My husband Andrew has a thing for cars, and as we were recently celebrating our 50th birthdays, he had a mid-life crisis and purchased a new Porsche Boxster Spyder as a surprise gift for us. One of the reasons we didn’t get divorced after this transaction is that the car is modeled after the same Porsche that James Dean loved and raced and died in, and I’m a huge James Dean fan, in fact creating a graphic novel about Dean to be published by Fantagraphics after doing art over my lifetime about him.

It’s a super cool car, and we love it too, and have already made full use of it by driving across country in the vehicle, stopping at the Grand Canyon, one of our most favorite places in the world. The Grand Canyon is itself sublime, but being able to go there with my husband (whom I’ve been together with for 25 years) and our little toy poodle Michelangelo was a sublime event, on our way to our new home in California where we recently moved to work, teach, and make art.

This image was one of the best from our trip, although it doesn’t show much of the Canyon, it shows a lot of our happiness of being alive and together with our pet, sharing this moment that we will never forget, transitioning into our future with happiness and well-being for all… This painting began the DESTINY section of the “My American Dream: Berlin Edition”, and it was also the beginning of the destiny of our journey for the rest of our lives.