Down the street from my place is a coffeeshop called Jackalope. I’ve been spending a lot of time there in the 5 months or so I’ve lived in Bridgeport. The other day it dawned on me that I’ve been logging serious time at coffeeshops for all the 18 years since I moved back to Chicago from Boston. I was 26 then, I’m going on 45 now and very little has changed. 

I’m still trying to figure out how not to have a job, how to depict these places where people work, talk, romance each other and otherwise live. These paintings and drawings are my way of documenting moments and eras in time. I won’t hazard to guess what it all really means or whether it means anything at all but obviously these places have grabbed my interest for going on 20 years and that’s gotta add up to something. Perhaps you can tell me what that might be.

Last Sunday I got to watch and listen to my friends George and Lawrence play in their old band Groundspeed for the first time in some 14 years. I’m not at all interested in nostalgia but it was good to see these guys honoring a thing they did long ago just for the sake of doing it. It wasn’t a cash grab or sentimental wallowing as so many reunions tend to be and I was glad to’ve been there.