Ask Her Out, Yo

We wrapped shooting on the documentary the other day. The last interview was Moms. Now editing and off to the races.

Not a peep from my press release. The American people may be spiritually and emotionally more dead than I anticipated. The mediators that guard their precious attention more crass and dilligent than imagined. I always assumed that once someone had the guts to bring the truth, that they wouldn't be able to ignore it. Would be forced to stop fronting. I may be wrong in this regard.

The current plan is to keep going. Full steam ahead. Maybe it's just the literary types that are moribund and monochromatic. Once the actual beat hits the streets, I am certain the kids will not be refused.

There was a great quote in the Trib. the other day about just this: "young people will pay whatever you charge. The jazz clients won't. You're forced to go in that direction as a business owner and it makes it harder to get jazz in."

That was Carolyn Albitton, who used to book Chicago's Cotton Club, where R. Kelly and Bernie Mac got their start.

She makes a pretty succinct case for why our culture always slides toward the lowest common denominator--sex, violence, teenaged drama--because adults won't pay for anything else. Not that there's anyone creating much else. The jazz she was trying to book is at best a middle-aged art form. 40 years old and hasn't had an originator in decades. I'm not surprised it can't compete. But we still expect to get over enjoyment, to surgically remove indulgence and giving a shit in public as part of what we call "being an adult". We expect to appreciate rather than enjoy art. (Which leaves us wide open to the multitude manipulations of the careerist artists and their accomplices in the art industry).

This is so boring Tom Wolfe wrote a book about it about 50 years ago. Luckily, I'm not a business owner but a child of god. And my missive is not to react fearfully to other people's fears, but to do what the fuck I'm here to do and make the shit I'd give my life to have exist. Regardless. I don't care if you pay for it, care about it, love it, leave it, get titilated, scared, verklempt or confused. I don't care if you never get over grunge, or admit you're still hungry after Sideways. I don't care if you insist that protest culture is where you want to hang your hat forever. I don't give a fuck. Or even a fuck that I dont' give a fuck. In fact I go to the gym 6 hours a week and do shit I don't want to just to forget how good you are at supressing your desires and controlling your emotions so I'll have half a chance at approaching you lovingly. But that doesn't mean I'm going to lie about it.

I'll be the crazy one. I don't care. I'll live at my mom's house with my sister and hang out with folks on the margin. (Not the white "margin"/cutting edge, which I've outgrown and now labor to indulge, mind you, the other, scary, one). You couldn't feed me anyway. So why would I do what you do? I tried your way. And it broke me. And bored me. And spit me out paralysed.

And it's not even your way. It's just what is. No one likes it enough to take responsibility for it, they just do it. That's one of the problems. The employee's not in charge, the manager is. The manager isn't in charge, the boss is. The boss isn't in charge, the board is. The board isn't in charge, the market is. The market isn't in charge, the shareholder is. White folks, for as fucking uptight and responsible as we are, have done a pretty good job at removing responsibility from the equasion. Well guess what? The shareholder is the employee. Is the manager is the boss. We are it!

I once wrote in a college manifesto (written with my friend Pierce), that our jobs will not support us, we will support them. Do the math. If you go back far enough, you'll find the only hand on the leash is your own.

I saw a great play the other night. It was based on Murakami's After the Quake--a book of short stories. If you don't know Murakami, he's a genius. One of the mo-fos that should be charging at least $60 for his shit. Maybe then people would appreciate what he's actually doing--making the absurd liveable (and meaningful). And training and charging into battle daily to do so.

The play was about just this. This battle going on. In the realm of imagination. In dreams. Around belief. And what it costs. And what we stand to lose if we lose. Or fail to face that which is real but which we can't see. I've read all of Murakami's stuff (except "After the Quake"). That's 9 or so books. And I'm not much of a reader. It's that good.

The nice thing about being alive at this point in time is that the battle is largely emotional.

In the old days, and still in many other countries, your path to true self-expression was one of the sword. And you risked being run through with sharpened stakes, or getting shot, tortured or worse.

All we've got to do is figure out what we want. Surprisingly, it seems just as hard or harder as winning our physical freedom was. But we're also turning the whole damn thing around--improvising. For generations after generation all people had to do was keep up the same old fight. Now half the deal is just figuring out what in the hell is going on. And what tools work and what tools don't work. We're not used to listening to our feelings. Taking care of ourselves. Resting when we're weary. Putting ourselves first. Getting real.

When you're a slave, or a serf, or an employee, there is a villain, a boss, a master. He's bad and you're good. Get free from him and you'll be better.

But in the realm of spiritual/creative freedom, it's just you and you. No one cares. You're the only one keeping yourself unhappy or preventing yourself from doing, saying or being whatever you want. You take responsibility.

And, After the Quake aside (a frog recruits the guy to go into battle with him), this battle you go into alone.

Utterly alone. Existentially alone. At the exact wrong time. Without the proper preparation.

AAAaaaaaaaaAAaaaaiiiiihhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!

And it is a freefall. Just cut the rope.

And you don't know what to do. And worst of all, you don't know what the hell you SHOULD be doing. Or what's acceptable, what's right. What's okay. Because you're creating, from the ground up, a new acceptability. A new okay. A new safety. A new right.

And that's part of the fun. If you were reading off a script it wouldn't be any fun. If it didn't take everything you thought you had and a little you never knew was even in you, you wouldn't even care to do it. Or grow a more solid faith as a result. If it didn't transform you into the person you always had a notion you were but never actually believed you could be, what would be the point?

And to get from here to there, in the present, (or maybe it's more like getting from there to here(?)), why wouldn't you do anything? Do everything. Drop al lthe bs? Why wouldn't you commit time and time again to moving forward? Why wouldn't you let the parts of yourself that you don't love die off? Why wouldn't you exercise your best parts and shine light on your darkest tar?

There's nothing else to do.

Which brings me to what I'm up to next.

I've done the money dance for a few weeks and the good lord (and our beautiful market economy) has hooked me up. I'm paying rent now at Mom's so I need a little more scrilla to hole up, but I've got enough for a couple months.

That's how we do it.

So back to the studio. The mine. Tha lab. I've got all my demo technical glitches out of the way. I've got the system down and almost know the software.

But even more important. I've grown a new chamber somewhere. I'd say my heart, but y'all might hate on me like Kanye. I'd say my soul, but it will help my singing more than the etherialality of that implies. I've just stared down another whole layer of this shit stone cold sober. Processed every feeling.

There was a killer part in the play where the writer character sits down at the foot of the bed where the woman he loves (and has just allowed himself to love) and her daughter lie alseep. He speaks to the audience saying what he wants to write. It's beautiful.

Well I want to write songs about the people who stay. About the love that gets deeper and jucier as it goes along. That fucks like there's no tomorrow at 45, at 50. That still feels it like the first time every time. Or at least bats .850 even after the kids are born.

I want to write songs about the miracle of every second, about the first bird of the year to risk opening his beak. The first squirrel to stop collecting nuts and return to goofing around as spring breaks.

I want to write songs about raising children in belief instead of protecting them from and preparing them for a cold world through doubt, testing and plain old adult wierdness.

I want to write songs that speak wordlessly, through tones and times, just like love itself. I force myself just at the right moment and you fucking love it. Eat it up.

Living this life is like fucking. Being alive is like fucking the world. You can shoot your wad any time you like. But you'll miss a whole lot of fantastic beauty if you give up and nod off sated. And are tired the next day because you didn't work hard enough. Or rest long enough. Even more if you have to get drunk to find the mood and coffee to recover.

There is another way. If you get nothing else from me, get this. Just being alive is enough if you allow yourself to feel it all. You can keep it up. Love does work. You can do what you want. You can feel it all day every day. And it does pay.

It might take training. It might take courage. It might take ten years.

Or it might happen instantly. Effortlessly. Right when you walk up and ask her out.

You won't know until you try. [Now go look at the accompanying photo, taken in Katmandu, btw.]