Jerry turned me on to the Avett Brothers recently. He has a thing for rockabilly bluegrass, and I can see why. They have a catalogue of about 109 tracks which he's now on the fourth time around. The only thing he'll break away for is Lyle Lovett. Who, I must admit, is far better than I remember.
Here's what I'm listening to right now:
beautiful song.
awesome beards.
from the Album/EP The Gleam II
31.12.09
30.12.09
tops, just tops 20:30
I was asked about my top ten albums of 2009. I recoiled at the thought.
Is my musical taste even noteworthy? Let's see:
10. Working on a Dream - Bruce Springstein (you know it's true)
9. Troubador - K'naan (surprise!)
8. The Wooden Sky - The Wooden Sky (fell in love)
7. Psychic Chasms - Neon Indian (it's just so effing cool)
6. Noble Beast - Andrew Bird (because he whistles so pretty)
5. Merriweather Post Pavilion - Animal Collective (new wave lives!)
4. Hospice - The Antlers (new wave dies!)
3. Horehound - The Dead Weather (requisite Jack White)
2. Wilco (the Album) - Wilco (not as strong Yankee Hotel Foxtrot)
1. Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix - Phoenix (even though it's overplayed, it's already a classic)
And there you go.
Now somebody get me tickets to see Wilco at Hamilton Place Theatre on February 23rd. The 24th at Centennial Hall in London is also acceptable. Call it an early birthday present.
Happy Hoggmanay!
Is my musical taste even noteworthy? Let's see:
10. Working on a Dream - Bruce Springstein (you know it's true)
9. Troubador - K'naan (surprise!)
8. The Wooden Sky - The Wooden Sky (fell in love)
7. Psychic Chasms - Neon Indian (it's just so effing cool)
6. Noble Beast - Andrew Bird (because he whistles so pretty)
5. Merriweather Post Pavilion - Animal Collective (new wave lives!)
4. Hospice - The Antlers (new wave dies!)
3. Horehound - The Dead Weather (requisite Jack White)
2. Wilco (the Album) - Wilco (not as strong Yankee Hotel Foxtrot)
1. Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix - Phoenix (even though it's overplayed, it's already a classic)
And there you go.
Now somebody get me tickets to see Wilco at Hamilton Place Theatre on February 23rd. The 24th at Centennial Hall in London is also acceptable. Call it an early birthday present.
Happy Hoggmanay!
27.12.09
butt-clenchingly honest 14:10
Simon Pegg (yes, the Simon Pegg) brought my attention - via twitter - to comedian Stewart Lee. Lee's comedy style is right up my alley: irreverent, literate, contemporary. Oh, and British.
This clip is the first episode of his BBC show, "Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle". Clever. In it, he cracks wise on the publishing industry and the trouble it's facing due, in part at least, to its lack of actual value.
enjoy!
This clip is the first episode of his BBC show, "Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle". Clever. In it, he cracks wise on the publishing industry and the trouble it's facing due, in part at least, to its lack of actual value.
enjoy!
21.12.09
(bit part) 21:00
Yes, I believe life is a performance.
No, I don't believe there's a rehearsal.
But then again I don't think there's really a difference: practice makes _______.
I don't even mean in a metaphysical sense. Everything we do is performative, is contrived, is artifice in some sense. We can internalize and make truth-claims all we want, but when it comes down to it all the things we've ever learned to do or say come from:
That doesn't make who we are any less real, mind you. But as someone who's spent most of his life watching, imitating, and improvising in an attempt to fit into a new community ever four or five years, you begin to feel less genuine every time you wear a different hat. But the feeling fades, and eventually the fidelity of the thing - it's faithfulness to your persona - becomes natural.
But how does that process work? What is it that finally convinces us that the hat we wear belongs on our head? How do we ever get over the imposter syndrome that follows us to every new job, on first dates, into competition, or whatever?
I'd postulate that it has a lot do with community. Everything about our language, our dress, our mannerisms comes from our community. We watch the way people act, we imitate them in their roles as we strive to fulfill our own, and we improvise within (or outside) the aspect of our characters. Usually we do it subconsciously...
Did you think you were in control? Maybe you did. Maybe you are. But not of everything, not by a long shot.
I'm trying to get a little more control over my performance as well, and I'm coming to realise that there are some core aspects of my performance technique that really get in the way. A significant part of my motis operandi is, I like to think, a healthy amount of personal generosity. In short, I give a lot away. A lot of time, a lot of talk, a lot of thought, a lot, a lot, a lot. Heretofore I've believed that I have an infinite supply of these things; "the love you make is equal to the love you take," kind of thing (not that John Lennon was really any wiser than you or me).
So, I've had a long-standing policy of being very, very generous with love. Downright amorous at times. Not just with the ladies, but with my friends both newly got and long lost. I love people, even the ones I really don't like. I've chosen to see everyone's redeeming qualities as the things that define them. Now, I know I can't be everyone's best friend, but there are times I feel like that's what I'm trying to do.
As a result, I have an enormous community around me, that I've gathered over the last twenty years or so. I have been surrounded with people of incredible value and spent no small amount of time and energy perfecting a performance of myself that is flexible enough to connect deeply with some very different personalities.
The trouble is that it's all too often on their terms. Which means the time and energy I spend on some people is lost. Gone for good. And I'm okay with that, because that's part of who I am. But I only believe that because I've spent so much bloody time and energy improvising personal generosity that I've nearly forgotten how to be for myself. If I was for myself, I would abhor all that wasted time and effort on people who didn't notice, didn't care, and didn't reciprocate; and I'd be done with it forever because I would know that I don't have time to play a bit part in anyone's life.
So from here on out, I won't.
...but this still nags at me:
Cynicism is about distrust. It's about believing that all people are motivated by self-interest. I'm not nearly as cynical as I make out to be. I can't be because I believe in things like decency and compassion; and because cynicism just isn't a very productive way to look at the world. It's apathetic and indifferent and miserable and just as selfish as that which it distrusts. Cynicism needs to be innovated so that it isn't just more of the same black-hearted, me-first, I'll-choose-my-side-and-shut-up-alright ideology that is the method of performance for people who are afraid to measure their lives against the hardest metric of all: the genuine acceptance of others, not for one's utility or worth but for the qualities of human empathy.
No, I don't believe there's a rehearsal.
But then again I don't think there's really a difference: practice makes _______.
I don't even mean in a metaphysical sense. Everything we do is performative, is contrived, is artifice in some sense. We can internalize and make truth-claims all we want, but when it comes down to it all the things we've ever learned to do or say come from:
watching
imitating
improvising
That doesn't make who we are any less real, mind you. But as someone who's spent most of his life watching, imitating, and improvising in an attempt to fit into a new community ever four or five years, you begin to feel less genuine every time you wear a different hat. But the feeling fades, and eventually the fidelity of the thing - it's faithfulness to your persona - becomes natural.
But how does that process work? What is it that finally convinces us that the hat we wear belongs on our head? How do we ever get over the imposter syndrome that follows us to every new job, on first dates, into competition, or whatever?
I'd postulate that it has a lot do with community. Everything about our language, our dress, our mannerisms comes from our community. We watch the way people act, we imitate them in their roles as we strive to fulfill our own, and we improvise within (or outside) the aspect of our characters. Usually we do it subconsciously...
Did you think you were in control? Maybe you did. Maybe you are. But not of everything, not by a long shot.
I'm trying to get a little more control over my performance as well, and I'm coming to realise that there are some core aspects of my performance technique that really get in the way. A significant part of my motis operandi is, I like to think, a healthy amount of personal generosity. In short, I give a lot away. A lot of time, a lot of talk, a lot of thought, a lot, a lot, a lot. Heretofore I've believed that I have an infinite supply of these things; "the love you make is equal to the love you take," kind of thing (not that John Lennon was really any wiser than you or me).
So, I've had a long-standing policy of being very, very generous with love. Downright amorous at times. Not just with the ladies, but with my friends both newly got and long lost. I love people, even the ones I really don't like. I've chosen to see everyone's redeeming qualities as the things that define them. Now, I know I can't be everyone's best friend, but there are times I feel like that's what I'm trying to do.
As a result, I have an enormous community around me, that I've gathered over the last twenty years or so. I have been surrounded with people of incredible value and spent no small amount of time and energy perfecting a performance of myself that is flexible enough to connect deeply with some very different personalities.
The trouble is that it's all too often on their terms. Which means the time and energy I spend on some people is lost. Gone for good. And I'm okay with that, because that's part of who I am. But I only believe that because I've spent so much bloody time and energy improvising personal generosity that I've nearly forgotten how to be for myself. If I was for myself, I would abhor all that wasted time and effort on people who didn't notice, didn't care, and didn't reciprocate; and I'd be done with it forever because I would know that I don't have time to play a bit part in anyone's life.
So from here on out, I won't.
...but this still nags at me:
Cynicism is about distrust. It's about believing that all people are motivated by self-interest. I'm not nearly as cynical as I make out to be. I can't be because I believe in things like decency and compassion; and because cynicism just isn't a very productive way to look at the world. It's apathetic and indifferent and miserable and just as selfish as that which it distrusts. Cynicism needs to be innovated so that it isn't just more of the same black-hearted, me-first, I'll-choose-my-side-and-shut-up-alright ideology that is the method of performance for people who are afraid to measure their lives against the hardest metric of all: the genuine acceptance of others, not for one's utility or worth but for the qualities of human empathy.
je suis là 15:30
This animated short film is probably the best thing I've seen all year.
I'm going to see Avatar this week. Something tells me it won't be better.
Skhizein (Jérémy Clapin,2008) from Bertie on Vimeo.
I'm going to see Avatar this week. Something tells me it won't be better.
19.12.09
the progress of process; or, the grace of the interface 13:12
I'm at Ideas Transform, a Culture Camp happening at Kitchener City Hall at the moment.
At table 1 right now, we're discussing art, led by Sunshine Chin (and later, Kevin Sutton). Not criticism or appreciation or technique, but rather art as a service industry and why, in this region at least, there's a surplus of artistic production but a general malaise of artistic engagement in the community.
The conversation revolved around market pressures, tools of production and distribution, value, and consumption. It all smacks of the Horkheimer and Adorno article about the culture industry and the politics of mass produced and re-produced culture. Not art necessarily.
I dunno. I tend to think of art as a subversive activity: something that goes against the grain, turns preconceptions on their heads, and forces the "consumers" to consider culture in a different way. Subversion isn't necessarily the most marketable thing out there... except for, oh you know, punk music, skateboarding, vintage clothing...
update: Brock just said that for him "Facebook is becoming less and less relevant. It's full of garbage."
... carrying on, I think that the marketability of art & culture has more to do with value-adds and distribution than content. Content drives things, like web traffic for instance, or repeat business, innovation, and other creative enterprise. The art itself isn't really the commodity - it's tough to sell or place a market value on expression because it's so generally diverse and incomparable - but the experience/time that's trade can be given a price... right?
So, producing art seems to be a contention that underscores this discussion. I mean, art is a priori a process that never ends. Creativity in general is something that happens at points of contact, by the grace of the interface, between an object (or moment because art is an event horizon, not static) and a subject (a person, like you, with specific and individual experience).
We're moving on to jamming on creativity as a right.
Or should I say rite. Yes, I think so.
Artists, or other creatively-awakened persons, are also the most likely to consume artwork. But again we're confronted with the affect/effect of art versus getting it out there. The key is knowledge-based agents who guide, connect, present, mediate, and provide us with the all important context for art.
Okay. back to it.
At table 1 right now, we're discussing art, led by Sunshine Chin (and later, Kevin Sutton). Not criticism or appreciation or technique, but rather art as a service industry and why, in this region at least, there's a surplus of artistic production but a general malaise of artistic engagement in the community.
The conversation revolved around market pressures, tools of production and distribution, value, and consumption. It all smacks of the Horkheimer and Adorno article about the culture industry and the politics of mass produced and re-produced culture. Not art necessarily.
I dunno. I tend to think of art as a subversive activity: something that goes against the grain, turns preconceptions on their heads, and forces the "consumers" to consider culture in a different way. Subversion isn't necessarily the most marketable thing out there... except for, oh you know, punk music, skateboarding, vintage clothing...
update: Brock just said that for him "Facebook is becoming less and less relevant. It's full of garbage."
... carrying on, I think that the marketability of art & culture has more to do with value-adds and distribution than content. Content drives things, like web traffic for instance, or repeat business, innovation, and other creative enterprise. The art itself isn't really the commodity - it's tough to sell or place a market value on expression because it's so generally diverse and incomparable - but the experience/time that's trade can be given a price... right?
So, producing art seems to be a contention that underscores this discussion. I mean, art is a priori a process that never ends. Creativity in general is something that happens at points of contact, by the grace of the interface, between an object (or moment because art is an event horizon, not static) and a subject (a person, like you, with specific and individual experience).
We're moving on to jamming on creativity as a right.
Or should I say rite. Yes, I think so.
Artists, or other creatively-awakened persons, are also the most likely to consume artwork. But again we're confronted with the affect/effect of art versus getting it out there. The key is knowledge-based agents who guide, connect, present, mediate, and provide us with the all important context for art.
Okay. back to it.
16.12.09
doing xmas 16:47
Been thinking about the reason for the season? Me too. But not like that. More like this...
At the behest of a friend who claims not to "do Christmas", Mike, Steve and I hosted the Very Party Mansion Christmas Dinner Special at our place (the Party Mansion... you can actually follow us on twitter). It was the second time I'd cooked a turkey, and the first time I'd made cranberry sauce from scratch - it's the only way to do it and I'll never go back to the canned stuff.
It was a chilly night with a little snow in the air. There's a neighbourhood outdoor ice rink on my street, and several guests (including our visitors from Paris, France: Nicolas and Josépha) went for a skate after dinner, while the rest of us kept warm with impromptu picturades (pictionary+charades) and screened Elf.
Friends and Family are, for me at least, a necessary element of Christmastime. Of course, we should treasure and revere the relationships we have with the people we love all year round and not need an arbitrary holiday to show them that we care; but the thing about Christmas (or Yule, Saturnalia, Chrifsmas, or whatyouwill) is that we all do it together. We gather. We eat. We keep warm in the dark and remind each other that things will get warmer yet if we just hang on. And it's like it does, simply because we believe it will.
Seriously though, with 20-odd bodies in our house, we were able to turn the furnace off at 7 o'clock.
The original feast days in December observed by the celto-germanic peoples of Western Europe marked the winter solstice as a time to have a bit of a party because they knew - keen minders of the earth's cycles that they were thanks to the ancient druidic tradition of paying attention to the world around them (imagine that...) - that the days were about to get longer and they wouldn't be condemned to eternal dark and cold.
I travelled back in time to verify my assumptions. Here's a translated, transcribed conversation I overheard between some celtic dudes:
"Hey Cedric, did you notice that the sun was in the sky a little longer today than yesterday?"
"Yeah I did."
"Well, if tomorrow is even longer, then doesn't it stand to reason that the day after will follow the same trend, and before too long it'll start to get warmer?"
"That makes sense, sure."
"Well, we have enough elk meat for, like, 6 months. And we've been saving all that mead your wife made. If it's going to get warm in a few months, crops will probably start growing and game animals will be easier to find, and we won't need our food stores."
"Huh. You don't say."
"Yeah. We should probably start eating a lot more, actually. I don't want all that elk to go bad."
"Here's a thought: let's have a party! We can have it at the Party Mansion!"
"You mean the Mead Hall?"
"Yes. The Mead Hall is what I meant."
Attached to the old traditions are a few interesting characters. We're all familiar with Santa Claus, Father Christmas, Pere Noël, and probably his predecessor, Saint Nicolas. In a few European cultures, though, St. Nick isn't the only visitor kids have at Christmas.
This creepy customer is Krampus. He's Santa's good buddy and traveling companion and, aside from inappropriate play, he sneaks up on naughty boys and girls and hits them with sticks. The basket he has (seen here full of apples) is to cart the especially bad children off to hell.
It was a chilly night with a little snow in the air. There's a neighbourhood outdoor ice rink on my street, and several guests (including our visitors from Paris, France: Nicolas and Josépha) went for a skate after dinner, while the rest of us kept warm with impromptu picturades (pictionary+charades) and screened Elf.
Friends and Family are, for me at least, a necessary element of Christmastime. Of course, we should treasure and revere the relationships we have with the people we love all year round and not need an arbitrary holiday to show them that we care; but the thing about Christmas (or Yule, Saturnalia, Chrifsmas, or whatyouwill) is that we all do it together. We gather. We eat. We keep warm in the dark and remind each other that things will get warmer yet if we just hang on. And it's like it does, simply because we believe it will.
Seriously though, with 20-odd bodies in our house, we were able to turn the furnace off at 7 o'clock.
The original feast days in December observed by the celto-germanic peoples of Western Europe marked the winter solstice as a time to have a bit of a party because they knew - keen minders of the earth's cycles that they were thanks to the ancient druidic tradition of paying attention to the world around them (imagine that...) - that the days were about to get longer and they wouldn't be condemned to eternal dark and cold.
I travelled back in time to verify my assumptions. Here's a translated, transcribed conversation I overheard between some celtic dudes:
"Hey Cedric, did you notice that the sun was in the sky a little longer today than yesterday?"
"Yeah I did."
"Well, if tomorrow is even longer, then doesn't it stand to reason that the day after will follow the same trend, and before too long it'll start to get warmer?"
"That makes sense, sure."
"Well, we have enough elk meat for, like, 6 months. And we've been saving all that mead your wife made. If it's going to get warm in a few months, crops will probably start growing and game animals will be easier to find, and we won't need our food stores."
"Huh. You don't say."
"Yeah. We should probably start eating a lot more, actually. I don't want all that elk to go bad."
"Here's a thought: let's have a party! We can have it at the Party Mansion!"
"You mean the Mead Hall?"
"Yes. The Mead Hall is what I meant."
Attached to the old traditions are a few interesting characters. We're all familiar with Santa Claus, Father Christmas, Pere Noël, and probably his predecessor, Saint Nicolas. In a few European cultures, though, St. Nick isn't the only visitor kids have at Christmas.
This creepy customer is Krampus. He's Santa's good buddy and traveling companion and, aside from inappropriate play, he sneaks up on naughty boys and girls and hits them with sticks. The basket he has (seen here full of apples) is to cart the especially bad children off to hell.
This cheery french fellow is Le Père Fouettard (the whipping father) who does pretty much the same thing as Krampus but without the weird sexual stuff. An added bonus is that he not only switches little buggers with sticks, but also gives them coal. I don't care who you ask, but coal was pretty useful stuff in the 14th century, just not as fun as straw dolls or wooden horses.
I saved the most interesting for last.
My Dutch friends (all two of them) would agree that Zwarte Piet (Black Peter) is a pretty compelling Christmas companion. He's allied with Sint Nikolaas, who's actually a patron saint of mariners in Holland, and he resembles a Moorish merchant - who would have arrived from Spain or Northern Africa in Amsterdam via trade ship (Othello, anyone?).
Piet became popular in the Netherlands in the 19th century and shares many of his attributes with the other two lovelies, except for the whole racial profiling thing. Let's face it: some Dutch political leaders aren't the most ethnically sensitive folks out there.
So, where does that leave us with the whole reason-for-the-season thing? I'm not exactly sure. The holiday is so all over the map that it's hard to say what, or whom exactly it's for. Oh wait, I forgot to mention the late JC. Mary's boy-child. Away in a Manger. Pa-rum pa-pum-pum, and all that. Except that Jesus' birthday is actually (wait for it)... June 17. That is, if you're a person whose faith doesn't blind you to verifiable, repeatable observation (ie.: science). If you are that's cool. Carry on. But you should check out Jer. 10:2-4 and Matthew 15:9 and let me know what you decide do about the heathen tree in your living room.
Interesting factoid: the Christmas tree is another germano-celtic tradition. It was popularized in England (and the rest of the Empire) by Queen Victoria in the late 19th Century because her German husband, Prince Albert, liked that fresh pine scent so much that he just had to have one. Actually, it was a long standing tradition among Germanic peoples to bring the evergreen into the house in December as a symbol of life during the dark winter months. I'm glad Victoria was enough of a proto-environmentalist that having a tree in her home wasn't an affront to her English protestant propriety.
Interesting factoid: the Christmas tree is another germano-celtic tradition. It was popularized in England (and the rest of the Empire) by Queen Victoria in the late 19th Century because her German husband, Prince Albert, liked that fresh pine scent so much that he just had to have one. Actually, it was a long standing tradition among Germanic peoples to bring the evergreen into the house in December as a symbol of life during the dark winter months. I'm glad Victoria was enough of a proto-environmentalist that having a tree in her home wasn't an affront to her English protestant propriety.
Obviously kids are big part of the main event: the possibility and anticipation (not to mention the apprehension of being dragged to hell by horned dude with one foot and one hoof) adds a nostalgic tranquility to our bleak Canadian winters that keeps most people in good spirits until at least New Years'.
Pagan solstice rituals are awesome, but now that we have science it hardly seems worth celebrating the inevitable outcome of a little rocky planet with a tilted axis on an elliptical orbit around a medium-sized ball of burning space-gas. All the magic's gone out of it.
Okay. Maybe I should ask a simpler question. What do we all want out of Christmas? Presents? Turkey? Snow? How about a blanket-statement like... oh, I dunno... happiness? What makes you happy? Go find it, make it, buy it, just get your hands on it.
...and then give it to someone you love.
Holy crap does that ever feel good to do.
Happy Christmas everyone.
14.12.09
populiterate 12:53
Singer/songwriter Gord Downie of The Tragically Hip, Canada's quintessential blues-rock cum indie-folk group, stars in this short film, narrated by the late Al Purdy, one of Canada's greatest poet-warriors.
11.12.09
pancake spaceman 11:45
stellar video. stellar music. stellar spaceman with pancakes for brains. wait for it.
8.12.09
the wake 01:04
ijustranoutonyouandimnotcomingbackidontcareifyoucryintheshowereverydayforayear
sometimes, i think i must be a heartless bastard for the things i've done. maybe it's my ferocious catholic guilt speaking, but i've been careless with the hearts of good people and left them without looking back and without really considering the affect i may have had on their lives.
of course, when they pop up in front of you at starbucks on a monday night, it's tough not to glance over your shoulder to make sure your eyes aren't playing tricks on you.
- I thought I left you behind a long, long time ago.
- You did.
- What are you doing here, now?
- Did you think I would stay in the past?
and i might have. but things like this keep happening to me.
maybe you can identify with this. maybe you see blind people everywhere you go and you wonder if it means something. maybe you keep hearing a certain song that evokes a very potent memory. maybe people keep asking you the same question: "How are you doing?"
maybe not. but there's a reason that i can't shake the feeling that my past is trying to tell me something. it's because i know that there's something i can learn from this - that i can take with me as i forge ahead in the starbucks queue.
i place my order. she pays for both of us because i've left my wallet in the car. i want everything to be casual, fun: reveling in the good times and pining for those days again if only for as long as my drink stays hot. it isn't like that though.
she's different than i remember; and i can say that honestly because i wasn't expecting anything at all, let alone a conversation. i listen intently. i'm trying to find the tracks the person i once knew all those years ago somewhere in the corners of her quiet voice. i can't find them in the forest of her words anywhere. there it is, in her laugh, but it's like an echo and i don't believe in it enough to follow it any further through the trees.
i tell her my secrets anyway - the ones that everybody knows - and she tells me some of hers.
hers.
hers are about me. they aren't recent secrets and i think i'm not the first one to hear them, either. she tells them like a tune that she hums when she isn't paying attention to anything but the feeling of hot water on her skin in the morning while the notes flow past her ankles and disappear into the drain.
sometimes, i think i must be a heartless bastard for the things i've done. maybe it's my ferocious catholic guilt speaking, but i've been careless with the hearts of good people and left them without looking back and without really considering the affect i may have had on their lives.
of course, when they pop up in front of you at starbucks on a monday night, it's tough not to glance over your shoulder to make sure your eyes aren't playing tricks on you.
- I thought I left you behind a long, long time ago.
- You did.
- What are you doing here, now?
- Did you think I would stay in the past?
and i might have. but things like this keep happening to me.
maybe you can identify with this. maybe you see blind people everywhere you go and you wonder if it means something. maybe you keep hearing a certain song that evokes a very potent memory. maybe people keep asking you the same question: "How are you doing?"
maybe not. but there's a reason that i can't shake the feeling that my past is trying to tell me something. it's because i know that there's something i can learn from this - that i can take with me as i forge ahead in the starbucks queue.
i place my order. she pays for both of us because i've left my wallet in the car. i want everything to be casual, fun: reveling in the good times and pining for those days again if only for as long as my drink stays hot. it isn't like that though.
she's different than i remember; and i can say that honestly because i wasn't expecting anything at all, let alone a conversation. i listen intently. i'm trying to find the tracks the person i once knew all those years ago somewhere in the corners of her quiet voice. i can't find them in the forest of her words anywhere. there it is, in her laugh, but it's like an echo and i don't believe in it enough to follow it any further through the trees.
i tell her my secrets anyway - the ones that everybody knows - and she tells me some of hers.
hers.
hers are about me. they aren't recent secrets and i think i'm not the first one to hear them, either. she tells them like a tune that she hums when she isn't paying attention to anything but the feeling of hot water on her skin in the morning while the notes flow past her ankles and disappear into the drain.
3.12.09
2.12.09
flaws 02:24
We've all got them. Sometimes I wonder how aware of them we are.
They make us undeniably, unmistakably, unbearably human sometimes. So we try to hide them. Occasionally we succeed. Inevitably we fail.
They are physical, psychological, emotional, total, and tragic. But they are also what is most special about each of us. Our flaws confound us and they confound the ones we love. They challenge us to overcome them, and they tempt our friends and families to abandon us.
But we need our flaws because they force us to become more than just what we arrived with.
When I was young things were easy. I was charming, bright, different. I knew things, was wise beyond my years, I was told. Maybe it was true. Probably it wasn't. Nevertheless, I came by success easily. I grew accustomed to it. As a result, failure is now the bitterest of pills I can choke down. But, Nietzsche tells me, whatever does not kill me makes me stronger (he went crazy and died 2 years after writing those words, just fyi). Since "growing up" I've had to rely less on my charisma and more on my intellect to get me through. It ain't easy because I'm really not smarter than anyone else. I find that now I often resent the poor lessons of my wooly infancy.
I've had some time to think since then though and it occurs to me that our lives aren't lessons or tests or even gifts. They aren't to be squandered on what we wish they could be or should have been or were meant to be. In Leviathan, Hobbes writes that human existence is "brutish, nasty, and short." And so it is, on an individual scale. On a flawed, lonely, bereft-of-all-meaning measurement.
What's one life? It has value, to be sure, but not so much as two lives, for what should be obvious reasons. We're more than the sum of our parts, and the more parts the greater the sum.
Our communities are flawed too, but within those communities are the salves to mend our flaws. My flaws and your flaws and his and her flaws are inconsequential when we bandy together to accomplish the things we cannot do alone. And I tell you: we can do nothing alone. So, I tell you this:
We're all in this together.
