Vibration

Here the dominant noise is buzzing. So many pollinators, so many insects. At the arboretum this weekend when we were looking for where to put down the picnic blanket, all the grass was twitching. Up here on a sweaty late afternoon visit to the formal garden, I finally noticed these giant gorgeous pods!

Here are the flowers I cut from the walled garden to see what will dry tough enough to make it home on a 6-hour drive, and then survive being shipped in a box to NYC to my photographer for a piece.

I'm packing the wet studio and cleaning a bunch, which leads to some dry studio stuff getting packed as well. These cords are bundled in a cloth and already in my car trunk!

From the light orange down, those are colors I did here. Onion, marigold, marigold plus icy salty fresh indigo leaves, and then those leaves again (very weak because this is NOT how to use indigo but I wanted one last hurrah in the dye garden).

This is the third version of this book and I am finally getting the hang of these paper strap bindings.

This one was from when I first practiced these structures years ago. Now it's finally holding a bit of content. I delivered one to the library and had a great visit because I finally found a book that got a grip on me.

These are the small papers from this month. That was fun!

Pods are bursting everywhere. Not all, but more than when I first arrived.

I saw this photo essay about blood quantum in Native communities today and it was wrenching, just as it always is when I think about this cruel colonial rule that lives to this day. I loved what the photographer said in response to the interview question about "being objective" as a Native journalist covering Native stories: why don't we ask white folks if they are being objective when they cover white stories? All My Relations covered blood quantum in two podcast episodes, this one with outside guests and then this more personal one with their own team. And then to contrast this with the one drop rule for Black people. How is it possible that white supremacist colonizers could come up with BOTH rules and apply them with no inner struggle? I mean, of course they did. It just sucks that they're still around.

I hope this one is praying for us because we really need it.