I thought I would compare my time on Isla Holbox (pronounced “Ol'bosh”) to the lyrics of Madonna's La Isla Bonita.

¿Cómo puede ser verdad?

How can it be true? I don't know. I don't think that it is, but maybe it's “emotionally true.”

Last night I dreamt of San Pedro Just like I'd never gone, I knew the song

Last night I dreamt of Isla Holbox (probably) I still haven't gone, there's much more than one song

Young girl with eyes like the desert

So, dry? Unemotional? Sandy? Or the dark desert at night? This island isn't desert. Nor at all deserted—even when we went to the far north end of the island tonight where this photo was taken, we were among other tourists.

It all seems like yesterday, not far away

It all was yesterday the day before and today and half of tomorrow too, not far away I'm still here

Tropical the island breeze, all of nature wild and free (Ah-ah, ah-ah, ah-ah) This is where I long to be, La Isla Bonita

True!

And when the samba played,

Not so much samba. A lot bordering on techno. Dance music. Big bass. Also cover singers. ABBA daily. Even some Madonna. Sade. Gay, Latin or Miami dance club music. Nonstop right now at 03:27! Absolutely nothing indie. Shakira! Shakira!

the sun would set so high

How is that possible? The sun always sets low, as low as you can see. Madge, is your island mountainous? Isla Holbox is not. And here is its sunset.

(Ah-ah, ah-ah, ah-ah) Ring through my ears and sting my eyes, your Spanish lullaby

My ears always ring. Tinnitus. The salt and sweat and sun lotion does sting my eyes. No lullabies. And if there were I'd likely call them Mexican (or whatever the country of origin) vs. Spanish. I know that the language is Spanish, but Spanish lullaby doesn't sound right, unless it's from Spain. He sang me a Spanish lullaby He sang me an Argentinian lullaby He sang me a Mexican lullaby 🤔

I fell in love with San Pedro Warm wind carried on the sea, he called to me Te dijo, “Te amo” I prayed that the days would last, they went so fast

I fell in love with Isla Holbox Refreshing wind comes off the sea, he called to me, “Are you looking for tequila?” / “Would you like to book a tour?” / “Prescriptions can be mailed to the US.” Te dijo, “No, gracias.” Pero hay un otro hombre y te dijo, “te quiero”! I didn't pray. The days did last. They flowed at the proper pace & it felt good. Yes I feel ambivalence about the time here ending but it's not permanent. My companion and I both look forward to what we will do next, separately. It's not sad just because this moment is good and temporary. I try to make every moment good.

I want to be where the sun warms the sky

💛

When it's time for siesta, you can watch them go by

??

Beautiful faces, no cares in this world

Patronizing, ignorant. But yes there are happy looking people here, why not? Society doesn't have to be miserable; it's a choice.

Where a girl loves a boy, and a boy loves a girl

A lot of that pretty much, though we did see 2 men holding hands walking down the street today. And that felt good.

See https://vernissage.photos/@Romex for photos of the trip. I'll continue adding to this gallery after the current trip ends. And I'll use that address for future Mexico travel.

Holbox is La Isla Bonita indeed. The best memories aren't all sunsets and lovers. I enjoyed meeting the Argentinian man who moved here, worked scooping ice cream for a year and then went in with a friend to open the simple & delicious restaurant where we ate tonight. A highlight of the time in Holbox is observing the many community games taking place in rotation on a central multi use court: practice soccer, volleyball, basketball. Wholesome night activities. And I hope to long remember the look that my words put on a woman's face tonight. In a convenience store where the line was never long but always steady, an older woman began ringing up my purchases. It was one of the few times here that I've seen someone looking beleaguered. “Buenas noches,” I said. She brightened, stood a little straighter, smiled and said, “Muy bueno!” Then we navigated selecting a Kinder Bueno for my friend & soon we parted.

¡Adios!

¡Hasta luego!

Smiling. Human beings being human. Smiling. Smizing. Living. That's why I'm on this trip, human being being human practice. And oh yeah Spanish practice too.

'Staluego amigos

“Thanks For Sharing”

I don't begrudge anyone their entertainments [2]. I don't want a world where everyone likes the same things; I just don't want different tastes to cause offense.

I've accepted an offer on my home. If it goes smoothly the sale will close by the first week of December. My bf is coming back with me to help me organize & process the next several days. I'm overloaded with doing things poorly through the pain. He helps me with perspective.

I have made a decision on how to process my stuff in a diminished state. I don't want to expend the energy it takes to sift through unknown Mystery Boxes of memories. First I want to identify the large items that I know I do not want to keep. These will be sold, given away, donated, trashed, whatever. There are friends, potential buyers, charities, and a nearby dumpster to accept those things. Anything that causes me pause & uncertainty, for now I'm just going to keep. I need to see how large this portion is. Can it fit in an already paid for storage space? Can it fit in my car? Only after that will I see the amount that I have to process. Yeah I hate that again (as always) I'm postponing decisions & putting off processing. I'm prioritizing. I have limitations. There will never be a time when I'm not forced to rank priorities, I don't think. There's more I could say but it is not high priority with my limited energy.

※

[1] Weekly Rworld News — Princeton University sends me a magazine that they call Princeton Alumni Weekly that does not come out weekly. They just like calling it the PAW! (It used to be weekly.) I don't know if I'll ever commit to issuing weekly news updates, but I enjoyed making this graphic. The source tabloid, The Weekly World News, was a hilarious periodical (that seems a lot less funny now that disinformation is ascendant). In the 90s I had 2 WWN covers as t-shirts. One proclaimed numerous US senators to be “space aliens”; the other I can't remember right now — wasn't bat boy, but they also gave us Bat Boy! Go see the musical if you get the chance.

[2] I don't begrudge anyone their entertainments — Is that true? It's more accurate to say that I struggle to accept and respect the tastes of others. I greatly dislike gambling and real violence as entertainment. (I'm ambivalent about simulated violence. I feel there's so much in entertainment that it may prime some viewers to expect & accept more violence in real life.) My acceptance for the differing tastes of others is expressed in hope that my own peculiar tastes, especially my lack of conformity to the preferences of the majority, might be likewise accepted. I consider this matter an essential component of a functional society. Tolerance.

I would list the social norms that I am breaking.

I would express ambivalence for some, regret for some, defiance for some.

I would assert that I am choosing to live in a manner that leverages every asset I have in service of long-term goals that might be considered unrealistic. I would explain that I prefer progress that feels slow and natural, that takes root within me.

I would explain my social norm breaking as an effort to resist what feels like a constant siege from outside influences that do not, cannot know what is best for me (and in many cases do not care; or are explicitly unconcerned with my well-being).

I would discuss how social norm breaking causes difficulties that are “added to the list” of goals. In this section I would further elucidate situations about which I feel regret and ambivalence.

At no point would I endorse shame. I would confess that titling this “My Sins” is a form of lazy discourse to dislodge my ambivalence. I would admit the incompleteness of my path. Self acceptance is the necessary goal. Striving towards it, my attitude towards religion has evolved: acceptance, incorporation, rejection, defiance. I am yet to fully find peaceful coexistence with religion; that's a barrier in many relationships. Social norms are not necessarily grounded in religious teachings. Perhaps I would describe the intertwining of norms and morals, and contrast with ethics. These are not my specialties. I center feelings. The feelings part is that breaking norms can lead to ostracization and condemnation. These struggles feel life and death. They are existential.

Breaking norms has not occurred frivolously. It's my choice in an effort to live a life that feels worth living. I will continue doing so and endeavoring to explain.

“You're in the war whether you want to be or not,” I can imagine someone telling me. And as I say I do consume left media. I'm a frequent viewer of The Majority Report, but I wouldn't be if it was entirely dunks on right wing media. I appreciate the interviews with authors, academics, & labor leaders more than the partisan attacks. Like, I'm happy if Hasan Piker appeals to young people but I can't watch him much—strikes me as maniacally immersed in online politics. I don't think “the battle” (or war) is online. Yeah you can say that's what swung '24; I'll still say that appealing to the oppressed & disengaged is more important. I believe it's a much larger number of people for one thing. And I want a politics of substance more than of rhetorical skill. Both are needed but I choose substance over rhetoric for the long term. “But, Rob, the American voters don't understand substance.” That's the challenge that I care about. I'm not in a culture war because I refuse to enlist. Not on those terms. I believe if we are always fighting on their terms then we are losing. I focus on self improvement, and respecting others. That's the content I want to share. That's my strategy, my battle, or my war. But those bellicose terms do not apply because I see victory by force as defeat. I'm a lover not a fighter. I do what I love. I seek to inspire others not convince.

Liberation is the goal. I don't believe freedom can be imposed. I do understand that tyranny is being imposed & must be opposed. I believe the way to achieve lasting liberation is only by the majority of people choosing it. I think that people must be awakened & inspired. The person I'm most concerned with is myself. I work to liberate my mind & emotions. I have ambition to share my journey with others. My path to freedom has been long, winding, & slow going. While I do not fault others for their methods, I seek to avoid commercial distribution. I watch plenty of YouTube videos but I know I won't feel comfortable with my output until it no longer subjects viewers to the harm of commercial platforms. The only sponsors I seek are individual donations. I never look at detailed metrics on any platform I use. These are my choices in order to keep my values in focus. The “race to success” is less important than my life satisfaction.

I describe the actions that work for me. I am grateful for the many others fighting for me & all of us in the ways that work for them. Respect for diversity is a core value in the better world we are building together.

Thanks for reading.

Tough question. When does life and experiences become a higher priority than art creation, and when does art creation become a higher priority than life and experiences?

He keeps a journal when we are apart. We have a long distance relationship that's getting longer. I'm not sure when we next see each other. He journals amazingly, recapping his experiences and feelings about them; sharing his creations; and posing meaningful questions to himself, to me, to all of us. And I am in pain. I feel moved by what he says and unable to reply meaningfully:

my answer to this could be long. I will try to write it soon, maybe as a blog.

And here I am, trying.

Binary thinking is seductive, easy to fall into. It's a trap. The answer cannot be that either art or living is the top priority. Right? But those are words. Talking and making it so are vastly different.

Aside: I'm sad about the word performative because I've learned that until it's recent popularity it meant something else. A rare usage, performative meant making it so — as in, “I now pronounce you wife & wife.” The words are performative. They exist and they perform a function. Now performative means the opposite, devoid of meaning, for performance. With the loss of this word I feel I have one less tool to make words into reality. I realize that can't make sense; it's just vocabulary. Then again that's what I'm talking about, the relationship of words to reality.

Sigh. Why can't I be brief? Let me go back:

When does one become the priority: living or creating art?

I don't enjoy living without creating. And obviously I cannot create if I am not alive. The two are hand in hand. The two may be the same to me. I'm a “bad choice” of person to answer this question because compared to many I am not living. I do very little every day. I do not earn a living. I'm isolated from most people I've ever known. Sigh. I type sigh now. And mean it. That's now a thing I do.

Let me try to simplify: At times I can take photos of anything and it feels like art. I could capture every moment — and not just photographically but why not the audio too? I could write the scenes and paint them! Every moment can be recorded. Think about all the shared photos of meals. My most recent text to my boyfriend is:

I made a beefy cheesy stir fry. No pic.

It almost feels like a big missed opportunity not to take a photo of a good meal, because the phones make it so easy. The implication may be there's no record of the event because I was busy living. That may be a point of conflict between living and art, taking the time to memorialize. Stories have long bothered me because they are all lies. In some sense a story must be incomplete. It is edited for time. It cannot take place from every point of view. It could take a lifetime to accurately understand one moment.

Here is where interaction is key, and the limitations of living as a solitary artist. Other people provide a form of constraint or direction. For example, I'm not happy with this answer and think it would be better as a conversation.

Still I have learned something important by writing this attempted answer: I don't have to answer any questions! Schooling, or wanting to appear smart, or just being a thinking being inspires me to attempt to answer every question that's posed to me. And if I'm going to produce an answer I want it to sound correct! In doing so I'm deviating from a core belief that there are no right answers. Since my words aren't performative (old sense) I find that I must restate that core belief over and over as I try to absorb it. My words — these words — pile up and get in the way as I continue to not answer! All I have any right to say is:

I don't know.

Discussing it is what makes it interesting to me. I don't think I'll ever know.

It's a recurring thing for me that I do not understand other people's energy. My mother always had unlimited energy that she directed (and directed me) to trivial projects. That's how I feel about most people.

Like, I think if people aren't devoting energy to improvement of self and all humans then that's wasted energy.

I want only to improve myself and with it to improve all humanity... and I have no energy.

My string of thoughts goes: If I allow myself to selfishly only look out for myself then in fairness, transitively, I allow selfishness. I know that I am condemned by others, my well-being is opposed by some. So I feel that my survival is tied to the betterment of all.

I'm not saying I'm right. I know I'm not surviving & I'm not functioning. But what I'm saying is that I believe that structurally the US is built on oppression & I do not believe any improvement is possible without facing that & rejecting it.

I believe strength is in numbers. If enough people would stop working for the harmful system & work to help each other then positive change is possible. I think just looking out for oneself prevents positive change.

The above is excerpted from a conversation. My current state of despair is global & based on decades. I don't present my thoughts as an argument. I specifically think that the way I am is faulty & incapable of survival. Hiwever I also believe there to be insight in what I say. I do not believe that progress will occur without disruption. It will not flower from current systems. If more people were like me, willing to fully reject the current ways, then improvement might be possible. I arrived at my way of being because I do not believe that “success” in a corrupt system correlates to happiness or satisfaction or peace of mind. My observation is widespread unhappiness under capitalism among all strata. The wealthy busy themselves to flee all thought. I made choices based on that belief. It's not worth the effort to survive & thrive in a system that produces misery for all within it. I'm a conscientious objector.