just another manic wednesday

So the bbq shindigger: Ariana's friend Eric brought over his rig. And by rig, I do mean bar-b-q although that seems a mighty small word for such a block-sized piece of grilling wonder. I mean, wow. Another friend went and picked it up, and transported it by loading it onto his trailer. I mean...wow. I'm not finger-wagging, just wow-ing. Ariana won't own a grill on account of personal/environmental/ethical reasons, and I can dig. What I love about her is that she will still occasionally eat top ramen even though she's vegetarian and has her moral compass firmly ensconced. We all do our thing, ya know?

And I am sure that the neighbors roll their eyes when they see my plastic bags hanging on the line out back on the porch. Well, hey. I don't buy garbage bags; instead, I occasionally respond, "Plastic" at the check out line and use those. And I put chard in them at the Kiva, to transport them home, and then rinse and dry and re-use.

I visited Chris Jordan's site just now. Here is one of his photographs. I dare you to go and look at the gallery.

This "Depicts 60,000 plastic bags, the number used in the US every five seconds." (artist quote) There are detail photos and others....I really appreciate how the photos look like so much noise, until you see the englarged zoom-ins. Of course they're meant to be viewed in person because the sheer size is a surefire way to get the message across. This one is of course more impressive if you go to his detail photos. I think this particular show is in Seattle next month, or maybe July.



by Chris Jordan © 2007.

Tell me. Why are we still on the planet? Why haven't we done ourselves in already? I think THAT is the miracle.

I watched Bjork's Pagan Poetry video first, and then headed over to Chris Jordan's online gallery. This video of Bjork's, in particular, never fails to impact me. I watch it every so often and I always shiver, get serious chills...I mean my skin crawls with goosebumps...and usually I cry. She's so raw, and by that I don't mean unrefined. Fierce. Holy fuck.

So I was already primed, in a way, when I saw Chris Jordan's photos (I'd seen one before, last week I think, on Drawn!). I'm feeling stunned. Wanting to rage and weep, feeling kinda vulnerable after my hit of Bjork because she allows herself vulnerability...maybe 'allow' isn't even the right word....I hope I'm not immobilized for very long, and when I am mobilized, I can focus on what's good and right in the world, and keep doing my art.

Which brings me around to what I've been thinking about and it becoming more clear to me, about selling on Etsy and CafePress and shit like that. Uh....I'm not exempt from consumerism...but it's hard for me to be adding to the total mass sum of Stuff On The Planet, though. Some existential crisis going on about this. Good to be noticing.