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Sunday, November 16, 2008
Saturday, November 15, 2008
This has turned into something of a tumble blog lately, so I thought I'd take this moment to get a little more personal. Part of my reluctance as of late has been the result of a deepening appreciation for the virtues of discretion and the benefits of allowing the little movements and turmoils of my inner life to incubate a little before I spew them into the public sphere. Another reason for my silence has been the decidedly unpleasant "what" of my life lately, despite the mildly encouraging signs of change in how I have been able to deal with them. Among the whats: my car died, I have fallen dangerously behind in my academic work, and my once beautiful relationship with an exciting new man exploded in an immensely painful fireball of destruction and betrayal. As it turns out, even this last one is passing through my system with surprising ease. I don't know if it's a result of my emerging maturity or a broadening of my perspective, but the downs -- indeed the bottoms -- are starting to recontextualize themselves even as they're happening. I've shortened the distance and the time it takes to put the pain and anxiety away and act on my better judgment. I'm not immobilized anymore, my panic just folds itself into motivation, and I forge ahead.
On the one hand, I can recognize in this the potential danger that Terrence Howard talked about in the interview I posted below. As an actor, he fears that he is experiencing life as an observer, that everything becomes a study in how to reproduce emotions, and that he will lose the ability to experience his own life as unique and irrepeatable. I have that sense sometimes, that I view all the ups and downs as passing scenes, grist for the mill of that great combine that will someday spill enough ink that I can bind all these experiences between the covers of a book, laced with ameliorating fantasy and tweaked to perfection. I wrote on my mirror when I was a teenager that I was "struggling to gain immortality against the human language," but now I think I see the folly of this melodramatic aspiration. The immortality of art is after all not the immortality of the artist. As an artist, I will not get to enjoy the full life of my art, especially if I am one of those who defy the odds and are remembered. I would like to enjoy my life as I live it, for as long as it lasts, and not perhaps to move so quickly from defeat to action to triumph and back again.
On the other hand, survival is a must. My survival is perhaps predicated on too many unlikely successes: a career that I enjoy, a loving family, material comfort and bodily security. These would constitute much more than survival, and yet the everyday getting up, feeding myself and providing for my dependents has seemed difficult or nearly impossible when I've been roundly defeated. In such moments the ability to put it all into perspective, to take a certain observing distance from my pain and anxiety has been absolutely necessary to my being able to move past my misfortunes.
I suppose the answer, as always, is the golden mean between the two. Walking some fine line of interpretation that allows me to experience the pain and anxiety even as I'm packing them away. It used to be writing that made this motion for me, but now it's becoming visceral, a certain sigh that burns my lungs and throat even as it allows the poison to escape. It's not something I consciously do, and in many ways it's a sign of a resignation I never thought I'd feel, but at the moment I guess I'm inclined to accept it as a progression, a personal evolution. If nothing else, my reaction time is streamlined, so I can pack more in! I'm not too busy searching for the magic words to notice that something else is already happening. I'm not so wrapped up in my transformative incantations that I forget all the good that's already within my reach, and sometimes, with a herculean effort, I can drop the bad shit where it is and let it work itself out, for better or worse. Sometimes you have to pass the buck, especially if you were wrong to accept it in the first place. I'm learning to accept it all, bit by bite.
I'm going out now. I'm going to be out in the world, practising my controlled roll. I hope you are all well.
On the one hand, I can recognize in this the potential danger that Terrence Howard talked about in the interview I posted below. As an actor, he fears that he is experiencing life as an observer, that everything becomes a study in how to reproduce emotions, and that he will lose the ability to experience his own life as unique and irrepeatable. I have that sense sometimes, that I view all the ups and downs as passing scenes, grist for the mill of that great combine that will someday spill enough ink that I can bind all these experiences between the covers of a book, laced with ameliorating fantasy and tweaked to perfection. I wrote on my mirror when I was a teenager that I was "struggling to gain immortality against the human language," but now I think I see the folly of this melodramatic aspiration. The immortality of art is after all not the immortality of the artist. As an artist, I will not get to enjoy the full life of my art, especially if I am one of those who defy the odds and are remembered. I would like to enjoy my life as I live it, for as long as it lasts, and not perhaps to move so quickly from defeat to action to triumph and back again.
On the other hand, survival is a must. My survival is perhaps predicated on too many unlikely successes: a career that I enjoy, a loving family, material comfort and bodily security. These would constitute much more than survival, and yet the everyday getting up, feeding myself and providing for my dependents has seemed difficult or nearly impossible when I've been roundly defeated. In such moments the ability to put it all into perspective, to take a certain observing distance from my pain and anxiety has been absolutely necessary to my being able to move past my misfortunes.
I suppose the answer, as always, is the golden mean between the two. Walking some fine line of interpretation that allows me to experience the pain and anxiety even as I'm packing them away. It used to be writing that made this motion for me, but now it's becoming visceral, a certain sigh that burns my lungs and throat even as it allows the poison to escape. It's not something I consciously do, and in many ways it's a sign of a resignation I never thought I'd feel, but at the moment I guess I'm inclined to accept it as a progression, a personal evolution. If nothing else, my reaction time is streamlined, so I can pack more in! I'm not too busy searching for the magic words to notice that something else is already happening. I'm not so wrapped up in my transformative incantations that I forget all the good that's already within my reach, and sometimes, with a herculean effort, I can drop the bad shit where it is and let it work itself out, for better or worse. Sometimes you have to pass the buck, especially if you were wrong to accept it in the first place. I'm learning to accept it all, bit by bite.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Saturday, November 08, 2008
I'm doing a comprehensive exam on Cornel West's prophetic pragmatism this year, and with the pretense of getting to work on it, I YouTube-ed him. This is the first thing that came up. After watching this talk (and absorbing a few pages of Prophecy Deliverance!), I'm convinced that not only is this man one of the great American philosophers, but he's delivering a political message that's a cogent combination of religion, philosophy and social criticism that I think resonates deeply with this moment in history, with our recent election and what it says about us, what we could be. I hope this really is the death of anti-intellectualism in this country, we are so rich with intellectuals.
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
So, we did it. In four short years, a young politician rocketed from obscurity into the highest office, buoyed overwhelmingly by the shared hopes and beliefs of millions of Americans. This morning I could almost feel the elation and relief around me. This is a proud moment for us. We can raise our faces to the world, wave our little flags with excitement and maybe for a moment believe that we can turn this country around. Last night and this morning, I can barely express my relief, excitement and pride. But there's a tremor somewhere in my gut, a trepidation that reminds me that though this is the first day of a brighter future, there are still dark days ahead. Americans are still sinking into poverty and alienation, those who were already desperate are clinging to shrinking strands of bare survival, and the wars that we are waging abroad are taking millions of lives, American and otherwise. We cannot rest on our laurels. We cannot absorb this victory and settle back into our old routines and wait for President Obama to save us. This is a call, wider and deeper than any my generation has heard. We have to stand with him and serve. We have to follow our hero's example and reach out to our fellow Americans, especially those with whom we have the deepest differences, and we have to own our ambitions and our ideals. This is a great day, and it's only the beginning.Monday, November 03, 2008
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Saturday, October 25, 2008
I've been in love with this man for so long (physically, since Mr. Holland's Opus; emoto-psychically since Hustle & Flow). Somehow I could always tell that he had that inner strength that makes people glow in a way that allows me to remember and understand that it's not what happens to you, it's what you make of it. Our inner combine isn't just a machine, it's magical at times too. This interview with NPR's Scott Simon is magical medicine for the cold, discouraging days.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
This is an article from Ron Paul published in Slate today that articulates the point about inflation and indebtedness that Zeitgeist made me think about. Especially scary is this paragraph:
"The monetary base jumping by such a large margin is an indicator that the Federal Reserve has not learned from its mistakes and is hoping to get out of this economic downturn by creating even more credit out of thin air. With such large increases in the monetary base and with banks legally able to hold zero reserves, the vaunted money multiplier effect could theoretically reach infinity."
I think if the Republicans had had the sense to nominate Ron Paul, this election would've been harder for me to decide. Read the whole thing here:
"The monetary base jumping by such a large margin is an indicator that the Federal Reserve has not learned from its mistakes and is hoping to get out of this economic downturn by creating even more credit out of thin air. With such large increases in the monetary base and with banks legally able to hold zero reserves, the vaunted money multiplier effect could theoretically reach infinity."
I think if the Republicans had had the sense to nominate Ron Paul, this election would've been harder for me to decide. Read the whole thing here:
Sickness Unto Debt
The Treasury bailout will only exacerbate red ink and inflation.
Monday, October 13, 2008
Zeitgeist: The Movie
(click through and scroll down)I've been watching this movie in bits and pieces for a couple of months now, mostly through the good influence of Mark and Chris. I've always been convinced that there was more to 9/11 than we were being told, and this documentary puts it squarely in the "false flag for the sake of profit" category along with the RMS Lusitania, Pearl Harbor and the Gulf of Tonkin. There is also a very interesting report on the creation of the Federal Reserve that with the current financial crisis makes the hair on the back of my neck stand on end, especially as the movie I posted yesterday about the massive bank fraud that Sen. McCain tried to immunize in the '80's proves to me that this might very well be the kind of thing happening right under our noses, right now. What are we doing? Infusing those failing banks with huge sums of tax payer dollars. Yay...
Oh yeah, and there's no law on the books that says you have to pay income tax. It's actually unconstitutional as a non-apportioned tax. I'm excited about that. I'd rather hand my money to the NYDOT for the roads and bridges, skip the Fed.
Peter Joseph (the writer and director) also argues that aspects of the Christian narrative are related to or extrapolated from ancient religious myths, which makes a lot of sense even from an academic perspective. But the writers are just a little too quick to say that thus Jesus didn't exist and Christianity is a crock. Like so many science and technology valorizing contingencies these days (I mean you Drs. Dennett and Dawkins, and the lesser Bill Maher), Joseph is way too excited about "debunking religion" to actually look meaningfully into the function of myth and religious narrative in human life and history, so he simply demonstrates that religions come from somewhere, are not "factually true" and thinks he has done with it. Overall, I should say that I disagree with the Zeitgeist Movement's perspective on the amorphous and personified force of "religion" in history, and think their position needs to be refined to specific historical institutions in order to be a genuine critique. That being said, the information presented is intriguing, and makes a lot more sense to me than the explanations for war and financial crises handed down by the current administration.
Oh yeah, and there's no law on the books that says you have to pay income tax. It's actually unconstitutional as a non-apportioned tax. I'm excited about that. I'd rather hand my money to the NYDOT for the roads and bridges, skip the Fed.
Peter Joseph (the writer and director) also argues that aspects of the Christian narrative are related to or extrapolated from ancient religious myths, which makes a lot of sense even from an academic perspective. But the writers are just a little too quick to say that thus Jesus didn't exist and Christianity is a crock. Like so many science and technology valorizing contingencies these days (I mean you Drs. Dennett and Dawkins, and the lesser Bill Maher), Joseph is way too excited about "debunking religion" to actually look meaningfully into the function of myth and religious narrative in human life and history, so he simply demonstrates that religions come from somewhere, are not "factually true" and thinks he has done with it. Overall, I should say that I disagree with the Zeitgeist Movement's perspective on the amorphous and personified force of "religion" in history, and think their position needs to be refined to specific historical institutions in order to be a genuine critique. That being said, the information presented is intriguing, and makes a lot more sense to me than the explanations for war and financial crises handed down by the current administration.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
I know that in a way this is preaching to the choir, and I don't usually go in for negative political ads. But I think everyone should watch this. It's about McCain's personal support of a corrupt financier, his attempt to use his office to excuse white-collar criminal activity on a grand scale and his involvement in the (now catastrophic) deregulation of the financial systems. What becomes clear is not only that he's not looking out for the American people, but that his motivations are the oldest in history: personal greed and ambition. This isn't just incompetence or poor judgment, it's criminality.
Saturday, October 11, 2008
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