Happy Accidents

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 I have recently begun to view Bob Ross's The Joy of Painting videos again before drifting off to sleep.  They remain wonderful night time stories. Ross's voice is delightfully calming, even when he discovers a new idea for a painting: "Oh, wait, yes, I see it. You saw it too. A little hollow here with a cluster of trees!" Hardly worthy of an exclamation point, the intonation is so restful. But what I have rediscovered and found particularly interesting here in the days of the pandemic is his idea of "happy accidents." 

Whenever a painting begins to slip a little sideways, as close as Ross comes to "Drat" is something like "Oh, wait. Let's not make that a cloud. Let's make it a tree, and put another one here next to it. Trees need to have a friend too. See? Doesn't that look nice? We don't have mistakes here. We have happy accidents."  The notion come especially clear to me the other day. 

Smitty had been watching me sitting on the couch doing some drawing, and came over and gave me a little sketch on a half sheet of paper. "There you are!" he said. And there I was, couch, drawing glasses, pencil. Very cool.  It came out that back somewhere in his 91 years he had done, and enjoyed, drawing.  We decided to do a quick in-and-out at the local Michaels to grab a couple of sketch pads and some drawing pencils.  

We came back and did some doodling. He did a neat cat cartoon - sort of along the lines of "Kilroy Was Here!" But then he fell into the "realism trap." He tried to do sketches of things around him - Vito, the black lab, hard to even photograph, let alone draw and a couple of things on the coffee table. "Those are terrible." he declared. "I'm a failure!"

A creativity mantra I repeated and repeated during my 40+ years in the classroom was "Never compare your work to geniuses!" So we can't sing like Pavarotti or Streisand, can't paint like Wyeth, sculpt like Camille Claudel. Big deal. Neither can most of humanity. Back to Bob Ross - "The only important thing about painting is that it makes you happy."

I thought I'd share a "happy accident" with you. Over the holidays I acquired - self-gifted and received - a couple of marker sets. You can never have too many markers. Both sets were water soluble, so I decided to experiment with how they might blend together.  That resulted in this "happy accident:" 

The phrase "a face only a mother could love" springs to mind.  But the "Happy Accident" was what I learned from that particular doodle.

Even before the water drop drizzled across the drawing I learned about which markers could blend and which could not, and the "Happy Accident" of the water drop clued me in to the idea that I might be able to use a damp brush to blend some of the colors in a "serious" drawing that I wanted to spend more time with.

So, especially during the time of covid, we need to remember to cut ourselves some slack.  There are, and will continue to be a variety of events and instances where we will want to declare ourselves failures.  "I should have done that better." "Stayed more in touch with that person." "Written a poem." "Been more forgiving, more understanding." "I'm a failure."  Nonsense. We are all just ordinary people in the midst of a very trying time. If we look closely enough I think we will discover that those "failures" are often happy accidents, just waiting to teach us something delightful.

Foster Harmony. Enable Beauty. Distill Complexity. Oppose Harm.

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Shhh. Quiet. My Brain is Full!

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I’m sure there is good science on this somewhere but what I have read often seems contradictory. I am talking about dreaming, what it means, what affects it; that kind of stuff. Right now there is a lot of talk about the affect of the pandemic and dreaming, Some focuses on the co-occurrence of Covid-19 and dreaming; weird dreams as a side-affect of the virus as it were. Other studies - more psychological than medical - look at these pandemic dreams as related to general increase in stress that comes from living with the pandemic, isolation, lockdowns, masks, the whole 9 yards.

I, not unexpectedly, take another tack - admittedly unsupported by any scientific evidence of which I am aware.  You see, I think it is all about sound. We are spending the holidays up here in our new locale, Burr Ridge, IL., a far western suburb of Chicago. Our “socially isolated cohort” is primarily defined by the extended family of my wife’s first husband. Long story, and unrelated to this current ramble. Anyway “the fam” is made up - generally speaking - of 9 or 10 adults, 3 tweeners, and 2 boomers (my designation for vocally active little ones younger than 3 or 4), a brand new infant, and somewhere up to 3 dogs. Seriously. It is quite a hoot when we all get together - often a literal hoot, a holler, laughter and other more unhappy vocalizations. And that is my point. Decibels - many decibels.

You might think that I am moving to an assertion that the significant, yet unavoidable decibel level when we all get together triggers the weird dreams associated with the pandemic. Actually I am moving in the opposite direction.  I would propose, instead, that the decibel level of “the fam” in full throat, actually fills up my brain. And contrary to what one might think, that full brain does not spill out weird dreams, as soon as the head hits the pillow. Rather, like a carnivore after gorging on a fresh kill, or a human being gorging on Thanksgiving turkey, the sated brain rolls over and passes out on the couch.

It is the more tranquil brain that, after a day of solitary reflection, amusement, and creativity continues that activity into the “sleeping” hours. Finishing, embellishing, often distorting, and contorting the day's creative activities. Add to that the rested brain’s inclination to engage the refrigerator in late night encounters, and the raison d’etre for these macabre dreams stands revealed. So, I think that I must sever the idea that the noise level that surrounds me during the day, particularly the current elevated "sounds of the season," triggers nighttime's strange visions,

I have come to realize that the parents and even the grandparents have become immune to the joyful, youthful cacophony that surrounds them at this time of year.  And I have no doubt I once possessed those intuitive editing skills. Alas, no more. My brain is no longer able to simply allow the playful pandemonium to slide in one ear and out the other. Instead the brain fills up. A question poised to me in ordinary conversation in these situations simply does not penetrate. It bounces off my brain and ricochets out into the surrounding auditory anarchy. However, oftentimes the facial nonverbal cues on the questioner's face makes it obvious that I was being addressed.

Hence I respond with the non sequitur: "Boy, you can say that again."

Unfortunately, they sometimes do.

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There are Breadcrumbs

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And then there are breadcrumbs, which leads us inevitably to the question of whose forest is this anyway?

The notion is that the path to truth, reality, belief - define your own target or endpoint, your "existential inclination" if you will, is a subjective journey, one we take alone. What’s the old Woody Guthrie lyric? Lonesome Valley? 

You gotta walk that lonesome valley,

You gotta walk it by yourself.

No, nobody else can walk it for you,

You gotta walk it by yourself.

OK, so Woody was never known as an upbeat cheerful lyricist. Still, a couple of points of clarification for that lonely assertion:

First, we need to realize that at every point along our personal journey to our desired ultimate destination, there are breadcrumbs. Someone has been here before. They have written, painted, composed, sung, danced - recorded perhaps in media or languages we have not yet recognized, their thoughts, feelings, about their experience at this same “here,” but perhaps in some other now, perhaps surrounded by an entirely different forest that nonetheless crosses ours at this same point.

Second, we need to remember that those are their breadcrumbs, scattered along their path. We can pick them up, sniff them, even - depending on your own interpretation of the ten second rule - pop them in our mouth and see how they taste. But they are not our breadcrumbs. They do not mark our path. We can gather them up and - again, depending on how completely we employed the ten second rule - stash them away in our pocket for later reflection and consideration. But they are not our breadcrumbs, they may or may not even be part of our forest.

Let me try to clarify what I mean if it is not too late for that. And yes, I realize that this sounds like one of the very first “computer-based text only” games. I think it was called “Colossal Cave Adventure.” Circa 1976?

Anyhow it went sort of like this - green words on a black screen - because that was all there was: “You are standing in the middle of a forest. At your feet there is a key. Pick it up?” And here you type either Y for yes, or N for no. If you typed Y you were presented with a variety of “next steps.” “There are three doors in a room. There is another key on the ground. Pick it up?” In my analogy the key becomes a breadcrumb left by previous travelers. If you pick up the breadcrumb, you have typed Y, but the number of “next steps” possible in our particular, personal, experience are infinite. The breadcrumb is a nugget from someone else’s journey in the "Colossal Cave Adventure." We can chose to employ it on our journey or not. 

What I am warning us against here is the common inclination to become a “fan” of some other pathfinder or another, of someone else’s particular existential inclination. Remember “fan” is the shortened version of “fanatic.”   As we pursue our own goals, our own existential inclination, we may find that some artist, philosopher, theorist, politician, or even celebrity, has been dropping breadcrumbs that we really like. But again remember, those were their breadcrumbs dropped along their path in their forest as they followed a "next step" determined by the desired endpoints of their existential inclination. 

We may use those breadcrumbs, if we choose, in pursuit of our own endpoints, but if we begin to substitute their inclination for our own, if we begin to use their breadcrumbs as a guide to a journey that leads to their endpoints we are in grave danger of crossing the line that separates a casual fan from a rabid fanatic. We may well find ourselves walking down a path in a forest not truly of our own making. We end up chanting in a crowd. Wearing strange costumes that identify us as part of that crowd. Getting tattoos about which our children will ask embarrassing questions down the road.

In a Distilled Harmony view of the world, it is the second tenet, Enable Beauty, that fosters our ability to make sure that we stay focused on our own forest, that we only use those breadcrumbs that help us move down the path that leads to the future we truly desire - our existential inclination. But before we get into that let us dial back a bit to the first tenet, Foster Harmony, because remember, the only way to the second tenet is through the first. Harmony and Beauty, to steal a concept from quantum mechanics, are entangled. Simply put, Harmony is the sunlight of creativity. I find that I am hard put to be creative in a discordant state. This is different than physical exercise that can purge negativity. If I attempt a creative task when in a bad mood I find that my bad mood leaks through onto my project. The words don't flow, lines wobble, colors clash. Yeech. 

Obviously there are a fair number of creative types who can channel their angst into their art. Or at least like Van Gogh, for example, are accused of doing so. Where else do we get horror films? Where - for crying out loud - did Picasso find Guernica?  Hopefully, discordantly fueled artists get the same release from their work as long distant runners - able to leave negativity behind them along the longer road. However, that reality is not part of my forest.

In my forest, the primary objective, the existential inclination is Harmony, and Harmony is the primary ingredient of Beauty. If all beautiful things carried a list of ingredients, Harmony would be the first thing on the label. So those are the breadcrumbs I seek. Beautiful objects, moments, sounds, images, people that remind us, and reflect the underlying foundation of, Harmony.

It is often difficult to remember that notion here in the throes of the pandemic. But it gets easier if we remember that entangled nature of Beauty and Harmony. You can't have one without the other. Empty parking lots, shuttered businesses, crowded hospitals, spiraling death rates. One could think that Harmony and Beauty have taken themselves off to some foreign galaxy, far, far away - especially now that winter is truly coming - at least here in the northern hemisphere.

But remember, symphonies still sound as sweet as before. A smile is still a smile even if it is on your screen. You can still see a sunset and flowers while wearing a mask. Maybe, having to gather Harmony and Beauty a crumb at time will remind us what treasures they truly are, and we will, eventually, bake sweeter bread for that knowledge.

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Nightscape

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[I am deep in the night’s little hours. 3:30ish. I default to sleep strategy 4,682. As I listen to my Naturescapes sound collection, I task myself with at least the opening line of a related poem. Tonight’s soundscape is the rumble of a train. Tonight’s poem I call Nightscape. Sleep well.]

I sometimes come to wonder

In the darkness of the night

How sound can paint a picture

Without benefit of light?

A freight train’s lonesome whistle

And the clatter of the rails

Drafts a clear horizon

Where painters’ efforts pale.

The empty fields rush through my mind,

As the rattle and the roar

Sweep all the world before them,

Places here, and then no more.

Perhaps a ghostly farm appears,

Caught by the passing train,

But on the lonely whistle moans

Through sheets of driving rain.

Then flashing images are smeared

Cross rocking window panes

Dancing to the thunder’s roar

As the mighty engines strain.

Yet all this bright creation

Within my conscience rose,

And truly was experienced

With eyes quite firmly closed.

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Schrag PPP: The Yellow Tree Project

 

I had already begun to work on this image when an old buddy of mine drew my attention to a project he had recently completed called The Yellow Pages - a sort of memoir to his wife who had died of pancreatic cancer a number of years ago. It was quite wonderful, and since this guy has been my best bud, literally since the week in which we were both born I decided to follow his color lead, and while I usually let the image decide what colors should be used I opted to let yellow guide my color choices.

The initial image is the scene that currently serves as the wallpaper on my iPad. It is a picture of a tree by a pond that lies along one of my walking routes up here in Burr Ridge:

Next I trimmed the image to separate the edges of the tree from the background creating more space for subsequent designs. [I am looking for that interim image, but recently I "upgraded" both my computer and its software. Neat for the most part, but they decided to shift all my images from JPG format to something called HEIC, designed primarily to "save me space" and ruin my life. It will eventually work out, but meanwhile it forces me to jump straight to this image.

And here I hope is the final image. The resolution is a bit iffy, since many of the details are quite small. But I hope you can increase the size enough to get the idea.

In The View of Distilled Harmony

If you have been reading the Wall for any significant portion of its 20-something year history you are well aware that it often deals with the exploration of the four major tenets of the world view I define as Distilled Harmony: Foster Harmony, Enable Beauty, Distill Complexity and Oppose Harm.  My own inclinations spin those essays most often towards the concerns of Foster Harmony and Enable Beauty; but last night’s violent protests in Washington, DC, and other scattered locales demand that I turn my attention to the the fourth tenet: Oppose Harm.

When Donald Trump was elected President I foolishly thought, “OK, he is a narcissistic, looney, game show host, but how much damage can he do in four years?” Never have my reflections been more off the mark.  We all tend to vote in our own best interests, and I will admit that mine follow traditional progressive issues; voting rights, social equality, etc. But my biggies have always been education, the environment and the arts. It soon became clear that where the current administration was concerned, I just needed to hunker down and try to tough it out. And true to my fears, the Trump presidency has cut a destructive swath through all my major concerns.

But now, I thought, we made it through. It is time to start repairing the damage. Again, foolishly, I assumed that Trump’s early bluster about not recognizing any election results that did not declare him the winner was just that - bluster. His recent behavior indicates that he was quite serious, and that he places his own personal successes above the Constitution, the will of the people, and the law. His refusal to accept the results of the election and the related pitiful legal actions attempting to overturn the election give tacit permission for his fanatic base to take violent protests to the street.

I do not know what, if anything, will convince him to acknowledge the damage his shameful behavior is doing to our nation. Hopefully he will soon realize that only he can put an end to the lawlessness his childish, selfish, behavior has called into the streets of the nation we, perhaps erroneously, assumed he loves. He must cease his divisive legal actions, concede that he lost the election, and tell his followers, in the streets and in Congress, to do same and allow the country some degree of healing. Perhaps then he can finally live up to what until now has been an empty slogan, and help Make America Great Again.

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Peeling the Many Roads of Life

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 I’m not sure what it is about nap time dreaming, but the images seem extraordinarily vivid, the perception of reality more enforced, making it harder to wake up.  That was certainly the case yesterday.   

I was walking somewhere, no place in particular, at least none that I recognized. The locale was more rural than urban, the path more a trail than a sidewalk. The atmosphere springlike, neither too warm nor too cold. It was sort of the “Goldilocks Zone” of dream environments. If there were other people or creatures about, I did not notice them. I am not terribly good at recalling dreams, so I might be missing some of the details. But what I definitely am not missing is the bizarre fact that when I glanced back over my shoulder the landscape was rolling up behind me.  The trail, trees, grass, etc., everything, was rolling up behind me like a giant version of those round hay bails one sees in fields nowadays. I stopped, and the “world bail” stopped. Backed up a bit and the bail unwound a bit. Started forward and the bail continued to wind up. I woke up. OK, pulse slightly elevated. It was a really weird dream.

Then, as is my wont, I began to try to unravel a bit of the weirdness of the dream. I don’t, as an old friend was prone to do, see dreams in a Freudlike reality. Whenever red meat appeared in one of her dreams it either represented her husband, or was an indication that she should cut red meat out of her diet - she seemed to give herself some interpretive flexibility there.  But neither do I just shrug my shoulders, mutter “weird dream” and get up to take the trash out.  I do think that dreams give us an opportunity to consider some alternative interpretations of our existence.  Here is where I am with the “Weird World Bail Dream.”

First I need to make it clear that I am pretty much in agreement with the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics - the idea that there are many worlds that exist simultaneously and parallel to the everyday “reality” that we walk around in. Furthermore, given the incredible physical and metaphysical complexity that such a universe implies, it doesn’t seem strange at all to me that some of those wires get crossed occasionally. Sort of a “cosmic butt-call” to use the technical jargon.

OK, so I wonder, if the World Bail is rolling up the reality of the world in which my dream is taking place, what is left? I do my best to remember if I could see anything left over behind the World Bail in my dream. But try as I might I draw a blank - pretty much literally a blank. But rather than seeing that as a dead end, I choose to treat it as permission to fill in the blank. And I choose to fill it in with the many worlds.  

To switch analogies on you, perhaps the roll that is following me around isn’t so much a cosmic bail of hay as it is a cosmic apple peel. You know, when you are peeling an apple and you try to peel the apple in “one go” as the Brits would say; remove the entire peel without it breaking. And what is left? The apple, of course. But in the many worlds view of the universe, what lies below the peel is another peel - another world ready for us to experience.

However, it seems somehow inappropriate to want to hop down and start peeling that new world before finishing this one. A better course of action would seem to be to stop looking over my dream shoulder at the bail following me along the path and concentrate on what lies ahead. Those other bails, peels, what have you, will - most likely - always be there. The current path, although no doubt rocky, still leads to ample opportunities to Foster Harmony, Enable Beauty, Distill Complexity and Oppose Harm.

Oh my! Look at the clock up on the corner of the computer! Coming right up on nap time!

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Enduring Life Without Challenges or Caught Between Two Worlds

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It is not that life amidst the COVID pandemic is devoid of challenges, rather it is that I have yet to encounter one, or several that truly stir me. That is a rather embarrassing admission.  I realize that there are many issues that should move me to passion. Social injustice, global warming, world hunger, science denial, good old COVID itself, and the social and political chaos left in the wake of “the Donald.” For crying out loud, Robert, latch onto some sort of cause. But alas, not yet. No project, candidate or campaign is able - to quote the Doors - “light my fire.” Assuming of course, that fire remains to be lit.  I sense that patience is of primary importance at this point in time. It was Heinlein in Stranger in a Strange Land:  “Waiting is.” Perhaps also, “Do, but gently, without impatience, with faith, with calm.” I’ll think on it.

Another observation: I find myself seemingly more adrift in what we think of as “the real world.” The pragmatics of everyday life; shopping, bills, insurance, the normal responsibilities of living life in the “real world.” Those realities seem to slip past me rather unnoticed. It is easy to write those off as “senior moments,” but on the other hand, my internalized conversations and considerations regarding metaphysical concerns; the nature of truth, of what we rather glibly call God, love, an afterlife, reincarnation, that “stuff” seems more intriguing and more clearly focused than previously. And those are issues that I regard as far more important and complex than the most recent location of my reading glasses. Unfortunately, the nature of god, the paths to inner peace, happiness and love are topics that rarely pop up in everyday conversations. And, when they are raised they result most often in raised eyebrows -the adult equivalent of the adolescent “eye roll” or “whatever.” So it is mostly in my art and writing that this “other world” finds expression beyond my internal dialogue. Mind you, I’m not turning my back on Distilled Harmony: Foster Harmony, Enable Beauty, Distill Complexity, and Oppose Harm.  That is still the path, but the road seems a bit muddy these days. Tires having trouble gaining traction.

“Waiting is.”

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