Creativity Tips: Find Your Zelda

Picture this: I'm 22 years old, just graduated from the University of Missouri School of Journalism, and am driving back to Kansas City with my entire life packed into my old car. I have to go home, because there's no where else to go.* I have no job and no money.

I do, however, have a bonsai! That I've grown myself. Potted, wired, shaped, cultivated, loved.

And, on that long drive, the bonsai dies. Falls down and dies. Given the mood I'm in to begin with, I take the tree's death as a sign.  Not a good sign. All life, as we know it, is over. We're doomed.

DOOMED.

Now, flash forward 40 years.The hubby remembers me talking about the heartbreak over my much-loved bonsai. He researches bonsai nurseries in the KC area, then takes me out for Valentine's Day to select a new little tree.

WHOO HOO! Perfect present. Maybe I'll keep him.

I'm proud to introduce Zelda, the Zelkova elm. She survived repotting, and is now happily settling in to her new home. Too early for trimming and shaping, but ... watch out world. My bonsai shears are ready to go.

The ridiculous amount of pure joy I get every time I walk by Zelda reminds me of the power of creative adventures from our youth. What did you love to do when you were a kid, a teen, a 20-something? Did you fingerpaint? Bake? Dance? Write poetry?

Are you still doing it? If not, that's your assignment for the day: Find your Zelda.

*'Home is the place where, when you have to go there,
They have to take you in.'
Robert Frost, The Death of the Hired Man