A caretaker generation

Nelson, NV - 2NOV2016

A few years back I was watching Interstellar.  While absorbing it there was a scene that stuck with me.  The father (Coop) is at a parent-guidance counselor meeting and the counselor mentions that their generation is a "caretaker generation".


This struck true for me.  As a middle of the years Generation X'er (born in years ~1964 to 1982ish).  I feel this is so true for us.  I didn't quite understand why this felt true  until I read this article from the Washington Post - "Baby boomers have been a disaster for America, and Trump is their biggest mistake yet"
.

Two quotes stuck with me:

"The boomers are idealists — same as the generations that led the United States into the Civil War and the Great Depression. Gen Xers are reactive — cynical and pragmatic — and clean up idealists’ messes. Millennials, like the Greatest Generation, rebuild institutions."

"... Rosen is hopeful. 'When we see national emergencies arrive, Generation X will be able to get things done when it needs to,' he says."

While I don't hold all the vitriol for boomers that the author does, I do find them (as an entire entity, not necessarily as individuals) a bit condescending and full of their "greatness."  Woodstock was pretty cool, but it was not the generation that got us to the moon nor brought  down a great deal of segregation and enact the voting rights laws.   The protests definitely helped, but it was many efforts from multiple generations that got it done. I am not saying all boomers are this way.  Just that as a group, there is something ringing true here.  On a positive generalization though, this generation created some best music ever. 

In my interactions with Millennials I often roll my eyes at some of their newcustoms and ideas.  Some things are truly annoying, i.e., man buns, but much of my annoyance is me knowing I am getting older and don't understand, nor feel a part of, a new vision and way of living that the younger generation is creating.  I also realize I am of an age to them where I am becoming invisible.  I am another middle-aged white guy who can help serve a purpose (I can buy stuff and leave tips).  Being unseen is not always fun, but in ways is very freeing. 

I find most of my cohort of GenX to not be the publicly inspiring, or self-aggrandizing types.  We work, we love, we live, and we keep the system going.  We keep the airplanes on schedule, the water flowing, and crops coming in.  We support the arts and participate in them, mostly for the love of the art, not for our own fame.  We are the quiet caretakers trying to keep the nation floating and slowly growing.  We have our flaws in our quiet self-effacing ways.  The music we grew up with sucked, well most of it.   We often go about unnoticed due to our quiet ways.    We also aren't the great visionaries or creators like the WW2 and Korean War generations.  Our deeds don't get easily noticed.   A few more charismatic voices would really help us, but they may seem out of place in the land of foggy grey boredom of Generation X.  While this sounds sad and dull, you need us to keep everything working. 

GenX are the caretakers.  We are keeping the house together after the wild and selfish party of the boomers and helping and supporting the Millennials get ready to rebuild a truly great nation.  Once they are able to take this on, I suggest that the boomers sit down, listen, and learn and the Gen X to retire out and make room for them. 

Doors closed and paths faded

Moods - 24OCT16

There was a young lady I grew up with in my senior year of high school.  She graduated the year after me.  During that year we became close friends.  I had a crush on her, but back then I never got out of the "friend zone" with any lady I was interested in.

A summer later I kissed her, once.

Empty Rooms - 24OCT2016

Decades later we reconnected, artistically.  We created a space for our art.  She lived there.  I lived here.  We got together one to celebrate and create.  While it went well... the paths didn''t merge again.  Shortly after, the paths faded into different forests.

As Donald Justice wrote:
Men at forty
Learn to close softly
The doors to rooms they will not be
Coming back to.

Doors closed and paths faded

Moods - 24OCT16

There was a young lady I grew up with in my senior year of high school.  She graduated the year after me.  During that year we became close friends.  I had a crush on her, but back then I never got out of the "friend zone" with any lady I was interested in.

A summer later I kissed her, once.

Empty Rooms - 24OCT2016

Decades later we reconnected, artistically.  We created a space for our art.  She lived there.  I lived here.  We got together one to celebrate and create.  While it went well... the paths didn''t merge again.  Shortly after, the paths faded into different forests.

As Donald Justice wrote:
Men at forty
Learn to close softly
The doors to rooms they will not be
Coming back to.

Ageism - scientifically speaking.

You are too old/too young to participate.  Sorry.

Unique Forms of Continuity in Space - Umberto Boccioni - MoMA  - 122813

In my last post a about Santa and Dollars, I wrote about many of the "isms" and the hope that they are fading away.  Friend UL wrote about an often overlooked type of discrimination - ageism.  It made me think upon a recent example of ageism I learned about that is part of science and clinical trials of medications.

As I've mentioned before, I work for a large pharmaceutical company in the pharmacovigilance (PV) department (Drug Safety).  We are the group that makes the list of all those nasty side effects that you hear listed in prescription drug commercials (e.g., dizziness, nausea, oily discharge, liver damage, etc.).  Most of these lists come from what is discovered as side effects during the three phases of clinical trials for the product.  When conducting these clinical trails, especially phase 3, you have to have very tight controls on subject selections so that  the product is being tested against the disease and eliminating outside variables, as much as possible.  To determine who gets the treatments (and depending on the target population of the medicine), you have to create a list of the Special Populations  of those that will be excluded from the study.  For most studies, the first two groups most often listed as special populations are pediatric and older patients.

Scientifically, it can make sense to exclude these two groups.  For too long, children were thought of as little adults when it came to medicine.  You just adjust the dose for the body weight.  This was a big mistake since the metabolism, brains, and organ systems of children are developing and are much different than adults.  In the past few decades, the FDA and other health regulatory agencies (MHRA, EMEA, SFDA, Health Canada, etc.) have increasingly emphasized the need for special clinical trials for children.

The older excluded group is a different issue.  Older humans tend to have multiple issues that can affect/draw questions to the clinical trials.  At 44, I am starting to age out of some studies.  That can be attributed to my needing two different asthma medications along with being on the verge of high blood pressure and cholesterol.  If I start taking meds for those, it would further complicate any clinical trials because of the potential issues of drug interactions and other pre-existing conditions becoming exacerbated.   As we age, we become more medically complex.  All of this can make medical testing very tough and is understandable for filtering out during clinical trials, but on the other hand...

The other hand is that by excluding these special populations, we don't learn what health issues the new product can introduce to the populations.  It may greatly help them, hurt them, or do nothing at all.  The danger can come though when the drug is approved and it gets out to the general population, which includes these special populations.  We often learn more about the side effects of drugs for these groups from reports of adverse events from marketed drugs than those in clinical trials, especially for special populations.  Sadly though, that meant a sick patient had to live (hopefully) through the adverse drug reaction.  Because we didn't test on these subjects, we may not know the issues caused by more-complex health profiles of children and our older communities.

When practicing PV, we don't only list the side effects, we build up a benefit/risk profile for the product.  We want to help the prescribing physicians, patients, and other healthcare providers by giving them the best and most current information on the drug.  This enables them to weigh the benefits and the risks of the product.  Many risks can be reduced or mitigated by taking special actions, so this knowledge is crucial for making the correct treatment plans.  To truly understand this, we must include special populations in the clinical trials and determine how the medicines work within them.  Sadly though, this isn't done, mostly due to the cost and time.

Currently it costs north of a billion dollars, not including production/manufacturing costs, to get a drug approved by regulatory authorities.  With the short trademark life on the product and that it takes 8+years to get approval, doing further clinical trials aren't deemed cost effective or time efficient.  For many products, warnings go out stating that data for special populations is incomplete or missing and that doctors should be very careful prescribing to them or should avoid prescribing them at all.

We (industry, regulatory authorities, insurance companies, advocacy groups, patients, etc.) need to determine a way to require further clinical trials that include special populations to ensure better data across all patient populations and yet makes it financially feasible for the drug companies to do so.  I think all sides need to be flexible and working toward a solution rather than trying to protect only their own interests.

Skyfall

Valya - 122412

Over three weeks ago I wrote about my growing up with James Bond.  I am only seven years younger than him and to the extent that movies can influence how I view myself in relationship to the world, Mr. Bond was a big part of it.

I now want to write on the recent Bond offering, Skyfall.  I went and saw it alone on opening night and again a few weeks later with my wife.  In it, I noticed four key themes and observations.  Below are my thoughts on each.  Warning - tons of spoiler alerts.  Don't read if you don't want to know.

Bond is aging.  Daniel Craig took up the role in his mid-thirties and is now in his mid-forties.  I feel that Bond is living a parallel age to both Craig and me.  Mr. Bond is still probably in the top 1% of fitness for men his age (and any age) and looks amazing, but all the wounds, bumps, bruises, drugs, alcohol, travelling, stress and age are catching up.  He has to contend with loss of martial mastery, a young quartermaster who thinks he is barely of use, and his own cynicism taking hold of him.

As a man his age and only a small part as fit and adventurous, I feel those wheels grinding too.  I can still do many things I did at half my age, but I will be sore for a long time after.  I know that in the not-so-distant future, I am going to not be able to do those things to the same level or degree.  James was feeling that too.

In Craig's first Bond movie, Casino Royale, he used brute force to get his way through physical trials.  M even called him, "... a blunt weapon."  In this movie, he had to learn that his physical prowess is starting to fade and he has to fight smarter, not stronger.

On a side note, this was the first Bond movie where I saw him shot.  He was shot twice in the first part.

Bond can not love anymore, except for his "Mum".  In Casino Royale, James loved and lost Vesper  after she betrayed him and died.  He spent a good part of Quantum of Solace avenging her death.  In this movie, after he has been shot by a fellow agent and left for dead, he goes into a drug-and-alcohol induced cocoon.  It feels like he can not love anymore until the headquarters of MI6 is destroyed, many of his fellow agents die, and M is endangered.  He slips into her apartment drunk to announce his return.

Both the Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig Bonds had the same M, played by Judy Dench.  In the Craig versions, you could feel their complex maternal/child relationship unfold slowly.  She is about the only woman... the only person he loves.  As with Javier Bardem's brilliantly acted villain  Silva, the relationship with M is complicated and not all beautiful.

I first noticed in Casino Royale, and every Craig Bond movie since, all of M's subordinates call her "ma'am", but with the British accent it sounds like "Mum".  She is the tough-love mother that all her people respect, fear, and are very loyal to.  She is the tough mother that knew she may have to sacrifice one of her boys (James) in the beginning by telling the agent with the sniper rifle to take the obstructed shot at the bad guy.  The shot missed the baddie and hit James leading to his above mentioned disappearance.

It is this same relationship that caused Silva, a former agent of M's, to seek revenge.  He was her favorite until he went outside of boundaries and she left him for the Chinese to torture.  Her betrayal of him served almost like a foreshadow for Bond that while she will have his back, if he steps out of line, he will be dealt with.

Bond lost both of his parents when he was young.  M became his Mum, for better and for worse.  When she died in his arms at the end, his tears were for real as he lost another mother.

Bond finally gets a new villain!  In almost every prior Bond, his arch enemy has fallen into two main categories; Dominators or Countries.

The first is the genius villain striving for some type of world dominance, whether with money, resources, or land, he will go to no end to dominate the world.  This is the cliche villain that often has a huge secret base with hundreds of soldiers and scientists working on the plan to rule the world.  He is usually very brilliant, but stupidly sets up some overly-produced death for Bond and leaves before seeing Bond die(why he never thought to just personally shoot Bond himself always confused me).  Bond escapes, grabs the girl, blows up the secret base, kills the baddie and has a post-battle coital reward with said girl.  It is no wonder that Mike Myers channeled this villain so well as Dr. Evil in the Austin Powers movies.

The second is a country/state trying to steal secrets or weapons that will let them hold world power.  There have only been a few of these movies, including For Your Eyes Only (my favorite Roger Moore movie).

In Skyfall, Bond gets a brand new villain with Bardem's Sylva.  As mentioned above, Sylva was one of M's favorites in the 90's, but was left to the Chinese as part of handover of Hong Kong.  While he does create a powerful terror/financial empire.  It is on a tiny deserted island.  It is mainly one big super computer.  He doesn't have a massive army or a bunch of scientists.

Sylva's main motivation is to deeply hurt M by setting the explosion destroying the MI6 headquarters, releasing the names of undercover agents around the world, and eventually hunting her down.  He outright calls her Mommy.  His motivation is deeply personal.  I wonder how his character would have moved on if he had been successful.

I appreciate his complexity.  He respects Bond and feels a kinship to him.  He hates, yet cares for  M when he sees she has been wounded.  He wants her to kill both herself and him at the same time to end the pain.  In ways, he is a more effective agent than Bond because he better  knows his limitations and plans around them and also has far fewer scruples.

During Sylva and Bond's great meet up scene, you learn more about both characters back story, history, feelings through some of the best character development written in a scene lasting less than 10 minutes. This included the great firework...

...Bond is bisexual.  In one very homoerotic scene, Sylva gently caresses and admires Bond's shoulder, chest, and collarbone.  He is caressing Bond as a lover.  There is the sense he is messing with Bond to fluster him and confuse him.  Even though he may be playing mental tricks on James, I feel Sylva was attracted to him for both his great physique, but also their shared life stories.  As he caressed the inside of Bond's thighs, James utters one of the best statements ever in a Bond movie, "you assume this is my first time."  (I am only paraphrasing since I can't remember the exact words).

For many years, I (and many others) have wondered if Bond has every seduced men as an agent, or even for his own pleasures.  From his response to Sylva I get the feeling both are true.

Other stuff - The movie itself had some major reoccurring themes and aesthetics.  They include how it was filmed and nods to Bonds passed.

Blue eyes, blue shirt, golden grass, and an ill-fated Aston Marton DB5 - Movie Still from Skyfall

Colors - The director, Sam Mendes, also directed American Beauty and Road to Perdition.  Both are beautifully filmed.  In Skyfall, he used color palettes and selected imagery and icons to enhance the story.  I first noticed colors.  In most scenes, there were two dominant colors - either or both blue and gold.  The blue matches Craig's eyes.  You see both Ralph Fiennes and Bond wear blue suits or grey suits with strong blue shirts and ties.  In the assassination bit in the Shanghai high rise,  there is even a scene where Bond enters a hallway with shifting mood lights between alternating blue and gold.  The bar in the Macau casino is a warm gold, as is M's apartment.  The inside of Skyfall is a cold blue, much like Bond's eyes.   After Skyfall explodes and M and the caretaker, Kincaid (played by the great Albert Finney), escape up the hill, the hills are golden in the light of the fire as they run to the old church.  There are many other examples of gold and blue in the movie, but I think you get my point.  These two primary colors are as vital as red was in American Beauty.  Watch the official trailer below to see many of the uses of blue and gold in the movie.

Nods to Bond History- 2012 marked the 50th birthday of Bond movies.  In an homage, this movie had many little bits that referenced many of the older movies, but with new twists.  This is a list off of the of my head and is not all inclusive.  Please share more you observed in the comments section.

Bond shags three women in almost every movie - There is a brunette beauty he is with during his time-out phase after his "death".  We can assume that he and the agent who shot him and turns out to be Ms. Moneypenny was number two.  His last conquest is Sylva's temptress Sévérine.  As a twist though, he doesn't end the movie in bed with any one of them.

Motorcycle chase through a bazar and the obligatory crashes through fruit stands and an amazing jump.-  The twist in this cliche is that instead of jumping the motorcycle onto the train, he crashes it head first into the bridge rail to flip him uncontrolled onto the train.   

No Aston Martin goes unharmed.  Ever since the infamous DB5 appeared in Sean Connery's Goldfinger and Thunderball, Bond crashed many Aston Martins as well as they were, blown up, rolled, wrecked, tortured, and destroyed.  Each Aston Martin is tricked out with weapons and protective equipment. I love Aston Martins and cringe watching their many deaths in these movies.  Another one is destroyed in Skyfall.  The twist starts in the appearance of the vintage DB5 with all of the Goldfinger original kit, including machine guns and ejection seat.  The big twist though is that it is the simplicity and age of the old DB5 that is needed.  It can't be tracked electronically.  It is too old and out of sync with the new world, much like the aging Bond as mentioned above.

The return of Q.  I never knew "Q" stood for "Quartermaster".  Q is the master of weapons and gadgets.  There are two twists in this version though - Q is a youthful computer geek/genius that has little respect for Bond and his old, brutish ways.  The only fancy tech he gives Bond is a Walther that will only let Bond shoot it due to a palm print lock and a radio transmitter that broadcasts his location.  As Q says leaving the museum, "Were you expecting an exploding pen?  We don't do those anymore."  Another poke at Bond's age.

A few more things - the women's perspective.  I've talked about this movie with a number of women and below are some of what they shared.

Liked/loved - Bond swimming in the pool in Shanghai.  Bond in a suit.  Bond doing chin ups.  Those weren't shockers, but all of them felt thrilled when the old DB5 appeared.  I tried arguing for how beautiful the new Aston Martin DBS that appeared in the last two movies is.  They just smiled and continued their appreciation for the old car.  One other thing they appreciated was his relationship with M.  It added depth.  One female viewer though felt tired with the continued cliche that it always takes a male (Bond) to save the day.  One last comment from a female - she loved Adele's singing of the theme song, but wondered if the late April Winehouse's voice would have had the grittier edge that matched the movie.

Final thoughts.  It is obvious I loved this movie.  I wouldn't have written all this fanboy stuff about it otherwise.  Look at the list of great actors, Dench, Fiennes, Bardem, Finney, and Craig.  Throw in some of the best dialog, character development, and action of any Bond movie, and add that most of the movie takes place in Great Britain.  This modern noir movie is my favorite Bond movie staring my favorite Bond.  My only hesitation is that I worry about how the next movie will do after the greatness of this one.  

"Skyfall" and a life in Bond-age. - Part 1

Valya - 120112

I just read a friend's posted review of the newest installment in the James Bond series, Skyfall.   After finishing her well written critique, I wanted to share my own.  It is based on my own Bond history and how I feel about this movie.

I am forty-three years old.  The James Bond movie franchise is fifty.  There have always been Bond movies around me.  I grew up with James as my fantasy uncle that I could live vicarious adventures through.  I love the Bond movies.  I love what he stands for and is.  He is the alter ego I wish I had.

My mom is a huge Bond fan and while raising me, she made sure I was as well.  I can't remember my first Bond movie, but I think it was one of Sean Connery's movies.    My mom has a big crush on that guy, much like her crush on Leonard Bernstein.  I know she enjoyed them both for more than their artistic talents.

My first Bond movies were all from watching TV.  The ABC network would play them on a Sunday night and they would go 2.5 hours instead of the usual 2 that most movies would get.  I had to get special dispensation from mom to stay up to 10:30 to see them.  I watched them for the fantastic action, the exotic scenery, and to try and follow the story.

As I got old enough to watch the movies in the theater with my mom and brother, I saw them on the big screen.  Even though Moonraker was my first in-theater Bond movie, the first one I remember and noticed something new was For Your Eyes Only.  I noticed the women.

Almost every Bond movie has two important bits with women.  The first is the opening title and theme song section where the women are usually naked and silhouetted.  It was the first time I remember seeing a naked woman, or at the negative black field of her, on film.  Seeing that may have been one of the little bits of my sexual experiences that made me appreciate the beauty of women in their natural state.  The second were the Bond women themselves and their silly names.  By my mid-teens, I was rolling my eyes at their horrible character names such as Pussy Galore and Octopussy.



During my young years, Roger Moore was my favorite Bond.  I liked his casual and slightly snarky approach to the character.  As I got older, I went back to liking Connery since he was more of a macho Bond.  In college I watched the subtler Timothy Dalton's Bonds and felt the franchise had gone into a slump.  It wasn't him, it was the stories and over-the-top lines and action sequences.  I had to ask if Wayne Newton should have ever been in a Bond movie (License to Kill).

By the time Piece Brosnan took up the helm, I only watched the Bond movies by renting them on VHS.  He was good, but each story felt like a retread.  Brosnan's Bond was a unique mixture of Moore's snarkiness and a darker side that included hints at James' alcoholism.  While he did well, I lost track and missed the last two or three of his performances.

In 2006*, Daniel Craig took on the Bond role in Casino Royale.  According to a recent Vanity Fair article about him and the role, Brosnan gave him a bit of advice, "Don't fuck it up."  Craig said he learned what that meant after his first movie came out and suddenly felt not only the weight of the role, but also the weight of the whole Bond universe was on him.

Bond's transgressive coming out of the water.

Vesper Lynd from Casino Royale still.

Casino Royale was the first Bond movie I went to see in a theater in over a decade.  I really wanted to see it for many reasons all of which concerned the new Bond, Daniel Craig.  First, he is barely a year older than me.  he is the first Bond my age.  That is important to me.  I feel connected to him because of that.  We were both in our upper 30's when that movie came out.   Second, he is the first blond Bond.  I am a blond too. 

In that movie he broke so many Bond rules.  First, he didn't have the sex with the usual three women in it.  Second, he drove a Ford Focus as his first car.  Third, instead of having a beauty like Ursula Andress or Halle Berry come out the water dripping wet in a swim suit, he came out buff and hot as ever.  I think even every straight man had to feel his privates twitch at that scene.  He represented masculinity and its raw beauty in that magic moment.  Fourth, he was rough.  In the famous parkour scene where he is chasing a villain through a building site, the baddy vaults over a half wall, Bond runs through it.  As M says in that movie to him, "You are a blunt weapon".  Fuck subtlety.  Sometimes you have to break through to the other side.   Fifth, Bond fell in love.  Vesper (which inspired the invention of a great and butt-kicking drink) was played by the unbelievable beautiful Eva Green who becomes his love and his heartbreak loss as well.  Her loss hardened his heart.  You could feel this happen with him and understood why he went cold to love and emotion after that.  This movie soon became my favorite Bond movie staring my favorite Bond movie.

A few years later, Craig's second Bond movie came out, Quantum of Solace.  It sucked for so many reasons I wont go into.  I was worried for the franchise after seeing it.  The only saving bit was Jack White and Alicia Key's them song, Another Way to Die.

In my next post, I will finally write about Skyfall. 

*I always wondered why they didn't wait to release the movie in 2007... as in 007 in 2007!

A diferent time piece

Gabbi (Noon o'clock) - 082212

I saw the first red leaf of fall today, and I was also thinking about change - it's cyclic and reflects nature.

A few days ago Carla mentioned noticing the changes around her in a comment she shared on my last post.  Recently I've felt tick-tock time is losing its meaning to me.  I am losing my ability to feel the seconds go by and know what part of the clock the hands are resting on.

If people have super powers, I have had two.  I can almost always tell where north is.  From that I can usually point toward any direction.    I am sitting in a windowless room right now, and just pointed north and then checked it on my iPhone compass.  I was off by less than 5 degrees.  This doesn't mean I don't get lost.  It just means I usually get un-lost pretty fast. 

Sadly, my second super power, being able to intrinsically tell tick-tock time without looking at a clock and being accurate within 15 minutes is fading fast and is nearly gone.  For many years, I only carried a watch when to-the-minute accuracy was needed.  Now I wear a watch so I know which hour it is in tick-tock time.

I use the term tick-tock time to represent the human-made time measurement system based on seconds, minutes, and hours.  While it is dividing a solar year down into 365 days (not including leap year) with 24 hours in a day, with each hour consisting of 60 minutes, and each minute containing 60 seconds.  That is 525,600 seconds in a year.  I have no mechanism in me to note the passage of a second, minute, or hour anymore.

If we are healthy, our resting heart rate is around 60 beats-per-minute (bpm).  I can't trust my heart to tell time though.  When I sleep, it drops to less than that rate.  If I am excited, it can easily double.  Without having an internal mechanism anymore to tell tick-tock time, where am I getting my cues?  The natural universe provides it.

The earth's daily rotation provides a good basic visual time piece, light or no light.  My next favorite is the 28 day lunar cycle.  I know that if it is a new moon now, it will be a full moon in 14 days.  I am always looking up at the moon, when visible to give me a clue as to it's path.  Here is a link to learn about the phases of the moon. 

For the past few years I've felt the seasonal transitions more and more.  I like some more than others, preferring fall and winter to spring and summer.  I feel each one though.  Every August I can tell when autumn is coming by noticing the lengthening of shadows and the quality of light around me.  I feel the winter solstice by enjoying the long, dark, cold days of winter.  The seasonal changes are one measurement of time I feel deep in me.

Maybe my spirit is trying to tell me something with my loss of ability to internally tell tick-tock time.  It isn't the second that separates present me from past and future me.  It is the changing of the universe around me affected by the cycles we physically go through.  I can't control these cycles.  All I can do is recognize them and make sure I live as much as possible through them. 

 

Kick in the ass

Yes. I used PS Dark Arts on Myself - 012812

"It's great to have a passion, but you must also have a work ethic around it." Unknown*

For the past month or so I received multiple subtle and explicit messages to get my shit together.  Most of these messages concern my art.  All of them are basically saying, "Karl, You take pretty good photos.  You have an eye for capturing people in your photos.  Good boy.  Now you really need to move on to the next level.  You need to do it better and you need to get it done.  Not only done, but done right."

I  hired a graphic/web designer/artist to help me build a commercial website.  She designed  a new logo for me late last year.  I was impressed by it and looked at her portfolio of commercial websites she designed and was very impressed.  I showed her my half-ass, stagnant website and she gently tore it apart in a critique.  I knew then I had hired the right partner to help build the new one.  A month later, and many hours of writing text, selecting key photos, and many other tasks concerning SEO, keywords, aspect ratios, and categorizations, it is almost ready to go public.  I will co-premier it here and Facebook when it is ready to go.  I will also share her name and website in that post.

That experience taught me a valuable lesson.  If I am going to spend a good chunk of money and get a strong commercial site going, I had better go all in or pack up.  You can't go into business half way.  All in or fold.   Balls deep.  Shit or get off the pot.  Ok.  Enough metaphors for that.

While on Christmas break I saw a great a video clip of a George Carlin tribute with Louie C.K.  Louie C.K. is a comic genius and speaks so many truths for me.  In this tribute he shares the influence of Carlin on his career.  The key lesson is to keep reinventing his work and push his comedy further and further and get to what is raw, core, and never stop exploring.  Go deeper.   The gold starts at 4:55.



It is too easy to keep producing the same images the same way and getting the same responses.  I keep creating the same stuff, just with different flavors.  I keep getting the same results, and not going too far both in my art and in the success of my art.

The golden nugget from this video made me realize that I get the best feedback from my stuff that pushes me in new directions, new materials, new concepts, new people, new methods, and new feelings.  It is time to let some things go that are finished and run their course with me.  It feels like being given a new wild world to go out and explore!!!

So, if the first lesson was to go all in or go home and the second lesson was to keep reinventing and pushing myself harder, deeper, and into new areas, the third one was a hard criticism on what I have done.  It made me first question what type of photographer/artist I am in the sense of the quality of my work and then kicked me in the ass to do something about it.

I sent out a few proof portrait images.  The subject liked a few and then did something shocking, but also taught me a lesson.  The subject edited  one of my photos and sent it back with the list of edits.  Holy fuck.  Nobody has edited my photos before, especially without telling me first.

At first I was pissed.  How dare somebody touch my work like that!  I went for a walk around the neighborhood and came back and decided to look at the edits and compare them to the original I had sent out.  In came the head kick of humility and the lesson - Karl, your digital photo editing skills are kind of rudimentary and basic.  Karl, you do some digital photo editing really well, but if you are going to do this seriously, you really have to get better at it.

I use Adobe Lightroom for my photo workflow, everything from downloading and storage, through editing and refining, to creating a print or digital output.  It has many great tools that are similar to what can be found in the traditional darkroom.  It greatly complimented my darkroom knowledge and helped me make the transition from film to digital.   All along I denied the value of Photoshop.  I felt it was too complicated to learn.  It made my art a technical exercise, not a passion of the soul.  I would get lost in all the layers and gadgets and my art would lose its soul.  All of these were excuses, not reasons.

I am in the middle of an intensive Photoshop course now and am finally beginning to understand that its a wondrous tool box that can liberate so many of the limitations that straight photography places on me.  I am quickly realizing that I am not making the best art I can and honoring my subjects by my reticence to learning this important (and let's face it, industry) tool.   It is sort of like learning magic.

I've learned many new things that remind me of the Harry Potter universe.  Magic has both its good and bad arts.  In the books, all Hogwarts students had to learn the Magic of the Dark Arts.  For some it became their primary tool for power, for others it became a last-use weapon or a knowledge on how to defend ones self from it.

I think this is true of Photoshop as well.  There are so many ways to manipulate photos within that program.  There is the subtle stuff like correcting for perspective, saturating or de-saturating colors, reducing wrinkles, getting rid of pimples, etc.  There is the heavy stuff like distorting the body to look thinner, taller, whiter, darker, and closer to an ideal of what someone should like vs. what they truly look like.  All of these tools are available for the photographer to change the photograph from simple edits to a work of fiction.  These are some potentially dark arts that I need to learn and master.  How I use my knowledge and mastery of the dark arts will determine whether my intent was good or not.

Below is a video about the dangers of Photoshop.



I haven't written a blog post in the past few weeks due to all the work I am pushing into my art while still working my paying job and trying to maintain a life.  I am not getting any younger.  I know I have many more years behind me than ahead of me.  I need to get my art done before I die and I need to get off my lazy ass and do it.  I also have to do it better or why do it all?

*I hate it when I hear a great quote and can't find who said it.  Google can only do so much I guess.  I know it was an author. 

Overstaying my welcome

Delta Sign - 121411

Back in college our group of friends would take turns hosting parties.  There would usually be a dozen or so of us laughing, dancing, arm wrestling, drinking, eating, toking, making out, joking, and then repeat.  Each party was a treat that lasted for hours and ended when everyone dribbled out.  This exodus usually would last only last ten minutes or so before everyone cleared out.

One night at Scott and Tracy's, four of us remained as we hung out in the living room talking, laughing and getting drunk.  At one point (around two am) there was a lull in the conversation and we could hear the music coming from the stereo.  The song was Contact by Phish.  The relaxing lyrics of the first verse so clearly poured into our ears.

The tires are the things on your car
That make contact with the road
The car is the thing on the road
That takes you back to your abode

We looked at Scott and asked if he was trying to give us a hint.  He laughed and shrugged.  We all then laughed and decided it was time to walk home.  That song became a running joke that we would all play at parties as the exit tune.  It was a funny way to give the soft message, "Time to move along."

We moved to California in 1997 and have lived in Vallejo ever since.  That is only fourteen years, but that is four years longer  than I've lived in  any other place in my life.  Vallejo feels like home and I am comfortable here, but I am getting the subtle signs, internal and external, that it is time to move on.  For the past year or so I've felt both pushes and tugs to leave.  These forces are communicating to me that it is time to move along down the road.

Las Vegas Sign - 121411

The pushes are all around me.  They are subtle and I believe exist in both my subconscious and of those around me.  Many of the pushes are probably my sub-conscious creating negative narratives affirming a need of my own.  One example is the feeling at work that it is time to move one.  The job feels old and rusting.  My performance is getting worn out and I am running out of enthusiasm for it.  I wouldn't be shocked if my coworkers feel the same about me. 

While I may be manufacturing many of the pushes in my mind, I've noticed real ones too.  I've burned a few bridges over the years.  One really bad and recent one is indirectly sending me push messages.  Through very indirect communication (some subtle, some public), the sender is giving signals that my presence and welcome are worn out.  The sender is done with me and it is time for me to fade away.  I earned that push so I am trying to fade out as quietly as possible.

Helping the push are the tugs pulling me into new areas.  The tugs come from going to New York, Las Vegas, Rome, and my other wanderings and travels.  During those times away I felt tugs to move to the new area and a growing regret when I got back to the Bay Area.  These tugs made me realize that a new home awaits me elsewhere.  These tempting tugs beckon me with promises of a  home where I am welcomed, wanted, and where I can bring fresh blood, no burned bridges, new perspective, experience, passion art, humor, and energy.  These places are not tired of or annoyed with Karl yet nor feel the need to push me out.  I haven't disappointed, failed, hurt, or broken hearts in those places.  I am sure though one day I will.  It seems everyplace I go I overstay my welcome.

Phish - Contact

Secrets, brilliant disguises, masks, and façades.

Candace Nirvana - 070211

If you reveal your secrets to the wind you should not blame the wind for revealing them to the trees. - Kahlil Gibran

I just read a post over at What We Saw Today by my friend Carla titled Secrets.  I recommend reading her post.  To summarize it, she shared some personal information with someone who betrayed her with the secret.  This reminds me of why we all keep secrets and must be careful with whom we share our most personal details.

I wrote a bit about façades and how we build up fake fronts to hide what is inside of us.  I think we also build safe rooms in our hearts and brains where we keep the most intimate secrets buried.  I've bared only parts of my safe room to a very few.  Nobody has burned me horribly, but I've had some bumps along the way.  Nobody, but me (and depending on views on God) knows all my secrets.

Secrets are made to be found out over time. - Charles Sanford

There were two people I shared a bit with that didn't hurt me, but never forgot a word I said.  Even months and years later, both will mention a shared nugget or two at relevant times.  I am not sure if they do that to show they have power over me with the secret or to show they were listening and remember what I shared and care for me.  It may be a mixture of both.  This reminds me of why during biblical times God, and other characters, were hesitant to share their names.  By knowing some one's name you had power over him or her.  Similarly, by knowing a person's deep secret, you have large power over them as well.

What is love? Love is when one person knows all of your secrets... your deepest, darkest, most dreadful secrets of which no one else in the world knows... and yet in the end, that one person does not think any less of you; even if the rest of the world does. - unknown

I recently had a falling out with someone (person A).  We "de-friended" on Facebook and cut other ties as well.  We still have common online friends and that is where the pixel forest fog comes in.  I wrote a status update on Facebook about an event that we and another friend had in common.  An hour later I got a Facebook private message from the shared friend (person B) that was meant for  person A, not me.  It had my FB quote, sort of trashed me and made a few jokes.

I don't know what hurt more,  that person A told person B about the falling out or that person B, a shared friend, was spying and relaying information back to person A.  The fact that all of this is happening online is not new, this type of coy spying has been going on for ages.  I remember these types of shenanigans going on in junior high, but now it happens in the pixel forest as well.

I purposefully keep things secret.  Some are to protect myself, loved ones, family, friends, and other interests.  I kept my name secret on my old blog out of fear of how my photography and dark and/or erotic thoughts could harm me.  I now own this blog and use my name, but no longer share those parts and only some of my photography for the same reason.   I have a separate day job and multiple lives I live and need to protect.

I was once talking to a friend about how our personal universes were shaped.  Hers was one big sphere where all parts of it swirled around together, colliding, bonding, and separating from each other.  Things were not compartmentalized.  My personal universe is more like a wheel hub with spokes going out.  The only place those spokes may touch is at the center, the hub, or me.  I rarely mix my work life with my art life or my family life or college life or blog life or church life.  If I do let them mix, I try to control the meeting as much as possible and am very nervous during it.  I really hate when those hubs or worlds collide outside of my control.

We dance around a ring and suppose, While the secret sits in the middle and knows - Robert Frost

Why do I keep such strict separation between these parts of me?  Part of it is that I know the spokes would conflict with each other, may not understand each other, and would hurt me in the end.  I also keep them separated because I seek out different things from each group that make most of them mutually exclusive for me.  I don't like mixing those groups because the mix rarely goes well.

At times I wish I could be as open as the friend with the sphere universe.  I think it is healthier because she has fewer secrets or perceived needs for them.  For me though, I can't do it.  I was raised this way and it is an atomized part of my essence.

It takes a lot of my energy to maintain my spoke universe and even though I am decent at keeping everything separated, the parts do bleed through to one another on occasion.  One such area is my art.  If you spend enough time looking at it, you can see what I try to keep hidden from other areas.  Maybe my reluctance to change is partly due to me not wanting to give up one of my internal muses, my secrets that make up most of my art and expression. 

The last song from the last Beatles performance on the roof of the Apple Offices- Get Back

Ecstacy and Death - tough acts to follow

Carmen waiting for her lover, Jacinto - Movie still from The Devil's Backbone

We watched Guillermo del Toro's * El Espinazo del Diablo (The Devil's Backbone)  last weekend (Del Toro also directed Pan's Labyrinth and the Hellboy movies).  Two of the repeating elements del Toro focused on were the acts of ecstasy and death.   In one, the couple is finishing there tryst, in three other scenes, three main characters die in drawn out sequences that make you feel part of each moment.  The acting in these pivotal, emotional and powerful scenes was some of the best I've seen.  Each conveyed their message whether it be love, lust, regret, loss, coming fate, or all of the these.   I wonder, how hard it is to act out these two moments?


I've only had one credible acting experience, as Francis Nurse in Arthur Miller's The Crucible in a high school production.  My part was small, but important.  It didn't really push my acting abilities though.  Even though I am not a thespian, I appreciate good acting.  What I saw from all the actors in The Devil's Backbone, I have to stand up and applaud.  In my opinion, two of the toughest performances to pull off were the long death scenes and the sex scene.


SPOILER ALERT - I am going to go into details about who dies... and orgasms in this movie.

The sex scene is between the middle-aged teacher/headmistress Carmen and her former student (and antagonist) Jacinto.  The scene opens with them at the climax of their intimacy, him on top her.  Both of their faces show they are in different places, yet still physically bound together at the hips.  Her expression shows the pleasures of the moment, yet the loneliness that she is with a sexual surrogate that she does not love.  Her love is for the much older Dr. Casares who recites his love poetry to her through the wall in the mornings.  Her regret and ecstasy combine into a moment of acting that tells more stories than a heart can bear.  


Jacinto's orgasm shows his temporary pleasure and his thoughts on how he is doing this to gain access to a key Carmen holds that unlocks the orphanage's safe containing what little money and gold it holds.  He is using sex as a means to an end.  Once again, the moment is complex for both characters.

Carmen's death - Movie still from The Devil's Backbone

There are three long death scenes showing the transition from living to death, the act of dieing.  The first is of Carmen dieing in Dr. Casares' arms from her wounds sustained from the explosion of Jacinto's bomb he used to remove the safe from the wall.  You can tell from Dr. Casares' initial reaction that he knows her wounds are fatal, yet he tries to mend her with delicate and loving ministrations.  She tries to tell him she loves him, but he tells her to listen to one more poem.  He shares his last poem for her, telling of how through death, their love pulls them closer together.  You can see her life slowly leaving her through each line he recites as he lovingly caresses her head.  Carmen fights to stay alive to hear the poem, but dies before the last line is finished. 

In the second major death scene, Dr. Casares sits in a chair overlooking the orphanage's entrance holding a shot gun.  He is there to defend the children from Jacinto's return to  steal the safe and kill all the boys.  Dr. Casares is bleeding from his wounds inflicted from the same explosion that took Carmen.  He is now deaf in one ear and is wearing out.  One of the boys, Jaime,  is in the room with him keeping an eye out.  You see the boy doing things to prepare as Casares looks out the window.  At one point you see Jaime notice the sound of flies buzzing about and looks at the doctor.  A fly flits about Carsares' open mouth as another lands on a cut on his head.  At that moment, Jaime knows the gentle doctor died.  It is a quiet death, but so well acted as the life quietly bled out of him.


In the third notable death scene, Conchita, a young beautiful woman who helps out at the school and was Jacinto's lover and fiance, is walking toward the distant neighboring town to get help after the explosion.  She runs into Jacinto who is returning to the school to get the safe and kill the rest of the boys.  Jacinto gets out of his truck and walks to her as his two thugs watch on.  He puts his hand on her shoulder and tells her to apologize and join him.  She tells him she is not afraid of him anymore.  He offers one more time and she responds the same.  He holds her close as they stand in the road.  You don't see anything more than his arm move, but you know he has just stabbed her in her side by her flinch and reaction in her eyes.  In the next half minute, you see all the emotion, pain, and sorrow of life in her eyes and face.  No words are said as he holds her and her life slowly fades out.  Jacinto is hurt by his killing her.  


All three of the deaths show so well that transition to death.  Each actor lets you know when the "lights out" moment occurs.  Each death moved me in different ways, as did the sex scene. 


Enough has been written on the connection between sex and death.  There is a French term for the orgasm, le petit mort.
According to wikipedia, la petit mort is...

La petite mort, French for "the little death", is a metaphor for orgasm.

More widely, it can refer to the spiritual release that comes with orgasm, or a short period of melancholy or transcendence, as a result of the expenditure of the "life force".

What I ask again is, how do actors prepare to act out these two moments and convey the reality of it?  I know that method actors may emphasize the point of making it feel like it has never happened before to make it feel real.  Other actors may look at references from literature, art, and music to reenact the death and orgasm. 

Dee's suicide - Battlestar Galactica

I recently watched the science fiction series Battlestar Galactica for a second time.   In one episode of the final season, Dee commits suicide by shooting herself in the head.  There was almost no lead up to the moment.  She is standing by her locker, putting away her stuff, looks in the mirror and shoots herself.  The whole moment lasted five seconds, at most.  So much of death portrayed in tv and movies shows the suddenness (and often violence) of the event, yet rarely shows the emotions and depth of what each character and the victim(s) experience.  Maybe this is due to challenge of conveying such a deep moment.  


The ability to act out sexual ecstasy and death so vividly and emotionally has to be two of the greatest acting challenges.  These challenges not only comes from the emotional/mental demands of the moment, but also the deeply personal and unique experience we all have during ecstasy and death.  I admire film makers willing to show the power of these moments and the actors creating them.


*Note: I highly recommend this period piece that tells of a orphaned boys school set during the Spanish civil war.

No news is... no news.

Rome - 041711

I gave up following the news for Lent.  I used to listen to NPR for at least 2 hours per day, read numerous news and opinion websites and followed other sources of information as well.   For the past few weeks my only news sources have been what friends tell me, what I get from NPR's game show, Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, and the occasional Daily Show with Jon Stewart or Colbert Report.

Here are the big things I missed.  Charlie Sheen craziness.  Japan's tragic earthquake and tsunami, the budget wars, some Wisconsin state supreme court race, rising gas prices, and more culture wars.  I've learned a few things.  I really don't need to know every bit of news concerning most every topic in the world.  So many of them are beyond my power and really have no impact on me, nor I on them.  As Paul Simon wrote in the song, The Only Living Boy in New York:

I get the news I need on the weather report.
I can gather all the news I need on the weather report.
Hey, I've got nothing to do today but smile.
Da-n-da-da-n-da-da-n-da-da here I am
The only living boy in New York

Half of the time we're gone but we don't know where,
And we don't know where.

Here I am..........

I can't help Charlie Sheen and by following every drop of news about him, I am only feeding the frenzy.  I can't do anything about the budget.   I heard about Japan's tragedy through friends and I can help by sending donations to the Red Cross, but I didn't need the news to help me figure that one out.  As for gas prices, I really can't do a thing about that except try to use less of it.

Come Easter Sunday, I will get out from under my news-free rock and start learning about the world.  I know I need to keep current with the world, but not at the expense of too much "currency".  This "currency" is sanity, lack of influence, helplessness, depression, and too many things that have nothing to do with me.

*The Boxer, Then and Now

Mollee 033011

My mom wore out three Bridge Over Troubled Water albums by Simon and Garfunkel while I was growing up. She loves that album. I know every song by heart, even the ones I don't like (So Long, Frank Lloyd Wright). I spent many hot summer days listening to that album with my mom as I read. Each song has meaning to me.

As a kid, my favorite was Cecilia due to its eccentric instruments and rhythms. I liked it even more when I hit puberty and understood the lyrics, I had figured out why he was washing his face -

Making love in the afternoon with Cecilia
Up in my bedroom (making love)
I got up to wash my face
When I come back to bed
Someone's taken my place

As I got older, I really liked Keep the Costumer Satisfied because of the massive brass section. In my mind, songs with "big brass ones" are the tops for instrumentation. You can listen to it here. The brass kicks in during the last half of the song.

In college, I listened to The Boxer's lyrics for the first time. One part really spoke to me.

In the clearing stands a boxer
And a fighter by his trade
And he carries the reminders
Of ev'ry glove that layed him down
Or cut him till he cried out
In his anger and his shame
"I am leaving, I am leaving"
But the fighter still remains

If you listen to the original recoding, Simon and Garfunkel sing "cut" with staccato, clipping it short so the listener feels the punch the boxer just suffered. That was the point when I learned that articulation of words can add so much meaning to the message. It made me listen to music differently. I wanted to hear how Frank Sinatra, Tina Turner, Pink Floyd, Al Green, Pavarati, and many other vocalists said the words so they had more meaning.

I also felt that verse of the song spoke to me since we all "carry all the reminders of ev'ry glove laid him down or cut him till he cried out in his anger and his shame." What college student doesn't feel they are a failure in school, socially, physically, psychologically at some point?

In my thirties, this verse spoke to me.

Asking only workman's wages
I come looking for a job
But I get no offers,
Just a come-on from the whores on Seventh Avenue
I do declare, there were times when I was so lonesome
I took some comfort there

All I will say, when haven't we taken some comfort in places we are not too proud of visiting. I do declare.

Yesterday, I wanted to listen The Boxer again. I found a 2003 version of it from a S & G performance on David Letterman. The video is at the bottom. Once you get past the interview, the music starts at 2:00. Part way through, I heard a new (to me) verse.

Now the years are rolling by me
And they rock uneasily
And I am older than I once was
And younger than I'll be. That's not unusual.
No, it isn't strange
After changes upon changes
We are more or less the same
After changes we are more or less the same

That pretty much sums up a mid-life crisis. As pitiful and cliche as a mid-life crisis is, those lyrics are speaking to me and I am listening. I am not going to dwell on them too much longer, but they are important now.

I've listened to this "new" verse a dozen times now and found out a bit about it through wikipedia. It was not included on the original Bridge Over Troubled Water album.



The Boxer by Paul Simon and performed with Art Garfunkel

I am just a poor boy
Though my story's seldom told
I have squandered my resistance
For a pocket full of mumbles such are promises
All lies and jests
Still a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest

When I left my home and my family
I was no more than a boy
In the company of strangers
In the quiet of the railway station running scared
Laying low, seeking out the poorer quarters
Where the ragged people go
Looking for the places only they would know

Lie la lie ...

Asking only workman's wages
I come looking for a job
But I get no offers,
Just a come-on from the whores on Seventh Avenue
I do declare, there were times when I was so lonesome
I took some comfort there

Lie la lie ...
Now the years are rolling by me And they rock uneasily And I am older than I once was And younger than I'll be. That's not unusual. No, it isn't strange After changes upon changes We are more or less the same After changes we are more or less the same

Lie la lie ...

Then I'm laying out my winter clothes
And wishing I was gone
Going home
Where the New York City winters aren't bleeding me
Bleeding me, going home

In the clearing stands a boxer
And a fighter by his trade
And he carries the reminders
Of ev'ry glove that layed him down
Or cut him till he cried out
In his anger and his shame
"I am leaving, I am leaving"
But the fighter still remains

Lie la lie ...

On David Lettermen




The original

x
One final note, it is good to hear S&G still have golden harmonies. They give me goose bumps with their beautiful sounds.