Travels

I've been traveling and not writing, although the ideas are spinning through my head. Saw a fantastic exhibit at the National Museum of the American Indian, of an artist who really impressed me. It was not so much his style that did it, but his integrity. He was consistently who he was. Fritz Scholder. He allowed his art to flow from his life in the moment. That is what I'd like my writing to do, and often, it does. In one series of images, he made skull images with spilled Coke and his own blood, on hotel memo note paper. It's provocative, fleeting, and something I will never personally do. I'd be too afraid they'd figure out a way to use my DNA and re-create me at some moment in the future when wearing polyester would be mandatory.

In a way, though, I completely understand it. From what it said beside the art, his health was in decline and he was facing his own mortality. Every moment that we exhale, we ought to be contemplating our own mortality, but denial kicks in and we go blissfully in the direction of thinking about something mundane.