making friends

New friends can arrive unexpectedly as delightful surprises bearing the gifts of mutual experience and understanding. More often we have to work on making new friendships. In our sterile culture we're careful about giving too much information about our thoughts and deeper feelings. A lifetime of subjective lessons doesn't translate easily between acquaintances of short duration but we try and that can only be good.




This is a picture of a friend I made in the purely literal sense of the word. His name is Baba Ganoosh and he required more effort than I've had the time or inclination to spend on most people in recent years. Of course, most people would object to having their skeleton twisted of sculpture wire, their head and hands moulded and baked from polymer clay, muscles made from cotton balls and gauze, joints of wooden beads and all covered in the blue skin of a favorite spandex camisole. Baba didn't mind at all and only seemed to become more pleased with each enhancement. His braids and wild long hair were glued and sewn on bit by bit; his eyes and smile lit up with a little paint. His boots were fashioned from the fingers of an old pair of gloves given to me by my mother (thanks, Mam), pantaloons from a dress I bought one afternoon on Thayer St. in Providence and his jacket from a bookmark a friend brought home from Turkey. Best of all, nestled deep inside, is the pink amethyst heart pendant I wore as a child. It's a little cracked but Baba is healing it for me. That's what friends are for.




I met another friend recently at yes is red where I discovered this beautiful little painting. When I asked if I could have it to show you Rene spoke of having painted it a few years ago and I was triple delighted. It's always good to have friends who are confident of their talents and willing to share.

Happy Mother's Day to all my friends.