Icarus @ 59 # 24, Epiphany

Epiphany: a moment in which you see or understand something in a new and clear way. I have posted this picture before, it is me feeling very small at the MACBA in Barcelona. Sometimes life does this, the overwhelming, over-demanding  overcoming hugeness of it all is sometimes too vast to comprehend, and when I do begin to understand something in a new and clear way, I realise it is just another small sliver of the picture in the high, stain glass window of life. Which means my life is full of small epiphanies as I build that stained glass window. Still, its good to be able to see the design, every now and then. My favourite literary epiphany is the James Joyce short story, 'The Dead' and I will read it before I sleep tonight and I will also listen to this (below). I have also posted this clip a number of times over the past couple of years, but I love this song by Salif Keita and also this short film so I make no excuses for winding down the first Sunday of the year and taking this posting into Epiphany with it. I can hear what he is singing but have no idea what he is saying, should this matter? Not if it produces a mood for me to think in. Judging by the piece and Salif it can't be anything bad. Rumour suggests the album it comes from is a celebration of the independence of Mali but I really don't know, all I do know is that it helps me to mull over what I am thinking, and to think about new things and perhaps to find an understanding of something a new and clear way:

folon, folon oo mago t

Icarus @ 59 # 23

Ok, so its Central Park in New York again, one of my fave places but it has to be because of the film clip below. Great editing, great Lenny C. song, great dancing and look at those clothes. One day I am going to dress like that, just for the hell of it. I'll be looking for a Cyd Charisse, too. But this sure as hell beats the winter blues that are befalling Brighton at the moment; enjoy!

Dance Me To The End of Love - Leonard Cohen from Liviu Balint on Vimeo.

Icarus @ 59 # 22

Wild weather but its temporary and we need to have a perspective on it and I hope I have. But perspective is such a random thing, really. Today I read a wonderful piece by Amy Tan on 'Rules for Virgins' which I got free on Amazon. Its about being a courtesan (which I have no chance of being) but she writes (as the is a tutor to a young courtesan), 'You are too young to know yet what nostalgia truly means. It takes time to become sentimental. But for the sake of your success, you must quickly learn. When you touch a man's nostalgia, he is yours.' Well, well now, interesting, 'when you touch on a man's nostalgia, he is yours...' It is an interesting idea, post Freudian its all about keeping the uncanny suppressed. We like what we know we like and are nostalgic for the memory of the new - hmm. I am nostalgic about newsiness and what is new for me, maybe that is why I travel. I am also nostalgic for the idea of this song - good one for a stormy, I need you at the dimming of the day:

Icarus @ 59 # 21

The 17th Biennale of Sydney, which I attended, had the title, The Beauty of distance: songs of survival in a precarious age, and with the benefit of hindsight, and working on the 'lyrical future of nostalgia,' I have been able to reflect on this idea. Distance is that other place, the place over there that we desire, the better place to be, I left Edinburgh thirty-odd years ago, yet others wish they lived there, I left London twenty-odd years ago and the same occurs, and I miss them both, but I feel the same about New York and Barcelona and Brisbane and Melbourne - oh and I had the most fabulous time in L.A. when I was writing films. The truth is I never sit still for long. But it got me thinking too about being in Newtongrange. For 84 years, my father has lived no more than 2 miles from where he was born and he is fine with that. He likes knowing every corner, every turn, where to pick the best brambles and when and that is okay too. The fact is, travel is in the mind. I travel to work with people I don't live near and cross continents to learn what they know and pass on what I know and then to develop what we can do to take knowledge forward - that's essentially the job I do as a modern academic. But with internet, Skype and the like its all changing. A bit like songwriting, really. In the old days we would travel from pub to club to places to sing and hear and now we can just post it all online, talk to each other over 10,000 miles, as I write this I am currently in discussion with Canberra, Au. So, I might now practice my online quirking, my quaint, eccentric whimsy and peculiarity of ideas, which is the academic equivalent of… well I don't have to spell it out, do I? Do I? I adore this song, irony and country music and the wonderful Lucinda Williams, 'how would broken find the bones':

Icarus @ 59 # 20

One of the most astonishing sights I witnessed in Cape Town (among the many extraordinary sights) was this. A Slave Bell which was used to punctuate the day when slaves still existed in the Cape. This particular bell was on a wine estate in Stellenbosch and it isn't too hard to locate the colonial past in that town. I was at a conference on postgraduate degrees, which is about as far away as you can get from a slave bell, but it was also amazing to receive the reception we did, while there. What was equally amazing was the  hotel receptionists were the campest men I have ever come across - and boy did they flirt (with everyone - men and women). But what was so satisfying was their  out, loud and black message was simply greeted with smiles and often appreciation. I would like to think they and we have come a long way since the slave bell tolled. 

Icarus @ 59 # 19 Happy New Year

Happy new year, 
a stormy start but think about it as a reading of the Shipping Forecast, which soon lulls away bad thoughts:
There are warnings of gales in Rockall, 
Malin, Hebrides, Bailey, and Fair Isle, 
Dogger, Fisher, Forties, and Forth are fine, 
so too Sole, Cromarty and Tyne, 
Humber, Thames and Shannon; 
Wight, Lundy, Faeroes, Portland and Hebrides 
face precipitation,

as do South-East Iceland, Utsire and German Bight; 

while Dover and Plymouth,
Rockall and Fastnet, sigh a late night lullaby, 

and after the lullaby it is safe to sleep and dream and listen to Samuel Barber… 
and to hold all other thoughts inward and close…
while we hope that our goodwill and good intentions spread far and wide;
happy 2014, it can only promise more than the year past,
which was what it was, what it was, what it was, what is was… as it will always be,
but it can always be better, always be, always…
happy new year...