Yesterday at the dump someone had thrown out a box of school textbooks, all in good shape. I took a 1962 physics book for the diagrams alone. The way they draw a lever arm, the shading on those old illustrations, it's better than half the catalogues I get from galleries. Some real care went into it.

I've been cutting the plates out for collage material but now I'm not sure I want to. It's like dismantling something that was built properly. Thirty years ago I'd have torn it apart without a thought. Getting soft, or getting old, hard to tell which.

Anyway the book is on my worktable now and it keeps distracting me. I keep stopping to look at the page about centrifugal force. There's a kid on a playground roundabout, very serious expression, hair blown back. He's been spinning there since 1962. I think he deserves the respect.