200920 - Extinction Chronicles ·

I don’t like being played - however the only logical foundation for that feeling is a conflict within myself about playing others · Madame Paradox is a bitch, then you die. I prefer the straightforward to the roundabout, when someone says “can you do this for me¿”, but what they mean is “will you do this for me?” Women are masters of this duplicity, and i’ve come to believe it is because they have learned to view their brothers with contempt for the ease with which we are manipulated. My anima, for the longest time has mimicked, often poorly this double standard by inferring my wants through artifice and guile, rather than face the frontal assault of “please” and then to live with the yes or no. But i am getting better, i often do not ask for much, rather let the gravity of “what happened” serve as a confirmation of my own predisposition. I find that i so misunderstand the world and lack fundamental confidence in my own ______fill in the blank, it is easier to accept outcomes not directly of my making than to place myself in the breech of intention and say full front to the universe this _____fill in the blank, is what i want.

I am not complaining about my strategy for it has left me fairly free to pursue those avenues of curiosity which the opinion of others often impairs, and it has forced me to carefully consider that which i desire, for there is no external agency with whom to conspire, but that of my own wants. I do not want much - i’ve gotten that far, but what i want, i want strongly. I want to be cared for, in the same manner that i find i have found myself capable of caring for others; and it is a weird mix to be sure. I once sat on a plane with a stranger whom i subsequently included in an seemingly endless pilgrimage of letters to my Mother with whom i had once again become estranged from. My thinking was that i did not want to say anything to my mother which i could not also openly express to a woman who had entirely captivated my imagination in a 4 hour flight out of Bali. At the time I was living an entirely isolated life in high desert of California and it seemed to be the most constructive use of that time.

I have no regrets nor shame for selling my house at the end of that 3 year retreat and flying to Paris to confirm the reality of my fantasies. Whether i punked out, or she did; we’ll never know, for when she explained that she and he would be out of town from - to, and i said “good i will call you then to rendezvous, but that is the only call i will make,” she did not pick up and i moved on. I am donkey like that; it has been pointed out to me by professionals that the i lose the “forest for the trees,” but i have yet to be cured of my weirdness after decades of what can only be described as extremely lucrative assistance from them, so i figure i must be suffering from terminal weirdness and so seek my tribe to die with, or at least near; though they remain in hiding, i am hopeful, for that is a unique symptom of my particular malady.

I gather from having been shunned by my family on FB and in real life that they believe my illness to be contagious; it may just be my weirdness, not the outward manifestation of hope, which i can’t seem to shake. My father was a high school cheerleader which for the year 1940 was not all that unusual, but for the pre-Dallas Cheerleaders of my generation his history gave me great pause. Now i have come to understand it was simply Pop being Pop to the core - he a tireless advocate of human potential, and that excellent example has truly been infectious. But not without its controversy; at his wake when my sister pronounced in a passing eulogy that “he embarrassed all of us” and i could only but interrupt, “No, he challenged us.” I would apologize to my sister for interrupting her misery, but that would only further confirm her myopic estimation of me as “victim” an insight she is not entirely entitled to, but one which i can empathize with for its inherent projection; another feature of our shared malady.

I do not blame Ma for her cruelty, or Pop for his, however much misunderstood, inexhaustible optimism. They were and are human beings having done their best, and to whom i will remain eternally grateful. Now it is our time to vacate the field with as much good effort as we can muster for the benefit of the “greater good,” not because that is how i was raised to roll which i was, but because it is the only right way to roll. I cannot say what comes next, and am beginning to understand that that is not my call to make - the only options before me are how to eliminate from my life that which does not aid my ambition for personal happiness as best i can fathom what that means, and to eliminate as much of my own contribution to the collective misery of those with whom i share this miraculous moment in time. We are in the midst of an eternity, and if that means we can put some small spin on that existential ball in favor of just that much more love and kindness, i’m all in; “but when you talk about destruction, Don’t you know you can count me out.” - John Lennon  

jts 20/09/2020  

http://stoanartst.blogspot.com

reprinted with permission - all rights reserved

∞

190920 - Extinction Chronicles

Once again the laundry is done, so the terror of having no clean underwear recedes into the future for another 19 days, baring unforeseen events. I am awash in food which feels contemptible when so much of the world is living hand to mouth. I have allowed the kindness of strangers to prevail over my own organization, and it confuses me. My last wife cooked a kettle full of vegetable soup the night of her great escape. I had been back from the hospital from an emergency appendectomy for 2 days, and preparing to work the next day. She stood over this kettle of simmering vegetables muttering to herself, “I love this man, I love this man,” and so thought little more of her declaration when she had picked me up at the hospital - “I am leaving you.” Gimping back from the Yellow Line train stop the next day, the neighbor kids trailed me from the corner asking where are you moving to?

My wife had left, and after that kettle was gone, i continued cooking variations of vegetables for the next 2 years. So when the wife of my current neighbors, the farmers, began placing dishes of prepared food in my window, it was disconcerting but also coincided with a time in my own development when i wanted to stop resisting the universe. However it has played havoc with my well developed sense of self-reliance, not to mention meal planning. The more complicated aspect of this conundrum is the effect of criticism on people’s good intentions. She i imagine is feeling compassion for a solitary stranger and as i understand it wants to relieve my suffering. I have tried to explain that i can happily manage my meals, and our arrangement has created a waste of food which i feel very badly about - to no avail. The language barrier is real, but the cultural barrier is more real.

For my birthday, i was gifted new sandals for reasons i’m not entirely clear about, but i think it was concern about my appearance because i prefer my well worn pair to the new ones i’d bought sometime back - a pair she the kind "gifter", knew nothing about. Again it is the lack of communication that is complicating matters. The individual in question could quite conceivably ask me to commit murder, which i might or might not comply with, but she has no real concept of her power of command. However, he is unable to ask me what it is i would want or need for my birthday. I am guilty of the same lack of communication and had made an extravagant gesture for her birthday the year before without verifying whether it would be useful or even desired. This lack of communication has created an imbalance i did not wish for or plan.

In the den of my scholarship, i often lose sight of the real world effect my fantasies might have. I have deluded myself into believing that as long as my intentions are pure and i honor my interior as honestly as i know how, the world and its response to my being be damned. I’m in no haste to unlearn that at a time in human history when so few are effectively controlling the wants and desires of so many. But along with that commitment to personal integrity, i struggle to listen carefully to those with whom i interact. This often results in what i understand to be “reaction formation.” My personal strategy to retire from society has left more of a footprint than i’d have thought possible, and the reaction of people being listened to has created more attention than i am comfortable with. When i say reaction formation, i mean i have also found very few who have any desire or capacity to learn about my wants or feelings, rather they view me, as i experience it, as a “Tabula Rasa” waiting for their imprint of what they imagine i am, or want.

I have curtailed my desires much, but i have not as yet satisfied my desire for a companionable partner looking for a quiet creative life; she the model/muse and proprietress of whatever we can collaboratively create, and i the errant knight struggling to comprehend and honor her quiet anima; an anima that no longer requires consumer objects to satisfy and support her desire for security, but who understands that with the years i have left and the resources i have accumulated i want nothing more than to love and cherish her gentle ways without defending her from the suitors she needs me not to repeal. I seek a helpmate to negotiate our wants and desires interdependently, rather than petition the wide world individually. I wish a couple-hood that welcomes my manic doting, and often severe solitude, someone whom i can explore with abandon, and to whom i can revel in my nakedness; at this point in my life it makes no sense to live for less.  

jts 19/09/2020  

http://stoanartst.blogspot.com

reprinted with permission - all rights reserved

∞

180920 - Extinction Chronicles ·

My father was an excellent teacher, so i am fortunate to find examples of decency wherever i look, as long as i am mindful of my shortcomings and don’t confuse reality with my imagination - not always the easiest classrooms to keep straight. The typhoon Noul has passed, yet the one following that hasn't yet formed will likely be more fearsome and dangerous rather than less so; my good fortune for the one just past was to be in a region that mostly, but not always, embraces the perils of ecological repercussion, and a place about which one would say back in the day "has their shit together". I say repercussion because the intensity and frequency of such natural phenomenon has been exacerbated by profiteering from the peoples of the Northern hemisphere of this planet we share with 7 billion odd other human beings, and a plethora of other species - half of which have been extinguished in the last 150 years from arrogance and ignorance by our species; we homo sapiens are on track for at worst, our own extinction - or at best, near extinction within the next 150 years.

There is not a scintilla of scientific data that i can point you to for your own verification of my Wild Ass Guess (WAG), but as an idiot savant of sorts, i’d be surprised to reincarnate and find my figures too very far wrong. So tell me, how can what i know benefit you to preserve your DNA strand and make it more viable to our collective survival than the "humanlike avatar database" the merchant class is planning to upload into their "next"  generation clones¿ snarky i know; the question is do you know just how snarky? The digital wizards, before Covid-19 hobbled had their plans, were or now with greater haste, preparing an uplink - concurrent with their hypothetical projections about the “singularity,” think digital version of the “rapture” - a lot of woo-ha coming from a bunch of geek billionaire geniuses that can’t feed the overflow population they conjured using their hired legislative goons to destroy "planned parenthood" and provide fodder for their infinite growth paradise.

From where i sit, the leaders are idiots and their managers are cowards to comply with such a twisted vision of humanity's future. The only real test can be made by using the lowest common denominator, not the optimal ROI that has driven our species to the brink. Conflating HNWI with competence is more a reflection of advertising success than any functional metric that i’m aware of. Just being around those that trumpet velocity over quality or price vs pride of product are highly suspect, much less worthy of patronage. When exploiting anything: people, opportunity, resource enters into the discussion i move away and my attention is drawn to those who care about the quality of their own lives: what is meaningful, what is kind, what in the interest of the greatest good, i’m all ears, or at least the one that still works.

It’s kind of fun in a lot of ways to be at ground zero of whatever will allow our species to survive, what Paul Simon had alluded to, but i don’t think fully fathomed to be “our darkest hour.” Writing classes caution against cliche, because it saps the vitality of one’s meaning, and darkest hour is certainly something we aught not underestimate. The opposite is equally true - “darkest before that dawn” is as meaningful and full with historical foundation as “cart before the horse,” or a “fool and his money are soon parted.” We should be aware of things we discover by our own initiative, and veer as far away from the consumer-based key-stroke prompts we are addicted to. I detest the intellectual cowardice and greed that is well represented on any computer platform you peer into - twisted egos and deformed characters peeking out from behind some avatar algorithm, like a teenage boy peering into a mirror before his first date.

And the broads are no better - little is spoken about how their nesting instinct got coopted by Gucci, or that their biological imperative got subsumed by half-naked fireman making extra bucks showcasing their tits; talk about your objectification. Top off this dystopian desert with a healthy dollop of shame for anything that resembles self-love, except the photo-shopped narcissistic avatar so many strive for in this empty digital commons - myself included. I sorely miss the heart-to-heart conversations of my emerging adolescent identity, drug or alcohol induced matters not. There is much to be said for temperance and i have lived enough of my life in both states to appreciate the value of moderation; not because it was proscribed, for i find i am not the enforceable type, but by personal choice - that exhilarating moment when one accepts it is possible to have it all, but not necessary ·

jts 18/09/2020  

http://stoanartst.blogspot.com

reprinted with permission - all rights reserved

∞

170920 - Extinction Chronicles ·

What am i doing writing into a non-responsive aether¿ Do i expect at any moment there will be a clamoring to understand better what i attempt to share from the heart, but can only touch on without having questions to which i might respond? Or am i crying in my beer to soothe the fear of dying alone in a foreign land - i think not. I can only guess that the prospect of facing a typhoon just off the coast has prompted high anxiety; that because my electric bill has more than quadrupled from having moved two house over without altering my routines, i am suspicious; the putz in the white house couldn’t win on his merits, so he’s playing the fascist race card everyone knew he would, but no one wants to confront; now there are jackbooted thugs in the streets beating up people exercising their civic duty objecting to a wanna be dictator from the investor class. who wouldn't have doubt?

My intrinsic sardonic wit is not rising to the occasion of my 66th rotation around the sun, and my “L” key is sticking; it seems to be a transient fault that started on the “4” key some weeks back and then moved to “A”, so it’s not even adjacent spaces. I’m at the point where a computer failure would not be an entirely unwelcome event, preferring the up close and "persona" misery found on any street corner of the world. It could the god of mindfulness just wants me to stay awake to what i’m doing and if i inadvertently type “persona” when i meant "personal" that would be from inattentiveness, not technological error. Yesterday afternoon after writing was finished i searched for ways to help the harried farmers bring the rice in before the rain - i was not the worker i’d been 5 years ago, much less last year - not an auspicious insight when changing ages.

As a cheery sort of bloke, i’m growing weary of uplifting dour people, or if it turns out that my new landlords have piggybacked their home electricity bill on mine, (hyper-vigilance is tedious) but so is patience with penny ante flim-flam; a popular sport for the oppressors, and sadly one willingly mimicked by the oppressed - monkey see, monkey do. But for the long haul and imagining a new economic paradigm based on equality and an even distribution of the resources of our dying world, dishonesty doesn’t bode well for the wee ones who watch and learn from what we do, not from what we say. Oddly enough it was exhilarating to, even for a moment, pit my muscles against heavy sacks and to try and not slow down the more nimble, much stronger younger men. What i realized is how powerful the mind is.

Were it i alone attempting to shift one of those full bags of rice, my knees would buckle and i’d have lost my grip grappling to raise the bag, but when faced with the smirk of youth at the old man out of his depth, my bile rose and my gall got the better of me - a sad truth, but a truth nonetheless; i am too proud a human to be seen relenting to infirmities i seem helpless or unwilling to stem. But for those fun few moments, i was a kid again on some labor line throwing bulk back and forth for the fun of it, and it felt good. So it is important that rather than curtail my efforts, i press on - just like writing this curious daily memorandum of an old man’s existential detritus - it is not so much for your wellbeing, as mine.

It is necessary at this late date in life to acknowledge flaws of character, like pride, sloth, conceit - the things i discover about myself while trying to blame others for the predicament i am in that can be resolved by no one but myself; i am the one that created the mess and must be the one to extricate myself into greener pastures, if indeed there are greener pastures anywhere in this miraculous, but sorely mistreated world of ours. I’m sure it’s the same for all the people i meet, agreeable or not; they cannot be that much different than myself - a speck in time looking for an even break and as honest as their ability to peer into their own hearts allows them. I am tired and will rest now, thanks for pressing this far along with me.  

jts 17/09/2020  

http://stoanartst.blogspot.com

reprinted with permission - all rights reserved

∞

160920 - Extinction Chronicles ·

I was feted this afternoon for a birthday i’m not anxious to face and sit deeply moved by the generosity of my friends. Nor is it as simple as that - for in my “secret life” romance hovers over my daily wanderings like some angel i pray to, but hide from for fear that the demon that is my heart will harm her. This year i turn 66 and all i know for certain is the distance from 66 to 67 will be shorter than the distance from 65 to 66, the same as 1 to 2 was half my life and from 2 to 3 was 1/3 - you do the math. Though the world is on fire from a plague whose destruction is as uneven as the leadership of our species, i do not feel much fear. The country i now live in, utilized effective measures to restrict outbreaks, and the educated, savvy population contributed with common sense compliance for the good of all.

It is an added responsibility for me to utilize my wherewithal in ways that blunt the economic and emotional impact and to search for language and behavior that encourages growth and optimism which could aid in financial recovery for all and hopefully the development of more robust strategies than the narrow spectrum of corporate destination-based tourism to a foundation worthy of the long history of this ancient city where i am privileged to avail myself of sanctuary. But how do i, armed with a daily 5-paragraph essay push that rock up hill, when i have difficulty pushing the rock of my own ignorance out of the way of my own wannabe open heart. It has something to do with not seeking validation from anyone for what i want, rather to peer into the cavern of my savage being and comfort the tormented child inside.

Today at lunch my cultural confusion was barely contained by the seating arrangement when i found myself sitting next to the object of my fantasies, who had been testy only hours earlier when i teased her about bringing the items she’d requested, after having been expressly forbidden the evening before to bring anything at all. She is under extraordinary duress having built her life around a homestay that now stands empty with the prospect of open borders receding further into the future rather than advancing forward toward her hopes. My words of encouragement feel hollow and i feel powerless to help her nurture the terrain of desires. The best thing that i can do is to continue on my path - seeing her when i am allowed and trying to better understand a common ground which seems to provoke kindness from her toward me however much spiked with a chronic disapproval i do not understand.

Where i sit writing now is the new Dingo Deli location that is, as i type, in the midst of labor pains, seeking solid ground even as the rug of its customer base has been yanked out from under its faithful proprietor by a capricious world doing what Bob Dylan sang about decades ago - “Seems sick and it’s hungry; it’s tired and it’s torn. It looks like it’s a dying and it’s hardly been born.” What’s awkward is the contrast between where i’d been comfortable writing previously, but has now become an act of faith and solidarity with a vision i don't fathom and which seems at odds with itself; making a customer comfortable. Even just now, the shade cover is being cranked open during the late afternoon heat of the sultry weather of this South East Asian nation facing the imminent arrival of a typhoon · maybe it's to showcase the heavenly view he literally moved heaven and earth to achieve for his clients, i d k ¿? 

The ambience i so enjoyed in the previous location, was as i have learned a petri dish for digital nomads to explore new excesses in nonchalant lounging and “poser arrogance”. The wayfarers who shift from nation to nation have earned little regard from me, a personal resistance i do not entirely understand but accept that the digital vagabond is an ethos i shrink from. My friend the proprietor had had enough of their affected behavior in the previous location and so formatted his new location, cafeteria style with open seating designed to minimize the statistical time spent by the average client coming to spend money - i can understand that however much i preferred the ambience of the former. Even “she who would be queen” commented astutely on the new location lacking ambience - she surprises me at times with a not entirely unexpected acuity about her observations · only just this afternoon revealing the basis for her reservations about a mutual acquaintance, “he’s wants to know too much.” I think i’ll just remain patient and maybe learn someday why she hasn’t entirely dismissed me from the pantheon of her "distant" admirers.

jts 16/09/2020  

http://stoanartst.blogspot.com

reprinted with permission - all rights reserved

∞

150920 - Extinction Chronicles ·

From Charles Darwin’s “Origin Of The Species” much hay has been made about the expression “survival of the fittest,” what they never seem to include is Darwin’s definition of fittest. As it happens, those species which have survived best are defined as “adaptive and cooperative.” Don’t believe me, do your own research, it’ll be good for you, you might even say adaptive. Look at my native land, U.S. of ‘merica; it’s been so long since these poor schmucks have had anything but kicks to the groin, much less achieving anything innovative to crow about that they more resemble whipped dogs groveling for a hand full of salt, more so than the leaders of the free world. It is almost as though George Orwell in some Machiavellian plot to drive his point home, left seed money in a codicil from his enormous estate from the gazillions he has to have made writing “The Animal Farm” and other neo-liberal training manuals to establish sub rosa training camps proving his ideas to be more than dystopian fiction, much less cautionary tales. 

Sorry George, if i didn’t say it someone else would have eventually. Everyone’s seen the meme, "1984 - wasn’t supposed to be a road map", but as a simile it’s a little too much like the African proverb about how to capture monkeys; drill a hole in a hollow tree just large enough for a monkey to get an empty hand in, but not large enough for the monkey to get a fist full of goodies out - leave goodies in the hollow tree and wait for you monkey to trap himself. These fuckers cutting the throat of humanity are “all in.” They are buying their own press and believe in their hearts that they can manage 7 billion angry human beings; after all they do have the “fist full of goodies.” Never mind that the tree their fists are stuck in is burning like a motherfucker - they have the goodies. What saddens me, is how many stupid people see these mooks with their fists stuck in these burning trees and are teaching their children “see him, he has a fist full of nuts; i want you to be like him with more nuts than anyone, never mind about the burning tree - he is on g_d’s side and god will put the fire out. I know this because he told me before he took all the nuts” ·

My greed is simply of another form - i want desperately for you to survive and am willing to sacrifice my dignity and my existence to explore the equally implausible scenario of a world living together in harmony. Only i am not the Hebrew David, and Goliath is no longer a sandaled thug with a big club; Goliath is the screen you are now peering into, except this Goliath resembles more the funny little balding man in “The Wizard of Oz,” too much of a pissant coward to come out from behind his/her technological curtain to claim his/her insignificance, or show him/herself as a pimply faced post-pubescent computer scientist who never read Dr. Faustus and so truly believes that surreptitiously hijacking your keyboard is keeping ‘merica great, besides s/he is making insane money at a time when the POC/homeless are leaving a nasty pee smell in the parking lot at the Starbucks where you sometimes treat your visiting relatives to Latte and sometimes use the public Yoga Studio to “keep it real,

" and besides everyone knows · pee smell, enlightenment and upward mobility do not mix.

I know, that’s pretty mean - snarky even, but how the fuck else are you going to get through to eggheads who think their algorithms are any match for the eons of wholesome suffering people have endured to get to this late stage of evolution¿ And again, like the truncated definition of “fittest,” what is it we are evolving to? I feel that all i have achieved in my life is an existential appendage to the platitudes of my childhood, though i am luckier than most i meet, for my parents had a high-minded conceit and life experience severe enough to back it up. So here at the apex of my conscious capacity, or more accurately, as my 1st wife the paranoid schizophrenic Cherokee from Long Beach might have said “with a tiger by the tail on a downhill pull,” i have seen many things, good and bad, i once stuck a spoon in a stranger’s mouth who was suffering an epileptic seizure on a sidewalk in NYC only because i’d seen it done on TV - turns out TV was right and she was very grateful.

That was an appropriate use of media, not the seizing of keystrokes that today's toddlers are aping from watching their older siblings scroll until their minds are numb and their attention span nil - that is exploitation in service of consumer “thralldom” - if you don’t know the word, look it up · it’ll be good for you. Arundhati Roy, is a tireless advocate of personal agency and the development of human potential - “The corporate revolution will collapse if we refuse to buy what they are selling - their ideas, their version of history, their wars, their weapons, their notion of inevitability.” Create your own world, one that is based on the love you feel for those close to you and about where you live; analyze your frustrations about achieving your own desires; and develop those objectives by working with those around you to achieve a cooperative end which will serve you and your children better than adhering to some vision shoved down your throats by a keyboard/screen that only answers the questions that it gives to you.

jts 15/09/2020  

http://stoanartst.blogspot.com

reprinted with permission - all rights reserved

∞

140920 - Extinction Chronicles ·

Well where the fuck to go from here, like there is anyplace else to go. I sat in the yard of my loving farmer neighbors after my bike ride this morning, and i think i was invited to live within their compound which i learned has been in the family for 4 generations - circa 1850, this based on a googol translation; so i pitched a book idea using 170 years of their family recipes coupled with a family tree and explication of farming methods and the influence of foreign traders in this unique seaside town about to mortgage itself to its neck chasing the Disneyesque yoke of Corporate-Flavored-Tourism. I’m pretty sure something got lost in the translation, if not everything, but it was fun and encouraging to be absorbed by something other than languishing in the miasma of waiting for the whiz-kids from corporate heaven to kick start a fictional economy that has served 7 human beings out 7 billion human beings so well. 

Ya’ wanna know what’s a hoax - the notion of an “infinite growth paradigm” foisted on a planet of “finite resources;” that my friends is an inequality dressed up like an equation; if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck - it’s a fucking duck · and you ought to duck; squealing like a pig, clearly ain’t gonna get you more tit. Back to my friends the farmers; i am not going to change the world at this late date, the best i can hope for is some small comfort in my dying days. From what i’ve learned in my too short a time on this luminescent spherical film of moisture covering its molten iron core like some virginal maid with carnal thoughts is that it’s really fun to do shit for other people, more fun than riding down a mountainside from the “Great Wall” on a ersatz toboggan behind a timid Latvian hitting her brakes at even the slightest hint of turn.

I think it is that - to give - which made the xmas holidays fun before it was overrun by the corporate consumer overlords - that look of delight on a child’s face receiving a gift that had only the scent of a relationship to behavior or on too many occasions some stink of relationship to one's place in the family constellation · mostly just “manna from heaven.” Even the poor fool parents enjoy the thrill of delight a child finds in a gift from out of the aether; however much those same parents were complicit in the con, or yoked with the bill that was maneuvered onto their shoulders by a bloodless economic parasite financing its prisons onto the backs of those same loving parents; ya’ gotta love xmas, cause if you don’t you’re a “godless communist” and you’re going to hell for masturbation no matter how many times you pray for forgiveness of your sins.

Back to my friends the farmers, and me without a friend in the world. There was a passage in “The Good Earth” - Pearl Buck, when the parents of the newborn spewed out vile epithets about their newborn · the thinking being if the deities felt jealous, they would loose their wrath on the life of that child; so too i fear commenting with fond regard about my friends should any internet curse of celebrity befall them. This is not an uncommon theme in literature; John Steinbeck found grist for the same mill in “The Pearl” wherein an impoverished family in Mexico was harried into obscurity by the sudden riches of a harvested pearl, a windfall that provided anything but the relief and security its absence and concommittant fantasy suggested. It is no different for this small seaside hamlet i may die in, it is already congested with speculator’s egos and tabled fortunes piling up interest debt against the gains imagined by the fictional “infinite growth paradigm.”

I am old, and hope that the four generations of wisdom accumulated against the pent up fury of greed at their gate will neuter the further Disneyesque delusion of boatloads of strangers disembarking on their shore for no other reason than to deposit money in the hands of all they meet. Rather I would continue to advocate to my farmer friends that the real harvest is in plumbing the depths of their history, their land and that of their families to develop compelling stories so vivid that the increasingly immobile but hungry for adventure world we are facing will pay dearly for finely crafted stories describing well the fortitude and courage of their forebears such that no one need leave their doorstop, but rather establish a strong exchange of ideas and cultures whereby everyone benefits except the corporate overlords and their fictions of unending wealth which always seems to evaporates at the drawer of the capitalist’s till - kaching · kaching · kaching ·   

jts 14/09/2020  

http://stoanartst.blogspot.com

reprinted with permission - all rights reserved

∞