Were you out? Where were you? In a field? In a forest? In your head?

Were you out? Or did you see Lynda live and in full bloom!?

Ode to Lynda Barry, 1/24: 

Oh Lynda Barry. If you asked me what the most critical point 

in my life to date was, I would reply "today!" Today with you. You give people reasons to believe in themselves. Reason to believe in art and creative processes...in others, in other worlds, and our own. 

5,4,3,2...Good! The world is yours! But it is also theirs, and his, and hers, and ours! You’re sitting here with us, but you’re also out walking in a field at dawn...

Lynda, You are dawn. You are many peoples dawn! You were my dawn, Thursday. You were my dawn the other day, when the world seemed to overwhelm...and next week, when I will turn to all one hundred of your demons to keep me company on a day which hasn't yet been filled. You are also what encourages us each to be dawn. We are all dawn. Together, we are the new light of each day.

Below is a piece I wrote while in Lynda's Workshop. It was a 7 minutes exercise, where we were prompted to brainstorm for 3 or 4 minutes and wrote for that same amount. It is un-edited. At the points where I introduce the alphabet, this indicates the points during the exercise where I was in continuous thought and movement, even if I was unsure of how to proceed with the short story. Blah, blah, blah, 5, 4, 2, 3, 1...

Here is the near-sighted monkey Lynda drew with a marker of mine...to give you something to focus on visually before this story. [do I need to break up my text more? *sarcasm*]

You are standing on gritty sand, pebbles, and dirt on a thin strip of beach, [is this really a beach?] which holds the ocean back. The wall of stones has been cobbled haphazardly to hold land away from water. Perhaps it was well crafted and time has merely taken its toll. It takes you three minutes to draw your gaze from a purple blob of jelly that seems to be beached on the rocks. The contrast of nature and this blob seems disconcerting. Your eyes quickly shift to the young kids kicking the wet ball on the green carper of the park. But that's just beyond the crumble of the wall and your eyes jump back to the jelly. You are fixated on this clump. The faint light from the sky shines through thick grey clouds and cuts right through the bright lavender blob all the way to the dirty pebbles. Was this dumped by some hooligan from the small Irish town?...Did it wash up from some fishing boat?...was it used in some obscure religious practice? My finger is drawn to it as if there is a magnetic pull. 8 inches. 4inches. 2 inches. I anticipate a wet squishy cushion to ABCD intercept my pointer finger. I hear my brother yelling from just beyond the wall...jelly...fish...zap.

One Hundred Demons that often give me inspiration! I bought this book at 47th Street Books in Chicago