Between Sleep and Awake

My dreams are reverting to that weird cusp between reality and fantasy which is nigh indistinguishable. Last night I dreamt that I got to go to a series of concerts to musicians and groups which I could have sworn I really enjoyed maybe a decade ago, when I first got into acoustic music and almost famous artists. The issue is that while the names elude me, the memories of the style , aesthetic, and sound were such a close approximation to reality in spite of being total fabrications of my psyche. I spent a better part of my morning trying to recall if I did indeed listen to bluegrass, or or music which had eccentric guitarists who were talented but would not garner main stream attention. The fact is I did, and do. They were simply no the musicians I dreamed of.
The night prior I dreamt I was in some shopping mall in France, but a few Russian speakers were also there. I think I was separated from my traveling group in that scenario. I speak basically no French, and can read maybe more than I can understand, sometimes. I was a lonely stranded expatriate in some indeterminate location which may as well have been an airport. Overall, it is a totally feasible situation which can happen, but has not happened to me. I find the nature of the trend towards the uncanny realism rather than the overt impossibility of the tings I usually dream of fascinating.

Maybe it is time to consider a different location to lay down some roots.

Chicago has been my home for over twenty years now, and there are many things and more importantly, people who live here who I love very much. All together those connections make the thought of relocating somewhere else really difficult if not damn near impossible. But it is NEAR impossible. After many years of nagging and an offer I could not refuse some friends drove me out to Easton Pennsylvania in the Lehigh Valley. It is near New Jersey, and not far from New York City. DC, as well as other choice destinations are anywhere between 2-3 hours away by car. There are several annual festivals with plenty of arts. I have had lackluster luck in trying to establish myself here in Chicago. Part of me thinks it is some sort of underlying current of self-sabotage. Another part of me thinks it has more to do with my stubborn refusal to do anything but what I studied in college to do because it is something which makes me happy rather than money. Money is however a necessary evil and living on such limited means when work appears to be scarce and what work there is is either minimum wage slavery. On an aside: we should raise the minimum wage and even McDonald's conceded in a very condescending report that if you wanted to live on minimum wage, you can't. You must have more than a McJob to do so. But whatever pride, or principles I claim to stand for has kept me from applying for a fast-food job are being pushed to a limit. That limit is relocation. If I can find some sort of meaningful employment which will sustain me, and permit me to do what I love: teaching art to adolescent age youth somewhere other than Chicago, why shouldn't I uproot myself elsewhere?

After 2 decades....

I just read this article.

I am aghast at the notion that in two decades the same statements are paraded forth and sexual assault continue to be a problem. The idea that commanders are doing anything about the epidemic of sexual violence at this point in time is laughable, and so devastatingly devoid of any iota of the purported values of honor and integrity, so profoundly and disappointingly bankrupt I struggle and fail to determine who has failed military sexual assault victims more: Military Commanders for allowing such a brazen problem to fester in their monumental denial, or Congress and the Department of Defense for not holding the Commander accountable to their word 20 fucking years ago?

Reflecting on the DOMA ruling today

When I came out to myself almost a full decade ago, I had resigned myself to the notion that there were some things in life which were never going to happen for me. There were things which I would never have and dreams I had to quell because of who I was, and what that legally meant here in the United States, let alone also serving in the military. It was a part of me I had parted with, which I saw as necessary in order to move forward with my life. It was my rearranging of the reality I constructed. Because of who I was, my religious identity changed because my being queer was seen as an abomination and a sin. I could not get married because that was something hetero folk did. Marriage was something which, looking back on now, I had subconsciously discarded. It was not something I was ever going to do.
I loosely followed the debate on the "Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA)", as well as "Don't Ask Don't Tell (DADT)". I felt the acute sting of betrayal when the first repeal of DADT failed, and elated when it finally was repealed. I knew that the Supreme Court was going to rule on DOMA this year after the knockout drag-out fight over California's discriminatory "Proposition 8 (Prop 8)". I knew that equal rights were something which was happening in small but important steps across the nation. That every year, and every election, there were small victories. Iowa was kind of surprising. Then eventually Washington State. But there was the challenge taken up to the Supreme Court. They ruled this morning that portions of DOMA were unconstitutional. There was in that ruling happiness that they did something which gave more rights to people who did not have them. There is irony in that they took some voting rights away just the day prior. But here was a federal path forward toward equality. Like Loving v Virginia, and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, here was another landmark ruling. I celebrated along with the hundreds of friends too elated by the ruling. And then it hit me. There is the possibility of if I fall in love with someone, and want to spend my life with him I can in the future get married. I was so overcome with emotion, it was like reuniting with a someone who I had thought dead, mourned, and missed brought back from the dead. I was paralyzed, weeping, and contrary to my countenance so overcome with happiness psychologically, and biologically, I had no clue how to react. I'm still grappling with the notion. A door I thought closed, and bricked over was all of a sudden open once again.
There is still a great deal of work to do. There are several states for which the ruling changes nothing for same-sex couples who wish to marry the one they love. There is still a tremendous and arduous fight for transgender rights both nationally, and for the military. In Illinois because there is no recognition of same-sex marriage, the ruling on DOMA is essentially meaningless. But the fact that it happened, is a monumental step in the right direction.

This has me on the verge of tears, and I am not sure if I will be able to stop if I break.

The Veteran's Affairs department as whole in the United States is striving up there as a spectacularly epic national embarrassment and shame. Veterans have to wait as much as 15+ months to hear whether or not they will receive treatment for their claim. There is a backlog of claims that is years long, and hundreds of thousands claims high. All this in gratitude for those who fight for our purported freedom... you know... if you still buy into that fairy tale. But still, the established promise we pay lip service to is that if you served in the military, you were willing to make the ultimate sacrifice, and we as a nation are in your gratitude. So why are there as many if not more than 22 veterans per day committing suicide, and 53 veterans dying per day waiting for their claim to be processed? Why is it that some veterans will make the impossible choice of committing suicide? I have no personal connection to Mr. Young, but I am emotionally devastated, and beyond ashamed at the United States.

Imagine for a moment that at your workplace, every day, there were 75 people dying off every day. It doesn't have to be your workplace, it could be your neighborhood How would you cope?

I feel such an acute pain of the betrayal this embodies by people who lionize and extol the virtues of our military service members, send us to war and then ignore us. My faith in the purported values of the nation is shaken to it's core. There is no excuse for this, and no amount of remarkable success stories which can overshadow this. This is damning and verges on the unforgivable.

A Moment of Reflection

I was looking through old posts in terms of what were some of the goals of things I wanted to have in my life. I was pleasantly surprised that I am actually kind of subconsciously realized one such goal: Having a Salon Style Art Display. In the past year my bedroom walls have become filled with an array of various artworks acquired as well as decorative elements, and show posters I like have meandered and accumulated on my walls.

Today I went to an opening for another gallery show. I've been sort of a hermit, and art making should not happen in the echo chamber of my own environment. I always find inspiration with various art collectives when they have different shows. This Opening had two shows "From Motion to Stillness" and "Copy*Right?". Both shows were well thought out and worked very well within the conceptual framework of  the titles. While I was inspired, I did come away with a growing sense of my own artistic insecurities and the fact that I am not sure the work I make in my spare time would be worthy of display alongside these artists. I'll definitely need to consider what work I consider "done" and what I could revisit....

An Arbitrary Anniversary

Eight years ago, I was fighting the flue and had missed a drill weekend which was part of my commitment to my contract with the United States Army Reserves. I actually agonized over whether or not I would go to drill that weekend because while I was sick and feeling rather miserable, I also had a misguided sense of duty combined with a diminished sense of self-care. I ended up doing what could be considered the responsible thing and stayed home with my sickness. It was February 13, 2005; a Sunday morning. My supervising NCO (Non-Commissioned Officer) called my house asking to speak with me. She asked me how I was, and if I was recovering well, and if I was sitting down. I said I was, and she replied with "You're going to Baghdad". Whatever visceral emotional response I might have had, I will never know. Reflexively I was a clear minded professional calculating a thousand things which were contingent on my almost robotic reply: "What's my timeline?"

The next day was a series of phone calls, and e-mails to school. I was within a year of graduation of a series of classes which I had fought tooth and nail through a portfolio review to get into. It was imperative I knew I would have my place held or if I was going to have to resubmit my portfolio again. I had to notify work, and I had to let certain friends and family know I was leaving soon - really soon.

After a few farewells, and a few very encouraging metaphorical but well needed kicks in the ass, I was not sad when I was saying my farewells and good byes. I consequently found out I would have far more time than the "This Thursday" my NCO told me, as there was training I had to complete prior to heading overseas.

The deployment was a profoundly formative experience in my life, which I cannot say with any sort of confidence that I would be the person I am today were it not for that experience. There are people whom I would have never been put on a path to meet were it not for how my military service and actually deploying affected the way I think, and helped shape my values and beliefs. There are people like Marc-Anthony, or Cherie whom I would have never spoken too or been fortunate enough to befriend. The introduced me to Sacha Sacket, wonderful ideas, and unbridled kindness of strangers. A longer lasting kindness than the Bangor Troop Welcomers, who also are very deserving of my respect.I would have never met the other "nerdiest person in the batallion" Lysandwr, my deployment girlfriend! If I had not deployed to Baghdad I would not have taken an interest in foreign languages and cultures, nor would I have gotten involved with the Vet Art Project, and met Lisa, Jessa, Tim, and subsequently Aaron, Sabrina, Nicky, Vinny, Alejandro, Barry, Hans, or Iris. My friendship with Susheela would not have been as nurturing nor fulfilling. I would not make the kind of art which I am making now, nor would I explore the ideas and grapple with the issues which I grapple with now.

So today, I honor my eighth anniversary to my deployment to a war we should have never fought, but my involvement in has made me a more conscientiousness and engaged inhabitant of the world.

Trying to organize my thoughts and creative impulses

In the past three days I have started preparing at least 5 canvases of varying sizes with a distinct spacial constraint in my work space. I'm juggling drying space with two easels on which I work with either painting or waiting for something to dry just enough before I continue working on it. Overall I am building backgrounds, though technically the works as they progress can be abstract explorations in themselves.  could leave them as well enough, but the premise is unsatisfying and weighs as intellectually lazy on my part considering I have several concepts which I have been toying around with. The intersection between my starting such a big workload in such a short time given my sporadic art making schedule is I am starting many surfaces and I am not certain or completely oblivious to how I am going to finish each artwork. I generally have two series of works which I have been working on recently or researching to work on; Idle/Idol Worship, and basically making works generated from a pool of artists whose work I admire. Both of these ideas generate several lists in how I will explore each concept.

Idle/Idol Worship was a concept which emerged from the sort of celebrity worship which starts in the teenage years with an unchecked zeal and fervor, but wanes over time. As an adult I keep that impulse in check to some degree, but I still have several favorite actors/actresses, singers, performers and celebrity individuals. My students do as well. They plaster their notebooks with printouts and cut outs, draw pictures of them for class projects, have stickers, and basically make small sort of shrines to them in their belongings. In this idea, I have been looking at the celebrities which I have followed overtime, and taking that similar kind of "celebrity worship" and juxtapose it with different religious images and representations, such as candles, and I would wager a lot of Medieval and Renaissance Art. In a sense it is a look at what other people including myself worship besides religion, and how that worship manifests itself in visible ways.

In the second which is basically a stitching together of elements from various artists and art movements I like, it is a little more nebulous and difficult to pin down. Consistently on my list are artists Jose Parla and Kehinde Wiley. I love Parla's free-flowing abstractions of script and the way he takes elements from the street such as wheat pasted posters, advertisements left behind, and layers onto them washes of paint and scripting. From Wiley I admire his skill in rendering his figures in such a naturalistic fashion, imitating the works of historically lauded dead European/White men and mixes in the decorative elements with very garish flowery sometimes feminine aspects to them. Generally any sort of realism involving the human figure draws my attention, and lately a lot of that has been J.C. Leyendecker and Jack Vettrianno's works. Usually I will find some random photo on a fashion blogging site and apply elements from everything I have listed in this paragraph.

I am not sure which way I will veer in this bountiful problem... though it is not a problem at all. After all, more art is a good thing.

The uncontrollable reflex of making meaning of random events

After three and a half years of working with the Community Arts Sustaining Academics at Hurley Elementary, it was decided that what I was doing with and for the students and what the School Administration would like to do with the students were no longer coalescing in the administration's interest. Having to show evidence that the program coordinators are working with their partners schools, they let me go. Today was my last day at Hurley Elementary, and I was touched by how much people there saw me as a part of their community, and their genuine surprise and heart-rending disappointment that I was going, and that my transition from there was only one day. I told my students the news and many of them responded with a loud and whining "Why?!" followed by a resolute "I'm just not going to come to class anymore." which also had the sting of feeling scorned. After all, this was not the end of school year fare well, but a sudden withdrawal and change in their routine. We took a photo together, and then I explained what we would be doing in class that day, how the class was going to change in a broader sense with the new art teacher, and that I would miss all of them very much.
Both before and after class, I sought out the people who I had worked with in the past three and a half years and gave them a small sealed "Thank you" card personalized with a short thank you for all the ways in which they had welcomed me and made me a part of their community, and how I cherished what they had done.  Some people, including in the administration expressed surprise and a palpable sense of disappointment, as if my departure was an injustice to them on some level. It was very heartwarming what they shared with me in my last work day. At the end of class, each of my students wanted to give me a hug, so I obliged. I organized the materials as neatly as I could in the cramped storage space, grabbed my bag and walked out of the building. Having been notified about my transition from the program, I had already mourned and basically accepted the reality of what was happening. To a certain degree, it paralleled my experiences bidding my farewells to friends, colleagues, and professors when I was deployed to Iraq. They were more distraught than I was at the moment.
On the drive home, listening to my playlist, two songs played consecutively; a paring which begged, and reflexively claimed meaning. Individually, and in any other context you can put any two songs together and assign them a meaning based on the situation. I had paired the song "Disarm" by The Smashing Pumpkins with an eight kilometer ruck march in Basic Training. My best friend had sent me the lyrics in a letter and I had read them prior to the march so fragmented memory of how the song went played in cadence with my footsteps. The song "Such Great Heights" by The Postal Service is forever associated with my family and a friend and his son dropping me off at the airport post Easter Sunday before I deployed to Baghdad. Given the context of those sample situations, the lyrics from the songs, such a memory is very strongly imprinted to those melodies. So after the ordeal of saying farewell to my students, and my seemingly sudden departure from the program, the songs "Used" by Sacha Sacket, immediately followed by "Risk of Change" by Holcombe Waller summed up both the mild bitterness from being let go, but also the ideals I would like to further embody in this new calendar year.
I do hope that my kids have been changed for the better, and they remember fondly the time they had spent in my class.