Fer cryin’ out loud. What does one do when they can’t see the trees for the forest? What does one do, one who creates in various ways, in this case, writing? What does one who is normally quite opinionated but denies such fact usually just by keeping said opinions to himself, one who’s head is so full and busy with art, creating it, keeping touch with others who create it, watching the industry, trying to understand how the gallery thing has become the dysfunctional, elitist, exclusionary monster it has become to both art lovers and artists, considering the critics of both art and industry, watching the auction houses and latest shenanigans, scandals and black-boxed, historic masterpieces bought and sold anonymously, the wacky peanut-gallery stars and lurkers, and of course the true and disgustingly over-rated stars of the show, those former artists-cum-rodeo *cowboy-hack, wannabe, creative-directors who only pick up a paintbrush when there’s a camera around and who suck up as much in handouts as modern television evangelists in their crystal castles and ultra mega-McMansions by commanding teams of on-staff “lesser” working-artists paid well by the hour to actually create that “artist’s dream” for said artist-cum-creative directors, or, in this case, art created for the rodeo, a rodeo featuring much more than Johnny, the one-balled man. So what about the one whose head is empty and full at the same time, the one who sentences run-on that have way too many commas – what does this one do when he can’t quite figure out what to write about?

Now what?

So yeah…, what can I write about? I’ve drifted, obviously, if I just answered a question with another question. I guess it needs rewording. Lets’s put it this way – what can I write about? That’s the question!

There could be plenty things I could discuss, like how elastic reality really is, or, either the meaning of art itself, or the meaninglessness of it, or both, maybe? How about why democracy has become a designed and disguised oligarchy, with voting being only a shallow, symbolic, empty-gesture designed to make us complacent and self-congratulatory, proud enough to wear a tiny, free-sticker with a flag printed on it, declaring my accomplishment for the world to see. I could write about that. Or, I suppose one (not me, no way) could write about the process of writing, or even write about the process of writing about the process. So, what to write?

That’s what I’m trying to figure out just now, right here, in this moment.

It looks like I’m getting somewhere

You see, I write a lot, I suppose, these days. Many times I scribble ideas, like sketches with words, just quick notes, topics, you know. Then, I’ll take to one of those ideas (or two, or three), and develop them a bit. I’ll end up with a few short essays at once in my wordbank, knowing confidently that one of them will suit my sharing mood — knowing confidently that I actually have something that I have something to say about. Then, behold, I suddenly don’t like what I wrote, that whole journey in words, from the beginning to the end, from station to station: that whole unlikable train-ride just sucks. I don’t like what I have, not at all, and end up with having nothing to share, and even if I’m certain that I do have something worthy of sharing, I really don’t. Its totally unlike painting!

Suddenly, as of yesterday, I’ve four essays, shorties, all written this week, and four failures. That’s four of those train-rides, four times touring that tree ineffectively, beginning to end, over and over. What’s up with that?

Now, I’m 15 minutes into a new train-ride, this one, and it seems to be one not going so great a distance, which suits me today, and this one is somehow enjoyable, for me: this one being a looping-tour around some bizarre and convoluted Banksy Dismaland neighborhoods with brief glances at the local dwellers and denizen, finally to return, ending where it started. I’m thinking that I don’t suddenly have five failures at this point.

So no, its no more of this poor-pityparty-me, no “oh dear, what am I to do but keep my chin up, cheerio, old chap” crapola. Nothing am I to use as an excuse for not knowing what to write about because I know what I’ll be writing about now (see list above from first paragraph, or maybe the second), but not meaning “now” presently, now being a general term, but maybe next week, or the following, or at least at some point, maybe.

Enter Bullwinkle

I guess the moral of the story would be a kind of weave where Rocky tells Bullwinkle, who was actually just as smart as that professor dude, the “You know, if you don’t know what to write, just sit down and start writing,” line, but this time Bullwinkle responds by saying, “You know, Rocky, its a bit more layered than that, more complicated” with his rubbery-deep but now smart-sounding, moosey-writer-voice talk. And, of course he’s right, Bullwinkle is, his Canadian Moose-brain being a lot bigger than some little squirrely squirrel-brain’s brain is (or his beaver-brained brain, whatever he was), but yeah, a small rodent-type animal is what Rocky is, with a small rodent-type brain, nothing adequate for a large cartoon moose who only pretends to be dumb.

So while we wait for me to figure out what to write about, and serving as powerful, non-sequitur, I’ll share a detail of a painting for you, one of those trees in that proverbial forest in the title. This one Is called Alpha and Omega – a Savage Elegance. You can see it in full in my online gallery at the button below.

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