Thursday January 13, 2000

I have an absurd life. mostly there are benefits to this: I've seen and experienced some truly rich juxtapositions between art and life, and for most part I have truly benefited by a willingness to put myself into extreme situations. one of the primary explorations of the abstrakt zone is an expansion and expression of a creative shangri-la. this of course requires a journey. we've learned this from the burning man, how the struggle to show up makes the ecstasy of being there much greater.

so the truth is, as like most things in life, showing up is half the battle. and unfortunately I've lost the battle this time. there is often a clash between my professional and personal desires, though part of my personal work of the last few years is to integrate all these desires, and thus I have been blessed with creative opportunities all around; I just don't 'paint' on the weekends. and one the ways I am able to do this is to have an uncompromising attitude about all that I deal with, to approach things creatively, ethically but also realistically. unfortunately, behind all that is a teetering logistical struggle that comes out of a functional reality: the city that I live in is often not the city I work in. so the truth is, I got stuck in LA.

I have a complicated response to finally missing an abstrakt zone; I am thrilled by the communitarian outpouring and creative effort that comes with long distance organizing; in fact I can't say enough about tim north (and his equally talented wife, susan manu) who for years has been an inspiration for living an artistically imbibed life and making it all work in an uncompromising manner. he was part of the first abstrakt zone and has performed in my space for several years with exquisite taste, ability and intensity. also thanks to those from the spiral who showed up early to cloak the space in it's accustomed zone trappings. to bev who has been looking after things in my absence and to the rest who seriously made it all happen. I can't tell you how gratifying it is that the zone actually went off (and yes I was _this_ close to canceling it...)

and it also broke my heart. besides missing the absolute revel that it was, I lose part of the benefit the of comes to me every six weeks, that ecstasy and warmth that I have frankly become addicted to. so in a weird way I know that I didn't let any one down except for myself. also there is that feeling that I missed something truly unique, of course this is one of the things that I've tried to make part of the zone, the temporal sand mandala aspect that every zone is related but different...and then gone. I suppose it is much akin to missing your child's birthday, you feel a bit guilty by not fulfilling the role of parent, but perhaps there is a bit of the feeling that you are not as important within the structure as you thought you were, that things work in your absence, that life goes on. ok, enough self pity for now (though that may change when I get home and see what shape everything is in...)

here is a request: I use this space to thank and reflect upon the zone that has just past; of course being there helps, that is, I can connect something that happened to the world at large (and I suppose that I am doing that now) to some cool little thing that happen at the party. so I'd like to hear about your experience in the zone. what was it like for you, describe the hoverdrum, the vibe, give me that one transcendent moment so I can properly record the experience in my small tried brain. this process has already started. thanks karen.

so what was I doing?

working on the music for a cool little film that screens at sundance, er next week. I was working on the killer edit of the last song trying to make it all work for the last day of mixing. the film is called Committed, directed by lisa krueger, and the composers are these cool guys in tucson, az, who have a band called Calexico. their vibe is great open sky music, beautiful stuff for long road trips. and yes I spent three weeks in arizona, recording and mixing over the turn of the century, but that is another story for another time.

and the next zone. well, how Ubiquitous can you be?

kevin keller will teach us how to flow in and out of time on 2/24/2000. see ya there.

 

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