Authority

I don't really want to write. I feel it pushing, pressing, ironing out wrinkles in metaphor and the like. It weighs me down. But I don't appreciate the pressure.

Idle nights with coffee were one thing. Waiting. These nights, raining question marks, lightning only to illuminate shortcomings, thunder to remind of atonement. Pandora radio to remind me I'm still here.

So many lack it though. Authority. Some is sneaky, ill-advised capitulation. Nexus lost. "Cave in. Listen here." In this Choose Your Own Adventure, that seems like a non-issue. You'll choose more interesting depth over cave-ins? Oh, you won't?" Swat.

I hit myself on the nose with a newspaper often enough.

Author, though. Who is it? Logos only go so far. The Word is still alive, and not even God knows how.

Worry worthy

It's about that time. About time to worry and fret. Everything's running out on me. Only the fence keeps the dogs home, but lapsing time means an end to it all.

Three months of idling have been busy enough for a lifetime were I younger. At this age though, it's a treasure. Didn't expect so many touches of gray at 34. Didn't expect wish fulfillment apart from a Sonic Youth album. Didn't expect any of this, but probably due to that whole "No expectations" thing to which I cling. Leaves me surprised daily. Surprised with family, fatherhood, foolish passing of gases as I breathe without a second thought. In, out. Countdown to count up to 10 in meditation and begin again.

Brightest prospects remain in the realm I left so I necessarily shudder and wonder why/how we got here. Do I want to return to that seasonal grind? Do I want to grind at all? Gotta, have to, else we won't even live on bread, but pressure is making that bread more like a corny slab and less like anything sandwich-worthy.

Cow

I dunno today. Watched this bug crawl into a cement crack infested with ants. It seemed to falter for a while, but a bit later it struggled out of the crack and wandered off to blades of grass.

If I'd shrunk into such a crack, I'd itch, but I saw ants pausing to nip at this critter. It may have itched; it may have died. The clock dictated I go back in to hit buttons on my phone, or wait, maybe I was already cheating.

Whatever. Watch the Last Temptation of Christ and wonder about ants. And Willem Dafoe.

And, for that record, I hit delete about 100 times recently. You decide. I can still probably type better than most.

Creativity and rebellion

Found this interesting quote today.

Economists and historians alike realize that there is a deep difference between homo economicus and homo creativus. One makes the most of what nature permits him to have. The other rebels against nature's dictates. Technological creativity, like all creativity, is an act of rebellion. (Joel Mokyr)

Made me think of Rollo May and something about daemons, something I barely skimmed back in college at some point, I think.

Rollo May introduces and defines the classic Greek conception of the "daimonic" or darker side of our being, noting that "the daimonic (unlike the demonic, which is merely destructive) is as much concerned with creativity as with negative reactions. ... constructiveness and destructiveness have the same source in human personality. The source is simply human potential."

from interview with Stephen A. Diamond, PhD: The Psychology of Creativity

I was originally skimming whatever it was I skimmed because the thought was intriguing. Creativity sure can feel like possession, and surely that's some sort of rebellion. Waking up with dissolving words in mind, poetry (but without the bother of verse, rhythm, rhyme, reason) spontaneous watching bark flap on a birch or some other peeling tree.* Think briefly I could be a birdwatcher as I watch a bird on the power line, half-spreading wings, twittering on about isobars or whatever birds feel they must incessantly chat about (the ones that come sit all too near my sleeping head every morning, making me think a bow and arrow might be better than binoculars).

Now, the new zen of banjo, from page one (or at least a rather early page) in my first banjo book, a quote from Lao Tzu. Never mind Taoism versus Zen Buddhism, for I've turned a page. It's absolutely the wrong book to have first, but definitely the right one for me.

Currently I sit in awe of other fingers. Don't think I can coax mine into moving bluegrass fast, but I've at least spent some time on it today. Just listening now. Earl Scruggs.

* They just make me think of the Codeine album cover for The White Birch.

Spent

We've just spent over a thousand dollars. On a banjo, an F-style mandolin, some cable, some picks, a pick-up, some brushes.

So I owe the guy on the couch, since he was the one with cash money, so to speak. And at this count, we have over a dozen instruments in the house. Musicians, we are. Really.

Oh and I reeked of alcohol, I'm told. Bravo.

This mess

It occurred to me on a recent yesterday that I meant to comment to myself on this choice of template thingie. Quite simple. It reminds me of shoes and phones.

Wow, my phone just rang.

Then stopped. No kidding, real time typing, here.

Anyway, the star. Look at the 6-8 pairs of Chucks. Then 897. The prefix where I lived for about 18 formative years.

That's all there is to it. Maybe I'll make it less of a mess some day, but not very likely.

Fools

The Internet really makes something new of April Fool's Day. I look forward to it every year now, more than Christmas. In the past, you might get the chance to trick a couple of friends, play some kind of prank. Look now though. The 'net brings to life a web of elaborate creativity.

Opera came up with some fascinating new peer to peer technology. The demo was to ask someone in your vicinity what day it was. Google struck gold with a beverage line and the Infinity+1 scheme, which is apparently only half-joke, as they're gradually increasing mailbox size from 1000MB to 2000MB today. I'm glad I happened across this handy link to a list of April Fool's Day Funnery.

Or whatever. Some folks hate it. I love laughing at attempts to trick me. Got to be savvy.

*Opera's went away.

Lost time

To make up for lost time, here again, drink in hand. So much is so demanding of my attention. Hearing someone talking about beer at work, for instance. Instantly better than most other conversations, so I move with gravity. Beer, you say?

Reading again a novel by J.P. Donleavy, The Ginger Man, which is also inspiration. Just to write... If I could jot it all down in the time my brain allows, I'd have many more than the six or seven journal volumes present. None are actually present though, most recent scribble being at least several months old. From early days on this particular journey.

Most recent addiction, lures me on, out, back, in, farther, further, sleepy hits. It's an art, if you make it so. Getting hammered and using screwdrivers to open boxen.

Twice the strange inspiration, plus one

I decided to look up this band again. I check every so often, just because I knew two of the guys in it back in the days of high school, and I like to see how things are coming along for them. They're still going strong, with a major label now, still touring, still being goofy (to judge by the web site). That warms my heart when I go out for a scheduled smoke break in the chilly damp weather. Covered in tattoos, still doing their thing.

Then the arrival on the car port. Not for me, but some meditation cushiony things, delivered here for a friend who only has a PO Box. But hey, meditation things. I never felt a need for special cushions when I 'meditated' more frequently, but it's almost as if this guy has found religion. Not eating meat, making himself a meditation stool. It'd do me good to become a vegetarian also, but I'm biding my time and apologizing to the critters.

Then a message waiting on the machine from my first real boss, the manager of a restaurant where I worked over a year. When it closed, he went to another restaurant and soon called me to join him there. I was a good busboy, see. It's easy to serve. His call was to inform me he's finally opened up his own restaurant. We talked about it briefly when I stopped by to see him at the second restaurant last year. He's wanted to for years, I know. Finally there.

So, inspired I come only to write about what inspires, sometimes. And tomorrow, if UPS tells the truth, bagpipes!

Those will probably be scary for a while, actually, but the need was to write, and write I have. Sim suggested I blog (more). Here we are. One can't always focus on a coatrack theme, especially lacking a coatrack.

Not that I meant to bring that up here.