Exit into the Next Beginning
the fear of change was finally smaller than the fear of staying the same.
(ref)
.::.
my mother can tell you that i am an unbelievably anxious decision maker. as a small child, i would systematically allocate my allowance so carefully, so thoughtfully, long after my sister’s was gone. this – my natural and unstoppable constant stream of internal calculations – may not seem apparent on the street. a lot of people seem to think my life is whimsical. blowing in the wind. crazy bohemian burningman jetset freespiriting 24/7, unattached and unbound. but anyone who knows me, has seen me fret – and probably the people who read this blog with any regularity – know how untrue that is. how anxious i get, how i turn things over endlessly, how afraid i am to sign on dotted lines until everything has been weighed. calculated. and even then.
but while i calculate, weighing all the sides, fretting over the options, the what-ifs, the maybes, i am also waiting for things to reveal themselves, and i have belief in this - for something to emerge out of the cloud as an answer to all those complex quantum equations of love and life and spirit and soul and truth and justice, with their endless strings of if-then variables. and when that answer is shown – that is where my impulse is revealed, and the part that people see. when that is when i book the flight, buy the ticket, take the ride. because after all the calculation, i trust the answer when it appears and i feel it.
and so with that, i will tell you all now that after several months of anxiety and confusion, prefaced by several years of existential angst, endless calculations and nothing ever quite making itself known, i (we) have made a Big Decision.
.::.
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Beyond Aesthetics: Occupy Art (post #12)
following up on my last #occupy post……
the Muppets have taught us so many things since 1976. and this week, they’ve taught us just how well popular Art can be used to call bullshit:
Watch: The Muppets Diss Fox News:
Miss Piggy was more combative and political; the puppet added that the charge was “almost as laughable as accusing Fox News of being news.”
(this is a response to this)
have the Muppets always been so intense?
anyway, i love it, and this is a great segue for me to post some of that which i recently wrote for my art school application on the subject of the current state and intersection of art vs. politics in America. this is definitively the longest post i’ve ever published, but if you’re interested, read on….
Filed in art, culture and random linkage, personal favorites | Tagged with #occupyart, #occupywallstreet, #ows, adbusters, banksy, capitalism, huxley, marxisms, memetic, mimetic, shepard fairey, TED | Comment (0)video promo for lovesick5
clinically attracted
in which i go crazy in love. (possibly NSFW)
look mom no hands
today is almost t-shirt weather, except that the air off the pacific is cold.
do you ever have those moments where you see yourself, unexpectedly, from 20 feet away, like watching a few split seconds of scene from the movie of your actual life?
do you ever feel unsafe with yourself? do you look up sometimes and realize how vulnerable you are? through either the reality of mortal life, or because you’ve lead yourself into a specific situation that is maybe not ok?
people are on guard here, a strange distrust in the fact that we are all only human. it should be safe to be outside in broad daylight on a sunny afternoon. but it’s not. we’re not safe from each other if we are not safe from ourselves.
as i say this i ride down city streets with no hands, my fingers laced behind my back.
Filed in me myself and i, not poems, personal favorites | Tagged with anxiety | Comment (0)I am trying to bribe you with uncertainty, with danger, with defeat.
Two English Poems – J. L. Borges
I
The useless dawn finds me in a deserted street-
corner; I have outlived the night.
Nights are proud waves; darkblue topheavy waves
laden with all the hues of deep spoil, laden with
things unlikely and desirable.
Nights have a habit of mysterious gifts and refusals,
of things half given away, half withheld,
of joys with a dark hemisphere. Nights act
that way, I tell you.
The surge, that night, left me the customary shreds
and odd ends: some hated friends to chat
with, music for dreams, and the smoking of
bitter ashes. The things my hungry heart
has no use for.
The big wave brought you.
Words, any words, your laughter; and you so lazily
and incessantly beautiful. We talked and you
have forgotten the words.
The shattering dawn finds me in a deserted street
of my city.
Your profile turned away, the sounds that go to
make your name, the lilt of your laughter:
these are the illustrious toys you have left me.
I turn them over in the dawn, I lose them, I find
them; I tell them to the few stray dogs and
to the few stray stars of the dawn.
Your dark rich life …
I must get at you, somehow; I put away those
illustrious toys you have left me, I want your
hidden look, your real smile — that lonely,
mocking smile your cool mirror knows.
II
What can I hold you with?
I offer you lean streets, desperate sunsets, the
moon of the jagged suburbs.
I offer you the bitterness of a man who has looked
long and long at the lonely moon.
I offer you my ancestors, my dead men, the ghosts
that living men have honoured in bronze:
my father’s father killed in the frontier of
Buenos Aires, two bullets through his lungs,
bearded and dead, wrapped by his soldiers in
the hide of a cow; my mother’s grandfather
–just twentyfour– heading a charge of
three hundred men in Peru, now ghosts on
vanished horses.
I offer you whatever insight my books may hold,
whatever manliness or humour my life.
I offer you the loyalty of a man who has never
been loyal.
I offer you that kernel of myself that I have saved,
somehow –the central heart that deals not
in words, traffics not with dreams, and is
untouched by time, by joy, by adversities.
I offer you the memory of a yellow rose seen at
sunset, years before you were born.
I offer you explanations of yourself, theories about
yourself, authentic and surprising news of
yourself.
I can give you my loneliness, my darkness, the
hunger of my heart; I am trying to bribe you
with uncertainty, with danger, with defeat.
- Jorge Luis Borges (1934)
Filed in not poems, personal favorites | Tagged with Borges | Comment (0)offbeat home: cleaning out your closets and advancing your style
oh hey! look! i have a guestpost on Offbeat Home today!
Cleaning out the closet: looking at the concept of age appropriate clothing
Filed in blogging, fashion, most linked/commented on, personal favorites | Tagged with NaBloPoMo, offbeat | Comment (0)your apocalypse was fab
telempathy fully dialed
exposing minority selves in a climax community
regression into stoned: immaculate : impeccable
the future willfully ignored;
phoenix philosophers waiting for everything to burn
and then rebirth at dawn:
5 a.m., july, new york city
7 a.m., september, black rock city -
sweat, dust, heat, atmosphere: utterly visceral, hedonistic.
romantic utilitarians, existential humanists,
shape shifters, line walkers, sliders, shadow selves
move through liminal space.
relative morality dependent on audience and a lack of absolutes,
the element-ary complicated by emotion,
disassociate and be grateful.
when I was an alien
cultures weren’t opinions
2/1/98 – 2/1/11
13 years
it’s hard to not have high expectations of someone who is capable of so much.
so much passion. so much life. so much beauty. so much spirit. so much love.
but expectations get us no where. only trust that it all will be.
if i have faith in anything, it’s you.
50 Reasons to Love Oakland
(In response to “50 Reasons to Love San Francisco” which was a response to “50 Reasons to Be Pretty Damn Euphoric You Live in New York City,” which, in its response to the NYC Haters, called for everyone to make a list for their city. so i did.)
in no particular order and without catering to anyone:
50. it’s usually at least 10 degrees warmer (and sunnier) than SF, sometimes 20, especially during fog season (July)
49. a long walk around and/or gondola ride around Lake Merritt
48. the hills: Joaquin Miller and Redwood Regional Parks
47. the Oakland Museum of California
46. Jack London Square, especially the First and Last Chance Saloon
45. the cranes!
44. conscious hip hop, esp The Coup
43. The Fox + Paramount Theatres
42. Jingletown
41. American Steel
40. Old Town bars & restaurants
39. “donettes” and french press coffee for brunch at Flora
38. the Chapel of the Chimes
37. the Piedmont Rose Garden
36. International Blvd – like the Mission before hipsters!
35. the Bordello
34. The Vulcan
33. The Crucible
32. the Cathedral of Christ the Light
31. Manzanita macrobiotic restaurant vs. Chicken and Waffles
30. Mama Buzz cafe, where the hipster watching is almost as good as their veg/vegan food (last time there: a table of 3 next to us: a chick knitting and smoking a joint saying really nonsensical “i’m so high” things while another girl read her facebook page out loud to the other 2 and a guy doing the total Joaquin Phoenix “I’m still Here” thing with the bushy beard and sunglasses. dude, that was 2009.)
29. people in oakland really are as weird as they look/act/seem, they’re not just TRYING to be
27. the A’s / Raiders – keepin’ it real
26. the Grand Lake Theatre marquee
25. the Grand Lake Farmer’s Market (sunday mornings)
24. Trestle Glen – so white-picket!
23. Van Jones + The Ella Baker Center for Human Rights
22. Middle Harbor Shoreline Park
21. FAIRYLAND
20. the Oakland Zoo, which i like better than the SF Zoo.
19. the Oakland Coliseum Swap Meet,, where you can find everything from on-site Chinese cupping services to your stolen bike
18. tapioca drinks from Chinatown
17. Temescal – awesome foods from Lanesplitters to Dona Tomas + now there is a Burma Superstar!
16. all the crazy incarnations of Eli’s Mile High Club
15. the Stork Club + The Uptown + 21Grand
14. the Parkway Speakeasy (RIP?)
12. “hella”
10. Chabot Space & Science Center
9. Oaksterdam
8. cheaper rent for more space than the West Bay
7. Cafe van Kleef
6. Piedmont – Rockridge Shopping
4. Art Murmur!
3. sitting on the patio drinking a local microbrew at Beer Revolution while eating Vegan Soul Food
1. being part of a truly multicultural urban renaissance
this list is not meant to be comprehensive or exclusionary. these things are off the top of my head and based on my own lifestyle/experience living in oakland – so please add more! and i know it was very hard for me to not to not list a bunch more restaurants…so i ask for you to please add things to do/places to go, not more places to eat unless they are *really* special 
and yeah, i remember the KML spoof “Oakland Tourism” video of 2009. spare me.
UPDATE 11/10: TK has now done a “30 Reasons to Hate San Francisco“. i’d take his lead again and do the same for Oakland, but outside of “gangbanger crime”, actually i’d have a hard time coming up with as many, as we don’t have your SF problems! we can park almost anywhere!
Filed in bay area gems, most linked/commented on, personal favorites, things you can do, travel | Tagged with NaBloPoMo, oakland | Comments (4)i ask myself
noting that the ordering of these two questions changes the meaning/subtext of the exchange:
Q: “does it matter?”
A: “who cares?”
Q: “who cares?”
A: “does it matter?”
whether it changes only a little or quite a lot depends on context.
Filed in personal favorites, philosophical ramblings | Comment (0)
