I am the Audience

Eryn Donnalley – Ephemeral Sands

August 21, 2025

a day in this life, art, dancing in the field of dreams, poetry

There is a small container in a parking lot off Churton Street in Hillsborough that’s housing a mandala as part of the Uproar Festival of Public Art.

There’s a shelf under the poem with 4 little bowls of sand that you can touch. Each bowl has finer sand than the last going from fairly course (almost like playground sand) to the much finer stuff that is used for mandalas.

The destruction ceremony is tomorrow night and I’m planning to attend.

I’m kind of persnickety about the idea of mandalas. I think they are lovely and understand people wanting to keep images of them. But, when people call a permanent thing they have made a mandala, they seem to be missing the point.
Aldo Muzzarelli – La Otra Señorita

August 17, 2025

art, Southern culture

There is an outdoor art festival going on around Orange County, NC this month. There are installations scattered all around Hillsborough and Chapel Hill.

This one is on the side of a building in Hillsborough. The artist is from Mauldin, SC.
Pickle experiment

August 16, 2025

a day in this life, grow your own, Southern culture

When we went to the farmers’ market last week, there were no pickling cucumbers and I thought I’d missed the window to stock up for the year. So, Chuck ordered some from his weekly vegetable service. Unfortunately, what she sent was 5 large, long cucumbers. My grandmother’s recipe expects them to be whole when you start and these things will not fit my pot. Also, I was afraid they’d be seedy.

I really did think I was out of luck. But, I was going to at least try to use the long ones and see what I could do with them.

I went back to the farmers’ market today to get enough tomatoes to fill up my gallon freezer bag for my Solstice tomato pie. (I ate most of the ones we grew before I thought about saving some and there aren’t enough.)

Lo and behold! The only table with tomatoes had pickling cucumbers this week. I got fewer than I thought would fit my pot and I’m trying some of the large ones, too.

I’m curious to see how the ones that are cut turn out. IF they turn out.

PS: Edit: Whatever: The long, skinny cucumbers did fine. I won’t be intimidated by them again.
Grrrrrrrr

August 15, 2025

a day in this life

I have taken so many pictures of art I want to share. Then I get overwhelmed by choice. And THEN I find I forgot to get the attribution.

So….

Here are some butterflies while I’m trying to get my shit together.

Tiger swallowtails galore, aka what happened to the dill.

Alternatively, here’s a picture I took on my way home from work. An advantage of driving around in the country at 1:30 in the morning is that you don’t have to worry about other people coming up behind you when you’re stopped in the middle of the road.
Not shocked but appalled.

July 14, 2025

activism, art, PSA

I didn’t take a picture of the room in a room. I thought I had.

In the middle of the main gallery at the Eno Mill Gallery for the incarcerated artists exhibition, a room was built. It was the size of the rooms that are used for solitary confinement. You could go in and close the door behind you.

I saw a lot of people give it a shot on opening night. No one stayed very long. I wasn’t sure if they were uncomfortable with the closed space or the fact that other people might be waiting for a turn.

I went in on Saturday when Chuck and I made return visit to see the show without other people around.

The space is small. The only way to stretch out is on the bed. There might be the space of a yoga mat on the floor.

And the light came on randomly. I coudn’t decide if it was triggered by my movement and sounds or if it just came on at random intervals. If it was triggered, it was a hair trigger. You could not roll over in your sleep without setting it off. If it was random, it is even worse. But, either way, that light would be a torture device.

Those who have a sipiritual practice that includes silence and stillness probably had an easier time than those who don’t. But, we all knew we could leave when we chose to.