Peace At Last, At Least Until The Next Package Comes In The Mail

Yesterday I finished sorting all of the bottle caps that have been given to me so far. Woo-hoo! It was a pretty thankless task but fortunately I had lots of help so that made it A Lot easier.

I can't say exactly how many bottle caps I have since I Am Not counting them but I guesstimate that I've got at least 23,000. Crazy! Whoops, forgot that I decided I am Not Crazy.  I mean, impressive, is it not?

More are on the way, though. So, it's really just a little reprieve before I'm back into it again. But it does feel good to be caught up and organized.

Yeah, back to the whole I Am Not A Crazy Person thing. It has been determined that I am Ambitious. Okay? Not Crazy. Okay? Right.

So, here's an image of bottle cap that I like. I actually like a lot of the bottle caps I have but I just so happen to have a jpeg of this one. Enjoy!

Video Recommendation of the Week:

Prop 8 - The Musical.

Have you seen this yet? I think it's pretty funny.

I Am Not A Crazy Person

Yesterday I finished punching holes in all of the bottle caps that will make up the back wall of the Bottle Cap Bar. That is a total of 4,140 bottle caps. And I punched holes in a few hundred more then that because I decided mid-way to make some minor design changes which meant that I had punched holes in some bottle caps that will not be used in that wall and then needed to punch holes in some different bottle caps. No biggie. Those extra ones will be used eventually. Work I would have to do later anyway. It took me about three weeks of some pretty intensive hole punching sessions. But all in all it was not a bad experience.

I have all of the pieces ready for assembling the back wall now which I will do after the first of the year. Gonna take a little time off during the holidays. Plus I've got a bunch of bottle caps still to sort so there's some other tasks to complete.

In a previous post I said I was a crazy person but I want to retract that. I was defining myself as crazy in relation to my Bottle Cap Bar project and all of the work involved with making this thing happen. But I don't believe that anymore.

I think that I was saying I was crazy as a way to protect myself when I talked to people about my Bottle Cap Bar. My assumption was, and still is to some degree, that when people heard that I want to make a bar out of tens of thousands of used bottle caps for the primary purpose of displaying it at Burning Man their immediate response would be You Are Crazy. And I have, in fact, received that exact response from some people. So, I figured, well, if I prefaced it with "I know I am crazy...." then they couldn't call me crazy first. Ha! Gotcha.

But that does not matter to me anymore. The more that I have devoted myself to this endeavor the more I realize this is absolutely the Right Thing for me to be doing Right Now. This is what I have been working up to. This installation is gonna be Awesome. You can quote me on that.

I Love working on this project. It is absolutely satisfying. I cannot wait to see the end result. There is no doubt in my mind it is going to be a complete success.

The best part has been the involvement of so many other people. First and foremost is the help and encouragement that I have been getting from my family and friends. Their contributions have been great. But then there are all of the other people, mostly in the Burning Man community, who have been helping in their own way as well by sending me bottle caps. These are people who are really excited about the project. They are part of the process; active participants in making this happen. And they've never even met me.

How awesome is the knowledge that every single bottle cap that will make up the Bottle Cap Bar will have been touched by at least two people. The most important person being, of course, the first person that removed the bottle cap and then made the conscious decision to Not Throw It Away. I love that! This, to me, is more important then even the idea of making sculpture with recycled materials. This is collaboration at its best.

So, I no longer think that I am Crazy to be embarking on this journey; I believe that I am Brave for making the decision to devote myself to the creation of this piece. 'Cause I know that there is a lot of work ahead of me. Lots of hours and labor will go into this project but it will all be worth it in the end. Just you wait.

Holiday Gift Idea of the Day:

Time.

You know all of that time that some people spend shopping trying to find a gift to give someone? Maybe it stresses them out a little bit feeling like they have to spend some money buying and then wrapping up some Thing to give to some person all 'cause that's What You Do.

Well, here's a great gift idea and it doesn't require a trip to the mall or even scotch tape and ribbons. Give the gift of your time. Spend some of it with that person. Do something special, something you both love. Maybe it's just quality time talking or a nice dinner out, whatever. But all of that time spent shopping could be time spent with loved ones. Just a thought. Happy Holidays!

The Dead Sculpture Garden

A couple of weekends ago I did something that I've been wanting to do for a while - I set up my Dead Sculpture Garden. This is a display area for all of my stone sculptures that are either abandoned works-in-progress or so old that I don't really consider them part of my "portfolio". Also one was made by Eric many years ago.

We have this spot along the back side of the house that I have attempted to grow shade-loving shrubs in but the problem has always been that Jasmine likes to burrow herself in that area which uproots the plants and is very unsightly. I mean, jeez Jasmine, how many burrows do you need? She's got three others in various spots in the back yard! So, we took out all of the plants there and removed some of the soil and then covered the area in rocks that are scattered around the "dead sculptures.

I really like it. Normally these are sculptures that I would not choose to display. But as a whole, it looks quite good, I think. See for yourself. Try to guess which sculpture is Eric's.

On another note, I found out recently that Spiral 2 made it into Sioux Falls SculptureWalk 2009. I won't be going out this time, however. Too expensive. I'll be shipping the sculpture instead. That will be an adventure; I've never shipped a marble sculpture before. Stay tuned for how I manage to do that next April.

Bottle Cap Quantity Update of the Day:

Received as of 12/14/08 - approximately 15,500.

Zen And The Art Of Bottle Caps

I just recently finished reading a book called "The Mindful Brain" by Daniel Siegel. It was really interesting, although sometimes the science stuff went over my head and I skimmed some of the last chapters that seemed to be directed toward teachers and health care professionals. But all in all I found it very informative. Using scientific research and personal experience, the author writes about how activities that focus on mindfulness, such as mediation or yoga, can actually change the make-up of our brains and help create a sense of general well-being and happiness. His definition of mindful is "being aware, of being conscientious, with kindness and care." I can get behind that.

Anyway, in my own life I have lately become interested in the practice of meditation and find it to be, while challenging at times, a wholly pleasant experience. And, in general, I am trying to be aware of being mindful, as defined by this book.

This past week I discovered in interesting activity that seemed to really tap into mindful awareness. As you know, I have been working on this Bottle Cap Bar project of mind. The technique that I am using to make the walls is basically to punch four holes into each bottle cap that are then connected to each other with a grid of wire. Check out these photos of a sample piece I made back in October.

Since the walls are going to be 10' wide by 7' high you can imagine that I'm gonna be punching holes in a whole lot of bottle caps. I have already designed the back wall and just this last week started the construction of it by, you guessed it, punching holes in the bottle caps.

Here's where the mindfulness comes in. In order to punch the holes in the correct place so that they are all at approximately 90 degree angles from each other I count the ridges on the sides of the bottle caps. I developed a method of doing this so it's consistent. I'm kind of detail-oriented that way. Anyway.... the thing about the counting is that I can't think about anything else or I lose track of what I am doing. Thus, the mindfulness.

I can take in information, like I listen to music or books on CD or podcasts, but I cannot respond to the information. I can't talk or think any thoughts other then the counting. I do this for a couple of hours straight and I really think it is doing my mind some good, much in the same way as meditating.

I thought that it would be a really boring chore, doing this repetitive activity thousands and thousands of time, but it's actually pretty fun. Books on CD helps A Lot. I am finishing up the Series of Unfortunate Events which I started a few years back driving out to Colorado. I begin Book 13, the final book, this week. It's been a great way to "read" some things I have been interested in.

This was the best discovery I've made in a long while. Who knew my crazy art ideas would actually be good for my soul?

Check Out This Photo of the Day:

Progression Structure #8. As seen at the Uptown Columbus Sculpture Walk in Georgia.

My friend Julie (pictured) checked it out for me last week on a road trip with her sister from New York to Colorado. Since I am not planning on going out to Georgia to see it myself, it's nice to see that the sculpture made it there safely and was installed with no problems. Cool!