i suppose it is the same just highly unedited; a first draft of sorts

kathy wash 2012

19 Oct 2013

i am reading Anne Truitt’s Day Journal. i picked it up (so to speak…more downloaded) i suppose for many of reasons. i am interested in why visual artists write. i write. i need to write. i am compelled to do so. i am try to set a course for the next five years or so; trying to balance and put together what i do well. it is not web design, math always a struggle in high school; the programming i took was continuing ed for my job at the time; it did not relate to my aptitudes, talents, or heart. why it keeps raising its ugly head in my life simply because it has the potential to addresses maslow’s hiearchy of needs and university art departments are desperate for it in their design programs. graphic design and programming are not the same. they require completely different parts of the brain. even funnier is that a below poverty level wage would be offered to adjunct those classes when the country is dripping with tenure track positions for the same….hmmmm poverty or liveable wage. what a stupid question. but my brain is not wired for programming and certainly not teaching it. i am wired for the soft side of creativity, maleable and intuitive, live breathing and mentoring.

back to anne and picking up her book. sure i’ve heard her name, but i really don’t know her or her work. well and she is dead. again, why write. is writing my lead or a follow? is it center stage or support or staging? does writing really require my making? does my making require writing? i waiver on what i should do when i grow up. i feel like i should know. i feel like the grow up is on me. why? technically there is no hurry. again, i’ve zero interest to be pass through my own life as a rock hurled from point a to be. this worries me in terms of the art “market” both directly and the supporting academia…age matters. old is not hip. i am not worried about work ethic, i’ve plenty. i think it is the game; i’ve never liked games in any field. life isn’t a game; i don’t need to win or dominate. i don’t need to be more special than X. i don’t want to peck, peck. i don’t ever think i’ve really applied for a job, doors have opened. i went through. there were a few hoops just to say we did in terms of securing the positions but not much. i didn’t even try out for collegiate basketball, but played. ha. just showed up in the college gym the first weeks of school to shot hoops and was recruited on the spot. it wasn’t even a crappy team desperate team[beat a&m, beat rice, etc state champs years in the running]. i loved playing but it wasn’t about the game and winning, it was about the physicality, it was about the precision, it was about pushing myself to see what i could do. it was never about winning. it was about playing well. my jobs have been the same. i’ve never needed to one up, i just needed room and the freedom to do and pursue what i’ve an inklying for and serves in some way. i’ve never been competitive, never believed in pecking order or systems. again, ha. i applied for college the first time a month before the fall semester started. picked one school, applied. again for graduate school, i picked one school and applied. of course i had no idea that art school was competitive, i just assumed everyone got in to grad school. i was wrong. i do suck at standardized testing, oral reading groups, and arbitrary systems of pecking order and oppression. if i have to beat you to move ahead in x, i simply don’t do x. gaming is stupid, in the end all the game pieces die. i die. you die. so again, i don’t want to pass through my own life like a rock hurled, to me that is the competitive game i don’t want to play, but damn if i don’t need people, need tethering. that tethering comes through a few key human moarings for me. i know this about myself but it doesn’t change the fact that largely moarless i ride this phase. so as i try to figure out direction i suppose even though i am trying to weave together my aptitutes, experiences, etc…fundamentally i will probably choose a path, even if an illusion, that will build moarings. of course this is going to require the GRE. grrrrrr. ha. so in fact i do have a pretty clear idea of what i want to do, but a few of the stone hurling activities that are indicative of systems of peck, peck, i must do. so a waffle a bit, crap, in case i can’t compete. SQUAT and of course there is no fiscal security in any direction that seems viable to who i am.