# I didn't write this morning as I overslept, well, technically I slept for the right about of time but forgot that the clocks were going forward. The UK is now in British Summer Time but it couldn't feel much further from reality: there's a cold wind blowing, literally as well as figuratively.
It got me wondering whether time borrows an hour from us and won't pay it back until October or if we borrow an hour for the winter and have to pay it back in the spring.
# Liked: Althouse: "Pick up anything and start sketching. Your iPhone - take all those ridiculous pictures you took - all of that is a form of drawing."...
The quote is from an interview with Jerry Saltz about his book "How to be an artist" (see the link.)
Art is everything, art is the act of creation, of seeing and noticing and making something from it, because of it.
It doesn't have to be good, it just had to be.
# I save items from my RSS feeds to read later. Sometimes I will return and re-read them, write about them, use them as the basis for something. Sometimes I will save them with an intention that never gets fulfilled.
Even after I have revisiting something I will, for some reason, often leave it in my "Read Later" pile. I don't know why.
I've got items going back several months so thought it might be interesting to go back over these posts to see if they still grab me in the way they must have done at the time.
Perhaps some were only flagged to clear the list and reach "feed zero" as I didn't have the time to read them. Perhaps some were supposed to be a spark that, on reflection, no longer burned with the intensity I had imagined.
It could be a waste of effort: some may be languishing there for good reason or I might have already said my piece and got nothing further to add. But, maybe, I might rediscover some forgotten gems or find threads running between different posts on different blogs, something to get the grey matter working.
Comments
# Over the past few days I've been repeatedly listening to Brian and Roger Eno's new collaboration "Mixing Colours" - an ambient/tranquil album of 18 relatively short pieces (between 2 and a half and 5 minutes) that the two have apparently been working on for years via Roger sending MIDI files to Brian, initial ideas for that latter to experiment with and develop.
This is a great interview from NPR with the two of them in which they discuss the making of the record.
(You can also hear extracts from the full album at that link.)
The best way I can describe the album is part neo-classical, part soundscape, part lullaby and somewhat surprisingly, to me at least, it has received mixed reviews, from:
"This kaleidoscope of colors, minimalistic sounds, and levitating textures result in a kind of imaginative synaesthesia constituting a deep feeling of oneness"
to:
"there's simply not enough variety, curiosity or sense of adventure here to dub it as a must-listen" "Elegant and haunting as the individual tracks may be, it's difficult to remain engaged throughout 75 minutes of music with such a uniform mood" "The album is too inoffensive to leave much lasting impression"
Having long been a devotee of the elder Eno's work, and more recently his younger brother, I am deeply invested in the notion that ambient music "must be as ignorable as it is interesting" so the idea that the album doesn't engage the listener is bordering on anathema.
One of Roger's descriptions of the process that I found quite delightful was him saying he was producing black and white sketches which Brian would fill with colour.
With the UK government announcing at least another three weeks of lockdown (it was always going to happen) it's right that there should be increased focus on mental health. People may have coped so far but the longer it goes on the worse it will be. One of the permitted reasons for leaving your home is physical exercise, that's been built in from the start, but getting out can also have a dramatic impact on mental well-being - just a quick break to change the scenery or see the sun and the sky can make all the difference. It's been particularly hard whilst in isolation, especially now that we've got a second potential case in the household thanks to a persistent dry cough, as you lose that opportunity to escape the confines of your house. There's the option of the back garden but it's not the same, it still feels too closed in. I dread to think how the most vulnerable people are coping, will cope, those advised to not leave their house for 12 weeks. I can't imagine that. There have been some discussions in our house about this, about longing to get out, but then you have to weigh any trip against the potential risks of exposure. As we know only too well it doesn't matter how careful you are you can still catch the virus. You've got to take solace from anything you can, especially the relationships within your household. My writing practices (morning pages and daily log) are of particular comfort, as is daily meditation, but you have to go further than that. Seeing Captain Tom Moore walk 100 laps of his garden to raise money for the NHS was particularly heart-warming. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge re-emphasising that lockdown can be stressful and calling for action to address mental health issues was also good to see, but they've long been mental health advocates. Then there's "Clap for carers" each Thursday evening. Still, it's hard to find the good news stories without being exposed to the bad and the bleak; all you can do is not get caught up in the 24 hour news cycle, dipping in only when you need to. We talk about returning to normal but that is a very long way off. Even once restrictions are eased it will be gradual and there will be some element of social distancing for a while, not to mention the issues around trusting other people. We are all going to be very wary of things for a long time to come. We talk about the current situation calling it "the new normal," but there is nothing normal about this whatsoever. Things will likely never be "normal" again, just different. A vaccine may be found and administered for Covid-19 but the impact of the virus will live on in our collective memory and will affect future behaviour, it has to. I mentioned recently about looking back on items I'd saved for later. One such item was "How many things really change us?" by Julian Summerhayes in which he says:
The pandemic is essentially a collective brush with death, it surely can't not change us. Too many people have lost friends and loved ones and the rest of us can only look on in disbelief at the rising global death toll. It is a huge shock to the system, both individually and societally, a wake up call that the status quo needs to be disturbed. We cannot possibly go back to how we were before but I fear many will, just as they have ignored the advice and seemingly tried to ignore the current reality.