Amococo or why it’s good to live in Ann Arbor

Sometimes it’s easy to get down on the place you live. Grass is always greener, right? I’m as guilty of it as the next person. But sometimes, I just have to completely appreciate the town I live in for everything it offers.

Exhibit A: Amococo

the outside of the sculpture

One of the best things Ann Arbor has to offer in the summer is the Ann Arbor Summer Festival. And it just landed this year. Lots of great shows, live music outside, movies under the stars, and great art installations. We’ve had stilt dancers, face painters, artist workshops – there’s just too much to list. The best part about it is it runs for nearly three weeks, every evening and much of it is free. Things like the Summer Festival remind me why I love my town.

My kids and I have been waiting oh so patiently to go to a very cool thing this year: Amococo. It’s an amazingly ethereal sculpture you can walk through, bathing you in brilliant color and light. The Architects of Air (a fabulous name, by the way) have been designing these luminariums for the past 20 years. The sculpture is made of colored plastic that is glued together by hand. Natural light shines through, just immersing you in a world filled with color and light and sound. It’s like walking through a giant kaleidoscope. It’s wonderful.

We waited in line for over an hour, but I think we were lucky. There were plenty of people who waited much longer than we did. The wait was well worth it.

there were plenty of people past this point.

While we were waiting, a couple in front of us who had just recently moved here from Germany were just gushing about Ann Arbor. (Yes, I was completely eavesdropping). They loved how there were so many cultural events, so many different kinds of people, so many languages, cultures, all here living together. Yes! That’s right! This *is* a good town!

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And Amococo was cool. If I didn’t have two smallish kids who were hungry and ready to leave, I would have stayed in much much longer. I would have been one of those people curled up in a cove, relaxing in the light and in the sounds. Thanks, Ann Arbor. It’s nice to be reminded of how wonderful where you live actually is.

So now it’s your turn to go out and find something cool in your town. Tell me about it. Or just come here 🙂