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Gravel and Potatoes
Mar. 7th, 2008 04:28 pmToday is my first day off in perhaps five weeks, and I am quickly remembering why I don't like days off. I have done nothing, for the reason that I keep imagining I am about to do something, which prevents me from putting on a movie or picking up a book.
I did, however, visit a nearby museum - The Wellcome Collection, repository of the monies and curiosa amassed by an American phramaceutical magnate. They give a lot of grants to artists who are willing to make a subject of medicine, and the results are a holy confluence of all modes of geekdom. As for the artifacts (the collection proper), they include a chinese torture chair, Napoleon's toothbrush, Japanese dildos from the 1930s, dummies on which to practice delivering babies, and a bookmark-sized piece of Jeremy Bentham's skin.
This is a frustrating time for me. Part of it's cyclical - I've finished a cycle of creative work, and although I have other projects in the wings, I'm not in a position to start them. Nor can I really be through with what I've done; I have to finish the documentation, make housekeeping touch-ups, and wait for criticism. Even unfinished scripts are frozen; no point making changes until I know which way the wind is blowing.
Otherwise, I'm grappling with three overlapping mires. I'm widely respected as a technician, but my cohorts are nervous about me as an artist. In other words, I am lauded for my ability to figure out how to express a given idea, but am not trusted with decisions about what to express. Wrong room. Whether there's a right room, I don't know. I can't tell on my own whether my ideas are worthwhile.
I no longer have stomach for people who don't know how to do their jobs, even though I am in a school environment - a safe arena for students to try things they've never tried, and to strive for work above their level. I'm tired of understaffing; I'm tired of underqualification; I'm tired of undefined roles and lack of accountability. I'm tired of student films. I'm ready for the real thing. This is a good sign, but it's come too early. All I can think of is to spend next term doing something I'm awful at and don't intend to pursue.
Ciro and I are three months past a milestone; we have spent more time living in seperate countries than living together. Of the past six months, we have been in the same apartment for one, and through the past two months, we have averaged two hours of conversation a week. Exhanges of e-mails and photos are fewer and further between. Too busy; we're both running ragged. It's almost easier, not talking - perversely less lonely, less a roller coaster. But estrangement takes its toll; when I return to Dallas after our second anniversary, we will have no routines, no boundaries, no combined budget, no pattern for settling arguments. We will be starting new, yet with dangerous familiarity.
I'm ready for the next challenge. Instead, I'll spend the next four months in deceptively productive stasis.
--
"Dreams are inventors." - Wolfgang Leuschner, Deputy Director of the Sigmund Freud Institut
I did, however, visit a nearby museum - The Wellcome Collection, repository of the monies and curiosa amassed by an American phramaceutical magnate. They give a lot of grants to artists who are willing to make a subject of medicine, and the results are a holy confluence of all modes of geekdom. As for the artifacts (the collection proper), they include a chinese torture chair, Napoleon's toothbrush, Japanese dildos from the 1930s, dummies on which to practice delivering babies, and a bookmark-sized piece of Jeremy Bentham's skin.
This is a frustrating time for me. Part of it's cyclical - I've finished a cycle of creative work, and although I have other projects in the wings, I'm not in a position to start them. Nor can I really be through with what I've done; I have to finish the documentation, make housekeeping touch-ups, and wait for criticism. Even unfinished scripts are frozen; no point making changes until I know which way the wind is blowing.
Otherwise, I'm grappling with three overlapping mires. I'm widely respected as a technician, but my cohorts are nervous about me as an artist. In other words, I am lauded for my ability to figure out how to express a given idea, but am not trusted with decisions about what to express. Wrong room. Whether there's a right room, I don't know. I can't tell on my own whether my ideas are worthwhile.
I no longer have stomach for people who don't know how to do their jobs, even though I am in a school environment - a safe arena for students to try things they've never tried, and to strive for work above their level. I'm tired of understaffing; I'm tired of underqualification; I'm tired of undefined roles and lack of accountability. I'm tired of student films. I'm ready for the real thing. This is a good sign, but it's come too early. All I can think of is to spend next term doing something I'm awful at and don't intend to pursue.
Ciro and I are three months past a milestone; we have spent more time living in seperate countries than living together. Of the past six months, we have been in the same apartment for one, and through the past two months, we have averaged two hours of conversation a week. Exhanges of e-mails and photos are fewer and further between. Too busy; we're both running ragged. It's almost easier, not talking - perversely less lonely, less a roller coaster. But estrangement takes its toll; when I return to Dallas after our second anniversary, we will have no routines, no boundaries, no combined budget, no pattern for settling arguments. We will be starting new, yet with dangerous familiarity.
I'm ready for the next challenge. Instead, I'll spend the next four months in deceptively productive stasis.
--
"Dreams are inventors." - Wolfgang Leuschner, Deputy Director of the Sigmund Freud Institut
