On Old Bear, by Jane Hissey

I always forget that this is the author's name and the name of the series. But just so that doesn't happen again, I'm writing it down here. I also don't think that these little thumbnails do justice at all to how charming her books are, but I think re-reading them might give me a sense of how delightful I might be able to make something if I tried. :)

"The Museum of Jurassic Technology"

At the end of our seminar class the other night, we watched a "cheesy" video (Ryan Griffis' description) about the Museum of Jurassic Technology in California.

The film we watched is called "Inhaling the Spore" and focuses on David Wilson, the museum creator, and the magic of his creation. I was thoroughly delighted, overjoyed, and enchanted by the whole film and the people in it, and frantically wrote notes in the dark as we watched.

I wrote:
This guy is the embodiment of it! So curious - accordion-playing on the street, such a wonderful, magical sort of man. Like a wizard.

Old museums are related to a "cabinet of curiosity" and made no distinctions between god-made or man-made, beauty or grotesque. Somehow they were just "out of the realm of ordinary experience."

(Example, the carved fruit stone who's caption card told of the myriad of impossibly complex animals carved into it. It "Plays with your credulity when it comes to those side captions" but there really IS one of those fruit stones to those exact specifications somewhere else.) Its amazing what you will believe because the side caption tells you to.

"We don't know exactly why they laugh, but we think its wonderful." David Wilson says

The book written about this museum is called "Mr. Wilson's Cabinet Of Wonder: Pronged Ants, Horned Humans, Mice on Toast, and Other Marvels of Jurassic Technology" by Lawrence Weschler. And I very much want to read it.

On the merits of Dogs

As a young person, recently graduated from college, full of knowledge and the hope of change and progress, the world seems to be a place of opportunity. It feels as if whatever we have been waiting for has finally arrived - freedom, adulthood. . . It seems to be full of essentially good people, some of which sucumb to terrible vices, but on the whole the net worth of creation is good. This is also an awkward time where we begin to awaken to the reality of beuracracy, selfishness, politics, and falseness. We are beginning to experience disolutionment, disenfranchisement, and disapointment in the greater things we used to admire - our country, religion, the institution of marriage, even the working world.

Dogs, on the otherhand, represent a sweet spirit. An inherently loving, accepting, being. If you ignore them for a week and come home, they are not angry at you for leaving, but thrilled that you are back again. They forgive endlessly. They are the opposition to this criticism and disappointment because they fill their lives with seeking and joy in the simple pursuits of food, attention, play, and sleep. There is no striving, so advancement, just the here and now. They are not so much hedonistic as they are appreciative, grateful, and completely lost in the moment in which they are alive.

Another thing that appeals to me about the dogs - dogs are not capable of irony. I guess there is nothing ironic or affected or cynical about a dog. They simply can't be. And it's wonderful.

There is something honest and straightforward about them, and this appeals to me, but is this enough? [to make them the subject of artwork?] They seem like a refreshing antidote to . . . um . . . everything :)

They offer uncomplicated social interaction - no pretenses. They are happy to see you, you are happy to see them, their tail wags. You can do nothing wrong. You can't talk too much or too little, you , there is no such thing as being akward.

In part, I think that I paint the dogs as a counter to this disapointment. I am trying desperately to ward off cynicism, and something in the sheer joy of these creatures seems to do that.

Benevolence

The following quotes are from Ira Glass in his introduction to the New Kings of Nonfiction.

10
"One thing i love about Weschler and Orlean (and, come to think of most of these writers) is their attitude toward the people they're writing about. Weschler is clearly skeptical of his protagonist, Akumal. Orlean is not in argument with her ten-year old. But they try to get inside their protagonist's heads with a degree of empathy that's unusual. Theirs is a ministry of love, in a way we don't usually discuss reporters feelings toward their subjects. Or at least, they're willing to see what is loveable about the people they're interviewing. (Weschler's an ineresting case when it comes to this, because he's mildly annoyed by his main character for the early part of his story, and then comes to have an ovious and real affection for him.)

14
In that environment, these stories are a kind of beacon. By making stories full of empathy and amusement and the sheer pleasure of discovering the world, these writers reassert the fact that we live in a world where joy and empathy and pleasure are all around us, there for the noticing. They make the world seem like an exciting place to live. I come out of them feeling like a better person -- more awake and more aware and more appreciative of everything around me. That's a hard thing for any kind of writing to accomplish. In times when the media can seem so clueless and beside the point, that's a great comfort in itself."