Judgments
There are no right or wrong answers, and you are not expected to agree with me (even if you think you know what my point of view might be — which is very unlikely). Remember; you are not to accept anything I say unless you actually experience it on your own. It is entirely possible that your experience may not agree with mine.
When we encounter something new, we are faced with having to deal with it in some way. When you get an assignment to read a story like Ape Cave, and because it is an assignment it has a certain special urgency about it, you have to figure out what to do. Perhaps you remember. Was your first thought something like “what am I going to do with this?” — and a subtext: “how am I going to eliminate this problem that stands in front of me?” You have a problem. You need to solve it. It won’t go away until you do solve it.
Once you have responded to the problem, and have written your response, you have eliminated the need to think about it any more. In other words, so often in the life of a student, or a person in other walks of life, the issue really boils down to getting rid of something. Something you have to do. Something that intrudes on the usual train of distractions (which we generally glorify by calling them “thinking”).
We look at what the (in this case) story is. First, we need to place ourselves in relation to it. For most people (if not all of us), we have to figure out what the parts of the story are and where we stand in relation to them. In this story, there were two groups of people. The narrator and the friend is one group; the people coming through the cave is another. The cave itself is the setting. We can pretty much all relate to the setting. Try to visualize, as you actually might experience it yourself, the dark, the cold, the boulder strewn cave floor, the dampness, the silence. We have all been in the dark, in the darkroom, or even just at night. That is not particularly a problem.
The people are more of a challenge. Do you identify with one of the groups, or with the other? Or neither? Or both? In identifying with one or another, most people will take on what s/he imagines must be the appropriate point of view and more or less adopt it. I suspect that most of you would identify with the narrator/observer; that is how the story is set up, and there is a tendency for the other group to have a sort of objectified aura; as if they were, in some sense, inferior. Or, you could possibly try to see it from the point of view of the noisy group. You might, especially if you are a parent, find a strong identification with them. You might identify with them and feel some anger at being spied upon.
Our minds do not seem to work under our conscious control. They can’t. There is far too much for them to do, and the boss is out to lunch. What do I mean by the last part of that statement? Minor White often said that our eyes prevent us from falling into manholes — some of the time. (He also said that the fact that photographers rarely actually fall into manholes suggests that they have guardian angels).
Have you ever been in an art museum, looking at a painting? Here’s an example:
It is puzzling. There it is, and you look at the id tag, and it says:
So, what goes on in your mind? Uh….uh….uh….
So you stand there looking at it. After a while, and you don’t even know how long, you find yourself in front of the next painting. Where have you been? Planning the menu for dinner on Friday night when friends are coming over? Worrying about the test in Psychology? Trying to figure out where you are going to go for your next vacation? New boyfriend/girlfriend? Maybe you have parked too long and your car might have a ticket on it? Or maybe it suggests another painting that you saw once, and so, while looking at Kline, you are actually thinking about DeKooning.
Where have you NOT been? You have NOT been seeing the painting. Admit it. You haven’t been there. And when you were in front of DeKooning, you weren’t really there either. And when you are making dinner on Friday, you won’t be there either. And when you get to the car, you will either see a ticket or not, and it will simply change the direction of your distraction. As soon as you get in the car and start it, you are reading some script or other. We attribute attention, fully integrated conscious unified thought and action, ability to do what we may wish to do etc, to ourselves. If we allow ourselves to think otherwise, it threatens our existence in a way. We feel a need to be perfect in a way, and to have holes in our perfection as glaring and monstrous as the ones that are really there, is NOT acceptable — to ourselves. So we deny it.
Our tendency is that we would see the painting for just long enough to make a decision about it that “sets” it in relation to ourselves. “I could make a better painting than THAT!” — end of story. NEXT! Off I go to Mexico and I’m lying on the beach with a margarita. Our brains have the capacity to trap impressions and divert them.
So, enter the Toast. Why do you suppose I want you to look at a stupid piece of toast for 20 minutes with no music, no pets, no distractions? Because I want you to actually LOOK at something and actually see it. It wouldn’t matter what you look at, really, but what could be more neutral than a piece of toast? Especially if it is burned to make it unappetizing.
Most people are very reluctant to do something that simple. They want to read something in to the toast, turn it into symbolism, find within it big important things. When we do this, we can’t see squat. It is actually necessary to train yourself to see. To see, you need to be clear.
Of course I am entirely familiar with this. I have had, and continue to have the same delusions. I try like mad to catch them, but sometimes, I too, am deceiving myself.
Regarding paper assignments, etc; in the world of students, it is usually seen as more important to look impressive. So, strategies are often devised to make one’s self Look good. I’ve done that; everyone I’ve ever known in school has done that. But that is not to learn, to change. To really grow, in your education, is to let that sort of thing go, altogether, and approach new experiences from the point of view that they really are new; that you don’t already know the answers.
And of course, you will have teachers who expect the other stuff. Loads of BS. You will know them when you see them, and give them what they want. I hope. Life is full of theater. Just not here in this class. You would have no place here if you are too good to be ignorant. Why do you suppose we go to school? To get a sheepskin that says “I told you so!! I AM perfect. Now you have to believe it too!”
