Supplement to Yesterday's Post

I'm totally submitting my kid's work.
http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=irule

Offspring

Hanging out with a baby is a lot like watching an infomercial: you start out convinced this thing is not for you, but you keep on watching. You don’t need that, you think. Hell, you already can do all the things it does. Then something happens. Somewhere, somehow, the pitch hooks into you. Suddenly you’re thinking, how have I lived my life without that? The next thing you know you’re in a Snuggie cleaning off a counter with your ShamWow and wondering how much a Chinese baby would run you.

--http://jesuskirkandvinny.com/

So here's a picture my son drew yesterday for me. Oddly enough, he's taking to signing his name as "Laim" as in lame. Perhaps this will be his artistic persona.

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Now I am way not into showing people stuff my kid does because, frankly, it just isn't that interesting. Who wants to see a bunch of scribbles poorly executed on scrap paper? Unless it's my kid's scribbles, I sure don't (so if you ever show me something your kid has done, know that while I'm nodding politely and feigning interest, I am really thinking about the awesome stuff MY kid does--that or wine).

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But when it's your kid, there's something magical about watching his step-by-step transformation from a shapeless lump of boringness to an actual person who spells love phonetically and represents me (consistently in all his pictures, mind you) as a squat, thick girl with crazy hair and a high hairline.

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Watching your child grow really is as if a miracle happens every day. Like when my son told his first joke. I don't remember the actual joke, but I do remember thinking 1) wow this is the stupidest joke ever and 2) holy crap, my kid has a sense of humor!

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So, yes, I hung my son's picture up in my lab for all the world to admire. Because right now, I need reminders that miracles are happening on a daily basis. And that somewhere in San Diego, there is a gorgeous boy who luvs me.

A Typical Moment at Work

B: Hey, I'm having trouble with this GFP assay.

S: What's the problem?

B: Well, I fused a protease cleavage site into the small loop of GFP but now I don't get any expression even in the absence of protease.

S: Are you sure the fusion is correct.

B: Yeah, it sequenced fine.

S: Could the cleavage site be disrupting GFP from folding?

B: I checked the literature. They usually insert it into the larger loop but this was an easier ligation.

[J walks in with lunch . . . ]

S: What is that?

J: Ribs.

S: I thought is was calimari.

J: No. I don't like that. Smells too fishy.

S: Funny, that's what P said about your mom last night.

P [looking up from where he was quietly working]: What did I say?

J: That my mom smelled like fried calimari.

P: She smelled like fried food?

B: No, if that were the case, she'd be crunchy. [Turning back to S]. There really isn't any reason for GFP to not express with this site in there.

S: Well, how long is the site? Maybe that is the problem. Let's check the amino acid sequence.

[and cut]

Yes, I work with lots of boys.

And yes, I actually made this way more PG.

What San Diego is Like For Me

THE WORLD is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

--Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–89). "God’s Grandeur" Poems. 1918.

Art is Everywhere

Yesterday, my son and I watched a documentary on Andy Goldsworthy. It was truly beautiful to see my five-year-old son sit still and be amazed at how Goldsworthy creates pieces that are both taken from and given to nature. The tension the artist creates between impermanence and permanence, light and dark, stone and water is both powerful and poignant.

During our viewing of the documentary, the sun began to reflect off our neighbor's pool in such a way that the light from the water shone through our blinds and onto our ceiling. The result? A perfect rectangle of shimmering light broken by thin, dark stripes.

My son looked up and said, "Look Mom, art."

Indeed.

Galen Rowell: A Retrospective

A collection of Galen Rowell's photography that spans his lifetime and the globe. Mostly breathtaking landscapes taken from his hikes and climbing adventures. Some portraits of people and animals. Photos are accompanied by essays written by those who Rowell influenced in his life.

I love that Rowell was committed to taking the picture as the eye/camera sees it without any post-shot manipulations. Using filters and film, he was able to beautifully duplicate what the eye so readily perceives. Because he wasn't going to modify the photo after the shot, Rowell had to plan his pictures very carefully over the course of time, watching the light. That said, he was also a master of constant preparation so that he would be ready to take an unforeseen shot. Many of his photographs are taken while suspended from a sheer rock face.

Rowell was committed to his passion. So much so, that he stopped living a secure life in 1960 (being settled, owning his own business) in order to exclusively pursue a dream that had little basis in his reality at the time. Rowell refused to settle as a hobbyist. He was constantly engaged in the discipline of his artistic process whether it be climbing, camping, writing, photographing, so that he would be prepared for anything life threw at him.

His daily pursuit of his passions reminds me of others I know personally. Those who know that time is how we fill it and fill theirs with things that make their spirits thrive. Also, they know that we can't just sit around and wait for life to happen. We have to actively engage in life. Actively discipline ourselves. Actively create and in doing so be artists.

That is difficult to do. I want to be like this. I want to drive from the tip of Baja to the arctic circle on small highways and back roads. I want to see the Northernmost piece of land in Greenland and the Southernmost in Antarctica. But I also want to be able to drive--in my backyard, so to speak--up the 395 and see the heart-breaking beauty that Rowell so perfectly captured.

Mostly I want to live. Wherever I am to find joy in life.

A Conversation

5yrold: When I grow up, I am going to run an animal rescue center.

me [not really paying attention because he talks nonstop]: That's nice, honey.

5yo: Yeah, and when hunters come, I am going to kill them.

me [now paying attention]: What?!

5yo: If they come to hurt the animals, I will stop them. I will kill them.

me: Do you think that's very kind?

5yo: Well, I hate animal suffering.

me: Yeah, but isn't killing humans also causing suffering?

5yo: But, Mom, they're killing animals.

me: So maybe instead of killing hunters, you could do something else.

5yo [honestly at a loss for another alternative to murder]: Like what?

me: Well, maybe you could take the hunters' guns and then have them go to school to learn about how not to kill animals.

5yo [thinking it over]: I could take their guns. . . [face lights up because he's just had a bright idea]. That's what I'm gonna do: I'll take their guns and tell them "hey, you have to stop killing animals. You need to get a house and a wife and a baby."

Apparently, yuppiehood is the solution to animal suffering.