Wednesday, November 30, 2011

being in the now means you get left behind


yes, you miss the bus, he gets the girl, she wins the prize. i've often been tempted by this philosophy, and it's gotten me nowhere. i stop to smell the roses, as i did yesterday, and fog rolls over the sun. i meditate and am too tired after to stand up. i think this path a ploy by the ambitious to get rid of the rest of us.

the hypnotherapist milton erickson said, 'always have something to look forward to.' the psychologist cg. jung maintained, 'westerners operate on a system of action, not contemplating the navel.' today, i passed the tents of those occupying our town and a ragged group sat in a circle, eyes closed, hands palm up on their knees, chanting om. i waited for the town square to levitate into heaven. it didn't happen.

usually i discover when i'm depressed i have too much unused energy inside me. instead of sleeping, the route i most often take, i need to bounce on my trampoline, jog in the park, anything to get the circulation going and to burn off the excess fat of the mind. being here now, i run down at the heels, the floor goes unmopped. i thank buddha for killing all my desires. alas, that includes the desire to live.

so what am i to make of this? californians the most ambitious people in the world. they want to talk with everybody, that's how silicon valley happened. and they love to run with wolves, until the wolves get hungry. at the same time we've spas, meditation centers, the exhausted go to the beach, trying to recover. yet we hop back on the freeway and gun the engine. we fly by the flowers planted in the median strip without a shred of attention. we're chanting with the beach-boys and conquering the opposite sex with our witty moves.

whew, i've worn myself out with this. i think i'll take a nap.  look at more of my contradictions: www.pbase.wwp/unified this is my contribution to einstein's last theory.

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

does the picture have mystery?





boy, in the last ten years it's become almost impossible for me to read a whole book. partly cause most books relate one idea from many angles, whether it's fiction or not. if i can browse a five hundred page book in two hours, i'll do it gladly and walk away satisfied. that said, i did finish watteau by the art critic jed perl just yesterday, and found it delightful.


can anybody look at a watteau painting and not wonder, what the hell is really going on? they're charming, beautiful, yet we don't know what stage of romance (or not) they have in mind. perl weaves together dozens of short stories of actors, movies, everyday scenes, in a magical way. his take: you will never know what's going on, the characters in the scenes themselves ignorant of what will take place next. in other words, these pictures leave you hanging (ah, the pun surprised me.)


have you ever been disappointed by a film where the first half hour keeps you interested without revealing the basis of the story and then when you know the trick, it's all over, you might as well go home? wings of desire by wim wenders struck me this way the first time i saw it. keep me in the dark, please, as long as you can. as for the surrealists, i find them witty, but don't they try too hard? di cirico, for example, simply jumps at our love of the mysterious without a disguise. 






i realized that's what i'm often trying to do: not give things away. and the best way i've found is the right kind of improvisation where i can't control all the factors. taking pictures in cafes, for example.  i don't really like to sneak pictures, i'd rather take them in museums and at parades. however, to catch people in private moments, nothing works better than the coffee house. and what happens, if it works, is the individual in a context where he/she emits unknowability. and that's the truth of us as human beings. whether a person bores me, angers me, excites me, or leaves me cold, other than my reaction to this particular person, i cannot really know him/her. 


i hope in this series sometimes two or three photos in the same scene create the mystery i'm trying to describe:http://www.pbase.com/wwp/sam and sometimes one by itself. 



Saturday, November 26, 2011

does it matter who wrote shakespeare's plays?



at twenty i found berkeley a bore, the teachers and institution very conservative. students continue to rebel. i did it my own way, stopping class attendance, saving up money from  working the libraries, and preparing for a move to mexico city where i could be a real writer. i made the journey, but that's another story.  while waiting, i read all of shakespeare, a play a day.

what i discovered, a continuous voice, similar images appearing and re-appearing, used this way and that in different contexts. so, i've never really doubted who penned the scripts - until this week. have you seen the movie anonymous? i enjoyed it immensely. edward de vere, earl of oxford, writes the plays, tries to get ben jonson to be his front man, signing his name to them. alas, a greedy buffoon, booming billy, snatches them up and takes the credit.

fitting all the facts together, i'm sure the movie-makers had a great time. de vere certainly more sympathetic than wee willy, and as an unknown playwright, i sympathize with a man who can never lay claim to his creations. yes, it shook my faith, despite visits to stratford, seeing the plays done under all kinds of circumstances and in many interpretations. if you look at jan kott's shakespeare, our contemporary  you find him a post-war french existentialist. he can be stretched and bent, part of his claim to fame.

okay, how do i feel four days later? alas, the bookstore carries a book called contested will by james s. shapiro.  this author seeks to debunk the debunkers by showing how historical climates since 1800 have led people to not believe in governments, identities, professed ideals. 'lying is what makes us human,' advanced one university lecturer in my own time. and then at the end, the author says it does matter who.  bold bill could have interviewed plenty of foreigners about italy and any needed information. and  to doubt the authorship to undermine belief in the imagination with the necessity for realist experience.

now i really am blowing in the wind. in college i  took a course in shakespeare's contemporaries. no doubt he rode the wave of his contemporaries: marlow, jonson, etc. and a lot of his stage craft could easily have been picked up from them. however, couldn't a theater-going royal have done it all, including the grand tour of the continent and avid tutors? somehow i wish someone else would be proven, as this would knock the bard off his pedestal. imagine being a writer in english and everybody declaring, 'no one can match will, the greatest scribe ever!' wouldn't you be a bit resentful?

i haven't come to any conclusion, browsing thru the plays. many insights assert themselves. one, this guy creates scenes with incredible drive, energy, bold, blustery, characters ready and attempting to grab whatever they want. that's drama! also, he could be infinitely bawdy, down in the dirt funny. this really made me wonder if the earl could spatter himself so? yet, to say that demotes the power of his imagination. how much did high and low experience together in that time? the answer might provide an answer.

to prove my own credentials, i directed a one-person piece by susan aylworth, gertrude, hamlet's story from his mother's point of view performed by jodi rives. pictures here: www.pbase.com/gert  and here's my theater doctrine: www.pbase.com/wwp/laugh  


Friday, November 25, 2011

art as a respite from the tyranny of time





my friend susan said, 'it's an odd thing we do, putting pictures on the walls in museums.' hmm, i'd thought about this, having spent half my life in such places. my first thrill came in the louvre at sixteen, not from a painting on the wall, rather from an american girl sitting on the floor, drawing. watching her do so made chills run up and down my spine. the same had happened in the darkroom as i watched the photo form in the developer. 


these first orgasmic experiences appeared in the process, not the finished product. rarely has a work on the wall stopped me, though it finally happened last week. a late painting by manet of a woman and the scene 'susanna and the elders' by tintoretto. they made me understand  what i love about art. you see, the transitory nature of our existence plagues me. it's as if i'm always sitting in front of an hour-glass, burned to ashes by the falling salt. did this come from being a preacher's kid, the baptisms, marriages, and funerals? this too shall pass, a lesson i learned all too early.


different forms of art may seem to act otherwise. take the movies, for example. they've transfixed me from the beginning. and i know it's cause i escape the circle of my own thoughts, the  world i've constructed out of the 10 billion stimulae striking my eye every second. according to my mood, the color of the sky, the sound of airplanes or butterflies, i form a buzzing conglomeration of images called 'reality'. my reality and your's? well, they're bound to be different. how do we agree on anything, except out of necessity?


in essence, a symphony replaces my flow with another. a painting may, certainly a poem. my time disappears (and i insist 'my time' my own construction), the passing moments which terrify me, the falling of a sparrow from the sky. we plague ourselves, no other does it, not even the universe. we've discovered art as a cure for life. 


posted more drawings. too bad they don't show up clearly on the web. printed, all the green tints disappear and what i'm hinting at stands out: http://www.pbase.com/wwp/android3



Thursday, November 24, 2011

thankfullness won't flow from a clogged faucet



jeez, not only did i wake feeling no gratitude, i felt absolutely resentful. why do i have to pull on my socks, straighten the bed, pour cereal in a bowl? can't somebody do all this for me? I mean, the president has a butler, clothes all laid out and he's helped into them. the cook brings the tangy coffee. his wife wipes his glasses and says, 'honey, is there anything more i can do for you?'


my anthropology teacher in college said, 'we live better than any kings in history before 1900.' and as i watch toddlers wheeled to the market in fancy strollers which could be  first class on an airplane, i think, 'enjoy it now. you'll never be royalty again.' so, i suppose i have to admit being spoiled. yet, it doesn't seem that way. the more i can buy, the more comfortable i get, the worse  my selfishness and ingratitude. 


i'm trying to cook up a little thankfulness. really, it depends upon vulnerability. when i'm injured and the doctor solves the problem, i feel relieved. that is his job, of course, thus i can't completely experience the indebtedness i should feel. or when my mother bathed me after i crapped in my pants during a spelling test in the second grade, stumped by the word 'of,' i experienced more pain than pleasure. however, now, i do appreciate the touch of her hands. 


okay, that's where i have to start. unless i can not only forgive my parents for bringing me into this world, i must muster some thanks. you see, life's a mixed bag. how can i thank them for the pain, the pleasure, the roller-coast of emotions and fortune, especially the tension i normally feel within me? and if i can't appreciate being born, how can i possibly be genuine in my embracing fate? 


hmm, so far it hasn't worked. let me try another route. what events, people, etc have moved me. i stumble across these pictures of 'hollywood babylon', a production by winston colgan. http://www.pbase.com/wwp/bab the show truly moved me and i still have the sensations. perhaps cause i loved judy garland in 'the wizard of oz'. maybe due to the father-son playing leads and the conflict true. and then again, most of us feel like dwarfs in a world of big people, particularly when we're children.


as i look thru my pictures, past and present, little bells of joy go off. http://www.pbase.com/wwp  i love the dancers, i remember the 11 year old hiking into the ruins of canyon de chelly and how good the oranges tasted in the heat. and my mother feigning great delight as i climb onto my christmas tricycle. aye, there's the rub. i got that vehicle stuck in the grass and wailed til she came and pulled me free. yes, it's mostly about mothers, all this, the ambiguities of thanksgiving. lucky the ones who've had a near-death experience and making the choice to come back, take responsibility for their lives. 



thankfullness won't flow from a clogged faucet



jeez, not only did i wake feeling no gratitude, i felt absolutely resentful. why do i have to pull on my socks, straighten the bed, pour cereal in a bowl? can't somebody do all this for me? I mean, the president has a butler, clothes all laid out and he's helped into them. the cook brings the tangy coffee. his wife wipes his glasses and says, 'honey, is there anything more i can do for you?'


my anthropology teacher in college said, 'we live better than any kings in history before 1900.' and as i watch toddlers wheeled to the market in fancy strollers which could be  first class on an airplane, i think, 'enjoy it now. you'll never be royalty again.' so, i suppose i have to admit being spoiled. yet, it doesn't seem that way. the more i can buy, the more comfortable i get, the worse  my selfishness and ingratitude. 


i'm trying to cook up a little thankfulness. really, it depends upon vulnerability. when i'm injured and the doctor solves the problem, i feel relieved. that is his job, of course, thus i can't completely experience the indebtedness i should feel. or when my mother bathed me after i crapped in my pants during a spelling test in the second grade, stumped by the word 'of,' i experienced more pain than pleasure. however, now, i do appreciate the touch of her hands. 


okay, that's where i have to start. unless i can not only forgive my parents for bringing me into this world, i must muster some thanks. you see, life's a mixed bag. how can i thank them for the pain, the pleasure, the roller-coast of emotions and fortune, especially the tension i normally feel within me? and if i can't appreciate being born, how can i possibly be genuine in my embracing fate? 


hmm, so far it hasn't worked. let me try another route. what events, people, etc have moved me. i stumble across these pictures of 'hollywood babylon', a production by winston colgan. http://www.pbase.com/wwp/bab the show truly moved me and i still have the sensations. perhaps cause i loved judy garland in 'the wizard of oz'. maybe due to the father-son playing leads and the conflict true. and then again, most of us feel like dwarves in a world of big people, particularly when we're children.


as i look thru my pictures, past and present, little bells of joy go off. http://www.pbase.com/wwp  i love the dancers, i remember the 11 year old hiking into the ruins of canyon de chelly and how good the oranges tasted in the heat. and my mother feigning great delight as i climb onto my christmas tricycle. aye, there's the rub. i got that vehicle stuck in the grass and wailed til she came and pulled me free. yes, it's mostly about mothers, all this, the ambiguities of thanksgiving. lucky the ones who've had a near-death experience and making the choice to come back, take responsibility for their lives. 

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

our investment in cultural icons

                                          their first murder (weegee)

using celebrities to stabilize our view of the world certainly a risky business. hence, our attention to scandal, especially sexual. i'm not surprised when a financier robs the bank. that's what he's born to do. however, if a president makes it with his secretary, big news! this, despite the affairs of jfk, the mistresses of eisenhower and roosevelt, and i find my interest (and more) aroused.

everybody likes to gawk at the mess of a car crash, the scene of crime, me included. i guess none of us can avoid three important questions: is it a danger, can i eat it, will it have sex with me? the survival of the species depends upon this awareness and taking immediate action. unfortunately, all kinds of sex illegal and threatening. no wonder fewer and fewer people marrying, both in the united states and in europe. why be prosecuted for having three husbands when you can simply live with three men? definitely, this is progress. if you can do without the wedding dress, maybe you can live modestly.

oscar wilde wrote: our servants will do our living for us. that's exactly the role of the public on pedestals we idolize. i sit in a bookstore cafe and watch men and women, young and old, studying US, people magazine, fan games day after day. the thrill only goes when one of them fails to behave - if it's a politician, he/she a dead duck. movie stars, on the other hand, cash in as long as they can. mea culpa gives them more covers.

and once a generation passes, new idols are born. each has its own. frank sinatra lives, as does elvis. we didn't depend on them at the bank. they get free passes. elect a poker-faced president on whom we can project all our hopes and desires and we're doomed to disillusionment, a huge disparity between promises made and promises kept. i, for sure, like to deny the complexities of the economy. print more money, that's my solution. why didn't anybody think of it?

you see how limited my resources and knowledge are. and i don't feel i'm alone. aren't you a one-issue voter? what matters most? mortgages, abortion, taxation? whatever we focus on becomes our god and we can do no wrong.

things can always be made to look different. here's a watercolor version of the revolving door: www.pbase.com/wwp/door2

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

who are those living in the tents?



confessedly, as i walked the streets of berkeley, the tent cities seemed created by the folks who sleep in the parks usually. that's a callous attitude, but i've always been reluctant to be rowdy. despite me being a slacker, it looks like this consciousness-raising technique working on everybody, in some way.

rep. deutch from florida introduced an amendment to the constitution banning corporation political funding and removing them from 'personhood' which gives them the same rights and assurances as individuals. the ruling by the supreme court to allow unlimited spending by the conglomerates could be considered the death-nell of democracy. more power to rep. deutch.

something else that had to be done: outing the people most responsible. a new poll on http://www.bravenewfoundation.org/ allows you to vote for the villains. this at least allows names, faces, and companies to be put together. these elders won't like it. everybody in america wants to be seen as democratic and middle-class, especially the most wealthy. to stand out too much makes you a target. i voted for my supreme evil-doer. see if you can guess who it is.

as more leaders come forward, the issues ramping up. you have to have charismatic figures speaking for you, centers of vocal and social energy, otherwise these grassroots movements peter out. going to be very interesting to see what develops.

the revolving door has more than one meaning: www.pbase.com/wwp/door

Monday, November 21, 2011

how did i find the other me in me?



discomfort. (unpleasant to say it, but somebody had to.) by changing places and circumstances, cat-sitting for a week in berkeley and roaming the streets and museums of san francisco. we're not talking extreme deprivation, just a change in routine, the house cold, the bathroom upstairs, walking to the subway past the homeless posing as demonstrators and kids flooding out of the high school for lunch.

what happened? people started talking to me out of the blue. a couple before a flamenco concert, a pretty grad student from san francisco studying in paris and complaining about the bus service. another time a woman from philadelphia asked me where to get off for golden gate park. she praised the transportation system! and said, 'how wonderful to live in a clean city.' yes, i remember years ago a pop bottle exploding on the top of our family car passing through her town.

i found myself joking with strangers, complimenting them on their work, in other words i came out of my shell in some way that encouraged people to speak with me. what a pleasure. that hasn't happened in a long time. and it's all because of discomfort. back home in my little room, i don't have to go anywhere. i'm not pulled out into the world of Titian and Pissaro, not stunned by a beautiful painting by Manet and a couple by Watteau.

in fact, i had a small epiphany. after gazing at photos in the realistic manner, not to mention aisles of art in the same style, i stumbled on a little cezanne. i'd never understood his appeal to picasso and the moderns. this time he felt absolutely refreshing, me seeing his piece as an abstraction. what a relief from all these wonderful, ordinary, expected versions of reality. abstraction lies behind every work of art, yet it took cezanne to bring it forward.

yes, here in my little nine by twelve foot monk's cell, lovely trees out the window, the bathroom and hot water a step away, the Internet service like lightning, heat in winter, coolness in summer, a soft bed, food a quick fix, i tend to rot away in my thoughts, my very pleasant daydreams. this time, coming back, i asked myself, 'where have the last thirty years gone?'

a few photos and watercolors from this expedition, the revolving door, and that is definitely meant metaphorically:

www.pbase.com/wwp/door

www.pbase.com/wwp/door2

Tuesday, November 8, 2011

once you owe money, you don't own your soul


'now wait a darn minute,' i can hear you saying. 'that may be true for some people but not for me.' debt is like death, or the ten commandmants, everyone insists on an exception. 'we need money for college, to buy a house, to invest in stocks. money makes money.' hmm, that's not what i'm hearing from the newspapers and my friends. 

take an education, for example. students leaving school after five years twenty to forty thousand dollars in the hole. how long will it take to crawl out of it? what options have you surrendered, like back-packing around the the world or meditating in an ashram? ultimately, you become a conservative by virtue of your pact with the bank. you may demonstrate against the government out of frustration: 'i was too young. i didn't know. you evil folks wrote checks for me.' tell it to the judge.

or buying a house. yes, property changed humankind forever, and i think for the better, ie. it created individuality. no longer were you merely a tribal entitiy. and now i'll reveal the truth, my family in bondage the whole time i was growing up. yes, i remember my mother writing she couldn't even buy a candy bar, adding insult to injury since her family lost  their wealth in the great depression. we closed off rooms in winter, slept with hot bricks, bundled up in warm clothes. when my father exited the bus from the east where he'd applied for the army, he almost fainted, not having eaten in three days.

and when food in short supply, the kids fight over it, identifying it with love. we survived borrowing money from my uncle walter, the batchelor. in the end i paid a terribly price for it, my personality undergoing a complete change when i lived with him and alcoholic uncle luzerne. driven inward by the feeling i must conform to their wishes, all of us indebted to him, i couldn't fight back and psychologically knuckled under and succumbed. read the letters exchanged with my family at the time: www.pbase.com/wwp/son

yes, a faustian bargain feels good at the time, saying to yourself, 'i will never have to pay it back.'  alas, the truth quite otherwise. the sword of damocles may very well hang over your head for the rest of your life.

Monday, November 7, 2011

can there be jobs without a steve jobs?



many moons ago, peter smith, head of university arts & lectures, said, 'what's needed is a center of energy.' in terms of the real world, this person provides the drive making things happen, whether it's a product, service, or religion. and, alas, i'm not one of these people. i'm the idea guy. when it comes to mustering community forces, i'm an utter dud.

i've been browsing through the coming jobs war by the ceo of the gallup polling group, jim clifton. usually i shy away from war books, however i figured i'd give this a shot. as usual, the book contains one premise: entrepreneurs needed. the innovative may announce, even begin, a revolution. the audience-builder has to create desire in the hearts of consumers. the author sites many examples of inventions turning into also-rans. i think of the lcd, invented by americans and ridden across the finish line by the japanese.

anybody advising steve j. about phones, music services, and pads, said, 'hey, stevee, these dead territories, why re-invent the wheel.' the rest history. building a better mouse-trap not time wasted. the rats continue to climb aboard a sinking ship, for that is what the gallup guy gallops toward. 'we need thirty percent of the world's smartest to survive. health care killing us. school dropouts, how they going to help pick us up?'

you know, the trouble with starting a business is you have to work all the time. it's so much nicer to collect a paycheck and have another life. mercifully, i've been able to do it. psychics tell me i've had so much responsibility and seen so much destruction, i get a vacation. i'm not sure inventing the device blowing up atlantis qualifies me for an easy time. well, life is not fair. i'll take what i can get.

usually, i've lost my jobs through boredom: bagging groceries, pulling chain for a surveyor, sweeping a dime-store. as long as i can dream while working i'm free. god-forbid i should be supervised! how i got through this lifetime i'm not sure. true, i'm a workaholic when it comes to writing, theater, art, photography. let me drive myself insane, even if i lack the skills and desire to make fame pay.

if you find the entrepreneurs at fault, you'll have to build your own factory for cannonballs. those will always be needed, even if it's  been done before. take choreographers  for example: www.pbase.com/wwp/dancepics

Saturday, November 5, 2011

the struggle to resist belief



like most mortals, at seven and eight i started creating categories, putting cats into this one, socks into another, girls into several. i couldn't help myself. the world overwhelmed me with too much information. for example, ten billion stimuli hit our eyes every second. of those we can actively recognize forty and deal with four at most. we create a life day by day, editing out what we fear or doesn't seem useful.

lately i've spent time with two friends devoured by conspiracy theories. these occupy their minds to organize the world. as usual, nefarious political and financial people conspire to get everything, to steal from us, to make us suffer. unfortunately, it's true, though the upper one percent would never agree. 'we're creating job opportunities.'

yet, what's really happening in the minds of my friends? the making sense of the world by adopting a system which keeps their busy minds occupied. and when i watch people pouring over the bible in cafes, i think the same, 'they've reduced life to this particular, very comprehensive and confusing book from which you can justify anything.' luckily, it evades science, economics, anything which might prove even more difficult to assimilate. again, frantic intelligences being absorbed in a complete universe.

any paradigm can be proven true. that's the beauty of it. all you have to do is accept a few basic premises without proof and the rest follows! this, you have to admit, completely ingenious. what it eliminates is doubt, ambiguity, and the hell of independent thought. and, of course, i would like to suggest an alternate route.

CANDLE

Surely you weren't meant
to be born here in this
kitchen, waiting for
the ants. Old Greek poets
sang of dresses falling
from lovely limbs, the moon
bouncing off the water.
Sanskrit sages denied
anyone could resist the
flute of Krishna, tunes
fluttering through the perfumed
leaves. Married women
dropped wedding rings,
shyness, customs, the
husband's heavy sighs,
to slide out the door
into the forest. And if
you find yourself doing
the same, open the poems
of Bhartrihari and drink
the deep silence of the stars,
burn like the candle
you left far behind
watching in the window.

taking in all the evidence: www.pbase.com/wwp/poems 

Thursday, November 3, 2011

make everyday count 'cause it's all you've got



it's painful giving people advice on how to live. they never do what i say. yet i can't stop it. for example, two fellows yesterday, both basically out of jobs, early thirties, upset about what to do next. one burdened by student loans, he can't even imagine what he might want. the other, just fired as the head of a theater in a state of shock. and i couldn't hold myself back, poor guys.

'go to saudi arabia for a year and pay off your debt.' 'figure out how to get to england and establish a career.' my god, these are big chunks to swallow. everything seems incredibly beyond reach when you're depressed. and you may be down in the dumps unexpectedly, me for example. this week a 200 dollar brake job on my truck turned into a 1000 dollar one. i offered to give the cashier at the car dealer my blood instead of cash. she didn't go for it.

okay, let's break this down into bites. at five years old you liked to dress up, 'who shall i be today?' you're on the edge, slaving as a cook, but you can do it. salvation army's just a block away. acquire an outlandish wardrobe and be a drag queen at breakfast,  join the local people doing mad fashion shows. and as for you, having had england as your playpen at five, you can start stealing english silver from antique stores and eat off it every evening. be a thief of time.

He did not dare touch the coffin
a passion in glass
a lesson in perfection
He
did not dare hope
for anything so living
as love
in the flesh
He satisfied himself with eyes
Imagine
the shock of the dropping
the cracking of the coffin
Snow White
jarred awake from the land
of her dreams
into his

We think of ourselves as victims
yes
that's a good beginning
victims
Everything done to us
birth was done to us
nobody asked
death was done to us
we resisted
personally
Eyes were done to us
and noses
socks and shoes
we didn't ask to live
in houses and pants
streets were done to us
circuses and cotton candy
beer and brothels came to us without our asking
We took them
we took it all
what else were we supposed to do


the androids have been asking for you: www.pbase.com/wwp/android2