my yogurt container runneth over

So I was playing with the Emmett Kelly idea today, and I thought it would be fun to try walking through a few public spaces doing someting rather than just sitting in one place. So I did, and while I did I carried a really full container of water. It was cool, like I was a little source of tension passing through a room...like a few sentences of a story.

It was interesting the way it attracted attention, because I wasn't walking  very fast but I was very tense and very focused so I got a lot of looks. People that wanted to know what was in the container, waiting to see if I spilled any (which I did fairly often) or sometimes seeing if they could help at all. A lot of folks seemed to get a kick out of holding the door for me, including a guy who, when encountering one of those double door situations with a little pointless room in between, held the first door and then ran ahead and got the other one. 

The other thing that tickled me was that no one really bothered to ask what I was doing, even when I ran into people I knew. I guess meandering through the stacks in the library with a full container of water is...pretty ordinary. Bren and I joked about being a fish EMT on call. 

I also didn't want somebody following me taking pictures because I thought this one would work better if it didn't seem to be a performance at all. But thanks to Molly for taking a few before I encountered too many people.  

and now, an unrelated joke.

So Noah is waiting by his ark for all the animals that God has promised will squeeze into his boat. And then he sees them, great numbers of beasts all converging on where he's standing. So he lowers the gang-plank and watches as the animals start filing on board, two by two. And as they go up into the ship, Noah can be heard making comments on each animal that goes by- "Hmm...two horses, they don't taste very nice, but they're edible. Ooh! Two sheep! I love roast lamb." And so on for each pair of animals Noah counts going on board he says something about what they're like to eat. Eventually Noah's son can stand it no longer and he asks his mother what Noah's deal is.

"Well," she says, "there's Noah counting for taste."

one bottle of pop, two bottle of pop...

So back in the day, about 1942-1956, Emmett Kelly was a clown for the Ringling Bros. Circus. He was a big deal because he had this great tramp clown, Weary Willie, when people just weren't doing that, circus clowns went in whiteface or auguste and made people laugh. Kelly would sweep up after the other acts, including a famous gag where he would try to sweep up the spotlight (other clowns have done spotlight gags since, like Oleg Popov or David Larible, but Kelly was the first) and he was the mascot for the Brooklyn Dodgers for a year. Generally, he's just great.

One thing he did that gained him a good deal of fame was that at the beginning of the show all the clowns would run around the ring, jumping and leaping and doing clown things trying to attract people's attention. But Kelly would just walk out calmly, find a seat on the edge of the ring and sew a button onto his very tattered coat. Rather than desparately trying to gain people's attention, he would just create his own little world and invite people in if they so chose. So naturally the crowd's attention would go to him because of the huge difference in energy level, a calm sitting figure amid an orgy of color, movement and sound. 

So I wanted to play with a similar idea, create a little world and invite people in if they felt like it. I got some bottles, figured out what pitch they created, and set up shop. I had a little pentatonic going, or the first five notes of a major scale in my case. I'm gonna say C D E F G, though I have no idea what key I was in. Not the point. 

I didn't really know how to play many things, given only a few pitches. But I managed some things, your basic Mary Had a Little Lamb, Tea for Two, Beautiful Soup and plenty of other ones that sort of worked, like Frere Jacques, except that I was missing a few notes. But a good time to be sure. 

I was set up on the back porch of my house, which wasn't terribly public but I chose it because it was raining and the porch was covered by a room that sticks out on the third floor (my room, actually.) so as it turns out, there are great acoustics in that little corner thanks to my jutting out room and the sound carried a lot more than I thought it would. Maybe that was a little less private than it should've been, but it got peoples attention. 

I wouldn't say anything profound came out of this. I hit some bottles with a spoon. But it was a nice dynamic to play with and one that I don't try often enough.  I definitely felt like I should be doing something, like making faces, so that it would be engaging since I didn't think my musical prowess was so captivating.  But it was nice being a quiet unassuming clown as a break from the tensed-to-every-hair feeling of something like commedia dell'arte. I'll keep playing with this.

Many thanks to Lily for taking the pictures. And I haven't figured out how to rotate videos so neck cramps ahoy!

good evening frieeeeeeeends!

snoetry

So I had all these plans for yesterday, all sorts of cool stuff to play with and explore...but no. instead, it snowed. and none of these plans involved snow. So I tried to make lemonade and find some snow score to do, but as much as Brennin and I wandered around looking for something to inspire us, nothing was happening. And all I could think about was how frustrated I was at there being MORE snow. Because Massachusetts really isn't cold enough already.

Then I got thinking about what I used to do when I was displeased with something, which was to make unhappy kid's stories with names like Shlumpy the puddle. So I decided I could write a story about a kid who hates snow and be the live-action illustrations myself.

Of course, that was before I realized that I don't really know anything about photogrpahy or how my camera works. Or why my camera gets grumpy when taking snowy pictures. So...I

don't know if anyone will actually be able to tell what's happening in the pictures, but that's what it is. I should learn how to take pictures in the future...

But anyway, we now present the story of Oscar and the Snow.

Oscar hated snow. He hated everything about it.

He hated how it covered everything,

 

how it fell on his head,

 

and how it got his pants all wet.

And he just kept on hating it until one day when he had had enough.

"That's it!" Oscar exclaimed "From this day forth there shall be no more snow EVER!"

"You can't just decide that," everyone else said "That's not your call."

But Oscar didn't care. He figured that if he didn't want there to be snow, the snow would get it that he wanted to be left alone.

Of course, word got around to Snow about Oscar's decision.

"I will do what I want when I want, thank you very much," retorted the snow with her nose in the air.

So the snow waited for Oscar to pass by...

when she pounced!

and buried poor Oscar

 until he had disappeared.

And everyone just sort of forgot about him because frankly, the world had enough grumpy people in it.

and the moral of the story is: there's no business like snow business.

Many thanks to Brennin for taking the pictures and playing the important role of everyone else.

My hand is actually sticking out of the snow in that last picture. I dare you to try and find it.

Another thing that occurred to me while doing this piece was that I didn't really know how "performative" it was. People walked by us while we were taking the pictures and told me I was going to get pneumonia,  but other than that we didn't really have an audience. But then if the presentation of this work is on the internet, a public space that anyone with a computer can access, does that mean I inherently have an audience? Or at least more of an audience than if I wrote it on a piece of paper and handed it to someone to read? Of course, just because it's here doesn't mean that anyone will see it, there are millions and billions of other things to interest people on the internet. It's not even a flyer that you might just happen upon on your usual way to work. Oh well. I guess those that are meant to see it will see it.