GRYPHON: IMAGE OF UNDIFFERENTIATED CONSCIOUSNESS

There is yet another layer to my Gryphon dream and subsequent tattoo. This is from a neurobiologist professor who seems to have a pretty good handle on the right-brained stuff as well.

'With the birth of consciousness in each of the rational functions, unconsciousness is also born, separating Heaven and Earth or creating the functions of feeling and thinking. These two opposites are portrayed in the Sumerian myth as the Lion-birds'.

The Lion-bird image comes from the Sumerian culture which dates from around 3,000 B.C. It is believed that this is also where Eastern and Western Creation myths both derive from. It is a significant image to appear in a dream and I am a bit overwhelmed by this piece of infomation.

Apparently also:

'Consciousness does not rise up like an island from the sea of unconsciousness, dividing into the island and the sea...or two that are no longer one. Consciousness and unconsciousness arise simultaneously out of the primal sea of undifferentiation, which might better be described as twins born from the same mother. The Self is the Mother, one twin is (soul) consciousness and the other twin is (ego) consciousness. The Self, or Great Mother archetype, remains undifferentiated energy'.

This relates to my Eclipse and Twin Dream as well. Though I am grateful for it, I am trying to write the conclusion to my thesis and this new knowledge is a major distraction. If I ever get this doctorate done, I really think that I need to do another. I have only just begun.

REFERENCE: W. J. Freeman, Professor of Neurobiology, University of Berkeley.

DRAWING IN PAINT

I have never considered myself much of a painter. My first love was drawing. It still is. From there, because I seemed to be into 'form' I moved easily into traditional sculpture. Although I learnt how to do lost wax bronze sculpture the whole process was just too cumbersome, time hungry and expensive. In my final year at technical college I transferred my major to painting, really a default position. Being a traditionalist I stuck with oils, but I never really liked paint.

When I began my doctorate I wanted to make big images. The logistics of doing 2.4 metre square drawings - getting flat surfaces large enough, figuring out how to exhibit and store them - was just too problematic. Now I realise that I didn't think it through well enough - too late, I decided the easiest thing to do was to make paintings. Again, I reverted to my default position - only problem was, I still hated paint.

5 years on I still hate it. I am just not a painterly painter. I don't relish in it, can't stand the stuff getting all over my hands, having to wash everything with turps, even though I use the pure stuff that smells like tree gum. (Don't even mention acrylics! They are passionless, no soul, dry 2 shades darker, are flat......) 5 years on I am now getting close to finishing the first big painting I started for my doctorate. There is now so much paint on the masonite support after trowelling it on that the craggy layers cast significant shadows in a side light.

It has got me thinking, it's really more of a drawing than a painting. It's tonal, even though it is in colour, it has been done with spatulas and common hardware store paint scrapers. The paint isn't lusciously applied, and any time I have tried to use a brush, I regret it and revert to the palette knives. I murder a painting with a brush. I should be ex-communicated as a painter. I recently said in an e-mail to my prac. supervisor: I am not a painter's arse! And this is no false modesty.

So I am going to call these works, 'drawings in paint' - because that is what they are to me. I know that in 2011 we shouldn't even be trying to negotiate the difference between a painting and a drawing, it shouldn't matter. But it matters to me because if I call it a painting it will be judged as such.

Anyway, it really is more of an 'idea' than a 'thing'.

images: 2 small drawings in oil. I'll post the painting in question when/if I finish the doctorate.

MY BEST CHRISTMAS GIFT

After toying with the idea for over 30 years, I have finally signed up with UNICEF as a Global Parent. It is a Christmas present to myself and many people I will never meet. It is only a small monthly donation but it feels like the right thing to do.

I haven't made this commitment before because I have rationalised all this time that my income was never assured, my job never secure enough. I didn't want to start something I couldn't continue. A phone call from UNICEF the other day changed that view. The caller simply said that I could withdraw from the program at any time if my circumstances changed. He also explained that his organisation was keen to get regular donations so they could plan and maintain programs. Rather than sponsoring one child they encourage people to donate to a pool of money that gets distributed where needed. I do prefer the more personal model where you get correspondence and updates re a specific child, but I can see how this new model is more effective.

I have no children. My 'step-children' are lovely but they have way more money than me. My nieces are completely indulged like so many in Western culture. They have probably never even felt hungry their entire lives. I am an atrocious 'aunt' - I don't remember their birthdays or Christmas. They don't need me and any paltry contribution I might be able to make to their lives, even if they did live within driving distance. I am disgusted by our collective childrens' attitudes to their entitlements and yes, I do blame their parents because I continue to meet kids who were not brought up that way.

The focus has been on Eastern Africa but UNICEF are now warning of a famine in West Africa. I know there are those who think we should simply let 'nature' take its course and let these people die. I have no answers but hope my small contribution might at least ease someone's suffering.

MORE FOSSILS

I can't help it, I just love fossils. This is a Dicynodon. It is believed to have lived in Australia over 30 million years ago. It's in the news because palaentologists are very excited - someone recently found a piece of jaw bone washed up on a river bank in Eastern Tasmania. How the hell they knew what it was is beyond me, it just looked like a bit of a tree or an ugly black rock.

This creature was about the size of a cow and was herbivorous - I think the tusks were just for protection, or perhaps rooting around in the ground for food. They have also found bits of it in Antarctica which is no surprise of course because when the giant continent of Gondwana Land was around, Australia and Antarctica were joined. The Dicynodon was a predecessor of the 'modern' dinosaurs and apparently survived a cataclysmic climate change to do that. There may be hope for some of us yet.

image: Mark Boulay, 2006 (I am guessing digitally generated)

WALKABOUT - ARCHETYPAL SOUL OF AUSTRALIA

Generally this has been a crap week. It's assessment time and I have students with the gall to query my judgement when they haven't even engaged in their own education. In reality they are just lazy, ungrateful, self-deluded little shits who don't want to make the transition into adulthood. It's ironic nevertheless, that I am one of those who has to try and mould them to a system that I don't even believe in myself. I am conflicted - but my job is to help them survive out there in the 'real' world and they won't if they don't learn the 'rules' and can't play the stupid game. It's not just them that has made me grumpy, it's the culture I live in - I am not only world weary, I am fucking exhausted. It must be time to go walkabout.

I have always loved wandering, not far, just around. When I was younger I lived right in the middle of the city. Apart from working in an office during the day I had no timetable, no real agenda, no responsibility - except in treating others as well as I could. In my attempts to try and inhabit the urban landscape I wandered at night, at will. I would walk through Northbridge (carrying a small knife) to King's Park where I dined alone, shimmy down the embankment, scale fences and explore the network of intersections at the edges of the freeway. I didn't really know what I was doing or why, it was instinctual. I guess I was trying to make some sense of a world that even then seemed completely crazy to me. Motorists probably just thought I was crazy.

Later I lived in my Kombi between Fremantle and Albany for almost a year. I had minimal income from my rental property, would help out at a friend's cafe for a feed, bunk down on her floor, sleep out in the Kombi at marina carparks where I could sneak in and get a free hot shower (inside knowledge). I remember parking on the limestone escarpment in North Freo for a few nights with million dollar river views - just enough scrub for a bush toilet and residents opposite who kindly let me be. Lying on my bed looking out of the Kombi's sliding door was pure and simple bliss.

Some nights I would wander around Freo. On one occasion I walked into one of the old historical limestone halls to find the joint cranking - a really great band on stage and a crowd of young people jumping. No agro, no alcohol. It took me a while to realise I had crashed a Christian rock revival. I stayed and had a really good time.

One summer afternoon I found myself at some kind of picnic on the grass at a gathering of mixed cultures with a great folk band. One family asked me to join them. They had brought food - it was ethnic, delicious and I thought somewhere from the Middle East. They were genuinely nice people and eventually I discovered that they were of the Baha'i faith - basically religiously tolerant people who believe that God reveals 'himself' through many divine messengers and therefore embrace Abraham, Krishna, Zoroaster, Moses, Jesus, Buddha and Muhammad. Pretty damn cool.

I know I am nostalgically pining for a time that is no more but I really need my life to be simpler. And I know also that I have wandered verbally here but I do have a point. I regularly get this desire to chuck my responsibilities and run away. I know this is not a viable strategy for life but I attribute it, partly at least, to what I think is the influence of the soul of this country on its inhabitants. There is a real wanderlust in Australia. Given that its traditional inhabitants have been going walkabout for millenia, it seems reasonable to suggest that even its immigrant residents feel the pull. I know traditional Aboriginals had a hard life but 200 years after white settlement I think we might still learn something from that.

IF YOU LOVE CHRISTMAS DON'T READ THIS

I fucking hate Christmas. People have so many expectations about it and it often lets them down. It's like bad sex, the anticipation is way better than the act.

Something weird happens to people - they start driving erratically. Everyone is suddenly in a terrible hurry. What for? Where are they all going? They are up your arse, taking ridiculous risks passing - I feel much more vulnerable on the road.

The lead up to Christmas is slow torture. Months out there are retailers making you suffer, putting you under pressure. Weeks out there are 'drinkies', office parties, decorations showing up on the admin. staff's desks. Fucking Christmas carols in the supermarket. Noisy parties everywhere. Aaaaarrrggghhh!

I don't do Christmas. I am not a fucking Christian. My bet is most other people I share it with aren't either. But awe, shucks, you gotta do it for the kids (simpering smile) Why? By the time they are 4 they don't believe in Santa, it's just another excuse to manipulate their parents. They have too much shit, are greedy and probably just want an update on last year's model of iPhone or latest 3D game. Bikes are standard issue, so nothing special there. We are all too fat but we eat more while the third world still starves. People who never jog start jogging a few weeks before Christmas. I saw someone today.

Oh, but Cristmas is nice because you get to catch up with family. You reckon? Every time we get together there's a stoush, some argument over politics (I'm the only one in the family with a social conscience, the only leftie in a family of capitalists since my Grandmother died). I get reminded of what a shit I was when I was 14 ('remember when you did.....' - no forgiveness there) And the jury is still out on whether Auntie Billy was a complete alcoholic bitch or not (she definitely was)

Most of my Christmas days are spent with other self-proclaimed 'orphans' - no pressure, no politics, no personal record file, no need to give gifts - no need to pretend. And the other excellent thing about Christmas - while most people are stuck at home with their loved ones eating too much with a hangover from weeks of celebratory drinks, I go for a surf in the much less crowded local break.

THE 'TATTOO' EXPERIENCE

Today, in between submitting students' results and negotiating with disappointed parents I slipped out for an hour and a half to get my latest tattoo. The pain was therapeutic in that it definitely made me forget about work! This is number 4 and probably my last. It is the image I dreamed and blogged about earlier this year. I stopped short of including the words I heard so clearly in the dream.

I had known him for about 15 years but Wayne was a new tattooist for me, which is a bit daunting because there is always the possibility that he might have been crap, or slack and given me some dreadful incurable disease with that needle. But I have found it's best, once the decision is made, to just give into these things and go with it.

He had worked at the local tyre workshop where I got my cars refitted. He was always good for a chat. In fact he talked a lot. I learned quite a bit about his complicated love life, his love of speedway and tattooing on the side. He had recently taken the plunge and gone pro. Wayne told me he now made as much money in one day as a tattoo artist as he made all week at the tyre place. I always liked him - just one of those instantaneous and illogical decisions. He talked very fast too and I always suspected he was a 'speed' freak off the track as well. Today he reassured me, without prompting, that he wasn't. He was fast though, and efficient.

The tattoo experience is quite surreal. Tattoo studios are a discrete culture in themselves. Once he knew I used a few expletives myself he relaxed and the conversation flowed naturally. He talked about the stress of being a tattooist: you're only as good as your last tat, some of the horror jobs he had had - like when he realised he had underquoted after a guy had taken off his shirt to reveal a very beefy back. And the woman who kept twitching so that in the end, after fixing quite a few wobbly lines, he advised her to come back later after a large dose of valium and mull - which apparently worked.

I learned about the politics of being a tattooist, how tattoo artists and bikies were inextricably intwertwined, how you had to make sure you only did work for one bikie gang - otherwise they were likely to burn your shop down. I also found out about the new breed of bikie. They aren't big fat bearded middle-aged guys who eat junk food any more, they wear hoodies, like me. What's the point of being a bikie if you can't wear the colours? This new breed are buff, they're on steroids, they're pumped - psychos. If you get in their way, they're dangerous.

I think Wayne did a great job. He said to me: line-work is my specialty, this is the new style - you don't go as deep - fine lines and tonal shading that's me, you've come to the right place for this sort of tat. Fascinating - I love the tat, and I reckon the conversation added value to the very reasonable $200 price tag.

DEATH OF THE LOCAL BREAK

It is hot, I am restless. I can't settle on anything. I've done a bit of my thesis, some docs for work, spread my first batch of compost, watered the vegies. We decided to give into the poodles' requests and went down the beach.

We hadn't bothered to look for a wave this morning because we knew it was onshore and looked like this. It has looked this way for months. While local potato farmers upstream, environmentalists and various interest groups argue it out, the inlet struggles. Another Western opening and a very wet winter have destroyed the usual beautiful aqua water and much anticipated sand banks that should be forming at this time of year.

I'll admit I went out in this a few days ago. But we jagged a small wave in the corner that day and it was offshore. But with relentless onshore North Easterlies and no swell, this is what we will probably have for weeks yet. The holiday season is upon us and there will be many disappointed visitors. Even though I kind of don't mind really, because they just clog up the local break, I actually feel sorry for them.

Oh well, back to the SUP (stand-up paddle-board) on the river for now I guess.

UNCONTROLLABLE 'CONTROLLED' BURNS

Yesterday I had to travel 60 kms east to another town for the day and I refused to leave my poodles at home. Today is another day of howling Nor' Easters. They woke me in the early hours when they cranked up again after some respite during the night. There is still an 'advice', not a warning, for a fire burning 19 km Northeast of us. Someone told me recently that a fire front can jump 5 km at a time.

FESA's 'Alerts & Warnings' website is now in my 'Favourites' and I am checking it regularly. We have bought a CB radio and so far managed to collect a couple of our neighbour's contact details. Yesterday I bullied my significant other into facing the possiblity, however slim, that we should have an 'action plan'. Nothing fancy, just things like, which route would we take if..... I am not completely neurotic, I accept that it may not, possibly will never happen. But our heated debate over which route we should take in unstressed conditions clearly revealed that these conversations really can't be left until the critical moment.

Augusta residents a long way up the S/W coast are now evacuating. Any half sane Australian would have said: 'Enough. Let's stop burning. It's obvious that we can't control these burns in these condiions'. But not the DEC (Department of Environment & Conservation) in their infinite wisdom. After the recent debacle in Margaret River I am completely stunned that they had the gall to push ahead with their bureaucratic timetable and start another 'controlled burn' the day before yesterday, with these conditions forecast. I really want to know who makes these decisions. They cannot possibly hide behind their Excel spreadsheets - these decisions are made by real people, in real conditions.

This is the arrogant mentality of the over-hormoned alpha-male - his refusal to accept that he is just an insignificant part of Mother Nature and can't control very much at all. Or perhaps worse, these are people who simply don't have the balls to reject government protocol and make the call to abandon prescribed burns. Heads will surely roll!

It has also occurred to me that we have an arsonist high up in the ranks of the DEC.

Photo: Margaret River fire. Google Images.