Last Wednesday we take a field trip, me, Rachel, Jon, and Jasmyne. We visit Ames. We stop first at Little Woods. Kristin is doing great, the shop is busy, she recommends a turmeric tea for me. She shows us a Chinese tea service. “I like it because, like me, it is messy and informal.” 

We travel together out to Reliable Street, Lindsay’s new art space. A warm fire stove and a tire swing and so much flex space greet us. Over the summer, people worked there, but now it is cold. We tour the 100-year-old cement grain elevator. It gets scarier floor by floor. Pigeon feathers become pigeon bones, broken eggs, mummified rats and fledglings and adult pigeons ripped open. Every room has holes in the concrete floor. The stairs steel mesh, six flights straight up and down. On the roof, my brain is panicking so much I can’t look up to see the top of the cell tower. I have to hold the wall by the door, praying for everyone to be done and want to leave. I can’t look down as we travel the stairs. 

I eat almost an entire pizza at Great Plains. 

Studio night at Buse’s.