Day Twenty-Two, Twelve Twelve PM

THIS IS A CLOSING CURTAIN. Closing curtain for the CalArts 2008 Producers Show. If you haven't yet ran into it somehow, it's the night that the faculty of the Character Animation department screens the top student films of the past year- which, I believe, is limited to the Junior and Senior classes.

Which is a perfect segue.

Because tonight was the closing curtain– this chapter, anyway –for the man who is my senior: Frank Terry Sr. A closing of just one section of a career resume that includes walnut picker, soldier, concrete worker, gas station attendant, animator, business operator, painter, photographer, alchemist, scholar, school dean, professor and not least, my inspiration. In short, an amazing man who ever since I sat under his animation table (drawing gun toting, plane flying stick figures, and not well), I've been in awe of his limitless talent.

So tonight, the family came together to mark the transition to another chapter. We watched, and then slipped off to our separate lives. But standing in that courtyard ever so briefly, we acknowledged the passage of this moment, and laid the groundwork for the next.

May it bring all the things that makes life worth experiencing.