Always Made The Effort

My father said that he never could see the “man in the moon.” The moon's face with it's big crater eyes and opened mouth that seemed to say “Oh,” had always been so obvious to me and a welcome sight, so his confession surprised me—especially since I held my dad to be a supremely thoughtful person.

I never heard the mention of God or Jesus or Moses while growing up. Most of my friends belonged to households with religious affiliations, at least nominally claiming to be of a particular spiritual persuasion. Not in my home. Yet, there were strong ethics involving morals and responsibility.

In my nineteenth year, while away at University, I found myself searching for meaning beyond the practical, and embarked on a spiritual pursuit, joining the Baha'i Faith. Perhaps my parents were surprised, especially when through the years my faith deepened. 

Throughout every religion are teachings on how to act in accordance with spiritual wisdom. Most religious people try and live righteously, with various degrees of success. Some are outwardly religious but inwardly lazy so as to make no effort toward benevolence or virtue.

Father always made the effort and could not tolerate liars or usurpers. As a young adult, after I found religion, we talked and he admitted that he regarded religion somewhat like Karl Marx (German, 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) did—as the “opiate of the masses.” The context of the Marx phrase appears in this sentence: "Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people." Father was determined not to accept unjust conditions in society. He felt that religion made people accept what they should not. When so much was being made of Mother Theresa caring for the destitute in India, taking a vow of poverty, he scoffed, and insisted her energies would be better used to change the sick nation so that systemic corruption and oppression were expunged and a new society with a more wholesome foundation was created to lift up the masses. Why accept the poverty and not change the conditions that created it?

Father left this world never having spoken the word “God,” but in his actions and beliefs living spiritually. I imagine his delight, when he “met his Maker,” and before Him, he stood clean, and they looked back at all those he unselfishly helped along the way.

Read here a very good article about my father, written in the Chronicle of Philanthropy:

Richard Boone: a Tireless but Humble Advocate for the Poor

I Always Loved Him

Dad, second from left at top

My father, who died only two weeks ago, was an enigma to me. I always loved him, and he represented a good human being and my parent, but he was mysterious and indecipherable almost from beginning to end. He had a fabulous life as an activist for social justice, reaching into the highest echelons of government and philanthropy, working behind the scenes to bring about better conditions for disadvantaged and oppressed people. A consummate strategist, his ideas were not about giving handouts, but rather bringing about social change so people could rise out of poverty and become contributing members of society. (See New York Times article.)

Richard Boone's trajectory from the time he finished study at the University of Chicago was that of social work, and he immediately rose to leadership in any work he found himself. For most of his life, he was at the top of his field—always the executive director.

For a man who worked so hard, he also had five children and a wife. I am the oldest son, and all the other siblings followed within eight years. Our circumstances were poor to begin, but improved to stable middle-class and upper middle-class. My father was never about getting rich—it was not in his perspective. He was a devoted father, but not the ideal family man. His work took precedence. I do have fond memories, especially the days we lived in Washington DC—of vacations, wrestling matches with him on the living room floor, and visits with him on weekends in his bedroom, where he sat me down and asked about how my life was going, lending all his attention to me for a wonderful hour. He also informed my life with the fascinating people he brought home. People of all races who he championed and chose as allies—people who would never have appeared in the homes adjacent to us. One summer, when I was a youngster and our family lived on Long Island, we welcomed into our home two inner city kids, brother and sister, from a gang riddled neighborhood in Spanish Harlem, New York City. I do not know how my father found them. They spent the summer as part of our family. The boy told me about the zip guns his friends made to shoot, and I was very impressed. I don't know how my mother handled seven kids then . . . my father was always surprising her and sometimes she complained loudly.

My father's folder he kept for me . . .

Dad was mysterious to me in that he did not share his inner feelings and was impassive. He studied and thought, and could be incredibly attentive, but also inaccessible. He never said, “I love you.” Yet, I knew he did in a deep way.
I never saw his body after he died, but arrived to the family home a couple days after he was taken away. Nothing much remained, since he was not a great collector of things and mementos. But he had folders for all his children, and I found letters and correspondence between him and I that he had kept.

I also found some hand-written notes he had made and considered important enough to stash away. Since he had no religion, he developed his own philosophy and reason for living. His notes indicate his primary beliefs were in:

1. The energy of love
2. Recognition of the world being bigger than “self.”
3. Live life so as to hurt others as little as possible.
4. Know that the individual is not the center of everything.
5. The imperative to build something of enduring value.
6. The dynamic process of becoming.
7. “Truth” can be found at any level; physical, emotional, rational, and spiritual.

I am feeling tides of emotion in the aftermath of father's passing. Death is final and draws a close to life.

Richard Boone
(1927-2014)Memorial Website

A Symphony Plays

It is odd, returning to my father's home in the wake of his death. The house that he loved is intact and outwardly at least, stands as it has for years. My mother is home, and the yard, garden, and inside are all neat and tidy. Yet, it is as if a symphony plays—missing an important instrument, and it is strange.

Click here to visit the memorial site for:

Richard Wolf Boone, March 29, 1927 - February 26, 2014

R W Boone Memorial

Death of Father

To laugh often and much;
to win the respect of intelligent people
and the affection of children;
to earn the appreciation of honest critics
and endure the betrayal of false friends;
to appreciate beauty;
to find the best in others;
to leave the world a bit better
whether by a healthy child,
a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition;
to know that one life has breathed easier
because you lived here.
This is to have succeeded.

attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson

Taking Risks

Sometimes, in olden days when ships were powered by sails and breeze, it happened that during a journey, the wind stopped. The ship and its crew could then only drift at sea, forced to wait for a current of air.

My artistic work life requires a steady breeze of inspiration, but occasionally the wind unexpectedly stops, and then I am in doldrums. I am not sure if every artist feels this. The common advise for artists to become successful is to find your style, and stay on that path without deviation. I think my career has been unusual in that I get restless for change, and do not like repeating myself and so go off on tangents frequently. Sometimes it is a dead end . . . but by taking risks, discoveries are made.

I have volumes of old work that is experimental, and most is in storage . . . awaiting further inspiration, or simply to be painted over and begun anew. This artwork of the woman stepping forward with a flowing gown is something from years ago, and just such an experiment. It has been in storage, and I will work more on it sometime. The circle around her head could be a halo, or the full moon.

It appears a shadow shaped like a bird is crossing over her. 

What A Long Strange Trip Its Been

Faithfully writing a weekly blog has brought My Fairytale Life to the number 400. That is four hundred posts; over 1000 photographs, encompassing global travel, musings on life and death, art, philosophy, and occasional random rambles into the unknown.

As the Grateful Dead sang, "What a long strange trip its been."

Oscar Wilde

Death and love seem to walk on either hand as I go through life: they are the only things I think of, their wings shadow me. -Oscar Wilde  (Irish, 16 October 1854 – 30 November 1900)

A couple of weeks ago I began reading, Oscar Wilde by Richard Ellmann. It is over 600 pages in small type, and a thorough and exhaustive look at this famous, complicated being. Over the years I have read elegant, cunning, and electric witticisms by Wilde—enough to make me interested in learning more about him. This biography took almost twenty years to write, and because of his comprehensive detective work, it seems that Ellman knows everything about the public and private figure of Wilde. There are so many biographical facts introduced, and all of Wilde's friendships, both academic, professional and personal, that I find the flow is slow and at times tedious reading, but very accurate. Because of Wilde's indomitable persona, it takes hold and won't let go.

Oscar Wilde's personality hinged upon pleasure and art. He was brilliant in language and could make a great impression upon people simply by his speaking. He thrived upon challenging the status quo, and in the end, this was his downfall. Wilde was homosexual, even though married with two children. His male lover, a younger man both handsome and quixotic, lured him into the dark paths of homo-erotic life, and in the end, Wilde was convicted in London of sodomy and sentenced to two brutally harsh years in jail. He lost everything—family, wealth, and health. The ordeal utterly devastated him and he died soon after his release. I have not yet read to the finish of the book. At this point, I have come to the section where, at the top of his fame and fortune, he has been in court, and is now facing his prison punishment. The downward spiral is violent.

“My ambitions do not stop with the composing of poems. I want to make of my life itself a work of art.”

Fun Intensity

Winter cold makes life contract—or so it seems. The sun shines for fewer hours of the day, plants go dormant and energy is spent in conservation rather than gleeful expenditure. And so it goes with my art business. The Steven Boone Gallery art sales lapse, as the Santa Fe art market declines to its nadir in January and February. 

It is a good time to take risks creatively. Why not let the modus operandi be that of surprise and exploration? 

I always come back to experimentation as a basis for my art. I am easily restless and never self-satisfied for long. This week, I pulled some large abstract monotypes out of storage and began painting on them. They were made years ago, during another period of exploration, and have been out of sight ever since. I allow my eyes to wander over the surface and like a Rorschach test, let imagination come forth to suggest a narrative. 

I love having archives to draw upon. This blog is an archive of my life for many years . . . and I have been drawing from it to write a memoir. Thirty thousand photos are in my files, and only last night I took delight reworking a photo from a session with two models in my studio that took place several years ago. The pair were young friends, a white woman and black man, roomates who had an easy ambience between them, and who were quite comfortable being naked and interacting joyfully for a few hours with me, as I took hundreds of pictures.

The studio was draped in black cloth, and at one point, the woman, who has marvelous milky-white skin, held a long black cloth that she used to duel with her friend, who had a good physique and cocoa complexion, and battled with a flowing white cloth. The action was wonderful and my camera captured the fun intensity.

Pressing Beyond Boundaries

There is no escaping racial issues when one is an American. It is in our history, from the days of slavery, and a terrible civil war was fought over the matter. I grew up in Washington D.C. during the days of the civil rights movement, and experienced forced de-segregation at my high-school. Black inner city kids were bussed to schools away from their neighborhoods, and in my sophomore year my classmates went from 95% white to more like 60%. I found that the experience of meeting the African-American youth added greatly to my education—not in a scholastic way, but rather a social one. 

Back in 2008, when I had determined to leave the familiar comforts of my life and begin a year-long solo sojourn around the world, I chose to go first to Belize, a country on the northeastern coast of Central America. It is the only country in the area that has English as the official language, and is primarily black. And I wanted to live in a black town, so I chose Dangriga. Perhaps I thought that this would awaken me for what was ahead—all the cultural surprises, and experiencing being a minority.

As an adventurer, pressing beyond boundaries and exploring outside of comfort zones is essential to the experience. From the start, when I first set foot in Belize and realized I was in a new world with different rules and scenery, I began a shift of consciousness, and instead of trying to hold on to what my comforts were, I let the the surprising events unfold and decided to live in the unfolding drama, calling life THE DREAM.

 

Click, for photos from around the world

Go Figure

Nudes have been figuring into my artwork lately, and were to be the subject of my blog this week, but I have already written extensively on the topic. Here are some of the posts, and to view, click on the titles:

The Artist And The Model

September 15, 2013

 Nude Depiction

January 13, 2013

Naked

 

 

December 09, 2012

Revel In Art

 

November 27, 2011

Pleasurable Dance of the Senses

 

April 10, 2010

 Sublime And Complicated

 

March 29, 2009

The Incredible Terrain

 

February 15, 2007

Disappearance Is Illusion

I visited my daughter's grave today. Yesterday was her birthday—she would have turned 34 years of age. Nobody else was around as I stood on the grass where she is buried. A cold winter wind made me pull my coat tight to my chest and I stood briefly, praying for her soul and remembering the day she was born. I was with my first wife at home, with a nurse and doctor when Naomi was delivered around 11 AM. I never would have thought that she would die in 1999, before reaching twenty.

A few days ago, I was in California, visiting with my parents who are close to death. This all makes me think of my own dying. I do not know when it will be, but death is certain for every created thing. As I think of creation, I realize it is always renewing itself—almost like a wave that arrives at a shore and at last culminates in a surge upon land and then disappears. The disappearance is illusion, for the ocean remains and gathers itself together continually to transform and surge again, over and over.

Created With Loving Care

The yard around my parent's home on a corner lot in Santa Barbara, California is a mature and stately oasis of greenery. Assorted tall pine trees watch over the humble house that is surrounded by lawn and a magnificent hedge that is thick and high, and gives the property a sense of privacy. Jade plants are in blossom, an orange tree is laden with fruit, some roses are in their last bloom before spring, and birds are always at the feeder outside the dining room window. It is nice to be able to sit in the gentle mid-winter sun and feel the balmy air amid this blissful scenery—all of it created with loving care.

I imagine that when my mother dies, and my father dies, the property will give a collective sigh of remorse. Especially when my mother passes. For years, she has glorified every blade of grass and tree leaf; and this is how she has talked with God. It is through His creation that she has gone to Him and given praise. I know she has done this every day, and when I have visited her, have seen her go around the house and speak intimately to the roses and trees, saying, “My, aren't you wonderful! How beautiful you are!” My father told me yesterday that the roes were especially spectacular this year. Now, my mother cannot see them, except when they are cut and brought indoors.

Chloris and Dick Boone, a couple months ago.

Both my parents need full time assistance now. I am visiting them from my home in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and came on short notice when I heard that they are now getting hospice care. My brother and sister are often at the house, and it seems to take an army to keep the place running. Thankfully, everything is kept clean, and order prevails. But my parents are in steady decline. My mother is in rapid decline and remarked this morning that she is shocked at her sudden deterioration. While my sister and I were getting her up from bed and into a wheelchair, she commented that she thought her rapid downfall was the result of shock, hearing that my father has aggressive lymphoma.

I walked slowly by father's side as he pushed his walker into the street and around the house this morning. He wanted to visit his office, which is attached to the garage. The neighbors waved and said hello, and he smiled and waved back. Another woman, walking her dog stopped to say hello. My parents are well-liked . . . anchors of the community.

Soon, I will have to leave the house on the corner, and I know, when my parents go away at last, the property will sense the loss and grieve at their passing.