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Thursday, March 26, 2009
Now that everyody's gone I'll quietly slip back into the room.
Didn't want to permanently leave off on a popvaginal note like that; it's just how that particular ball bounced. Exhuming, culling, discarding, confronting, enshrining and puzzling over my dead family's flotsam, jetsam and then-some proved to be a mighty tough endeavor, and even Pointer Pussy failed to distract any longer.
After many overnights alone at 275, wading through dust and sorrow, I realized how much of my loved ones' lives were needlessly consumed by worries and hopes that came to nil and worse. If anything positive is to be made of this, maybe it's what I've landed on: it's all mostly bullshit. That can be monstrously oppressive or liberating; make the choice or else accept what's chosen for you.
I concentrate on my wife and kids. I strive to live a bit healthier for their sake and devote my personal attentions to idle amusement for my sake. I dunno when my delight in making things with paint, magnetic tape, scissors and glue, film and words turned from private tinkering to a daunting chore, toxically connected to the ignes fatui of "career potential," self-image (as validated/squashed by the received or anticipated opinions of others) or source-freezing aesthetic judgements, but finally... fuck that noise.
There are a lot of things that lead straight and direct to my brother's corpse - like those bullet trajectory strands they show on those forensics shows - and I want none of it. I could explain what I mean by this, but not now anyway. Along with a surprisingly debilatating sleep disorder, this perspective shut down my interest in communicating via this blog. I'm here today, though, and this is, perhaps, part of a rehabilitation.
The child who drew and drew, made tapes, shared dirty jokes in the backyard tent, obsessed over ZAP, Duchamp, Berrie Jigglers and the Bonzo Dog Band is father to the man. That kid got up from the desk whenever school got too tedious to bear and walked the fuck out. The costs - derision from some of the other kids, frustration on the part of my folks, laughably out-of-proportion retaliation from authority and the strange limbo of isolation - seldom outweighed the delight of moving through time on my own broken clock, letting imagination slither where it wished, watching the world from my particular vantage in the weeds of the vacant lot ...or through my bedroom window in the wee hours of magic...or through the darting phosphenes in my skull.
I am a middle aged man now, putting it optimistically, and I give up trying to figure out why exactly I'm supposed to be any different than I was then. There is a death's head before me that only fades when I see Lily and Miles dancing or when I laugh with Shelley, or when Garland honors me with a collaborative request, or when Thingumajigsaw and Arlt sing their songs, or when I sit in the School Yard Gents with Spero, O'Connor et al raising middle aged hell, or when I join Alex, Dan and Rob at ol' 275, screaming wretched Bon Jovi lyrics over Rock Band (you heard me right) and a few Tom Collinses. Dayenu.
OK. Onward.
Didn't want to permanently leave off on a popvaginal note like that; it's just how that particular ball bounced. Exhuming, culling, discarding, confronting, enshrining and puzzling over my dead family's flotsam, jetsam and then-some proved to be a mighty tough endeavor, and even Pointer Pussy failed to distract any longer.
After many overnights alone at 275, wading through dust and sorrow, I realized how much of my loved ones' lives were needlessly consumed by worries and hopes that came to nil and worse. If anything positive is to be made of this, maybe it's what I've landed on: it's all mostly bullshit. That can be monstrously oppressive or liberating; make the choice or else accept what's chosen for you.
I concentrate on my wife and kids. I strive to live a bit healthier for their sake and devote my personal attentions to idle amusement for my sake. I dunno when my delight in making things with paint, magnetic tape, scissors and glue, film and words turned from private tinkering to a daunting chore, toxically connected to the ignes fatui of "career potential," self-image (as validated/squashed by the received or anticipated opinions of others) or source-freezing aesthetic judgements, but finally... fuck that noise.
There are a lot of things that lead straight and direct to my brother's corpse - like those bullet trajectory strands they show on those forensics shows - and I want none of it. I could explain what I mean by this, but not now anyway. Along with a surprisingly debilatating sleep disorder, this perspective shut down my interest in communicating via this blog. I'm here today, though, and this is, perhaps, part of a rehabilitation.
The child who drew and drew, made tapes, shared dirty jokes in the backyard tent, obsessed over ZAP, Duchamp, Berrie Jigglers and the Bonzo Dog Band is father to the man. That kid got up from the desk whenever school got too tedious to bear and walked the fuck out. The costs - derision from some of the other kids, frustration on the part of my folks, laughably out-of-proportion retaliation from authority and the strange limbo of isolation - seldom outweighed the delight of moving through time on my own broken clock, letting imagination slither where it wished, watching the world from my particular vantage in the weeds of the vacant lot ...or through my bedroom window in the wee hours of magic...or through the darting phosphenes in my skull.
I am a middle aged man now, putting it optimistically, and I give up trying to figure out why exactly I'm supposed to be any different than I was then. There is a death's head before me that only fades when I see Lily and Miles dancing or when I laugh with Shelley, or when Garland honors me with a collaborative request, or when Thingumajigsaw and Arlt sing their songs, or when I sit in the School Yard Gents with Spero, O'Connor et al raising middle aged hell, or when I join Alex, Dan and Rob at ol' 275, screaming wretched Bon Jovi lyrics over Rock Band (you heard me right) and a few Tom Collinses. Dayenu.
OK. Onward.