blog (March, 2003)
baby i like it raw
I've moved on to my third farm. A few days in Granada and then another bus trip south through the incredible Sierra Nevada mountains to a town called Jete, just short of Almuñecar, on Spain's Costa Tropical.
Rufino owns the place, and Paco lives here as well. Also working and living on the finca are Piotr, a Pole with dreadlocks down to his ass, and Abdullah, an Islamic Moroccan who isn't yet sure that he wants to like an American.
We have no electricity, no bathroom but the piles of sticks around trees (the backs of Chirimoya leaves make great toilet paper,) and no place to cook food. Rufino and Paco are Crudites, or Crudos, or I don't know... They only eat raw.
The idea is that man in his present form has been around for a couple million years, but only been able to alter (cook/preserve/mix) food for a very relatively short time. Not enough time for our our bodies to adapt. Very interesting and simple philosophy, and my body is slowly acclimating to this mode of eating. A couple weeks of detoxification won't make up for twenty-two years of stuffing myself with chemically adulterated food, but, nevertheless, it should do me good, and the key is to take the knowledge with me. We feast mostly on fruits (chirimoyas, apples, oranges, lemons, tomatoes) veggies (avocados, lettuce, cabbage, carrots, onions) and nuts, but a couple nights ago I tasted my first raw cow. Meat is very rare around here, though.
my black slop
Somewhere near Lorca on the way south to Granada -- a 30 minute bus stop and I walked the other direction, away from the travel restaurant and down a wide gravel path pinched between highway and big, box-shaped factory buildings. A gravel walkway through lonely trees with weepy branches that tickle the ground and its litter.
What am I looking for? Something tacky to add to my already hard-to-zip-shut backpack? Forgotten money left on the ground? Something interesting to photograph and capture for the blog here? That the girls on the bus think I'm hip for taking the path less traveled?
Maybe I'm just stretching my legs and trying to avoid food at the restaurant.
How is it that I don't know why I'm doing something? Is that possible?
What do artists look for? How do they see things from a different angle? How do they convert this industrial wasteland into a documentary of sterility, morosity, bleakness... to their audience... to themselves?
This place evokes nothing in me. It is sad and barren; another of humanity's embarrassments. Not even a fantastic embarrassment like a war or a supermarket aisle with 50 varieties of breakfast cereal. Just a bunch of trees and trash growing in gravel, with a pipe at the end spilling a steady flow of horrible, black foul-smelling slop into a pit that must have a bottom.
To find beauty in something, capture it, compose it to signify something, and release it to the public: this is art. Its quality depends on its supposed sincerity in the encounter of beauty, its depth in signifying meaning, and its craft in composition.
To find beauty in something, enjoy it, and release it completely: this is what I should strive for.
debil
I have a weak stomach... or a weak body, or a weak soul. Or all three. These last three months have brought me the worst bout of health problems I've had in quite some time. Right now I've got a pretty terrible stomach bug that doesn't want to fly away. It's really ruining my outlook and my situation, not to mention my general well-being (no details divulged.)
I wouldn't mind so much were I with my parents, or in my own place, but living with another family twists things a bit. The last thing I'm here to do is add complication to their lives. They are doing what they can to keep an eye out for me and try to help my situation, but I don't want to have to be cared for. When I'm sick I like to crawl into my little corner until I'm well again, but I have responsibilities here, and the corner I have doesn't belong to me.
So, Luis left for the Mercado Medeival alone today -- it wouldn't be a good situation with me in my state, sleeping in the back of the van in a city street. Having facilities nearby (albeit of the ecological, composting variety) is a requirement.
Ugh. I hate feeling like a burden. I also hate feeling like I'm doing more and more right to take care of myself, but I'm still so weak and susceptible.
This network is my solace -- my repose -- right now. Maybe my problems stem from some sort of internet withdrawal. Oh, and it's nice to be able to think in English for awhile. Dave asked if I'm dreaming in Spanish yet: the sign of language cross-over. I'm not sure where counting-my-situps-in-Spanish falls on the spectrum, but there I am.
tranquilo
I've moved on, but not far away, to live with a Spanish couple, Luis and Nube and their 4-year old daughter, Zaira. They are the ex-hippie sort, very chill, very mature, and very kind. Tranquilo is the phrase of the stay so far. They have a small finca that is a little piece of paradise, and do a bit of pottery, that Luis sells at Mercados Medievales around Spain. Nube teaches T'ai Chi/QiGong in the local pueblos. I joined Luis this past weekend for a trip to the market in Alicante, where we dressed in medieval garb to sell earrings, magnets, vases, ocarinas, and more.
They speak no English, so I am learning Spanish quickly, though I've got so far to go...
Clear skies.