Last week, on our final day in Minnesota, we caught the much-anticipated show Radical Presence: Black Performance in Contemporary Art at the Walker. I haven't seen such bad-ass collection of work in a fine art establishment since visiting PAMM in Miami. Some of my favorites of the show included the following:
One of my former backup singers, Nicole Sangusuree Barrett was struck by a car and killed last week while attending a Buddhist education course in Chang Mai, Thailand. I didn't know Nicole at all when she came over to my house to rehearse for the Traffic Backup performance, but she had a lightness and humor that instantly made it easy to work with her. On top of being a songstress extraordinaire, she was also an activist, artist and poet, advocating for LGBT rights and sustainability. She will be missed indeed.
It's my birthday today. I'm either 12 or 4 or 37 or 69. I'm all of these ages wrapped up in frizzy ombré hair, tuckered hazel eyes and a wiggly scar or two. I've chosen to work today, so I'll mostly be sitting at a desk downtown, designing web layouts involving smiling children in poppy colored clothing. Afterwards I'll buy cupcakes and watch my daughter pretend that my birthday is really hers.
It's been nearly a month since I last updated this blog. The reasons behind this little absence of mine vary:
I've been concentrating on healing my knee, which now bends to a whopping 115 degrees, but also requires tremendous efforts to strengthen my puny, atrophied quadracep. In doing this, I'm learning more about my own everyday choreography. I feel each step, turn and subtle knee bend as though I'm looking through a microscope to do so. These subtle actions, and the slowing down my body has forced me to do over the last 3 months, have planted seeds for all sorts of creative projects and has clarified and rounded out some of the concepting for current projects (such as Process Mundane and Musical of an Average Day). So again, I've accepted this broken knee situation and am doing my best to find the invitations it provides.
I still have to wear the brace pictured above while walking in crowded public areas, while dancing with tribal conquistadors, while hiking in the woods, and while trekking across smoky desert plains. At least that's what my physical therapist says.
I'm thinking of my stinky, sweaty brace as the hottest new trend for fall and have decided to wear it alone, with only the hide of a civet to cover my upper regions.
The other reason behind my absence was a much-needed trip to Bemidji, Minnesota where my older sister lives with her partner Angie and there 3 kiddos (my nieces and nephew), four dogs, three cats and 38 acres of frolicky fields. It was a whirlwind trip, and I didn't get much sleep, but the kid creatures had fun getting to know one and other and the Mosquitos had fun getting to know me.
