Take Down

Uninstalled the pottery show, 11 or 12 pedestals with bonnets, 3 shelves, 50 or so pieces. This is the first breakable, 3D, I'd installed solo, so that in the use of museum wax, to assure myself nothing would fall if accidentally bumped, I probably erred on the side of using too much. We use single-item mini-peds to vary heights when several items are on a single ped. Small painted boxes, blocks of 4x4, plexi holders and shelves. At one point today D was getting a pot for us to wrap and when he picked it up, with a slight twist to free it from wax-attachment, the mini-ped came away with it. Talk about secure. The good news is that nothing broke. Remembering back, I spent an entire day making small balls of Museum Wax and setting the pieces. I sing the virtues of this stuff, it's micro-crystalline structure, can't remember the label exactly, but it stays flexible forever, is aggressively tacky, doesn't stain, is archival, clearly a very good mouse-trap. I've mentioned before, but worth noting, I'm so old that when I started in theater, we used mortician's wound filler. So maybe I used too much, to be on the safe side. Maybe an ounce, total, rolled into maybe 99 or even 66, small balls. Downside is that I have to spend part of tomorrow, while D returns pots to Springfield, de-waxing philosophical. Nothing broke, but how much less could I use? I don't know how to find an answer, I do, really, but how could you learn without breaking art? Err on the side of caution. Nonetheless, too much wax. Remember, my training is theater, and actors are sometimes awkward, so we tended to screw things down. Emily said:

Nothing is the force
That renovates the World.

We could argue meaning forever, or could agree she was talking about nothing. I tend to trust my fellow inmates, we have similar tats, which implies something. You thought I knew. For the record, I didn't know, I just look at things. You have to allow, I'm a simple observer. I merely watch, what I see might be merely actual. How much time do you have, we could talk about about this forever.

Phone out again, the dead burned trees on Mackletree falling in every high wind. Verizon has promised a crew to clear the hazards, but I'm the only phone for a two mile stretch, and the end of the line, so not high on the list. De-waxing philosophical went well, step one is scraping with a dead credit card (the stiff plastic we all carry) and I have a Discover Card I didn't ask for that was canceled from lack of use. I keep it in my wallet for odd jobs, it's opened many doors. Step two is wiping, forcefully, with a cotton cloth; step three is cleaning with Orange Cleaner. The ped tops will need repainting, but they always do, especially after a pottery show, marks and scars. Maybe two hours cleaning something that I might not have needed to clean, had I not, let's say, over-waxed. No big deal, fact is I'm happy to be doing it, nothing broken. "I love talking about nothing... it's the only thing I know anything about." Oscar Wilde. "Nothingness lies coiled in the heart of being --- like a worm." Jean-Paul Sartre. A couple of breaks, during the de-waxing, for a smoke on the loading dock with Sara, discussing the state of the museum, what could be done for whom, in support. One thing that makes our relationship so special is that there is no vested interest, we both just love the museum. Speaking of love, or at least lust, I was thinking about beauty, docenting a lovely German exchange student through the main gallery, her English as good as mine, except for colloquialisms, which threw her, and her laugh was a lovely thing, reverberating in the open space. I wanted to get her a green card, marry her, and have her organize my library. nothing wrong with a brief fantasy. She left with her keeper and I went outside for a smoke. I'm thinking about beauty, probably just in an iconic sense, SI, February, being cynical, and in the parking lot across the way, in pulls a tinted Camaro, I don't know the year, I don't keep up, and this lady steps away. This is my point here, she's nothing really special, not even the most attractive woman on the block, but she walks like she means it. Her carriage is beautiful, she flows, and I stare at her because she demands presence: fuck, how could you not? And it's because of the way she moves, she inhabits her body, and because she does, she becomes beautiful, she fills that breaking crest of a wave. You and your little board coming through the tube, as if that was something, she is, you, my friend, are a dream. My intent was just to be obvious. I'm sorry if I don't respond quickly enough. Listen, that world, out there, is important. What I might call up. I like, for instance, the way I'm called.

Tom

I have to go now.