Fairly soon after I started running, I ran in a 5k and recorded a decent time for a guy my age. Yesterday I came up with a chord progression of some sophistication, but I realized I was using similar ideas shortly after I started writing songs in the first place. Once I started doing these things, I was simply doing them and haven't necessarily improved much since. So, too, with meditation: I probably won't be all that much "better" at it in five years than I am now. That's ok, though. Establishing the habit is the thing, not necessarily improving it every year.
There are improvements too. For example, I can now play piano a bit better, even if my songs are basically of the same quality. I'll take those, but I think the main thing is just doing it in the first place.
Monday, August 26, 2019
Saturday, August 24, 2019
4 years
All my running and piano playing, choral singing, has been since 2015. I guess I didn't have as many hobbies before. I've made good progress, running a 5k charity event this morning on my birthday in 31:27. I was faster in 2015 but I've only restarted running this summer, and I've only lost a minute and a half since I was 55, so that's not too bad. I would probably have to train just to keep under 35 minutes looking ahead to my sixties.
All my scholarly interest in music dates only to 2018. I've only played classical since fall of 2017. I'm thinking late 50s, early 60s can be a good age with good physical and mental health.
I've only meditated daily starting this summer, too. Once a habit becomes permanent, it seems like it has been in place longer than it really has. There was a time four years ago I didn't run, meditate, play piano, or sing in the choir.
All my scholarly interest in music dates only to 2018. I've only played classical since fall of 2017. I'm thinking late 50s, early 60s can be a good age with good physical and mental health.
I've only meditated daily starting this summer, too. Once a habit becomes permanent, it seems like it has been in place longer than it really has. There was a time four years ago I didn't run, meditate, play piano, or sing in the choir.
Tuesday, August 20, 2019
Euphoria
I had a moment of happiness yesterday, which is not common for me. Not that I am unhappy, but this was almost euphoria. I had done my running and meditation in the morning, after returning at midnight the night before on the train from Chicago. I had some good ideas about the preface to the Lorca and music book, and started in on that in an extremely good mood. The combination of having had a good visit with my daughter in Chicago, the runner's high, and a clear mind from meditating made me approach my work with enthusiasm.
Today, of course, I am not euphoric, but I still feel pretty good.
***
I have an ivy-league tenure case to do. They gave the candidate until last week to turn in materials, but expect me to get my letter in at the beginning of October. They ask for a comparison with three specific individuals at other places, so I have to look those people up too. Luckily I have already read this person's book, but I would have preferred to get this out of the way before the semester started. I have three trips coming up soon.
Today, of course, I am not euphoric, but I still feel pretty good.
***
I have an ivy-league tenure case to do. They gave the candidate until last week to turn in materials, but expect me to get my letter in at the beginning of October. They ask for a comparison with three specific individuals at other places, so I have to look those people up too. Luckily I have already read this person's book, but I would have preferred to get this out of the way before the semester started. I have three trips coming up soon.
Tuesday, August 13, 2019
Some meditation lessons
It is important to know when you are not enjoying yourself and to ask yourself why. Something you generally enjoy can be unpleasant in certain circumstances. It could be the voice of the inner critic, or something that causes frustration or physical discomfort. Yesterday I felt frustrated running uphill, because I have mostly been training on the flat. Running is something that is generally nice to do, for me, but it also has a whole slew of potentially unpleasant aspects to it. So the inner critic was saying "you aren't much of a runner" while the legs were saying, "that hurts." A "mindful" approach to this, if I am understanding this right, would be just to say "Oh, that's inner critic again" and move on. Or to say, yes, "running uphill does hurt a bit."
***
During meditation, I felt hungry. Once again, the approach to take is to ask what that is. Is it a physical sensation? How intense or painful is it? Is it a craving for food in general, a simple arousal of appetite? A feeling of weakness or loss of energy? What other emotions go along with the hunger? Irritation? Anger? Frustration? Or is it just a physical sensation with no strong emotion attached, like your nose itching.
The hunger doesn't go away by answering these questions, but it is less "I am hungry" than "Oh, that appetite is building," which can be a pleasurable sensation in a way, or a realization that the hunger pangs are of somewhat low intensity. Just framing it in these ways is helpful.
I often get itches all over while meditating. It is natural because more attention is focused on the body. One itch will arise, be present, then subside. It is really no big deal. I learn to enjoy, not the itching itself, but the ability to see what it feels like and rise above it a bit.
***
During meditation, I felt hungry. Once again, the approach to take is to ask what that is. Is it a physical sensation? How intense or painful is it? Is it a craving for food in general, a simple arousal of appetite? A feeling of weakness or loss of energy? What other emotions go along with the hunger? Irritation? Anger? Frustration? Or is it just a physical sensation with no strong emotion attached, like your nose itching.
The hunger doesn't go away by answering these questions, but it is less "I am hungry" than "Oh, that appetite is building," which can be a pleasurable sensation in a way, or a realization that the hunger pangs are of somewhat low intensity. Just framing it in these ways is helpful.
I often get itches all over while meditating. It is natural because more attention is focused on the body. One itch will arise, be present, then subside. It is really no big deal. I learn to enjoy, not the itching itself, but the ability to see what it feels like and rise above it a bit.
My things
My main things (I can't quite call them "hobbies") now are these.
1. Piano playing, composing music, and singing in the choir. This occupies about 1-2 hours a day, depending. For example, if I have a two hour choir practice, or a piano lesson and also practice on the same day, then it will be two hours.
2. Meditation. This will be 15-30 minutes a day.
3. Running, every other day, for 20-40 minutes. Walking on the days I don't run, for an hour.
4. Various crossword puzzles, etc... This can be 30 minutes to an hour, if I have time.
All are important to me in various ways. I see puzzle solving as a "hobby" in the classic sense, but I think that I am a musician, fundamentally, and that the other two are necessary means of self-support.
Running, I have extended into a more social activity by running in various groups, a possibility that had not occurred to me as realistic before this past week or so.
1. Piano playing, composing music, and singing in the choir. This occupies about 1-2 hours a day, depending. For example, if I have a two hour choir practice, or a piano lesson and also practice on the same day, then it will be two hours.
2. Meditation. This will be 15-30 minutes a day.
3. Running, every other day, for 20-40 minutes. Walking on the days I don't run, for an hour.
4. Various crossword puzzles, etc... This can be 30 minutes to an hour, if I have time.
All are important to me in various ways. I see puzzle solving as a "hobby" in the classic sense, but I think that I am a musician, fundamentally, and that the other two are necessary means of self-support.
Running, I have extended into a more social activity by running in various groups, a possibility that had not occurred to me as realistic before this past week or so.
Sunday, August 11, 2019
Simic rage
I remember my rage at Simic for dissing Creeley in the NYRB. See also here. And here, I guess I don't feel those sorts of rages any more with that kind of intensity. It seems now to me to be an unnecessary attachment or clinging (in the Buddhist sense). I am not a Buddhist but I do think I get this concept at a very basic level. Of course I am right about Simic and Creeley. But the level of passion I feel about being right? The level of investment in the cause. No, just no. I want no part of that any more.
Giving up that investment is very freeing. I don't have to be identified with certain positions, upon which nothing really depends. I feel the same way about my role in the García Montero controversies. Of course I am on the right side of things, from my own perspective. I don't disagree with myself, but not as much seems at stake. Worrying because people miss out on Creeley and respect someone like Simic is largely pointless. Of course a certain facile kind of poetry will be more popular even in somewhat intellectual circles. How could that not be the case?
I also take misunderstandings of my own positions as occasions for humor rather than rage.
So little depends
upon...
That would be a good start to a Creeley poem.
Giving up that investment is very freeing. I don't have to be identified with certain positions, upon which nothing really depends. I feel the same way about my role in the García Montero controversies. Of course I am on the right side of things, from my own perspective. I don't disagree with myself, but not as much seems at stake. Worrying because people miss out on Creeley and respect someone like Simic is largely pointless. Of course a certain facile kind of poetry will be more popular even in somewhat intellectual circles. How could that not be the case?
I also take misunderstandings of my own positions as occasions for humor rather than rage.
So little depends
upon...
That would be a good start to a Creeley poem.
Thursday, August 8, 2019
The Literary Value of cante hondo
I will write for 30 minutes on this topic. Here goes.
When we talk about "literary value," we are talking about the kind of thing literary intellectuals place a premium on. So I don't have to define this value in absolute terms, just say that there is an aesthetic preference among some such literary folk to value what we might call the aesthetics of stark simplicity.
This has a history behind it. For example, a taste for the "popular" might be in contrast to the taste for the baroque, or for literary aesthetics which emphasize how poetic language is supposed to be elevated (associated with higher levels of society.) The symbolist aesthetic of Mallarmé is not a populist one.
The taste for the popular as such arises with romanticism. Specifically, in German romanticism and preromanticism Herder begins to translate Spanish ballads in the 18th century. So the aesthetic of the popular has always been bound up with interest in Spain.
The cante jondo is a sub-set of Spanish folklore. We have a general sense of Spanish folklore as including romances and canciones, ballads and non-ballad songs, along with their music. Within this general set, there is a privilege accorded to Andalusian folklore, and the cante jondo is a subset of this Andalusian folklore It is important to remember that the general taste for the popular and for Spanish folklore includes other parts of Spain as well, even though Andalusia tends to stand in as a metonymy for the whole peninsula.
Machado y Álvarez mounts a solid argument in favor of the literary value of the lyrics of the cante jondo. He is the first Spanish folklorist and already by his epoch (the 1880s) the cante jondo had become a favored genre within folklore. The value of the cante is its extreme succinctness and directness and the absence of extraneous material, or ripio, filler. There are two kinds of work in folklore: the scientific gathering of material, and the anthology made simply for the delight of literary taste. His Cantes flamencos y cantares is in the latter category.
There are echoes of this aesthetic in the praise for the lírica de tipo tradicional found in Margit Frenk and other later scholars. The idea is a kind of pristine simplicity and directness.
Also, poets like Lorca and Hernández employ this aesthetic in some of their works. The popular has a value as such. I have to confess that I too place a premium on this style, so I cannot be objective. But the point is that this is something that quite a few people have learned to value immensely. My perspective is not some idiosyncrasy of mine, but something I have acquired from others. There is no wrong or right here, in the sense that positive aesthetic values don't ever have to be justified unless there are detractors.
Lorca's poetry exemplifies this tradition, but relates not just to the cante jondo, but to the larger universe of popular, anonymous poetry. In fact, I wouldn't give special priority to the lyrics of the cante jondo, since his view is more expansive than this. The cante jondo is tangential to his work. By this I mean that it touches at one point rather than overlapping substantially. He is writing about the cante jondo, not imitating it directly. (That's another way of putting it.) Yet overall, his contribution is to emphasize the literary value of these poems.
I could easily find examples that are excellent poems, from my perspective. They aren't very similar to Lorca poems:
Flamenca, cuando te mueras, [when I die, Flamenca]
la lápida la retraten [let them decorate your tomb]
con sangresita e mis venas. [with the blood of my veins]
Ok. I have more to say, but the half hour is up...
When we talk about "literary value," we are talking about the kind of thing literary intellectuals place a premium on. So I don't have to define this value in absolute terms, just say that there is an aesthetic preference among some such literary folk to value what we might call the aesthetics of stark simplicity.
This has a history behind it. For example, a taste for the "popular" might be in contrast to the taste for the baroque, or for literary aesthetics which emphasize how poetic language is supposed to be elevated (associated with higher levels of society.) The symbolist aesthetic of Mallarmé is not a populist one.
The taste for the popular as such arises with romanticism. Specifically, in German romanticism and preromanticism Herder begins to translate Spanish ballads in the 18th century. So the aesthetic of the popular has always been bound up with interest in Spain.
The cante jondo is a sub-set of Spanish folklore. We have a general sense of Spanish folklore as including romances and canciones, ballads and non-ballad songs, along with their music. Within this general set, there is a privilege accorded to Andalusian folklore, and the cante jondo is a subset of this Andalusian folklore It is important to remember that the general taste for the popular and for Spanish folklore includes other parts of Spain as well, even though Andalusia tends to stand in as a metonymy for the whole peninsula.
Machado y Álvarez mounts a solid argument in favor of the literary value of the lyrics of the cante jondo. He is the first Spanish folklorist and already by his epoch (the 1880s) the cante jondo had become a favored genre within folklore. The value of the cante is its extreme succinctness and directness and the absence of extraneous material, or ripio, filler. There are two kinds of work in folklore: the scientific gathering of material, and the anthology made simply for the delight of literary taste. His Cantes flamencos y cantares is in the latter category.
There are echoes of this aesthetic in the praise for the lírica de tipo tradicional found in Margit Frenk and other later scholars. The idea is a kind of pristine simplicity and directness.
Also, poets like Lorca and Hernández employ this aesthetic in some of their works. The popular has a value as such. I have to confess that I too place a premium on this style, so I cannot be objective. But the point is that this is something that quite a few people have learned to value immensely. My perspective is not some idiosyncrasy of mine, but something I have acquired from others. There is no wrong or right here, in the sense that positive aesthetic values don't ever have to be justified unless there are detractors.
Lorca's poetry exemplifies this tradition, but relates not just to the cante jondo, but to the larger universe of popular, anonymous poetry. In fact, I wouldn't give special priority to the lyrics of the cante jondo, since his view is more expansive than this. The cante jondo is tangential to his work. By this I mean that it touches at one point rather than overlapping substantially. He is writing about the cante jondo, not imitating it directly. (That's another way of putting it.) Yet overall, his contribution is to emphasize the literary value of these poems.
I could easily find examples that are excellent poems, from my perspective. They aren't very similar to Lorca poems:
Flamenca, cuando te mueras, [when I die, Flamenca]
la lápida la retraten [let them decorate your tomb]
con sangresita e mis venas. [with the blood of my veins]
Ok. I have more to say, but the half hour is up...
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