When it came time to choose the twenty photos for our coloring book, we held a family meeting. Democratic process, one vote each, all photos considered on merit.
The dog took six pages.
Six. Out of twenty. The dog polled higher than the beach house, both grandparents, and me. I got one page, and in it I am partially obscured by the dog.
Twenty pages in the book.
The dog took six.
{Tweet that.}
I contested the results, obviously. But watching the kids argue his case, photo by photo, I had to concede they had voted honestly. Ziggy at the beach, ears inside out from the wind. Ziggy asleep in the esky, a mystery to this day. Ziggy mid-leap for a ball, every part of him airborne and hopeful. He was, frame for frame, the best content the holiday produced. The man has range.
And here is a thing I’ve learned since: pets turn into wonderful coloring pages. All the qualities that make a photo convert well into an outline, the clear edges, the good contrast, the close-up face full of feeling, dogs supply by simply existing. A dog against sand or sky is practically a coloring page already. Cats too, on the rare occasions they consent to be photographed.
The kids color him with total freedom, is the other thing. My youngest has produced a purple Ziggy, a rainbow Ziggy, and one alarming red-eyed Ziggy she describes as “his angry dreams.” Nobody colors outside the facts like a four-year-old, and no subject invites it like the dog.
But I think the real reason he swept the vote is simpler. To my kids, Ziggy was on the holiday. He dug the holes. He stole the sausage. He is a full member of this family, and their book is the story of this family, and they were never going to leave a main character out.
The next book is being assembled now, and early polling suggests he takes seven. I have made my peace. When a creature brings that much joy to a family, he can have all the pages he wants. I would just like to appear in one photo, unobscured, before I die.
Making a coloring book with Outline Origins? Put the pets in. Their photos convert beautifully, the kids will color them first, and around here we now suggest at least one page of the dog per book. Or six.
