I sometimes think the wisest man in my life is John Baldessari.

I’ve had a pretty incredible day, by all accounts, from morning till finish. My job was predictably chaotic for a Monday, so the deep sleep I had last night worked wonders. Unusually early morning chaos brought an early job release, just in time to walk out the front door to a rainbow crowning South of Market. There was a heavy drizzle, something I failed to predict this sunny morning when I opted to bike to work. I didn’t even have to question my perception in that moment: I knew I was biking home.

Incredibly windy, I met the resistance with joy as I petaled forcefully ahead. My recent stress relief, an alternative to masturbation, has been westerly dusk bike rides while the wind blows in from the ocean. As I made the right into the final segment of the wiggle, hail came from the sky.

Every possible type of meteorological influence one could have imaginably crammed into a single day was the reality of San Francisco, today.

Once in the shelter of my home and studio, the evening continued fortuitously through. The apex of the evening was the realization of perseverance. Of the short-term, the long-term, and the periods I hadn’t yet given myself credit for. This message came through when, toying with a set of three panels I have been subconsciously calculating day-by-day for almost two years, I finally solved the puzzle of it.

Color is my reward.

“The object is the idea.”

John Baldessari, as I have repeated many times before, has affected me dearly since I was a teenager, and he is one of a few artists I credit as having inflicting me with the desire to be an artist. “Solving Each Problem As It Arises” (1967) is in my top five works of all time, and growing up in Connecticut I spent many moments viewing it. The text of the work became indelible to me and I found myself reciting it regularly in my twenties, particularly when I was a teetotaler.

Solving problems. That’s what artists do. Some of us do it beautifully, and some of us are messy. We use tangibles and solvents, we avoid objects altogether. But, ultimately, we are purveyors of ideas.

“Grace has success
In small matters
It is favorable to undertake something.”

- I Ching, 22. Pi. “Grace”

“13 January 1988. Art is wretched, cynical, stupid, helpless, confusing - a mirror-image of our own spiritual impoverishment, our state of forsakenness [sic] and loss. We have lost the great ideas, the Utopias; we have lost all faith, everything that creates meaning.

Incapable of faith, hopeless to the utmost degree, we roam across a toxic waste dump, in extreme peril; every one of these incomprehensible shards, these odds and ends of junk and detritus, menaces us, constantly hurts and maims us and sooner or later, inevitably, kills us. Worse than insanity.

Consolations are sold: all shades of superstition, puffed-up little ideologies, the stupidest lies.”

- Gerhard Richter, “Writings 1961-2007″

Tonight, laid across the floor, are fifteen! completed works. I’m in shock. Organized for cataloging, naming, and to be accounted by chronology, it is a rather proud, daunting moment to look at them all at once.

I stood there, in a rather ecstatic stare, trying to remember which works were finished in 2009 when it occurred to me that none of them were. Talk about a continuance of shock. What a waste of a year of my life. I know I’ve said that before but it’s worth repeating. To think how hard I worked in 2008 to start off this body of work, ten of the pieces are really from that period, and then I just stopped for almost a whole year. It makes one quickly focus on forgiveness.

This weekend I switch into mounting and framing mode in preparation for a mini-show I have lined up in March. I’m fairly excited about this, it will be the first time my work is publicly displayed in San Francisco. By my count, I have 10-12 pieces ready for display. I may or may not have a newer, large piece done in time, too.

Framing is providing atmosphere for a work.

This dawned on me as I was eating in a fairly nondescript restaurant and I realized how my surroundings affected the flavor of my food. I think that good works transcend the borders of their ground, and framing works in such a way to contain the idea to a certain space, manipulating yet another worldly element to encourage the viewer to approach those ideas in a favored fashion.

For those of you keeping extended scores, my series of work to follow the mini-show is already in progress. I’m very excited about them and I’ve been working on them for about three weeks now and the series is about 15% done. Coming soon, new blog and website structure.

Thanks to all my friends and followers for the continued support. I’m elated to have approached and crossed the point where I move my work from a private practice to a public performance.

I do not feel good today.

It has been a rather long day, preceded by a rather long week. I am tired and listless. Vacant. I’ve had several rather intense panic attacks this week. I finished three works on Tuesday. I don’t really know what to make of the past seven days just yet, but to quote myself from last evening, “I understand three months ago a lot more than I understand three weeks ago.”

I had a day today where I lost faith.

I qualify myself as a nontheist. This on a day of conversations about irregardless. Troubling that as I type this, spell check underlines the former affixed word, but not that latter. It is sometimes remarkable how blind humans are. What is the allure of denial? Troubling to witness those who cannot discern the writing on the wall; troubling to have the experience yourself while witnessing the same experience in another.

My Gmail just reloaded and displayed a new message in my inbox as I was typing the last sentence. It was an email marketing message for Mr. S Leather Company. The subject, “The Many Ways in Which We Have You Covered…” It is primarily advertising leather hoods.

How does one even capably expound after that?

The only real thing I feel like shit about these days is that the balance between friendships, being social, work, and my job is a tough one. I often feel I don’t give my friends enough time, and then at the detriment to being alone and working on my pieces. I’m (currently) trapped between the guilt of doing either because I run into the (flawed) emotion of feeling as if I’m ignoring the other. It’s hard to say no to people, especially ones that you love and want to be with, but it crushes me that I’m so focused on working and trying to make time… but I keep saying yes to hanging out or going out on a date (to get laid & wake up with a guy.)

See, I feel better talking it out now.

Honestly, I get, more and more each day, why artists are often recluse and independent, self-sheltering and censoring, singular and single. It’s lovely and convenient to our trade.

Now, where is my muse?