Diamonds in the Stanislaus

i push and push and push and finally, i squeeze it out. when the diamond finally pops out, it's saturday night, it's 1am and i'm sitting on a deck in Arnold, CA, leaning back looking at the space between the trees where the stars live, listening to guy's new band birth their own diamonds inside the A-frame behind me. i've just finished shooting many photos of the boys playing and i actually feel exhausted from it. my eyes burn and i think about the fat catalogue of photographs i've taken in the last few months and what the common thread might be that ties them together. my brain is sifting, it's working the granules hard, trying to refine what the pictures are saying or what they say about me, refine refine refine, grind it down to the essence. i'm sitting smoking, looking at the space, listening to some beautiful keyboard-plunky, light drum strummy, funk bass groovy, sing-song move-y music and BING! the answer comes to me. i'm amazed at it's simplicity and once again what a difficult task simplicity of thought is to accomplish in art. this is why i love pop art, but that's another story.

i've been in the woods 12 hours and it's starting to sink in. i can relax and do nothing. i take an hour nap upon arrival due to the bass player's wife (M) getting us super freakin' high in the car for the 3-hour drive to Arnold. the boys have transformed the living room of this very nice woodsy cathedral-ceilinged home, into some kind of monkey house musical playground with endless wires, amps, instruments and pieces of recording equipment covering most available living room space. the kitchen counters are a mosaic of fruit, plastic 7-11 peanuts, cookies, chips, bread and wild turkey. the fridge is filled with beer, vodka and lunch meat. (M) and i arrive a day after the boys, with two more overflowing bags of food and a cooler too. we've furnished the house with enough food for a week-long lock-in for the six of us. if only.

musical breaks allow us dips into the raging stanislaus river which reaches a peak temperature of 50 degress. the 100 degree weather outside has cooked our skin enough to create a sizzling sound as soon as we submerge ourselves in water as cold as the north western pacific. this provides much comedy as we scream and yelp and involuntarily engage in lamaze breathing upon entering the life-threatening river.

we eat well, we sleep well, we play well: guy is super lovey and sweet to me and i swoon. this bodes him well on the ride back.

then sunday we come home.

then monday we work.

next weekend: camping and tubing on cache creek. summer has really arrived.