A game of backgammon in Green Park, Athens

Green Park in Athens was full of families pushing strollers and little knots of men playing backgammon. Or else performing a curious ritual that we would see again in Italy and Spain. It’s a kind of walking discussion. But I don’t think it’s anything like what we do as we walk, which is most often idle chit chat or casual appraisals of what we see. These older men, in twos and threes usually, proceed very slowly, almost as if the stroll is mere pretense to the real purpose. I would watch many of these perambulations over many visits to the park. The men walk in rapt discussion, often accompanied by hand gestures, or else with hands firmly clasped behind the back. Suddenly they would pause as one man would try to drive home a point. Then they would both stand still and face each other. One man would gesture with a bit more animation, hold forth while his companion(s) would focus intently on him. After a period of about a minute or so there would be a brief exchange, maybe a shrug or two, a “this or that” gesture by flipping over the hand, and then the walk would continue. And always, an inward focus on the subject at hand passes between them. The conversation was the focus, not the walking and the watching.

Conversation is the focus in Baeza, Spain

I’m struck by the character of these gentlemen. They seem to be engaged in a foil with the important thing. They parlay, rejoin, sally and engage each other with opinion. The exchange of views is the only priority. A good day is one that includes this event. A productive day, one that has the highest value is a day spent in conversation with a good friend.

I’m reminded of the ancient philosophers of Greece, as they walk today in their steps. Though their discussions may not always reach to those realms, they operate in the same spirit. The salient features are there; an intensely inward focus, the need to express one’s views and to seek out a response to them. The desire for clarity.

The forum at the train station, Baeza, Spain

Thoreau says that man is not meant to do everything but man is meant to do something. These older gentleman have passed from the doing which characterized their active lives into a “doing” that expresses itself in simple, elegant conversation.

You can go ahead and laugh at the superstition behind the Wishing Tree. I’ll just stand off to the side, arms folded, with that “I know better” look on my face. By the time we arrived at the airport in Bali, my wayward bag was sitting there with a red “rush” tag on it, next to the luggage carousel. I just know that that orange, tied to a wish, hanging up in that tree in Hong Kong, had something to do with it. Now, the other wish about lording over the known universe is looking more in the bag for me.

It seems to take me at least a couple days to transit the mental space between here and there, in this case between Hong Kong and Bali. The typical adjustments of travel; changes in currency and climate, orientation to the new lay of the land, etc, take some focus to achieve. It usually takes me that long anyway to begin to feel a part of each new place. Inside that time frame I usually feel a little disjointed.

Since I was here once before, I’m also dealing with “return visit syndrome”. My first urge is to tell Stefanie, “you wouldn’t believe how nice it was here 15 years ago”. Well shut your cake hole you big fat travel snob. OK, maybe Ubud (our home in Bali for the first week) was less crowded back then. On that basis maybe it was marginally nicer since less of my touristy types always equals better (forgetting for the moment that I am one of those tourists). But isn’t it curious how memory manages to sift out all those nasty little problematic negatives associated with distant experiences. For example, the last time I was in Bali I was also nearly broke and struggling to finesse a bank transfer to pay my lodging bill. Memory makes the grand positive out of the past. It can use that as a bludgeon then to pummel your appreciation for things during the return visit.

Our memories of first trips are unique. Eye opening. Revelatory. But I have to remind myself that they are also a fabricated assemblage of glowing details seen in the sweet gloss that comes from having a positive initial experience. I’ve sifted out all the negatives by now to create a nice little romance story. The return visit I experience now not only lacks that gloss of novelty, it’s also a much more vivid mixed bag of good and bad. So it’s a false comparison. Of course that first trip to Bali kicks butt… because god, it sure was great back then.

Total illusion. The classic downfall of the travel snob. And the big reason I think that this is a problem is that it begins to interfere with my ability to appreciate the events as they occur and people I meet. If I decide that I’m having a bad time then guess what, it’s no picnic for the people I meet either. Each encounter during any given day has the potential to transform, for good or bad. And those moments are abundant. Sometimes I’m amazed at how small gestures or behaviors from others affect my mood, and my opinion of people and places. To think that my attitude towards others has the same effect…

We were talking about these things over dinner and Stefanie gave a good illustration. While we were waiting for the plane to take us from Vancouver to Hong Kong she began to get a little anxious about what comes next. The flight attendant who took her ticket greeted her with such open warmth and measured calm that she instantly forgot her concerns and understood that all would be well. It transformed the moment for Stefanie and she was left not just impressed with that one Chinese woman but helped her believe that those she was yet to meet in Hong Kong would treat her the same.

Part of the problem of thinking, “it was all so much better the last time I was here” is that I may miss out on all that.

It’s a complaint I hear all too often among frequent travelers. Don’t ever believe it when you hear that a place is not worth visiting anymore. If you’ve never been there, go. It will probably be spectacularly worth it. Don’t use someone else’s take on how someplace has changed for the worse as your guide. You’ve never been there before. Enjoy the first moments. Let second moments and return visits be what they are. Someone else’s fiction (or your own) can lead you off the trail of a treasure.

Okay, New Year’s Resolution: no more heavy, philosophical bullcrap. Just the facts as I see ‘em ma’am. Though that may not work out too well since I can’t seem to resist those meanderings, at least every now and then. Then maybe… okay REVISED New Year’s Resolution #1B: not so much heavy, philosophical bullcrap. Keep it light and tight. No one wants to spend ten minutes of their valuable allotment of discretionary time reading someone else’s brain noise.

Morning sky over San Miguel

The problem here is the same as Popeye’s and everybody else’s: I am what I am. Just bear with me and I promise to mix it up.

One promise I made myself for the new year was to get this weblog up to speed. Thanks to some new software you can now try to toss me a line when I go out dog-paddling in the deep end. Post your comments and save me from drowning in simile.

Welcome to the New Year! The “new” thing is very big in this world, so no wonder this holiday is popular. Western Culture keeps us hungry for it. Keeping on top of it is our lifestyle and you’re some dotty old crank if you aren’t right there.

The sharp point of “the new” is always staring us down as artists. While making a fresh instance in art is vital, there’s really nothing new under the sun, so finding a context and then developing a viewpoint seems to me more important. Or else you’ll go around with a big, neon, self-conscious arrow pointing to your “new art”; all shiny and new but trivial at last. It’s like the “New Toy at Christmas” phenomena. The toy that gets twenty minutes of attention Christmas morning and then passes onto a heap of mediocre plastic.

Stefanie in the campo

At some point as we age the opposite value makes its stand: Old is amazing! I see it as the ultimate test of value: been around the block a few times, still kicking and looking good! (well maybe just the first two parts). We met many great people at our art fair this week but some of our favorites were well up there on the chronological scale. One lady told us she painted watercolors for ten years but gave it up because “I decided I didn’t know what the hell I was doing!”. Another charming lady told us she decided not to buy land here thirty years ago. “I could shoot myself. In fact I’m surprised I haven’t!”

Sunset blaze on templo edifice

These old beauties tell me the wonderful part about the age I’m entering. Its time to have fun with my foibles and weakenings, let go of the pride that is death to humor and the unflinching opinions about what is real quality that make me a snob and get on with opening my senses to this big fat juicy life.

Smiles at the art fair

Sure we love our new things; new house, new car, The New Christie Minstrals. But god forbid we Americans learn a new language. Talking to a lady from San Luis Potosi (who spoke multiple languages), I lamented the lack of foreign language study in the States as well as my own inability to master Spanish. She asked me if I knew what a person who spoke three languages was called “trilingual”, Two?, “bilingual” One? “gringo”.

Happy New Year. May it bring you new ways to see growing older.