How We Fit [David’s blog on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Yesterday it rained all day. We tossed out our plan-for-the-day and decided to hunker down at home. After cleaning everything that was possible to clean in the house, we turned our attention to the Enneagram. Kerri already knew her number. During his visit, she and Dwight compared notes and learnings. He not only knows his number but studies the Enneagram. I listened to their enthusiastic conversation but could not participate because I was ignorant of my number. They each had notions of where I would fall in the 9 types but refused to offer their suspicions; they did not want to unduly sway my discovery. Now, after a rainy day inquiry that included a test and some text queries with our chief-Enneagram-informant, I am certain of my number. The core character traits described in my number fit me like a too tight glove. “No wonder!” I sighed more than once while reading the narrative on my type.

We had fun during our rainy day pursuit. We read about ourselves and the compatibility of our respective numbers, the potential trouble-spots and issues. We laughed when reading general descriptions that might have been written specifically about us.

The exercise sent me down a rabbit hole. I wondered at the real-desire to type ourselves into a connected system. What makes the Enneagram or astrology any more or less valid and valuable than the minute marketing data that tracks my movements, my interests, my purchasing patterns and types me into a neat predicable category? Boomer. GenX. Progressive. Liberal. Conservative. Extrovert/Introvert…Judging/Perceiving. Survey upon survey. Sacred numbers. Archetypes. Where do I fit? Where do you fit? It’s a layer-cake of association. The rabbit hole? In a nation that is so hell-bent on defining itself as divided, irreconcilable in our differences, we are – on a much deeper level than the political – intensely interested in how we fit together in the web.

Scrape a layer off the noise. On the next rainy day, sit on your raft (bed) and take note of how much energy you and your world-o-technology are investing in weaving a greater web of interconnectivity. Pay attention beyond the toxic rhetoric of the stream and you just might see that we are, as a species and as a nation, much more interested in how we fit than how we are irrevocably broken.

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE SHADOWS

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Prepare For The Freeze [David’s blog on saturday morning smack-dab]

In our home there is no task so daunting as the cleaning-out of her closet. We’ve had several near-attempts. Occasionally, small dents have been made to the outer layer. But, in the end, all forward progress shuts down. This mountain is too formidable to climb. With the closet door open she stands staring in; frozen.

I understand. It’s not simply clothes to be tossed. It’s memories. Associations. The archeology of a lifetime. For my story-thready wife, taking her old clothes to the Goodwill is like tossing her memories into an abyss.

I’ve suggested leaving it alone and building another closet to make badly needed new space for the present-and-future clothes. My suggestion always inspires THAT look. So, I’ve learned to keep silent. Hold my tongue. I’ve learned the art of the silent head-nod.

Now I know, on those dubious occasions she declares, “This is the day…” my job is to prepare for the emotional-lock-up, the mental freeze. The inevitable zombie-stare of defeat. I fluff extra pillows for her favorite chair. I position the hassock so I can rub her feet. I open a bottle of wine.

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE CLOSET

smack-dab © 2024 kerrianddavid.com

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Don’t Ask Why

DR 002

From my archives. I call this painting Alki Beach.

When I woke up this morning, researching the color blue was not on my to-do list. Did you know that in Belgium blue is the color associated with baby girls? Pink is for boys. To be blue in the German-speaking world means to be drunk rather than the English assignment of depression. Color associations are cultural.

I jumped down the rabbit hole of color symbolism and meanings because I’ve been building a new catalogue for my paintings. I’ve been revisiting the eras of my work, looking at every painting I’ve done (those that I documented…). A few days into my cataloguing Linda asked me why I never paint with the color blue. Linda loves the color blue. She is a veritable celebration of blue in earth, air, and water. “You never use blue!” she exclaimed. “Why?”

BlanketOfBlueSky

A Blanket Of Blue Sky

“I always use blue,” I sputtered, convincing no one. Since my move from Seattle to Kenosha my paintings have been more earth tones, umbers and sienna. The blues are there but certainly not dominant. Linda has never seen the work from my blue period.

“Why don’t you use more blue?” she laughed.

‘Why’ is one of those words that can either bring you to clarity or will drive you crazy. Knowing ‘why’ is useful in a Simon Sinek seminar or valuable in the pursuit of a purpose driven life but is near-to-impossible when attempting to articulate an artistic choice. The top two responses are conversation stoppers: 1) I don’t know, and 2) It feels right. I suppose there is a third response, the anti-why: 3) why not? It, too, leaves no room for discourse and is generally a lousy explanation.

IslandDreaming

This one is called Island Dreaming

“Why don’t I use more blue?” I asked Kerri. Without looking up or missing a beat she responded, “Why don’t I use seventh chords?” Leave it to my wife to hit me with a musical-zen-koan.

Horatio often reminds me that to enter the studio is to also enter stillness. Working in and from stillness precludes all questions of why and how.

Did you know that blue is the most commonly used color in corporate identity and that it is a color rarely found in fruits and vegetables? It has more complex and contradictory meanings than any other color. Among the seven billion people on earth, roughly 4 billion of them prefer blue to any other color.

This morning while entering images into my catalogue – most were predominantly blue – I heard the echo of Linda’s question. “What’s up with blue?” I asked myself. Abdicating all responsibility for internal answers, I did what we all do at such moments: I turned to Google.

Did you know that blue is generally embraced as the color of heaven?

Why?

 

Shared Fatherhood

My latest: Shared Fatherhood.