Wednesday 30 December 2015
"Love is the only thing you get more of by giving it away."- Exupery / A Midwinter Hitch
Written at time (25/12):
'Sheltering in Lisbon where all seagulls come to winter on dropped bacalao and uneaten sardines.No snow but a festive scene produced by the strivings of an erupted beanbag in a winding back alley. Polystyrene balls all over the shop.
Came through Extremadura in Luis's truck (cargo was bananas). Landscape like a bar billiards table dotted with oaks for toadstools. Stork nesting on a 20 ft novelty roadside tomato bid us safe passage out of Spain. Soon over the border we were greeted by cranes stepping through the fog on their hunt for food. Luis dropped me half an hour before sunset on a small road 70km from Lisbon. After when a stream of cars passed (many farm pickups stacked with hay, all with drivers shaking their heads doubtfully) I told myself to enjoy being surprised by who'll be on the road at this time. Sure enough André and Sandra soon stopped and whisked me to Lisbon whilst giving me a tour of their worlds in perfect English. Made it to the main train station to hear 'God only knows' playing on the radio.'
Doesn't cover the untold generosity I received at the hands of two thoughtful hitchhiking buskers (Agata and Michal) who decided to rent and open an apartment to travellers for two months. I stayed here for 5 days and learnt important lessons from my hosts and other visitors about how literally vital it is to remember how to give.
The way out there was simple enough, just a metro ride to a garage on the west side of Madrid. Within 20 seconds of waiting Javier drove me 10km down the road to the next station. As I stood waiting for the sun to come up a driver noticed me shaking my hands for warmth and gave me a pair of gloves. Soon after Javier 2 drove me 20km to a station in the countryside where the grass was frosted and waiting was just enjoying the sun and quiet, till Jaime appeared and got me about 50km further to another countryside gas station in Castilla. From here I met Luis (as mentioned above).
To be honest there's not much more I can say about Lisbon asides from its sleepiness and dreamy atmosphere (and the creativity inherent in the thought of being as far west as one can go on the 'rope, and how far eurus bears you past that). The trip has raised far more questions about Portugal than answers, but I will be back to explore and meet more people there. My stay was spent more in being perplexed at how to contribute to a situation created by people who are content with relatively little. I guess the answer as usual is to find ways to pass that on. Great conversations and walks with a Dutch busker named Daan who had just come off the camino and gotten over the theft of his backpack and belongings with resounding positivity.
Left Portugal on Monday at 6am. Found the first Hitchwiki plan backfired fast and instead of an on-ramp to the bridge out of Lisbon I ended up with plan 2- two trains and a scramble around a fence to reach a motorway service station. Starting there at 8am it was two hours till Sonia took me 20km up the road on her way to work. The next wait was 5 hours. Most of it spent at the entrance addressing the stream of cars and adjacent oak tree with a smile and a sign, and then addressing myself with the memories of luck, kindness and possibility that flicker past when you're waiting.
For some reason a moment that cracked my face in a wide grin was a man with his family looking at me as his wife drove past. He didn't frown or shake his head, but watched with an anxious smile as if waiting for the finale of my roadside show, whilst practically squeezing the air with his hands for reassurance. I can't put it into words really, it just felt like he'd decided he was going to be a bystander to the whole thing and then couldn't decide if perhaps he'd made a mistake. I don't blame him but it puzzled me until just after they'd passed, when I realised I'd have to remember carefully never to make that expression to anyone asking for help. The thought filled me with laughter.
Eventually Duarte tapped me on the shoulder and got me out of there. (Lest I forget to mention it, the average English level in Portuguese is another demonstration of how effective it is to subtitle rather than dub English films and TV.) He told me about life in Luanda (Angola) and the difficulty of watching your children grow up over skype, and shared thoughts about moving to London and the reassuring sense of privacy he'd feel there in comparison to his hometown of 60,000 people. I also learnt a lot about the cork industry and the diversity of cultures and landscapes in Portugal.
Reckoning I'd do better on the national road to Spain he dropped me in the rain at the junction where this was possible. I was about ready to call it a day then but said to myself 'Ten more cars.' There were so many it was easy to slip to "Ok, after 50 cars...".
Soon taken a few more km up the road by Claudio. As soon as I got in the car the conversation turned into one about English, and then his teenage son's proficiency in it. Within minutes I was speaking to his son on speaker phone about hitching, living in Madrid, what it's like to be in a band and 'Did my dad tell you he plays sax? Not yet? Ask him!'.
The rest of this drive was spent listening to his son's rock band, interspersed with Claudio stopping the car to point out biological curiosities of the region.
As soon as he stopped I realised it was time to call it a day. Past daylight, empty garage, rain coming in, temperature drop and lettering-akimbo roadside hotel a field's hop away.
I don't know if waiting at the roadside all day and then spending a little money for a lot of comfort counts as living 'the middle way', but not wanting to repeat my usual hitching pattern of 'hitch until you can't stand and then get ill not sleeping enough in the cold' I decided to take the risk that it's not.
This morning at 6am I practically skipped down the drive to the same empty garage and stood there smiling at cars and dancing for warmth for about 5 hours again. Can't put my finger on the thought pattern, there is a happiness that returns every time I remember I put myself into this situation and a bored stupour that comes on once in a while. I wouldn't change any of it. Spent a long time thinking about Van Gogh, it was basically his scene. Big field with a row of bare elm trees in the mid distance, and on the opposite side tilled earth and tidy olive trees watched over carefully by a flock of brown sheep, each slowly jingling the bell it wore.
Well 5 hours of Van Gogh and roadside dementia can do a lot for a person's morale. I packed in my sign (España) at 11 and was making plans to hitch to the nearest train station when a pickup stopped and Luis the foreman offered me a 30km ride down the national road.
Any lift after a wait like that just wipes the slate and you're ready for the next one. Brief chat about politeness in Portugal and Spain and a bunch of location tips for my return in the spring (well that has a lot of plans to fight with but all the best to it), and a brief look at the incredible aqueduct looming out of the fog in Elvas. Throwing caution to the winds I thumbed again and instantly met Antonio who told me he would be passing through Madrid. After a brain tumour and surgical complications ushered him into early retirement he's been living up in Andorra and was returning there.
Exaltation pervades all hitch-hiking. It probably pervades most human situations but for me this is the place where you have the time and social estrangement to really take it on board. And I suppose as with everything else it depends on exposure to chaos and how good one's narrative engine is at sewing the whole story up neatly in hindsight, but jesus christ. The whole thing flips around and what was to be a slightly downbeat bus-ride to Madrid becomes a shoehorning back into the context of yet another person you wished you'd known sooner, and elation at gradually making the distance home to sleep.
10km from Madrid (as Antonio took the road off to Zaragoza) I got my final lift from a young Spanish couple about to drop off their rental car and fly home to Majorca. They dropped me in Goya and I metro-ed home on a cloud of 'did that really happen?' whenever I thought about the morning in Evora. Whole trip's still sinking in but just glad to have recharged my faith in standing at the roadside and to have re-exercised my patience.
Morning in Evora.
'Sheltering in Lisbon where all seagulls come to winter on dropped bacalao and uneaten sardines.No snow but a festive scene produced by the strivings of an erupted beanbag in a winding back alley. Polystyrene balls all over the shop.
Came through Extremadura in Luis's truck (cargo was bananas). Landscape like a bar billiards table dotted with oaks for toadstools. Stork nesting on a 20 ft novelty roadside tomato bid us safe passage out of Spain. Soon over the border we were greeted by cranes stepping through the fog on their hunt for food. Luis dropped me half an hour before sunset on a small road 70km from Lisbon. After when a stream of cars passed (many farm pickups stacked with hay, all with drivers shaking their heads doubtfully) I told myself to enjoy being surprised by who'll be on the road at this time. Sure enough André and Sandra soon stopped and whisked me to Lisbon whilst giving me a tour of their worlds in perfect English. Made it to the main train station to hear 'God only knows' playing on the radio.'
Doesn't cover the untold generosity I received at the hands of two thoughtful hitchhiking buskers (Agata and Michal) who decided to rent and open an apartment to travellers for two months. I stayed here for 5 days and learnt important lessons from my hosts and other visitors about how literally vital it is to remember how to give.
The way out there was simple enough, just a metro ride to a garage on the west side of Madrid. Within 20 seconds of waiting Javier drove me 10km down the road to the next station. As I stood waiting for the sun to come up a driver noticed me shaking my hands for warmth and gave me a pair of gloves. Soon after Javier 2 drove me 20km to a station in the countryside where the grass was frosted and waiting was just enjoying the sun and quiet, till Jaime appeared and got me about 50km further to another countryside gas station in Castilla. From here I met Luis (as mentioned above).
To be honest there's not much more I can say about Lisbon asides from its sleepiness and dreamy atmosphere (and the creativity inherent in the thought of being as far west as one can go on the 'rope, and how far eurus bears you past that). The trip has raised far more questions about Portugal than answers, but I will be back to explore and meet more people there. My stay was spent more in being perplexed at how to contribute to a situation created by people who are content with relatively little. I guess the answer as usual is to find ways to pass that on. Great conversations and walks with a Dutch busker named Daan who had just come off the camino and gotten over the theft of his backpack and belongings with resounding positivity.
Left Portugal on Monday at 6am. Found the first Hitchwiki plan backfired fast and instead of an on-ramp to the bridge out of Lisbon I ended up with plan 2- two trains and a scramble around a fence to reach a motorway service station. Starting there at 8am it was two hours till Sonia took me 20km up the road on her way to work. The next wait was 5 hours. Most of it spent at the entrance addressing the stream of cars and adjacent oak tree with a smile and a sign, and then addressing myself with the memories of luck, kindness and possibility that flicker past when you're waiting.
For some reason a moment that cracked my face in a wide grin was a man with his family looking at me as his wife drove past. He didn't frown or shake his head, but watched with an anxious smile as if waiting for the finale of my roadside show, whilst practically squeezing the air with his hands for reassurance. I can't put it into words really, it just felt like he'd decided he was going to be a bystander to the whole thing and then couldn't decide if perhaps he'd made a mistake. I don't blame him but it puzzled me until just after they'd passed, when I realised I'd have to remember carefully never to make that expression to anyone asking for help. The thought filled me with laughter.
Eventually Duarte tapped me on the shoulder and got me out of there. (Lest I forget to mention it, the average English level in Portuguese is another demonstration of how effective it is to subtitle rather than dub English films and TV.) He told me about life in Luanda (Angola) and the difficulty of watching your children grow up over skype, and shared thoughts about moving to London and the reassuring sense of privacy he'd feel there in comparison to his hometown of 60,000 people. I also learnt a lot about the cork industry and the diversity of cultures and landscapes in Portugal.
Reckoning I'd do better on the national road to Spain he dropped me in the rain at the junction where this was possible. I was about ready to call it a day then but said to myself 'Ten more cars.' There were so many it was easy to slip to "Ok, after 50 cars...".
Soon taken a few more km up the road by Claudio. As soon as I got in the car the conversation turned into one about English, and then his teenage son's proficiency in it. Within minutes I was speaking to his son on speaker phone about hitching, living in Madrid, what it's like to be in a band and 'Did my dad tell you he plays sax? Not yet? Ask him!'.
The rest of this drive was spent listening to his son's rock band, interspersed with Claudio stopping the car to point out biological curiosities of the region.
As soon as he stopped I realised it was time to call it a day. Past daylight, empty garage, rain coming in, temperature drop and lettering-akimbo roadside hotel a field's hop away.
I don't know if waiting at the roadside all day and then spending a little money for a lot of comfort counts as living 'the middle way', but not wanting to repeat my usual hitching pattern of 'hitch until you can't stand and then get ill not sleeping enough in the cold' I decided to take the risk that it's not.
This morning at 6am I practically skipped down the drive to the same empty garage and stood there smiling at cars and dancing for warmth for about 5 hours again. Can't put my finger on the thought pattern, there is a happiness that returns every time I remember I put myself into this situation and a bored stupour that comes on once in a while. I wouldn't change any of it. Spent a long time thinking about Van Gogh, it was basically his scene. Big field with a row of bare elm trees in the mid distance, and on the opposite side tilled earth and tidy olive trees watched over carefully by a flock of brown sheep, each slowly jingling the bell it wore.
Well 5 hours of Van Gogh and roadside dementia can do a lot for a person's morale. I packed in my sign (España) at 11 and was making plans to hitch to the nearest train station when a pickup stopped and Luis the foreman offered me a 30km ride down the national road.
Any lift after a wait like that just wipes the slate and you're ready for the next one. Brief chat about politeness in Portugal and Spain and a bunch of location tips for my return in the spring (well that has a lot of plans to fight with but all the best to it), and a brief look at the incredible aqueduct looming out of the fog in Elvas. Throwing caution to the winds I thumbed again and instantly met Antonio who told me he would be passing through Madrid. After a brain tumour and surgical complications ushered him into early retirement he's been living up in Andorra and was returning there.
Exaltation pervades all hitch-hiking. It probably pervades most human situations but for me this is the place where you have the time and social estrangement to really take it on board. And I suppose as with everything else it depends on exposure to chaos and how good one's narrative engine is at sewing the whole story up neatly in hindsight, but jesus christ. The whole thing flips around and what was to be a slightly downbeat bus-ride to Madrid becomes a shoehorning back into the context of yet another person you wished you'd known sooner, and elation at gradually making the distance home to sleep.
10km from Madrid (as Antonio took the road off to Zaragoza) I got my final lift from a young Spanish couple about to drop off their rental car and fly home to Majorca. They dropped me in Goya and I metro-ed home on a cloud of 'did that really happen?' whenever I thought about the morning in Evora. Whole trip's still sinking in but just glad to have recharged my faith in standing at the roadside and to have re-exercised my patience.
Morning in Evora.
Monday 21 December 2015
Sunday 20 December 2015
Thursday 17 December 2015
Tuesday 15 December 2015
Pynchon On The Death Of Marilyn Monroe
- "When Marilyn Monroe got out of the game, I wrote something like, 'Southern California's special horror notwithstanding, if the world offered nothing, nowhere to support or make bearable whatever her private grief was, then it is that world, and not she, that is at fault.'
- "I wrote that in the first few shook-up minutes after hearing the bulletin sandwiched in between Don and Phil Everly and surrounded by all manner of whoops and whistles coming out of an audio signal generator, like you are apt to hear on the provincial radio these days. But I don't think I'd take those words back.
- "The world is at fault, not because it is inherently good or bad or anything but what it is, but because it doesn't prepare us in anything but body to get along with.
- "Our souls it leaves to whatever obsolescenses, bigotries,
theories of education workable and un, parental wisdom or lack of it,
happen to get in its more or less Brownian (your phrase) pilgrimage
between the cord-cutting ceremony and the time they slide you down the
chute into the oven, while the guy on the Wurlitzer plays Aba Daba Honeymoon
because you had once told somebody it was the nadir of all American
expression; only they didn't know what nadir meant but it must be good
because of the vehemence with which you expressed yourself."
EDIT: Re-reading this after Koestler's The Act Of Creation and art as the blending of the trivial and tragic planes.
The Temptation Of St Anthony by Hieronymus Bosch
"What is a saint? A saint is someone who has achieved a remote human possibility. It is impossible to say what that possibility is. I think it has something to do with the energy of love. Contact with this energy results in the exercise of a kind of balance in the chaos of existence. A saint does not dissolve the chaos; if he did the world would have changed long ago. I do not think that a saint dissolves the chaos even for himself, for there is something arrogant and warlike in the notion of a man setting the universe in order. It is a kind of balance that is his glory. He rides the drifts like an escaped ski. His course is the caress of the hill. His track is a drawing of the snow in a moment of its particular arrangement with wind and rock. Something in him so loves the world that he gives himself to the laws of gravity and chance. Far from flying with the angels, he traces with the fidelity of a seismograph needle the state of the solid bloody landscape. His house is dangerous and finite, but he is at home in the world. He can love the shape of human beings, the fine and twisted shapes of the heart. It is good to have among us such men, such balancing monsters of love."- Leonard Cohen (Beatiful Losers)
Monday 14 December 2015
Thursday 10 December 2015
“I looked about me. Luminous points glowed in the darkness. Cigarettes punctuated the humble meditations of worn old clerks. I heard them talking to one another in murmurs and whispers. They talked about illness, money, shabby domestic cares. And suddenly I had a vision of the face of destiny. Old bureaucrat, my comrade, it is not you who are to blame. No one ever helped you to escape. You, like a termite, built your peace by blocking up with cement every chink and cranny through which the light might pierce. You rolled yourself up into a ball in your genteel security, in routine, in the stifling conventions of provincial life, raising a modest rampart against the winds and the tides and the stars. You have chosen not to be perturbed by great problems, having trouble enough to forget your own fate as a man. You are not the dweller upon an errant planet and do not ask yourself questions to which there are no answers. Nobody grasped you by the shoulder while there was still time. Now the clay of which you were shaped has dried and hardened, and naught in you will ever awaken the sleeping musician, the poet, the astronomer that possibly inhabited you in the beginning.”
-Antoine de St.-Exupery (terre de hommes/ wind, sand and stars)
Tuesday 8 December 2015
Tankyou Tyssen
Paintings:
Tatiana Glebova- Prison (1927)
Emil Nolde- Marsh Bridge
William Bradford- Fishermen Off The Coast Of Labrador
Henri Le Sidaner- The Hut On The Forest Edge
Grossgmain- St Jerome
Max Beckmann- Still Life With Yellow Roses
Saturday 5 December 2015
Friday 4 December 2015
Thursday 19 November 2015
"When I have a terrible need of — shall I say the word — religion. Then I go out and paint the stars."
Vincent Van Gogh
EDIT 2: But then maybe it's about these...
Sunday 15 November 2015
Thursday 12 November 2015
Third Man Factor
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Man_factor
"Who is the third who walks always beside you?
When I count, there are only you and I together
But when I look ahead up the white road
There is always another one walking beside you
Gliding wrapt in a brown mantle, hooded
I do not know whether a man or a woman
— But who is that on the other side of you?"
-T.S. Eliot (The Wasteland)
"Who is the third who walks always beside you?
When I count, there are only you and I together
But when I look ahead up the white road
There is always another one walking beside you
Gliding wrapt in a brown mantle, hooded
I do not know whether a man or a woman
— But who is that on the other side of you?"
-T.S. Eliot (The Wasteland)
Tuesday 10 November 2015
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