Getting up getting ready. Hope it all goes steady. Didn’t make any spaghetti. Beats and rhymes, confetti. Making it rhyme like an alien to SETI. 

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I began something and took it as far as I could. The rhyme could only go on for as long as it did. There were other pressing matters to attend to. Conversations to have and things to do. So I needed to continue my project which I don’t know if it is going to be finished in time. Two more weeks here in Hull. Time is quickly floating away so I focus on what has to be done. 

I’ve been cutting. Not the skin but newspapers and magazines. When I was living in Stafford I began after I noticed that I had a pile of free newspapers piling up on my dresser. Some of the images were quite striking as they are sometimes in a daily. These images are disseminated across the country and sometimes around the world. In the beginning I was going to save articles for later reading. To do some kind of archival project. I quickly realized that it wouldn’t be practicable. 

Images are what drew me to the project to begin with. I see this as some kind of preparation for a creative output. Certain themes pop into my head and these have to be actualized. It is something that grows inside as it is fed by the world around me. On the one hand there are the immediate personal experiences and on the other are events in the wider world. It’s been something of a pivotal year. Two democratic results in the western world have shaken society and in some way woken people from their complacency. A strange stirring of cultural identity has taken place.  They see what is happening and are afraid of being diluted, of not having a say in what is happening. There is more to it of course but as the images become detached from the story and just its composition remains their random distribution becomes intriguing. 

Associations based on my beliefs, my desires, my thoughts and feelings at the time wonder off on their own until another drop begins the process again. Thought pieces and articles as well as stories encompassed by some headlines speak volumes. My pile is just a physical manifestation of information. Information that is both skewed and accurate, edited for brevity and impact. Graphically with the associated images that are clear and blurred depending on resolution. A newspaper is easier on the eyes but it is dirtier and it is incapable of conveying the way people see and experience the world now. We are used to little screens. The physical weight and its accumulation over time is striking. Newspapers will disappear from shelves within my lifetime. What will remain will be something that is extremely well produced and will be more of a novelty than anything else. 

These raw materials will hopefully shape a run of images. These images are to be more than just the sum of their parts. What will be triggered by a snippet of something familiar yet not quite recognizable? I’m not doing anything new just unique to me now. In any rate it helps me avoid the feeling of restlessness. With a few weeks left before my departure to Canada the tendancy for that wonder about the future to creep in. I’m avoiding the worry part by transmuting this energy into something productive. On the other hand I sometimes think I’ve gone nuts with this obsessive activity. Last night I felt some rhinitis beginning. Must have been from breathing a combination of the humid air from my drying laundry and the dust from newsprint. Fingers become dark with ink and then they dry and the skin begins to crack. I look at the pile and wonder if I will have enough time to finish what I started. 

Soon I will have to pack and prepare for my journey back. Subconsciously my mind processes how I will manage to do that. How will I fit everything and how will I get it all to London. What will I take in my upcoming visit to Poland? I would like to write more about my life here. The way that these living conditions have affected me. I am cocooned and insulated from the outside world. Physical distance and my inability to conquer it easily and purposefully has hampered my enjoyment of the outdoors. It gets dark so early now. A bitter cold has descended upon the land and these elements have contributed to hardship. The little bit of whinging that we do as neighbors makes me laugh. We complain that there isn’t any heat or any hot water on some days. We are used to the comforts of modern society and expect them to be there all the time. As resilient as we think our systems are they need constant attention due to their fragility.