A Strange Facial Expression

"Silence will not betray your thoughts

but the expression on your face will."

-- H.G. Mendleson

Self portrait (collage) 12-11-14

"The face is more honest than the mouth will ever be."

-- Daphne Orebaugh

" ... it took her some moments to recall

what her normal face even looked like,

but after several attempts she was able 

to settle on a reasonable facsimile."

-- Haruki Murakami, IQ84

"I want freedom for the full expression of my personality."

-- Mahatma Gandhi

I have been working away on this particular self-portrait for quite a while.

Cutout hands, glue, adhesive spray, X ACTO knives, razor blades and magazine pages have littered the floor of my workspace since about August.

I tinkered with it a little here. A little there.

In literal bits and pieces, this collage has evolved over the past few months. The good part is, it's finally done.

Yeah, I know, it's a little bit strange.

I won't bore you with inadequate words trying to explain what this self portrait means to me, or what it says about me. 

I'll just let it speak for itself and if it says something to you, that's great. 

If it makes you feel something, that's even better. 

If not, that's fine too.

Exfoliation

"You've got to exfoliate, you know?"

-- ASAP Rocky

Exfoliated Barbie 8-26-14

"I think the biggest mistake people make is being heavy handed," says Henriksen.

"A little goes a long way -- let the exfoliating particles do their job."

-- Dana Oliver, 

"How to Exfoliate Your Face and Get Smooth Skin in 3 Minutes,"

Huffington Post

My "beauty routine" is pretty much a bar of Ivory soap.

But I do try to exfoliate a couple of times a week.

I don't waste my money on expensive, fancy-schmancy scrubs, gizmos and "systems" though.

My preferred exfoliant is a couple of headache powder packets. It's crushed aspirin with caffeine in it. But instead of ingesting it, I dampen it with a little bit of water and scrub my face with it to slough off the dead cells and stimulate blood flow to my skin.

The aspirin is anti-inflammatory and the caffeine kind of tightens everything up, for the moment anyway.

It's cheap. 

It's easy. 

It feels nice. 

It's good for my skin.

And it leaves my face as soft and smooth as a Barbie's bottom.

Still Playing With Barbies, At MY Age

"You can't stop the future

You can't rewind the past

The only way to learn the secret

... is to press play."

-- Jay Asher, Thirteen Reasons Why

Self portrait 7-15-14

"She was not one for emptying her face of expression."

-- J.D. Salinger, Franny and Zooey

"How old would you be if you didn't know how old you was?"

-- Satchel Paige

Yesterday I came face to face with my age.

Again.

It was my birthday.

Again.

So that happened.

I Found My Mitten

"The three little kittens, they lost their mittens,

And they began to cry,

Oh, mother dear, we sadly fear,

That we have lost our mittens.

What! Lost your mittens, you naughty kittens!

Then you shall have no pie."

-- Eliza Lee Cabot Follen, 

"The Three Little Kittens, They Lost Their Mittens," 

New Nursery Songs For All Good Children (1843)

Self portrait 6-5-14

OK, so I'm not exactly a kitten, and I didn't exactly lose a mitten.

I lost a glove.

It was one of my cycling gloves from my favorite pair. They're the only gloves I have that fit my paws just exactly how I like them to fit.

When one of them went missing a couple of weeks ago, I was very, very sad.

Sad is bad.

I searched and searched for my little lost glove, but alas, I couldn't find it.

In the meantime, I wore other gloves -- gloves that don't fit my paws just exactly how I like them to fit.

When my wayward glove finally turned up in a drawer today, trapped inside a tangle of cycling tights and shorts and jackets, it made me very, very happy. 

Happy is good.

Also, I think now I get pie.

Something To Keep Me From Totally Flipping My S#!T Because I'm Stuck Indoors

"To be human is to keep rattling the bars of the cage of existence,

hollering, 'What's it for?'"

-- Robert Fulghum

Self portrait 4-17-14

"Human beings want to be free 

and however long they may agree to stay locked up, to stay oppressed, 

there will come a time when they say 'That's it.'

Suddenly they find themselves doing something 

that they never would have thought they would be doing,

simply because of the human instinct that makes them turn their face towards freedom."

-- Aung San Suu Kyi

It snowed, again and dropped into the low 20s, again.

Remember those lovely daffodils I talked about a couple of days ago? They're fucked.

After the rain beat the shit out of them, the show completely crushed them into the ground.

I tasted freedom during an all-too-brief weekend breakout, but then Winter threw me back in lockup and slammed the cell door.

I'm trapped inside looking out, again.

Yesterday I could be have used my time in solitary confinement (or as I like to think of it, "the hole") to get a jump on Spring cleaning the house -- the windows need washing, the carpets need sweeping, the furniture needs dusting, the grout needs scrubbing.

Instead, in a desperate act of survival, I spent the afternoon fighting back the crazy by making this self portrait of how I'm feeling right about now. I had to get it out of my system before I totally flipped my shit and started smashing stuff. It's a good thing, cuz I was about to start eating my own offspring.

The grout can fucking wait. I have more important things to do.

Soft Focus

Rita:

"I'd like to make her look a little more attractive.

How far can you pull back?"

Cameraman:

"How do you feel about Cleveland?"

-- Dorothy Michaels' screen test, Tootsie

Self portrait 4-16-14

I bought my new camera in part because of rave reviews about its crystal clear, laser sharp, high-resolution image quality.

Crystal clear, laser sharp image quality is a beautiful thing in a camera, especially when you're shooting, say, the stamens and pistils of flowers, or a bird on a faraway branch, or the delicate, flaky texture of a pastry. So far I've been very satisfied.

And then yesterday I turned New Camera's lens on myself to shoot my first self portraits with it. It had to happen sooner or later. Self portraits are my bread and butter. They're what I do most. I am my most often photographed subject by far -- and not in a duck-lipped, outstretched arm, "selfie"-crazed way -- but in a genuine, self-portraiture-as-genre way.

So I took a deep breath, set up the tripod, found New Camera's 10-second shutter delay, and went for it.

Yep. As advertised, the images were crystal clear.

Yep. As advertised, the details were laser sharp.

Yep. I was horrified.

I could see every pore. Every whisker. Every bump, lump, acne scar, flake of dry skin, errant eyelash, eyebrow, nose hair, sun spot, red patch, broken blood vessel, eye goober ... as advertised, in every brilliantly focused, crystal clear, laser sharp, pixel-packed, high resolution shot.

Holy fuckballs, Batman.

Situationally speaking, stellar image quality isn't always a desirable thing. Not when you're 46 and wearing no makeup and haven't exfoliated in, well ... ever, and wear all the sun damage from every long, un-sunscreened childhood summer at the lake and the accumulation of the ravages of life -- every hard blow, every sleepless night -- right there front and center.

Thankfully, New Camera understands. And tucked away in New Camera's "creative filters" features is a sweet little blessing called "soft focus." With the touch of a button, New Camera took the harsh edges off the images, gentling them ever so kindly, making them just a little easier to take.

Which led me to ask the question, is soft focus dishonest? Is soft focus cheating? Is soft focus a lie?

I've thought about it a lot and have decided that it isn't. I've decided that soft focus is simply a creative choice sitting there alongside the other creative choices like fish eye, and grainy black and white, and watercolor effect, and vivid color.

I won't always shoot my self portraits in soft focus. There'll be times when I want to show all the sharp, horrifying details. That's also a creative choice. But for the first time out, New Camera was kind enough to handle me gently. To ease me in.

So for today, soft focus isn't cheating. Soft focus is a good and useful thing.

I'm OK with my age, mostly. Sometimes I hate it. Just like I'm OK with/hate lots of other things about myself -- my hair, my boobs, my habits, my behaviors, my compulsions, my mistakes, the weird little bump on my chin that I'm pretty sure contains the teeth and spine of my unborn twin.

But love 'em or hate 'em, all added up they're what makes me me.

Each of them is part of who I am, but, thankfully, none of them is all of who I am.

The Fragility of Trust

"... allowing yourself to be vulnerable makes you weak

but also opens you to the nuances of beauty ..."

-- John Geddes, A Familiar Rain

Self portrait 4-2-14

"I am the keeper of fragile things ..."

-- Anais Nin, House of Incest

Trust is fragile. We all know that.

Artistic trust is particularly delicate.

Having artists for friends means I get asked from time to time to peek at their work before it's birthed. Before it's full-grown. While it's still incubating.

When someone trusts me with their art, I try to be extremely careful, to handle it gently and with extraordinary care. I try to be as honest as I can without treading too heavily on someone else's creation with my bulldozer of well-meant, overenthusiastic criticism.

This is something that I try very intentionally not to take lightly. I know how important this is because I've gotten it wrong before and done regrettable damage.

Yesterday I participated in a reading of a new play trilogy. The playwright, Juliette, invited me and a handful of other actors to sit around a table and read her words aloud so she could hear them in voices other than the ones in her own head. The readers were carefully and specifically selected. We all had history with Juliette. We'd all had opportunities to trust her and to be trusted by her.

The fragile bond was still in tact.

The atmosphere was fun and energetic, but also reverent and respectful. We knew we were being allowed a rare privilege, to look at something before it was ready. We knew that our job was to help Juliette find flaws in her own work so that she could correct them. But our job wasn't to criticize or to suggest or to judge. She'd invited other people to do that dirty work later on.

Our job was simply to read.

I've been at similar readings where the actors are invited to give input and opinions about the play. Generally I think this is a terrible, terrible idea. There is no temptation quite like the actor's temptation to jump all over someone else's manuscript. It's like a runaway freight train. I've seen these conversations turn ugly, unwieldy and unhelpful. Damaging, even. I've watched the doomed, discouraged look of doubt darken the playwright's eyes as she sits there helpless while a roomful of divas tells her what they think the characters should say, or do, or want, and how they should say it or do it or want it. 

It's a good thing last night wasn't one of those times.

At the end of the evening, as soon as the scripts were closed to a little round of well-deserved and honest applause, we chatted briefly of other subjects, packed up our things and went to our cars. I was proud of my fellow actors for holding Juliette's work gently and with such tender care. I was also proud of Juliette for having the backbone to invite others in to her creative process.

It was all good.

Being In A Really Weird Mood

"I'm in a weird-ass mood today, Doc. 

Wired up, mind all over the place, looking for answers, 

reasons, something solid to cling to, something real, 

but just when I think I've got it figured out and neatly filed under fixed instead of fucked, 

turns out I'm still shattered, scattered and battered."

-- Chevy Stevens, Still Missing

Self portrait 3-29-14

"I may be weird, but creative-wise I have the knowledge to know and believe in my heart 

that my weirdness makes me unique. 

It is also in my so-called  weird that I am also able to know the difference 

and then stop my complaining and go out and make something somebody has never seen before."

-- Henri Matisse

"When you're strange

Faces come out of the rain

When you're strange

No one remembers your name

When you're strange ..."

-- The Doors, "People Are Strange"

Yesterday I felt unfocused, unbalanced, jumpy, unpredictable, impulsive and volatile.

Nothing was wrong, necessarily. I was just in a really weird mood.

Being in a weird mood isn't necessarily a good thing in and of itself. But it can be if you tap into the weird and create something artistically strange out of it.

In my weird little world, strange art is better than no art.

So that's what I did.

In the morning I was exercising and saw a mental image of me with my hands over my face and my eyes peering right through my hands. Not, like, peeking between my fingers, but looking right through my hands. Hmmm, I thought, that's strange. But I went with it anyway and translated my weird mental image photographically into a strange little self portrait.

I can't say for sure if I think it's a good thing. But I am fairly certain it's a little bit strange.

Weird, huh?

Ding! Ding! Ding!

Which brings us to the One Good Thing "Get Your Weird On" creative challenge. Here's how it works:

Next time you're having one of those weird days like I just did, don't let the strangeness pass unnoticed into the rear view of your life.

Document that shit. Take its picture. Write it down.

Whatever your chosen craft, use it to make yourself a weird souvenir, a memento, a post-card of sorts to remember it by. Nobody else has to see it, unless you want them to. It's meant for you and you alone, so tap into your weird-ass dreamscape and let it flow. My only rule is that there are no rules -- the weirder the better.

If you're a writer, write a strange little poem or story, without the annoying, discouraging voices of critics and editors or your mother telling you "You can't do that, it's too weird." You know what? Fuck 'em.

If you're a painter -- well, you're probably already a frequent traveler to the island of weird, so you can really push the envelope of strangeness here. Paint on the kitchen floor with the expensive unused condiments crowded into your fridge door. Call it "Tapenade on Tile with Sriracha."

If your medium is cakes and pastries, experiment with some strange new ingredients and whip up some kind of savory Geoduck and Daikon tartlets. (If you aren't familiar with these ingredients, it's probably because they're pretty weird. They also both look strangely like gigantic penises, which is a fun bonus.)

Anyway, you get the picture. Just make it weird.

You can go back to "normal" later on. For now, enjoy playing with some of the other less-used  settings on your dial.

Just remember --

Weird is good.

Getting My Stitches Out

"Scars are not injuries ... A scar is a healing.

After injury, a scar is what makes you whole."

-- China Mieville, The Scar

Self portrait 3-6-14

"I don't want to die without any scars."

-- Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club

Looking Like I Could Kick Yer Ass

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder 

and it may be necessary from time to time 

to give a stupid or misinformed beholder a black eye."

-- Miss Piggy

Self portrait 3-1-14

When I took this self portrait of my newly surger-ized face yesterday, there was hardly any swelling yet.

I looked kind of tough. Scrappy. Like I was looking for a rumble. Like I could maybe kick ass in a street fight.

This morning, however, it's way worse. My eye is almost swollen shut, and I look like I got my ass kicked. More precisely, I look like I got my face kicked. By a mule. Also, it hurts.

At times like this, vanity and beauty go out the window. You simply have to suck it up and accept that you're going to look  like shit for a while.

Mostly I've been staying inside and hoping to avoid other people until I'm relatively healed. But I'm going to have to venture out sooner or later. So I guess I'll just put on my big kid panties and my tough guy swag (and some sunglasses), and go with it.

Because this is a disguise I can't wash off.

I'm just gonna have to roll with the punches.