the mystery of life

I can't say why these particular images mean something for me. Perhaps they reflect my own desire to be seen for who I am - as well as the fear (which runs alongside it) that I will be seen for who I am. In some world where I carved out my career on my own, instead of waiting to be told what to do (the story of my youth, "wait here, son, while I find something for you to do." followed by, "I don't understand why you're not doing something."). I come from a class that is always being told what to do. And that's my dad's frustration with life - which he bequeathed to me. That's not blame. That's the way we are. We are without a firm grip on our own agency - which as Miriam pointed out to me is the crux of my depression. My authority, my authorization, is in an "other's" hands. I think this is why, or contributes to why, I've not done the incredible thing, the big art qua artwork that captures a wide public, in my life. I've aimed low, taken work that is a deflection from the course - at the advice of others. I have not been aggressive or audacious. In truth, I think that's what I needed. 

I am a quiet, sensitive soul. That's what others tell me. In truth, I embed myself in books, pondering the workings of great minds. What wonderful thinking machines Deleuze, Lacan, Foucault, Blanchot, Freud and Jung (and especially Merleau Ponty) possess. When what I need is  to use my own "machine of thought" more often. I would say this to anyone. The spiritual trick, demand as it were, is not to retreat from the world. To Not retreat. Not to try out flanking the world, either, I suppose. I think I need to go forward now. My movement, as an old art professor (who loved my work, raved about my work) commented, is tentative: always a hesitation, even as the lines breathe life. Like the alchemist in Durer's Melancholia I, I find my tools ineffective (for a man who possesses a hammer when nothing needs nailing so much as joining). When I voice these concerns, I receive joking responses or else reassurances.