Things

These are just some things I’ve had kicking around for awhile. The first photo is all of my little brother’s unwanted soccer and science fair trophies. I took them apart to remove the little plastic genie lamps and soccer players, and I took off the name plates. I don’t know what, if anything, I’m going to do with them, but they’re nice things to have around. I’ve actually never won a trophy, though I’ve always wanted to. Quite desperately. I’ve won a few ribbons (for some reason they’re always pink. I don’t know what that’s about), but never any trophies. I don’t know what I would have gotten a trophy for, mind you, but that’s really neither here nor there.

I’m beginning to think that, if all of my work were to be shown together, it would have the effect of resembling nothing so much as a kind of pathetic, miscarried child’s birthday party (that was meant to mean a miscarried party for a child, not a party for a miscarried child, but either sort of works… though the second reading is way creepier). Between the sadly distorted party decorations and the ambiguously dead stuffed animals,  it’s all getting to be a bit too melodramatic for my liking.

The second photo are some things of Mom’s that I gathered together. The blue saucer on the left is from, I believe, a tea set that she had as a girl (it was in a box with all of her old dolls); the one on the right is a piece she bought a couple years ago, when she was very much into collecting Limoges porcelain. The tag at the bottom is one of her old calling cards. There was a nearly-full box of them in her office. I don’t think calling cards were that frequently given by the time the 60s came around.

I don’t know if I want fix everything in place and seal it up (the box is the backing for a shadowbox frame), make it a “piece,” or whatever. It’s just nice to have. There is sort of a Perfect Lovers feel to it, as it stands, which I appreciate. But I just don’t know. I don’t really have a framework in mind for working with found objects. I’m pretty rooted in labor. Meticulous, repetitive labor. So things like these feel like cheating. Which, in a way, they are.

Anyway, speaking of Félix González-Torres, if you haven’t seen my friend Jack’s work, I think it would be worth your while. “Friend” is a bit of an overstatement–mostly we spent three years at school just smiling awkwardly at one another whenever we’d pass, but, suffice it to say, I think his work is probably the best that I’ve seen come out of MICA in… ever. Anyway, the connection is just that there are González-Torres references throughout. The work is very smart. And cold. But also incredibly sweet, more often than not. Basically, it’s everything I wish my work was.

So that’s that.

May 13

Oh, but it’s all up and down today. I don’t remember how I fared last Mother’s Day, but this time around the constant barrage of last minute gift-idea and weekend-sale ads are really getting to me. Mom’s been in all of my dreams for at least the past week, but it’s really not so bad. The dreams used to oftentimes be quite violent, and she’d usually be quite sick in them; I’d wake up in real distress every time I had one, doubly so because not only were the dreams themselves unpleasant, but I’d have to remind myself each time I woke up that she was really gone. The ones I have now seem to be getting more mundane–pleasant trips to whacked-out dream-time shopping malls, airports, hotels and whatnot (I don’t know why it’s always large public places; probably means I need to get out more), and she’s appearing healthy and at her old weight. It’s actually nice, like being able to spend time with her again.

But still, today’s a bit rough; I’ve been rollercoastering between giddy excitement and protracted sobbing jags. We’re stepping up the packing and cleaning process: dad seems to want to have the place ready to have movers (for an estimate) and a realtor in by the end of this coming week. We’ve got landscapers coming in this week; repairmen are coming to fix the tile and deck around the pool. It makes sense, I suppose. The plan is to move to Oxford some time in mid-June, so it stands to reason that moving would be in high gear. Still, it’s patently bizarre, preparing to permanently move out of the only permanent “home” I’ve had since… 1994, I guess we moved in? Much more so because it means I won’t have a place in Florida to come back to. What’s more, deciding what to keep or pitch of my own belongings is harrowing enough, but I suspect that packing mom’s office, which has been more or less untouched since she died, is going to be considerably worse. Because, though I would really like to keep all of the old books on paleontology and palynology and whatnot, it’s clear that neither I nor anyone else is ever going to read them.

So, anyway, Mother’s Day + moving + grad school have conspired to put an edge on everything.

Yesterday I got an email with my TA position and preliminary committee (new media with Sigi Torinus. My friend Susan speaks highly of her; I’m just worried that I’m going to be mostly in the way, since I know little to nothing about “new media art” except a fair amount of the software). Also, for the first time I know the names of the other people who’ll be starting the program with me. Sadly, my efforts at Google-stalking haven’t yielded much. There’s one guy, who I think is more or less my age, who has/is a band, and another guy who has paintings up at the Saatchi thing, who seems nice (that assessment being based on the fact that I think he “looks friendly”) and just graduated with his BFA. I wasn’t able to track down any of the three women (Nadia, Marzenna, and Henrejeta–such good names!). Well, one girl was on Facebook and had a one-line mention as a theatrical set painter. Didn’t friend-request since that seemed… weird, somehow. Her profile picture was her (I assume) in a geisha costume and makeup (…). So not much to go by. My not-so-secret hope is that there’s at least one keener in the group who’ll be all “yay! let’s all get to know each other! and be best friends! an give each other pedicures!” so that… I don’t have to. I hadn’t thought until now to try and track down the second-year candidates; that will be next on the agenda. We were also instructed to put together a CD of ten or so images to present when we get there, but every time I’ve tried to think ahead that far, I’ve started dry-heaving.

The reality that I’m going to be moving somewhere hundreds of miles away from everyone I know, to a program with only eleven people in it, is starting to set in. Cam called midday and I actually cried out, “but what if nobody likes me?” in between sobs. That’s something that only people in sitcoms say. But really, what if?

Anyway. It’s clearly time to return to my personal Lord of the Rings movie marathon, because if I think any more about any of these things, or, indeed, the ottoman-humping youtube videos, I’m going to get a migraine. Because miming the boning of furniture while wearing… surgical masks and latex gloves (as shown in the second link), it absolutely and utterly beyond my capacity to interpret.