Alan Gordon Illustrations- Journals, blog 1 Bibliographical

1. Me, Myself, & I

"Our ideas held no water, but we used 'em like a dam." - Modest Mouse

1- Me, Myself & I 2-Politics 3-Art 4-Race 5-Consumerism 6-Children 7-Media & Society 8-General 9-Paranormal next

(August 2007) What's in a name?

My son Asher XT Gordon was born in 2004. My wife and I labored over names; we both knew that it had to mean something special. Something for us, something for him, and something for the future.

I was exposed to charged racial situations early in my life. At this point, I think that it is important for me to point out that I have not had an abundance of black friends. I am not pretending. But, I have had a few good friends and acquaintances throughout my life, which makes these incidents (by percentage) all the more powerful. I may not have had a lot of black friends, but I have had even fewer real heroes.

In grade school, I moved from nearly all white suburbs to a nearly all black city school. My first experience with race was with a “troubled” boy (whom I befriended) named Cecil Cooper. He was black, and I invited Cecil over for dinner one day, and he abruptly asked “how do your parents feel about black people?” I didn’t really know the answer to this, and I was surprised by the question. I remember thinking: What difference does it make if you’re black? That’s how naive I was. This was the first of many experiences of being reminded and confronted by race while growing up. Sometimes it would go under my radar, sometimes it would raise my awareness, and other times it would raise my anger. I went from the white middle class suburbs to the inner city, and then back to the upper class suburbs. My education placement went from average (middle class), to top tier (inner city), to bottom tier (upper class). That upper class placement never let me forget where I came from. I was that white kid from the city, a place where poor people lived. Later on, there was the time I went into a record store with my black friend Al, and after leaving he pointed out that they had heat-sealed his bag shut, but not mine. There was the high school bon fire where my black friend Derek had numerous racial comments directed solely at him by the one of the sheriffs who busted it up. There was the boyfriend from Kentucky of the girl having a small college house party who pulled out a Ku Klux Klan outfit and told nigger jokes as soon as the “negroes” left the party (true story). Race is so prevalent to my history, that it is intricately interwoven into who I am.

I grew up during the 70’s- with heroes like Hank Arron, and Muhammad Ali. I grew up during the dawn of Hip Hop, and was exposed to Run DMC in 1983, and regularly believed that the dawn of rap was the music of the revolution. In my first college literature class I was exposed to the works of James Baldwin, Langston Hughes, and the Harlem Renaissance. When I read the autobiography of Malcolm X in 1987, it literally changed my life. I heard one of the most moving political speeches of my life come from Jesse Jackson at the 1988 Democratic convention ("You must never stop dreaming. Face the pain of reality- yes, but don't stop with the way things are. Dream of things as they ought to be."). When I was turned on to Malcolm, the prevailing mentality from the white population was that he was a violent reverse-racist (which is in itself a misnomer). I came away with a different idea of Malcolm. His life and the changes within his short life were deeply inspirational.

I saw Malcolm X as a hero. Not make believe, but a real hero. And like I stated earlier, I did not have an abundance of real heroes. The short facts are: In his youth, his family was subjected to horrific crimes ranging from racial humiliation to murder. His life followed a road of crime, hustling, and superficial coping mechanisms. In prison he was exposed to Islam and education. He returned to a childhood love of knowledge and changed his life to move away from avoidance to confrontation. He became a leader out of a love for his people, and as a necessary defense (some may say offense) in racist America. He advocated change “By Any Means Necessary”, and was a vocal critic of race, American history, and the government. He had the courage to confront his own convictions, and he did by constantly evolving his philosophy until his murder in 1965 at the age of 39.

As of this writing, I’m 39.

I was once asked at a conference to name the most educated, and well rounded individual I could think of, and why. I named Malcolm X (to the obvious shock of my educational counterparts). I explained that he was the total package. He is the high water mark of how good and admirable a human being can become, no matter where they start out. He was versatile in knowledge, had ferocious oratory skills, legendary convictions, he sweated truth and bled honesty. Always fiery, but never showy- he liked to Make it Plain. That’s the way he preferred to be introduced. How could I not have someone of this caliber, this American hero, this example of what I think the human race should strive to be- factor into the name of my son? For many people Malcolm X is the past- a history of what was. For me, he is the future of what will be.

(April 2008) Thunder's End

In September of 1993 at the age of 78, my father passed away. In October of 1993, I took a part time job working in an animal hospital. I wanted the job because I loved animals, and I needed to do something extra that felt soothing. One day in October I came in to find a large German Sheppard half in a large cage, and half on a blanket on the floor of the back exam area. It was alive, but just laying there. His name was Thunder. Thunder suffered from a common problem with large dogs. His stomach had twisted and he could not ingest food, nor process anything in his bowel. At the time it was a $600 surgery to fix the problem. All day I sat around and petted him, waiting to see if he was going to have surgery or if he was going to be put down. ALL DAY I waited. The whole time I was petting him I was thinking about my father being in intensive care for 3 months. There was medication being administered to ease the discomfort, and an IV, and everything we could do to make him comfortable. Just at closing, the owner came in. He was a gruff man in his 30's that looked like a trucker. He could not pay for the surgery and opted to put Thunder down. I held Thunder on my lap while they injected him. I made the decision to have my father taken off of life support less than a month prior. I felt his breathing slow, I felt his heart stop, and then Thunder was not there…my father was not there- they were just gone. There was a body, but no dog. There was a body, but no person. Whatever my father was- what was left was not what I knew.

At the same time as this event I was teaching Illustration at R.I.T., and I did a painting demonstration for every class I taught. I thought that this was a great chance to show students that the depth of visual art can hit on many levels. That the idea was to capture the change of that moment, from life to death. Something “real” and something missing. Chaos to nothing. Sound to silence. And in my head, maybe to understand the weight of my fathers death. This painting hangs in my dining room and represents one of the great turning points of my life- the one where I had to suddenly pay attention.

I find myself thinking about this a lot- that moment when what makes us "us"...goes away. That moment when we just return to being a random selection of stuck together carbon. I titled it “Thunders End” for a few reasons. Obviously it was the end of this dog’s life. But more importantly there was a painting by Andrew Wyeth called Distant Thunder. Many people have characterized this painting as a signal to the oncoming turbulence of the mid to late 60's. It was painted prior to the mass social upheaval and change (The dog is said to have his ear perked at the thunder which represents the coming social change). I was a big fan of his work, and it just clicked: "Distant Thunder...Thunder's End". His painting may have symbolized the social upheaval breaking the peace of the nap. My painting was more about the internal struggle and loss of my father. I am not comparing my work to Andrew Wyeth, I am bringing Wyeth into my understanding. I have 2 or 3 paintings that I think are actually important. Not just as art, but as markers for my life. This is one of the most important.

(August 2008) The Wall within

"We don't need no education. We don't need no thought control.

Hey- Teachers leave those kids alone! All in all we're just another brick in the wall."

I had no idea what I was listening to as a teen when I put Pink Floyd’s the Wall on my record player for the first time in 1982, but I knew it was something important. I had no idea why so many people wanted me to watch this new fangled V-H-S of a movie based on the album. You can just sense when you are witnessing creative genius unfold in front of you. It pulls up the shades to let the light in, and that is what this music did to me- it blasted the light into me. It planted the very first seed of doubt in large political or social movements. It fed the small lil’ part of me inside that was hiding an individual. It’s only now that I am older, how much I realize the powerful effect and the importance of that message. (That's Roger Waters spray painting "No Thought Control" on Israel's separation barrier in Bethlehem.)

As a teen, I fell into the group in “need of direction”- but there was very little there to offer me anything substantial. The adults in my life were very removed, some cared- and some didn’t. That’s life, but every kid desperately desires help- whether they admit it or not. I had friends who were all over the board; some studious-some slacker, some racist-some political, some sexist-some old school, some innocent-some guilty, some tuned out-and some tuned in. They were all products of the adults in their lives. That IS what adults are, every adult is a guide and a teacher- whether they admit it or not. What the Wall did for my generation x was to reinforce the belief that we do not need to fall in line like everyone else. That individualism keeps a society honest. It spoke to us in a way that only true art can- to the core of our being. That is the importance of art. It made us believe that we can rise up, that in the end- we can win…even if winning only means that we get to stand up before being slapped down. It exposed those slippery slopes that lead to dubious power, slopes that are created by a weakness and insulated against through bully-like behavior later in life. It strengthened an old-core-moral standing that we all contain the ability to make the right choice, even after many wrongs. And it shined a light on the growing disconnection of youth and adults. God this music is good!

I credit this story- this music- this creative genius with starting me on my path of self examination, and my interest in community equality. I am not crediting it with making me Mother Teresa (I am far from it), or making me utilize every hour to help mankind- just in being a piece of the puzzle that gave me direction when I really needed a map. All along my life's way, at any point- I could have taken a different path. What kept me on the right path was music like the Wall. And to all of those moral activists preaching that music is what ruins youth, I give you one more rebellious Johnny Cash middle finger to tell you that music is part of what saved me. How many have been saved by censorship?

So whenever I am overwhelmed by the struggle of financial life as an artist...when I am hounded by those barking about 401K's, and money-money-money, and expensive cars-vacations- success and failure, or the grand technology running every aspect of our lives...when I watch CNN-or FOX news-or read a newspaper, or see the latest self-help craze (scientology, mediums talking to the dead, or kabbalah anyone?) or hear just about any politician- I just need to put this CD on to feel strong again. It led to the right path- one of free and independent thought.

(January 2009) Fence sitting as a classification

Dying does not wash away the sins of living, it just makes us realize that we must fix the ills within alone. (My own proverb)

I think that I am a fence-sitter. My whole life points to having this dilemma as a core of my DNA. I always find myself stuck between 2 places, so much so that I am not even sure how to write on this topic. Do I make a list? Do I approach it in humor, or in all seriousness? Is it too personal, or is there a chance that someone reading it may identify with it or be helped? Maybe I am a split personality that has yet to come unglued. Maybe I'll end up at a Midas Muffler shop at 3am trying to order tacos with no pants on. Oh, that'll probably never happen as I don't really like tacos. So, I guess I’ll just start with the collision of my father and mother.

An abbreviated outline of my father:

My father was a child of the great depression, and a veteran of World War II. He came from a tight Jewish family. I was brought every weekend to the synagogue, and had a yamaka slapped on my head, but I was allowed to sit in the lounge reading comics instead of being in the service. I was also called by my father on every Jewish holiday and reminded to call his family- but I was not forced into religion. Despite a huge age gap (he was 52 when I was born), we got along very well. I celebrated Christmas, which my father also celebrated…by “celebrated” I mean he gave gifts and cards and came by for dinner. He was a recovering alcoholic and a liquor salesman. He had 20 years on my mother, and they divorced when I was 5. He was a pack rat…he had dust so thick on his tables it turned into a wax. His organization skills of what he owned was simply to stack it up on the floor against a wall. Tables were loaded with papers, coupons, fast food napkins (he would simply walk into Burger King, take about 100 napkins and leave!), paperclips in piles, and on his car gear shift he had hundreds of rubber bands. To put it mildly, he kept everything- he was a clutter savant.

An Abbreviated outline of my mother:

My mother was adopted and at the very least emotionally abused. She has shown little in the way of ties to family through strained-tenuous interactions. To put it even more mildly- we never really got along. She grew up in an all-white area of Florida, and in her own words the only black student was thought to just be “un-washed and dirty”. Bigotry was the norm from her childhood. She was also an alcoholic and lifelong smoker. She worked a variety of jobs, from selling Tupperware to home realty to house cleaning. Her first husband (she has had a total of 4) worked for NASA, and they were friends with Neil Armstrong when he landed on the moon. My mother was not obsessive compulsive (OCD), but she was all about having things put away. She would spontaneously repaint a room, or re-organize, or steam clean the carpets. Eventually she ran her own cleaning business, and in stark contrast to my father often prematurely de-cluttered by throwing away things she might need in the future. So to sum that up...

Depression/WWII vet, pack-rat/clutter king, Jew, family tied father

50's teen, overly organized, anti-clutter, Christian, non-family tied mother

This created quite a dynamic by those assigned to my rearing...how has this all translated to me?

Career

1. I went to school for both commercial art and fine art (2 complete opposites, to put this in perspective...one is someone telling me what to do/ and doing it in a clear concrete manner...and one is independent/ and doing it in an abstract manner...it would be like trying to talk in English and Spanish at the same time).

2. I am an artist, but I do not care for the stigma attached to that choice. Artists are stereotyped, and I do not fit (nor do I embrace) that mold.

3. I have worked as a college professor, and in social services (for a number of years at the same time). So I have full degrees in one field, but work in a field that I have no degrees in. That dichotomy came to be due to my art studies spurring the social justice within me, but offering little in the way of doing anything to create meaningful change.

Personal

4. I have a wicked sweet tooth and I am a diabetic.

5. I am a white guy that has had a long passion for race. I was a white suburban kid dropped into a nearly all black grade school for 3 years, my MFA masters thesis was on race relations, large portions of my artwork has a focus on race, I worked with nearly all inner city black youth for 9 years, and I read a lot of black literature (I love Harlem Renaissance poetry- in particular Langston Hughes).

6. For at least 7-8 years, I spent weekdays at my mothers house, and weekends at my fathers. They remained good friends throughout the rest of my father’s life, even after my mother re-married. This meant as a child my weeks were always divided.

7. I am very familiar with World War II era history, but I am a 70's child. Growing up, my friends heard Crosby Stills & Nash, and stories of Vietnam. I heard the Andrews Sisters, and World War II stories.

8. To add perspective to that I listen to jazz, big band, and modern alternative music.

9. As an adult, I also continue to play videogames and like toys.

10. I am skeptically minded person that also loves the paranormal, but I don't believe.

11. I have 12 years on my wife, my father had 20 on my mother.

12. I am from the pre-internet/computer days. I am always torn between technology and hands-on methods. Which is funny because I have had a website since 1999, but I have NEVER had a cell phone.

a. This does not even touch the typical family secrecy aspect of alcoholism, as that is a personal issue that I have spent much time on myself. I only mention that because it created another split in my life of real life and fake life. It’s worth pointing out that I am not an alcoholic (I rarely drink), and I am fully aware of the children of alcoholism syndrome.

b. Nor does it really take into account religion. As I mentioned, I was exposed to both the Jewish and Christian faith- but left to my own accord. This means that I am in neither camp. In fact, I am in a whole other area. While I am spiritual, I consider myself a Taoist. In actuality, I am anti-religion. While I respect those beliefs that respect my belief- I do not believe in "God".

I have used that term “fence-sitting” for a long time, because I was so regularly challenged in college about my choices in art. Being an "illustrator" in a fine art program caused great distress for my professors. I may just have well been sitting there smoking crack and planning serial killing with the way I was looked upon. People want you in a category, not outside. That's a normal response, otherwise we become overwhelmed by all the variations we come into social contact with each day. I honestly think that my first protest to being “pigeon-holed” came in 4th grade. Instead of actually taking the standardized test, I just randomly marked boxes. I remember thinking "Why do I have to sit here for an hour? This is boring. I can do this really fast and be done." After they scored the tests, there was some type of meeting and I was put in a remedial class! …Swear to god that's true (see? I don't believe in God, but here I am swearing to one). Just as good is that when I switched from a nearly all white suburban school in 4^th grade to an inner city school, I went from that remedial class to the advanced class. Then two years later when I returned to another suburban district, I found myself once again pushed back into the remedial class. I went from the middle class suburbs to the inner city to an affluent suburb, only to return to where I started. Even that young I was exposed to (and understood) the effects of money and social status.

Does this mean I am doomed to never pick a side, or is it just a life-long case of not wanting to be classified? I still enjoy having someone look at me, the way I dress, my skin color, my education- and have certain expectations. I embrace gorilla tactics in social situations. They expect a soft core vanilla, and instead get Malcolm X. They expect nice sofa sized paintings of flowers, and instead get a dead dog painting. I waited 10 years to become a full time professor of art only to throw it away for an ethical argument that I was sure to lose. People expect me to hum Journey tunes, and instead hear me pop off Soul Coughing lyrics. I think that the majority of the times that this has affected my life, it has not been in a serious manner. I tend to split myself, but I reap both the benefits and detriments of numerous placements both in social situations and career decisions. So I guess all that this self-indulgent journal amounts to is a shrug of the shoulders. Eh...Time spent writing for no real reason beyond capturing the idea. Whatever the case is, if you should ever see me ordering tacos at a Midas Muffler shop at 3am without any pants on- just go about your business.

(August 2009) The circular wisdom of age and stupidity

As I am navigating through a point in my life where I am noticing everything as it ages, I am finding a lot of time for self-reflection. Which is a chapter that I guess I skipped in my youth. I am seeing the aging of people that I know, and witnessing a loss of parental figures and celebrities that have accompanied me along the way- which in turns forces me to consider what I am doing and I guess, how long I have to do it. We all misspend youth, and I feel like I spent mine on a credit card binge without the income to pay the bill. Youth is about beauty and stupidity. There is the rare youth who is both in the grasp of beauty and experienced wisdom- but I was not one of those few. Little did I realize the comfy ease of day to day living with the want to do’s over the have to do’s.

I aged the hard way, like putting on pants that don't fit- lot's of struggle and denial. Getting older should be about acquiring wisdom. Wisdom that helps cope with the fading beauty and the willingness to comprehend what is changing around you. As I am getting older, the days do not ease by- they are overcrowded with the have to do’s in order to complete the responsibility checklist of adulthood. I think that may be the great life prank- we misspend our youth on trivial issues and cannot return to the days gone by when we are wise enough to know better. Now not everyone that ages is wise, and not everyone that is young is stupid. In 10 years, I may look back to now and declare what an clueless moron I was at this age, as I tend to do in looking back on my youth- I was not overflowing with any fantastic life choices.

I have a favorite common philosophy about intelligence. There is book (or academic) intelligence, and street (or common sense) intelligence- too much of one negates the other. Academic and street smarts are very different things- as are wisdom and intelligence. Intelligence knows how things work, wisdom makes the mistake and learns how to work things correctly (and better) down the road. Intelligence knows, wisdom considers. Wisdom does not forget the mistake, intelligence never knew it in the first place. I know those that are street smart, but are stuck in the rut of always outsmarting themselves. And I know many academically intelligent people, but they seem to be manufacturing a bland life. They have not explored the experiential quandary of making mistakes that pose a serious challenge to one's convictions. And that creates a particular dilemma. Let me put the example of two men I know out there. I have seen the path of an intelligent man (I'll refer to him as a boy scout) living the straight edge life, staying safe with youthful choices, picking a good path. He has made intelligent choices of schooling, employment, wife, and home. Sensible...vanilla...safe. I have seen it all play out to a lovely (if not bland) life. And I have seen a similar (almost identical) safe path destroyed by an unexpected/unforeseen incident mid-way through those vanilla choices. Without any experience, that incident grew to epic proportions- and he had no means to manage the dilemma before it became a full-on disaster. It was enough to derail that train, and once tipped- it could not get back on track. Even though I am watching the boy scout lead a "perfect" life, I dread his looming train wreck. And make no mistake about it, I wish for the best for him- but that train is coming down the line. And my conclusion as I witness these two lives, is that the early mistakes of youth prepare you for the wisdom to manage your life when things don't go right. The life without mistakes offers no true challenges to WHO the person will become through their convictions. But then again, I have never led the mistake-free vanilla life, I have no real idea what it means to always be on the right side of the train wreck. So maybe the prank is not in misspending our youth, but in how that youth is spent in our age. You cannot be old without first being young, you cannot be young without eventually getting old- and you cannot become wise without first experiencing stupidity.

(September 2009) Todd Ponder...the generic life coach

Meet Todd Ponder. He is my generic life coach, he seems to tell me something by saying nothing.

Todd Ponders top 10 Life coachisms:
1. If you go down that road, you'll end up somewhere.
2. Judging others is like building a LEGO house, you'll always be looking for the tight fit and not that one

odd LEGO that doesn't quite snap in so it must be a leftover from another set.
3. A messy house beats a cat on the roof at 4am.
4. Take a stand for something, and don't forget that.
5. If you think it through, you'll end up realizing the pasta is done.
6. You can lead a horse to water, but you'd better be organized about it.
7. You can't live in the past- unless you have a time machine, but mine doesn't work.
8. If we all shook hands more, we'd have one less to punch with.
9. To overcome something means you overcame it.
10. All problems everywhere can be solved with Yoga and a good vegan paste platter.

A bit about Todd:
Todd is 36 years old and used to sell veggie burritos from his back pack at Grateful Dead and Phish shows in the 1980's. Now he has a bachelors degree in life coacheology from EFUCC: Eastern Florida Upstairs Community College. Todd's life goals include: hugging 1 million trees on all 11 continents (including Cuba), performing yoga with Barrack Obama, Rob Lowe, and Tom Cruise, sitting for a spell with mother earth to life coach her back to wellness, and rescuing the Beluga whales from Marineland. He has not quite figured out how to get the Beluga whales out using his moped (74 mpg ya'll!)- but he is looking for a big recycled earth-friendly container that can hold approximately 16,0000 gallons of salt water...preferably with a snap on lid.

1- Me, Myself & I 2-Politics 3-Art 4-Race 5-Consumerism 6-Children 7-Media & Society 8-General 9-Paranormal next