Went back to R.I.T. this afternoon when there were people around, and I was blown away by the School of Film and Animation's presence on the ground floor. It is magnificent. The fourth floor is now all Photo. No wonder it seemed empty and lifeless last night (no offense to any photogs out there). Anyway, the newish digs of the film program are a far cry from when I was there. My friend and colleague Jack, who started teaching there when I did and is now a chair in the program, gave me the tour. Such an amazing space, and the program has grown immensely. Remember I said an MFA in anything other than animation didn't exist? Now there's an MFA in Production and in Screenwriting. Those lucky devils.
But I wouldn't trade my days in for anything. Those were golden years, and they are spawning several more golden years.
Aside from meeting with the Career Services specialist and hanging out in the SOFA, I went to the Memorial Art Gallery with a dear, old friend and saw the intriguing, surprising, thoughtful Extreme Materials 2 exhibit. We had lunch at the cafe there, which reminded me tenderly of a time my mother and I ate there. She kept the matchbook from that visit in her jewelry box all these years (it's still there).
At the risk of sounding like a skipping record, I really do need to be in a city with more going on. Not that Rochester is the center of all culture and thought in the Western World, but compared to Ithaca, it is positively cosmopolitan. This place is wayyy too provincial and hippie-dippie for yours truly. But we already knew that.
I am definitely ready for a good night's sleep after last night's very rocky night of nightmares and my friends tearing their daughter's room apart at 1 a.m. to find a wayward little brown bat (the exterminator came in this morning to find it and kill it, poor little guy - om mani padme hum).
Time now for some shut-eye.
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