If You Want It, Here It Is, Come And Get It

I had a dream about basketball--me worrying about touch fouls and a radio DJ from the S. Side informing me bluntly that the game was played much more physically where he was from.

So maybe I've been pussyfooting it a bit. Trying New Age style to stay on the so-called positive and ignore the so-called negative. Maybe even whitewashing?

Which makes it a great time to bring up what else has to happen before we get to this glorious world, part of which will be pioneered by White Gold.

Coming up I lived for what we then called "college rock"--the second generation of punk made by folks who had never seen a working class neighborhood in London.

These guys were smart, unapologetic and had balls to boot. They did what they wanted. They were powerful.

My relationship to all things counterculture was such a given that I didn't even think of it as counterculture. My love and knowledge was deep. I investigated Situationism, found old school freaks and hopped on board long before many of the trends became commonplace.

I loved Mayakovsky and other Suprematists, Constructivists, Futurists, and all their proto, cubo and splinter offspring. It seemed to me that they had found a way to live, a way to thrive.

And it seemed obvious to me that the be-boppers, the beats and their modern offspring in hip-hop and punk were the closest things we had to a modern truth.

But alongside of this cultural appreciation lay a profound unhappiness. It seemed that not only had I been born too late but the whole world had conspired to deny me of a good time.

I, of course, responded by "good timing" as long and as hard as I could. Staying up all night, destroying people's property, destroying various parts of myself, creating art that would show the squares what living was really about.

But none of this eventually went anywhere. It never made anything in me stronger--even my feeling of freedom or abandon. It never erased the almost stifling self-consciousness I had picked up somewhere along the way.

Even though all of it tried so hard to shake it loose.

Which is pretty much how I ended up a former successful graphic designer with $8,000 in the bank sitting down to write a book called The Love Artist.

At the time I was listening almost exclusively to Leonard Cohen and Elliott Smith, with a little Al Green and maybe a little Lauren Hill thrown in for good measure.

My friends who weren't "in the scene" called the music depressing but to me it represented the truth. It was literally a representation of the nature of the universe. The closes one we had. And the beauty it contained was proof of that.

When I started writing I could see immediately that the book was going to turn out one of two ways: I could write it from who I was at the moment--some kind of uber-Clerks know it all Nihlist, taking sarcasm to some insane quantum DNA level and insisting that God himself was fucked and everything that had ever happened was innately wrong--or it would be something else altogether.

The first option held the allure of possibly detaching me once and for all from "bourgeois" society. Even though I knew everything, I was still relying on commerce--as a professional none the less--for my living. Maybe if I renounced capitalism all the way I would finally be free or pure.

The problem with that was that I already didn't like myself very much, and that seemed to be accelerating a tack that I had already explored. Being cool-er from cool. I wasn't sure there was anything on the other side of that door that I was truly interested in.

In fact, I wasn't sure that there was anything, for me, on the other side of that door but death. My own. I wasn't necessarily suicidal but I felt like I knew where unhappiness and detachment led to when the flames were fanned.

I didn't enjoy life. At all. And although there were plenty of philosophers that agreed with me that that was due to the nature of the universe, I couldn't ignore the people who seemed to get pleasure out of things that I derided. Things as simple, sometimes, as shopping at Old Navy. And no matter how much I convinced myself that those people were full of it, a trip downtown held incontrovertible proof that leisure and a full stomach, along with some clothes and a safe, warm place to live were at least sufficient to make people BELIEVE they were happy.

My second option scared the shit out of me. Something else.

Anything else.

It wasn't really much of a choice as I knew the first option would lead to my swift demise and, despite my condition, I wasn't really interested in that. Plus, I had known love and could feel what was real.

If only I could maintain it.

So my guiding principle became fuck it. Not only would I not give a shit about that part of society I considered "mainstream", right wing, crass, deluded, and repressed; but I ALSO wouldn't give a shit about what MY people thought: the freaks and punks, the leftys, the "in touch", the cool, the hip, the artists.

I just couldn't afford them anymore.

And so I wrote--deprived of both my scathing criticism for normal society and the comfort I derived from being part of the crowd that "knew" what was going on.

This didn't leave me much to write about from my old perspective. In fact, there wasn't much to write about but myself. --Which felt selfish, self-important, ego-centric. And exhilarating.

I couldn't do it straight right away. I gave the characters different names and told the truth. But even the truth was a little boring. So I told the emotional truth. A truth that could cut as quick and shift as completely as the wind. Just like real life.

Starting out I would get jacked up on coffee to write. To "get in".

I could see that this was fucking up the book--that anything written on coffee would feel like coffee--but as the story was essentially a suicide note I figured it worked.

Then I started editing.

While editing I realized that I was crushing all the beauty and all the delicate, vulnerable parts that I had somehow mustered up the courage to write. Or had managed to let out while my internal editor was turned off.

Writing I had promised that I would just write the truth and the later worry about the emotional, personal, creative and spiritual risks of putting it out. Coffee helped turn the stream on--even if I payed heavily for it afterwards--but coffee while editing was the exact opposite: it napalmed everything but the biggest trees and eradicated all but the darkest colors.

Still dependent on the kick, and still unable to release the truth in an atmosphere of peace; I switched to tea while doing the primary editing and then weaned myself off slowly. Realizing that I was axing huge, wonderful parts of the jungle I had created, but still not wanting to leave an unedited free-associative mess, I took to just crossing out and leaving parts I thought were dubious.

Which ended up working very well. As much of the book it about "the editor", what better way to be that than to see the editing going on while the book progresses.

Somewhere along the way I realized that half the shit I was editing out was the cute shit. (Some of which could be done without). Along with it was the reaches, the delicate, glistening hopeful parts. Anything that could be labeled corny.

But some of life is cute. And some is corny. And some is wistful as hell. So how is erasing all of this somehow the truth.

Which brought me straight back to my relationship with the counterculture.

The counterculture is a signal. An amplified, standardized signal that broadcasts from a certain place to a certain audience. It started off with many anomalies and quirks but has come of age as of late and is essentially as "professional" as the mainstream.

In some cases more, as the mainstream doesn't try as hard to be what it is. Still gets drunk and dances once in a while. Or takes their kids to ballgames and cheers. Or hangs out at the playground.

I don't know when it occurred to me that the separation was going to be complete, but it happened. And when it did, I started seeing that much of the music I had chosen to surround myself with was depressing--consciously.

That it didn't represent more accurately the nature of the world. Sure, it talked about things and entertained emotions that the other side didn't have access to, or were afraid of, but it's own fears and prohibitions were just as severe--possibly moreso.

The counterculture was in some respects an improvement on normal culture. It was developed hundreds (thousands?) of years after whatever started mainstream culture and had lots of time to ponder things before making decisions. The mainstream's shortcomings were pretty apparent at this time to anyone with access to even half a heart.

But like all reactions it didn't quite get it right. And underneath all the righteous posturing and knowing it all in myself I found an even stronger desire to relax--and give up both control and judgement. And a deep, deep desire to simply TAKE--for myself--what it was that I had always wanted from all the politicians, art movements, girlfriends, moms and dads, brothers and sisters, punkers and teachers I had ever LOVED, admired, disparaged and/or HATED.

Why not just do what I wanted? Like the Nation of Islam. Wear a suit. Go to they gym. Eat, live, pray, walk, feel, smell, wash, buy, sell, make, process, enjoy, fuck, love what, who, where and when I wanted.

Why not just do what I wanted? Why just not wait? Not wait for individuals or communities. Not wait for business or non-profits. Not wait for reform or conservation. Why not just be who and how I wanted?

Why not just exist as the signal I was? Why not give up on standardization in all of its forms.

It felt lonely.

Very lonely.

It had been one thing to step out on the squares with only some weird punk rockers waiting, but I knew the punk rockers and they were kind. They were smart. And, best of all for me, they had the best art--bar none.

Which meant they must knew what the fuck was going on.

But leaving the rounds. That was different entirely. It wasn't a mental exercise but a physical separation. I wasn't 15 but 32. There wasn't anywhere I was leaping to. There wasn't any pillow, no one cared that I was leaving (as my parents may have when I shaved my head, got a chain wallet, pierced my nipples, or stopped bathing regularly).

And their wasn't any art that had been yet made where I was going. Except possibly some of van Gogh--and some of the other greats. And maybe certain beats. Or hints of songs, parts of movies.

It hurt when I turned off Elliot Smith and Leonard Cohen. It didn't hurt when I stopped playing the song with the chorus "Hate makes the fucking world go round!", that I had just grown out of. [Eb: That would be Olivelawn, who I relied upon to make it through my time as a bike messenger--when I literally (chose to) exchange drops of sweat for quarters.]

But I felt I related enough to Elliot to know he was going to kill himself. And when he did (or even after he tried) it just seemed to me more and more clear that whatever the counterculture was, whatever it had given us, that it had failed to take us all the way. And was toxic.

It's hard for me to write that. Part of me feels like a reformed smoker decrying the evils of smoke and another like I may just be an uber-hipster--one who has turned against even hipsterism. But I don't feel I can be honest about what I am creating unless I also describe with clarity what it is not.

I say that not because I think creation--no maybe that's not true either. Maybe creation takes equal parts destruction and growth. Equal parts life and death.

I was going to say that we were at a turning point and so needed clarity about where we were going before things turned more positive, but maybe the best, the truest life, like the truest art, has as much shadow as light. --I did think they ruined the Sistine Chapel when they cleaned it.

And I do think that new age folks can get a little full of it when they insist on being popsitive. (I'm gonna leave taht mistake just cause--that one too.)

Have you ever seen a ball illuminated by a light source that wasn't half dark? NOt saying that that that ball wouldn't be completely happy being it's half-illuminated self--or even that it wouldn't be later illuminated by multiple light sources (though only one of them could be the sun).

When I got to the bottom of the counterculture (and I should pick it up now, cause the Bears game is on), I found a love for the bottom that mirrored exactly the mainstreams love for the top. I found an idealization of the victim--and a conferring of authority on the victim/loser--that was identical to the idealization of the oppressor/winner the mainstream displayed.

And I often thought back to the phrase that you can't build a new house with your father's tools. The one thing that the counterculture hadn't given up was the critical method. Was control. They were still fighting to be right--and they had succeeded in convincing multitudes that being wrong was right.

I don't know what else to say except to clarify that the culture I am talking about, that will reap prices of $120 for a book--and up--is not a new counterculture. It is not a splinter group.

Maybe I should talk directly to my artists here.

You can't get there listening to even Neil Young. Unfortunately. And I have loved me some Neil Young. As in listened to every day loved. (Everyone Knows This Is Nowhere).

It's not going to be a better Neil Young, or Grunge that gets us anywhere. Because that's not what we want anymore. We are more sophisticated than that. Thanks to Neil Young and Grunge.

What I really want to tell you is that you can still pick up the guitar, or keyboard, or mouse, and be the artist you are. Be unbelievably valuable.

But first you've got to be ruthlessly honest. Lovingly honest. Tenderly real. About what you want and what you want for others. Your children.

And what kind of adults--what kind of you--that demands.

All this other stuff--talk of mainstreams and countercultures, politics and religions, yoga and lifting weights--this is all just training, preparation.

Training for us to be alive enough to make an entirely present culture. One that doesn't age. One that exists out of time. One that shows effortlessly the journey that we have already taken--and landed us here.

Right Now.

To do this, we do the work first. We be who we want to be and then let the song drop. The work is in the front side--in the letting go and the strengthening. In the acceptance and acceptance. (That would be "positive" acceptance--allowing--and "negative" acceptance--letting go).

Because the TRUE truth of the matter is that we are neither oppressors or victims, we are neither right or left. We are neither more accurate worshipping a male or female god (though I tend to think that the universe skews ever so slightly creation at the moment, which would probably suggest .001% or so greater "female" energy--which would also probably mean that we can relax--be slightly passive--and still enjoy all that the world has to offer, as it will come to us in our beauty and we don't have to go out and hustle it up like exhausted used car salesman.)

We are also neither dirty or clean--though both are certainly proper expressions of ourselves and should be believed if someone insists upon them.

We are neither perfect NOR flawed.

And the most beautiful thing about all of this, although it seems to constrict us to the most narrow of patches in the middle of the road--and the most tepid of possible positions culturally, socially, politically and personally--is that we get to be what we've always already been: WARM!

And with warm comes loving, enjoyable, relaxed. Active, constructive, flexible.

And forget how good the art is going to be. That's nothing. The love is going to be off the hook. What we're dropping into is the present, where our fears on both sides are gone. And it is only in this present that we can even recognize true love to accept it.

And that's a deep warmth--that's the premise that Hollywood has been faking as "hot" for years but somehow never delivers. And I've fucked women that hot. (Actually a bit hotter.) And it was a downright chilly experience compared to the deep warm. To even the shadow of the real thing.

When the chemicals are engaged. When the emotions are straight. Even if it took a fight.

Forget about it.

You can't forget about it.

And that's what we're building.

Right in the middle of our society--with a price point that guarantees it will be there forever like the church never had.

(Note: The church I went to--right downtown, beautiful building--no gorgeous building--and the most loving and honest church I could find--just sold off half its block for a high rise. In whose shadow it will spend the rest of its days.)

That will never happen again. Not on my watch.

All the love in the world.

Go Bears.