Imagery

Remember that teabag with Ben's face on it that I made?  Teabag Ben is currently lost in the Columbia Museum of Art.  Either he'll find a new home, meaning that someone bought him at the Contemporary Artists show, or he'll be coaxed back in to an envelope and mailed back to me.  I haven't told the real Ben yet.  I just don't know how to break the news to him.  Maybe over a gallon of tea?

Teabag Ben was a sculpture that was inspired by the association of people with particular things.  These "things" aren't just random things that the person may like.  They're things that involve me, my relationship with that item and that person.  An experience. 

When I was younger I used to go with my dad to see my grandparents every other weekend.  They'd have a long list of things for him to do, mostly yardwork, and a short list of things that I could do.  I always switched out their winter and summer clothes that were in the attic.  I can still feel the heavy, suffocating heat from being up there during the summer.  I'd pump gas for them, and later drive to the gas station for them.  It didn't matter who had the cheapest gas, they were loyal to one locally owned place.  It smelled like smoke, had wood panelling, and a deformed dog behind the counter. My favorite chore was checking their mail.  They had a post office box in town that you had to open with a little gold key.  This was a new experience for me because I was only familiar with a mailbox.  For years I thought that if you lived in town you were automatically given a post office box and that it was a high class "rich person" thing.  It was exciting to open the little door and have mail in there.  Of course I stuck my hand all the way through it because I was fascinated about the goings on on the other side.

Today, for the first time since I first went off to college, I checked my grandparent's post office box.  There was a small cardboard box in it that I could barely get out- a treasure!  I don't know what was in the box but trying to get it out with one finger and then pulling out the envelopes behind it brought back the images and memories from older days.  I had to resist sticking my hand all the way through it.