Today was a good day with bits and pieces that entered my memory scrapbook.


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I'm still delighting with Lewis Nordan's book Lightning Song. This tiny book by this remarkable author has been shuffled across the US - packed more times than Mohammad Ali's nose. (Um, that was kind of a creepy analogy.) I bought it at Latitude 33 on Ocean Avenue in Laguna Beach many, many years ago - I know this only because I came across a tiny bookmark tucked in the pages. It's fabulously quirky with enthusiastic reviews from esteemed publications. Inexplicably, Nordan didn't reach the acclaim of other famous Southern writers - he's brilliant. The following is an excerpt I read today and must share:


They came into a space where the trees were strange and low, unlike any of the other trees nearby. These trees had been planted. It was an ancient abandoned apple orchard. The limbs swagged to the ground, freighted with ripe red apples that would never be harvested. Mr. Sweet picked up a few of the apples from underneath the tree and handed them around. They stood in the leaf-stained sunlight. The senorita bit into an apple. It cracked like a gunshot. They all ate. Juice both sweet and tart flooded Leroy's mouth. He had never tasted such an apple, such an amazing piece of fruit.





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I also read a fascinating article about art in Cuba. There are more artists packed on this tiny island than the number of times Mohammad Ali's nose has been packed. Oops.

Artists are among the few Cubans that are allowed to travel with the government having no concerns about their return. A Cuban artist can sell one canvas in any other country and live well in Cuba for several years - while not being able to live elsewhere. Cuban artists have become the well-traveled elite... and always return.

The article also described that there are no art supply stores in Cuba, so many of the artists depend on friends from abroad. They've also developed a talent for scrounging supplies from garbage. An artist was quoted as saying, "The lack of materials forces you to develop your intellect. How to create something with nothing? It's easy to work with plenty. The hard thing is to work with little."

That quote resonates strongly with much of my collection, which is created from the nothings of extreme poverty and passion. My collection is eclectic with Outsider, Folk, and highly skilled artists of every genre imaginable.

I have a very unassuming canvas in my office. No one pays it no mind but me. It's by Charles "Chico" Wheeler. He was one of the original Florida Highwaymen. I waited and researched and waited a long time before I found a Florida Highwaymen canvas I could acquire - that fit into my budget. Wheeler was black and blacks weren't allowed in art galleries until the 70s. He and the other Highwaymen would stand on the side of the highways in Florida, starting in the 1950s, and hold up their canvases to sell - this was before Interstates and such. These men had passion and determination and are legends of the truth that "It's easy to work with plenty. The hard thing is to work with little."

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I hate it when I scribble a note in the little notebook I lug around. Today I wrote, "It wasn't a bee in my bonnet, it was love in my heart."

Dagnabit! I can't recall why I wrote that down, but I like it and think I'll stop right here.

Thanks for visiting.