A Writer's Work

A writer's work is harder than you might imagine. It isn't about sitting down and writing what comes into your head. Oh no. It's about ideas and creativity and then structure, structure, structure. Then it's about editing: self-editing and then editing by A. N. Other.

Lizzie knew a theatre person (back in the mists of time) who would start out with the text of a play or some dramatic ideas, then begin to take things out as opposed to adding things in. This process of taking out meant that what was left carried more freight of meaning for the reader because there was 'space' around the signifiers. If everything is spelled out, then there is no room for the piece to breath through it's floating signifiers and no room for some creative search for meaning

I realise this is all sounding somewhat postmodern (Should it have the hyphen these days?) Most of the population prefer  classic realist texts that will reassure them that life is knowable and predictable. Most TV is like this. However, I'm afraid this view of life is incorrect. We are in an unknowable and unpredictable universe and our sense that there is a foxed and knowable reality is an illusion.

Hmmm. How did I get from "A writer's work" to our sense of reality being false? Exciting stuff, eh!

Authenticity

I am an authentic personage. I am a worthy sheep.

A writer's work...............

A writer's work is harder than you might imagine. It isn't about sitting down and writing what comes into your head. Oh no. It's about ideas and creativity and then structure, structure, structure. Then it's about editing: self-editing and then editing by A. N. Other.

Lizzie knew a theatre person (back in the mists of time) who would start out with the text of a play or some dramatic ideas, then begin to take things out as opposed to adding things in. This process of taking out meant that what was left carried more freight of meaning for the reader because there was 'space' around the signifiers. If everything is spelled out, then there is no room for the piece to breathe through it's floating signifiers and no room for some creative search for meaning

I realise this is all sounding somewhat post-modern. (Should it have the hyphen these days?) Most of the population prefer classical realist texts that will reassure them that life is knowable and predictable. Most TV is like this. However, I'm afraid this view of life is an illusion. We are in an unknowable and unpredictable universe and our sense of reality is false. 

Hmmm. How did I get from "A writer's work" to our sense of reality being false? Exciting stuff, eh!

An upward-reaching ewe........

It's not that I'm in any shape
to feel myself anew.
Despite the many years of change
I'm still a sheepy ewe.

It's not that I can shape or feel
my way to peace and calm.
A fully rounded personage
of veritable balm.

I'm ovine-dwelling into shape
and burgeoning to be
a roundly upward-reaching ewe
whose almost bourgeoisie.

Mouton Potato: I don't think so!

Yesterday I was really excited about the photo shoot on the terrace for my 'look & feel' in the book. Today, things have taken a serious turn for the worse as Lizzie has been trying to recreate a version of me from a potato. Yes - you haven't been seeing things. A potato, no less!

 

I don't know about you, but this isn't exactly the 'look & feel' that I had in mind. Not only did she make this ...... what I can only describe as a .....'thing'.......... but she actually thought it worth a discussion with some visitors, over tea. 

As if that were not bad enough, these visitors referred to me - real me - relaxing on the lawn, as a "plastic sheep". Plastic! I'm too depressed to write any more............................ 

Photo shoot

Yesterday, I was on a photo shoot for my 'look & feel' in the book. We spent some time outside with Keith and Lizzie taking photos from all angles. It was a fantastic day - very hot and sunny - and today, I'll be outside again just relaxing and thinking about the book. The creative process is a slow one, as all you artists will know. I'm not exactly sure about the theme yet  but it may be something about 'identity'; with a  working title: " Ah...but this is now".

I'm writing a book

I'm writing a book!! Well not me on my own. It's being done in collaboration with Lizzie and Keith, my two house mates and fellow creative types. How exciting is that? We are just in the early stages of getting a feel for what it might look like and what the theme(s) might be. I feel very professional already and am really looking forward to it all.

The three of us will be working on it together (not all at the same time, you understand), so I will keep you informed of progress, both in the literary department, as well as in the 'process' arena - or how well we get on together as a creative team. Hmmm!

Other than this piece of exciting news, life is pretty much the same as one might expect for a sheep in France in the summer: lots of grazing outside and lots of brilliant thinking.

Waving at Schroedinger's Cat

There was this cat. It was in a box. There was this radioactive atom. It was in the box as well. I know it's Sunday and I'm only a mere mouton, but the obvious things to put in with the cat would be some food and water. However, this is science and science is weird.

Now then.......... The fate of this poor cat is dependent upon something called a 'wave function' and an 'observer'. Oh, I forgot to mention the hammer and a flask of cyanide, which is also in with the cat. Well I did say science was weird!

So, while this atom is waiting for the observer to wave at it, both the atom and cat are said to be in a 'superposition'. What might that be then, I hear you ask. Good question. A super position for the cat would be lying down and having a kip, no doubt. But no...The superposition for this cat is next to a geiger-counter. (Stay with me.)

Anyway, it seems that if this atom (Don't forget it's radioactive.) hangs about too long, it decays. (Well don't we all!) Also, if the hammer hits the flask of prussic acid, the cat will die. (But the cat will die if it is left in the box, anyway, so why all this additional paraphernalia!) Oh, I forgot. It's science.

It seems that an important part of this experiment is the wave function of the atom. (Sorry if I misled you about it being the observer waving............) Hence, according to Shroedinger, the atom remains in a 'superposition' of decay and undecay, up until the time the observer opens the box. (The lack of a space in the word 'superposition' as opposed to 'super' and 'position' is clearly crucial, here.) Because this possible dual state of potential pertains to the atom, Shroedinger claims the same can be said for the cat: it is in a 'superposition' of being both dead and alive.

So, the question is: Should the observer open the box? No need. It isn't a real experiment. It's just a Thought Experiment.

However, if you want to know more about atoms, particles, waves and observers, go to this fantastic animation and be truly amazed.

The Never Realised Question

Well hello to Mr Occasional Stirrings. How nice of you to drop in and chat.

I haven't been eating any of those magic mushrooms, (Thank you for asking.) but I can quite understand your reasoning in relation to my recent posts. As a matter of fact, it had crossed my ovine mind that I might be turning into you, now that I stir only occasionally.

I'm not sure what's going on with me, lately. The good lady of the house is busying about and is full of enthusiasm for her latest art projects which she seems to be squeezing in on top of everything else. Me, on the other hand.....................

You are very kind to draw my attention to Half Remarkable Questions. Lordy, Mr O-S. If I'm lost for words, I'll bet they weren't lost for mushrooms!

So there you have it

So there it is. 'It' being anything that you choose it to be. Know that it is there and know that you have it.

If you think about this for a moment, then we have something incredibly liberating: imagine anything in the place of the 'it' and then know you have it. Some 'its' can be had in reality - actually possessed; others can be had in your mind's eye. In each case, there is some aspect of ownership, n'est ce pas?

Seeing is as seeing does

The good lady of the house thought she had cataracts forming on her eyes, last night, because the pages of her book appeared to be somwhat fuzzy.

This morning, she realised that she had put moisturiser on the skin around her eyes and that it was interfering with her ability to see clearly.

But on a clear day, she can see for ever

After the Moment

After my last post there has been a gap. Nothing new there......

So................... when I have a moment, I will take a moment, to be in the moment, to write a post.

On the other hand, I might disappear for a moment, up my own moment, and talk about the 'n-th moment'.

"The n-th moment of a distribution is the expected value of the n-th power of the deviations from a fixed value"

OR, if that doesn't grab you. How about a 'couple moment'?

"The moment of a couple is the product of its force and the distance between its opposing forces." Now why doesn't that surprise me?

Maybe the gaps between my posts are more interesting than the posts?

Knowing in the Moment

The good lady of the house has been discussing the notion of 'presence' with her friend. (Why she can't just talk shopping and hairstyles.......... ?) They were musing on 'context', and the present moment set in linear time.

Let me explain:
Let's say that you are going through old papers, selling things that you have owned for a long time or having a clear out of accumulated 'stuff'. Will the experience of the present moment, doing each of these activities, be different from... say.... creating a new garden or furnishing a new home or choosing a new car? The former list could be framed in terms of 'dealing with the past', whereas the latter could be thought of as 'creating the future'.

Her question was: when doing the doing, does the fact that it might be contextualised as either past or future focused, actually impact upon the experience of the moment of doing?

Now there is some research that suggests that humans can't envision the future without being able to access the memories from their past. If this is so, then notions of past and future are connected in the brain. So where is the present? Is it lost, somehow, between the past and future? I have also heard told, that the whole idea of linear time is a human construct involving a miss-recognition of consciousness. Also, that neither the past nor the future exist at all; that humans live only in the present but are not 'conscious' of it, living 'as if in a dream'. (Try Eckhart Tolle)

So there you have it. The future/past, thing isn't important. Only the present moment can be experienced and that is all there is. The problem for humans is that you are rarely 'there' to appreciate it! (See interesting discussion.)

Deep for me, or what!!
I'll be tackling Cosmology and The Second Law of Thermodynamics next.

Motoring in Moutonland

Motoring in Moutonland
All is going well
Inner landscape getting there
No need to rebel

Motoring in static mode
Trying to be here
In the present moment
Nothing else to fear

Motoring within myself
That's the place to be
Then the world is easy
Happying as me

Motoring Mouton

It seems that the good lady of the house has a new computer. She is very excited by all the new and bigger accoutrements: memory, screen, mega thingies and more up to date programmes. Then there's the size of the Ram! Now there is something to grab my attention this cold winter's morning!

That's the good news. The not so good news is that, having looked at my blog on this all singing all dancing computer, she and this new (big) ram have discovered that my title box (with photo and Monsieur Mouton's Talking Practice in it), has a sort of red section on the right hand side that we hadn't noticed before. I kind of assumed that the photo went right up to the right hand side of the frame. It does on mine. I suppose it will be her new screen being more oblong. When she gets back I will be asking her to have a look at this and perhaps help me change the photo to reflect my current thinking and interests.

As my regular readers are aware, I am contemplating a bit of a reposition of my blog to reflect my reconstituted self. (I know................... makes me sound as if I have taken on copious amounts of fluid.) Funnily enough, I certainly feel more flowing and less stuck; more of a 'motoring mouton' than a melancholy one.