A SHELTER FOR SADNESS

A child tends to their sadness.

“I am building a shelter for my sadness and welcoming it inside,” declares a skinny White child with brown hair. They begin to pile sticks in a clearing, surrounded by tall, thin tree trunks rich with twinkling lights. Illuminating the scene in a pale teal glow is their sadness, an oval-shaped cluster of sketch lines that might be mistaken for Humpty Dumpty’s ghost. Throughout, forest and light frame the sadness as its human caretaker “giv[es] it a space” to do “anything it needs to.” It can be loud or quiet, it can run or stand still, it can sit in darkness or light, “or anything in between.” It can even “breath in” (a regrettable typo) the smell of roses that bloom around the shelter that the child lovingly maintains. The sadness is as cute as a pensive figure can be, and the decorative whimsy of Litchfield’s illustrations softens the melancholy. Psychologically, it seems useful and healthy to visualize compassion and acceptance toward one’s own feelings, and these meditative scenes provide gentle emotional prompts in that direction. Still, the metaphor plods on a bit longer than is compelling; by the time the child starts visiting their sadness every day with tea, the point feels belabored beyond meaning. The pair’s final walk into the sunset reinforces the complex, necessary idea that beautiful and difficult emotions can coexist.

Moody contemplation made engaging with luminous artwork.