Intelligence carries with it a burden. It's hardly an original thought, but it's something into which I've run lately. Intelligence. When you're able to see a bigger picture, you're burdened by having to consider it in all of your actions. If only you could see each issue as only having two sides, or better yet, one side. If only everything had one finite answer! If only a sort of universal truth were achievable for any single question! But alas, it is not to be so, and so those who can fathom that an issue might not be resolved, that terrorism isn't the fault of all non-Americans, whose origin is to be determined by those in power at any given point in time, that there are several ways of mitigating natural disaster, that there is no pro-life versus pro-choice. It's all much more subtle than that. Of course. I'm preaching to the choir.
Sensitivity makes you pay a price. I'm sensitive to other people. I think about other people driving on the road, how well they're doing, making up scenarios for what might be causing them to drive the way they drive. I think about other people on the subway. I can make headaches go away, I can absorb that pain. But I can't let go of it. I'm too sensitive, not tough enough, and it takes a toll. I have to learn now how not to care about everybody, how to not absorb the negative energy of others, for my own sake.
Emotional depth makes you pay a price. You can spend your whole life pulling people in, needing this and needing that from others, and it can work for you pretty well, with only the occasional heartbreak, for which we have many outlets in this society. But try sometime *not* holding on to people. Try sometime just loving without expecting anything in return. You can find that you had a lot of assumptions that don't hold true. Even if you know it's the right way to act, you can feel like you're taken advantage of, because being selfish and needy is so much easier and so much more frequently done.
Isn't it ironic that doing the right thing just paves the way for those doing wrong to do worse? You can't be an honest politician, because the dishonest ones will smear your image or worse faster than you can say "Paul Wellstone." You can't love others freely, because those who love with strings attached will move in some day and want to take all of that love away from you, keep it for themselves. You can't address problems with multiple solutions in mind, because those who see in black and white will be more present in the debate with their extreme views. It's hard to tread fine lines. We're all treading such fine lines.

Bikes in Boston

Did I mention that I do my commute on a bike? At least, right now. As long as I can, that's the plan. it's faster and cheaper than the bus (well, maybe not actually that much cheaper, with bike maintenance included). In fact, provided that there's not a huge pile of snow around, everywhere in Boston is faster to get to by bike. Faster than the "T" (Metro). Faster than a car. Ever heard of Boston drivers? Massholes? Ringing any bells? So I'm really psyched about getting a bike.
Today I managed to get a nail embedded fully into my back tire on the ride home. Fortunately, I got the flat next to the one bike shop on the eleven-mile ride home. So I just walked in, and they say "Nice bike. Wanna borrow some tools and buy a tire and fix that flat?" Sweet. I was back on the road in 15 minutes. Which is nice, because the alternative is to wait for the bus, and go home dejected that my biking master plan has failed. Instead I just strolled in 15 minutes "late" with a story.
This bike I'm riding used to have a garage-door opener on it, back when it was at the apex of suburban bike glory.

Musicians have a certain power to insinuate themselves into your life. You could meet a guitarist, say, who happens to know a song that you love. And then he plays it for you, and you're hooked. That song has taken on new meaning for you. That song is now firmly attached to whatever it is he meant when he played it for you. Was he looking you in the eyes? How did that make you feel? You remember that every time you hear that song. Musicians have a power, when we mean to.
Sometimes you play a song, and you really see it when you're singing and you really mean it when you're playing. And sometimes you're just going through the motions. You can tell when a musician means it, because that's when you're paying attention. When they don't mean it, that's when you're sipping your drink, looking for somebody interesting to talk to.
When you write a song for somebody, you have that same power as the cover song, but with greater potential. That power to do harm or good. But you only have that power if the subject knows that the song is about them. It's amazing how a song that you thought was so personal as to be non-applicable to any new situation can be taken out of context.
I guess there should be a point to all of this. Nope. No point. Just an observation. Point withheld.

people

i've been thinking about holding people close. a lot of people in my life, myself included, have gone through some sort of dramatic personal life change lately, and it's typically got a lot to do with breaking up with other people. everybody's doing it. these things come in waves (why) they come in waves is a whole other blog entry).
i've been told that a lot of hurt in life comes from holding people too close. you hold people too close to you, and it inevitably hurts you during those times when they lean away from you. and everybody's got their threshold for how far that leaning away is. that's beside the point. the point is, the closer you hold on to a person, try to draw them into your life, the greater your potential to be upset if change occurs and they don't want to be with you anymore.
there's one thought. everything changes. no two people are ever going to end up the way they started. you have to deal with change throughout any relationship. change happens everywhere in life, which is ironic considering the human tendency to try to organize the inherent entropy of the universe. even energy tends toward randomness. how can you fight with energy?
but there's the other side of the coin. commitment. there comes a time with certain people where you can't afford to or simply don't want to have them be some floaty presence in your life anymore. you want them to be a big presence. in some cases, the only or the biggest big presence in your life. you want, in short, to draw them in.
but commitment and attachment aren't necessarily the same thing. you can be committed to somebody, but not require them to be in your presence, or require that they be so thorougly thinking about you 100% of the time. it's something that maybe we all know, certainly something that i know, but something that you constantly need to remind yourself is the case. because in my opinion, to have a successful commitment, you need to be exclusive, but not overly attached. it's a fine line to tread. a fine line indeed. at some point, you have to acknowledge that things will change between the two of you. energy tends that way. if nothing else, your perception of the situation will change as time goes on. little things will start to nag you, or big picture things will come to light and make you all the more wondrous at who you've got in your life.
the answer, then, is to create an environment where change is acceptable, and you change with those people who are close to you. you don't abandon them when you're tired, and you don't ignore them if they're trying to tell you something, verbal or otherwise. not if you're committed. but you don't close yourself off to change either. some of that change is going to be intentional, and some of it is going to be gradual and subliminal. when you're committed, you're going to end up in a new place from where you started. and that's what's beautiful about commitment: you get to experience your whole life and know that someone's going to be there to see it with you.
this makes less sense in every paragraph. maybe some other time.

Road Trip

So I talked about moving in to Boston. Well, the latest turn in the move-in was that last week (or was it two weeks ago?), I was going to stop by Potsdam for a weekend, grab a bit of stuff and come back down to Boston. Then my mom was like, "why not stay longer and drive your stuff home in my car?" I was like "Sure." Then my dad went "Why not grab some of the stuff for your apartment that I've got in Ottawa?" I was all, "All right." Then I remembered that I was supposed to go to a wedding in Milwaukee a day or so after I was supposed to come back to Boston. So I asked mom, "Mom, how's about I take your car to Boston, then drive it to Milwaukee and then back to Potsdam?" She was totally down.
I just got back from that road trip. Boston to Potsdam in the car with Danielle Cornett, sister Renee, and Becca D., all high school friends who happened to be going back home from Boston. Hang out in Potsdam. Get myself to Ottawa. Hang out with dad. Drive stuff down to Potsdam in dad's car. Drive all of my stuff to Boston in mom's car. Turn around the next morning and head toward Milwaukee. Stop at a friend's in Columbus. Wedding in Milwaukee. Back to Mansfield, Ohio. Then to Poughkeepsie, NY for a few days. Drive up to Ottawa, Canada, and then to Potsdam. Then take a bus back to Boston. I just got back.
So, it's been a relaxing lil' break for me. There are good pictures of it all, but I didn't take them, so you'll have to wait for them to show up at alexmarvar.com or something before you can see them. Aw, heck, maybe I'll post a couple... Later.
Congratulations to Kjerstin and Adam on their beautiful wedding, by the way. Love you guys.

The Neighborhood

I live in Jamaica Plain, Boston. That could mean one of a million things. That could mean that I live in a mansion on a hill surrounded by trees or next to a pond. That could mean that I live in a Dominican/Cuban semi-ghetto. That could mean that I live in a hippy crunchy organic vegan co-op. Walking around here is a study in neighborhoods within neighborhoods, and just how small the boundaries between one and the next can be.
Today, I walked over to Franklin Park, which is about half a kilometer away from here. I leave my house, which is in a predominantly Spanish-speaking, not-too-wealthy little sub-section. Cross over Washington Street onto a street called Peter Parley, and the houses get big and ornate, full of white folks. Across a street and you're in a different world. The streets are narrow and windy, and there are more trees. Everything is more closed in. Then I get to Franklin Park, which is sketchily maintained at best. But it's gigantic. So gigantic, in fact, that I almost missed the fact that there's a giant fairground set up in it, minutes from my house. A big big fairground. With Ferris wheels and booths and a stage and everything. The rest of the park is largely wooded, with these boulders and piles of stones everywhere. It's kind of fascinating. But then you turn around and it's the same thing in reverse.
I live in a house of music. The landlords are in a band called Lovewhip (which has a website you can google in your spare time). They have a recording studio in the basement. My roommate goes to the NEC, but I think I'm treading on familiar ground here. I think I just wrote about this. I'll skip it for now.
More neighborhood. There's a subway stop minutes from my house, and another just a few more minutes in the other direction. Downtown Jamaica Plain is about fifteen minutes' walk from here. I get wireless internet. I found a desk on the front sidewalk. Life is good.

Apartment Update

I walked home this evening, and found that the upstairs neighbor is moving out, and left his desk that is perfect for my apartment out on the sidewalk right in front of the house. So now I've got a perfect desk, and all I had to do was walk it in from the sidewalk. That's totally bitchin', if I do say so myself. I'm going to try to get my camera working and possibly take some pictures right now!

Boston, Baby!

I moved in to my apartment in Boston on Sunday. Yes! It's really great. It's within walking distance of two metro stops; depending on whether I want to go downtown or not, I can choose one or the other. Sweet. It's a three-story house, I'm on the first floor with Tim from Macalester, who plays trombone and upright bass and goes to the NEC (New England Conservatory). The second story is more musicians, who are moving out soon I understand, and the third floor is the landlord, who's also a musician in a band called Lovewhip. It's funny music. They have a recording studio in the basement. This is great.
I still haven't really moved in. I have nothing but a suitcase full of clothes, some books, and a guitar amp. It's daunting. I suppose I'll get my digital camera up and running and then post some pictures on my web page.
Oh yeah! I changed the web page, also. If you want to download the latest album, go to latiflearned.com. If you want to go to my exceedingly outdated pictures site, go to Opus 1. If you want to see a page I made for a friend, that includes a lot of pictures of me, head over to alexmarvar.com.

latiflearned.com

My web page is now at a (more or less) permanent site. Head over to latiflearned.com to see my (more or less out of date) web page that's not a blog. Sweet. I swear that there will be more development on this in the coming months. Eventually, it'll have my music and not be at all about me, personally. but more about my invented personality Latif Learned who plays guitar and sings.
I'm moving to Boston in a few days. Maybe just maybe I'll take pictures and then put them up on my latiflearned.com. Word.

I Showed Up Again on the Web

Explo put me on the website again. Also, I'm told that if you Google image Search me that I actually show up, thanks to CosmoGIRL! Thanks CosmoGIRL!, for making my web presence that much stronger. The front page of an image search! Sweet.
In other news, New Haven is hot as hell. Today is the first time in three weeks that it's been below 90 and not like a billion percent humidity. Darn! I like the heat. Although it limits your wardrobe options. Survival first, looks second. Ummmm... That's all.

Def Leppard

The one-armed drummer from Def Leppard is going to be wearing a t-shirt designed by my brother Ryan in the next issue of Spin Magazine. It was originally going to be somebody in Death Cab for Cutie, but now it's Def Leppard. But if you're cockney, the first word of each band is pronounced the same way. I never thought in a million years that I would be in any way, even the most periphally, connected to the one-armed drummer from Def Leppard. This is like a vicarious dream come true for me. Amazing!
Go see Ryan's T-Shirt Designs. Check back at this site in a couple of weeks. It'll be more complete then. You might even be able to buy a t-shirt on it then.

Go check this out.
What a crazy fun summer!

Summer

It's summer. I'm in New Haven again. The problem with sporadically blogging is getting back into the swing of it. What do you say? Does anybody even read this anymore? Probably not. No problem.
I'm at Exploration Summer Programs again this summer, working as the computer guy again. This is good. So good, in fact, that I'm going to be working for them full-time starting in September. Right now I'm just one of the summer employees. So that means move to Boston (Jamaica Plain, of course), have a salary and health insurance once again, pay off some of that impending college debt, put money toward retirement. The plan is to move in to a house full of musicians in a neighborhood full of musicians with musicians and record more albums and generally be a better musician in my non-computer-guy time. Then I want to bike across the country. Interested? In two or three years? Give me a call. Or email.
I got a new laptop. This is a real boon for me, because it's the first time since early in the France experience that I've been able to keep all my thoughts/music/data in one place, which means that things like blogging and recording music and taking photos and what-have-you are much easier. Its keyboard lights up in the dark. It makes me happy.
So yes, Boston. Music. Computers. What you would have guessed if you were guessing, basically.

Update

I've added translation features to the blog. This is basically the funniest thing ever. Check the sidebar.

Minnesota, Chicago, Whatever

I'm in Minnesota now. You know, hanging out with Anna, seeing all of my newly dumbfounded recent-grad friends, in addition to the old-school graduates who've been dumbfounded for a year or two now. I'm gradually re-accumulating my stuff, so that I can put it all in one place for once in my life. I found my classical guitar and all of my cool music books here in a closet. Sweet. Minnesota is nice, in the way it's always been. The trick is not to be fooled when you visit during the warm months into thinking that the climate is livable. Because it's not. It's the arctic circle.
There's a radio station here in the Twin Cities that is rockin'. It's an NPR station, but it plays cool and new, generally hip (if not often rockin' to the max) music. Go check it out, because you're wasting time anyway, and you know it. Among the recent few bands they've played (off the web site): Spoon, Sly and the Family Stone, and Thievery Corporation. That's not bad for a radio station. Plus they do a webcast. Go listen. I'm going to submit my stuff once I've got it in totally awesome CD format for them to sufficiently digest.
By the way, stop and ask yourself, "Self, am I sufficiently pimping Donald's CD to my family and friends?" If the answer is no, your horoscope will start telling you bad things. It's written in the stars, bitches.

Y'all should check out Esther's Blog. Especially if you know her. Actually, you should really only check it out if you know her, or want to know her, because it's like this one: news for people who cared before they got here. And if you don't write anything for long enough, even those people stop caring. Esther has Lyme Disease, which gives her mad street cred. And she linked my blog, so I've got to link hers. Tight, yo.

I'm going to Minnesota tomorrow. This is part of a larger trend of not being able to spend any significant hunk of time in one place, uninterrupted. I haven't been in Potsdam for longer than a week at a time, really, without having to do something like drive to Montreal/Ottawa/Toronto/Boston/Rwanda. It's not like I want to complain about it, because really it's cool that I get to do things like hang out in exotic Canadian cities, but it kind of blocks my flow, you know? Like, throws a wrench in the gears of my flow. Plugs the pipe of my flow. Thumbs its nose at my flow. That kind of thing.

I swear that one of these days I'm going to put up pictures of the guitar I'm building. Probably when it's done. My digital camera pisses me off; this probably has something to do with why I don't use it very often. You have to hold it funny and tell it you love it just to make it take a picture. And it has to like the way you framed the shot, or it turns out sepia. Fucking sepia. Gross.

Minnesota, here I come!

Some News

I'm now employed as a real-time person. Well, I will be in September, anyway. So it's off to Boston, I suppose. In other financial news, I'm back up on CosmoGIRL.com because apparently I'm good-looking and I stand to win a thousand bucks for it. You should really go and check it out. Because Anna also wins a thousand bucks if I win. That's two thousand dollars between us, all because you clicked your mouse (once a week until I win). And let's face it, if you're here and reading this, you're procrastinating anyway. Go and make me a winner!
There's something about seing two big burly truckers lounging in a pit stop on highway 401, eating burgers, and speaking French. Ah, Canada.

Lots of Time

I just realized, as I wrote the title of this post, that some people write "lot's" when they mean "lots," and that this has always bothered me.
But I digress...
It's been a while since I last wrote, I suppose. This isn't to say that I haven't been busy. Because I have. I've been building a guitar, for instance. This is like the most exciting thing ever, the concept of having something so complex and personal, and having made it myself. You always develop this rapport (pronounced rap-poor) with your guitars, and it seems like if you make the guitar yourself, you've already got your best friend there with you when you play. Plus it takes the music-geekiness to a whole new level, which can only be good. He said, as though it were inherently true.
I'll post pictures of the progress of my new guitar in due time. Right now I've got a functional but no-frets neck and a body-shaped hunk of swamp ash (that's a type of wood, people). All in due time.
I'm also about finished with the next album. In fact, you can go download all of the tracks right now if you want. That was a link. You can click on it. And then you get my new music for free. The site is http://seasac.gotdns.com/UglyByNow/latiflearned in case you want to type it in yourself. The tracks I'm giving away for free are the unmastered mixes, which, being MP3, are of a lower quality than the CD is going to be. I'm going to make a production run of the CD after I get the cover art all squared away and the final mastering (sweetening) done. Then you all can (and will!) buy it. I'll make a web page for that to make it easy on you. Independent musicians. It's more effort, but it's worth it.
Other news in my life: I'm singing (tenor) in a church choir. I fixed my bike. I bake like 6 loaves of bread a week. I work construction all day every day and it's tiring. I'm learning how to play pieces by Heitor Villa-Lobos, the Brazillian guitar composer genius. I recommend his stuff.
I'll write more frequently now. I'm in the swing of things. And it occurred to me today that I've been neglecting my friends since I got home. I'm on it.

To Clarify...

Here's the question posed to me, regarding my survey about love:

Do you feel our culture idolizes LUV and ignores reality OR did you mean that common love, i.e.: awareness of our interdependent existence, is being weakened by sex and violence in the media?

(That's Tim Weld who asked me that, by the way)

I initially wrote that I think we've got love all wrong because I just had this really bad feeling about it, and the time that feeling hit me coincided with me writing my last blog entry. Like, I was mentally processing all of the things that people have said to me about love lately, and was coming up short of a satisfying conclusion. Which would lead me to say, have we got it all wrong? Or to use Tim's vocabulary, is something getting in the way of our experience of common love (awareness of our interdependent existence)? I would say that our culture (our media, among other things) idolizes some sort of mishmash of love with other emotions or states, like attachment or commitment or sex, but is that the only problem here? I guess, Tim that I'm asking both of your questions, in an effort to get at the root of a problem that I can't articulate clearly. If that makes your response any easier.

I've been wanting to go to bed earlier and earlier the longer I'm home. I started out on a roll, capable of working all day and then doing errands and minor jobs until it was time for bed. Now, it takes me a couple of days to get anything done, if I do it at all. Because, after you work, well, you've got to eat and then shower and then eat some more and then you got an hour or two and then you start really getting tired. This is that routine I mentioned. On the one hand, I appreciate the slowing effect it has on life, but on the other, it can be disturbing to eat up a day so proficiently. Next week I paint, so I won't be so strained at the end of the day.
I don't have any new sweet music links, as I alluded that I would downstairs on this page. My computer in this house is really noisy! I can't record on it. Fortunately, Anna comes into town in three days (!) with her totally sweet computer, which I will use. That last track that I put up was recorded in New York City on my brother Ryan's laptop. It turns out that all you need is a powerbook, and everything is dandy.
The guitar I'm building is started. If anybody has the blueprints for a Fender Telecaster (69 thinline), I'd appreciate it. Sweet. I'll post pictures of the progress of that. Fascinating.
Does it ever occur to anybody out there that maybe we've got this love thing all wrong as a culture? Let me know. I'm doing a survey.