Pop Culture

I love pop culture especially anything having to do with music and movies. I found this blog and now I don't have to do any digging around the Internet. Whitney just lays it all there for me and I just point and click.

It's the kind of blog that you keep open at the bottom of your screen and obsessively refresh to see what else has been posted.

Important

Very important subject - very important blog
Kept by the woman who wrote the book I just finished on PTSD.

Do You Believe In Luck?

I don't. I don't think things happen by "accident" I don't think people just "fall" into our lives and I don't think situations just "fall" into our laps. I had one of those moments the other night. You can think it was lucky or you can think it was divine intervention. I prefer to believe the later.

As my friends already know, I have been working on my bachelors degree. I am in a program that allows you to create the degree you want and study the things you want. It sounds kind of hippieish don't you think? Well believe me, it isn't. The sheer volume of work that we have to pump out more than makes up for the lack of class time. The program is a tough concept for most people to understand. In September I will be starting my fourth and final semester, so basically I've been in the program for two years and I still have people ask me almost daily "so when do you go to class?" or "do you have class tonight?". I've just learned to say yes or no and leave it at that. Unfortunately for the most part we have become a society that moves to fast and listens very little. It's quite sad actually.

Anyway, what I was saying before I rudely interrupted myself about school is that I although I am getting my degree in Psychology I have spent a ton of time studying Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and other veteran's issues. I was all set to start graduate school in the Fall and begin working on my LMHC (Lic. Mental Health Counselor) degree. The thing that bothered me the most about this was that it was going to be a minimum of 3 years before I was able to really get in the field and work with the men and women I want to work in. Then it happened.....

Last Wednesday night (when I should have been doing school work) I happened across the final meeting of the President's Commission on Care for America's Returning Wounded Warriors. This was a non-partisan commission put together specifically to make recommendations on revamping the current care system for veterans. Anyone who reads the newspaper knows how bad the system is right now. Care is at an all time low and if you have done any research on this subject you know that this actually happens during and after any war we've been involved in. The biggest difference with Iraq and Afghanistan is that more people are surviving their wounds. Sounds like a good thing right? Well it is until they get home and can't get treatment or worse tell them that their mood swings that are being caused by a Traumatic Brain Injury are actually part of a personality disorder that they had before they joined the service. So in other words - bye bye no benefits for you.

As I was watching this commission meeting they started to go over their recommendations. The very first one that they talked about was the creation of a position called "Recovery Coordinator". This caught my attention immediately - they went on to talk about this position. This person would be the first point of contact for vets who were wounded physically or mentally and needed care. They would be the person to cut through the bullshit and red tape and get the services to the right people. They would work directly with the vets and make sure that the Dept. of Defense and the VA lived up to their promises. It was like a lightening bolt had come down in front of the TV and I said to myself "THAT'S IT!". That's what I want to do. So now my graduate degree plans have changed. I met with my professor and we went over some ideas but I'm looking at maybe public heath - public policy or health advocacy. I've actually emailed the commission to see if they can tell me what kind of an education they imagine this position to have. We'll see if they email me back. One of the men on the commission is a wounded vet who is currently attending Harvard Business school so I might be able to find him...we'll see.

So to go back to my original thought. Do I think it was lucky that I found that meeting on C-Span? Not at all - I was meant to find it - so it could lead me in the right direction.

What's my rating?

I think this is hysterical....

Mingle² - Online Dating

I guess I have to step it up to get a better rating. I'll get working on that right away.
Sorry couldn't get rid of that silly little ad.

Music, Music, Music

I have a friend who can't stand music. It's such a strange thing...so foreign to me. I have music on all the time. I wake up to a CD (this week it's Candy-O by The Cars) and the music stays on through the shower and then the radio or a CD goes on the minute I'm in the car. Right now I'm still listening to Year Zero by NIN obsessively (I'm waiting for it to pass but so far...) Then when I get into work I immediately put windows media player on shuffle and listen to that all day. It's a rare occasion when music isn't playing. Right now I'm listening to Alice In Chains (we miss you Layne) and lamenting in my head about the lack of good music being produced right now. There are a few bands out there still producing great stuff - Nine Inch Nails and BRMC come to mind and of course my all time favorite Tom Petty is still kickin it out. But other than that good music is scarce and I find that a bit sad. And I swear if I have to look at Britney Spears one more time...well we'll just leave it at that.

Its seems the entertainment world has gone a bit list crazy. Some of these lists are strange. But of course I totally dig the one's that have to do with music. The one I like the best so far is Top 100 One Hit Wonders on VH1. I mean when is the last time you heard Norman Greenbaum's Spirit In The Sky (and did you really need to hear it again)? Not only do you get to hear a snippet of the song but you get a bit of background which I adore. I love trivia about music, both new and old. I have another friend who is as into music as I am and we are always trying to outdo each other with the trivia.

The problem with this is that with the invention of iTunes you can have these songs immediately. Great for me - not so great for my debit card.. iTunes if fabulous but if you aren't careful you'll spend $20-$40 before you know it. They also have this dangerous thing that pops up that basically says "people who bought this also bought..." YIKES!

Here is my iTunes trail from last night.....
"Don't Leave Me This Way" Thelma Houston because it was the first thing on the One Hit Wonders list this led me...
to Bronksi Beat because Jimmy Sommerville who was the lead singer for them later formed a group called The Communards and they did a cover of the Thelma Houston song - anyway I downloaded the song "Why" just because it's a great dance song and its an amazing example of a male falsetto. The next song on the list was "I Don't Want To Fall In Love" by Jane Child. You might remember her as the woman who had a nose ring with a chain attached to her earing. She also had cornrows that were about 4 feet long...an interesting look to say the least. I then remembered I wanted to download some ELO so I brought them up and bought "Do Ya", "Livin Thing", "Don't Bring Me Down", and "Evil Woman". I'm not a huge Jeff Lynne fan but I love these four songs. Queen was on that insidious little "this is what other people bought" tab so I click over to them and discovered that you can only buy albums not individual songs blah!. But while I was there I noticed Queensryche a metal band from the 80's that I loved so I bought "Jet City Woman" LOVE that song. So then I cheated and went to the VH1 website to look at the list to see what else I had to have and decided that I absolutely couldn't live without "The Night the Lights Went Out In Georgia" by Vicki Lawrence - probably the geekiest thing right now on my iPod but what can I say? I love that song.

The rest of the downloads looked like this - "Epic" Faith No More - "Cool Like That" Digable Planets - "Pleasure and Pain" The Divinyls - "Turning Japanese" The Vapors - "Unbelievable" EMF- "It Takes Two" Rob Base and DJ E-Z Rock - "Let It Ride" Jerry Harrison - "Bust a Move" Young MC - "Feel Like a Stranger" - Grateful Dead. The next day there was some Chris Isaak, Allman Brothers and some others that I can't even remember.....it's all an iTunes fog. Not all of these were on the list, but somewhere in my brain I remember I wanted to buy them.

The good news is I loaded over 1700 songs on my iPod tonight and 10 podcasts of Ask A Ninja.

The internet

There are a lot of strange things out there on the internet. But this is the best thing that I have seen in a very long time. This just shows you how many creative people there are out there in this world.

There are eight pages of episodes - you won't be able to help yourself.

Color

Thursday nights I have art class. I love my class. We have great people, great conversation and of course a great teacher. Tonight I was so excited to paint. I mentioned this to my teacher and she said "well you know what that means." What is usually means is that I usually wouldn't be able to produce anything. It's almost like your excitement gets the better of you. I'm happy to say that wasn't the case tonight.

The painting above is by Jamie Wyeth. He's the son of the more poplular Andrew Wyeth. I am however, partial to Jamie's use of color. This painting is called The Lighthouse. I love how he used green for the sky and how the subject's (man? woman?) hair is whipping around. You can feel the impending storm, you can feel the energy and the electricity. Color is what draws me into a painting plain and simple. It isn't about using the right color for something. It doens't mean all sky's are blue and all tree's are green. It's what the artist represents with their use of color. In this case Jamie Wyeth shows us energy. You aren't sure what kind of energy. Is it positive? Is in negative? Is this person slowly and carefully approaching the home of on old lover or are they running away to the safety of the lighthouse to meet someone? You don't know. For me a big part of the beauty of art is that you can make up the story. You can look at something and be so drawn in that before you know it you've created a life for the person of people on the canvas.

This is a painting by John Singleton Copley called "Watson and the Shark". It's in the permanent collection of the MFA in Boston. One of the things I like best about this painting is it is a large painting - probably 4 feet by 6 feet. When I look at this piece I no longer feel like I am an observer. I feel like I am on a boat watching this all take place. Without knowing the story it's obvious that the person in the water (Watson) is about to be attacked by the shark. I can feel the terror coming off him, I can see his shipmates rushing to save him and you can see the shark has one target in his sights. All of this from paint on canvas AND seeing how this painting was done in 1778 all done from memory. It's fantastic and I love it.

All of this being said, I don't paint representationally, not at all. I paint abstract. I think that the argument could be made that color is even more important to abstract work. Color becomes your subject. Most people are thrown off by abstract because they want to know "what it is". Sorry folks you just have to look at it and make up your own story.


These are two that I finished during class. As I mentioned the non producing prophecy did not come to pass. I especially like the blue one, I'm really happy with how it came out. The colors are a bit more vibrant in person but I think you can get the picture.

Watercolors

I've recently begun fooling around with watercolors. I'm having way more fun that I thought I would with this new medium. Here are a few of my favorites:



I'm giving this one to a friend who is having major surgery on next week. One of the great joys of being an artist is being able to give your stuff away when the opportunity presents itself.



I did another one like this one in green. It's hanging on my board over my desk where I can see it all the time. It's my absolute favorite.

Short Rant

We all have things that bug us. It's just a part of being human. One of the biggest things that bother me is the way that people throw the word "retarded" around. This makes me absolutely crazy. The way people will call each other retarded or call themselves a retard when they feel they have done something wrong makes my blood boil.

True Story- I used to share an apartment with a mildly retarded man. The deal was I got free rent and a small stipend and we worked on life skills like cooking - money - taking the bus - using the phone etc. It was a good deal. He was a nice guy. He was never going to live alone but he was more than capable of living in a supported enviroment. One night I had a friend over and the three of us were sitting in the living room. She begins to tell a story about something she did. I can't remember the details but it involved her making some kind of a silly mistake. In the course of the story she called herself a "retard" not once - not twice but THREE times in front of this man. I was horrified - he was devastated. I always said the worse thing for him was that he was mildly retarded - so he knew enough to know he was not like everyone else but didn't really have the tools to deal with it. We had a long coversation after she left about people using that word. He wasn't angry but he was hurt and confused. He went to bed that night very sad and I can honestly say never really looked at that friend the same way again.

In our fast paced, give me everything now, mine is better than your's world we have become completely desensitized to the fact that there are people out there who carry the real and very serious diagnosis of being mentally retarded or developmentally delayed. I am lucky enough to do some respite work with two teenage brothers who both carry this diagnosis. They are severely handicapped mentally and have some physical issues;mostly just fine motor issues and a little balance stuff. The 6 hours or so that I get to spend with them are often the best six hours of my week. I can show up there after working my regular job and be cranky and exhausted but in just a few minutes they have managed to pull me out of that mood, made me laugh and feel unconditionally loved.

They are simply two of the best people I know. Unfortunately I cannot say that about most of the "regular" people I know.

OK rant over...

Commissions & Bob Dyan

I have a friend named Nancy who absolutely HATES Bob Dylan. It never fails; I think of her everytime I hear him. She does this hysterical impression of him - all nasaly and stuff. It's pretty damn funny. Now me and the other hand- I LOVE Bob. I love his music - his lyrics - his arrangements - his musicianship -all of it. The way he can tell you a story in 4-6 minutes (for the most part). I love it. Add to that the fact that The Band (at that time The Ravens) was his backing band when he went electric at the Newport Folk Festival and you just have literal musical genius. My absolute love and devotion for Robbie Robertson is for another day.

I'm sitting in my condo tonight working on a commission - well its kind of a commission. A family member (who I love dearly) has asked me to paint them something to fit in a certain space in their kitchen. I'm happy to do it, it's just nerve racking. They see something you did and they like it so they want something just like it...but a little different. I've started playing with watercolors and for lack of a better subject I did a few abstract florals. This family member saw one I gave to my mom and loved it. I gave them one and now they want another. Its a strange shape kind of short height wise and long. Doesn't make it easy. Luckily I work pretty fast and I'm going to do a couple and let her pick. And if she doesn't like any of them? I'll just hang them in my show in January and go from there.

My art teacher told me that my florals tend to look like Emil Nolde. I couldn't think of a better compliment.

Night!