Oh my heart! So much here speaks to me and calls for response, which will have to come later. Meanwhile, one brief tale: an 80-something-year-old man once told me, never greet someone with the question, "How are you?" because people rarely answer honestly and, he said, many people who ask it don't actually want to know how you really are. Instead, he instructed, say, "It's so good to see you!" or something similar. Only ask someone how they are, he said, if you really want an honest reply. I've never forgotten that.
Good afternoon and thank you, Adam and others, for these words and stories. They elicited many images and thoughts for me---one being the need/role of the "town crier" in days past.
Some years back, I had invited a fellow artist friend of mine to come here to the State University of New York- Plattsburgh to work with my students and give a public lecture about her work. She is among the most inspired, humble and talented artist that I know. She and her husband built a house in the woods of Michigan where they raised much of their food and two amazing children, tended to extended family and neighbors and lived simply enough that they managed to have their art-making sustain them (food, children's education, healthcare) in a way that is rarely possible. They are not art market "stars" but they made choices that limited their material needs, etc. Right before my friend was about to begin her talk, an audience member, who I knew was a wealthy art collector, leaned forward from the chair behind me and, knowing I was hosting the artist, asked, "Is she successful?!" I knew what he meant (does she sell alot of her work for high prices) but I remember saying something like, "You'll have to tell me what you mean by that" before the lights dimmed and the gift of her sharing began. The conversation did not pick up when the talk was over. I can only hope he got an answer to his question....
This is so good. I am sitting in a farmhouse in Veneto, surrounded by so much of what you describe, happening a world away in Italy. I am off to meet the 92yr old baker shortly. Warm greetings from someone grateful for your work.
yes to so many things you write about here-- and I have so much impatience myself with this boring question that's the norm in our culture, for a lot of different reasons, some you name. When I'm feeling alive & creative I try to be playful with it when its dreaded weight hits a conversation, but it annoys the heck out of me.
Thank you, Adam. This opens a deeper window for me into the real work of creating a gift economy/neighborhood from scratch. I read this post when you first released it, and it's been marinating since.
I'm not so sure Old Sally would've felt a deep sense of worthiness as her foundational M.O. for being able to accept the gift of help when needed. I'm also not sure self reliance wasn't already present in the DNA in those earlier times. For all we know, she may have been quite uncomfortable with the outpouring of care shown her.
But she would've had an unquestioned sense of belonging, a faith in the fabric of community that is completely missing now. Her faith in that community fabric might have also included religious faith, which would perhaps have enabled her to place some or all of the miracle of neighborly helping hands onto the divine.
I think the immense courage required for you to step into the lives of others when no fabric exists, and hold out your bits of colored yarn to them, as you are doing, is phenomenal. It's an act of real vulnerability, which you are performing over and over. And because there is no fabric to support you as you do your best to weave something from nothing, this very real vulnerability will naturally bring up your own stuff (like that sense of unworthiness), in way that Old Sally would probably not have experienced? That's my take on it anyway.
Oh my heart! So much here speaks to me and calls for response, which will have to come later. Meanwhile, one brief tale: an 80-something-year-old man once told me, never greet someone with the question, "How are you?" because people rarely answer honestly and, he said, many people who ask it don't actually want to know how you really are. Instead, he instructed, say, "It's so good to see you!" or something similar. Only ask someone how they are, he said, if you really want an honest reply. I've never forgotten that.
Good afternoon and thank you, Adam and others, for these words and stories. They elicited many images and thoughts for me---one being the need/role of the "town crier" in days past.
Some years back, I had invited a fellow artist friend of mine to come here to the State University of New York- Plattsburgh to work with my students and give a public lecture about her work. She is among the most inspired, humble and talented artist that I know. She and her husband built a house in the woods of Michigan where they raised much of their food and two amazing children, tended to extended family and neighbors and lived simply enough that they managed to have their art-making sustain them (food, children's education, healthcare) in a way that is rarely possible. They are not art market "stars" but they made choices that limited their material needs, etc. Right before my friend was about to begin her talk, an audience member, who I knew was a wealthy art collector, leaned forward from the chair behind me and, knowing I was hosting the artist, asked, "Is she successful?!" I knew what he meant (does she sell alot of her work for high prices) but I remember saying something like, "You'll have to tell me what you mean by that" before the lights dimmed and the gift of her sharing began. The conversation did not pick up when the talk was over. I can only hope he got an answer to his question....
This is so good. I am sitting in a farmhouse in Veneto, surrounded by so much of what you describe, happening a world away in Italy. I am off to meet the 92yr old baker shortly. Warm greetings from someone grateful for your work.
Friend speaks my heart!
yes to so many things you write about here-- and I have so much impatience myself with this boring question that's the norm in our culture, for a lot of different reasons, some you name. When I'm feeling alive & creative I try to be playful with it when its dreaded weight hits a conversation, but it annoys the heck out of me.
So good to find you on here, thank you.
Thank you, Adam. This opens a deeper window for me into the real work of creating a gift economy/neighborhood from scratch. I read this post when you first released it, and it's been marinating since.
I'm not so sure Old Sally would've felt a deep sense of worthiness as her foundational M.O. for being able to accept the gift of help when needed. I'm also not sure self reliance wasn't already present in the DNA in those earlier times. For all we know, she may have been quite uncomfortable with the outpouring of care shown her.
But she would've had an unquestioned sense of belonging, a faith in the fabric of community that is completely missing now. Her faith in that community fabric might have also included religious faith, which would perhaps have enabled her to place some or all of the miracle of neighborly helping hands onto the divine.
I think the immense courage required for you to step into the lives of others when no fabric exists, and hold out your bits of colored yarn to them, as you are doing, is phenomenal. It's an act of real vulnerability, which you are performing over and over. And because there is no fabric to support you as you do your best to weave something from nothing, this very real vulnerability will naturally bring up your own stuff (like that sense of unworthiness), in way that Old Sally would probably not have experienced? That's my take on it anyway.