I have been teaching my daughter some origami the last couple of weeks, a rather ambitious undertaking for me seeing as I haven't done anything remotely like origami since I was her age. I can't even fold towels. You can even ask my husband.The real problem with origami, however, is that the instructions are written by runaway chickens. Arrows and dotted lines obscure the picture and the stilted written instructions are not much help. I look at at the next step, cock my head, turn it around a few times, flip my paper every which way and finally determine to just make a fold. 75% of the skill involved in beginning origami is simply the ability to decipher the instructions. And at least that much of the pleasure comes from the many minor victories you accomplish getting from step A to step B, no thanks to their diagrams.
So today I checked out a book from the library because we have exhausted the possibilities of the instruction packet which came with the paper I bought. I got it in the children's section, even. My son flipped through it and decided he wanted me to make him a fish. I looked at it and it said it was for beginners. I qualify as a beginner. So it should be for me, right?
Ha! I folded this way and that and got nowhere. My fish looked more like a dollar bill you pull out of your pocket after it has gone through the wash. Not easily defeated, I smoothed out the paper and tried again. And again. And finally determined that the fish was mislabeled. This was advanced stuff. I can see it right up there with this giant kraken devouring a ship. Except that my design required one little snip with a pair of scissors. That one didn't.
Then I came into the front room after putting the children to bed and heard my least two favorite words.
Uh oh.When my husband is sitting at the computer and says that, it usually means something bad. That is what he said last week before crashing the computer. And this time it is what he said before making everything turn black. And losing all of everything. Fortunately, he actually took my advice this time and actually set a system restore point before he went about messing with things he didn't really understand so all was back up and running within twenty minutes rather than within a few days.
Having nothing else to do, I resumed my battle with the fish. AND I WAS VICTORIOUS. Maybe I can enter in this year's design challenge: Prehistoric Non-Dinosaur. I am certain to get some curious attention.
