Citizen of the Universe

Travelblog For the Cotu's Big Adventure

2006-08-02T17:05:00.000-07:00

I will be out of the office through Mid-December 2006.

Follow along at my travelblog.

My Aura

2006-05-15T21:04:00.000-07:00

On Saturday, I had a picture of my aura taken. Its overall, well-balanced shape indicates a normal, healthy flow. All of the colors were bright, which means its all gravy baby!

The color White indicates Ideas, Decisions, Purity, Clarity, Release, A Challenge turned to Gain, Strength of Will, and Illumination.

The color Green indicates Self Healing Energy, Regeneration, Balance, Love of Nature, and Abundance.

The color Pink indicates Unconditional love, Female Intuition, Feminine Creativity. The interpreter said because it is at the top, it means that others are sending me this energy. Thanks people! Right back atcha!!!

Monday Mourning

2006-05-13T13:17:00.000-07:00

What happend to the weekend?
I wonder while walking into work
When will this week be over?
Sooner than we know I'm sure

As we wish the days away
The wrong wishes come true
We're still tired after sleeping
Waking up when life is through

One night I had a dream
The kind you can control
I was making things happen
Yeah man, I was on a role...

How I envy those
Who live life like their dreams
Manifesting their intentions
Floating scene to scene

Hour by hour by hour
We wish our days away
Then one day we realize
We've wished our lives away

So lets forget we woke up
And begin to live our dreams

Another One Heeds the Call

2006-02-03T20:46:00.000-07:00

Another friend moved to the Pacific Coast this week. Farewell Mr. Bane. In the end there is one reason we move: Hope. Take this opportunity to reinvent life as you know it.

100th Day of Drought

2006-01-27T22:25:00.000-07:00

Well I heard the old rancher say
"It ain't rained in a hundred days"
And he sold his last cattle
A long time ago

And I wondered what it means
For the Ponderosa trees
And just how many more of them trees
We'll lose this summer

And then Walt wished it would rain
To hide his tears of pain
So he could go outside
And not have to explain

Then it occurred to me
That when nothing grows
There's nothing left to burn
How winter rains fuel summer fires

And now all the land will grow
Is cookie cutter homes
And the city spreads itself
Ever thin

And the press pretends not to know
Though I must admit my smile did grow
When the warm rancher chukled
"I guess we'll be drinkin' soda pop this summer"

The Wealth of Friendship between Men

2006-01-15T20:42:00.000-07:00

I hereby declare that we are rich.
How did we accumulate such wealth you ask?

By opening the curtains of stoicism
revealing the play of truth
reveling in the play of truth.

By searching for perfect arrangements of black and white
with written words on page
and chess pieces on board.

Diving deep down to the bottoms
of the bottles of our spirits
uncorking the bouquet of such souls.

Trading in truth and wisdom
appreciating beauty
in music and those crazy women.

In your company I have grown rich
for there is no louder laugh than yours
and no freer cry.

And if we keep this theater open
we will die wealthy men, my friend.

It's Baaack...

2006-01-14T23:18:00.000-07:00

MILE HIGH MAJIC BABY!!!

Happy Birthday

2006-01-13T22:47:00.000-07:00

Ben Franklin...

When I get up there, you are one of the first I will look up. The first round's on me, though I'm afraid I won't have good news about the democracy. Actually, don't even ask.

Conspiracy Theory

2006-01-13T22:26:00.000-07:00

There is a secret ingrediant in the sauce of Totino's frozen pizzas that makes me:

A) achieve a state of zen where time and space cease to exist until every last slice is gone (I say slice assuming I have not created a pizza taco of goodness, of course);

B) eat so fast that I no longer need to drink or even breath while eating (unless inhaling pizza counts as breathing);

C) go into a cholestercoma, resulting in the oven running at 450 F for 9 hours (What?! I was cleaning the oven! Why'd you turn it off?!)

Happy New Year from PB, SD, CA, USA, E, MW, U

2005-12-31T18:14:00.000-07:00

A quick happy new year to all my family and friends. I am in PB visiting BJ... the guy has got it figured out. Its raining but its a nice misty rain... doesnt stop you from walking down the street. If this is the worst SD has to offer, I'll take it. Much better than the PHX in August.

Happy New Year to all, lets make 2006 a break out year, the year it all came together.

Back-up your hard-drive...

2005-12-15T07:26:00.000-07:00

and buy yourself some spy-ware removal software. This blog will return to regular programing once circuit city returns my computer. Who knew it takes three weeks and counting to install a hard drive? Regodamndiculous.

Neighbors makin' a ruckus...

2005-11-12T00:07:00.000-07:00

... i'm there. If you an investigation insues, it was the neighbors to the North.

Watched Rusmore

2005-11-06T21:30:00.000-07:00

Watched Rushmore. 5 Stars.

An Office to Make a Living

2005-11-06T15:00:00.000-07:00

Sitting in the park here, I have found my new office. My neighbors are picnicking and fishing. Couriers run through delivering the usual sounds of squeaky tricycles, children’s laughter, and profound statements like, “that hill was hard!” and “I hate fishing.” Everyone I see has smiled within the last five minutes, if they are not currently, and this is quite rare, as offices go. We should all work in parks.

Much of my life, I have purred at the thought of being a writer for a living, my only excuse for not being one was that I did not know how. Something has clicked now; not that I have learned to write well, or even how to use a semicolon. Something has clicked in that I have come to the conclusion that in order for one to become a writer, one must write. I am now a writer.

When people ask me what I do, I will tell them the truth: I am a writer. I am living. Therefore, I write for a living. Currently, I do other things for money, but for a living, I write.

It is not that simple though, for one must do things other than writing in order to write well. I must also read. I must sit in this park, or other parks, watching multitalented birds that both fly and swim and rest for a living. I must let a fly rest on my shoulder as I write and on my finger as I read. I must watch families choose picnic spots with no assigned scout, carrying all of there picnic gear to one spot, only to change their mind and carry themselves and the whole lot to another. I must listen to the universal languages of music and laughter, pondering it all.

Unfortunately, because I enjoy writing and it does not cause me pain, some may become upset that I spend my time this way, doing these things. They will say things like, “life is hard. It is tough and no fun, and that is just the way it is.” They will also say "you cannot run away from your problems. If you are a mouse trapped in a barrel of cream, you must swim and fight until you have churned the cream into butter and can climb out." I guess I don’t mind cream.

Another theory I am developing about writing is that I must do some interesting living if I am to write anything of interest. Maybe that is why I write best at the beginning and end of the day; those quiet times when the mind journeys to the future and past, looking forward and back, polishing the gems of dreams and experience.

This entry is sponsored by The Majic Fishing Pole.

What Makes Good Art

2005-11-05T03:03:00.000-07:00

Disclaimer: this posting is long for several reasons.
1) because it answers a question you did not ask and may never care to ask;
2) because it is way too long for the attention span of a web surfer; and
3) because I have not gotten around to making the color/font scheme less taxing on the eyes, all of which are very inconsiderate to you, the maybe reader.

If you'd like, you can scroll down to the previous posting where there are more pictures and less words. There are even pictures of a puppy!

So what is good art? Good art is so good, you don’t want to leave it. You resist letting it go, maybe because it expresses a piece of you that you can never express yourself, and you feel incomplete without it. What book do you read over and over? What movie have you watched so many fucking times you know it by heart? I know there are songs. Maybe even paintings, or photographs. Polaroids you took? Even if it was just a snapshot at some event with some people, your best friend or random acquaintances, the moment you put it down on paper, on some medium, recording it, it becomes art. So if there is a picture in your shoebox of photos that you can never throw away, one that you pull out when you are nostalgic or lonely and want to remember or make up memories, that is art that is good to you. And it is good because you hate to part with it. You don’t want it to end.

I had three errands to run today. Get my hair cut, pick up a library book that I had reserved, return a video that someone else had rented but let me borrow, and buy water and bananas. Ok, that’s more than three but I have a point, focus. My wife suggested I go to the beauty school place where they dress hip, are all twenty something with tight asses and stylish looks, they wash your hair with cherry almond vanilla someshit, and they massage your head. Fuck that. My barber is an artist. He learned to cut hair in the Soviet Army, has cut so many men’s hair that he has to watch movies while he does it otherwise the boredom might cause him to stab himself in the neck with his scissors. He is often grumpy, doesn’t bullshit me and would call my bullshit if I let him smell it, and I am pretty sure he would stab me in my own neck if he knew I was telling you that his Turkmenistani wife, whose eyes are art that you would try to avoid if you are smart because they could talk you into just about anything and you are sure he is watching you through some billiards combination of the three walls of mirrors, and he learned to cut hair in the Soviet Army. Aside from all of that priceless context, he cuts my hair with the attention of someone who owns his business, and that’s how he does business. I will not part from art like that. Even if I move to the suburbs and water my grass so I can mow it, I will drive to his shop every three weeks, cause any ritzy salon or national chain, with supermodels or rotating clock punchers, would leave me feeling empty with the taste of styrofoam. I can massage my own head, just give me the truth before I get on with my errands. I am taking a really good book back to the library.

The drive to the library was quiet. This book and I had spent the last month or so, a very confusing month, having a very deep and important conversation. The book (Soul of Nowhere by Craig Childs) shared the passenger seat with the borrowed DVD. The car ride was quiet like one taking an old friend or flame to the airport, one who is leaving with no return ticket purchased. I felt the same way the night before, when I finished it. It was late and I just couldn’t go to bed. I stayed up, lingering, like I would have with that old friend or flame, saying nothing important, but just not wanting the night to end because I knew the next day's memory would be distorted and less fresh, when I could not quite taste the imagery of the book, my very thoughts no longer flowing in the rhythm of the book’s prose. And when I dropped this book in the drop-box, it was a different feeling than other book returns. It was not goodbye, or even farewell, it was good seeing you, call me, we must visit again soon, I’ll be thinking about you, and then one day when I have forgotten what you are like, but remember you were great, I will look you up again.

On to Blockbuster to return I (heart) Huckabees. Talk about a movie I did not want to say goodbye to. Watched the movie. Loved it. Laughed out loud, which for me is the equivalent of a normal person peeing there pants. Watched it again, this time with the director's and two of the main actors’ running commentaries. Loved it more. Watched it again, this time with just the director’s running commentary. If there had been a special feature with the janitor telling me who had the messiest trailer, I would have watched that next. I even wanted to watch it again so I could point out to myself all of the inside baseball that the actors and directors had showed me. “It starts and ends out of focus, giving a blurry symbol of the big picture perspective. There is red in that scene because there are existential happenings, and that is intentional, trust me. Lilly Tomlin and Dustin Hoffman are improvising here and they are brilliant.” But instead, before falling asleep in my clothes, I decided that I wanted to be a screenwriter or director and at the same time resolved that I could never be a screenwriter or director because if I had something to say, it would be a futile attempt at what they had already said perfectly, not to mention that they used up every good technique, line, and scene that could ever exist. That’s how I felt when I started reading the previously mentioned book. “I want to be a writer, but this guy already took every good word, simile, and metaphor out there. The rest will only be crap.” But my point is that I had trouble turning that DVD off, because I knew I did not exist completely without it.

Later tonight, I went to a screening of a new Sundance Channel documentary series called Iconoclasts, in which one Iconoclast (Samuel L. Jackson) hangs out with and chats up another from a different field (Bill Russell). The thing I got from both of these guys is that they had no insecurity about who they were (truth) and about being who they were. No regard for outside opinions of themselves. Granted, they had reached a level of success where they could afford to, but I really believe that their confidence in what is true to them and maintaining integrity to it was what took them to such heights. I want to watch it again because I cannot remember all of the wisdom they just poured in my lap. Sure, I can access it because it is true, but I want to articulate in my mind like they did. That’s why I want to watch it again with a pen and paper and capture it, so I can call them up sometime when I have forgotten the sound of their laughter.

After that, I went back to Blockbuster and watched High Fidelity. I know and knew I should have seen this movie a long time ago, and again, it was obviously good art to me because I watched it, then watched every extra feature, becoming irritated when I had to select each feature individually. “Just play them all, I’m not going anywhere!” I went through the same emotions again. “I want to write a novel, write a screenplay, direct a film, but I can’t because these guys took all the water, all the soil, and all the sunshine, and what kind of art can I produce stirring a coffee cup full of gravel, sitting in the spare closet with a burnt out lightbulb anyway.”

It is that attitude that stops many would-be artists, I think. “I have come to know what I think good art is, and I am not capable of that. My art would be so flawed, so cliché ridden and utterly imperfect that it would be painful to put my name on it.” One writer I met warned me of this. “Don’t not submit something because it isn’t perfect.” That is how we learn anything, trial and error. There is just something so risky about sharing one's art, be it drawn or written, a sketch or a poem, especially a poem, because what you are really sharing is yourself, your version of the truth. And we all know how open that leads us to disagreement, read criticism. It opens the door to the stairs of vulnerability and knee-jerk defensiveness. “Who asked you anyway you fucking critic. Create something yourself you fucking bastard.” And because art is sharing of the truth of one’s self, if you critique someones art, you are critiquing them, and noone likes being punched in the nose, especially when punching back won’t make your nose feel any better. All you can do is say “fuck ‘em,” and thank the God of words for words like fuck.

But the point is, or was, that I wanted to express what good art is to me. Good art is like good people: you don’t want them to leave, you linger as you say goodbye, and you look them up when you realize you have forgotten them. And if it is very good art, you might even gain the courage to go make your own damn art, regardless of how imperfect it may be.

Watched High Fidelity

2005-11-04T23:11:00.000-07:00

5 stars.

Circumference Trail - Piestewa Peak

2005-11-04T03:50:00.000-07:00

Hiked around P-peak again today. Introduced Miah and Cheeba to the Circumference Trail, the valley of the giants, taking photos in the golden hour. More photos here.

Miah is a good person to hike with, because he has the curiousity of an explorer "wanna check out that peak?," he has the atheltic ability to skip downhill swithbacks with a single leap, and he too enjoys the thrills of downhill trail-running, or as I like to call it, "controlled falling." He also brings Cheeba along, who is a dog that would hike all day and all night if she could (me too!) and by the smile on her face, I suspect there is a secret power in her dirt naps that she cannot tell us about. They both have the endearing quality of not talking too much while hiking, an element that is crucial to experiencing the out of doors, for me anyway.

To Hike. Per Chance, to Breathe.

2005-10-18T17:55:00.000-07:00

I spent the afternoon hiking around the eastern base of Piestewa Peak. It was a wandering hike with no set agenda or goal. I did not have a destination, and I did not come to exercise.

It has been a cloudy day, rare for Phoenix, and to the east there was a foreboding purple wall threatening rain and lightening that kept me from starting anything too ambitious. Fear. Why did I let fear slow me? It never did rain, and I could have taken the summit or circumference trails (or even both) in their entirety had I been just a little bold.

The interplay of the Sun and clouds has been beautiful to watch, the landscape a patchwork of light and dark. I relish in the moments when the clouds part and warm my skin, counterbalancing the steady wind. Windy days like this make the valley a great place to live: all of the beauty plus clean air to breathe. Maybe that is why I came out here… to breathe.

I brought the camera but so far have failed to capture the beauty of either the landscape or the moment. I get so frustrated to see such beauty and not be able to capture it. But now that I think about it, part of what makes landscapes so powerful is their multiple dimensions of sheer size. The mountain I am looking at right now reduces people to the size of ants, and the majestic saguaro to a toothpick.

I have given up on capturing the big picture in its entire splendor, though I will no doubt continue to try. It should also be noted that if a place does look appealing in a picture, I should get my ass over there because it is likely 100x as grand.

This road brought me to another question: Why do I feel the need to capture beauty? Do I fear that it is fleeting and may never return? Does this yearning to capture beauty take something away from the experience of encountering, embracing, and joining it? How much joy do we miss out on in life because we are trying to preserve what little piece we already think we have? Later, my Mom said it best with the Buddhist (I think) saying: "Looking at the moon is not the moon."

The sunset is beginning, and there is so much beauty that I have to pull out my camera, for though it may be impossible to capture such a scene with a camera, it is impossible not to try and take a little piece of it home.

I finally found an answer

2005-10-11T12:19:00.000-07:00

to the questions asked in a comment last year.

Maggie's Farm, by Bob Dylan

2005-10-03T10:03:00.000-07:00

I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more.
No, I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more.
Well, I wake in the morning,
Fold my hands and pray for rain.
I got a head full of ideas
That are drivin' me insane.
It's a shame the way she makes me scrub the floor.
I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more.

I ain't gonna work for Maggie's brother no more.
No, I ain't gonna work for Maggie's brother no more.
Well, he hands you a nickel,
He hands you a dime,
He asks you with a grin
If you're havin' a good time,
Then he fines you every time you slam the door.
I ain't gonna work for Maggie's brother no more.

I ain't gonna work for Maggie's pa no more.
No, I ain't gonna work for Maggie's pa no more.
Well, he puts his cigar
Out in your face just for kicks.
His bedroom window
It is made out of bricks.
The National Guard stands around his door.
Ah, I ain't gonna work for Maggie's pa no more.

I ain't gonna work for Maggie's ma no more.
No, I ain't gonna work for Maggie's ma no more.
Well, she talks to all the servants
About man and God and law.
Everybody says
She's the brains behind pa.
She's sixty-eight, but she says she's twenty-four.
I ain't gonna work for Maggie's ma no more.

I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more.
No, I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more.
Well, I try my best
To be just like I am,
But everybody wants you
To be just like them.
They sing while you slave and I just get bored.
I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more.

The Revolution Turns 29

2005-09-29T00:00:00.000-07:00

Your deeds are famous, so stay resolute, my lord, defend your life now with the whole of your strength. I shall stand by you.
~ Wiglaf to Beowulf before joining to fight the dragon.

Happy Birthday my brotha from anotha motha.

A Perfect Storm

2005-09-28T23:09:00.000-07:00

like this bathroom stall
the door to the poor
leads straight to the sewer
when the system works
the smell is contained
and once in a while
they paint the tile
to cover the writing on the wall

but when katrina sailed
the system failed
and the sewage swelled
washing away the conglomerate facade
and with the janitors gone
it did not take long
for the manufactured song
to fall to the writing on the wall

Get Busy!

2005-09-27T23:11:00.000-07:00

"He not busy being born is busy dying."
~Bob Dylan in the film No Direction Home (thank you PBS)

Well the birthday trip is over
I asked to be reborn and was
I know who I want to be
by what feels good
and I'm ready to start being me.

Birthday Wish

2005-09-26T23:59:00.000-07:00

A regrouping of values
an awereness of the senses
hearing the music
reading the writing
and sending the soul to the walls
spread it on mine and yours
from the back of the eyeballs
to the skin of the drums
to the walls of the drum
that beats just for fun

Do NOT Read this Book...

2005-09-22T07:36:00.000-07:00

... if your work does not stir your soul. You may do something "irresponsible".

No doubt they can ride at last who shall have earned their fare, that is,
if they survive so long, but they will probably have lost their elasticity
and desire to travel by that time. This spending of the best part of
one's life earning money in order to enjoy a questionable liberty during the
least valuable part of it reminds me of the Englishman who went to India to
make a fortune first, in order that he might return to England and live the
life of a poet. He should have gone up garret at once.

~Henry David Thoreau, Walden