Friday, June 10, 2005

I don't want to write about what happened to Naomi. I just want to remember that I was often really curious about her ability to maintain certain positive personality attributes despite the conditions of her life. You know you're a sulk when Naomi's trying to show you the bright side. You may have been to the school of hard knocks but Naomi had the fucking docterate. Guaranteed.

In one of my first meetings with Naomi back in 1998 (for those that keep track) I learned something that brought me out of my own scope. I had met her at a place I was volunteering. She found me soon after at a studio I was involved with. We had a place called the honeycomb. 6 different studios constructed out of framing covered in chicken wire then covered in fresco. Out back was a large workshop and in front was a showplace/meeting space which we eventually opened a store in to support the art going on in the back.
It was fascinating to her. She had no idea that people made things. No idea. She had never been subject to this idea in her life. Mostly she was fascinated by the jeweller. She couldn't believe he made these intricate and detailed pieces with precious metal. In complete innocence she came day after day to see people painting, sewing, constructing, jewelling, etc. helping each other with ideas and feedback. These ideas were so foreign to her, that you could put your mind and emotion into something. That you could leave your special order tools openly on your workbench, that you could special order tools, that there were tools other than hammers and screwdrivers. That many people could pool their resources together for the good of them all, that people had resources. And the people she met that would come by were equally intriguing to her, writers, musicians, dancers, actors, carpenters...
I realized about Naomi that there were things she didn't even know to dream about or learn.
She was often offered basic methods, everyone was inspired by her questions "How did you know to want to learn how to do that?" But she wouldn't touch anything.
It wasn't the particulars of the crafts she was interested in, she just wanted to be around something different than all the crap she was used to.

Tuesday, June 07, 2005

THIS made my day...

I don't think it's good that when the sun finally finds the coast I'm living on this brown bump starts growing on my upper forehead. There it is all of a sudden this brown bump. I supoose it will be a mole in a day or 2 but I don't think they're supposed to grow that fast. What is the normal rate of mole growth? Perhaps it's a freckle, they come out pretty fast. I've been wearing my SPF everyday and eating my vitamin & free radical scavenging food, getting all my beta carotene content in but I am a pasty face and that is a big sun.
So, putting myself out there for new situations. Setting myself up to win, it unfolds itself to me in bits and pieces, this how-to does.
The new surfer dude store has the same tiki art as the hula picture here
Yep, it's the same owner you used to paint signs for Tiki at the first location. You guys have some connectioin.
All the gum packs in my house are empty. Bummer. I swallow my gum when the flavor runs out. I read on a facts & myths webpage that gum doesn't really hang out in your intestine for 7 years because xantham gum breaks down quite quickly. Still, can't be good. All the little wormies probably stick to it. Not that I expect to have little wormies in me, but you never know. The amount of fibre I've been eating lately, it'd be hard to imagine. I'm newly addicted to edamame. Cooks up in like 4 minutes. So delicious, and peanuts, I've been eating tonnes of peanuts in the shell and wild rice, the long black type. Oh, so good. And greens, bowls & bowls mixed greens.
If you were named Anna Maria Italiano at birth would you change your name to Anne Bancroft?