Because Leah asked

Bemidji is a city with a rich history of supporting the arts. From the Sculpture Walk to local summer theatre, our little town in Northern Minnesota actively participates in promoting, funding, and taking pride in the arts and cultural community. My favorite (other than Paul & Babe) is Niimi, a Native American PowWow dancer.

Construction of the Bemidji Regional Event Center is partially funded by a $20-million bonding bill from the State of Minnesota. As a part of that bill, 1% ($200,000) must be dedicated to public art for the facility. Before I arrived on the scene, a committee of local leaders and the art community was formed to determine how best to utilize this funding. The two projects that were included in the project were a terrazzo flooring for the Arena hallways which depicts life in Northern Minnesota and a hanging art piece for the main Arena lobby.

It is hard to make out the detail from this photo, but this is the floor pattern for the arena concourse. Lakes, rivers, and streams are represented on the lower portion... earthy fall colors and leaves dominate the middle portion, and it transitions into the landscape of trees eventually ending on the upper right with rich reds, pinks, and violets of a setting sun over the horizon. Laid into the terrazzo as it is poured will be brass accents in the shapes of the various fish, wildlife and birds that inhabit the region. Below you can see sample tiles of the blues, browns, yellows and reds that will be used in the project.

The other Public Art project is a hanging art piece for the Arena lobby, which you can see from the artist's rendering below:

This would be the view as you enter the Arena doors. As you remember (or may not remember), Bemidji is derived from an Ojibwe term, Bemidjigamaag, meaning "lake with cross waters." The cross waters are well represented in these two sets of waves. Each set will consist of three waves which will be 24 feet long and be suspended at a height of about 16 feet above the floor. The material used to form the waves will be translucent but have some space age properties that allow it to reflect and refract light. As you can see, the colors will be those of the water, but will gradually transition as both the down-lighting and natural ambient light change or the viewer alters their viewpoint. If it does what the artist says it will do it's going to be really cool. If there is any of the dedicated public art money left after these two projects, a hanging art piece for the Convention Center lobby is being considered.

There will be other opportunities for local artists to temporarily display their artwork within both the Convention Center and Arena sides of the building. That's it.... another slice of life from a small town in Northern Minnesota.

Yesterday's schedule

7:30am - 8:30am: Presentation for Bemidji Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors

8:30am - 9:30am: City of Bemidji Department Head Weekly Meeting

10:00am - 12:30pm: Construction Progress Meeting & Walk-around with Architect and City Manager

1:00pm - 2:00pm: Corporate Programming Conference Call

2:00pm - 3:00pm: Retrieve voice mails & emails, return pertinent calls and messages, try to start editing job descriptions for publication (this will be the first time I sit at my desk all day)

3:00pm - 5:30pm: Public Art Committee Meeting on Hanging Art piece + tour of the facility

5:30pm - 7:00pm: Return to office to answer phone/email messages... finish job descriptions

7:00pm - 8:00pm: Answer remaining emails on Blackberry while eating dinner at Sparkling Waters Restaurant (this will be the first time I've eaten all day)

8:00pm: Crash on couch, fall asleep

11:00pm: Wake up, set timer on coffee pot for Wednesday, go to bed.

One more reason to love Bemidji

This is the Keg N' Cork Pub, located at 310 Beltrami Avenue here in Bemidji. It's a nice little pub, kind of old, but they serve a good lunch and a cold draft.

This is Brigid's Cross Irish Pub and Restaurant located at 317 Beltrami Avenue here in Bemidji. It's a little more on the Irish side, with more traditional Irish servings (Shepherd's Pie!) and either Irish music or European Soccer in the background.

Every St. Patrick's Day, including yesterday, Bemidji holds the "World's Shortest St. Patrick's Day Parade." This year it started at the Keg N' Cork and ended at Brigid's Cross... a tremendously long jaunt of nearly 100 feet between the two Irish establishments. Last year, the parade started at Brigid's and ended at the Keg N' Cork.

You have to love a city coming together, closing off a city block, and turning out to see a parade that lasts all of 100 feet. Not quite like celebrating St. Patrick's Day in Boston, but the spirit of the participants are no less enthusiastic.

Out of Hibernation

Out of hibernation, just like this fellow

If you're still out there, you are probably surprised to find something new up here. I don't blame you. What used to be a semi-active corner of the internets slowly became a dusty corner with cobwebs, seemingly abandoned.

In the heyday of "The Essence of Bobness," you could find quippy writing, a laugh or two, and a healthy slice of honesty about life in general and mine in specific. I used this place, much to the chagrin of my readers I'm sure, as a bit of group therapy to get through some awful tough stretches back on the west coast. My life sucked, my job sucked even harder, and the people I worked with royally sucked. But you took it all in stride, offered up yourselves as cheap, but caring therapists, and kept encouraging me to find a light at the end of the tunnel, to pull myself up from my bootstraps, and struggle on until things got better.

Well, things did get better... and I didn't keep writing to share that with you. I feel guilty about that. Maybe I was subconsciously trying to keep them all to myself, afraid that having not had many triumphs that if I gave them away there wouldn't be any more to come. Not really fair on my part. If you made the trek over to Facebook, you kind of know how things are now. Single sentence updates, sort of Bobness cliff notes if you are old enough to remember them from high school.

A quiet Saturday has drawn me back here... hopefully for more than just a once a month visit. Life here in the Great White (and melting) North has been everything I'd hoped it would be. Everyday is a new adventure, staring down the enormity of the task at hand, focusing on what needs to get done immediately, and prioritizing the rest. I can't say for certain how often I'll keep updating this blog, or how entertaining or enlightening it will be, but I'm going to give it a shot. As Blottie keeps on writing, there is a difference between Facebook and Blogger that I somehow lost in the increasingly quickening pace that life has become for me. It's kind of ironic that things got faster by moving to a slower, smaller place.

But let me fill in the gaps for you. The people here are great. Everyone knows just about everyone else, but more importantly they care about each other. When you ask "How are you doing" you actually get an answer, not just a response. If someone needs a little bit of help, people pitch in, roll up there sleeves, and pick them up. Kind of like the little community we've got going on here. I've been able to stop taking all of my medications. The blood pressure is back down where it is naturally supposed to be, and I don't get the panic attacks that were so ever present back in California. Some days are rougher than others, but the worst day here has probably been better than the best day back there.

I love my job again. While I'll never be a morning person, I don't mind getting up at 5:30 in the morning to be at work by 7:30. I don't watch the clock for 5:01pm to flee my workplace, and more times than not work well past 6:00pm. Some of that is because there is so much to do, but it is mostly because what I do matters again. It matters to the people here in Bemidji, to the people I work for and with, and it matters to me. I'm not just going through the motions, dreading the next minute, hour, or day like I did months ago. The calendar shows I've only been gone from that for three months, but it seems like a lifetime ago.

But I've missed all of you. I've missed reading RC's crazy and funny stories and writing. (By the way, if you haven't bought her book yet you better hop to it before she becomes a mega-star and forgets us). I've missed Leah and her talented writing. Even though she keeps poking me at all hours of the day and night, I've missed Kylie and her tales from down under. I've missed chatting online with Megarific. I've missed the on again, off again, I'm blogging, I'm not blogging, I'm leaving Facebook, I'm coming back to Facebook of Suzanne. (Honey, I'm so sorry about your loss... I hope you find some peace in your memories of your brother Gary). And Cece, MerelyMe, and on and on and on.

I'm pouring a lot of my creativity into my work, expanding my horizons and doing things I never thought I'd ever be doing. So don't expect much of that here. But like a few other goals I've set for myself, I'm committed to writing here more and catching up with all of your blogs when time allows and tiredness relents. Thanks for helping me survive a very difficult stretch in my life. Words can not fully relay how much it means to me. You were, and are, the friends and companions I didn't have by my side physically. But you were always just an internet connection away.

Now on with life, with much brighter minutes, hours, weeks, and years ahead. I hope you'll stick around and share them with me.

Because Annie asked...

Yesterday Annie asked on Facebook... "did your blog die?"

Well, the answer to that is not really. Work has not only kept me busy, but very content as well. I guess I used my blog for the past year + to blow off steam and bitch about things. Somehow it doesn't really seem all that fair that the 10 faithful readers haven't been able to share in the good things as well.

Last night, again on Facebook, I posted the status update, "Today is one of those days I feel very fortunate and thankful." Having spent the past three days at our corporate meetings, I was struck by how lucky I am right now. I'm working with a great company and people whom I like and respect. Spread out all over the country, they are a great group and I can't wait to get together with them again in either July or August. I'm working in a wonderful little town on a fantastic project. It's a place I can see myself spending the second half of my life. I'm fulfilling one of my career goals of opening my own building. It's something I've always wanted to do and I get to do it in a place I want to live with a company with which I truly enjoy being involved. I've been able to stop hanging out with biggsy, and would suspect that once I finally get to see a doctor up here that I'll probably find out that my blood pressure has dropped back to an average level.

So, this blog isn't dead. But I won't be posting as frequently as I once did... especially until after the new building opens in October. I haven't been keeping up with your blogs either... for which I do apologize. With a winter storm rolling in this weekend, it looks like I'll be staying in and catching up. If you're a Facebook friend, I'll see you over there. If you're not, why the heck aren't you? Click here and befriend me!