small, straight lines

I spent the majority of my productive day yesterday working through the logistics of an extensive plan to travel the southeast, stopping at some 60 or so cities from corpus cristi to ocean city.  I took a white sheet of heavy, high gloss paper and eyeballed cities I represented with small, blue circle-dots, making sure to write the city names in a way so as to keep from interfering with other adjacent or neighboring places.  I only wrote down cities of a certain size, and those within my approximation of where to travel from maryland to texas.  Quite proud of my spacing and silently thanking the art instructors who forced me to consider negative space and objects in relationship (as if there were some that aren’t), I then slipped the sheet of paper into a clear plastic sheet protector, and admired my work.

The circle dots were begging to be connected of course, and like so many constellations, it took great restraint to assume a practical stance and begin at the heart of it all.  atlanta.  my first attempt was a great circle, in a jump-rope sort of way, that was so intimidating I pictured insane interns jumping out of a tour bus with their heads on fire jumping into the ocean and mississippi river and gulf of mexico.  a new sort of cabin fever: spontaneous combustion combined with bird flu.  My second go at it, thin tip sharpie on a fresh, clear sheath, was a slow success, starting toward florida and circling back like a spirograph through savannah and virginia beach and greenville and memphis and austin and new orleans until I had a geographic hibiscus, and a plan.  I spent hours pouring over a calender ensuring that major cities were given multiple days leading up to weekends, leaving time to rest on sundays, and calculating highway mileage between the small, straight lines.

I enjoyed this process far more than I would have imagined.  There’s something about lines I’m drawn to.  And perhaps, soon enough, I will visit some of these indistinguishable blue, circle dots; and in that way, we will be drawn together.

yours,

Clifton