Taking the Brain by Storm....

    Tonight we are discussing our group project. Wondering how to influence the nature of our audience's response and the cause and affect dynamic. Addressing aspects of environmentalism and the participants place in the interaction with Art as a facilitating medium creates BIG questions and a multitude of possibilities.

    I fantasize about the concept of engaging the audience in the "Life-Jacket" way.... where the components don't seem to be much until you actually assemble them and feel the whole weight of the piece, and actually see it for what it is.... whatever that may be for each viewer. The experience and process itself, the comradarie or the standing back and realizing the completion of something unimagined.  

    Defining the perimeters of  this project will be a challenge and delight, for the class is filled with Artists who are engaged in many different aspects of the creative process here at UAS.  

Every day I must try to be the best I can be...but above all I must dare to fail, for when I dare to fail...I dare to succeed.

This evening I will attempt to insert the following link

 http://juneauempire.com/jazz/randall.shtml 

Last Night Great heaps Of Snow Fell From The Sky

• Years ago when my mother was a younger woman, and all of my children were small, she would come to visit me twice a year. My father would come too. For him it didn't mater what time of year it was, because his self appointed tasks were to chop firewood and do dishes. Afterwards he would sit in the living room, in the brown chair listening to the fire snap while he read his book. And every afternoon he would take a nap. In the summer my mother would busy herself with yard work. 
• In Alaska, in the summer, things grow all the time, even at night. My mother harvested the beach-grass we used for a front lawn, like she was a basket-maker, (she was not). After she got done with that she set about to tidy up the forest. She cleared away the sticks and branches that the winter-winds had carelessly tossed to the ground with a vigor and determination that commonly lay dormant until company came for a visit. She would stand back and admire her labor and will it to stay tidy, (it did not)
• Winter visits brought a different kind of energy. We stoked the wood-stove continuously day and night. Below the ice the creek still ran. Hauling water involved chopping a hole in the ice at the deep part of the creek. At the beginning of winter we tied a length of clothes line onto a galvanized bucket, and lowered it through the hole. Inevitably water slopped over the edge because the bucket always seemed to catch on the edge of the hole as it re-emerged. As the winter progressed the hole got smaller as the ice got thicker, and water was acquired by kneeling on the thick ice and reaching down through the hole to scoop the water, one "camp-cup" at a time, into the waiting bucket. 
• Late at night after everyone in the house was asleep, my mother and I would venture out into the night to shovel snow. We scooped great heaps of snow. Whispering, luminous snow that waited in the still, quiet darkness of the night.   It felt like the whole world was asleep and unaware, save for us. Three-hundred and fifty feet of the earth provided us the opportunity of shoveling snow. We took special care to shovel and scrape down as close to the earth as possible. The more snow we could remove the less ice would develop when the rains came again. When the surface met with our satisfaction, we went back and  tidied-up the edges along driveway and the trail that led to the house. Then invigorated, but weary we gloated with pride as we stood back and admired our artful accomplishment like it would stay that way forever, (it did not). 
• Last night great heaps of snow fell from the sky. My mother is 89 years old now. In the winter when I talk to her on the telephone I remind her of  the times when we would shovel in the still, quiet  night.  I can hear her smile, and feel our togetherness, as she sings out: "Oh yes... we did do that. I used to shovel snow."

Home Away From Home

Pondering The Role of New Media Narrative In My Life

Tonight 

I am aware that saving the world

one smile at a time 

may become a reality
faster than I thought.

Digital literacy affords

 strong visual components 

that can speak to many

on different levels of comprehension 

all at once

This is a profound concept

to think about

It might snow tonight

Tonight is my second Capstone course. We are all inside, in the classroom, while the night waits outside. I am wondering if it is snowing yet.