…of divers topics lately arisen within my sphere:
Advancement
Blood, mine (again)
Consciousness, the question of
Employment
Exam preparation
Expansion, activity participation
Faith, questions of
Family, fundamental trade-offs
Friends, new and old
Growth, personal
Imperative, Kantian
Purpose, eternal
Swordplay, brilliant
It’s not the life we would have chosen, but it is the life we have made for ourselves.
Things are tentatively set to be really great / tough on the employment front. I shan’t too closely calculate my flightless avians until we’ve reached an appropriately post-gestational point.
Hope to have some presentations and surprises re: HEMA prepped in a week or two. I imagine it’s not much of a priority for anyone but me, nowadays, given where we all are in our respective lives, but I’d like to share it anyway.
And finally, it’s been quietly exhilarating to know that my secular humanist faith has been tested and found sufficiently robust. Many atheists and less rigorous believers in science find in times of crisis that theirs is a brittle faith when they suffer too-great personal loss or challenges. It sometimes gives spontaneous rise to some sort of home-grown agnosticism, and possibly eventual conversion.
But I feel.. well, blessed, if you will, that I’ve successfully upheld my faith in the god of Science. That is, science as a metaphysical philosophy. It can be a tough reconciliation to make, in the face of multiple deaths and personal losses, difficulties, etc.
Apparently, I made mine years ago, b/c I’ve weathered recent events with an almost indecent aplomb. I had moments of doubt, wondering whether I was just callous and insensitive to e.g. my parents’ problems. Objectivity can seem heartless, but I have the best reasons I can find for the manner in which I’m helping them — which no longer means doing what they want me to do. There’s no calm postgame here — it *is* tough, and we’re not nearly done yet.
And a lot of my strength to face it has come from the fatalistic belief that we are all ultimately in a zero-sum game. It has led others to nihilism, cynicism, Gen X angst, or emo (goth, punk, or grunge in earlier eras). But I think the billion-year death throes of our planet’s constant decline are beautiful.
As the sun dies ever so slowly, it indiscriminately casts its prodigious energy into the void. The merest ray happens to glance off our planet, which itself is slowly cooling from its fiery birth to a lifeless, cold end. Ancient light fed and induced unthinkably random molecules and compound substances to recombine again and again, until seeds and squirrels, mushrooms and mammoths, sea cucumbers and swords, and pretty girls in short skirts all came about.
Now we have chemical combinations existing in such complex dynamic stability that they each perceive themselves as a gestaltic consciousness beyond mere molecular reactions. We have created sorrow, war, religion, anger, joy, romance, spoken word poetry, and whimsy. It’s like a firework rocket that explodes and cascades into countless swirling submunitions — they all flicker out after a too-brief flash of brilliance.
How is that *not* grand in its tragic elegance, its simultaneous sophistication and simplicity? A beautiful profusion of life inevitably headed for death.
And when it all ultimately ends someday, either when our star becomes a red giant, goes supernova, or beyond at the heat death of the universe, it’s okay. Because, for a brief billion-year instant, we existed.
So it comes back to us individually: No death is cause for grief, because it means we existed for a short while. That is our wyrd, and it is the wyrd of our gods. All that remains is how we go to meet it. Concern yourself only with what’s within your power to effect; don’t worry about what you can’t affect. Live the best life you can, always growing, learning, doing, screwing up. Be satisfied with what you’ve done, who you are, but never settle. Difficulties and failures serve to teach, and thus are natural parts of our existence. There can be no stasis so long as there is time.
So what is consciousness, then? A computer runs on on/off bits, zeroes and ones. Put gajillions of them together, and you get… an electronic copy of the entire corpus of Shakespeare’s work. Hydroelectric turbine performance figures. Rag doll physics and first-person shooters of unnerving verisimilitude like CoD 4.
All of which is meaningless zeroes and ones without a human observer to interpret them in 32-bit color. A dog or a fly wouldn’t see all the color and detail of the computer screen.
The natural world would similarly be meaningless without a human observer to appreciate fresh spring breezes, smog-tinted rosy sunsets. Glass-sheathed skyscrapers and Argentinian tango are just as natural, though we usually and arbitrarily call man-made artifacts unnatural or artificial. All of our endeavors are natural, because we’re part of the natural world. There is nothing unnatural in the universe, because it all *is*. And we can each say about ourselves: “I am.”
In their own way, maybe that’s what the ancient Hebrews were trying to capture — that sense of the self — in their simpler, pre-Kierkegaardian language.
And when it all dies or burns, it will be. What is, is natural. Nothing to regret about a lifeless lump of rock — because who will be around to regret it?
But I am working at living a rockin’ life long before we get to that point, and to ensure the best possible quality of life for my spiritual or genetic descendants.
On Tuesday, I attended a memorial service for Emma Hutchinson, the younger daughter of my favorite professor. I met her when she was 7, and wondered how she would turn out, growing up in such a wild environment full of college kids and all their rambunctious excesses. She spent more than half her life on campus at Rice. And the 700+ people who attended (some of them from New York, Chicago, Wyoming, and London — on 3 days’ to 8 hours’ notice) are testament to the way she and her parents have lived their lives. Students from before and after my time spoke at the service, as did Dr. Hutchinson and Ashlyn, Emma’s older sister.
Throughout all their words, I heard a constant thread which was: She lived her life well despite the odds when she started. Do everything, do it well, and do it a lot.
Ashlyn said that she had prepared for this moment from when she was seven, and learned that Emma was born minus a kidney. And after twenty years of readiness, what can one say that hasn’t already been said? She was just glad that Emma got to go to college, graduate, see Ashlyn’s wedding just two months prior, and, trivial as it sounds, finish the Harry Potter series. Ashlyn said she’s always found inspiration to keep going in Emma’s attitude: In 20 years, Emma went to and spent more time in hospital than most people go on holiday. But she was always upbeat, using all the time she was granted to surf, ski, help her friends with homework in college, watch the Simpsons religiously, and on and on. To Emma, every moment was an opportunity. Ashlyn concluded that, now that Emma can’t do these and other things, Ashlyn will do them, in part, for Emma. She’s terribly slow going up the Colorado trails — she’s always the last one to finish. But she will finish them, for herself and for Emma. Ashlyn’s hope was that everyone who’s ever known Emma would use her memory as a positive source of motivation to do and be a little more than they started out, each and every day of their lives. My synopsis may sound as though we who are left behind will live the rest of our lives under a cloud of unworthiness, but that’s not at all the meaning intended or learned from Tuesday’s service.
Hutch said that Ashlyn and the others had already touched on many of his biggest points. He thanked everyone who had ever known Emma, and all the doctors who had given years of their time to her; he appreciated how the doctors had treated Emma seriously, talking to her as an adult from the very beginning. Then he talked about how he became greedy, wishing for just a few more hours with her when she was born, then a few weeks, then months and years. Finally, he realized that he needed to enjoy what he did have. It’s okay to be greedy, to say, “Well, at least we had that. At least she had that.” Or “I wish we could see another year together.” But it’s equally and perhaps more important to say, “This moment, right now, is wonderful.”
In 2002, I went to Vietnam for a research trip. In Hanoi, my great aunt Tam took us around and showed us how to haggle like a local. She was an energetic old lady, bubbling over with conversation and nosy questions. :)She came to Houston last year, and seemed as vital as ever if a bit grayer on top.
About two months ago we heard that she’d had a stroke and was in hospital, unresponsive to any communication.
Today, I took my mother to the airport for a flight to Chicago, where my remaining grandfather also lies oblivious, at my aunt’s house, without the energy to eat these past three days. She called and told my father that my grandfather lies there, looking at her or anyone who comes in the room. He doesn’t give a sign that he knows who she is, where he is, or what’s happening.
I dropped in to see how my little sister was coming along on her homework, and looked up at the wall. There we’ve hung a framed painting on a ceramic mat. Ba Tam gave it to me in 2002, to convey to my parents with her compliments and best wishes. It depicts in abstract style a quaint street in one of Hanoi’s older sections, a holdover from the French colonial days. It’s competently executed, though it never really grabbed my attention. The painting was probably worth about $7-15 USD at the time.
Even then, I realized it was the thought, the effort — on the parts of both the artist and my great aunt — that mattered, more than any sum of money can ever capture.
These are just some of the thoughts that cross my mind this balmy summer afternoon.
Where does the time go, and to what end do we live out all our days, hours, minutes, and seconds?
As these fellows write about John Allison, it’s the simple joys, the unlooked-for successes and foregone failures in his characters’ lives that appeal to us. And so it is with the characters in our lives as well.
These past three-plus months have been filled and stuffed with work in half a dozen flavors, like some ghastly turducken from the bowels of holiday hell. The various duties I’m called on to carry out include project management, finance, client / employee / vendor relations, research for due diligence, and a little hard labor. I enjoy everything tremendously, the hard labor perhaps most of all because it’s a nice physical break from paper-pushing. I feel like I turned some unseen corner in May, and by June I was rocking it 14 hrs / day. Juggling two-plus jobs requires a lot of rapid gear changes, and constantly. But I’m more than competent, I’m on top of it all. Every week poses new challenges. Every day I see my MBA working at capacity for me. Hell, I’ve even had to pull out my old Stat and Accounting books that I vowed to never crack again ere the hosts of Heaven and Hell assembled. And I liked it.
And maybe I could happily define my worth by my work because it is worthwhile in so many ways. But I shouldn’t and won’t.
Because the only real success I’ll count is if, when it’s my turn to lie somewhere (a ditch, a hospice) in a coma, someone remembers me fondly and thinks on what meaning he can bring to his own life.
In a world of 6+ billion people, the sun casts no doubtful shadows — there is nothing new left for us and those who will come after us. That doesn’t matter. Winning and losing often don’t matter either. The only thing that matters in the end is that *we* do. Something. Anything. Learn, grow, change, adapt, and savor the doing of it.
That was a lot of fluff and window-dressing, but there it is. Live well, leave no regrets, and trust that you’ll inspire something in those you leave behind.
I’ll catch up on lesser things later, like what I’ve been spending 60-70 hrs / week of my life on these past some-odd months.
More linkage.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war
http://www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20080523.html
This is a brilliant metaphor for my recent work actions — solving problems with clients by means of the exuberant application of violence and reason in carefully-metered portions.
The only consequences that matter are the ones you wanted.
Well, I say that, but I don’t believe it. It’d be more accurate when rendered as:
Nothing doesn’t matter.
Which is nothing like what I say. But that’s the kind of hypocrisy I can live with.
http://xkcd.com/59/
And a friend posted this excerpt on his xanga blog as part of the latest meme:
5th sentence of p. 123 of the closest book at hand, plus the next three sentences…
When counselors assume that one value system (their own) is superior and preferable to another; they engage in ethnocentric behavior that is insensitive the their clients’ worldviews. Ethnocentrism can easily occur in career development interventions when counselors assume that individualistic and self-sufficient actions are preferable to collectivistic actions reflecting interdependence and group loyalty. Individualists use individual attitudes, private interests, and personal goals to guide their behavior, whereas collectivists rely on shared interests, group norms, and common goals to inform their decision making (Hartung, Speight, & Lewis, 1996). For many people the emphasis on individualism found within numerous theories of career development generated in the United States does not mesh with worldviews in which the family or group is the principal arbiter of appropriate occupational choices.
From Career Development Interventions in the 21st Century by Spencer G. Niles and Jo Ann Harris-Bowlsbey.
Or to put it more succinctly and confrontationally:
This is not yo’ life!
You are not the boss of me!
Seriously, though, I’m usually guilty of projecting my own values and preferences onto others’ decisions. In any of the three forms above, I ought to take this advice to heart. As should we all.
A caveat: Variety and perspectives are important, though, and I often (reluctantly) find value in hearing POVs that contrast with or contradict mine. So the trick is to share (or receive) my and others’ POVs without subsuming one in the other.
/soapbox
A tear in Hanko’s beer. He gets no love. :)
http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/archive_page.php?comicID=371
That’s pretty cool, though.
Having gotten pasted in the man-boob, right pinky, right forearm and nearly the nuts at Sunday’s practice, I can’t say I’m eager to fence sans masque despite it being quite the accepted convention up through the late 1700s.
(And yes, I am also aware of the various wicker / wire masks devised prior to La Boessiere’s invention.)
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Man, that was one of my favorite lines from previous productions (’96 and ‘04). Well, at least the ‘08 Hello, Hamlet show gives a lot of songs the old heave-ho — the show was starting to look a little long in the tooth. I think Grease and a bunch of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s tired recyclings of Barbara Streisand are getting the collegiate spoof treatment.
[OMG (and I say that non-ironically) — that dig at ALW was a completely random stab in a dark room with a new moon. And I squarely skewered the grand poobah’s liver. Google it for yourself.]
Trivial goings on further below. First, some soul-scourging and rokking out.
The nutshell:
I rock!
Everything rocks!
Wait, no. Backyard fu sucks hairy, unwashed monkey nuts. But everything else still rocks. (the Three Stooges, cheese, concealed handgun licenses, and sunsets among all other things — but only one of these mentioned items actually bears on this month’s mega-post. See if you guess right.)
(So I lied; no soul-scourging today. Whaddya do? :P)
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On Saturday afternoon, we gradually collected at Rice’s front sally port. Directions (mine) were apparently a little difficult, but everyone interested managed to get there. Ultimately, we had 9 people participating. The cool / warm afternoon was gorgeously clear, with that special teatime lighting — golden on green grass, clear air, long and sharply slanting rays of sunlight.
We stretched for a good 20 minutes or so, using a mixture of methods from running, kung fu, theater, and yoga. From an early point, we established a comfortable peer dynamic, with knowledgeable people chiming in and easily trading in and out of the practice leader role.
Then we went into shoulder rolls, both forward and backward. The quad is a great place to do it — with large, open grassy spaces. We went back and forth along one of the four main stretches. I think we easily averaged 80-100 rolls. unggoy was a huge help here — he made reference to Dr. Masaaki Hatsumi, describing the roll position as a comfortably bouncing ball. Personally, I started to learn how to bring my knees in to my chest. This allowed me to more safely land on my feet and flow up / forward into a run (you don’t want to land with your rear leg flat in a typical martial art fashion, b/c from 6+ feet up, the extra shock of the landing can potentially break / injure the ankle if you fail to land on at least the edge of the foot).
I also found that throwing oneself into a nonstop series of rolls either forward or backward results in entertainingly incapacitating doses of dizziness after about 5-8 repetitions.
unggoy took the lead a lot, from this point on, but Aardvark also contributed a lot. I just occasionally prodded people to keep them in constant motion, which didn’t take much effort. People were really good about pausing only to catch their breath, drink water, or wait their turn to vault whatever the current obstacle(s) were.
And that’s something I really appreciate about the Texas parkour community I’ve encountered. Like Johnny Depp says, “Are you a Mexi-*can*, or a Mexi-*can’t*?”
unggoy was recuperating from a sprained ankle, while Aardvark was still nursing an incompletely recovered sprained wrist. In both cases, they carefully and intelligently worked with and around their injuries as much as they could. I joked that Aardvark was going to end up like a male crab, with an overdeveloped right arm from all the one-sided vaults.
They didn’t allow one marginally injured part to sideline them completely. Sort of a zero-tolerance attitude toward excuses. It’s so easy to say, “Oh, my left wrist is killing me. I guess I’ll stay home and read a book.” But as Blane suggests, there is always a way to practice some aspect of PK (or any other activity) — even something as simple as walking can exercise mental and physical aspects of planning out efficiency and responsiveness. So I’m sure unggoy and Aardvark would have found a way to safely practice, even if they’d had two broken limbs.
But at the same time, they were both very careful to only do as much as they felt they could handle. Traceurs understand better than most people that pain is the body’s way of saying, “Stop that, you dumb sonofabitch.” But at the same time, pushing to the limit (and not beyond) is good, because exercise for hale or healing body parts is really just putting near-maximum-tolerance levels of stress on them. Doing so expands those limits over time. Exceeding those limits *will* irrevocably damage your body and diminish the capacity for stress in the long run. Intelligent athletes understand that, and it seems that these traceurs have an uncommonly good grasp of the concept, for having only been at it for 3-15 months.
The contradiction is so simple yet fascinating:
The more you work out, the more fit and able yet damaged you become. For a while, throughout most of an adult lifetime, the upside outraces the downside. But eventually, the body’s natural and exercise-induced rate of decline accelerates past the ability to increase at first, then past even that of merely maintaining fitness. And sometimes (not always!) working an injured part in exactly the same way that caused injury, albeit in a controlled and metered fashion, is exactly what’s needed to preserve and promote flexibility and strength — first recovering, then protecting against further injury.
unggoy then showed us how to do basic monkey and speed vaults on a low bench. After a while, we moved to the Will Rice quad, where we got to use the benches, low walls, and picnic table for higher or longer jumps / vaults. Along the way to WRC, we threw in some simple hops, inverted press-ups, and whatever else seemed to fit the objects found along the way.
unggoy and Chester had a couple goes at diving kong vaults (or saut de chat) over the length of the picnic table. Really impressive. The terminology is a bit awkward, since monkeys and kongs are both types of saut de chat vaults, but in English usage, the saut de chat has become confused / conflated with the saut de bras.
Will and unggoy also scrambled up onto the WRC rooftops and down again, for the heck of it.
All in all, I think I must have performed at least 50 jumps and vaults of various kinds all afternoon. My glutes and a whole bunch of other muscles that I can’t quite identify (mostly inside and underside thigh) are still really sore this morning.
In the end, five of us finished up at Sid Richardson’s ramp for people with handicaps (I think that’s the current term en vogue). It has 2.5 switchbacks and awesome metal rails plus wooden rails on both sides. Several of us crabwalked in prone and supine positions up and down the rails.
unggoy and Chester tried a couple of different approaches to flow. We were all pretty beat by then. As twilight fell, we ended practice and walked over to the RMC (student center) to hit the restrooms and water fountains.
Patrick and unggoy talked a little bit about applications of parkour in evading pursuit and its role in a martial art / self-defense context. Since parkour is still new to me and initially had no martial connotations as I discovered it, it feels peculiar to talk about our harmless leaps and vaults in such a way. But it’s really no stranger than talking about using many martial art techniques in vanishingly unlikely circumstances. I doubt I will ever have the chance to use White Ape Offers Fruit in either its purported function as a headlock or my hypothesized root function as a neck break. And I’d like to keep it that way.
We all had a blast, and we plan to meet again this coming Saturday at Tranquility Park downtown (opposite the Hobby Performing Arts Center). Sugarland and Spring are potentially in the pipeline.
If you want to end on a good note, preserve the positive vibe, stop here. If you want to know my latest frame of mind (which is both good and grim), well, you’ve been warned.
Not sure where else to put this latest iteration of my recent soapbox on my personal unfitness:
So I was recently told at a dinner that a friend of mine looked a lot better ever since he “filled out” — that he used to be too skinny. Me, I estimate that he’s probably 15 lbs heavier than me (mostly not muscle), and I know I’m 60th percentile BMI. I’ve gotten similar comments as well. Such a comment coming from someone considerably heavier than either my friend or me could be construed as an attempt to paint over a personal insecurity.
What I cynically suspect such people are really saying is, “He looks good b/c he’s skinnier than me, but I feel better now that he’s not as lean as he used to be.” That sliding scale rationalization is very insidious — by those lights, an unfit 250-lb man could be favorably regarded from an unfit 325-lb man’s POV. It’s true, but it’s utterly relative and fails to acknowledge that both people would probably be healthier, happier, and marginally richer if they were 200 lbs. Bear in mind the incident I relate above was at a non-SCA gathering — I am not SCA-bashing. But Tristan and I do get it a fair bit at SCA practices as well. He’s made it clear that he’s not as lean as he’d like to be. Ditto for me.
I know this sounds brutal. I am not in any way criticizing other people’s weight b/c we are all behaviorally and genetically wired differently. I *am* criticizing the ways in which I suspect we, as an overweight society, are hiding our heads in the sand with such comments. What I *am* saying is that I’m overweight. Some other people are more so. Whether or not they are, my friends are still my friends. It’s good to be happy with who you are, but that does not preclude wanting to significantly improve yourself. And as I often try to emphasize (and somehow it gets lost in all my hectoring), I only expect to drive myself hard. (Though I am not an example of the ideal case. In many meaningful ways, I *am* happy with who I am, and I want to truly and positively change. But I am also fundamentally unhappy in a couple ways, and I tend to project that deep dissatisfaction in superficial ways — like desiring dynamic patterns in my life.)
Since fencing in various WMA styles (and kung fu, and sorta PK) can really use partners, I have been frustrated and have frustrated other people with my agitation for more constant physical activity. So to lessen the social tension and disjunction, I’m finding like-minded people who don’t find my attitude grating and in fact agree and welcome it — specifically for those activities.
Most SCA events and people are not geared for what I want. When I’m in SCA full fig, *I* am not geared for what I want. After all, who wants to put some hardcore wear and tear on an attractive and historically accurate wardrobe? Not me.
I’ve danced around this idea before, but I hadn’t fully formed the thought or explicitly said it, so: I am very sorry that I’ve ever upset or annoyed others with my attitudes. I’ve only occasionally been called on it, but I can tell I sometimes (often?) offend people. Maybe it’s my overdeveloped sense of guilt, but I hope the relevant (and sometimes overweight) parts of the world accept my apology, and that we can more merrily continue upon our course henceforth. :D We can only hope I’ll become pleasant company in social circles once again.
I have become lazy. I feel as though everything that needs to be said has been said.
But just as with the 14 archetypal stories, there is an infinitude of ways to express what I believe. And I’m newly reminded of this.
I *am* on a PK kick right now, I’ll freely admit. But just as with ba gua and swordsmanship, capoeira and cooking, I will eventually settle parkour into its proper niche in my life.
I believe in finding depth behind any activity. Karl invited me over for a small dinner party last week. After half the group left, Karl, Xander, and I got deeper into all manner of topics. Xander and I talked about being in the moment of an activity — snowboarding in his case, and fencing in mine. Zenshin and mushin came up, not because I brought them up, but because Xander described that state first and I just put a fancy name to it.
Now Blane Hinckley has mentioned it, in something equally unrelated yet physical. Aardvark, a fellow aspiring traceur, pointed these articles out to me:http://blane-parkour.blogspot.com/2007/11/when-worlds-collide.html
http://blane-parkour.blogspot.com/2007/10/how-often-do-you-train.html
http://blane-parkour.blogspot.com/2007/06/descent.html
And if you’ve read this far (and perhaps even read the very well-written entries linked above) without immediately dismissing this as Dakao’s latest flight of fancy, then you already understand. But I like to hear myself talk. The reader doesn’t have to indulge me; instead, go read Blane’s articles if you haven’t already. His writing style is considerably more refined than mine.
Take out the word “parkour” in the first two articles. Replace them with “crochet”, “wine tasting”, “juggling”, “network administration”, or any other activity for which you have a passion.
The third article is a bit more specialized, but has personal relevancy to my other interests, as well as immediate relevancy to my recent near-miss incident.
These, and other PK articles, are rediscovering and exploring anew the same topics that previous generations of actively engaged people have discovered in the course of living their lives. In order to more fully realize your potential, discover zenshin in everything from moving the mouse cursor to pay your online bills, to presenting an analysis report, to putting the dishes away. It’s the montage of daily village life in The Last Samurai. It’s me closing my car door with a nudge instead of a slam. It’s slipping through a crowd.
In order to preserve your well-being, you must be aware of not only your surroundings at all times, but also of your physical ability to respond. If you cannot or should not run and hide, shoot. If you cannot shoot, fight. If any of these are deficient, reconsider your priorities and goals, and train for them as you see fit.
Training can be as subtle as never putting your hands in your pockets, to keep them free in case of a fall or a fight.
Do you ever maneuver through your house with all the lights off?
When someone bags on you for something entirely true, have you honestly and fully worked to prove them wrong? Then thanked them?
The danger, as with the contemplation of the angel food cake in the total perspective machine, is that you can lose yourself in the leaves of the tree. I see it in myself, and have to remind myself that one of my larger goals is, in fact, to make a difference socially and environmentally (while making funky mad $$$), to use my MBA for something other than a dart target. Otherwise, I’d just end up committing omphaloskepsis (which itself defeats the idea of engaged living). B/c when big things go wrong, it’s very easy to retreat into enjoying or recalling those things that still work for me.
I’ve referred for a few years to an idea I call the Grand Unification Theory of Martial Arts. But even though I first realized it over wine and cheese, I never acknowledged the non-martial art component. It could as easily be called the GUT of art, skill, spiritualism, philosophy, or just plain life. Oh, wait. Someone already beat me to it — Daoism. In a cosmic way, this forms the yin to the yang of the real GUT.
We had a Thanksgiving lunch with some folks. Two of my mother’s teachers, a family friend. This was the first such holiday event our family’s had in … years where it’s not a madhouse of relatives, social circle peers and influential Vietnamese community types; it was so laid-back and even a little surreal. The friend, bac Truoc, used to be in .. the ARVN air force, I think. I also seem to recall he’s missing a finger, but I always forget which one, b/c his hands are so small and stumpy. These days, he’s a painter.
[edit: I think I’m confusing him with bac Cuong, who is missing the thumb. I think he was a lt. col. in the ARVN. He’s not an artist.]
He recently saw an exhibit by an artist he knew from Vietnam. Forty years ago, the man had a distinctive style, strong lines, great expression. He was well-known for his work. The recent exhibit of new work was by the same dude.
And he still showed a distinctive style, strong lines, and great expression — the same style he had 40 years ago.
Bac Truoc talked about how we can grow to think we are successful — complacent, I ventured, and he concurred. And if we perceive we are successful, we perceive a lack of impetus to further develop ourselves and our skills. We become a snail, a mollusc that hides in what it has crafted, maintaining but not exploring or pushing boundaries. (VN civilization being traditionally 43% coastal, our idiomatic speech reflects that background.) Duh, right? Stick with what works.
Another consideration is that anyone from the immigrant generation has had to deal with the amber-trapping effect of traumatic upheaval. For many people I’ve known, much of their attitudes and perceptions froze on April 30, 1975. Everything that’s happened since has existed in a hazy fog of getting by — as though perhaps one day my father might wake up and find himself back in his old room with the windows open, his prized stamp collection still on his shelf, his record player crooning out the Righteous Brothers, just as they were when he abruptly left home 32 years ago. To think that you’re just leaving for a little while, that you’ll be back to put away the record in its sleeve, and then not… for three decades. Well, if not that, then what is traumatic?
:/
(Never mind the panic and terror of being on overcrowded boats and ships, risking pirates, starvation, dehydration, trampling, robbery, and arriving in a new country with no language, money, or possessions beyond the clothes on your back and maybe some jewelry stitched into the hem lines.)
And there is nothing terribly wrong with sticking to what works. It has risks (getting left behind by new developments), but has benefits as well (refining and building upon established strengths). Regarding art, plenty of artists have enjoyed commercial success with it.
It just has to be tempered with change, and vice versa. Neither is better, but most of us tend to one side or the other.
So whether one prefers stability or change is a matter of personal philosophy. The fence-straddling approach is to profess faith in dynamic stability — businesses today stress the value of creating and institutionalizing a learning culture, one that emphasizes formal processes of constant improvement and reaction to shifts in customer needs.
Fancy bizspeak, but they’re just words.
What do you believe in?
What works for you?
:/
A disclaimer: I’m not Christian, so I wonder how much of the following synthesis is mere sophistry and specious reasoning, and how much is true?
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