Writing for exercise
This is one of those days where I don't have much to say and I'm hoping that by just writing, I'll come across something universal or brilliant or just entertain you. >points<
Currently, the Modest Mouse song "Float on" is on both MTV and FUSE. How crappy is that? It's an interesting song, in a "boy, this song drives me crazy" kind of way. It does... it's one of those songs, and maybe they are one of those bands, where people who "know" music say "Oh, Modest Mouse is so good because they do their own thing and don't sell out and blah blah blah"... but you listen to the music and it's just irritating crap. Go ahead and say they're a good band, you elitist bastard, I'll stick with stuff that I actually enjoy listening to, thank you very much.
Mah Pistons won game 7 last night. I was unable to watch the game as I was making (I think around) 28 pans of ice cream... but I used Ken to give me updates (thanks Ken). And, ladies, Ken didn't mind being used. >wink wink, nudge nudge<
On to something else... my throat still hurts. I'm pretty sure I have some kind of inflamation of something back in the back of my throat, and that I should get anti-biotics, but I honestly have no idea where I'd go to do that. So I'll just have a sore throat and bitch to you non-verbally about it.
Andrea lent me a book last night... "Letters to a Young Poet" a collection of letters by Rainer Rilke. It's interesting in a "artists will always feel alone for some reason" kind of way. I was reading through it and one of the things Rilke asks this poet he's writing to is if this kid (a Mr. Franz Kappas) can live without writing: if he MUST write. If the answer is yes, then by all means, keep writing: if the answer is no, then one shouldn't write at all. I tend to disagree... but perhaps that's because I don't feel like I must write. But, even as I say that, I realize that I've created my own webpage just so that I can write whenever I want to. I've been going back and forth with this question for a while (obviously): must I write? Most of the time, my mind answers "No, I don't have to write to stay sane or to have an enjoyable, fulfilling life" but then I keep writing... plays, poems, songs, blog entries... I just keep writing. So maybe there's something my body or soul knows that my head doesn't?
And, yeah, I just alluded to it in my last paragraph, but I still don't understand why artists (writers in particular) always feel this great sense of solitude. I don't get if maybe they think no one would understand (which isn't true for at least two reasons), or if it's some kind of self-inflicted solitude... which is just stupid and unproductive.
While "poets" claim to be one with nature in their isolation from humanity, can't it be said that humans are a part of nature? Isn't it some kind of denial of nature to go without writing a simple poem about humanity, human nature, or basic human interaction? Rilke says to focus on subjects that are somehow 'eternal' (he is talking about staircases designed my Michelangelo at the time), but if one were to truly tap into human nature, wouldn't that be as eternal as the ocean, the sand, or the sky? Couldn't future generations enjoy the experience as well? Or are we, yet again, trying to separate ourselves from nature?
Don't get me wrong... I don't disagree with everything he's saying. I just read a passage where he says (translated quotation) "that something is difficult must be one more reason for us to do it." I find that a totally true statement... I'll always tried to do what I thought was difficult. Perhaps it was to prove something to myself, perhaps it was to prove something to others... but I wanted to go to college where I didn't know anyone and succeed on my own, and I did; I wanted to stretch my mental horizons by getting more interested in Literature, and I did; I wanted to move to a big city and try to make my way there, and I'm doing it so far. All these things were not easy, and it's taking distinctive and separate incarnations of myself in which to do it. ("Um what?" you say) Well... I'm under the belief that I have been at least three separate and completely distinct people already in my life. Perhaps you >points< would call it a transition from where I was to where I am now... but I view it as a reinvention of myself, of who I am. This is why I will always be 'for' someone branching out and leaving the cushy past behind, and 'against' someone staying in the same city, doing the same thing their whole life... because I feel that these "reinventions" are a way of making me better... they are improvements, and the improvements are almost constant. I'm always getting better and better ("at what?"). Okay, I'm getting centered, I'm becoming my own whole and not looking "outward" for completion... all these things are important, yet I still understand that to be truly complete I must find >shrug< whatever it is that I am and have been looking for. I guess that might make sense only to me.
Wow... I'm almost done with the book already. Rilke started talking about women, and the immediate connection that they have to nature (because of the whole 'being able to give birth' thing). I tend to agree that women have a more immediate connection with nature, and perhaps even have a better insight into nature. But, I feel that the kind of higher status with which he attributes to women can (or rather should) only be granted to women who have had children. Correct me if I'm wrong (because I know you'll correct me even if I'm not), but what seperates a woman who hasn't had a child from a man? There is no connection with the genesis of "life" on a very basic a fundamental way that only a woman who has been pregnant truly knows. In my opinion, women who have gone through life (a full life, I'm not talking about my peers) without experiencing childbirth are somehow denying nature: missing something. I can see the backlash from this statement from a mile away... it goes something like this "blah blah blah... women don't have to be pregnant... blah blah still lead fulfilling life... blah can do whatever I want... my body" and so on. But I would say the same to a man who dies a virgin... there's something very basic, natural, and primative that you were supposed to do (according to the "laws" of nature) that you denied. Yes, of course you can still lead a fulfilling life... and you can still be artistic, poetic, and creative... But we're talking about a basic level of natural understanding that, really, only women who have had life created inside of their bodies can experience. Men don't even come close. Even if we wanted to. The best we can do is make claims as to the nature of nature based on logic or insight. Hello Philosophy!
So the next time you hear of a woman poet who has had children talk about giving life or the creation of life... I think it's safe to assume she knows a little more about it than, say, I do.