Someone needs to redesign detention.  I pulled up to the border yesterday around 11am.  I rolled down my window at the checkpoint, placed a polite hello and ended up in Canadian immigration detention for an hour and a half.

I’m convinced that the border employees had a pool going on who could get the most benign person thrown out of their country.  Everything about my presence in Canada is legal.  I’m not a threat to jobs or security and I had my passport, a smile, and a hood with pink lining but it wasn’t enough. It was almost as if I tried to enter Arizona.

My pink hood and I sat in detention next to a man who had tried to bring guns in to the country. We chatted. A Russian man with wispy hair came in looking disgruntled.  We waited together. Us. The three amigos. Three’s Company.  When the immigration officer came in and asked, “who’s next?’ the Russian pointed at me and said, “ze pink hood.” Aw, shucks.

I'm about ready to get a flag tattoo (image from immigraitionvoice.org).

While I was sitting around with my new pals I couldn’t help but think that we might come up with some crazy ideas in a brainstorm. What a fantastic opportunity to have a group of people together with extreme diversity of perspective and experience, and plenty of time to dive into a range of issues.

Friend time was cut short by my immigration officer, Mr. Happy.   Without going into details, I wasn’t doing well in the interview.  It was fascinating to watch myself fail.   Words were vomiting out of my mouth and each one was incorrect.  I had no idea how to save myself and Mr. Happy was twisting my language, seeing nuance, and wanting clarity where I was comfortable with ambiguity.  Eventually, he accused me of changing my story.  I needed a Twix.  I told him I was as confused as he was and asked for a phone call.

I’ve always wondered what happens to prisoners when they use their single phone call on someone that doesn’t answer. I’ve had the same question for contestants on ‘Who wants to be a millionaire?!”  If your ‘phone-a-friend’ doesn’t recognize the number, will he or she pick up?

My release included a large rubber stamp that Mr. Happy didn’t enjoy using as much as he should have.  I read the word ‘approved’ in outlined font upside down because Mr. Happy couldn’t bring himself to tell me that my lifeline had passed the test.

I hope it wasn’t the pink hood.

Two weeks ago I was eating real fruit.  I was also eating plantain chips, tortillas, beans, and apparently anything else I could get my hands on.  I’ve just returned from an excellent trip to Belize and in every photo, I’m eating.  To be fair, my sister realized that she was capturing most of my eating moments on camera as we were on our trip, and then to be unfair, she made it her personal goal to accumulate as many as possible.  I now have a library of myself with my mouth open.

We didn’t realize that Belize lacked the tropical vacation staple, the beach, until we arrived.  Shoreline, yes, beach, no. After double-checking in the Lonely Planet book for pages that may have described this but were accidentally stuck together like the ones that caused Rachel to layer ground beef between lady fingers and whipped cream on the classic 1999 episode of Friends, we iterated on our intentions and embraced our adventure.

Nice beak! Lots of room for food.

Face down in warm water, our snorkel-enhanced faces watched a sea turtle mow a lawn of seagrass in slow motion.  The sea turtle made me feel better about myself.  Both of us were eating.  Belize is known for its birds, and it turns out that they love eating too.  The state of Michigan and Belizian wildlife both eat a lot, and there I was, suspended between two worlds.

My mouth was open again as my plane neared Grand Rapids and hugged the Lake Michigan shoreline.  There they were: miles and miles of beaches.

On my first day back to work I rode my bike home and took a big whiff of Michigan: hot dog.  I won’t ever compare to real smell savants, but I know pink pleasure as it wafts up my nostrils.  I was ‘home.’  But the Michigander Fairy wasn’t done with me. I walked downtown to meet a friend for a drink and on the way I encountered this:

This is Holland, Michigan.

I’ve been in a daze lately.  I started to think that my life here in Michigan is normal, but no – papaya, pineapple, and cantaloupe all taste different in real life.  Real life fruit is drippy, soft, and unexpectedly amazing to those of us that usually have to get it at grocery stores in Michigan.    It took a trip to Central America and another to Starbucks to wake me up.  I bought a fruit cup from Starbucks on a connection through Dallas on my flight home.  This fruit cup had ingredients – ingredients! And, there was one I didn’t recognize: Ver 2.  What?  I am not even going to give it the time of day to look it up.  I know that Ver 2 makes fruit taste like chemical.  Fruit, version 2. Fruit 2.0.

I’m a fan of prototyping, but there are certain things that do not call for iteration.

Fruit, version 2.

“Let’s push it out of the road and into the church,” said the Michigander.  Yes! Let’s.  As a friend pointed out, I was “lucky there was one nearby.”  Friday was my Jeep’s first day with its new Michigan license plate.  I made it approximately half of a mile before it broke down in the middle of Holland.

If you’re unfamiliar, this license plate was a long time coming. Months of struggling with the California DMV ended with a blog post, contest, and subsequent connection to two fantastic California DMV employees, Jan and Kitty, that Arnold should promote if he hasn’t already.  Arnie can you hear me? I consider it a major life achievement (check!) that a DMV employee called me at home.

"Plate it your way" -State of Michigan

As winner of the contest, Micah Lande was given the opportunity to design my new Michigan plate.

A friendly neighborhood Republican helped push my car out of the street and half-into a parking lot that is shared between a church and the Holland Tulip Time Festival Store.  A patch of ice and tolling church bell prevented us from making it all the way.

Have you seen those mini shorts with writing on the butt that many teenagers think they can pull off but can’t?  My car was essentially wearing butt shorts as it stuck out of the church parking lot.

Don't dare bring one that's not laundered.

Before I even finished dialing AAA I was pre-annoyed with the tow truck company.  What do you do if you work in a job where you are set up for failure?  It is impossible to be excited when calling for a tow, but what a design challenge! Can the experience of a tow ever exceed expectations?

When you are stranded, even in your own town, you see things you would have otherwise missed.  It’s neat to be forced to look at what’s around.  The feeling is similar to doing user studies in design.  How else would you know that the Dutch Costume Resale next week is the 59th straight resale?

It's official.

Remember the days before mobile, internet-ready phones when we read Sweet n’ Low packets as we waited for coffee, and shampoo bottle ingredients as we sat in the toilet at a friend’s house?  Your mind seeks something, anything, to take in to pass the time.

When the truck finally came my Jeep was hoisted up and its butt shorts were rolled through town.  The process was fast – too fast. Shouldn’t there be more pomp and circumstance?  I waited 45 minutes for a process that only takes six?  What a great word – pomp!  More things in life should involve pomp.

There’s a strange exhilaration that comes while watching your car being driven by another car.  Is everyone looking at me? Hey everyone, look at me! It’s a combination of awkward exposure plus pride.

Butt shorts.

I was called out on my consumption orientation yesterday.  I’ve eaten and enjoyed meat my whole life, but during dinner last night I wasn’t sure and my poker face was no help.  I’m not ready to subscribe to one camp or another.  Then “it” was said: “you are a vegetarian.”  But, I’m not ready.  I want to change my affiliation for each new food encounter but society frowns on those that are indecisive or misrepresent themselves.  Why would you try to be something that you’re not?

Why? Because it’s much more interesting for the rest of us. Conflict! Intrigue! Gossip fodder! Go ahead and surpass awkward and head straight to bold.  If Holland put out a magazine that featured a group of seniors sitting smiling on a sidewalk on its cover, it might be authentic, but I probably wouldn’t read it unless the pages accidentally opened because some sort of coffee spill made it cling to the napkin I was using to wipe up the mess.  The saturated area would swell and give the paper that damp bubble that pills like a sweater when wet but feels extra crunchy when dry.

If something contradicts itself an even number of times, is it true?

Holland took the opposite route. It put out a magazine cover that screams of an urban identity and downhill skiing.  Wow! Now this was a magazine I couldn’t pass up.  I even picked it up with bare hands from the free stack near the coffee shop bathroom and paged through, vigorously looking for the place where the secret urban mountain is located.

Would the urban mountain have good hot chocolate? Tattooed people? Democrats?  Would it be a haven for the apres-ski set? Are there other half-French words I could learn there? Are there sandwiches named after movie stars?

I’ll skip ahead.  We all know that Holland didn’t deliver on the urban mountain, but kudos for the generative cover. In this era of diminishing print media ID magazine has shut down but Holland magazine was packed with enough intrigue to get me to page through.

I wonder if the urban mountain has any vegetarians?

I hurled my body down an icy chute yesterday in a day of luging that just might have made the entire state of Michigan worth it.   In order to luge, you lay down on two big blades and the flimsy hammock that connects them and flex your entire body.  To turn, you look the direction you want to go and use your calf to lean your outer blade into the curve.  In order to stop, you sit up and pick up the front of the blades, or, in my case you allow yourself to continue to hurl until you smash into a giant foam cube.

I wish foam cubes had a greater presence in life.  Awkward conversation with someone you wish you were friends with? Lean over into the giant foam cube.  In the middle of saying one of those sentences that you can’t figure out how to end so you keep adding more and more words hoping that some kind of closing magically comes out of your mouth?  Fall face first into the giant foam cube.  Giving a presentation and a booger accidentally floats out of your nose? There should be a giant foam cube for that too.

It’s a subtle sport, the luge, and Michigan should be proud to be home of only one of three such tracks in the country.  I’d like to take part in more sports that can only be done here, but I’m not sure what they are – any ideas?  What would a Michigan triathlon look like? Deer hunt, snowmobile, luge?  Each state should design its own sport.

My whole body hurts today.  I wonder if the Olympians hurt this much after their races? Speaking of hurting and Olympics, it’s that time of year again – time for me to get teary while watching the Olympic torch relay on TV.  Each runner with an emotional story – it’s like watching a hyper-condensed version of Extreme Makeover Home Edition – waterfalls.

The Olympics are in Canada and the US government has its commercials on TV in case Americans get any crazy crazy ideas about not coming back, or don’t realize that Canada is a different country.  The spots are reminders to bring a passport if you go see the games, and the website they’ve created for it is www.getyouhome.gov.  The embedded subtlety, that getting home is more important that going out and seeing the world, is on par with that of a luge turn.

Our country and Apolo’s facial hair may always stay the same, but if you’re looking for something new, let Michigan deliver you down a hill on a luge.  We have foam here.

Hello again, chin fuzz.

I’ve lived in Michigan long enough that I have routines now.  In the dark dark Michigan morning:  I wake up. I lay in bed looking up.  I stand up.  I waddle over to our space heater.  I straddle our space heater and let warm infuse me from all directions.  I venture beyond our space heater and into the day.

I wish my space heater had a saddle on top.  In fact, more things should have saddles.  I love the craftsmanship embedded in a great saddle, but I’ve never taken to the large animals that are under them.  Heaving a heavy saddle over a horse sounds great, save for the horse.  In fourth grade I went to a week of horse camp with the Girl Scouts.  I was most interested in how cool I would look in my tall, leather riding boots, walking all over town and leaning nonchalantly on walls in public places, but once at camp those boots ended up materializing as chunky rubber overshoes.  I tested into the most beginner level of horses named Heineken, and he and I walked in slow, clockwise circles for five days.

Heaters always look like heaters, except when they look like other household appliances.  Who hasn’t let his or her fingers linger a little longer over the toaster on a cold morning?  I learned a tip from some Michigander friends – after cooking something in the oven, leave it open as it cools off – free heat.  Hot showers are an obvious good idea except if you have hair that’s equivalent to a shammy when it comes to retaining water.  A head in the midst of evaporation is as uncomfortable as those pants that are just a smidge too tight.  If you stay perfectly still you can convince yourself that everything is just fine.  Move the slightest bit and sirens go off.

Twenty-two wisdom-infusing years have passed since my special time with Heineken.  I just bought a new, fantastic pair of boots

Happy New Year 2010 from Holland, MI. Photo by Ty Kennedy-Bowdoin.

I’m sure the town of Holland is preparing to drop the ball and ring in the new year, and a quick read of the Holland Sentinel’s reader comments about New Years Eve activities shows that my fellow citizens are either drunk driving, sleeping, or at church:

“I don’t have much planned for the new years. Probably will just get a case of beer and ride around town for a while.” -love to fish

“What is the make and model of your car and plate number on the back? I want to be sure to stay out of your path.” -DReading

“Nothing planned, doubt I’ll even be awake at the new year.” -brewsky

“Watch night service at church, what else?” -Tim Eno

I’m a designer, living in West Michigan, and it’s a blue moon tonight, but it’s snowing and I can’t see it.  On TV, Jennifer Lopez is wearing a full body alien skin suit that makes her crotch look like a barbie doll crotch.  Everything is arbitrary, and I’m happy to embrace it. I don’t know where I’ll be in another decade, but here’s a recap of some prevailing thoughts of the decade past and where I thought I’d be in ten years for ever year since 2000.

2000: I stayed up late splaying Snood with my girlfriends as we realized for the first time in our lives that our democracy was no longer democratic.  I will live in New England and work as a Geology professor at a liberal arts college.

2001: I was mid-air with my family on September 11 and think it’s strange that a large number of country music stars came out with America songs within a week.  I will live in the mountains and work as a Geology professor at a liberal arts college, and become an Olympic snowboarder, or at least be able to ride a half-pipe.

2002: I spent most of my time doing Kung-fu. Why do anything else? I will be a blackbelt.  I will need to balance snowboarding with martial arts. I will live in the mountains and work as a Geology professor, somewhere.

2003: Hakuna Matata. Santa Cruz has parades for even the most obscure of occasions. I will have a house near both the ocean and the mountains and oscillate between excelling at snowboarding and surfing.

2004: I will be a science writer for the New York Times, and make movies about geological phenomena.  I will champion the Adobe Creative Suite to scientists around the world.

2005: I submitted a TV sitcom screenplay to a contest with one of my girlfriends. It was called “The Job” and chronicled the absurdity of work.  “The Office” comes out in the next week.  I will write Hollywood screenplays while making animations about geological processes.

2006: Vans, hoodies, cruiser bikes, surfing, and too much organic sausage.  Why think about the future?

2007: Design teaches me an entirely new way of thinking. There are no good restaurants in Palo Alto. Everything seems attainable again but I don’t sleep much.  I will design constantly.

2008: Will mustaches ever be in style?  I will be cool enough to talk at TED. I will become a professor of Design. I will never work at a company again unless it’s my own.

2009: I wish Holland had restaurants as good as the ones in Palo Alto. I’m working at a company that’s not my own. I got married! I will write a design romance novel, live both overseas and in San Francisco, have two kids, and work as a designer on the projects that interest me.

Bring it on, 2010. In the meantime, I’ll start learning about Canadian birds.

Why is it that airplane bathrooms highlight and magnify facial blemishes better than any other environment?

Do you think the owner trims these? Or does he or she hire someone to do it? If so, is there any art direction involved?

My choice of glasses frames has paralleled my taste in hair styles.  When one side of my hair was short and the other was long in sixth grade, I had two pairs of colored metal frames – one of which had classy tinted pink lenses too.  At the start of college I went through a chin-length bob, and felt it appropriate to pair it with some frames that came with snap on sunglasses.  As a first year design student I became acutely aware that my frames were out of date, and switched to a pair that I could only tolerate for a week.  The heft of high performance plastic needed for the frame style and my prescription was too heavy on my nose.  Santa Cruz had rubbed off on me.  I wasn’t about to tolerate oppressive eye-wear.  Roar! I’ve since settled  into a brown and teal pair that may or may not auto-tag me with: design, designer, internet4eva.

Recently, I wore these glasses into an airplane bathroom.  Never again! They can’t leave the gate on time but they can perform pore-enlarging, blemish accentuating magic in those cramped, human-scented closets.  I saw intricacies of my face that have never before been explored, and it dawned on me that I like living in semi-blur. “Hello, you.”  I think people with perfect vision might also be super organized.  Let’s talk about these hedges that belong to a neighbor of my sister in Menlo Park, CA.  Three tiers of organization in hedge trimming, and not one Jumanji animal!? Congratulations on your eyesight.

This morning a waitress at the sub-par breakfast place near our house recognized us. This first, non-acquaintance public recognition is alarming. It indicates that I live here now. I like remaining blurry because it allows me to escape, but I love focusing in because humans are bizarre.  Is design about the balance?

I run into my clutter all the time, but it’s not all Windex and streak free shine on the other side either.  Just last week I wore my glasses to the salad bar at work and full-on smacked my face into the sneeze guard.

I’m willing to hedge my bets on the blur-life.  What do you think? Has your eyesight shaped your outlook?

I have trouble picturing the genius at the other end.  I wonder where he or she goes for lunch, what type of footwear he or she has selected for the day, and how many other decisions he or she is arbitrarily deciding based on a game of ‘we have too many of these forms, let’s send some out arbitrarily to draw down the pile.’  How can the genius send me an address change form that clearly, I’ve submitted already, if the notice is coming to the new address?  Are all of his or her life choices based on similar logic?

“I have a whole container of baking powder in my cabinet. I think I will turn on my car.”

“My face has a nose.  I should drink salt.”

I’m currently caught in DMV purgatory.  My rusty, trusty 1996 Jeep is stuck in a loophole.  I went to register my car at the Michigan DMV, which, fantastically is called the Secretary of State – SOS!   For some reason, I don’t have a copy of the title to my car.  I don’t know where it is; I looked everywhere. It’s just not here.  Unfortunately, this four by six scrap of paper with dot-matrix printed personal information is the only thing that proves vehicle ownership.  How is this possible? My Jeep has an unmistakable ‘barrRUUUUUUga’ call that only it can make upon acceleration.  My friends know I’m coming because they can hear me three blocks away.  It has a folded up towel crammed into the crack of the driver’s seat to provide the perfect amount of lower lumbar support.  The left side of the hood is more rusted than the right, and I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: my car turns on a dime!  Why is it then, that all proof of ownership resides in that scrap of missing paper?

I sent in the correct form to California to get a duplicate copy of my title over two months ago.  The genius had no problem cashing my check within a week, but three weeks later I still didn’t have a duplicate scrap of paper.  One evening I decided to play chicken with the DMV and I called the automated version of the genius that told me the wait time for my call was over 20 min. and I should consider calling back.  I wasn’t going to fall for that trick- oh no.  I put my phone on speaker, sat on the couch and watched two and a third episodes of Modern Family before the voice of the human genius squeaked through the line.  After typing in my personal information to his or her futuristic computer, I was told that my case needed to be handled through the DMV headquarters.  YES! Genius base camp.  Bring. It. On.

I called the number that the genius gave me and it went straight to a busy signal.  I tried again. Busy. BUSY! Who has a phone that has a busy signal? Could it be that the genius’s were trying to fake number me? Would they dare? Game. On. I Googled the first three digits of the broken genius base camp phone number and searched the results until I found my way to an inner phone directory for genius base camp.  The number I’d been given wasn’t listed.  I decided to try a different tactic.  I called the number for a group that I figured didn’t get many customer calls but would have to be nice to me: human resources.  I launched into my story about needing my duplicate scrap before the genius cut me off to let me know I’d mistakenly called human resources.  He or she would transfer me to the right department.

Ten minutes later, I was on the phone with a human genius at genius base camp in the correct department that told me that everything was alright with the processing of my duplicate scrap, he or she could see it all right there in his or her futuristic computer, but it would still take another few weeks to arrive. He or she ended the call by asking me how I got the phone number.

The information about everything being all set: lies. All lies.

On Monday, I checked my mail and a fat fat package from team genius was waiting.  Instead of inserting my duplicate scrap, they inserted all of the forms I’ve sent in already, a second duplicate address form, and a document written in genius code telling me that in order to get my duplicate scrap I needed to appear in person in California. I live in Michigan.

Incomplete - see above? To what? The bar code? Worst design ever. Worst experience ever. I do not know what to do. Please help.

Why is there a budget crisis in California? Let me see. At a minimum, four geniuses have interacted with my file in one way or another. Nobody helped me.  My case isn’t complicated, but not one genius is empowered to solve my problem and move on to a new one.  A direct quote from a co-worker when I worked for the government in Colorado applies here too: “It’s my job to make the problem, not to fix it.”

California is paying state employees to be the opposite of creative.  As Joey Tribiani famously stated before launching into a set of lunges wearing all of Chandler’s clothes: “Opposite means opposite!”

The alternative to appearing in person is to do the process through an insurer.  I went to my insurer in Michigan last Thursday. As perplexed as me, they called my former insurer in California, and it turns out he passed away.

I need your help.  My CA registration has now run out, my car is currently illegal to drive, and I can’t head to the SOS for a Michigan version without a copy of my title.  Can you send  or tweet this post on to one other person? If the person you send it to knows even the slightest bit of information on how to get me closer to a copy of my title, you’ve helped.   I need to get to someone on the inside, and I need my title. It’s rightfully mine. I’ve paid my dues for needing the duplicate copy, and I’m at my wits end.

Someone, somewhere, will be instrumental in putting the scrap of crap back in my hands.  Whether it’s through a connection, a song, a flash mob, or picketing Arnold’s offices, I don’t know.  To this person: as a reward, I will buy a MI vanity plate with a message of your choosing. I will install this plate on my Jeep with pride, and then turn donuts on a dime on the streets of Holland, MI.

I’m partial to one side of the street in downtown Holland, MI.  I’ve tried the other side, but really, I have no interest in it other than looking in at the seniors eating bagged lunches at the downtown retirement home.  Brown paper lunch bags are fantastic in their own right, but I also slow my gait and people-watch the elders as they watch me.  I like the messaging that’s packed into a senior citizen.  They’ve seen everything come and many things go and, with each one you may or may not have a gold mine of experience, a fortune cookie message that you might save in your wallet or leave on the table.  I don’t know what age you have to reach to employ the Q-tip hairdo, but if it’s bold enough to tackle my straightness I will embrace the halo of white fuzz as my own.

That's it?

In the meantime, I usually walk on the non-retirement side of the street.  I counted 40 storefronts between my house and the one coffee shop that makes me feel like people live here.  Out of the 40 storefronts, eight of them are empty. For effect, I’ll repeat this fact in a different, generalized, and therefore slightly inaccurate form that highlights the economic downturn: twenty percent of the stores in downtown Holland, Michigan are empty.  The feel of a barren corridor of previously Papyrus font-laden establishments is particularly enhanced on Sunday, the day when nothing is allowed.  I went out to breakfast this morning and found myself excited as we pulled up, simply because the place was open.

My norms might be shifting and I will be the first to tell you I’m a bit delirious, but I still know a winner when I hear one.  On the radio station that used to wake me up with sub-par humor but has switched to all Christmas music, all the time as of November 1, I heard a radio contest this week where the winner was to be awarded one dozen frozen pigs in a blanket.  One dozen, frozen, pigs in a blanket – might as well throw in a whole chicken and can of hairspray.

The potential joy of the arbitrary will keep me listening to the Christmas music for another 40 days.  Pigs in a blanket can overcome pa-rum-pa-pum-pum.  Why is the unexpected refreshing?  Why does it take the unexpected to show us the obvious?  What is the most unexpected item I could put in a brown paper bag?