or, 'is that what it takes to escape your comfort zone?'
my freshman year in college english class we read an essay on comfort, how it was the main enemy of the artist. and those few words determined much of my life. not that i seek pain and unrest. they just seem to come as a by-product of thought. and as richard carlsen so wisely said, 'our thoughts create emotions, and we're thinking all the time.'
of course, it's a fine-line between starvation and inspiration. the ravenous stranded in the desert dream of nothing but food, as the character in 'night' by elie weisel did at the end of his concentration camp stay. yet one must remain lean, both to live a long life and to fill it with creations.
ben shahn in 'the shape of content' said pretty much the same thing, describing how the teachers of art drift away from making it to analyzing the process. many have called divine discontent necessary. certainly, it's a pain in the ass, but it can keep you going at a remarkable pace!
the dynamite metaphor has a basis in today's reality. yesterday, on an isolated piece of private real estate in the middle of the forest, some wandering miners discovered 200 sticks in a mine-shaft, only thirty feet down. today the bomb squad from sacramento sought to burn the cache while a high wind blew at three in the afternoon, the humidity at eight percent. it took the forest fire bosses to call in a large crew, several engines, and a whole day of pleading to put it off until 6 a.m. tomorrow morning. i imagine the shaft having another exit half mile away, a huge blow-torch shooting out that end to ignite a major conflagration.
we'll have to see what this means for my dreams - and what i wake to in the morning.
meanwhile, my photo site is back up. i've posted pictures of the silver fire:
and last friday's cdt dance class:
and i've added a potpourri of photos to:
the temperature dropped twenty degrees last nite, and winter dances on the horizon. however, i expect i've a month to go. summer i love, winter's a disaster.
