Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Personal Resolution:

Take a week’s vacation (Spring Break) from the internet.

Adbusters’ Digital Detox week is April 21-26, but I figure I’ll need the interweb more during that time, for work and class and the hustle-bustle. Must also admit, I do like the idea of relishing my hiatus while everyone else is still plugged in.

Just fatigued by: hundreds of copies of digital, pixilated versions of art flying by me every day.

I’m planning to spend time… a lot of time… looking at individual pieces of art, individual sections of photographs, individual brushstrokes. Watching bugs make tiny, strenuous journeys and letting flavors rest idly on my tongue (eating while rushing somewhere or during a ten-minute break will not occur).

And reading individual sentences. Words.

I’ve been troubled by my waning ability to retain anything. It’s not chronic indolence- a need to speed up, do more, see more. I need to slow down. Look longer.

We learn the most when we are kids, before we forget how enchanting everything is. Or, maybe, before we forget how to let everything enchant us. My mom told me that when I was a little tot, I could sit on the living room floor for hours, fascinated by a single strand of yarn in the carpet.

The things I’d give up to return to the flashes of connections and experiments buzzing in my little, bald head- definitely include a week of internet.

Friday, March 5, 2010

Life's little uPS AND DOwns


I am exhausted. Or, 'expahhred,' as I would say if I were a belle from the south.

I decided today to reclaim ownership of my blog and type a few things down.

Exhausted in that sort of light, giddy way, especially with the sun shining as it is and my hour of sleep in my back pocket, or rather, in my coat pocket, as the dress I am wearing today has no pockets, and I think may have been sewn experimentally, something I adore about it. It has too much fabric at the back of the neck around the zipper- easily remedied by a sweater over top- and two buttons on the front that do not match.

In class today, I learned about ceramics and earthenware- history, technique, glazes and slips, kilns, and the lot- Archaic Greek black figure pottery was made by filtering clay which contained iron and carbon and then cutting off and reintroducing oxygen while it was firing, incredibly complex- then polished my rings and bracelet with jewelers' rouge while we discussed silver.

On my walk from class to the Henry, I watched a crow toss a little slug into his mouth and gobble it down. I am generally averse to crows, I find them to be frighteningly intelligent (crow's have the ability to recognize individual people), but that slug looked.. tasty.

I think soon, though, I will be tired in the heavy, achy way that I'm almost certain you can only climb back up from after a hug and some sleep.