a case of false resonance

Psychologists say we often blame things on the most sensational events in recent memory. Vivid as they may be ..they are often suspect. Many people believe that the police framed OJ Simpson for the murder of his wife. After he was acquitted, jury members said things like “..reminded me of how the cops pulled-over and harassed my cousin Charlie.” A high school student shoots and kills his teacher and another student ..and people say “..have you seen the computer games kids play these days?” Our neighbor’s teenage daughter is committed to a mental institution and my sister goes “..no wonder, you should have seen how OCD her mother was.” I have to agree with Psychologists ..real life is not so easy to explain. Violent computer games don’t necessarily escalate into high school shootings. A brutal cop at a traffic stop is not the same as a police conspiracy. And I don’t think there’s any evidence that strict child rearing practices cause insanity ..although my sister says the neighbor drove her crazy as well.

Danielle Haim

See I'm not afraid no more / I'm not afraid no more / To turn you away no more / Turn you away no more / To turn you away, to turn you away

Moonlight mile

Buddha teaches that the nature of life is change and that the cause of suffering is clinging to the past and not accepting change.

Joe clings to the image of the good son 

The father clings to the image of his grown daughter when she was just nine 

The mother clings to the illusion that the daughter is still alive ..unable to grasp the reality of her death. 

The lover clings to the illusion that her boyfriend, missing in action for 3 years, will walk through the door.

Each one, unable to acknowledge change ..keeps the others stuck ..until Joe publicly drops the ‘good son’ illusion ..allowing the others to let go of theirs.

Boat repair Log

Status Update
By Mckenzie Clark
12/10/13 Boat repair Log

Time on boat: 3.5 hours
Time spent thinking this might be a bad idea: 3.5 hours
Hats lost:1
Time on boat before hat lost: 2 minutes
Toenails almost lost: 1
Toenails almost lost to date: 3
Baby toe prints in blood on deck: 4
Paint spilled on deck : ¾ quart
Time spent contemplating spill: 3 seconds
Amount of deck hastly painted after spill: ¼
Amount of paint in ocean during spill: none (success!)
F-bombs: 6
Footprints in paint on deck: 2
Projects completed: 0
Projects completed to date: 3
Projects completed successfully upon first attempt: 0
Projects pending: 10,000
Time spent contemplating own competence at boat repairs: 3.5 hours
Time spent contemplating boat partner’s competence at boat repairs: 3.5 hours
Times attempting to channel successes of sailor friends: 10?
Falls into ocean: 0 (success!)
Near falls into ocean: 3
Tools dropped in ocean: 0 (success!)
Tools dropped in ocean to date: 4
Hats found after 3.5 hours: 1 (success!)
Hypotheses: this might be a bad idea

Tantra yoga

Tantra yoga has the power to enhance and sustain well being. It releases a hormone called ‘oxytocin’ ..often referred to as the “bonding hormone”. Oxytocin plays a role in the development of intimacy. Over time it serves to deepen the commitment felt between practitioners  [ Tantra Yoga ]

Growing up

Delayed adolescence: During High School, I experienced my mother’s struggle with divorce and single-parenting more than anything going on in the classroom (or school grounds). Not sure I’d call it depression ..but things sure looked awfully bleak. It felt like I was living in a cave without much light until about my senior year when my head started clearing a little ..although I hadn’t really learned much. I had begun practicing zen although I’m not sure that had anything to do with it. College is where I actually started  growing up (delayed adolescence ..?). I began to realize that things happening to me were the consequence of my own actions. More so than chance ..or the actions of others (karma ..?) I noticed when I put in the effort I succeeded more often than when I didn’t (big revelation). Now I felt like I had a lot of catching up to do ..not only in school but in my life as well. I put in long hours at the library and started getting good grades. I dated like a gentleman and started getting laid (continued ..?).

Adèle Exarchopoulos

Adèle and Léa while waiting for the technical team during the love scenes. Video ~>( x )

(Her laugh is so contagious.)

The Mexican Girl by Jack Kerouac

On the Road (1947) Jack Kerouac chronicles his brief love affair with a young Chicana migrant worker, ‘Bea Franco,’ in California’s Central Valley. It was a true story and part of the book with the most heart ..I felt   (♡)

Audio of Jack Kerouac telling the story can be heard here ~>  "The Mexican Girl"

in and out the rabbit hole

The Art of Leaving by Anna Stothard

With the first kiss people usually invent a story about falling in love “..Eva couldn’t help inventing a story about falling out of love. She considered herself talented at leaving people and places. The first smile of a love affair was mostly fiction and blind hope, but you knew where you were with good-bye. You knew that mistakes would dissolve, doors would open, and then everything would be possible again. It was the ending, Eva maintained, that gave meaning to the story.”

Anna Stothard

”The secret to getting away with shit is to switch off your personality and go undetected: .. most of the million ghosts walking mindlessly from A to B in every city of the world are inconspicuous because they aren’t noticing themselves, but an arrogant person or an anxious person is noticeable because they are so aware of existence.” ‘The Pink Hotel’

Stephen Moyer and Anna Paquin plan to film ‘The Pink Hotel’.  The narrative follows a seventeen-year old London girl who flies to Los Angeles for the funeral of Lilly, a mother she’d barely known. While there, she uncovers a suitcase full of photographs, letters and clothes in the attic of the eponymous hotel and, led by these clues, sets out to unravel her mothers’ secrets. Stothard is hoping that, as locals, Paquin and Moyer film on location at the real pink hotel (also known as The Cadillac) in Venice Beach.

Waking in L.A. with Anna Stothard: "I lived in Thai Town and Little Armenia, in this apartment block full of just all different sorts of people. And I found that, not driving — I have never driven — I just found that I walked this version of Los Angeles that none of my friends seemed to know anything about. And I’d walk out of my apartment and there would be a huge Armenian wedding going on, and then you’d pass through the crowds of these Armenians and you’d get Thai children peeling oranges on a street corner for a Thai altarpiece. And the Armenians never seemed to talk to the Thai people. There were all these different layers of the city that nobody seemed to cross over. Everyone says that LA is all these suburbs looking for a city. But actually in every little bit of Los Angeles there are so many different layers. You just have to look beyond the cliche of Los Angeles."

Liz Clark

Voyage of a swell: "At ten, I completed a 5,000-mile, 6-month cruise in Mexico on my family’s sailboat, The Endless Summer, experiencing a different culture, the freedom and beauty of sea travel, and opening my mind to horizons beyond my hometown reality. At 23 I spontaneously came upon the chance to become the captain of my own sailboat. Swell. October of 2005, I pointed Swell’s bow south from the Santa Barbara harbor. I’ve sailed over 18,000 nautical miles of ocean since. I’ve discovered that the most important sort of exploration happens within.” [link]

Catching Fire

"remember who the real enemy is"

(Image source: StalkerAE)

An interpretation:  The film shows what can happen when economic class differences are enforced by the Government. They become structured rather than fluid. The possibility for advancement is eliminated ..except by winning the hunger games ..inspiring a false sense of hope.

Attack of the jabberjays

Safety not guaranteed

 
“It’s that time, and that place, and that song. And you remember what it was like when you were in that place.”

Under the Skin

Under the Skin (4 April 2014) with Scarlett Johansson
The film was shot on location in Glasgow and the Scottish Highlands.

Scarlett Johansson plays an alien predator. She wears a black wig and is not immediately recognizable as she cruises through Glasgow and the surrounding countryside picking up hitchhikers in a van equipped with hidden video cameras. Like candid camera, their reactions are real and authentic. Their stories offer a glimpse of society from the point of view of the ultimate outsider. Muwahahaha

Natalie

Saturday Night Live (2006) - Natalie Portman... by Eklecty-City

Blue

Had an old dog and his name was Blue / you know Blue was mighty true / you know Blue was a good old dog / Blue treed a ‘possum in a hollow log / you can know from that he’s a good old dog / Blue treed a ‘possum out on a limb / Blue looked at me and I looked at him / Grabbed that ‘possum and put him in a sack / Don’t move Blue till I get back

Walking in Santa Barbara

I’m walking up State Street .. keeping my eyes focused on what’s ahead of me while dimly noticing what passes on the periphery. Images from the past also flash by. Mostly shops and restaurants that are no longer there. I watch them come and go. Now I’m focusing my attention on the rhythm of my gait ..now I’m focusing on where I feel tension and where I feel relaxed ..now I’m focusing on my breath ..feeling pressure build when I inhale and drop as I exhale. Now I’m noticing pressure build as others pass by. Feeling self-conscious. Funny, you’d think I’d outgrown that by now. Oh well. Now I’m remembering an article I read this morning in Luminosity ..reminding me (for the millionth time) how presence of mind is my ally against craziness of mind. I duck into the library on Anapamu and listen to a room full of children sing. Sweet. I don’t leave until they’re done.

walking in L.A.

This must be L.A. 

Mercury's in retrograde 

And so are sidewalks 

 ~ R. Daniel Foster

walking in Laguna Beach

Thank you for not killing me
in the metal-grilled cross-hairs
of your monstrous SUV
as I crossed the street
cautiously, in full view, in daylight,
in the crosswalk where I thought I had a lawful right to be
and indeed once did in a different, slower world
when I could meander and even take a peek upward
at a trail of pelicans
or outward at a glorious pod of dolphins,
but now I must deal with the likes of you
as you fight for space, wrecking the world
with anger and the awful weight of your toys. ~ John Gardiner UCI

Jen Buxton

Paris

1993 ~ I’m in Paris with Anh. We found a cool pensione in the Latin Quarter. Underneath our window four streets the size of alleyways converge on a small corner where a flower market blooms and we can get fresh baguettes in the morning. We watch trekkers with backpacks checking their maps below the street signs. One of those streets takes us to Pont Neuf. We can get from here to the Louvre, Notre Dame and Champs Elysee on foot. !I’m stoked! Our lovemaking is enhanced. Anh says: “when we get back to the States I’m going to go ..lets do it like Paris.”

milky way

above Santa Cruz California

past incursive

During a conversation with Colleen and Sasha I hear the word “sisters”. We’re talking about the Von Grey Band but what pops into my head is the time I kissed my girlfriend’s sister at a party. This is followed immediately by my girlfriend’s reaction and my own feelings of regret. Now I’m asking myself: Do Colleen and Sasha somehow know about this? That can’t be ..it happened too long ago! Yet, I’m moved by an urge to confess this shameful act and redeem myself. I resist but end up missing the rest of the conversation. “You okay?” Sasha asks.

proof

Baby, if I’m half the man I say I am / if I’m a woman with no fear / just like I claim I am / then I believe in what you say / there’s nothing left for you to do / the only proof that I need is you.