it's been such a long time
My o my it has been so freakishly long since I wrote in this thing.
I don't know where to begin. Kurt Vonnegut died. He was one of the greatest writers of our time, a brilliant oracle of insanity, laughter and depression. His death brings up less articles than news about Anna Nicole Smith and her baby and the father of said baby. So it goes.
I read this incredible and sad article today, from the Washington Post. They had Joshua Bell, one of the greatest violinists of our time, wear totally nondescript clothing and stand in front of a metro station and play, much like any street musician. Of course, Bell is AMAZING and they wanted to see what people do. Do they stop and listen to the incredible beautiful and masterfully skillful sounds? Or do they walk on by? Sadly enough, out of an estimated 1077 people (this may be wrong, I'm remembering off the top of my head) in an hour or so, only 7 bothered to stop for a minute or longer. A total of 27 people gave money (yes, he had his case open, like any good street musician), though most of them just in passing.
To be fair, it was a morning rush hour, most people were really busy with other things like the report they have to file in today or whatnot.
Still, what have we become? Why do we just walk on by?
They found that it occurred through every demographic (black, white, male, female, etc.) except one: children. Small children consistently tried to stop and listen, only to be dragged away by their parents. There's a great quote in there by poet Billy Collins. It says that all babies are born with a knowledge of poetry, because the lub-dub of the mother's heart is in iambic meter. Then, life slowly starts to choke the poetry out of us.
So it goes.
Stop. Please. Stop and listen, stop and look. Live. Just learn to stop and fucking live.
In other news: I think I'm dumb, maybe just happy.
I don't know where to begin. Kurt Vonnegut died. He was one of the greatest writers of our time, a brilliant oracle of insanity, laughter and depression. His death brings up less articles than news about Anna Nicole Smith and her baby and the father of said baby. So it goes.
I read this incredible and sad article today, from the Washington Post. They had Joshua Bell, one of the greatest violinists of our time, wear totally nondescript clothing and stand in front of a metro station and play, much like any street musician. Of course, Bell is AMAZING and they wanted to see what people do. Do they stop and listen to the incredible beautiful and masterfully skillful sounds? Or do they walk on by? Sadly enough, out of an estimated 1077 people (this may be wrong, I'm remembering off the top of my head) in an hour or so, only 7 bothered to stop for a minute or longer. A total of 27 people gave money (yes, he had his case open, like any good street musician), though most of them just in passing.
To be fair, it was a morning rush hour, most people were really busy with other things like the report they have to file in today or whatnot.
Still, what have we become? Why do we just walk on by?
They found that it occurred through every demographic (black, white, male, female, etc.) except one: children. Small children consistently tried to stop and listen, only to be dragged away by their parents. There's a great quote in there by poet Billy Collins. It says that all babies are born with a knowledge of poetry, because the lub-dub of the mother's heart is in iambic meter. Then, life slowly starts to choke the poetry out of us.
So it goes.
Stop. Please. Stop and listen, stop and look. Live. Just learn to stop and fucking live.
In other news: I think I'm dumb, maybe just happy.