birds flying and gathering in tree in Regents Park

Trigger Ramble

My mother, who in addition to being a mum to 5 children and starting an antiquarian book business with my dad, wrote many poems, some were published, before she devoted all her time to family and business. She continued to write poems and sometimes self published. One of her slim anthologies which she printed a few years ago was called 'Triggerpoints'. And I wondered why. Had she noticed things that triggered anger in her hubby or in others? From what I remember on reading it through some years ago there didn't seem to be obvious clues in the poems within. How aware was she of how much 'trigger' is used in the modern sense, where trigger points - buttons you press that unbalance someone - are seen as points of psychological weakness that 'trigger' predictable unbalanced behaviour eg the much seen clip scientologists exploiting the anger they triggered in the BBC reporter investigating them.
Maybe 'trigger points', particular to each person, are our personality- get rid of them and become a supposedly 'perfect human being' ... but maybe becoming a bland rational machine is the thing to be aimed for. (Therapists aim to eliminate trigger points. Maybe they are in secret league with computer designers). In the future all people will aspire to become computers- in a world where computers are as intelligent and more so than humans maybe some humans will be able to pass as computers. Computers will construct some kind of test for humans - the reverse of the Turing test. Look! The first human computer! No, nothing wrong with them no quirks! Completely normal! No personality!

After the March

This is from my diary but its all about the march. It has taken  my attention the last few days

Jan 21
Went down to join the march but couldn't get in to Grosvenor square, where the American Embassy was. It was huge it snaked my way through Mayfair and joined March near St James Square. Trafalgar Square was full, cut through National Gallery from Sainsbury wing, After a time of feeling with the march, my physical condition was getting the better of me -my legs were getting tired, I was losing balance and moving slowly. I had not run into anyone I know to bouy my energy and wanted to get out of the crowd so I cut through Gallery, Leicester sq, Soho and walked home. I stopped off at the cafe on Baker St had a brief chat with the waitress ' How are you?' She asked 'tired' I said 'I've just been on a march in the centre of town' ' but it's cold' she said 'What was it for? ' ' against Trump US president'  I said . ' But it's cold' she repeated as if to say, 'and you went out in the cold for that? Why?' Ooh the microclimates and filters in this big city. But the seat, the rest and the coffee was oh so welcome.


Jan 22
Looking at twitter feed, news and FB in aftermath of Women's March and Inauguration is making me ill -It takes my attention into a realm that I really can't do anything about- the Trump side is really going for mainstream media refuting accurate news, accusing them of bias. And I have chosen not to be involved in the world. Words are being devalued, images are being devalued - photos of huge empty spaces at the inauguration 'have been photoshopped and manipulated' to propagate the lie that 'the biggest ever crowd saw Trump being sworn in'.
John Pilger, on New Matilda website writes that "they've got it all wrong, Obama not Trump is the problem". Weird to see Pilger ( a crusading outsider journalist, but always until now, definitely an outsider) becoming an apologist for Trump and establishment- I think he's wrong -Trump, and the people behind him is who we have to deal with, Obama is gone.
I watched the new  Press Secretary Spicer telling the press that it was the biggest crowd ever for an inaugaration and then telling them they were biased against poor li'l ol' Donald.
Wow there is alot of fear spreading and false info. Argument seems to polarise, discussion brings together-drawing attention to onto possible common ground. Its drawing attention towards peace.
It really does make me sick plugging into all this trump biz and it's all a distraction from doing accounts which really shouldn't be hard. And I have £100 until I start living off my credit card and I have to check my HB is being paid and reclaim health costs, see that parents are OK and I want to go Laurie s memorial next week, raise money to do website and its Nicola's 60th birthday tomorrow she retires this week and I am going blithely on as if nothing is urgent but the world is changing and every country is more than its government.

Jan23
After the march,  I received many favourable responses but there were two questioning responses, one from a man one from a woman, from different sides of the gender divide; she: 'that must have been so hard for you'  he: 'I feel sorry for you, being taken advantage of by misandrists'.  Different sides, but my  reality of being in the march was so  different from what they thought it was going to be.  The gender issue did not seem  important to me - there were a lot of blokes on March (mostly partners or looking after kids, mostly 'attached' in someway. Not many loners like myself but I did not feel out of place. I felt more invisible than unwelcome. There was a shared sense of purpose amongst the crowd.  Other marches in different places may have had a more exclude-males agenda but I did not feel it here. Yes there were a lot of angry women, but loud aggressive polarisers were a small minority, it felt most of the anger  was anti-Trump rather than anti-male. I know that I was moved to take part because of Trump the way the US is going and myt friends there. Yes the march was instigated by women and that threatens many men and pushes them back on an older male stance. But argument polarises;  pushes men to trad positions, pushes women into misandry, men into misogyny; dialogue moves forward.

Before the March

Why I am going on the anti-Trump women's March today?
I watched aghast at the nightmare of Trumps inauguration. I know it seems irrelevant to many here but  I feel deeply affected and wonder why. For many in this country, anything that happens in the US is not interesting or surprising, many here can't be bothered with American stuff. Hmm but  that angry primeval self righteous  all-American energy trump has harnessed is only a small part of what is there; Somehow that has swept him to power. It is  deeply hurtful to  the many wonderful people in US, incinceivable where he has got,
My time living in NYC many years ago transformed me, taking me out of this small country;  making me realise how small minded, bigoted and class ridden this country was. For many who had not travelled, England was still the centre of the universe.  They say moving away from your parents is a rite of passage but then so is living outside your culture and country. Maybe it was the quality of the work that took me there (yes! I like to think so), maybe being English privileged male helped  but undoubtedly being in NYC, living in downtown performance scene where straight white males were practically non existent, being in love, mixing with an African American crowd, being taken seriously as an artist.
I remember one day in I think 1991 walking past the then newly built Trump Tower in midtown NY and thinking 'How tacky how garish' (oh lawdy, it offended ma delicate Inglish soul!)How inconceivable that that man, could become president.
And now he is president
That is why I am shocked and hurt by what is happening in the US.
That is why I will go to Grosvenor Square and join the march

Moving on, shape shifting

In theatre and dance training the non-holding, going with the flow 'softer' qualities of movement and the listening and responding through the senses, were seen as 'feminine' qualities rather than attributes that belonged exclusively to women. 
Sense of self in both men & women was seen as a combination of both masculine and feminine energies. Back then, it felt like this sensibility would spread, it was just a slightly more intelligent take on male female roles. 
That kind of listening and responding certainly enabled Barnaby and I to look more objectively at politicians behaviour and our own patterns and gameswhen we were making our performance piece the Summit. It seemed to speak to people wherever it went -25 countries  and survived for over 20 years (1985-2006). In 1989 the Berlin Wall  and many barriers came tumbling down and it felt like the world was changing. 
That attitude of listening and being receptive and adapting to the situation is something that women have traditionally been much better at than men and something they have had to learn to do, to just survive in a world where men carried on unquestioningly just being men. Maybe fed up with this ignorance and intransigence,  women have had to be more confrontational but now it's seems more polarised and cruder than ever- women own the feminine and men the masculine. Both are entrenched and rarely do they meet. 
Maybe its inevitable with the passing of the optimism  and idealism of the late 20th century  and the current disillusion  at how little has changed, but recently I  heard someone say ' feminism had won' ???? Won what?  In this gender war, often it is the more empathetic men who are the acceptable collateral damage that any war involves. Whilst not denying the re emergence of redundant species like Nigelopods, Vladiraptors  and Donosaurs, it is not a conflict between men and women-  it is a conflict against old ways of doing things, and the newer, more fluid energy, will  erode the old.

A BAD DREAM LAST NIGHT

 Jan 16th
'You dream about what's worrying you'.  Often dreams in their bizarre, imagistic and surreal way can give a different perspective of a waking situation. Well last night I had a dream that wasn't surreal or bizarre, nothing happened in it that might not happen in real waking life.  A very believable down to earth dream. It was definitely related to what is worrying me- I need paid work badly now, I don't know why, but income, for whatever reason, ain't flowing.
I dreamt of being asked by a leading director (a real person, I won't name them- it was a dream) invited me for some exploratory work with some others but when I asked about being paid for my time I was told I wouldn't be paid. It acted as a trigger and I got furious. I remember feeling flattered that I was asked; the offer the interest in me and my work was genuine and heartfelt, I felt I had something to offer and that was recognised and wanted, but  the assumption was made that I would do this for nothing. Was I  supposed to be grateful? Why do some people think they can get away with it? I know this was only a dream but its a script  that too often happens in real life.

But when I told this dream to a friend she said " that's not a dream! it proves the continuum hypothesis.
Well dream or not I don't like the assumption that your ideas  and energy should be given for free.and for better or worse, I take that anxiety to bed with me

Facedances - AUTHENTIC? WOT DAT?

For some time, between 2005 and 2014 I collected Facedances - short video portraits of poeple listening to their favourit music I filmed about a thousand of them, They are stored on a variety of formats -mini DV tape, sd cards, hard disc. I filmed in this country, France, Spain Germany Ireland and the Netherlands. Facedances are short video portraits of people, non-performers, of all ages, listening and dancing with their face to a piece of music they know and love.  They chose their own music. Each video shows the face, the head and shoulders. I gave minimum direction i told them dance with your face to your favourite music. They could interpret that how they liked.

Often when I have shown Facedances, people say things like such and such a person is not being real, when all they are being is a bit self conscious at being filmed by a camera and person very near them- Authentically self conscious . Some people attempt to disguise their self consciousness by performing to the camera, sometimes extrovert people become shy- you cannot tell how people will be. That is great- they are authentically trying to hide their shyness by performing, or vice versa. Its unpredictable. Some people think thats  phony, for me, a self conscious face is as real as a performing face is as real as someone just listening to the music is as real as someone who is does nothing and just looks at the camera.

I don't know what people mean by authentic/ inauthentic, real/false. 

The viewer can choose to judge the Facedancer or simply engage with  what is there- There is no such thing as a dishonest Facedance. If some one chooses in their Facedance to avoid contact with the camera, we, the viewer can see it- we can read that, they are still lovable, we don't know the battles they have had to fight in their life, their braveries, their loves, their laughs, but we can empathise, but we can imagine their stories, their life. Whether they choose to perform for the camera, to have fun, be shy... to try to put on a front is  as much a sign of authenticity as those who choose to just listen to their music and want 'to be natural'.