This past weekend, I attended the annual Art Retreat in lush Newport at the wonderful as always SeaKrest Lodge. This was my first Art Retreat as an alumni and not an art student. My professors and friends were more than welcome to have me chill with them and I was honored to get to go. I went four years in a row since 2004 and now this was my fifth time round. The lodge has never changed and has remained as classic as ever. It's got a spacious living room with a nice fireplace in the middle, comfy couches all around, a piano, a pool and foosball tables - where I've both won and lost many late night games. I brought my guitar along, and I think I have for the past 5 years. I also brought a ton of guitar tabs. I basically sang and played guitar all weekend. It was fantastic. Exactly what I wanted to do.
Jenny Honan and I drove down with her roommate Rachel. We made it down they're pretty fast, although the traffic was lame for most of it. After everyone settled down on the couches, Mary Saunders got us all to do some icebreaker games. One involved throwing one of your shoes in a pile, picking up a random one and finding the owner to get to know them. I met Karina Salgado, who's the sister of my friend Dania (Salgado) Behrens. Small world. She's a graphic designer! Yippee! Then we played a huge game of Rock Paper Scissors where the loser has to get behind the winner and chant their name. At one point I got three people behind me chanting "Jon! Jon! Jon!" It was pretty funny. After introductions where everyone said their name, major, hometown, we had to say something cool/interesting about ourselves. I didn't have anything cool so I just made mine up. I said that I was a Mathlete in high school and we went to a competition held in Disneyland and got 2nd place. In unison, everyone gave an impressed "Ohhhh" and I was surprised that they all believed it! I later told my friends Mary, Jenny, Jen Morse, and Austin that I made it up. They thought it was smart that I said we won second place because if I had said 1st place it would have been too good of a story and if I'd said 3rd it wouldn't have been that impressive. So I was quite amused with myself for convincing everyone I was a hardcore Mathlete. I apologize to any current/former Mathletes who may be reading this. After getting acquainted and such, Bob the graphics professor said he had a video for us and that it was only going to be 30 minutes long. It ended up being 2 hours long and was essentially a shoddily made Evangelism tool about a Black Muslim man named Mohammed in Africa who converted to Christianity and was persecuted by his family and almost killed. The movie had a good message in it and there were parts to it that were engaging but the last 10 minutes or so had a terribly cheesy spouting of verses we'd all heard before (i.e. John 3:16) and to make it worse the man who was saying it was in a room full of specially positioned candles. Bob had good intentions I'm sure, but it was rather uncomfortable having to sit and watch it and not wanting to be rude and walk out and do something else. It was awkward and by the time it was done it was 11:30 and everybody went to bed, so it messed up our chance of doing anything. We at least had Saturday and part of Sunday to do stuff.
Saturday I woke up at 8:00am, took a shower and hung out on the beach to play a few songs before breakfast at 9. I played 4 songs and went back up to eat some flapjacks and syrup-covered hashbrowns. Two other art alumni came back to the art retreat to help cook for everybody, Kirsten and Breanne. So it made feel okay to go along even though I graduated already. They did a bang-up job cooking meals for everybody. They made some killer chili from a recipe by Mark Terry. Best chili I've had ever, and it was from scratch! Yeah. So the day was pretty casual. Tim, Austin, Mary, and Jen Morse did some sand casting on the beach and I sat on a log and played some more guitar. I even busted out my harmonica rack and played both. It was fun. I had a audience of surfers and sand casters. I hung around all the people making sand faces and even a dog. Mary was making a dog and as she was scraping it out, the head and leg broke off... :( It looked cool, what was left of it. The rest of the day I watched Jenny Honan make a really rad book/journal with wax polka dots on it. She even put a little Bon Iver song quote in the margin on the first page. Just thinkin about how rad it was makes me want one. I went outside after a PB&J lunch, sat on a red picnic bench, and played guitar and sang tons of songs for what must have been hours. It was weird. I played better than I normally have in a long time. I actually sang them like they were meant to sound. It was crazy. I was on point or something. For some reason, I had three quarters in my pocket and I flung them on the beach after a couple songs, sorta like my penance to the sea. I had a fantastic relaxation time sitting by the sea, strumming my guitar and singing my favorite songs. I sang a lot of Thrice, City And Colour, Decemberists, Morrissey, and Jimmy Eat World songs that I know. I even sang a few of my own songs and sang them like I've never sung them before. I'm really dig this one I just wrote called "Devil in my Skin." I hope to put up the lyrics and maybe even a video of it on here soon. Yeah Saturday was baller. That night we had our usual gigantic bonfire time where we light tons of wooden palettes on fire. The heat was unbearable and you couldn't stand that close. Jen Morse, Mary, and myself did a thing called startripping where you run around in a circle looking up at a star, then a camera is flashed directly in your eyes. It totally disorients you and sends you falling to the ground. It's the best thing next to a roller coaster ride. We did that a lot that night. Then Austin, Jen, and I did a triple startrip and it was gnarly! We all fell down hard, but it's sand so it wasn't bad. We even got Tim Timmerman do do it! Although it only took him 10 seconds and he fell down before we could flash a camera in his eyes. It was flat-out hilarious! I love Tim. :)
We stayed up a little more after that in the lodge, watching videos of turtles having incredibly awkward sex (apparently the male turtle pokes his neck out extremely far and the female wasn't having it - check out youtube). We all went to bed early, at least early for me at midnight. Sunday I woke up at 7:30, took a shower again, ate some Froot Loops and drank some earl gray tea, and then brought the tea with me onto the beach where I wandered around for an hour while everyone had breakfast. I listened to The Frames, drank tea, and I couldn't help being stunned by God's frickin amazing beauty right in front of me. It was transcendental to say the least. I climbed up on the side of the rocky cliffs and sat watching the coming and going of the waves, the bright sunshine beaming down on me, and random people adventuring around me. It was beautiful and perfect and I couldn't have asked for anything better. I sat for a few Frames songs; I was listening to their For The Birds album and the songs "Giving Me Wings", "Star Star" and "Friends and Foe". As I was walking back listening to the song "Lay Me Down," I couldn't help but boogie my way back, singing along and strutting in time. It makes me smile just thinking about it. The whole weekend was perfect and I am so happy that I went. It was truly a retreat for me, both from the funk that Portland has me in and the post-grad depression that has enveloped me since May. What was really funny/sorta cool was that Jenny Honan and I were the last ones to leave with professor Gary Buhler in his white truck. It was odd and yet really fun riding with Gary as there was never a lull in conversation and it wasn't awkward at all like we thought it'd be. We had a good but long ride back to campus, where I went to Jenny's apartment so she could shower and take me back to Portland. I had an awesome time hanging out at the Art Retreat with her, my other art friends like Mary, Jen Morse, and Austin Salzwedel and of course all the art professors like Mark Terry, Tim Timmerman, Doug, Dave, Karen, and Bob. It was like being home again. Thanks for having me and mentoring me and being there all those years. I guess I'll see all of you when the Lippi Awards come around... Here's my crazy friend Austin. Seriously good times!
