Things I have:

Seen:
- This japanese? print has been in my digital collection for a while and I just rediscovered it after rescuing a crashed hard drive. Not sure if I will keep it there or just display the weekly image in its place. I think it's purty.

Listened to:
- According to NPR, the walkmen are a cross between Dylan and the Velvet Underground. I think any statement of that sort is absurd, but likely one I might make as well after listening to the studio recording. THe live is a bit different, but listen for yourself to see.

Done:
- We went to the Gnome (only my second time for some reason... busy, busy, busy, broke, broke, broke)and finally tasted a bit of their food. And I must say it was damn good. Far too damn good for a simple little bar in Saint Paul, but big enough to turn a little bar in Saint Paul into a big bar in the Twin Cities. I had a grilled cheese made with Black Diamond Cheddar, Asparagus and Red Peppers with a big ol' plate of skin wearing fries (the skinny ones, not the wedges). And they make their own ketchup blend dammit! With horseradish and syuff in it! If you haven't been, go! Before they hike up their prices.

Digitally meandered:
- Eco-geek is one of those trend-blog-things which are popping up which seem to be a sort of style-digest for the lazy and otherwise occupied. It has some interesting things, even for those who are still so lazy they throw bottles and cans in the garbage. Those silly lazy people.

Bonus:

This week only!
An extra web link for those who want to hear the sounds of a beaver, the speeches of Joseph Stalin, Malcolm Ex, and George Bush I, and watch old documentary footage... and to make potato cannons..

Hmm...

Well, I took Greg's suggestion in saving the previous links (though in a different way) and I am having problems...

but I am learning HTML through experimentation alone, so...

it will look better soon, hopefully.

Marriage is what brings us together...

Another friend of mine got married and I am very happy for them. It was a beautiful place and the ceremony so simple and pure and true and that's wonderful.

During the ceremony there was a part left open for people to say things. I thought for a few days and even asked for a dream about what to say, but nothing would come to me. I flipped through Emerson and thought of Gibran and Dickens and even randomly jumped through Dumas looking for some words from Porthos that would be both comical and inspiring to them, but nothing ever made itself known to me. Even as I drove to meet them yesterday, I listened to all of the music in my car looking for some clever way to throw in a quote from Dylan or something but nothing came. So when the moment came, I sat there...

and said nothing...

and though I felt a bit... uncomfortable at my own silence, I hope it didn't make them feel like I had nothing for them in the way of well wishes or good thoughts.

But as I was thinking about it a bit ago I realized why it was that nothing was coming to me.

They already knew.

Though most everyone knows the same good-times-and-bad-times speech and the Apache wedding blessing, they know what lies behind all of that. I think they have both experienced love and love lost before and know what opening yourself up to that level means. They know that the only way to truly love someone is to let them see you for all you are. They know that it is truly to love someone to show them the details of your weaknesses. They may even know that it is OK to pee with the door open (maybe not). But they know enough... more than enough.

So I got nothing but a smile for these two people. They are going to be great together and amazing parents if they so choose.

As I finish this now, however, I realize I do have one blessing for them:

May you come to laugh uncontrollably at each others flatulents at 3 am.

Weeklies in Brief

Music:
Fusion of Bossa Nova and Bee-bop and Reggae and all sorts of this and that from KCRW out of LA — the place where I get most of my streaming performances as you may know.

Picture:
You will have to forgive me for my phones poor camera, but this contrail (sp?) was left and so often they do such strange framing of the objects on the ground...

Place :
I saw Alice in Chains with their tour singer this weekend in Chi-town (which by the way is named after the stinky onions that grew nearby when it was founded). Again, mixed Chicago feeling. Also mixed feelings about the band. Lost a bit of respect for the salty Cantrell but it was definitely the band that they used to be. Still holdin up. I would put money down, though, on the lead singer not making it through the tour. He seemed a little too pleased with life to be a member of this brooding troupe.

Thing:
I really, really want to see this film.

I mean really.

I promise... soon a longer post about something. Things is as hectic as hectic gets these days.

Annotated Weeklies

Seattle:
The music and image are directly related to my missing Seattle and the area around it. I don't know why, but that place is a child tugging at my hand when I am in the middle of a conversation. I feel commited to finishing my words, but I really want to run off and play tag with the kid.

I went out to visit Seattle and the Olympic mountains when my brother and his wife first moved out there, though Emily had to stay back in MN. We spent a good deal of time in Seattle itself and I found that I loved it there. We also took a day trip around the mountains in the car and I fell into a sort of trance that I can only compare to the feelings of a deep friendship. Occasionally I find myself daydreaming about the Pacific Northwest and feel the need to just pack Emily, the creatures, and I up into a U-haul and get on the road.

So the weekly music is a clip of the song (Tori Amos' "Your Cloud" from Scarlet's Walk) we listened to as we drove around the mountains and by the place in the photo: Lake Crescent. I was really wishing Emily was there at the time to see this lake for which I had some unexplicable fondness. That feeling and the trip that I was on made me extremely empathetic to the character of the song (though she and I were not splitting up). I think that album was on repeat for a few hours of the drive.

By the way, that album is more and more influential to me each month. My understanding is that it is meant as a sort of exploration of the U.S in body and spirit and it overflows with impressions of journey and emotion. Listen to some good clips at that link I provided.

Internship
The "place" is the organization I am interning this summer. They do a lot of restoration work and have started doing pilot design programs to serve as examples of what can be done with native plants in design to integrate instead of separate a site from its greater ecosystem. I am very excited.

Rastafari
One more reason it is great to work with so many people from all over the place is that they teach me so much. A guy I work with explained to me that the Rastafari movement was about the guy in the article and it made Bob Marley's music make so much more sense. It also makes me finally understand references in the lyrics of Common and Lauren Hill.

Why doesn't anyone explain these things to the Honkies? Some of us want to know...

Take care y'all. More to come.

New Weekly Things

I have recently actually listened to Gomez and found that I really, really dig them. So they are your music this week.

The picture is from the National Wildlife Foundation Website and reminds me how awesome squirrels are.

I have added Weekly Local Place to share a place that I enjoy that I have gone this week. It will encourage me to go new places, and maybe other people, too. Yestaerday we went to Fasika. It is Emily's favorite place and we met some old friends there for lunch after the Living Green Expo. Good times, all around.

Oh and the Other Thing this week is Stephen Colbert at the White House Correspondants' Dinner. Wow.

Thoughts on Jospeh Campbell's Thoughts

Joseph Campbell has officially become a hero of mine. You may have notices that link to the organization which carries his name and legacy on the right side there.

It seems that his work carries the message that I have only been starting to realize and trying to puzzle out on my own. There are so many things that he says that are so much truth to me, but I want people who are interested to look into it for themselves. So here is just a taste and I hope I do it some justice:

Myths/religions serve four purposes:
1. To give a sense of wonder regarding all of the unanswerables.
2. To help humans come to grips with the brutal nature of life by accounting for/mystifying/explaining all of the things which we must do.
3. To guide us through the psychological milestones we experience through life (rites of passage, etc).
4. To provide a society with rules of conduct and a sense of morality.
(I am trying to recall from memory, but I am pretty sure that is about it).


"Dreams are personalized myth and myths are depersonalized dreams."
He believes that dreams are a person's way of sorting out what goes on in their lives (as Freud and Jung), but also believes that those dreams can and have been carried into a culture's public realm to become their mythos. As I have studied some small level of American Indian philosophy, I see that notion very, very evident in their mytic culture. Just reading "Black Elk Speaks," one can find many examples of the vision made manifest to help them understand what they were experiencing and how to get through it.
Campbell also believes that the shamans of the past possessed a type of schizophrenia, but were given a special place in their society for their ability to dream and interpret myths from them for the betterment of their culture. They were honored, not committed.

I still have many questions, but there is so much more to his work. I am only one book, four lectures and two documentaries into it so far.

One, hmm... uncomfortable(?) part about my affinity for and agreement with his work is that I seem to be growing both closer and more distant to religious people. On one hand, I understand better how they find answers to questions within the writings of their chosen perspective... but on the other hand, I feel even more distant from those who view it as... well, as gospel.

Did Jesus exist? It doesn't really matter, I suppose. Buddhas? Doesn't matter. If the guidance one gets helps them get through this world and helps make it better, cool.

Campbell seems to say, though, that our understanding of science creates too many inconsistencies with old mythologies/religions; that new myths must be made which can account for modern scientific understanding. But considering the very nature of myth, how can one form a modern mythos for today's people? If myth is metaphor, must it be believeable as fact and put through the scrutiny of the scientific method? I suppose for some people it does and others it doesn't. I read the Celestine Prophecy a number of years ago and was very upset knowing that it was fiction as I was reading it. I was upset that they were trying to convince us of phenomena through an entirely fabricated story. At that point, I thought that it would be better to tell of the wonder of our world through true stories. I still kind of believe that, but see the power of narrative to emphasize things that create wonder in this world.

Anyaway, something to dwell on for hours as I drive around campus.

More to come for sure.

New Weekly Selections Posted

Imagine being on a small island with Tom Waits and flowers that smell like rotting meat.

That's the kind of experience I bring to you people.



No thanks necessary.
You're welcome.

Opening Doors

To begin, apparently non-Blogger members were not able to comment. I was unaware that I had that enabled but it has bene removed. Feel the liberation! Thanks, Katie, for letting me know.

In bigger news, I am suddenly finding myself commissioned to do the design work for which I have been spending all of this time studying and sketching and fretting about. I must say that I was initially very intimidated by the idea that I am now going to be imprinting my grown-up version of coloring books into people's living spaces. And I have to accept that they are going to like and not like what I design... though I think I accepted that when I started realizing that what I want to design is very different from what I see everywhere.
And though my gut reaction was to say, "I am not done with school yet. I can't do this!" I realized that so many of the strings tied to my fingers that I could never find the end of were at last braided into the rope that is harnessing this beast now before me. All I have to do is take control...