1 word = 1/1000th of 1 picture.

I am kicking myself for not bringing my camera along for today's adventure. Plans changed in a hot minute this morning, so I actually forgot several things. Perhaps some words will do. Gregory convinced me to rent a car and come pick him and janne up in Billund tonight, which is about three hours away by car. They are returning from a short holiday in Rome. Driving in Denmark is like driving in the US, only when you request a subcompact from the rental agency they give you a brand new VW Golf TDI with manual transmission, by default. In the states I might have gotten a Daewoo, or a Hyundai if I was particularly lucky.

I had planned on spending the day in the studio, but I decided to hit the road instead. First stop was Lindholm Hoje, an Iron Age/Viking settlement outside of Aalborg. This place is really incredible. The focal point is an enormous burial ground with each grave marked with a ring/triangle/oval/boat of enormous stones. The entire thing was covered with a sand dune for almost a thousand years, so the stones were never used for modern architecture and the graves were never opened. I have become a sort of archeology nut in the last few years, and in the back of my mind I sometimes think about going back to school for it, so this was a treat. Check out the website here (which is unfortunately only available in Danish, as far as I can tell): http://www.nordjyllandshistoriskemuseum.dk/index.php?id=4
there is a great wikipedia entry on Lindholm Hoje as well:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lindholm_H%C3%B8je

Right now I am sitting on a bench in the central district of Aalborg itself, which is a cosmopolitan city that ranks as the fourth largest in the country. It is beautiful and I am enjoying people-watching, which is one of my favorite things to do. More on Aalborg later.

As an aside, a popular activity on the coast of Denmark is to collect amber that the sea washes onto the shore in stormy weather. Apparently I have the eye. I won't be returning to the US as an amber mogul, but I have a tidy little collection that grows every time I go to the beach.

I have been in the studio a lot this week, and I have several good pictures that I have yet to edit for the blog. I don't often have several weeks of studio time to do whatever I want, so the reality is that I have been experimenting with some ideas that have sat in my notebooks for years. The focus has been these drawings using thread and pins stuck straight into the wall. They aren't made to last, because of course the only way to make more wall space is to destroy them. This, however, has become an integral part of my experience here; the destruction of these things has opened up a great number of new options I think. I still haven't finalized any plans for the next week, which will be my last at the museum. I will try to post about that more often.

So I have been alone a lot. For those of you that travel internationally by yourselves, you know what I mean. This is a real, true loneliness; I can't walk out the door and simply talk to anyone I want. I can't come home and be with my wife at the end of the day. When I have a bad time the only person who listens is myself. All of this leads to great introspection, and an emotional rollercoaster oscillating between absolute confidence and utter self-doubt. These are feelings I have at home as well, but they seem compressed into such a short period of time here. I will say that I have a sense of clarity I haven't felt in years. That is mostly a good thing.

There was a feature years ago on Myspace and also on early blogging sites that I really liked. You could set your status, such as "what I a listening to", "how I feel today", etc. Does anyone remember this? It seems so useful in hindsight. With Facebook the only way to figure out what someone is listening to or how they are feeling is to pick apart the cryptic lyric snippet they post as their status (I know, I am complicit). So...
What I have been listening to:
Bright Eyes, Cassadaga (this album takes some getting used to. it isn't what you would expect from this artist, but clearly he has grown up a bit)
Also, streaming NPR. I love the internet.
What I have been watching:
Live football (soccer...), Denmark vs. Senegal pre-World Cup friendly
How I feel today:
introspective. up and down. slightly anxious.

OK, to my valued reader(s?), I promise to do a bit better with regular posts.
Love, me.