Nothing grandiose. Actually never is. I was doing what I used to do… Daytripping in some tea-adjacent safe space aboveground as a workerbee after the psychological exertion of an unwieldy arthead. Re-aclimating lol.

It started post 1st experience of Japan, in complete reverse cultureshock. Slumming in design rooms as safe spaces blew up in my face because no matter how small I played it freelancer cog in wheel wise, even with coverage cloaking from my big sis (design-wise), some dumb chick would stir up jealous nonsense that’d have my then resume pulled, they’d see what I had done and who I’d trained with and try to foist me into slots where I more ‘belonged.’

So I fled. Into restaurant realms. Supplementary lol.

In hindsight I see what God did with all of that. I worked…for people… who built safe spaces for crazy assed artists in the 80s to decompress. Entrepreneurial artheads. In the aftermath of all that.

This was after the Space Untitled gallery cafe invasion that launched the Grievechronic adaptive, as the publishing exclusive was delineating itself. I’d been crewed but was penniless in the hurry up and wait so I’d gone to work lol.

I was always weirdly specific about the joints too. Intuitive. I was going on visuals and vibes. Outposts where I wouldn’t be bothered as I processed all the things I had to back then.

Was a waitress…a tea Server. Figuring out how to flip designhead into writerhead, being tipped 4x more than most by the grace of ye arthead gods as I went. My boss was usually upstairs fussing on the phone with the plate painting dude who was a bff and used to pay for food in art back in the day at her soho spot after entrusting the first floor to me.

She used to come in. Was one of my regulars. & I was never a chatty Cathy server when I did it. Introvert and writer. All observer mode. She started asking me questions. Watching me watch everything, I guess.

I knew who she was because she gave me her card but I didn’t 🤔, you know? It was a ‘get out of jail free’ card arthead wise, if needed. I knew the show because I was a pbs kid. But other than that, I was on my own journey. Perfect mentor for me. Checked in occasionally. Cheekily, when all the stuff was lining up for Miami arthead by the grace of God lol. I was six years into #AOLAB when she died, I think in New Orleans. & I found out late.

It was only after she died that I discovered that what i had been doing with AOLAB was in her original arthead lineage the whole time. It carried her arthead DNA. I thought she just dug me lol. & got me. And had left it at that. Turned out she knew me when she saw me in a weird way as one of hers.

I don’t ever really have the experience of being ‘out there, alone’ because experientially I tend to be extremely ensconced in gestating whatever arthead baby is in my belly. But if and when I did or do… God always had some elder arthead like a kairn on the road, lowkey and absently looking out for me.

To this day I don’t know if she was part of the efficacy I experienced in Miami’s notorious art scene. I was down there but working, not in it making rounds, in it ensconced in what frothed up for me to do. But I know she sent love to me down there. For me? That was enough.

The spirit of elder arthead statesmen speaking sense into neophyte artheads on the road ? She definitely was part of all that.