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Michael seeks to create works that reflect his struggles with the world he finds himself living in, and the commonalities that we all share in this. Desire, Defeat, Acceptance, Judgment, Love, Fear, Time, and Space. Michael's studio is downtown Los Angeles in the Spring Arts Tower. "Happiness is that funny little place halfway between fantasy and reality." -me

Sunday, November 13, 2016

For the concern of All

It is only from the outside one can tell the size and movement of something.

I grew up learning this lesson. Daily. From mid elementary years starting on occasion, and then beginning in the 7th grade until graduation from high school I did not know one day where I wasn’t bullied and harassed from classmates for being what they considered a fag. The worst of this was from teammates on my basketball, track, and cross country running teams, and perhaps the most difficult to handle. Imagine striving for your best as those running alongside you taunted and teased. A living metaphor isn’t it? But what is the metaphor, and does it signify anything? Then there was the day I was physically attacked in a shopping mall and punched in the face as the attacker yelled, “fag,” knocking me into the wall as he walked away from me.
After time one has to question the toll psychologically, emotionally, and psychically what this does. 
For me I found my best defense in an ever increasing sense of the space around me and the inhabitants. A constant scanning and screening of those, near and far. An ability to see a room in its entirety in a flash, searching out danger. I would do everything in my power to avoid confrontation and attacks. Going to school was for me a nightmare I suffered with daily. Despite this, and perhaps because of this, I had to find those who I felt safe with. I searched places I could survive and be friended. I relied on these safe havens. A Peregrin nesting aside a church steeple. Sanctuary.
I knew I had to get through those years, somehow. I knew once I was older, I could leave home and move to a big city. A city large enough I could disappear into, and find those like me. Safety in numbers. Safety in the mix of difference.
Difference, the great equalizer.

I took with me an ability to scan a space. I discovered a psychic awareness, a doppler effect which stayed with me all the many years post high school trauma. It helped me in my work, this ability to see into something or someone quickly, evaluate, and respond. It takes an enormous amount of energy, this constant surveillance, and please do not mistake it for paranoia, but it worked for me and I thrived. It also allowed me to tap into a considerable creative flow. I found sensing, searching, viewing, also had side benefits of inspiration. It would come to me nearly constantly, and this I also sift through continually. It is as if a radio is on all the time, and hearing this ceaselessly I tune it out until a thing catches my attention. Then I zero in on it, reading and watching and listening, gathering information to distill, for art. 

I can’t locate the numbers for the lottery, or find my missing keys, but then I didn’t tune my awareness for this, and I guess this was not one of the side effects. I tuned it for protection. I sat on the side of the pond, from a safe space, and watched. Watched the ripples in the pond, learning their many meanings, and began to listen. I remained on the edge of the pond all the years once I was put there. Not swimming in the depths, lazing on my back staring into the nothingness of space, dumb to what lay below. I was on the edge, the perimeter, the outside. It is only from here one can see the size of a thing and how it is, or maybe isn’t, moving. 

I wonder now in this later stage of my life, with partner and daughter to care for and protect, how the times we have entered will effect our lives. I note I am suddenly sitting up again. Watching. Concerned and curious if I, if we, if our daughter, are safe. I don’t know that we are. I am aware now when we go out together, a little family, we are different. I am aware of others noting us, two men with a child, and considering us differently. I am not wrong in this. I know this territory well. It isn’t something I can mistake. I am an old tree. My roots are deep, and my branches have grown to reach out far as I have been a still and silent witness to many, many things. I am aware now of old feelings, from childhood years ago when I first learned them. It is very possible my nest is not as safe as it once was. I have with me now something I have not felt in the cities I have lived in for the last 30 years, New York and Los Angeles. Cities I always felt safe in. This something I thought I had left behind to the small town I grew up in. This something you could not possibly understand unless you were also on the outside, the perimeter, the edge, looking in.  

But you can trust those of us who are. We are your family members. We are your friends. We are your neighbors. We are your co-workers. We have seen this before and though time has passed since it was incredibly bad, it is now here again but it isn’t just our safety at stake, it is yours too. It is this country’s, and as this world grows small there are those who would give up their populations to have what America has, this place. If you want to take over something, simply undermine their internal relations, separate them one from another like chaff from wheat. Take the spoils, and harvest what remains. 
If we don’t stick together, if we don’t protect one another, if we don’t value what is different we will lose everything. 


I know this because I am on the outside. I know the size of the thing and how fast it is moving. I invite you to join me here, where it is safe, where we can all watch together and see through for the concern of All.

2 comments:

  1. This is deep and profound. I think we all feel a change in the air. I agree that we all must stick together and fight for each other. I believe we are all more alike, than we are different. Thank you for sharing your story. ��

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  2. The question marks are hearts.

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