Here I am
The Metaphorical Man
With words meaning me
The best that I can
My mentor’s Will Jumper
A high-jumping man
A poet that’s poet-y-er
Than poets can stand
I smash words together
And do it real soon
And when I get going
A cow jumps the moon
I string stanzas together
Like glimmering pearls
And crimes against poesy
My behavior unfurls
So now we take stock
Of the things you can stand
In the words of a poet
Metaphorical Man
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I like this subtly beautiful portrait. I used a photo of a little girl to base it on, and the eyes are slightly more crooked here than in the model, though I basically traced them. But faces that are too perfect do not seem real. This Egyptian Princess is so real she can talk to me.
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Wow! Such a movie! It is a movie about the movies. A historical fiction about movie history. It tells a bittersweet fable of the 1950’s, when the Un-American Activities Committee was conducting its witch-hunts in Hollywood. And it’s about a postwar town that is still suffering from heavy losses among their young men. And about a case of amnesia and mistaken identity. It is hard to explain, so go watch the dang movie!
I borrowed this image of the movie’s movie theater from a blogger, prasenjitchaudhuri.wordpress.com, whose review will probably make more sense than mine does. But that theater marquee is the one icon from the movie that I first fell in love with.
As I said, this is a movie about the movies and a love of the movies. It weaves in through the story of 50’s communist witch hunts a tale about a somewhat spineless young man who bumps his head, loses his memory, and is adopted by a whole town as a missing war hero come back from the dead. It hits every Frank Capra and Jimmy Stewart cliche in the books. Just like It’s a Wonderful Life it makes me laugh so hard I have a wheezing fit, followed a couple of scenes later by something that makes me want to cry so hard that I will drown out all the weeping females in the audience with half-stifled basso sobs. Any movie that I walk out of embarrassed that my face is tear-streaked, is a movie that made me feel so profoundly good about life and love and laughter, that I want to see it again and again. There are so many movie-references in the film that I need to watch it two or three times just for that. For gosh sakes, the idol head from Raiders of the Lost Ark makes a cameo appearance in the movie within the movie, Sand Pirates of the Sahara.
So, basically, I watched this movie for the first time on DVD at home in bed, still recovering from scary new heart condition #2, and had a chance to laugh and cry and enjoy this movie without any fear of being laughed at for how I responded to it. And, so what did I do about it? Why naturally, I got on WordPress and exposed my secret shame to you. That makes about as much sense as everybody in that little town grabbing an amnesiac out of the river and making him into their beloved son. What a great movie! Wow!
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I get down for diabetic reasons. Cold, wet weather doesn’t help either. But I am a veteran in the war against depression.
I have a hundred and one tricks for avoiding a fall into the dark blue depths of the tiger traps of self-loathing and bummed-out-and-perpetually-in-bed depression.
Radasha, my faun, makes fun of me relentlessly when I am depressed. Being able to laugh at myself is a defense against the dark arts. Eating chocolate can help too. And sleeping is useful if you can avoid too much of it.
I talk to other imaginary friends when I am depressed and have the blues too. I have an imaginary granddaughter who is very playful and makes me laugh. I have to remember, though, why Susu is only an imaginary granddaughter, and avoid dwelling on the tragedy of the situation. She’s precious, even if thoughts of her origin are traumatic.
I also have a real daughter still living at home with us. She’s an artist and writer too. Her ambition is to be a cartoonist. Talking to her about such things brings me joy.
I have also often used music as a way to conquer the blues. But November is a blue month. I listen to sad Classical music like Barber’s Adagio for Strings in November.
Do you remember… that time in November…
Yes, sad songs, sad music. It’s difficult to explain how that can help the November blues. But it can. I wrote a book about it called Sing Sad Songs. Sweet, sad songs recall lost love. And lost love is sad. But it is better to recall than seasons without love.
November is a blue month. And blue is a good color… if you don’t let it overwhelm you.
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I admit it. I was a goofy teacher. Kids never knew for sure whether I was serious, joking, or halfway in-between. I worked for hours sometimes preparing the chalkboard, or later, white board, for the days lesson, putting key points and reminders up in cartoon form. I used characters, symbols, jokes, pokes, and silliness to get the idea across. Principals and others who evaluated my teaching always wondered why my classroom sounded so raucous and wild from outside the door with kids laughing, music playing, and sometimes desks being shuffled and shoved around the room. The perfect-classroom-is-a-quiet-classroom crowd always hated my teaching style. But the ones who came in and participated, got involved in paying attention and watching the kids interact with the content loved it. I am not bragging. My lesson plans were a mess filled with booby traps, explosions waiting to happen, un-intended consequences (also called teachable moments), and brainstorms that threatened at any moment to electrocute somebody with lightning. Teaching is a dangerous business. But the point is, there is an art to teaching that brings out the artist in you. I offer the following evidence;
You know how creepy penguins in cartoons can be, right? The Penguins of Madagascar are like a Mission-Impossible Team gone horribly wrong and transformed into penguins. The penguin in Wallace and Gromit’s The Wrong Trousers disguised himself as a chicken to perform acts of pure evil. Cartoonists all know that penguins are inherently creepy and evil.
I recently learned a hard lesson about penguins. You know the joke, “What’s black and white and red all over? A penguin with a sunburn.” I told that joke one too many times. Who knew the Dallas metroplex had so many loose penguins lurking around? They are literally everywhere. One of them overheard me. And apparently they have vowed a sacred penguin vow that no penguin joke goes unpunished.
As I walked the dog this morning, I spotted creepy penguin eyes, about three pairs, looking at me from behind the bank of the creek bed in the park. When I went to retrieve the empty recycle bins from the driveway, there they were again, looking at me over the top of the neighbor’s privacy fence.
“Penguins see the world in black and white,” said one of the Penguins.
“Except for purple ones,” added the purple one.
“Penguins can talk?” I tried unsuccessfully to ask.
“Penguins only talk in proverbs,” said one of the penguins.
“But the purple one gives the counterpoint,” said the purple one.
“The wisdom of penguins is always cold and harsh,” said one of the penguins.
“Except on days like this when it’s hot,” said the purple one.
“You should always listen to penguins,” said one of the penguins.
“Of course, people will think you are crazy if you do,” said the purple one.
“People who talk to penguins are headed for a nervous breakdown,” said one of the penguins.
“Unless you are a cartoonist. Then it is probably normal behavior,” said the purple one.
“Is this all real?” I tried unsuccessfully to ask.
“Everyone knows that penguins are real,” said one of the penguins.
“But there are no purple penguins in nature,” said the purple one.
So, I sat down to write this post about penguins and their proverbs with a very disturbing thought in my little cartoonist’s head… Why am I really writing about penguins today? I really have nothing profound to say about penguin proverbs. Especially profound penguin proverbs with a counterpoint by a purple penguin. Maybe it is all merely a load of goofy silliness and a waste of my time.
“Writing about penguins is never a waste of time,” said one of the penguins.
“And if you believe that, I have some choice real estate in the Okefenokee Swamp I need to talk to you about,” added the purple one.
Filed under artwork, birds, cartoons, goofy thoughts, humor, Paffooney, philosophy, surrealism
Samantha and her talking cat are ready for their big night flight.
Digital Samantha and her digitally talking cat.
It was in her head to go in a Shirley Temple costume. But she didn’t need a costume. She could go as Shirley with only her own face as a disguise.
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Still being under the weather and filled with sinus head-pain, I decided to go back to a subject I love so much that the post will simply write itself. You know I love Norman Rockwell and his art, and I fervently believe that kind of mass media oil-painting does not put him in a lesser category than Rembrandt or Michelangelo or Raphael or any other painter with a ninja turtle namesake. He is a genius, and though he is not a realist in so many ways, his work is more truthful than practically any other kind of painting. If you are taken by surprise and didn’t know I had this passionate obsession, maybe you should go back and look at this post; Norman Rockwell
Now that I got that out of my system, here is another Saturday Evening Post artist that is often confused with Rockwell. His name is Amos Sewell.
Sewell was an amateur tennis player who was talented enough to win tournaments. He was an employee of Wells Fargo who was headed towards anything but an art career until he decided to make a leap of faith in 1930. He started as an illustrator for Street and Smith pulp fiction, and soon caught the notice of the big-time magazine markets for his art. He published art for Saturday Evening Post, Country Gentlemen Magazine, and Women’s Day.
Like Rockwell, he was able to find the funny in everyday scenes, like the dance party to the right. That young man at center stage is trying so hard not to step on the feet of the red-headed girl, that you want to laugh, but can’t because it’s obvious how embarrassed he would be, and the charm of the picture leads you to shun the thought of interrupting. The scene is so real the boy would hear you laughing as you looked at the Post cover.
More expert on this kind of art than I am is the Facebook site that I first got turned on to Sewell by. Children in Art History
They can also be found on WordPress. Children in Art History (WordPress)
There is no doubt that Amos Sewell belongs in the same pantheon of artists as Norman Rockwell, Thomas Kinkade, or Paul Detlafsen. They are all artists who achieve in their work exactly what I have always striven for. I want to be able to hold the mirror up to our world the way they did. I want to capture both the fantasy and the reality in the subject of everyday family life. I also want to share this work with you because I cannot stand the idea that such artistic ambrosia could one day be forgotten in archives where no one ever looks at it and feels the message in their heart.
Filed under art criticism, homely art, humor
I drew this while looking in a mirror in 1980.
This is the digital version I turned that pencil art into rather than using ink as I used to do.
This is an even younger me with a magic hat on.
This is my personal conception of David Copperfield after reading it in grad school in 1980.
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Catch a Falling Star 