[MD] Painting

Fri May 7 12:20:28 PDT 2010

Marsha,

Care to join me for Lunch today?

Have a seat.  I'll order the wine.

White Zinfandel, only, I'm afraid.  Its the only kind Lu drinks usually and
I'm more of a beer guy.

I had an incident this past weekend, that coincided with some thoughts I'd
been having about that whole "fuck your questions" soliloquy of LIla, which
you relate to and somehow it ties in to the whole definition of the
intellectual level.

What Lila's soliloquy pointed to, imo, is the natural human hatred of being
objectified.  As Jacques Ellul puts it, "pinned to the wall in a butterfly
museum" and it has been his thoughts and philosophizin' on the subject which
have triggered some insightful realizations which coincide with my daughter
Cassi's reaction to the normal vicissitudes of adolescent girl-hood.  Boy
trouble, to be exact.  Worse than mere boy trouble, however.  Boy trouble
coupled with sister trouble.  The boy in question being a good friend of
hers that happens to be an on/off boyfriend of her sister, Sarah.

Anyway, Cass has been real, real upset over her feelings and frustrations,
and we were at my mom's visiting and she kept on wanting to leave, tugging
us to the door, she wanted to go real bad and finish a painting she'd
started, that was calling to her from home.

What she'd been feeling the most, was a lack of caring on the part of her
sister.  A lack of understanding and a lack of compassion.  So it seemed to
me that she was driving for a way to express herself that would be
understood.

When we did get home, and she did get to work on her painting, she got even
more frustrated, more upset over the way it was going.  Her mom tried to
give some advice, and Cass just took it really bad, as criticism and ended
up sobbing and almost hysterical.

Over a bloody bit of paint on a canvas.  I mean, I just don't get that.  I
mean, I do get that, but I don't think that way at all.  I can't care that
much over artistic effort.

Her mom did  succeed finally  in showing her how to lighten some muddiness,
which had been Cassi's complaint, and how to undo what some things she'd
done.

Cassi didn't finish the painting to her satisfaction, but she got to where
she could leave it alone and go back to school in contentment.  And I like
it.  It's unfinished, slapdash and vivid emoting from a 16 year old girl.
 But she was correct in her attempt.  It expresses something to me, to us
all, that I didn't get from her words, from her situation, from her reality.

"Oh, you're just another  teen girl suffering from adolescent angst and
excessive hormones."

That's her reality and my statement is the truth.  Big deal.

"Yeah, thanks for the intellectual analysis dad, that really helps."  I can
hear her saying, if I bothered to tell her that, which I didn't.

What fascinated me was seeing this repugnance at being intellectually pinned
down, combined with a deep-felt need for expression, for being understood,
create art.

Lu put it on her website for me so I could actually show
you<http://www.portraitsbylu.com/ART/CassiPainting.jpg>what I'm
talking about, but I want to tie this all in to our discussion here
on "the intellectual level" and how that whole realm of intellecuality is
such a male dominated world.  There's an amoral coldness to it that seems to
repel the feminine mind.  Hence the truth contained in Lila's Soliloquy in
rejecting intellectual traps.  And which Pirsig understood so well!

And mind you, all men possess feminine minds, even as women have a heaping
helping of the masculine to their mix.  But primary orientations toward
reality are deeply entrenched in sex differences.  I saw this clearly with
my daughter.  She worked through her mental problems in a different way than
I or most guys would.  She used a different part of the human
thought-repertoire.  And by no means an inferior one!

In fact, I'd assert along with Horse's recent postulation, and Platt's
long-standing assertion, that an artistic aesthetic is the "highest" of all
levels.  That when it comes down to it, rationality itself is an artistic
creation that evolves according to aesthetic considerations of order and
beauty.

And Leonard Shlains fascinating book, Art and Physics, makes a profound case
for the evolution of new ideas in human experience coming first through the
arts, the poets, the mythos in whole.  THEN comes intellectual description.

I'm thinking the MoQ would be well served to rename the 4th level something
more along the lines, "the code of art" level.  With intellectual thinking
part of this level, as rationality is an art.  In fact, the 4th level ought
to be considered a division between classic and romantic thought - with the
Romantic aspect of human consciousness closer to DQ than the Classic.

The synthesis of art and science that puts science in its place.

Thanks Marsha,

burp.

On Wed, May 5, 2010 at 9:07 AM, MarshaV <valkyr at att.net> wrote:

>
> John,
>
> A very, beautiful and playful family.  Thank you sharing the video.
> It is no wonder you seem like a happy, quality guy.
>
> I did enjoy, and smile!   And feel some nostalgia.
>
> Thank you...
>
>
> Marsha
>
>
>
>
> On May 5, 2010, at 11:30 AM, John Carl wrote:
>
> > Here Marsha,
> >
> > A smile for you.  My three talented dauhters:
> >
> > http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1UUC20gsqM
> >
> > Sarah's my middle girl, Cassi the redheaded youngest girl and Emily the
> > talented videographer.
> >
> > Josh my son starts  off the extravaganza, and  there are also sneak peeks
> of
> > Lu and me in my daughter's  video.
> >
> > Enjoy!
> >
> > John
> >
> > On Wed, May 5, 2010 at 3:00 AM, MarshaV <valkyr at att.net> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >>
> >> round and round...
> >>
> >>
> >> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbIuC9hTY9Y
> >>
> >>
> >> Marsha, the out of tuned...
> >>
> >> ___
> >>
> >>
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