"ET Birthday Mountain" created with Eric Todd and featuring The Red Hot Salt Room by Annie Albagli at the Djerassi Resident Artists Program
September 14, 2020: I turn 32 on a mountain in relative isolation in the mouth of a record breaking wildfire season in the year of the plague during the rise of orange-tinged fascism. This is not a new moment but it's my first time here. I’ve been struggling. Have you been struggling too? My partner came to see me this weekend and we romped around a smoky mountain and we tinkered in the studio barn and we made this visual-poem-song because making is my most used map. I am grateful. I feel loved. For my birthday I hope you create something today. And after you create it, I hope you share it in some way. A song you sing for your house plant. A special way you cut the stone fruit, arranged smartly on the best plate in the house and presented to your roommate for breakfast. A string of words all strung together you scrawl onto the back of a postcard and drop into the outgoing mail. A dance you perform with deep and sincere gusto for your neighbor. I love you. This is a hard year. I doubt they get easier the way we’re headed. So let’s build a new kind of forward. Let’s get to work on the maps. When they’re done, let’s share them. They’ll never be done, but still, let's share them. Let’s teach each other how.
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