A Biplane, Art and Lies
I finished my biplane. It's a Sopwith Camel, which was flown in WW1 by the Royal Air Force, and it was this kind of plane that was said to have shot down the German Red Baron's triplane.
I will get another biplane. But I will paint and decorate it the way I like, without attempts at making it look like military craft. Neither of my models are historically accurate anyway. And I was never the type to color by number and keep things within the lines.
In nursery school I was scolded for using inappropriate colors. Car windows, I colored red. The wheels, blue.
Two years later I drew my fractions as pizza - no matter what shape they were. My teacher said she enjoyed them.
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In the spirit of finishing things, I've also finished reading Jeanette Winterson's Art and Lies. From my notes:
Clock culture. Stuff me until I burst and make an installation out of the purée. Art? Don't be silly. The contemplative life? I have a lunch appointment. How long will it take?
Lunch? Forever. Be forever lunching. Chomping bovinely through the day, wondering why all flesh is grass.
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But I dream of flight, not to be as the angels are, but to rise above the smallness of it all. The smallness that I am. Against the daily death the iconography of wings.
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For my wife:
What marries me to you?
Is it a piece of paper? Then I am not married to you. Is it Church approval? Then I am not married to you. Is it the fact of a roof, the fact of a bed, the fact of two keys in one lock? Then I am not married to you. Is it the Eye of the Law? Then I am not married to you.
If it is the daily pleasure in your face... if it is the quickening of my spirits at your presence, if it is your face I seek when I seek no other, if it is the love of you that is consent, if it is the consent to be of the same mind, then to this marriage of true minds let me admit no impediments.
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I am waiting to hear from something work-related. I do not need the money, but I need to do this work. I need it.
It is not prestigious. It pays peanuts. But I need it.
My wife is right. How can I possibly prioritize her over work if my work isn't something I do for money? How can I do that if my work is an integral part of who I am? My work is my life, my life is my work. As a child I dreamt I'd spend my adult life writing, and now that I do it I feel like I've been true to the spirit of that child. What more can I ask for from life? After experiencing this, how can I be forced to live otherwise?
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There is no autobiography there is only art and lies.