I have a camera again

 

the soft must prevail

I was helping clean out the lifeguard shack at camp today. The guard shack is a dark place full of things like snakes and spiders and stink bugs and rusty metal and saws and hammers and mouse poop and dust and detritus. An inhospitable place where only the roughest toughest meanest grimiest nastiest can exist.

And there in the middle of the filth and gore where is this little rubber ducky. Not even a rubber ducky. One of those squishy gummy things that all dust and dirt stick to and can never be unstuck. And there it was. In spite of everything around it.

The soft and weak and squishy MUST exist! It must! There is no way around it. 

"Only the strong survive!"

No! This cannot be true. In the entirety of existence is the irreducible element of the easily broken and destroyed and tarnished and it MUST be so!

"Why?! But why?"

Because, baby, because baby.

 

Erin living with me this spring/summer!

 

on being 33

Some people are like, "I never thought I'd live this long." I always had a pretty good idea I would live this long.

I feel younger than I thought I'd feel.

Do I have any profound insights having lived this long? What have I learned?

In the long run, it pays to be kind.

Be an easy laugh.

I feel like I need a spicy one.

My fake chicken nugget intake went up SO MUCH this year. Skyrocketed. When you're 32 you realize fake chicken nuggets are a winner.

I really like the QORN ones. I buy a big bag of like 30 at a time.

That's something I'd tell 29 year old me. Get on the nug train.

why I think mitski's my love mine all mine is so so so good

 Look at the lyrics! Look at the poetry!

Moon, a hole of light

Through the big top tent up high

Here before and after me

Shinin' down on me

You don't have to think deeply about the beauty of these words but I think you CAN and you'll be richly rewarded for it!

What is Mitski describing?

Why is the moon a hole of light through the big top tent up high???

THINK ABOUT IT!

What is a big top tent associated with?! A CIRCUS! A SHOW! I don't think it's too much of a stretch to say that Mitski is looking up at the moon and seeing illumination from outside of a world that Jean Baudrillard would describe as hyperreal!

What what what? What fancy words is this?

It's not that complicated! The hyperreal is simply the point when a representation or symbol of something real becomes indistinguishable or confused from reality. Something that is REALER THAN REAL! We feel this all the time when we point out something is simply a construct. Swing a dead cat in a dark alley and you'll find an example of the hyperreal. 

You know what ISN'T the hyperreal?? THE MOON! The moon is outside of the circus of the hyperreal that's riddled with media and ads and the constant bombardment of information that's meant to make you forget who you are and what you're doing or could be doing!

In a moment of epiphany Mitski sees the moon and recognizes that the Moon has existed before her and will exist after her. THIS IS IMPORTANT!

What kind of mental state does the circus of the hyperreal want to cultivate?? Anxious! Self-conscious! Self-centered. It wants to keep you running! It wants to keep you worried about temporal things and always more more more!

THE MOON CARES NOT! THE MOON SHINES DOWN ON MITSKI BECAUSE IT ALWAYS SHINES AND ALWAYS HAS AND ALWAYS WILL! THE LIGHT OF THE MOON IS UNCONDITIONAL! Feeling the connection to the Moon has a profound impact on our protagonist Mitski as she goes on to explain!

Moon, tell me if I could

Send up my heart to you?

So, when I die, which I must do

Could it shine down here with you?

The line that resonates with me the most is "So, when I die, which I must do"

AHHHH!!!

I love all media and stories and songs and poems that openly confront the inevitably and certainty of death! You can find hordes and troves and piles and heaps of meditation on the importance of being mindful of the fact that one day you and everyone you know will die! I CAN'T OVERSTATE THE IMMENSE IMPORTANCE OF THIS FACT! THIS IS ONE OF THE FUNDAMENTAL PARADOXES THE DRIVES THE ENGINE OF THE SOUL!

IF ALL I'VE EVER KNOWN IS THE EXPERIENCE OF BEING ALIVE HOW CAN I POSSIBLY CONCEIVE NOT BEING ALIVE?!

I could say a lot more about this but I'll move on to the final idea which is expressed here in the verse and again in the chorus.

What is Mitski getting at? What is Mitski proposing??!

To put it simply! The feeling that resonates within Mitski upon gazing at the moment is a feeling that is BEYOND EGO. The self that calls itself the self. The ego can be thought of as linked to or an extension of hyperreality. 

SIMPLER! Mitski sees the moon! Mitski feels a connection to something that is completely outside of herself. Mitski wonders if this feeling--this feeling of connection to eternity and light--can this feeling live on! Which, of course it can! It must!

I'm not explaining it well. But it leads into the chorus which I would argue the kind of love that Mitski is referring to is the love of universal consciousness. Being outside the ego is associated with this endless compassion and love and oneness with everything.

'Cause my love is mine, all mine

I love mine, mine, mine

Nothing in the world belongs to me

But my love mine, all mine, all mine

My baby, here on earth

Showed me what my heart was worth

So, when it comes to be my turn

Could you shine it down here for her?

When Mitski says 'nothing in the world belongs to me' she's saying that she is renouncing the world of things, the world of the hyperreal, the world of the ego that wants to be attached. That wants the temporal to be permanent. But what IS eternal is love. 

If it feels paradoxical it's because it is. You'd think the repeated use of the word 'mine' would indicate something very selfish and self centered but it is NOT UNLIKE!

NOT UNLIKE!

NOT UNLIKE!

SONG OF MYSELF BY WALT FREAKIN WHITMAN!!!

YESSSS!! WE DID IT! WE GOT THERE! WE GOT BACK TO WALT!!

I celebrate myself, and sing myself,

And what I assume you shall assume,

For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

IT'S THE SAME THING! IT'S THE SAME THING! DON'T YOU SEE?! THEY'RE SAYING THE SAME THING BUT DIFFERENT WAYS!

In the state of mind that Walt and Mitski are in it makes no difference to say I own everything and I own nothing! Because they're talking about a boundless self! 

Swiftly arose and spread around me the peace and knowledge that pass all the argument of the earth,

And I know that the hand of God is the promise of my own,

And I know that the spirit of God is the brother of my own,

And that all the men ever born are also my brothers, and the women my sisters and lovers,

And that a kelson of the creation is love,

WHAT THE HECK IS A KELSON???

IT"S LIKE...THE LONG UNDERSIDE PART OF A BOAT! LIKE THE SPINE OF THE BOAT KINDA?!

Anyway, I just think the economy of Mitski's words are brilliant and the song is beautiful and her voice is incredible and it affirms the soul when you listen to it. Our capacity for love is what opens us up to the possibility of a world beyond the self and that is eternity and eternity is love. Right? It sounds less cool to say it that way when you can feel it in Mitski and Walt Whitman.

:P

one time when I was in kindergarten we had a day where the only point of the day was that some guy brought in a cow heart

and it was like cow heart day where everyone got to go out to the blacktop where the cow heart was on a table and look at it and maybe even poke it

and I didn't feel well or something that day so I had to stay inside while everyone else went out to look at the cow heart

to this day I still haven't seen a cow heart in person or in photographs

at this point I'm sure you're thinking the same thing I'm thinking which is "well Andy why don't you Google a cow heart picture right now and react to it?"

No.

Don't you understand. Can't you see what this has all been about the whole time?

That's not my path to walk. In the words of blink-182 "fate fell short this time."

Why don't YOU look up a picture of a cow heart and tell me what it's like?

Also, now as a person who has worked with kids his entire professional life, it is absolutely WILD for someone to be like, "hey I got this cow heart, we should show it to ALL the kindergartners." 

I'm not saying it's a bad thing it just ain't no cocomelon.

I'll be thinkin' boutcha

happy birthday (yesterday) mawmaw

saw this on Instagram today and it reminded me of my own mawmaw. powerful words.

 

Making these rings

 

works in progress

 sometimes (yesterday) I go to youtube and search 'tigers' and just watch videos of tigers like walking around and swimming and stuff

but not the fight videos! I don't want to watch animals fight!

I just think they're neat

Ezra Pound once wrote!

A Pact

I make truce with you, Walt Whitman—

I have detested you long enough.

I come to you as a grown child

Who has had a pig-headed father;

I am old enough now to make friends.

It was you that broke the new wood,

Now is a time for carving.

We have one sap and one root—

Let there be commerce between us.

He also wrote in Notes for Canto CXX

“I have tried to write Paradise

Do not move

      Let the wind speak

        that is paradise.

Let the Gods forgive what I

        have made

Let those I love try to forgive

        what I have made.”

DO YOU SEE THE CONNECTION BETWEEN LET THE WINDS SPEAK AND THE POWER TO SUCK IN THE AIR OF SPRING?!

Ezra Pound and Walt Whitman are masters of their craft and they have climbed to the top of the heap that is rickety pile of human achievement and admitted that the air and wind are more precious on their own than any lyric they can fashion!

TWO POINTS!

ONE: This reminds me of how mad that awful Robert Frost poem made me when he tried to tell the winds how to blow! What an absolute buffoon!

TWO: I love that Ezra Pound calls himself a grown child and refers to his younger self as a pig-headed father! And then he goes on to discover for himself what Linkin Park had already been telling us the whole time! "I tried so hard and got so far but in the end it doesn't even matter!"

The point is in trying! The point is to go with full intention and belief and then look back and say "Oh yeah I was completely wrong" but you can't say that if you never try. 

DO NOT MOVE! LET THE WIND SPEAK! THAT IS PARADISE!

THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU MAKE PEACE WITH WALT WHITMAN AND STOP CREATING ITALIAN FASCIST PROPAGANDA! EZRA POUND YOU ABSOLUTE DOG!

BREATHE the air of spring

"In all pure poetic work there must especially come in the power to suck in the air of spring, to put it into song, to breathe it forth again—the palpable influence of spring, the new entrance to life."

Do you understand what this man is saying?! Do you understand what Walt is going on about??

Have you harnessed the power to SUCK IN THE AIR OF SPRING?! Have you smelled it? Have you tasted it? Have you absorbed it into your being and breathed it forth again? Have you?

Have you???

There's nothing else. I've seen it. I've looked. There are many things like it but the resonant frequency of being on this Earth is encapsulated in this sentence by Mr. Walter Whitmanthony himself! Stop looking! It's right here! If you keep looking then you've gone passed it and you'll maybe never find it. It's right here! It's the start line that you've failed to cross and you're headed the complete opposite direction looking for a finish!

This isn't about poetry! Do you know what Walt Whitman thought about poetry?? He said,

"Have you reckon’d a thousand acres much? have you reckon’d the earth much?

Have you practis’d so long to learn to read?

Have you felt so proud to get at the meaning of poems?

Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of all poems,

You shall possess the good of the earth and sun, (there are millions of suns left,)

You shall no longer take things at second or third hand, nor look through the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectres in books,

You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me,

You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self."

HE'S SAYING YOU MUST LIVE! HE'S SAYING THE CLOSEST THING A POEM CAN EVER APPROXIMATE TO IS GIVING YOU SOME SEMBLANCE OF WHAT IT FEELS LIKE TO LIVE!

IF POETRY WERE A LA CROIX ITS FLAVOR WOULD BE LIFE AND LIFE IS FOUND IN SUCKING IN THE AIR OF SPRING!

It's not any more complicated than that. 

Walt Whitman said,

"To elaborate is no avail, learn’d and unlearn’d feel that it is so."

You can't puzzle it out! You can't think your way to it. The only thing you can do is feel it in your whole lungs and then remind yourself that YES! YES! THIS IS THE ENTRANCE TO NEW LIFE!

IT'S LIKE A DOOR! IT'S LIKE A THRESHOLD THAT YOU CROSS AND YOU KNOW YOU'VE CROSSED IT BUT THERE'S NO OTHER THERE THAT IS THERE! YOU JUST KNOW YOU'VE CROSSED IT! YOU CAN'T STAY AND AS SOON AS YOU'VE ARRIVED YOU'VE DEPARTED BUT BREATHE THE AIR! BREATHE THE AIR OF SPRING!

BREATHE THE AIR OF SPRING!

CHARGED UP ON GRANOLA NOW!

 MORE LIKE FUELOLA!

relistened to Dr. Dog's The Way the Lazy Do

 this is just the most incredible song ever penned to music

a sonic celebration of life and time

it ends in this magnificent crescendo where the Doctors Dogs bestow upon the listener the blessing to end all blessings. go listen to it!

May your thoughts be kind

May your knots unwind

May your dogs drink wine

May your days kill time

And may your fears go blind

As your regrets rewinds

A little peace of mind

May you wake to find

It's just that time of the year

That holds you dear

my own heart let me more have pity on

 lil poem by Gerard Manley Hopkins

--------------------------------------------

My own heart let me more have pity on; let

Me live to my sad self hereafter kind,

Charitable; not live this tormented mind

With this tormented mind tormenting yet.

I cast for comfort I can no more get

By groping round my comfortless, than blind

Eyes in their dark can day or thirst can find

Thirst's all-in-all in all a world of wet.

Soul, self; come, poor Jackself, I do advise

You, jaded, let be; call off thoughts awhile

Elsewhere; leave comfort root-room; let joy size

At God knows when to God knows what; whose smile

's not wrung, see you; unforeseen times rather — as skies

Betweenpie mountains — lights a lovely mile.

new animal terms

horse big- something that is very big

mouse big- something that is not very big

bat focused- seemingly chaotic but very precise

duck wise- loud and simple

chicken fancy- it's like that thing where ygoou put on aluminum foil and act like it's a crown

dog big- medium

horse small- arguably big

goose perfect- menacingly perfect

snake loose- very loose

mouse loud- quiet

 never mistake the ant for being blind to itself. it is only blind to any and all illusions cast upon it. PROTECT THE COLONY! BITE BITE BITE! BITE BITE BITE!

the flashlight of language illuminates nothing before the absolute shining WORD

and with your brain arms, hold up high with your left brain arm the truth that actions have consequences and with your right brain arm raise high the truth that all the rules are arbitrary and made up

heroism is a state of action guided by principle 

 today I had to pay TurboTax $0 to file my taxes and then on the checkout screen they got cute with me and were like

"um....for your billing address...for all this money we're billing you...don't you think it would be better if your zip code was 029847xcvcv09587294" and they put a bunch of extra numbers behind my regular zip code

...

...

...

sure, TurboTax. It's your none dollars. Do whatever you want with it, big dog.

 I was using a leafblower at the bottom of an empty over-one-hundred-years old pool and I ended up with these big piles of leaves at the edges that I would then use a shovel to heave out of the pool and onto a tarp. And as I was getting to the end of one pile a little mouse appeared and started running from the pile. I felt bad for the mouse so I used the shovel to move it to another pile but I'd been working in the sun for a while and forgot that I would eventually need to heave that pile out of the pool as well. Some time passed and I started throwing that pile out of the pool and I never saw the mouse so I guess that was good. Then when I was all finished I went to my water bottle and a big of tortilla chips that I'd left at the end of the pool and a mouse had clearly chewed through the bag and took some chips.

There's no lesson here and nothing was learned.

straight to bed with ya's

 big day today. tired and need to get to bed.

the unspoken conversation

 I spent a lot of time on my trip last week thinking about how, for me anyway, the goal of a conversation or interaction is to say in a roundabout way "I care about you." Especially in cases where nothing really needs to be done or accomplished. The less practical the talk is, the more it is really about affirming, I want you to know I care about you. 

Or you could phrase it a lot of different ways: I see you, I value you, I appreciate you, I enjoy being around you. It's all kind of swirling the same proverbial drain.

I don't definitely don't think it's true of all conversations at all times. I get the sense that some people try to get across, "I'm better than you" or "I'm smarter than you" and it tends to color their choice of topics and words. There's an infinite number of possibilities and a good amount of time we're probably saying things for ourselves more than the person we're talking too.

But maybe my favorite part of the trip was I felt like I was in that space a lot of the time. Where the reason I was talking was to try to get that across.

So that was cool.

new buc-ee's crop

 

instant potato spread