FINISHED READING ~ When Marina Abramovic Dies

by James Westcott

As biographies go this is a one off much as Marina Abramovic is herself.  It opens with a run through of what she decided the performance of her funeral should be like. She's as determined to leave this world with the same attention grabbing flourish she's become known for through her work. One might be forgiven for thinking that Marina Abramovic and Laurie Anderson invented performance art on some jokey drug fueled evening, way back before anyone can remember. That this is certainly not the case, only serves to demonstrate how completely these two women have come to dominate how performance art is popularly perceived.

As an art form, it is frequently women who have often stamped their presence upon it ,at least in the general public's consciousness. It's an area that comes with a less overtly male interpretive precedence and baggage. Performance art itself has either been ignored or ridiculed, even by the traditional art establishment. This has left the field wide open for women to explore and make of it what they will.. That performance art has recently started to garner serious attention is down in some degree to Abramovic's determination to create an enduring legacy for her work. Far less accommodating and accessible than Anderson's work, Abramovic takes you on a journey with her endurance, a place you'd not always want to go, let alone watch happen before your eyes. Her work is compelling, large scale in ambition and time scale, attracting a certain type of voyeuristic tendency similar to being present at an execution, observing an horrific event or watching paint dry. Abramovic is possessed of an attractive and charismatic presence, that is frequently spiritually and physically quite naked.

Balkan Baroque

Abramovic's reputation built slowly and entered an iconic phase once she started her personal and working relationship with Ulay. The work they did together, appears to have mutually egged each other on to further extremes, just how far can you go and for how long could you simultaneously throw yourself at a wall? This exploration of testing physical resilience and suffering always had an existential pulse to it. They come to  symbolise something about the human condition. These works later morph into a more meditative series of works such as sitting still on a chair whilst facing one another across a table. For this work 'Night Sea Crossing' they both committed to performing on 91 occasions in 91 different locations over several years. Each time brought its own physical, emotional and relational challenges. By the end Marina and Ulay's relationship was itself at breaking point through personal infidelities and creative resentments. Their famous simultaneous walk from opposite ends of the Great Wall of China to meet in the middle, proved to be the swansong for both their working and personal relationship.

Night Sea Crossing

Since then her work has gone further in exploring face to face human contexts. From her involvement with Tibetan Buddhism and meditation practice. developed elements of stillness, identity, presence and being truly seen by another, that have attained an almost spiritually transcendent aura that people flock to be a part of . This culminated in The Artist is Present at MOMA a few years ago, where she sat for nine hours a day for three months, alone on a chair staring at a succession of people who sat down in front of her. These people often moved to tears by this encounter. Its well worth looking out the DVD of this work.http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2073029/

The Artist is Present

The Artist is Present was accompanied by fifty of her performances, this time performed by her students. This retrospective element further confirmed her status as the Godmother of Performance. The urge to establish a legacy for her work began during the writing of this biography, when her desire to see her works re-performed was already set in motion. Performance work has generally been viewed as a happening of one particular moment, and being of their time, Abramovic is now establishing a body of work that may have a life and relevance beyond her own performance of them. Painters leave behind paintings, performers can leave performance ideas that can be re performed. Each time they are re-performed they are re-contextualised, by the different time, place, personnel and mood. Similar to how an orchestra replays music from previous centuries.

After reading this biography I am left even more impressed by the single-mindedness of her vision and purpose. On paper any description of what she does can seem utterly unhinged, if not verging on self-abuse. However, all performance work needs to be intimately experienced in person, imagining it will never be enough. Quite often it is unimaginable what a performance artist does, but the effect of seeing, feeling and being with it can be a challenging,cathartic and trans-formative experience.  Abramovic's work explores the dangerous edges of the human condition, our endurance, resilience and ultimately our own desire for self-transcendence.

DIARY 129 ~ ....and Windhorse too will cease to be

With the results of Windhorse:evolution's Christmas trading in, the state of the business talk by Keturaja on Monday 5th January bore all the hallmarks of a death knell. It was clear to most of us before he'd even spoken a single word that things had not gone well. Facing a huge loss much much greater than last year's, the business is now in no position to carry on. Ways to downsize the business were looked at, but each one gradually ruled themselves out as the continuing rate of business decline made even our core profitable shops look less and less bankable. Even though Jnanasalin had told me of the decision ten days before, actually hearing the announcement 'we were to close' brought forth a downhearted somber mood.

With our warehouse landlord offering us the possibility of getting out of the lease early, The Managing Directors felt they had to grasp the slim chance that this offered. A way of exiting that was as ethical and clean as is possible given the circumstances. The main concern now is to be able to pay all our loyal suppliers the money they are owed, and to allow Windhorse staff sufficient time to adjust to redundancy and start preparing themselves to find work outside of W:E. I guess its inevitable that there will be some who'll use the redundancy process as an opportunity for settling old scores, venting resentments and generally getting things off their chest, which we'll all have to bear with however stroppy, malign or unfair those views may be. This is just one of many obstacles, both practical as well as emotional rites of passage that we will all have to pass through and get over.  Many things could still call a halt to the planned 'managed closure' and force the business into administration. The latter prospect would be a far far more brutal and unpleasant way to end the business, but currently there is still hope that this dire outcome can be avoided.

If all goes well, all the remaining warehouse stock should be sold, and the shops closed by the end of March. By this point most of the redundancy notices should have been completed, and all the people I've come to know at Windhorse will gradually disappear and disperse to who knows where? Its the end of one thirty year experiment in doing business ethically and a spiritual ideal, One that has provided both a context for ethical work, and for literally hundreds of people to deepen their Going for Refuge to the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. Deciding at this point how best to mark its passing, its significance on a personal level, to the Triratna Buddhist Community,and to celebrate its achievements, all seems a little premature at present, but if we are not careful the moment will arrive and few of us will be left to participate in it. Hopefully the appropriateness of the time will become obvious.

At the moment I'm feeling more the effect on other people of Windhorse closing than upon myself. Particularly those people who will soon have to return to their home country, to reconnect with a situation and employment they'd had to give up in order to come here to deepen their Buddhist practice. I've also a feeling for the effect making this decision has had on the Directors who've been holding the responsibility for the businesses future for so long, all the stress and strain that has led up to this point, and dealing with the fallout afterwards. The burdonsome weight of this responsibility is not yet ready to lift from their shoulders.

In myself I'm feeling more subdued but sanguine than morosely melancholic at present. I don't think I'm experiencing any more difficult emotional responses than preparing to let go, and the sense of loss to come. Though my past life experience has been recollected; in the early 1980's I was made redundant twice in the space of two years and in 1997 I had to close my own business, so I have walked across the hot coals of this territory before. It never proves to be quite the end of the world as we know it, though it might have felt like that at the time. Changing my situation and my context for practice, undoubtedly will upset the stability of the old apple cart for a while, and I ought to expect some of my old demons to show me their bleak little faces again.

At the moment we are in the first ten days of the wind up. My present task is a rather tedious one of going through the Property and Retail Team areas. Throwing out all the useless tat we've acquired and doing an inventory, then deciding what to keep, dispose of or sell what's left. I am finding this a rather drawn out and emotionally difficult process, going through vast amounts of accumulated crap and throwing them away is painful and dispiriting and not remotely cathartic. It is no good me moaning about it, this has got to be done, and I am quite good at sifting, organising and cataloging.

For the immediate future Jnanasalin and I are intending to stay in Cambridge to find work and start saving money. We have ideas for longer term plans, which though only roughly sketched out at the moment, we both can become quite excited about should we start discussing them. Moving these ideas forward will inevitably be a steady gradual process. Our energy is going to be a bit divided for a while. Once most of the emotional and physical challenge of helping Windhorse wind up effectively is done, then perhaps we can start putting realistic flesh on the bones of those plans. What these plans are I'll no doubt be blogging about as they take firmer shape over the coming year.

DIARY 128 ~ Christmas in Abbey House Community No 1

As you may have guessed from my last blog post, Hubby and I rather enjoy Christmas. Yes, as Buddhists its not, theologically at least ,our festival. So much of todays Christmas traditions don't come within close sniffing distance of Christianity, and are connected either with folk traditions or at worst Americanised product placements. I think its perfectly possible to celebrate Christmas without Christianity. I enjoyed spending this Christmas at home in my community. Jnanasalin and I do largely steer the proceedings, making Christmas puddings/cake and nut roasts in advance, and doing the rest of the cooking on the day. Everything went more or less to plan: eating by 1pm, finished by the Queen's speech and then watching the 1951 black and white film of Scrooge, starring Alistair Simm. Though slightly creaky and overacted in places (the film not Christma Day ) it nonetheless was an enjoyable affair . Something about it's datedness and larger than life characters complemented the style of Dickens story. After a walk into town and back along the river, we settled down to a light Tea and the first Die Hard movie, which was a moderately diverting explosion fest.

Here are a few photos taken of the festivities.

FEATURE 126 ~ Make the Yuletide Gay

POEM ~ The Half Hearing of Small Voices

Another retreat, another set of poems. This time from my recent retreat The Gods Will Offer You Chances, led by Paramananda & Mandarava at Rivendell.  I tend to write one every day, pretty much off the top of my head. Sometimes these poems indicate the effect a retreat is having upon me, sometimes they seem to come from somewhere, half heard and mistranslated. So here they are seven poems from a seven day retreat.


DIAMANTE

Tiny specks of diamonds
glittering pin pricks, perched
on the tips of grass shards
in a winter lawn, lit up
by unearthly powers
fired by lightening, solar flares
or elfin LED.


GRAVITATIONAL PULLS

Whatever
is thrown up
comes down
at some point

Probes and rockets
investigate space
data falling
in a digital rain.

Heartfelt aspirations
when they drop to earth
form impact crators
where else is the hurt?

Our pain is ours
and can't be discarded
like a boomerang
it keeps coming back.


NEW DAWN

The sun broke behind the church
over an hour ago
now its carousing
with the crowns of trees
and cloud tufts
each its own breaking beauty
that is let go of,
to make space
for the next
whilst I am still as
drowsy and grumpy now
as I was earlier.


MEDITATING DAYS

All the days
rolling into one another
with the consistency
of pastry
roughly compacted
in a ball, or
pressed, stretched and eased out
like a glutenous dishcloth
some might say
these people look like
they're bored with life
others
they're indulging in childish whims
of being meaningful
of spiritual playacting
there are times
when it is all of these things
jumbled up and wrongheaded
despite appearences
everyday life is like this too
this is just a time
and the space
where the soul gets
a bit of tlc.


BROKEN HEADED

Here is an unlived face
eyes that function
but do not perceive
a mind operating
but does not reflect
the body is
an empty vessel
with utilitarian uses
yet his actions
are unoccupied
as though walking has lost
all sense of direction
other than foot steps

Its a face unoccupied
by terrors, by joys, by loves
by interests, by engagement
it looks out on the world
and receives nothing
via the mirror
a face not even distressed
by its predicament
too passive
to feel indifferent
all expression
is conserved, is
unredeemed by calling
this blandness
the result of hard years
of spiritual practice

This is a face
that has misconceived
the whole purpose of life.


MYTH SHAKEN

The heart
as a muscle
flutters and flinches
its fist
when the shadow
of its metaphorical twin
is shaken into life
by the pulse of mystical blood
alchemy is snatched
as though a current of electric
zapped through and
stars expanded their spectrum
pouring down
a new colour
a shape shifting medicine
into the arteries and veins
and the heart purred
like a bedraggled familiar
being offered
pure white milk.


MYTH HEARINGS

In the room
of the shrine
before
I was to
just sit with myself
listening, quietly
preparing the senses
to be more
all encompassing
in the opening and closing
opening and closing
opening and closing
of the door
half hearing a small voice
singing the opening phrase
of an unrecollected song
moarnfully mordant
think Morrissey, sung by Cohen
incanted over and over
as if the repetition
would serve up
the rest of it
this moment though
was left unresolved
when close by, a mobile vibrating
muffled beneath layers
of clothing or blankets
sounded as though
young calves
calls for their mother
were being
left unanswered

BOOK REVIEW ~ The Unknown Craftsman

The Unknown Craftsman  by Soetsu Yanagi

The Unknown Craftsman is a compendium of articles given by SoetsuYanagi over a pivotal period in Japanese culture from 1939 to 1962. Through these Yanagi became the pre-eminent figure in a revival in the appreciation and practice of Japanese folk crafts after the end of the Second World War. Eventualy he Founded the Japan Folk Craft Museum in Tokyo. Yanagi was a close friend, mentor and profound influence upon the English potter Bernard Leach, who helped translate and compile this book and provides useful background context via his introduction. Most of what we in the West understand of Japanese pottery and aesthetics, such as wabi sabi etc comes in large part from Yanagi's work.

Yanagi's route to becoming a pottery obsessive, arose as a result of his rediscovery of 16th century Korean pottery of the Yi dynasty. These simple, often crudely executed pots became for him, not just the aesthetic benchmark by which he measured all other work, but a sort of spiritual talisman for the creative attitude that a potter or artist should endeavour to cultivate. It is this latter aspect; the creative process being shadowed by spiritual practice, that I found the most inspiring thing about this book. I have read no other book that so clearly and imaginatively explains how creative work can become a spiritual practice.

Those Yi dynasty pots are in themselves the key. Technically those pots are poorly made, with misshapen bases, glazes blobby,irregular, and riddled with cracks and surface imperfections. Churned out by local craftsman with no thought to aesthetic appeal, beauty or there being perfect objects. They were simply made to meet a practical requirement. These pots became highly sought after by Japanese masters of Tea Ceremonies, often paying huge sums for them. They also become the models for Japanese versions of this pottery, where imperfections became highly valued, however self-consciously created.

Yanagi is quite dismissive about this artistic contrivance, particularly when these potters later on began to sign their pots. This declaration of creative ownership was anathema to the ideal relationship he thought one should have with what is being created. Part of the aesthetic appeal of Yi pottery is the anonymity of their creators, the men and women who made them are all unknown. There probably was no one person involved in their creation, being collectively and unselfconsciously formed. It isn't just what was created, but how they were created that makes them important. He is particularly good at teasing out that this absence of an individual creator is what makes them the epitome of beauty and the role model for Buddhist artists desiring to make their work a spiritual practice. Here are a few representative quotations:~

' The deepest beauty is suggestive of infinite potential rather than being merely explanatory.... All works of art, it may be said, are more beautiful when they suggest something beyond themselves than when they end up being merely what they are.'

'Truly beautiful objects usually contain in them some element of irregularity......Beauty dislikes being captive to perfection. That which is profound never lends itself to logical explanation;it involves endless mystery.'

'Would it not be possible to say that all beautiful work is done by the work itself? When an artist creates a work, he and the work are two different things. Only when he becomes the work itself and creates the work (in other words, when the work alone is creating the whole work) does true work become possible. Not the artist but the work should say "I am" : when this state is reached, a work of art deserving the name has been produced.'

'So long as the man who strikes the drum and drum that is struck are two different beings, true music can never be born.

'As soon as the principle becomes formalised, death approches'

I could go on and on quoting, as the book is packed full of such pithy and inspiring aphoristic sentences. Though written over sixty years ago The Unknown Craftsman, is still quite relevant to modern day artistic and Buddhist practice. Some of Yanagi's hopes for a craft revival have petered out in our high tech world of the internet. His analysis of the role of Individualism on the creative process is still particularly prescient to today's art market.


















'They did not see the extraordinary in the extraordinary...They did not draw their cherished treasures out of the valuable, the expensive, the luxurious, the elaborate or the exceptional. They selected them from the plain, the natural, the homely, the simple, and the normal. They explored the uneventful, normal world for the most unusual beauty  Can anything be more uncommon than to see the uncommon in the commonplace....Most of us today have grown so commonplace that we cannot see the extraordinary save in the exceptional.'

The Unknown Craftsman is for me a very significant book, one that inevitably will roll out changes in the wake of my having read it.

CARROT REVIEW - 8/8

FEATURE ~ The Laughing Heart by Charles Bukowski

THE LAUGHING HEART

Your life is your life

don’t let it be clubbed into dank submission.

be on the watch.

there are ways out.

there is a light somewhere.

it may not be much light but

it beats the darkness.

be on the watch.

the gods will offer you chances.

know them.

take them.

you can’t beat death but

you can beat death in life, sometimes.

and the more often you learn to do it,

the more light there will be.

your life is your life.

know it while you have it.

you are marvelous

the gods wait to delight

in you.


Charles Bukowski

DIARY 127 ~ This is the time and this is the record of the time

Recent months, if not this whole year, has been challenging.  Somewhat dominated by concerns and efforts at work to contribute towards reversing Windhorse's economic woes and precarious position, and with my own aspirations to develop the artwork I do, being to some extent sidelined because of these circumstances. The balance between the personal and the practical has never been more finely or painfully drawn.

Windhorse's future is still in the balance after a year of ideas,creative solutions and optimistic efforts to turn things around. At the moment I feel a bit out of optimism and wondering if throwing in the towel gracefully would not make a cleaner break, rather than floundering on trying to survive like a half dead fish already out of the water. I sense a tide of war weariness rising particularly in myself, but also in the overall atmosphere at work. I doubt there is much energy left for many more battles. There's a sense of confidence being withdrawn, painfully reminding me of the end of my own business.

Creatively I've been focusing on my artwork, largely in terms of the process, style and finish of it. I'm still quite enthusiastic for where I can take this. I can see a gradual loosening up in its design and structure as I push into new areas, trying not to let what I've done before set false limits on what I can do now. Though it remains clearly still my work, as some of the aesthetic interests I have never appear to alter.  The evolution of my working process, is increasingly more 'lets see where it goes when I do this' than 'I have this idea lets carry it out meticulously to the bitter end'  I've become much more relaxed and confident within this evolving process and rarely get the anxiety I used to about it all 'going wrong.' Things never do 'go wrong', they just go places different to what I originally thought.  Paradoxically this is more satisfying, and enjoyable.

I've had to let go, for now, of ideas to sell my work via galleries or the web. I just don't have the personal resources of time or energy to bring these into being at the moment. This feels a more difficult thing to let go of. For not doing anything about it produces its own tension, as if I'm trying to keep hold of an aspiration that will slowly slip from my grasp if I let it. But life like my artwork, is all the better for not being held too tightly to a specific course. What life has so far thrown at me has rarely accorded to any vision I had for it. This has never been easy territory for me to be in. I've been endeavouring lately to see life itself as being a constantly evolving process too. One to an extent you must ride along with, rather than continually put yourself in opposition to, or try directing.

So if Windhorse does close, and I'm unemployed, then I''ll have to deal with whatever that leads to, both the positive and the negative consequences. I'm not saying that's going to be easy, probably not. Today I'm about to go on retreat to Rivendell, on a retreat called 'The Gods will offer you chances' a title that seems somehow prescient.  Seizing and following through on such chances when they arise seems to be more in keeping with how life is actually lived.

BOOK REVIEW ~ Everyday Aesthetics by Yuriko Saito

In one of my previous diary blogs I wrote of some reflections I'd had concerning 'the present moment' whilst I was on retreat. That there was a quality of listening with all of ones senses to become fully aware of the present moment. To be this aware is to be appreciative and absorbed in the broad sensory scenario that arises with each moment, and that this experience is primarily an aesthetic one. It is therefore a good practice to learn more about appreciating ordinary everyday occurrences just as they are, unadorned by our internal interpretive commentary.

I wanted to explore this area further, which prompted me to pick up this book Everyday Aesthetics by Yuriko Saito from the Cambridge Central Library. It has at times the feel of a book originally written as a dissertation, no stone being left unturned in its remorseless thoroughness. It appears also to have a few personal hobbyhorses of Saito's that clomp through it, sometimes creating more noise than perhaps they justify. One might say it was academic in tone, but it is actually quite an easy read, if a little plodding and tending to drag its heals a bit. For me it lost engagement and momentum early on when it went into a rather detailed discussion of 'green aesthetics'. This was to an extent illustrative, but it took the discussion away from establishing the basic principles on firmer ground, and on to the application of those principles far too soon. She never fully states what her overarching purpose is in wishing to explore everyday aesthetics, is it in search for greater meaning or purpose, or just for better more humane focused design? Due to it floating in some sort of non commital academic hinterland, it is emotionally neutral and has a curious lack of warmth and humanity.

It does present the broad range of what aesthetics of the everyday is, isn't, or might be. Establishing her major points in the first chapter, all subsequent chapters then ruminate upon them, sometimes quite flatulently. Her explanations are illustrated by well chosen examples, occasionally these do misfire entirely and one loses grasp of any finer point she's attempting to elucidate. Her own interest in design ( she teaches design theory) can take the discussion into areas that seem only tenuously connected with everyday aesthetics. She often admits as such, 'well' one is left to think 'what's your point in bringing it up then'  Unless it was purely to get her overall word count up.

These criticisms on the books structural weaknesses aside, I did gain from reading and reflecting on the content of this book. Though it was perhaps not quite what I originally thought it might be, which was mostly analytically rather than experientially based. It nevertheless brought unexpected insights into the perils and pitfalls of dwelling on aesthetics in the everyday. Her strongest arguments are around the relationship of art-based aesthetics to everyday aesthetics. Traditionally aesthetics is placed solely within an art-based framework, where it has an elevated function to point towards the sublime, to challenge our perceptions, to uplift or enlighten us. The making of Art is essentially a self-conscious activity, whilst everyday aesthetics is perceived as the antithesis of this and suffers from neglect because of it.

Attempts to broaden the boundaries of what falls within an art-based aesthetic runs the risk of turning the ordinariness of everyday aesthetics into something extraordinary and hence paradoxically making it more, not less remote. Becoming aware of everyday aesthetics is then, not about raising everything up so they become extraordinary or lowering everything down so they become ordinary, but appreciating things deeply in their essence, simply as they are. Traditional Art-based aesthetics exploits the intellectual/perceptual sensory qualities of sight and sound in order to engage us, but is neglectful or discouraging of the more earthy/embodied senses of smell or touch. Everyday aesthetics is however sensorially all inclusive. In appreciating art based aesthetics some experiential distance is required, if not demanded, whereas everyday aesthetics occupies entirely the sphere of being open to whatever is present in the immediate experience.

Being originally from Japan she uses a number of examples from her culture, which has Buddhist ideas of transience, no-self and non attachment woven through it, One aspect of the Japanese approach to aesthetics is that any object, place or ritual has its own essential character that the artist's creative role is purely to bring this out. This view, incidently, influenced the aesthetic principles of the Arts and Crafts movement in Great Britain. The artist becomes less of an active innovator and more a receptive facilitator. Its not about the imposition of an artist's ego onto a material, but the sensual sensitivity they have towards what the material is or wishes to be. This concept is still widely manifested in Japanese culture, ancient and modern, through Zen gardens, wabi sabi, tea ceremonies, even packaging and product design. Tellingly she points out that what was originally an aesthetic way of looking at objects and a sense of place, became distorted for social, political ends by nationalists trying to distinguish Japan from the West, which ultimately contributed to its tyrannical behaviour in WW2.

To more closely appreciate everyday aesthetics requires conscious effort. To break out of our perceptual blinkers, as if we are putting on a different set of spectacles. The objects we use and the places we occupy all possess a functional aesthetic, in how you use them, how they are to use,stimulating subliminal or strong aesthetic responses.  The imaginative care and attention to detail present in a buildings design can be aesthetically pleasing. The way a present is packaged can be a delightful experience for those who are wrapping it and those who are unwrapping it. The way one moves, or is moved through a Japanese garden has its own spatial aesthetic of expectation and delight in the concealing and revealing of a landscape.

Obviously the lack of such imaginative care and attention also has its own aesthetic feel, in the ugly, dirty, messy, trashfilled, abandoned or barren places. Saito is particularly good at highlighting how context and culturally dependent such prejudicial aesthetic judgements can be. The differences we make between productive and unproductive land, scenic and unscenic landscapes, flashy new developments and urban wastelands. The way that old ruins were once seen as 'eyesores' until the romantic movement changed our perceptions of them. Graffiti on an art gallery wall being viewed more favourably than graffiti on a wall in the street. Whether we approve of wind farms depending on if they're placed close to home or out at sea.

These days there is often a 'tyranical aesthetic of design' which we feel is being imposed upon us, in the many things which surround, annoy and alienate us. No matter how aesthetically pleasing a product maybe, our view of it may shift were we to discover it was less or more ethical, environmentally beneficial or damaging, made by hand or machine, or by people who are well paid or on poverty wages. Everyday aesthetics has no perceptual absolutes, its highly suggestible to subjective views, instincts and habits.

This draws out that fundamentally everyday aesthetic judgements have moral values underpinning them, which people, objects and environments can support or offend against. When we are presented with an object or a building that doesn't show sufficient respect for our humanity then we are existentially hurt by it.  She puts her case well for how everyday aesthetic judgements are not as trivial or insignificant as we might assume, they are what makes the human world we inhabit what it is. If we find we live in an ugly, inhuman heartless environment, then this is reflecting back how much our civilisation has lost its human scale and values.

The aesthetic feeling for the everyday moment is so embedded into our way of being, we are rarely fully conscious of the judgements we are making. The next time I pick up a kitchen knife, I'll try to respond to it not just from a strictly utilitarian viewpoint, but pay closer attention to the aesthetics of its design, how it looks, how it feels in my hand, how its functionality feels as it cuts through vegetables, the sounds it makes, the smells that arise, the affect this has upon me and in what way I respond. Do I find this experience aesthetically pleasurable, unpleasurable, or am I a little bit unmoved by it all?

BOOK REVIEW ~ David Sedaris ~ Me Talk Pretty One Day

Sometimes I get the feeling that I'm always coming late to a party everyone else has been at for 'absolutely ages darling, where have you been' and so it was with David Sedaris. Most days of the week at 6.30pm its time for dinner in our community, the six of us gathering around our grand sized dinning table for some vegetable based dish in a red sauce with chick peas thrown in for added flatulence. For some reason, past recollection, Hubby and I were in our room at 6.25. one evening, when the Radio 4 news slipped seamlessly into the 6.30 comedy half hour, and the deep voiced announcer said 'and next we have Meet David Sedaris.' At first Sedaris's high register voice was an alarming contrast to the bass resonances of the announcer, raised questions; who exactly were you hearing 'is this a woman? a man but transgender, halfway towards an op? no, I don't think so'  Once you've adjusted and tuned ino this, his witty gently self deprecating stories do, gradually cast a spell over you. By the end I turned to Hubby and said, 'I've not heard humorous writing of that quality in a long time, its rather rare and unique these days.' His stories, though they remain funny on the page, do become something even greater when you hear him speak them, full of telling inflections, sharp comic timing, and that subtlest of skills, the well judged pause.

And so began our hunt for anything Sedaris related. We scoured You Tube, and Hubby began pestering me for when I'd be finished with 'And when you are engulfed in Flames', so he could read and giggle to himself too. Both of us applied for BBC tickets for live recordings for his Radio 4 show, and both didn't getting any. For some reason I'd thought 'Me talk pretty one day' would be ideal reading matter to take on a largely silent Buddhist retreat. Maybe I just thought a little levity wouldn't hurt. Well, actually it does. Luckily I ended up in a dorm on my own, otherwise I'd have had to actively suppress my guffaws, giggles and hoots a bit more assiduously than I did. Well, I say that, but I still had to bite my knuckles and slap an open hand right over my mouth after 11 o'clock at night. So never ever ake this book on retreat with you, or read it late at night because I guarantee you'll not get to sleep afterwards.

Like the best humorists, Sedaris knows just how far to stretch the truth without breaking credulity. Well judged exaggeration for comic effect is a fine art. There are many excellent stories in this collection but Big Boy, though short, is a particular favourite. He's at dinner with friends and he goes to the loo, finding to his consternation there's a huge turd already floating in the toilet basin. It was a 'long and coiled specimen, as thick as a burrito'. The humour comes from his attempts to get rid of it, and his self consciousness about not leaving it there, in case the next person using the toilet thinks it came from him. It observes in fine detail the ridiculous lengths we go to sometimes, in trying to maintain our dignity in the eyes of others.

A subject matter Sedaris returns to quite frequently are language classes. For someone who doesn't appear to be naturally gifted at learning a language, he attends these a lot. Maybe he holds secret hopes of being a linguist, or simply sees it as a useful source for material, in other words its research. In this book the story Jesus Shaves documents a French class, and how he and his fellow learners struggle with sentence construction, grammar or simply finding the correct word to use, such as in this extract.

'Faced with the challenge of explaining the cornerstone of Christianity we did what any self-respecting group of people might do. We talked about food. 'Easter is a party for to eat of the lamb' the Italian nanny explained. "One too eat of the chocolate" " And who brings the chocolate?" the teacher asked. I knew the word, so I raised my hand saying. " The rabbit of Easter. He bring of the chocolate." 

His attempts to be an artist, his first job as a teacher, the problems of moving and living in France with his partner Hugh and his teenage difficulties with a speech therapist who tried to cure him of his lisp. All become subject matter to be scrutinised with his wit and a keen observational eye for that telling detail or phrase. We can all recognise ourselves in the human frailties on show here, the ludicrous behaviour, irrational idiosyncrasies, evasions and foibles. Sedaris's relationship with his Mother, Father or siblings, and their evident mild eccentricities make them all the more loveably human, and hence you tend to hold them in affection rather than ridicule.  Rarely cruel just to get a laugh, his humour works on recognition rather than the use of gratuitous swearing, personal insults or cruel putdowns. Sedaris is more scathing and honest about himself, lampooning his own behaviour far more than anyone else's. This I think is why its so easy to fall in love with his writing, it has a genuine warmth that rarely panders to sentimentality or loses its frankness or cutting edge.

DIARY 126 ~ Under The Breath

The purpose of most Buddhist retreats is to take you deeper in ones practice, in your understanding and appreciation of it, on technical, experiential and spiritual levels. I chose Receptivity, Death & Rebirth at Padmaloka Retreat Centre because, being a person who finds regular meditation a difficult ideal to consistently meet these days, its good for me to actively partake in a meditation retreat. They act as a reminder that its not impossible, given good circumstances, for me to still be an effective meditator.

There was a strong emphasis on the Just Sitting practice, of being openly receptive to the fruits of previous practice and encourage an open flexible experience of the present moment. 'Being in the present moment' is one of those terms tossed around quite loosely within populist psycho-spirituality, sounding so matter of fact and knowingly obvious, it appears as if this must be easy to do. It is far from being so. For what exactly is the present moment anyway? How could one become aware to it, when the practice as it presents itself is almost a methodless method.

Like in most meditation practices, a beginner's initial experience of Just Sitting will be of your attention being dragged left and right in a constant flux of distractedness. You just sit with this, with whatever presents itself to your experience within any moment. Any such perception is a subjective one, you cannot be truly objective about it. Objectivity would suggest that you and the present moment are something that could  be stood separate from and be impartial about. This is not really possible. The looker and what is looked at are locked in an intimate embrace.  Philosphically this can lead to more abstruse questions about whether ourselves or the world out there, actually have any verifiable concrete reality at all.  Whatever the theoretical view of what the present moment is. experientially it is mediated through the feeling responses, mental ideas and concepts we generate around and about it. The lover and what is loved cannot be divorced without there first being a falling out of love.

What I began exploring on the retreat was how, and to what extent, it was possible to drop the interpretive filter that experience gets passed through.  Could one just sit with experience as experience and not make it 'mine' by naming, defining and describing every single sensory sensation in a running commentary?  To change awareness you must take closer notice of the timbre of that awareness . The Mindfulness of Breathing practice gave the first clues on how I might adjust my approach.  I've heard it said numerous times that the key in the Mindfulness of Breathing is to take a real interest in the breath as a living changeable process, and how this affects and manifests itself in the body. For the first time I abandoned my previous view that the breath was inherently uninteresting, and allowed myself to become drawn into the gentler subtleties of the breath.  Concentration arrives in the Mindfulness of Breathing when the breath and the present moment become intimately aligned.

Subtle and light, like dust specks caught in strong sunlight, is suggestive of the sort of qualities required in Just Sitting. One morning halfway through the retreat we were all sat in silence in the breakfast lounge. A thought crossed my mind, 'why don't you just listen to sounds in the present moment? '  So I took in sounds, of doors opening, toast being buttered, knives cutting on plates, people eating, people sighing, tea urns steaming, wind buffering against glass, wood stoves humming etc. It turned into a beautifully wrought and intricate symphony. The present moment does have a musical quality to it; of soto voce, everything under the breath, of crescendo to pianissimo and all manner of combinations and counterpoints in between. Gradually, visual movements, my own presence at the feast, and my responses all began to weave themselves into the fabric of the present moment. It became utterly beguiling, quite delightful, if not a we bit thrilling. This experience became the guide for how in the future I might approach not only Just Sitting, but any practice, even extending it to practice in everyday life itself. Adopting an air of interest that isn't possessive of what it sees.

The content of the present moment varies, somethings are currently still, for them movement is in stasis, but the things which are in movement do so in complex, simple, gross and subtle ways.. I sat at times in the shrine room, where everywhere appeared motionless in the meditative atmosphere, yet within this were tiny gentle sounds blending into the background, or the visually insignificant passing of a shadow across a vase of flowers. Our experience of the present moment can be over focused on the central dramatic event unfolding before us. Our senses becoming closed down, numbed or indifferent to the full spectrum of what is there within one moment. When you start to open up to just sitting with the present moment, it has a quality of wonder and childlike fascination to it, as it inhabits your awareness. One is no longer just the interpreter that collects and names experiences like ticking off a list - toast check, cough check, rain check, door closing check, feeling bored check etc.

At your best one sits in the present moment taking it all in, and being aware that you are taking it all in, with little or no subsequent analysis. The long term consequnces of regularly brushing against this state, learning how it might be sustained, cannot be underestimated. Just Sittng  shows great potential for insight should one wish to go there.

DREAM ~ Needing To Bury Ones Dead

I've been experiencing a sequence of dreams, in a three part serialisation, stretching over a few weeks. I'm in my parents old house in Crowle, and I'm in the bedroom I had as a teenager. In the first dream I'm playing music in that bedroom, but I am me now as agrown up, not me as a teenager. Into the room arrives a young boy around 12 years old I guess. I want him to leave my room, but he wont go, so I push him, he hits his head on the corner of a walland falls slumped on the floor. I go over to check he's OK, but he is dead.

The second installment, quite a few days later, felt like it picked up from the end of the last dream. I'm less clear what it was about but it had a lot of hightened anxiety and horror at what had happened. The third and,hopefully, final part happened whilst I was on retreat. This is quite a while after the death, I'm still in the bedroom with the dead body, but the dead body is rotting and there are maggots wriggling all over it. I know I have to dispose of it before the stench aroses attention. The dream centres on anxieties about how to move the body. This imperative dominates the emotional tone of the dream, but the body never gets moved in the dream,because I prevaricate about what's best to do.

These dreams seem like companion pieces to a previous dream sequence I'd had five or six years ago. Those all revolved about someone I'd killed and buried under a hearth. I have to move it before its discovered, and this took place in three different places over three different dreams. In the first, it was under a hearth in an old house that was being modernised to blend in with a new estate. In the second, it was under a hearth in a fireplace showroom on the top floor of a department store, In the third dream, I'm walking along a street near where I know the body is buried under a street grate, one of the person's walking with me knew this, and is trying to expose my crime for all to see.

These dreams do mean something to me on a feeling tone level, something was put to an end in my youth, youthful dreams were perhaps dashed. The evidence of this is somehow lingering with me now .Its rotting psychological corpse is metaphorically perfuming my senses still. I need to leave this to further percolate to feel exactly what needs giving a decent burial. 

POEM ~ Its Amazing What Happens When You Just Sit With Yourself

Here are a few poems, a bit unpolished, that I wrote whilst on a retreat Receptivity, Death & Rebirth at Padmaloka, which has stimulated quite a lot of reflections, of which I may write more later.


MISSING MOMENTS

Not less than one
is the beat of my thought pulse
with little to gild it with
but a nano second of a passing muse
with no time to wave
before it too has gone
no crowning moment
devastating finale
or clasped hurrah!
just the muffled crunch
of slippered steps on gravel
moving into the distance
and fading within my mind
into mist.


REFLECTING ~ ON EVERYTHING THAT MOVES

This appears to be no more than an attitude
a point of perspective
placed at an irregular angle
best not make it a defined intent
it gets complicated
its a sliver of something
pasted into the background
like a convex mirror
in a Dutch masterpiece
reflecting on everything that moves
from a clear, yet distorted viewpoint
as if seen from the back
in reverse
in a fishes eye
a fraction of a second
after the moment has passed


PRESENT TENSE

Not in my guts, in my sex,
in my little toe, am I
today I am
an excess of acidity
searing my stomach lining
medium rare
grumbles and moans surface
tuning in to my inner teenager
'who are you to tell me what to do
what I am or am not
whether I is an am at all
serving up your existential quandaries
before I've even had my porridge,
its cruel, Christ! its breakfast time!!
surely if hunger exists
it can be satisfied?'


SIMILARITIES IN SOUND

It sounds similar to....

the soft bass and thrumming drum roll
of wood burning in a stove.

a car's low intoned throaty hum
far off on a motorway

a plane's high trailed crackle and thrust
long passed beyond sight, and out of time,
leaving condensed air waves, and a resonant hum
as an after thought.

or a fart, from an unknown fartee, recently blown off
but lingering regretfully in the air

Note what, who or which of these it was
and let them go, let them pass through
don't hold them here, damn it.
bloody let go of them!
let them all die away


CLOSE ENOUGH BUT NO FURTHER

There is always
a something
a person
an ideal
we are stepping away from;
phenomena ~ natural or supernatural
feelings ~ base or refined
pursuits ~ trivial or profound
relationships ~ interpersonal or trans personal
in all cases
we're backing off
we're scared
we know and don't want to know
as the strings are drawn
tighter
ineluctably moving us towards
an ever closer bond
with whatever intimacy it is.


WHETHER

For some
whenever it rains
it falls both inside and out
whenever its sunny
it shines both inside and out
whenever its cloudy
it overshadows both inside and out

Whenever rain falls upon a sunny nature
it blesses everything it touches
by cooling, bathing and glistening them

Whenever sun shines upon a rainy nature
it warms everything it touches
mopping up the moisture
from pools, gutters and tears.

However,
whenever clouds blanket the sky
cunningly withholding their beauty,
both from inside and out
no glimmer of light escapes
unsuffused or obscured by doubts
or fear of the unhealed dream
leaving us at the mercy and merits
of our own devices
and whether
in the state we are in
we swim or drown.


THE RUN THROUGH

Wildness, is a dance, often
done blindfolded
by those who desire
to be free of form
arching, crashing and bending everywhere
like branches being whipped by a storm
flailing after expressing something
that in their flailing
they can never catch
yet in this ungraspable state
lies the appeal of being wild
of being in touch with
a facsimile, a trial performance
fully dressed up and everything
but dreadfully under rehearsed
for the true liberation.


KEEPING IN CIRCLES

Winding round
as though turning a windlass
navigating ritual space
with only a stupa to guide us
everything and nothing is present in each step
no praying, no chanting, no pressure
but the catching of a thought
in respect of each moment
and through such momentum
of concentrated circularity
we walk with our time, clockwise
feigning indifference to the fizz of mosquito's
squiggling the air around us
but nonetheless are distracted by them
whilst above, in the dimness
of a late afternoon autumnal sky
a posse of black winged birds,
sweep counter clockwise
as if mimicking or mocking us
instinctively forming an orderly circle
and collectively feeding
off flies.

DIARY 125 ~ Holiday In Old Amsterdam

In September Jnanasalin and I had a six day holiday in Amsterdam. For us holidays are rarely about where we go for a break, but just giving ourselves one. Amsterdam was one of many places in Europe we'd like to visit; Centre of the Dutch Golden Age; the Van Gogh Museum; Dutch Apple Pie etc. What draws us anywhere is usually a mix of History, Art and Cakes, with a fluctuating sense of priority.

Our first day was quite exhausting. take my advice don't set off on a walk into the city centre from your hotel thinking it would only be a forty minute amble. An hour and a half later we arrived in the frantic commercial throng of the Leidsplein and Dam area, an area which I have to say has little left to make it appealing. Amsterdam looks deceptively small on maps, distances appearing to be a shortish walk turn into a huge hike through the marijuna haze of other tourists. As a city, Amsterdam does have a warm, welcoming and friendly demeanour. You have to remind yourself, you're not a resident, you're a tourist too, as a phalanx of tourists on cycles wobble / hurtle dangerously past you.

Having learnt from our first days herculean effort, our second was executed with slightly more knowing and relaxed sophistication. We followed a circular tour around parts of the Jordaan, which was a lot more like what we were hoping for from our holiday. Nice cafes and restaurants, historical houses and churches, an idiosyncratic and interesting  range of shops. Here we could take our time more. We'd plannned after our second day we'd buy a three day 'I Amsterdam Card' for 67 euros, and from then on hit the museums and tourist spots with a vengance. We bought a similar thing when we were in Bruges, which saved us quite a bit of money. In order to make the most of it, it did mean we were averaging around five places visited a day, sometimes more. We got our money's worth, our 67 euros buying us about 200 euros of entrance fees and travel.

From the Hermitage exhibtion

So, we saw a lot, and consequently the trip became a quite busy and full on one, but satisfying none the less. Some personal highlights were an exhibition at the Amsterdam Hermitage of Romanov tableware, which doesn't sound remotely exciting, but its amazing what presentation that is inventive and superlative can do. The Winkel Cafe, in the Norde Kerk area, where we had an excellent coffe and the best Dutch Apple Tart of our visit.

Winkel's Cofee & Apple Tart

Then there was the Stedelijk Museum of Modern Art, which, not surpriingly given the central role played by Dutch artists,had a very good collection of 20th Century, plus an engaging range of contemporary art. I loved the multi screen video work of Sarah Carlier, eight screens each with an apparently motionless, slowly changing image, at some point there was or will be an event or action, but when? There was a wonderful sense of expectation, of waiting, a quiet patient space, similar to Just Sitting. You just sat observing small comings or goings. there and not there, the things that were quietly changing.




Of the Amsterdam Zoo we both had mixed feelings, some of the animals just appeared sad, or depressed to us. Apart from the seals which were a simple delight, just watching their playfulness and joi de vivre.

The Museum that looks like its under a sink

My first De Witt wall drawing in the flesh, Hurrah!

 Comparisons between countries are often odious, but there are things which are glaringly different. Amsterdam has a reliable, frequent and truly integrated transport system. The UK appears not to know the real meaning of those words. There are hardly any large scale national or international retail chains, consequently there are a thousand varieties of independent shops. In the UK we support enterprise and innovation by encouraging bigger companies to move here, their greater market clout squeezing out those smaller entrepeneurs trying to nuture something interesting to grow.  In Amsterdam good pleasent customer service seemed natural, and always present, people appeared to enjoy it, whereas in the UK its seen as more like a contractual obligation or optional extra.  On our return from the continent the UK always feels small and pinched, in scale, in ambition and mindset, not to mention grubby and mean spirited.