Wednesday, March 30, 2011 - Orange, CA
Just sitting in the library at Santiago Canyon College killing time between classes. I actually got a whole six hours of sleep last night, which means I'm semi with it for a change. I'm still burned out, though - and bored. I can't wait until my life starts moving in other directions ...
I did manage to see an old friend last week, which was a nice change of pace. My buddy Eric H. and his wife and kid came down from Petaluma for a week to get away from it all. We didn't hang out much: I just had breakfast with all of them one morning and then Eric and I went out for a beer one afternoon. Still it was nice to see him. It's interesting how some relationships always pick up right where they left off. He and I met about fifteen years back, when we were both students at Cal State University, Long Beach and working in the same restaurant. He eventually moved back up north where he was from, but we've stayed in touch, sporadically. Still we can hang out with each other as if nothing's changed, like he'd never left, which is something I can't do with too many people I only see occasionally. He's just a very laid-back guy, who doesn't get thrown by my eccentricities, which in regards to the latter, makes him a bit of an exception. It was great to see him - I need more simple, enjoyable relationships like that one in my life.
Other than seeing Eric nothing much new has been going on - physically. I have been doing a lot of thinking, though - about my upcoming Greece trip and more importantly what it might represent in the larger currents of my life. For a long time now I've been struggling thru many issues, as a writer and a person. These issues have been huge, make-or-break kind of stuff. I feel myself now coming out of the other side of them into something that will be truly new for me, into a place of greater confidence and much more joy, but a place that also features a great deal more risk. I've reached the point where the shackles that have bound me since childhood are naturally starting to fall away. I believe as if I am beginning the last and best period of my life and doing it with eyes wide open ...
What this means in in a day-today sense is still hard for me to say. For sure I see myself transitioning out of teaching. Though my degrees say "anthropology" on them I've never really been of that world and the longer I stay there the more of a charlatan I will become. Though I don't know how it will occur, what I will be transitioning into is the life of a free agent - somehow I will make my living thru writing and related endeavors. Over the last few years I've begun to realize that I simply can't be told what to do by others. I don't believe that this is arrogance on my part - I don't walk around with the belief that I'm better than everyone else - but simply an expression of something that's in my DNA. My basic nature is that of the drifter, of a person who must filter thru life as freely as possible - and it is in this unfettered that both my happiness and social worth is to be found. My first, best, and only role of note is being a reflector of my culture, specifically as a writer (and sometimes painter). Again, I'm not sure how it will play out, but somehow, soon, my income will be coming largely from my pen. With this change I will have essentially found my place in the world. Perhaps more importantly it is this change that will ultimately make me a useful part of the human community. I mean, I really can't do anything else other than write. Therefore my attempting to live a different life, by definition, is a waste of time for everyone involved ...
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Big thoughts. Big insights. A little too big; they're swamping me a bit. What else is going on? The latest edition of Art in America has a nice little article on Brice Marden's latest work, on a small show he has going on, in New York, I think. There are just a few reproductions, but what's there looks really interesting. He's still working with the tangled lines he's been exploring since his "Cold Mountain" period, which got going in the late eighties, if memory serves me correct. He's also going in some new directions as well. I'm looking forward to seeing a fuller exhibition of this stuff, hopefully in the near future. Seeing new Mardens makes me want to get back to picture making myself. Hopefully there will be time for that after Greece ...
There was one annoying thing about the Marden piece. In the magazine's table of contents there is a little picture of a new triptych of his, a dense fascinating work in powerful reads. However, this piece, easily the most interesting of the paintings of his in this issue, is not reproduced in larger scale in the main article. What the hell, man? A cruel, pointless little way to do things, if you ask me.
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