Learning How To See Again

"He was a hard man to know and I don't mean that he was hard to get to know, I mean it was tough to know him."

I'm fond of that sentence. It sums up an aspect of Dan that was always in play. Since hearing this news I've been spending my little extra moments of think time back in the years between '89 and '91. These last few years bear a great deal of resemblance to those years. My sense of awe and the drive to explore is just as great as it was then. That first trip to Chicago nailed the coffin on any chance for what we'll call a normal life. I clearly remember getting on a greyhound bus in Ypsilanti and watching the known world pull away from my view. In a first floor apartment in Wicker Park, Kali ## put me up in her temple room. The room was painted a deep red and contained an altar with all manner of bizarre items on it. The night of the show at The Hothouse I walked all the way from her apartment to the gig with a 15' high wooden psychic cross. Wicker Park was a different place in '89. It was a bit rough and the Latinos we're very concerned about an odd looking white guy carrying a huge cross through their hood. It was all in the name of art and magic.

These were the days I learned to see differently. Everything became an oracle. Each interaction, billboards, every license plate number, the smell of a place and even the cracked paint on the wall began to speak to me. Maybe I should say that I learned how to see AGAIN. I think this is the sight of a child, the gaze that sees meaning in every detail. The imagination is embraced and given as much if not more import than the rational mind. Magic comes alive and reality is altered based upon the abilities of the subject to interpret the objects that fall under its gaze. This way of seeing, of giving meaning to everything has since this time been integrated so completely into my being that I often forget to praise it. It 1999 I began to write about the Church of Wide Eyed Awe as a means to praise this manner of sight.

Appropriately, this nostalgic babble comes at a time when I am engrossed in Alex Grey's "The Mission of Art." Grey's observations are sound and his words are inspiring. Though I produced art (mainly large dada inspired collages) for a few years I never considered myself an artist until this trip to Chicago when we created a ritual and performed it in front of the public. The piece was total chaos with drumming, slides, dancing, and the construction of a table that was infused with all of our intentions. My intention was a more direct connection with the network that was TOPY and within 6 months I became the one of the few people who knew the majority of the network by sight. I traveled to every corner of the States and visited every access point of the network, save the East Coast that would become TOPY Joy. I rode on that intention and it took me on quite the adventure. The success of this caused me to consider myself an artist.

On the surface this was all quite dark and dangerous, but there was a guiding light and a purpose that is still revealing itself to this day. That is a part of learning how to see as well. When there is meaning everywhere there is also purpose and, I believe, a path. Of course I'm flexible on this and totally non-dogmatic. I often simply careen down my path, somersaulting, wiping out, making note of signposts and fumbling on joyfully. That yogic non-attachment comes in real handy here.

Boy, what a mass of head junk the above is. Ah, the joy of blogging without a psychic censor! Maybe I'll work on cleaning that up a bit and making it presentable or maybe it will remain a rough mass of humor for future Gregg.