Whiteboy, Colorblind; inheritance...

Inheritance? 

What does inheritance have to do with race and whiteboys?

The other day we were listening to a program on the radio...about inheritance... here in Mexico.  The spokeswoman's position was that the offspring of the deceased didn't do anything for amassing the fortune or properties of their grandparents or parents.  So, why should any one child be given a greater inheritance than the others?  Here in Mexico there is a belief that the first or the last son should be given the inheritance...  

Now, what happens when the grandmother amassed the fortune and it was passed down to her son and her son had various daughters?

For some reason the sexism, male chauvenism didn't prevent the grandmother from creating successful businesses, from buying land, from constructing houses... 

Ok, maybe this isn't flowing as I had hoped hours ago.

What does this have to do with being a whiteboy?  What does it have to do with race?

Race is about competition.  It's about opposites or opposing teams.  About winners and losers...  If you are a New York Yankees fan, you want your team to enter the World Series every year... How many teams compete for the final two positions?  So, if your team must enter the World Series each year, that means that all the rest of the teams in your league can NOT win the race...

So, dad died, leaving behind property, wealth, businesses... to his only son and not to his only daughter.  The son's family benefits from the privileges of being wealthy.  The daughter's family grows up poor... The grandchildren and great grandchildren growing up wealthy avoid the grandchildren and great grandchildren growing up poor... And they grow up explaining to themselves and others the reasons why the poor side of the family is poor... explaining everything BUT the truth.

When Todd Golub had all of the 7th grade bullies call me "Poor Boy" what could I have said in defence (actually in offense)? A retort...  "Spoiled Brat"?

What could the poor side of the family say in defense against the wealthy side of the family?

We all know that the plantation owners had a need for creating extra-marital affairs with some of their female slaves... Most of those plantation owners were aware of their offspring created with their African lovers... The female slaves knew, just as did their children... 

So, when the plantation owner dies, did he give his child of his slave a part of the inheritance?

No, this isn't flowing as I had wished. 

White Boy Color Blind...a layperson's guide to racism, sexism, illness and healing...

Yes, that's correct. I'm a white boy... nothing I can do to change that... Granted, those who pride themselves on their skin tone, those who consider themselves the true "White Boys", wouldn't allow me into their club... What to do? What to do?

Here in Mexico, I'm a "white boy", meaning that I'm a "Gringo"... meaning that regardless of what is the truth, I'm extremely privileged... Looking at the true concept of privilege based upon systems of comparison, it's true, I'm extremely privileged, although not nearly as privileged as those you and I would consider extremely privileged... but then again, we're not putting things in perspective when we see ourselves as so much less priviledged... or maybe we are... The teenage budding intellectuals would call everything "relative"...  Relative is convenient... makes intellectualism extremely easy, always a quick escape route... And maybe there are quick escape routes for those at the most extreme end of the underpriviledged: death.  But, if we consider human nature that of self-preservation, then escaping "bad luck of the draw" by dying is not acceptable...

"White Boy color blind" is a play on words...  How can you be color blind calling yourself a "white boy"?  Ironic... it's not that I call myself "white boy", it's that they call me white boy or gringo... Are they to blame?  The Mexicans, the "blacks"? In a world divided by skin tone, historically and culturally, the lighter skin-toned and the taller are given positions of power and influence.  Yes, we can point to 5 dictators who were NOT tall and possibly weren't white washed: Napoleon, Hitler, Stalin, Franco, Mussolini... But, something else about those people helped them be anomalies, such as pure force of character... possibly...  

Today a "white" friend posted this article "

Let Black Kids Just Be Kids

 by the New York Times:  
https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/07/26/opinion/black-kids-discrimination.html?mwrsm=Facebook&referer=http%3A%2F%2Fm.facebook.com%2F

I posted it on the wall of a "black" friend and wrote the following comment that I posted on my wall and on the walls of a few other friends:  

"Just wondering... as I've wondered since we were bussed 5 miles to Somerville High School, where for the first time we found ourselves "mixing" with Blacks and Latinos... After 8th grade graduation, the older brother of a neighbor of a "friend" said, "now you're gonna go to school with the Niggers and the Spicks! Boy do those niggers smell!" I never forgot that statement, especially in the locker room where all the white boys seemed afraid of getting semi naked together... but you always heard the showers running after gym class. For 4 years the white boys put their cloths on over sweaty bodies... but the showers were running... the only kids who used them were the black kids,... ALWAYS. I didn't have to wonder how the "niggers" smelled. I knew: CLEAN. But all anyone truly cares about is what was said, not what truly occurred. This was central Jersey in the 80s... where racism couldn't possibly exist; "we're from the North; we fought against slavery in the Civil War!" Uh! Huh! I guess you slept through that part of "American" history 101... But that's not only what's on my mind... and directing this towards you "miss Black" could be considered racist... my having been the only white boy member of the Black Student Union at the community college may be considered racist, although I was invited... and when my peers called me "nigger lover" because I manned a table during Black History Month... I think we're all racist because we notice the differences... although there are differences between racist and racist, just as there are differences between rape and rape... and maybe we should try understanding those differences... but I still haven't gotten to my point... why you? Because of all of my 600+ so-called friends here, maybe you are only one of 2 who is interested in this stuff and may respond... not even the social-activist types truly give a damn or maybe they're afraid of blemishing their image... my image always was blemished regardless of my intentions. They called me a "nigger lover"... I wasn't. Why should I be? There's this world within which we live, within which we were born, whether or not we wished... and there are these incredible lies being cultivated and spread, for even thousands of years. From before puberty I didn't want to participate in those lies... but here I was born a white boy... shouldn't be a problem... but the problem makes us participate in so many ways... ignoring is participating... so the adolescent black boys seem older and can't behave as whites their age behave... seems violent... they seem older... must be judged as older? What's the problem here? Could it be that feeling the pressures/risks/concerns of "race" makes adolescent Blacks more intense, more serious? Is it that white social consciousnesses has "us" knowing that the "other" has reason to be angry and tense, regardless of the truth... so "we" are in constant defensive... but no one likes suffering passively in waiting. So maybe "we" become aggressive at "the drop of the dime"... knee-jerk reactions to modern movements against police violence and what "white privilege" truly means... yes, I'm a white boy... in most parts of Mexico that means Gringo. In East New York, Brownsville, Clinton Hills, Bed-Stuy, central Harlem, that was clear... what could I do? Paint my skin Vaudeville, not enter those communities? The true heart of darkness... is the greater lie we live... So, better to shed some light not avoiding."

One of the friends who grew up with me, who also was bussed to Somerville High School responded:  

There is no one, and I mean no one that can claim to be not racist. I had this conversation with gentleman a few weeks back. He was telling me the first time his mother heard herself being referred to as black and not Jamaican was here in the US. When people as me if I am gay, I tell them no, I am Italian American, what I do in my bedroom is have sex with men. Just an fyi, Bed Stuy and Harlem is now very hot neighborhoods that are colorblind. I have had roommates from various backgrounds, but I still would tell you black, hispanic, and white. We have been trained to see color and not ethnicity. I try to ask and learn something about their background and culture. Still I am a racist, because of the what is learned via society, and most government forms. You just be you, and screw what everyone else thinks.

To which I replied:

I was running in the park the other day... sounds like a 70s folk song... I was running 10k at 21 hours of my 24 hour fast... and a whole novel appeared in my mind titled, "White Boy color blind"... And I never got to the computer... because I've found myself writing and writing and writing about alternative health... touch-typing in the comfort of a downstairs couch... and I never got to painting either... But, the idea while I was running was just awesome! If I could pull it off... So, at the moment of your current comment, I was on my blog beginning "White Boy Color Blind primera parte"... Never comes out as I would wish... For me, it's all very sad... At once you are who you believe, at the same time you are who they label you as... no escape... I use the Spanish Inquisition and the Holocaust as examples: During the 1st phase of the Spanish Inquisition, Jews were offered the option of converting to Catholicism... or die... (or escape to France and Portugal or to Morocco)... Many converted... And many of those who converted to Catholicism embraced Catholicism in their hearts, as their own... And here they were, beautiful Catholics when the second phase began claiming that even the converted must be burned at the stake... So, what do you do? Now, if I were living in Hitler's Germany, no matter how much I explain that I do not believe in Judaism... I am Ross... myself... and even the Jews don't accept me... the virtue that by Jewish law, since my mother is Jewish (Father too), by default, I'm Jewish. No escaping the gas chamber... So, here is a very convincing explanation of it doesn't really matter how you call yourself, what is important is what others call you... which is why I've started calling myself "white boy" and "color blind" is actually ironic...

"Nigger Lover"... Now what does that mean?  Do you understand love?  Now what does THAT mean?  "Love"... hum... What is love damn it?  Do I love you?  Should I love you?... regardless of your appearance, skin tone, gender, sexual preferences...  Now, tell me that I should love myself... How many people become so confused when you say, "Before you expect someone to love you, you must first love yourself."? So, call me a "Nigger Lover"...  Go ahead... What does it really mean?  When I was being called that, I was supposedly loving my very white girlfriend who's maternal grandparents were of Welsh descent... Did I choose her for her skin tone?  No...  The woman with whom I was "in-love" at the time also was white... But, her parents were from Germany.  I guess I shouldn't have been attracted to her...  because of the Nazi risk...  of anti-Semitism...  She would have kissed me, if I wasn't a "prude" at the time... Who knows?  Maybe we would have married one day... maybe not... but not because of her skin-tone... But I was a damn "Nigger Lover"... And, NO, I wasn't color blind... I was attending towards that issue within... what racism meant for me... what racism meant for others... how it worked within the society, within history, within culture, pyschologically...  economically, politically, religiously...  And I was just beginning...  Not because I was a "Nigger Lover"... 

And what if that young female student who engaged me on the issue of racism and discrimination who told me that in no way I could enter the "Black Student Union" causing my 22-year-old response, "which means you are discriminating against my skin-tone", who then went to the officers of the Union with the debate, returning to me the following day (although I hadn't asked for admittance into the union, it was just a fun intellectual debate for expanding our minds in garden of R.V.C.C.) with the news that YES the officers would allow me to participate, but not as a truly active member... kind of as a guest... What if I had kissed her?  In some way or another we must have been "in-love"... "In-Love"? Yes, with something that engaged us... With the desire for erasing what created the need for the debate in the first place...

But what if Sue and I weren't in that 3 year relationship?  What if I wasn't "in-love" with Cathy?  What if this young "black" intellectual woman and I decided to be a sexual couple?  Remember, this was when Spike Lee came out with "Jungle Fever" and "we" couldn't look at those two hands intwined black with white...  Remember the social identity to which we were attending, trying to come to terms with the color lines, the distinctions, trying to resolve the differences... "The Grand Canyon" new age film just came out too... The response was to live in harmony but white families being white and black families being black and no true mixing... just mutually respecting one anther...

So, this young intellectual woman and I in central Jersey...well we begin dating... What happens?  What happens when I bring her to a family gathering?  What happens when she brings me to her's?

Racism didn't exist in New Jersey... at least that's what the "liberal" whites said... fantasies...  

So, I wasn't a "Nigger Lover"... although they said I was... I wasn't truly a white lover either... 6 years later I would bring Mónica to my mother's pre-wedding party in the house where I grew up... And she and her best friend Judy would start dancing a jig and singing "Maria" from "West Side Story"... Mónica was Puerto Rican... Of course I got angry... And Judy immediately accused me of bringing Mónica to the wedding just to cause a reaction... I guess I'm living in Mexico 14.5 years and married to Margarita 14 years for creating a reaction...  Now, come to the family and friends dinner parties and listen to the intense "liberal" arguments on human rights, sexism, discrimination, racism etc. and you'll be incredibly surprised by the hypocracy of that moment of singing and dancing to "Maria"...  All discussion is fine as long as it is isolated within the "in-crowd"... And if the "whites" or the "Jews" say that they aren't racist... well, you take their word for it until their REactions prove them wrong... 

By the way, Mónica was a very white Puerto Rican with "honey-colored" hair, born into a wealthy Polish and Spanish Puerto Rican family... She and her younger brother Martin, like their paternal grandfather, graduated from Cornel University in Ithaca.  Her father studied medicine in Massachusetts and her older sister Mercedes studied law at Johns Hopkins.  Her grandfather could have bought and sold Marsha and Judy.  

Perceptions, Perspectives, lies, hypocracy, power games...destructive illusions...  

What can you do?

https://youtu.be/ZHwVBirqD2s

Pearl Jam - Do the Evolution

Residente - Somos Anormales (Official Video)[Explicit]

Ricardo Arjona - Ella y El

A commentary about the Ricardo Arjona/Intocable song/video and interview "Mojado"

"El Mojado" ("The Soaked"; the indocumented migrant)...Ricardo Arjona was part of the Guatamala Nacional Basketball team before becoming one of the most succesful folk-pop singers of Latin America... If I'm correct, like many other Latin American pop/rock stars, he lives in Miami...
This is the video of how and why the song "Mojado" was produced... A wonderful view of the border between Tijuana and San Diego... along with the interview of Ricardo Arjona and the "Mexican" Norteño band "Intocable" (Untouchable)... I put Mexican in parenthesis because Intocable actually is "American" ("Gringo")... Yes, you heard me correctly... and yes, they "look" Mexican and they speak Spanish... But they are "American" citizens and not Mexicans... meaning that they were born and raised in the U.S. (Texas)...and as they explain during the interview, they have absolutely no experience with Mexican immigrants in the U.S.; all they know about the "mojado" experience is what they read in the papers, meaning that their families are "American" for more than one generation and no one else has been crossing the border seeking refuge with their families...  

Arjona wrote the song as a criticism of the reasons why Latinos have the need for travelling "illegally" to the U.S. wishing that the pueblos/countries of origin could offer the would-be "illegals" the ability for addressing the needs of their families (adequate education, clothing and food) without people abandoning their families and risking their lives in the crossing and in the U.S.  

"Mojado" (Wet) is the term used in Mexico that originated from the idea of having to cross the Rio Grande or Rio Bravo swimming in order to enter the U.S.  Arjona says that the word has two significances... the second significance is that the immigrant is "wet" from all of the tears they shed upon finding themselves so far from their families and all that is familiar... in the name of looking for a better future for themselves and their family... I would say that there is a second significance of tears: tears shed by those left behind who never hear from their father, son, husband, brother and female equivalents because those people died in the desert or were killed by assailants... or became immersed in addictions on the other side... or they created a new family in the U.S... and stopped being in contact with their spouses and children... stopped sending money back...  

Now, if the video and interview were in English, I think "Americans" would have a much easier time seeing the point I've been trying to make for years... that "American" doesn't have only one reality, one face, one language or one culture... and that most "Americans" have ancestors who entered the U.S. for the same reasons (lived through the incredibly similar experiences; living in a hostile nation, within an incredibly different culture... standing out as "sore thumbs")...  

It's funny, in the book "Rabbit Run" by John Updike, one of the characters tells the main character Rabbit that she believes her family is originally Mexican... (The story takes place in semi rural Pennsylvania in the late 50s or early 60s)... Rabbit responds to his lover, "But you're too tall to be Mexican!" and she calls him a jerk... I mention this because "Americans" tend towards believing that Mexicans are very short... Well, come live here to know the truth...  Half of my 8 brother-in-laws are taller than me...  Most of Margarita's male cousins are taller than me...  Many Mexicans are taller than me... I'm 5'6"...  Yes, I'm short, although not incredibly short... So, if many Mexicans are taller than me, then I guess they aren't what "Americans" believe them to be... I think this is important... all of this... if you are truly against the "Trump" anti-immigrant/anti-Mexican movement and all that it seemingly stands for... for putting it into perspective...

Ricardo Arjona - Mojado (Video Oficial)

Ricardo Arjona - Mojado; Interview of how and why the song and video were written and produced

Los Pericos - Anónimos ft. Carla Morrison

My favorite Latin-American or Spanish songs and videos as I find myself ...

Heroes del silencio Tour 2007

Golgotha Primal Scream silent for the moment...

Blood as water
What once was your life fluid, what it meant to be you,
Drained, as butchers drain cows and pigs and goats and chickens...

Humans not for human consumption...
Perspectives... 
we consume ourselves

we consume others...
Humans butchering Humans

Some believe... only the terrorists
No one else...
The Romans
Never brought to "justice"

What happened in London? In Portland?

Smart bombs
And millions of tons of missiles
Aren't knives or hatchets 
or vans driven into crowds...
No horror, no terror
Political and clean; lazer-guided missiles

Christ purified Golgotha
Cleansed our brains of horrifying memories
A brainwashing...

There weren't hundreds or thousands of bodies...
Decaying on a hill...
Just the 3 Marys and Jesus

Terrorism, brutality, horror
Once unpardonable
Sanctified
The only miracle to which you'll believe...

If we believe in Christ, we can't terrorize
If we worship his horrorfying crucifixion,
No other crucifixion can exist
Just as there is only one God...

The Romans cleansed themselves and history...
1700 year legacy of exhoneration of the henous
Pigs lapping up a never ending puddle of blood...


This time, your blood drained
Nurturing pigs
Pigs nurturing humans
Nurturing your captors, your mutilators, your assassins...
In the end, your blood seeps into the earth like water
what wasn't pooled and lapped up by pigs...
your body decomposes
nurturing... nurturing...
nurturing...

Vaginas... Primal Screams... Gritos Interiores... "Prude"

When Anya left me in her mother's studio apartment in Brighton Beach... when she left for Kiev saying she may not return to me... I wouldn't blame her... Afterall, had we known was the purpose of our relationship, for me learning about taking a Greyhound bus from the Port Authority to Laredo Texas for only $120 USD, who knows?  Had I known that the "fun" was just about to begin 2 years later, having almost nothing to do with her... had I known that I would obtain what I sought... No, I'm not so easy... for fooling myself... Not that I haven't been a fool... Of course I have!  However, it's not so easy as saying "had I known..:"  No.  We don't know enough for being truly comfortable with our decisions... So, I imagine I would have suffered anyway...  

"I wouldn't blame her... Afterall, had we known..." the purpose of our relationship... had we known... had we known... 

From that night that I found myself sighing... like a fool... not the first time... that night that she called me back up the hill... I knew... I knew...  that I wasn't supposed to kiss her...  the awkwardness... Believe me when I say this thought that bugged the hell out of me:  "Her forehead was too wide.."  No, it wasn't a physical fault of hers... To me, she was beautiful... "Our heads are so different..."  I truly believed that there was a conflict within the distinct difference of the shapes of our heads... and that was how we couldn't kiss... Something just didn't make sense...  Crazy... yes... but if I told you all of the things that would occur before they occured... that they were set in motion years earlier and thousands of miles apart...  

The painting that I'm currently working on... Finally painting "The Woman in the Sky" that I drew at the Tea Lounge in Park Slope 14.5 years earlier, that predicts Margarita and my dilemma in April 2003...

My stating that a man would appear... and help us pull ourselves out of the hole... Something I mentioned for 3 years before Chris appeared with the $30,000 USD...  

Crazy is only crazy if it isn't supported by real events...  

So, Anya...  ?

Did I tell you that the night she arrived on the plane from Scotland to New York City I suddenly felt a horrible familiar tension... Tension...  that I only experienced with Anya... for how long?  I imagine that it's this same tension that keeps me writing about her... but what is it?  Something that continues connecting us... something within which we are mutually immersed? 

Debra had a wonderful idea... Since she was leaving for a graduate program at the University of Michigan and would leave her incredibly lucrative nanny job open, maybe I should take her place... Wonderful idea... Me a nanny...  For the adopted children (I believe they were adopted) of a very wealthy lesbian couple living in Bergen County New Jersey...  So, I went with Debra to check out the situation... a nanny for children... Me... incredibly uncomfortable around children... me awkward around children... me, with absolutely no experience with children, other than working a few months at the Salvation Army Foster Care services... that I dropped a month or less after Anya left for Kiev... a "decision" I greatly regret... And, yes, I do regret...  Children...  the picked on me... too much... too long... yes, I was a child... Supposedly I wasn't a child when Anya left for Kiev, when she returned from Scotland...

Debra took me to the bus station and she returned to the house where she was terminating as a nanny... It was night... I was thoughtful... buses do that for me... I become meditative staring out the window, watching storefronts, houses, rivers, headlights pass by... Thoughtful... about what I had just experienced and the crazy decision to become a nanny or the equally crazy decision to put aside such a lucrative opportunity... But the tension that began entering my body (not my mind), was not related with the nanny opportunity. The incredibly clear thought entered my head, "Anya has returned to New York City..."  And that was that... something to which I must address within the moment... 

I returned to my apartment on Ocean Avenue and called Joey... I imagine I was exlaining to her how the trip to New Jersey went... In the middle of the conversation, my telephone beeped, call waiting.  I put Joey on hold.  

Anya was on the other line, calling from John F. Kennedy airport.  She called me before calling her parents...  Atypical...  

Over time, I've learned to understand things about myself.  First, I'm not psychic, no matter what I said about the appearance of Chris or all of the people whom appeared in my paintings before having met them, or feeling that Anya was approaching...  That doesn't make me psychic... For me, psychic is having control over the knowing... and truly knowing what will occur... how and when... No, that's not me... although, over time, I've learned that so much isn't actually a coincidence... and that's why I continue writing about Anya... because this isn't about coincidence... 

Anya shouldn't have dated me... But we had no other choice...  regardless of the obvious problems or issues or tensions or struggles that made it impossible for us to have a future together... irreconcilable differences...?  Maybe for the purpose of the relationship... of the experience... Irreconcilable...  Sue just appeared in my head... a night when a super blizzard was hitting us at her dorm at Bennington College, where she studied art and then put it aside, when I had absolutely no interest in anything related to art... But, thinking about Anya and irreconcilable differences, that night at Bennington College during the blizzard that never truly materialized... comes to mind... as a photograph... What is that called?  What are those connections called?  

I can call myself all the things that Anya would call me... now...  We were a mis-match...  And how lost in the mind was she when she thought she should marry me?  I should paint her with her head detached from her shoulders as "Anya, Have You Lost Your Head?"  

I don't have a problem pointing my finger at myself... and "how did I get myself into that situation?" A place, situation, relationship within which I didn't belong...  Or was it that I was truly what she sought?  The crazy artist...  The artist who never truly found himself within his art...  Pause...

Pause...

Pause...

That was Anya:  The crazy artist who never truly found herself within her art...  Maybe I had found myself within mine... But, I never found the irregular polygon hole within which I would fit...  Truthfully, I had no idea... or maybe that wasn't the issue...  She didn't fall in-love with me because she wasn't comfortable with that aspect of her self... She fell in-love with the me she invented in her head...  Not with what was actually available for ourselves within our situation... the lives we would make for ourselves...  

Her forehead didn't fit with myself.. No matter how much I would sight, I wouldn't encounter the adequate response within the situation... I must remain running behind her, off balance... burning my breaks and my clutch at the same time... accelerating and breaking, breaking and accelerating, but never knowing exactly when I should do one or the other or when I must make the turn... she must do it all for me... until her friend from San Miguel de Allende would show me the exit door... the reason for having put ourselves through such an ordeal, Anya and I...  

But you still don't understand my point...  

Why was Donald Trump elected?  Why must the "American" people and the world be subjected to such an ordeal?  Why is there a rampage of terrorist attacks in England?  Why doesn't anyone understand?

Do you truly believe that I'm only talking about myself?

When I first met "Estrella" the psychic or the clairvoyant or whatever you should call him, I was working in Foster Care... I imagine Anya had left for Kiev... Or maybe she hadn't... who knows?  And, no, this time he didn't say anything about my personal relationships...  It was too soon...  

When I entered his room, after having waited at least 3 hours, "in line"... beyond the hour of my appointment with him... The first thing he said was, "Have we met before?" I responded, "no"... Then he said, "You're a warlock?"  I said, "no"... Now he must respond, "You're afraid of your powers..."  To which I respond, "I imagine you have a point..."  

What powers?  And I find myself asking that question 16 years later...  

The other day Margarita said that she loved my drawing, self-portrait of myself beheaded by ants... a response to a Facebook comment by my mother... I screaming at her, not at the ants that had just bitten off my head...  I was surprised by Margarita's comment that she loved that drawing... to which she proceeded explaining that it reflected something very primal within... Primal?  No, I'm certain her comment was much more profound...  Yes, what she loves so much about the drawing was that she sees my Grito Interior... "Grito Interior":  Primal Scream...  I understood clearly... something related to what Estrella mentioned...  

The firewood was green... "the wet wick wouldn't light so we found ouselves in the dark..."  The matches were damp...  Everytime I became excited, enraged, or enthusiastic, someone threw a bucket of icy water on me...

"The Mother of the Earth" is squatting, about to give birth, but you can't witness... you can't see that part of the painting...  I've always been a "prude"... especially with my writing... afraid of being crude or lude or that it would become pornagraphic... and it doesn't matter how Phillip Roth writes or how Ken Follett describes sex scenes between two lovers...  

There was a moment in Brooklyn when I wanted to painted lynchings of "black" men and women... photographs I had stumbled across at the Mount Holyoke College library researching something else... Horrifying photos... Photos that tell you of another "America"... Photographs that tell that your perspectives about "the American People" are incorrect...  I started painting blood and a raped woman and probably didn't reach the hanging charred bodies... I became sick... Horribly sick... and I never returned to the subject... although it's incredibly important for me...  

I do believe that some people paint for shock effects...  

Somewhere I believed that paintings should make people feel good... although one of my favorite paintings has always been "Golgotha" at the Princeton University Art Museum... I first went with Sue for her community college art project and then I went with Cathy for hers...  (I was still with Sue and never truly cheated on her with Cathy... I should have... My primal scream)...  Golgotha... Not just one crucifixion on the hill... but possibly hundreds of people nailed and hanging to crosses...  in the foreground, at the bottom of the painting are pigs lapping up the blood...  

A very very important modern truth...  

Blood as water
What once was your life fluid, what it meant to be you, 
Drained, as butchers drain cows and pigs and goats and chickens...
This time, your blood drained
Nurturing pigs
Pigs nurturing humans
Nurturing your captors, your assassins...
But, in the end, your blood seeps into the earth like water
what wasn't lapped up by others...
and your body decomposes
nurturing... nurturing...
nurturing...

No, I'm not a good writer...  

Doggy style, or as a bull would a cow... the only way she could achieve orgasm... if I could perform... like a bull...  her fingers on that button... what button?  I'm a prude... can't write that ...  The myth of sisyphus, sifilus, wussy puss...  prude... her tongue on the other's clitoris, because sex clubs do that to you...  No, her tongue wasn't on the other's clitoris... her mouth bathed in vaginal juices, pussy juice, almost drowning in the viscous fluid, as her friend, the man who invited her accompanyment, was being swallowed... swallowed... swallowed, with his finger in Joey's... Joey's... Joey's...  I'm a prude, wouldn't have been that dude for the life of me... Prude?  No... No... Not actually an interest of mine... Just as I couldn't just kiss Anya because I was supposedly within the situation, because I was attracted to her... I couldn't kiss her... Randi I were a couple how many days before we actually kissed... on the Amherst lawn just below Amherst College, where they were showing open-air movies... we were laying on a blanket... very romantic... although not the first romantic moment...  It was just the right time... the moment... We were an item, a couple... and hadn't kissed for at least 4 days... for at least weeks... We knew we were an item the moment we decided to live together that summer...  Psychic?  Just things we know... circumstances to which we are being prepared...  Randi?  2 years... 2 years... of preparation... for that true meeting... I didn't paint her...

Because I didn't paint... No interest... Not even while visiting Sue at Bennington... Randi and I had met when Sue and I were still a couple... No attraction... but what truly is attraction?  Is it something you decide, determine?  

Remembering vaginas makes me sexist?  Georgia O'keefe?  Vaginas can be disappointing... They can be frightening... They can be amazing... like sculptures... like a Georgia O'keefe painting...  Vicky's turned into an orchid that turned into a serpent, a cobra...  days after Valentine's... days after she broke up with me on Valentine's...  Something was occurring in Margarita's life that day... a connecting I forgot about... Yes, we can be reaching... or I can be teaching...  But Vicky returned to my apartment for one last experience... for some reason I brought something out of her that...  How many times have I cooked something that I just loved... loved...?  Although I ate more than what was necessary, before turning off the lights in the kitchen and the study, and going upstairs to bed, I had to serve myself another portion...  That was Vicky's last visit... and I said I would paint her vagina... since I had never seen anything of the sort, not with her during those two months...  No drugs... never been a problem of mine... 

Something occurred that had never occured before, now afterwards...  we never had to do the dance, no movement of bodies... and she would suddenly say, "it's coming!  It's coming! as if she were pregnant and her water was breaking...  not urine... not cum... no viscosity... no smell... bedsheets, mattress drenched... no smell... never... Seth would accuse us of having drenched his brother-in-law's bed that New Years party in Hillsborough...  Foolish us!  Foolish us!  Vicky the alcolic modern dancer... became incredibly caustic that night after enough drinks...  Mr. Hyde...  

Walking along Prospect Park West, where Randi ended up living after we broke, Vicky pointed to the brownstones and said, "one day one of these will be yours!"  People shouldn't say things that aren't true...  We turned down 9th street towards Dizzy's...  There is only one person living within our bodies...  One day I would work with Matt, the owner of Dizzy's... One day I wouldn't own a Brownstone overlooking Prospect Park...  

One day I wouldn't become that husband Anya imagined upon leaving Scotland for New York...  Randi had said that she knew we had serious problems... that she knew that it was improbable that we could make it to that end... So why did she become so angry, resentful?  Afterall, we were friends, weren't we?  But, Anya never allowed us to be friends... because she didn't believe men and women could be friends... She didn't believe that women and women could be friends...  and she had her list of reasons...  Maybe she's changed her mind... She says that people don't change... although she did... when she returned to me... Maybe she would have said, "I love you" this time... instead of responding to my foolish statement, with tears in her eyes, "But I don't feel the same way towards you!"  Laying on the floor of her bedroom, because we didn't fit in her single mattress bed... she had said once, "I imagine this is symbolic that I will never marry, because I bought a bed that fits only one person..."  We were a "couple" (couple of fools) and she repeatedly talked about her concern about being a spinster... about what her father said... what other's believe... that she was too old (supposedly making her too ugly) for marrying...  

I imagine she married...  why does it matter?  I'm just a gossip queen I guess...  Or maybe because Anya  marrying would mean that she could evolve, change... 

She's married to me, although she doesn't want to acknowledge that...  Inextricable...  

Can I get pornographic with you?  

Drenched white panties... no viscosity I can recall... on the couch on the first floor of the duplex, looking out to the wonderful patio-porch-deck...  That day I would have sex with 3 women... Why?  Remember Joey and my issues with her?  Did I explain those?  My problem... not actually an existential problem...  Drenched white silk panties...  And the last time I would be untrue to myself... what I loved between her legs... the most beautiful of vaginas...  kind of like straight out of Pink Floyd, "The Wall"...  Like a Georgia O'Keefe Painting... too wet... too white and silky... no smell whatsoever...  I couldn't return... And there was the Haitian woman I met on the subway... we bumped into Joey on 6th Avenue... very awkward, although Joey understood... the situation she believed she put me in...  And the young Haitian woman at the Moonstruck Diner (where Vicky dumped me that Valentine's Day), repeatedly saying, "Do you like Peach Cobbler?"   When we bumped into Joey, Joey was looking for "honest" work... I imagine I wasn't working... And "Peach Cobbler" (like Anya) insisted upon paying for EVERYTHING...  That night was the last time I would lay with her... like Anya...  Bitches in Heat and I was just a dumb mutt trying to stop being so dumb...  She said that my penis was beautiful...  and I am shy about painting it... although it's in "Self-Portrait at 33" with my colon in my hands...  Her's was the smallest, cuttest vagina I had ever seen... She didn't like oral sex... What did she want with me?  I will never know...  

Fortunately for me, no sexually transmitted diseases...  Fortunately for Margarita...  How foolish we can be...  

And why didn't I paint vagina's... maybe I could have had a show... maybe I could have sold... easily... and Anya wouldn't accuse me of not being an artist... Or maybe that's just the point:  I don't paint vaginas... my primal scream...  

Or maybe it's because of flashbacks... memories pre-dating puberty... what made me so precocious and then so prude...

Who showed me theirs who shouldn't have... I know Anya, you probably shouldn't have, although that was beyond our control... Anyway, this really has nothing to do with you... does it?  Or maybe you would see things differently...  

Radiohead - Live at NOS Alive! Festival, 2016 (Full Concert) [50fps]

Artist or Prostitute... That is the question...

She asked him, "if you don't think of selling your paintings, why do you paint?"  

This wasn't the first time they argued about whether or not he was truly an artist... on a prior occasion she had said, "One reason you're not an artist is because you don't paint everyday..."  To which he responded, "look, painting isn't my only artistic passion... The days that the painting clearly isn't working or I'm not inspired, I cook... A sure bet... never fails me... and we've gotta eat.  Why not eat inexpensively and what you truly crave?  Other days I write or I read...  I don't know how that would discredit me as being an artist..."

Her block-headed stubborness had been grating on him for awhile... His girl"friend" was rapidly taking the form of a horse with blinders pulling a carriage through Central Park, her self-constructed trap... He thought of calling her a stubborn mule... Instead he responded out of character, 

"Now tell me, honestly dear, when we 'make love', are you really practicing for a role in an upcoming porn movie?..."

a pause, allowing the impact of the question to sink in...

"...I mean... afterall... in your mind... passions are truly valid ONLY if you're being paid... So, maybe it's true what the feminists say when they defend prostitution; that all women prostitute themselves to their husbands in some way... an exchange of sex for their husband's paycheck, the house, the nice car, the vacations... so why give it up for free and permanently?  I mean, that's what you believe isn't it?  Everything comes with a price tag and must be exchanged for money... In order to be an artist, I must sell my paintings... 'straight from the horses mouth?..."

Devo - (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction (SNL 1978)

No me gustan los hipócritas

¿Tengo que decir más?

Terrorism, over-population, competition for resources and "middle-class" (American) excesses...

Response to a commentary on Facebook about the Terrorist Attack in Manchester England

Original Post:  

"Just thinking out loud. I am sitting in the center of Cambridge just opposite Kings College, looking around and feeling so proud to be a part of this community. I see Indian ladies passing by in the most beautiful saris and choli tops, Orthodox Jews in their kippahs, I see Muslim girls in hijabs,I see Africans, Asians, Europeans, all speaking different languages. And I am thinking, how cool is that! How cool, that people came into this country, but managed to keep their language, their national clothing, their cultural identity. How cool that all these people are mingled together and accept each other's difference. I am very concerned that after the recent tragedy in Manchester, the level of racism and intolerance will plummet. Again. But I think that the whole nations, or religions should never be judged by the action of the few fanatics. The strength of this nation is in its diversity. Only diversity brings progress. Cultural, intellectual, even biological diversity is the main attribute of progress. Closed borders, suspicion, racism and uniformity are the beginning of the end. They are the route of stagnation and degradation. Of course I think that people, who come to live in this country should learn its language and history and obey its laws. But other that that, I believe they are free to keep their national individuality and should never be judged by their race or religion. We are all people of the earth. We are all the same. And we all deserve peace, respect and acceptance."

Ross:  But I do wonder what the nation/nations has/have done to recieve such attacks. One of the reasons for such incredible diversity is the horrible colonialism and imperialism in the past and present

She: "Very true. I believe my country is reaping what it sowed in previous generations in some ways."

Ross:  James Baldwin wrote the novel "Above My Head" basically attending to the incredibly complex issue of historical racism or the heritage of slavery of Africans in the U.S. and the "black" experience during the civil rights movements... During one part of the novel, the main character (a gospel singer turned rhythm and blues/soul singer of African descent) is talking with his French lover ("white")... The French lover explains that France was actually a victim within the conquest of Africa... "a VICTIM???" 

Victim of colonializing half of Africa? How could that be? 

But, the explanation, although clearly written as a riddle, is interesting: 

Capitalism was "invented" in England just before the discovery of the Americas, before England created the first Industrial Revolution... To compete with navies and armies in Europe at the time, each country must encounter the means of obtaining fist-fulls of money in seconds... Remember that the European countries with coasts and navies ended up being the "rulers of the planet"... Truthfully, it didn't matter that one fleet sunk the fleet of another country... as long as the kings had money in their coifeurs for replacing those ships... 

It doesn't matter how many billions of trillions of dollars were thrown into the garbage manufacturing nuclear arms between the USSR and the U.S., although those arms were never used... 

Get my drift on that point about the navies? 

So, in order to keep your head above water and your country afloat during such European competition from the 15th century through the 19th century, France had to obtain lands high in natural resources...

(as England would learn when it lost the cotton and wool market to the U.S. in the 19th century, when the U.S. began the second leg of the Industrial Revolution, human bodies are also natural resources)...

and they couldn't compete with England and Spain in the Americas, nor with England in Asia... So, they HAD TO conquer Africa... The repercussions of such a history places France in a victim status...

The terrorism is directed against the original conquerers and against who is deemed ally to the "white devil"... And it doesn't matter how diverse is the country and who wonderful lives are lived by the immigrants and the "people of color"... 

What matters is how each government acted against the countries of the people who have decided that they are "white devils"... How those countries depict the other countries and peoples... When George Bush Jr. began his wars against Iraq and Afghanistan, the "crusades" language he and others used justifying the U.S. and NATO's actions was extremely clear... The U.S. is "the Santa Crusada" (during the Crusades, certain Kings were labelled emperors of the Crusade and led armies against "The Infidels"...) 

When the "two sides" (as if it was truly a dichotomy) can decide to change the language and the perceptions/perspectives, truly and sincerely and honestly erasing the titles "Crusades" and "Jihads", erasing the need, then the terror will cease... But, there is a certain built-in need for maintaiing the hostility, the dichotomies, the violence... Until then, things will continue escalating... 

the evolution of culture and technology is moving too fast for people to sit back and consider... Knee-jerk reactions and the addiction for quick stimulation combined with immediate gratification and immediate and simple responses, makes it incredibly difficult for people to take the time necessary for truly considering... throw in explositions in public spaces and now no one has time for consideration, everyone is thrown into panic within an urgent and horrifying situation, which is why it is deemed terrorism... A local government can manipulate its own people with terrorist attacks... You don't need an outside attacker to accomplish your goals for moving the people as you wish... In the name of "millions", a few lives are sacrificed... afterall, in 1980 we were 4 billion people... In 2017 we have almost doubled that population... easy for strategists to forgive genocide and see people as numbers and not as individuals... And how do you feed so many people? How do you offer so many people jobs, especially when capitalism means economizing, being as austere as possible, automizing, removing the excess workers, the bank tellers for instance... 

Remember Pink Floyd's song "US and Them"? 

How do you turn the Islamic people, the Jews, the Africans, the Asians not living in Great Britain into part of the "US" part of the "WE"? 

And when the workers began losing their jobs but see a continuous influx of immigrants... who for some reason are able to eat, still...? 

Just so you understand, I live in Mexico for 14+ years... born, raised and educated in the U.S. I see the Mexican reality of why so many enter the U.S. "illegally" from this side... watching the "Trump-related" events from here... Learning about the terrorist events in Europe here... And, to tell you the truth, not even the "American Intellectuals" and people supposedly concerned about human rights etc, care about what I describe?  Why not?  Because they are only acting a certain role they've been taught means being an American... If it's a social gathering and the topic is such... grouply accepted... everyone seems concerned and interested... good people...  But, when it's not about participating within a role, a theatrical performance, what really matters to them is their creature comforts... their right to relax... after 5pm and weekends and vacations, not understanding that that's not the norm for most of the world...  and wasn't the norm for their "forefathers"...  and those creature comforts end with terrorist attacks and crashed in the economy or incredible rises in the cost of farm goods, especially with Trump smashing the sledgehammer on Mexican exports to the U.S.; the highest percetage is agricultural product necessary for feeding "Americans" as they wish for eating, but at the lowest prices possible...  for the highest paid workers on the planet...  

"Mexicans" love the idea of Hitler and Nazism... even though, had they understood the truth about Nazism, they would understand that they too would have been horrible victims had Hitler's people arrived in force in the Americas... 

One must ask "whys" before making final conclusions... just in case you see some of my statements as justifications of genocide... 

The culprit is historical... and is so ancient, dates back well before the invention of monotheism and modern religion, meaning that it dates back to well before Judaism... it dates back to the aftermath of the Ice Age... which is over-population... Natural survival instinct and protection of the family (survival instinct) and the community became horribly exagerated... seems like a communal mental illness of aggression and paranoia... obsession with control, power and accumulation... hedonism to the extreme... When do the wealthy determine that they have enough... Why can't the middle-class or upper-middle-class "Americans" live without increases or live as had their grandparents, without excesses?

Mon Laferte - Amárrame ft. Juanes

Café Tacvba - María [480p]

Do you hear those birds...?

Violent intellectuals, nationalist "self-empowerment" movements justifying popping up around the globe... Some in the name of "Trump", some against that tendency...  Down with the Yankee pirates, abajo con los "Gringo" sanguijuelos... And I ponder during my walk to the vegetable market, parsley for a Palestinian Babaganouj recipe... Oh yes, it could be Israeli or Lebanese or Egyptian...  The religion or nationality doesn't really matter... The flavor, the festivity within the memories, the sharing... that's what connects us... a need for nurturing....

And I wonder if the worry was truly worth living... concerned about what's occurring in Argentina or India... I don't have to talk about the U.S., England, Venezuela, Turkey... Putinlandia...  

When I close my eyes... when they're open, I hear the birds in the Avocado trees... regardless of what's occurring around the world... what's about to occur... No matter how it feels; the concern, the worry, the questions of "what if"...  I still hear the birds... if only momentarily.

What does this mean?

We can't know the dates, the times... But we can still listen...

To the birds... for the moment.

Now isn't that a strange thought?  I never liked birds... years ago...  What was it that I had said?  Was it because they didn't have arms...?  Rats with wings?  No... a New Yorker dislike for pigeons... like rats with hoofs the central Jerseyan hater of deer... crossing infront of your headlights, driving at too high a velocity... not paying attention... not paying attention to the destruction of fields and forrests for over-population centers of human living... accusing the animals of over-populating themselves, placing their needy selves infront of our headlights in the moment of collision...  

What foolish boys we can be!

Love animals don't eat them...  Save the environment; kill a developer... Did that Saab or Audi or Volvo-driving college student kill her father, uncle or grandfather?

"I'm a vegetarian, but I eat fish..."  I'm not vegetarian and I know the difference... I'm not a pacificist, nor am violent...  If you sit too close to me on a very hot and stuffy day, maybe I'll become difficult, uncomfortable... If you live too close to another person, breathing on them... forcing them to listen to your overly volumed heartbeat...  they can't escape from your rhythm, from your smoke... maybe there will be violence...  

And what does this have to do with Trump and international nationalism?  Multi-national nationalism...  

"The Indios Gringos..." as if there is a difference between a "native American on one side of the U.S. Mexican border than on the other side... I guess it could be if they had learned Spanish or English... or how one federal government historically treated the other group...  

"Indios from Gringolandia"... As if they had made a choice of which invading army or government they wished for as oppressors, exploiters, rapists, assassins, destroyers of community, family, culture, health, future...  

But what does this have to do with birds?

Margarita said, "I don't like Parque Metropolitano because it doesn't have birds..." 5 years ago... a great place for running... for sunning... I wasn't sure I aggreed with her... And then the birds appeared... and we noticed the changes of the seasons... different birds... and what incredible appreciation... their different forms, structures, colors... voices... The park became filled with small wild parrots and the raucous ruckus voices... not exactly attractive... but a continuous novelty... and the bright red cardinals, if that's what they are... and the shy woodpeckers that announce their arrival at another tree... and if you hear them and look in the direction of that trunk, you'll see them... to whom are they announcing?  Today, Margarita notices lots of birds... no complaints...

And what does this have to do with violence and nationalism?

If you notice the birds, listen to them, you notice peace and liberty... you notice momentarilly that things aren't as tense as you thought... Momentary hope...  

Birds don't have to be only symbolic... I don't have to paint them... They appear against my lack of will...  against my will... no power... no will... everything will fly away upon their wings and disappear into the sky... 

Don't worry mi amor...  we aren't just petals or feathers on the wind... we are spirits... immortal... hand-in-hand, fingers entwined in an eternal dance... and there I will be, sitting upon that bough, observing you through the eyes of a crow...  hovering over you as a falcon on updrafts... as a seagull over the waves crashing upon the beach, a sparrow dancing on the air... That's me...

A king dining upon fragments of light passing through the trees, illuminating light pink or bright yellow flower petals, reflecting off pools where doves bathe... swallows gliding over the water scooping up mosquitoes with their beaks... pirouetting, diving, turning corners at 45 degree angles...

But, BANG! the racist nationalist with an idea just pulled the trigger, point blank, a bullet in the head of his neighbor, "the other"

For a moment the trees went silent... the birds concerned about what the sudden explosion of noise meant for them... When the gunpowder smoke has dissipated upon the wind... deathly silence is replaced by the aviary response... communicated by the birds... 

Do you hear them?