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I got to spend a lot of time with my daughter this weekend. I love to just watch her make art. It’s so frenetic and joyful, and yet, there is intent and purpose. I remember years ago going to hear an artist in residence at the Isabella Stewart Gardner museum talk about the great lengths she took to simply have adults make art. They were so uncomfortable with being asked to make art that she resorted to asking them to make marks on paper to facilitate art making. The concept of making art gets freighted with over thinking and value judgement throughout our lives and, unless we receive outside validation, many of us stop making art altogether. Not only is exposure to art and creativity important to the soul’s experience, the making and process of it makes us more human and happy, in my opinion.

Frankie dashed this piece off in about 10 minutes this weekend. I love the motion and color in it, and I love that she spelled “LOVE” backwards–something that she has been experimenting with for a while now. I don’t know where spelling backwards is on the arc of learning, but it is compelling and I like to think she is a junior Leonardo daVinci, who kept whole journals in backward handwriting. I also love it because it reminds me of one of my favorite albums by one of my favorite bands, “EVOL,” by Sonic Youth. I am reading Girl in a Band right now, so this is all serendipitous to me.

So, I have been spending a lot more time at my local post office these days. Actually, it’s the first time in years I have been in any post office. I fondly remember living in the UK in the 70s and, as a budding philatelist, queuing up to buy the latest first edition stamps from the Royal Mail. It seemed, at the time, that that was primarily how the Royal Mail sustained itself. A quick glance at their web site today suggests stamp collecting has fallen out of favor. That’s the internet for you—obviating scarcity and rareness—thanks!

Anywhooo. . .my Chestnut Hill post office, besides having peeling walls and ceilings and, apparently, no AC, as evidenced by the strong breeze coming through un-screened open windows, does have art. In fact, this mural, which I mistook for WPA work, is in fact, by a group of similar artists, referred to as “the Section,” and they operated roughly at the same time as the WPA group, and the art is referred at as “the New Deal Art.”

This mural is attributed to a William Abbott Cheever, and is entitled, ““The Reverend John Eliot Preaching to the Indians” and was painted in 1941. Looks like it needs some cleaning, and I do wonder what the elements do to it.

It was a nice little surprise, though, and I look forward to visiting it and studying it some more.

For more information about New Deal Art in Massachusetts take a look here.

The Dandy Warhols sang that every day should be a holiday. It’s hard to argue with the logic. But then, who would cook our food, clean our homes, read us bedtime stories, dress our cuts, do our homework (well, perhaps a bridge too far). Since becoming a mum, I have learned to be more patient, to be less judgmental, to be more compassionate, and yes, a slightly more organized cleaner.

If you want to thank your Mum, you could do worse than give her a piece of art. Yes, I am engaging in shameless self-promotion.

Use coupon code MUMLOVESART to save 10% on any purchase over 30$US  until May 10 in my Etsy shop.

I have always loved the DIY ethos of punk. Malcolm McLaren, Vivienne Westwood. In many ways, Margiela represents a perfect distillation and a certain disciplining of this philosophy.

I love this little video!

Much has been made of Proust’s Madeline, but little of The Debt to Pleasure, a marvelous book by John Lanchester. It’s one of those under-the-radar books that literally heaves with references to literary icons, including Bertrand Russell, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Elizabeth David, and others, but also presents a sumptuous feast for the senses. I remember reading this when it first came out and being captivated by the vivid, nay, lascivious, descriptions of menus and meals that made you positively reel with a feeling of satiation and almost drunkeness. Lanchester is a brilliant wordsmith, and his prose crackles with a kinetic, savoury floridness that entices the reader to continue to down the road of licentiousness that the lead character, Tarquin, leads us.

Of course, I cannot hold a candles to the great John Banville, so I will stop here, and recommend, at the very least, that you read his review, and indulge yourself with a reading of the book itself.

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/jan/03/john-banville-john-lanchester-the-debt-to-pleasure

Perhaps no one was less surprised than I that the Wall Street Journal had a an article devoted to Wabi Sabi this weekend (http://www.wsj.com/articles/could-japanese-design-be-the-cure-for-your-tech-addiction-1429897425). In this era of manufactured fun and simulcra of simulcra of flavour (with due to regard and apologies to William Gibson), where you can purchase a cracker or cookie with no gluten, no sugar, no trans fats (!) and sadly, no flavour, it’s perhaps time that we all recognize that the  imperfection afforded via the imperfect rendering of a sow’s fat or the pungent smell of rotting milk is in fact not only good for us, but possibly sublime.

Yes, I have my technology upon which I compose this piece, but I have found no greater pleasure than in taking long aimless walks with friends to find an unfindable “lost ” pond, and making irregular but yummy and gooey homemade macaroni and cheese to take to a dear friend. My child’s goofy grin when she is aware that she has been found out but knows I will not bear a grudge about the upmteenth mess of the weekend.

I was lucky enough to work with a Mr Paul Prindle in my earlier days of educational publishing. He was a gentle, patient spirit—interested in everything and everyone—and always had a moment to spare to shoot the breeze or talk strategy. He worked with a Mr Donald Jones (Snr), of whom I shall write at a later date, to build an amazing company that made amazing products. Paul cared deeply about education and was a great businessman, but he also cared deeply about life, and a life that was worth living. I fondly remember being asked to pull up a chair and have a small (or large!) glass of wine on Friday afternoons and discussing the latest products my team was working on. You could argue that this type of discourse is now a luxury in the publishing business, and that there was perhaps a myopia or willful denial that the winds were changing in educational publishing, and that the development of the world wide web and ebooks, and amazon are only hastening a reckoning. I’d prefer to think they represent an opportunity to create even richer learning experiences and options for non-traditional leaners.

But this isn’t about pedagogy and learning technology. This is about one man’s generosity of spirit and willingness to take us all along on a wonderful ride.

As Paul often said, “we’re not here for a long time, we’re here for a good time.”

Careers are your life’s work. Make sure you have a good time.

I have been reading Harry Eyres’ Slow Lane column for most of the 11 years in the back pages of the Financial Times Weekend Arts section. He was a brilliant, and gentle, counterpoint to his page-mate, Tyler Brulé. Today is his last column for the FT. Give yourself a small gift. Read it.