It's been a while since I posted one of these, but the fact of the matter is that I am having a hard time trusting words. It feels half finished to show an outfit and not tell the story - that, for example, right now my days feel full of watching. New York is a fantastic place for being a watcher of things. You can move like a ghost through the crowd, you can overhear conversations, you can see little dramas played out, all without any obligation for participation. Last week someone asked me if I felt like I lived here or if I still felt like a tourist. I didn't know what to say, because there has always been a degree of detachment in my life - here, Cleveland, wherever. I generally feel that at any moment I could end up somewhere new and start over.
Words involve a tethering action. Once they are there, they are there. Hard little pebbles. Free to be selected, picked up, rearranged and misunderstood, cemented in place in unintended patterns. I worry about misunderstandings. I worry about flattening meanings, oversimplifying, losing the magic of possibility, about tying myself down to one thing, about being understandable.
Clothes are easier to control. They go on and come off. They suggest but don't tell. There's no permanence. And you can adjust them as needed, to accommodate life wherever you land, like New York City, spring 2010.
