The restorative effects of vacation almost can't be overstated. After a week in Vermont and a week in Vancouver, I feel refreshed and at least a little refueled. Reminded of the value of a hard stop every now and then, and of laughter. Which brings me back to Vancouver, where my favorite piece of public art adorns a corner of Stanley Park on English Bay. 14 bronze sculptures of a man laughing. Simple. A little silly. But it makes me feel good every time I visit and, now that I've been there a few times, every time I see a photo of it. The inscription around the base of one of the cement benches that ring the artwork: "May this sculpture inspire laughter, playfulness, and joy in all who experience it." Yup.
ahh, vacation
Two weeks. Starting tomorrow.
See you on September 9 or so.
god speed
"God speed, Screw-On Head."
It might be my favorite line of dialogue in American literature. It's from the one-off comic book The Amazing Screw-On Head by Mike Mignola, who is better known for the Hellboy series.
I'm not a comic aficionado, but every now and then one captures my imagination, and Screw-On Head did it. He's an agent for President Abraham Lincoln (who speaks the line). He's a robot head that screws on to different bodies to suit the occasion. (Talk about vulnerability.) And he's on the trail of Emporer Zombie, who's looking to gain supernatural powers from a stolen "melon-sized jewel." Fear not, Screw-On Head is on the case.
on dancing and vandalism
I'm not categorically championing vandalism. I'm just saying some vandalism is an act of creativity, that a society without such creativity is a society without mischief, and that a society without mischief is a less vibrant place to live. Keep dancing.
this slow trek to discover
"A man's work is nothing but this slow trek to discover through the detours of art those two or three great and simple images in whose presence the heart first opened."
– Albert Camus
... in whose presence the heart first opened. Yeah. I believe that. It resonates. And I have two thoughts about that (and only two, today):
1. For me, no artist embodied that more fully – more beautifully – than the late Russian filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky.
2. I am still in search of my images. I can feel them, but I can't yet, even after all this time, articulate them. I think that's part of what keeps me writing. And it reminds me I still have work to do in terms of opening my heart.
5 summer songs
Every summer, there are songs I can't get enough of. Walking with my ear buds in, driving with the sun roof open, I play them again and again with seemingly endless capacity for repeat (which my daughter, at least, marvels at – and not in a good way).
This summer's endlessly repeatables:
"Diane Young," Vampire Weekend
While this song is blasting through the speakers, I'm not worried about my own mortality.
"Keeper," Shovels & Rope
Easily the happy discovery of my summer. Thirteen seconds into this track, when the kick drum makes itself felt, joining electric guitar, harmonica, and tambourine, I grin every time. 3:43 of delicious back-porch stomp.
"Weight," Mikal Cronin
Pure hard-pop bliss. Thanks to Phil Wilcox at Tres Gatos for this one.
"Troublemaker," Camera Obscura
Yes, I could listen to Tracyanne Campbell's voice all day no matter what she's singing. But this breezy-jazzy bit of mischief is a favorite from their new record.
"New Mexico's No Breeze," Iron and Wine
Speaking of breezy-jazzy beauty...
they're building a Tesla museum (and I got a tour)
Yup. Those crazy people at the Tesla Science Center at Wardenclyffe have pulled it off. Undaunted by how unlikely and unrealistic their dream seemed (long-abandoned property, $1M price tag, need for serious clean-up, etc.), they said, what the hell. We want to make a museum happen. Let's try.
Two years and one wildly successful, cartoonist-fueled Internet fundraising campaign later, they own the property and are in the midst of a series of Saturday morning clean-ups.
And I got to visit (with my adventure-loving wife)! And talk to two of the board members, Chris and Margaret. And get a tour of the property. Pretty awesome.
Pursue those dreams. Because why not. Because sometimes they actually come true. Me, I can't wait to visit a working museum down the road. And I was thrilled to get to wander the grounds in their semi-haunted, fully disheveled pre-reclaimed state.
Right now it looks like this
Someday it will look like this again (except, you know, modern)
