MORE SKETCHBOOK/ STOPGAP/ ON KNIFE TWISTING/ COLD HARD PROOF

All right, full admission: I’d planned on running part 2 of the WHY ART MATTERS piece, but it’s dense, heavy, and frankly a little bit intimidating to post. I want it all the way there, and it’s not quite, yet.

So, a couple of sketchbook things, because it’s Wednesday and why not.

But it brings up a thing that speaks to what I’ve posted already, what I hope to post in the future, and why I decided to fire up this newsletter in the first place.

Every day I’m inundated with things to completely freak the fuck out about. So are you. Today was no different. It’s difficult and exhausting and confusing and at any given moment it can lay you right out on your ass. 2 things are simultaneously true: there are a lot of things to panic about, and we live in a panic machine (which does not help).

I’m not sharing this stuff with the idea that I’m terribly smart, or have particularly special or deep insights that others do not have. I’m not trying to explain anything to anyone, or really convince anyone (other than myself, maybe) of anything. I’m writing this to try to stay sane. And I’m putting it out there because when I see and read things from other people trying to stay sane, it’s generally more helpful in keeping that ball rolling, personally. Which is no small task. Being on the internet or looking at the media these days is like dodging heaps of shit that are constantly being chucked at your head. Or your soul.

And I am writing this on the internet. And I guess in some way it’s media. So, for the record:

One thing I absolutely do not want to engage in is the knife twisting.

It’s everywhere. I mean, I get it. The urge to scream out THE WORLD IS ON FIRE, SEE HOW FUCKED WE ARE?!?! is hard to tamp down. And simply avoiding it (look at my pretty drawings and art!) is tone deaf and head-in-the-sand denial. And both options feel pretty selfish. I’m not claiming that I’m above either of those things, or that it can’t or won’t show up, here. It’s not an easy line to ride.

Panic, anger, fear and helplessness are all reasonable and warranted states to find yourself in, these days (if that’s not the case for you, congratulations and can I come visit where you live?). But. However honestly come by it may be, those sentiments are not particularly helpful, to anyone.

I don’t want to do that. That’s not my intent. This newsletter is a place where I can at least attempt to not engage in denial about the situation we’re all living in, while also not making it worse for myself or anyone else. How can I not add to the pile of garbage, while still trying to be honest about what the pile is. If you see the garbage and know it’s there, and don’t like it, well…try not to make more.

I’m TRYING to not add to those piles, in whatever small way I can.

Words like “positivity” and “optimism” don’t really fit the bill in January 2025; honestly, I don’t feel a lot of that, right now. I wish I did, but it’s hard to come by. Neither do I have much in the way of “solutions” (other than “try as hard as you can to not to be a dick”, which seems wildly unfashionable, these days). But there is a needle threading that I (and, I think, all of us) am going to have to get better at, and quick: I wish I could define it more clearly beyond “I know it when I see/read/hear it”, but but boils down to this— GIVE UP vs. FIND A (new, probably small and simple because the big shit is out of your control) WAY TO KEEP GOING.

If you wake up on any given day and reach the conclusion that everything is irrevocably fucked, and that really we’re all at the mercy of greed, catastrophe, hatred, intolerance, and a deep civilizational death wish…can’t blame you, there. Hard to argue, observationally. But it’s not everything.

Maybe I could save a lot of reading and words of WHY ART MATTERS and just have posted the clip below. It’s not explaining, it’s cold hard proof. Listen to the whole damn thing.

Because if you can listen to this— not just Sam, but the crowd, the whole thing happening— and still feel awful, that life is a march into the abyss, and it’s ALL fuckery and hopelessness…you’re not listening. You’re only twisting the knife. This is as real and valid as the garbage. It’s the opposite of the garbage. I’d like to believe it’s more real. It goes beyond music, and art, and whatever else.

It’s a way to keep going, and it’s worth remembering.

—z