Sam's Files

Sam's Files. Although never used in quite the way I imagined--always the goal of a certain kind of efficiency--as if the organization itself might produce meaning. Which of couse it does, but not in the ways you'd expect. Here the central item is a set of filing shelves, made for stacks of 8-1/2 x 11 paper. You can see the slots where each masonite shelf slides in (I insisted on knotty pine, probably #3, so the fit always varied and the sliding can still be tight.) They were made by dear Sam Harrison, maybe at the end of the 1970s. (He'd balk at "dear.") Sam was an unusual type--intelligent, intense in his own quiet way, given to pondering. Which animated his work in a very particular way. Trained as an architect (he was in the grad program at the time), I remember a fence he'd built, in West Berkeley. He showed it to me, proudly--but the color of the wood hadn't mellowed, and it was hard for me to see past that to Sam's (no doubt admirable) design.

The project here was of my own invention--those shelves. Sam was generous enough to construct them for me--it took a lot of close carpentry work in the shop--and I think of him from time to time when I see them.

The dark chairs in front are old Wurster issue--metal frames with naugahyde--which I continue to find comfortable and appealing. A row of them, where my GSI's would sit during our early morning meetings before class, with Katie. (One of the white ED11A binders sits on the shelf above, along with Jansson's History of Art.) The guitar's a steel-string instrument, found in a second-hand shop in about 2003, when I was working with Sara Glaser on the Jerusalem book, at her studio in South Berkeley. The paper bag with red handles--well, that's another story entirely. Jack Hu, brought to me by his mother, Annie, as a gift on the day they visited me together. I can see both of them as well...
_____

The cubby with the cloth bag (I removed some shelves to make a space) which contains a beautiful set of wooden blocks, in different colors, made by one of the students for one of the classes. I can't quite bring into mind just who, but I remember that that gift was important, too... All gifts, maybe...

.