Upbeat. Downbeat.

I've got an upbeat half and a downbeat half of this post.  I suppose I should start with the downbeat, to finish on a happier note.

Last night we had a terrific evening display of heat lightning. John and I sat on the back patio in the close, breathless summer night and watched the lightning flash across the sky. Each flash illuminated a different layer of clouds that seemed to swirl overhead in a great spiral. We hoped for rain, but of course none came. 

I dreamed dark dreams of conflict and frustration, and woke to John gently laying his hand on my shoulder to remind me that I needed to take him to work before 7.  Honestly, I was glad to get up, to escape the dreams, which left a sort of pall over my mind, though I couldn't remember them specifically.  Before I had quite shaken off the dreams, John told me about the theater shootings in Colorado last night.

We both just sat there on the patio, shaking our heads and looking up at the sky and the trees. So peaceful there. Full of sunlight and birdsong and the busy bossiness of Kobi strutting around the yard. It's hard to come to grips with something so violent and stupid and senseless.  Among the dead, a six year old child. Among the wounded, a three-month old baby.... I've been a bit somber all day.

Add to this the news I received earlier this week that a friend of mine's brother was killed by stray gunfire from a gang shooting. He was standing inside a Best Buy store in Tulsa, with his ten-year-old daughter.  The horror of that leaves me cold still.  What that poor little girl went through, and will carry with her for the rest of her life.  She was just a year younger than Grayson. It strangles me. There are no words for that grief.

On a happier note, however...


I've been much more content at work the past couple of weeks and I realized recently what the cause of that contentment was.  I've been learning things.

The past week I've been engaged in several writing projects that required research and/or interviews into areas hitherto unknown. I've researched several paintings for an article I was writing, and did background research on an artist, Max Ferguson, whom I later did an hour-long interview with by phone. He was in Israel, which was cool, and he gave a nice, friendly interview.  I get nervous when I do artist interviews. I'm always afraid I'm going to say something really stupid, since I'm no art historian or art expert of any kind. But I'm assiduous about my background research, I write down tons of questions in advance, and then I do my best to channel NPR's Terri Gross when the time comes to pick up the phone. Once we get started it's usually okay, but I still sweat through the whole thing.

A high point of this week for me was the privilege of shadowing a pair of conservators who have been visiting the museum all week to do some first aid on a few of the paintings in our collection. I've seen natural history conservation, of course, but I knew only a very little bit about art conservation, so it was interesting to  get to hang around and ask questions.  I got to see them work on a painting that was more than 200 years old, and saw them administer a number of treatments, from simple surface cleaning to in-painting of cracks and little bits of lost paint to more in-depth things like applying adhesives to secure paint that had come loose from its canvas.  All of it was incredibly focused, close, and repetitive work.  I don't know how either of them has any eyesight at all. But they were easy-paced and patient and the tedium of the tasks didn't seem to phase them at all.  It was a pleasure to engage them in conversation as they worked. I learned all kinds of things.

And that seems to be key.  I enjoy writing, of course. That's what I'm here for. But I think I get the greatest pleasure out of gathering information prior to the writing. I'm learning things. My brain sort of lights up. It's like the old Robert Louis Stevenson poem:  "The world is so full of a number of things. I'm sure we should all be as happy as kings."