I am at a lovely place called The Virginia Center for the Creative Arts.  It’s in the Blue Ridge Mountains.  I’ve been here before.  It is a place for doing the work that doesn’t quite get done when like you get up and go to work or you get up and look for work or you get up and wonder how the hell will I make it through one more day.  So this is truly a gift to be in a place of beauty.  Where artists, composers, poets and other writers get up and work all day on what they need to.  Me included.

While here, the tvs are often off and the news is not constantly heard.  But even here, the horrors of this August are upon us. The Israel/Gaza conflict; the brutal policing of Black and Brown people including children; the murder of citizens; the acquisition of even greater wealth, all of these things are heard/seen/felt/ deflected if need be.  Artists rarely get this kind of time and space.  We are all grateful.  But it is almost feels as if the whole world needs some time and space to work on things creative, life enhancing, beautiful. Without this side of the proverbial coin, we’d all be as cynical as the men (mostly) and women who wage war; brutally police; make lives difficult for ordinary people.  It is a new century, a new millenium and yet we find ourselves talking about medieval shit–beheadings and such.  Really, this is the best these “rebels” can do.  I think all of those really awful video games have become all too real or have inspired aspects of behavior that no one quite anticipated.  I do a lot of praying.  I don’t know if it helps.  But you know what it helps me.

Okay, now I must get back to work.