Kosmos: World as Adornment

One day last spring, when Cosmo was still fairly spherical, he was lying on the bed and I started thinking about what it would be like if the Kosmos were like our Cosmo.  I didn't get very far, but I'll probably never finish this, so I offer it as a tribute to our sorely missed friend:

Cosmo is big and round.  Cosmo is a prefect sphere.  The sphere is a perfect shape.  The sphere is all points a certain distance from one point and so it is perfect. The points are on the surface of the sphere, so you can see them whenever you want.

Cosmo never answers any questions.  Cosmo doesn't like to answer questions.  Cosmo doesn't need to answer any questions because the answers are all on the surface.  They are all on the outside where they can be seen so there is no need to answer any questions.

Someone wanted to spell it with a k and a z.  She said otherwise it would be too heavy.  Cosmo is a little heavy but that’s no reason why not to spell his name correctly.

Cosmo is very watchful, but he includes all things in himself.  You just have to calculate the distance from the center and you realize that it’s all there.

Cosmo’s unity delights us.  Cosmo cannot be divided, even in perception, without sorrow.

Farewell to Cosmo Lemurstein

Last night we said goodbye to Cosmo, our dear friend for fifteen years. Mira had it right when she said, "It's very unusual to have a space alien for a housepet."

Holiday in Berlin: Full Blown (Reprise)

Back in Berlin after 30 years or so. Been traveling with Indi across Germany over the past week, picking up Mira and Jai in Rot-an-der-Rot and Leipzig respectively, with a stop-over with friends in Hamburg in between. Never really thought of this as a holiday destination, but it is interesting and you know plus ca change ...

I had a Spartans dream, and a nice one: we were driving in James's old 88 and he was singing a song he'd made up, a Beefheart howl called, "I Can't Couple" and Stephen was riding shotgun, gentle as a lamb and Jimmy had a bunch of new songs he wanted to teach me. I had my ukulele with me and I couldn't wait to learn the new songs.  I was happy that we were all together.

Weekending

My blind and disabled friend Pat the Peacewalker and I brought our message of large pink tricycles and happy smiles to Takoma Park, Maryland's annual fourth of July parade. The weather was nice. Jessie marched with the swim team, and Ellen and Annie helped fill out the audience.

The Flag Day performance was fun. We had a capacity crowd of 35 or so, peanuts by Washington Mall street performance standards, but capacity for the hair salon/loft. The hostess made some beautiful food and bought plenty of drinks. I had expected just some cheese and raw vegetables and a bottle of white wine, but beauticians know how to throw a do. We'll be presenting a new show at the end of August, this one with music, text and film. I'll be doing a piece I presented a few years ago, based on the "Way to Sea" section of Witchenbye. I'll be in the market for texts, sounds and songs, so Jim please take notes during your Jubilee Sabbatical and pass them on. (I'm always counting on Jimmy and Peter for material). The texts of the other pieces that were performed are now available at http://www.betweenartandlife.com/ for the interestial.

Family travels

Since Jimmy regaled us with the globe-trotting exploits of his crew, I thought I would tell you a little news of my own. Ellen and the girls are headed off to Invercargill, New Zealand (see map) for a year in September. Ellen has always wanted to take advantage of some of the international opportunities that exist for medical professionals, and now that the girls can take care of themselves, they are all going to go for it. For Jessie, it is a unique opportunity to get two summer vacations in one year, and for Annie, it is chance to stay out of college and do some backpacking and stuff for a year. I will probably go down for a visit in January, and I hope to turn it into an around-the-world adventure through Mumbai and Europe. I am planning a career change myself, since I have lost interest in computer programming (I was never really that interested in it), so I hope to spend most of the year at one of our local universities, meeting new people and ideas. On the other hand, I could just hide in my office and sink more deeply into depression. What do you think?

BTW: When you've had your car break in half in Zell am Ziller, Rot am Rot is entirely believable. Other folks, however, have been known to refuse to acknowledge the truth about both Rolla Costa and Regula Pickel. I try to forgive them, and I pity them.

peace,
jim

Hey, Bartender

Well Spain won it and I'm now back in Mumbai. Monsoon is in full form -- rain and wind and monsoon flowers blooming on the terrace. The five cats and Mary, our maid, and her baby Preston (not making that up) for company. Mira and Jai are on their ways to intensive German courses in Rot-an-der-Rot (not making that up either, but you won't find it on a map) and Leipzig respectively. Indi's taking them, then heading to Pietrasanta in Italy to visit friends and draw.
Bartender, I'll have another.

Wish I Was There

Hey Johny, hope your event is a great success in every way today. Look forward to the photos and video. I'm in Zurich with Jai enjoying the sporting mob frenzy of Eurocup 2008. The Swiss are out. The Spanish look good. The Romanians are surprising. And the world cheered at the mighty Germans defeat at the feet of the feisty Croats. Of course it rains every day and the trams are floating on beer.

Today while I was walking the dog, at the railroad crossing on Third Street I actually saw two trains going down the track.  There was one a-going forward, and the other going back.  Hey look at that!

Seven Rooms You Never Imagined In Your House

These are Jim's "programme notes" that we'd like to get printed on cocktail napkins for the performance next week. Sorry I couldn't figure out how to include the accompanying illustrations.

1. The Instrument Room is dominated by an ominous moaning, growling sound coming from a large metallic cone, shaped like a flower bell. Discarded instruments litter the floor and shelves. Some are rusty and bent, some new and brazen. It’s dark, dusky in here. The whole room kind of vibrates dully. Your palms get sweaty, but you’re smiling like an idiot as you seat yourself at the drum kit and start swinging. The windows are covered by a uniform coat of grime through which you can barely make out a red cardinal in a yew tree.

2. The Mourning Room alternates black and white tiles. The walls are bare. The cupboards closed. There’s a phone but no one calls. There’s a slat for memories in the floor. You put them in there and they leave you alone. The window opens on the sea, dark and still. You see a very long way to the horizon.

3. The Show Room has always a little more air being sucked out of it than comes in. They do it carefully so you don’t suffocate right away. You expect to meet your friends here and sometimes you do. This is where you try not to talk about what you really want. And fail. You want to be here until you get here.

4. The Fast Fun Room – talk about a good time! There’s food and smoke and beer and music and everyone’s talking loud and laughing hard. Your pulse is racing and there are some wild ideas in back of your eyes. Everything’s accelerating until you pass out. When you wake up it’s empty, you smell bad and hurt. You struggle to remember what you told whom. You vaguely remember something you promised or threatened. One by one your friends awake and drag themselves out from under the furniture. They look much better than you feel but still pretty bad. Can’t stand seeing each other.

5. The Temple Room is where you worship temptation. Here you gravely measure and confine the full extent of your desires. It’s a small room without a ceiling. There’s no door but you find it difficult to enter, which you do with breath held and an obsequious tilt to your body. Start here by thinking about everything you can’t have, can’t do, don’t want until your spirit rises above and beyond the limits of the room to encompass the vast reaches of the unknowable.

6. The Room of Dregs is where you’ll find everything you've thrown away and discarded. They collect it at the recycling center and make installation art of it. When they've got enough they bring it home to you and put it right here.

7. The Cameroum is like a foreign country. Everybody’s talking but what are they saying? Everything’s familiar but slightly different. Everybody seems friendly, but what are they laughing at? You’d like something to eat but are afraid you’ll get sick. It’s frustrating but nice – nobody knows you here.

Witchenbye: Hotel

This is Room 100.  It’s bare except or the television screaming in white.  It never goes off, just gets bigger and smaller.

You may get the Tower Room.  It’s exceeding long with high ceiling.  Children make their noise en masse outside in the schoolyard.  It comes with a fever.  Not many choose it or can find it.  It may no longer be there.

Room 612 has a view of the parking lot.  It’s very reassuring.

On the fourth floor, all the rooms are one.  Desks and beds are laid out for efficient work and rest.Please keep the lavatories clean.  Or else.

Some choose to stay in the elevator.  Saves choosing.  They’re pleasant!  And they work.

The north staircase is the most used.  It doesn’t clean easily and still carries the smells of smokers past.  Cockroaches can occasionally be seen.   Some food trays may not have been cleared.  It can get hot.

Room 202 has vast curtained windows.  All the furniture is large.  The carpet is thick.  There’s a table for the Board of Directors.  They’re not here; they rarely come.  It’s very clean.  You feel someone might walk in at any moment.  With a request for you, or to take your request, or maybe with an order.  Whatever it is you know you’ll accept it or maybe they’ll accept it.  Whatever it is, it will be acceptable.

The central landing on the fourth floor is simply appointed with a couple of desks, chairs and framed pictures from old magazines.  The window ledges are rather high.  You have to stand almost on tiptoe and lean over to see the busy students and professors hurrying in the courtyard below.  It’s a perfect place to consider suicide.  Never been done, though.

The terrace is a good place to meet and talk.  There’s a flow of people and there are spaces for little groups to form and dissolve naturally.  Most people are happiest here, in between where they’re coming from and where they’re going to.

Here’s the first floor reception area.  Remember: waiting is not the same as striving.

The men and women who work at the reception desk see you as an object to be processed by screening.  Just do what they say.  Don’t be affronted if they appear to regard you with curiosity or without curiosity, with or without interest, in a friendly or unfriendly way.  They don’t care about you at all.  You’re just passing through.  Do so quietly.

In Room 100, you’re trying to figure out what the TV’s screaming about.  Actually, it’s you screaming.

The power plant is very impressive.  Nobody works there, they just oversee it.  It works by itself, making power and moving it, heating and cooling.  Always turned on and pumping--for your benefit and mine 

You can get there by train.  Who are all those people, heads nodding?  Are they waking or falling asleep?  Some are fresh and some are wilted.  They all seem to have been riding for a long time.

“Which room is mine?”  Which would you like?  Choose one you can have and make it your own.

Room 617 has a small kitchen and dining room.  A couple of plants here and there could make it quite cheery.  Put a home entertainment system with cameras, speakers, phones and screens.  Watch yourself or allow someone else to watch you.  It’s like picking at a scab or eating potato chips though; you can’t always stop when you want to. 

Some prefer the dormitories.  They make it easy to be oneself by resembling someone else.  Deserted throughout the day, by night they’re saturated with the warm, heavy smell of communal somnolence.  What a thrill to escape from the severe rows of identical cots and lockers into wild, turbulent dreams.  And how satisfactory the relief at returning, your departure not noticed or remarked upon.

Sometimes you don’t get enough privacy.  The sound of someone else shitting, or trying to come, or sobbing may disturb or arouse you.  Pretend you’re not aware.

A little more Witchenbye (but not much)

Another project wrapping up

Just wanted to pass on the into that we have basically finished the building at our local swimming pool club. I got involved a few years ago with flipping burgers at swim team fundraisers and just kept getting more involved as the old building deteriorated and we had all kinds of hassles keeping the place afloat. Eventually, we had a reasonably good group of "Board of Directors" and I decided that we needed to replace the building. After a long battle over costs, planning, etc "Why should we get a new building when Jim can duct-tape the old together each Spring (for free)?" etc, etc. we went for it, and it has been a long, stressful Winter and Spring. We passed our final inspection the morning that we were supposed to open and everybody brave enough jumped into the freezing water. Like so many things, it was a huge hassle, but it is done enough that other people can take care of it now, and I can move on to other things. I never did make that exploding meat puppet, but I think that I want to do more appealing art. No clear idea yet.

Witchenbye: Hotel

Jim, in about a month I'll be performing a tuba-n-text version of the section of Witchebye that begins, "This is Room 101.  It's bare except for the television screming in white.  It never goes off, just gets bigger and smaller" and ends with, "Sometimes you don't get enough privacy.  The sound of someone else shitting, or trying to come, or crying may disturb or arouse you.  Pretend you're not aware."  All performance notes gratefully accepted.

It is, briefly, quite hot here in Berkeley.  I shall have to open the famous skylight.

I've been reading Bolano's "The Savage Detectives", do you know it?  I find it suitably entertaining.

Oh and here is a poem I like by Bill Knott:

      Even when the streets are empty,

      even at night, the stopsign

      tells the truth.

As long as we're talking golf...

Here's one of the exhibits I did for the USGA Museum. It not only features the exciting rivalry between Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus, it has a stack of vintage TVs! As we all know, one TV is nice, but nothing sucks you in like a wall of glowing screens.

I had originally given this program a cool, jazzy soundtrack. But the client didn't like it. So now the music is more than reminiscent of an old Marlboro commercial. Palmer was quite the smoker in his day, but I think he smoked L&Ms and I don't know if they had a song.

Flying Lady

Well well: they have a little putting game here that my colleagues enjoy, and what should I find next to it but a pile of pink golf balls, of the distinguished Flying Lady brand. Now sing it with me, my friends:

“Flying lady’s in the rough
Didn’t know love could be so tough…”

I'm back

I was out in Pennsylvania and New Jersey last week, visiting my family for Passover.  I also saw Professor Gilbert, who had returned from DC where he welcomed the Pope to our United States.  He tells the story here.

Kevin Ayers has a new album that I just got.  He was never my favorite in the Roxy/Soft Machine/Henry Cow axis, and I find the album less exciting than, say, a new Robert Wyatt album, but one still can't help but be pleased that he still making music.

This obituary was sent by correspondent Stephin M. of Los Angeles, California.  Monsters from the id, indeed.

James, I received a ballot for the June primary.  If you have any friends running for Green party nominations in Alameda county, let me know and I'll offer them my support.

Physics anyone?

On Friday, we took the Peace Bus around town for some adventures and kicked off a new campaign to promote the resignation of Sec. of State Condoleeza Rice. We walked around the State Department some and then went over to the Einstein memorial for a photo shoot. I thought it would look nice since we all have such big heads. Albert's was the biggest.
Today it's rainier, but we're planning on going out to the big Earth Day concert with some of our magical machines and serving Pink Lemonade to the kids. I thought it would be nice to serve cucumber sandwiches as well, but have not generated great interest in that idea so far. A little nosh goes a long way, I always say, when I'm not saying something else. Indeed that is Johny's neighbor and Trinity college professor Brenda in the center of the picture. She lives up the hill from Johny, a block or two from the house I grew up in. I look forward to visiting California again soon.

I spoke with my 95-year-old Uncle Milton today. He called Grandma while I was visiting her.  He told me the discovery he made about human motion: that it is like a wheel, which goes forward by falling.  One side of a wheel goes down while the other side goes up, but the wheel goes forward.  He asked me to think about this carefully, and I have been doing so.