Vernacular Spectacular

2012-02-01T22:01:00.000-08:00

A Time for Everything

¹ There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:

² a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
³ a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
⁴ a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
⁵ a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
⁶ a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
⁷ a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
⁸ a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.

⁹ What do workers gain from their toil? ¹⁰ I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race. ¹¹He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet^[a] no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. ¹² I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. ¹³ That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God. ¹⁴ I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him.

¹⁵ Whatever is has already been,
and what will be has been before;
and God will call the past to account.^[b]

¹⁶ And I saw something else under the sun:

In the place of judgment—wickedness was there,
in the place of justice—wickedness was there.

¹⁷ I said to myself,

“God will bring into judgment
both the righteous and the wicked,
for there will be a time for every activity,
a time to judge every deed.”

¹⁸ I also said to myself, “As for humans, God tests them so that they may see that they are like the animals. ¹⁹ Surely the fate of human beings is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath^[c]; humans have no advantage over animals. Everything is meaningless. ²⁰ All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return. ²¹ Who knows if the human spirit rises upward and if the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth?”

²² So I saw that there is nothing better for a person than to enjoy their work, because that is their lot. For who can bring them to see what will happen after them?

2012-01-29T16:37:00.000-08:00

Metamorphosis and Theoretical Physics, or the M theory

When i think about you,

i think about you in the fifth dimension.

In the fifth dimension, our time line is but one branch of the tree,

where every decision creates the possibility

for infinitely many different branches

and thus infinitely many other timelines.

I like to think of myself as a caterpillar,

tracing my way back down this branch

to the branch where things were different,

where i made better decisions,

and somehow, things worked out.

Knowing that that time line exists somewhere in the fifth dimension makes me smile.

i think that would be a good place to build a cocoon.

2012-01-27T08:17:00.000-08:00

2012-01-18T22:43:00.000-08:00

2012-01-08T20:22:00.000-08:00

My friend and I exploring and goofing around on roosevelt island, new york

2012-01-05T12:12:00.000-08:00

2012-01-05T03:28:00.000-08:00

2012-01-04T13:35:00.001-08:00

2012-01-03T23:46:00.000-08:00

2012-01-03T18:14:00.000-08:00

birthday pics

2012-01-03T15:57:00.000-08:00

Splitscreen: A Love Story from JW Griffiths on Vimeo.

2011-12-26T13:19:00.000-08:00

2011-12-26T12:20:00.000-08:00

2011-12-26T11:33:00.000-08:00

2011-12-16T11:38:00.000-08:00

2011-12-12T17:59:00.001-08:00

2011-12-11T13:12:00.001-08:00

2011-12-11T10:45:00.000-08:00

Awake, Oh Sleeper

This place is but a dream, only the sleepers believe it to be real.

So hold fast to hope and find comfort in the truth of yourself.

And when death comes, do not be afraid.

It will be like blowing out a candle at the dawn of eternal day.

You will wake up laughing at what you thought was grief.

2,000 years will be contained within a single breath.

You will wake up understanding what you thought was omnipotence.

The universe will be contained within the eye of a needle,

And duality will be blown away, like ashes from a holocaust.

For though the believers are sleepers, we are the dreamers,

And we walk through the valley in the shadow of life, lucidly,

Until we are called to awaken.

2011-12-08T21:34:00.000-08:00

LANGUAGE CREATES REALITY. WORDS HAVE MAGICAL POWER. SPEAK ALWAYS TO CREATE JOY.

‎I DON’T UNDERSTAND YOU. YOU NEVER WANT WHAT’S TRUE. YOU WANT WHAT YOU DON’T HAVE AND DON’T WANT WHAT YOU ALREADY HAVE, AND SO YOU SUFFER. IT’S SO PERPLEXING! WHY NOT SIMPLY REVERSE IT? WHY NOT WANT WHAT YOU HAVE, AND NOT WANT WHAT YOU DON’T HAVE? IT’S SO SIMPLE! YOU CAN BE HAPPY; IT’S HERE FOR THE TAKING. YOU WANT LITTLE THINGS WHEN YOU COULD HAVE THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE AND ETERNITY.

— SRI NISARGADATTA MAHARAJ

2011-12-08T21:13:00.000-08:00

Yesterday my father cut down a tree growing in my front garden. It had grown from little more than a weed to a massive force, marking the months I was gone from this place with the cracks it was putting into the gutters of my home. So strange how something so still and silent, so seemingly peaceful, can move bricks, can shake foundations, can break homes. Today it lies in pieces, scattered across the lawn, its leaves brittle and lifeless, still and silent. Tomorrow I'll go out and pick up the pieces, keep what's salvageable for fire wood, throw away the rest. No more threats. No more creaking of my gutters when I lie here alone on windy nights. No more birds singing outside my window.

2011-12-06T15:14:00.000-08:00

hah!

2011-12-05T22:13:00.000-08:00

2011-12-05T21:59:00.000-08:00

once I had a dream
once I had a hope
that was yesterday
not so long ago
this is not the end
this is just the world
such a foolish thing
such an honest girl

2011-12-05T11:04:00.000-08:00

2011-12-04T21:43:00.001-08:00

Come on now little man, get away from your worldly occupations for a while, escape from your tumultuous thoughts. Lay aside your burdensome cares and put off your laborious exertions. Give yourself over to God for a little while, and rest for a while in Him. Enter into the cell of your mind, shut out everything except God and whatever helps you to seek Him once the door is shut. Speak now, my heart, and say to God, "I seek your face; your face, Lord, I seek."

2011-11-30T19:51:00.000-08:00

2011-11-07T21:39:00.000-08:00

2011-11-07T21:25:00.000-08:00

A Year in New York from Andrew Clancy on Vimeo.

2011-11-07T17:00:00.000-08:00

Halloween in New Orleans

Images via my friend Jennette, more to come

2011-11-06T10:30:00.000-08:00

2011-11-06T10:24:00.000-08:00

2011-11-04T07:17:00.000-07:00

Oh, what false ramblings traverse these tired lips!

Oh, what great numbness permeates these restless hips!

Oh, what sardonic musings play across a mind, unloved.

To crawl into this moment, wrapped tight in its silence, would be such sweet relief.

Yet still, one must go on, as moments do.

They tell me nothing stays in one place forever.

They tell me the only things that moments cradle are memories and forsaken hope.

Oh, to be like the rain, and cling to nothing much longer than the weathered storm's subsidence.

To be like the rain, and fall away in a moment.

2011-10-25T21:47:00.001-07:00

2011-10-24T21:09:00.000-07:00

2011-10-18T08:37:00.001-07:00

Support NOLA Fashion Week from Joseph Miner on Vimeo.

2011-10-17T20:09:00.000-07:00

2011-10-17T15:50:00.000-07:00

2011-10-11T11:43:00.000-07:00

Dear Mantis Shrimp,

I wonder what sorts of things you can see, that I can only dream of...

2011-10-11T11:30:00.000-07:00

2011-10-11T11:27:00.000-07:00

2011-10-10T11:36:00.000-07:00

2011-09-25T11:51:00.001-07:00

2011-09-24T19:46:00.000-07:00

“It is my ambition to say in ten sentences what others say in a whole book.

Friedrich Nietzsche

2011-09-24T19:29:00.000-07:00

Rulesformyunbornson...

2011-09-24T19:24:00.001-07:00

2011-09-20T21:24:00.000-07:00

youmightfindyourself:

White Walls, Consumerism: When my friend Joanne McNeil asked me about my thoughts on the origins of whiteness as signifier of high-tech. I ignored any associations to traditional cultural meanings (death, life, good, bad, purity, what-have-you) and biology (teeth, rice, ivory) and instead challenged myself to look at technology as an historical artifact of modern science. It did not occur to me until after the English riots were disparaged as “shopping riots,” and just as I experienced the heady consumer-high from my first new cell phone purchase in over five years - a white iPhone 4 - to look at it Whiteness an artifact of consumerism.
What Joanne was asking me about was the exterior whiteness of consumer electronics - this is very different from the interior whiteness of control rooms and linen undershirts - it is more akin to the exterior whiteness of the earliest experiments in Modernist architecture and the white dresses worn by nurses. The whiteness of my new iPhone is not an expression of my personal aspirations - there are millions of other people with the exact same phone. The whiteness is an expression of a public aspiration. To borrow a term from Jean-François Lyotard the “narrative knowledge” that girds consumerism is not too different from the metanarratives that gird “scientific knowledge.”
While Republican candidates are more than happy to pander to a crowd that cheers the death of someone who can’t afford health insurance, but most Americans to not want to believe that their gain comes at someone else’s expense. The American dream which is the “master narrative” of consumerism was never a simple promise of personal progress; of “I get MINE, and to hell with you.” What fun would a jetpack be if you had the only one? It would be almost as worthless as owning the world’s only fax machine. If you are king it might be cool to own the only one of something, but in a consumer society you would look like a bigger jerk than a Segway owner. I didn’t buy an iPhone because no one has one. I bought one because everyone I know has one. That means I have lots of people to tell me what the best apps are and to share the features of the phone.
Americans might dream of having a good job that enables them to own a nice car and a charming house in a pleasant place, but an element of that dream is that they are not alone in that pleasure. That along with millions of others, they are enjoying luxuries that once only a few kings might have hoped for. The dream was never to exclude that wealth from the rest of the world, it was explicit that billions more people would someday soon enjoy the justice, stability, mobility, and material pleasures of modern life. Millions of Americans fought and died for that dream in the twentieth century. In the 21st they were convinced to fight an enemy that “hated their freedom.” It is not clear to me that they would have fought to keep their big cars and cheap fuel prices if that had been the justification that had been given.
It was clear this summer that the super-rich consumer elite have abandoned the “we” aspect of the American Dream. It is not at all clear that consumer culture can survive without it. No matter what wonder scientific progress is able to deliver, it is meaningless if it is attached to a dream that no one buys. Whatever else high-tech whiteness is, it would be a truly tragic thing to be nostalgic for.

2011-09-16T22:41:00.000-07:00

no self is of itself alone.

2011-09-14T21:06:00.000-07:00

Today, I learned that 33-34 is considered "Advanced Maternal Age" - when the chances of conceiving a child with congenital birth defects begin to increase more rapidly. Today, I also realized I won't graduate until I'm 29.

2011-09-14T10:41:00.000-07:00

It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt.

2011-09-14T10:33:00.001-07:00

2011-09-13T23:31:00.000-07:00

2011-09-13T23:24:00.001-07:00

2011-09-13T22:13:00.000-07:00

mcqueen puma

2011-09-13T21:58:00.001-07:00

DON’T YOU SEE THAT ALL YOUR PROBLEMS ARE YOUR BODY’S PROBLEMS — FOOD, CLOTHING, SHELTER, FAMILY, FRIENDS, NAME, FAME, SECURITY, SURVIVAL — ALL THESE LOSE THEIR MEANING THE MOMENT YOU REALISE THAT YOU MAY NOT BE A MERE BODY.
— SRI NISARGADATTA MAHARAJ

wepostmusic:

Coeur de Pirate — Wicked Games (The Weeknd cover)

2011-09-11T22:22:00.000-07:00

I MUST NOT FEAR. FEAR IS THE MIND-KILLER. FEAR IS THE LITTLE-DEATH THAT BRINGS TOTAL OBLITERATION. I WILL FACE MY FEAR. I WILL PERMIT IT TO PASS OVER ME AND THROUGH ME. AND WHEN IT HAS GONE PAST I WILL TURN THE INNER EYE TO SEE ITS PATH. WHERE THE FEAR HAS GONE THERE WILL BE NOTHING. ONLY I WILL REMAIN.

— FRANK HERBERT

2011-09-11T11:21:00.001-07:00

ten years...

2011-09-10T21:07:00.000-07:00

"let us not love with words or speech, but with actions and truth"

2011-09-10T18:57:00.000-07:00

"What I give form to in daylight is only one per cent of what I have seen in darkness."

2011-09-05T19:38:00.000-07:00

to live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering.

2011-09-05T19:22:00.000-07:00

2011-08-29T20:09:00.000-07:00

Henri Gervex, Rolla (1875)

2011-08-28T07:35:00.000-07:00

Genesis

2011-08-26T16:42:00.000-07:00

want.

2011-08-25T21:34:00.000-07:00

The government has allotted us each 257 words per day. It may not seem like much, but it's quite enough once you get the hang of it. "I'm thirsty. May I have a Coca Cola, please?" becomes "Coke?" "How are you doing today?" is easily replaced with a smile and a nod. I haven't heard a preposition, article, or adjective in years. Still, some people use up all their words by mid day, and spend their evenings in silence. Me, I save all mine up. I walk around in silence day and night, not wasting a single syllable if I can help it. I save them all, every one, every day, for when I call you in the afternoons, so we can talk about our days, so I can tell you jokes and hear you laugh. Sometimes I call, and you pick up the phone, but there is only silence. You've used up all your words for today. So I hold the phone close and whisper "I love you" 85 and 2/3 times. I hear you smile, and that is enough.

2011-08-25T21:01:00.000-07:00

"He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how."

2011-08-23T22:08:00.000-07:00

I gave so much of myself to the infection, I always seem to give too much of myself at the onset, until I’m all used up, weak, tired, vulnerable, and alone, until I have nothing left to give, until the fever has subsided and can never again be rekindled, until the wound that once gaped open, festering, pestilent, tender, has sealed over, immune, until the rib that pierced my side is healed, ever stronger, ever harder to break - now that it has known the pain of such a fracture. I will keep these scars as mementos. I think I’m finally come to a realization, that I’ve finally found the elusive, elysian cure within myself. My very blood pulses with it. The antibodies have been cultured. I think I will be okay.

2011-08-23T17:54:00.000-07:00

01101001 00100000 01101101 01101001 01110011

01110011 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101

2011-08-23T16:25:00.000-07:00

lecture doodles

2011-08-21T20:36:00.000-07:00

Tear me open: rip the skin from the fascia from the muscle from my bones,
decipher the trail of my veins, as you peel away my bruises,
look into these eyes that no longer see
examine these lungs that no longer breath
listen to these old bones creak, heavy with the whispered burdens of 87 years
look at these old hands, creased, calloused with the labours of a life unfulfilled
feel the wrinkles of these chapped lips, hiding secrets never spoken,
study the larynx of this dry throat, stifling mundane words like afraid, hold, and love
ask me about apnea, and I’ll tell you what catches my breath
ask me about tachycardia, and I’ll tell you what makes my heart race
discover what makes it tick, and I’ll tell you what made it stop.
eventually, everywhere, everybody dies.
why should I fear death? There’s far more to fear in living.

2011-08-21T19:25:00.000-07:00

Too low they build who build beneath the stars

2011-08-18T17:51:00.000-07:00

BON IVER "Holocene" from nabil elderkin on Vimeo.

2011-08-13T15:52:00.000-07:00

If only you could see what I have seen with your eyes...

When old age shall this generation waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st,
'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.'

2011-08-11T19:41:00.001-07:00

All the people here are exactly the same,

and the people who think they are different are even worse.

I want to drown myself in books, I'll resurface in four years.

2011-08-11T18:23:00.000-07:00

“When I’m 80 years old and sitting in my rocking chair, I’ll be reading Harry Potter. And my family will say to me, “After all this time?” And I will say, “Always.” - Alan Rickman.

2011-08-11T16:52:00.000-07:00

I laughed so hard I cried at some of these texts from parents to their kids. I love autocorrect.

2011-08-11T11:52:00.001-07:00

“President Obama is a strange man whose sincere desire to restore cooperation and civility to government is admirable, but for nearly three years has been unreciprocated. Despite that, he seems unwilling to be president. What a contrast he makes to George W. Bush, in his boots and with his swagger—the Decider who promised “to create chaos, to create a vacuum” in every corner of the world if that were necessary to save America from the mortal threat he saw everywhere, and ruthlessly started out keeping that promise. He left Obama with the wreckage.”
— William Pfaff

2011-08-09T15:44:00.001-07:00

2011-08-09T11:03:00.000-07:00

I want your hair
to cover me with maps
of new places,
so everywhere I go
will be as beautiful
as your hair.—Map Shower (for Marcia) by Richard Brautigan

2011-08-09T08:23:00.000-07:00

As looters and rioters smashed up shops, looted and fought with police in Camden Town, Philippa Morgan-Walker, 25 and her husband, Jonny Walker, 31, made tea for the police who were protecting their street. Some of the officers had been on duty for more than 30 hours.

If you take a second look, the tray is actually her police shield.

2011-08-09T00:50:00.000-07:00

Death on the Streets, Skid Row, Los Angeles, USA

staph

photos by Lee Jeffries

2011-08-08T23:25:00.000-07:00

praying the violence stops in London.

2011-08-08T22:21:00.001-07:00

2011-08-08T22:18:00.002-07:00

2011-08-08T22:18:00.001-07:00

2011-08-08T20:45:00.001-07:00

2011-08-08T19:03:00.000-07:00

Sleep well
With untroubled dreams that never wake your slumbering lids
And a ceaseless breathing that never betrays your somnolent lips
Gently, I unplug your ears and take off my eyes
We lie in a silence, void of any wavelength of light or any undercurrent of modernity
Allow you to slip into a meditation unencumbered by your daily burdens
Sacrifice your fears to the pyre of the Sun
For the Moon will have only your musings
Demagnetize my touch and feel nothing but the peace that lies between us
Let there be nothing else between us
As I baptize you in a reconciliation between mind and soul
Your body confesses its faults to mine
And we bathe in a forgiveness all our own
What lies between sleep and waking hours?
Only the sacrament of our tranquility.
Could we remain in this liminal reality forever?
No, but for you, I would.

2011-08-05T18:18:00.001-07:00

MOVE from Rick Mereki on Vimeo.

2011-08-05T14:02:00.001-07:00

2011-08-03T15:49:00.001-07:00

Laura Marling - New Romantic (Live Jools Holland... by anhh2

2011-08-02T22:23:00.000-07:00

"People like us, half of them think it will never work out. The other half believe in magic."

2011-08-02T22:08:00.000-07:00

How to Meditate

-lights out-
fall, hands a-clasped, into instantaneous
ecstasy like a shot of heroin or morphine,
the gland inside of my brain discharging
the good glad fluid (Holy Fluid) as
i hap-down and hold all my body parts
down to a deadstop trance-Healing
all my sicknesses-erasing all-not
even the shred of a ‘I-hope-you’ or a
Loony Balloon left in it, but the mind
blank, serene, thoughtless. When a thought
comes a-springing from afar with its held-
forth figure of image, you spoof it out,
you spuff it off, you fake it, and
it fades, and thought never comes-and
with joy you realize for the first time
‘thinking’s just like not thinking-
So I don’t have to think
any
more’

Jack Kerouac

2011-08-02T21:43:00.000-07:00

2011-08-02T21:30:00.000-07:00

I was told from a young age that God exists. And I believed. One might even say I was indoctrinated.

You were told from a young age that God does not exist. And you believed in Nietzsche’s proclamations. One might even say you were indoctrinated.

Like it or not, we are not so different, you and I. We all adhere to a set of beliefs, each unique, each our own. I choose to believe in something more, and that gives me hope. You choose to believe in nothing. Tell me, what does nothing give you? I’m not trying to preach, to save you, to make you agree with me, for I certainly have more questions than answers, and I gave up on evangelism long ago. I’m simply asking you to respect my beliefs, even if you can’t understand them, or me, and in exchange, I will endeavor to grant you the same courtesy.

I believe in Truth beyond that which we can comprehend, and by that Truth, God exists - even if just in my mind – there is no reasoning, there is no arguing about who’s right and who’s wrong, there are no facts, only interpretations.

We won’t know until we know, and that is enough for me.

2011-08-01T17:10:00.000-07:00

femoral triangle

2011-08-01T09:34:00.000-07:00

2011-08-01T07:37:00.001-07:00

2011-07-31T03:46:00.000-07:00

home, but not really here

missing things that never were

figments of one's imagination

delusions of one's musings

it's funny how months can seem like moments

and a couple of weeks can seem like a lifetime

I want so many lifetimes

I want so much musing

I want.

2011-07-20T09:42:00.000-07:00

a few sketches from Paris -

2011-07-20T04:51:00.000-07:00

its funny how the smallest of things can brighten your day.

2011-07-19T12:35:00.000-07:00

In the morning, when the sun breaks from the horizon and paints the sky with purples and pinks, briefly, Scotland is magic. The old gods whisper their true names, memories awaken, like tiny fires, always burning, like a stillness that never sleeps, like secrets kept. Somewhere, or maybe nowhere at all, a nymph giggles at earthly eyes that see only the greys of human existence, as hers reflect the sky.

I’m afraid that things will never seem this beautiful again.