December 2013 – Up In The Valley

Bring me the hands of Vicente Fernandez

At once, jefe. Here they are, in downtown San Fernando.

Shakira, too.

Right next to the bridal shops…

And up the street from the San Fernando Pananderia…

Where men still create with their hands…

If your holiday has not gone well, take heart. You could be here, doing laundry in a minimum security correctional facility, a stone’s throw from the 405, and the beeps and thwaps of cars going to and fro, wherever they may choose to go.

Wish Kome True, Dream of Change

Do dreams come true when they are wished for ungrammatically? Is there such a thing as mis-spellings in the subconscious? Are wishes and dreams still counted as aspiration when they are commodified as mural art for a retail establishment selling car stereos, rims, window tinting and lambo doors? Perhaps the artist was trying to write ‘wish home true’, a phrase of deep poetic geometry, but messed up his gangster cursive, just as the left cerulean eye doesn’t quite match the aquamarine right. In the great Mid-Valley Cultural Ghoulash, even an after dinner walk comes with meditative delight, free of charge.