Reverse the Hip-Gnosis

Okay. Your friendly neighborhood lover artist is--IN.

Cachunk. (That was the quantum time clock being punched. Luckily it measures not time but love--the root of all space, matter and time.)

Here're the current dilemma horns on which I'm hanging my hat:

When I was grunge, back in the day, my absolute worst fear was that I was supposed to be with someone I wasn't physically attracted to. That the women who for me induced Robt. Williams-like tongue dragging were the world's window dressing. To be seen and know "known".

As a youth I never felt confident about the way I looked but I did remarkably well with girls. Not often but certainly quality. Smart, energetic, beautiful girls and, when I grew up, women.

I didn't date as often as I would have liked, and it was often years between serious girlfriends. And as I became more serious about being an artist, a troubling gulf began to show itself.

The folks I was hanging out with were at the least bohemian--and at the most full-blown punk rockers with things like FTW tattooed on their hands or necks. I had the chain wallet, the earrings and at one point even nipple rings. I cut my own hair, wore dirty shirts and bathed sporadically. I rode a motorcycle and got in free to most shows. I drank 40 ouncers of Country Club and ate spaghetti topped with soy saouce--I think I've already detailed most of what would give me whatever counterculture cred, but suffice it to say that I was about as close to being down as you could be.

But I never liked punk women. I like women with spunk, and luckily the real counterculture back in those days wasn't really about studded leather jackets and working at Starbucks--at least where I was--so there were plenty of extremely intelligent people who rocked a variety of styles. And likely less black than these days. The dress code wasn't quite as set.

But even with that, I still lusted after beautiful, clean, tall women who stood up straight. Almost any ballet dancer could catch my attention just with her posture. And the lines of them that came out of the Pacific Northwest Ballet center up by where I worked would have me planning where I would eat lunch. And insisting on a window seat (or pleasantly surprised when it all worked out, anyway--I was a stressed out graphic designer and more at the mercy of the clock than I would have liked to admit. Even though I worked 7 hours a day five or six months a year.)

This truth filed me with some sort of shame. Part of me felt like a sell out--that I wasn't true to the egalitarian nature of socialismo. The other part of me was more succinct: I can't hit that.

I tried at times to date women I wasn't really attracted to. And they were attractive, and incredibly intelligent and kind. And probably wondered what the hell I was doing scooted all the way over to the edge in their queen sized beds. I heard later that one of them wondered out loud to a friend if I was gay.

I wondered to--and I think I've already gone into this before so I'll spare you. But if my sex, my lust, my fucking was so unholy that it needed to be moderated with significant doubt, it's only a matter of time before you just assume that the opposite of what you want is right or holy.

These days, after much soul searching and hours of walking the streets letting truths distill in myself--and some therapy--and some balls, I am comfortable with the women I want for the most part. The remaining question is what do I really want?

(And I should note that it's no surprise that the house I'm living in is getting its basement redone, and that I'm making significant progress on an old hip injury. That's where all this stuff resides. These are the physical manifestations of some seriously deficient beliefs I've been carrying around for a long-ass time. Pun intended. And I'm sure they have just about everything to do with my artwork, my finances, my love quotient and my health and vitality.)

I should also mention that I though that January was the Monday morning of the year. I think it actually may be the Sunday night--which may mean that things are still shape shifting and being examined before becoming clear.

The wonderful thing about working with belief and imagination is that what is possible expands greatly.

The downside being that what we think is possible may expand ever further.

When I started out love art-ing the whole premise was that it is possible to have everything. That you can have the love of your life, be fully realized as a person, make tons of cash, do what you want every day, enjoy a relaxed life and be real as a mug. And even have kids and hang out with your friends and family.

If you're willing to do what it takes. And if you're willing to be yourself and take complete responsibility in all of those areas.

But maybe I'm still pussyfooting around the issue. The issue for me is how much do I wand, and do I really believe that I can handle a 100% relationship and be 100% artist with 100% commitment.

One of my recent girlfriends, the one who I was the most magnetically connected to--frighteningly so--seemed like she wanted more attention than I was able to give. I was much younger at the time, especially emotionally, and I may have been shrinking from some of my responsibilities at the time, but it felt like it was either her or art. Almost like my connection to the muse was drying up as I loved her.

Another, more recent, was much more supportive, but much less intense. My point here isn't to digest the past or say he said, she said, but to find out if being completely myself and completely in love are mutually exclusive.

Do we sell out for love? Or is it selling out when we take an easy relationship so that we can "get more done"? Can we be the best possible artists if we settle for less than what we most desire in our personal lives?

Or is what we're most fervently attracted to an addiction of sorts--a fantasy/the dream of dreams--pornography that takes us away from ourselves. (This is what the most expert expert I asked said.)

There's no doubt that when I was younger part of my fascination with beautiful women was a hunger for the power they possessed--stemming from insecurity. But it's not like as I've gotten stronger and happier--more myself--I've started liking women I'm less attracted to. If anything I'm more confident in my ability to attract and satisfy them.

At the gym today I was hypothesizing that maybe this uber-desire--the type of desire for me embodied by women like Halle Barry--may just be some kind of childish attempt to break off and detach from everyday life. Join the tanned, surgeried, airbrushed hotness of LA.

But I'm not attracted to most women. Which is long-term most likely a good thing. And the women I am attracted to usually fall into two catagories: the first is younger, with a buoyant energy and very fresh-faced. This type of woman in my estimation, hasn't been crushed by society's divisions--hasn't really taken sides yet and so is still fairly whole, if somewhat (for someone my age--almost 40) inexperienced.

The second is closer to my age, still with positive energy but more grounded and fierce. Has seen both sides and did something, somewhere to manage the two. It's not very common, and maybe sometimes the women I see like this just appear to have it together (I don't get to talk to all of them, unfortunately). The first time I brought a woman like this into my bohemian shared housing, a roommate noted: shes a real woman. (She may have said "She's a grown-up). Tends to be taller, more imposing--more high maintenance possibly (at least seemingly) but also more learned in what the speed of life is like.

If I can risk being completely un-PC here, I'll admit that as I'm often symbolized by a house in my dreams, that these women are as well. The question being--is one best off buying low in a yet to be discovered neighborhood--the traditional artist's way to financial stability (gentrification)? Do we bring the world to us--become Brooklyn cool before it's cool and make a mint?

Or is that played? Do we go for what we want right off the bat? Spend longer in the wilderness then clean up/drop in fully realized, large and in charge? (Humbly of course). Do we knock it farther out of the park and then start taking over "their" serious real estate? Buy the biggest brownstone we can right downtown? (I've already got it picked out if this one wins). Are we at the point where we're going to do less pioneering the ghetto and more topping the bland mainstream? There's no way I can talk about this--what is essentially a personal choice--without being somewhat offensive, but please understand that the spirit behind the inquiry is as pure as I can make it. These questions are as serious as they get.

And I think it's all connected. I feel its all connected.

I should mention that I haven't been going to church lately. The spirit that moved me to do so in the first place started unmoving me. I also feel like I've got more church in my day to day life. --Not the first time that doing something that felt and looked less "holy" was actually progress--assuming I'm not summoned back. (It wouldn't be the first time I've flip-flopped either, though eventually things stick pretty solidly).

I can't help feeling it all comes back to belief. Can I have it all? The question is can I believe I can have it all? Can I give up on the drama and uncertainty and potential futures and nail down the concrete present? Ccan I give up my fear of success, my fear of money, my long cherished fear that material prosperity comes with a spiritual price. That realized love comes at a productivity/potential price? (Well if you put it that way..)

Cause I don't give a fuck about potential. I want the real deal--in front of me. To have and hold.

Though there was that one dream that suggested that when you can pull women like Tony Bennett...

But that seems like a lot of work too. And who do you bring for Christmas? I'm happy to consider it, and if it's true, I'm open to it. It certainly makes sense to part of me. But I'm not sure if that part is my highest self. Or even what I really, really want.

One of the main things I believe Christ was teaching was that the path to god is through the body. (No one shall get through the father except through the son). This didn't mean that you must accept Jesus as lord but that we must fully understand the physical manifestation of this airy fairy concept of god we've been batting around--the relationship between concrete reality and god's will. That the body is holy. That we are creators like the creator we are created in the image of--and therefore responsible for much that we see, feel, and hear around us. This world is real, and we are not separated from god--or anything real, important or meaningful. And we're here for a reason.

My question is how much body? And what's real body? It's no secret that we want to get more sensual and more sexual--rock the boat a little, feel our feet and smell with our knees. Relax our noggins and taste our food--but where do we stop? Or do we stop? Where do we apply discipline and where do we indulge? I gave up four-fifths of the foods I enjoy (more actually), most of the drinks and most of the substances--was this so that I could indulge in the most holy of feelings--and be present for it? Or was that just showing me that the reason I'm really here is self-denial.

I'm heavily invested in the former. It took a lot of crocodile tears as I gave up pasta, sugar, coffee, smokes, potatoes, beer, tomato sauce, and an almost ridiculous laundry list of other enjoyables, but I've already been cashed out emotionally and physically and mentally. The jackpot, though, the pot of (white) gold at the end of the rainbow, is love. And money.

I believe, but am still taking notes. I'll let you know what I find.

And now that I'm officially talking about doing it instead of doing it about talking, I bid you adeiu. Buy and read my book, The Love Artist. This is all the stuff that it's about, but more essentially--I believe the answer is actually in there--and I still read it often in my attempts to find and hold on to it. $120 is peanuts for this kind of information. (Gave up those, too, BTW.)

If you get it now you can say you were there before everyone else. And early copies should be going for thousands on eBay within a few years.

If you wait until the album comes out you'll get the mass produced Bantam-printed copy like everyone else. And where's the fun in that?

Love,

Eben