Arts & Crafts Means Jewelery

My lady and I were walking around Embarcadero today in the Arts & Crafts.  I used to be excited about arts and crafts when I was a little kid.  I liked the idea of people making little, interesting things in their spare time.  No more.  Now, Arts & Crafts means jewelery.  It seems like 90% of the wares you find are things to put around your neck, wrists and fingers.  And it’s not that I have any problems with jewelery, per se, just that it’s not interesting.  And it’s misrepresentation, really.  They ought to call such fairs, “Jewelery and Such.”

They did have a few artsy, crafty things.  One lady had a giant bowl made out of something that was not quite glass.  It looked like the kind of thing displayed in the fancy glass stores up in Sausalito that nobody seems to actually be buying from.  There was also a display of flattened bottles.  They would take all of these wine bottles and flatten them.  God knows how.  I suppose they’d take the label off, put them into a furnace, let them slowly melt down flat, then reapply the label.  Kinda cool.  Not really sure what one does with it besides hang it somewhere and let it clink about from time to time.

There was also this guy who made necklaces out of quarters.  Now, on the face of it, it’s just another jewelery display, but this stand was different.  The guy used a very thin, diamond saw, more of a string really, to cut into the quarters the way you carve out a pumpkin, working in the negative space.  His display had the slogan, “wear what defines you,” or something to that effect, and then I just had to laugh because almost all of the images carved into the quarters were brands ranging from the Dodge Ram to the careful cursive of Cal (university).  He even had an impressive Star Wars line.  It was clearly not jewelery for women.  I am sure of this because of two factors.  One, it did not sparkle, catch any light, or generally improve any sort of outfit.  Two, I liked it.  Clear deal breaker for any sensible woman’s tastes.  But what I liked most about this fellow was that he seemed to be trying to sell his own sex appeal as well.  Featured in the center of the display was a professional headshot of him wearing one of his pieces.  He had kind of the nineties, Johnny Depp look of hair in sleepy eyes and subtle facial hair.  He had shaved since then, and was a lot more boyish in person.  I kept wondering, this young, not bad looking fellow, what his Thanksgivings must be like back at home.  How does he discuss the business with his family?  You just know his older brother is a Lawyer and his younger brother just opened a restaurant.  And here he is, out in the plaza, doing what he loves, cutting Bobo-Fet into quarters.

And that was it.  The rest were variations on the same thing.  How to get this rock and this metal around your neck.  Pretty colors, to be sure, but it does nothing for me.

When I was little, my folks and I would travel in our motor-home all around the western United States.  We’d stop in all of these small towns that were rife with crafty people.  I remember we met a retired couple in one of the motor parks when we were headed to the Grand Tetons.  This fellow made model airplanes out of soda cans.  He had dozens of them hung up around his motor-home.  I chose a bi-plane made of Coke cans because even though the Pepsi Spit-Fighter had a bit more flash, I was a Coke man.  Airplanes out of cans?  That, to me, is a goddam craft.

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