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| photo credit: Joshua Franzos |
I used to collect stuff. I believe Andy Warhol said two of anything is a ready made collection. In my twenties, it seemed like I collected everything, pretty easy when you work at an auction house. I collected Victorian post mortem pictures and old apothecary jars and coins. Furniture. Books. Art. Clothes. Shoes. Stamps. Skeleton Keys. Iron bottle openers. Tools. Fabrics. Sewing Machines. Glass. Porcelain. Music. DVDS. Lanterns. You name it. Having so much stuff was a joy then. It showed off my hard work, my thrifty, savvy ways, or how cultured I was trying to be. I think I was probably trying to define myself as an adult by playing house. I finally arrived at the doorstep of adulthood at age 29. I shed a lot of things that year. A marriage. Some weight. A lot of stuff. I thought I'd miss it, but I didn't. It was almost as if I was cutting away the parts that didn't make sense anymore, much like a reductive sculpture where a stone cutter starts with a block of marble and ends up with a contrapposto statue.
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| photo credit: Joshua Franzos |
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| photo credit: Joshua Franzos |
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| photo credit: Joshua Franzos |
By and large, I've stopped "collecting." I've hung onto some artwork, knowing full well I could liquidate it at any moment if the market's right. I still have a drawer full of skeleton keys somewhere. I've drastically cut down on the physical books and music due to the digital age of things, but books are a bit of an occupational hazard as a writer. I *try* to only own the ones I return to time and time again. I'm also doing that with the clothes and shoes...keeping only the ones I return to time and time again. I guess, I also technically have a collection of dogs, since we now have 2. But besides that stuff, there's one other thing I sort of collect. I also have this weird non-collection of white rabbits. I say non-collection because I don't actually own any. Nothing physical anyway. It's pretty much just digital copies of white rabbits.
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| photo credit: Joshua Franzos |
It's a fragmentary and fleeting thing, but the white rabbit keeps coming back in a variety of forms. One might say I'm haunted. Just the other day, I was re-reading Stephen King's On Writing. Wouldn't you know, he mentions a white rabbit in there. While in California, I kid you not, I averaged about three white rabbit sightings a day. But it's not just me. Once people catch wind that you collect something, *that* is typically what you get as any gift. Forever. I half expected to receive gift box, after gift box full of white rabbit figurines into perpetuity. But in all the years that I've been following the white rabbit, I haven't received one (happy dance). But, people often do send glimpses of him my way. Most recently, a contractor friend on instagram sent me a video of white rabbit wallpaper from a house he's going to remodel. I receive random, out of the blue, texts from friends that spot him. My husband sends them to me. I never really stated my catch and release policy, but it seems everyone's on board with it. Everyone but myself.
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| photo credit: Joshua Franzos |
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| photo credit: Joshua Franzos |
There's a well known aphorism, If you love something, set it free...you know how the rest goes. Lesson learned yet again. I find real joy in seeing how many times the universe cares for our paths to intertwine. So here's to the endless chase for those ideals that keep us chugging along and staying curious.Curiouser and Curiouser.
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| photo credit: Joshua Franzos |
What I Wore:
Hat: Pittsburgh Pirates
Top: past season, Zara.
ripped jeans: Express, here.
shoes: somewhere far, far away in China.
Your Bosom Friend in Pittsburgh,
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