The Best Story I've Found About Doing Good Work

Sharing a poignant piece of advice from a children's book

Louis Sachar made an indelible impression on me as a young reader with his absorbing and wonderful children’s novel Holes. I regularly cite it as the story that turned me into an incurable reader. Nearly thirty years later, Sachar has once again left a mark on me.

In 1978, twenty years before Holes hit my bookshelf, Sachar published Sideways Stories from Wayside School. It’s a series of connected stories about an elementary school that was accidentally built sideways — the 30 classrooms are stacked atop each other rather than occupying a single floor.

I had no familiarity with this book until my lovely 8-year-old daughter asked me to read it aloud to her this week. She knew it from school and we recently snagged a free copy of it from . . . somewhere (I can’t keep track of all the places I acquire books). Each story is just a few pages and we breeze through a couple each night.

The story of Bebe, “the fastest draw in Mrs. Jewls’s class,” left me gobsmacked. I was moved by its playfulness and wisdom and I felt the need to share it with all of you. It may just change how you see art, creation, and doing good work — any good work, not just art. It’s especially poignant for the age of AI.

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illustration by Tim Heitz

Bebe was a girl with short brown hair, a little beebee nose, totally tiny toes, and big brown eyes. Her full name was Bebe Gunn. She was the fastest draw in Mrs. Jewls’s class.

She could draw a cat in less than forty-five seconds, a dog in less than thirty, and a flower in less than eight seconds. But, of course, Bebe never drew just one dog, or one cat, or one flower. Art was from twelve-thirty to one-thirty. Why, in that time, she could draw fifty cats, a hundred flowers, twenty dogs, and several eggs or watermelons. It took her the same amount of time to draw a watermelon as an egg.

Calvin sat next to Bebe. He didn’t think he was very good at art. Why, it took him the whole period just to draw one airplane. So instead, he just helped Bebe. He was Bebe’s assistant. As soon as Bebe would finish one masterpiece, Calvin would take it from her and set down a clean sheet of paper. Whenever her crayon ran low, Calvin was ready with a new crayon. That way Bebe didn’t have to waste any time. And in return, Bebe would draw five or six airplanes for Calvin.

It was twelve-thirty, time for art. Bebe was ready. On her desk was a sheet of yellow construction paper. In her hand was a green crayon. Calvin was ready. He held a stack of paper and a box of crayons.

“Ready, Bebe,” said Calvin.

“Ready, Calvin,” said Bebe.

“Okay,” said Mrs. Jewls, “time for art.”

She had hardly finished her sentence when Bebe had already drawn a picture of a leaf.

Calvin took it from her and put another piece of paper down.

“Red,” called Bebe.

Calvin handed Bebe a red crayon.

“Blue,” called Bebe.

He gave her a blue crayon.

They were quite a pair. Their teamwork was remarkable. Bebe drew pictures as fast as Calvin could pick up the old paper and set down the new — a fish, an apple, three cherries, bing, bing, bing.

At one-thirty Mrs. Jewls announced, “Okay, class, art is over.”

Bebe dropped her crayon and fell over on her desk. Calvin sighed and leaned back in his chair. He could hardly move. They had broken their old record. Bebe had drawn three hundred and seventy-eight pictures. They lay in a pile on Calvin’s desk.

Mrs. Jewls walked by. “Calvin, did you draw all these pictures?”

Calvin laughed. “No, I can’t draw. Bebe drew them all.”

“Well, then, what did you draw?” asked Mrs. Jewls.

“I didn’t draw anything,” said Calvin.

“Why not? Don’t you like art?” asked Mrs. Jewls.

“I love art,” said Calvin. “That’s why I didn’t draw anything.”

Mrs. Jewls did not understand.

“It would have taken me the whole period just to draw one picture,” said Calvin. “And Bebe would only have been able to draw a hundred pictures. But with the two of us working together, she was able to draw three hundred and seventy-eight pictures! That’s a lot more art.”

Bebe and Calvin shook hands.

“No,” said Mrs. Jewls. “That isn’t how you measure art. It isn’t how many pictures you have, but how good the pictures are. Why, a person could spend his whole life just drawing one picture of a cat. In that time I’m sure Bebe could draw a million cats.”

“Two million,” said Bebe.

Mrs. Jewls continued. “But if that one picture is better than each of Bebe’s two million, then that person has produced more art than Bebe.”

Bebe looked as if she was going to cry. She picked up all the pictures from Calvin’s desk and threw them in the garbage. Then she ran from the room.

“I thought her pictures were good,” said Calvin. He reached into the garbage pail and took out a crumpled-up picture of an airplane.

Bebe walked outside into the playground.

Louis, the yard teacher, spotted her. “Where are you going?” he asked.

“I’m going home to draw a picture of a cat,” said Bebe.

“Will you bring it to school and show it to me tomorrow?” Louis asked.

“Tomorrow!” laughed Bebe. “By tomorrow I doubt if I’ll even be finished with one whisker.”

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Each story in the book is a delight. If you haven’t read it yet, now’s the time.

-Jeremy