After being a guest on the Baltimore radio show “The Signal” in September of this year, our protagonist invited radio producer and host Aaron Henkin to be a wild card for November. He submitted his wild card task through a recording this month. Listen below to hear his mid-month challenge.
November Wild Card
So I am about half way through Luce Irigaray’s “Elemental Passions” and I am convinced that her words are mostly a long string of blubbering nonsense that sound in-genius and palpable for moments in time –perfect for a precise moment but then disappear again into nothing but distilled disillusion and disappointment. OH OF COURSE she is writing about the state of being in love! The elemental urges, ebb and flow of that electric emotion that makes the world go round. How could it or would it make sense? If we understood it – it just wouldn’t be interesting right? We would simply stop yearning, trying, challenging ourselves to obtain it.
Maybe I am having a hard time relating to her words right now because this text was originally written in French (maybe the translation is off?) or it could be because I have been thinking too clearly and directly these days (I am currently past my last bout of love/sickness that clouded my judgement). For better or for worse, I don’t happen to be swimming in the sea of love at the moment, but I may be floating upon it. Love, like water has this way of making you thirst again as soon as there is a draught or you find yourself landlocked.
I have been attempting to read Laura’s recommended book a bit each evening reading it out loud before going to bed on the sailboat– savoring each sentence as if it were poetry, I am letting the words, and waves of confusion rock me to sleep. I am finding myself getting lost in its layers and caught up in the repetitive cycle of expression from ecstasy to misery and then back again.
I resonated briefly with this moment from Irigaray’s philosophical ramblings and then in a flash lost its meaning again:
“What attracts me in you, what I love in you, is what remains of your own self that part you have left so far behind, covered up so much that I alone, without ever letting it appear, can sometimes catch a glimpse of it like a faint light shimmering in the night.
In that frail illumination. I love you, I love myself. I would like to go back to it as to a place, an environment, full of impulse and growth, still vibrant with life. The whole of the living, the whole to live for, is that not kept captive within the almost imperceptible enclosure of light?”
An intangible elixir that intoxicates in ways beyond any chemical substance could. Love drugs us into such oblivion that we find ourselves singing, painting, purging, whining, writing and running furiously. Of course we all return to love. Who wouldn’t want to do all those things again and again? Although I tend to believe that love afflictions are not chosen – you don’t find love – in the end true love finds you.
Here is some wisdom from another who has spent a lot of time in love and madness:
11/14
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It’s been a while since I have made a recording with my brother Jason. About five years ago I did an interview with him to collect his perspectives on ‘silence’, which was a really positive experience for the both of us as we found out that we held similar insights in common on the topic. This new interview experience was just as good for us, if not better. We talked for more than an hour covering topics that ranged from our relationship with each other to our relationship with our parents, love in general, faith and religion, creative writing and self-love. I honestly do not think we have ever had such a rich discussion.
Unlike most people, if you put a microphone between Jason and I, we just seem to make a better connection rather than become uncomfortable. It may be due to the fact that our recording history goes way back. I think we actually formed our relationship at an early age around recording ourselves – we made our first recordings when he was 12 and I was 8.
During this interview exploring our relationship, the most memorable (and I would have to say most amusing) recording experiences surfaced. Jason and I for a brief time were in a “band” together. My role in the band was primarily making the background sounds. I made drum sounds on chairs – hit glass bottles together, did some occasional screaming and once put my tape recorder in a metal mail box and threw rocks at it to get the right clinking sound. Jason was the genius 12 yr old rhymer and rapper who also took samples from popular songs and looped them together for background music. I only made guest appearances spewing out Jason’s written lyrics on certain songs. All of these songs were recorded with the high tech technology of hand-held tape recorders.
I find it fascinating that both he and I are still making recordings today. And strangely enough we are both recording ourselves talking to ourselves. (He records his written poetry that he recites and I keep audio journals)
Listen below to hear an excerpt from our conversation. Here we talk about our relationship today, what it was like when we were growing up together and most importantly the first time ever release of JJ Creator and BB Originator. I also included some excerpts from his experiences with life changing relationships and love in general.
** Warning** I must apologize to my mother as I am not sure if she has ever heard our early recordings before now. We were not really bad kids just kids in the country with a lot of time on our hands. We also looked up to the Beastie Boys and Weird Al Yankovic a bit too much.
JJ Creator and BB Originator
Like an inner child
Love and Grace
11/11/13
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So I have talked to myself most of my life, many of us do. However, should I be worried about my sanity now that I am also answering myself AND recording it? This article says not to worry, talking to myself might actually make me smarter? With this in mind, plus the fact that I needed to practice my now rusty audio recording and editing skills, I decided just to dive in and do a self interview.
I figure, If I am going to ask the people I care about some heavy questions about interpersonal relationships, I should be ready to answer them myself. I also believe that being on the other side of the microphone and the questions is a valuable exercise in general if I want to become a better interviewer.
What I learned from this experiment is this: I actually prefer expressing myself through the written word or through visual images than through a formal interview experience. Although making recordings is not a new experience for me, I find that I am a bit nervous and long-winded when being recorded. And after the process was over, I felt as if I could have come up with a more articulate responses. Hmmm… can my “writing self” teach my “speaking self” a thing or two?
Each interview I do this month will most likely flow in an organic direction but I decided that for all interviews, I would like to focus on learning something about my relationship with the person I am interviewing. I will try to do so by posing the following questions:
1. From your perspective, what or how can I learn from you or our relationship?
2. What or how have you learned from me or our relationship?
I also would like to see if any interesting stories come to the surface by asking this question:
Tell me about a specific relationship that has made a major impact in your life, one that may have changed your path or direction.
Asking myself these questions was more than a bit awkward but I gave it a go. The recordings below are results from the one and only take and are only slightly edited to take ums and pauses out.
Learning from myself?
Teaching myself?
Relationship that changed my path.
11/8
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I have been seeking stories for a while now both in my personal and professional life. It seems to be the one thing that I never tire of, listening to people share an opinion, a feeling, a perspective and observing the way in which they share them.
Even though I have been doing interviews for a long time and have had some success at collecting some incredible stories, I have never been taught officially how to do formal interviews. I just started doing them. I relied on doing my best to build a connection or relationship with the person that I was talking with to help the subject feel comfortable and open to sharing their thoughts. Out of the hundreds of interviews I’ve collected though, I really have done very few recorded interviews with those that I already share a connection with.
I began this new month last weekend spending time with two people who I hold strong connections to, Emily Wheat (October’s Chapter writer) and Cosmic Jim Naeseth (The Living Chapters Referee). As I did not have proper recording equipment with me, I simply tested the waters in my conversations with both of them to see how the interview process would go with people I knew well and cared about.
I didn’t technically interview Emily, although I spent hours hiking in the woods interrogating her and contemplating on why stories themselves are so important and why we are drawn to passing them on. By asking Emily these questions, I came closer to understanding what I, personally, want to get out of the process of collecting and interviewing. What do I want to learn? By the end of our visit, I came up with a list of questions in which I intend to explore with all who I interview this month.
Focusing on interpersonal relationships, I have decided that it makes sense to just dig in and ask directly about them. I would like to focus on interviewing individuals who have changed my path (either subtly or directly) through their engagement in my life.
What can I learn from my relationship with these important people?
What have they taught me? Or how have they impacted me?
What have I taught them? Or how have I impacted them?
Who has changed the path or direction in their lives? How?
How have relationships played a role in their lives?
These are questions that I would like to seek answers to through my interview process. I am interested in learning about the relationships that change the path of our lives. Who are the people who have helped you become who you are or land you where you are or helped you shape your values?
After leaving Emily in the mountains of North Carolina, I stopped in Hampton, Virginia to visit Cosmic Jim. He was there visiting his family’s first home where he grew up. It has been about a year now since his father passed away leaving him the only one alive in his immediate family. This visit may have been the last trip to this place where Jim’s story began. It seemed appropriate in this moment of closure to witness and capture the beginning of his next chapter. A good place and time to inquire about his feelings about his path and relationships. And a good place to question myself about why I decided to drive here to Hampton, VA to share the experience with him.
I tested out the questions with Jim, after we visited his old street and the sea-side spot that he and his parents use to vacation at. I realized that these questions about relationships are not easy questions to ask nor are they easy questions to answer (whether you know your interview subject or not). It was more complicated than I had originally thought.
Years ago, I actually taught interviewing and story collecting to middle school youth in the neighborhood I lived in. In Remington Youth Community radio class, students interviewed their fellow neighbors and business owners in the community collecting the story of a neighborhood from the youth’s perspective. In order to get them use to the process of recording and interviewing, the first assignment I gave them was to interview themselves.
How could my students ask questions of others when they had not gone through the process of sharing their own answers with themselves? I’m now realizing that I may have something to learn by revisiting this assignment and interviewing myself first.
Before expecting the people I care about to answer questions about our life stories or our personal relationships, I would have to be willing to answer these questions myself.
11/5
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Your requests this month seem to have come at a perfect time for me. Throughout the month of October I spent a lot of time thinking about the multitude of amazing people that are currently in my life or have been in my life – for the “treasure a day challenge” I created objects with the intention of honoring or thanking the individual I sent it to for being in my life. I feel as though I am not quite finished with this process. Even though the month of making things is over. I still have a long list of names to return to and think about. I am lucky to have entered into and developed so many rich relationships with others and I am seeing clearly now how much this has shaped who I am.
I also spent a lot of time in October thinking about what my purpose is – what I want to do using my skills to achieve my purpose – what I do well and how I can make the most positive difference doing what I do best. I have not come to specific conclusions on any of this as of yet but I do know this: Listening, creating, story collecting, and building relationships and connections with others have emerged as the most important elements in what I would like to embody moving forward.
Asking me to continue to think about the people I care about and interview them seems like an obvious direction to not only continue creating in my search for purpose but it is also an opportunity to learn something more about my myself and others by examining the relationships we share.
Thank you Laura for observing these threads and sewing them all neatly together in November’s new challenge. You may not know this but ever since you were my photography professor, now over 14 years ago, you have acted not only as a great friend but also a mentor for me. You have been someone that I have looked up to as you are always creating, questioning, and appreciating the world and people around you. As a collector of stories yourself through a variety of media, you have helped guide and mold my inquisitive nature. Watch out Ms. Burns because you are one of the people I love most in this world and I will be knocking on your door shortly on a quest to capture your story.
I am looking forward to our road trip together this month!
Love,
bb
11/4
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In December there will not be a chapter submitted on the first of this month. I think that there should be a way of marking the halfway point in the Living Chapters project. An intermission or reflection period seems to be the best way to do so. The last month of the year is as good as any to take a moment and look back on what has actually happened during this past six months. Where did I start at the beginning of this project? Where did I start at the beginning of 2013 and where am I now at the end of 2013? What have these “Living Chapters” taught me thus far? What do I hope 2014 will bring?
Instead of running with a new chapter this month, I think it would be wise to take some time to let the lessons and adventures of the past six chapters sink in and ask a few questions. I want to start the second half of this story in the new-year with a fresh outlook and new knowledge. Let’s see if I can use the collective guidance from the past six months to help me make some of the life decisions I will be making in the next four weeks (without directives from a chapter writer) This is the month of the year that I am allowing myself to make my own new year’s resolutions and reflections.
Chapters will resume as usual on the first of January 2014. I will return to each theme explored in this past six months with new writers, new wild cards and in a new location. If you are not too busy hibernating or holidaying this December please check in here this month for a few protagonist reflections as well as other Living Chapters players. I am also accepting guest posts about the project overall. Please contact me if you would like to share your ideas or thoughts about the process thus far. I welcome and will post questions, observations or comments that Living Chapters readers may have.
Thanks for reading,
Beth Barbush
12/1
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Dearest Beth,
I have been wondering for months what the hell I’ve gotten myself into and how to engage with something so intimate and something so not my business as your interpersonal relationships. But talking to you has helped me come to grips with this dilemma. Our conversations over the last month have been extraordinary. Because of these conversations, you have been floating around my daily life even more than usual. I hear something, or see something, or think of something and you immediately come to mind. But even though you wash over me as a presence, there are times when I wish that I had recorded our talks so that I could pull you to my side in a more physical way.
This month, for the chapter on interpersonal relationships, I’d like to see you blend your friendships with your love for collecting stories. I would like you to interview four people (feel free to interview more if you like the idea) who you love, care about, or are intrigued by. You may choose old friends or people you want to get to know better. It would be wonderful to interview and record people who you’ve talked to for ages just to see what it’s like when you move from spontaneous conversation to a slightly more purposeful format. And I think one of these interviews should be with your Mom.
There needn’t be specific rules as to how you go about your interviews. You could decide to be dead serious, dead silly, to talk about deeply personal things or to talk about your favorite foods or films. You could talk about the past, present or future. You could ask someone to read your favorite story to you or to sing a song. Whatever is important to you at the time is good. I do think you should decide on some key questions before you begin your interview. It would be nice to begin by asking that person something you’ve always wanted to ask them or something that you’d like to be able to replay in the future. If the conversation meanders and you get completely side tracked, that’s fine. There is no need to share these stories or interviews with anyone if you don’t want to.
I would aim for one interview a week.
Now you have much more experience than I do related to collecting stories and thinking about story telling. But I’ve come across a few beautiful stories or meditations on storytelling over the past few weeks and I’d like you to listen to them. (Can you feel the teacher in me coming out here?) Hopefully you will just enjoy these. And we can include these pieces in our future conversations. Maybe, maybe, maybe you could think about the idea of a “single story” and your family.
What Are The Dangers of a Single Story? By Chimamanda Adichie on the Framing the Story episode of the Ted Radio Hour
http://www.npr.org/2013/09/20/186303292/what-are-the-dangers-of-a-single-story
Hitchhiking as A Family from Dick Gordon’s The Story program
http://www.thestory.org/stories/2013-10/hitchhiking-family
Terry Gross interview with Maurice Sendak from September 2011. This link takes you to the last 5 minutes of the interview, illustrated by Christoph Neimann. There is a link to the entire interview on the page.
http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2013/01/03/terry-gross-maurice-sendak-christoph-niemann/
I am going to use this challenge to record some stories from my parents. I have thought about doing this for years and will now get off my butt and do it. At the very least I can immortalize the story of my Mom getting her mouth washed out with soap by her father.
In terms of romantic love, I would like us both to read Elemental Passions by the philosopher Luce Irigaray. I will be sending you a copy of this book soon! Now this book will in no way give you any kind of useful advice about creating, maintaining, or leaving romantic relationships. As a matter of fact, you may find this book way too oblique and even annoying. But I’ve found sections of this book strangely beautiful and I thought we could talk about love and try to untangle what Irigaray is saying together. It’ll be a slightly different interaction between us, but it would certainly make a car ride to western Maryland edifying as well as fun.
love,
Laura
11/1/13
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So at the end of this month of searching for meaning and purpose, I find myself in Spruce Pine, NC at the end of a mission to visit two very important people. I first stopped in Richmond, VA to see my cousin Dena and her family in and then wandered further up into the mountains to track down this month’s chapter writer Emily Wheat.
I could spend a whole month highlighting all the wonderful making and creating that these two have done in their lives but will simply share these few examples as highlights from these two special birds.
Emily Wheat’s amazing bird costume. “What kind of bird are YOU?”
Both Dena and Emily have played a large role guiding me and helping me to understand what my purpose is and how to articulate it.
For my last creation of the month, I decided to make something for Emily. I call it the “hunt for meaning”. This is not an object but more of a journey or scavenger hunt in which Emily will be led to random places around the state of North Carolina to find hidden objects and messages. I won’t say too much about it here as I would like to leave the adventure a surprise to her. But I think it was while finishing this last act of making for the month when it became clear what my purpose may be. It simply comes down to two things.
As noted in the very first post of this chapter, my meaning is found in the process of making (or the doing) itself coupled with a specific intention behind the making.
Although, I have spent my life enjoying materials and treasuring artworks and objects large and small, I now find I am drawn not to making these treasures but to developing places, spaces, opportunities, and connections for others to create, care and share their own experiences and talents. That created living shared space or place is the making I want to do or the purpose that I want to pursue.
After making and sending treasures this month, everything from a written letter out of Necco wafers to a headdress out of popcorn to a sea monster scuba mask puppet, I have returned to some conclusions that I think I have been enacting all along.
1. The meaning IS in the making. There is no meaning or purpose without the act of making or doing itself. I must continue to engage, play, glue, cut, write, color, photograph, dig, cook, reflect, and connect to continue living fully.
Miss Emily Wheat has set a great example for me and has reflected this fact back to me every day that I have known her.
2. Set your intentions. Reflect what you are. Deciding why I do something and for what purpose seems to lead me closer to where I want to be. By setting an intention I can also set an example for others to find what their intentions are. This somehow feels more important to me than the made object itself and feeds my motivation to continue to create, care, and share.
My cousin Dena has been a great inspiration and example in learning this.
As today, October 31, is a special day for tricks and treats – I am going to stop making for a moment and celebrate this beloved holiday with some wind, witches, walking in the woods , and WHEATIE of course!!
I will leave you with a short message that I left for Wheatie in “the hunt for meaning” and two songs sent to me by the Living Chapters maestro this month that were more than helpful in my own search for purpose.
“There just is no rhyme nor reason – On any day or in any season – To be searching out purpose and/or meaning – When all we need is found in gleaning” – The Hunt for meaning 10/30/13
The meaning is in the making:
Reflect what you are:
10/31/13
Check out images of the adventures creations made this month on the Chapter 5 Gallery or on the Living Chapters Facebook Page
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Last week I had the opportunity to visit with this month’s wild card Doug Sadler on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. There may not be a better place to contemplate the purpose and meaning of our lives than by the bay, rivers, and streams, on the Eastern Shore. It’s been a couple of weeks now since Doug posed his very simple, yet poignant and thought-provoking questions challenging me to pin-point my purpose.
I haven’t responded in writing until now because I just have not been able to wrap my head around any definite answers to his questions. However, even unanswered these questions themselves have already begun to make waves in my life. Since reading the wild card requests, I have been consumed with dissecting my daily and life intentions. Are my actions honest? Have I been acting and reacting though self-direction or following external pressures? Do my actions add up to an overlying goal or purpose? Well, I must step back and grant myself a bit of slack here; I think it should take more than a few weeks to figure out or to define this “super objective” as Doug calls it.
During our visit last week, we spent hours crunching on and contemplating the “super objective” question, brainstorming the steps needed to come closer to it. I came away from the conversation without an epiphany but with much more clarity, and many more creative ideas and navigational tools. As always, I find spending time with a like-minded individual to be valuable and rewarding. The time serves as an act of reflection itself. It brings me closer to articulating in words the meaning and intentions behind my involuntary intuitive actions and responses. That specific space and time spent sharing and reflecting back to one another is definitely a large puzzle piece in picturing what my purpose may be.
On to Doug’s first question, “Define your ‘in the moment’ objective”. What am I attempting to accomplish day-to-day, project by project, minute by minute?
With each object that I created this month, I included a note or letter. In these letters, I wrote to the recipient of the object why or how they have made a difference or impact in my life. What was my intention in creating and sending this to them? My objective was to let those receiving know how they have impacted my life. Expressing myself through written words in this way was not only refreshing but also came easily, in a way that doesn’t flow freely when speaking in person. I wrote to many people who I have not over the past few years.
Moving onward to Doug’s second question, “Define your life purpose or super objective”. I tried to apply the same tactics and wrote my thoughts in a paragraph and then condensed it to a sentence and then down to a few words. I had a hard time separating my personal life goals and my professional life goals. Especially in this time now, when I feel my personal and professional goals are transitioning and changing. I had the best luck looking at where the two overlap and came up with a temporary personal mission statement.
Stay engaged, continue caring, and keep sharing.
I tried it out in my letters to people – and although a statement like this feels a bit forced to me, it somehow does ring true with all that I believe in and have been working toward in my personal and professional world.
Now onto the third Wild Card challenge “ask and receive”. I feel as though I have taken baby steps in this area, becoming more and more confident as I go with this “ask and you shall receive” territory. This past year, I feel my “big ask” was to all of my friends who have participated in this Living Chapters project. I asked them to go out on a limb and take a hand in lending some navigational and directional advice for my future. I asked them to assist in my self-growth and trusted them to guide me gracefully. This “ask” has already helped me tremendously personally. I feel like receiving my friends’ contributions and reflections through this process has been an enormous gift that is propelling me forward at a great speed.
The next step though, as another wild card noted in Chapter two, is – what will I do next? How and what will I choose to move forward ? I think both the “super-objective” question and the “ask and receive” question will really help me focus in on the answer to this question. And I do think that it will be an examination of both the personal and professional realms.
So with one big personal ask under my belt this year, I have made a pact with myself to make at least one big professional ask before the year is out as well. Doug’s previous questions have all helped me come closer to devising the next big ask. I am feeling it is time to make a change, one in which I won’t be able to make without support.
Don’t worry Doug I’ll let ya know when I do and it will be big and it will be scary – please do have that beer waiting for me on the Eastern Shore, I may need it.
10/29/13
** Thanks to Doug Sadler for the great reflective photographs of our visit in Easton and Oxford, MD
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