This bird crashed into my window and died on my deck. When I heard the loud thud I went outside to find this tiny body on his back with just a little life left in him. I saw him struggling and then he just gave up, there was no movement, just silence. I felt a sense of sadness as I witnessed the end of this little life. The day was warm and dreary. My deck was a deeper red than usual due to the water it had absorbed from the dense air that day. To me the wood seemed to take into its porous grain both the water from the sky and the breath from this bird; the wood seemed alive like it had a heart beat of its own while the bird lay still. I couldn't help but think a beautiful way to end things. Death is always avoided, and is thought to be the dark side of life, gruesome and ugly, but this bird left the world in style. As a witness of this transition from life to death I took a picture to capture what I can not describe in words. This is my homage to a bird, to life, loss and beauty.

ideas not to forget...goal to finish this summer

Ideas not to forget:

Photograpghy: series of contemporary obsessions. Starbucks coffee with tons of kissss. Where one writes what coffee you want you write "Please never leave me" T.V. involving reflecion...coment on reality T.V and our connection with it. Cell phones, internet...etc.

Painting: remember my water accident off my flash cards, try that see what can happen

Painting: from doodle of mother coming out of water

Painting: from doodle of figure with guitar

Photo/Painting- flowers composit to hide the fact they are flowers. Don't want to have one notice that they are pretty flowers, but rather the design you see when you look really really really close at them

Painting- take the design of the bird poop on my car and work off that. It is kinda a cool design.

Doodles to Paintings

So now that I am back in school, I am remembering the copious amounts of doodling that I do during my note taking process. I am sure this is a testiment to some sort of attention imparement but I rather like my doodles, so I will keep the ADD if thats what keeps em coming.

Here are two of my doodles that have come to full fruition as proper paintings. I have one more to do in this series, I will post that later.

Charachters in my daily routine

Do you ever have those days that seem different than others...almost surreal? Where you feel like you are inside the eye of a tornado, just sitting in silence, looking at the swirling chaos going around you?

Today that feeling was extra strong. Maybe it was because I go through the same motions all the time and eventually they come to feel automatic. I know what time to wake up every morning and what time I need to leave the house... exactly 8:02. I know my toothpaste will have the same minty flavor, my shower will slightly leak onto the floor and my dog will lick the drops of water off my leg when I get out. I know that the same voice will be on the radio when I turn my car on and that I will make the same right turns, take the same freeway exit and will use the same alarm code to get into the office. Sometimes I just want something to happen, even if its bad, to break up the monotony. I can honestly understand how Harold Ramis came up with the movie, Groundhogs Day.

Within my routine there have also entered other human beings. Like extras in a movie they stand there like cardboard cutouts with a heartbeat. Today when i went to Starbucks, which I go to about twice a week, I had an eerie feeling of being on repeat. There in the corner was the same bunch of old men who rhythmically seem to laugh on cue, then the same motorcycle cop came in with his knee high boots, waxy skin, and permanent smile to show his unnaturally white teeth. The same Starbuck's worker was standing there behind the same vitrine filled with the same pastries looking like a giant floating head full of Starbucks cheer. She is an older woman of my mothers age with a genuine smile that always makes me feel happy when talking to her. I wonder if her life has made her perfect this cheery facade, or if her smile is in fact real? I wonder why she is working here at her age? Did she have a hard life? Was she dependent on man for most of it and is now on her own with no skills other than motherhood under her belt? Or is she just bored and wanted a job where she could spread her abundance of cheer? I also wonder about the old laughing men in the corner, what is their story? Are they old friends from the past, are they a support group for widowed men, or are they a group of old homosexual swingers? What about that cop, he seems so vain in his appearance, what does he do when he is not working...does he love his boots so much that he keeps them on during sex, does he use Vaseline on his face every night to avoid wrinkles? Who are these extras that appear in my life over and over again?

I want to know their routines, and I want to know what their secrets are. What story have they written for themselves to bring them to this Starbucks where for a moment in history our lives all collide together.

For now, my imagination is all I have.