[L, diary, ephēmeris] 1) BLOG

This will be an imperfect post, brief but heartfelt.  My inner critic has been sent to sit silently in the corner for the duration of this writing but she's an impatient wench, even now tapping her foot, a pencil in one hand and a long list of tasks in the other. She's already attempting to edit words as I think how to begin.

A disturbing email arrived from a special friend. 

Loyal and sensitive, respectful, he is a dedicated and disciplined man in intellectual endeavors, as well as a talented, free-spirited musician, singer, and uninhibited dancer.

His email said he'd been struggling with rejection;  the second time within a few months when a negative opinion of his qualifications had been expressed publicly.

A lot has been written about vulnerability, and the shaming effects to us when stringent comparisons of our efforts are made.  Sadly, our inner critic's voice is often stronger than praise we hear from  loved ones. Days, weeks, even months and years can retain the pain of feeling not good enough at something, stunting our ability to feel confident enough to fully embrace within our lives.  Why is that? I wondered.  Then fragments of a story by Todd Walton drifted slowly into view.

The story was a chapter in Walton's Under the Table Books. It was an exchange between a young boy and an old man, the boy listing exciting visions of his future that were rising from his practice of new-found skills.   Delighted, I recognized his dreams as ones I'd serendipitously experienced in my life, and had joyfully, affirmatively, self-congratulated them with a Todd Walton blog post, many years ago.

The old man's affirmation of they boy's plans was exactly the response needed for my friend to hear., but I couldn't remember EXACTLY what the quote was. So, I went in search for the post. Found it. Began reading the post, smiling, anticipating the key comment at the end. Reached the end.

It wasn't there. 

Oh, it was, sort of.  But only a mis-mashed summation of the story's final paragraph, not the succinct summation I remember intending, had thought I'd been leading up to, but had somehow lost my way.  Without even recognizing the failure. Or the lack of cohesion that must have had readers scratching their heads after I blithely posted.

My inner critic was now out of her chair and had me by the throat; I was choking with shame.  

"WHY ARE YOU ALWAYS SO FEY?! 

WHAT A FOOL YOU ARE!

YOU ARE ALWAYS THOUGHTLESSLY WHIRLING THROUGH THE MOST SIGNIFICANT PARTS OF EVERYTHING, DANCING OUT THE DOOR ON YOUR WAY TO WHO-KNOWS-WHAT-STUPID THING NEXT!"

Perhaps, when we were young, when we were just learning how to do something new, we didn't hear often enough the words, 'You are a perfectly fine person just as you are!'   That would have stopped our inner critics from gaining their crippling powers. 

For myself and the imperfect blog post made several years ago, accepting the goof and probably annotating it with a link to this one may suffice, but to my friend I can now send these supportive, fully affirmative words he deserves--words my inner critic is now memorizing in her corner--with the hope that my friend's personal nemesis does the same:

"Last night by the fire at my cave I sang Mr. Laskin the start of my song.  At first when I finished singing he didn’t say anything.  He just stared at the flames for a long time, and then he added a few twigs and said, “Derek, the thing is, you’ve begun to bear fruit, and that, above all, is our purpose here.  Bless you and your song.  Don’t ever listen to anyone who says you aren’t a perfectly wonderful soul.”

OUR FORCE FOR COUNTERACTING CHAOS IS CONNECTION

Maria Popova recently began another pertinent Brain Pickings post that, even though written at the start of Covid19, continues to nag me to upload into a blog post.  She began with: We might spend our lives trying to discern where we end and the rest of the world begins

Below, I've summarized her essay, based on Jan Mooallem's book, This Is Chance!: The Shaking of an All-American City, A Voice That Held It Together,  into a shorter version that resonates with my expanding experience of this epic period of world events, the last being relevant to having to close my Saturday Art with local children--loved as if relinquishing my own--for safer environs.

 

Alexis de Tocqueville

Democracy in America

 

“At certain periods a nation may be oppressed by such insupportable evils as to conceive the design of effecting a total change in its political constitution; at other times… the existence of society itself is endangered. Such are the times of great revolutions… But between these epochs of misery and confusion there are periods during which human society seems to rest and mankind to take breath. This pause is, indeed, only apparent, for time does not stop its course for nations any more than for [individuals]; they are all advancing every day towards a goal with which they are unacquainted.

 

“There are certain epochs in which the changes that take place in the social and political constitution of nations are so slow and imperceptible that [people] imagine they have reached a final state; and the human mind, believing itself to be firmly based upon sure foundations, does not extend its researches beyond a certain horizon.”

 

 

Jon Mooallem, Author

 This Is Chance!: The Shaking of an All-American City, A Voice That Held It Together

 

“…there are moments when the world we take for granted instantaneously changes; when reality is abruptly upended and the unimaginable overwhelms real life. We don’t walk around thinking about that instability, but we know it’s always there: at random, and without warning, a kind of terrible magic can switch on and scramble our lives.”

 

 

Genie Chance,

letter to her concerned mother in aftermath of Alaskan earthquake:

 

“I must admit that during that first dark, cold night, as I began to understand the tremendous scope of the problems that would be facing us in the months and years to come, I toyed with the idea of sending the children out on a plane to stay with you until everything settled down. Working there in the headquarters, where the reports were coming in from the survey teams throughout the city, I realized that there could possibly be a real health hazard for some time to come. I realized that the schools might not be able to resume for an indefinite period of time. It looked for a few hours as if the damage had been so extensive to all utilities and streets that even a semblance of normal life could not be resumed for weeks or months…

 

…But this was just a fleeting thought in a weary mind. I would have been ashamed of myself had it not been for the next thought that came so swiftly: We must be together… That night I saw strain, heavy hearts, and fear in people separated from their loved ones by the sudden disaster… As long as we are together, we are confident of the future…

 

That Good Friday night I knew that we had survived miraculously. And for this reason, there must be a purpose to our lives. Apparently the children must sense this, too. For they have remained calm. They have been fully aware of the emergency, but they have not feared. We are proud that they are such dependable, responsible youngsters. I would not undermine their confidence in the future — in themselves — by sending them away for safety.

What is safety, anyway? How can you predict where or when tragedy will occur? You can only learn to live with it and make the best of it when it happens. These children have learned this — and they are all the better for it. They were in the midst of devastation. And they feel that they are a part of the tremendous task ahead in rebuilding this land we love… The children are not afraid. Their father and I are not afraid. Please, don’t you fear for us.”

 

Jon Mooallem, Author

 This Is Chance!: The Shaking of an All-American City, A Voice That Held It Together

 

“What is safety, anyway? Genie seemed to be conceding how randomly our lives are jostled and spun around; that nothing is fixed; that even the ground we stand on is in motion. Underneath us, there is only instability. Beyond us, there’s only chance.

But she’d also recognized a way of surviving such a world. It was what Genie had created in Anchorage that weekend by talking on the radio, and what she planned to stay focused on now: not an antidote to that unpredictability, exactly, but at least a strategy for withstanding it, for wringing meaning from a life we know to be unsteady and provisional. The best she and her family could do was to hold on to one another.

 

Our force for counteracting chaos is connection.” 

"Briefly, I now have two of the most wonderful books, written by Marie Popova. One is called THE VELOCITY OF BEING, Letters to Young Readers. Here is a drawing discovered after class, influenced by this book:

The literary part of the book is a little above the kids but so gorgeously illustrated they are continually drawn to it, responding to the stories within the letters as best they can.  With almost non-exisistant English, Chay Chay had no idea what the letter says about the power of reading, but the illustration reached him, motivated him, and I had the private joy of discovering his path in the casual clutter left behind at the end of the day.

    

What delights me most is that I can find a match for every one of his illustrations except the figure at the top of his copied ladder and moon...I think he has marvelously inserted himself in it.     What do you think?"

 

Later, this email was edited into a larger post but the kids continue to surprise me with private examples of the book's continuing influence.  Last week, this was discovered in Resty Joy's drawing book:

There's a funny story about my not realizing she'd copied/edited it from Popova's book.  I'd taken it seriously, as if SHE were the one who'd discovered the described note in her drawing, had found it inside one of OUR books, so I was almost frenzied searching through the bookcase seeking a book old and worn enough to be the one...until she produced Popova's  Velocity of Being.  Here's the page that inspired her:

Confession Time:  Lately, I've been feeling emotionally unable to effectively continue holding Saturday Art with the kids, as well as having the energy to maintain this website. I was about to pull the plug on both.

The last four months of full focus on hauling PILAR, the re-stepping of her masts, re-rigging them, too, has been intense; ultimately rewarding but depleting on several levels. So, while my boat's needs were being met, the kid's needs were not. That morning, I'd gotten frustrated and disgusted with Resty Joy's lack of interest in an, admittedly hasty ('busy-work') word game, given to the others.  Later, after my bad attitude towards hers, but prior to being suddenly allowed to see what she'd been working on, I'd seen her sitting alone in the far corner of the room, hunched over her drawing book with a large and droopy pillow on her head, and knew I was failing.  Time to quit.

Everything changed when she freely brought me her book to show what she'd been working on.  This, from a child who hates having her photograph taken, who routinely speaks so low she cannot be heard then says, 'Never-mind' when asked to repeat what she'd said, and routinely answers, 'I don't know,' to any inquiry for a personal preference...though she does know because she's extraordinarily bright when it sneaks out of her.  No wonder I'd thought that the lonely letter found in the artwork story of a library book, asking someone to write to the author, had inflamed my own guilt for earlier being dismissive towards her!

Sometimes the way she designs her art work, or asks a difficult question, or repeatedly watches one special video of a Israeli/Palistinian Women's Peace March, I am filled with awe. Humbled. 

Saturday, it was clear that it is not for me to judge how much or how fast what I have to offer bears fruit.  Selfishly, it bears fruit in ME, so I will continue to provide a Saturday place of exposure to exploration for the children to visit.  And, I will continue to post what we do there...in all it's gloriously messy humanity. 

In that, Maria Popova guides me, again:

 

"Looking back on the most important things I have learned about life, I keep returning to a central paradox of our culture: We know that the flower doesn’t go from bud to blossom in one spritely burst, yet we crave stories of overnight success and spontaneous self-actualization, disinterested in the tedium of the blossoming, in the incremental ripening by which we become who we are, the innumerable tiny choices, the imperceptibly small steps by which we pave the path to our own destiny in the very act of walking it. We are each a continuous becoming, our future a rosary of presents strung along the strand of presence — presence with the smallest corpuscles of existence: the smell of a neighbor’s curry slipping through the window cracked in midwinter, the atlas of wrinkles on the hands of the cashier scanning the box of strawberries at the grocery store. Sensing, noticing — the raw materials of presence, and thus the elemental stardust of our becoming."

Self.  Other.  A Work of Art.

These were the last three words for a thirty-one day photo challenge, completed last February 9th of this year, nine months ago today, as I write.  Though there were three words for three days, only two photos were produced, each created from photographs originally taken by other photographers.

For the first two of these three daily words, an exuberant portrait (taken twenty-seven years ago by George Hyklema) was cut apart, rearranged, one-half was edited as sepia to visually emphasize a literal meaning of Self & Other. Separation. Two, not one. Which, especially when two are strongly entwined in a relationship, always remains a reality, but poignantly even more so when bereaved of the other.

Day 29/ SELF             -             Day 30/ OTHER

The photo for the last assignment in the 31 Day Photo Challenge, A Work Of Art, was taken by a National Geography photographer. Admired for the warmth and humanity it radiated, it was cut from a magazine and framed more than thirty-five years ago. It has been hanging on the bulkhead of PILAR's sleeping cabin for most of those years; the husband's large hand, gentle around his wife's shoulder, his wife's good humor reflecting long years of companionship, toil and joy, daily serving as inspiration for an equally satisfying marriage.

Day 31/ A WORK OF ART

During the time of the Challenge, I wrote daily of the process, printing small copies of the photographs to paste into my journal.  Here is what was written on Day 31:

(0530hrs) Friday, February 9, 2018 -

     Hard to stop looking at the last page, the last photos of the 31 Days...the three together are their own work of art.  I wonder how many (if any) will understand the symbolism.  See the effort put into them to present--fulfill--the words of each challenge.

     Originally, I'd wanted to reduce the opacity of Bill's photo when I saw that sepia alone still dominated as much as the vibrant colors of Self. How true that still is, isn't it? His presence has barely faded since his death.  Which is what I'd hoped to convey by the sepia. Ironic that Other and Self remain equally strong, past or present, whether in metaphor (sepia) or life's vivid color.

     Finally leaving it as it was, not taking the 'learning curve' time to alter the image in Photoshop was an artistic decision as well as practical.  The challenge was SELF/OTHER, not grief.  Widowhood.

     But what I love about the synchronicity of Day 31's Challenge is the message of togetherness.  Marriage.  Not separation of self and other.  A good marriage is a true work of art.

In conclusion:

     ...regretfully the 31 Days of photo-focus has ended--but not really.  Only that specific format. The structure. I take photos almost everyday, focusing on life around me, PILAR, the garden, the activities at the house...

     The enforced structure of the specific words was educational. It pushed, forced a deeper level of thought.  Not just in choosing a subject but in composition and production.  It was HARD to light that last photo!  I didn't think I was going to be able to do it--the light was so dim, the glare on the matte glass dulling the faces behind it.  A flashlight cleverly propped on the bed solved the problem.

     Almost didn't think I could make the 31 day commitment, either.  It took a LOT of time away from work on PILAR's needs.  But it did bring enormous satisfaction.  Enough so that I'm considering using a list of my own words...all the ones beginning with 'TRANS' that I'd collected when hoping to make collaborative art with...someone.

   But NOT every day!

"What you produce is not always sacred...What is sacred is the time you spend working on the project, and what that time does to expand your imagination, and what that expanded imagination does to transform your life."

 

The above quote came from the book my niece, Alison, recently sent to me:  

BIG MAGIC, Creative Living Beyond Fear, by Elizabeth Gilbert. 

 

When I read it, I immediately put down the book and opened the laptop in order to make a quick post of it to my home page, which I've begun using somewhat like one of the social media platforms I don't know much about, other than they are quickie ways to connect.

 

I have not used any of them because I'm not very good at quickie anything.  Generally, I have to labor to unearth what it is I want to say or accomplish; the lasting effects of a perfectionist mother impatient with young children's learning curves. Sigh.

 

However, ingrained ways can be modified, I'm happy to report, which is why I responded so strongly to Gilbert's observation about being creative...it is exactly what I persist in conveying every Saturday with whomever joins us for the afternoons of discovering our collectively innate creativity.

 

It is exactly what gave me the courage to post something further to this site's navigation bar category, SATURDAY ART. 

 

When I'd set up the new format, several months ago, I'd had my biggest hopes for showcasing the truly delightful artworks being produced by children and adults who swore they had no abilities for art.  But then the sheer variety of what we were doing overwhelmed me...I wanted to make short videos rather than still photos, wanted readers to feel they were participating, too...but all that took time to do right, and DOING IT RIGHT (NOW!) became a taskmaster I couldn't face.

 

So let me say right now that I'm determined to not let that old buggaboo--needing to be PERFECT--keep me from practicing what I preach to the others:  it's okay to not be perfectly skilled--ever. 

 

It's GOOD to make imperfect things because that's how we learn and grow and make our lives happier and more rewarding. 

 

Maybe not perfect, but as deeply rewarding as if it were. 

 

And who's to decide Chay Chay's little sculpture isn't perfect?

 

 

 

INSIDE & OUTSIDE

Day 8's challenge, INSIDE, was the first time I realized I could combine two days into one:

"The sensitive vibrating string oscillates and results for a long time after one has plucked it.  It’s this oscillation, this sort of inevitable resonance, that holds the present object, while our understanding is busy with the quality which is appropriate to it…vibrating strings have yet another property—to make other strings quiver. And thus the first idea recalls a second, and those two a third, then all three a fourth, and so it goes, without our being able to set a limit the ideas that are aroused and linked in a philosopher who meditates or listens to himself in darkness and silence."

GETTING IN THE GROOVE -edited by Sally Davies

I thought I was very clever to take a photo of a hand-painted plate of an outside (Day 9), waterfront cafe scene, hanging inside (Day 8) on the cabinside of a boat. It quickly disposed of two days' challenges.  Plus, I loved the intricate harmony of multiple perspectives it offered.

And, just  like the vibrating strings of musical resonance, a quivering which arouses further harmonies, the sudden recognition of there being a porthole alongside the plate with it's own view of outside from inside...well, oh MY!

But what a challenge THAT was to capture.  The exposures needed for the inside plate caused over-exposure to the scene through the porthole, while a correct exposure for the sunlit yacht outside then underexposed everything inside PILAR.  Obviously, Photoshop was needed to combine the two.  Which then began a time-consuming nightmare of having to recall how to use the software from the dim recesses of what's left of my brain.  Too clever for my own good, wasn't I?

But it worked.  Eventually.  Not perfectly, the yacht through the porthole was still over-exposed, but then--this was just an exercise to stretch one's self. Next time, and then the next time after that, and so on...it would improve.  It was/is so wonderful to feel the hesitant baby steps of developing skills begin to have direction, strength, and joyful (even if possibly premature) confidence.

Too long have I meant to begin sharing some of the delight I enjoyed while taking up the challenge of photographing a specific topic each day, five months ago.  It took a surprising amount of time and energy, so when completed (and full focus returned to work on PILAR), I had hoped that simply fiddling with the Events page would allow the series of photos to be seen as Past Events until I could blog about it. But that hasn't worked too well. 

Here's the direct link to make it easy if curious to see them before I begin posting why some of the photos were taken (Day 17), how the process evolved (Day29 & 30), challenges surmounted (Day 8 & 9), and not a few unexpected insights revealed. 

The morning I took Day 1 photo (Up Close), I had no idea I'd just begun the challenge...I'd just rolled out of bed, put the coffee water on and then stepped into the bathroom ('head'), as usual, and startled myself with a glance in the mirror, unexpectedly thinking, "Hey! YOU LOOK OKAY!" 

I did.  Amazing.  I laughed and decided to accept and celebrate it.  I took a Selfie.  NOT a common activity for me so I told myself it was a Portrait...a fun one with No meaning except it felt good.  Right.  Not to mention challenging.  

It was later that day when I saw the 31 Day Photo Challenge from Pinterest that it struck me I had already begun the first day's challenge with the portrait.  Easy!  I had a LOT of photos taken already that fit a few of the topics I saw, which would make it possible for me to participate.  Never mind that it was the middle of January and the thirty-one days began May 1st. It was just a poster-type announcement; an idea; a project for anytime, anyone, anywhere...     

If others are inspired by this, also, I recommend they do begin on the first day of the month.  It was confusing to do it otherwise.