Banksy's Ladder

I am nothing more than a four letter word today.

Fuck.

Be Like Art

I didn't watch Conan O'Brien's last episode of The Tonight Show, but my friend Art did. Art is a friend of 20 something years from my high school days, and he, like me, carries the battlewounds of struggle and watches the world through the lens of someone who has seen more than his share of ugliness in the world. I think he holds a jaded perspective that people in the know in Chicago tend to do for the sake of a practical protection....but frankly, I think it's sort of an act because I know he's a die hard romantic like me. He just has to deal with different realities being a Latin American father in today's cynical world.

So...last night, I logged into facebook and saw a status update that Art wrote about Conan's last show that read, "God bless Conan !!!! Very touching words brother! Keep that shit REAL!" Naturally, his post sparked my curiosity bc he mostly shares music, so I asked him what he said, and a few hours later, he posted Conan's words on my wall.

I don't know about the rest of you, but Art's kind of kindness makes me believe what Conan said about it. Simple acts like sharing a post on a facebook wall define what kindness is in action. It's a "friendly, generous, and warm hearted" gesture that can make another person feel really, really good. Everyone has the capacity to be kind, but a lot of people don't choose to be kindness incarnate, despite the joy it has the potential of bringing to a person's life. I think kindness comes from having heart, and thankfully, Art has enough to spare for the likes of me and I am a very grateful recipient of his overflow. I think it takes a person like him, who cares enough about people to share something uplifting, to do it well...and he does it really, really well.

I started writing this with the intention of advocating a Be Like Conan mantra, but it's turned into what it should have been from the start. I think we should Be Like Art. :)

Love After Love

The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

Derek Walcott