Bonus - Little and Great

When people talk about seeing a world in a grain of sand, they may be on to something.

At x250 magnification, even the smallest irritations can actually be works of art.

* * * * *

In other news, and apropos of nothing, when I walked in to church today I was immediately asked to play prelude music as the accompanist had "overslept". The chorister was a little taken aback when I said "No" - I gave in (of course) and ended up playing for nearly 15 minutes while we waited for the actual pianist. She didn't show up, so I played for Sacrament meeting, rest hymn and all. It wasn't terrible (I kept up the tempo, no matter what) but it wasn't good, either. Annnnnd daily piano practice goes back on my 'to-do' list! (Kids, listen to your parents. PRACTICE THE PIANO.)




Original and other images here

Ten Things - Part 4

4
PROFESSIONALISM IS NOT ENOUGH or THE GOOD IS THE ENEMY OF THE GREAT.
Early in my career I wanted to be professional, that was my complete aspiration in my early life because professionals seemed to know everything - not to mention they got paid for it. Later I discovered after working for a while that professionalism itself was a limitation. After all, what professionalism means in most cases is diminishing risks. So if you want to get your car fixed you go to a mechanic who knows how to deal with transmission problems in the same way each time. I suppose if you needed brain surgery you wouldn’t want the doctor to fool around and invent a new way of connecting your nerve endings. Please do it in the way that has worked in the past.
Unfortunately in our field, in the so-called creative – I hate that word because it is misused so often. I also hate the fact that it is used as a noun. Can you imagine calling someone a creative? Anyhow, when you are doing something in a recurring way to diminish risk or doing it in the same way as you have done it before, it is clear why professionalism is not enough. After all, what is required in our field, more than anything else, is the continuous transgression. Professionalism does not allow for that because transgression has to encompass the possibility of failure and if you are professional your instinct is not to fail, it is to repeat success. So professionalism as a lifetime aspiration is a limited goal.




As always, full essay here

Ten Things - Part 3

3
SOME PEOPLE ARE TOXIC. AVOID THEM.
This is a subtext of number one. There was in the sixties a man named Fritz Perls who was a gestalt therapist. Gestalt therapy derives from art history, it proposes you must understand the ‘whole’ before you can understand the details. What you have to look at is the entire culture, the entire family and community and so on. Perls proposed that in all relationships people could be either toxic or nourishing towards one another. It is not necessarily true that the same person will be toxic or nourishing in every relationship, but the combination of any two people in a relationship produces toxic or nourishing consequences. And the important thing that I can tell you is that there is a test to determine whether someone is toxic or nourishing in your relationship with them. Here is the test: You have spent some time with this person, either you have a drink or go for dinner or you go to a ball game. It doesn’t matter very much but at the end of that time you observe whether you are more energised or less energised. Whether you are tired or whether you are exhilarated. If you are more tired then you have been poisoned. If you have more energy you have been nourished. The test is almost infallible and I suggest that you use it for the rest of your life. 






Full essay here

Ten Things - Part 2

2
IF YOU HAVE A CHOICE NEVER HAVE A JOB.
One night I was sitting in my car outside Columbia University where my wife Shirley was studying Anthropology. While I was waiting I was listening to the radio and heard an interviewer ask ‘Now that you have reached 75 have you any advice for our audience about how to prepare for your old age?’ An irritated voice said ‘Why is everyone asking me about old age these days?’ I recognised the voice as John Cage. I am sure that many of you know who he was – the composer and philosopher who influenced people like Jasper Johns and Merce Cunningham as well as the music world in general. I knew him slightly and admired his contribution to our times. ‘You know, I do know how to prepare for old age’ he said. ‘Never have a job, because if you have a job someday someone will take it away from you and then you will be unprepared for your old age. For me, it has always been the same every since the age of 12. I wake up in the morning and I try to figure out how am I going to put bread on the table today? It is the same at 75, I wake up every morning and I think how am I going to put bread on the table today? I am exceedingly well prepared for my old age’ he said.




Full essay here

Ten Things - Part 1

I just ran across a remarkable talk by Milton Glaser, given in London in 2001.  I want to share it with you a section a day, so that you have a chance to think about each point. That's what I'll be doing.


Ten Things I Learned

1
YOU CAN ONLY WORK FOR PEOPLE THAT YOU LIKE.
This is a curious rule and it took me a long time to learn because in fact at the beginning of my practice I felt the opposite. Professionalism required that you didn’t particularly like the people that you worked for or at least maintained an arms length relationship to them, which meant that I never had lunch with a client or saw them socially. Then some years ago I realised that the opposite was true. I discovered that all the work I had done that was meaningful and significant came out of an affectionate relationship with a client. And I am not talking about professionalism; I am talking about affection. I am talking about a client and you sharing some common ground. That in fact your view of life is someway congruent with the client, otherwise it is a bitter and hopeless struggle.

Full essay here

Unbelievables

- I can't believe that I'm still regularly having to wear a jacket. In August.

- I can't believe people seem to think skinny jeans are flattering.

- I can't believe leggings (and tights) are considered acceptable alternatives to pants/trousers.

- I can't believe I let myself wait until the summer to do 'touristy' things.

- I can't believe I'm suddenly living in a war zone.

That last one is the most unreal. Hampstead looks the same as ever, clouds blew through an otherwise pleasant, sunny (if a little chilly) England summer day, people are still out and about (carrying on), and yet...

And yet.

There is a communal tension. I can still feel it, 3+ floors above the street, tucked away in a house off to the side. Stores on the high street were not only closing by 5:00, they were emptying out display windows and packing up shelves of stock before closing the security grilles. One jewelry store even posted notices in the windows saying 'all stock removed', just in case... well, just in case. Walking down the street there are (were) small clusters of people talking together: 'closing' 'hear' 'go?' 'police' 'riots' 'say' 'home' 'cafes' drifting sporadically away from whispered conversations. There is (was) a larger group standing near two Metropolitan Police listening to them talk about... something, while other pedestrians (like myself) who really wanted to stop and ask 'What's going on? Are.. they... coming here? What have you heard? What should we do? Everything is going to be fine, right?' kept moving instead, not wanting to seem panicky or overly concerned or un-British.

I still can't quite figure out how/where this started. A peaceful protest gone bad, over the death of someone who may or may not have been a gangster/drug dealer/party fiend/choirboy. The idea of racial tensions, at least, have been pretty definitively shot down (no pun inte... er...) - it's either the disenfranchised youth rising up and acting out in the only way they can, or a (possibly organized) group of opportunists seizing the moment to loot and burn and destroy, trusting to safety in numbers and using social networking to produce those numbers... none of which actually seems to have anything to do with the initial protest. No one seems to know. The government wants to stop the violence now, figure out the reasons later. Even then, though, will anyone ever be able to say 'THIS is what happened, and WHY'? It's all rumor, speculation, exaggeration... In fact, don't listen to anything I just said. I don't know, either.

Wars and rumors of wars, indeed.

It's unbelievable.

Riots in London

I'm fine. I haven't seen or heard any violence, just been monitoring the news online and the paper. As I sit here in my room at 8:30 in the morning, though, I can hear sirens outside and... I wonder.

Penny Red talks about the rioting in London


It seems a little trivial to be working on a paper and figuring out which shows to go see. I should be doing something. Cleaning up something. Talking to somebody. Listening to someone. Holding someone accountable. Observing, being present. There is a message here, a story, - dare I say it? - a play, and I (a dramaturg) should be finding out what it is. I forget sometimes that theatre is more than entertainment; theatre has always been about social change.

Things don't get much more theatrical than the last few days in London.




And at the end of it all, I am very, very glad I don't still live in Peckham.


Watch out for falling turtles,

Cyd