“What a writer wants is praise, praise, praise, praise, praise.” – Gertrude Stein
Tag: Musings
Among my personal fears
Don’t we all have demons?
- My fear of jumping in — of doing it wrong, an unfamiliar act
- or of falling, physically
- or in debt
- or on my proverbial face
- fear of being subsumed or losing freedom, especially in relation to others
- or feeling shamed when I make a mistake
- being left holding the bag or unable to get to a plane or train in time
- of things breaking down or not doing what they should
- unable to find the right word, as in trying to describe a high-tech snafu or somebody’s name
- Though not so much now that I’m retired on a marginal income.
Being unlovable has somehow fallen away.
As if it makes a difference
In the fine arts and likely elsewhere, is it genius or rather madness we admire more?
Oh, no, not me
The secret to getting ahead, in one list: the ability to say NO.
Every circle, organization, office needs somebody in this role. Few people want to have the responsibility. They’d rather be liked.
“Let me check with Joe,” also works.
Reach for the heights
There were no mountains where I grew up, but even then, they rose in my imagination.
Here are ten related perspectives.
- “The summit is what drives us, but the climb itself is what matters.” — Conrad Anker
- “There’s no glory in climbing a mountain if all you want to do is to get to the top. It’s experiencing the climb itself — in all its moments of revelation, heartbreak, and fatigue — that has to be the goal.” — Karyn Kusama
- “I learn something every time I go into the mountains.” — Michael Kennedy
- “Going to the mountains is like going home.” — John Muir
- “Fresh air is as good for the mind as for the body. Nature always seems to be trying to talk to us as if she had some great secret to tell. And so she has.” — John Lubbock
- “Heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads.” — Henry David Thoreau
- “It is in the wild places, where the edge of the earth meets the corners of the sky, the human spirit is fed.” — Art Wolfe
- “Birds have always had the ability to bring me out of a dark space and provide relief in bad times.” — Jason Ward
- “Not just beautiful, though — the stars are like the trees in the forest, alive and breathing. And they’re watching me.” — Haruki Murakami
- “Embrace your local nature — it’s not necessarily going to look like these mountain-top moments. There’s so much more than just the baseline of what you think exists. You probably know the biggest park in your city, but you probably don’t know a park that’s within a mile of your house that would blow your mind.” — Pattie Gonia
Apart from fame or fortune
Found myself thinking about pastors laboring much of Saturday to craft a sermon heard by a congregation and then likely forgotten, something that was a more common occurrence when I was growing up and everybody went to church on Sundays, back when Blue Laws were in effect. It was “important” and discussed over the dinner table.
It also had me also thinking about long letters, back in the day, the kind that are more likely to get published as a book today.
So here we are in an era when going viral or having blockbuster sales or ratings is the goal of so many. What a contrast to work that’s done in loving detail for a limited audience. Not just that Sunday sermon. A passionate teacher within a classroom. A doctor, just one patient at a time. A concert performed for a few hundred people. (Perhaps after months of rehearsals.) A single piece of art, to be prized by a single collector.
It sets a different measure of success, along with self-worth.
Now add to that jobs done one-to-one, say caretaker in a seniors residential facility. Or even gardening, with only the universe as a witness.
These don’t reflect in economics reports or, when they do, they’re discounted as marginal. Not so, I’ll argue. Besides, how much does joy weigh?
As a communal emblem
The Harmonites (Rappites) believed Christ, in his Second Coming, will carry a golden geranium. It became their sign, though they also used red geraniums.
~*~
So we learned in a visit to New Harmony.
Performers at an open mic
- J tasted colors, like a connoisseur of drama.
- S sharpened stones.
- R, who likes to listen, was fondest of springtime.
- H came after everyone had settled, hustled her book of bleeding tomatoes, and left early.
- E and T had a thing about penises.
- X told us he was trying some technical shit he didn’t think worked or was presenting an old or new piece or would like to score later that night.
- B marshaled his troops in a half-hour late, like a conquering army.
- P bolted, apparently peeved.
- W used a tambourine, needed a gimmick.
- Z, totally disorganized, spent more time flipping through books or journals trying to find pieces than he did actually reading.
And that’s before getting to musicians who spend the allotted time fussing with their gear and then expect to run longer.
Can we categorize gallerygoers and the like?
Fine art is, after all, an extension of religion. Just look at museums, concert halls, theaters, even arenas as temples.
That said, here goes:
Proprietors: Middle-class or desiring to move up, the kulcher-seekers. Subcategories those seeking familiarity with the old, beside those with “taste,” a little knowledge of “masters.”
Those dragged through: Spouses, dates, children.
Those seeking Experience: Usually modernists with “taste” but possibly those seeking play within art, qualities antithetical to where art must be “serious.”
Fellow practitioners: Usually too poor to collect new work except by trading, but also the most critical and appreciative, depending.
Now, for atheists and agnostics?
After drafting this, I see parallels to dining out for fine cuisine or attending concerts, live theater, even cinema.
Care to add to the list?
Don’t call them ‘starfish,’ OK?
Although they live underwater and are commonly called “starfish,” they are not true fish. Unlike fish, they do not have gills, scales, or fins.
Also, they move quite differently from fish, which have tails to propel themselves. Instead, sea stars use tiny tube feet for moving along.
Thus, since they are not classified as fish, scientists prefer to call them “sea stars.”
Now, for ten more points.
- They belong to the phylum Echinodermata, relating them to sand dollars, sea urchins, sea cucumbers, and sea lilies – about 7,000 species in all.
- Like many echinoderms, they have radial symmetry – their body parts are arranged around a central axis. Since many sea stars have five-point radial symmetry, ruling out an obvious left and right half, only a top side and a bottom side.
- Sea stars come in roughly 2,000 species ranging from tropical waters to the polar regions. Some dwell in the intertidal zone, while others live in the ocean depths.
- Not all sea stars have just five arms. Some species have many more, such as the sun star, which can have up to 40 arms.
- Most of their vital organs are housed in their arms. Some species can regenerate an entirely new sea star from just one arm and a portion of the star’s central disc, which is useful if a sea star is injured by a predator. It does, though, take about a year for an arm to grow back.
- Instead of blood, sea stars have a circulatory system made up primarily of seawater.
- Their appetite is bigger than their mouth, but no problem. A sea star’s mouth is on its underside, so when it catches food, the sea star will wrap its arms around the animal’s shell and pull it open just slightly. Then the sea star pushes its stomach through its mouth and into the bivalve’s shell, digests the animal, and slides its stomach back into its own body. This allows the sea star to eat larger prey than it would otherwise be able to fit into its tiny mouth.
- Sea stars do have eyes as a spot at the end of each arm. While a five-armed sea star has five eyes, the 40-armed sun star has 40. A sea star eye looks like a red spot. It doesn’t see much detail but it can sense light and dark.
- Rather than a brain, a sea star has a decentralized nervous system, with nerves extending into each arm, something that allows each arm to operate independently while coordinating with the others.
- Predators include birds, fish, and sea otters.
