the ’sham

Here’s the podcast of a “short note on method”, one of my regular anxiety postings from a year ago!

Listen in here.

Read the original here.

…in which I seem to have gotten over my anxiety from yesterday (good grief) and catch up on events from the previous days. A visit from my mum, a visit from my dad, a Petersham pub crawl, a garage sale attended by a priest, a radio interview and a pilates class.

Listen to it here [8 min mp3, 4mb]

or read the original posting here.

In Good Grief, one week has gone by in the ’sham. I reflect on the difficulties I’m having with the flow of the project. I come to a resolution: that I need to be more forthright in demanding what I want, rather than just hoping it will happen and being disappointed when it doesn’t.

I discuss the problem of trying to be “normal”. One idea for the project was to just be a “normal” citizen, neighbour, resident whatever. In retrospect, this obviously is not going to work. In fact, now, a year later, I find it downright objectionable. Who am I to know what the hell “normal” even is?? And what a gall, to think I can lay aside my specific characteristics, the things that make me who I am, in order to try and fit in!

Of course, everyone has their own set of “these things that make me who I am”. In a way, that’s normal. It’s what the Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben calls the “whatever singularity”. I might write more later about this idea of the “whatever”. Essentially, it’s not “whatever” like how, you know, like, teenage girls talk, like. Instead it is (as I (very sketchily) understand it) the idea that the particular characteristics I possess are not necessarily of earthshattering importance - in other words, they are no more important than anyone else’s characteristics - but they are at the same time, vital. The “whatever” of Agamben is not an indifference, but is instead a translation of the Latin term “quodlibet” which in English is roughly “being such that it always matters”. It can be whatever, anything, but that’s not to say that it’s transferrable, equivalent, or insignificant.

This is definitely in keeping with the ’sham philosophy, the idea that the more I look into the details, the more interesting a thing becomes, on its own terms.

Oh, listen to Good Grief, if you like! [6mb, mp3, 6min]

OK, here’s what I do.

I wake up really early every morning, make myself a strong black coffee using the aluminium stovetop percolator, and I boot up the computer. In my dream like state, the words just flow out of me, my fingers machine-gunning the keyboard until all of my memories from yesterday are vomited up into the blog. This process takes about an hour, and then I’m free to go about the day however I please.

Hmm. That’s the theory at least.
(more…)

It’s been a week. I’ve just spoken to Chris in Perth, who knows my history (more than nearly anyone), and I feel clearer now about what needs to be done.

Following my post from yesterday, where I expressed concern that I was not “feeling the freshness” - that I was going through the motions a bit - that it all felt like a bit of “a job” (heaven forbid!) - I received several encouraging emails and comments, urging me to keep “powering along” with it. To all who wrote, thanks. It helps. At least I know what I’ve done so far hasn’t been entirely tedious, tepid, or turgid. However, I still think a change is called for.
(more…)

I’m struggling a bit to hang in here. I’m very much enjoying “just being” in Petersham, but the writing is not coming as easily as I would have hoped. In Kellerberrin, the form of the project - blogging each day - seemed to grow from the place itself. It came easily. Here, it seems partly like I’ve taken a strategy from somewhere else, and attempted to apply it in another place. In fact, that’s exactly what I’ve done. And it’s an uncomfortable fit.

Something about the town of Kellerberrin being “different,” and “new” to my experience meant I could write with a freshness. I felt that freshness. The very task I set myself - to see if I could experience that freshness in my own neighbourhood - is proving more difficult than I expected. Or maybe, I did expect this difficulty (it’s built into the project brief), but I haven’t developed a method of moving through it yet.

So, to hammer away on the daily writing regime might make me seem a busy boy. But is it distracting me from something else?…to allow something to grow from this specific place…

…while you wait for me to work through this one (or even better, while you’re contacting me with your brilliant ideas!) have a look over at these photos of the Great Petersham Pub Crawl. Hooroo!