The back of the bus in progress on Wednesday, with Henry's dog and logo, originally uploaded by MaryWit.

I came upon this beautiful, rusty old 1968 Ford school bus in the Golden Gardens parking lot, two dogs peering out the window, two guys with buckets of paint painting it, and a lady sitting in a lawn chair. I was dazzled! I stopped to talk to them. They said the smoke stack goes to the wood stove inside. The bearded man turned out to be muralist Ryan Henry Ward, or just “Henry”, who’s faithful black, paint-spattered dog was never far away.

The couple (and their two dogs, Jellybean and Sis) bought the bus on CraigsList for $800 and were fixing it up, before moving in and taking it on the road. I went back the next day, delighted to see them still there; the painting was progressing nicely. The second day, Tuesday, Henry was painting alone On Wednesday, I left the young home/bus owners sitting on an old blue bus bench seat on the grass laughing with delight, “that’s our HOME, man! That’s our new home! This is where we live!”

I’ll follow the progression each day until the bus is gone. To see more photos of the school bus metamorphosis, see my flickr.com set “1968 School Bus” http://flickr.com/photos/marywit/sets/72157607333979228/

For more on Henry's murals, see this NW Source article here: www.nwsource.com/entertainment/visual-arts/visual-art/loc...