in memory

Today was the big day. Carrie and I, in the interview we had done about the fence, invited everyone in the community to join us and participate in writing and hanging the names. We really didn't think anyone would show up... as I would find throughout the morning, my silly assumptions were generally wrong.

The man who had started hanging the flowers and the flags years ago (who we just met last week) brought the table. And when 20 people showed up almost before we even got out of the car, he went to get another table and more chairs.

When we started this project years ago, we weren't sure the community would stand for it. But right away the flags and the flowers started showing up. We weren't happy about the flags at all. We feared instantly that our project was being hijacked by this mob mentality that was spawned by 9-11 that began to use flags as band aids for everything. We wanted to tear them down.

It was one of the first questions we had to face on this thing. And we made an agreement that no matter what happened we wouldn't interfere with whatever anyone else did. It was now a conversation.

Well, it turns out that the flag guy we dreaded for years is the sweetest guy there is. And not pro war. In fact, he was a conscientious objector during Vietnam. He was a different kind of vet... and he reminded me that it's my flag too.

Another woman, who we hadn't met until today, was putting up signs that read WE LOVE OUR HERO'S (yes, with the incorrect grammar). Those signs with their glaring mistakes drove us nuts for 3 years. These signs wouldn't go away. They are even out there now. If one fell or disappeared, a new one would follow it, this time laminated... she was evolving her technique, just not her grammar.

Anyway, we met her too finally. A nice older woman... four brothers who served in WWII. 2 Nephews in Iraq right now. She came up and kindly asked if it was okay that she put her four brothers' names on the fence... (and i'm bitching about grammar? sheesh)

So all these people show up. All different kinds. The guy in the photo with the crazy flag shirt. He was first with his wife. I saw him and in my head a little voice was saying, "oh shit, it's going to be that kind of crowd."

but it wasn't. Next came a lesbian couple. Then an asian woman, some bikers... all kinds. They came and they dove right in.

Besides the cars driving by, you could hear a pin drop. It was like study hall. I could see them having that same feeling Carrie and I did when we would sit and meditate on each name as we wrote it. I could see them wondering who this person was? what were they like? did they have kids? that realization point... shit. people are dying over there. (horribly, more than just the names on this fence...)

at one point i walked up to the table to get more names to hang, and a woman writing stopped suddenly and i heard her say to herself with a quiet shock, "i know this guy." I took a big breath. I remembered the day i wrote my friend's name down only to realize what i had just done.

And the day was like that. This action of writing and hanging the names one by one in the cover of night... suddenly all of these people were doing these actions, as if we had been cloned, in the middle of the day... we never really showed them how to do it, not that it's complicated, but it was if information had passed on its own, through something porous.

We had expected to be there all day. But these people... they wrote and hung 1000 names to bring the fence up to date in one hour.

A lot of my fellow art bloggers are discussing art and what and who it is for. I think I have my answer. Painting is what it is. And galleries. And the bubble. And Art Inc. And they have a place, don't get me wrong. But in the US especially, where most are living on some magnetic track that takes them to work and to the mall and home like a ride at disneyland that you can steer but not derail (perfectly titled "Autopia"), to be fascinated again is all that we are silently yearning for. To participate. To have, as Joseph Campbell says, an experience of living.

Magic is not magic. According to my computer, it's just "a quality that that makes something seemed removed from everyday life, especially in a way that gives delight." I'm not sure it needs to be delightful as much as a real experience of living. An interruption of "life" with life: