Getting Into It

I am definitely NOT Jesus (thank the lord), but I am having fun comparing my Lent to his. I just figured out my second temptation this morning (it has to do with a killer deal I'm working to procure). I'm constantly surprised at the number and variety of ways that I'll allow myself to feel put out. Basically whenever something switches from what I consider "going my way" to "not going my way". Forget that 99% of "not going my ways" actually end up going my way in ways I later come to understand. Put it this way--I got mad as hell when I got a chest infection and had to stop smoking.

The sermon today at church was great. (If you're not into church, consider this a Sanskrit teaching like in yoga class, or a particularly good moment on Oprah or something). Abraham, the chosen one, is ordered by god to sacrifice his only son, Isaac. He goes to do it and god says, no, no, just playing. But thank you, now I know you're serious. (Of course, this also mirrors god's devotion in sending his only son to die for us--now I know I've lost half of you. :) I'm amazed at how many people can draw from just about any source but the bible. Maybe I shouldn't, as I was the same. I took from self-help, Buddhism, Hinduism, Sufism--just about every ism but the bible. I'm not going to insert some wack pagan remark here, because these are all holy traditions in their own right, but I do find that I have the most to learn from the tradition in which I was raised. Even if it did take me the longest to be able to stomach it. More on resenting/taking for granted that with which we are most familiar later.)

The gospel reading was Peter trying to get Jesus to stop with all the "The son of god will be put to death stuff". Jesus replies that Peter has his mind on human things, not heavenly things. After, of course, telling him famously to "Get behind me Satan!" (See, it's a White Stripes reference!)

The priest this morning put everything through a Hollywood/movie lens. For Abraham, it was how he was, until that time, the star, and by being humbled so, he realized how much of what he was doing wouldn't be felt for generations--by other people long after he was dust. And how much of an opportunity he had to create something for future generations (this wasn't in the sermon, just my own editorializing). That it wasn't "about" him. Even though he was chosen, promised, etc. This one sunk in.

For Peter, the priest described the fear of a supporting actor taking the stage alone. He described in wonderful detail how many killer lines Peter got to lob, and what kind of seat he had while Jesus knocked them out of the park--what basking in the Jesus glow must have been like in general. In this passage, when Peter was confronted with Jesus' mortality, and the notion of having to carry his own cross (or even having his own cross), the fear shot straight through through him--and promptly trampled what he knew was right.

I'm not conveying this half as well as the sermon, but I really liked the idea that we're neither the star of the show nor a bit player. We can neither take the whole stage (what I needed to hear) nor can we shrink off and hug the curtain (what I used to try to do--and probably why I need to hear the first one now). Every one of us is crucial to what's happening and none of us is the only thing that's going on. (Not to mention that it's just as often our insecurity that leads us to imagine ourselves the star as it is to want to bask in someone else's reassuring glow).

The most radical part was when he asked us how we would write our own screenplay. What would we leave out? What juicy lines would we deliver? I'm moving at Reader's Digest speed now. Imagine the things you would take out of your own story. Imagine the things you don't want anyone to know. Are ashamed of even thinking. God's love for you was 100% even as you did it. Pretty great stuff. His punchline: nothing can separate us from god's love.

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I'm in the Lent mode and looking hard at what I want/am ready to learn to come all the way around. Who am I resisting? I've "done the work" reluctantly enough to know that there is an actual, physical and emotional payoff to learning that which I fear and resist. So now I usually just try to muster up the energy and "git 'r done". Or just enjoy myself--they often turn out to be the same thing.

In many ways I come from the vanguard of the liberal white tradition, and I think my last 5% (in the coming full circle metaphor) is in many ways coming back home. Like a reformed smoker, I went as far out and as far away from how I was brought up as I could. If it had informed the way I was living, and especially how I felt, after doing what I was supposed to do throughout high school, college and the work force, then I didn't want any part of it--and it must be wrong, right? I ditched Chomsky for Ayn Rand, Elliott Smith and Radiohead for hip-hop (and mainstream hip-hop at that--gasp!), I ditched yoga for lifting weights. I cut my hair, started shaving, doing my laundry, waking up early, and wearing Italian suits and English bench-made shoes. Earrings--gone. Nipple rings--gone. Moping--gone. Cutting own hair--gone.

I told myself that I was creating a hybrid of liberal and conservative--of community-based and individual values--but the way I felt the checker at the co-op held my organic chicken (like I had tortured it--and a baby seal or two--gleefully) pissed me off much more than George W. jumping into Iraq to finish his daddy's business. And lying about it.

To tell the truth, I was burnt. And people being jerks overtly and openly seemed much more real, much more honest in a way, than the morass of cloyed intentions and confusing care that seemed to swirl around on the left. Individuals claiming to represent communities and importance being doled out on the basis of need exhausted me. As I understood it at various times, the best thing that I could do, as a privledged white man, was de-privledge myself. And shut the hell up. Needless to say, this was problematic. Ultimately, I just wanted to know where people stood without mind-reading. And, what they liked and wanted. What their vision for the world was.

But even those statements hint at the kernel of control that seems to wriggle down deeper as I pull pieces out. In one sense, getting tired of critique and leaving the seminar is nothing but a more perfect form of critique. And an even more passive one at that. (Even though it may be a necessary step). The question remains: who's bringing the love, baby?

And to include myself in the answer, I'm going to have to love my own people--and, like it or not, the blue-haired young woman at the co-op, with or without PETA pin, is probably closer to who I am right now than George W., may god bless his soul. I am going to have to love white people. My white people. Even though I know our tricks inside and out. Our strengths and weaknesses. I'm often immune to their (see), our, strengths and often painfully aware of our weaknesses. But I'm white. And if I want the world I want this time around, then I'm going to have to love my people. It may be a distant love, it may be a close love, but it's going to have to be love. Appreciation on a bad day. Real time. Sounds good.

After all, I give everyone else the benefit of the doubt.

They say you should only critique that which you love. And that you can only truly hate that which you once loved. Are we getting somewhere yet?

And beyond all that, I just don't want to carry any dislike inside of me--for anyone! I don't want to be responsible for the foibles and shortcoming of my people. A know-it-all (too late?). I don't want to cringe as the already drunk college guy throws his keg cup down the street before noon on a St Patty's Saturday. I don't want to care if you ignore me at parties (if you can find me at one to do so). I did that and more. Much more. Way more. The sullen indie kid won't make eye contact, the businessman turns my hand over while shaking it.

What haven't I done? Nothing as far as I can tell. And I'm not self-flagellating here. I don't care that I did it either. How could I even tell someone not to smoke, if 10 years of a pack a day ten years ago is who I am? What if it's all process? Think about that? What if it is all ends? If the Nazis were means to an end and it was all ends. Every second an end? Every moment the payoff? What if it's all necessary? Everything happening right now? Everything happening right now!! And the best thing we can do--to be the lovely and lively individuals and communities we are--and to be more so as quickly and powerfully as we can--is get into it!?!

I watched the movie Shine last night, it wasn't quite as good as the book (is that critique?--that's a JOKE, yo!), but it had a few good points. If you don't know the story, David Helfgott was an Australian classical piano prodigy who had a schizophrenic break and largely came back from it. And could kill some almost unplayable pieces. In the break, he became like a child. He would walk around naked, hug everyone, get lost, leave the water running all over the floor, and in general have no boundaries or fear. Some of which was great, and was probably liberation, and some of which was probably a reaction to a more essential fear that he had swallowed whole.

The remarkable thing, though, was that he was pretty much into it all. Some he had to work on (especially "Daddy", who may have inspired or complicated the break), but I believe he could really see--most of the time. He loved traffic! When was the last time you sat in traffic excited? And why not? Finally at rest and moving at the sane pace we've dreamed of for years!?

Now if we could just have that freedom without groping women randomly or endangering ourselves or others (not to mention keeping the wheels of our considerable society moving).

Anyway, I want it all. As Snoop Dogg says: "I want it all--clean socks and draws". I want to walk down the street and be happy that we're all not talking to each other--if that's what we choose to do. Because that is what we have chosen--and are succeeding.

On another note: I think I may have been using my imaginative powers to try to escape. I think I may have been trying to construct a place to escape to instead of bringing what I want to me in the real world. Thinking I was in an unenviable position, of course, another reason to delay my success. I'm coming to see that I'm doing exactly what I want and how little I want to change. I already have cashmere, a $2,500 microphone and the guitars I want. I want my own house and I'm sure I'll find another $25K or so in recording equipment once The Love Artist goes big, but if I've been taken care of like this during my salad days, it ain't gonna be no thang to do a mortgage, flowers, a few trips, whatever. I've been out of the country flat broke--and that worked out too.

So, in the spirit of eternal prosperity, once my work reaches critical mass, I think I may want to put some of my hard earned scrilla into getting creative tools into the hands of young people. It's amazing that for $10K you can build a recording studio and almost no schools have them. We teach wood shop, technical drawing and commercial foods and we don't teach beatmaking? That's crazy. Maybe I'll put them up in Boys and Girls clubs and negotiate a 10% cut off of every beat sold.

Turn that into more.

Turn that into more.