A Heart On Ice in an Esky
Where is your heart? Find your vehicle of expression
Note: Don’t like reading? The Podcast audio is at the end of the story.🫡
Where is your heart?
Is it lost? Did it pack up for the coast? Shoot through? Bail on you? Is it gone? Did it leave you in a box at a stranger’s darkened door with no blanket, no note, no nothing? Is it coming back? Did it say: “I’m just nipping out for some milk,” and leave your cereal dry? Is it with someone else right now? Where did it go? Can you get it back? Is rescue off the table? Is it flailing in the Sea of Uncertainty, drifting toward the Cape of No Hope?
What size buoyancy vest does it wear?
Is it suffering? Is it lonely? Does it ache and wrench out its pain as muffled sobs in the Pillow of Anguish1? Do people look away from it? Does it hide the agony of its shape under baggy coats, black cloaks, and defensive humor? Is its load too heavy, its burden too wet, its strain too intense? Is shame in the control booth twiddling all the dials? Does it speak shy and quiet? Is it crippled by grief? Has the muscle atrophied?
Does it need a doctor?
Does it cower in fear? Is it drowning in dread? How is it with worry? Does it take a punch? How is its shield positioned? Does it have one? What is the force field set to? Does it have a code, numeric or moral? When you walk down the Darkened Alley of Unknown does it quake in its boots, seek out the cracks, look for the exits? Does it startle at thunder, hide under blankets, panic at lightning?
My God—is it even dressed for cold weather?!
Caution. Is it hanging out with shallow thinkers? Has it been engorged with hate’s blood? Does it plot and scheme and connive? Does it fall into cesspools, hold hands with travesty mongers and mongrels, package itself into spyware of emotional destruction, or conspire against humanity? Is it charred and overcooked? Is it too late to course-correct it? Does it leave a mark? Is it a bad mark? Where did you get that heart? Can you take it back?
Where is your heart?
Is it glowing in your chest and throbbing with the melody of possibility? Is it awake? Engaged? Free? Does it skip to the sound of a voice? Does it turn into sublime and liquid love upon viewing a sunset? Is it riffling through the attics of memory, allowing itself to sit in the emotions both good and bad? Does it adore? Is it up in the rafters looking down upon a stage and thrilling at the courage? Is it taking notes? Does it lay soft in your chest and warm to the touch of the world? Does it swoon and sing and struggle and grow? Does it wear the stains of love proudly? Will it try, try, and try again? Is it full? Are you feeding it?
Could it be fuller?
Is it open? Does it receive fully, totally, and without cruel judgment? Are all frequencies active? All signals online? Does it crackle and pulse and shimmer with the energy of 10,000 messages zapping into the flesh, the vision, the zone? Does it take chances? Is it getting pulled over for riding a motorized cooler on the sidewalk? Does it know “the vehicle is the method”2 defense? Is it adapting? Is it practicing daily? Is it putting itself out there? Is it learning? Is it making cheeks flush and hair stand on end? Is it pursuing dreams while both inside and out of your body? Is it naked and unafraid?
Where is your heart?
Standing on the corner of nothing and everything.
In the dream lighthouse to the fog of our time.
By the once-blown-out speakers of Forever Optimistic.
Around the warming fire of awakening consciousness.
Seeking universal empathy while at the intersection of Work and Progress.
There. There is your heart.
Go get it.
Yours in tiny thought,
Janeen3
This week’s amends…
“There’s no point in saying, ‘I don’t have an idea today, so I’ll just smoke some drugs.’ You should stay alert for the moment when a number of things are just ready to collide with one another… The reason to keep working is almost to build a certain mental tone, like people talk about body tone. You have to move quickly when the time comes, and the time might come very infrequently – once or twice a year, or even less.”
- Brian Eno
From “Developing Your Creative Practice: Tips from Brian Eno,” which from what I can tell is taken from Eric Tamm’s book “Brian Eno: His Music and The Vertical Sound of Color.” You can download that book in PDF form and it looks to be a very deep dive into Eno, if that’s what floats your boat.
Well, this is a fascinating historical document. The first two hours of MTV.
These raw wool portraits by Iranian artist Salman Khoshroo are just 👌🏻. See and learn more at Colossal.
Via Colossal
Dune Bad Lip Reading. Enjoy!
Via Boing Boing
Did any of this spark a tiny thought of your own?
Patent pending.
I don’t know if this is an actual defense, but whatever works to express that heart and get it out there, baby! Find your heart’s vehicle of expression.
Where is your heart? “In humans, it is situated between the two lungs and slightly to the left of center, behind the breastbone; it rests on the diaphragm, the muscular partition between the chest and the abdominal cavity.” Source: Britannica