It's Right In Front of Me

Sometimes the answer to all your dilemmas is right there. In front of your face. Sometimes the answer is as simple as this: do your own thing, let others do theirs. That might take the form of not going along with FFP to workout at the country club and rather pretending to workout across the hall in the condo gym and really sitting here and working the Sunday NY Times magazine crossword and then blogging. It might be more complicated than that. Not trying to make others love what you love and not trying to be more than the audience for others' efforts, rather than a cheerleader and promoter. Not trying to be all things to all people, to be every place at once and to get people together who can allegedly help one another.

The head picture today was shot on South Congress at Uncommon Objects. I like it, particularly the way my face is pretty distinct except obscured by the ornate candelabra.

I was trying to work the aforementioned crossword puzzle in a printout from the Times digest (rather than in the magazine itself). There was a typo that caused puzzlement. (Or, you know, extra puzzlement.) Last week there was one also. Why always look for other people's typos? (Even if, as in this case, it interferes with your pleasure?) Mother's Day is driving me crazy as people keep saying "Happy Mother's Day to all the mother's [sic] out there." I had an e-mail the other day where an accusation on a heated topic used an adjective where and adverb belonged. For some reason, both FFP and I leapt on that. Just like we always do with something in print. Ignoring the meaning, ignoring the accusations, going for the syntax.

But I digress into my digressions. We were talking about art (were you here the last few days?) and what it represents and I mentioned we might discuss the delicious whiff of criminality that some art carries.

Today's picture has triggered my discussion above about things that are right in front of you or "as plain as the nose on your face." I was looking at how my obscured but recognizable face is an element of the 'meaning' of my 'art.' When I made an artist's statement back in 2006, I initially used a picture with the reflection of people, but absent myself. My partner in artistic pretending, SuRu, offered that the artist often makes an appearance and I added this revision. I appeared in that shot, although you have to look twice since the (non-reflected) person and shop window are so distracting. And, my face is obscured by a camera. (My jeans, hiking boots and black blazer are recognizable, though. My tramping about in other cities outfit. Paris in this case.)

What happens to obscure my face, what interferes with a pure mirror image, is important to the messages of the pieces. I love this picture because the whimsical irregular painting on the wall obscures the face. (It's reflected in the window of the sales center for the W condos, with part of the model building.) Whether obscured by folds and sparkles or partly by the camera and a pig's head or by light streaming from an opposite window, it's me. For sure. I love this one where my hubby is completely recognizable (to me) from the back with his head turned slightly.

To loop back around to the whole criminal element of these shots: I have actually been approached by a security guard at least once (at the fancy Domain shopping center) about it not being 'allowed' to take pictures of shop windows. This is the merchants, shopping mall people not wanting competitors to rip on show windows, I think. Because he said that it was OK to take pictures of people or the art work (outdoor sculpture, etc.). He really didn't know how to respond when I said I was taking a picture of myself in the window. Of course, when passersby appear, I (almost) never ask their permission. Photographers take crowd shots or details or full-on individuals. Sometimes they have permission, often not. With my shop windows, the art of them and the things they reflect may well belong to someone else. As does most everything but the sky and plants. Even domesticated animals are a 'possession' of someone else. Like graffiti artists putting their work on things, photographers and even painters take away images of things.

For all that I feel like this work is mine alone. Especially when it's stamped with an image of me, however obscure.

Hubris

Nah, it's not my car. The friend walking with me said it was an older Rolls. It was at a repair shop on South Congress.

It did seem like a photo worthy of the title of this piece, however.

I've never owned a Rolls. I've never ridden in one either. I don't have anything against someone who does, however. I'm a capitalist. I like having money to get things I want. But I know that I am lucky to live in a place where I could amass a little money (starting at zero? less than zero?) and enjoy things I like in my dotage. Oh, I have a beat-up Civic I bought eight years ago because my other beat-up Civic got totaled. And I only have 1200 square feet to shelter me. But it is a cool place, downtown where things ain't the cheapest and I spend profligately (by Honda Civic standards) on eating out, travel (well not so much last year) and my favorite charities.

Apparently there are people who will hold my lifestyle against me. (An article we wrote in the Austin Chronicle about walking to bars and restaurants and museums elicited a detractor who compared us to French royalty during the French revolution. Off with their heads!) And, certainly, there are people who will hold a Rolls or a yacht or a big estate and 'compound' or lavish trips against those (many) folks richer than I. Not me, though.

I know that if you start deciding what people 'deserve' to own, you are no longer a capitalist. Of course, it doesn't mean that we shouldn't have sensible regulations, prosecute fraud, have reasonable taxes (not punitive ones).

What I find unforgivable is hubris. Not just pride but:

hubris–noun excessive pride or self-confidence; arrogance.

I think it is fine to be a little proud, to stand up for yourself, your accomplishments. But in excess it is the thing I despise most.

Hubris can be exhibited by anyone, too, not just the rich. You see rich people, though, who believe their circumstance is the direct result of superiority, of brains, wits, risk-taking with no element of luck. You see it in the poor, too, who adopt a victim's mantle with an excess of pride, as set apart and enamored of their lack of luck and their circumstance as any rich man who worked for (or defrauded for or stumbled blindly into) his riches.

I love my life. No Rolls although I suppose I could have had one if I'd wanted little else! I have food, shelter, health, a computer, a retirement income. I have most of what I could possibly ever want. Maybe more than I can successfully consume (especially if you count newspapers to read, books to read, movies to watch, walks to take, blogs to read, etc.).

But I hope I always remember that while I tried to get to this place and have the things I want and be safe and happy some luck helped, too. I try to be thankful for potable water, shelter, medical care for me and those I love. I try to be thankful I live where women, if discriminated against sometimes in some ways, are basically considered human and free. I know that my luck in having these things has little to do with me and much to do with where I was born. I also don't believe a god blessed me with these things but if you do, that works, too.

Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall. Proverbs 16:18

I have trouble forgiving pride and think gods do, too.

I also think there is a great amount of hubris people adopt in their attempts to identify and right wrongs. Some people are convinced that only they see the true path to what is right. That the world is only flawed because they have not come up with the right procedural path to an ideal world. I think the world is flawed and we only make it better when we admit how unimportant one person is although our acts are magnified if others adopt them.

Perhaps I would have been more successful (hard for me to imagine, though) if I had been more proud, more sure of my own ideas. But the doubt of my anti-hubris kept me grounded, I think, and perhaps kept me from making a few frightful mistakes.

And, maybe, just maybe, I'm too proud of not being proud! Still I hate hubris. But I love the word.

Generally Speaking

Generalizations are dangerous. Everyone is sitting at a different juncture, looking out at certain things and interacting with the people and things near them while watching a film reel of things just out of reach. Of course, with TV and the Internet and old school newspapers and such that passing parade of 'other lives' is congested with scenes from here and yon, with images imagined and brought to life with pictures or videos.

I snapped a photo in one of the penthouses in the 360 at a benefit party. I decided that going out on the various balconies would get better pictures. But this one shows the Palmer Events Center through the window, from above. You could live up there and that would become one of the exterior views in your life, as common as breathing to you. Just as our views from our windows and balcony have become a little expected if not ordinary to us.

We are all doing things that wouldn't seem that weird to others but things which are not what they are experiencing. We grab onto things where we can relate. People talk about their illnesses and their cures (two people at dinner last night had done acupuncture). Folks chat about TV shows, sports events, movies that they watched separately but can now discuss and analyze. We are interested in people talking about places we haven't been, things we haven't done but, in our heart of hearts, we want to have been there and have that first-hand experience.

When we generalize about people, though, we need to remember that while their age, race, sex, sexual preference, diet, habits, wealth and where they live shapes them, it shapes each into a completely unique individual.

Does this all sound like I have nothing to say? Yeah, that's pretty much it. I've thought of writing a piece about how I hate Internet and Text abbreviations (and yet made one up myself the other day). I've thought about writing something about the walkability of my new home. But, no, this is the drivel you get. Sorry.

Contradiction

I have been on facebook more than I'd like to admit lately. Why, after all, do we need to be that in touch with friends? When we went to see "The Wrestler" and we were leaving we saw a friend who was first in line for the next show, smart phone in hand. "I knew you were here!" she said. And, indeed, I'd said I was off to see the movie a few hours before. This is what the kids have been doing for a while, starting with their voice calls "Where are you? Oh, I see you..." and ending up texting a continuous stream to one another and now, with Twitter and facebook, to everyone they know. I'm not sure I'm happy with it. I don't use the phone that much and I tend to pull back eventually from chat streams to write entire paragraphs for you to read (or ignore) at your leisure. I'm tantalized by the immediacy of things and by all these smart phones in the hands of my smart friends. But I resist as well. (I have a stupid phone. It does text messages but don't send me one. I don't know how to read it.) This is typical of my contradictory nature.

People (including FFP) have been writing notes on facebook with "Twenty-five random things about me." They are fascinating, but I haven't done one myself in spite of being "tagged." I don't take to tags or tagging others. If I inspire someone to write or comment, fine. Otherwise I'm on my own spouting nonsense, usually here. (Or, you know, one blog or the other.) These lists, though, are conduits of contradiction as people find themselves writing that they are one way but act another or desire some other path.

The above photo is a house in Old West Austin. Dramatically modern and different from its neighbors it would be patina-less but for the winter-stripped tree in the yard. I love patina, actually, but I find the house and its modern, sterile aesthetic appealing, too. We adopted a very modern look for our condo decoration albeit softened with art and books and some whimsical toys and collectibles. We left the concrete pillars and ceilings with their patina of seams, nail marks, wood grain from the forms. We used wood which has its endless swirls of grain but we have some sleek glass and chrome, too.

My personality is full of contradictions. I like to go places and see people but I'm shy and have spent a lot of effort over the years trying to get comfortable in social situations especially with strangers. Yeah, I'm the person who will invite fifty people to a party and then be exhausted, not by the effort to entertain them but by the effort to interact with them. (Of course, we won't be throwing parties for fifty in our new digs. Maybe twenty tops.)

I'm constantly yo-yoing between getting out among folks and retreating to my recluse mode.

I like to talk and I like to be listened to, but social situations still feel like work.

My love of patina extends to art where I'm a fan of abstract or the slightly fantastical realism (but nothing too fantastical, mythical or comic-like). I love collage and found object sculpture and assemblage and well, whatever you choose to call it. Mixed media. I love clean modern lines, glass and chrome. But take some paper ephemera, arrange it artistically and it grabs me. Rusty junk? Priceless.

I'm a bundle of contradiction. We all are, I guess. Collage appeals because we see ourselves in the complexity.

Perspective

There are lots of state-wide associations in Austin. These organizations lobby the legislature on behalf of their members and put out newsletters and maybe vet members with some sort of credential. This one looks interesting in today's charged environment. Do you think the members of this group got a lot of business during the Enron debacle? Has everyone forgotten Enron in the wake of Madoff and bailouts? I haven't because I had one loan bond that the *&^%$ broker who sold it to me has to keep on the books at zero value because occasionally the powers that be send a few dollars or a few shares of stock in some company. I then have to explain these little poops of money to my CPA as return of principal on that bond. Assaulted by fraud and terrorized by bookkeeping. It was a tiny part of our portfolio and I'd have been glad to show the loss and move on but NO...couldn't even do that. A couple of failed munis have been similarly troubling. We diversify, though, so we try to just ignore this stuff. Piles of paperwork about restitution arrives. We recycle it. Can you imagine what paperwork the Madoff investors will receive and, if they want a chance at any of their money back, how much they will have to fill out? Ugh.

But I digress. I diversify and so these matters are not extreme to me. Not yet anyway. They are just little additional glitches to add to keeping up with different accounts, stocks, funds, bonds. But is interesting to think of the perspective of fraud investigators coming along, after the fact, looking at things knowing that the financial statements may be a crime scene.

I really wanted to return to the topic I touched on earlier, during Holidailies. Sadly, Holidailies is over now. Oh, it's a good thing really as most beginnings and endings are in a way. And that topic was perspective which I talked about in the entry entitled "Do You See What I See."

Did you look at Holidailies while I was participating? Did you actually arrive from Holidailies? I know some people read from there due to comments and some "Best of" designations. (Thanks, anonymous readers panel.) But beginning on a portal like that is like going to a giant outdoor concert with hundreds of stages with different bands playing around the clock only you can go back and forth in time. You can still never quite see it all and you will never experience it quite like any other visitor there.

The page is static now when you open it because folks are not allowed to post new entries because the fun ended 2009-01-06 23:59:59. Miraculously someone managed to post at the last minute. The happy result for us is that this entry is on top of the Holidailies page. And it is an amazing entry about projects and focus. That entry really hits home for me. I've written many times about the struggle for focus. But a never made an art project to represent it and then blogged about it. Yo! (An example here. Or search for 'focus' in my blog. Searching for a word in someone's blog is an interesting random walk.)

The penultimate (I just love that word, don't you?) entry recorded went with the writing prompt of epiphany (Epiphany) and has this great quote: "Anyway, you can imagine how the kings might feel about their holiday nowadays, latecomers to the party, bearing wine and snacks, not knowing that coffee has already been served, or worse, that the hostess is already hungover."

You see what I'm doing, right? I'm conducting you on a random walk through Holidailies. How long will you be able to follow along without succumbing to the temptation to just follow a link yourself?

Often when I went to the Holidailies page I'd use it to find Chip and Jette's entries to see if they'd updated because when they write they are very cool. I'd just search the page for 'Chip' or 'Jette' to find a link into their blogs (even, though, yeah I have them bookmarked and Chip's on syndication). Today this strategy runs me first to an entry where the excerpt mentions Chip and Jette. A delightful entry it is, too, with a 'Best of' designation which made me look at it and made me learn a new word, triolet, and marvel at someone's long-standing Holidailies production of one (a triolet is a certain form of poem in case you didn't follow that link). The next button in my search does lead to a new Chip entry, however, and I had to stop and read it. (He used the word penultimate. Sweet.) I had to comment, too. I'm back now.

So I searched for Jette and found a new entry. She posted a picture of this, only close up. And, oh...there is my building in the picture! After veering off to Jette, I for some reason I decided to go to the entry recorded just below hers. A rant about returning Christmas stuff. I'm not a returner. (The world is divided into those who return things and those who simply give them away. Or regift them.) But I, um, digress.

So you get the idea. We all take off on a tangent through life, seeing what we see, missing what others see, learning new words at 60 and not knowing some words ever until we die. Do you ever read an obituary of someone you knew slightly and find out about ton of things they did and knew and places they went and think "Hmmm...what a different life from mine they had." And also be amazed that what you knew of the person was a very different view.

Well, that's my random walk of the day. I'm going to exercise and do chores of the domestic variety as well as some financial chores. I may keep up blogging here after the Holidailies rhythm or I may drift into other pursuits. I have several ideas for the long-neglectd Journal of Unintended Consequences, for example.

I Don't Like Cupcakes

Holidailies is over! It's the last day. I wrote an entry for thirty-three days! (When I get this published, but actually I started before that.) Does this feel like an accomplishment? No. I have, some time in the past, written an entry for every day of the year. I did enjoy the structure, the occasional push that a writing prompt gave me and, of course, the gift of other people's writing and ideas. So thanks Jette, thanks Chip. Let's hope we find ourselves doing this again when holidays 2009 roll around.

I'll keep writing, of course. Perhaps with less frequency. I hope to find time to read a bunch of the contributions to Holidailies and give my few readers a few links to interesting things in other peoples' heads. I haven't found enough time to do this reading. And now it's, ugh, tax time and other obligations loom.

[Ed. Note: So what's with the title. And the picture. Cupcakes??? LB: I'm getting to that.]

Today's Holidailies writing prompt is 'Epiphany.' It is Epiphany, a Christian holiday having something to do with the manifestation of Christ in the person of the Magi. Since all the Holidailies writing prompts begin with an initial cap (the site is run by a writer and such things are not sloppily done) it is hard to say if the Christian meaning was intended. In fact, did Holidailies run to Jan. 6 just for this happy coincidence of this writing prompt? Anyway, the word epiphany, initial letter lower case, is where we are going today. To me it's a sudden feeling that makes something (or everything) clear.

I've had a few of these flashes. Hundreds. They are identifiable to me because from that moment forward these realizations changed my perceptions. They didn't necessarily change my behavior, they just provided a lens or filter through which certain things in the future would always be processed.

Cupcakes are all the rage. This happened outside Austin first. I read about cupcake shops in New York City. Then Austin got a cupcake trailer on South Congress and now there is a cupcake shop on Burnet Road. (Its giant cupcake is pictured above. The shop will probably be the Austin, Texas Daily Photo tomorrow.) I did not have an epiphany about cupcakes. Rather it was about a larger class of iced cakes. I don't really like cake. I don't care for a lot of desserts, really. One day I was at one of those office parties and there were some fine cakes, not just sheet cake with sugary icing, but Italian Cream Cake maybe. And as the pieces got passed around I just skipped it. Because I love dip, chips, cheese and a good cobbler. I like pure sugar candy like those little hearts you get at Valentine's with messages on them (like I DIG U). I like coffee ice cream although I don't usually want other flavors. Gelato with a shot of espresso? Yeah!! But one day I realized I didn't care for every dessert. So why eat them? I mean sometimes you are hungry and the only choice is a hamburger or something. But you never have to eat dessert becuase there isn't anything else. After that I usually passed up the cake at office birthday parties. Sometimes I went to the office kitchen and made nachos afterwards. So this isn't a story about beating calories or losing weight. It's a story of learning to embrace and trust what you like.

I've had other epiphanies, too. Most of my life I was trying to get things into this wonderful, impossible static state of neat organization and correctness. This goal did drive me to do things that were good, I suppose. I kept books for FFP's business by hand in ledger books for five years, balancing everything to the penny, for example, and I think that it did help us through those years. We knew what money we had. Back in those days, vendors would give you a discount to pay ten days from billing instead of thirty. We made our margins on these 2% discounts, but you had to keep a tight rein on all the money coming and going. But I digress. I agonized over every decision about how to account for something, every line on a tax return. One day I was working on something and I thought "Well, this could be the way it should be accounted for according to the IRS, I'm not really sure. It isn't a very material amount. Why don't I go with my best guess and, if they want to audit me, they can change it." This was very freeing. And, no, this isn't a story about how I went from there down a slippery slope to running a Ponzi scheme like Madoff. Nope, I just finally gained the perspective to understand that there was black and white but also gray areas. I would just do my best to do things correctly and follow rules. And understand that I might do it wrong. Similarly, I try to keep track of everything, but I realize that things will get lost and misplaced. So be it. I think I just realized that the world is messier and moving faster than I could control. Balancing a set of books to the penny, by hand, month after month, gives you the feeling that you could do everything just right. But it's a false notion.

My last epiphany was much more recent. It concerns my responses to certain people in my life. Not those closest to me, good friends, FFP, parental units. But some people outside that circle. People I'd felt obligations to that were silly. People who were more than capable of taking care of themselves (particularly financially) who imposed these obligations in my head. They weren't trying to control me or ask anything of me. Not really. But I had a flash one day, talking to one of them on the phone that I didn't have to really worry about them, that I was on my own and they would never be there for me in any non-trivial way but on the flip side, they could probably get along fine without my help and I should be worrying more about me and those close to me who did need and deserve my help. It was complicated but very freeing. It didn't really change anything I did. It just changed my feeling about it.

I guess I have these all the time. Flashes of perception that add another nuance to my approach to life. I think today's is this: things get done when the time is right. It was too wet to play tennis today and my plan was to go after tennis to my dad's to take care of some things. So I've blogged, drunk coffee and discussed some financial decisions and movies with FFP. Now it's time to move forward. Do things, however imperfectly, the best I can, when I can, concentrating on the people I should. And not eating cupcakes.

And I leave Holidailies with that, um, wisdom. Thanks for following along.