Orangizing chaos, was a reductively poetic phrase I learned last winter, from Theodore Barth. As may truths go, many people say them; yet some voices that have the ability to imbue letterforms and their tenants with more gravity. Gravity formed by a myriad of vehicles: vehemence, persistence which is not quite the same as insistence, but really the voice of experience has always settled differently with me than the youth. And even that, is simply a way to organize chaos, to ascribe value, virtue or valour to empiricism, versus novelty. This is all changing now, as social media allows parents to record the profound things kids say. Instead of kids saying the darndest things, they say the true things and reveal their personaes and psyches with less fear than adults wearing masks do.
In the wake of 2020, novelty is not our only societal fixation but a an incantation to call in order to the perception of chaos. As people physically do go bumping into each other, it is not that humans have become a molecular stew alone, but our mental realms have taken a higher value to the realms of others personal spaces. Though commonly blamed, the cell phone is actually controlled by a human, not the other way around. We are information addicted, but is that by being informed we feel we are correct? Good pupils? Fully dilated and wide eyed recipients? And if so, are we receiving the truth or at least both or a few of the sides reality can be seen from a single point of view? The consideration for others, honestly, can be taken on one extreme by the covert narcissistic personality as a puppet glove of control through another, and on the other extreme a glib disregard for the lives of others. As indicated by the infamous stomping baby in Frognerparken, everyone just wants to hold his hand. But no one sticks around to stand by his side.
Without a context, these words mean what exactly? The words used to describe societal conditions and social movements evoke an experience of religiosity, the very thing everyone seems to want to be escaping from. And yet these orders of conduct ascribed as virtues or sins have their connections to the realm our days are dressed up to be governed by: science and reason. These are very different things that are quickly conflated. One of the key tells in my perception of a conflated experience are the boiling over of emotions.
Mental turbulence, as DaVinci had described, was essential for the formulation of a new invention…something novel. So what is it that humans want so much? New! Neu! Neo! The one? What is wrong with what is? Our minds are glued with a kind of slick sludge of options of all the things to flaggelate ourselves with.
And yet the earth, in its eruptions, shifts, shakes, does not only tolerate but speaks to those who are listening. This voice of god phenomena is often ascribed in certain contexts as pathology as well. So if we actually do go into the nature and notice, the glass buildings are reformed deserts (silica) and the older buildings formed of clay and concrete are aggregates of sedimentary things, we can find ourselves as children pointing to duck! tree! sun! and everyday these genres are new again. Enter the nourishing wisdom of naturalists, calm and not so insular and jacked on java as the emergence of tech-bros.
The question of organizing chaos and who gets to be tasked with such dangerously subtle areas of power is indeed ripely in question. As the rise of “down with patriarchy” and every other witch or wizard burning trope of our current time, I wonder how many people think 20 years from now, where does this idea lead to? Are some of these ideas written over and over throughout time?
In a resounding yes, we do have an aggregate of evidence and organization of which conglomerate of ideas tend to go towards: serenity or chaos, or benevolence and malevolence. These are as close to opposities in their totalities as we can get. I often wonder if people think birthing a new reality is THE answer, if that is really some will to power more than a well considered creation.
I don’t know everyone, as I continue to get to know myself, but I spend years thinking about an idea before pursuing it. There are things I would love to create more than others, and I have noticed often the more I push for that creation, the further away it becomes. And yet, governments or institutional structures are not women in labor, though it often feels lately the societies and earth is hee-hee-hoo, breathing as if to birth out some new life. There are going to be certain kinds of people you will want holding your hand in the delivery room, and others who you do not. And our daily lives can be structured that way as well.
What are we getting at? reaching towards? filling ourselves in? or contributing to a functioning society? I don’t know about you, but walking mad with torches through the streets feels pretty barbaric when it results in destruction. The blatent disrespect for beautiful creations that already exist do not spell a positive outcome of chaos but a snowballing of behavior that reeks of mismanaged adolescent angst.
Yet who is allowed to say such things in public without getting egged? The school teachers were condemned by Pink Floyd, and what about the kids who actually loved to learn? I use this example because I am wanting to point to reality that often the quietness, not in the news, is running along, and inviting anyone who wants to join to be there.
Another question to lend from a friend was: what is it that you want most to create? As an organizing force, the questions open up a different way of being. What is it that you want? is about getting, and the luciferic is not only a mythological creature in the bible, but an energy sucking concept. The generating or resonating concepts are focused outwardly. As a woman in a flesh suit like most of you (as it seems) creating does indeed require the sacrifice of other choices, focus of energy, breathing particular ways, possibly pain, or as The Cookie Jar exists for…bits of other pleasures.
A funny sidenote before closing this somewhat sermon-like biscuit, The Andy Warhol Foundation picked up The Cookie Jar as a title. I was tickled by that. As I had come to title this because of a play on “cookies” from your browser stashing on your hardrive, these ideas are stashed somewhere in your attention vector of awareness, and some of them might not be sweet, some might be hard, some might taste ok, go down easy or others cause indigestion. Alas, there are more than a few cookie recipe websites called the same thing, and I already went through the rigamarole of trademarking Yoto, and understand the trademark and patenting process is slow, and costly, but also effective if one wants to fight to be the king of the snow pile of ideas. And while most people agree money is evil; I actually don’t. I think it is that kid that stands on the melting snowpile that could be…not really evil, but foolish. Because the top gives an overview of what everyone is doing, takes your breath away for a moment, but can get pretty lonely which primes people not for the richness of relating but the internal structure for self-destruction if not disciplined enough to ask this question:
The joy of creating is not in the trophy or imagined shining glory of attention, but the satisfaction of caring enough to consider what something created is done in the world. As ancient as yin/yang, good and evil, what intentions are your creations imbued with? And how much of what you think you are, is reflected in what you are doing on a daily basis? Because isn’t it those small mundane things that make life? (.…not to be pedantic about it.)
Regulatory pedantry