that time of year to disappoint myself again! of course, the first thing i always say: i will exercise more. and you know what? i never do. what this teaches me, however, is: i feel fat and unsexy. then i think of the hottest woman i've ever seen, in a los angeles irish pub dancing. believe me, she must have been at least forty-five and had those extra love-pounds. and wow, every guy in the place couldn't stop watching her, not just that iridescent dress, those hips, those moves.
and in the survey of web porn, two billion wicked thoughts, the authors discovered most men do not like thin women. and when a woman looks at a man, she must be desiring more than muscles. i mean, look at all these guys they're with! pretty amazing, those beards, scuffed shoes, watery eyes. and i'm not just talking about the old ones. i see combinations i simply cannot believe, i feel like i'm watching a horror movie, hallucinating.
which i bring up to prove my point. what we wish hides the substance of that desire, the true impulse, so time to back up, examine what you will never do cause it's not what you really want. now, if i said, i'm going to get more sex this year, i'd have to confront my fears, figure out what a woman really wants (good luck!), and go for it. and i suspect all our hopes for a higher salary, a fancier car, a trip to tahiti disguise the same thing, pure unadulterated lust. if i say, i'm going to have a kid this year, it means, i'll risk a lot, the fear of aids, the scary business of a possible involvement, and of course pregnancy, to have a lot of fun.
i encourage all of us to get real. that pub-dancing lady knew what she wanted and made no bones about it. we have to get past manipulation and self-consciousness and the attempt to play it safe, broadcasting want me, i can give you what you'll never get alone, and all because i'll be satisfying a passion even bigger than yours, my own.
new pics, out xmas eve and the day itself, this depth of darkness needing a release: http://www.pbase.com/wwp/kiss and http://www.pbase.com/wwp/xmas11
portrait by alice neel
actually, i like to forget this kind of disturbing identity dream as fast as i can. oh, i've read tons of freud, jung, and their followers, an interesting thing to do, yet i've decided most of our dreams merely practical. they integrate the trials and tribulations of the day into whatever makes up our 'self'. usually, they start pretty nasty, calming down as the night goes on.
unfortunately, i ate very sugary cookies last night and this means disaster. yes, scrooge was right, a bit of undone potato can undo you. anyway, i spent the last couple hours in andy warhol's apartment, the dump filled with drug-besotted hangers-on. andy himself drove me crazy, friendly one minute, honoring my opinions, and scathing, ironic, damaging my self-image the next. finally, i decided, after failing to be able to take a shower or find my shoes, 'i'm getting the hell out of here.'
one item disturbed me most, a young theater director who recently lost his job part of the retinue. i attempted to convince him this a bad scene. alas, all he could do was imitate warhol, even deciding he was gay and celebrating the fact. when i started to take off my clothes, all these guys stood around me salivating, eager to see my tally-whacker.. needless to say, i became very self-conscious. what was i, one of these or somebody else? down in the street, i at first simply wanted to return to that hell. then i realized my pack back and my loafers on my feet and i walked with a firm gait. ah, a dream, i knew it.
maybe it's the holidays too. yesterday at the cafe, i felt disconnected, other people unreal. not until i picked up a manga story and read a bit did i feel myself returning to this world, certainly a contradiction. oh, hell, as whitman said, 'i contradict myself, therefore i contradict myself. i contain worlds.' if only he would come to me when i need him!
these ipad drawings related: http://www.pbase.com/wwp/nf
ps. once sat behind andy warhol at the theater. white hair. faded denim. a ghost-like aura. pretty freaky.
my friend dennis palumbo just published an article on the subject in psychology today. and what an embarrassing topic it is. believe me, i can envy just about anybody, depending on my mood, say the young, just because they've got so much to look forward to. us crusty old guys figure whatever they seek to do, we've done it better. once staying with a friend's daughter in seattle, i denigrated her work and that of her friends. she jumped all over me. and i realized what i was doing: ENVY.
since then, i've tried to catch myself, even enjoy the successes of others. one trick, i say to myself, now i don't have to do that, it's done. usually it stops me from trying to save the world or re-invent the wheel. i could, of course, build a better mouse-trap, and that's an option, depending on how interested i am. i used to covet the warmth and security of home and family. at night i'd walk the streets, look into kitchen windows, and see everybody having a great time. PROJECTION. my jealousy based on an assumption of the unreal, viewing whatever they have as lacking flies in the ointment.
today, i consider how much time and money all that is costing them. and i know the tensions in families all too well, my own had enough for four broods (nice word, that). take christmas, coming up this weekend. when we were little, we've be full of excitement, my mother's xmas eve ceremonies comforting, we'd listen to a recording of dicken's christmas carol and stuff ourselves with the candy my father had made. later, as we grew older, we became disenchanted, uneasy with the whole affair. ah, if only i still believed in santa claus!
and then there's sex. when i see a gorgeous woman with another man, i turn green, completely forgetting i'm looking at her as a goddess and not a real person. i forget how she had to color and tease that hair, how long it took for her nails to dry as the guy stewed, late for the theater. i totally ignore her bad moods, her demands for attention, and so on. some nights i do go to bed wishing i'd a lovely beside me. and in the morning i wipe my brow and thank god i'm alone. so much for coveting my neighbor's wife.
here is the article mentioned above. tough going in an insanely competitive environment. again, i say, wish for the victory of your buddies. they may carry you to the top: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/hollywood-the-couch/201112/envy
this is the one i mean. we all know the expression 'tip of the iceberg', yet do we really take it's significance into account? the captain of the titanic certainly didn't, nor did george armstrong custer at the battle of the little bighorn. my vanity creates more assumptions than stars in the galaxy, not to mention the universe. for example, i believed invading iraq a bad thing, the only possible result civil war. now that this war is 'officially' over, i'll have to reassess my position. after all, the price of gas dropping!
and afghanistan, where civilizations go to die? hmm, exceptions to the rule? maybe all those drone bombs killing people necessary steps in human evolution? am i being ironic? damn, i never know. some things i am pretty aware of. for example, when touring the teddy roosevelt house in new york, i heard the guide say americans don't know their own history. once i took a course in our revolution, and i didn't remember the colonies had three million people. no wonder the british had a fight on their hands. and did a million citizens move to canada after it was over? somewhere i read that.
does my ignorance matter? that's the big question. so far i've gotten thru life without knowing what the hell E equals MC squared means. and if i'm sailing the ocean of thought, what dangers lie in the deep? true, i do believe as things begin, so do they go. a revolt in violence creates a violent new society, whereas a peaceful one, say new zealand, doesn't lead to a lot of blood-letting. can i see like the author of the rational optimist the whole of human society progressing, even as individuals suffer? and when does bowing to complexity, not allow us t0 cut the gordian knot?
nothing ventured, noting gained. after all, any of our lives fatal! new drawings: http://www.pbase.com/wwp/nf and new photos: http://www.pbase.com/wwp/meso2 where students reconstruct what might have been.
my friend marilyn once said, people who think they're always right have more energy. when i go down the list of people i've known, i believe it to be true. not that they're necessarily more successful, however i suspect conservatives happier than liberals, fathers more than sons. and they can be as obnoxious as hell, without feeling guilty.
transposing this to the big names in art, i must confess i'm puzzled. lately i've streamed documentaries on bob dylan, alice neel, keith haring, robert anton wilson, and countless other artists. guess i'm still looking for the key to fame and fortune. certainly amazing what these people have done, yet doubts seem to creep up on them all the time. hemingway said, courage is grace under pressure. what amazes me: how cheeky a bob dylan or john lennon can be.
is it simply the drive to 'do something', write songs. paint. direct? suicide does often raise its sad head, much more prominent among creative people. we can all think of examples, hemingway himself and marilyn monroe. and i haven't found people who consider themselves infallible to be geniuses, in fact they very often live by cliches. that gives them a rectitude money can't buy.
one example i love: the man with the highest IQ in the world. i forget his name. he lives somewhere in the american midwest. what a dolt. never having the chance to train his brain, he thinks killing dumb people okay. here the mind creates a demon, or as goya would say, the sleep of reason creates monsters. informed intelligence the way to go. unfortunately, the more you know the more you know you don't know. awareness takes away certainty.
started a new batch of drawings, night flight: http://www.pbase.com/wwp/nf i'm sure it will prove again photographs have more universal appeal than artistic creations. artworks seem to narrow the audience, the quirkiness of individuality limiting you to an audience with the same quirks!
hugh mccloed wrote in ignore everybody: and 39 ways to creativity. this, of course, has it's pluses and minuses. another wag wrote, don't ask if it's impossible until after you do it. just having come from helping review a theater class auditions, i feel melancholy. and other local theater people who helped expressed the same. high hopes dashed by the market. a single mother with no time. and so on.
henry james wrote plays and failed on the stage, despite a very insightful book of reviews. it hurt. and i know the feeling. at some point i realized my number one need: community. and every time i tried to satisfy my desire with drama, i cried once the production ended and the stage immediately dismantled. every body who'd become one goes their separate ways, the profound intimacy scattered to the winds. one auditor who'd tried the lost angels route said, i envy you and am glad i'm not where you're at.
america as the land of opportunity has a built-in cruelty, promising the presidency to half the population, children, you can do anything and everything if only you try, don't be satisfied with being a senator, a judge, a governor, always a bigger prize in front of you. alas, you may get what you want first-most, but not what you want second-most. i've found this to be all-too-true. we've so much energy, talent, time, focus. and the truth is, almost everyone ends up opting for a home and family.
as i said, for me it's community. i like having a doctor and dentist, neighbors, clerks who recognize me, it satisfies my herd instinct, the animal i am, especially having avoided the common doom above. and this fulfilled, i don't have the drive to make theater work for me, much as i may love it, much as i may have learned, to write and direct plays. and i could see in the kids auditioning most didn't have the necessary focus, something else more important, and the path to finding it due to be a rough one.
even my androids are having second thoughts http://www.pbase.com/wwp/android4 they too not really sure what they want.
at an environmental conference in ashland, oregon, a native-american woman maintained other people couldn't use her tribe's symbols and ceremonies, these private property. despite my urge, i didn't stand up and declare, 'lady, if this knowledge would benefit all of humankind, cough it up. what's at stake now is survival of the species.'
last night i watched the art of the steal, moving of a famous art collection, the barnes, to a new building in downtown philadelphia. one of the good guys opposing it said, 'the collection belonging to walter, he could do whatever he wanted with it.' alas, his family died out and everybody else in the world jumped to secure the paintings, the most famous in post-impressionism. and i believe these a treasure to be shared with everyone. in an art book, when i see, in a private collection, i grit my teeth, knowing i will never see the original.
no, i don't believe in the government owning everything. military dictatorships simply don't know how to do business. and a individual life given by a room of our own very precious. when radicals exclaimed, 'the personal is political', i realized they were asking for the police to step into the bedroom, sex having become a public football.
yet national forests and parks for open use make life for me livable. and i really enjoy little perks like the return sunday fare free on the new york subway. this lost, i felt diminished. there's something about freedom of access which stimulates me, widens the world.
added a few free pics of my own:
http://www.pbase.com/wwp/meso2
http://www.pbase.com/wwp/net
