-->

Pages

We Used to Speak the Same Language

Recently one of my friends asked for some help, a bit of assistance with a project. He/she told me that if I went to the museum and looked at the sculpture in viewing room #4 and then went to the gift shop and purchased the replica of the key depicted in that sculpture, I would have all I needed to complete the requested favor/task.

Being a friend, I did indeed go to the museum and found viewing room #4 but alas, there was not a single sculpture in that gallery. So I inquired of my friend about this mystery. She/he was unable to get back to me until later that evening, but then told me that I had gone to the wrong museum but not to worry the same key could be found in a local art store near where I lived. She seemed a bit stressed, so I did not make a point of the "wrong museum" being the one he had originally directed me to.

I googled the location of the art store and discovered it was not anywhere near where I lived but if one store had the key then why not another. After a bit of searching, I found an establishment with the same key and I picked it up the following day. I then called my friend again, only to discover that he had gone out of town until next Monday, which apparently was why she needed my help in the first place.

The key, however, had to be delivered by this Friday in order for the task to be successfully completed. Since my friend would not be back in town until Monday and she had not given me the destination for the delivery, it would seem like all was for naught. Further, he was not answering her cell phone.

Making one last attempt to salvage the endeavor, I called my friend's colleague from work and inquired about his knowledge, if any, of the process and discovered that the whole enterprise had been rethought and not only was delivery of the key not needed by Friday, apparently the key was not longer going to be required at all. So in the end my help was entirely unnecessary.

I have been sitting here reviewing this little escapade, which briefly goes something like this: a favor is asked of me, the favor is outlined with incorrect information, when I attempt to comply using initial instructions and discover the bad link, new allegedly simpler information is discovered, which too proves to be inaccurate. Through my own devices, I managed to acquire necessary item, which cannot be delivered in a timely manner, but which is no longer needed in any case. My friend managed to delivered incorrect information or instructions each and every time she spoke to me and neglected to tell me the entire project was no longer necessary before she up and left town.

After due consideration, I have come to the conclusion that I can shorten my list of friends by one inconsiderate flake and I now consider the entire adventure a complete success.

Big Week

After nearly a fortnight of prep, negotiation and staging; this week big progress will be made on the new digs. Not only will the plumber come by to fix the annoying leak but the donated car is being moved out of the garage, internet and phone go in and the book dealer will spend a whole day cataloging and packing up a goodly portion of the 4000+ tomes in the apartment.

This is the week to satisfy the most ardent list-maker, numerous items will get the inky slash-thru before any sabbath doth arise again. I myself am not so lexiconic, but I have friends. And I am not critical of the need to chronicle a life, personally I don't worry so much about what I may have missed.

Hopefully by the end of this week an actual move-in date will be in sight and the settling process shall begin after over a year of having a key to a storage locker always at hand, whilst periodically scratching my head over the unanswerable question: "Where the hell did I put that?"

I often need to admonish myself that I am indeed the architect of this life style and creator of the confusion but the conversations in the mirror don't always go so well in the seventh or thirteenth month of the same discussion. She loves me, she loves me not. She loves me not, who cares anymore. Particle, wave, flour, corn, boxer, brief...

Another new chapter begins, already I am knee deep in the preamble.
----
art credit: Ron Mueck (Australian, b. 1958). Big Man, 2000. Mixed media, 80 x 47 1/2 x 80 1/2 in. (203.2 x 120.7 x 204.5 cm). Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.

On the Other Hand

Call it ying & yang, woof & wharf, dark & light or simply balance. It does seem that all things trend back to the center over the long term. The only question is how patient can we be when seemingly at the other end of the happiness continuum? But metaphysics is not my topic today, rather synchronicity.

I have been searching for the answer to a particular question a good friend had recently posed to me. Suddenly with an ever so quiet eureka! it came to me. Like so many "answers" it was informationally correct but implementally incomplete. I knew what to do but I did not have the means to complete the task. The following day, she called to tell me about a message she had received from another friend who told her exactly where to find what I had been seeking for her. He has no clue we were looking; she was unaware of my answer without an answer. It all just fell into place--synchronous.

Then another friend offers me the second draft of his novel to read. Here I find not only a needed aspect for my own writing but a story that deeply parallels my own. Reinforcement is a powerful motivator. Knowing others are wandering on the same mountain as you, even though their path be different.

A good antidote to yesterday's thoughts. May all creatures be happy.

In-attentive-ness

As I have said before in this space, one of the clarion calls of my existence is the phrase: pay attention. Notice it is not written Pay Attention! nor Pay Attention! or even Pay Attention!!! I simply and quietly attempt in my life to attend to those thoughts, words and actions that present themselves to me during the course of my day. In particular, I try very hard to practice close attention when I am speaking with someone I like, love and/or treasure.

I do admit that some part of this attending fervor of mine is a learned behavior from my years of training as a psychologist. But clinical techniques are really not necessary in the ordinary course of going about one's life; what is required is a desire and a commitment to really paying attention to what is presented in hearing, seeing, smelling, tasting, touching and other.

One of my current writing projects is thematically all about this topic, the plot and story build on attending to the tiniest of motes of action and information that pass before the eyes, ears and heart of my protagonist. Think of the word "attend" not in the sense of attending a performance but of attending to a person. Being in service to them, to look after, to minister to. The exact oppose of ignoring or dismissing. This is the quality I am speaking of and fostering moment-to-moment in my interaction with others.

Which brings me to an observation about the variety of my acquaintances. Once again I refer to my recently ended journey on which I saw and interacted with so many friends both old and new. Now I am back in the Bay Area and once again in the midst of my academic cohorts. I noticed in my travels that while my friends were busy with their full and active lives, they had time or we could make time for intense, meaningful, in-depth conversation and friendship. If I attended to them, they were able to reciprocate, even if generally speaking such interactions were not the norm in their everyday life.

Sure most of the human contacts in my life have college educations. There are many big brains outside of my academic tribe and many more big hearts. What surprises me then, is that within the large cerebrum, fully lettered gaggle of friends there are several examples of gross non-attending. I don't just mean the stereotypical absent-minded professor. I mean fully functioning, highly educated, well-meaning friends, who just don't have a clue. They seem to talk the talk and grok the written word, but in action they simply fail. They either will not or cannot pay attention to what so many of us find important. Ideas and feelings they give lip service to, seem not to actually be of any significance in the day-to-day conduct of our friendship.

What I feel about these friendships is sadness. What I hope to communicate to them is simply nothing because I know none of these individuals will ever read this blog. To those who do, let's have lunch, I have something wonderful to tell you.

Writing for an Audience or Something Like That



Writing gives you the illusion of control, and then you realize it's just an illusion, that people are going to bring their own stuff into it. -- David Sedarus

This has been an interesting week for communication and failure to communicate. I have shared my writing with several individuals and found that where I was going with a piece or a scene was not necessarily where my reader found themselves.

One wonders, I wonder, how much of my stories are going to be transmitted as they are in my brain and how much will just be fodder for the fantasies and mindscape of a reader. For instance, I told three people the same story with four parts. I was clear that the writing was true but not accurate. This literary genre being variously called: non-fiction fiction, nearly fiction, or the old artistic license. As Mark Twain is said to have said:

The difference between fiction and non-fiction is that fiction must be absolutely believable.

So I told the four part story to the three people and each found some part believable as fact or at least non-fiction. However, each listener found different combinations of fiction versus non-fiction in the elements of my tale. Apparently we decide which is right and which is an illusion.

Which leads me to another strange discovery on the subject of the written word. Being back in a stable environment, meaning I am going to be here for a time measured in months not days, perhaps even years not months. Being in such a place, I have launched myself onto an internet dating site or two. On one of these I use "Poker Shrink" as my screen name. One member of the female variety actually found a way to make Poker Shrink obscene. Yes, there actually is an X-rated interpretation of that moniker. A large dill pickle if you get it; don't try too hard she was a really inventive ....... character.

So the moral of this pondering -- Don't be careful what you write, it's all going to be interpreted completely differently by whomever reads it anyway. Speaking of which, you know a good plastic surgeon could fix that.

A Different Sunday

While today is Super Sunday for many of you, for myself and a small gathering of my close friends here in San Francisco, the celebration will be of a different nature. Thank all you facebookers and calendar keepers for noticing and particular thanks to Sir Paul for the wishes.

A Cleat in Time


There comes a time in every man's life and I've had many of them.

-- Casey Stengel

I am not a big resolution person. I don't make dramatic changes in my life or lifestyle. 'A line in the sand' always seemed a fairly impermanent metaphor for taking any sort of critical moral stand. Minor tweaks or slight course corrections seem to work better for my phlegmatic demeanor.

However, I have had friends argue that the above analysis flies in the face of certain realities, not the least of which are my fairly frequent employment changes and my fluid homestead history. Add to that I have just added a six month undomiciled meander to my life record.

Pondering this last evening while meditating in a damp San Francisco garden, I was reminded of a dream I had during what passes for a life crisis in my world. This was back in the mid 90's. The dream involved a sailing metaphor. For the sailors in the audience, I am not one. I am not a boater of any sort, so I do not know from whence this imagery arose, but it did.

I felt at that time that I had spent a number of years a bit adrift. I had a job and several serial relationships but there really was no direction in my life. I wasn't headed anywhere in particular. In the dream I was alone on a single masted sailboat with the large sail untrimmed and lolling in the wind. I caste a single line out to a cleat. I felt as if I got just a bit of trim into the sail I could or would begin to navigate the course of my life, instead of skimming around the surface at the behest of whatever wind might blow. Now mind you, these "winds" were providing me with a fairly interesting life at that time but a bit too directionless.


So, feeling directionless again are we? Well, no. I have learned how to use those life lines and cosmic cleats to bring some dynamic tension into my life. The sense of purpose that I consciously laid aside during the last year, while I traveled about the country is slowing rising. I am already lining up both the mundane and the creative endeavors for the next several months. The lanyard is in hand and thankfully the youthful desire to grip and tug mightily is well suppressed.

Watch your head, we're coming about.