Last night I hit rock bottom. After a very good and rejuvenating film production meeting with Kevin, at Grendel's Den, I went home to watch the Major League Soccer Cup. The game - in and of itself quite gnarly, a rough-and-tumble fight to the finish - was fun to watch, but I followed it up by watching SportsCenter. I watched SportsCenter longer than I ever have before - longer than I thought possible - for one goddamn hour and a half. Rock bottom.
And while that hour and a half was the culminating moment in a hazardous series of strung-together-moments of sitting in front of the television, I had my reasons. As far as football is concerned, I'm not the biggest fan, but I take an interest from time to time. Whereas I'm lukewarm about Favre, I love wreck and carnage in the arena of professional football. And Favre and the Vikings have proven martyrs in my spectacle of carnage this season, perhaps most exemplified by their 31-3 defeat at the hands of his old team, the Packers. And I had a perverse desire to see those highlights and the post-game interviews on SportsCenter.
Instead, I get to see briefly the highlights of the Pats-Colts game, which is good, but then I'm subjected to one hour of highlights and interviews from the Giants-Eagles game. While I'm lukewarm about Favre, and feel an intense dislike toward Peyton Manning, I have almost no feeling whatsoever about Eli Manning. And I have absolutely no interest in watching him - or for that matter, anything that is not the actual game - for one hour. But I also had no idea it would take that long. When it's finally over, the knuckleheads at SportsCenter go back to the Pats game, only for much more in-depth "analysis." I don't care anymore; when will it end? No carnage, so I give up. One hour and a half that I will never get back.
But "Today...
tomorrow is not within your reach
To think of it is only morbid:
If the heart is awake, do not waste this moment -
There is no proof of life's continuance. (Omar Khayyam)
...today I found out about Buy Nothing Day and Carnivalesque Rebellion Week, an attempt at organizing a bit of creative opposition to the Spectacle and drudgery epitomized by SportsCenter and Black Friday. It appropriates one of the most estimable situationist mottoes - "Live without dead time for a week" - as a means to mobilize this opposition. By itself, this attempt does not necessarily amount to much (that mostly depends upon how successful it is in garnering participation), but it is something. Something to go on... and to be honest, I find it inspirational. I have no illusions about what I must do to survive in this world, but the more I can cut out the time I spend watching Eli Manning's post-game press conferences and replace that time with potluck dinners and walks in the park, the more I come to life. Imagine the possibilities if Dr. Frankenstein, rather than directing all his resources toward the creation of the monster, had directed them toward creating his own authentic life.
* Incidentally, I really would like to organize something creative for Buy Nothing Day - in Boston, Vermont, wherever. I haven't put any thought into it yet, but we still have four days... if anyone's interested, hit me up.
Monday, November 22, 2010
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Sufficiently disoriented, as the French once were
"With Michele, Debord lived only a stone's throw away from Les Halles, the old fruit and vegetable market halls, destined to be demolished in 1971 to make way for the rapid commuter train. (The Centre Pompidou, completed six years later, would seal the neighborhood's fate.) Before that, Les Halles had been a sprawling, delirious, humdrum world, intensely alive, bawdy and beautiful, an urban paradise for Debord. When Baudelaire wrote in Le Voyage 'To plunge into the abyss... And find in depths of the unknown the new', it might have been the old Les Halles he was describing." - Andy Merrifield, Guy Debord
Les Halles no longer exists. Probably not much like it in the "western world" still does. So I'll never have the opportunity to experience that "sprawling, delirious, humdrum world." But, I can do the best with what I've got, and find other ways to create other experiences.
On Halloween, I went to the SoWa Open Market, the last Sunday of the season, with Dan and Megan. It's an art, clothes, and farmer's market in the South End. We got hot dogs, which were expensive but marvelously satiating, and walked around. Lots of very cool local artisans' work... Diane Koss (Cutesy but not Cutesy) designs intricate and adorable stuffed monsters. Fuzzy Ink specializes in T-shirts celebrating the handlebar mustache, especially if accompanied by a monocle. Greg Stones's M.O. is "penguins, zombies, nudes," and let me say that until you've seen his work, you can't imagine the possibilities within that realm. So we walked and took it all in. Until we got too cold.
Then we went inside - to the SoWa Vintage Market - to a warehouse/barn-type building, with big, mostly wooden interiors, connected by a long hallway. The place was packed, with people (because of the cold) and things: all sorts of old ("vintage") and antique art, accessories, knick-knacks, trinkets, what-have-yous, and you-name-it. In other words, a ripe atmosphere for the sort of disorientation I seek in a place such as this... not exactly Les Halles, but, like a mild drug, enough to give me a buzz.
The first thing that struck my fancy was a rack of old men's magazines - like Man's Life and Adventure - the type with cover stories such as "My Gun is the Law," "Why Foreign Girls Make Better Wives and Lovers," and even, "I Battled a Giant Otter." If the Surrealists had lasted, they would've deemed this shit genius. But at $25 a pop, I'll move on. Save it for the museums.
Megan came across a very cool Steadman reprint, before we ended up at a stand selling antique prints, from old atlases and art books and that sort of thing. I was only vaguely interested, until I came across this, from La Brique Ordinaire 1878:
IMMEDIATELY transported, I was. To a time of 21 or 22 years ago, in New London, NH, perhaps a Saturday afternoon. There was something I used to play with my grandmother - I don't even know if it was blocks, or a puzzle, or a board game (Mom thinks it may be the puzzle) - but this image brought me instantly to an olive carpet past the dining room in New London, with my grandmother. Everything about this print... the brick facade, the symmetry, the lighting, the tree on one side and gate on the other, even the number of floors and windows... everything. The combination of an image, a memory, and the disorientation of my surroundings (all these people and things) produced the most vivid and (at the same time) transposed reality within my being. Inebriation by proxy, by receptiveness, by heart. It was remarkable.
The right combination... I was ready for it and I'll try to be ready again.
Les Halles no longer exists. Probably not much like it in the "western world" still does. So I'll never have the opportunity to experience that "sprawling, delirious, humdrum world." But, I can do the best with what I've got, and find other ways to create other experiences.
On Halloween, I went to the SoWa Open Market, the last Sunday of the season, with Dan and Megan. It's an art, clothes, and farmer's market in the South End. We got hot dogs, which were expensive but marvelously satiating, and walked around. Lots of very cool local artisans' work... Diane Koss (Cutesy but not Cutesy) designs intricate and adorable stuffed monsters. Fuzzy Ink specializes in T-shirts celebrating the handlebar mustache, especially if accompanied by a monocle. Greg Stones's M.O. is "penguins, zombies, nudes," and let me say that until you've seen his work, you can't imagine the possibilities within that realm. So we walked and took it all in. Until we got too cold.
Then we went inside - to the SoWa Vintage Market - to a warehouse/barn-type building, with big, mostly wooden interiors, connected by a long hallway. The place was packed, with people (because of the cold) and things: all sorts of old ("vintage") and antique art, accessories, knick-knacks, trinkets, what-have-yous, and you-name-it. In other words, a ripe atmosphere for the sort of disorientation I seek in a place such as this... not exactly Les Halles, but, like a mild drug, enough to give me a buzz.
The first thing that struck my fancy was a rack of old men's magazines - like Man's Life and Adventure - the type with cover stories such as "My Gun is the Law," "Why Foreign Girls Make Better Wives and Lovers," and even, "I Battled a Giant Otter." If the Surrealists had lasted, they would've deemed this shit genius. But at $25 a pop, I'll move on. Save it for the museums.
Megan came across a very cool Steadman reprint, before we ended up at a stand selling antique prints, from old atlases and art books and that sort of thing. I was only vaguely interested, until I came across this, from La Brique Ordinaire 1878:
IMMEDIATELY transported, I was. To a time of 21 or 22 years ago, in New London, NH, perhaps a Saturday afternoon. There was something I used to play with my grandmother - I don't even know if it was blocks, or a puzzle, or a board game (Mom thinks it may be the puzzle) - but this image brought me instantly to an olive carpet past the dining room in New London, with my grandmother. Everything about this print... the brick facade, the symmetry, the lighting, the tree on one side and gate on the other, even the number of floors and windows... everything. The combination of an image, a memory, and the disorientation of my surroundings (all these people and things) produced the most vivid and (at the same time) transposed reality within my being. Inebriation by proxy, by receptiveness, by heart. It was remarkable.
The right combination... I was ready for it and I'll try to be ready again.
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
In Other News
"When our man after the day's work comes twitching, tired, off the assembly-line into what are called without a shred of irony his 'leisure hours,' with what is he confronted? In the bus on the way home he reads a newspaper that is identical to yesterday's newspaper, in the sense that it is a reshake of identical elements . . . four murders, thirteen disasters, two revolutions, and 'something approaching a rape' . . . which in turn is identical to the newspaper of the day before that . . . three murders, nineteen disasters, one counter-revolution, and something approaching an abomination . . . and unless he is a very exceptional man, one of our million potential technicians, the vicarious pleasure he derives from paddling in all this violence and disorder obscures from him the fact that there is nothing new in all this 'news' and that his daily perusal of it leads not to a widening of consciousness, [but] to a species of mental process that has more in common with [the] salivations of Pavlov's dogs than with the subtleties of human intelligence." - Alexander Trocchi, A Revolutionary Proposal: Invisible Insurrection of a Million Minds
I've always found this passage interesting, and to be honest, I haven't entirely made up my mind to what extent I agree or disagree. But it's a bit provocative, isn't it? Bearing in mind that I think Trocchi may have some valid points, here's a somewhat different take....
Occasionally, while reading the news - something I do much less frequently or thoroughly than others - a few stories will "team up" in order to produce a strong effect on me, an effect that only exists in response to the sum of the multiple of stories. The articles in the set may have a vague connection, and enough to induce a reaction in me that I want to share (examples here and here). In that sense, it may be as simple as A + B = C, with C being my reaction.
In other cases, the effect may be purely dissonant. No synthesis at all. I can think of one example, because I happen to have written it down. Not sure exactly what I was reading at the time, but it might have been Vaneigem's "Total Self-Management" ("We want the enjoyment of all rights, or what amounts to the same thing, the right to all enjoyments"). In any case, I had something on my mind that had me thinking about "living subjectively and creating art (while also fighting imperialism)." Then, in the Boston Metro on 11/17/08, I noticed two articles: one about a selection of music streaming services on the web; the other about horrible situations across the African continent, third world countries where too many people die every day. Three elements - anti-imperialistic subjective living, music streaming, and untold deaths in the third world - with seemingly no common ground. This apparent lack of connection is what produced such a strong effect on me.
And then there are times when I read a string of articles that seem to be connected somewhere... somewhere out in the cosmos. In other words, I have no idea how they are connected, but I have a feeling. It's a feeling I cannot - and do not wish to - elucidate, but it's somewhere. Perhaps you felt it too?
I got a feeling while reading this past weekend's edition of the Metro (11/5/10). In order to try to illustrate this feeling that I can't describe, I have taken a selection from each of the articles I noticed. No editorial, just quotes:
1. "Somerville officials are examining a band (sic... okay, one editorial) on an alcoholic and caffeine mixed drink popular among college students. The Board of Alderman wants to see if it can ban Four Loko from store shelves..."
2. "A pair of books, 60 years overdue, were returned in a mailed package to the Boston Public Library's Copley Square Branch Tuesday[...] The returned books were the 'Autobiography by John Stuart Mill' and 'The Writings of Henry David Thoreau.'"
3. "[Senate Minority Leader Mitch] McConnell said Republicans, who will hold a majority in next year's House of Representatives, should aim to hobble the health care law by 'denying funds for implementation' of the measure."
4. "Two days after congressional elections, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs signaled that Obama might consider a compromise with Republicans that would keep tax breaks not only for the middle class, but for wealthier Americans as well."
5. "At this point, Zach Galifianakis knows a thing or two about how to make an unstable character funny. 'People who are like a truck with no brakes are inherently funny...'"
That's all. Somewhere out in the cosmos it all makes sense.
I've always found this passage interesting, and to be honest, I haven't entirely made up my mind to what extent I agree or disagree. But it's a bit provocative, isn't it? Bearing in mind that I think Trocchi may have some valid points, here's a somewhat different take....
Occasionally, while reading the news - something I do much less frequently or thoroughly than others - a few stories will "team up" in order to produce a strong effect on me, an effect that only exists in response to the sum of the multiple of stories. The articles in the set may have a vague connection, and enough to induce a reaction in me that I want to share (examples here and here). In that sense, it may be as simple as A + B = C, with C being my reaction.
In other cases, the effect may be purely dissonant. No synthesis at all. I can think of one example, because I happen to have written it down. Not sure exactly what I was reading at the time, but it might have been Vaneigem's "Total Self-Management" ("We want the enjoyment of all rights, or what amounts to the same thing, the right to all enjoyments"). In any case, I had something on my mind that had me thinking about "living subjectively and creating art (while also fighting imperialism)." Then, in the Boston Metro on 11/17/08, I noticed two articles: one about a selection of music streaming services on the web; the other about horrible situations across the African continent, third world countries where too many people die every day. Three elements - anti-imperialistic subjective living, music streaming, and untold deaths in the third world - with seemingly no common ground. This apparent lack of connection is what produced such a strong effect on me.
And then there are times when I read a string of articles that seem to be connected somewhere... somewhere out in the cosmos. In other words, I have no idea how they are connected, but I have a feeling. It's a feeling I cannot - and do not wish to - elucidate, but it's somewhere. Perhaps you felt it too?
I got a feeling while reading this past weekend's edition of the Metro (11/5/10). In order to try to illustrate this feeling that I can't describe, I have taken a selection from each of the articles I noticed. No editorial, just quotes:
1. "Somerville officials are examining a band (sic... okay, one editorial) on an alcoholic and caffeine mixed drink popular among college students. The Board of Alderman wants to see if it can ban Four Loko from store shelves..."
2. "A pair of books, 60 years overdue, were returned in a mailed package to the Boston Public Library's Copley Square Branch Tuesday[...] The returned books were the 'Autobiography by John Stuart Mill' and 'The Writings of Henry David Thoreau.'"
3. "[Senate Minority Leader Mitch] McConnell said Republicans, who will hold a majority in next year's House of Representatives, should aim to hobble the health care law by 'denying funds for implementation' of the measure."
4. "Two days after congressional elections, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs signaled that Obama might consider a compromise with Republicans that would keep tax breaks not only for the middle class, but for wealthier Americans as well."
5. "At this point, Zach Galifianakis knows a thing or two about how to make an unstable character funny. 'People who are like a truck with no brakes are inherently funny...'"
That's all. Somewhere out in the cosmos it all makes sense.
Monday, November 1, 2010
Tying up the shoes
It's been over a month since I've written on here. I'd like to up that frequency quite a bit, primarily just by writing shorter entries, as opposed to storing up a month's worth of thoughts and experiences in order to write some epic passage that's only cohesive in the most tangential of paths. (Posts from here on out will likely still be tangential, but shorter.) But first, to excuse myself for not writing much lately, let me illustrate my last Friday night.
Even before that, the background: I'm living in Quincy (though up until the past couple of weeks, I had been going back and forth between here, Vermont, and Maine, pretty often, for various weddings and visits with family), and I'm enjoying it. However, I've noticed that I am much less social and less likely to leave the neighborhood than I ever have been before while living in Boston. I'm aware of this, and it's not a bad thing. Part of the reason, in fact, is good: I live in a little house with my friends Jeremy and Dan, and we hang out a lot, talking, listening to music, watching movies, eating, and reading. Because of this, and because it takes me longer to get into Boston or Cambridge or Somerville, I'm much less likely to leave the house or hood. (The neighborhood includes several grocery stores, Atlas Liquors, the Old Railroad Cafe, No. 7 Restaurant (Chinese and Malaysian) and Paddy Barry's pub.)
In the midst of writing this, I got hungry. So I went for a walk to No. 7 to beat the lunchtime cut-off and save myself two bucks (and get a free soup). Walking down Copeland Street during the day is an interesting experience. Lots of dudes hanging out, in groups or singly, on stoops and lawns, both sides of the street, all races and creeds, speaking a variety of languages. I wouldn't call most of them "sketchy," just peculiar, curious. And it makes me awfully curious to know what they're up to at two in the afternoon, all congregated on front steps. Take one of the buildings on the block before No. 7, for example. On my way there, a guy with a big, bushy mustache and flight jacket is pacing out front, on the sidewalk. Then another guy hurriedly walks out of the building in athletic shorts and a tank top (and it was cold today), talking rapidly on his cell, and walking toward the parking lot. From the lot comes a third guy, with baseball cap and track jacket, walking even faster than the other two. On my way back from No. 7, the first two guys are standing out in front of the building. The third, cap-and-track-jacket, is speed-walking down the street. Then he picks up the pace to one of those speedy jogs you do when you're crossing the street in front of cars. Then he literally starts bounding, the rest of the short distance to the 7-11. All the while, shorts-and-tank keeps repeating a three-digit number on his cell (who knows?). By the time I catch up to cap-and-track-jacket, he is hiking up his pants (from the bounding), then tying his shoes, and about to turn around. He didn't even go inside the store. I literally have no idea what these guys were up to (a relay race?)... but you can imagine the fun in guessing.
So anyway, Friday night... by the way, there isn't much of a story here, and you'll see why... Jeremy was out, and Dan came home. I made a ham, Swiss, and honey Dijon sandwich, and then we went to Atlas for some beer and wine. We watched The Office (which I am slowly catching up on, season by season) on Netflix. Megan, Dan's girlfriend, was out in Quincy Center with some of her friends, so we decided to go meet her. Bad Abbots has apparently been renovated and "gone country" (or was this just for Halloween?), so we went to the Half Door. We got a table, got a pint, and had fun talking and dancing (rather ridiculously) at the table. Before long, it was last call. So back home, and at this point, I had three things I could partake of - Jeremy's excellent spinach lasagna, some Montepulciano, and of course, The Office - and the exclusion of any one of the three would've meant going to bed and getting a good night's sleep. Conversely, to choose any one of the three necessarily meant partaking of the other two as well. I don't remember the order, but it could've been this: "I think I'll watch one episode of The Office before bed. I feel like a snack; there's plenty of that lasagna left. You know what would go great with this? Montepulciano. Now I'm full, so I should probably watch a couple more episodes, so I can digest, before bed. That lasagna is so good, just one more plate...." You get the idea.
So I stayed up late on Friday, slept late on Saturday, and that's it. You and I both know that there are more productive ways for me to spend my time. But the fact that I do know this, and the act of putting it down in words right now, is what will allow me to make today so much more productive. I'm not even exactly sure how it works, but there's a circle of energy that allows me to act slovenly and passive on Friday night, realize it on Saturday, verbalize it on Monday afternoon, and "rectify" it on Monday evening. (Next, I go to the library to do some research, I get groceries, and I hit the net to try to find somebody else that will pay me for services rendered, pay me to make them happy so I can sustain myself. That's productivity, you know. You know?) And anyway, I don't regret the indulgence of late-Friday night, the triumvirate of lasagna-wine-The Office... That was three days ago, now immortalized, now gone forever. Today is Monday. Off to the library.
So much for writing shorter entries.
Even before that, the background: I'm living in Quincy (though up until the past couple of weeks, I had been going back and forth between here, Vermont, and Maine, pretty often, for various weddings and visits with family), and I'm enjoying it. However, I've noticed that I am much less social and less likely to leave the neighborhood than I ever have been before while living in Boston. I'm aware of this, and it's not a bad thing. Part of the reason, in fact, is good: I live in a little house with my friends Jeremy and Dan, and we hang out a lot, talking, listening to music, watching movies, eating, and reading. Because of this, and because it takes me longer to get into Boston or Cambridge or Somerville, I'm much less likely to leave the house or hood. (The neighborhood includes several grocery stores, Atlas Liquors, the Old Railroad Cafe, No. 7 Restaurant (Chinese and Malaysian) and Paddy Barry's pub.)
In the midst of writing this, I got hungry. So I went for a walk to No. 7 to beat the lunchtime cut-off and save myself two bucks (and get a free soup). Walking down Copeland Street during the day is an interesting experience. Lots of dudes hanging out, in groups or singly, on stoops and lawns, both sides of the street, all races and creeds, speaking a variety of languages. I wouldn't call most of them "sketchy," just peculiar, curious. And it makes me awfully curious to know what they're up to at two in the afternoon, all congregated on front steps. Take one of the buildings on the block before No. 7, for example. On my way there, a guy with a big, bushy mustache and flight jacket is pacing out front, on the sidewalk. Then another guy hurriedly walks out of the building in athletic shorts and a tank top (and it was cold today), talking rapidly on his cell, and walking toward the parking lot. From the lot comes a third guy, with baseball cap and track jacket, walking even faster than the other two. On my way back from No. 7, the first two guys are standing out in front of the building. The third, cap-and-track-jacket, is speed-walking down the street. Then he picks up the pace to one of those speedy jogs you do when you're crossing the street in front of cars. Then he literally starts bounding, the rest of the short distance to the 7-11. All the while, shorts-and-tank keeps repeating a three-digit number on his cell (who knows?). By the time I catch up to cap-and-track-jacket, he is hiking up his pants (from the bounding), then tying his shoes, and about to turn around. He didn't even go inside the store. I literally have no idea what these guys were up to (a relay race?)... but you can imagine the fun in guessing.
So anyway, Friday night... by the way, there isn't much of a story here, and you'll see why... Jeremy was out, and Dan came home. I made a ham, Swiss, and honey Dijon sandwich, and then we went to Atlas for some beer and wine. We watched The Office (which I am slowly catching up on, season by season) on Netflix. Megan, Dan's girlfriend, was out in Quincy Center with some of her friends, so we decided to go meet her. Bad Abbots has apparently been renovated and "gone country" (or was this just for Halloween?), so we went to the Half Door. We got a table, got a pint, and had fun talking and dancing (rather ridiculously) at the table. Before long, it was last call. So back home, and at this point, I had three things I could partake of - Jeremy's excellent spinach lasagna, some Montepulciano, and of course, The Office - and the exclusion of any one of the three would've meant going to bed and getting a good night's sleep. Conversely, to choose any one of the three necessarily meant partaking of the other two as well. I don't remember the order, but it could've been this: "I think I'll watch one episode of The Office before bed. I feel like a snack; there's plenty of that lasagna left. You know what would go great with this? Montepulciano. Now I'm full, so I should probably watch a couple more episodes, so I can digest, before bed. That lasagna is so good, just one more plate...." You get the idea.
So I stayed up late on Friday, slept late on Saturday, and that's it. You and I both know that there are more productive ways for me to spend my time. But the fact that I do know this, and the act of putting it down in words right now, is what will allow me to make today so much more productive. I'm not even exactly sure how it works, but there's a circle of energy that allows me to act slovenly and passive on Friday night, realize it on Saturday, verbalize it on Monday afternoon, and "rectify" it on Monday evening. (Next, I go to the library to do some research, I get groceries, and I hit the net to try to find somebody else that will pay me for services rendered, pay me to make them happy so I can sustain myself. That's productivity, you know. You know?) And anyway, I don't regret the indulgence of late-Friday night, the triumvirate of lasagna-wine-The Office... That was three days ago, now immortalized, now gone forever. Today is Monday. Off to the library.
So much for writing shorter entries.
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