"They also serve who only stand and wait." ~ John Milton

“Delayed gratification,” said one of those English teachers, “is the key to satisfaction.” We sat, grub-like, mystified. We wiggled in our chairs, held our breath, and hoped he wouldn’t ask us anything. He was tall and large-boned, with dark, wavy hair. His voice was deep and musical. He made references to sex and war, which we could not understand. His face was “chiseled” and “handsome,” with large, soft brown eyes that suddenly turned angry. He was one of those men whose women had better be uglier.

His words. Delayed gratification = satisfaction. Was it true? Was this not the argument for heaven? Or Santa? Wait, suffer, “be good,” and you shall be rewarded. It’s true that many good things take time, like growing tomato plants. Those are things you cultivate: friendships, skills, and intricate works of labor. What about the things you have to catch? Trains, feelings, and opportunities dangled by a sliver of time.

There is a difference.

Who is paying more attention?

Spring evening in a small old house. Two of us not knowing what to do.

A pile of videos.

“Do we want to watch something we have to pay attention to? Or something we don’t have to pay attention to?”

“Um.”

“Something we don’t have to pay attention to.”

I singled out D. A. Pennebaker’s Bob Dylan documentary, “Don’t Look Back.” A Dylan fan since high school, I had never seen this movie or any video footage of him.

The film drew me in, especially scenes in which Bob was being a jerk. I noted his icy behavior toward Joan Baez and Donovan.

Then I looked up and Bob was quarreling with a Time reporter. He called the reporter’s work irrelevant. He said Time magazine meant nothing to him. He said he didn’t care what the reporter wrote about him.

He said he didn’t read Time magazine! 

I felt sorry for the reporter. I reprimanded Bob.

“B-AAAAH-b!” I whined. 

“Bob is such an asshole,” said my host.

He smiled. I smiled. We ate popcorn. I was in love at some point. The movie ended at some point.

I went home wondering what was so bad about Time magazine. Wasn’t it well-written? Didn’t it tell the news? Wasn’t it a good source of interpretation and commentary? Richard Corliss wrote for Time. Wasn’t he a pretty good movie critic?

A few years later, everybody got the Internet.

I watched the Dylan movie again once (I think), but with even less attention. It’s not like watching “A Hard Day’s Night.” “Don’t Look Back” is more like an experience to absorb. It’s a good choice for a movie you don’t have to pay attention to.

Happy Easter.

A veiled figure, one in a series of many such paintings by Brian Counihan of Roanoke, Virginia.

"Idle Hands are the Devil's Workshop," by acclaimed artist Susan Jamison of Roanoke, VA.

Another by Susan Jamison. Her figures are bald, cerebral, serene, and decorated in exquisite body-art detail.

Dear Whoever is in Charge of Selecting Public Art in Roanoke,

The finalists you gave us for the Market Building art project do not meet local standards.

• They are not from here, first of all. (See Dan Smith’s series of posts on this. Here’s a good one to start: http://bit.ly/gOzjD4).
• They seem to have no idea how to capture “us” in their art.
• From the looks of their submissions, they design clip art for brochures about how happy everyone is. Perhaps they work for the pharmaceutical industry. Their painted “people” are depth-less, with round hypnotic eyes and retracted lips.

Let corporate America have them, Roanoke. We have artists here.

Have you heard of Susan Jamison? She is a celebrity among fans of contemporary art in other places. You know, bigger places. Brian Counihan? His paintings of veiled figures evoke themes of identity, non-identity, mystery, and possibility. Isn’t that were we are now, Roanoke? Wouldn’t Brian’s veiled figures be a better and more intriguing choice than your generic row of glorified public servants, including the creepy, guffawing firefighter? Who is he? Why would I want to look at him? What is he laughing at?

What I am trying to say is I don’t like his face.

The Guffawing Fireman, what the City of Roanoke thinks is "inspiring" public art. This image, if placed in the Market Building, would lead to higher health costs for the city, mostly in treatments for broken wrists.

I’ve probably left out other local artists who deserve consideration. I’ve included my two favorites. And even if these two artists were presented with the opportunity to make an artistic contribution to the Market Building, I don’t know that they would be interested. Their art has elements that may be too challenging for public art. I understand that. I believe, however, that they would be able to come up with designs that would be friendly to the public while still imparting the qualities that make their art interesting. That make their art ART. That make us want to claim them.

Sincerely, Your Fan, Because I Live Here, and I Rely on You to Select Good Public Art,

Jill

The Cycle of Violence (2007), a 15 x 15 feet installation by artist Zeina Barakeh.

What follows is a stunning argument — quoted exactly from the media psychology textbook I’m studying — about cultural desensitization to violence. I don’t feel like paraphrasing the text (it’s my blog and I’ll be lazy if I want to), so here it is, straight out of A Cognitive Psychology of Mass Communication, 5th ed. (2009) by Richard Jackson Harris, page 286. I hope it falls under the category of fair use. If not, the publisher is welcome to contact me and I’ll edit.

Box 9.6: Who Shoots Better, Soldiers or Video Gamers?

In studying historical battles, military psychologist David Grossman (1996) discovered that there was often more posturing than killing. For example, 90% of the muskets picked up from dead and dying soldiers at the Battle of Gettysburg in 1863 were loaded, over half of them with multiple loads. This was surprising, considering that it took 19 times as long to load a musket as to fire one. Such findings suggest that there was a lot of loading and posturing by basically decent young soldiers who could not bring themselves to actually fire their weapons. Another study found that only 15 to 20% of World War II soldiers could bring themselves to actually fire at an exposed enemy soldier. Once the army discovered this, they set out to improve this record through training involving classical and operant conditioning, desensitization, and a heavy dose of brutalization. Their results worked. In the Korean War, 55% of the soldiers were willing to fire, and over 90% were in the Vietnam War.

Grossman (1996; Grossman & DeGaetano, 1999) argues that we are doing the same thing with video games and violent movies, except that we start training shooters much younger. Teaching people to shoot immediately in response to the sight of the enemy is not always good soldiering or good police behavior, but it is successful video game playing. Associating brutal killing with entertainment greatly lessens the distress and inhibitions we normally have about such behavior, and that is what is going on all the time with teens playing a steady diet of violent video games as regular amusement. “We have raised a generation of barbarians who have learned to associate violence with pleasure, like the Romans cheering and snacking as the Christians were slaughtered in the Coleseum” (Grossman, 1996, p. 5).

Reference:

Grossman, D. (1996). On killing: The psychological cost of learning to kill in war and society. New York: Little Brown.

My question: Damn. Is this true? I know a lot of people who play violent video games, and none of them has tried to shoot me (yet). I *am* persuaded that the psychological tactics used to train soldiers would likely produce the intended effect. But the two contexts — war and video gaming at home — are different. Children have always played war games, whether with toy guns or joysticks. I’m not buying Grossman’s argument at face value. But still. F*ck.

Art is frustrated science.

Between my online graduate studies in media psychology and my new job as a barista at a popular coffee chain (not an easy job, I am telling you!), my brain hurts. I feel like my brain is being squeezed within my skull for an extract that simply isn’t there. Maybe instead of being squeezed it needs to be ground first. For a cognitive filter of some sort. Yes, a filter would be helpful. And boiling water. And something to catch the brew in.

I'm alive at last, and I'm full of joy.

11/28/2010: This post will be about how to achieve happier, more efficient and profitable lives. If it’s a good post, it will be appropriate for a family audience. If it’s a really good post, it will discuss sex toys.

12/12/2010: Oh, sweethearts. I haven’t forgotten this post. I simply haven’t had time to write it. I am going to re-cap the comments of Howard Behar, former president of Starbucks, at his recent Hollins University talk in which he: 1.) tells an anecdote about a worker who asks for a new broom, and 2.) recounts the subversive measures he had to take against his company’s marketing department in order to bring the Frappucino, now a $3B a year product, to market.

2/15/2011: Searching for my notes from Howard’s speech.

I do not like Jill's dreams.

A large blue tarantula fell on its back. It was alive and struggling, legs kicking upwards. Trails of ants swept in. They moved so fast they made a wind blow. The ants covered the spider. Meanwhile, several snakes of different sizes gathered around. They wanted the spider too, but the ants had already parceled the carcass into four parts and wrapped it in plastic film. They marched away with their spider-flesh packages. It would be their food for the winter.

Not pictured: Me.

The principles of critical thinking may lead us to conclude there is a difference between you and me. It is a conclusion we must be willing to make. And, by that, I mean it is a conclusion I must be willing to make.

Small snake in the driveway tries to get away from me. I talk to it in a baby voice. It does not talk back.

(Correction 10/31/2010: I originally thought this was a garter snake. But a friend informed me it is likely an Eastern Milk Snake.)