beware! this blog's gone sporadic!

So obviously I am in a season of random blogging at best. No rhyme, no reason, only when I feel like it. I suppose that's not too different than what I normally do, only I seemed to be much more consistent. Not sure if that's a good thing or not.

Pet peeve of the week - saw another national ad using the word less when it should be fewer. I know, less is more punchy and to the point. It's also wrong. No wonder our country can't speak its own tongue.

Social faux pas of the week: so our housechurch combined with the Rogers housechurch for some fellowship and so we could try to take care of some of the brush in my back yard by burning it in a fire barrel. All went well for about an hour, when my neighbor came out and complained that the fire was too close to his house and he'd be happy to call the fire department and let them know we were illegally burning stuff. So, being the non-confrontational person I am, I grabbed a bucket of water and threw it on the fire and called an end to it. I'm sure Steve was right and that I wasn't doing anything wrong, but why antagonize neighbors who probably don't like me anyway? It's times like these I wonder if I'm made to live in a neighborhood. You know, around other people.

Over halfway through Lent - I gave up chocolate (as usual) and TV, which is not at all usual. Haven't really missed it much, though trying to catch up on it all on Sundays doesn't always work. The problem is, I haven't found a constructive way to fill the time. Not sure I could say what I have done - probably more time online. The goal was to remove distractions, which I did, but don't feel I've redeemed the time so to speak. Sure, I've read more, but wonder if I should do more. Geesh, guilt-ridden much?

So last week for artwalk I spent some time in the Surrealism exhibit. If you're in the Cincy area, I highly, highly recommend it. Great stuff from the Jerusalem museum in its only North American appearance. Here are some random thoughts I had, both last week and on Saturday:

Unlike much of what passes for modern art, surrealism I get - the physical expression of the unconscious. Like dreams, we often cannot explain them, but they are felt and experienced all the same. Reason takes a back seat and we bypass the logical and see how it feels. We find within that which we can almost identify, but it slips through our fingers as soon as we try to grasp it. The familiar shifts to the left and suddenly what we thought we knew is something new altogether. Lines blur or disappear or become impossibly thick, breaking boundaries, opening us up to a new way of seeing. The colours seem brighter, more real than the muted ones we see in real life. Like our dreams, these images lie closer to the truth than our rational minds can grasp. These images force us to stare - with nothing solid to hold on to, our eyes try to make sense of what they see, but as soon as we think it makes sense, it slides and shifts, leaving only impressions, not knowledge.

Later...

These images, like half-remembered dreams captured on canvas - they remind me of moments thought forgotten. I do not understand the image, yet I connect with it. You do not explain these - you experience them. Like God, they resist category, resist examination. They are and we find ourselves examined by them. And whatever they elicit from us speaks more of who we are than of what they are.
Æ

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Now playing: Pomegranates - This Land Used To Be My Land, But Now I Hate This Land
via FoxyTunes