Intrusion

bedroom floor

bathroom

Wednesday evening I came home to find my front door open and the security door unlocked. After trying the door and seeing a few things on the ground, I freaked out and backed out, worried that whoever made the mess was still there. I called Mike, who works in LA, and said he would come home immediately. I called my landlord and friend Aviva who lives 5 blocks away. Both did not answer. I called my friend and co-worker James who also lives in Long Beach. He didn’t answer either, but shortly thereafter called me back and said he would come over.

I didn’t want to assume that someone had broken in, since I could still see the TV and stereo, and most of the things in the living room. The cats could have knocked over the things. Maybe I didn’t close the door all the way, and it came loose. I had done this once before, but was careful to shut the door after that, and usually, I locked the outer security door. When James came over, we both entered the apartment, but as soon as we came inside, I could see clothes strewn on the floor and opened empty drawers. We quickly went out, realizing that someone had definitely broken in. I called the police, and we waited for a while. Mike came home, and the police still hadn’t shown up, so we called again, and they said because it wasn’t an emergency, they didn’t send someone immediately, but that the police were on the way.

The police came and cleared the apartment. I came into the bedroom and saw that the screen on the window had been cut. We left one of the windows open for air during the day because we don’t have AC, and over the summer, the whole apt heated up, especially the bedroom. Our flat is built over the garage attached to a house on the corner. The roof of the house wraps around the bedroom. The window that was open was on the far side of our bedroom and is not clearly visible from the street. The thought had crossed my mind that someone could climb up on the roof from our front porch and go around the side and kick in the screen, which is what I had to do once when I locked myself out. I guess I thought it was unlikely because our neighbors in the house were home during the day most of the time, and it would be suspicious that someone was coming up the stairs and crawling around our roof.


The apartment was ransacked. The only room that appeared untouched was the kitchen, which has been noted. If you want to hide something, maybe the last place someone would look for something valuable is the kitchen. Whoever broke in pulled out all the drawers and boxes and dumped everything on the ground. They didn’t take anything big. We don’t have a great TV, but my stereo is relatively new, and I assumed that those were the kinds of things people steal. I figured they were looking for what they could carry out without raising suspicion, since they must have come in during the day. ( I left for work around 8:45am & came home around 7:30pm. ) They didn’t take any of my camera equipment or computer, which would have been bad since all my work art and otherwise, was there. They didn’t take the wireless headphones that had been a xmas gift from a friend.

My jewelry boxes were completely upended and jewelry was all over the bathroom counter and floor. Collectively, I’ve spent a fair amount on jewelry though far more on CDs, but I don’t own any valuable jewelry. I’m not all that crazy about gold nor can I afford it. It’s strange how thorough they were with some things. There was an envelope full of wheat grass seeds a friend had given me, and the intruder had dumped that out. Did he/she think I had diamonds tucked away somewhere? What was this person thinking? Did he wonder about the people he was robbing or how he screwed up my organized mess of things? That what he took more valuable than money was my time and sense of security?


In the end, this person took $450 in cash in a box that we made from a garage sale a few weeks earlier and reserved we decided for a self-cleaning cat box. It sucks. The thing would have saved me time, which is valuable when you are constantly trying to find it to do art while working to make money to do art and do all the usual life things. But no one was hurt, and nothing of great value was taken. I can’t help but stare at the hole in the window screen and feel a little paranoid when I’m home alone, watering my plants or sitting at my computer. A nice lab tech dusted a few items, but seemed to think that whoever did it wore gloves, and that it was planned. I think she got one fingerprint, but was not very optimistic about it. Her fingerprinting was not as exhaustive as you would imagine from watching episodes of CSI, but she seemed experienced and knowledgeable. Apparently, certain materials retain fingerprints better than others, which she didn’t bother to try to dust. By the way, that magnetic dust that is used is a pain to clean off, but really stains your hands.

make 3

i don't know if my intermittent musings can be considered a blog. maybe a sad one with far and few between posts. the summer came and went. i became obsessed with making jewelry, and took almost every conceivable class i could within my work/life schedule and a few beyond, including enameling at cca and chainmaking at farrin o'connor design studios in pasadena.

and yet my obsession has not abated, but i have to step back, and resume focus on getting into grad school as well as continuing work on art. as i said. the summer came and went. i did some preliminary tests for my latest led project and got the resistor values i needed for the value scale. oh yes...my latest project is based on a photo of my late father taken at the refugee camp we stayed at in Korea while en route to America in 1975. it will be constructed out of approximately 7,000 leds.

i bought a sewing machine and have to practice sewing in straight lines. ironically, the electronics part of it is proving to be easier than the sewing. i have a history of being horrible at sewing. my mom taught me needlepoint, and i was pretty good, but something happened on the way to junior high where you had to take shop or home ec. i kinda wished i had taken shop now, since all i remember in home ec was setting tables and a simple sewing project gone awry. in the 8th grade, i made a diorama of a scene from the scarlet letter. i couldn't really sew very well, and enlisted my brother's help with sewing hester prynne. he was a natural! so here i am with books from the library determined to make a comeback.

speaking of sewing, i know this woman named Tila who is awesome at sewing. she's been sewing since she was 7. that's what her family did when they came to the states. my family told me this story of how they sewed American flags one summer when they came to the states for minimum wage, which at that time was about $1/hr. i wonder if i will have hardship stories to tell my children.

The Great Picture

On July 4th, I went to see the World's Largest pinhole Camera made from an old airplane hangar on what was formerly the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station and the ghost image of the control tower and mountains in the background reflected on a large piece of canvas that would become the World's Largest Photograph. It was pretty damn amazing. If you're not used to spending long hours in the dark peering for that latent image to emerge, you may miss the ghostly image.


On July 13th, I came back to see the unveiling. I think for most people, it is hard to visualize the final print, as it was a negative image, and one that was upside down, but the sheer size of it
amazed me. I'm glad to have had a small part in it.

Check out the Website (built by moi) for more info: http://www.legacyphotoproject.com