Duck and Cover: Self Preservation or Cowardace?

Things happen quickly around the office. Hours are spent doing nothing, then WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! the deadlines come fast and furious. It's the result of being the end of the line for the jobs that go out. As it happens, errors sometimes occur because there is a shitload of information I need to know, and sometimes I just forget.

Sooooooo! A job went out rush, rush this week from our largest client for a HUGE promotion into our local paper and I made a mistake by not changing the Photoshop black text to 100%. This means that the four color plates will be laying down ink, and they can get out alignment and put down a layer offset from the rest of the copy resulting in a blurry unreadable text.

Whoops.

However...so far the Client hasn't called about the ad. The folks from the paper say that their copy looks aligned, so perhaps they got it all worked out after they sent us our copy (we get the first edition), but we are right down the street from the client, so they could have gotten a bad copy, or a good copy, or folks are already on vacation, etc.

I've taken responsibility for my error to my boss, and while she is bothered, she knows that this sometimes happens. But, the owner just arrived; the very annoying, wants to get involved in everything, doesn't accept errors owner.

I've made the evidence disappear. Poof. Paper what paper?

As snoopy as he is, I'm sure the topic will come up. An account executive may squeal, "there's been a problem with the ad." Or he may just be focused on his work and vacation and skip out as quickly as possible. It could go either way.

And that is where I stand. I had mentioned before here at EA, that I would take responsibility for my actions even if it means getting in trouble. Apparently there is getting in trouble, and there is getting in trouble. So I am choosing to duck and cover because I don't want to get in italic trouble.

There is no time to think about the ramifications of the Avatar, higher awareness has switched off and I am hunkered down in my work space practicing ninja invisibility, while putting out other fires, hoping that the Big Man just fucking leaves.

The End


UPDATE:
At the end of the day, the AE whose job this was, had reported back that the Head Guy we deal with at the client held up the ad, and triumphantly declared it "Great!" He must have gotten a good one. The owner of my company saw nothing and I made off with another bum copy that was in the AE's office. Paper what paper?

I must now change my shorts.

The Avatar of Self

I am me. I am the sum total of my experiences, layered upon one another, scrambled and viewed through the lens of time. It's not perfect, but it's all I have.

I walk the Earth at this time and place, and perceive a with limited but deep spectrum of senses. All around me 360 is viewable and open to interpretation. It is what we make it...when we remember.

I am the learning, the yearing and the hoping.

I am flesh and blood, breath in / breath out. I celebrate myself, and my personhood because I am an individual and puny golden words fail to describe my magnificence even as they fail to describe yours.

I am me. You are you.

We are gods and goddess.

For better and for worse.

The Avatar of Grief - or She Took a Crap in My Heart

Last night my relationship with my lover of two years officially ended.

Actually, it ended three months ago when she started getting together with another guy. The guy who got her hooked on heroin, supplies her with it and shoots her up. She told him she had ended things with me months before. But I first learned that when I called her cell phone last night and he answered and told me about it (which she has since verified).

I invested so much of my life, energy and soul into her over the past year, and even more so in the past five months because I thought she was showing signs of needing help. But no amount of assistance will help a person who does not want to be helped. She told me our relationship had been the healthiest with any person in her entire life (that has been constantly filled with horrible ones). Apparently that is not what she wants.

And there is nothing I can do to get that energy back to stop the gaping void she left filled with shit.

You've got to plant your hopes to grow tomorrow

In a few moments, Katie and I will be heading up to Connecticut for our friends James and Luara's wedding tomorrow. They are getting married on James's grandmother's land, and it will also be the solstice and a full moon, so it should be a quite powerful occasion.

It's strange to look around at all my friends and see just how many of them are getting married and having kids these days. Not that I blame them, our community is incredible right now, people are very supportive of each other and want to make some stronger commitment to being here together. I hope it still exists when I'm ready to have my own children, as I couldn't imagine wanting to raise kids in the social isolation of the modern nuclear family. But that's still aways off. Even though this is the age in which this type of thing happens I still feel too much like a kid myself and have so much I want to get done before "settling down," going back to school and traveling the world and publishing a novel not the least in my plans. But that doesn't stop me from being utterly blown away by the courage my friends have to do this themselves, especially in this day and age, or from thinking about it a lot.

For years now there's been a long debate in the "scene" about whether it is a good idea to have children when the whole world seems to be falling apart around our heads. Look at the mess we're leaving them, and look at how overpopulated our small planet is already. But at the same time, having children is like the ultimate act of hope, it says "I believe things can get better. I believe there is a future." I've known a lot of older punkrockers who've sneered at this sentiment, but really, if we say we want to make this world a better place where better to start than by breaking the cycle of kids raised to conform to the world around them instead of shaping it to their desires, or of families tearing themselves apart under the lonesome weight of this emotionless system on their backs and in their wallets. Yes we can plant gardens, and have riotous parties, and learn alternative health care and bike repair and whatever else we need to take our lives into our own hands, but it is this community we have here and the families that are springing from it that will ultimately grow and carry these small techniques of revolution out into the world and time. Already I see my friend's children, just starting out in their lives, but so full of wisdom and autonomy and the desire to live, and I can't even begin to think what they will accomplish twenty years down the road. The word miracles comes to mind. We may be leaving them a world full of problems, but we are also building the foundations to leave them the tools to fix it and that spirit necessary to actually do so.

My bandmate Spat and I were talking before our recent cd release show about why we do what we do, create music and writing and revolutions with the passion that all good madmen and artists have, and he said that he used to do this so that he had something to leave for his children. A box full of novels and lps that they could point to and say, "my dad did this." We even wrote a song about the revolutionary potential of child raising when our friend Courtney had her son Sonedore, called Resistance is Fertile (it's on the album). Now he's not sure if its in his cards, though I suspect he won't always just be "crazy uncle Spat" to his friend's kids. I told him that regardless of his future parental status this work will all get left to the annals of culture as well, which offers some motivation, but I do want to have a more personal stake in that legacy than just some scattered words and sounds. Our children are left to society too, and are just as much part of the work as recipients of it. They literally are the future, and I would rather not leave the making of it solely to those who have no regard for making it a bright or sustainable one. And it would be nice to be taken care of when I can no longer take care of myself. Society's certainly not going to do it for me.

Man vs. Man: Did Advertising Kill the Great American Alpha Male?

A pdf I made from an article I read in Advertising Age. It's a very interesting read about the difficulty of marketing to Men now that gender roles are shifting, and what is predicted for the future of the male gender. Those are my boss' notes as we try to get ready for the next big pitch.

Personally, as things shift I have to wonder about the point of searching for the Masculine Archetype when it becomes readily apparent that the people think of when they think of "Manhood" at its root is the role of Provider and Protector. What happens when these are no longer the bailiwick of men? Aggression, cunning, physical strength and spatial thinking, and semen provider are no longer necessary to the survival of the tribe or the nuclear unit what happens to those who whose identity is built of such things.

In Everyday Avatar, part of what I'm looking for is an understanding of essential maleness. Perhaps instead of these qualities as definition of maleness, maleness will one day be more of a flavor than a structure. Our essence is a combination of the traits, but not overpowered by it, unless it becomes necessary to do so.

It would appear to me, based on this article that the best way to go is the Fiction Suit route. Who do I choose to be right now? What qualities can I bring to the table in this situation without getting nailed down?

I think it's funny that Madison Ave. can't nail you down. Me? I'm 38 and am now ignored by the 18-35 demographics even though as mentioned in this article and here, that 40 is the new 30. Oddly enough, for the Uberman, who is too young to really know who Steve McQueen, the new Ford Mustang is marketed towards them along with nostalgic Boomers with larger bellies and stiffer knees. Listen to this story from NPR : Ford Mustang Designer Revives an American Classic.

Inspiration, move me brightly...

A few days ago I got a Grateful Dead song in my head and decided it was time to start learning Dead tunes on the guitar. So I went to The Big Chain Store and bought the Grateful Dead Songbook.

I plunk around with some songs trying to get a feel for them and playing very slowly because they are in Keys that are different from C which I am used to playing. And there are weird triple notes in the score that I don't know how to play.

But I continue on because I feel the music in me and I finally get to the Terrapin Station part of the song Terrapin Station where I discover it's easy to play.

Inspiration, move me brightly. light the song with sense and color;
Hold away despair, more than this I will not ask.
Faced with mysteries dark and vast, statements just seem vain at last.
Some rise, some fall, some climb, to get to terrapin.

Counting stars by candlelight, all are dim but one is bright;
The spiral light of venus, rising first and shining best,
On, from the northwest corner, of a brand new crescent moon,
While crickets and cicadas sing, a rare and different tune,
Terrapin station.

There I am playing a song I recognize and love goosebumps are raised on my arms, the hair on my neck is standing up and my eyes are watering. It's happening now as I write this, and I am so filled with emotion that I'm about to burst into full-cry (but I don't). This is the reason I signed on to play guitar, and it's glorious!

I am hoping that Alessandra, who is sitting near by watching tv, will shift her attention due to the power of the music, but alas it doesn't and she continues to watch the tube. She not only misses the whole thing, but also (when badgered by me) fails to get the gist of the replay. I am aghast and crushed because while she had been to some Dead shows with me, never really listened to them. And the breadth of my disappointment is as great as my recent high. I go to sleep is a bad, bad mood.

Even as I am hurt, I realize that it is my fault, my thoughts of reality crashing with hers, but that doesn't lessen the pain. For a brief shining moment, I thought the music would be enough to turn off the tv trance, and she would recognize the song, and praise me for how good I could relatively play it.

But that's how it goes. The world doesn't stop turning in either situation. I guess, I'll just keep on playing what I want to play, and let it take me to where it takes me and let the rest of the world go hang. "Some rise, some fall, some climb....to get to Terrapin."

Sibling Support

I just recieved a long email from my little bother, who I haven't talked to too much since before he moved up to and then left Pittsburgh, talking about how he is really triyng to face up to and figure out a lot of the issues in his life about who he is and what he is doing. I guess being a young punk just really wasn't working out for him, and now that he's back in school and triyng to get serious about life this is the time to figure this stuff out. He said he now recognizes that Pittsburgh is really an incredible place but he wasn't in a spot to enjoy it in himself, and that he is a little envious that I've managed to find a group of caring and supportive friends here who aren't just concerend with how drunk they got the night before or what bands they saw last weekend. The last line of the letter read: "I don't think I ever thought this before, but growing up is a damn hard thing to do." And when I read that I cried. It's true, and now that he sees that he can actually throw himself into that challenging task of growing up into the intricate and beautiful person I know he is.

When we were younger Devon really looked up to me. Or more like he idolized the image of contemptuos rebellion that I was wearing at that time of trying to figure my own self out. When he moved up here, in his black studded jacket that outpunked anything I had once worn, he took one look at me and said, "Tait, you're a hippy now," and then went down to the local punk show space to get drunk with the kids. I guess it was hard for him to see that rebellion isn't always worn in patches on your sleeves, or in fitting in with people who you have just enough similair interests to go to shows with but nothing else. And now he's going to art school and getting his shit together, even he still doesn't have many friends to relate to on that. I'm immensely proud of him for getting this far. Last time I was down there he showed me that photographs he's been working on to create a new film processing technique that makes them look like impressionist paintings my jaw dropped and I couldn't stop telling people about it for weeks.

It's kind of flattering that he still looks up to me now, and can write me a letter saying what he's going through and ask for support in that. I can give it to him. It's nice being able to be the stable older brother I never was when we were growing up.

Maybe my family can work through its dysfunctions after all.

A Surprise Visit from an Old Friend

I hate Advertising, I mean really, really hate Advertising, which is weird considering I work in the field. I go to the point of doing my best to No Logo my life, with very few exceptions.

Late last week I was called to a company meeting wherein we were told that we have a huge pitch coming up in 2 weeks, and any and all ideas for The Big Client would greatly be appreciated. The President of our company began to speak in Advertising Blah, Blah, Blah, but I immediately tuned it out, borrowed a pencil from my neighbor at the table, and began scribbling like mad as Advertising Ideas began rushing into my head. I came up with at least 10 or so concepts for the Big Project.

It occasionally happens; when the tumblers fall into place, unlock the door and a shitload of ideas fall into my mind, nearly formed. It happened with my book, the Simpson's Script, now this. I want to say that it is because I want to help the company out because a successful company hopefully means a secure job. But the ideas were too immediate for any kind of rational process. The ideas came because the ideas came. Period.

At my most basic core, I'm just an average Schlub. I have an average physique, an average intelligence, less than average coping and communication skills, but occasionally I get to shine as a conduit for something else.

I can't rightly say what that would be or where it comes from. Is it a Collective Unconscious, a higher being, or does it just come from me and only me? The answer I could come up with would be a snapshot of where I am at that time. It could easily change with conviction the next hour. So I have to choose not to decide.

I am the Avatar of Creativity. My source is Everywhere and Nowhere. I Manifest at random and may occasionally be courted if fed new concepts, but the payment is always hard work.

It's the payback that might explain why the fully manifesting ideas come so rarely. I'm a lazy man, given to the pleasures of the flesh. Hard work does not come easy to me, and very often the effort put in does not equal value paid back. As things go now, I've been diligently practicing my guitar several hours a week, nearly every day. While I am in no rush, I have seen improvement. I have hope that I will again receive a visit from Creativity when I am finally ready to begin writing songs one day in the distant future.

Sensitive and Strong

When I first posted here I mentioned just how difficult it was to date and try and be an avatar in my own life. Since then it only got worse, to the point that I briefly considered writing a diatribe against the shallowness of the whole "dating scene" and the ritualization of meaningless sex in our culture, and finally gave up completely on wanting to ever meet anyone again.

And as predicted by my closest friends, as soon as I gave up on finding love it walked straight into my life, and I now wonder why I had any doubts for this at all. More importantly however I also found that this was only possible because I try and live up to myself and the world and be the best person I can be whenever the opportunity arises to do so. And it always does. She loves me because I am an avatar, because I attempt to be honest and caring and sensitive and attentive. And this doesn’t conflict with the fact that I am also sometimes crazy and melodramatic and prone to intense fits of seeing the world through a filter of ideals and archetypes. She loves me for that too, because I don’t deny that it’s also a part of who I am.

Of course I’m not saying that the whole dating game isn’t still fucked up, or that a lot of people actually want honest and sensitive men in their lives. This is a culture of masculine archetypes after all, soldiers and cowboys and cutthroat businessmen. My lover’s sister broke up with her abusive boyfriend yesterday, and when it was suggested she try and date someone who might actually be good for her she laughed and said "I don’t date pansies." I don’t understand where the idea came from that sensitivity is synonymous with weakness. As far as I see it, it takes a near infinite amount of strength to be a caring male in our culture. Or just a caring person. Though admittedly some "sensitive men" really are pansies and let their lovers and parents and bosses walk all over them so that they aren’t seen as exerting even a little power or authority over other people, but that just buys into the stereotypes of weakness as well. Which is more sensitive, denying you have power or knowing how to not hurt other people when you use it? Which is stronger, heedlessly fucking everyone else over just to get a leg up or being aware that your actions affect everyone around you? Why is our culture obsessed with these extremes that only seek to keep people at their worst, and what can we do about it?

The most obvious answer perhaps is to be as strong and sensitive as we can, and maybe create a different role for people to fill.

The Story of The Good Son

In brief: It’s not me, its the son of my Neighbor Mike. Mike Jr. and his wife have closed down their house and come from Springfield with his wife to move into the house for up to year to ease the transition of his Parkinsonian mother who isn’t ready to leave her house of 40+ years.

I’m blown away. The Good Son, I am not, and don’t know if I’ll ever be, but Mike Jr. was raised right with a happy family and good values so he seems genuinely happy to be back in St. Louis and taking care of his mom. His wife Suzie began work on the Mike Sr’s Garden yesterday, and we are happy that life has appeared next door once again.

The Good Son, another Avatar, along with Fatherhood, that seems so alien to me. It’s probably not too different from Good Husband, which I am, but still that’s a commitment I can’t ever see myself doing. Perhaps is merely an offshoot of being a good person, and I may end up one day taking on that role.

But this post is less about me and is more about the honoring of Mike and Suzie for being Good Children. I think what they are doing is fantastic and I just want to tell the world even though you will never meet them. Bravissimo Mike and Suzie!