Iron Orphans.

I was sitting around a table outside the Thirsty Hippo with some friends and some kids I didn't know. My friend Melissa was telling me how she met her boyfriend Loren, and it was ridiculous. "So then I moved to Texas, and this ex of mine was calling me every day, was obsessed with how over we were. One day when I wasn't there he just showed up!" One of those stories.

Some dude walked up and started talking to one of the kids I didn't know. He was asking about her sculptures and whether he could buy one, and I started picking up little clues from what he was asking. I got excited. When he wandered off I asked her if she'd shown an installation of cast iron babies hanging from the ceiling a few months ago, along with some of Spence Townsend's amazing paintings. She had, and I went on forever chattering about how much I'd loved the show.

There'd been about twenty of the babies, different sizes, hanging as though they were parachuting down. In the gallery light you could see the slim strings that held the babies up, but if I squinted or removed my glasses I could just have seen these little iron orphans falling like snow.

I talked about the show for weeks after I saw it. I'm angling to buy one of the babies. Where am I going to hang it? I've been thinking about what I'll do with it for awhile, but I feel like I need one of them. Cast iron baby!