Oh to be artistic

I am not artistic. I can draw a pretty good box, and like, Saint-Exupery in The Little Prince, I can do a pretty good elephant under a hat, but that is about it. So, when it comes to illustrations for things that I am trying to write or teach, I have to be dependent on the kindness of people who are artistic to let me use their work. That means that sometimes I have to write to publishers to ask for permission to use a picture or activity.

Right now, I am attempting to write materials on living in peace, to make it my own rather than a translation of the Young Peacemaker. I am not sure why I feel so compelled to do this, but I do. That means I have to find something to replace the wonderful illustrations.

The other day, going through a file, I found a great activity for kids that I had gotten from a magazine and that been sitting there since 1991. I searched through the internet to find the publisher and asked for permission to translate and use it. I got a very nice, short reply from a lady saying they would be happy to allow me to copy it--twenty copies for use in a classroom. TWENTY COPIES?

I wrote the lady again, a long explanation of how I wanted to use the activity, and that I would need more like 500 copies than twenty. She replied that their copyright regulations didn't allow them to let me make that many copies.

Question in reply--Could I purchase them? Answer--the picture is out of print and unavailable for purchase.

Sigh.

Actually, I didn't sigh. It struck me so funny, I had to laugh out loud.

I would love to be artistic, and if I were, I would want people to respect my intellectual property. So, I won't use the lovely little activity that is out of print, and therefore someone's creativity is not going to be appreciated and used by anyone. That's okay. I'm just trying to figure out how to fit an elephant under a hat into my lesson plan.