Start. Stop.

Discussion about Marconi and the telegraph today, out on the smoker's loading dock. None of us knew very much, mostly that he probably didn't invent macaroni or macaroons. He shared the 1909 Nobel Prize for Physics with someone. Excellent productive day at the museum, better than that even. I have to install the photography show tomorrow, labels and lights on Friday, so D and A (a box man of no equal) along with several students from the Cirque (Linda, who reads me closely, had predicted this) assembled boxes. Almost half of them. Boxes everywhere, and start locking the various components together on Friday, and I'll have the help of some young fearless acrobats for the actual installation, which starts next Tuesday. I was able to prep the galleries upstairs, then after a quick staff meeting, Sara and I set the photo show. Don't think I can quite install the whole thing tomorrow, but it is within reach. 39 pieces, 27 in the Richards gallery and 12 in the Mehser. If I get the Richards hung, I'll be in clover. I love working with Sara, learning from her with every show, and we've developed a very cryptic language that communicates a great deal of information without many words. Mostly, arranging a show is a sense of balance, but even more, a delicate sense; everything visual is at play, color, composition, relative weight, the play of light and dark, subject matter. A tangled web of things. Setting a show is not a walk in the park, it may look like a walk in the park, when it's finally installed and lit, but it isn't necessarily easy. This is the heart of the heart of it for me. I love setting and installing shows. A mystery in crates, until we un-package everything and see what we have. I finally glued down a large rock behind my keyboard, so I don't have to chase the damn thing across my desk. I'm a vicious hunter and pecker, burning through keyboards, and, as I'm at the end of the line, frying modems. I need a really good day tomorrow. I could have started hanging the show today, but I would never start hanging a show after 4:00 o'clock in the afternoon, I know I'd make too many mistakes. But tomorrow I need to be on my game, throw thirty pots after dinner, and still mow the lawn; cook a legendary meal, for legions, write a great page, and get a good night's sleep. I can still do this, but the stars have to be constellated just right, and the museum has to pay for the steak and the protein shake I'll need in the morning. D looked at me, just before we left this afternoon, asked if I was sure I could hang this show alone: sure, I said, almost a piece of cake. And that was good enough, because he trusts me. The three of us, D, Sara, and myself, are really quite the team. D selected the photos, Sara arraigned them and I will hang them, a seamless event. Both of these shows are edgy, and  D is making a point, and Sara is going along with it. And it's good, I think, that the younger teach the older something. Samara calls and we're on the same wavelength, we're tight that way, what one of us thinks. The conversation flows, one thing into another.
 
Tom
 
What did Glenn say, we didn't have our usual five hour conversation.