It’s pretty hilarious to see a white person use land acknowledgements to peddle their often middling art.
Like, we get it, you feel guilty in some vague way about ‘taking up space’ but will take $16 a ticket from the general public to hear HOW you take up space. Is that $16 going explicitly back to a ‘land back’ cause? I’m waiting for an answer. The acknowledgment is a slap in the face unless you’re recognizing that you should be returning that cash to those who actively steward the land. Often, that’s not ‘the artist.’ Capitalism at its finest, amirite?
It’s interesting to see how limited their relationship is with the land through their art. How repetitive, how much they try to search for a soul outside when there’s no connection, possibly none existing within. It’s the same photo, of the same land, under the same prescribed conditions, waiting for something new to happen. There’s no reverence for the soil, the unique qualities of light, the hug of humidity or the clarity of aridness as you move further away from the sea in the art. It’s at best a fossil. It has no life. It has no longing for a moment that has passed or the excitement of potentially returning to this sacred land, no more sacred than any other land we’re lucky if we’re able to dig a toe into the soil with.
We too often exploit the reality of the world around us for attention to ourselves. We ignore the reality that we should be sharing, inviting in others to appreciate appropriately the true magnificence of the world should we choose to capture a moment of the landscapes around us. What are the details, the nuances, the variety that can be contained in one frame. How do we sequence the sprawl and wonder that seems so vast, but in a universal context is so small? We are also so… so…small.
There comes the theme of humility again. I’ll say that for 42 of my 43 years of life, I’ve been more than lucky to call what is more or less the spine of the San Andreas Fault, and the various branches of it, home. There’s a bittersweet feeling that I’m soon to leave the beguiling chaos of this land. The way the soil warps into rolling hills, magnificent cliffs, random mountains so high next to valleys so low that they canyon themselves to the sea on a variety of beaches made of sand, glass, or stone.
The frigid ice blue waters of various shades sometimes blending in with the infinity of the sky, or contrasted with the melancholy mystery of cold fog. It’s very unique in that there’s going to be other lands that fascinate me, as I plan to settle just a little east of Appalachia, as the Piedmont slowly sinks into the far warmer Mid-Atlantic. I leave behind the worries that the land I’ve always called home (for the year in Oregon is just a volcanic variance of what I know as a Californian). There’s no need to wonder if Earthquake insurance actually will save in a need to ‘rebuild.’ The fire insurance already doesn’t exist, neither does the flood. A mile from the branch, 3 miles from a combustible eucalyptus grove, looking over my back deck that stands over a daylighted section of creek carrying the strained water from the skies down from that grove, across the branch of the San Andreas Fault, right under my feet.
I live right at Foothill. I straddle the resistance between land determined to stay neutral and flat versus the ribald attempts at hot core desiring to find new stability on the surface. It’s kinetic, it’s lively, it also seems to drive the droves that live on it without understanding the land crazy. I’ve lived here knowing the peculiar rhythms, and how you need to find steadier places, steadier companionship with place and people. I find myself exhausted with the knowledge I’ve known, lucky to be a part of people lucky to figure out what’s possible, what’s not, on this land for 3 generations. I have to admit at best, those were also adaptations to fit into the fallacy that we humans can really CHANGE something that will outlive us.
That eucalyptus grove is a nightmare mismatch that is always a wildcard in such an arid environment. Yet, those trees sit in a smattering of backyards, on a hilltop, prone to get strong winds blowing hot, turbine fueled off of two other mountain ranges. Those winds often pick up even more hot air as they cross a vast valley, turbocharging themselves, looking for a spark to cause chaos. Sometimes that spark is fueled by a shimmy of the earth, because of those branches of the fault that lay beneath our feet. Sometimes its a promethean lightning strike out of the rainy season, exploding a dried patch of grass. It’s not the surly vacuum of a Tornado, not the drench of a hurricane, both of which can be ritualized into their Spring-Summer-Fall rhythm.
This land has the zap of static electricity at all times. A Certain shimmer, sparkle and light dances even in the shadows. You have to really sit still and think of the complexities of yourself, and life to really see that, and also, some of the flat banality of the light. You have to give yourself a lot of time to commune with each part of the land. I seriously count myself lucky to be educated in such a chaotic place.
I had thought of going to Detroit for this years Birthday. I wanted to honor a sonic past that I hold so dearly, as I watch my life somewhat start to play out literally like the soundtrack of Holland-Dozier-Holland hit parade songs that dominated the AM airwaves during the Summer of 1965. That 60 years ago can wait, honestly, til I feel my life doesn’t match that hit parade and kinda goes out with a whimper. In that case I’m either waiting for when “Forever Came Today” by The Supremes was recorded or “I’m In A Different World” by The Four Tops was recorded.
In this world of ups and downs, my dreams all fall through
Things just don’t work out, no matter what I do
Disappointment haunts me, through each lonely day
The world around I see, in only shades of gray
But when the love light shines upon my face
I’m in a different world
A world I never knew, I’m in a different world
A world so sweet and true, I’m in a different world
The sun breaks through in a mysterious way that you can never count on north of the Golden Gate. The love of existence seems to permanently hide behind that shroud of fog. You have to climb out of the most intense obscuring of reality that submerges San Francisco seemingly permanently. You have to drive up the Waldo Grade as the thumb tips that make that strait widen to meet the rest of the body around the bay, expanding, extending to join despite the clear fracture, the rest of the world.
You don’t experience the connection of the unique to the great vastness we are so privileged to navigate if you stick to the Marin Headlands, Stinson, Point Reyes, Marin County in general. You have to wonder what madness would it have been to have Marincello perched right over that deadly strait that there’s no turning back once you decide to leap. I’ve lost one dear soul to the waters and that fog. I’m wary always to stick my toes into whats nearby. I’m watching as it clutches to another one, sinking them in plain sight, while they want to charge you admission to witness how repetition often begets destruction.
I sadly know the traps this land may land you in, the chaotic cycles. I always know, way too intimately when the signs say to get off of it. Signs say I needed to find what I loved about it, to keep it close, to take on my next journey. I’m realizing I may never want to come back as living flesh. I might want my ashes to be spread here when the time comes, so I live forever in the chaos.
I took a Chrysler, like my great grandmother called me to do, to go have one last good Cheeseburger at Jenny’s Giant Burger. The fries are fresh cut without the proselytizing on the soda cups at In & Out. It’s been Jenny’s since 1982, tellingly, despite the architecture dating to the mid-century. Fort Bragg also has that glass beach to brag about. I was still able to pull polished emerald greens and amber beer bottle elegance pounded away from the pacific.
The pieces are smaller now 60 years from the wise stopping of the trashing the landscape practice. The pieces are more pearl like now. I wonder how I honor them as jewels. How they’ll move away from sitting in the film canisters that I ironically documented their origins with.
I savored each saw of the steering wheel to favored places further away in Mendocino. With each prod of the throttle made me realize I sorely miss the simplicity of just having 2 gears in an automatic transmission. There’s no need for 8. A 300 will make an excellent winter beater back east but I need keys to another Corvair first. Limitations will familiarize yourself with the landscape more intimately. It takes time to finesse and make love to any land. I’m ready to commit to another. I’ve learned all I can from this set of soil, other than I have remarkable respect for its beauty. What it displays, and what it hides.
It’s telling that, in each time I encounter something that needs to be private, the roll of film of the moment does not cooperate with my ambitions. Six months ago, as I broke before Ted’s eyes, my Olympus 35 UC had given up the ghost the night before. I needed to be deeply involved in the moment with the man that has said I love you to me the most. He had to be there with open arms as I passed through an exhibit that reminded me so much of what I want love of place, space and ‘home’ to be. I had to be given kleenex by a stranger too to know not only the land I know, the faces I’ve always seen, will be capable of taking care of me.
The same goes for the misloaded roll that stumbled into Point Arena Pride. Where I was beckoned by Country Music, a Land Back sign holding hands with a Gay Liberation Front sign perched high on a hill. I saw the demographics of the country, mostly white with a significant Latinx population come see me as the sole Black outsider and welcome me in. We commiserated about escaping the insane urban cores that precariously seem at risk on this spine of the world; The Bay, Los Angeles and its fires and corrupt mirages, San Diego and its allegiance to the United States Imperialist Project. Honestly the allegiance of all three. Everyone said it was wise to go.
Everyone said, once I was honest with my health, that they understood why retreating to these woods, this sea, to live out the rest of my days slurping oyster and eating ass next to a fireplace on perpetually foggy days wasn’t viable. Singing where only the trees hear the top of my falsetto, adding a reverbing echo to the heavens.
I’ll always praise this land, look forward to returning to it from time to time with the reverence of distance between us. I recognize this is the greatest heartbreak of all: I’m closing out this album of my life recognizing that I’ll always take a piece of it where I go yet all it asked for in return was my ephemeral presence that will always break out in a song, savor the unique treats it has to offer, and perhaps brag a little about it being a little fortress of Chaos that will forever be a treat.
