I'm learning things about myself

Because I symptom google like a good hypochondriac, I learned that this one thing I have, that I thought was slowly killing me, is not only meaningless, it has an awesome name. I have Exploding Head Syndrome.

From Wiki:
Exploding head syndrome is a condition that causes the sufferer to occasionally experience a tremendously loud noise as if from within his or her own head, usually described as an explosion, roar or a ringing noise. This usually occurs within an hour or two of falling asleep, but is not the result of a dream and can happen during the day as well. Although perceived as tremendously loud, the noise is usually not accompanied by pain. Attacks appear to change in frequency over time, with several attacks occurring in a space of days or weeks followed by months of remission. Sufferers often feel a sense of fear and anxiety after an attack, accompanied by elevated heart rate. Attacks are also often accompanied by perceived flashes of light (when perceived on their own, known as a "visual sleep start") or difficulty in breathing. The condition is also known as "auditory sleep starts." It is not thought to be dangerous, although it is sometimes distressing to experience.

Exploding Head Syndrome. God, that makes me feel so much better. Now I can focus more time on my twitching finger.

What's up scro?

Here's a few unrelated things I've noticed lately.
1. If you drive in a big city with lots of traffic, a good way to get around traffic is to drive through the neighborhoods that white people won't go in. Chances are the neighborhoods aren't as bad as their reps and there is a lot less traffic. One tip: At red lights, don't look too closely at anyone in the car next to you.
2. When you go hear live music, and the drums are really, really loud, so loud that you can feel them beating in your chest and their rythym joins the rythym of your heart... That's a really good feeling.
3. There really isn't anything manmade that can match the pleasure of eating cold, ripe, summer fruit on a hot day.

on sight

Recently, we went to a park and made paintings. This is something that used to be at the center of my artistic process, but over the last five years, has totally disappeared from said process. What happened? The short answer is academia. But, who cares about short answers.

For me academia was a good thing. I am eternally grateful that I went back to school. It forever changed my life for the better. I had to rethink the ways I was used to working and question what mattered to me. This led to new and interesting challenges, which led to changes, which made more people interested in what I'm doing. Communication being the end goal. This being said, there are certain things that are frowned upon in a contempory, academic setting. One of them is making paintings that looked cutting edge fifty years ago. Which mine did. My process used to be, go out and make drawings and paintings of an area. Collect items from that area (mostly rocks and bits of things). Go back into the studio and make finished paintings by combining all these things. Sometimes I would flip the sketches over and tear them up and then reassemble them into collages that I would paint from. Sometimes I would superimpose the rocks and detritus over the landscape. I would be as complicated or as simplified with this process as I felt the piece required. Sometimes I would throw all the stuff on the ground, mix it up and make a painting. I sort of left it up to intuition. Looking back, this turned out to be the real lesson. I learned to hone and trust my intuition, which is invaluable to me now.

But sitting in a place, taking it in, really taking it in, was at one time, the center of joy in my life. I doubt my paintings from this time communicate this. Although I do think they communicated my loneliness and detachment from the world, which people only want to look at, if it mirrors theirs. Mine didn't. I was definitely more interested in staring at the world, than participating in it. Although I now know that this is unhealthy, a very small part of me still remembers the pleasure and freedom of checking out. I guess the reason I equate on site painting with detachment, is because I was a concentrating, solitary figure in a moving world. A part, yet apart. What happened is that there wasn't an exchange beyond my pure reaction to the world. Now that sounds great. Pure is good. Pure is pure. Pure sounds like something good, nay, great art strives for. But ultimately it is a closed system. The dialogue ends where it starts. Never reaching into our shared world. At least for me it didn't. And I stuck with that shit for about eight years, so you can't say I didn't put the time in.

I guess the major change was more me than academia. I grew up, got in touch with my shit etc... Academia helped me through it though. It holds you accountable or more accurately, it makes you hold yourself accountable. Especially, if you pay for it yourself.

I think we are going to make this a regular thing. The "we" componant also being the major difference. No more solitary figure in the landscape. Now there are two figures hunched over concentrating. And better snacks.

So we went and made paintings in the park. I had no ambition, except to savor the moment. We found a great spot. On the lip of a canyon, looking directly at the other lip, with the city peeking out from behind a spikey bush to our right. A red tailed hawk circled above us. A sunny day. I chose to paint nature instead of the city. All those plants, bushes, and grasses merging together. It was formless and uncomplicated in its spirit.

Stories from the days of yore.

My brother (let's call him Gypsy Prince) came to town recently and brought with him one of our mom's college textbooks on Modern Literature. It was probably the 1950's equivalent of the comp 101 paperback that was called Contemporary Literature when I was in college, only instead of Joyce Carol Oates , it has T.S. Eliot and he's listed as being a living writer. My mom is pretty old, I know! She is so old that she remembers Civil War veterans marching in Veteran Day parades when she was a small child. She did say that the soldiers were pretty old. Still, I'm not that old, she had me when she was old. Okay, I'm seriously digressing and using the word old so much, it doesn't look like a word anymore.

One great thing about this book is not only is it full of what we now call Classic Literature, it's also huge, thick, and the cover is that shade of forest green that only books printed before 1960, come in. One other great thing about this book is that this is one book that inspired my mothers love of literature, a love that she passed down to me and Gypsy Prince, that has shaped us in profound ways. It has her notes and doodles in the margins. Among the great stories in the book, there is one by William Saroyan titled,"The Pomegranate Trees" that I had never read before last night. They had a short bio that included this quote by the author (also listed as still alive).

"You must believe that as much as death is inevitable life is inevitable. That is, the earth is inevitable, and people and other living things on it are inevitable, but that no man can remain on this earth for very long. You do not have to be melodramatically tragic about it. It is really one of the basically humorous things, and has all sorts of possibilities for laughter... Try as much as possible to be wholly alive, with all your might, and when you laugh, laugh like hell, and when you get angry, get good and angry. Try to be alive. You will be dead soon enough."

Someone who was close to me is now buried near William Saroyan. When I saw Saroyan's grave (which was marked by a hugantic obelisk, it lifted my spirits on what was otherwise a very sad day. I just love that quote because laughter is such a powerful reflection of the force of life that the two juxtapose quite nicely. It's just such a thoughtful thing to say and stated in such an inspiring and heartfelt way.

golden hour

My favorite time of day is the golden hour. Technically, the golden hour is two hours a day, so it should be golden hours, but this sounds less poetic. The golden hour happens the hour when the sun rises, and the hour it sets, for those who may not know. The light is magical, warm, soft. The deepest of blues. It's when the world slips into the magical, mystical moment of change. It's the time of day where the sky and earth begin and begin and begin to meet, until they finally do. It reminds me that all is temporary, that all good things come to an end, as do all bad. Here's a maudlin quote from a German writer Jean Paul Richter, "The darkness of death is like evening twilight. It makes all objects appear more lovely to the dying". Or if you prefer something lighter, there is always Oliver Wendall Holmes, "Love prefers twilight to daylight". I think I'll stick with the Doors," You know the day destroys the night, night divides the day, tried to run, tried to hide, break on through to the other side". Anyway, I've been going out for an hour or so after dinner and shooting the twilight with my new camera that I love very much and know how to use, not very much. But that's cool because the point of this experience is not to make good pictures as much as it is about understanding and observing this moment that I love. This moment that feels rare and important, but actually occurs twice a fucking day!

the boredom, the freedom, and the time spent alone.

So, recently my accomplishments were celebrated and this was a strange albeit pleasant occurance for me. I spend most of my time alone. I like this about my life, although I don't consider myself a misanthrope. I'm actually pretty social and I like talking to people, asking questions, sharing andecdotes and whatnot. But, to be the center of attention for hours and hours was tiring and simultaneously a really a fun experience. It suprised me to find so much pleasure in it because even though I enjoy people, I always felt like I could be one of the last people on earth and be okay with that. I have always enjoyed fiction about the last people at the end of the world (The Stand, The Quiet Earth, Where Have All the People Gone, After the Plague, god there are a lot more I'm getting tired of naming them). But tonite I watched that 28 Weeks Later and I don't think I can romanticize the apocalypse anymore. Sidenote: apocalypse means lifting the veil in Greek. I really enjoyed the first film, and I guess I liked this one (like is a weird word for such a hopeless, sad, violent film) but I also kind of felt emotionally abused by it. Like a little piece of my soul died while watching it. And I guess that's a good thing for a film, or any piece of art to make you feel, or is it? I mean it's something, for sure, but is more of bad. good? Anyhoo, I have rejoined the land of the talkers and the cocktail partyiers and the barbecuers for at least the temporary. And I feel pretty good about that. I love the people. I recently reread Revelations (for artistic research) and I think I'm going to trade it in for some People magazine for awhile. For the sake of my delicate heart, sometimes I gotta dial it back.

Am I secretly in love with Dave Eggers?

One person I really admire is Dave Eggers. He could have just been some writer living the high life on the upper East Side, with some super skinny, ironic, model girlfriend and coke parties galor. But instead, he's helping the kids, writing books about child soldiers and I'm sure a bunch of other generous shit we don't even know about. It's cool that his essence is in the world in such a major way that he probably doesn't even have enough time in the day to fulfill that shit. When I read his first book, I totally wanted to call bullshit on him and his Miranda July groupies. But, he won me over. And he gave a TED talk where he was nervous, so he doesn't even know that he's totally fucking awesome. Inspiring....

It's not easy to get off that ass.
And make a difference and make it last.