Aug 4, 2010
For the record, there have certainly been more of these days than not.
Best and love to all of your days,
David
p.s. To link to my new website entitled “Art Needs Community” go to the link below. I won’t be updating it as frequently, but hope to have contributing authors as well. As it’s a full website, you’ll need to click on “The Entries” button to see all of the information.
Aug 3, 2010
Last year at this time we were somewhere in Virginia, waking the pups in a slightly smokey room, about to grab a bagel and banana before jumping in the family hoopskit to make the last leg of our trek. On that leg we saw some of the most beautiful hill country in the world, visited my childhood home in New Jersey where we had ice cream at the same place my baseball team went after games and then watched as the Manhattan skyline rose before us and welcomed us into a hot August evening.
I was about a week into this daily blogging experiment and enjoying it, but hadn’t stopped to wonder on the perspective of what it meant for me. As I sit one day away from closing the one-year door on this hot August morning that promises considerable perspiration, I’m glad that I’ve been a part of this world.
Those of you who might have read some of it I may or may not know. Some have commented, others have told me you keep up every now and again. As I write, however, the anonymity of the greater you is much like the city; the two went hand in hand beautifully. Like walking into the crazy streets of this hamlet-upon-hamlet and facing the layers of what may or may not appear, I move through my day available to a thought or image or reflection that might represent to whomever may or may not appear to read it, something of life.
To say that it is my life represented is somewhat simplistic, for, like the gift-feeling artists of yore, I have had the experience more of being a conduit, a filter of shared experience~~the day in the subway tunnel when everyone was late by an hour, the three crazy-looking and oddly-notated bells in the post office, the traffic and sculptures and feelings of pressure and release~~these are all New Yorker’s, all people’s, to feel and see and share when they are so led. For whatever the reason, this electronic medium became my “so led” and it’s helped me patiently sink into the hurried world around me and find nuggets of pause on a daily basis. So, to New York, to the blogosphere, to those who have stumbled upon it all, I bid you good morning and wish for us all a slightly more connected experience.
August 2, 2010
I haven’t talked much about the people we’ve been meeting here in New York, and that’s really unfortunate. The city is a funny place to know people, because most of the people you know, you don’t get to see that often. Still, because of that, I think everyone is a little more willing to connect quickly and then float on fumes of a good engagement or two. Ashley and I have both been lucky in meeting fascinating and caring people who have an amazing energy for life. Some we see more than others, but almost all of them have a brilliant way of interfacing with our lives and challenging the way we see things, which is a great benefit to having friends, even if you only see them once in a while. Would that I had ten more nights a week to be closer to many of them, yet, somehow I think New Yorkers just wouldn’t abide by too much time spent together…Oh, I’m sure there are people who hang like the Friends crowd or Sex In The City types who do everything in conjunction with a tight little band, but it doesn’t seem the norm from my first year here, though, I look forward to learning more about how this whole thing functions.
August 1, 2010
I’ve really not spent enough time on this blog talking about Ashley. Originally we were going to do it together, but that fell through as she got swept up in starting her new job last summer and after a month or two the whole thing just had my stamp and seemed silly for her to do more than an occasional update.
What I should have spent more time doing, however, is talking about how amazing she is. This whole move was really her idea, and I fought against it for a few years (when we were still in the hypothetical stage) and she was the one who continued to encourage me that it was going to work, she was the one who got the first-year sustaining job and finished school at the same time and she pushed for our Brooklyn move, etc. But these things are just the tip of the iceberg. In reality, I’ve never known anyone like her and don’t think I ever will. I got really lucky convincing her to jump into this life thing with me before she was old enough to realize how she could probably have anyone she wanted:) Every day that goes by it seems we get a little bit better a life and a little more connected to one another and thems ain’t so bad. I wish for everyone a connection as powerfully affirming as ours.
July 31, 2010
I went up to Poughkeepsie today for a C4 retreat at one of the member’s cabins. It’s pretty amazing to me that just outside of the city are all of these hidden places in the woods where no one goes. The scene was gorgeous and we had a good meeting, good times and some tasty grub. Keep an eye out for this group, they have a good chance to be something in the real soon.
July 30, 2010
I’ve been wondering about how I’m going to transition from this blog after the 4th and I think I’m going to start an arts-focused blog that I update a touch less frequently and focus mainly on the arts events, books, etc. that I engage with, and invite a few other authors to join. We’ll see how that goes.
Last night Ashley and I went to what is becoming a Brooklyn treasure, the Issue Project Room. They have an amazing sound system with fifteen independent hemisphere speakers designed by my new-found friend Stephan Moore in a long warehouse-like room and constantly put on shows by people in the sound-creation and cutting edge contemporary music world. Which edge are they cutting? Anything that’s electronic or experimental might show up there, the odder the better.
One of the pieces we heard had us laying on the floor and listening as the microphones in the piece reflected the sound of a grave being filled (he put 15 of them, one for each speaker, inside a coffin and then filled in the dirt and recorded it), or, being buried alive. It really actually felt as if you were (if one closed their eyes), which led me to wonder what you would think about if being actually buried alive. Would you freak out and try to get out, or would you just give up and let you mind be present with the final moments?
I enjoyed the concert. The creativity was of a particular brand that asks “why the hell not?”
July 29, 2010
When you think about quiet places on this earth, bits of tranquility, oasis even, you might not list Brooklyn among them. Windsor Terrace sounds a little more idyllic, but still not as salad days-like as say, The Bahamas or The Black Hills, etc. Yet, after a year in the pressure cooker that is Manhattan (which we loved, by the way), our new place is a veritable paradise. The people are so very friendly, the pace is slow, today in the park people were laying around in the sun randomly or fishing in the pond, and way more people hang out and hand feed the geese (never happened at Central Park), the traffic even moves slower and next to no one blows their horn, groceries are cheaper and when your window is open you hear the birds and the wind and the best part of all is there is no white noise to speak of!!
I have to say, I didn’t know what I would think about it, but I’m B-smitten.
July 28, 2010
On July 28, 2009 I posted the third blog post (I was really just trying to get used to the process) from friend Joe’s place in Austin. Seems like we had been out on the town, had a few beers and I had woken before anyone to sit outside with the pups (all four of them) and write about our travel experience. It was good times.
Now Joe is our neighbor, having moved to Brooklyn in March of this year, and we happened to move in about 3 blocks away from him. That doesn’t mean that we see him that often, but there’s something smallish about the world I think I heard once.
I’ve been thinking about Meghan a lot in the past two days too. This 365-day record depends often on the last year of her life. She was a good pup, and it’s equally fascinating how significance and happenstance often cross paths in unexpected ways.
July 27, 2010
Apparently Brooklyn is a place where cars can go to die. The first three images are of a truck sitting in the Lowes parking lot (yes, big box stores also have a few homes in Brooklyn). What’s fantastic is that no one seems to care that a bombed out tortilla truck is sitting in a major parking lot, I don’t know, for safety reasons, the broken window principle, etc. And then one has to wonder how it lit on fire in the first place.
The second car sits just south of the huge cemetery nearby. The death haven is gorgeous, the car didn’t fare as well as the grounds.
July 26, 2010 “10 Ocean Parkway”
And here we are at 10 Ocean Parkway B3, Brooklyn, NY 11218. It’s been a lovely two days here. And, although I need to spend a little more time with this feeling, it seems like I’m much more relaxed and engaged here…like there’s not a magnanimus pressure to produce all the time like there was just a few miles away.
Windsor Terrace is lovely. Still busy, but also with a quiet hamlet feel to it. We are steps from Prospect Park, and Sylvia seems to enjoy it a touch more than Central Park already b/c people tend to be more liberal with their trash. Our first walk in the park yielded her a piece of bread, something we didn’t see before it was down her throat and a rib bone (she didn’t get to keep it).
And, there are several unattended flower beds at our building that keep calling to me to talk with the building supervisor…this may be a good place after all.
