At age 13, I wanted to have stronger arms for playing basketball. My mom had some aerobics hand weights and I decided to build a wood bench in our backyard, for weightlifting. I found some scrap wood. nails. a hammer. i started. the nails didn't make it through the thick wood. the legs were off center. crooked. when i tried to lie down on it, it wobbled pathetically. the bench was a total failure. in my frustration, i think i kicked it over and walked away.
While getting my undergraduate degree in cinema studies, i dreamed of an environmental law degree. From there, i would make environmentally-related documentaries, fusing both interests in one great effort. That never happened.
While working on feature films in a variety of art department-related roles, I wrote feature length screenplays: "The Killing Frost". "Buckshot and Joy". "West of Nature". A handful more. They sit in one plastic bin in our garage, collecting dust.
As 2007 draws to a close, I look forward to this new year and this art project. On the one hand, I am wanting to leave any fear of failure back in 2007. On the other hand, I suppose it's wise to take fear by the hand and dance with it while i move forward with this art project of 800,000 nails. We have all failed at one thing or another. That's part of being human. Of trying things out. As I get older, I see that those things once perceived as failures often were not at all.
And, I have to ask myself: what would failure look like in regards to this art piece?
I have envisioned a huge piece of art and want to take it out of my imagination, three-dimensionalize it by making it real (with my own hands and the hands of others) and share it with a community that's interested in peace...in the much needed constant exploration of the idea of tolerance...in the fight for awareness. So, I think failure for me would mean not being able to get all the wood, all the nails, the space to do this thing. Or that, as i build it, it is as weak and as lopsided and poorly constructed as that bench i tried to make alone when i was 13. Failure would be not getting this into the community to start (or continue) a discussion of ideas. Failure would be not honoring a country whose people have suffered so much.
That being said, I feel like beginning this process has been a remarkable success, in opening my eyes deeper to the political and social climate of present day Rwanda. This subject matter has bestowed to me many fascinating conversations with loved ones. I recently sat with dear friend Danah and her youngest teenage daughter. Over soup and tea and chocolate cake, we looked at the idea of art. How much art, film, literature can be created about the Holocaust of WWII? How much is too much? Is the reminder ever too much? What about other injustices in the world? why don't public schools look more deeply at those as well? Danah and Nina both had wonderful insight about such thoughts. And, just one rich conversation with friends helps me see the value in this idea of 800,000 nails.
So, I guess I'll befriend fear. And failure. Walk with them. Look at them. Converse with them. And what will be, will be.
