Laurentia Does 365: Day Ninety Eight: Happy Birthday

My wake up call was met with howling winds and sideways driven torrential rains. The skies were threatening and beautiful in blues and grays and whites, lit from within unfathomed depths. Yet even as the sun rose their light was kept dark and foreboding. My windshield wipers nearly had a stroke, my knuckles where wrapped, and the standing water on the freeway was a fright. It was unrelenting and exhilarating.

Still came the thought that it is my dad's birthday. When I was a kid we would invite friends over for cake and ice cream and some joke gifts and lots of running around on my part (cake still does that to me). But if it was a weekend and a particularly warm spring day, we would take a picnic basket and go for a drive into the mountains, around a lake to see some wildlife and hunt for spring flowers. There were always candy bars purchased somewhere along the way on those trips, a particular treat at the time. He taught me how to peel an orange in a single peel, how to ride my bike and how to tell a joke. Twenty one years after his death I am glad to be able to feel the joy of the memories. Happy Birthday daddy. I love you.

So, I had that going for me.

Next stop after counting stumbles in speech and an impromptu talk on what snacks I prefer when playing games, I had breakfast with a friend.

With the tried and true routine of eggs and potatoes and fruit, we had plenty of time to talk and share ideas of things we are working on. Most notably is a new interest in screen printing. He has been working with the most basic of tools, learning as he goes from Google. While it is a good and cheap way to begin and experiment with the your ideas, a talk with someone who does it would move the concepts along so much faster. As luck would have it last weekend at an art event I met an artist with some finely executed paintings. Upon discussion, I discovered that he screen prints on some canvas' and is a graphic designer in a print shop. Holy Crap! Ask and it is given... So, after a couple of Facebook exchanges with him, we arranged to meet him at his shop.

After breakfast, a couple pots of tea and probably one or two too many trips out back to smoke, we went to the screen print shop he works at.

They were the most gracious hosts, the most thorough in their education of us, the most accommodating to a non-ending stream of questions from complete novices. My new artist friend introduced us to his boss, the Art Director, and together they orchestrated a semesters worth of education in an hour and a half. We started with Illustrator, the tool that they use, complete with a full demo, and tips and offers of assistance as we learn. Next came a full tour of a rather large operation. The floor manager guided us through what becomes of the printout from the designers upstairs.

How the screen is prepared, how the emulsion is applied to the screens, how the print is applied to the emulsion, how the emulsion is hardened, how screen is mounted, how the ink is applied: both manually and by an automated machine. The properties of different colors, differing screen mesh. How the ink is dried, how the screens are recycled. We saw every tool, every machine, and nearly every employee visible on the floor spoke to us and gave a demonstration. Freaking amazing. At one point, a young man (doing athletic shirts on a run where the number increased by one on the front of each shirt, what? A new stencil applied each time!) asked where we were from, like a company or school or something. The floor manager replied, "From the streets of Spokane" and on the demo went. And that was the only question asked about our motives.

I was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of information that we were given. And even as we left, contact information was exchanged, in case we have more questions, art supply website names given for supplies. And even though we were astounded as we drove away, I still can not express the gratitude I feel for such a friendly, welcoming, beautiful, mind-boggling, experience.

Everyday I am so grateful for the amazing people in my life. And more show up everywhere I look. If I weren't so tired now I would break down and cry over the voracity of goodness!