go to art museums.

*****

Ever since starting at the factory, Isaac had been a model employee. Today, though, was different. Maybe it was the humidity in the air, the worst that Isaac had ever experienced. Maybe it was the dullness of the work. Maybe it was the fact that he could not sleep the night before, the sound of his baby’s cries as he rocked him mixing with the terrible moans of his wife, who had taken with fever. It may have been those things, or maybe it was the flapping of a bird’s wings a thousand miles away, or maybe a thousand years ago. Who knows why this day was different? Maybe it was for no reason at all. But it was different.

This day, Isaac couldn’t keep his hand from wandering.

Consistency was key in Isaac’s work. There was no room for variation, no room for mistake, no room for personality. Every person who bought one of these finished paintings had to believe that it had been painted by the original artist himself. They had to believe that it didn’t matter if they saw the same painting hanging in their friend’s home, because that one was a fake, and the one they owned was the original, no matter that it only cost $1. See, they would say, you can even see the brushstrokes. Isaac understood this need. People wanted to be respectable. People wanted to feel that their lives were not as mean as they were. And a painting, even an uninspired painting like the one Isaac had copied again and again, could do that. It made the unbearable bearable. It elevated what was often left in the dirt.

And yet, on that day, against all rules and sense of self-preservation, Isaac found that his wandering hand had painted a woman in the left-hand corner of the canvas. Amidst the sweeping greens and dabs of blue, the woman stood there, proud, even defiant, staring at him intently. It was no woman that Isaac had known, he was sure of that, but he was also sure that somehow, somewhere deeply, he had always known her. Yes, everything about her was different from him, and yet, as Isaac finished painting her, he was absolutely sure that he could not paint over her.

No, to paint over her was unthinkable. It would simply break Isaac’s heart.

And it was over the next few weeks that Isaac continued to paint her. For a time, he got away with it. It seemed that no one noticed the changes he made, And if they do notice, they don’t seem to mind. Of course, an outside observer could not always see the woman that Isaac painted, he would be the first to admit that. Sometimes she stood in a house or behind a tree, but each time, she was there on the canvas.
Isaac knew it. And that’s what mattered. And as he painted her, Isaac wondered who this woman was, to be so different and yet feel so familiar. Yes, of course, he knew that she was a figment of his imagination, but, that didn’t mean she wasn’t real.

Isaac was an artist and a religious man, he believed in the eternal, he believed that everything in the universe was connected, from the smallest bit of dust to the highest mountain to the erstwhile thoughts that enter our heads when we bathe. This woman was made out of paint, but once painted, she was a part of the fabric of the world around him, just as he was, just as his thoughts and dreams were, just as everything was. And once part of the world, how could he even think to remove her from it?

And, once Isaac made one change to the painting, well, it was easy to make others. And so he did.

Eventually, the paintings he turned in were a creation all his own. Eventually, he was happy, for the first time, with the work he made a living by. For the first time, he went home smiling. For the first time, he was a content man.

That is when the Foreman, a kind man with a family of eleven, a man who simply had a job to do, called Isaac into his office.

“So,” the Foreman said, meeting Isaac’s gaze but desperately wishing he could look somewhere else, “I have to let you go. I think you know why.”

*****

Beth had never looked at art before. Yes, she had seen it, practically everyone in the world had at some point, but she had never tried to understand it. A friend here or there would try to get her interested, but much to their annoyance, it just never stuck.

Realist paintings were all too boring.

Abstract to weird.

And cubist…well, Beth didn’t know what to think about those paintings, she just knew that she didn't like them.

And when something didn’t make sense to Beth, when she couldn’t find a use for it, when she didn’t like it, it was easy for her to discard. There were too many other things in the world to spend time on the things that she did not understand.

Beth stood in the museum that day because…well, it was something to do. Her husband was off at work, and she thought it best that the news of her sudden unemployment be delivered in person. Besides, she wasn’t ready to send out job applications yet, and something was better than nothing. She was somewhere into the second hour of her trip, wondering if there would be a third, when she turned a corner into a small, seemingly almost forgotten room. In it, she saw something familiar. Something she had seen every day of her life, just never in this way before.

She saw herself.

*****

Isaac walked back home that afternoon along the river, the path he always took. The river was a dull thing, nothing like back home, but it was a comfort nonetheless. And, as he walked, as he tried to understand the day's events, he realized that he still held his favorite paintbrush tightly in his hand. The paintbrush was the property of the factory, meaning he had stolen it, and so he was a thief, there was no other word for it.

Isaac thought for a moment that he should turn back, return the property that was no longer his. But he didn’t. He continued walking forward, anger, disgust, and rage boiling over inside of him. Isaac had gotten used to being hated, he was a Jew, he was an immigrant, he was poor, and he was married to an American.

Hatred from others was just a fact of life. But it was not until that moment that he hated himself.

It was suddenly and without premeditation that Isaac made to throw the paintbrush away into the dirty river.

Let this thing be lost forever! This destroyer of dreams. Is this what I left Odessa for? I could have saved myself the trouble and stayed poor there! It is a terrible thing, a truly terrible moment, when you think that your life is for nothing. That everything you worked and suffered for in the hopes of something great was in vain. And it was this paintbrush, this putrescent paint-stained thing, that tortured him so. And so, without the paintbrush, he would be nothing. His old self would be gone. Killed and discarded. But at least that would mean he could create something new out of himself.

And yet…

And yet…

And yet he could not do it. He stayed his hand. He held onto the paintbrush.

He was a thief, yes, but the paintbrush was his. It was him. And he could not be without it. He could not lose himself. He simply refused.

*****

An art dealer, Beth would come to learn, would not have valued the paintings she stared at, at more than a couple hundred dollars apiece. As a collective, they may be worth something more, but really, they were only of value to a handful of people with niche interests. Most museums in first-rate cities never would have even shown these paintings to a paying audience.

It was later, and only with the assistance of the nice people at the Help Desk, that Beth would learn that this museum used to be a factory. The men inside these factory walls turned out copies of paintings, hundreds a day, almost all lost now to history, dust that had long ago been brushed away. Isaac Bar had worked in this factory before becoming an artist in his own right, or at least before people began to buy his work.
The room Beth had wandered into, the room that looked almost abandoned, was dedicated to local artists, both past and present. Now, it was Isaac’s turn to be featured.

She didn’t know any of that yet, though. That would all come later. For now, she just stared at what was before her.

In the corner of the room was a photograph of the painter as an old man, and when Beth looked at it, she couldn’t help but see herself. They looked nothing alike. But she saw herself. She saw it plain. And for a moment, she felt whole. And as she turned from the photo back to the paintings, as she looked deeply into these paintings, she saw herself too. Sometimes in the corner. Sometimes in a house or behind a tree.
Sometimes she seemed to be leaping off the canvas. Sometimes hidden. Sometimes in plain view.

Wherever she was, she was always there.

*****

Isaac had always had strange dreams, had always wandered off to odd places that he knew could not be real. Tonight’s dream was perhaps the oddest of all. In this dream, a dream he had entered with no memory of falling into, he walked through a building that was far too bright for its own good, and altogether too clean-looking. The people in this dream wore strange clothes, either flimsy pieces of nothing, or complicated matters that only confused Isaac. He would have felt out of place in his own attire, embarrassed even, but he had always been a proud man, and he was not about to start walking with a bowed head now. The walls of this place were lined with paintings and art that he did not know. In a different dream, he would have taken the time to look at each piece so that he could offer his judgment. Yet, his feet carried him forward.

Eventually, Isaac’s feet led him to a room filled with his own work. He knew it was his. But he also knew that he had not painted it yet. And overall, he was impressed.

And standing in the room with him, was her. The woman. The figure. Her.

And he feared that he might weep with joy.

Because she was real.

And he had not lost everything for nothing.

*****

Beth turned and saw Isaac. The man in the photograph. But different, she thought, he’s younger.

“You,” he said. He spoke in a language Beth did not know, but she understood it all the same.

“Why me? Why am I in these paintings?” she asked. Beth knew she should have been surprised, maybe even scared, at seeing this man before her, this man who could not be there. But it all felt so natural. So real. And when things feel so real, so natural, sometimes you just don’t question them.

“You were there,” Isaac said carefully, “because you were there. I could paint nothing else.”

Beth nodded, it made sense to her, somehow, “The paintings. Your work. They’re beautiful.”

Isaac nodded as if considering it for a moment, “Yes. Not my best, but good. They were never in a place like this. Or they will never be. Or…they were…will be scattered. Sold here and there.” When Isaac spoke, it was as if the words came from a far off place, as if the words he spoke were true, but new and strange to him.

“But now, they are whole. And that is good. That is…right.” Isaac looked around him, taking in everything, and after a moment his confusion seemed to dissipate, and he seemed content with what he saw. It made Beth happier than she had felt in a very long time.

Beth didn’t know what to say to Isaac, didn’t know what to do, and so, she said nothing. Isaac didn’t seem to mind. And whether it was hours or moments they spent together, neither knew, and neither cared. They were where they were supposed to be. For the first time in a long time, they were where they were supposed to be. The two enjoyed, and examined, and took in the paintings together, in silence. And it was good.

The silence ended when Isaac turned his attention to Beth, and smiling, he reached into his front jacket pocket and took out a paintbrush. To Beth, the paintbrush looked ordinary enough. But it was the way Isaac looked at it, the care in his touch, that told Beth that it was something more than it appeared.

“Do you create?” Isaac asked cautiously.

“Never,” Beth said, for the first time embarrassed by that answer. “I…No. My work…it wasn’t creative. And I guess I just never had any time for it.”

“A shame,” Isaac said, never taking his eyes from Beth’s. “Everyone should create. It’s the only way to know you are alive.”

“I don’t think I’d be very good at it,” Beth did not know where these words came from, but she knew they were true.

“Good,” Isaac scoffed, “who cares for good. It is not about that. It is about you. What you want. Nothing more.”

“I don’t think,” Beth began before stopping for a moment, collecting herself, remembering who she was, “I don’t think I work like that.”

“Try.”

And without a moment’s hesitation, without another word, Isaac handed the paintbrush to her, and Beth found it in her hands. The paintbrush was certainly well used. And well-loved. It was a type of gift that a person could give only once because there was only one of it to give.

It was the type of gift that contained all things within it.

When Beth looked back up from her gift, from her one of one, Isaac was gone.

She was alone.

And then again, she wasn’t. And she never would be again.

The world was different for Beth when she left the museum that day, although she couldn’t say exactly how. Not yet, at least. She would just have to learn.

She would have to try.

And in trying, she would create herself.

And in creating herself, she would create the world.