at the end of the day ...

progress has been made - but never enough - the 'to do' list carry-overs stretch back for forever ...
didn't forget to post - it just didn't fall into priorities as the days unfold - even though its a promise i made to myself and intended to keep - like so many others ...
who knew the framing of some of the 'veil' pieces wouldn't look quite right - that i'd have to spend half a day tracking down suitable solutions - that a few drawings i thought would take a few hours took a few days - that i'd get stuck on a paragraph of what i thought was a clear thought - that the wind and rain would make an ordinary commute an odyssey - that i'd lose two days trying to translate an ordinary 'track bouncing' procedure from a tech manual that was designed and written in british english, manufactured and re-written in japanese only to be distributed by silicon valley tech interns who could care less about my ineptitude for algorithms - that i'd get lost in the details of laying out a strategy for a client who wants to finance and launch an alternative arts venue - that visiting collectors would become enthralled with my work and atmosphere of my studio - that grant application deadlines would sneak up on me - that taxes are coming due - that some friends in need really needed some help and time for clouds to pass - that i'd get so absorbed in a new book on alchemy that i'd lose a day - that prayer time would take unusually long - or that planning proposals for financing a new crop of paintings gets more difficult with each passing year ...
anyway, i'm here today ...

black ice, brutus, knives, and buicks ...

'morte de cesar', camuccini + '54 buick

ever since i was a kid in high school reading julius caesar [1969] and getting into my first traffic accident, i’ve always been a little superstitious about this day ...

no one was hurt, i got a minor traffic fine [before the point system], slid on black ice, cracked a wooden utility pole, slightly dented the rear door of my ‘54 buick, nearly got electrocuted, hurt my pride, earned some street cred, and worked out a deal with the electric company to pay $900 for the pole [which at that time was no small change - gas was only 30 cents a gallon] ...

what bad could/would happen - what/how could i avoid it ...
probably nothing more than an event [reading], coincidence [accident], and circumstances ...

1969 also brought about a lot of ‘impending doom’ feelings; political unrest and an atmosphere of distrust, viet nam, the cold war, looming threats of nuclear annihilation, disappearing optimism born of fallen flower children, draft lotteries, the end of high school nesting, seeing the futility of friends not knowing how to deal with young adulthood, assassinations, and the confusing confidence of being seventeen ...

from a kid i was raised to understand that its a dog eat dog, cut throat, back stabbing world ...
maybe it was just a fear-based perspective from a somewhat rural, working class, lower middle income steel town - but now it was starting to look like the world [through 'live' tv news and history] supported those theories - and even something as divinely personal as my first auto accident - worlds in collusion ...

in the nearly 40 years that have passed, i still subscribe to the notion of conspiracies to cheat, hurt, and deceive - some of which i’ve even participated in - but i take things a whole lot less personal these days - could be age, but also the belief that i’m doing the best i can with what i have and know - in a world still mad with power and coercion ...

beware the ides of march ...

watching you too ...

veil #24 ...

i’m always more than a little surprised by the discrepancies in communication between web space and real space - and people i talk to usually have reasonable explanations that enlighten me in ways that help me feel too dumb to live in their world - or maybe its just some kind of pride thing - anyway, the loop begins ...

i see art -
[galleries, museums, windows, billboards, tv, print adverts, the web, etc...]

i respond - give off some evidence of cognition -
[double-take - gasp - sigh - shake my head - gesture, speak aloud - invite conversation - dialogue - monologue - write in my journal or the margins of pages, comment on sites, etc...]

i see others see -
i know they’re looking -
[by watching them, catching a reflection in a window, mirror, or traffic analysis programs, etc...]

in the real world i can usually gauge audience response; visually or audibly ...
statistical analysis of sales as a result of pedestrian and print advertising is measurable ...
popularity of institutional art[museums, galleries, brokers, etc...] is defined by attendance, reviews, purchasing, trickle-down fashion, and street buzz, ...
site ‘hits’ are countable ...

so in this world of connectivity, interactivity, and fingertip availability - what are all the anonymous visitors thinking that pass by - and often spend considerable time looking at or reading what i and millions others post ...

is it a matter of not caring - desensitization ...
casual browsing without thinking or response - careless or clueless ...
some odd satisfaction of being able to get something without investing anything of your self ...
a new form of disrespect or hybrid narcissism that is disengaging and dismissive ...
the pleasures of anonymous voyeurism ...
do the operational mechanics of response make it too cumbersome to leave comments ...
are we afraid to be judged by our response [more so than in the ‘real’ world] ...
is a written word more of a commitment than other methods of reaction ...
have our thoughts become currency - what is the going rate for a plot of intellectual property ...
are we too busy to be bothered - and if so, doesn’t that beg a little assessment ...
or is it really like surfing - where the act requires an attentiveness that precludes other involvement ...
like most people, i don’t take a lack of ‘comments’ personally - its not like i’m distributing lifesaving commodities [?] - i’m just curious when i evaluate the ratios between site visitors and comments - totally disproportionate ...
imagine an audience leaving an art gallery, poetry reading, scientific symposium, or political rally blank faced and speechless - kinda spooky ...

what do you think ...

it ...

i used to enjoy flipping on the news -particularly cnn or bbc throughout different times of the day or night - as part of my coffee break and world update to pull me out of my work - until i began to start taking too many breaks that developed into a morbid curiosity - so i disconnected the cable until a few years later when i felt comfortably removed from my preoccupation ...

then 911 happened and i was off to the races again - curiosity - yes ... what happened, who, where, and why ... then what really happened and what the ramifications or consequences would be - security, policing, legislation, preemptive retaliation, threats, ineptitude, unprecedented action, dysfunctional diplomacy, world opinion, arrogant justifications, profiling, alliances, defiance, pomp, slight of hand, election rigging, water boarding, interpretations of conventions, dissension, economic instability, epidemic incivility, catastrophic diseases, genocides, legal debates, debacles, pardons, alienation, uncontrolled borders, food for fuel, domestic abuse, funding misuse, rising prices, foreclosures, bankruptcies, preserving legacies, and on and on and on ...

i’ve watched and listened to more than a lifetime of opinions over the past few years that the farmers in my neighborhood seem like they could care less about except to say “its a mess” or “its all about greed” or “it’ll pass” or “it doesn’t get my work done” or “it doesn’t leave much for the kids” ...

still, i have this unrelenting need to call ‘it’ a name and try to understand the convoluted reasoning behind innumerable permutations of issues and events that have evolved into an ambiguous momentum of confusion that the media is left to define with all its bias and corporate funding ...

hell, they can’t even get the weather right ...

these days i’m reticent about hitting the on button - afraid of what i might find out that’ll upset or color my sensibilities and afraid that by not doing it, i’ll be uninformed ...
so now i figure if there’s something worth knowing, one of my trusted friends will let me know - and the money i save on cable barely fills my tank ...
fair and balanced ...mmmm...

id - irresponsible disorder ...

snake tail + mobius ...

i forgot ...
what do you mean ...
why ..., but ...
i didn’t realize ... i didn’t see it coming ...
yeah, i was on the telephone,
playing a video game,
programming my gps,
i didn’t think,
changing a cd,
looking for my ipod, eye makeup ...
they should have seen me ...
maybe they were distracted too ...
then whose fault should it be ...
yeah, i was over the double line -
but you should try holding a phone, having a conversation,
a coffee and cigarette - and driving too ...
see how good you’d do ...
its not like anyone got hurt,
an innocent mistake,
besides, i was in a hurry,
i was late ...
no, i didn’t do my taxes ...
there was a playoff game on tv ...
i was chatting online, surfing the web ...
i need a life too ...
i forgot, fell asleep, had other things,
didn’t feel like it ...
life should be spontaneous too ...
a little latitude should be due ...
i deserve a break ...
why can’t you see it my way ...
what do you mean, you forgot ...

a.k.a., idiota syndrome ...

ccd - colony collapse disorder ...

vespula [circa 1999] + honey bee ...

when things are not ...
where expected -
they’re usually somewhere else,
or vanished -
but not without evidence,
or trace of having been,
or trails of intent -
if only in fragments, memory,
speculation, or documentation ...

do they simply move beyond perception,
dissolve in the physics of phenomena -
become particles of solar wind -
or assimilate into the depths of obscurity -
waiting for future acheology,
or technology ...

rapture ruptures interdependence -
severs connections,
like unanswerable questions ...

"Albert Einstein once predicted that if bees were to disappear, man would follow only a few years later.
That hypothesis could soon be put to the test, as a mysterious condition that has wiped out half of the honey bee population of the United States over the last 35 years and now appears to be repeating itself in Europe.
Experts are at a loss to explain the fall in honey bee populations in America, with fears that a new disease, microwave, global warming, and the effects of pollution or the increased use of pesticides could be to blame for “colony collapse disorder”. From 1971 to 2006 approximately one half of the US honey bee colonies have vanished."

tss - time shock syndrome ...

not a bad week - the tv interview with the new arts program series went well - tied up loose ends - figured out what needs to be tied - finished an architectural rendering - turned 56 - was of service to others - reasonably healthy - learned of a residency possibility in st. barts - was asked to provide insight to a contemporary art development project - found out my work is going to be in canterbury's law [tv series] - learned of an art symposium in marfa, texas this may - made some daily bread ...
simple gifts - gratitude lists - petty rifts - cash withstanding - under handing - reconciliation - acrobats - sworn depositions - autobiography - seeing is believing - sensing is knowing - glowing reviews - recompense relief - delicate folds - odor of clean - karmic machines - clogged cogs and centrifuge - reprinted plates - carborundum faith - toxic deluge ...
snapshots can be beautiful too - but usually too personal or subject to nostalgic views to be too beautiful to more than a few - like seeing you cut yourself shaving in a mirror - something anyone can do or does - but it becomes personal ...
i haven’t posted much ...
[its not that i don’t care]
its because i care -
i’ve been wondering why again ...
wondering through w’s ...
[not the chic, slick, trendy, edgy, fashion mag(got)azine, rag, tabloid publication that insidiously erodes the substance of culture with quick-fix, fast-food substitutes for meaning that’s so exciting and colorful and pleasing to the fantasies and eyes that i keep leafing through the pages of like i’m counting a stack of dollars i wish i had or will discover in the imbedded codes of popular motifs]
its the why, what, where, when, want, will, wish, and who am i to think -
that i’ve been grappling with again - thoughts strewn about like a handful of thrown dice left to vector analysis; magnitude, velocity, position, place - actual or hypothetical - random, coercion, dispersion ... who cares ...
where have the honey bees gone ...
did i feed the dog, renew my drivers license, submit applications, show up for business, contribute something more than garbage for environments to assimilate ...
was i on time or late - and in a hundred years, or days, or minutes, or less does it matter ...
there’s probably more schnabels, tapies, twombleys, kiefers, miros, and gorkeys than there are walls in the world now or yet to be - and who would i rather have on my wall - them or me ... or maybe bill gates has it right with slideshows of everything on flat screen tv’s ...
there’s yourtube and myspace, scented plug-ins, virtual this and that, halo decks, jetson reruns, webspace, blogs, gigadrives, and archives - technology to keep us alive and clone life, head space and storage rentals for thoughts and things presently important ...
focus, clarity enhancement, career and spiritual advancement ...
surrendering to the true meaning of disposable - and industries that can be created around it ...
what happens when things don’t pollinate - what’s left to put in my tea ...
shaker syndromes and winter doldrums sound like excuses to me - like turning fifty - and then some - remembering carlin’s aging theorems - surrounded by stupidity, yet somehow feeling dumb, or dumber ... not yet numb - yet to succumb - but more succumber than i could or would want to be, if ... or than some would have me, not ...
destined, charmed, and diseased - what isn’t unlike me and a few million others that do what i do ...
packaged properly, anything can be beautiful ...
opiating ides, manipulated lies, sampled cries, blind eyes, futile tries, ‘i’ ...
where are the bees ...