Does that include inspiration?

We live at the top of a mountain. The last quarter mile to our house is unpaved and kind of like the surface of the moon, except the craters are smaller and more plentiful. 

We had a slow leak in one of the tires on our car. A trip to the auto repair shop revealed the dreaded bent rim.

I wasn’t surprised at the cause, but when the mechanic quoted the price to replace it, I stood silent for about a minute.

I could only think of responses that required a drum and cymbal crash.

Is that the gold or platinum model!? (ba dum pum)

Do I get a massage and pedicure with that!?

Does that come with a 3 night stay somewhere!?

So I spared him and just said, “I’ll let you know…”

Searching the internet that night, I found a guy an hour away who repairs rims using a blow torch.
He didn’t have a fancy website. Just one picture. Him with his blow torch.

I called the number. He seemed nice enough, but a man of few words. 

Me: “Do you have time today?”

Him: “Yes.”

Me: “How’s 1:30?“

Him: “Sure.”

Me: “What is your…”

Him: “I’ll text you the address.”

Click


He did. After an hour through backwoods country roads (but that’s kind of everywhere up here) I found the address.  

Leading back into the woods was a long driveway filled (ironically) with potholes.  
I thought to myself, “I really hope this is legit, because if I have to leave in a hurry I’m going to dent all the other rims.”

Then a rather nice house came into view with a large double garage, half of which was used for his business.

Everything was neat and orderly.

He stepped out of the garage in a black hooded sweatshirt.
But he was smiling so I got out of the car.

There was no usual 15 minute Q & A about the vehicle that one often experiences at auto repair places. No recitation of endless up-sale add ons.

Just a very simple “Hi. How are you? Which wheel? This one?”

“Yes,” I said.

And before I could say anything else he rolled a jack under the car and had the tire off so quickly that I wished I had timed it.

The last time I changed a tire it took about two hours, but that included unloading a full trunk and scouring the car for the missing lug wrench. 

He rolled the tire toward his garage. “You can come watch if you like.”

Inside he removed the tire and mounted the rim on a large homemade contraption made from small hydraulic jacks welded to large metal plates. A precise measuring caliper rigged on the side showed him exactly where the rim was bent.

Blow torch in hand (like in his photo) he heated the rim. “You might want to stick fingers in your ears,” he said, putting on protective earphones.

He hammered, blow torched, hammered, blow torched.

I was fascinated by the process and he seemed to enjoy having an audience. Glancing up from his work every so often, he smiled and explained what he was doing.  

I found out why he was a man of few words. His phone rang about every ten minutes. He was cordial, but brief. Made the appointment quickly, texted the address and got back to work.  

Soon the wheel was back on the car and I was carefully navigating my way out. The price was far below what I had been quoted for a new rim.

I began the day thinking about what a pain car repair can be and ended up feeling inspired by this guy who had created his own thriving business doing something I didn’t even know existed a few days ago.

I thought of a more appropriate question to ask next time I’m quoted an exorbitant repair price:

“Does that include inspiration?”

Guessing til I get there.

I over do it sometimes with the symbolic meanings of things. That said, the most beautiful dragonfly I've ever seen flew inside our house yesterday as I was painting.  

It rested on my finger momentarily and I took it to the door to let it fly away.

I did get a picture of it when it landed on the sliding door frame, but I'm not going to show it to you.
The dirt and the dead fly next to it kind of dull its magnificence.

The dragonfly symbolizes a number of things, but the ones I usually associate with it are Change and Transformation.

At the moment it flew in I was working on a new painting that I had just changed and transformed completely.

It made me wonder if I should change it again... into an image of a dragonfly. Maybe next week.

Most of the time I stick with what I envision. Occasionally, an entirely new piece emerges.

I started with the intention of a bold, dark abstract and ended up with something that was soft and light with more realism.  

All the while I was questioning until there was a shift and I started feeling good about it.

Then Erin came home and reacted positively.

Not that she's the deciding factor or anything.

(Editors Note: Yeah, right.)

But if she says, "That's amazing!" instead of "Interesting"...well you know.

(Editors Note: Yes, we do.)

Change is a process of questioning.

And sometimes it's...

(to borrow a line from the song, All Will Be Well)

"Only guessing 'til I get there, then I'll know."

Hyphenate.

My name is David and I am a hyphenate.

I've only recently heard the word used as a noun, but I am definitely one. (A person who is active in more than one occupation or sphere.)

I envy people who are not hyphenates.

However, I'm always looking around for fellow hyphenates (especially successful ones) for confirmation that it's ok for me to be one.

I'm mostly surprised that we haven't come up with a better term, which is probably why it's so seldomly used.

I hear "renaissance man" often which sounds like someone who spends their days in costume at medieval fairs playing a mandolin and selling paintings.

Actually that's not bad idea.  Note to self...  

"Slasher" is being used in some circles now.  Painter SLASH writer SLASH whatever.  But slasher sounds like...slasher.

Most of my life I've felt at a disadvantage for being a hyphenate.  In fact I was told several times that I needed to focus on one thing if I wanted to be successful.

When I'm at a party and someone asks what I do, after I reel off the third occupation I get a look back that I call "the chicken stare."

It's the look that chickens give when you approach them and they're not quite sure what your intentions are.

That moment before they flee.

It's interesting to me that most of us are hyphenates in our personal life: parent/ cook/ housekeeper/ gardener etc.

We are taught as hyphenates growing up and expected to do well in reading, writing, and math, etc.  But in our professional life it's confusing if you pursue more than one occupation.
 
I think we like to define each other. We want to know who you are and what you do and we don't want it to be confusing.

Coming up with a better word than hyphenate would be a good start.

The Like Trap.

It has come up in more than a couple conversations recently that there is a trap in confusing opinion (or number of "Likes") with what matters.

If people like it, it must matter. If they don't, it must not.

Various authors tell us we should be independent of the good and bad opinions of others. Others say we shouldn't use the word should.

Whenever I finish a painting, I feel the same butterflies that I have felt before a performance. I'm putting something new out there and I don't know how people will respond.

It is a feeling that has paralyzed me in the past. Even this newsletter produces the same twinges.

When I first moved to New York years ago, I was playing the lead in a little musical called Star Crossed Lovers. It was well attended for the most part, but there was one stormy night when we had one audience member.

Yes, one.

A small, elderly woman in the front row. It was a 99 seat theater so I guess you could say we were 1 percent sold.

The director came backstage saying they were going to cancel the show, but we were all young, non-union and already in makeup. We wanted to do it.

She laughed at everything and clapped as heartily as any performer could wish for. When I took my bow I came down to the front row, knelt down, and kissed her hand. She said, "I feel like the Queen of England!"

To this day it's one of my peak theater experiences.

We only got one "like" that night but it made a life long impression.

Whether it resonates with one or a hundred others, it feels good. And, more importantly, it moves you forward.
(Sure, I might have had a different impression if our one audience member had said, "This sucks!" But thankfully, she shared our enthusiasm.)

The fact that we have the desire to create means our work matters. It matters because we are doing it and it propels us.

To the one who is practicing or vocalizing or dancing or creating or whatever you have a passion for… if you are out there doing whatever it is you do...

Consider yourself "Liked."

No.

I talk to myself out loud quite a bit. If I mess something up, I don't mince words. 

One of those un-minced words escaped this morning as I was struggling to get a sliding screen door back on track.
 
Immediately there after, Finn found Erin and repeated it perfectly in a hushed tone, retaining the emotional essence of my delivery.
 
Not my proudest moment, though it gave Erin a great laugh.  
 
Finn has become a mirror for us, of sorts.
 
We have been amused for a while now about how he recalls the events of the day.
 
If we've been apart for several hours he begins by recounting all the things that Mommy said no to, regardless of how few. 

And visa versa. 
 
"How was the park buddy?"
 
"Mommy said, 'No!'"
 
More amusing are the emotional embellishments.
 
When he has eaten most of a four pound melon and I say, "Finn, let's have something else," he runs to Erin crying and creates an imitation not unlike a mini Darth Vader.
 
Thrusting his hand out and deepening his voice he'll say, "Dadoo said, 'NO MORE CANTALOPE!!!'"
 
From our stand point it's a simple "no". To him it's devastation.
 
At least for next two minutes.
 
Clearly, it's all in the interpretation.
 
It brought me back to the way I talk to myself in the first place and my own embellishments. 

My self-narration is far from supportive at times and my judgement of hurdles are almost always exaggerated.
 
I could think of a million cathartic applications for Finn's brand of expression, if it were acceptable in adulthood.
 
But I'm grateful for the choice of discernment.
 
A "no" or a setback, or a door falling off the track 
 
is not devastation. :-)

Dances with Wolves.

Guilty confession: Erin and I are fond of movie soundtracks.

Especially the one from Dances with Wolves which played an important role in Finn's first year.
 
There was the rousing number from the stampeding buffalo hunt scene (track # 10) where Finn would make galloping horse sounds and bounce up and down while pretending to hold the reins. (He may have been mimicking me.) 

One or two tracks later (the important part) he would be sound asleep.  

We hadn't listened to the soundtrack in a while.  Then about two weeks ago it came up on the ipod in the car. 

After a look of vague recollection he was soon galloping like a horse again.

Minutes later he was out like a light, though it was nowhere near his nap time.
 
The other night after dinner Erin said, "I'm envisioning a night curled up on the couch with a good movie and Finn falling asleep on my lap." 

This, by the way, never works. 

He ends up wanting to watch the movie, we abandon the idea, and it becomes even more difficult to get him to sleep. 

Erin is the eternal optimist.
 
We flipped on the TV and there was Dances with Wolves right on the stampeding buffalo scene. Finn had his galloping fun, then a scene later was fast asleep.

That movie is always inspiring to me, not for it's epic nature, but the incredible story of Michael Blake, the author of the novel and the screenplay. 

While living out of his car, sleeping on friends' couches and being fired from his job as a dishwasher, he wrote the novel that would become this iconic film. 

I couldn't help thinking of his story throughout the entire movie, imagining the satisfaction he must have felt seeing his story become a piece of film history.

At the end, while the credits rolled and we wiped our tears, Erin casually mentioned that Kevin Costner just happened to be in her two favorite films.

Hmm. What a coincidence.

Looking over at Finn, still sacked out, I was reminded how personalized inspiration can be. 

What I find inspiring in one way, moves someone else in another.  And may put others to sleep.

Literally. 

I suppose the important thing is just to be inspired, whatever that means for you.  Inspiration finds you or you seek it out.  But it's always there.
 
I hope this has inspired you.

If not, pleasant dreams.  :-)