Me: “Ready to do this?”
Everyone else [All at once]: “this guy’s not here, we didn’t order that thing, do you remember where we put the tool, I hurt my foot, we are going to need more people, you forgot to measure from here to there”
Me: “Is there coffee?”
There was some threat of legal action in a fusillade of vindictive invective launched at myself and another with whom I am proud to be associated, but who shall remain herein unnamed.
Like a good piss-boy, fearing as I did for my job and my very throat, I took down the mentioned posts, lest authorities seek me for further investigations and flogging reprisals. I am a member of the faculty and staff of Duke University, an institution that might find offense with this story
I would rather be a lousy piss-boy and enjoy the rain of frogs brought down on my snow cap’d head, bitches. I will not be a party to censorship, whatever form it takes. Tell a friend.
And now, by popular demand [of my newly clear conscience]
Night on the Wards [Cops get involved]
I am not an attention whore, I mean I like to be noticed, but that fact doesn’t drive me. Last night it was important for me to have at least one person to acknowledge me, and remember that I existed. Wait, let me go back.
I have been doing graffiti since I got out of high school. Not the Sharpie on the bus window kind, I approached it with the intention if raising the bar from the banal status quo. I made a case to house my kit, which contained the following:
1) A rechargeable DremelÔ rotary tool, along with associated bits
2) A butane powered soldering iron, and extra butane
3) A silk screen setup
a) A 2″X3″ screen
b) A scrub brush
c) Screen Black
d) A 2″ squeegee
e) Five small bottles of ink.
With these very portable items I was able work nearly any material, and give it new life under my hand.
I had a studio in St. Paul Minnesota, right on the edge of the rail yard. Highway 35 W passed nearby and along that highway was a strip mall. [I am sure there are many, many good stories that start out with the phrase 'along that highway was a strip mall'] There was a tall, lighted sign facing the road that advertised The Water Bedroom Superstore. I got the notion in my head to make some mischief one night, and made a deal with myself.
If I could perform the tasks I set out to do with two tools; a flat head screwdriver, and a 5/16″ nut driver, then I would do it. If not, I wouldn’t.
The hard part was getting to the sign, situated as it was atop this 40-foot tall steel pole. I shinnied my way up to the first rung on the ladder, about ten feet up. By the time I got to the top, it wasn’t 8 minutes before the deed was done. I had rearranged the back-lit 18″ square yellow panels that had once said ‘Bedroom’ now said ‘Boredom’. At night you could not see the rest of the sign, as it was not illuminated. For a while it was a glowing advertisement for a dearth of captivating distractions.
That was easy. Didn’t even need the nut driver. I got down, enjoyed my work, and went back to the studio to watch the sun come up over the rail yard, which is something I did every, single morning without fail. By 8:30 AM, my work had been destroyed.
Two summers later I was living in Portland, Oregon and I worked in Tualatin, an awful suburb. I used to take the train to the bus with my bike in tow to get to work, and would ride my bike home 36 miles. Tualatin was just like all of the other 11 suburbs I rode through, in fact I wrote a little song on the long ride home one night, to the tune of “Greensleeves.” It was called “What town is this”.
The highway splits into two one-way streets that travel through downtown, which is the Oregon way. There is a low brick wall. It curved gracefully, defining a widening patch of green between these divergent streets.
Attached to the wall it said: Welcome to the City of Tualatin, in four inch tall stainless steel letters. I made careful note of the style and finish of the letters, and during my lunch at work, I set about making the necessary tools to exact social reform. On my way home that night, I stopped and applied my changes with two-sided-tape, and love. When I left, whistling, the sign more accurately read:
Welcome to the “City” of Tualatin.
That was 1999. At last report, the sign is still in it’s proper state, and doing well. I like to think of a city worker with a pressure washer out there in the spring, making sure the whole thing sparkles. I like to think that there is a budget for the maintenance and repair of this public work.
That takes us up to last night. I now live in Durham, NC and work at Duke University. I have never had much patience with the police, and for their part, neither have they for me. We have mutually been ignoring each other for a good long while now. Duke’s campus is expansive, and their holdings even more so.
Duke has it’s own police force, which would manage to attend to the business of noise complaints and the seeming endless stream of hit and run cases on pedestrians completely without offense, if it weren’t for the garish design of the graphics of the police cars. It is such a noisy and tacky illustration of bad aesthetics as to intrude on my otherwise peaceful bike ride to work.
Something needed to be done.
This weekend I set aside some time with white vinyl, black vinyl, and an exacto knife for my preparations. When the time was right I went to a place where one can depend on an unoccupied University Police car to being at any hour. The BP station on the boundary of East Campus.
This was the result:
Everything was at the ready and I parked my bike at the sidewalk for a smooth getaway. I walked between the car and the wall beside it and applied the decal. When I stood up I looked across the roof of the car at two uniformed officers leaving the store. All I could think to do was to hit the ground. I thought this was a very compromising position to be in, so I convinced myself to stand up and walk calmly toward my bike.
I heard one of the policemen yell “Hey”. I kept walking. Three feet from my bike, and freedom. I looked back as I pushed off to see one breaking for the car, and the other running toward me.
I was riding away, and formulating a plan at the same time. I could hear the hoof-steps behind me, and the officer yelled “Stop”. This not being an option I had considered, I said “No.”
I looked back to assure a safe ten steps between us. I was laughing, but he had a very serious look on his face. Thinking of the public good, as I often do, I said “Fatty, you are going to hurt yourself”. The other officer had found a clearing in traffic, and was headed our way on the other side of the street. I continued with the next step of the plan. There was an opening in the wall that surrounds East Campus, with a walking track just inside. I turned through the opening where I knew the car would not go.
I looked back again and asked “Fatty, why are you chasing me?” He responded knowingly “Because you are trying to get away.” That was just the type of attitude I didn’t want any more to do with, so I picked up the pace. I cut across the grass, leaving the two to their winded explanations and exited onto Buchannnon Street.
The next part of the plan would require some stealth, and a lot of pluck. I had to get back to the studio, about three miles without being spotted.
Normally this would not be difficult on a bike, people don’t notice bicycles any more than they do potholes, and in my case, they treat us both in much the same way. Aye, though, here’s the rub: I am riding a 1943 Wards Hawthorne. Purple and Gold metallic. With a gold-plated springer fork. And Whitewalls.
This is not a bike that gets ignored.
I need to get home on this bike, change clothes, and go out again on a different bike to find some alibis. It was suddenly imperative that I go to the bar. For my own good.
I put on my favorite shirt. Red nylon, unabashedly red and shiny. Think disco blood. It also has flames of black velvet, and tight, oooh, arms all squeezed like sausages, and every button straining. I put on some clingy black slacks, and my creepers. London underground, black patent, with woven white leather at the toe. Spritz a little smell-good, top it with my black leather trench that nearly drags the floor, grab another bike from the arsenal, and I was out in less than ten minutes.
I wish I could have driven the Wards, I would have been a vision.
I went to a place about eight blocks away, where I knew there would be a mid-sized crowd. I needed to make an entrance, and if the place was packed, I wouldn’t be able to separate form the crowd enough to suddenly become a part of it. I made a big deal about buy a round for six fellows around the pool table. Then I tipped the barkeep a twenty, and began to relax.
I had a serviceable Martini, which I milked for all it was worth, and made sure to go out and lean on my bike with anyone who seemed like they were going out to have a smoke.
All in all it was a pretty productive night. Made some art. Had some drinks. Didn’t get arrested. Good times.
Have you heard of Dudeular TV? It’s the next big thing, where have you been? This person has something to do with it. You can see it here. They give out a number that you can call and leave messages, or comments. I thought I would document the art action detailed above on their voicemail.
Now, like I say, I am not an attention whore, and this was something I was going to do anyway, but sometimes it’s just better have witnesses.
I’ll let you know if it makes it onto the show.
Post script:
1]What was not made clear was the fact that I was on the phone with Dudeula as I approached the police car. Then I called back and was leaving voicemail when the chasing was going on.
It took place live, and I would love to hear the recording. I need to know if voicemail can capture a moment
2]Damn! I can’t beleive I didn’t mention in the story that the decal was of quotation marks. Around the word ‘Police’
I should note that if you weren’t looking for it, you would probably never notice, it really was well done
