I'm now in Norway, sitting in a high wing of an old house built circa 1900 overlooking a white landscape populated with quaint A-frame houses and brick chimneys. Certainly an idyllic picturesque scene I can hardly believe. I'm staying here with my girlfriend for awhile, whose parents have painstakingly restored this house based on their extensive experience with historical painting techniques and wood beam construction. I've only been here a few days but we've already had some extremely tantalizing conversations about the sources and varieties of indigenous wood resins and minerals for painting the traditional Norwegian cabins, how to prepare handmade paints on open fires, and some of the clandestine associations of carpenters that sounds very similar to the American Masonic lodges. The forest is mysterious and full of magic. I'm looking forward to hearing more about the mythologies and methodologies to make connections - at least in my own mind - between these expanded stratifications of reality.

I'm here waiting out the American political turmoil to make some decisions about what comes next. Not to get all controversial or anything, but if Trump wins the election then I will have to try to find a way to stay abroad on a more permanent basis I think. Otherwise I'm considering where I might like to relocate in the states in order to initiate a teaching "career"... I have it in my head to jump in to the community college level and start building some experience, wherever the opportunity might arise. I'm also considering applying to some phD programs, which I've been on the fence about for the last couple of years. I re-read James Elkins book on the subject and found some interesting programs in Sweden, The Netherlands, and Austria, but I find it increasingly difficult to compartmentalize my thoughts and theories into a fine art dialogue. Don't get me wrong, I know that artists have an essential role to play in the revolutions of consciousness, one that no other disciplinary perspective may be capable of fulfilling, but I am less sure that my pursuit of increasingly specialized interests will be best sustained within the art institutional dialogue as opposed to perhaps say to a more rigorous philosophical program.