Deus ex machina

"What marks his plays is the way things get so mixed up the characters are trapped. Do you see what I mean? A bunch of different people appear, and they've got their own situations and reasons and excuses, and each one is pursuing his or her own brand of justice or happiness. As a result, nobody can do anything. Obviously. I mean, it's basically imposible for everybody's justice to prevail or everybody's happiness to triumph, so chaos takes over. And then what do you think happens? Simple - a god appears in the end and starts directing traffic. 'You go over there, and you come here, and you get together with her, and you just sit still for a while.' Like that. He's kind of a fixer, and in the end everything works out perfectly. That call this 'deus ex machina'. There's almost always a deus ex machina in Euripides, and that's the point where critical opinion divides over him."

"Norwegian Wood", H. Murakami

Feeling Good

Birds flying high you know how I feel
Sun in the sky you know how I feel
Breeze driftin' on by you know how I feel

It's a new dawn
It's a new day
It's a new life
For me
And I'm feeling good

Fish in the sea you know how I feel
River running free you know how I feel
Blossom on the tree you know how I feel

Dragonfly out in the sun you know what I mean, don't you know
Butterflies all havin' fun you know what I mean
Sleep in peace when day is done
That's what I mean

And this old world is a new world
And a bold world
For me

Stars when you shine you know how I feel
Scent of the pine you know how I feel
Oh freedom is mine
And I know how I feel

Wrinkles

"There was something almost mysterious about this woman. Her face had lots of wrinkles. These were the first thing to catch your eye, but they didn't make her old. Instead, they emphasized a certain youthfulness in her that transcended age. The wrinkles belonged where they were, as if they had been part of her face since birth. When she smiled, the wrinkles she was neither smiling nor frowning, the wrinkles lay scattered over her face in a strangely warm, ironic way. Here was a woman in her late thirties who seemed not merely a nice person but whose niceness drew you to her. I liked her from the moment I saw her."

From Norwegian Wood by H. Murakami.

Listening You

They are strong; because they give meanings... They are fragile; because they live at the cliff of the beauty. You cannot even touch; you cannot even move your eyes. Watching them is as though understanding everything in this universe just for a moment… The colors, the softness, the innocence, the shyness, and the fragrance; how beautiful - how fragile - how mute. They capture me; my legs turn to be their legs, my arms become their arms. Then, they could go anywhere they would like to… This is the moment they could run, and my arms and my legs could feel.

Listening you is as though watching one of them.

Nelson Mandela

"No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite." N. Mandela

Antagonistic

From Austin. It was on the wall of the hotel room where we stayed. Thank you Olga!

The Dispossessed

The Dispossessed!

Searching for Words

"I wondered if she was trying to convey something to me, something she could not put into words - something prior to words that she could not grasp within herself and which therefore had no hope of ever turning into words. Instead, she would fiddle with her baratte, dab at the corners of her mouth with a handkerchief, or look into my eyes in that meaningless way. I wanted to hold her tight when she did these things, but I would hesitate and hold back. I was afraid I might hurt her if I did that. And so the two of us kept walking the streets of Tokyo, Naoko searching for words in space."

Norwegian Woods, H. Murakami

Just-in-time

Nina Simone!

Torn Apart

A dialog between the man and his shadow after the Gatekeeper torn apart the man and his shadow (by H. Murakami):

----------------

I drew near the shadow. "Sorry, I must leave you for now," I said. "It was not my idea. I had no choice. Can you accept being alone for a while?"

"A while? Until when?" asked the shadow. I did not know.

"Sure you won't regret this later?" said the shadow in a hushed voice. "It's wrong, I tell you. There's something wrong with this place. People can't live without their shadows, and shadows can't live without people. Yet they're splitting us apart. I don't like it. There's something wrong here."

But it was too late. My shadow and I were already torn apart. 

"Once I am settled in, I will be back for you," I said. "This is only temporary, not forever. We will be back together again."

The shadow sighed weakly, and looked up at me. The sun was bearing down on us both. Me without my shadow, my shadow without me. "That's just wishful thinking," said the shadow. "I don't like this place. We have to escape and go back to where we came from, the two of us." 

"How can we return? We do not know the way back." 

"Not yet, but I'll find out if it's the last thing I do. We need to meet and talk regularly. You'll come, won't you?"

I nodded and put my hand on my shadow's shoulder, then returned to the Gatekeeper. While the shadow and I were talking, the Gatekeeper had been gathering up stray rocks and flinging them away. As I approached, the Gatekeeper brushed the dust from his hands on his shirttails and threw a big arm around me. Whether this was intended as a sign of welcome or to draw

my attention to his strength, I could not be certain. 

"Trust me. Your shadow is in good hands," said the Gatekeeper. "We give it three meals a day, let it out once a day for exercise. Nothing to worry about."

"Can I see him from time to time?"

"Maybe," said the Gatekeeper. "If I feel like letting you, that is."

"And what would I have to do if I wanted my shadow back?"

"I swear, you are blind. Look around," said the Gatekeeper, his arm plastered to my back.

"Nobody has a shadow in this Town, and anybody we let in never leaves. Your question is meaningless." 

So it was I lost my shadow.

----------------------

The Roads

It was early in the morning, February 2014. The sun hadn’t been embraced us yet. A long way was waiting towards somewhere that we don't know, towards somewhere that we couldn't put our intentions… We were feeling as though the roads were already chosen and we were just the follower… I remember the sunrise on the road. I remember the sunlight penetrating the fogs on the empty fields and the shadows of the trees lying on them. It was a moment that the time should freeze its ticks. It was amazing… It was breathtaking… 

The Diagrammer

The Diagrammer by Mergenthaler - 1970 from Linotype: The Film on Vimeo.

Cicadas

"The officer gave his order, and the bullets from the Model 38 rifles ripped through the smooth hide of a tiger, tearing at the animal's guts. The summer sky was blue, and from the surrounding trees the screams of cicadas rained down like a sudden shower."

The Wind-up Bird Chronicle, H. Marukami

The Man with the Books

While he is reading his books, you are the light in the house... And, the sorrow is the cry of the light, to be seen, but not to be realized... This is the love and this is the hate. You are on the bridge connecting these two worlds. You are on the ocean between the lands.

Lia Soleil

7:38 PM!

The Vlad Astrophysicist

Thank you TomTom!

A December Night

It was a December night in New York City. I was walking in the crowded streets as if I knew where to go. Unknown faces, unknown places. My steps were like the ticks of the time. Tick... tock... tick... tock... I was seeing the first fall of the snowflakes.

2013-2005

From 5GNOW presentation by Gerhard Wunder.

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Rice Pudding or Macaroni Gratin?

"... Like, when something happens, whether it's a big event that affects the whole society or something small and personal, people talk about it like, "Oh, well, of course, that happened because such and such" and most of the time people agree and say, like, "Oh, sure, i see," but i just don't get it. "A is like this, so that's why B happened." I mean, that doesn't explain anything. It is like when you put instant rice pudding mix in a bowl in the microwave and push the button, and you take the cover off when it rings, and there you've got rice pudding. I mean, what happens in between the time when you push the switch and when the microwave rings? You can't tell what's going on under the cover. Maybe the instant rice pudding first turns into macaroni gratin in the darkness when nobody's looking and only then turns back into rice pudding. We think it's only natural to get rice pudding after we put rice pudding mix in the microwave and the bell rings, but to me that's just a presumption. I would be kind of relieved if, every once in a while, after you put rice pudding mix in the microwave and it rang and you opened the top, you got macaroni gratin. I suppose I'd be shocked, of course, but i don't know, i think i'd be kind of relieved too. Or at least I think I wouldn't be so upset, because that would feel, in some ways, a whole lot more real."

A nice complain from May Kasahara :)

May Kasahara's Point of View - The Wind-up Bird Chronicle, H. Marukami,