another day, another birth day reminder

strudel and cortado to blow out the candle

55! ouch

Captions

first the bad news:
day before yesterday, encouraged by a friend who suggested i post larger photographs, i started mucking around with blogger to change the format.  horror of horrors, i realized how difficult it is to reach a layout that is both pleasing to the eye and portrays all the different cants of my complex persona, the subtle messages i want to communicate in an instant, the sense of life i seek to share, the encompassing of it all on what they now call "the front page" or "first impression".  two days later, i am still fixing what i messed up, a task that requires alot of patience.  which reminds me
"if it works...don't fix it".

moving on to the good news...i just found out my son jon's band Captions just won the

 

at The Roxy Theatre in Los Angeles.  Captions is an alternative music group with a vintage feel in music.  I can feel alot of English influence, although i can't quite pinpoint the exact influence yet, i just know i have felt it before.

 

"Words make you think a thought. Music makes you feel a feeling. A song makes you feel a thought." -E.Y. Harburg

Then arrives news that my daughter tatiana is fast becoming a self taught chef, much in the tradition of my mother.  Actually, this is a family of alternative people, mostly all self-taught.

ALL NATURE HAS A FEELING
All nature has a feeling: woods, fields, brooks
Are life eternal: and in silence they
Speak happiness beyond the reach of books;
There's nothing mortal in them; their decay
Is the green life of change; to pass away
And come again in blooms revivified.
Its birth was heaven, eternal it its stay,
And with the sun and moon shall still abide
Beneath their day and night and heaven wide.

i have been so so lucky to have spent the past few weeks immersed in nature, which is truly what brings me utter inner peace.  away, at the beach, lots of sun, few worldly worries, sunrises and sunsets, walks, picking seeds and making the eye more acute to every little detail, outdoor barbecues and picnics, improvised searches above in the sky and below on the ground, buying fresh vegetables at the market, relishing in the colours, the smells, the textures, the surprising plenty.  if only life were that simple, always!   the beauty of it makes me want to drop everything and extend these errant days into a complete sabbatical year.  oh how important that sounds. and since i have never taken a sabbatical year, maybe now is the time.  i DO have the opportunity to stay a few more months down in the south of chile in a little house my brother envisioned out of a container.  i am thinking about it, i am thinking, why not plunge into an adventure? ...and in nature (have you ever heard about the chilean and argentinian patagonia?)

a la recherche du temps perdu

FLY CALYPSO

 
 oh how i lusted after this piece for weeks before actually buying it.  i had remembered a similar coffee pot i have which i am using to decorate a hutch in my guest room and, in the tradition of my enamelware accomplice maria cecilia, thought lots of similar pieces together would make it all the more striking.  so off i went in a taxi one saturday to make it mine urged by the added fact that the owner of the antique stand would be leaving for texas in a couple of days.

so here it is with me in my hotel, brighteningmy environs until i return home at the beginning of february.

due to the season, maria cecilia and i have not been able to venture out to the flea markets as much as we would like, it's very very hot and some of them are miles large so we get very hot and cranky but this friday we have promised ourselves to go.  i am still anxious to find more of my collection of catholic medals. 

isn't she beautiful my friend maria cecilia?

te quiero chichi, mi complice

DIAS DE SOL Y CAMPO

ESTAS VISIONES ME HACEN MUY MUY FELIZ, AMO LA NATURALEZA!

actos son amores

new years always make me think. what am i to do while i'm here? what can i contribute?  how can i help others? how can i become a better person? what must i change? what will i endeavor to accomplish this year?  ofcourse i will continue my artistic path, i AM the artist's way.  but on a higher plane.......?
philosophically speaking, i have adhered more to the ideas of pierre pagniez than any other, believing that it is enough to appreciate this world with intelligence  and to forge oneself a happiness; fully imbueing myself in the instants in life and experiencing  a sensation or a mood are what turn me on as a rule. i believe that is why i am an artist and an aesthete. i have also given up deep thought (a voracious passion of my university years) also believing as pagniez, that life always passes through ideas and that it is life itself that is interesting.  in other words, i have chosen a life more inclined to lightness, having concluded that a heavy life wouldn't really lead me anywhere or, if anything, lead down the path of madness. much as i admire Virginia Wolff, i much prefer a room of my own with a huge quota of humor and not-so-deep-thought.

however, i also believe that our humanity requires a social responsibility (not in vain did i convert to Catholicism as an adult). I have endeavored to practice Hope, Faith and Charity, although venturing only as far as those closest to me. This awareness of my duty to tune into this responsibility has been re-awakened more strongly  now that the world is in crisis and i have once again found it necessary to stand up for an ideal. my whole sensory environment has become tainted by so called "progress" which is threatening my sensations. to the forefront the resurrection of  the credo of miguel delibes

"True progress at this junction in history lies not in an unlimited development and competitiveness, nor in making more things each day, or in inventing more needs for man, nor in destroying nature, or holding a third of humanity in the delirium of waste while two-thirds die of hunger, but in rationalizing the use of technology, facilitating access to the entire community to that which is necessary,  in revitalizing the human values in crisis today, and establishing the man-nature relationship harmoniously. "

"If progress, according to the dictionary, is making progress on a given subject, the task is to analyze whether these developments involve a decrease in others, and assess to what extent it is advancement to justify what is sacrificed. Man has certainly reached the moon but social and political organizations remain stuck in a difficult dilemma: the exploitation of man by man or the annulment of the individual by the State. In this sense we have not advanced a step. "

Miguel Delibes referred in his speech to what he calls the "butt" effects of progress, to warn that " current human development is nothing but a process of a "decantation" of materialism subjected to a marked acceleration in recent decades. Medieval theocentrism and Renaissance anthropocentrism have given way to an object-centricism, eliminating any sense of elevation of man, causing him to fall into abjection and egotism. "

Original in Spanish

"El verdadero progesismo no estriba en un desarrollo ilimitado y competitivo, ni en fabricar cada día más cosas, ni en inventar necesidades al hombre, ni en destruir la Naturaleza, ni en sostener a un tercio de la Humanidad en el delirio del despilfarro mientras los otros dos tercios se mueren de hambre, sino en racionalizar la utilización de la técnica, facilitar el acceso de toda la comunidad a lo necesario, revitalizar los valores humanos, hoy en crisis, y establecer las relaciones hombre-naturaleza en un plano de concordia."

"Si progresar, de acuerdo con el diccionario, es hacer adelantamiento en una materia, lo procedente es analizar si estos adelantamientos en una materia implican un retroceso en otras y valorar en qué medida lo que se avanza justifica lo que se sacrifica. El hombre, ciertamente, ha llegado a la Luna pero en su organización político-social continúa anclado en una ardua disyuntiva: la explotación del hombre por el hombre o la anulación del individuo por el Estado. En este sentido no hemos avanzado un paso".

Miguel Delibes se refiere en su discurso a lo que llama los efectos "culatazo" del progreso, para advertirnos que "el desarrollo humano [el actual] no es sino un proceso de decantación del materialismo sometido a una aceleración muy marcada en los últimos lustros. Al teocentrismo medieval y al antropocentrismo renacentista ha sucedido un objeto-centrismo que, al eliminar todo sentido de elevación del hombre, le ha hecho caer en la abyección y la egolatría".

actos son amores y este es mi primer paso a la accion en el 2011

MY CUP IS FULL

i have crossed the threshold of a new year. i have only taken a few steps but already i feel as if the change in chapter is but that, a new chapter. and, as i celebrated the arrival of 2011, in the midst of partying, my first thought was a realization that MY CUP IS FULL. i have, above all, health and my six senses without which i wouldn't really amount to much.  i have love a plenty both from and for family and friends, i am happy with little and have more than i could possibly deserve. my life has been interesting and challenging, i have learned and grown. yes, my cup is full, it actually overflows.so full, that everything that should happen to me from this day forth will be added gifts, bonuses.  

 the new year was spent 'neath the stars in a small seaside resort called papudo on the pacific coast of chile watching the most amazing spectacle of fireworks i have ever seen, up close, with a glass of champagne in hand and friends around me cheering and hundreds of people from all walks of life dressed carnival-style.

 we then headed home to the summer home of our hosts, sara and andrew, a chilean-australian couple of geologists who had provided a full rack of lamb basted in rosemary and mint for dinner, the other guests, their niece ale and her husband ricardo and their son maxi, isabel, their housekeeper and my close friend anita.  there we ate and drank "the chilean way" and vowed to await dawn.

sara & andrew

 only three of us made it, sara, myself and isabel.  sara and i then went for a long walk along the beach promenade watching the sky slowly turn from a dark blue to light.  we had welcomed the new year in true form.  a few hours of profound sleep were enough to allow us to continue with two more days of celebration, eating, drinking,eating, drinking, eating, drinking, on and on and on with small breaks sunbathing on the beach, walking around the village, reading, listening to music, conversing, visiting the avocado farm of the hosts in la ligua.

 mucho vino

machas a la permesana

ponche

happy new year!