Thanks, giving

Is there anything more innocuous than gratitude? It’s one of the few values endorsed by solemn religious leaders and vapid lifestyle gurus alike. Unlike other virtues, which require going against instinct (e.g., you feel afraid, but decide to act with courage anyway), with gratitude, you simply lean into it; something good happens, you feel good, and you need only recognize that warm and fuzzy sensation.

Gratitude is seemingly easy. Basic. Indeed, even parents who give their children little other character instruction still teach their kindergartener to say thank you.

Yet there’s more to gratitude than commonly countenanced — higher and harder shades of it to reach for, beyond its elementary-level start.

“Advanced” gratitude retains delight in someone’s admirable qualities and small acts of service . . . even after the novel and noticeable becomes the ordinary and expected.

Advanced gratitude remains thankful for the good that resulted from a relationship . . . even when the relationship went sour in the end.

Advanced gratitude continues to acknowledge the assists that got you to where you are today . . . even when the steps between that past help and the present day have multiplied, and the memory of the connection between a once-vital-boost and your current happiness has faded.

Advanced gratitude is evinced even when it doesn’t feel good; it is fought for even when its recognition makes you feel indebted, dependent, or less than.

If elementary gratitude is instinctual; advanced gratitude is effortful. Whereas one is merely felt, the other is expressed.

If, in the kindergarten class of gratitude, the warm fuzzies of thankfulness are for the heart-lightening benefit of the individual alone, in post-graduate gratitude, they are used as a spur towards being better, doing better, giving back. It joins one's rota of work-tasks, a tithe of worthiness.

Gratitude then becomes not only as morally strenuous as all the other virtues, but, as Cicero put it, the very parent which gives them life.

https://www.bustle.com/life/farmhouse-aesthetic-suburbs

https://blog.lostartpress.com/2021/11/05/imagine-theres-no-adhesion/

 

 

 

Re: The Alexandrian Ague

 

I always hear that jerk's voice from that stupid show yell "New rule! ..." in my head.

I'm always revising my long and complicated list of interconnected rules/standards, apparently requiring a voice-over.

It doesn't happen out loud, though, so no one else is aware. Random holes just appear in other's assumptive expectations, meanwhile I'm over here in my new universe.

Apocrypha

"I may have inadvertently started a revolution in the convenience store today. 

I stopped to grab a water, and on the way in I saw a homeless man I know sitting in the shade with his bike beside him. He was red-faced and shaky looking. I asked if he was ok, and he told me that he was just resting. This guy's got the mind of a child, and I'm afraid he doesn't know he needs to stay extra hydrated when it's super hot outside. 

There were a bunch of people in line in front of me and only one cashier, so I grabbed two waters and yelled to the cashier that I was taking one to the guy outside and I'd be right back (I'm a regular there). 

When I came back in, the lady in front of me turned around, hands on hips, and told me that I was just enabling that 'homeless person' (said with a sneer) and that I shouldn't be wasting my money on him.

It's hot as hell in Florida right now. Mid nineties with humidity around 80%. It's a good day for heat stroke, and I told her so. I said I'd rather give him a water than call an ambulance. 

I was gonna shrug it off. Let it go. Chalk it up to ignorance and the heat making everybody cranky.

And then she told me I should be ashamed of myself. That someone should call the police on him, and that it should be illegal to beg for money. That people who give the homeless money just encourage them to stay homeless and that should be illegal,  too.

Ashamed.  I should be ashamed for giving some poor old guy a water - it cost a whole dollar, BTW - and I should get in trouble for making sure he didn't stroke out in this heat. 

I guess I look nice. Approachable. Like I wouldn't rip your head off. I am nice, most of the time. 

But not always.

And I lost my temper. 

I told her to call a cop and report me for buying shit at a convenience store. 

I told her that I wasn't in the damn mood for crazy right now. That it's a hundred fucking degrees outside, and I'm hot and tired and sick to death of stupid people. That if she had an ounce of compassion in her whole body, she'd buy him a cold drink, too. That maybe she should figure out why she needs to accost complete strangers. And how's about after that, she back the fuck up outta my face and outta my business and turn back around and not say one more damn word to me. 

I'm just about deaf in one ear. I try to modulate my voice. Unless I get angry. 

It got pretty loud there at the end. There was dead silence in the store and then someone said loudly "For real!"

And the guy at the front of the line told the cashier to add a sandwich to his purchases for the guy outside. 

The guy behind him bought an extra ice cream. The girl behind HIM got change for a twenty 'cause that guy could probably use some cash.' 

Every single person in line got him something. Every one, except the now very embarrassed lady in front of me, who slunk out without saying another word. 

When I got to the cashier, she didn't charge me for either of the waters, because she was going to take him one anyway. And mine was free because of the entertainment. 

When I went outside, he was eating his ice cream and drinking his water with a pile of stuff all around him, a big old grin on his face. He didn't look shaky anymore. 

And there, people, is the story of why I hate people. And why I love people. All in the same damned minute. 

I sat in the car and drank my water and laughed with tears in my eyes, same as I'm doing now."

 

 Being healthy is valuable, but it is not what makes people and the lives they live, have value. 

But even as I say that, I realize that if I make the claim that people are valuable in and of themselves just by virtue of being alive, we can count down the minutes to the counter responses to that. This will likely include value statements about moral character (some people are not as valuable because they’ve done terrible or ghoulish things) or commodification arguments (if you can’t work and provide value or provide enough for yourself, you’re a burden.)

This is why there is a frightening undercurrent to placing value on the health of an individual.

That first one comes with a slew of terrible things. The main one is that moral assertions about one’s lot in life being a direct reflection of one’s character, leads to the conclusion that anyone suffering from misfortune is suffering that misfortune because they deserve it. That would be the “bad things only happen because you’ve been bad or are bad” crowd. This leads to things like:

“Why should I pay for the healthcare of someone who makes bad decisions?”

Then of course there’s the commodification argument and it’s sinister underpinnings. If people are too sick to care for themselves, or too sick to produce as much as the other person, they’re a “burden on society.” 

“Why should I pay for someone who doesn’t contribute to society?”

*(Perhaps it’s dishonest to use that statement in this context. I am using it for a specific purpose, to lead to a particular point, but I do recognize that it is not usually used in the context of “inability”, which health would be included under. Surely it’s aimed at people who are ‘capable’ of contributing but just don’t want to, while still expecting to have access to all of their basic necessities, and to the services their society has to offer. Which I don’t generally have a problem with because I don’t think that that mindset is prevalent enough to cause a substantial lean on a society’s resources given our current production abilities. If all lives have value as I argued before, then so to do the lives of those who are capable of contributing to society, but who refuse to put back into society, if those people do exist. But I wanted to address the difference in case someone brings it up)

The “why should we support those who don’t contribute to society” mindset is the direct result of the “human beings have a monetary value” outlook, which tends to lead very quickly to conclusions that people whose healthcare is “too expensive” are producing a deficit in resources that they don’t make up for. The “cost” to “benefit” ratio is more cost than benefit, when looking at things from a purely profit based value perspective.

This actually once led to a certain group of people referring to anyone too sick to care for themselves as “useless eaters.” They had a very particular approach they used to handle this “problem”. 

They only valued people if they could contribute back, “pay back,” the cost of taking care of them, with interest (profit). If they couldn’t pay back, they were deemed “too expensive.” 

When we place health as a given that people “just need to work hard enough for and they’ll achieve it,” we are ignoring the very real limitations that the world puts onto us in regards to controlling our health. Which is blaming an individual for things outside their own control, an action that I would argue is unjust. 

But arguing that makes it easier for a system of commodification to keep that argument in place, without people feeling horrible for thinking it. If people could just “work harder and be healthy” that means anyone can work hard and be “valuable enough to contribute” and thus no longer be “a burden for the rest of us.” If they don’t, they are doing so because they’re “lazy.” And we don’t have to care about lazy people.

It’s a cynical perspective I’m selling here, and perhaps I’m coming across as dramatic in my commentary. And you’re probably right. I am pretty partial to theatrics. 

But if you disagree with the idea that we place too much emphasis on the health of individuals, in that we tie the value of an individual to their health and thus ability to produce and contribute, and that that process is directly tied to a dehumanizing commodification of our lives by a system that demands of us that we produce something, even if it is unnecessary for anyone’s survival and is only to make people whose lives are already taken care of even more wealthy, think for a moment on this:

If you became too sick to work tomorrow, and it lasted the rest of your life…

Who would pay for your survival?

And…

How terrifying would it be to worry that others might think of you as a burden for being that way?

 

 

 "I have brought you to the ring, now dance the best you can!"

These words were purportedly shouted by Wallace to the Scottish army at the Battle of Falkirk on the 22nd of July 1298 as the English cavalry began to charge.

 

@nation.decay

Entire Staff walks out of Blue Moon Cafe in Shepherdstown, WV #westvirginia #kitchennightmares #resturant #smallbusiness

♬ original sound - N.!D3caY

@nation.decay

Blue Moon Cafe Walkout part 2 #smallbusiness #westviriginia #kitchennightmares

♬ original sound - N.!D3caY

 

 

 

 

brilliant trees sessions . Berlin . 1983 from Samadhisound on Vimeo.

Brilliant Trees sessions . Berlin . 1983 . raw camera footage

This raw footage shot on, what’s now seen as a primitive camera but which was a top of the line consumer product at the time, a massive, unwieldily object, was documented by Yuka Fujii. I’ve put the material together in the order it was recorded to give a very general idea of the process of development. It’s been my practice to work closely with each individual musician since my earliest days with the band in an attempt to get the best results. I’ve always maintained the band prepared me for working with others, gave me the confidence to work with my peers, the ‘newcomers' in the room all being older than myself (25). At this point in time Ryuichi’s english was very rudimentary (this was to change radically within the next ten years or so) so we had to communicate as economically as possible, or rather, 95% of the exchange was purely musical. Yuka and Peter Barakan would step in when greater explication was needed. Holger’s english remained consistent throughout the years i knew him. Again, subtleties could be lost so the dialogue was relatively basic. These sessions in Berlin were my first step in creating what would become 'Brilliant trees' and my initial move away from the structure of the band. It was one of the happiest recording experiences I can recall while signed with a major label. Because of the success of having everyone meet in Berlin, a city native to no one involved, it felt like an adventure. People arrived with a spirit of openness and receptivity. I went on to repeat this process with albums such as 'Secrets of the Beehive', 'Rain Tree Crow', and 'The First Day' among others.

I've left a lot of Jon’s conversation in as it's of interest. In one section he’s explaining the nature of raga and how he came to it by working with renowned Indian singer/teacher Pandit Pran Nath. He was also intimating that, as 'Brilliant Trees' asked that he play in the western tradition, ‘steps’ as he describes it, he didn’t see how his performance could be incorporated into the title track. I persevered. He returned to his hotel room that evening to work on it and, overnight, came up with something so beautiful and complimentary to the piece, that moved away from raga (outside of the coda), and gave us one of the rare, if not unique recordings, of Jon playing in the western tradition.

Besides the limited nature of my vocabulary, the paired down nature of our exchanges for the reasons given above, my only regret is that I didn’t use Holger’s guitar solo on ‘Red Guitar’. At the time I felt it a little lightweight compared to the mix Steve Nye was prepping. I would now mix it quite differently pushing the drums way back (from the mid 70s through the 80s drums were often foregrounded, a trend I wasn’t fond of. I fought for a change of approach on ‘Beehive' and that’s about the time when things began to resemble how I’d initially imagined the material. There are always exceptions of course, ‘weathered wall', ‘Before the Bullfight’ are just two examples). I loved Holger dearly and wish I’d immortalised his solo in some capacity. If it still exists on multitrack all is not lost.

I came away from Berlin with an incomplete album and preceded to write a few remaining pieces to complement the best of what I had. 'The Ink in the Well’, ‘Nostalgia' and ‘Backwaters' were added, 'Blue of Noon', an alternate version of ‘Forbidden Colours', and a new track composed with Ryuichi were, with the exception of the latter, to find a home elsewhere. 'Blue of Noon' was originally a vocal piece but I felt this version didn’t hold together and, in any case, was out of place in the context of the album. Virgin released a working rough mix of the track as the B-side of a single.

I hope the mutual respect and good humour of everyone involved comes across along with their seriousness and committed nature to the material. Rarely has this proved otherwise for me. In this respect I feel very fortunate. From this session I made lifelong friends, a trend that was to continue for many years to come.

david sylvian july 2021

in order of appearance: Ronny Drayton . David Sylvian . Ryuichi Sakamoto . Holger Czukay . Jon Hassell . Steve Nye.

© david sylvian / yuka fujii
no unauthorized copying, broadcasting, reposting without permission.

 

 

 

“Job openings are at record highs. Why aren’t Americans filling them?”

— The Wall Street Journal, 7/9/21
- - -

My good lords, I must bring to your attention a grave issue that requires our utmost concern. You see, my fellow land-owning gentry, it seems that the invention of mechanized industry, the rise of “capitalism,” and the impact of the recent plague have brought upon us a wave of moral degradation and irredeemable sloth — specifically, nobody wants to be a serf anymore.

This newfound modicum of control the peasant class has over their lives has brought us to a dark new reality in which the serfs have become so lazy that they’ll no longer toil without pay on land they do not own yet can never leave, and instead leach upon the system by searching out more equitable work.

Surely you are already aghast, but I fear the problem does not stop there, my good, rich, sirs. Be sure to be seated upon your golden chairs for this next bit of news. Not only do our current serfs refuse to labor, but the serfs we ejected from our fiefdoms when we feared the plague would harm our profits now don’t want to come back and replace the workers we kept who then subsequently died of the plague. Did they not know that we banished them with the expectation they’d come crawling back at our earliest convenience? What has the world come to when the whims of noblemen no longer control the lives of the masses?

And it’s not just the serfs who have left; now that we have fewer laborers, we’ve required our remaining peasants to work longer hours without recompense. But the villains refuse! They demand something called “overtime.” Apparently, they now think their time belongs to them, and if we use too much of it, we should pay them for it! There’s no way to describe this phenomenon other than plain moral rot. How else would you? “Social progress”? Don’t make me guffaw.

Not to mention the safety demands! Simply because a large number of peasants have died of this plague, the remaining peasants do not wish to work under conditions that make them vulnerable. How can they value their lives so much when we’ve always valued them so little? Do they not realize by ascribing meaning to their lives and the lives of their family members, they’ve turned this mass death event from a simple labor issue into an incalculable tragedy? Don’t they know that the only thing standing between us and disaster is our resolution to ignore the human cost of our actions altogether? The cold, cruel fools.

I, for one, my good lords, am at a loss. We’ve already tried tossing them a pittance. What else shall we do? Toss them a pittance more? Establish a higher minimum pittance? Ludicrous. Something drastic must be done to stop this unscrupulous scourge of “exercising one’s personhood” from poisoning our laborers, lest feudalist society crumbles as we know it. For where would we be without the noble principles of greed and oppression that allowed us to build the shining cities on a hill that only we are allowed to live in while everyone else suffers in squalor? I dare say, we are in grave danger of losing everything great about our way of life that also makes us rich.

If we fail, our only hope is to bend this new, so-called “capitalism” to our will and turn it into something akin to our beloved feudalist oligarchical system. And that could take hundreds of years.

“I can't pay no doctor bill, but Whitey's on the moon.” —Gil Scott-Heron

The courageous antifascist Auschwitz survivor Esther Bejarano has died at the age of 96. A lifelong antifascist activist, she was also a strong supporter of Palestinian rights and an opponent of Israel's colonialist policies.

REST IN POWER.

 

 

 

 

 https://itsgoingdown.org/neo-nazi-group-patriot-front-behind-wave-of-racist-vandalism-chased-out-of-philadelphia/