Two photos. One is myself in Greece, listening to a Street Musician. I think Street musician should always be capitalized. They are unsung (sic) heroes of the Urban Assault Zone we live in. And they certainly seem to need more capital.
It has been said that trees 'humanize' a landscape by bringing nature in. Song and music do as well. Of course, the Parthenon in the background on a sunny Spring day helps humanize anyone. And it can connect us to the past, in a deeper sense than history we know in the consensus world. I stood here, in 2003, with this beautiful harmonica and sweet guitar arpeggios filling the air, and my eyes got a little wet. He and I each knew enough French to communicate; and enough music to appreciate each other. Music isn't music until it goes in an ear. Music is sound created for a human effect. You cannot get music alone(its practice, or worship at that point) you can only get it with communication as a key.
My wife shot the photo. I bought a few of this guys cds. Sally will not let me play them because she says I get too sentimental. How could I not be? I was there in the place where street music had been played for about 2500 years, humanizing landscapes... I stood there and heard this guy offering up music from the place where the word 'muse' was first spoken. From within a mile of where Socrates drank a Hemlock smoothie because he would rather do that than put up with a retraction of his speech.
From where posters used to say: 'Tonight- the sensation of Lesbos! Sappho!"
She makes the Beatles look like a little cafe band. Her music was popular before recording, for over 300 years. It was all sung by heart, and the fragments of her poetry are mostly preserved from those who lived and wrote hundreds of years after her death. I like this poem by her best..."If you are squeamish, Do not prod the beach rubble."
But then I have never met a Lesbian I did not like. Gay people, in my opinion, are aptly named 'gay'.
I need to say that the Greeks, who invented or appropriated some wonderful methods of discourse, written word, and mathematical ingenuity, were not what you would call environmentally-minded. Sure they invented the words eco and enviro, but were they saving any trees? In order to build what they did in stone, they needed tons of timber.
Locally harvested forests soon dried up so they did what we are now doing with oil. They got it from trading or wars with other nations. If the nation was strong enough, they paid; but if the nation was weak anyhow, the Greeks had people for that. Something tells me our current administration has more than a passing interest in that sort of democracy.
And the goats nibbled grass right down into the roots, killing the understory, and
the timber was harvested, the spoils of that were burned, and somewhere in there, Greece became functionally a desert. A limited ecosystem.
In Mexico City, where I am headed, the folks had the first known zoos and botanical gardens on earth. Way before Christian-era gardens to collect species. I will comment on what I find there in the next few weeks. The gardens look pretty arid in the photos.
I used to be such an intrepid traveller. Once, I was even a street musician for a while. I played for literally tens of people, and was a legend in my own mind.
Now I am a bit older, and have bouts of worry I never used to have. Will I remember to- have I brought enough- is there a dangerous neighborhood I should know about?
it reminds me of the Tree Fear. It only came at night, before a major project. It visited when I was trying to sleep. It was all the could be's and better nots I never felt during the day. In the photos here, I am in a rented lift just a few years ago, at about forty feet up, cutting dead poplar out of a tiny little yard. I can say with certainty that that job did not scare me, after I got up there. It only scared me to think about it beforehand.
I think for myself and most of the Tree People I have talked with, it is the same. When it is going down; you just do the next thing necessary. When you have time to think it over, it is freaky where your mind can go to.
Does this mean I should ignore the little discomforts of worry? I do not think so. I think they should be noted and put away for later. In a time of action, like being in a strange country, lost and short of appropriate words, I will not have time for worry, and I'll feel fine. Now, with language cd's all over my house and car, and phrasebooks proving my ignorance to me time and again, I can worry I will not get it right. I can toss and turn.
Some people would not worry about the things I do, but would worry or fear the tasks I perform on trees daily. One way I can deal is to think what I would tell them if they were learning to climb, and listen to it as advice form inside;" Concentrate on what you are doing right now; not what you are going to be doing later. Keep you rope tight and your knees loose. relax, slips are part of the learning curve..."
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