docublog

Halftime

First thing this morning, we checked out of our beautifully quiet harbor-side motel, loaded all our things into the car, but left the film gear on top. We had a few spare hours and returned to Fort Worden before taking the ferry and freeways to Seattle's SeaTac airport. Teesha and Tracy had taken over one of the dining tables and were actually sitting down. Artfest halftime, classes in progress for the second day, 500 happy, creative and content participants, they were finally off the hook and returned to their journals.

Teesha said she hasn't done any journaling in weeks. As playful and relaxed as ArtFest is, someone has been working long hours to put it together. While she doodled a bit, she was thinking about ideas for ArtFest 2007 and then put notes in her journal… It was hard to say good-bye. Really hard.

Back to school

I cannot imagine any of the ArtFestians having a better time than Ralph and I: we got to peek into many workshops, from mold making to a class that involved some really dangerous (and smelly) chemicals, collage making, metal work… We ended the "school day" at Lynne's  large format painting class, and then interviewed her about being turned onto 1000 Journals by Tracy, adding to Journal 917, and serendipitously coming across another journal one of her art students had brought along to a workshop in Arizona…

And finally, the journaling beach party, with Sangria, a bonfire, people roasting marshmallows, making a couple of entries in Journal 172, getting the first few pages started in Journal 775 which was dormant for all these years…

PS. On Thursday, I received an email from Kathy, subject "One week ago," with her filled in questionnaire.  She wrote: "I worked on one of the two journals circulating around Artfest one week ago at the Beach Bonfire Journal Party. I believe that Sangria improves journaling, so I always take a gallon. My Sangria has become somewhat famous and this year I made a commemorative ATC for the occasion with the Queen of Hearts on one side and the Sangria recipe on the other side. I pasted two cards in the journal so people could see both sides of the ATC. I was passively wanting to participate in the journal project and then miraculously I was handed a journal to work on!  And then in the blink of an eye, the journal was gone again. The link to this website was given to me by Andrew. He sat across from me at the party and was filmed while he was working in the journal. I would have been totally overwhelmed by that. When he gave me the link to the website, I went to the blog and Lo! and Behold! there was the page from my own Artfest journal and half of my face. Too funny, it all comes full circle."

ArtFest kick-off

When we came to Fort Worden in the morning, we could imagine how it looked over a hundred years ago, with soldiers parading on the grounds. A few hours later, the scenery had radically changed: Welcome greetings, hugs and kisses, artists carrying their trades, tools and paints, and, after they were checked in, one of Teesha's goody bags. We set-up our equipment in the entry hall of the "Commons" building, and interviewed Amy, the moderator of the ArtFest email list. We started with just a handful of people around, and ended with Commons flooded with artists from all over the country, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Canada…

A few hours into ArtFest kick-off, I asked Rhonda if I could see what she's trading, but was too late: All her trades were gone already, exchanged for several journal kits, fiber embellishments, buttons, Chinese paper, many colorful ATCs… She laid it all out on the floor and it was a huge pile. The trading frenzy happened during dinner. I asked a few people if they even had a chance to eat, but it was diet night for most.

In between, we took a breather at yesterday's waterhole, and chatted with our waiter, Efra from Mexico. Efra came to Port Townsend 13 years ago, visiting from Los Angeles, and stayed. He called his L.A. friends and told them if they wanted to see him again, they would have to come to the Northwest. "On second thought," he said, "I told them rather not…"

Ferry to Port Townsend

Seattle is a cool place, but after so much traveling, it felt good to leave the city and get to a shoreline. We could have taken this ferry across the Pudget Sound, but we wanted to share the ride with Michele. Just like us, Michele is a first time ArtFestian. She wrote to me: "I try to follow the admonitions of Eleanor Roosevelt by doing something scary every day," and said that being filmed would count for at least a month' worth of it. She packed art supplies and trades in her red truck, tucked in her journal, and with Ralph riding shotgun and me following behind, drove onto the Kingston Ferry.

And here she smiles -- so much for being scary! We said good-bye to her, for now, drove to Port Townsend and went right away to the local waterhole for a few drinks, red-wine remedy for my insomnia. I'm going to sleep like a happy stone.

Issaquah

Waking up very, very tired, but to bright sunshine… I was only wearing two and a half layers today, and waiting for Ralph, tried to soak up the energy of a few rays in the parking lot. The last few nights, I haven't slept well. I feel like I'm too tired to sleep. Can this be? We drove to Teesha and Tracy's who made time for us in their busy pre-ArtFest schedule. Both are fabulous artists, but above all, inspiring, generous people. Just seeing them in their studio made me snap back to life. And that was before we even started talking…

Teesha and Tracy will be hauling this container to ArtFest tomorrow morning at seven o'clock. We'll see what's inside the boxes at Art Asylum…

Tracy runs a fire protection business during the week. But nothing can stop his art: He takes his journal to meetings with engineers and architects, in fact, he takes his journal everywhere.

Mount Rainier, which we thought was Mount St. Helens... We "fact-checked" when Lil wrote "I saw your blog picture of Mount Rainier." Lil knows her NW, and she's subtle.

Kinks

Should we have taken the freeway instead of a surface route? Not followed the advise of a porter to line up at counters 80 and 81? Tried our luck at another curbside check-in? Maybe we should have given O'Hare an extra hour or better, two. We were standing in line for 90 minutes, and when we finally arrived at the counter to check the bags, our flight to Seattle had closed. The travelers before and behind us missed their flights as well in the utter chaos that was O'Hare this weekend. Hundreds of passengers got wait listed for the next flights out. Two lucky people waitlisted for the flight we didn't make made it on. And two passengers, who were probably still standing in line when the evening flight to Seattle took off, had us in their seats. Agonizing hours of limbo, waiting, hoping for our private miracle, jam-packed with thousands praying for theirs… travel hell. But we made it. We hopped on the I-405, our bumper-to-bumper 405 we took to the Long Beach, California, airport weeks ago, and it felt like coming home.

Two parts two

There are so many more possibilities to flesh-out a story if we can spread filming over a few days. Exterior and interior, at work and at home, alone and with friends or family… the more angles we can use, the better. The logistics (and budget) of this film are quite challenging as it is, and sometimes we just don't have the opportunity to stay around. In Chicago, though, we did: we met Chuck at his home, we met his wife Vero and their kids Maximo and Pia, and we saw Holly and Massi roam the Wicker Park neighborhood. At Chuck and Vero's, the true star behind the camera was the maxi-cute 3 year old Maximo, who's ready to trade in his many kids toys for some decent Sennheiser sound equipment. To Maximo's delight, Ralph employed him as assistant cameraman…

Thanks to Vero, we managed to spend an hour talking with Chuck about Operation Baghdad with all the sound equipment in place.

Holly and Massi discovered an interesting installation under the train tracks. Just half an hour earlier, Holly was journaling about coming home to Iowa, in bright sunshine, but it suddenly got cloudy, and half an hour later, it was raining. The skies here are magnificent. So much weather is pushing through. Constant drama. Tomorrow, we'll be in those skies again, flying west, to Seattle.

Chuck & Co. and more

I couldn't get out of the hotel fast enough: After a day of production chores, it was time to do some filming. We drove around looking for backdrop and insert shots and caught a bit of a snowstorm. Not enough for snow balls, but still… For the Californian I turned into, every flake counts. In the early afternoon, we had a date in the offices of a staffing company, located in a business park in the 'burbs. Chuck passed Journal 957 from cubicle to cubicle and into the president's corner office, and then started Operation Baghdad. Chuck has scans of all 2003 Chicago entries and had stored them in the kitchen drawer for today's filming. While the intercom buzzed -- Joe, on line 42, Joe on 42 -- the five took time out.

James, Luis, Chuck, Tom and Ben with their release forms. More on Operation Baghdad when we meet Chuck again tomorrow.

If Holly hadn't moved to Barcelona, Spain, to get married to lovely Massi a/k/a/ Said, she might still have Journal 953. Although a voracious journal keeper herself, when she finally received 953, she stalled. "Being a perfectionist, I wanted to put something in it that was truly special and would get noticed," she said. And so the pages remained blank, until just days before she left the States. A few weeks ago, Holly and Massi packed up their Barca lives and came home to Iowa. Lucky us: When I told her we'd be filming in Chicago, they jumped into a car...

Tomorrow morning, Holly and Massi will wake up to this view, in their friend Steve's beautiful loft. We'll meet them again at the Earwax Cafe in Wicker Park.

The schedule

I spied on Ralph who was taking the bus to downtown Chicago, while I did a lot more homework: I was scheduling our route all over Europe from end of April well into May, shuffled interview dates, wrote more emails, and checked flights, hotels, car rentals… The next time I looked out of the window, it was dark outside and I saw a few snowflakes dancing in the streetlights. I was hungry, and decided to cruise the malls lining Touhy Avenue in search of food to bring back to my room, because so much more is to do. I'm still hungry. But happy. Europe is going to be fun.

To Chicago

Before we drove back to the Toronto airport, we took a few exterior shots of the Staircase Theatre and ran into Hugh one more time… Good-bye Hamilton. Since then, I've spent a lot of time with my mini Powerbook: fine tuning the second half of this production trip, I wrote new call sheets, notes on transitions and connections between our interviews, and of course, countless emails. Our flight from Toronto to Chicago was delayed by a couple of hours, but as this was the first slight hick-up on all the many flights we have taken so far making this film, I'm really not complaining…