for douchebags

music is fully a realm full of wandering douchebags. knowing nothing at all about music beyond their own taste. i grant that a lack of theoretical knowledge shouldn't preclude you from having taste, but you telling me what is and is not good is rather meaningless when its pure opinion. basically, i'm just sick of being bombarded with music. who would have thought that was possible? maybe its break time. maybe its time to immerse in my own sound and stop listening.

melanch

i miss scheming surprises.

suburban ennui

how douchey is it to use french words to communicate existential thoughts. the period signifies that the previous sentence answers itself. furthermore, why the hell do my titles always prompt comment from myself? that one has no answer as of yet.

updike is fantastic. it doesn't matter that i haven't read the rabbit books that take place when harry is my age, i probably identify more with the old rabbit anyway. besides, so much of why i find updike great is based on his pinpoint descriptions of everyday nothing. the everyday nothing harry faces as an old man is closer to my everyday nothing based on the time period alone. but, it's not just the way he captures the empty nothing of modern life; he consistently drops insight that contains more in five words than i can communicate in an hour. or at other times simply strings words and thoughts together in ways that link directly to my experience.

"...with that exaggerated, creaking stealth of small children..."

"he closes his eyes... and in the intimate red of his brain envisions..."

"how suggestive female flesh is."

"the stark plummy stars press down and the depth of the galactic void for an instant makes him feel suspended upside down."

in any case, i'm basically just advertising for updike. those were lines from maybe ten pages i've read over the last while. more treasure awaits. avast, me hearties! set sail for his books. pathetic.

hippie dating tips

1. be clean. hippies still like cleanliness, just a different kind. find the nearest waterfall, bring along your organic shampoos and natural soaps. drip dry for natural hair styling. throw on some tea tree deodorant. brush your teeth with baking soda, or... some burts bees toothpaste thing.

2. put on your best hemp shirt or organic cotton. fair trade sustainable clothes never fail to impress.

3. approach your mark. start up a conversation about the merits of local food, how you never drink bottled water, or only ride a bike.

4. invite the mark back to your place to watch planet earth, light some incense, offer a friendly hippie joint or beer.

arutperumjothi

ok so this does continue the last one.

sometimes in life you have crazy dream experiences that link up to real life and lead you to meaningful events.

last night i dreamed i saw a bald man stab a woman after robbing a store. then i went back to the store and tried on hats since the store was empty. this has been irrelevant.

MORE importantly. i also dreamed i was in a bookstore and some man, an artist of some kind, who was meant to draw four characters, was talking to me. i felt as though i was some kind of seer, interpreting important symbols for this man. one of the symbols i read on the cover of a book i read aloud as "joth_." Ann Green was there, and right away that's an interesting sign for me because she is a very well respected/important person to me in a strange way considering i never see her. regardless, i woke up and looked up jothu, knowing it wasn't the exact word i had said.

i came to, by the typo correction, jothi. arutperumjothi or jotyi. evidently a hindu mantra for ascension, a way to get in touch with divine grace. weird. i had just been trying to surmise how to access a creative force or daemon in some way.

that's kind of where i'm stuck for now, but this could be interesting. dream journeys ahoy!

daemons, genies and a glimpse of god

i heard an idea today. a plausible explanation for artist anxiety, that feeling of discomfort the accompanies an unfinished project, an idea not fully realized. whether it be musical, visual, linguistic, i think we can all relate to that sensation, assuming "we" are somepeople who indulge our creative impulses from time to time.

as we struggle with our desire to flesh out the wispy ideas that float around in our heads, anxiety, the speaker posited, results. this is because of the social stigma of attributing creativity to the individual. that's a lot of weight to carry around on a single pair of shoulders. when things fail to work out as envisioned it's nobody's fault but mine.

those bastions of creative thought, the roman and greek empires, had a different take. creativity was siphoned from the gods, or from daemons (a demigod type entity). these beings enabled a collaborative process that would result in... "stairway to heaven" or some such nonsense.

first of all, that's way cooler. it's more fun. it's less pompous. but, it also resonates with me on an individual level. it seems more akin to the way my process occurs. there were times when i would record little messages to myself on my phone constantly, phrases, word sequences, thematic ideas. all sorts of little nuggets that would come to me at inopportune times had to be stored for later use. at other times i would/will sit down with the intention of creating something, and find myself devoid of inspiration. it's far more comforting to believe that inspiration is externally supplied.

but how to channel this concept? that requires a little more thought, i think.

it occurs to me, before i conclude, to address the fact that its the height of sillyness, logically speaking, to believe this. however, this isn't something like religion. i'm not claiming that some totem animal is commanding that i cleanse the world of methodists. although, on second thought it does function in a similar way. some people use religion as a way to feel secure in their morality. i might use this to feel secure in my creativity. however, unlike religion i acknowledge that i often reason out good creative ideas on my own. i also acknowledge that ideas sometimes slap me in the forehead as suddenly and unexpectedly as bird shit falls on my shoulder.

to be continued... maybe.

thanks liz gilbert on ted. (and al green for the sumptuous background tunes).

wistful thinking

Then he remembers, descending into the molecules, what love feels like: huge, skin on skin, planets impinging.

this is going to sound mopey, imagine.

i remember.

i remember biking home at 2 am, the stars were exploding, the moon a bullet hole ripped through space leaking, no spewing, something powerful and vibrant.

i remember my guts being squeezed as she told me what she was living, wanting so badly to reach down and pull her up, knowing that my stomach was telling me how much i cared.

i remember myself lost in ceiling stucco, in those minute mountains, feeling myself at the summit, buffeted by wind, amazed that i would sleep beside her, just sleep.

and now i try to convince myself, now i lie. or wait.

those were nice times.