Michael

Listening to the World

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I discovered this long after the day that the world listened. World Listening Day 2020-08-18 in Portland, OR was one of many World Listening Project recordings.

The World Listening Day 2020-08-18 in Portland, OR talks about the experience of making the recording. It also has a link to the recording he did last year. If you have trouble listening to his recording, it is ambient noise, on his site you can listen here on the Internet Archives.

Or you can list to other places on the World Listening Project. It’s fascinating stuff. They describe it like this,

The Collective Field

There is something new afoot. The field itself is changing.

The creature world knows.  The creative one does too. 

So what does it mean now to listen? How do we express what we know?

Be alert.

Individually and in concert,

There is sanctity in it.

Amid new conditions, travel the field and explore

By call and response

The rhythm within. 

How does your song fit

Within the collective chorus?

Drawing Circles and More

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This sounds like something from Lynda Berry. Drawing circles, like making a spiral, can well, let’s have John Green explain it.

This doesn’t work for me. I don’t chill out. I look at the empty space and how much circle drawing to get to the end. And it’s going for the goal, not just drawing circles. And that is the point. Just draw circles. Do not make things with them. Just draw.

Austin Kleon touched on this topic in Something to Do. Which is about being cooped up, locked up, land all that stuff I don’t understand during the lockdowns of Covid-19. He describes it like this.

There’s an essay in Zadie Smith’s Intimations called “Something To Do,” in which she thinks about why she writes. She comes around to this very simple truth: “It’s something to do.”

~ Austin Kleon

Something to do? I don’t lack for things to do. There are way too many things to do. I keep trying to keep myself focused on what (pick one, any one) thing to do.

There is always plenty to do. It’s like being an artist. I’ve got this studio, a home with lots of space downstairs. I get to do lots of somethings. As soon as I move out all the stuff I’ve accumulated.

Before and After

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So at last. What made it slightly more difficult was my formerr haircutter relocating to Oregon City. 12 miles of driving for a haircut? Surly there had to be someone closer. And there was. And, I have to admit, I could have been gong to this place for years. It is walking distance away. Walking Distance. Maybe one of the services you are looking for is also so close to you. Check on it.

  • Me, Beofer
  • Me, After