(houston) new studio?
i spent a good hour revisiting a studio in the heights that i'm contemplating buying. this would be a stretch, of course. it would involve a long commute in my new hybrid, if it ever arrives. it would involve living in a building that was really designed more for commercial use than residential. it would involve giving up my life in the suburbs, which, as anyone knows, is utopic. if, that is, your idea of utopia is stepford. it would take a lot of work, and it would be a decision to stay in houston for a while.
all of this is a lot to think about, since i never planned to stay in houston, and i'm ever so antsy to leave. on the other hand, it may be wise to just kill the ants and homestead for a while.
another thing on my mind is etiquette, in general, and more specifically the modern unspoken rules of behavior. why do we have social rules? what happens when one person decides that these rules or expectations don't apply to him or her? an example might be johnny ramone, who said people never asked him for interviews because he was grumpy and unfriendly. which people get to be outside the rules and expectations of society and why? how should and how does it affect others when one person doesn't play by the rules? at best, it can be entertaining, strange or just slightly uncomfortable. at worst it can be alienating, hurful, and sometimes insulting or offensive. where are the lines and who draws them? who is responsible for them? how do they change?
posted by cherry blossom @ 12:19 AM
6 Comments:
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Why?
Where get, you say, a binding law, a rule
Enforced by sanction, an Ideal throned
With thunder in its hand? I answer, there
Whence every faith and rule has drawn its force
Since human consciousness awaking owned
An Outward, whose unconquerable sway
Resisted first and then subdued desire
By pressure of the dire impossible
Urging to possible ends the active soul
And shaping so its terror and its love.
Why, you have said it--threats and promises
Depend on each man's sentence for their force:
All sacred rules, imagined or revealed,
Can have no form or potency apart
From the percipient and emotive mind.
God, duty, love, submission, fellowship,
Must first be framed in man, as music is,
Before they live outside him as a law.
And still they grow and shape themselves anew,
With fuller concentration in their life
Of inward and of outward energies
Blending to make the last result called Man,
Which means, not this or that philosopher
Looking through beauty into blankness, not
The swindler who has sent his fruitful lie
By the last telegram: it means the tide
Of needs reciprocal, toil, trust and love--
The surging multitude of human claims
Which make "a presence not to be put by"
Above the horizon of the general soul.
Is inward reason shrunk to subtleties,
And inward wisdom pining passion-starved?--
The outward reason has the world in store,
Regenerates passion with the stress of want,
Regenerates knowledge with discovery,
Shows sly rapacious self a blunderer,
Widens dependence, knits the social whole
In sensible relation more defined.
continued
"A College Breakfast Party."/ George Eliot
All experience is moral, she would have us believe, and capable of teaching man the higher life. That is, all experience tends slowly to bring man into harmony with his environment, and to teach him that certain actions are helpful, while others are harmful. Hence, the greatness and the impressiveness of the moral lessons of life.
She also found in the conscience and in the moral intuitions were simply inherited experiences.
"Our consciences are not all of the same pattern, an inner deliverance of fixed laws; they are the voice of sensibilities as various as our memories."
Daniel Deronda
i have to admit that i'm sort of thick when it comes to poetry like this. i try to make sense of it, but it all runs together and nothing really gets through. but thanks for the offering. perhaps i'll check back from time to time to see if i can make any more sense of the poem.
I will agree, rather lengthy, but don't waste your time going back and rereading. And since we have changed a little each day, a sudden thought like leftovers has little impact as its splendor of the moment.
the answer my dear, values, values, values
Post a Comment
<< Home