We All Love in Accepting Ways

 

 

Even when so much has passed

Through and next our path to go

It will happen that the foretold

On a day clear as a singer’s throat

Will join a promise with its own

Surprise

 

And in the rush of finishing

A journey we started alone

Across the way, where footprints show the way

It will happen that the foretold

Will make a wet rock

A rest for our tired wait

 

And then, as quiet as an acorn falling

Vast spaces will hold the whisper we shared

In acceptance and in hope

That foot prints along our journey

Will still leave a patch of old snow

Untouched

 

And it is there

That winter will carry the cozy in its breath

To melt that patch in slow and in the sign of the goodbye

That was left behind a door, on a winter day

In a past that let footsteps mark the path

Where we once got lost

With acceptance

 

November 21, 2020

© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2020

 

PS/ In 2014 I co-authored a fictional biography book with a friend and writer I had met four decades ago. The publisher of the book, a Montréal, Canada based printing house, wanted to use one of my photographs for the cover. The choice was made to use a photo I had taken in Nazaré, Portugal where a couple walked on the sandy beach next to foot prints already on the sand.

Here is about that book and a photo of the cover:

https://vahezen.blogspot.com/2014/04/this-posting-will-be-different-from-my.html

This poem tackles similar memories.

Chambre En Desarroi

 

The shadow 

Of an orchid

Washes the wall

In purple and in promise

Pillows 

Got lost

Fell off the bed

In remembrance

And with a smile

Sunrise is bright

As windows are

Without curtain

So the Big Dipper

Finds its way

Unnoticed

The dog snores

Under my bed

And a coyote

Retires

From the night

It is time

To water

The orchid

November 10, 2020

© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2020

Neural Connectivity and Social Distancing

 

Years ago, when the first Apple Macintosh 128K computer was released in 1984, I recall spending countless hours writing my dissertation, and being delighted that I could change anything I had typed in a second compared to the typewriter days that were only a couple of years in the past.

And, typing till the early hours of the morning while the snowstorm was raging over that small Midwestern town, we had a definition of our relationship with the Macintosh: “Companionship without Compassion.”

The Internet seemed to remedy to the above solitary relationship by facilitating social connectedness. Now we learned to use technology to stay connected.

Yet, compassion did not seem to be defined in the innumerable combinations of 1&0. Even when connected, we had distance among and across us. The virtual boundaries of our connectedness were "safe" because denuded from compassion, touch, and smell and often sound. We were now part of a network, created through and by technologies that would change us and our world in less than 40 years. And the social connectedness definition would now join a new paradigm, that of “connectivity.” Indeed, now our interaction, virtual and without being enwrapped in compassion, was defined thru becoming one of the at least two points in a network and establishing a connection.

A book I enjoyed to read about this topic is by a professor from Utrecht University José Van Dijck “The Culture of Connectivity. A Critical History of Social Media.” And, while learning about the role of the media in connectedness and connectivity, my mind made connections between the biological world of the brain and the importance of distance in both social media users and the connectivity in neural networks.

Here is how my medico-biological world helped me understand digital connectivity and social connectedness:

A distinct line of analytic neuroscience research deals with the understanding of geometric distance and the effectiveness of human brain networks. It is of course unadvised to make comparisons across disciplines by mixing biologic, metabolic and social topics, but the connectivity in the digital world reminded me of neural network connectivity, and the connectedness across media of the concept of distance. A recent article about geometric distance and brain networks by Alessio Perenelle at al. “Dependence of connectivity on geometric distance in brain networks” Scientific Reports 9; Article no. 13412 (2019) discusses this topic in an accessible style for wide audiences.

Another scholarly analysis of the brain networks is from Brazil by Jean Faber et al’, “Critical elements for connectivity analysis of brain networks” (2019) arxiv.org/ftq/arxiv/papers/1904/1904.07231.pdf which builds upon the earlier work of Bullmore and Sporns. My favorite summary of the latter authors' thesis is:

The dependence of connectivity on the physical distance appears to be a trade-off between the complexity required to carry out cognitive tasks and the metabolic costs of establishing and sustaining s huge number of elements and links

And that trade-off brought me back to the physical distancing imposed upon us by the digital technology. Interestingly, no one today even thinks about how life was before virtual everything. But we are now affected by “social distancing” imposed upon us by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Physical distancing and social distancing. In both instances it is a form of isolation, of loneliness and often depressive moods for some. But in either instance it is for survival either in a world changing because driven by new technology, or a new social configuration where people remain fellow humans but also vectors, carriers, and sometimes inconsiderate citizens.

So, we will connect two points in a network and we may learn where the nods are, but many of us will often take a halt and recall how things were when  “good morning” was followed by a warm hug not an emoji!

 

September 21, 2020

© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2020

 

PS/ I took this photo with a Soviet/Ukrainian medium format Kiev camera in Vienna, Austria near the Stefan Dome cathedral. There is a lack of connectivity AND connectedness in this photo even when one person was mimicking Charlie Chaplin!

Short or Long, the Tale of Our Lives Remains Ours

We are filled with the uncoordinated sum of blessings. And tears. And wishes. But we always dream of that volcano that has left the mountain dormant. Or quiet.

Our fingerprints are formed when the fetus touches the womb. It is the first touch, the one that defines us. Ridges, arches, whorls and loops mean nothing then. How we touch remains in us as the memory of a chaotic world where we bounce in the density and fluidity of our time capsule.

And when we leave feet out first or shoulder or head, we already know what to expect. Just that we do not know when.

The rest is a tale shaped as pre-planned. We just go through it pretending it is a surprise, a discovery or a riddle. But when we smell the last night’s sweat upon our pillow, we know. It was not a surprise, nor a riddle. A discovery, perhaps.

And when we leave again, feet pointed west or shoulders caved in from the burden of time, we have forgotten it all.

Except, when  feet pointed west or shoulders caved in, we still think of that volcano which now has a name we recall. One more time. For the last time.

Because a dormant mountain is just a pile of rocks. It is boring.

September 5, 2020

© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2020

La Belle Dame Sans Soucis

I do not need a muse

 Floating like a mid-morning thought 

To remember

The gentle breeze 

That left  me lonely

 On an August night 

When hands that had made 

Breakfast 

On a snowy morning 

Waved goodbye 

And left the door open 

 I do not need a muse 

To paint photos of blue seas 

Where I left a name so short 

That a midnight breath 

Could hardly recall 

After a search in the narrow streets

Of a city where a secret was shared

Next to a building of old stones 

And never repeated 

Over time

Continents

And lonesome sunsets

 I do not need a muse 

To know that I still can 

On a full moon or through 

A desert storm 

Repeat 

What was once left 

With me 

As the door was left open 

And I was left to wonder

If I could still find words 

Colours 

Or a simple touch 

To paint the gentle breeze 

Of an August night 

Next to the bluest sea 

But now I know

That

All I need is to keep 

The door open 

And when on a humid night 

I hear distant thunder and the promise 

Of rain

Away from the seas

Away from cities of steel and concrete 

I secretly let the desert whisper again 

A name 

So short 

So it simply 

Feels good 

To not have a muse

But to know

That I once 

Had 

One 

 August 27, 2020 

© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2020 

 I took this photo with a 1954 Canon L3 rangefinder during a concert by Andrea Bocelli. The slow speed of the shutter made it a parade of memories, muses or ghosts on that stage…

The Beginning and The End of The Tango is The Walk (Robert Duvall)

… And in between walks

Solitude stands alone

On its toes

It is a fight

With the steps

Not taken

It is the look

That sees inside

And not beyond

Skirts with ruffles

Wrap

Around that fight

Like a summer rain

When walking on the beach

Alone

… And between walks

Shoulders carry

The tired tempo

Of rejection

PS/ I took this photo of street Tango dancers in Barcelona with a 1969 Nikon F.

July 19, 2020

© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2020

If There's Any Kind of Magic in this World, It Must be in the Attempt of Understanding Someone, Sharing Something. (Céline in Before Sunset)

The pandemic has given me the space to rediscover what I had forgotten to remember.  I have focused on writing and painting since street photography is at halt now: how can one take photos of people when the streets are empty?

In some ways, walking back on the streets of time can have similar challenges. What if you walk back and over the past half a century there are few people you meet again on those streets? What if they seem now different, strangers, and you do not find anything to talk about?

Walking back is also surrounded by goodbyes. You see faces, you recall names, but you mostly find yourself in buildings, in various countries, in train stations, in airports. You hear the crowd, or you hear nothing. You smell tobacco and tea in a remote countryside, or your senses become sterile and unassuming.

.. When I am not writing or walking the desert away from masked and unmasked people, I like to watch a movie. In fact this is a new experience since before the pandemic I never had the luxury of personal time so frequently.  I like Scandinavian TV series and movies. Somehow the minimalist action and the thoughtful content are fresh escapes from car chases, violence, drugs and gratuitous sex. It also makes it comforting to see that actors do not have perfectly white implanted teeth! It makes the watch more compatible with daily life. 

But this time as I was moving through the movies on Netflix, I stopped on a Spanish 2016 movie titled “The Reconquest” or “La Reconquista”. I knew nothing about it so decided to start watching it.

…As a street photographer I am not keen on studying context or frame of where a shot may take place. Rather, I have learned to anticipate (people are mostly predictable…) what can happen when this or that are in the moment. So I stay ready to click just before it happens. So I did not read about the movie, just thought the title fit in my present mood of returning and rediscovering.

… A few seconds after the movie started, I had the funny feeling of watching the 1995 cultish movie ”Before Sunrise” by Richard Linklater. Like thousands of viewers, I thought Julie Delpy was someone many have met at some point. She was fresh, spontaneous and real. Of course Linklater built on the success to proceed with a Trilogy as “Before Sunset” (2004) and “Before Midnight” (2013).

The central theme is goodbyes and retrouvailles between a young couple. It was perhaps that aspect of life that attracted me most. After all, since the modern Homo sapiens walked this earth 50,000 years ago, it is estimated that 108 billion humans have so far come and gone. I think it would be impossible not to have 108 billion goodbyes having happened, with or without retrouvailles.

The simple statements, and underlying down-to-earth philosophy of “Before Sunrise” may be when Céline (Delpy) said:

“It's depressing, no? That the... the only thing we're gonna think of is when we're gonna have to say goodbye tomorrow”

And Jesse (Hawke) proposed:

“ Well, we could say goodbye now. Then we wouldn't have to worry about it in the morning.”

There you have it – instead of rejecting what is bound to happen, finding harmony with reality.

… La Reconquista has a similar theme. Manuela (Itasaso Arana) and Olmo (Francesco Carril), childhood sweethearts, meet in Madrid for one evening to relive the past and think about the future. The movie is fresh as Manuela’s smile and delightfully conversant eyes. It is as comforting as Olmo’s silent smile. There is no violence, no sex, not even a single kiss. It is all about walking that street back and celebrating the walk they separately took 15 years before that evening in Madrid.

While Céline and Jesse shared existential philosophy in there conversations through 3 movies, La Reconquista  lets the Spanish troubadour/poet Rafael Berrio sing the philosophy of expectations, wasted time and goodbyes. It is pure poetry sung by Berrio and embodied by Itsaso and Carril.

Here are a few translated lines from Berrio’s songs:

If everything in it is an improvised and stuffed part

I am afraid I have spent my life gathering the courage I lack

And declaring solemn intentions in front of the mirror

Leaving things for a better time that never arrives

… That time might have happened early in life but we always think there is more to come., That is why we live a life of postponing things instead of recognizing that the best moments of our lives can be early on. Hence we need to celebrate and hold on to these. Not bypass them as mere building stones toward something bigger. In some way, that is the message of La Reconquista – not goodbyes, not retrouvailles and Hollywood endings. Just now 30 year old Manuela ad Olmo who meet for one evening in Madrid to recognize and celebrate that the best moment of their lives happened when they were teenagers, 15 years ago. There is no reconquest in the sense of getting back together. No. The reconquest is of the times 15 years ago when they experienced the magic of being together, unconditionally. And in order to keep that feeling unaltered, Manuela wrote a goodbye note to Olmo. Not because she wanted to leave him, but because she wanted to keep the moment in its grandeur.

And these are reflected upon in other lines from Berrio as:

I have always been distracted with my mind so far away

I am afraid I am badly wounded

I am afraid I have used myself up

To live

And now it is late

Quite late

I am afraid I am badly wounded

I am afraid I have used myself up

As if I

Had the talent

To live

Twice

… We do not sleep in the same bed twice. We do not step in the same river twice. And surely we do not live twice. But if, like a street photographer, we are ready to click when a story unfolds for us, we may have captured that magic moment that does not need the rest of our lives to wait for. It is now part of our rediscovery to love, celebrate and remember.

PS/ By coincidence, this morning I read a January 22, 2020 Vanity Fair interview with Richard Linklater where he does not seem to dismiss the possibility of a 4^th “Before” movie… Well, I do hope that he keeps it to the trilogy as they represent a specific time capsule of a genre.

July 18, 2020

© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2020