On the Verge of the Next Great Thought

In case you have forgotten, Amadeus is a magnificent film.

For a moment, let us forget how abso-freakin-lutely brilliant Tom Hulce is in it. I mean, that laugh alone takes moxie. And F. Murray Abraham, powerhouse that he is, plays the duplicitous and political antagonist like he was born to it. Hell, let's even forget the soundtrack which any idiot, film lover or otherwise, can appreciate.

Let's put all of that aside.

Above all else, Amadeus is a film about what it means to live a life dedicated to the arts, but to lack the talent to live up to that dedication. And, more than that, about what it means to know true talent, true genius, and having that knowledge only underscore your own mediocrity.

Salieri was a man living on the verge of the next great thought. He just could never quite get there.

This is the saddest condition in all of human existence. Or maybe just the most terrifying. And maybe I just mean for me.

Let's consider this for a moment.

If I want to be a doctor when I grow up, it means I take all the requisite courses and pass my exams and become a doctor. Now, I may not be naturally suited to being a doctor. I may be terrible at math. I may have to study ten times harder than any of my peers in labs. I may have to overcome a fear of touching blood or vomit or snot or any other of the human body's fluids.

But I can be doctor with enough work and perseverance. And whether I breezed through or earned it through sweat and grit, I will be recognized by others as a doctor.

But what if I want to be a writer? A sculptor? A musician? Sure, I can take courses. I can attend the finest art schools and live my life dedicated to nothing else. But that does not mean I will ever have enough talent to be recognized for my efforts. I mean, who amongst us hasn't known that "painter" who works at the locally owned coffeeshop?

"Jeremy? Right, the [insert finger quotes] painter. Think they'll ever sell that painting of his mother crying hanging near the men's room?"

How terrible is that? It's almost unbelievably so. Jeremy may love art more than the rest of us put together. He may live, breath, and sleep painting. But none of us may ever give half a damn because he lacks the talent.

And what's worse is that Jeremy may be more aware and better able to judge true talent in painting than the rest of us. When he looks at a truly talented painter, do you think he aches inside? Does part of him recognize his own mediocrity and cringe when faced with the work of a true master?

All I wanted was to sing to God. He gave me that longing... and then made me mute. Why? Tell me that. If He didn't want me to praise him with music, why implant the desire? Like a lust in my body! And then deny me the talent?

Why indeed, Salieri.

I'm Not a Gymnast, Maury

Try as I may, try as I might, I simply have not been getting to my keyboard every week as regularly as I would like.

Admittedly, posting to my blogs every week might be a bit excessive for me. After all, I have other creative projects I'm trying to maintain - I need to practice drawing, I should learn to play the guitar, I need to work out, for Christssake.

Even still, blogs are important to me. I have hopes and aspirations for them, for what they can do for me psychologically and creatively. However, they will never live up to their potential unless I get around to actually posting to them.

Failed Plans to Enforce Regular Blog Posts

1. Remind myself daily to create a new habit
2. Make color-coded weekly schedule that includes writing time
3. List blogging on Weekly Objectives list in organizer
4. Creating a monthly calendar of creative activities
5. Make weekly trips to local coffeeshop with free wireless access

Clearly, I require a new plan.

Let us begin with #1.

1. Reminding myself daily to create a new habit is, in itself, creating a new habit. I have accomplished setting a new habit, a habit of daily self-recrimination for not starting other habits. I have both accomplished and failed here.

2. I have had some success with this. Through my recognized addiction to my BlackBerry, I have managed to schedule weekly blog writing time, as well as a nagging reminder window which pops up until I dismiss it. I've even colored coded it blue, blue for Scheduled Task. But you know what the problem is?

Impermanence.

That's right. I can move things around on my calendar. So what happens when my phone tickles me to write a blog post but I don't feel like it, I have other plans, or I am busying talking to a man with seven motorcycles but no keys? I can move my writing task to a different day or even delete it outright if I'm feeling rash.

If I had the strength of character and will to abide by these technological reminders, wouldn't I have the strength of character and will to just write my posts on my own?

3. I gave up keeping the Weekly Objectives list. It was a good idea, in principle. Make a list of those things which are most important to me to accomplish in a given week. This list was not to be used for mundane tasks. No bills to be paid, errands to be run could appear there. The Weekly Objectives list was reserved only for those actions which advanced my higher aims.

And I gave up writing it. Why did I give up writing it? Because I got tired of how many things made the list and how few got done.

I know what you're thinking. The same thing I was thinking when I encountered this problem. Why not limit myself to fewer objectives in a week? I'll tell you why. Such a short list makes one feel like you have no objectives at all. When I looked at a list of only a handful of things, I felt like I was not holding myself to a high enough standard.

Well, screw that! I hold myself to high standards or none at all! At least, apparently that is the case.

4. Monthly calendars are, in theory, a great way to accomplish these bigger objectives. Take a large scale objective, say master the art of perfectly diced onions. You break this objective into small objectives: buy onions, sharpen knife, think about cubes. Then you schedule these smaller objectives across a month, ensuring steady successes and ultimate completion.

You know the problem with this approach? The small steps can feel intensely stupid. Insanely stupid, in fact. Why do I want to learn to dice onions anyway, if it means sitting around with this stupid whetting stone sharpening a knife I bought because it was cheap at the Safeway. Pointless!

5. This one was clearly to round out a list of five. First of all, I spend enough time drinking coffee without giving myself more reasons for hyper-consumerism. Secondly, what is with that proviso about free wireless? Like I can't do this shit from home? Like my real impediment here is connectivity?

"Oh," I daily swoon, "if only I had a wireless connection, I could finally post this blog I've been working on."

Please. Even I can see through this one.

I can spin this situation any way I like. I can create a thousand systematic methods to ensure my writing and then create a thousand mechanisms to escape them. Sadly, I cannot adapt to this new way of being with the regularity and grace that I desire.

I guess I'm just not an ambiturner.

What I Though on Flight 1450 to Denver

That baby looks like an old man.

An old man who has lived sixty years hard years.

On his face.

I could really use a soda.

Did I pack deodorant?

What do I remember about my dad?

I wonder if that kid would let me color a page in his Transformers coloring book.

I shouldn't have worn these old Converse. They smell. I can't take off my shoes now. I wish my feet didn't stink.

Does my breath still stink? He said it did last night. Time for a temporary complex.

His parents must know he looks like an old man.

I mean, look at that shirt.

I feel conspicuous pulling out Obama's book next to this lady with the trashy crime novel and sleeve tattoos.

I wonder how I'm going to get to the hotel.

Seriously? Do we need the drop-down TV's for an hour and a half flight?

When we finally landed in London, our wing was on fire. I was the only one entertained.

If my life were a novel, that would mean something.

He said Paul Auster's first five novels were superb. I should have picked up that used copy of The Music of Chance

This is that show about Chris Rock as a kid. It has a terrible knock-off name. What is it? Everybody Hates Chris? My Big Fat Chris Childhood? CSI: Chris Rock?

I wonder if Alan Alda is fun to talk to.

The best part of the opening scene of Me and You and Everyone We Know is when she says...

When I call a name...

When I call a name...

It'll be your name....

What's your name?

Nevermind. Let's go. Say it...

Let's go.

Sometimes we need to be willing to take a risk with someone knowing nothing about them but that they are willing to take the risk with you, too.

In Dispatch's The General, he dismisses the troops before they have even begun to fight. The line says Go now, you are forgiven.

I love that. They are forgiven not for their actions, but for their intent to act.

Some intentions require forgiveness.

On Nomenclature

My Uncle David. Well, technically my great-uncle David, but we've never been a family terribly loyal to the traditional familial naming structure. My entire life I knew this man as Uncle David, my paternal grandmother's brother. I had always assumed that he knew himself as David his entire life as well.

In going through an old family album, I came across this picture of Uncle David as a young man. It came with this caption:

Your great-uncle David. He lives in San Francisco and you will see a lot of him in the next few yeras. He was born Mack Ladd Faulkner...was always known as "Buddy" but legally changed his name to "David" when he was older.

Uncle David was actually Uncle Buddy who was actually Uncle Mack Ladd? An odd prospect, but not one that rocked me to my core. But it had piqued my interest.

I called my grandmother and asked her when it was that Uncle David had changed his name. She did not remember what I was talking about. More specifically, she remembered that people called him Buddy, but she did not remember what his name had been before that.

What a sucess! My mind spins thinking of what such a transformation would entail. First, deciding to change your name. The implications of it! Imagine having to have that conversation with all the people in your life. Your family. Your friends. Your co-workers. Your neighbors. Then there are all the people you'd have to inform for purely legal reasons. The HR lady at your office. Social security office. Insurance agents. DMV. How often you would have to give your explanation speech, how rehearsed it would start to sound before you had even made it part way through your list.

"Hey there, Mack! What'd you do this weekend?"

"Yeah, about that. My name is David now. If you could please start calling me David, I would really appreciate it."

"What?"

"I have legally changed my name, and I would appreciate it if you called me David from now on."

And that's only for the people you think of giving the speech to. Think of all the incidental explanations you would have to give! All those people who reach out to us from our pasts, those people we run into at coffeeshops, at random get togethers. I imagine my Uncle David at a business lunch, after he had been David for years, and having some past acquaintance come up to the table, slapping a hello on the back to his old friend Buddy. By then, Uncle David's business associates might not have ever known him as anything else. How awkward must that have been? Not only the explanation to his old friend, but then a revamped explanation to his current friends.

And how does one go about choosing a new name? I've always considered the act of naming a child to be an incredible responsibility. But choosing a name for yourself? If you're named Mack Ladd, that burden lies with your parents. But if you rename yourself, the responsibility for that act of nomenclature is yours alone.

It seems like such a simple act, going by a different name. But the act of changing your name implies a whole series of transformations. When you think of yourself, which name do you think? When you dream, in that way that dreams have no coherent sense of time, by what name do you go when your grandmother appears to you on your seventhieth birthday? How thoroughly can that act of transformation penetrate? Into your memories? Into your daydreams? Into your future?

When my uncle dreamed, did he dream he was Mack or Buddy or David? Did it vary? When he chided himself for a poor choice, how did he call himself? It must be exhausting, relearning to turn your head when a name is called, filling out forms, creating your signature.

What a tremendous act of will. I wonder, have I the strength of will to be so transformed?