Strawberry Shortcake After Two Courses of Dirt

"The great question was that eternal, seemingly unanswerable one: what have I to tell the world which is so desperately important? What have I to say that has not been said before, and thousands of times, by men infinitely more gifted? Was it sheer ego, this coercive need to be heard? In what way was I unique? For if I was not unique then it would be like adding a cipher to an incalculable astronomic figure." - Henry Miller in Nexus

"No other problem is as important to me as a difficulty I encounter throughout the long daylight hours: how can I invent a passion, fulfill a wish or construct a dream in the daytime in the way my mind does spontaneously as I sleep? ... If I write, it is not as they say, 'for others'. I have no wish to exorcise other people's ghosts. I string words together as a way of getting out of the well of isolation, because I need others to pull me out. I write out of impatience, and with impatience. I want to live without dead time. What other people say interests me only in as much as it concerns me directly. They must use me to save themselves just as I use them to save myself. We have a common project." - Raoul Vaneigem in The Revolution of Everyday Life

A sort of question and answer forms for me when I place these two quotes back to back. And then this, a note I jotted down at work on September 16, 2009, which I recently stumbled across: "Often I catalog the feelings that make up a good mood. But I'm in one right now, and at the moment, it seems superfluous to document it. I know that yesterday, I was beat, and not feeling particularly good - not bad, but not good either. The point is that some times I feel good and some times I don't, and why bother dwelling on either? It's all part and parcel. I guess I just like to remember good times...."

Well, there's a bit of a contradiction there. And I think the last statement is more correct than the one before it. But there's more to it than that.... I started this blog for several reasons (I like to write and blogging is good exercise and practice, I wanted to share things with my friends and others, etc.), and looking back on the early stuff, I see experiential descriptions of life's charms, a roving catalog of the moments in life that make up what I would call living. And as the posts develop, a critique also develops: the problems I perceive, the constraints that seem to hamper this desire to live... the illusions and masks that prevent us from making these criticisms in the first place. From a simply linear perspective, one detects a negative pattern emerging. Am I becoming more negative?

Am I becoming a sourpuss?

The answer is no, and I know that. But it can be difficult to explain why. The Vaneigem passage above proves important in this explanation: I write about the wonderful experiences in life - the people and places and events that make me happy - to remind myself what I am capable of in this existence. As accompaniment, I write about the constraints - those imposed from above (Power), those self-imposed, those willed outwardly as impositions on others - to prevent myself from allowing them to obstruct my will to live. And in addressing myself, I reach out to others for help.

The positive and the negative work simultaneously, regardless of a superficially chronological read. (Another Vaneigem quote (of which I have an endless and growing list): "Ideally a book would have no order to it, and the reader would have to discover his own.") But since a chronological read naturally befits the form of the blog, and since the critique seems to reign as of late on this blog, I offer a purely rapturous day recounted in a paragraph or two:

Last Sunday, I woke up after noon (as usual), had cereal for breakfast, and went right over to Bouldin Creek Cafe. Met Eric, recently back from a five month trip through South America, and this was the first time we'd really caught up. Sat outside, over coffee, and let the recollections fly. He had great, picaresque scenes to describe (the salt flats of Bolivia, the plateaus, oasis cafes in the jungle), as well as the psychological toll taken on one by five months of backpacking. Coffee refills, and the talk moved to books, of which we'd both read a few since last talking, everything from Dostoevsky to Malcolm Lowry. I had planned to go for a run and go to an experimental music show in my neighbor's backyard that evening, but momentum, dear reader, momentum... when Eric suggested horseshoes and home-brewed beer at his friends' house, the path had already been bushwhacked.

Over to Jeremy and Jenny's, we loaded up on great nacho pies, avocado, and bean salads, then sampled pale ales and IPAs that Eric and Jeremy had brewed. Tasty, all I could say. Jenny's relatives were visiting and everyone seemed to be in spirits of the most agreeable sort. To the backyard, to play horseshoes on a freshly-laid course (as fresh as yesterday, literally). Ringers and beer, metal on metal and hops... until the course was dark enough that the metal clang was only the hope of a successful toss; it was simply too dark to see. And later we went downtown with Jenny's cousin Kat, first to Ginger Man, for beer and darts, and then to the great Peche, a Prohibition-era bar, only serving cocktails from that time period. Happy hour all night on Sundays. For me, this included a French 79, a Sazerac, and a Rum Old Fashioned, but I must say, the happiest hours are those spent in good company, and this set, on this night, was of the utmost. A pure joy, in all subjects and subsets, manifested in conversation rolling off tongues without a hint of mediation. Later, we went to Jackalope's, but the sensation had already been cemented. And we made hopscotch footprints as soon as the cement was laid.

So it's simple... in theory. I felt great on this day - a day absent of those constraints which I will not speak of this in post - and I remember it in words. The challenge, however, comes not in theory, but in practice: I only remember it in words because I want to live it now, in action.

Black, white, red, and now

Hey hey, not much to say... as of late. Living the life some times seems more like a struggle for awareness than the unabashed awareness of living that I believe it should be. But the train continues to chug-a-lug, even if there's a mountain in the way. I find my memory lately reverting to the first two years of college, for some reason. That was a time when, for instance, I might sleep soundly enough that my alarm would not wake me up for class. The alarm would, however, wake up my neighbor, and her subsequent banging on the wall would then wake me up. A good system, huh?

Particularly fond memories of the times at 21 Lewis St. in Somerville, where Jorge and Eric lived, as well as Julian and Troy (a.k.a. the hip hop artist Magmuzzle) and later, others. These memories appear in black and white and red. Black and white, because of the film stock used in the document of that time which most sticks out in my mind - "Mondo Politico" - which, if one ignores the pretentious attempt at a message that the film makes, is a fun and esoteric snapshot of our lives at the time. Red, because of the "Commie Room," in the basement, where some times there was a fight club, and more often, there was a smoking circle. Also in that time period, there was romance (and equally, mishandled situations and blown opportunities), there was cinema (nights watching L'Age d'Or, Underground, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me, etc., with an always eclectic group, in the living room), and there was music, which seemed to perpetuate it all; something about the centripetal force of our location between Harvard, Central, Inman, and Union Squares. Not only a creative time (or, it would've been, if we were motivated enough), but a time of camaraderie and passionate association.

I watched Underground again last night. It reminded me of the genesis of "Mondo Politico:" Alexandros had suggested we watch Underground - a great, great film - and then explained that the plot is a sort of allegory for the history of Yugoslavia since WWII, represented by the relationship of the two main characters. When the U.S. military invaded Iraq in 2003, I thought it might be fitting to make a cinematic allegory of the relations between the U.S. and Iraq since '79 or so. Peter played a Satanist, representing Iraq, and Eric played a Mod, representing the U.S, and in the film, they are roommates. The interstellar pretensions of a second year film student! But I still enjoy watching Peter pour holy water onto the ground while reading from The Satanic Bible, and Eric dicking around on a skateboard while wearing a derby hat, and then the two roommates getting into a fight. And of course Underground has a large Communist element to it. The Commie Room at 21 Lewis had a huge hammer and sickle flag draped over its sound-proof walls. I believe it was like that when the guys moved in. Black and white and red....

In a circumambulatory path, this drift of the mind has led me (yet again) to a declamation against practicing the arts. You see, earlier in the day, I was thinking about the effect that trashy TV has on the psychological and social make-up of the masses. I thought how I'd like to make a film not about the consuming, alienated, and isolated lives that TV seems to encourage; but about authentic participation and communication, lives imbued with an active poetry that has nothing to do with words. And perhaps making that film would be a step towards living that life. Then I watched Underground - one of the most wonderfully anarchic, vibrant, unique, and lively films I've seen in quite awhile - and I felt a bit empty inside. Passive and uninspired and ready for bed.

I must quote Vaneigem again: "What do I want? Not a succession of moments, but one huge instant. A totality that is lived, and without the experience of 'time passing.' The feeling of 'time passing' is simply the feeling of growing old. And yet, since one must survive in order to live, virtual moments, possibilities, are necessarily rooted in that time. When we try to federate moments, to bring out the pleasure in them, to release their promise of life, we are already learning how to construct 'situations'."

An afternoon of a few weeks ago. Susanna was visiting, and making a breakfast of couscous, honey, and nuts. I got out the OJ, and noticed a full bottle of Andre in the fridge. She suggested mimosas, I put Operation Ivy on the stereo, and we were off. The warm breeze under the ever-more-luminous sun reminded me that I have a hatchet in my room and a stump in the backyard. So, to the yard for an axe-throwing expedition! My roommate Anjela mentioned the Cathedral of Junk, Jess came to pick us up, and off we went. A three-story tower made entirely of items that would've been thrown away, an afternoon of leisurely exploration, looking into mirrors surrounded by hubcaps and bicycle tires, climbing ladders to a massage table in the sky. And industrial freezers populated with paraplegic dolls.

And then to Taco Vallerta for gorditas and horchata, sitting next to the window, families coming in for a Sunday meal, while other patrons watch Sunday soccer on TV. Simple, yes? Let me federate these moments, let me make this instant last forever....