So when I’m tired of all the bullshit that surrounds me, I have a look at this page for some quick and dirty inspiration.

_{Thanks to Fluor for accumulating these nuggets of wisdom.}

“When Bill Evans-we sometimes called him Moe-first got with the band, he was so quiet, man. One day, just to see what he could do, I told him, “Bill, you know what you have to do, don’t you, to be in this band?”.
He looked at me all puzzled and shit and shook his head and said, “No, Miles, what do I have to do?”.
I said, “Bill, now you know we all brothers and shit and everybody’s in this thing together and so what I came up with for you is that you got to make it with everybody, you know what I mean? You got to fuck the band.” Now, I was kidding, but Bill was real serious, like Trane.
He thought about it for about fifteen minutes and then came back and told me, “Miles, I thought about what you said and I just can’t do it, I just can’t do that. I’d like to please everyone and make everyone happy here, but I just can’t do that. I looked at him and smiled and said, “My man!”. And then he knew I was teasing.

From ‘Miles, the Autobiography‘.

Sitting on a high bar stool
Holding my dreams up to the sound of jazz music

I live uptown
Where I don’t exactly know
I’m always down town
And it seems I’m always with the blues

I talk to myself in public places and hum jazz tunes
I love jazz
But soon I have to make it up town to that ol’ furnished room of mine
I guess that’s why I stall so long down town
But I like the cafe bars down here
Especially the ones across the streets from theaters

I once wanted to be on the stage
But this is the closest I’ll ever get to one
I couldn’t afford a seat next to the Sears

That was jazz music you heard blasting out
Now I’ve got 15 cents between me and starvation
And I’d probably have to walk all the way up town
Cause I’m playing that music again
You see, I love jazz music

That’s pretty music, boy
Pretty but it ain’t really pretty
It ain’t like girls in magazines
It’s beautiful
It’s terribly beautiful, man

Say like a woman you’ve been with last night
Or say an hour ago

Sad huh
Sorta reminds of that old building I live in
My room, looking out over [?]
Now catch this.
Dig!

Now here I am standing at the window in my old building
It’s nighttime in Harlem
I sure wish I could just relax and be cool
It’s just like my mother said
Don’t cause nothing to wish, Jack

[?]

Yeah, early in the mornin’ time
Late in the night time
I’m with the blues

Sometimes I’m laughing and having myself a ball
And that’s why God keeps tellin’ me that the blues ain’t all up there in that ol’ room
Sometimes it’s dancing and strikes like a woman
Skips in the heart like children playin’ ball
And maybe that’s why I always manage to change once in a while
Even with the blues

Whether I like it or not, I love the idea of living, man
And sometimes it’s tough, man
And I don’t mean tough like when Miles is groovin’ with his horn
I mean tough like when I can’t make that morning meal
When I’m duckin’ the landlady and everything I have is in harm
Like when I think

When I think about all the places I haven’t been and won’t ever like to get there
I think maybe I will
Yes that’s the way I think
Like the song says the sun gonna shine in my backdoor someday
All the way down to the bottom of my stomach and up again
That’s the way I feel

Pretty, man
But not pretty
Beautiful like a woman
A real woman

(from the ‘Tijuana Moods‘ sessions)

“All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, to make it possible.”

~ T.E. Lawrence (“The Seven Pillars of Wisdom”)

And what’s more, I found this great article about being an introvert in a world full of extroverts.

Maybe I just think differently (being an introvert), or was raised in a different way but to me talking is, in most cases, not much more than externalizing your own insecurity. Validating your own existence, getting other people to agree with you. And if they don’t, quickly adjust or polish your belief about something so you fit in some more. Or at least act like you agree, so other people will accept you and think you’re really neat.

Why else would you give someone your opinion about something? Yes, to enlighten, or to get a discussion going. But that’s only 1% (and now I’m being really generous), the other 99% is complete and utter bullshit, hot air, staving off boredom, fighting the dread of silence in social situations, the insecurity about your own beliefs about petty little things that don’t matter at all and worst of all: bad breath.

To me not talking much has two great advantages: a) you have much more time to observe and b) you have much more time to think. Put a) and b) together and eventually you get a wise human being, someone you can really look up to.

Read a hopeful bit of news here…

I’m definitely hanging tight!

Men had always wanted her, this Karintha, even as a child, Karintha carrying beauty, perfect as dusk when the sun goes down. Old men rode her hobby-horse upon their knees. Young men danced with her at frolics when they should have been dancing with their grown-up girls. God grant us youth, secretly prayed the old men. The young fellows counted the time to pass before she would be old enough to mate with them. This interest of the male, who wishes to ripen a growing thing too soon, could mean no good to her.

Karintha, at twelve, was a wild flash that told the other folks just what it was to live. At sunset, when there was no wind, and the pine-smoke from over by the sawmill hugged the earth, and you couldn’t see more than a few feet in front, her sudden darting past you was a bit of vivid color, like a black bird that flashes in light. With the other children one could hear, some distance off, their feet flopping in the two-inch dust. Karintha’s running was a whir. It had the sound of the red dust that sometimes makes a spiral in the road, At dusk, during the hush just after the sawmill had closed down, and before any of the women had started their supper-getting-ready songs, her voice, high-pitched, shrill, would put one’s ears to itching. But no one ever thought to make her stop because of it. She stoned the cows, and beat her dog, and fought the other children…. Even the preacher, who caught her at her mischief, told himself that she was as innocently lovely as a November cotton flower. Already, rumors were out about her. Homes in Georgia are most often built on the two room plan. In one, you cook and eat, in the other you sleep, and there love goes on. Karintha had seen or heard, perhaps she had felt her parents loving. One could but imitate one’s parents, for to follow them was the way of God. She played “home” with a small boy who was not afraid to do her bidding. That started the whole thing. Old men could no longer ride her hobby-horse upon their knees. But young men counted faster.

Her skin is like dusk,
O cant you see it,
Her skin is like dusk,
When the sun goes down.

Karintha is a woman. She who carries beauty, perfect as dusk when the sun goes down. She has been married many times. Old men remind her that a few years back they rode her hobby-horse upon their knees. Karintha smiled, and indulges them when she is in the mood for it. She has contempt for them. Karintha is a woman. Young men run stills to make her money. Young men go the big cities and run on the road. Young men go away to college. They all want to bring her money. These are the young men who thought that all they had to ho was to count time. But Karintha is a woman, and she has had a child. A child fell out of her womb onto a bed of pine-needles in the forest. Pin-needles are smooth and sweet. They are elastic to the feet of rabbits… A sawmill was nearby. Its pyramidal sawdust pile smoldered. It is a year before one completely burns. Meanwhile, the smoke curls up and hangs in odd wraiths about the trees, curls up, and spreads itself out over the valley…Weeks after Karintha returned home the smoke was so heavy you tasted it in water. Some one made a song:

Smoke is on the hills, Rise up
Smoke is on the hills, O rise
And take my soul to Jesus

Karintha is a woman. Men do not know that the soul of her was a growing thing ripened too soon. They will bring their money; they will die not having found it out… Karintha at twenty, carrying beauty, perfect as dusk when the sun goes down. Karintha…

Her skin is like dusk on the eastern horizon,
O cant you see it, O cant you see it,
Her skin is like dusk on the eastern horizon
…When the sun goes down.

Goes down….

~ Jean Toomer / Karintha

(1947 – from the book Cane)

Is it advisable for one who is not an expert on economic and social issues to express views on the subject of socialism? I believe for a number of reasons that it is.

Albert Einstein wrote about the ‘evils of modern society’ and how it could be better for all of us… here.

“You remember when I said how I was gonna explain about life, buddy? Well the thing about life is, it gets weird. People are always talking ya about truth. Everybody always knows what the truth is, like it was toilet paper or somethin’, and they got a supply in the closet. But what you learn, as you get older, is there ain’t no truth. All there is is bullshit, pardon my vulgarity here. Layers of it. One layer of bullshit on top of another. And what you do in life like when you get older is, you pick the layer of bullshit that you prefer and that’s your bullshit, so to speak.”

~ David Webb Peoples (Accidental Hero)

Inamorata.
Mission: Music, masculinity.
Master of the art, music.
Who is this music
That which description may never justify?
Can the ocean be described?
Fathomless music,
Body of all that is.
Live everlastingly.
Man initiate inamorata:
Your music art tomorrow’s unknown known life.
I love tomorrow.

~ Robert Conrad

“The puppet masters have all these gatekeepers trying to stop anything new, because if the standard of enlightenment is raised or widened, their mediocre products are in jeopardy.”
~ Wayne Shorter

He’s talking about music critics here, but he could have been talking about the entire fucking world.

Oh, I snatched this quote from this book called ‘Miles Beyond – The Electric Explorations of Miles Davis 1967-1991′ which comes highly recommended.

Charlie Haden
Jack DeJohnette
Ravi Coltrane
James Genus
Jeff Watts

A modern jazz masterpiece and swan song. Ranks way up there with 50s/60s/70s era jazz output.

I don’t think there is real a function other than being able to show the world you’re alive and/or to flaunt your insecurities. Maybe a little of the ol’ existential angst has something to do with it too. There’s something psychologically interesting about people who have 300+ friends on their profiles. It’s just feels like self-delusion to me.

So yeah, it’s not for me. I have a personal website, a personal blog and a personal Twitter account. I even collect listening stats through Last.fm. These are things I think are interesting, even to others. These websites give people a way to contact me if they want to.

What I don’t find interesting is embarrassing myself by sharing my personal comments with other people, or sharing the things I like and dislike with everyone else. To me it’s just another way of saying: “Here’s me! Please judge me!”, something people do enough as it is. Although with Facebook it’s from a safe distance.

It’s not about socializing with people. It’s more akin to voyeurism. It’s why people like to look inside other people’s houses when they walk by. After a while you just put blinds up.

_{Thanks, Fluor}.

people so tired
mutilated
either by love or no love.

people just are not good to each other
one on one.

the rich are not good to the rich
the poor are not good to the poor.

we are afraid.

our educational system tells us
that we can all be
big-ass winners.

it hasn’t told us
about the gutters
or the suicides.

or the terror of one person
aching in one place
alone

untouched
unspoken to

watering a plant.”

~ Charles Bukowski (of course)