Yesterday, after a lovely and unexpectedly gourmet lunch at the new cafe' in the modern wign of the Art Institute, I slowly wended my way around the new Matisse exhibit. It took a bit over an hour, even with careful reading of each of the wall descriptions, and close observation of each of the larger paintings that I learned had been reworked and scraped and repainted and re thought so many times. That was the fascinating part - that, and the fact that this watershed period of Matisse's life as a painter occurred during a wartime period when art was probably the most difficult to accomplish - what with moving, and shortages of necessities, and such.
In one room, there wss a display of small drawings - portraits - that Matisse had sold during that period to make a living.
But the largest part of the exhibit was the display of how he moved from bright color and somewhat greater representation in his art, to just a few colors, and different methods, drawing on Cubism but never actually going that direction, including the reworking of a painting, or a sculpture, or doing it over and over on different canvases, during that period of 1913 to 1917 until he felt it was not exactly "right", perhaps, but at least more "right" than it had been several iterations earlier - witness up close the extra layers of paint taking away - deleting portions of a face, changing the outer dimensions to render it a bit more abstract - or in one case, the scraping away of long curved lines of the dark paint to create white curved lines emanating from and around the figure which melded with and enhanced the figure.
I did not buy the book - $45 for just the paperback vedrsion - but I am rethinking that. I just read online that the book is very unusual in the care with which it describes this entire metamorphosis.
It also shows the xrays of the paintings, to truly see the various stages of development and redevelopment.
I will go back to the exhibit and see the x ray evidence in the one room I missed - the hands on information room that apparently accompanies the exhibit. It was 5:00 , I had entered at about 10 minutes to 4:00 , and the museum closed at 5:00. But I'm a member, it is two bl0ocks away, and there is no reason that I should not revisit it a couple of times.
From here, it will go to the MOMA in July.
I think I need to write an article about this exhibit, from the standpoint of someone who is far from an expert - who, in fact, had never known very much at all about Matisse previously. I had to read one of Arnie Greenberg's articles in Bonjour Paris to get some background (and purchase a small $5.00 book in the gift shop and read it during my meal) so that I had at least some background.
Nevertheless, the exhibit was not just an exhibit, and not just the kind of learning experience that such art exhibits always are, but a very different learning experiend - one in which I really was fascinated each step of the way, and had not desire at all (as I often do) to skip any part of either the art on display, or the explanatory material on the walls.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Wild Things
I had thought for a time that I might take my 18 month old grandson to the new "Where The Wild Things Are" movie, but now I guess not. This morning (after a full day yesterday of payment and time entry bringing me inches from finishing and creating/printing the bills) I woke this morning realizing it was Sunday, and I had yet another full day to finish that task - then I watched tv till I realized it was 10:25, and went onto my Blackberry for the hell of it to see what time the earliest show started and it was at 10:45, so I threw my toothbrush and toothpaste into my purse, washed my face and put on a bit of eye makeup (just in case the man of my dreams appeared in the next seat), put on my new MDB shoes with the rocking sole that is supposed to reduce my butt and gut and force me to stand up straight, and put on my stretch jeans with the unwashable blue inkspot (now, at this 145 pound stage, actually almost too tight) and the new black sweater coat that was $35 at Old Navy, wrapped my wool Kenzo scarf (the one in shades of turquoise and pink) around my neck, and hailed a taxi.
Sitting in the theater with a small unbuttered popcorn and a bottle of water, I noticed a young man with a little girl of about 5 and her younger brother, perhaps 3.
The studio announcement with the logo had a crayonj outline of a wild thing's head over it, and the credits had crayon words and scribblings on them. A good sign, indicating that the movie was perhaps really aimed at children.
And the creatures on the island looked large and fuzzy and just like the Sendak drawings. And so did Max in his white wolf suit.
But, the movie, though not really frightening (except for a couple of moments - such as when the wild things at first threatened to eat Max, something true to the book but much more vivid with actors and closeups), there was a bit too much violence (though generally playful - such as when one of the large creatures jumped on top of Max, followed by all of the others, one at a time, until there they were, with Max at the bottom of the pile, having created a gigantic furry Max-plus-creatures pile for sleeping; or when they took Max's lead and waged a "war" by throwing hard dirt balls at each others' heads)...................as I said, though it was not really frightening, nevertheless it was lengthy and primarily about complex interpersonal relationships.
I of course appreciated the concept of how loneliness, and self involvement (and immaturity, of course, since even the giant creatures had the personalities of children) can sabotage close familial relationships by resulting in violent acting out-angry outbursts rather than caring and concern. And I do think that perhaps a child of 8 or 10 might get it. Nevertheless, it is not a movie for small children.
And what about my two little neighbors down the row? They sat thrugh much of it (it IS a large screen and a relatively small theater, rendering the screen that much larger) but they also seemed a bit restless. At one point the little boy walked by his dad to stand in front of his sister , at one point the girl leaned over and curled into a bored sleeping position, and they did ask questions from time to time.
Did I like it? Yes. I enjoyed the special affects and the personalities. On the other hand, I love fantasy and the fantastic. I can have a great time at Disney all by myself. I remember the first time I visited EuroDisney (I think that now it is called something else). I took the train from Paris, got off at the stop, and within a few minutes found myself standing in a tiled plaza with the magic castle rising into the blue sky just on the other side - and my heart jumped, my eyes teared up a bit, and I had to stop myself from clapping and chortling and jumping and saying out loud what I was yelling inside my head - "oh boy, oh boy, ohboy, it's Disney! Yeahhhhhhhhhh!"
So, what else did I do today?
Well, though yesterday was cold and dank and dreary and wet and I shivered when i ran across the street for a coffee, today the sky was blue and the sun shone warmly and the air had that nice slightly cool but smooth perfumed smell of a spring day. I think it was maybe 55 of 60 degrees.
So I left the theater, unwound my scarf and hung it over my arm, and started just walking . A few blocks later I heard the musical sound of La Francaise and sure enough there were three young men walking just behind me. They were good looking and casually dressed in that European way of nicely fitting jeans and nice shirts and jackets, and they were chattering away in Parisian French. I had been walking quickly to get my heart rate up, but hearing their voices slowed me down. I let them stay within earshot so the sound could wash over me. Finally, they stopped at a Bentley dealership and window shopped for a bit, then pushed each other through the door to look more closely.
Then, a block later, a thin young man in a dark suit was talking into that earpiece-mouthpiece contraption that let him talk on his "portable" hands free as he stood by a black towncar waiting for whomever he was driving - and yes, he too was talking in French.
Finally, two blocks later, a group of young men and women were standing at the curb talking about their days activities in..............yes, French! As if the world knew how strongly I am feeling my urge to jump back to Paris, even if just for a weekend. Or perhaps it was just that I was near the Hotel Sofitel - but I have walked by that hotel many times and never had this "on the streets of Paris" out of body experience before.
Then, I went to Bistro Zinc and had an oeuf poche' avec epinards and Hollandaise on English muffin, with little pieces of well spiced potatoes (that I only ate part of), along with a smooth glass of beaujolais, and finally a cappucino . I drank a lot of water and at the same time read the first two stories in the Murikami book "After the Quake".
Then, I left the restaurant and breathed in the warm air and felt the sun on my fact and decided to walk for a bit, and ran into a couple standing on a street corner with an unfurled map of Chicago, looking confused. They were in their fifties - he had white hair and a red face, she had blonde/brown short hair and wore a blue jacket. I always ask such people if Ican help them, and they took me up on it . They were staying at the Palmer House and had just fnished an architectural tour on the river where they were told of the Tiffany vaulted ceiling at the Cultural Center and wanted to somehow get there without navigating the oh so crowded Michigan Avenue so I told them they could head east and take the Lake route, and decided to accompany them. So this nice couple from Seattle and I then . walked to the Lake, back south to Navy Pier where we walked part way down the Pier (and I got someone to give them a tour of the Shakespeare Theater when intermission started), and then we walked the Navy Pier, North Pier, past the Sheraton, under the Columbus bridge along the Lake and River route back to the Cultural Center where I waved goodbye.
So I have not eaten badly today, and I did exercise of sorts, and I have blogged somewhat, and it is now 1:18 a.m. and I need to get some sleep, so I think I will set an alarm for very early so I can first finish the billing, and then walk to the end of Navy Pier or the Museum Campus to see the sun rise.
Sitting in the theater with a small unbuttered popcorn and a bottle of water, I noticed a young man with a little girl of about 5 and her younger brother, perhaps 3.
The studio announcement with the logo had a crayonj outline of a wild thing's head over it, and the credits had crayon words and scribblings on them. A good sign, indicating that the movie was perhaps really aimed at children.
And the creatures on the island looked large and fuzzy and just like the Sendak drawings. And so did Max in his white wolf suit.
But, the movie, though not really frightening (except for a couple of moments - such as when the wild things at first threatened to eat Max, something true to the book but much more vivid with actors and closeups), there was a bit too much violence (though generally playful - such as when one of the large creatures jumped on top of Max, followed by all of the others, one at a time, until there they were, with Max at the bottom of the pile, having created a gigantic furry Max-plus-creatures pile for sleeping; or when they took Max's lead and waged a "war" by throwing hard dirt balls at each others' heads)...................as I said, though it was not really frightening, nevertheless it was lengthy and primarily about complex interpersonal relationships.
I of course appreciated the concept of how loneliness, and self involvement (and immaturity, of course, since even the giant creatures had the personalities of children) can sabotage close familial relationships by resulting in violent acting out-angry outbursts rather than caring and concern. And I do think that perhaps a child of 8 or 10 might get it. Nevertheless, it is not a movie for small children.
And what about my two little neighbors down the row? They sat thrugh much of it (it IS a large screen and a relatively small theater, rendering the screen that much larger) but they also seemed a bit restless. At one point the little boy walked by his dad to stand in front of his sister , at one point the girl leaned over and curled into a bored sleeping position, and they did ask questions from time to time.
Did I like it? Yes. I enjoyed the special affects and the personalities. On the other hand, I love fantasy and the fantastic. I can have a great time at Disney all by myself. I remember the first time I visited EuroDisney (I think that now it is called something else). I took the train from Paris, got off at the stop, and within a few minutes found myself standing in a tiled plaza with the magic castle rising into the blue sky just on the other side - and my heart jumped, my eyes teared up a bit, and I had to stop myself from clapping and chortling and jumping and saying out loud what I was yelling inside my head - "oh boy, oh boy, ohboy, it's Disney! Yeahhhhhhhhhh!"
So, what else did I do today?
Well, though yesterday was cold and dank and dreary and wet and I shivered when i ran across the street for a coffee, today the sky was blue and the sun shone warmly and the air had that nice slightly cool but smooth perfumed smell of a spring day. I think it was maybe 55 of 60 degrees.
So I left the theater, unwound my scarf and hung it over my arm, and started just walking . A few blocks later I heard the musical sound of La Francaise and sure enough there were three young men walking just behind me. They were good looking and casually dressed in that European way of nicely fitting jeans and nice shirts and jackets, and they were chattering away in Parisian French. I had been walking quickly to get my heart rate up, but hearing their voices slowed me down. I let them stay within earshot so the sound could wash over me. Finally, they stopped at a Bentley dealership and window shopped for a bit, then pushed each other through the door to look more closely.
Then, a block later, a thin young man in a dark suit was talking into that earpiece-mouthpiece contraption that let him talk on his "portable" hands free as he stood by a black towncar waiting for whomever he was driving - and yes, he too was talking in French.
Finally, two blocks later, a group of young men and women were standing at the curb talking about their days activities in..............yes, French! As if the world knew how strongly I am feeling my urge to jump back to Paris, even if just for a weekend. Or perhaps it was just that I was near the Hotel Sofitel - but I have walked by that hotel many times and never had this "on the streets of Paris" out of body experience before.
Then, I went to Bistro Zinc and had an oeuf poche' avec epinards and Hollandaise on English muffin, with little pieces of well spiced potatoes (that I only ate part of), along with a smooth glass of beaujolais, and finally a cappucino . I drank a lot of water and at the same time read the first two stories in the Murikami book "After the Quake".
Then, I left the restaurant and breathed in the warm air and felt the sun on my fact and decided to walk for a bit, and ran into a couple standing on a street corner with an unfurled map of Chicago, looking confused. They were in their fifties - he had white hair and a red face, she had blonde/brown short hair and wore a blue jacket. I always ask such people if Ican help them, and they took me up on it . They were staying at the Palmer House and had just fnished an architectural tour on the river where they were told of the Tiffany vaulted ceiling at the Cultural Center and wanted to somehow get there without navigating the oh so crowded Michigan Avenue so I told them they could head east and take the Lake route, and decided to accompany them. So this nice couple from Seattle and I then . walked to the Lake, back south to Navy Pier where we walked part way down the Pier (and I got someone to give them a tour of the Shakespeare Theater when intermission started), and then we walked the Navy Pier, North Pier, past the Sheraton, under the Columbus bridge along the Lake and River route back to the Cultural Center where I waved goodbye.
So I have not eaten badly today, and I did exercise of sorts, and I have blogged somewhat, and it is now 1:18 a.m. and I need to get some sleep, so I think I will set an alarm for very early so I can first finish the billing, and then walk to the end of Navy Pier or the Museum Campus to see the sun rise.
Saturday, October 24, 2009
My Sister's Nostrils
I just watched that commercial about some kind of sucking candy that makes your lips pucker- the one where parents are moving their son into a dorm room, and the roomate (an Indian, or Native American kid with dark hair , moist dark eyes, and large nostrils at the tip of a prominent nose) gives the Mom a sucking candy, then interior monologues first the question of whether she likes it, then, from observing her puckered mouth sucking with exaggerated movements, and a slight glaze of joy in her eyes and upturn of her lips, telling himself that yes, indeed, she likes it -all the while sucking his candy with even more exaggerated motions that are something like kissing. And the dad and son walk in and observe the two with their eyes fixed on each other, their faces a couple of feet apart, their mouths sucking, and the very slight smiling upturns of their lips, and the son says "Mom!" and the dad drops his carton (which has a coffee pot in it).
That reminded me of my sister's nostrils. Strange, right? I remember noting to myself when we were young girls that she had rectangular, almost square shaped nostrils. Mine are oval. Most nostrils are oval. I just did a moment's research by obsrving the actors on an episode of "The Practice" (black and white) and in the advertisements between scenes, and sure enough, they are all oval. That's what I thought! But when I referred to those oddly shaped nostrils to myself (and sometimes others, or her) in the context of their shape, I always used the term "flagpoles." Not "flags" but "flagpoles". My mind was too lazy to complete the thought. Clearly, I was thinking of the rectangular piece of cloth, not the pole on which it hung, but nevertheless I used a simple shorthand the first time I voiced the thought, a wrong shorthand that was a reminder of what I really meant, but not the accurate metaphor, and then, after having done it once, my mind was too lazy to rethink it, but simply, repetitively, used the same wrong phrase always. Why?
That is the question I never thought of, until lately. It was simply a proclivity to fall, easily, into an habitual pattern of thought or action, without thinking. An avoidance of being fully aware of what I was thinking, or doing, once done. A need for repetition? For habit? For familiarity? A fear of change? A fear of the untried? A fear of failure? An anesthetizing of full awareness? Can I take this one small habit and see in it what has become a life habit? And, in so doing, if it has indeed become so, by seeing it, change that habit?
I don't know.
I know that as a child I feared change, as do most children. But more so than others? When my mom wanted me to go to camp I fought her and she gave in. I remember my fear. I feel it again clenching its fist in the bottom of my stomach. I didn't want to go away. I hated the idea of being in a strange bed, with people I didn't know. They might not like me.
I was very small, and I was very shy. "Shy." I don't know what that means exactly, except that I remember being very afraid - of so much. I was afraid to talk to people I didn't know . I was afraid to telephone anyone other than best friends. I was afraid of my teachers. I recall in the second or third grade how horribly embarrassed I was when I was too afraid to raise my hand to ask for a toilet break and, finally, the sphincter loosened from the pressure, the damn broke, and warm yellow liquid wet my pants and then my chair and then spilled onto the floor. "Look - she peed on the floor!"
I was little, and the rest of the world was big - so very big - like a giant in a Grimm fairy tale. I liked The Brothers Grimm, but I don't know why. I recall that those tales were rather gruesome - trolls and giants and horrible creatures. I also liked the Oz books, not just "The Wizard of Oz" but also "Ozma" and "Rik -i-Tik" and the others - and they, too, were filled with witches and other horrible beings, including a frightening Nome King living in a deep cave surrounded by wraith like Nome creatures whose bodies flowed and swayed against and into the stone walls, along with their long streaming hair and beards.
But in my real life, I didn't want adventure. I wanted to stay home with my mom and dad (and sister, my sometime enemy). I was afraid to be away and I still remember the comfort of walking back into my house after school each day, petting the dog, pulling out a bag of chips and some dip.
Fear and that "shyness" (a failure of self worth) ruled so much of my life. I dreamed of being a popular cheerleader, but I never tried out. I was so certain that I could never have made it. Nevertheless, years later, I learned to run a marathon, and to do yoga, and lift weights.
Today, I avoid the "shoulds" in my life by retreating to my quilted, kitty occupied couch life. I love so much curling on the couch in my messy apartment, a soft drink or water (every so often a glass of Bordeaux) and the remote and my Blackberry and a good book and the newspaper (and a bottle of Excedrin for my occasionally tweaky lower back muscle) all within easy reach to my right on the coffee table, my cuddling kitty just at my left shoulder on the top of the couch with her soft paw reaching for my arm, a quilt on mylap, clicking past unfamiliar shows into those I have learned to know and love - even reruns of episodes.
On the other hand, last month I attended an open house at a nearby college for a possible MFA. In July I ran off to France again for two weeks during my birthday month, including not only a week in my familiar neighborhood, at the left bank hotel where I know the owner and all of the employees, but also, and first, a week in the Aveyron, first taking two trains (with a short and uncertain connection) to the unfamiliar town of Figeac for two nights, then renting there a stick shift car (not having driven one for years) and driving on narrow country roads to the town of Villeneuve d'Aveyron, turning right down an even narrower road to the tiny Village of Mayrinhagues, and spending the week in a stone cottage, lighting a gas stove, listening to the morning sound of birds and barking dogs.
On the other hand, I failed to visit the town of Conques because of my fear of taking that little stick shift car onto highways for the hour or two it would require, fearing the speed, and the large trucks bearing down on me.
So, who am I? Am I a creature of habit, someone who needs to feel and taste the familiar to avoid fear? Or an individualist who salivates at the adventure of untried experiences and places ?
In college I didn't try anything truly new (except for some sexual experimentation, but never "all the way" out of fear of either my reputation or my skill, or perhaps both). I never thought to take a semester in Europe, to travel, to join the Civil Rights movement ( or even notice it existed or to care if I had noticed) I didn't join or even recognize the womens movement. . I wanted to do something creative but ended up first getting a teaching certificate and then going to law school - as I have called it so often , taking the paths of least resistance suggested by my parents. Who could I have been if I had instead travelled with a backpack through Europe, used my writing skills in any disciplined fashion?
I went from College, to law school, to a pretend marriage with someone as immature as I (a marriage that was more like two little kids playing house and having tantrums, then a mutual relationship between two adults - we pretended to be in love, neither of us having the ability to even guess what that should really mean) - and all out of fear of saying "no" to my parents, or "no" to my husband. Out of that failure to say "no" I entered the practice of law and a marriage , and moved on to motherhood (ok - let's not put motherhood into that inadvertant category - I was never sure I wanted to be a mother, and started that family out of my husband's insistence, but from the moment when my first son kicked against my innards, motherhood has always been a joy - had I followed my independant conscience instead of my fear of making the wrong choice or losing my last chance, had I developed a significant sense of self worth, and therefore had I not married at that time, I would have never produced my two sons and daughter and they would not have produced my grandchildren - a thought that is inconceivable).
But, continuing on into my analysis of my life of fear and stagnation and inertia . In the practice of law, the only thing I was confident of was my intellect - not my ability to talk to people, or my ability to think on my feet, or to reason, or to manage subordinates, or to do any of the things required of me as a lawyer. I admired one of my partners' ability to do all of those things. I would sit in his office and listen to him, with confidence and that Ivy League arrogance and that equally Ivy League humorless but socially acceptable (and required) laugh, questioning and advising clients on the phone, and fear that I could never learn how to do that. (Now, I am proud of my ability to deal with clients, and equally proud that I never developed any of his other characteristics, including his crying need to do what is considered "appropriate")
Today, in the context of law and business I have somehow developed the confidence that I could, if given the time, learn how to do anything, and the confidence and skill to deal with the interpersonal mind games needed for client control and relationships.
So, who the Hell am I? To what extent do fear and inertia rule my life? To what extent am I fearless and independant and free?
Why do I spend so much time here, on the couch, instead of here, at the computer, or there, on the road running as I once did and thereby bringing back that Audrey Hepburn body?
Why do I let so many months elapse without having written?
Why do I develop so many ideas for travel articles, and never get to them?
This blog is clearly erratic, badly written, meandering all over the place, and written without thought or writing skill. When, if ever, I develop a feel for it, and subject matter control, then, and only then, will I permit it to be read by others. In the meantime, at least it is something that I can go back to, and a place to save my morning thoughts.
Daily writing . That is at this point the only purpose. And a means to analyze who I am and out of that analysis perhaps discover a means to kick myself in my butt and move forward. I have been making some of the same promises to myself for now almost ten years. I know that by reading earlier writing, which I did this last week. Enough!
That reminded me of my sister's nostrils. Strange, right? I remember noting to myself when we were young girls that she had rectangular, almost square shaped nostrils. Mine are oval. Most nostrils are oval. I just did a moment's research by obsrving the actors on an episode of "The Practice" (black and white) and in the advertisements between scenes, and sure enough, they are all oval. That's what I thought! But when I referred to those oddly shaped nostrils to myself (and sometimes others, or her) in the context of their shape, I always used the term "flagpoles." Not "flags" but "flagpoles". My mind was too lazy to complete the thought. Clearly, I was thinking of the rectangular piece of cloth, not the pole on which it hung, but nevertheless I used a simple shorthand the first time I voiced the thought, a wrong shorthand that was a reminder of what I really meant, but not the accurate metaphor, and then, after having done it once, my mind was too lazy to rethink it, but simply, repetitively, used the same wrong phrase always. Why?
That is the question I never thought of, until lately. It was simply a proclivity to fall, easily, into an habitual pattern of thought or action, without thinking. An avoidance of being fully aware of what I was thinking, or doing, once done. A need for repetition? For habit? For familiarity? A fear of change? A fear of the untried? A fear of failure? An anesthetizing of full awareness? Can I take this one small habit and see in it what has become a life habit? And, in so doing, if it has indeed become so, by seeing it, change that habit?
I don't know.
I know that as a child I feared change, as do most children. But more so than others? When my mom wanted me to go to camp I fought her and she gave in. I remember my fear. I feel it again clenching its fist in the bottom of my stomach. I didn't want to go away. I hated the idea of being in a strange bed, with people I didn't know. They might not like me.
I was very small, and I was very shy. "Shy." I don't know what that means exactly, except that I remember being very afraid - of so much. I was afraid to talk to people I didn't know . I was afraid to telephone anyone other than best friends. I was afraid of my teachers. I recall in the second or third grade how horribly embarrassed I was when I was too afraid to raise my hand to ask for a toilet break and, finally, the sphincter loosened from the pressure, the damn broke, and warm yellow liquid wet my pants and then my chair and then spilled onto the floor. "Look - she peed on the floor!"
I was little, and the rest of the world was big - so very big - like a giant in a Grimm fairy tale. I liked The Brothers Grimm, but I don't know why. I recall that those tales were rather gruesome - trolls and giants and horrible creatures. I also liked the Oz books, not just "The Wizard of Oz" but also "Ozma" and "Rik -i-Tik" and the others - and they, too, were filled with witches and other horrible beings, including a frightening Nome King living in a deep cave surrounded by wraith like Nome creatures whose bodies flowed and swayed against and into the stone walls, along with their long streaming hair and beards.
But in my real life, I didn't want adventure. I wanted to stay home with my mom and dad (and sister, my sometime enemy). I was afraid to be away and I still remember the comfort of walking back into my house after school each day, petting the dog, pulling out a bag of chips and some dip.
Fear and that "shyness" (a failure of self worth) ruled so much of my life. I dreamed of being a popular cheerleader, but I never tried out. I was so certain that I could never have made it. Nevertheless, years later, I learned to run a marathon, and to do yoga, and lift weights.
Today, I avoid the "shoulds" in my life by retreating to my quilted, kitty occupied couch life. I love so much curling on the couch in my messy apartment, a soft drink or water (every so often a glass of Bordeaux) and the remote and my Blackberry and a good book and the newspaper (and a bottle of Excedrin for my occasionally tweaky lower back muscle) all within easy reach to my right on the coffee table, my cuddling kitty just at my left shoulder on the top of the couch with her soft paw reaching for my arm, a quilt on mylap, clicking past unfamiliar shows into those I have learned to know and love - even reruns of episodes.
On the other hand, last month I attended an open house at a nearby college for a possible MFA. In July I ran off to France again for two weeks during my birthday month, including not only a week in my familiar neighborhood, at the left bank hotel where I know the owner and all of the employees, but also, and first, a week in the Aveyron, first taking two trains (with a short and uncertain connection) to the unfamiliar town of Figeac for two nights, then renting there a stick shift car (not having driven one for years) and driving on narrow country roads to the town of Villeneuve d'Aveyron, turning right down an even narrower road to the tiny Village of Mayrinhagues, and spending the week in a stone cottage, lighting a gas stove, listening to the morning sound of birds and barking dogs.
On the other hand, I failed to visit the town of Conques because of my fear of taking that little stick shift car onto highways for the hour or two it would require, fearing the speed, and the large trucks bearing down on me.
So, who am I? Am I a creature of habit, someone who needs to feel and taste the familiar to avoid fear? Or an individualist who salivates at the adventure of untried experiences and places ?
In college I didn't try anything truly new (except for some sexual experimentation, but never "all the way" out of fear of either my reputation or my skill, or perhaps both). I never thought to take a semester in Europe, to travel, to join the Civil Rights movement ( or even notice it existed or to care if I had noticed) I didn't join or even recognize the womens movement. . I wanted to do something creative but ended up first getting a teaching certificate and then going to law school - as I have called it so often , taking the paths of least resistance suggested by my parents. Who could I have been if I had instead travelled with a backpack through Europe, used my writing skills in any disciplined fashion?
I went from College, to law school, to a pretend marriage with someone as immature as I (a marriage that was more like two little kids playing house and having tantrums, then a mutual relationship between two adults - we pretended to be in love, neither of us having the ability to even guess what that should really mean) - and all out of fear of saying "no" to my parents, or "no" to my husband. Out of that failure to say "no" I entered the practice of law and a marriage , and moved on to motherhood (ok - let's not put motherhood into that inadvertant category - I was never sure I wanted to be a mother, and started that family out of my husband's insistence, but from the moment when my first son kicked against my innards, motherhood has always been a joy - had I followed my independant conscience instead of my fear of making the wrong choice or losing my last chance, had I developed a significant sense of self worth, and therefore had I not married at that time, I would have never produced my two sons and daughter and they would not have produced my grandchildren - a thought that is inconceivable).
But, continuing on into my analysis of my life of fear and stagnation and inertia . In the practice of law, the only thing I was confident of was my intellect - not my ability to talk to people, or my ability to think on my feet, or to reason, or to manage subordinates, or to do any of the things required of me as a lawyer. I admired one of my partners' ability to do all of those things. I would sit in his office and listen to him, with confidence and that Ivy League arrogance and that equally Ivy League humorless but socially acceptable (and required) laugh, questioning and advising clients on the phone, and fear that I could never learn how to do that. (Now, I am proud of my ability to deal with clients, and equally proud that I never developed any of his other characteristics, including his crying need to do what is considered "appropriate")
Today, in the context of law and business I have somehow developed the confidence that I could, if given the time, learn how to do anything, and the confidence and skill to deal with the interpersonal mind games needed for client control and relationships.
So, who the Hell am I? To what extent do fear and inertia rule my life? To what extent am I fearless and independant and free?
Why do I spend so much time here, on the couch, instead of here, at the computer, or there, on the road running as I once did and thereby bringing back that Audrey Hepburn body?
Why do I let so many months elapse without having written?
Why do I develop so many ideas for travel articles, and never get to them?
This blog is clearly erratic, badly written, meandering all over the place, and written without thought or writing skill. When, if ever, I develop a feel for it, and subject matter control, then, and only then, will I permit it to be read by others. In the meantime, at least it is something that I can go back to, and a place to save my morning thoughts.
Daily writing . That is at this point the only purpose. And a means to analyze who I am and out of that analysis perhaps discover a means to kick myself in my butt and move forward. I have been making some of the same promises to myself for now almost ten years. I know that by reading earlier writing, which I did this last week. Enough!
Friday, October 23, 2009
Start Again - and From Now On
Haven't posted since November of last year. Several posts, and before that it was April of that year.
It's 8:12 a.m. and with the lights off the apartment is dismally dark. Rivulets run down my window and the sky is a thick blanket of grey-white merging with a misty grey Lake. With my long tie die t shirt and jeans on, the scale hit 146 this morning. Even allowing for a crapload of crap still stuck up the colon, and the weight of the clothing, that is still probably 144. The specter of 150 - a number I never thought I could ever reach is just over the horizon of a few more engorgements. Stop! I mean it - really - this time - Stop! Stop...stop.......stop.STOP!
The world is dismal and dank and dark and my life a dismal daily display of sameness....promises unkept, apartment unkempt, work undone.
I have a blog so I must use it.
The rivulets are more insistant now. Plummeting separate drops followed by streaks with long undulating tails racing down the window. Some are competing for space, crossing each other on the way down. There must be a wind, though the trees down in the park seem still - but the water runs at an angle.
There's a certain beauty in the juxtoposition of the still lushly green lawn and green haired trees just north of the flat metal of the bandshell roof, and the melange of orange and rose and dull yellow in the more tousled crowns of the stand of trees just west of the sculpture path.
Yesterday, as I lay on the couch willing myself up and at it (at something - whatever), the sky turned pink as the day rolled in over the lake. That was a day of more promise, if its entrance is indicative of anything other than the happenstance of the temperature and precipitation. I choose to believe that it is. But, then, what did I do yesterday? I worked on the MFA application, and in the process I read old articles, travel pieces, political prognostications, and a cuple of stories, dating back from before year 2000. Some were not bad, some were pretty good, and all of them reminded me of how long I have been promising myself that I will get to it, get at it, start writing, start reading, develop discipline, lay out an even slightly marked though meandering life path.
So today, perhaps there is a dankness that the pushy part of my personality needs to break through. A challenge. Better than the smooth sailing of a pink and clear sky? With the pinkness comes hope and a quiet smile and perhaps a lethargy. With the dark and the wet (and perhaps even some cold) comes a need to do something.
And 146 . If that isn't a challenge! And a horrific sign. A precursor. A future. A failure of hope. An evaporation of my still continuing self image - that interior self of Audrey Hepburn who just requires some discipline to break back out. Those pictures of myself on the refrigerator. That picture not on the frig but still clear in my head of me standing in a large room filled with revelers one evening at Club Med (at the age of forty plus), wearing tight and very short cut off jeans and a little tank top and looking damn good!
So what about today?
Well, I AM writing. Drivel, repetitive drivel, but nevertheless something. And in the blog. At least I HAVE a blog.
And then there is France. I have this insistant hunger in my stomach to be back on a narrow street with cobblestones, to sit at Cafe Panis with a glass of red wine, to talk about le truc and how I am desole' about quelque-chose, and to decide that I want to prendre un verre and apres ca peut etre something simple, and to read Le Monde, and sit on the second floor of Shakespeare & Co. with writers and readers and Lynn or Thirza and to feel a part of an arts community, to be someone with something to say, and the ability to say it with panache and metaphor .
Today is a day of writing drivel, expressing my unhappiness with my lot, and watching, still (now at 8:40) the hypnotizing streaks and drops racing down my window, and the glow of the red blinking light on the land line on which I never check messages, and feeling the accusing eyes behind me of the piles of papers and books on the table and before me on the desk and surrounding me on the book shelf and the floor, and the undone dishes slogging in the sink, and the tightness of my jeans over my stomach, and the filthy feeling in my mouth.
And then, I watch a quiet cat with large round eyes looking at me lovingly from the arm of the couch, and hear the soft movement of another snuggling in the basket on top of my blue and gold flowered cloth bag, and decide to close up this useless blog (till later?) and walk to Starbucks for some coffee, and then get to it................whatever...............get onto something.
It's 8:55. My teeth are clenching and scraping against each other. I realize I am hunched over the computer. Need to move things from the floor so I can wrap my legs around the wheeled table , move it closer to me, and sit up straight. If possible, it appears to have become even darker and more dismal outside and in this room.Only the computer screen and the hall light that I neglected to turn off last night when I dozed off after Greek food.
This day must start.
Now.
(Whatever).
It's 8:12 a.m. and with the lights off the apartment is dismally dark. Rivulets run down my window and the sky is a thick blanket of grey-white merging with a misty grey Lake. With my long tie die t shirt and jeans on, the scale hit 146 this morning. Even allowing for a crapload of crap still stuck up the colon, and the weight of the clothing, that is still probably 144. The specter of 150 - a number I never thought I could ever reach is just over the horizon of a few more engorgements. Stop! I mean it - really - this time - Stop! Stop...stop.......stop.STOP!
The world is dismal and dank and dark and my life a dismal daily display of sameness....promises unkept, apartment unkempt, work undone.
I have a blog so I must use it.
The rivulets are more insistant now. Plummeting separate drops followed by streaks with long undulating tails racing down the window. Some are competing for space, crossing each other on the way down. There must be a wind, though the trees down in the park seem still - but the water runs at an angle.
There's a certain beauty in the juxtoposition of the still lushly green lawn and green haired trees just north of the flat metal of the bandshell roof, and the melange of orange and rose and dull yellow in the more tousled crowns of the stand of trees just west of the sculpture path.
Yesterday, as I lay on the couch willing myself up and at it (at something - whatever), the sky turned pink as the day rolled in over the lake. That was a day of more promise, if its entrance is indicative of anything other than the happenstance of the temperature and precipitation. I choose to believe that it is. But, then, what did I do yesterday? I worked on the MFA application, and in the process I read old articles, travel pieces, political prognostications, and a cuple of stories, dating back from before year 2000. Some were not bad, some were pretty good, and all of them reminded me of how long I have been promising myself that I will get to it, get at it, start writing, start reading, develop discipline, lay out an even slightly marked though meandering life path.
So today, perhaps there is a dankness that the pushy part of my personality needs to break through. A challenge. Better than the smooth sailing of a pink and clear sky? With the pinkness comes hope and a quiet smile and perhaps a lethargy. With the dark and the wet (and perhaps even some cold) comes a need to do something.
And 146 . If that isn't a challenge! And a horrific sign. A precursor. A future. A failure of hope. An evaporation of my still continuing self image - that interior self of Audrey Hepburn who just requires some discipline to break back out. Those pictures of myself on the refrigerator. That picture not on the frig but still clear in my head of me standing in a large room filled with revelers one evening at Club Med (at the age of forty plus), wearing tight and very short cut off jeans and a little tank top and looking damn good!
So what about today?
Well, I AM writing. Drivel, repetitive drivel, but nevertheless something. And in the blog. At least I HAVE a blog.
And then there is France. I have this insistant hunger in my stomach to be back on a narrow street with cobblestones, to sit at Cafe Panis with a glass of red wine, to talk about le truc and how I am desole' about quelque-chose, and to decide that I want to prendre un verre and apres ca peut etre something simple, and to read Le Monde, and sit on the second floor of Shakespeare & Co. with writers and readers and Lynn or Thirza and to feel a part of an arts community, to be someone with something to say, and the ability to say it with panache and metaphor .
Today is a day of writing drivel, expressing my unhappiness with my lot, and watching, still (now at 8:40) the hypnotizing streaks and drops racing down my window, and the glow of the red blinking light on the land line on which I never check messages, and feeling the accusing eyes behind me of the piles of papers and books on the table and before me on the desk and surrounding me on the book shelf and the floor, and the undone dishes slogging in the sink, and the tightness of my jeans over my stomach, and the filthy feeling in my mouth.
And then, I watch a quiet cat with large round eyes looking at me lovingly from the arm of the couch, and hear the soft movement of another snuggling in the basket on top of my blue and gold flowered cloth bag, and decide to close up this useless blog (till later?) and walk to Starbucks for some coffee, and then get to it................whatever...............get onto something.
It's 8:55. My teeth are clenching and scraping against each other. I realize I am hunched over the computer. Need to move things from the floor so I can wrap my legs around the wheeled table , move it closer to me, and sit up straight. If possible, it appears to have become even darker and more dismal outside and in this room.Only the computer screen and the hall light that I neglected to turn off last night when I dozed off after Greek food.
This day must start.
Now.
(Whatever).
Monday, November 17, 2008
On Not Enough
Ok. So I think, in the middle of my second West Wing rerun this morning, I've just felt an "aha" thought shoot its way into my ear and take a seat somewhere in the cognitive portion of my brain. "Aha!" I watch tv from time to time (sometimes more than others) to anesthetize myself and escape. That's a fact. But why, when I watch West Wing reruns - which I started to do during the final weeks of the election - do I feel not so much a sinking into short term oblivion, but instead, a rising of some kind of need. Aha! I just watched C.J. Craig sitting there in front of the tv monitor with Josh Lyman (the Rahm Emannuel clone, I've just learned - talk about another aha! - sure - should have known - but that's another topic). Anyhow, they were sitting there, watching Jed Bartlet (my very favorite President in my dream world -at least, he was until Barack Obama came along - and he may very well take Jed Bartlet's place). And, as I was saying, Jed Bartlet is rehearsing for the State of the Union, and he doesn't look well, and C.J. is fondling and sometimes sipping from a paper cup which I assume contains coffee, and Josh say something like "He doesn't look so good - sweaty and not so good. Do you think he has swollen glands?" and C.J. says something like"Omigod! I forgot! I didn't check the President's glands today." And Josh says "Ok. Perhaps your joke reflex is what is keeping you from keeping a man." and then, "seriously." and they discuss it for a bit, until the President collapses onto the floor (I don't remember whether he has a flu, which is what the doctor thinks, or whether this is an early season precursor of the M.S. thing).
Anyhow, I started thinking. And "aha", I realized that the reason I started watching them so regularly, even to the point of putting on the dvds late at night when the early morning reruns weren't on was not only the reason I allowed myself to think and told others during the campaign -that I was so worried about the possibility of things going wrong, I wanted to watch a Presidential election that felt similar (with Matt Santos and Arnie Vinick - which I discovered later, after recognizing something in Santos' speeches and checking on google, WAS similar, since apparently Jimmie Smits had talked to Barack Obama as he was preparing for the role, and, also, David Alexrod was a close friend of the writer who wrote the character. Hmmmm). Anyhow, I used these reruns to dream, and to pray to whatever is out there (or just cross fingers and toes) that reality would follow fiction, since (what with the Obama/Smits thing) reality had already followed fiction which had followed reality etc.l - particularly when I saw, during that last Florida campaign spot, the one with Bill Clinton, that Matt Santos - or rather Jimmie Smits dressed as Matt Santos - was there on the stage with them!)
So, anyhow, that was one reason. I wanted to sink into the wonderful dream world of a Jed Bartlet presidency (rather than George Bush) flowing into a Matt Santos presidency, so I could stop being a basket case about what I feared was the very real possibility of a John McCain/Sarah Palin administration. It makes a shiver run up and down my spine just thinking of it now!
Now, for the second reason - the one I just hit on. The one that makes sense, seeing that I am also listening to the audiobook of Merril's biography of Obama while racewalking, and reading "Team of Rivals" when eating (finally - since I love Doris Kearns Goodwin, ever since I read "No Ordinary Time" years ago, and had dinner with her just before she spoke at the NAWBO annual luncheon - and have had the book on my shelf since right after it came out). Therefore, my reading has exacerbated my dissatisfaction with the lack of meaning in the parts of my life outside of my family. I am spectacularly satisfied with my children, their choices in spouses, and the grandchildren. I am not so satisfied with the rest.
Perhaps that is part of the proclivity for sloth and procrastination sometimes. I cannot get energized about helping a wealthy person get richer, or acquire more real property, or acquire or dispose of a business, or win a fight with another wealthy businessman. Yes, I'm good at it, and will need to continue doing it , probably forever, since I have yet to develop the discipline, regularity, and perhaps talent (I don't know - perhaps I have that, and have not had sufficient levels of the other qualities to accomplish anything with it). In any case, simply, my writing is going nowhere, certainly not where I can make a living at it.
And I remember when my high school friend/college roomate was first elected to Congress, and I went to D.C. for the installation, and walked into her office, and saw her happiness and energy. She was thinking, clearly, that now she could really do something - and I was thinking the same. And there she is, rapidly becoming a leader in the party, and appearing on the Rachel Maddow show, and being considered for the Senate. And here am I worrying about whether a client for whom I have just converted a four unit building into condominiums will be able to close two units in time to fight off his foreclosing bank! Wow! What an awesome issue with which to be involved.
And there is C.J., with whom I relate. Sure, she knows so much more than me. (Rather, all of the characters on West Wing are capable of rapidly, machine gun style, spewing well structured verbiage with historical, economic, literary and biblical content. They are all so damned smart and educated! -Or at least, the writers have made them so). I know I'm as smart as them. Absolutely! But I don't know anywhere near as much.
So, as I read (listen to) the Obama biography, and "Team of Rivals" and for the first time, ever (starting with my need to be "talked down" during the last months of this electoral cycle) I'm watching CNN and MSNBC and even Fox, and reading the important sections of thenewspaper (or more often reading them online - New York Times, Washington Post,Huffington, Politico.com, TNR, The Economist, etc.).............................as I do all of this, I feel that maybe I COULD learn enough - or I could have. But it's probably too late. I'm old.
And I want to be C.J. or Josh or Sam or any of them, or my friend Jan. I want to work in the White House, or in Congress, or in a think tank, or to be a reporter, or an important writer. I want to make a mark in this world. I had a taste of looking out at a crowd and talking, and feeling good at it, when I was president of a major business organization ten years ago. I liked it.
I feel good about talking to people about important issues. I feel good when I can help someone, even a homeless guy for whom I purchased some new blue jeans last year, or friends I can put together to help each other in business, or when I helped a friend last week to revise her proposed contract so she could retain some business with a government agency.
I write well. I talk well. I have a huge reserve of energy and strength when I decide that whatever I'm doing is important enough, or urgent enough (more often than not, it is the latter not the former - I'm too often in the wrong "Seven Habits" quadrant).
So, C.J. reminds me of who I could have been had I not been lazy, or willing to follow the path of least resistance.
Unlike Barack, I had it too easy for too long, and never had to gain the qualities that he needed in his life (discipline and organization and a strong need to better the world). He and I both have a strong intellect as well as intellectual curiosity . But he also has an ability to get things done and a much stronger, life moving desire to help others (I have that, but not often enough) . Barack has a unique background - a deep inner turmoil with too many competing definitions of self needing to be resolved, the lack of a father, a mother who idealized his absent father and his black heritage until he discovered through the real world the half truths he had been told, the experience of being the only black face in a white private school with Asians as the only historic minority , the experience of being a small child living among abject poverty in Indonesia, etc. etc. My background has been easy and simple - too simple - a loving and protective set of parents who paid my bills and covered bounced checks in college and told me it was ok when I was too shy to go to summer camp and therefore I didn't go, and were always there for me even well into my forties; growing up in a 98% Jewish and white neighborhood where almost everyone was just like me, my only problem being that I was short and late to develop and maybe too smart so I felt I could not be a part of the "popular" crowd even though, in retrospect, I now know that I probably could have; an intelligence and ability to learn quickly that helped me to become salutatorian in my high school class and to do well (though not spectacularly) in a very good college, and a nationally revered law school, all without ever working very hard at all . I never had to push myself, so I didn't, and therefore I grew up being successful, but only to a point, with the realization that I could have been very successful and changed the world (I truly believe that) but never did, due to my very own inability to kick myself in the pants and do what I had to do to get there!
When I wanted to finish Ulysses and go to the 100th Bloomsday in Dublin - I did.
When I wanted to become a part time citizen of the world by travelling periodically to France, and writing articles for an online publication, I did it (and still do). My dearth of recent articles come from my lack of writing them, not from the publication's refusal to accept them.
And now, with my becoming truly interested in the daily workings of the world, and observing Barack Obama's fantastic success, and working so hard for his election and worrying so much about it - I am back to watching West Wing, and living in a dream world where I am an integral part of Jed Bartlet's administration.
I speak French, because I'm good with languages, but I am far from beingh fluent, because it came too easy, and it is enough for my trips to Paris.
I write decent short stories, because I'm good with words, and my friends, and now, even a professional writer likes them - but I haven't written one since 2006, and have only sporadically edited the old ones for possible publication.
I write pretty good travel articles, because, again, I'm good with words, and particularly good when I'm writing about something that excites me (and going to France and sometimes to places like San Francisco and New York excites me) and I attended a course this Spring where I found that I am probably as good as those who make a living at it, and came back with a plan on how to take steps to get published, a plan that I have not even started to follow.
I was once a pretty good runner, because it came easy despite my having done nothing athletic until then I started running in my mid thirties, I ran farther and faster, and became semi competitive in my age group in my early forties, and then stopped doing it as often, and now, for a number of years, not at all, because it was easier not to, and I've gained weight and feel fat and slothful and no longer fit as I once did.
When I wanted to learn Polish, I quickly learned enough to talk to the folks at a wedding in Poland, and then forgot it through non use.
When I wanted to learn Russian as a teen, I did, and have now forgotten most of it.
I've written pretty decent poetry, and expository articles, and travel articles, and short stories, and legal documents, and I've journalled, and I've succeeded acquiring what my clients needed in negotiating rooms with antagonistic and aggressive lawyers, and I've accomplished legal tasks in areas where I had to learn from scratch, and developed friendships with people from many different parts of society.
I am a deep and wide well of potential - of unused potential - and I'm bursting at the seams with regret.
I've done so much, and still do, but never enough. Not nearly enough. And it's all from my own lack of doing.
This is not a good blog, but I had to get it out. It's very poorly written. Some of that bad writing that the journalling experts tell us is good for us anyhow. I've been writing for an hour. I shouldn't publish it, but I will, and then I'll go get some coffee, and I'll perhaps make today a better one (I've told myself that so often - but here again I have that blank notebook that is a new day,and the sky I see through the window when I raise my eyes from my laptop starts out at the horizon with a thick grey cloud but with the gold of a morning sun breakng through since up near the top I can see the orb of the sun through some thin layers, and through an opening further down a bright blinding light escapes, but just barely. It is visible in front of a backdrop of cloud , and emits some rays that it aims downward towards the lake . The planetarium is in dark relief at the far end of its equally dark spit of land, but the lake around it is a smooth surface on which someone has painted several long, narrow streaks of shimmering light starkly apparent under the dark sky at the horizon and the dull blue grey of the rest of its quiet speckled surface.
It's 9:24 and time to start the day.
Anyhow, I started thinking. And "aha", I realized that the reason I started watching them so regularly, even to the point of putting on the dvds late at night when the early morning reruns weren't on was not only the reason I allowed myself to think and told others during the campaign -that I was so worried about the possibility of things going wrong, I wanted to watch a Presidential election that felt similar (with Matt Santos and Arnie Vinick - which I discovered later, after recognizing something in Santos' speeches and checking on google, WAS similar, since apparently Jimmie Smits had talked to Barack Obama as he was preparing for the role, and, also, David Alexrod was a close friend of the writer who wrote the character. Hmmmm). Anyhow, I used these reruns to dream, and to pray to whatever is out there (or just cross fingers and toes) that reality would follow fiction, since (what with the Obama/Smits thing) reality had already followed fiction which had followed reality etc.l - particularly when I saw, during that last Florida campaign spot, the one with Bill Clinton, that Matt Santos - or rather Jimmie Smits dressed as Matt Santos - was there on the stage with them!)
So, anyhow, that was one reason. I wanted to sink into the wonderful dream world of a Jed Bartlet presidency (rather than George Bush) flowing into a Matt Santos presidency, so I could stop being a basket case about what I feared was the very real possibility of a John McCain/Sarah Palin administration. It makes a shiver run up and down my spine just thinking of it now!
Now, for the second reason - the one I just hit on. The one that makes sense, seeing that I am also listening to the audiobook of Merril's biography of Obama while racewalking, and reading "Team of Rivals" when eating (finally - since I love Doris Kearns Goodwin, ever since I read "No Ordinary Time" years ago, and had dinner with her just before she spoke at the NAWBO annual luncheon - and have had the book on my shelf since right after it came out). Therefore, my reading has exacerbated my dissatisfaction with the lack of meaning in the parts of my life outside of my family. I am spectacularly satisfied with my children, their choices in spouses, and the grandchildren. I am not so satisfied with the rest.
Perhaps that is part of the proclivity for sloth and procrastination sometimes. I cannot get energized about helping a wealthy person get richer, or acquire more real property, or acquire or dispose of a business, or win a fight with another wealthy businessman. Yes, I'm good at it, and will need to continue doing it , probably forever, since I have yet to develop the discipline, regularity, and perhaps talent (I don't know - perhaps I have that, and have not had sufficient levels of the other qualities to accomplish anything with it). In any case, simply, my writing is going nowhere, certainly not where I can make a living at it.
And I remember when my high school friend/college roomate was first elected to Congress, and I went to D.C. for the installation, and walked into her office, and saw her happiness and energy. She was thinking, clearly, that now she could really do something - and I was thinking the same. And there she is, rapidly becoming a leader in the party, and appearing on the Rachel Maddow show, and being considered for the Senate. And here am I worrying about whether a client for whom I have just converted a four unit building into condominiums will be able to close two units in time to fight off his foreclosing bank! Wow! What an awesome issue with which to be involved.
And there is C.J., with whom I relate. Sure, she knows so much more than me. (Rather, all of the characters on West Wing are capable of rapidly, machine gun style, spewing well structured verbiage with historical, economic, literary and biblical content. They are all so damned smart and educated! -Or at least, the writers have made them so). I know I'm as smart as them. Absolutely! But I don't know anywhere near as much.
So, as I read (listen to) the Obama biography, and "Team of Rivals" and for the first time, ever (starting with my need to be "talked down" during the last months of this electoral cycle) I'm watching CNN and MSNBC and even Fox, and reading the important sections of thenewspaper (or more often reading them online - New York Times, Washington Post,Huffington, Politico.com, TNR, The Economist, etc.).............................as I do all of this, I feel that maybe I COULD learn enough - or I could have. But it's probably too late. I'm old.
And I want to be C.J. or Josh or Sam or any of them, or my friend Jan. I want to work in the White House, or in Congress, or in a think tank, or to be a reporter, or an important writer. I want to make a mark in this world. I had a taste of looking out at a crowd and talking, and feeling good at it, when I was president of a major business organization ten years ago. I liked it.
I feel good about talking to people about important issues. I feel good when I can help someone, even a homeless guy for whom I purchased some new blue jeans last year, or friends I can put together to help each other in business, or when I helped a friend last week to revise her proposed contract so she could retain some business with a government agency.
I write well. I talk well. I have a huge reserve of energy and strength when I decide that whatever I'm doing is important enough, or urgent enough (more often than not, it is the latter not the former - I'm too often in the wrong "Seven Habits" quadrant).
So, C.J. reminds me of who I could have been had I not been lazy, or willing to follow the path of least resistance.
Unlike Barack, I had it too easy for too long, and never had to gain the qualities that he needed in his life (discipline and organization and a strong need to better the world). He and I both have a strong intellect as well as intellectual curiosity . But he also has an ability to get things done and a much stronger, life moving desire to help others (I have that, but not often enough) . Barack has a unique background - a deep inner turmoil with too many competing definitions of self needing to be resolved, the lack of a father, a mother who idealized his absent father and his black heritage until he discovered through the real world the half truths he had been told, the experience of being the only black face in a white private school with Asians as the only historic minority , the experience of being a small child living among abject poverty in Indonesia, etc. etc. My background has been easy and simple - too simple - a loving and protective set of parents who paid my bills and covered bounced checks in college and told me it was ok when I was too shy to go to summer camp and therefore I didn't go, and were always there for me even well into my forties; growing up in a 98% Jewish and white neighborhood where almost everyone was just like me, my only problem being that I was short and late to develop and maybe too smart so I felt I could not be a part of the "popular" crowd even though, in retrospect, I now know that I probably could have; an intelligence and ability to learn quickly that helped me to become salutatorian in my high school class and to do well (though not spectacularly) in a very good college, and a nationally revered law school, all without ever working very hard at all . I never had to push myself, so I didn't, and therefore I grew up being successful, but only to a point, with the realization that I could have been very successful and changed the world (I truly believe that) but never did, due to my very own inability to kick myself in the pants and do what I had to do to get there!
When I wanted to finish Ulysses and go to the 100th Bloomsday in Dublin - I did.
When I wanted to become a part time citizen of the world by travelling periodically to France, and writing articles for an online publication, I did it (and still do). My dearth of recent articles come from my lack of writing them, not from the publication's refusal to accept them.
And now, with my becoming truly interested in the daily workings of the world, and observing Barack Obama's fantastic success, and working so hard for his election and worrying so much about it - I am back to watching West Wing, and living in a dream world where I am an integral part of Jed Bartlet's administration.
I speak French, because I'm good with languages, but I am far from beingh fluent, because it came too easy, and it is enough for my trips to Paris.
I write decent short stories, because I'm good with words, and my friends, and now, even a professional writer likes them - but I haven't written one since 2006, and have only sporadically edited the old ones for possible publication.
I write pretty good travel articles, because, again, I'm good with words, and particularly good when I'm writing about something that excites me (and going to France and sometimes to places like San Francisco and New York excites me) and I attended a course this Spring where I found that I am probably as good as those who make a living at it, and came back with a plan on how to take steps to get published, a plan that I have not even started to follow.
I was once a pretty good runner, because it came easy despite my having done nothing athletic until then I started running in my mid thirties, I ran farther and faster, and became semi competitive in my age group in my early forties, and then stopped doing it as often, and now, for a number of years, not at all, because it was easier not to, and I've gained weight and feel fat and slothful and no longer fit as I once did.
When I wanted to learn Polish, I quickly learned enough to talk to the folks at a wedding in Poland, and then forgot it through non use.
When I wanted to learn Russian as a teen, I did, and have now forgotten most of it.
I've written pretty decent poetry, and expository articles, and travel articles, and short stories, and legal documents, and I've journalled, and I've succeeded acquiring what my clients needed in negotiating rooms with antagonistic and aggressive lawyers, and I've accomplished legal tasks in areas where I had to learn from scratch, and developed friendships with people from many different parts of society.
I am a deep and wide well of potential - of unused potential - and I'm bursting at the seams with regret.
I've done so much, and still do, but never enough. Not nearly enough. And it's all from my own lack of doing.
This is not a good blog, but I had to get it out. It's very poorly written. Some of that bad writing that the journalling experts tell us is good for us anyhow. I've been writing for an hour. I shouldn't publish it, but I will, and then I'll go get some coffee, and I'll perhaps make today a better one (I've told myself that so often - but here again I have that blank notebook that is a new day,and the sky I see through the window when I raise my eyes from my laptop starts out at the horizon with a thick grey cloud but with the gold of a morning sun breakng through since up near the top I can see the orb of the sun through some thin layers, and through an opening further down a bright blinding light escapes, but just barely. It is visible in front of a backdrop of cloud , and emits some rays that it aims downward towards the lake . The planetarium is in dark relief at the far end of its equally dark spit of land, but the lake around it is a smooth surface on which someone has painted several long, narrow streaks of shimmering light starkly apparent under the dark sky at the horizon and the dull blue grey of the rest of its quiet speckled surface.
It's 9:24 and time to start the day.
Sunday, November 16, 2008
On Creativity and Sloth
Random thoughts.
Just now I am watching a biography of Janis Joplin,running on the tv just to the left of my shoulder as I face the computer screen, and as she rehearsed “Down on Me” with the Holding Company, and I turned to watch the grainy black and white video and felt her energy and heard her strong voice, so full of life and vigor and feeling, I felt again (as I did the last time I heard Janis – months ago- and danced to her in my living room) – I felt again an excitement, a thrill, something in my stomach and chest, wanting to be , maybe not her, but someone like her (the full of life, funny, powerful, talented part of her , without the drugs and insecurities, of course)– remembering me in College – wearing my tight or short clothes, my long hair, my white lips and eye makeup, drinking beer and dancing with a wildness that I had not been able to show in high school (or I had been afraid to show then)………..it comes back………….the exciting freedom of movement – and this has been a morning for that, since prior to this biography, there had been one of Jimi Hendrix, and though I came into the show during his final phase, just before his death, nevertheless, during the few moments when his music was played, I felt a bit of that emotional rise, but not so much. Now, with Janis, I want to move all of the crap from the floor and surfaces of my living room, all of the bags and files and books and boxes and furniture, to make room to move, and to put Janis on the stereo (on the Bose), and let my hair out of its ponytailed band, and just move!
And I know that both Jimi and Janis were sad, lonely people who died young of drug overdoses. But when they flamed, when their fires were still lit, their flames were so blindingly bright that you couldn’t stop yourself from being drawn to them, and moving your body and feeling your soul rise from the sheer excitement of their sounds and their personas. The purple pants and the feathers and the high full notes followed by gutteral emotion or the squealing and erratic guitar riffs -just writing about them brings back those sounds and feelings swirling through my aging body and catching in my throat.
Now, interestingly, when they (and I) were in our primes, I had no interest in them – I think that I felt they were too far out there. I loved the beatles and such. I loved music you could dance to. My wild abandon was mostly relegated to the dance floor.
But in recent years, whenever I hear their music, I regret having missed them – I am angry at myself for having let myself miss it – and I feel that emotional high, that almost orgasmic need to move, that I should have felt back then.
And I wonder, had I let myself feel that way when my life was as blank a slate as this Sunday started out being - back then, would I have skipped law school, and taken a guitar and a notebook and a pen and wandered through Europe? (Instead of sitting on a beach in high school with a ukulele for a short time, and sitting in my living room with a soprano recorder and some bongos, but otherwise following the path of least resistance through college, and a teaching degree, and law school, and employment). Would I? I feel so much stronger a connection to that life then my current life.
If I had let myself succumb to the joy and excitement of Jopin and Hendrix would my life have moved into the creative mode that I now regret having bypassed? That I keep promising myself I will find and work with ( but then put aside for tv or the newspaper of a client project? )
Yesterday, as I fast-walked between three and four miles to my daughter’s house (to sit with her cat recovering from surgery – maybe a bit more on that later) , I listened to that Obama biography by David Mendell – “From Promise to Power” – and heard about his desire to leave the world a better place then when he entered it – and the optimism inherited from his mother, along with her conviction that there was good in everyone, and a commonality to all humanity, and I related to those feelings, as I have always felt the same, and I remembered having first heard him in 2004, and read his book in 2005, and how I loved the beauty of his way with words and the beauty of his introspection and raw emotion; and then I came to the part of the book where Mendell described Barack’s proclivity to write down his thoughts and observations and his feelings and insecurities in a notebook, and that he was doing such as early as his college days in New York, and that he later continued to do the same in a leather bound notebook, and that he probably wrote (and perhaps still writes) short fiction, and how he used those notes to write “Dreams of My Father”
And I hated myself for having umpteen partially filled notebooks, sometimes written in with regularity for days, weeks, or perhaps months at a time, and then abandoned for many more months at a time, and the good stuff I often find when re-reading them but hardly ever use for any regular writing activity, and my disciplined starts and lazy stops, two steps forward, one step back, perhaps then another step back, the short stories I haven’t written since 2006, the books of short stories I have intended to read in order to learn my craft, and the political books and great fiction that I sometimes read and sometimes just start, all as contrasted to Barack’s control and energy and discipline and organization and voracious and diverse reading habits, and his writing (which left me in tears when I first read “Dreams”) .
And so here I am sitting at my desk, looking out at what appears will become a cold, overcast dismal day smothered with a blanket of thick and dreary clouds hiding the sun and sky. Here I am, once again with another blank canvas - another Sunday – another day in which I could possibly move forward and accomplish something and do something fulfilling or useful – another Sunday, now at 7:37 a.m., and this morning I have so far slowly and slothfully and sadly risen from my quilt – my warm, thick, slightly dirty quilt where I awoke to feel the soft, sweet, silky curve of my kitty China’s body (sheesh – is there some reason for all of that alliteration?), watched some tv, spotted the sky beginning to lighten from across the room and therefore moved to my desk where I could look out across my laptop towards the Lake – and at first saw that the sky was crowned with narrow steel grey clouds floating thinly across its top, over a deep and wide strip of dark orange at the horizon, below which the bright rows of lights in Millennium Park glowed and sparkled out of a dark background – and it felt exciting and calming at one and the same time, but I didn’t feel that I had the strength or the muse to describe it – not this time - so I took out my camera and photographed it , and took photographs maybe 10 minutes apart as the sky lightened, and it remained beautiful for a while, until the day really arrived with its dingy presence.
But now,as I write, it is 7:56 a.m., and up to the left, just at the edge of the Prudential, a yellow glow started shining through the grey………only to be swallowed up again.
I think I’ll walk across the street to get something to eat – my usual excuse to walk out of my lair, and put off starting anything – then I’ll return and perhaps put on some Janis and dance, then read some of the morning’s newspaper, or go upstairs to a treadmill with the Obama book, or go outside with jogging shoes with the Obama book, or maybe just wait till almost 11:00 when I have a work out scheduled with Luis, my trainer, or……………..
It’s an open book, this Sunday, with many blank pages, just a few less than when I started this entry…………..and I haven’t blown it yet………..net yet………………….
Just now I am watching a biography of Janis Joplin,running on the tv just to the left of my shoulder as I face the computer screen, and as she rehearsed “Down on Me” with the Holding Company, and I turned to watch the grainy black and white video and felt her energy and heard her strong voice, so full of life and vigor and feeling, I felt again (as I did the last time I heard Janis – months ago- and danced to her in my living room) – I felt again an excitement, a thrill, something in my stomach and chest, wanting to be , maybe not her, but someone like her (the full of life, funny, powerful, talented part of her , without the drugs and insecurities, of course)– remembering me in College – wearing my tight or short clothes, my long hair, my white lips and eye makeup, drinking beer and dancing with a wildness that I had not been able to show in high school (or I had been afraid to show then)………..it comes back………….the exciting freedom of movement – and this has been a morning for that, since prior to this biography, there had been one of Jimi Hendrix, and though I came into the show during his final phase, just before his death, nevertheless, during the few moments when his music was played, I felt a bit of that emotional rise, but not so much. Now, with Janis, I want to move all of the crap from the floor and surfaces of my living room, all of the bags and files and books and boxes and furniture, to make room to move, and to put Janis on the stereo (on the Bose), and let my hair out of its ponytailed band, and just move!
And I know that both Jimi and Janis were sad, lonely people who died young of drug overdoses. But when they flamed, when their fires were still lit, their flames were so blindingly bright that you couldn’t stop yourself from being drawn to them, and moving your body and feeling your soul rise from the sheer excitement of their sounds and their personas. The purple pants and the feathers and the high full notes followed by gutteral emotion or the squealing and erratic guitar riffs -just writing about them brings back those sounds and feelings swirling through my aging body and catching in my throat.
Now, interestingly, when they (and I) were in our primes, I had no interest in them – I think that I felt they were too far out there. I loved the beatles and such. I loved music you could dance to. My wild abandon was mostly relegated to the dance floor.
But in recent years, whenever I hear their music, I regret having missed them – I am angry at myself for having let myself miss it – and I feel that emotional high, that almost orgasmic need to move, that I should have felt back then.
And I wonder, had I let myself feel that way when my life was as blank a slate as this Sunday started out being - back then, would I have skipped law school, and taken a guitar and a notebook and a pen and wandered through Europe? (Instead of sitting on a beach in high school with a ukulele for a short time, and sitting in my living room with a soprano recorder and some bongos, but otherwise following the path of least resistance through college, and a teaching degree, and law school, and employment). Would I? I feel so much stronger a connection to that life then my current life.
If I had let myself succumb to the joy and excitement of Jopin and Hendrix would my life have moved into the creative mode that I now regret having bypassed? That I keep promising myself I will find and work with ( but then put aside for tv or the newspaper of a client project? )
Yesterday, as I fast-walked between three and four miles to my daughter’s house (to sit with her cat recovering from surgery – maybe a bit more on that later) , I listened to that Obama biography by David Mendell – “From Promise to Power” – and heard about his desire to leave the world a better place then when he entered it – and the optimism inherited from his mother, along with her conviction that there was good in everyone, and a commonality to all humanity, and I related to those feelings, as I have always felt the same, and I remembered having first heard him in 2004, and read his book in 2005, and how I loved the beauty of his way with words and the beauty of his introspection and raw emotion; and then I came to the part of the book where Mendell described Barack’s proclivity to write down his thoughts and observations and his feelings and insecurities in a notebook, and that he was doing such as early as his college days in New York, and that he later continued to do the same in a leather bound notebook, and that he probably wrote (and perhaps still writes) short fiction, and how he used those notes to write “Dreams of My Father”
And I hated myself for having umpteen partially filled notebooks, sometimes written in with regularity for days, weeks, or perhaps months at a time, and then abandoned for many more months at a time, and the good stuff I often find when re-reading them but hardly ever use for any regular writing activity, and my disciplined starts and lazy stops, two steps forward, one step back, perhaps then another step back, the short stories I haven’t written since 2006, the books of short stories I have intended to read in order to learn my craft, and the political books and great fiction that I sometimes read and sometimes just start, all as contrasted to Barack’s control and energy and discipline and organization and voracious and diverse reading habits, and his writing (which left me in tears when I first read “Dreams”) .
And so here I am sitting at my desk, looking out at what appears will become a cold, overcast dismal day smothered with a blanket of thick and dreary clouds hiding the sun and sky. Here I am, once again with another blank canvas - another Sunday – another day in which I could possibly move forward and accomplish something and do something fulfilling or useful – another Sunday, now at 7:37 a.m., and this morning I have so far slowly and slothfully and sadly risen from my quilt – my warm, thick, slightly dirty quilt where I awoke to feel the soft, sweet, silky curve of my kitty China’s body (sheesh – is there some reason for all of that alliteration?), watched some tv, spotted the sky beginning to lighten from across the room and therefore moved to my desk where I could look out across my laptop towards the Lake – and at first saw that the sky was crowned with narrow steel grey clouds floating thinly across its top, over a deep and wide strip of dark orange at the horizon, below which the bright rows of lights in Millennium Park glowed and sparkled out of a dark background – and it felt exciting and calming at one and the same time, but I didn’t feel that I had the strength or the muse to describe it – not this time - so I took out my camera and photographed it , and took photographs maybe 10 minutes apart as the sky lightened, and it remained beautiful for a while, until the day really arrived with its dingy presence.
But now,as I write, it is 7:56 a.m., and up to the left, just at the edge of the Prudential, a yellow glow started shining through the grey………only to be swallowed up again.
I think I’ll walk across the street to get something to eat – my usual excuse to walk out of my lair, and put off starting anything – then I’ll return and perhaps put on some Janis and dance, then read some of the morning’s newspaper, or go upstairs to a treadmill with the Obama book, or go outside with jogging shoes with the Obama book, or maybe just wait till almost 11:00 when I have a work out scheduled with Luis, my trainer, or……………..
It’s an open book, this Sunday, with many blank pages, just a few less than when I started this entry…………..and I haven’t blown it yet………..net yet………………….
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
My aunt sent me another bunch of those e mails this morning. You know the kind. "This is a keeper" and "This is important" etc. Jokes and cute pictures and thoughts of the day set to flowing pictures of water and mountains, surrounded by smarmy music. And I am tempted to write to her, but it would get nasty, and she doesn't deserve it. She is retired and has time on her hands, and thinks this stuff is cute and /or important, and that the rest of us are grateful to receive it. I need to figure out a way to tell her, without hurting her, that each day I have to rapidly erase 20-50 e mails, a number of times each day, so my box does not get clogged and refuse to admit others; that I am feeling overwhelmed with projects I have to do to serve my clients, with documents I need to review for volunteer work, with my current resolve to again to fit in some daily work out time (which has been difficult for so long, but at my age is truly a life and death issue ) with the need to do my billing (of which I am solely in charge, and if I don't do it, then there is no money coming in, and bills cannot be paid), and the fact that my apartment is an unsightly pile of clothing and books and files and papers since I can't (or won't) find the time to clean it up - probably because when I do get to it, periodically, I cannot let myself just do a half job, but need to really organize things so that it takes a very, very long time - time that I just don't have. So I'll just hit the "delete" button over and over, and take a deep breath, and get up to the treadmill for a bit, maybe, and grab a healthy 250 calorie Vivanno with green tea matcha powder across the street at Starbucks, and then work on revising the joint venture agreement that I really have to complete by this afternoon, and enter time into the Timeslips program so that I can print out at least a few bills, and read two files for my volunteer work because it is overdue, and review a client's proposed consulting agreement that another lawyer revised by rewriting so I have to look at it and my earlier draft side by side rather than reviewing redline sections, and do a favor for a friend/business contact by going through her documents with a litigation attorney to find out if she has a prayer at resurrecting a judgment, and go through the rest of the loan documents for a client facing foreclosure, and call a client whose check to me bounced but who I cannot ignore because he needs me to help him finish the development and sale of units in his condominium before his foreclosing lender can take further steps against him, and go back to editing some of my short stories so that I can stop avoiding the self publishing company representative who keeps calling and put them together, finally, into a book, and write the three travel articles for Bonjourparis.com that I took notes on during my last trip to France a month or so ago, and find the time to wash my face and brush my teeth and get a salad for lunch, and call my son to see if he still wants to go out this evening to celebrate his birthday, and ...........................................
No, Aunt G, I really don't want to yell at you - but I cannot read your cute, fun, important e mails. I hope you understand.
No, Aunt G, I really don't want to yell at you - but I cannot read your cute, fun, important e mails. I hope you understand.
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