Don't tell them you've never done it until you're done...

Wow! What a crazy weekend around here. The bathroom got a face lift. 3 days of tiling, scraping and painting. I could set up camp in there! Aisha and I were able to get my bedroom window unstuck from the outside. Air... Speaking of air, it just happens to be heavenly this evening. 69 degrees, clear, wind from the NE, humidity 76%. Our new friends, Keegan and Molly, who live around the corner, gave us some eggplant, zucchini and cucumber plants for our garden. We planted them as well as some basil and the plants donated by Thomas and his family. This morning the bunnies were out of their hole. I thought they might have wandered off but I noticed them behind the ivy after I planted the garden. Oh well.

"I like it when my kombucha mushrooms talk to me..."

As it turns out, Detroit is living and breathing gardens. There are vegetables everywhere! Around the corner from our house, a man gave us a twenty minute tour of his impeccable backyard farm, bragging about hybrid squash and gourmet carrots in a sassy Caribbean lecture as the evening sun set behind him. On another day, during the Indian Village garden tour, Logan ran into an Up South Foods van selling fresh produce to the neighborhood (music spilling from its windows). Up South is one of many initiatives created to fulfil the needs of this urban "food desert," where grocery stores are sparse enough that the local Walgreens advertises "fresh produce."



So, in a city so eager to support new growth, how do you start a garden? Go to the nearest bakery and order a cup of coffee. That's what we did. At our (of course) favorite morning eatery, Avalon, a beautiful family sat down at the table next to us and started talking about kombucha. Since Logan's ear is always tuned to Kombucha radio, we were soon talking 'shrooms (not psychedelic), and before we knew it, they had invited us over and offered us a bunch of tomato, okra and pepper plants for our garden. One half of this couple, Thomas, is a full time gardener (and daddy to the two adorable, sprout eating babies below), as well as a veteran who hopes to start a gardening organization as a means of recuperation for other vets.



Earlier in the week, Logan had met the folks at the West Village community garden on a bike ride. She was given the job of Neighborhood Compost Person. She subsequently arrived at our yard with a rich batch of black compost from the suburbs.

The dog is, apparently, a fan.


Logan was turning the soil (ooooh the difference from dusty Arizona) in the backyard dog run, mixing the compost in, when WAM! She unearthed a baby bunny nest! (More on that later...)

There is now a nice strip of compost-rich territory, guarded by a rock wall (formerly the porch steps!) just waiting to feed some roots.


We bought a bit of basil from Eastern market today, but should be able to fill a good bit of the garden with plants donated to us by various new friends and community resources. The Retired Horticulturalist of Belle Isle around the corner has offered native ferns for other parts of the yard, and my grandmother's lilies are blooming along the perimeter of the garage. We're off to a good start!

BUT WHAT WILL HAPPEN NEXT?

Will the bunnies grow up over night and eat our Rio Grande tomatoes?

Will Logan's kombucha mushrooms morph into giant lily pads and float away on the river?

Will Chris Farley live in a van down by the river?

Who knows.

This is only the first of many garden episodes, so stay tuned.

Dry Humidity. Logan's journey from Tucson to Detroit as a list.

arizona. the desert was ocean. el paso. gas station coffee. austin. creek life. queer life. life in a trailer. living on the street. after austin. middle america. toll booth operators. road as a wildlife death trap. walmart parking lots. chitown suburbs. shitty roads. draining lake michigan. d-town. d-boy. 313.

Aisha's Favorite Detroit PrideTattoos (and Earring) at Motor City Pride

Time Travel Travelogue #1: Aisha's Journey (as List)

Tucson. Wichita. St. Louis. Detroit

1. I throw away a full container of lukewarm milk at the gas station just before we get on the 10 to leave Tucson. My dad threatens to fish it back out. This cross-country journey is off to a great start.
2. A two hour long car jam in Phoenix is spent listening to Outkast sing "Spottieottiedopalicious." I say, "Dad listen to this lyric. Did you hear it? Let's hear it again. I mean, this is brilliant. Don't you think? Did you hear it?"
3. Hundreds of miles later, dad ejects the Outkast CD from the player while uttering, "Ooooooh kay then." We are floating through the dark down a near-empty highway out of Texas, toward Oklahoma. Headlights appear alone at the top of a hill in the rearview, and the curve of the road is coasting up behind us like we are a dipper in the sky. Dad puts in a CD of his own. Opera plays with windows open while red lights skinny as acupuncture needles flash on and off outside some sort of factory or plant to the left.
4. Lovely late night poolside walk with the dog around a cheeeeeeeeeeeeap motel with caution tape "decorating" the thin metal posts that are, I think, keeping it standing.
   
5. Wichita? We don't talk about that.
   
6. My father speaks of meeting and not meeting the photographers he admires near Parisian parks and in Manhattan high rises when the men were at the end of their lives. The topic of our conversations is often mortality.
   
7. Late lunch at an outdoor restaurant in St. Louis. As the dog splashes around in the koi pond, we see actual groups of real black people for the first time. The meal is a ridiculous extravagance: blue cheese and steak sandwich for me, a savory crepe and beer for dad. Why? Because of the chemical smell of gas station food we were being poisoned by.
   
8. Pushing it, we drive through Chicago after midnight with three hours to go...
9. In the middle of the night we get to Kalamazoo and are rewarded by the first gas station thus far to sell the New York Times.
10. The city is quiet. An empty, yellow tunnel turns into Jefferson and we are blocks away from the first house my father bought, where my mother waits.
    

Six Words

One way we like to think of Detroit Ho! is as a "resignification" project. Remember all those Henry Louis Gates Jr. articles about the signifyin' monkey from your undergrad thesis research? Don't worry, we won't get into all that theory.

But...

We want to plumb the subconscious minds of everyone we can and take some samples, maybe leave behind some experimental treatments. What are the synapses in your brain that are touching the word "Detroit" connected to? Poverty? Gardens? Peacocks? Greek food? We want to know. We also hope, with every intention of being manipulative, to get down in there and add "photography" and "sculpture" and "literary reading" to the web of associations. The power of impression is strong, and if the whole country-- nay, world!-- started to feel creatively inspired when they thought of Detroit (instead of using it as a punchline for cynical jokes) who knows what kind of innovative energy could waft Detroit-ward?

As a part of our not-so-technical research process, we've found that most of the associations that people currently have with Detroit are pretty apocalyptic. Even if they are beautifully so. For example, at a panel on "Writing Other People's Stories" at the Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference (AWP) in Denver last month, Jo Ann Beard spoke about the two essays she's written since The Boys of My Youth. One is "Werner" (read it!) and the other "Undertaker Please Drive Slow." Beard said: "Cheri T drove her mother to Detroit to Jack Kevorkian and he euthanized her. This is another kind of mother/daughter story. Take your mother to the arms of death and drive away."

The presence of Detroit in this narrative isn't negligible. It helps create the sense of despair that makes the story so inexcusably painful. It would sound different if Cheri T had driven her mother to Brooklyn or Los Angeles or Tucson to die. Wouldn't it? Detroit has become a kind of metaphor for the shoreline of the river Styx.

At our recent auction, we asked people to write a "six word short story" that takes place Detroit and put it in a jar. This is somewhat inspired by all that NPR reportage on the six word memoir, and by the Ernest Hemingway story: "For Sale: Baby shoes, never worn." And by magnetic poetry and collage and whatever else. Pablo Picasso.

It turns out that people's associations, while the dominant mood of them may be grim, have novels-worth of feeling behind them. For example:

• Anguish. Passion. Growing up in mud.
• Tiger's game. Parking. Wisest little brother.
• Newstory: a missing girl. Dogtown, Quarry.
• My mom in dumpsters, retainer found.

Want to add one? Comment to this post! Even if you don't leave your name, please say where you are from. Help us create a map or catalog of associations, to chart the city's resonance in the collective unconsciousness. And perhaps, slowly, resignify.

Detroit Summer Nights Art Auction: The Artists

Art has been pouring in for this Saturday's art auction! (Scroll down for details). Here are some of the bios of artists who have donated thus far:

Rachelle Diaz: Except for a stint in Florence, Italy, Rachelle has been a Texas resident her entire life, in big cities and bucolic wide-spots-in-the-road alike. She has worked with DiverseArts Culture Works, served as art director for Austin Downtown Arts magazine and The BackWord online magazine, and was a founding member of Pump Project Art Complex. She recently moved from Austin, Texas to Tucson, Arizona where she works from her home studio as a graphic designer and enjoys doing visual art and fashion design in her spare time. Currently, she is producing paintings on vintage fabric and recycled fabrics incorporating embroidery and puff paint. She is also the diva behind Tu Scene, Tucson's premiere art blog.


Lisa Lennon: A commercial photographer and horticulturalist, Lisa currently lives in Tucson via Austin, Texas. She shoots landscapes, architecture and engineering projects.



Emily Yetman: An Arizona metal artist, Emily designs jewelry that enhances "the perfect curves, lyrical forms, and sensual lines that are the human figure." She takes inspiration from the texture of the desert landscape, using "stones and minerals to connect with the body on an emotional level." She is currently earning an MA in Landscape Architecture at the University of Arizona.


Carl Hughes is the founder of Hughes Moto Art. According to his website, it was a passion for art and motorcycles that led him to pick up an airbrush in the early 90's. For the next few years his airbrush skills were honed and his knowledge of automotive paints and materials grew. Earning a little extra money and experience custom painting motorcycles while going to school, eventually Carl graduated from the University of Arizona with a BFA. In Phoenix, he had an opportunity to be the art director for one of the nation's largest and most reputable custom paint shops.

Scout Phillips: Self-described cowboi and bike riding ninja, Scout likes to draw and ride unicorns. He currently lives in Tucson, Arizona.

Ilyea Olsen recently began meditating.

Monica Weinheimer is a painter and an acrobat. She can be seen spinning from pieces of silk hung from the ceiling during performances by the Tucson dance troupe, Zuzi.

Kristin van Fleet worked on organic farms for seventeen years before enrolling in the Landscape Architecture program at the University of Arizona. She plays soccer and is going to France this summer to start up a garden.


Adam Frumhoff is a carpenter, musician, and bike mechanic who is converting an ice cream truck into a house.


TC Tolbert is a genderqueer, feminist poet and teacher committed to social justice. S/he earned his MFA in Poetry from the UA in 2005 and currently teaches Composition at Pima Community College. TC is the Assistant Director of Casa Libre en la Solana and is a member of Movement Salon, a compositional improvisation group in Tucson. S/he is a collective member of Read Between the Bars, a books-to-prisoners program, and s/he spends his summers leading wilderness trips for Outward Bound.


Daisy Pitkin lives in Arizona, grew up on a farm in Ohio, and at fourteen coerced her friends to read "The Tempest" and "A Midsummer Night's Dream" on a roof. Her job as a union organizer kept her moving around the world, and for ten years she rarely spent more than five days in the same place. For the last several months she has been mastering the mysterious art of photography and photography-related processes. She will be a candidate for an MFA in Creative Nonfiction at the University of Arizona this coming Fall.


Lester Sloan: After teaching himself to develop photographs at the age of nine, Lester became the first African American cameraman at Detroit's CBS TV station. He worked as a staff photographer for Newsweek magazine for over twenty years, covering assignments in the Southwest, Mexico and Central America. He served as a contributing editor at Emerge Magazine and as a contributing essayist at National Public Radio's Weekend Edition; he currently blogs for the Huffington Post. He is also the owner of the house where the First Annual Seminole Street Artist's Colony and Exhibition will take place this summer.


Leila Ruth Sarah Simpson is a 3rd grade GATE student at Lineweaver Elementary School. Her talents include reading, writing, making art, gymnastics and magical thinking. One of Leila's many goals is to open a sanctuary for abused animals with a clothing boutique and a cafe on the premises. Leila has an older brother, Brian, and two pets: Sophie the dog and Hermione the hamster.

Laura Milkins earned an MFA in Visual Art from the University of Arizona, and most recently completed a Fulbright Scholarship by crossing all of Mexico City on foot in the company of strangers and their stories. Since 1993, she has shown her work in Boston, Portland, Maine, Grand Rapids, MI and Tucson. Prior to settling in Arizona, Laura traveled to Europe, Asia and South America, documenting the experience through email with text and drawings. Laura has worked in a variety of media from traditional painting and drawing to mattresses and altered books. Her current work seeks to create community and engagement by involving the viewer in the art making process.

Amanda Sapir defends Gabrielle Giffords from flying bricks by day, is an art therapist by night, and is also, somehow, getting a masters degree in her spare time. She can do a killer (whale) Powerpoint that will make you laugh and cry.


Emily Feingold lives here in Tucson, where she has been blissfully taking refuge from northeastern weather for nearly three years. Leaving her full-time job this year has afforded her time and energy to devote to art, which has taken the form of portraits in pencil and charcoal. Since January, she has drawn around twenty portraits and intends to keep it up.

Logan Byers grew up on an ice boat in a remote location surrounded by water for most of the year. She currently resides in Tucson, where she learned to draw from a desert tortoise named Tank.

Aisha Sloan first learned about photography from her photojournalist father as a teenager, but never got into all that technical stuff so calls herself a "multimedia" artist to explain away all those blurs and scratches. She studied printmaking, video art and New Media at NYU, where she earned an MA in Cultural Studies and Studio Art, and rode in an elevator with Ashley Olsen. She will be in Detroit this summer, interviewing her father on the sun porch over coffee.

Sarah Donnelly's brain is a fish net knit by the nymph Calypso after her infamous affair with Odysseus. The net disappeared from Coast Guard radar once when it was carried to Antarctica by a school of renegade sharks. After a raucous time fishing up sushi for Somali pirates, Sarah's brain now contains infrared maps of an ancient, buried civilization which may or may not be a metaphor for the future of mankind. Spelled backwards and translated into Farsi, her name means the distance between Saturn's cutest moons.





Andy Steinbrink - While the majority of the drawings created by the American Apparel staff are, shall we say, obsessively "anatomical," the print that will be featured this weekend makes a direct critique of the kind of workplace malaise endemic to the modern American workforce.


Patsy Gelb was born in 1987 to a couple of working musicians. Her parents separated and then traveled throughout her childhood, bringing Patsy along for many tours. Left to her own imagination, Patsy spent most of her spare time drawing and looking at bird books. Home base was the hot valley of Tucson, Arizona where Patsy completed grade school. She began studying at the University of Arizona for a few years before migrating north to Portland, Oregon where she now attends the Pacific Northwest College of Art (PNCA). It is there that she discovered printmaking, which among other things has become a versatile medium for her work to grow from.