Making Treasure Maps

Falling Like Water

Summer 2009 Paintings

Line in Light

 

Line in Water

Eric requested that I make him a painting, so I painted two and gave him a choice. He picked Line in Light, and I gave the other one to mom.

New York City 5-09

I was lost in nearly every part of New York City. I took this picture while I was lost in Central Park. How do you get lost in Central Park? Exactly. I even got lost in QUEENS. Why was I even IN Queens? Yeah. It's a special talent of mine, apparently.

I was in New York for six days, which was technically the same length of time I was in Puerto Rico in February, but for some reason I feel like I was only there for like five minutes. No time for rest or introspection. I don't know what happened.

My doula training was awesome. I did huge massive amounts of walking, usually aimlessly. I did not document or process the trip really at all. I'm not even sure I was there. Good times!

My Overall Impression of New York

Like the center of the universe. And it made me thirsty.

Crowded places make me feel lonely. I had been feeling really drawn to New York for a while, and part of me was like, oh, god, what if I go there and I'm like I HAVE TO LIVE HERE. But that didn't really happen. I did enjoy myself, and I do like it, but it all felt sort of like an out of body experience. I wasn't really IN New York. I was watching it, like through a barrier of some kind.

Like watching the gorillas that time at the Denver zoo through a glass wall. It was cool. But I can't say I have experienced life as a gorilla, know what I mean?

A great New York moment: I walked up to this slicked back hair, tough looking (but like New York tough, not like scary) dude and asked him if he had a lighter. And he looked at me with kind of a cocky grimace, handed me his cigarette, and said, "I ain't got Swine Flu. Not yet anyway." With that awesome tough guy accent.

It was amazing. I felt like I'd just had an encounter with some kind of wildlife. Like I'd just spotted a manatee out in the marina while I ate breakfast or something.

My Impression of MOMA

Museum of Modern Art. What a confusing place.

Now that I know what art is (and if some of that stuff was art, I honestly don't think there is anything in this world that isn't art, which is reassuring to an artist like myself - much less chance of failure) I intend to create art at all times and in all manners with absolute reckless abandon.

From what I've seen, I believe that part of the trick to getting art into a museum is that it needs to be a thing that is so hugely oversized that it will only FIT into a museum. My first project will be a twenty-five foot taco constructed entirely out of recycled sheet metal, crude oil, and butternut squash. With holes the size of my lunch and ego.

My Impression of Walking Around

New Yorkers walk around looking straight ahead. The rest of us walk around looking straight up. There's just so much to look at up there!

There's a part of me that is like, how can they not look up? I know you stop seeing the things you look at every day, but could you really stop seeing huge hulking skyscrapers and some of the most famous and beautiful landmarks in the world? I suppose. Like the way I stop seeing Avenue C. Rockefeller Center. Gateway Fashion Mall. Empire State Building. Medcenter One. Whatever...

My Impression of St. Patty's Cathedral

I've never seen so many collection boxes for such a variety of causes ranging from good to fine to questionable ("For The Poor" said the gold-encrusted box) in a single church before. And a gift shop. In the church. What?!? My question: how many dollars did it take to rub the letters off of this collection box? Think about it. A lot of dollars.

So Many Dead Animals, So Little Time

A cold rainy day forced me into the American Museum of Natural History, where I saw a truly staggering number of dead animals. The worst: a display containing four Labrador Ducks, which are now extinct. I bet the guy who made that display feels like a jackass.

So Long and Thanks for all the Coffee

Here are Rodolfo and Marisol, my hostel bffs, in Times Square only moments before we went to the Hard Rock Cafe and got drunk. Arriba los Chihuahuenses!

Thank you, New York, it was a pleasure. I loved your taxis (especially the one that drove by and splashed me as I stood at a rainy bus stop and made me suddenly wonder if I was on a Hollywood sound stage built to look like New York) and I loved your super shwanky rich people and your pigeons and all the pizza that was probably delicious but I couldn't eat it so I had to eat hamburgers without the bread instead.

I loved your fancy businessmen, especially when they were riding on the subway. I loved never knowing what language anyone would speak. I loved feeling very seen, and also completely invisible, at the same time.

I hope we can be friends. And next time, maybe not so much of strangers. What a beautiful city!