Two questions for which no one may actually have answers (or, that may answer each other, IDK)
1. Why couldn't I decide I wanted to go to graduate school for something easy, like History, where all I would have to do is read a lot and write a bunch?
2. I've been thinking some more about Patti Smith's Just Kids, and about how during that time in our cultural history, "art" meant something different, and to be an "artist" created a separate linear drive for people. Success was important, but celebrity wasn't. Aside from Warhol's Factory kids, there wasn't any exclusion or division among those milling about. Music and art and words and performance were so closely tied, and artists were so psyched to work with each other, they would all just pile into Janis's room at the Chelsea and sing and drink until dawn.
And this makes me think about what I consider art, and how, for me, working with people is a form of creativity. I have spent my life learning bits and pieces and tilting my head whilst looking at the world and waiting for some great answer to come upon me. I've been waiting for a magical voice to swell and tell me why I am here. Why do I have this certain set of talents and this unending curiosity about human beings and a passionate desire to make the world a better place? Why haven't I met my Jim Carroll or Sam Shepard to help me figure out that, to me, working with people is my art, that my greatest creative endeavors don't involve words on a page or colored pictures, but the whole shebang, all mushed up together, with the messy emotions and disruptive behaviors thrown in for good measure?
I suppose I don't need Jim Carroll or Sam Shepard to point these things out to me. But it would be nice to have that community Smith, et al, had, somewhere I could go and collaborate and debate and share and get drunk and cry with. I guess I thought grad school would be that for me, but it falls short in so many ways. We are so focused on our work and progress and getting professors to take us on (a la Andy Warhol) so our names will be included in their publications and presentations and awards and for fuck's sake WHEN ARE WE GOING TO TALK ABOUT THE PEOPLE?!? And I get frustrated because I do it too.
I have spent the past week with a twitching eye and extreme paranoia that I'm not going to find a Practicum site, that I'm not "living up to my potential" as a grad student, that I'm already behind professionally, even though I'm only a year into the program, that I'm forgetting the whole fucking reason I decided to do this in the first place.
I was born with this certain set of talents and this unending curiosity about human beings and a passionate desire to make the world a better place. How do I get back to that now?