i'm home.  or rather - i'm back at the address that my bills get mailed to…i feel like i just left Home.  In case you didn't know, I just spent 5 days in the Texas hill country, at Lucky Star Art Camp.  If you weren't there - you should've been.  If you weren't there, you must go next year.  If you don't go next year, don't blame me.  this is your final boarding call. I've been to any number of art retreats and workshops in my time, and each one has it's own flair and flavor - some cotton candy, some BBQ and chilis, some apple pie.  Some are just plain as water, with a Just Learn The Stuff strictness.  I have to say, this past week in Texas won my heart.  None of the drama that often ensues when 100 or so folks are snatched out of their comfort zones, travel way too many hours in every sort of unreliable mode of transportation, and arrive sweating and stinky and needing a shower and a chardonnay.  NOW please and thank you.  add into the mix that you'll be bunking with women You Don't Know, that may/may not have strange bathroom habits or snore or use all the hot water or sleepwalk or talk/fart profusely in their sleep.  now, add to THAT the fact that all those shiny new art supplies have to be used In Front Of People.  there's your recipe for bad behavior, if it was ever to occur.  and the tipping point will come, and which way the pendulum swings is determined by the organizer, and how he/she acts/reacts.  Lisa must have been exhausted…she has no less than 22 kids (i lied right there) and 3 full time jobs (there too, but who wouldn't want to get out of the house with that many kids), and on top of that, she has at least 2 chickens that i personally saw, and by the way, took a leap and a chance and made Lucky Star from a ball of golden yarn and hopes & dreams.  so if she grabbed a microphone at lunchtime and shrieked that we should all be ashamed and Go Stand In A Corner for time out, no one would blame her.

But she didn't.  she was sweet and honest and as overwhelmed to be there as we were, and was In Charge.  You just knew it was all under control, and you could relax and enjoy every single thing.  if it wasn't good, she would make it good, so - no worries, no pouting.  But it was all always good, and if under that cool, calm, happy exterior, IF she was paddling like a 1-legged duck, then she hid it well.  but i think she was just diggin' it.

more tomorrow, including The Ghost Dog, The Badge of Courage: Water feature, and the Badge of Courage: I Rode A Horse.  (a real one).
Now I have to go talk on the radio, which seems cruel, but there are many worse things, and many worse jobs, and i have worked at each one.  so i am grateful for my job, and grateful for my time in Texas.  and grateful for my totally rocking real live cowboy boots with just a little bit of horse poo on them.  i will wear them to work, specifically because of the poo, knowing that the fan doesn't work in the studio, and now no one will bother me.

Did you do something courageous at camp?  Was even just going a major breakthrough for you?  tell me and I'll make you a Badge of Courage.