"Another Man's Trash?"

Flirtatious: "Well that's my favorite color too!"

Real Mood: Enigmatically Amused

Prediction: An archeologist in the year 3,000 will be institutionalized after spending ten years of his life trying to decipher our graffitti.

Okay, I must be losing it. I just sit down to type and this computer screen lets out this very brief, but very clear MOOO. We do strange things here, but we've never kept a cow in the house. Has this happened to any of you? I'd feel better if it had.

I'm now suspicious that AOL monitors blogs.  Yesterday I noticed in the middle of their promotional blurbs they threw in this picture of John Roberts with a clear emphasis on his not from this planet EYES.  I think every once in a while I'm going to throw in an authority test. Or would that be a paranoia test?

Back to the Highway.

Like many of you I detest some graffitti.(Before I started this I was amused to discover there is a singular noun form for graffitti. It's graffito. You probably knew that. But I didn't and I'm easily amused.) But I also have to tell you I get a real kick out of some it. Some of it I could defend as works of art. But I wonder if we all use the same value systems in our judgments?

Here in this city there is a prolific serial graffitist whose "artistry"  in the past has besmirched more than a thousand trash bins.

She, and yes I know she's a she, makes a unilateral decision that the city owned trash bins need some sprucing up.  So in the middle of the night she creeps through the urban alleyways with her wares. With cat like precision she pulls out her compressed paint cans and goes to work.  In seconds a container of waste becomes a work of art? I offer this up as a question because here is where our individual value systems come into play.   What is she trying to say to me (you)? What do I (you) think about her message? What do I (you) feel about her message?  

Of course these questions (and the answers to them) arise with  the sun as you are emptying your excess in to this big ugly brown receptacle. Your eyes are magnetically drawn to something new, and you immediately begin the value judgement process.

I have to say that I like the fact that this is not an angry message of defiance. Those bore me. But with my value system, that's about all I can say positive about what I see. I see before me a "Pink Flamingo."

I'll pause here to say I know this "Flamingist."  I've been to her studio and her house. She is very talented but I feel misguided in her graffitti choice. The police also know her but never seem to respond quick enough to catch her in action. But that's all another blog I think.  Back to the issue at hand.

There are people living on the planet who want no other human contact. They often go to great lengths to insure that's the case. They put up expensive gates with automatic locking mechanisms. They purchase elaborate camera systems atttached to screaming alarms. They surround themselves with "Keep Out" signs. They employee vicious beasts to snarl and bark at you when you get near. But if we all had MY value system all we'd have to do is put a "Pink Flamingo" in a front yard. (The only thing that frightens me more is getting a fruit cake in the mail.)

I'm sorry but "pink" is not my favorite color.

There is nothing more naturally dramatic than a flock of a thousand flamingoes lifting off a lake bed. But isolate a flamingo standing there on one leg, and you've just got one dumb looking beast. It comes as no surprise to me that flamingoes at the zoo must be herded inside like cattle when winter arrives. While doing a story on this practice I'm informed failure to herd them will result in these bird brains just standing there as the water in their pond ices up.   The zoo did, in fact, have to chip them out of the ice one year.  

There is a new fund raising scam sweeping the country that warms my heart. You sneak on to some "well to do" citizen's home in the middle of the night and fill it's yard with plastic "Pink Flamingoes." Then you send the home owner a note that says those flamingoes could be removed for a price. I'm predicting it will have a success rate equal to the bikini car wash scam. Its just comforting to know you are not alone when you detest something. 

I will say one neutral thing about a flamingo graffito. In some historical perspective it will make sense.  It will at least be an accurate reflection of some evolving fauna.

While short of praise I can also compliment the graphic skills of some of the less imaginative graffitti artists. Their spray can strokes and color mixing can be impressive. And their work will inspire copius cultural anthropology studies in the year 3000. Let's take a peak at one.

"The primitive attachment imagery carbon dated to the years 1990 to 2005 indicate there were basically two social orders competing for dominance in the region once called The United States of America. One order was called THE CRIPS. The other order identified itself as THE BLOODS. From early forms of TV (Total Vision) called DVDs we've learned political differences were always settled violently. The graffitti left behind and discovered in our archeological sites are very enlightening....blah, blah, blah, blah."

But there is yet another form of graffitti that I'm confident will never be deciphered. Scientists will go mad in search of it's meaning. It's the spray can work of engineers, housing inspectors, contractors, utility workers.

A case in point. Driving along a highway today something catches my eye on a concrete barrier. It's obviously a secret code of some officialdom. I say officialdom code because the drawing has no beauty, no imagination, no aesthetic connection to reality or dream.

It's merely off white clumsy, dripping paint strokes that say something to somebody but nobody knows who. I will describe what I see as one attempted vertical stroke of approximately one foot in length. Coming off the squiggle to my right is a horizontal squiggle of approximately one foot in length. It may be unfair to call it horizontal. It's all over the place. At what appears to be the end of that squiggle I see two strokes of different lengths, appearing at angles. They seem to be heading towards a common vanishing point but miss badly. Finally to the right of the missed point there is a recognizable image.  It appears to be the letter R in capital form.   

Okay you code wizards. When you've got that one solved get back to me and I'll toss another one at you.  Just tell the nurse it's part of your therapy.

You know how some stores check ID when you buy spray paint? They ought to be more interested in what people do for a living than how old they are.

I think this has gone far enough so I'm just going to fly out of here on the flamingo I flew in on. Quick before we ice up!