pop!

this is coco's first preschool art creation, a work of striking contrast, displayed on our refrigerator, which doubles as a gallery for temporary exhibitions.

panzón calls it paul, after the famous german octopus that recently foresaw spain's victory in the world cup.

i like to call it pop, which is the catalan word for our eight-tentacled marine friend that i personally enjoy a la gallega, but also in reverence for our dearest father of pop art, andy warhol. after all, it is andy's magnetic bust that holds the art in place. oh, the symbolism!

coco just calls it ¡un pulpo!. so, we proudly present to you ¡un pulpo!, 2010, mixed media (including some edible media). admission, as always, is free, and may or may not include a cold drink.

chewed gum

this one time, when i was around eleven (i might have been older), my parents and i went out to dinner with a doctor who had come from out of town. i hardly knew him at the time, but my parents were delighted to see him and to be able to invite him to a nice italian restaurant.

i being my usual self and was under very good behavior, when my mom turned to me with piercing eyes and asked me, "why did you put your gum there?". i had no idea what she was talking about, so i followed her pointing finger to find a piece of chewed gum placed on the booth divider. "um, that's not mine", i said quietly. my mom and i were looking at each other in a silent duel, when we heard a loud voice saying rather casually, "oh, that gum is mine. i put it there". we both turned in astonishment and were met with the smiling face of the doctor, who would become a close family friend.

the bucket

coco's sand toys include: two buckets, one shovel, one rake and a set of rainbow stacking cups. we have managed to keep the cup set complete, which is pretty impressive, considering we share our toys with the other kids at the playground, which is an unspoken rule at our park. in the past week, our modest toy collection has been targeted twice by parents infected with a very unsettling, yet common virus: greed.

the first incident happened when i was gathering up our toys to leave the playground. our blue bucket (see image above) was missing, so i scanned the playground and found it in the sand amidst other plastic toys. i approached the middle-aged father sitting nearby and politely pointed out mine saying, "excuse me, i think that's my bucket", to which he replied, without even glancing at the aforementioned toys, "it's not. this is all our stuff". i said, "oh, okay" and walked away, even though i knew for a fact that it was coco's. i'm not spineless, i just figured it's not worth arguing about a bucket that costs a dollar.

just this morning, i witnessed a similar occurrence. coco and i were walking back to the playground after filling her remaining (pink) bucket with water, when i heard a mom asking her toddler, "isn't that your shovel?". she then walked over to the bench where our things were, grabbed the plastic toy and inspected it carefully. unsatisfied with her findings, she threw it on the ground. this woman is very attractive, drives a luxury suv and has a giant diamond ring. why does she care so much about a plastic shovel? i wonder what i would have done had she taken it.

it saddens me a little to think that i'm going to have to sharpie coco's name on her toys to avoid future confrontations with greedy parents and not possessive toddlers.