the darkside of openess

dramatic title eh?  i stole it.  i guess i made it a title, but this phrase, idea, proposal of some sort came about twice this week.  marten spangberg.  he is this tall, typically hipster looking swedish person who i gave 6 hours of my brain to this week.  long, straight, slightly greasy hair (no bangs) that he pushes back with his hands a lot.  clear, big frames for his glasses.  skinny black jeans, 43 years old.  a choreographer and philosopher- (an avid delleuzian), among other things of course, or i guess. oh yes, and the director of an mfa program for choreography in sweden.  a critical education theorist. he's also weird, and often inappropriate.

me and 25 other performers came to his workshop on monday- an afternoon workshop, where we sat and listened to him talk for 4 hours.  he told us in the beginning that he observes and assumes that we move a lot, and so we would not move at all.  he said that he thought that there was a lot of important things that we should know, and that he was going to talk as fast and as much as he could in 4 hours.  most things were out of my reach/ understanding.  but a lot of things stuck with me too. since i have been here, i have realized that i have exposed myself to lots of situations with a hope of being passionately persuaded or motivated.  nothing has been quite like that- i more feel, something between indifferent and the feeling you feel when you shrug your shoulders- which i don't have words for, and would rather not find them either.

some things that he said: bare with me- or skip over them- just three things he talked about that i am not eloquent about. at all.

1) the aforementioned title- the dark side of openness.  in education, in art.  ppl's desire or push to be "open", to be "tolerant".  thought of perhaps to be a rebellious strategy to break down walls and push boundaries.  tolerance as a dangerous word- makes its own walls, and consolidates an authoritative position.  people engage or talk about, or put energy into things that are within the realm of tolerance.  he argues, when someone calls someone creative- it inherently places you within that realm- which is mediocre- and limited. he argues, that we should not push for more openness in dance/choreography- that it is inherently open already.

2) political art.
Kant argues that an art object can not have utility and that it must be autonomous. it must not depend on relationships.  so "conceptual" artists accepted this notion, but then wanted to make the art object politically active. this is theoretically impossible if the object can not have utility. so how to look at it?  it is not a dead end, but an opportunity to look at how you labor in the politics of making your object. ie.. "i'm not interested in making political films, but i'm interested in making film political."
**also- marten is taking a position to not just situate himself in the notion that the body is inherently political, and thus- everything from there is..*** but he is also from a super homogenized european background- which is really different from growing up in the states during a time when identity politics merged with radical "politics"- particularly if you were looking to be or were a part of those radical discussions.

3. "my job is to always leave behind what i can."  (his abilities and belonging, groups, identities, etc)
this one really gets me.  there are things that really resonate with where i currently find myself out here.  so, he explained/my take on this is that- you don't abandon these things for something else, it's for not something else.  this not something else can not be found until the moment of leaving it behind.
i don't know why this feels so different to me, but it really does.  i applied this notion directly to the immediate resistance i had to his lecture.
a white, straight? european artist who is super educated in philosophy and critical studies...talking at a group of people for 4 hours.  furthermore he asked nothing of anyone else, or our names and referred to us by physical markers- "hat girl over there", etc.  it's so easy for me (particularly when it comes to white males), to just list the reasons why something is not ok.  my critiques have become jargon, and are not full expressions of who i am, and the conflict i feel so often in my life.  but i keep them, probably for a number of reasons.  because they associate me with an identity, a group, and also maybe because i don't want to spend the energy to expand those critiques, or maybe i'm too afraid to throw them away? or maybe because i don't think i'm smart enough to come to any other conclusion, and i've got that one down?
i've been coming up to this alot out here.  particularly in the art scene here, since it seems the most accessible to me at hte moment.  people ask me what i think, i ask myself what i think, what i felt about that completely fucked up or amazing experience i just had, and i don't even want to open my mouth.  because i;m tired of what i know my questions are.  even more so- they are just not serving me anymore. the questions don't do shit for me.  i ask the same questions, and they frame the responses in the same way each time.  so i'm not getting new perspectives that i yearn for. ache for really.  it's time for new questions, and if i don't leave the other one's behind to an extent.. how do i find the other one's?  the old one's are apart of me, for better or worse, so i dont think i have to be too scared of forgetting them. but it is hard. cracking yourself open.

the darkside of openness.  i confront it outside of the philosophical realm of course.  in my gut, in my heart, in my nagging mind.  i went to a "gathering"the other night.  tessa's house.  i think she is a part of hte burning man community i am told.  from england, really well spoken and smart. friendly, has a funny, totally unfashionable bowl haircut, and i believe is married to a gay man for love.   the house is beautiful- like nothing i have seen in the area for someone who is not rich.  the house reeks of pot, so you know it's growing, and there is a view of the city. (which i find breathtaking by the way).  there is also a hot tub.  there are ten people there.  all dancer/dance maker folk.  i knocked a bottle of whiskey over earlier in the night.  i was embarrassed by the attention it brought.  cause you know- i am the new person in town.  i had weird interactions with this person laura that makes me sad- cause we use to be friends- and she is someone that you should get along with in the dance community- cause she makes a lot of things happen in a really admirable underground kinda way.

anyways- the night proceeds and it gets slightly less awkward for me, as  i push myself to be friendly- open, and exciting or something.  we have dinner- talk- i begin to feel a little more relaxed with a couple o glasses of wine slugged back.  and so we all cram into the hot tub.  nudity isn't huge for me- so i feel ok about it.  but the closeness- the proximity of our bodies in the hot-tub is hard for me.  my mind starts tricking me to start spacially organizing the people together according to affinity, and consistently leaving me out on the side- like how i do in my dances- obsessed with the periphery and not the middle space.  i am the weird box on the end of the crossword puzzle word- the "s" that pluralizes something, but wouldn't change much if it were there or not.  low airplanes fly overhead- and there is crazy wind and mist in the air.  so cold that if you lift your shoulders out of the water you shiver immediately.  it's kinda magical,  amongst ten other bodies in this moment- only inches separating our flesh, sometimes none at all.  i am there, because i have told myself that it would be a good idea to put myself out there- to make myself open to people and make friends.  and in the wind and magic, i longed for two simultaneous things- to be alone in the hot tub- and to be with you all- my loves- my family that make me feel so held and wonderful- that i cannot even describe.  i got out of the hot tub and knocked someones bowl to the ground and it shattered.  the second piece of glass i had knocked over that night.  i got a ride home with some nice folks and went to bed, and felt like i made a good effort.  i tried to be open, but i sure as hell felt alot of darkness in it:)

i guess i can say that things are moving.  there are some things i have no choice to leave behind in a sense, because i keep finding myself without them.  but they are a part of me, so i am not afraid of forgetting them.

forgive my rambling- thought i would just go for it ya know?  miss yous.  come visit soon.  think about ya'll every day.  for realz.

all my love,
dr. sara

a day of not quite knowing

hello my favorites

tessa thank you for that post. i wanted to respond right away but have not had the moment to sit with it and really take the time. and now it feels like i have responded to it in person in some ways, but i will say that the structure of this blog feels really good- and it would feel really good to have a conversation happening, so i am going to be putting some energy into trying to make that happen, so its not just updates of individuals, (which is also really great) but a conversation between folks when that is possible. so, obviously we are all going to use this in a way that feels good to each of us and that will look different. for me right now, i want to be responding to people.

so. tessa, you talk about the idea of scarcity. on another occasion you and i talked about how we respond to it in different ways but that we are both directly responding to that belief that we will not have enough.

i respond by always making myself available to others because if i am not ready and waiting for the moment to dive in, then i am worried that i will not get the kind of attention that i need and desire.

im trying so hard right now to shift that.

and i feel like i am in the awkward place of trying to break the pattern, but the belief is still there so its super vulnerable and super raw.

its like i have this box around me, and one wall of the box is always drawn down, always open, ready to see something and then to spring into action. and i think that this is partly why i have a challenge to create sacred space for myself - because i cant fully close off to the rest of the world. because i am worried then i will be forgotten and left alone.

leah called the other day and i was available - it was a great time to talk and i wanted to talk. what would have happened if i had not. i did not want to be stubborn and say "NO i wont pick up just because i dont always want to be available, but at the same time i dont want to always be available...hmmmm"

anyway we had a great conversation, an illuminating one in terms of her expressing affection and love and also how much a part of her world i am even when she is bad at being in touch.

and for me illuminating because i am starting to figure out what i want to have with her and with other people as well in my life. i want her (and nate) floating around in my brain, as something that i am putting energy into, even when i am not really actively talking or writing, or thinking about them.

sara it feels like you opened this in me somehow when we were talking about how to be in touch when you were gone.

there is a way that its easy, in our transient community, in our non traditional day structures, in our attempts at radical friendships and relationships, that we could just say, "ok you are over there. i am over here and we will see each other next time and we just trust that no one is going anywhere." which of course i do trust. but the shift that i am feeling has to do with saying "you are there, i am here. and i want you in my brain space, and i want you as a part of my community even though we dont talk all the time, even though i don see you. it has to do with something very practical, that im not even sure of yet. tessa you touched on it the other day when you said maybe i am looking for leah to show evidence that she is putting energy into me when she is not directly in front of me... like maybe the difference between humans and dogs..dogs are responding so presently. humans think about things that are not in front of them. maybe i want to live more in her human realm. maybe i do and i dont know it..im not sure

does this make sense?

im trying to pick up on clues that make me feel this thing that i am looking for .

for example, showing up in ohio it was so clear to me that nate just talks about me as if i am there, he just includes me in his life and experience as a person in his life so that everyone there just welcomed me back into the rhythm of things.

hearing from leah that notes and gifts that i have given her are framing her desk that she is thinking about me in these certain times that she can isolate - allows me to realize that i am there in spirit. there is something about spirit.

artistically this is all very interesting for me too because i think about performing (i took a workshop today with dan rothenberg which I loved and it reminded me why and how much i love theater and also what the fuck am i going to do with my life )but that is besides the point ;)

i think about being a performer who is allowing her attention to be present and yet to also have a sense of command about her energy and her action, and an awareness in the space.

how to be a human in a city inside your body when everything around you is pushing and pulling and desperation is a quality of a capitalist structure.

i see desperation in my classes in so many forms. fear, self hatred.. etc.

this is all over the place, but its what i am thinking about right now and about how today as a performer, there was this tendency or interest in disassociating from my experience when someone entered the space. scarcity - like if i dont give that person all of my attention, then i wont know what to do, i wont know how to respond to them.

instead, maybe i could keep my breath in my body and just allow them and their actions to come to me sometimes and then step out of myself for a moment to go to them, but this is more of a dance - a back and forth as opposed to ....something else. whatever it is that i am doing.

words are only half working right now

im going to go eat some food

and i love you all

fevers cause it all to pour out

beloveds,

sick in bed today. fever and aches and i'm not able to to anything but read a few pages and wipe my eyes, drift into sleep with strange dreams and wake again to sit something luke warm.

in all this sickness i am thinking non-stop about andy. how much has changed in how i feel about it, but also how little has changed. i saw his truck two nights in a row outside caroline's. i realized how there had been this growing hope that he had heard me and was choosing to live his life in a less charge ahead, less violent, less territorial way. and i also realized that my work is learning to let go of expectations, hopes, desires, and connection to anything he and they do. which, of course, is a super-human feat and i have no skills with which to pursue that intention.

not talking to him, not having him in my life isn't working. i miss him too much. want him to be the face i open my door to. and when i did see him all that love was so present between us. its just it all becomes dangerous when i step back to him, when he isn't in front of me, or when he runs from himself and uses my open heart as a kick-stand. i think that i'm falling a little bit in not knowing how or what to know.

all the time lately, when i can get past the chocking feeling of it all, i think about scarcity. how this world, this economy we exist inside of has made us all, to some extent, believe in the lack of resources, the lack of space, the shortage of available energy. its why i admire the push towards polyamory, and also why i think it so often fails. we have come to believe at the marrow level that there isn't enough for all of us. and to come extent there isn't. what with how the world throws us around and how the earth is being destroyed. but between us and for us again and again i come to recognize that i fall into believing that there won't be enough space or love for me. it comes from my family, sure, but it is so real in the everyday, and has become so weakened with andy. sigh. how do we unlearn the things we did not choose to take in?

in my weakened state i sent him an email. a flurry of texts later, and i think a mediated conversation might actually be best. it is awful this disappearance, and awful the ways i don't get any farther towards feeling free of the entanglement. thank you, sarah, for the push.

after that doosy, i won't write too much more. expect to say that i've decided on a chapbook project to finish by the end of spring. about letters and voice and witnessing. wanting you all to know so that i am help to my own dreams.

sara - hard days there. where are the places for ease? did you get the mission spot?chenda is playing music, and sarah downstairs cooking. i am so grateful for you three.

-t

its wednesday, a full moon in cancer among other things

i woke up with a cold today, a bit groggy and the sun is confusing although i welcome it.  i've been sitting in the same cafe for hours trying to feel like i am setting things in motion, or trying to be part of that.  there is soulful music playing and i kinda want to lie down on the cafe floor in the sun and tap the side of my foot against the cement floor, or slow dance with a stuffed animal.

lowry is sick in bed, tessa just sent an important letter, and chenda... i imagine you are up in the attic?
and so i started this today- hope we can all get down with it.
love you love you love you.