I Got the Will (Drive Myself Sleepless)

Most common "gym rats" are notorious addicts looking to divert their angst-driven energies into something else besides cocaine and alcohol, and the endless sleepless nights that accompany serious bouts with manic depression. When I trained in martial arts, the sales pitches mirrored the mentality of their community comprised mainly of high school drop-outs, with the occasional two-year college program for a sports-related major thrown in for a better salary, which meant that they tried to sell me on their type of packaging. I didn't "train" to lose weight from the holidays or from over-eating, I wasn't there to get ready to go to the beach for the summer (I'm a native, yo! My routine is: wake up, brush teeth and hair, put on a suit with a cover-up, grab a towel, and LET'S FUCKING GO!!), or counteract my hypertension and/or hyperactive disorders. I was actually much weirder for them.

I was there because I'm a fighter, and I fight everyday to make the world a better place through my works. I know! It was like I was so fucking alien and strange to them, that the sports kids working the joint finally gave up talking to me (a great sign that they finally "got it" about me), or trying to use some tired sales pitch to "get me" to buy more classes. I either have the time, money, and inclination, or I don't. There simply isn't anything some junior can do or say to me that will "get me" to do anything, which makes Gen X the most hated marketing demographic the modern world has ever seen, giving me and my friends a great deal to be proud of, as it reflects our angry young punk view of the world. "Fuck you! Feed someone!" <middle finger> You know? Just get real with it, already. I don't need your tired ass tryin' to pick my pocket, muthafucka. I already ride the subway every day.

That's how I felt about it back then. If you're not adding value to my life, you're gone from it. I didn't have anything leftover to give. I was already making beautiful books for the public as fast as I could, at a cut rate price point that was way below market-value, giving the rest away to rent, food, medicine, clothing, and some fucking gym(s). They weren't putting money in my pocket, you know? It was all one way with them, so no need to be so fucking coy about it. Anyway, it was a "no harm, no foul" kind of situation for me. You don't go out of your way to mess with me, then I will show up, take your class(es), train, and then leave.  That's what I give: a perfect, static-free ride that puts money in your pocket with my attendance. What more do you need?

But, that's not what an addicts sells. They always want more. Way more. When I "leveled up" to my brother's harder martial arts school for the seriously wealthy wanna-be and those athletes who are supported by their deep-pocketed fandom, I knew it was risky just being there. My brother routinely lies about how much experience he has as a martial artist with a lot of disposable income, and artificially lowers his belt rankings whenever he feels like, so he can appear more like a beginner, and win against more gifted fighters with less experience in class and in competition. He's also a lot bigger than most dudes, which makes him less injury-prone in BJJ, and he likes to hurt people. Badly. He's a dude with some serious issues.

And so, his "pro" school reflected this warped world at an insanely jacked-up rate, with a lot more intensity than the average McDojo at your local strip mall. Know what I'm sayin'? Our gi's were embroidered with the word "competition" emblazoned on them already, regardless of a student's level or skill, just to let newcomers know that they're all seen as "fresh meat". And the kooks were quick to come-out. My flushing mechanisms were well-honed by then, so I knew crazy bitches would try to hurt me. What can I say? I was already injured. I popped my own meniscus (already damaged) and my partial ACL tear to a full one at my own discretion, doing a class drill common for BJJ but killer on your knees. Most addicts immediately get surgery (and more than just one or two knee surgeries, these are hard-bitten junkies, after all), but I didn't have the time or money to do so.

Besides, ACL replacement surgery is this harmful roll of the dice where you can either 1) receive a cadaver graft (!!!) from a recently expired person, and hope it takes to your body post-surgery without rejection or 2) get a graft made from a ligament lifted from another part of your body, and then keep your leg almost completely immobile for an entire year, and that's before the grueling PT part of your rehabilitative process even begins. Oh, and then you re-tear and re-injure your knee soon after resuming MMA/BJJ training, anyway. It just buys you another year or two in the game.

Huh? Say wha', muthfucka? I ain't in this business gettin' rich! There was absolutely no reason for me to undergo some serious life-threatening procedure so some out-of-town muthafucka can nurse his growing bank account (including his posh pad in Rio), just so I can pretend to be some bad-ass bitch. I rehabbed my knee injury at the YMCA in Brooklyn, because I had to do a similar thing after my first knee surgery from my dog walking accident with Ted. And then, like my doctor said, I just changed sports. It was hard to do, but I did it. I did Tai Chi, an aerobic kickboxing class (for amateurs), swimming, weight lifting, yoga, Pilates, bag training, and running on the elliptical. Problem-solved.

I still have some knee instability, but I have a professional knee brace for more intensive sports (like, say, downhill skiing that I don't do), and a series of other types of commercially-made knee wraps to compensate for rough times, like spring, when the weather turns really wet and humid. Always bothers my knee. C'est la vie. Here I am still writing to you, and that's what really counts in my world. My life story is what I trained to be a sensei* in, not your broke-ass view of the world, rife with crime and drugs. Feel me? I'm not a gym toy or a work-out machine for a bunch of screw ups to use at their discretion, pro career or not. Seek yo' gym fodder elsewhere.

After my real agenda became known, the intensity of the "hard sell" upon the other gym clients became more intense. If they slept a decent 8-9 hours worth of sleep a night, then they were characterized as "shiftless and lazy" in some classes because (in the words of one famous athlete) "your competition is training while you sleep!" Uh, excuse me? That muthafucka in the UFC was out bangin' last night at some club with a bunch of ugly-ass hookers, and I know that because I saw the footage live on entertainment t.v., whacked out on coke and his own self-created case of OCD. Get the fuck out! 

But, the more susceptible people around me took such wildly-made and totally irresponsible claims to heart. For them, their newly adopted sport held the zeal of a recent religious convert, pouring their emotions about their lives into something that could be as banal as sweating it out on some funky blue mats on a Monday evening with an out-of-shape fat dude in a bright headband sporting a really bad attitude because he isn't a real athlete, or fighter, or warrior. The reality behind any kind of training is the regularity and repetition of it, though with the more advanced classes and sparring sessions of MMA, that boredom is alleviated by the harder challenges each fighter faces, whether they be emotional, financial, mental, psychological, or physical. 

At the end of my stints training in other people's places, I came out with the exact same sense of self that I had before (and after) my MMA training: if I work hard enough, I can do anything. Of course, age and injury visits us all at some point in life, but the awe the other martial arts students in class had for me—and my relative maturity, in comparison to theirs—in those highly stressful fight sessions (regardless of age), pointed out anew to me what every art and design studio I'd ever worked for already knew about me: that I was already a "black belt" in life, and that I'd been one for a very long time. It wasn't something you could buy, or earn at some gym. And dip-shit, get a good night's sleep. That's mandatory. See you out there!

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sensei

for Cassius

Sleepless by Soul Coughing

I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless

So much time is cashed
So much smoke is wasted
Sudden disappearance
And the air is thick and cool

And I can't approach myself
Skidding over this perdition
And now I'm out on the veranda
When I should have gone to school

I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless

Well I call for sleep
But sleep it won't come to me
Shuffling in the hallway
I can hear him on the stairs

And I hear his lighter flicking
I hear the soft sigh of his inhale
And the whole width of my intentions
He exhales into the air, yea

I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless

I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless

I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless

Skeedunt, stunt the runt
Smoking Buddha blunt
Skeedunt, stunt the runt
Skeedunt, stunt the runt
Smoking Buddha blunt
Skeedunt, stunt the runt

I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless, sleepless, sleepless

I got the will to drive myself sleepless
I got the will to drive myself sleepless
Sleep, sleep, sleep
Sleep, sleep, sleep
Sleep, sleep, sleepless

Walking Dead

We've learned about different types of soulless humans inhabiting this sphere with us: how to suss them out, bust them on their egregious bullshit (which usually sends with them running away), while keeping our heads above water. It isn't easy. I've known people so wrecked by life that they become easily programmable drones with nothing to lose (besides a soul that's gone), and those are the most dangerous types of people we have on this planet. What do you say to someone who's been brain-washed since birth to accept death as a part of their human sacrifice to some fictional netherworld? It's hell, boy.

And that's what this culture of death and fear is about: getting you to accept the premise that life is pain, and the only way out of it is through your death. But, how can that be? His Holiness the Dali Lama recently posted on Twitter that human problems require human solutions, and it couldn't be any truer. You don't want to know the life conditions divinity exists under, and be glad for it. Celestial levels exist for a reason. Faith requires trust, and nothing erodes trust faster than fear and pain.

I've seen rotting souls up close, and its even uglier than some bloody cartoon made for t.v. You couldn't put on television the horrors that warriors deal with excellently every day. Those taped-up rooms full of broken bodies are not sights for the uninitiated. It's take a lot of focus, discipline, and training to overcome the worst humanity has, to see through to better days. In our religious world, we repeat the sayings, prayers, proverbs, and gospels that carry us to the promised land of light and hope, but how to reach the ignorant and insane? Repetition helps, as does a solid foundation in education.

The analogy I've always used in my work with the disordered people I'm closest to, my own family, is that they need much more help than I do. I am their "Anne Sullivan", so if I don't get through to them who will? Doctors? Pharmaceutical companies? Therapists? Television? It hasn't worked so far, has it? So what if some nut plays head games with me? I can break through any mindset borne of sickness, because I'm healthy. No matter the stimuli or conditions, I will endure to survive. 

I was talking to a lovely older African-American woman here at the library the other day who is struggling from job loss, economic instability, and the destabilization of her family unit that comes with sudden changes in her life. Right, been there: "If Mama goes down, we all go down!" And she knew exactly what I meant when I said it. She's been through it before. But, why me? She wanted to know. "Because G-d always chooses the strongest to challenge, not the sickest and weakest among us." We laughed about it, as she nodded her head in agreement, because the cornerstone of our faith is the juncture where the warrior meets their own inequities to adapt and change to. 

She struggles with old technological advances like computers (typical for her generation) and as we talked, she realized that we were the same person, because I told her honestly than no one has ever helped me with my work. I'm largely self-taught, because there are no classes, or books, or television programs, to become "Master Illuminator". I've also been alone and challenged as the people around me fell apart, and it's always me that pulled me through. 

In this modern world of psychotherapy that fails so many ailing people, I consulted an expert on her turf and conditions, under my family's threats of financial hurt (as is typical for them) when 1) I lost my job in the economic crash, like so many other people around the world 2) my friend committed suicide practically on Facebook 3) I got punched in the head repeatedly during MMA training and 4) I finally lost my beloved and very aged grandmother—as my psychotic aunt guarded her hyper-vigilantly so I couldn't see her during her last days, caught in the grip of paranoia that marks schizophrenia—as the last good link to my maternal line, because if my world goes under, so does theirs. 

The woman I consulted under my then-doctor's recommendation already knew I was extraordinary, but she still wondered about my state of being. I couldn't help but smile when I brought her back in a full circle to my troubled family as the source of my lifelong woes (the place I always come back to, because it's true), which led her to ask me (and for this question, she leaned in, with her eyes shining brightly): how? I told her the truth: I am the source of my strength. Huh...but who supports you? Ah, yes, the language of any typical psychology student in these troubled times that we think are so unique to today. It always comes up short in the face of superior technology, doesn't it? I couldn't help but laugh to myself during this last session with a human healer who wants to be on the forefront of this new world with us; my very own Counselor Troi on the USS Enterprise (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deanna_Troi). "I do", I told her. 

Normally so poised, she shuffled in her chair, adjusting her notepad on her lap, switching her pen to the other hand. She waited a moment to see if I would go further, so I did what I always do with people who are light years behind; I repeated it. "I am the one who supports me." And that's "my truth", a recurring motto of these times lifted from pop culture, as a justification for an insanity that cannot be explained away. I am the one who supports me. It's me. I am the strength I need. I am the one I seek. I have been all along. And so I became the one she sought after, too. I hope it was worth it, Dolores!

It couldn't have been easy for our breach into your usual patient confidentiality clause, but I'm sure you'll forgive me. Same with you, Dr. Elizabeth, and my fellow confessors. It's disturbing to be known like that, isn't it? There's no secrecy in our world. But, now you know and you can never not know it. Now you know the truth about transparency, and living a life beyond reproach. See you on-board my ship. Hope you make it! Until then, fight. Fight back with all your might. That's what I do. Life is worth it, all of it: the good, the bad, the ugly, and the indifferent. That's my mantra. Life is beautiful. So...what's next?

"Everyday I Write The Book"

Don't tell me you don't know what love is
When you're old enough to know better
When you find strange hands in your sweater
When your dreamboat turns out to be a footnote
I'm a man with a mission in two or three editions
And I'm giving you a longing look
Everyday, everyday, everyday I write the book
Chapter One we didn't really get along
Chapter Two I think I fell in love with you
You said you'd stand by me in the middle of Chapter Three
But you were up to your old tricks in Chapters Four, Five and Six
The way you walk
The way you talk, and try to kiss me, and laugh
In four or five paragraphs
All your compliments and your cutting remarks
Are captured here in my quotation marks
Don't tell me you don't know the difference
Between a lover and a fighter
With my pen and my electric typewriter
Even in a perfect world where everyone was equal
I'd still own the film rights and be working on the sequel

  

Death by Art Director

The Blood Vote: Anti-conscription handbill poem issued during anti-conscription campaign, 1917. Purportedly written by W.R. Winspear. Under Australian law this is now out of copyright and in the public domain.

Suffice to say, the disabled, disordered, demented, and delusional of the world are not sequestered together on one strange island by themselves, like ancient mythical lepers of Biblical days gone by. Besides, it doesn't work. Humans have mastered the art of moving around, sick or not. That means people with serious health problems are present in every sector of our daily lives, because no matter how weird of a shut-in that you style yourself to be, the world manages to seep in anyway. Life always finds a way, like Mother Nature itself.

In the work worlds of major media in New York City (and in "The Empire State", hint hint), we were (and are) not immune to smelly weirdos compulsively typing and muttering next to us at corporate-owned desktops everywhere. It's just that high performers like us don't have time to water the fucking company houseplants, and please shoot us if we ever do. Kidding. Don't do that, you fucking weirdo. We'd have lost all relevance in the human worlds by then if we're relegated to life's sidelines, which is highly unlikely as modern masters of this times' communication.

That doesn't stop resident nut-jobs from trying it anyway, dull as their unending mental problems are. Think I'm exaggerating? Imagine being sentenced to an eternity of "Dr. Phil" reruns, always with the exact same family of inbred hicks freaking out and living life as poorly as possible, in that ever-annoying regional twang they have, and you're not even close to the hell I'm describing at our work. Of course, transferring their homegrown pain onto as many healthy people as possible is part of the fun about having violently untreated psychoses, limited as those days now are, you blood-sucking freaks. 

Because the kicker is, for me to have received those plush newspaper union benefits of yore, I had to take a couple of piss tests at the drug-screening lab of their choice TWICE (paid by the union), so they would be reassured that their union-mandated income didn't fall into the hands of an addict who's so clearly fucked up, he/she couldn't even go two weeks without passing a urine sample cleanly. You dumb fuck. You don't deserve a job! And that wasn't all. 

I had to pass a psychological screening, too, further weeding out the crazies at other levels. That's right, jittery assholes: I had to fill out several multiple choice answer sheets, write out my handwritten answers to those essay questions that required it, and then mail it back to my potential employer in the time frame as requested in a sealed, time-stamped USPS package that was several pages long with clearly detailed instructions, and that was after I had two or three interviews appropriate to my level, which also included: answering the ad correctly with my relevant portfolio submissions included, meeting with the hiring creative and any of the other senior staff in the department, with yet another possible portfolio review that included other key members of my team, and that was before I even reached the Art Director's level. I actually had to pass (in my early 30s) a mental stability process that's more labor intensive than the process it takes for some Texan to walk into Wal-Mart to buy a handgun, just to design your special four-color newspaper inserts. Makes sense, right?

After my meteoric rise in any type of environment (set your internal clocks by it, grunts), the kooks come crawling out of the woodwork with full pockets and barely hidden agendas. Insult rock-star talent = handy firing with lazy benefits package included. In fact, it's become such an industry standard, we openly discuss it in offices as part of our managerial lives. At the end of my term in other people's offices, I "graduated" to the Maestro level, which means I am now the Grand Wizard of your fucking mental disorder, bitch. Get it? No more firings by pissing off that "pretty" girl in design who runs the show. Now, they just run in the opposite direction. That's what my former art school mentor meant when he said to me that "you are so made for this game, girl". Go get 'em! Ain't no one beatin' a working class New York kid. We work that fucking hard. See you in the funny pages.

Share the Project

http://www.arcofrockland.org/

Do you remember that homework assignment from your elementary school days called "Show and Tell"? You chose an object from home, brought it to class, and then you got up in front of the entire class and your teacher to deliver an impromptu speech about it. For most of us, it was our first real experience with speaking in front of a crowd, and a nerve-wracking one at that. What to choose? What to say?! You spent your free time thinking about it, and then on the day of your speech, you second-guessed yourself all the way to the front of the classroom by fretting over each minute that passed by on the classroom's big clock, while another classmate did the talking. It actually does a lot of important tasks for human brains, organs that operate at their peak efficiency through utilizing all the advanced arts that are necessary for human communication.

It was the same thing for me in college. I took "Public Speaking" because it was required for all S.U.N.Y. school attendees, and then I "graduated" on to much harder skill sets, like talking about the projects I made all by myself at the world's premier art and design school. Bullshitting people you don't really care about for a good grade is an easy trick for most of us to pull off, but to be emotionally invested from your labors enough that you actually care about what you've made, and you want it to be well-received unanimously, is par excellence. A lot of people with some technical abilities do enough that passes off as skills people pay for, but a lot of the time, it's work we don't want to do ourselves because it's boring or dirty.

That's where we pick it up: you at the end of your rope, because you fear getting your hands really dirty, or because you're afraid of the risk that comes with those of us who are brave enough to fail in public without even trying. It means you're strong enough to survive a loss(es), so much so, you can visibly pick yourself up from the floor in front of a huge crowd, dust yourself off, heal, learn from your experience, and then get pissed off enough to do it better than next time. Some of us even publish the results. My father always told me that failure is essential to success, because it's true. If you win every single time you try something, then you aren't trying hard enough. Really brave warriors go out on a limb that can break at any time because that's where the sweetest, rarest fruit always is. So what if you fall down? Who hasn't?!

People afraid to fail in front of others are easily controlled through their visible fears. They're those athletes who illegally dose to have a secret edge over their opponents because deep down (or not so deep), they know they aren't good enough to succeed without rigging the contest to their advantage. They're the type of scumbag managers in your daily business who use access to your computer over a secure network to block or track your every move every chance they get, because they know they aren't good enough to be in your position of importance at a company. They're cowards, and cowardly people lie, cheat, and steal all the fucking time because they know they'd suck without you, their high performing muthfucka, to pick up their slack, and there's a lot of that to be had in this world.

I don't trust people who haven't been banged up enough by life because they're too afraid to live it. If you don't have war stories about your epic adventures (with some cool scars to show for your hard work), then you haven't lived enough, because you're too busy sitting on your fat ass peeking out from between lace curtains, like a punk ass bitch in your lazy cushy suburban home, passing judgement on those of us who love life enough to take risks, by taking a fall or two on our asses out in public. Ain't nuthin' but a thang to me, yo. In fact, in my chosen sport of MMA, we don't have "perfect" records (none of us do, really. Not one single athlete), because it isn't a fixed game like some of the shadier sports. There's no such thing as a "perfect" win in our world, because Samurai's accept that they are, like life, imperfect.

It can be jarring for fans of other sports that play dirty through drug use openly ignored, and/or with the assistance of funding from illicit gansta money to front their operation. Whachoo mean he lost? Whaaa....?! They can't even comprehend, because they've learned through a twisted game to expect a fake impression of perfection that's not real because it's a cheat. Some sports are choreographed for a narrative outcome like pro wrestling is, with it's funny over-acting and hammy role-playing, but make no mistake about it: when Brock Lesnar fought in the MMA, he fought a real fucking sport with skill sets so profound, it blows the minds of people who try it. There are just too many mathematical outcomes to predict statistically, and so our sport reflects the genius mentality of people who understand concepts like "hard" and "difficult to achieve" really well, because it's the life they live everyday: a tough game with the odds stacked so much against you, you can't help but draw on a crowd of admiring supporters.

And so it is with my charitable endeavors and active daily service to y'all. I do it because I love it, and I trained for it because I'm the best at it. But there are tons of fuck-ups. I don't have the money to operate a closed system of my own, so I "copy and paste" shit on some old fuckin' computer at the library, because it sucks too much to interact with my better (and older) plug-and-play Mac technology. I call them "Work-Arounds" that are essential to any "real world" type of living: those life situations that reflect the poorer thinking of the people around you who are too blind or dumb (or both) to put real money where it actually belongs. And so you see broken links with dead video uploads and missing photos (stuff I could never do for you at your rich white man's company without aggressive public censure in meetings or firing), because I'm operating under war-like conditions that accurately reflect the angst that I write to you about almost daily, on absolutely no budget whatsoever, because that's what the sick people around me choose in their deluded fantasies: a deliberately purposeful impoverishment that's my accurate lifelong reality.

I tell you this today, in this season of gratitude and thanks, because I don't ever want you to get it twisted with me, and because I care enough to commit my ideas and passion to you on this century's version of "paper" that is semi-permanent in this new digital age. This is my version of "Show and Tell" for you, because I care enough to humble myself by sharing broken work that is still better than any rich white muthfucka's gamed version that's aided and assisted by a thousand other people in support to just him and his goals (usually staffed with lots cheap women and other minority folk), who prop him up look like "Mr. Big Stuff", because he doesn't have the talent or the heart to fail publicly like I do. I want you to be clear about that moving forward, as we go forward on this enterprise that you support with your time and attention.

http://rocklandsample.org/

So, when you come across some joke of a "celebrity" who's puffed up with artificially padded social media accounts that are bought and paid for by advertisers and promoters (unlike yours, maybe), I don't want you to have any doubts about who they fuck they are, or how they got there. They're usually pumped up way beyond their actual skill sets, because most of them don't hold up to scrutiny up close and personal like I do, makeup-free on the daily and going on age 46, baby. That means no weirdo surgeries, no hidden cosmetic procedures behind closed doors, no airbrushing beyond all expectations tied to reality, no surreal overly moneyed shit to throw you off your game by bankrupting your pocketbook in service to someone else. I AM the real deal. Are you tho'? And why not, miss?

Because in my world, part of our "bragging rights" goes towards proud, prominently displayed post-fight photos that show you how we are never really injury-free from this life we battle through daily, smiling back at you through temporarily banged-up faces that show our hard-won war wounds, just like the bad-ass muthfuckas you know we are. I don't want you to be thrown by these supposed low numbers you think you see online, just like the too big ones represented by the false premise that some fat-ass porn star has got it all over you, because you care about teachin' yo kids right from wrong on the cheap, like my new friend Jeanne Newman does. Who the fuck are you compared to her, a woman who has devoted her entire life to public service through teaching and annual Thanksgiving dinners for her people? Just who the fuck are you, anyway? Because you ain't nuthin' to me.

You best be believin' that, because that's what time it is: only 350 followers on your page, or that many likes on your charitable site, or a paltry show of "thumbs-up" on your giving photo today? Oh hell, no. What the fuck is that, anyway?! Gone, baby. It's gone, gone, gone that-a-way. You are what's "it" to me. That's what's up. Same thing for my man Barnaby and his service to our beloved ARC friends, here in town (Hey, there Kevin! Mommy says "hi" and gives you big warm hugs all the time:), now takin' his act on the road to Massachusetts, armed with one of my lil' black stickers for prove positive of our unification. You know I do that, too! You think these people are unknown to me? Fuck y'all, then. You're a rock star to me in my world, baby. Don't think this false "divide-and-conquer" shit where you have to sweat it out alone on an isolated pocket is unknown to me as a strategy to keep you down. 

They're that afraid of us, my friends, because we are that strong and that good. Believe it. Believe in me. Believe. We've just grown out-of-bounds by one more person today, my friends. Yeah! That's it! We've grown by one, and now my wolf-pack is more full for it. Haha!

http://sharetheproject.org/20-2/

This one's for you today, Ms. Jeanne Newman! 

Thanks for all that you do daily. We see you!

https://www.facebook.com/sharetheproject/timeline

Paragraph President

A deleatur symbol, from Martin Vogel's freeware TrueType font, MarVoSym.ttf, available at http://www.marvosym.com

People have strange ideas about the arts, sometimes based solely on the flawed premise that Hollywood cares about getting it "right" over making movie sales. Witness on any given day the striking differences between the book version and the movie, or the actual way historical people look like over, say, the "sexy" movie-version of Stephen Hawking. Yeah, that vast. The same goes for me in my artistic life with art, design, publishing, and just about anything else, which are dependent on one solitary truth: I work at it until I get it right. The idea of hard work is something that's usually glossed over in a movies' musical montage, spanning over the soul-crushing hours of repetitive monotonous labor, but the truth is, once I learn the basics, I move through the rather pedestrian qualities behind my work onto the more difficult and infinitely harder intellectual questions that are at the center of each business, person, place, or thing that I meet with.

Take, for instance, my graduation from the world's best art school into the "real world" of work: I expected it to be a bumpy ride between student life and my apprenticeship, and so it was. I'd never used a fax machine with any sort of regularity before, or worked in an office environment, nor measured out a mechanical for its' adherence to printer's specs (which changes with country of origin and measurement systems), nor did I have any idea about how to price out a book for manufacturing purposes (with equations for paper weight, spine width, trim sizes, and their individual bulk), but soon I did know all that and more. I moved quickly through production to the art department, because as a RISD grad, I could breach the gap that existed between different departments with relative ease, unlike the rather rote qualities that mark the average "designer": typically a skilled craftsman who is highly dependent on the work of others, along with a strict sense of hierarchy that is guided by the Maestro sitting at the top of the pile, someone who supposedly also worked their way up the same corporate ladder very slowly.

But, I was different than the other people around me....very different. 
If designers couldn't guess the font used in a previous edition (which was supposed to be their "expertise"), they came to see me in the production department working as an assistant, so that I could give them my best guess, and I have never taken a type class in my life. One "designer" told me she went through art school and couldn't draw. Yep. She went to (and was accepted, and then, this is even weirder, graduated from) a noted New York art school knowing that she would never draw a single decent picture on any day of her professional life to come. Can you imagine that? I couldn't then, and I still can't now.

I did, however, quickly pick and choose which work qualities I liked, and what tasks I would farm out to that rather scary dull Asian girl from design, the one who always seems chronically tired and depressed. These were necessary assessments that I began right away in my career, so as to avoid boring tasks that were better suited to lower minds, like taking wild guesses with fonts. Gifted people suffer from other people's boredom rather quickly, and the effects can be markedly excruciatingly for us. I could never be a book designer in the last century. They ruled up boards, made sheets of black type on white photo paper, and then pasted them into lines, day after day after day after day. Always the same thing, over and over and over again.

If we didn't have desktop publishing now, I wouldn't be a book designer at all. I'd have been a children's book artist, or a greeting card painter, or a nature photographer. But I soon learned the key components of graphic design, text, and books during my apprenticeship by combining them into the rather unknown and new art-form that has become the rock star genre it is today, and the leading creative intellectual at any house: that of Lead Book Cover Designer. It was precisely because I could draw, and photograph, and then set the type, while mastering manufacturing materials, with an understanding of computer programming (for your innately disordered brain), that allowed me to rise above it so easily, carefully avoiding those currents that trap minor artists and craftsman into eddies they can't get out of, without spending a lot of money on other people for help.

I'm glad I don't have a compulsive disorder, or a lack of will, or any other sense of entitlement about myself, because if I did, do you know what I'd be today? I'd be the "President of a Paragraph", like the bitchy admin who uses the stockroom supplies to yank yer chain on any given Monday: a rather small unpleasant little pissant who hates their life, but does absolutely nothing to get out of it. That's why I made coffee before anyone else was in the office because I got there first, then I changed the water tank on the cooler by myself, put new toner in the color copier and ordered more cartridges, opened up the design department by turning on all the equipment, put on some tunes, and began working the keyboard through your lunch break and after you left at 5 p.m., to sit here today at a public library to absolutely no applause whatsoever, and I wouldn't have it any other way. Like any high-minded human, I wanted more from life. I still do. Don't you?

Half-Assed: A Homer Simpson Story

At my first "real" job after college (working for a publishing company), me and my art department friends quite quickly and easily noted a disturbing trend among office staff, a term forever "re-branded" for me by an ex-boyfriend as those low-paid women who are our "Office Cows": mostly useless ladies who wander around grazing on break room tidbits so they can gripe about their weight to anyone who will listen, gossip, backbite, email petty plots and schemes around using the company IM (not the smartest crowd, as me and my IT friends noted), talk on the phone, surf for shoes on the web, hate their friends on Facebook, and make bitchy comments under their breath each and every time you walk past them to use the bathroom, in case you ever forgot that you got your job through grueling years of hard work and a three-tier interview process that's harder than most exams the President takes on any given day, you know, because design is up there with a nuclear attack on the scale of importance for humanity. 

Oh, it isn't? Huh...well, that certainly isn't what that fat bitch behind the desk is projecting at me. She's telling me with her "death stare" that I rule the world, and so I must. I mean, it happens to me everywhere I go, so it has to be true. Kidding aside (I really do use my intelligent design to help save the world, as is the gist behind my intellectual and academic movement), gifted people are used to being the center of attention wherever we go, dull offices included. You saw "Whiplash", right? It's kinda like that, except instead of an overpaid actor starring in a hammy ripoff of every artist's actual life, it's the real thing that you cannot buy. We go into rigorous rounds of critiques with the biggest power brokers in business, while they sit there gleefully taking potshots at us, under cover of a "meeting". We're ready for it. We've been trained to do this exactly. But...you haven't had you? I imagine that must be really hard for you to withstand psychologically.

So, you do catch my drift, then? OK. That's what I thought. We can resume our regularly scheduled programming (one that doesn't include you) to return to the task at hand: the hard job done under an impossibly tight deadline (rigged for failure on purpose), with as many human douche-bag obstacles as middle management thinks they can safely get away with, to deliver you the best information available on Planet Earth, in each and every century, regardless of country or language. I'm sorry. I don't understand "Office Cow" when your mouth is full of donuts from the break room. "Gosh, she looks sooooo fat in those jeans!" (Whisper it loudly in a blatant showy stage-whisper for the best effect). Heh heh. Maybe you should go on a diet? Or, you could passively-aggressively suck at each and every task that we ask you to do for us, because you're a complete bitch who thinks we don't see your blind hate and envy coming right at us. Because we do.

You see, that's the "Homer Simpson Way": do each and every job task really half-assed, until someone better than you notices that you suck, and then re-does your shitty work on the company's dime with absolutely no support whatsoever. Yeah, just like that! Do everything really half-assed. That's why they pay me the big bucks. And hey, you're welcome for saving the company again, on an underpaid teacher's salary. Ah yes...there's the almost silent "fuck you" mouthed behind my back that I was waiting for. Thanks! It was the opening I needed to get you fired. Buh bye!

Crack the Whip

Lately I've been finding out how similar my experiences were to other alumni at the world's hardest school, through our magazine RISDXYZ (thanks to Amanda Blum for writing about it, in a piece called "Submission": http://issuu.com/risd/docs/risdxyz_fall-winter_2014-15?e=0/10291099), but at the time, we were deeply in "survival mode". I used to characterize my time there as "Art Boot Camp", because the purpose of our training was to weed out the weak and insane, leaving only the best and strongest among us to excel. And that's the point behind any really difficult process; it's similar to my martial arts training with its' belt ranking system, which is similar in tone to the military, and the same intense vibe as my former ballet studio. We all wanted to win at our chosen trade(s) and profession(s).

In that teeming cocktail of teenage insecurities and intensive learning is a road about a mile wide that goes right into the heart and soul of who you are as an artist/scholar/athlete/scientist/engineer/author/thinker. It's supposed to develop the strength and toughness that's necessary for us to go on. But not all of us make it. Just ask any Navy Seal: their C.O.'s tell them right beforehand that's the day's exercise is called "You Not Breathing" (thanks to Marcus Luttrell with Patrick Robinson for that scene from their movie adaptation's first few minutes, of actual Navy SEAL training footage).

We did exercises called "Drawing with a Blindfold" or "Figure Drawing from Memorization to a 5-Minute Timed Clock With Your Back Turned to the Model"; you know, the kind of stuff that gives most students the "heebee-jeebees". That's the actual phrase one of my former housemates from R.I.S.D used to describe how she felt about her experience, and what her time there brings about nowadays, like a shell-shocked soldier struggling with PTSD. She went to our school for "Fashion Design", so she could be the real-life version of a Bryant Park show during "Fashion Week" in NYC, or a leading contestant on a major show like "Project Runway". Guess what she does now? She surfs, repairs wet-suits, and knits the same wool hat over and over and over again. Yeah, like, that bad.

Another rich suburban kid I knew, whose F.O.B. Armenian parents bought him everything he could ever desire, now works for a big factory studio (run by someone else), where he sits at one desk among many, compulsively animating the exact same robot car and/or booby anime girl with rabbit hybrid ears for his fetish fans and addicted gamers every single day, much like a dysfunctional business manager I worked with who HAD TO eat the exact same turkey sandwich on whole wheat bread every single day, or he would freak out.

My "fashionista" seamstress friend had a nervous breakdown over "my" unwashed dishes in the common kitchen sink during my RISD experience; you know, when I had all studio classes to complete AND three part-time jobs. In truth, they were a combination of all of our dishes in the house, but my cleaning compulsive mother had told her to "teach me how to clean", even though I've done every house chore known for her all my life. I'm talking about a "gnashing-teeth, hysterical tears with hair-pulling" type of tantrum over dishes, kids. My animation friend couldn't handle the all-day wait for "The Cable Guy" while living in his nice, new, and very white Brooklyn Heights apartment (all expenses paid) that his parents gave him back then. They also wouldn't have been able to live or survive in NYC if it wasn't for me, but did they ever tell me that? Uh, no: http://mariedoucette.blogspot.com/2014/12/times-square.html.

And that was part of the challenge: surviving the little "psyche-out" head games and petty insecurities of the kids around you who fell down hard and didn't get back up. It wasn't just the students either. Wildly, obviously inept, mad teachers had open love affairs with their underage students, maybe even in violation of the state's minority sex laws, in clear view of the administration. It was somehow worse than my SUNY school as a violation of trust, because I paid for my education through my blood, sweat, and tears, and a diploma from this prestigious school could seal my fate among the elite for all times.

They knew that, and I got blacklisted with some other working class friends of mine for wanting a basic computer class as a primer for the real world, where I knew I had to work to survive and pay off my debt. Like, right away. There was much more at stake for me, because I had (and have) no safety net in my life but me, and so I risked much more by speaking out than my cowardly classmates.

It's what me and my childhood friends talked about (Hi, Donnel!), on all those night and afternoons when our parents were simply gone from our lives: how to go out into the world to make a difference, permanently. It's what my friends since Felix V. Festa Junior High remembered about me, as did all my friends from elementary school through to high school: leave no man, woman, or child behind. 

And so I give my service in honor of you today, and every day after, because I said I would. Our suffering hasn't been in vain.

http://becauseisaidiwould.com/

My man, St. Francis! What's up?!

A spot I hadn't noticed that before.

I took up the practice of Roman Catholicism again several years ago, after leaving the faith of my youth for many years. After my parents divorced (a huge "no-no" for strict Catholics), my mother asked me to continue with my religious studies until Confirmation, the rite of passage that marks our early teens, after which I would decide for myself whether or not I wanted to continue with church and religious practice. I didn't continue, for a bunch of reasons. I was a teen, I needed a parent to drive me, and during that time, both of my parents were uneven, sporadic churchgoers at best.

What is that? A statue?

But it had always been my intention to fold it back into my life later on: after school, work, and travel, I would return home and settle down, at which time I would become reacquainted with my faith, in order to practice it alongside my future husband and children. Despite a brief marriage that was not my choice by design, I've held on to that life plan. I hadn't really considered getting married until 40, long after I'd seen the world as an artist, and so it has come to pass.

Yep, it is. Lemme guess, who could it be?

I wanted to reintroduce myself to Catholicism, so I could discuss and lead the conversation with my family, building a common base of values, ethics, culture, traditions, and practices that would continue long after I was gone, and so that will be, too. We are in the year two thousand and fourteen, in reflection of that very same practice amongst our followers. Because our faith is among the strictest branches of religious practice, it was something I deferred picking up until later, which I did at a parish in Brooklyn, named after a saint in the tradition of my man Francis.

Yep, it's my main man St. Francis as a birdbath, ever tending to animals.

It is more than a series of "rules", though to an uneducated outsider I could see why it seems so restrictive. It is an intellectual tradition. We attend school during the day through the state, and after hours, we attend parochial schooling: that's double than the American average, something I forget until I start conversing with someone who lacks the discipline and foundation that comes with a rigid and difficult educational background. Now that I practice it again, it's no surprise to me that these deeply held values have re-emerged in my life to manifest my commitment anew: I've been abstinent and celibate for years, a sort of baptism back into my faith, where once the doors were closed to my college partying and city lifestyle. Some coincidence.

Compassion, beauty, nature, gardens, a love for the outdoors. Yep, that's me.

Since then, I've had more of these supposed "coincidences" come into my life, like finding an almost hidden devotional garden tucked into a development near me that I hadn't seen for many months, even though I walk past the apartment complex almost every day. Usually I cross the street at a certain point, but one day I didn't, and then I saw it: a garden with a statue, tucked under some pine trees in a courtyard with table and chairs.

Hey! I bet whoever made this is like me!

So here he is, the leader of our Franciscan tradition, a movement so powerful, we continue to uphold his principles today: serving to love and protect the animals that reside within this garden that is our planet Earth, refashioned for us to reflect on as a birdbath. It's something me and my main man, the patron saint of animals, would do anyway; we'd provide a welcoming environment for all G-d's creatures to dwell in. It has affected every aspect of my life, even when I don't actively look for it. That's the power of mythology, the pull of a story so strong, it endures until it becomes an almost human type of forever.

You ain't gonna top that, honey, so don't even try it with me. Someone's got my back, big time: http://franciscantradition.org/about.

To Be And To Have

I watched a wonderful documentary, Être et Avoir, about a teacher in rural France assigned to an all ages, one-room schoolhouse. It captured the spirit of education, but I was disappointed to learn that the director fed the teacher lines to get the kids to talk about certain subjects (found in the DVD extras) and looking back, you can see those scenes are forced.

The best parts of the movie are the teachers' impromptu interactions with his students that are centered around small classes, focused attention, and lots of interpersonal contact. This is the model we should be striving for, with or without the bucolic French countryside as a backdrop, and there are no good reasons why we can't have it.

Teachers already sacrifice their financial security for their vocation, as do those of us who work in fields closely related to education, like publishing. We have the drive and the dedication needed to provide excellent resources for our children. What we don't have is the support and exposure for our collective causes, backed by the popular vote to provide the appropriate funding.

Make it happen. Get out there and speak to your educators, go to your schools, attend meetings, have facts, figures, and research on hand to make the changes needed, so we can all benefit from the types of schools our children deserve. BE LOUD about it, if you aren't heard the first time. Then, do it again.