8/7
Jentel Foundation, Banner WY
Today breakfast in Sheridan at the Silver Spur. I saw a man at the counter eating a half dozen or so scrambled eggs smothered in thick white gravy. It was reminiscent of the Big Horns with a fresh coat of snow. Reminded me also of shit on a shingle – as my grandfather called it – which evidently one has to eat a lot of in the army. The Spurs’ claim to fame is that their sweet bun is about as big as a rather large middle aged one – bun that is. The pancakes are the size of Frisbees. A short stack takes about a week to sleep off – anything else should be nicknamed the Rip Van Winkle stack.
I am now the proud owner of a coyote – or coyot’ as they call them in these here parts – only the furry part not the internals. To most of you this should come as no surprise. I was really hoping for a fox but I guess no one has shot one lately. No I don’t really have a plan for it yet but I will let you know.
We had Jentel presents the other evening, so went to town to hang out with the locals. Ravi Shankar (no relation) spoke about his poetry writing education as a mandatory delving into the subconscious in search of the true inner voice. I could not help but think this art practice was comparable to bobbing for apples. Hands behind the back, dunking into a bucket of the primordial goo kept in the brain’s back room. What one wrenches forth -impaled on sharpened teeth – could emerge a shining apple, or oil-slick with a sinister distortion of rot. I think my pictures have a bit of both, wouldn’t want anyone to feel left out.
Spent the morning trying to better decipher the word postmodernist. The act of defining seems somehow less than Protean – would a true Postmodernist call themselves one? Would a deconstructionist really construct a term in order to assuage the chaos? Is that what they tell their moms?
i.e.:
Madame Derrida: “Jacques, votre chambre est un vrai fouillis!”
Jacques: “Maman, je suis une deconstruction!”
Oui!
And in case you can’t figure my internet French – trans:
Madame Derrida: “Jacques your room is such a mess!
Jacques: “But mom, I’m a deconstructionist!”
I can hear Nina in the next room talking to her paintings. I have nicknamed her The Paint Whisperer.
Painting is boring, might need to make scones. Want to make scones but do not want to share scones. Hmmm…complicated. Want to have scones many breakfasts much more than esteem and appreciation from the scone eating masses. Will have to make lots and lots of scones to assuage hording instinct.
In front of me I have a picture of my folks’ dog Wendel running through the snow in a yellow jumper which they sent to me in a cure homesickness package. It is tacked to the wall next to a St. Exupery Little Prince card
which says:
‘I have always loved the desert. One sits down on a desert sand dune, sees nothing, hears nothing. Yet through the silence something throbs, and gleams’
This I like a lot – except the word ‘desert’ has the habit of throwing me into a pondery as to whether one s or two, and so like desert is dessert. Forrest forest does the same except one is a tree filled wood which is nice and the other is a person’s name and as I don’t know anyone so named it does not spark much reflection. Whereas dessert brings us on back to scones which though they are great for breakfast can be equally delicious as an after meal sweet…