Notebook

Sometimes designing a website can veer into unexpectedly existential terrain. Who am I? And what do I believe? That’s what happened today when C. and I began sketching some ideas for a new project website. The internet has become bloated and ugly, not only spiritually but in terms of code. Everything I click feels over-designed with font stacks, carousels, gargantuan banners, and wall-to-wall bullshit. So we decided to aim for something as spartan as possible. One font size. Two columns. Dead simple with white space galore.

When you cut something down to the bone, every decision becomes much more dramatic. Adding a few pixels to a margin can feel like a sudden crescendo. We spent the entire day and much of the night dithering over these decisions, and it was the most fun I’ve had in a while, bickering about whether to use regular or semi-bold.

Nowadays, reduction feels far more productive than addition.

Belong – Remove the Inside

October Language | Carpark, 2006 | Bandcamp

There were no foiled plots today, no shocking revelations or newly infected politicians or footage of horrifying violence. Just another hurricane in the Gulf and a continuing rise in coronavirus cases. But these calamities are becoming familiar, and it almost felt like a slow news day, aside from the president’s usual braying and bullshit. I fantasize about the day this man’s face no longer lives in my head, a time when I can return to forgetting about the president for a few hours.

This afternoon C. and I rode the train to Green-Wood Cemetery, where we’re planning a project in its beautiful Gothic chapel that was designed by the architects who built Grand Central Station. We switched off the chandelier and watched the pools of stained glass light that glittered on the limestone floor. For a moment, I felt as if I was standing outside of time. Because it was such a rare quality these days: silence.

Authorities charged thirteen men with plotting to kidnap the governor of Michigan. Another hurricane is bearing down on the Louisiana coast. It will be the tenth hurricane to make landfall this year, the most ever recorded. Lately I’ve been having a dream about a weatherman grinning in front of a map while talking about a hurricane of bullets.

But I miss driving through this country. I miss the sensation of collapsing into a vinyl booth and listening to her softly recite the items on the Denny’s menu like a koan: “Lumberjack slam, grand slam, triple slam, or maybe the grand slamwich…”

Earth – Omens & Portents I: The Driver

The Bees Made Honey in the Lion’s Skull | Southern Lord, 2008 | Bandcamp

A fly sat atop Mike Pence’s head for two minutes and three seconds during the vice presidential debate. This headline appeared in the New York Times and elsewhere, and I’m glad it was recorded for posterity. During this debate between two supernaturally telegenic candidates, a large fly landed on the vice president’s perfectly shellacked, snowy-white hair. It hardly moved while the man rambled about hallucinatory riots. The fly complemented the aura of this man who already lives in the uncanny valley, a man who seems like an alien lifeform doing its best impression of a movie president circa 1958.

The fly felt like a portentous symbol in a year that has reached the caliber of myth. Perhaps it was an emblem of this administration’s rot, bringing to mind Sartre’s play that introduces Zeus “as the god of flies and death.” (As a counterpoint, there was the time a little bird landed on Bernie Sanders’s podium in 2016.) The fly could also be read as proof of our craving for spectacle—and as a symbol of our attention spans. Within a week, we’ve darted from the president’s tax evasion to a horrifying presidential debate to wondering whether the president was dead to tracking the spread of the coronavirus throughout the White House to, oh look, a fly. For two minutes and three seconds, the fly had done what even a pandemic could not: it briefly unified the nation.

Suicide – Creature Feature

The First Rehearsal Tapes, 1975 | More

I woke from a dream where I was frantically searching for the unsubscribe and unfollow buttons while a giant mouth kept telling me the news. As I sat down in front of my screen this morning, it occurred to me just how much of my life is spent entering text into imaginary boxes and pressing publish or send. Maybe one day I’ll become one of those middle-aged men with a fervent interest in woodworking.

Took the subway to the bottom of Manhattan to catch up with a friend. Life feels so unsteady right now, yet the city is still plastered with messages reminding me to drink coconut water, subscribe for non-stop entertainment, and check out the latest styles.

I once saw an old woman in a red sundress flying a big yellow kite down a busy street. This image has been stuck in my head lately. Maybe because we need more moments of public joy.

Deadbeat – A Joyful Noise (Part I)

Something Borrowed, Something Blue | ~Scape, 2004 | Bandcamp

My father would have turned 72 today. He taught me about grace during the year we spent together, waiting for a lung. Sometimes we snuck away from the hospital and went fishing. “If I’m going to die,” he said, “I might as well die outside doing something.” We played long games of chess while we waited for the phone to ring. I came across a picture of him as a little boy that feels like a fragment from a dream. Maybe it’s the blue spoon.

After losing someone, maybe the soul goes one of two ways: it hardens into a scar or maybe or it can . . . I don’t have the words to finish this thought.

Meanwhile, our president has escaped the hospital, and he’s hopped up on steroids and sneering without a mask while the networks scramble to figure out who he’s infected. He’s telling people the virus isn’t that bad. It’s the fountain of youth, in fact. “I feel better than I did twenty years ago!” he says, spitting on the graves of over two hundred thousand dead. Any compassion I’d tried to muster for another human being who was ailing has turned to dust.

For a moment my eyes flick to the ceiling, and I’m almost thankful my parents aren’t here to see what’s happened to the world. As if I’m doing something wrong just by living in such an embarrassing time.

Flying Saucer Attack – Dust

Mirror | Drag City, 2000 | Bandcamp

The president’s condition remains a mystery. There he is, waving at his fans from the backseat of a bulletproof Chevrolet Suburban. Now he’s back at the hospital, receiving steroids and experimental cocktails while headlines range from “improving” to “alarming.” Conspiracies dribble across my screen, not just from the sludge of the internet but otherwise sensible people I know. Theories run to extremes. Some say it’s a calculated ploy to reveal a miracle cure that will win the president a second term. Others wonder if he’s dead.

This year has made conspiracy theorists of so many of us to some degree. We hunt for patterns in senseless tragedy and bizarrely cruel behavior, trying to clear some kind of path through the daily onslaught of bullshit. Extreme voices. Extreme weather. Extreme wealth disparity. Extreme sports, flavors, and entertainment. Does a culture ever become more mild?

Some enchanted evening. Room full of roses. How high the moon. For some reason it broke my heart, watching an elderly man slowly type the songs from his youth into a search box. As I walked through the park tonight, I wondered what I’ll search for when I’m grey and clutching a cane. Maybe I’ll be looking for Autechre and Basic Channel and Plastikman, the music that sounded like the future to me. Even now, I find myself craving the days when a 303 sounded like it contained all the mysteries and possibilities of the world.

Fuse v. Plastikman – Krossover

Krossover | Minus, 1999 | More

Today the president went to the hospital after testing positive for the coronavirus. Three days ago, he stood on a debate stage and mocked his opponent for wearing a mask. Now he’s hospitalized and details are sketchy. I’ll be frank: when I saw the news, my lizard-brain flickered with glee. It was the grubby pleasure of somebody getting what they deserved. The sensation left me feeling ghoulish, cheering for another person’s illness.

Maybe it’s not wrong to crave justice in the universe, some balancing of the scales. Particularly if that person’s recklessness and viciousness led to the needless deaths of so many Americans. Tonight it’s 208,536 and counting. But in this case, justice was not delivered by the crowd, dumb luck, or karma. It was entirely self-inflicted and avoidable. Justice cannot be self-administered. And so the effect is like watching a Greek tragedy: it’s not enjoyable, but it feels instructive.

The First Lady, two senators, and some aides and advisors have also tested positive for the virus. I wish them well. I wish the president well. And humility on the other side.

C. and I returned to the Met this afternoon. It’s my favorite activity in the world: wandering the halls of a museum with her while we chatter about our projects and plans. And today we began plotting some interesting new directions for Ritual Fields.

The pilgrimage to inspect a painting or ancient relic is inherently ritualistic, and it felt even more so as we stood before statues, scrolls, and gelatin prints in hushed galleries with masks covering our mouths. The scene brought to mind one of my favorite moments at the Met: the fragmented statue of a soldier from two thousand years ago, a mixture of marble and steel that looks like a collision of the past and future.

Bersarin Quartett – Futur II

Methoden und Maschinen | Denovali Records, 2019 | Bandcamp

Heavy rain fell last night, and it felt like a much-needed shower after the degradation of the first presidential debate. Today was my training session for becoming an election worker, and I was grateful for this small concrete thing that occupied my attention for a few hours while everything else feels like it’s coming undone.

We reported for training at the Javits Convention Center, which had been a makeshift hospital earlier this year. Now it’s a husk of Robocop architecture filled with shuttered shops and empty escalators, save for the decals on the floor that kept us six feet apart before we filed into a conference room for four hours. A small bald man barked at us like a drill sergeant, running us through the logistics of address changes, court-ordered ballots, and affidavit requests. “You’ll be working at least seventeen hours on Election Day,” he said. “So bring a sandwich.” Seventeen hours is workable, but I made a strangled noise when he said we had to be there at five o’clock in the morning, which is usually my bedtime. But I’ll gut it out. Every vote truly counts in this election, even in New York City. Each vote that makes it onto the scoreboard on election night will help inoculate us against the thieving fuckery that’s sure to come.

They gave us a 116-page manual and showed us a video that told us not to wear flip flops. “And remember, remain calm and neutral in all circumstances,” said the video. I learned that ballots come in packs of fifty, and we must mark an X on a paper grid whenever we give one to a voter. The machines are horribly complicated creatures that require configuration reports, diagnostic tape, serial-numbered tags, and sealed envelopes. There’s a device with a beautiful sci-fi name called The Cradlepoint that networks the polling site. We learned how to plug it in. They told us to cover extension cords and remove any items that a voter might bump into. We learned the appropriate distances that must be observed for exit polling and political discussion. We did hypothetical math problems that tallied up emergency ballots, voided ballots, and any ballots remaining in the scanner.

We will wipe down surfaces after each voter. And we must work in bipartisan teams at all times, so maybe I’ll make a Republican friend.