In the dead of night i entered my bathroom to rinse a kidney, the irritating automatic light did not come on; aside from an empty bladder, there was a moment of relief which one instinctively feels in the absence of anything automatic. That relief was soon followed by the not implausible reality world leadership had gone off-the-rails and the nuclear option extinguished some part of civilization and its handmaiden - electricity. Sublimating my terror outside with puffs of tobacco, i could see street lamps, but not whether neighbors had suffered a similar outage. I lit a candle on the stairs of my hosts, and began to wonder about the complexities of life without electricity - for example, my computer battery . . . 26% . . . 25% . . . I am fortunate to have writing as an expression to explore feelings of panic, depravation and curiosity when faced with turmoil, however unlikely it is i’d resort to longhand should my battery expire. That is a bizarre commentary on my commitment to the written word, but then again, since waking, i’ve considered the possibility that our world might have been extinguished at the hands of a “leader” - an even more bizarre commentary. I think i’ll have another cigarette existence . . . 23%. . . 22%. I guess the question is whether my desire to express myself is greater than the convenience afforded me by technology.
I wonder how important expression is when what one says runs counter to most of what is heard about the world we live. I'm hard-wired for survival, so for me the alternate reality of corporate expression creates cognitive dissonance. The sound of rain on the roof and the familiar petrichor outside my window are ancient like the smell of damp fur for our forebears, yet our species' possible extinction based on actual data saps any security i might feel having shelter from the rain. Electricity has been restored, and the obnoxious automatic bathroom light that may have been a luxury to our forebears only seems to exacerbate my feelings of precariousness - why is that¿ One of the foundations of design engineering is repeatability; if we are entering an epoch of intermittent utilities, would it not be wise to cultivate tolerance for outage, be that food, water, electricity, and g_d help us - the absence of the internet. In a capitalist society such as ours, where the ruling elite are buffered from the same austerity they would use to build character for a restless population, it makes no sense to look to the profit model as a solution for shortages that are a fact of an infinite growth economy in a finite resource world - shortages which will only grow in severity and scope.
Reform of our economic model is not viable or correct. What i resort to for legitimacy is an intense application of my skills, with challenges beyond my experience. If this defines me, then good. Whether my selfish inner direction provides an example of a life beyond consumer addiction, i can’t know. I mistrust mobs or group-think, and persuasion of anyone about anything is bullshit. Yet i care deeply about the injustice and oppression fostered by hatred and the grasping born of an exclusive concern for one’s own wellbeing. I am able only to take care of myself and to extend help to as many as i may without taking on water. This selfishness torments me when i see rafts of human beings being plundered and shipwrecked by those from whom the refugees would seek haven. Is there a solution? How does a solitary creative life contribute anything to a new paradigm? I am no saint, yet it our times demand the best from all of us. I do not possess the inner fortitude for the selfless devotion of a monk, except, as Arundhati Roy said, to chase "beauty to her lair”. I am grateful Mssr. _rump for giving a face to the vanity our entire planet turned into a bloodsport. This is a remarkably harsh and unforgiving judgement, and i include my own existential quest in the equation. I see nothing else to turn my hand to, if not the finest work i can create - that is sad.
Perhaps not as sad as success defined by some amount of bytes catalogued on a financial server, or assessing a person's character by how many human beings agree with that person. Michelangelo painted a view of himself as skin held by Saint Peter; when asked why, Michelangelo replied, and i paraphrase, “when i die, i wish to be empty of all i was meant to create.” That idea makes perfect sense, much more sense than qualifying merit based on publication or shows. I don’t know what to be means, which may be my most successful creative effort - to have doubt in a world full with certainty. I know some things about family, about love - esoteric knowledge - worthless to anyone but the curios. The most difficult subject i’ve ever encountered is to know myself. I have a vague idea, a hazy outline that might suggest a "who", but not an "am"; why is that¿ I am happy, i am sad describe states of the who, but not the kernel. Descartes said, "je pense donc je suis." which satisfied many, but the nagging question remains, what is the throne of consciousness, what's driving the train? hunger, pain, love - your cell phone¿
This line of thinking is dwarfed by the enormity of our physical world, meaning either the expanding universe, or below the event horizon, depending on one's perspective. Can we be more than that which we are comprised, gas, molecules, protoplasm, minerals, gravity, wavelength, etc.¿ How could anyone possibly answer that question when we have no real idea of just how extensive our universe is, or parse what's missing from our primitive catalogue of knowledge¿ These are the questions i come up with when attempting to “know myself.” Is it simply a case of will, "i think i can, i think i can"¿ Can one wake up one morning and say, I will become president of the United States, and epso facto - voila - one is president; it would seems so for Mssr. _rump. The deeper question for me is, who would want to be the president, and why; who would want to be the richest human being in the world or the fastest, smartest or most beautiful when one can just be happy¿ Sounds goofy, i know, but is it any goofier than spending one’s entire life acquiring things someone else said they should have, and then going to work to pay for those things because someone else said you had to earn them. What does that even mean - to earn. Have i earned the right to express myself¿ Apparently I have, because i am right now. Yet daily there are more and greater attacks on that ability, nor are these attacks solely on our rights of expression; now the attacks are on our very right to exist. This right i will never cede. I don't know why i am here, but i do know any force other than death which is greater than the sum of my parts is the only force i acknowledge; I do not know what it means to be, but i will keep seeking answers, with or without permission from the media shot callers and their cell phones attempting to define what it means to be.
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-
not being - the sonnet
prior to the big bang there was something
the event horizon is not the end
our presence or absence is not nothing
and all in between is more than a trend
up, down, in, out, off or on is our lot,
so why do we squirm so vigorously?
Is there meaning in that steam off our pot¿
Do we make matter from mortality?
Is it possible our lives radiate
outward like the big bang forever more
still emitting once we de-animate
like some odd Hawking black hole metaphor
who gives a fuck if we are mystery¿
our legacy - whose memory are we
jts 08/12/2017
http://stoneartist.com
reprinted with permission - all rights reserved
No comments:
Post a Comment