Imagine Us
In our Secret Mall Apartment
“Right now I’m doing my serious project,” my son said to me last week.
He was working on a project about Blackbeard. I hope everyone’s “serious project” is about Blackbeard, especially one made out of plastic bottles and black yarn. Construction paper, yarn, glue, maybe a swipe of paint you refuse to clean off the desk? Good to go. Serious projects commenced.
God preserve me from novel-writing, thought Mrs. Touchet. God preserve me from that tragic indulgence, that useless vanity, that blindness!
- Zadie Smith, The Fraud
One of the things I am admiring between now and when we saw each other last is the determination with which this Blackbeard unfolds. Ten minutes before bed? Why not craft some weapons. More time after school? Let’s get a nice long coat on him. Twenty minutes past bedtime and your parents are breathing down your neck? Now seems as good a time as any to complete that impressive beard. The focus, the zeal! This will always inspire me, even as the artist actively ignores my requests. Why can’t I dash off my novel in the same manner, one day have it gloriously done? Type out three sentences before leaving for the gym. Two more while the pasta boils. Why must I cleave such sanctimonious writing hours from the rest of my life? The mother here knows the answer loud and clear - I’m not able to fly into the dream state in those moments because I may not come back, may in fact burn the kitchen down. That’s the fear, anyway. (A wooden spoon with a black butt - everyone thinks it’s hilarious I did this - shows it’s more than a slight possibility.)
The thing is, I’m already doing it. I don’t need to read about it.
- child’s take on Richard P. Smith’s book about making money with bottle returns
I’ve been watching a documentary on Netflix called Secret Mall Apartment and falling down a rabbit hole of questions about the focus it takes to create art, the damage one does occasionally to relationships in doing so, the privilege of making it, who it is for, eventually - who we help and who we imagine we’re helping. Who we’re talking to, really, when we make our art, and how much more cohesive and big a conversation we can have when we change the audience even slightly.
This last question, of audience, is especially on my mind as I watch young people in Secret Mall Apartment set up domestic space in a blank hull behind the mall’s front-facing veneers. I thrill at their ingenuity and focus while also wondering, what if they weren’t talking back to soulless developers? What if ogres were out of this conversation entirely? What if building a thing wasn’t about power or subterfuge but instead about spreading resources and care?
As soon as I write that, though, I’m thinking about a scene where the main artist Michael Townsend1 (different from that guy in the picture) compares the mall apartment to a barnacle on a whale - an arguably neutral thing, no subterfuge here. I also recall the backdrop of this time, the artists taking on other projects grounded in tragedies like 9/11 and the Oklahoma City bombing. I haven’t finished the film so this isn’t a comprehensive take, just to say that this documentary is giving me soooooooo much to think about. Isn’t that what great art does? <3 <3
Another thing I’m thinking about is a scene in which the new wife of Townsend complains that she wants to work on their actual house and buy goods for their real home, rather than spend money on this make-believe apartment.
In a present-day interview on camera, Townsend says these complaints are absolutely valid. And they are. But there’s a look this woman gets in the food court, filmed by a little portable camera someone held at the time, where her eyes get distant and her face takes on both a hardness and a blurred softness, like she and her gaze are falling off the end of the table into an abyss of emotion. Frustration? Disbelief? I can’t even with this guy-ness? A chill comes over her in real time. You can almost see her thoughts in a bubble above her head. This is the person I married. Uh-ohhhhhhhh.
To be fair, every married person ever has probably had this moment.2 Some of us may have them several moments a week (Tim, watching me bring yet another piece of furniture into the house). When I saw that scene, I thought how every woman (or child or disenfranchised person) knows that stare, that far away, this’ll never do, no-one-is-listening-even-though-I’M-EXTREMELY-RIGHT stare. Something happened in my body watching that scene where a woman had to swallow her voice and go underground, start making preparations for a different way. It was like a fracturing of the soul in real time, or a coalescing of it, I’m not sure.
Later, on-camera, she says something like, “I was able to realize that wasn’t what I wanted, it wasn’t a good relationship for me.” These two people are no longer married, a fact I am neutral about (like a whale and a barnacle???). But good for her, being able to realize such a pivotal thing. It isn’t always a given that we will realize anything! Especially so momentous a care-taking as what we really need. I loved the way she said that and kept playing it in my head throughout the day. It sounded so gentle in her articulation, both to herself and maybe to her former spouse, while also protecting what is probably a much longer, more drawn-out story.
I’m definitely not saying everyone needs to leave a situation when the cracks start to show. As mentioned in my last post, there are plenty of epoxies on the market. I happen to LOVE epoxies. I should probably be investing in them right now! (please send NASDAQ info.) And/but man, that stare. I am haunted by the possible loss of potential inside of it.
I also don’t think every struggle ends in fracture, in leaving, in blowing apart. And/but the struggle is real (I don’t mean the struggles of marriage although let’s be honest, the ability to stay in right relationship with beloveds can be trying sometimes). I mean the struggle of change, of becoming, of evolving. Even the struggles of dreams.
Speaking of dreams, this movie has inspired me to wonder who I would assemble for my A Team of weirdos. I definitely have them scattered across the country which, as you can imagine, isn’t convenient when you need help painting a cabinet or hanging some tapestries. I’d love to find more people to call on locally, someone who wants to go to a river or a movie or help me paint a mural on my ceiling (is this just called a friend? lol). Shout out to my mom who lives far away but will help with arts and crafts in a heartbeat (this woman sends half the flare featured here - if you see a colorful thing there’s a great chance she sent it). Also to my dad who, as the last post attests, is handy with several brands of epoxy (even if the search for one that stands up to marble is ongoing).
And now for our regular feature titled What’s In Kara’s Freezer??
Also, I saw this book at the library and thought, alternative title for Under a Spell?
Last thing: I was on a stationary bike at the gym next someone who brought knitting to their workout. I love all humans but may love retirees most. I also forgot to tell you that our coat rack heard me call back to our old broken one and fell over in a big splat. Like all of us, it needed in on the drama!
Okay, last last thing. Speaking of partnered life, it was my birthday this week. On the day before my daughter said, Enjoy your last day of being 47! I knew I’d forget so I wrote myself a sticky note and put it on a shelf. Later I was like, what happened to that note reminding me to enjoy my day? I found it under a pile of junk mail which Tim had plunked onto it. (Thanks, love!!) I did have the sweetest birthday, though. One of my kids had a fever and was in and out of sleep on the couch, like a friend who had too much to drink. It was a quiet and bizarre day, but I drafted this post - spending time thinking about other people’s art - and Tim brought home dinner and a cake (the regular baker was passed out on the couch). I was given the best hand-crafted present and also slaughtered one of my kids in a game of Othello (twice!!). My inner ten-year-old cherished that gift, lol.
Be well, my friends, stay soft and wild, whenever possible. Thanks so much for being here!
XOXO
Kara
I’m feeling a little sheepish writing about someone else’s personal life so openly, especially since I like this film and Townsend’s whole approach to art so much (not to mention the art itself!). I hope this is abundantly clear. Buuuuuuuuut, while we’re at the assumptive thresholds (here she goes) I’ll just step further in and add that Townsend’s family has a military background, a fact I found fascinating because some of his ideas are as large-scaled, ambitious, and covert as some military operations. It’s probably especially fascinating to me as someone who had military people in her family and who believes that creativity and destruction can be two sides of the same coin (so-called “defense” can further cycles of violence rather than focusing on the reparative qualities of creativity….). Anyway, I’m grateful for this film and am always inspired by sly, ambitious people who put their skills to use for the common good: aka artists.
I feel the need to add here that in the same food court scene, Townsend somewhat sweetly explains why the secret apartment is so important to him, why he would want to allocate resources this way. His explanation makes A LOT of sense to me. He says something like, he is creating something special with people that are important to him. He throws it up lightly, somewhat tenderly, like: I know you don’t agree and I see that, and this is why it still matters to me.
In some ways it is a perfect moment of partnership: two people trying to agree on how to spend their time and money, in other words trying to agree what dream they are (consciously or unconsciously) creating together. When I re-watched that scene to make sure I got her words right, I felt compassion for both of them. I also saw what I had missed in the first watching: Townsend’s nurturance of this group in addition to his own mad dream.
As someone who has often craved a sturdier circle behind my days (don’t get me started on the lack of formal support for young mothers, I will probably jump off a cliff), that made sense to me. At the end of the film, it is revealed that most participants still carry the key to that long ago apartment. I mewled at the screen, my sick child with me on the couch, as if I were watching a nature documentary about cute baby bears. I was deeply touched by that fact.
I have zero judgement for people who divorce. I don’t care how closely your values and talents align (and this is before we tackle malevolent people or any number of real problems like addiction or family tensions or poverty or abuse) marital rapids are really difficult to shoot. And our culture gives us toothpicks for paddles while throwing alligators into the water, asking why we’re so stressed.
I’m sorry (not sorry) to end on a rant. Here’s a joke if you made it this far:
Happy to report that this sticky note is for someone else in the house, phew. In spite of the many things I’m working on right now, hair brushing is a skill I have mastered. ✔️ ✔️
Oh man, you had me at the miniature goose lamp! I love the books you find. Thank you also for this intro into Secret Mall Apartment. It feels very Gen X. Like zero-technology mayhem. I miss those days!! Condolences to the coat rack. Hope she gets some rest. xoxx
Ahh I just watched Secret Mall Apartment last week, loved it so much!! Your screen shots are GOLD. I looove Amelia's concept of "zero technology mayhem" eeee! Just so much joy and mischief <3