Fred the artist - an allegory

I used to have a friend named Fred.

I always really liked Fred - he was a cool guy that wouldn't hurt a fly. He worked as an artist, and was very creative and always had some new crazy idea he wanted to work on. At the same time, he was always ready to hang out and have a good time. I've got a ton of good memories with Fred, and I've met a lot of equally cool people by way of him.

However, Fred had a few flaws. He didn't take criticism well, often brushing it off and refusing to acknowledge it, or instead adamantly attempting to explain how he was in the right. He didn't admit mistakes, even when they were right in front of him. Sometimes he would grow unresponsive for weeks, or even months, on end, and hanging out with Fred wasn't nearly as fun as other times. He would retreat so far into his work so as to become ignorant to our other friends and I, and it grew frustrating for us. Nonetheless, I always maintained my respect for Fred.

One of Fred's most ambitious, but no less amazing, projects was a massive tower, which he kept in his garage. The tower was an enormously complex sculpture made up of several interlocking pieces he would carve, mold, and shape out of materials such as wood, metal, plastic, glass, and paper, in dozens of colors and shapes. Fred was always very proud of how each interlocking piece was unique in its shape and color, to the point of sometimes even being annoying about it. My friends and I would spend hours admiring the sculpture and studying every intricacy of its design.

The tower was a project that spanned several years, almost seven now, I believe. At first, the tower could hardly hold that title - it was just a few dozen scattered wooden blocks on the floor, mostly in their natural tones of brown and grey and in simple shapes like circles and squares. But as time went on, the tower grew in both height and sheer complexity. Pieces grew ever more and more innovative, more and more daring, sometimes to the point of threatening the tower's sculptural integrity, but Fred never seemed to mind. He was proud of his creation, and we were as much in awe as he was in happiness for his work. Amongst our circle of friends, we all had our favorite piece that we liked to vouch for.

Time passed. Pieces began to appear that almost seemed to invalidate past ones - incorporating their design but also adding something new or exciting. The oldest pieces, near the bottom, grew old and worn: faded, rotting wood, dull glass, wrinkled and dirty paper. Sometime Fred would remove them and replace them with a similar piece near the top, but it was never quite the same. Sometimes he would simply remove the piece and clean them, putting them back in a few days later - he even would go back and amend the larger and more risky pieces, although very rarely. Some older, or more problematic, pieces, even some near the middle or top of the tower, were left forgotten in their respective places at the tower. Some of the people in our circle of friends pressured Fred to fix the problems these pieces posed, and to clean and replace the old and worn pieces near the bottom, but he said that making new pieces was more fun than fixing old ones, and the tower grew ever taller and more ornate, stacking higher and higher to the ceiling.

Throughout this process, the tower became somewhat of a celebrity in the neighborhood. People would come to take pictures, to pose with Fred in front, and spread the word about it through social media and word of mouth. Fred became increasingly less concerned with the tower's stability, or its more forgotten pieces, and instead worked his very hardest to make the tower as flashy and conspicuous as possible, to generate more attention. Our friends and I began to notice this, and some even spoke up about it, but Fred didn't care to listen. He loved his tower, and wanted to make it as big and beautiful as he could. People soon flocked to it, and we grew more distant from Fred, our friends and I. The tower appeared in many celebrated art galleries and events, and when it became too big to keep in his garage, he moved it out onto his lawn for the whole world to see.

We still keep up with him, of course, but its not the same relationship as it once was. I'll go and see the tower every now and then, but the sheer novelty, and spontaneous glee that it once evoked has dulled with the passage of time. Many of our friend group have since moved away, and although some have seemingly replaced them, the community we built around Fred and his stupendous creation isn't quite the same.

I miss Fred a lot, and his tower too. I wish him all the best moving forward.