Not Valid for Travel

I have been immersing myself in contemporary art discourse as part of my cultural absorbtion. This week left me in the company of theorists (and those soon to be) explaining and examining the structures of all things in art and life. Titles lead my not so linear mind down entirely different paths.: Principles of Hope, The Practice of Everyday Life, Nameless Science, lead me places, but I am not yet sure where. It was a week of densely packed knowledge with Artists with their game faces on (yes a capital A is necessary.) Sipping into the brain of the other momentarily.

New York Minutes

Anna's summer adventure summary

Tubing the Delaware River
Hamlet and Hair in Central Park
Philharmonic performance in Central Park w/fireworks
Kayaking in the Hudson
Eating 16 lbs of cherries *not at once
Bronx Zoo Rain forest
Long Island Beach combing
Walking in the rain
Filming under the plants in Central Park Lagoon
My roller"trick skater" park debut
5 percussion concerts outdoors
falling asleep in the grass
learning where the Herons sleep
working my way through the Icy Fruit vendor menu
Saving a small dog from jaws of a big dog
Passing cyclists on my skates just to hear them cuss
Asia Society/MoMA/New Museum/Neues Museum
Bubble Sword
Seeing a friend on stage
tandem Chair Dancing in rolling chairs
Joey's Puppet show
Catfish sandwich and collards in Harlem
Drinking Iced coffee until I am sick
Having Chris Rock stomp on my foot in Gray's Papaya
Thunder in Greenwich
Watching Anthony dance a hurricane

Nest building

It was long over due, but I had to try to make some kind of inspired studio corner to work indoors. I had begun a makeshift library, suspended some art pieces, but never really had a place to work. I have been editing on laptop and working in the field, but everyone who knows me knows that I am a great builder/reconstruct-er/salvage-r. Today was my day. Now or never. I built an ever so tiny workspace by the window. My painted card table wedged into the tiny "Manhattan apartment" corner. Two separate neighbors had discarded their tropical plants. I quickly hauled the tree home stuck the six footer in the shower and allowed it to be the towering plant on the table. I laughed as I treated it like a rare tree specimine in the urban jungle, while two years ago I hacked at this same variety with a machette. Life is funny that way.
Another neighbor gave me perfect natural elements like a piece of fan coral that she found washed up in the Caribbean, two small carved frames from China, and the very same Indonesian travel guide that my Mom had wanted, so I had relinquished it to her years ago, though I loved it so. My neighbor down the street is uprooting, ready to travel again, while I settle a bit. I walked around in the beautiful breezy night both exhausted and relieved that I had created this mini studio, an in the process found 4, 7 foot long birch saplings, cut, cleaned and dried. Someones decorating project discarded. Beautiful.

What are the odds that all of Manhattan would decide to discard natural objects that work so perfectly with my art and my inspiration. The saplings will be a part of my sculpture "forest" that I recently transported from Switzerland. It is the piece that has five long strands of wooden thread spools that wind up towards the ceiling. I had to leave the critical piece behind for now, the curved piece of bamboo that is the critical central element. The saplings would make it a different, but still interesting work. For now they form a tee pee headboard for me. All the found pieces fit together so nicely creating an interior jungle of sorts. chucked full of art like some eco cabin. Miyoko-san gasped as she entered my city jungle. Plants and branches intermix with art and rainbows from my chandelier. If this doesn't get me working...I have no excuse. Will post some studio snaps soon.

The Sound

Drift

Maybe Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn was the last straw for me. Specifically the mall that greets you as you rise up from the underground. I was humbled to start with, having allowed the Starbucks monkey onto my back again after being clean for two weeks. The Venti iced coffee came back into my life in 90 degree weather right before a very long subway trip that was to take me to Coney Island. The timing was less than perfect to say the least. The 20 oz Venti took me off the Q in search of a bathroom, in a strange neighborhood where many streets converge into a horn honking mess. I saw a Modell's Sporting goods and was drawn in to look for snorkel gear, maybe some Tabi's or aqua booties, something to protect me in this long month of jellyfish watching that lay ahead of me. It took me three minutes to realize that I wasn't in Hawaii anymore. There were ten or so fishing poles and a few silicone worms, and a couple of squirt guns. That was it for the water section. That summarized the Flatbush Avenue relationship to the sea.

I pushed on looking for a bathroom and found in route a Chuckie Cheese. I was tempted to rekindle my glory days as a skee-ball champ or maybe win a teddy bear after spending $50 at Wack-a Mole. But instead I reminisced with the security guard from Jamaica, the real Jamaica not one where you change trains. I once had a great love of Chuckie Cheese, even though the robotic pizza man always scared me and reminded me of the real pizza guy of my Wisconsin childhood, who made the headlines for both his amazing thin crust and for being the master mind international cocaine ring. So much for my favorite childhood pizza place. Now that I think of it all of the robotic characters scared me a bit, especially when they convulsed and twitched when the spotlights were off them. They had a secret life too. I was sure of it.

The day was careening out of control. It was noon and I was nowhere near the 3am low tide jellyfish watch that "Lenny the Angler" had directed me to. Yes, I did write am not pm. I wasn't in Long Island, but staring in the window at Chuckie Cheese. This had to stop. Sometimes you have to hit rock bottom in life before you realize that you are off course. There I was with a tee shirt and linen pants thrown over a bikini, reeking of Hawaiian tropic sunblock and an entire underwater camera system stuffed into a Sierra Club backpack, staring into a Chuckie Cheese on Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn. My life sucked, but just temporarily.

So I made my way to the LIRR to see just where I could go. Anywhere was quite possibly better than the children's video arcade scenario at the mall. Oyster Bay was in "the Sound." There was a nature preserve of some kind where scientific boats trolled for those clear creatures just above diatoms. I had done a quick cross reference the night prior trying to figure out where I could get to on the train. The next train was leaving in seven minutes. Alright, lets go. I fantasised about crab cakes and lobster, red painted hulls on boats and the smell of diesel near the pier. I could not wait. But it was soon after leaving the Oyster Bay train station that I realized that my fantasy was about Cape Cod and not Long Island.

I walked through a cloud of sea breeze to the squawks of seagulls, ready to enjoy my day of solitude. I soon found that my arrival at Oyster Bay caused the entire beach to stop and stare at the newcomer. My day of getting away from it all landed me on a very full, very public beach. I tried to blend in by going to the snack shack and ordering some fries. The seagulls were on to me from the moment I left the train. They left me alone for the twenty minutes it took to make the fries, then attacked from three sides when the fries were plated up. One cheeky gull pulled out a fry after his friend nipped at my left arm. They definitely had this all worked out. I may as well have been with the pickpockets at Coney Island.

There was a reason to be here. It wasn't really for the beach, but rather the access to the sea, which in turn is an access to myself. The sea reminds me of the big questions that are easy to overlook in our culture. So I turned to my french fry making friend, payed six dollars for under a liter of water, I took off across the tidal flats as the sea pulled back. I was on a half day vision quest. I walked along the coast like I have done all over the world. Just walk and look. It really could have been anywhere, with the buzz of cars and the sound of jet skis. Canadian Geese rested next to a flock of Great Black Backed gulls and their smaller cheekier relatives. It was the smell that I needed more than anything. The smell of salt, life and decay all rolled into one. The tall beach grass served as a place to catch all sorts of things left from the high tide. Beautiful pink seaweed and green bubbled varieties. None of which could be seen through the green murk of the tide, but when washed up on the shore they were beautiful like the ones in my videos. I realized how wondrously clear the water was up in Newfoundland. Something I will always feel privileged for discovering. Water clarity is special. I have been spoiled for too long.

It was after an hour of walking that I really began to observe anything. I needed some time to retrain my eyes. Just as badly, I needed to stop fretting and focus. Walk and look was the order of the day. I was able to step carefully enough that the great white Heron let me cross behind her. She kept me in her sights though, I could feel the gaze. Dappled teenage gulls worked themselves into a frenzy as I drew near. They were juicy plump from enthusiastic mothering. After a couple of hours spent out there, the calm returned to us all. They returned to their normal behavior, ignoring me almost entirely as they battled like siblings. I also seemed to return a bit of myself as well though I left my battles behind. I watched a Herring gull drop an oyster from fifteen feet onto a shoreline rock, then retrieve it and repeat the process. It wasn't pretty to watch. It was aggressive and dynamic at the same time. It was well practiced precision

This short half day journey did give me a chance for mulling over a few things. It has been a turbulent year and a half. I would like to say turbulent year, for we all have one of those, but to be honest, I am past that. I maybe do not give New York the chance it deserves, but really I think I do not think I give myself the chance I deserve. I feel as though I am observing, but not really digging in to deep. It has been nearly ten months which seems like an eternity in a place that is so hard to crack. But just like Hawaii, places like this take some serious "earn your wings" time. Ten months doesn't begin to cut it. I have to say that I have only met a few NYC lifers. Many of the people I come into contact with are new, temporary, or passing through. I am not sure what I am, but considering I spent three hours researching opportunities for artists at the earth's polar caps, I might be passing through as well. Regardless of my own timeline, I have to learn patience for myself.

I felt the pang of not belonging as I sat in the salon chair in last weeks session. The stylist sprayed a very expensive synthetic sea water spray into my newly coiffed hair. I felt a bit like the castaway who has been rescued from the island and plunked down in the city again with orders to clean her up. We did not understand each other, but we kept trying to relate. They had just spent a combined six hours in two days discussing every aspect of my skull shape, hair porousness, texture, and hairline, as well as acting on their discussions with straight edged razor and vats of color. I could not have been more styled if I tried. Then came the fake ocean in a can. I questioned why I would need it, and naively joked that I spend most of my life trying to get sand, salt and seaweed out of my hair. I mentioned that I could go to the sea, and get that look if I needed it. I mean I was long over due for some real ocean time. My stylist halted at the prospects of me going in search of the genuine.

The genuine thing. It is getting harder and harder to inspire myself to look for it. Looking takes time and a whole lot of effort. Just the mention of your quest creates a divide between yourself and others. There are ocean people and ocean in a can people. It isn't always that easy to define. Sometimes there are long uncomfortable pauses when your search for the genuine reminds others that they have lived their whole life happy with the non-genuine. Sometimes your simple search becomes sea salt in an other's wound. Regret is a word that I am using frequently in my explanations to people about why I am in New York even though it seems so obvious to so many that I should continue on another island with fewer inhabitants than Manhattan. I mention that I had to try it here, inform myself here. I did not want to live knowing that I never looked under that one rock called New York City. I think it is something that I would have always looked back on and wondered why didn't I? If I could find the courage to travel the world but never bothered to check out domestic art opportunities, then how could I live with my ageing self. Perhaps the bigger question is why is it so hard to inspire myself to keep searching and researching here. Is it the distractions? The endless possibility, or maybe the competition. Are there maybe too many options, so you sit frozen with too many choices to make, and make none in the process. Tonight, the elderly Haitian woman down the hallway told me that she prays everyday that I succeed with my art, and she gives thanks that I was brought into her path. I walked away asking myself, why don't I.

Escape From Central Park

It is true that I can get myself all over the world without a map, but put me in Central Park and I cannot seem to get out. In, Yes, out, No. Today, I was again reminded of that fact as I went searching for an illusive hot air balloon. Yup, that was today's big quest. Now most people inform themselves by reading the newspaper. I on the other hand see things or hear about things and then stumble about trying to locate them. So imagine trying to track down a balloon that lowered itself into a circle of trees just as you thought you knew where it was. Yeah, real funny. I know I could have asked, but it was one of the places in the park that I only see at night, so I wanted to see if daylight helped me at all.

I used to short cut through the park at night and end up in many areas that have snotty, proper names that New Yorkers use like weapons against the newbies. That fact brought me to give them realistic user friendly names: strange bog area, fake Paris area, park benches and lots of concrete area, performance area where nothing happens, and area where "raccoons jump out of bushes and scare the hell out of you", oh and we must not forget "smelly area" that is just too darned organic for its own good. Those would be my Central Park map labels. I am considering making a map with printed warnings like..."creepy dark path surrounded by trees like the ones that throw apples in the Wizard of Oz," and "area where paths take you in circles for nothing," then maybe have the police patrol zone marked as well to aid any others who really are just trying to get out of the park past closing hours. Yes, there must be others who thought they had enough time to get out of the park before curfew, but then ended up on "winding path from hell" and then on the wrong side of "the lake that seems bigger when you are just trying to get around it," and now here we are facing getting arrested, or worse, being made fun of by NYPD. I might choose the arrest. Oh by the way the balloon is in Cherry Hill or something like that. I still prefer to call it "smelly swamp area next to the vendor who never, ever has coconut ice."

Feeling Global

I have felt the tug of travel this week with emails from Hong kong, Hawaii and Newfoundland. I dreamed of icebergs in NFLD only to find that that very same day they were perched in the same cove where I was last year. Funny how life is. You seem to still be connected to a place even after you leave.Hawaii rears its head as homesickness ebbs and flows. It is in those quiet moments where new co workers ask where I am from, and I fumble to name a place. I think of Hawaii a lot these days. It seems like all still consider me and my art a representation of the islands. Spring could not be any more beautiful than it is here in NYC. Every flower springs forth and blooming branches frame architecture so beautifully. I joke about pollen festivals at the botanic garden.

I bought myself miniature bromilliads at the plant store. I nested them into my new found chandellier so that it now grows. I wanted to make the empty places a point of growth rather than focusing on the missing pieces of glass.

four o' clock

The stronghold of Deco's golden age,
flowing in aquamarine breath
in imaginary heavens above.
Diamond ringed fingers tip bellhops
buttoned to the chin.
Dripping crystals hang like stalactites
in the cave of luxury.

frescoed maidens. blushing, in flowing lines
like velvet curtains made of muscle and flesh.
Arcs of bronze lean into their beauty
as if to point to impossible symmetry.
mocking our inabilities
with the curve of their smile.
Our perfection lost with tipped over luggage,
and tennis shoes.
plastic bags hang like chains about our wrists
keeping us bound to an economy
more powerful than gravity.

Alstromeria adore day lillies in a sphere of balance
like a sun rising in the west.
All are too busy to notice
that the flowers are
the color of the flaxen haired angels
who gather to listen from the walls.
to hear the one who who dares to soar
as she tinkles her way across the keys
with the voice of spring rain.

For Natalie
written on an envelope today

The Tale of the Chocolate Tractor

How is it that a chocolate "Easter Tractor" could find its way across the Atlantic only to melt in my room within two hours of receiving it? I had been sent the most wonderful gift from friends across the ocean. I marveled at the perfection of the piece and the travel that it endured. Little did I know that it would become a time based piece that seemed to self destruct in my possession. I stepped from the room for about and hour and a half. I greeted my neighbors. I set up a time to hear music with Miyoko. I ate dinner and returned a phone call. Upon reentering the room I did a double take at the tractor that was now Amoeba-like in its appearance with two eyes looming from the glob. "What in the hell..." I mumbled to myself as I peered in to see the lava flow of organic chocolate. The same fleeting light that has resuscitated "Hokkaido" the tropical plant that my side kick and I rescued two weeks ago in a feral night of poetry, raccoon watching and emergency plant rescue was now destroying my chocolate tractor! Or did it. Maybe I would have never gnawed at the perfect line of the tractor grill, just as I never cared to chew the head off chocolate bunnies. An amoeba on the other hand is fair game for consumption. I need to gain back a few pounds so I am grabbing a spoon and jumping into the flow. So Thank you dear Irish friends...it is exactly what I needed..

Silence

My last few days have been a struggle for silence. It never occured to me how many people expect conversation from me until my voice escapes me. I have been dodging around my building so to try to avoid having to explain that I cannot speak. I leap into the elevator when I see the lady who always wants to speak at length about my haircuts and fashion choices. I sweep in towards the mailbox when I see the woman from Argentina who is never silent. She sees me though, and follows me to the mailboxes, half screaming at me to speak to her. The doorman eagerly asks about my literary adventures and my quest to explore music. I smile at him holding my throught. Miyoko san gives me packages of medicines written in Japanese. They make me laugh as I try to figure out how and why to use them based on the cartoon drawings on the packages.

I lost my voice after avoiding the advances of far too many eager men at work. Anyone and everyone thought themself to be Mr Wonderful, while I simply wanted to do my job. After 27 hours of work in two days, the voice was bound to fail me. I was beginning to fell greatly outnumbered as the last party was for 475 men and 25 women. They threw me to the wolves by having me carry cases of beer through the crowd. Just like parting the Red Sea. My jobs are odd, eventful and always full of drama. It makes me treasure the moments of solitude at home, my new Phalaenopsis orchid named "Inky" due to it's patterning like fuscia ink dropped onto blotting paper, the woodpecker in the tree outside, and curling chartruse leaves on the tree inside my home. I watch silent videos and realize how much I like the little hideaway I have created. Surrounded by books, colorful videos, art and my plants.

Secret Life

I have stopped writing even though my life is at an interesting point. Chaos inspires me and chaos surrounds. I am using my free time to try to organize three or more years of my video DVDs that are not really labeled very well. I get lost in the underwater worlds. I screen the videos and the hours slip by. Then it is always time for something else. I wash, work, commute. I keep myself holed up in my room trying to make back up files before restlessness and obligation tear me away. I need the reassurance of back up files every once in a while. My photographer friend is probably the most organized person I know. I am organized in some ways, but the global crossing have left me to sling images, and videos and writings in various places. I forget what is where. At the storage unit in the town where I was born, I found my fledgling paintings and snap shots from my very first trips abroad. Ticket stubs and stickers from later travels, coin collections from Indonesia, addresses of fellow travellers I met along the way, photos of me and the village , with smiles all around. It brings a odd mix of emotion as I sift through these things. Each triggering an image, a scent, a taste of another time and place. One day I will also look back on these current days as equally inspired moments and realize their importance as well. So I must write and keep track of the wonders around me for later, when time and distance lead to wisdom.

Redirection of inspiration

It is so easy to get off track, to allow fatigue to make you miss everything but the paycheck earning work. I fought back this week aside from the post illness fatigue and the lack of entertainment funds. I managed to carve out some pretty inspired moments in the hours between hard worked days and crashing into bed. I managed an amazing concert by a 20th Century French Composer, a French film on political asylum seekers, a gallery viewing, a book lecture, two museums and even spoke tiny bits of four languages and learned several words in sign language without ever spening a hard earned dime.

I marveled at dark wood concerthall stained blood red with light. I was inspired by a Chimp who knew more sign language than our entire cynical audience combined. I crawled into the dark red welcoming seats at the theater and endured two hours and fourty minutes of a film that has changed my perspective on life and my place in it.

Recovery

Ok, so the up and down struggles of an orphaned kitten seem to be taking over this section of the blog, but I have good news to report. My friend is making a comeback and I am happy to report that I am completing my second month of working as a volunteer at the shelter. Luckily he and his two new strays of similar age were given run of the cat room and 'Annie' the golden eyed Mama cat who raised five sick babies of her own now cares for the lot. The ever growing kittens are nearly as big as Annie who is a young mom. All three kittens look as if they could be hers. We had a little extra quality time today playing with a pink feather cat toy. The lot seems to be bright eyed and most illnesses seem to be receeding, except for mine that is. I have been stuck with another bout of a horrible flu. Coughing, congested with a high fever to boot. Hawaii girl can not take the winter anymore I guess!

Loosing ground

I fear that I am loosing ground with my little kitten who I have been trying to socialize. He is dropping weight and ill, shell shocked and hiding. His support team is all gone, fostered out across the city. I feel for him and can do very little more than take him in my arms, endure the initial scratches and sing made up combinations of songs in a Billy Holiday style until he falls asleep. Something between 'I've got a crush on you,' and 'Loverman.' I rub his cheeks until his ears stand up again, forgetting the fear for a few seconds, a few minutes. I tell him that I love him no matter what he has been through. Other plump, less scared kittens look on in a questioning manner. They obviously haven't seen what he has seen, they couldn't begin to understand.

Along the Way

Peoms are short, so I read them between stops on the train, between meals; between interviews. I read them tucked between essays and tucked into moments at the end of the day. Poems are small giants that I carry with me between jobs, between hopes and between fears. Poems wait for me downtown on cafe chalkboards and in bins at library booksales. They wait patiently in my bag that swings over my shoulder as I collect paychecks that too are small. Poems are adaptable, sitting along edges of pages or in empty places on subway headers. They sit there in hopes that someone will read them. Poems are small so I fill myself with them before something else begins.

Tea Bag Wisdom

Live from your heart,
you will be most effective.
A relaxed mind is a creative mind.
Let your heart speak to others' hearts.
A relaxed mind is a creative mind.
Let things come to you.
Your destiny is to merge with infinity.
Live with reverence for yourself and others.
Man is as vast as he acts.
May this day bring you peace,
tranquility and harmony.
Act, don't react.
Life is a flow of love;
your participation is requested.
Act, don't react.
Be happy so long as breath is in you.
Keep up.

Two weeks of messages found on my 'Yogi Tea' bag string.

This post is dedicated to my friend Robert who knows this stuff and lives it for the betterment of us all.

Supporting a Friend

I am in transit again, I shouldn't be, but my gut said to be there and stand by my friend as he says goodbye to his last parent. My friend has been in my life for twenty years, he is as consist ant as the sun rising. He always felt bad that I had spent so much of my life mourning the dead. Now within the last five years he has lost both of his beautiful parents. It will bring me home and center me as only these shared experiences can. I think of his Dad and I having a pint in Galway. Talking about cancer treatments, love and pursuing one's dreams. He thought the topics deserved more than a 'glass' of Guinness, and I guess he was right. A pint was in order. I had a strange feeling that that would be my last memory of him, and that has proven to be true. I had an equally beautiful talk with Tim's Mother that would also prove to be my last. You see they are a tough family that only speaks of illness and death when it draws very, very near. Mary turned to me in their bright sunny kitchen, filling me with Oreos and coffee. She tilted her head and said in a low lounge singing voice, "I am ready to go." It is a special honor to be witness to that moment when they verbalize that they have made peace with themselves.

So I scramble to find a way to carry me home. To hug and cry and be another friend in the wings. Be back soon.

Environmental Action Proposal Writing

Trying to apply and interview for work balanced with filming in the Hudson made proposal writing seem like fun. I am multi tasking and doing performance actions. It is a crazy mix of things to take on in this freezing cold week. After a few hours of rewriting, I head outdoors and the jolt of cold air seems to do me good. My body has a memory for cold. It reminds me of my undergrad days doing photos inside Buckingham Fountain in January. Returning to the darkroom when my eyes were no longer able to take the cold.

My twelve days of Christmas-days 7

I have been so busy good deed doing and not really writing about it. Let's face it Christmas is long gone, and I am more than a little behind.

One of the most memorable good deeds that was about as close to helping an old lady across the street as I could get. I was asked to hail a cab by an elderly woman. Well this seems like it doesn't qualify and you may think that it is pretty wimpy, but please hear me out. This was no ordinary cab hailing. This was rush hour mid-East side cab hailing. This was near the United Nations that was surrounded by police cab hailing. Add to the mix a torrential downpour that had been going on for an hour or more. So we have thirty police cars, about fifty officers on foot, a dozen rescue vehicles, a downpour and a lady with a walker. Now were talkin' good deed. I shamelessly stepped off the safety of the curb and tried my best to look like a rich movie star that would tip well. They took the bait. One pulled over, I loaded the walker in the trunk, smashed my umbrella in the folded walker, and tucked her into the warm cab. Mission accomplished. Even the soda delivery truck guys cheered my drenched endeavor. Bonus return fortune...1/2 price entry to the Japan Society if I filled out a questionaire for them! Yippie!

This good deed is dedicated to my friend Tim, the greatest 'open the door for old ladies' person I have ever met

Operation Domestication Support Crew

They say it takes a village to raise a child, and this seems to be most helpful when dealing with a frightened kitten as well. This crew works around the clock to be good role models for him. Tiger at top is a lightly older cage mate who shows him the ropes through wrestling matches. The grey guy is his litter mate and purring coach, Mister Ginger allows all the kittens to slap at him and even pull his tail, and finally "fake Mama" who acts motherly even though she doesn't need to. Together we have made little man go from a terrified ball of claws to a playful, though still somewhat unwilling student of domestication.

Peace Returns to the Heart

I have never been the kind of woman who would become so obsessed over a man that my every thought was about him, but this little man is different. This photo only tells the happy ending where our dear friend learns to trust me enough to not only fall asleep in my arms, but to also purr for the first time today. Day 3 of intensive domestication training was a success.

Wierd Return Generosity Continues

So tonight I write a thank you card to the person who decided to put those cd's out with a 'please take' sign. I walk over there thinking it is the least I could do considering I listened to them for half night and they are some of the best classical music recording I have ever owned. So there I am using strapping tape to secure the card up high enough on the tree so to be out of dog pee zone. I had scrawled in big Bubble Sharpie letters "TO THE PERSON WHO LEFT THE CD'S HERE." Well that should do I thought as the neighborhood watch called the police. I decide to walk back on a street that I have never walked down. That was kind of an odd decision to make but I thought yeah, six blocks South sounds good. Along the way I decide four blocks South should be the route.

Sure enough Curbside garbage heaven awaits me as I stand speechless in front of a large apartment building and a black garbage bag mountain that is as tall as me. Now this amount of waste is always troubling, but it was what was next to the wooden bar stool that stood on top of the heap that caught my eye. A framed painting in murky palette thrown atop the bags in king of the mountain style. I lift it up noting that is was roughly the size I paint 24x30. It was a still life of an indiscernible object, possibly a semi open paper bag of walnuts. I flipped it over to decide that it was on linen and when examining it under the street lamp it was clearly a vintage oil, thinly painted with a couple of small flakes that have come off and some spiderweb cracking. The wooden stretcher bars were a heavier wood than what is used now, It just sort of screamed student art. I brushed off dust bunnies that were older than me and dusted it as I walked. When I got it home, I realized that the only weird thing was that it appeared that there was a signature that had been painted over at a later time with a different hand and a thicker texture. As I tilted it in the light it was really evident that there was something covered by the zigzag brush stroke. It is the kind of painting that grows on you with time and distance. It is the kind of painting that is quite powerful from ten feet away. I really could not put a date on it, but the pallete choice makes it seem like 40's or 50's. The stretcher bars are helpful, but I still cannot tell. Hmmmm, well regardless, when I got it home it looks like it belongs in my room. It fits the vintage style of the building so much that it looks like it was painted in this building. I would not be at all suprized if it was. Nothing seems accidental anymore to me. I just have to keep going with it and see where it takes me next.

My 12 Days of Christmas-Day 6

I am a little out of order, but here we go. The other day prior to my researching galleries, I volunteered at the cat shelter again. I made a special assignment for myself for the day. I worked very hard on helping one terrified kitten learn to trust people. He is terrified, huddled in the corner any time he sees a person. I endured a few scratches, but it was well worth the effort. I grabbed up his steel grey social butterfly of a brother and simply held them both until the he wasn't so scared. It seems so simple until you try it. I think regaining trust is maybe one of the harder things to try to teach. He and I are better for it. He seemed to even have enjoyed it briefly. Well, ever so briefly. I will continue with him so that he has a chance at adoption.

This act of kindness is dedicated to all of the people who adopted the cats that I saved in Hawaii, especially Ms Andrade

My 12 Days of Christmas-Day 5

Alright, lets begin with a disclaimer. First I am normally, and still consider myself to be a good samaritan when it comes to lost items. Tonight I decided to put a timeline on the recollection of lost gloves. Say, if a glove wasn't claimed from the fence post in a day or two I could take it and redistribute it to someone in need. I take myself on "inspiration walks" that are a nonlinear ramble that often clears my head and gives me some fresh insight. Tonight was a well deserved walk after a day spent writing about yesterday.

As I walk I always continue to find lost gloves. I came up with the idea that I could redistribute these lost gloves to the homeless citizens that I encounter in my journeys. I thought to myself that if gloves were not claimed by the time the chuch bell tolls tonight, then it would be finders keepers and I would collect them for redistribution to the homeless. I decided that that was justifiable as tomarrow was trash collection day and they usually get thrown in with a nearby building's usual garbage. They are percieved by many to be garbage like a can or bottle.

I came past some knit ones who had been left on a fence post for days. I know because I put them there. Ha! that would be my first collection. I tried to think which street had the gorgeous men's glove the other day. I remembered as I walked and headed over to that street again. For some reason I remember the fences where I place these gloves. But nope, the glove was gone. Well good, I thought to myself maybe the owner came back.

I took no more than six steps on down the street when I saw a note taped to a shopping bag. I stopped and glanced shyly back towards the people coming towards me on the sidewalk. I stepped back to the bag even though I felt a little snoopy. The note was written in a beautiful hand. It read "Good CD's-classical-please take." I gasped and peered into the bag. As I peeked in I even quietly said "oh my God" outloud before turning to the umber toned three story whose occupants had left this secret gift. I had felt like I was being watched. There inside the doorway was the man who had been walking behind me who was now also turning over his shoulder as he entered the umber building. His silvered wild hair was like Beethoven himself. He looked me over trying to decern if I would be a fan of classical music. I think my dropped open mouth and prayerlike mutterings must have given him all he needed to know. He smiled and added a sincere nod before turning to go indoors.

I tied to rationalize the act as it was just too perfectly unexplainable. Here I was combing the streets for gloves to possibly save a few people from frostbitten fingers this season and I was rewarded almost immediately with 17 cd's of music created with some of the world's most talented hands. At each stoplight my hand dove into the bag to pull out recorded performances by Cedric Tiberghien, Yo- Yo Ma, San francisco and Chicago Symphany Orchestra's and more. I was stumbling home shaking my head thinking these are the albums that I would buy if I could ever justify the expense. Surely something I could never do at this moment. But maybe the most wonderful part was the three second exchange of smiles as two good deed doers crossed paths in the night.

This glove relocation is dedicated to my friend Karl whose empathy for the homeless is constant and true

My 12 Days of Christmas Day 4

Supporting a non for profit is a nice way to help keep them around. Today I gave my day to The Poetry Project. I spent the day supporting their wonderful service to writers by attending their 34th Annual New Year's Day Marathon Reading. Your ticket helps fund their projects, and all of the food items including Magnolia cupcakes were donated and their resale raised money for them too. What a wonderful way to start the New Year. I ate and listened and met some interesting people. I was inspired knowing that such things exist. Lets just say I tried to eat enough chili and baked goods to insure that there will be a number 35.

This is dedicated to the hundred poets who gave of themselves for the betterment of us all today

My 12 days of Christmas day 3

I decided to try to make up for some of my slips into dining at McDonaldland by making a conscious decision to reclaim clothes for my new wardrobe. I am in a new place and having to build a work wardrobe from almost nothing. Much of my clothing was donated to charities when I left Hawaii since tropical clothing wasn't going to help me elsewhere. I decided to try to off set crazy American consumption by buying only reclaimed clothes. It is taking patience and creativity to pull this off, but what better place to do it. I had forgotten how much black colored clothing that event companies expect you to have in your wardrobe. I feel a little bit better knowing that these clothes are getting a second chance, and they are smashing to boot.

This act of reclaiming is dedicated to my blogging buddy Cally who gently encourages us to think a little more about the earth http://callycreates.blogspot.com/