by Marty Coleman | Mar 30, 2010 | Malachy McCourt |
With your mind convinced you are getting back at someone, your hand around their psychological neck, with the free hand you are popping the pill that will kill you. You might be able to make life a bit miserable for the other person, it is true. You might be able to distort their world in the short term. But in the end, the resentment inhabits you, not them, and you will be the one disfigured and distorted by it.
Drawing and commentary © Marty Coleman
“Resentment is like taking poison and waiting for the other person to die.” – Malachy McCourt, 1931 – not dead yet, Irish-American writer, actor and politician
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by Marty Coleman | Mar 29, 2010 | Eric Hoffer |
What makes a person fill their life with hatred? We see a lot of it lately in the political realm with people who are so vehement about their hatred for all things Obama, just as we saw it with anti-Bush people not so long ago. It seems to be getting worse. You see it in people who go over the edge with hatred for their co-workers, family, spouses, etc. They let it consume themselves so much that they rationalize violence and murder.
What can it be but an empty life that allows for nothing to take them off the path of hatred? Where else can they travel if nothing else exists for them? How do you get off your hatred path when you are on it?
Drawing and commentary © Marty Coleman
“Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life.” – Eric Hoffer, 1902-1983, American writer and philosopher
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by Marty Coleman | Mar 28, 2010 | John Sebastian |
I am easily distracted. I was thinking about it recently after a conversation so went looking for a profound quote about it. Instead I found the real essence of distraction in this song lyric from my youth.
Distraction is about stimulation and passion. The young boy is passionate, and then he is passionate again in a different direction. The artist is passionate about oil paints, then is passionate about watercolors, then woodcuts. The engineer is passionate about vibration modalities, then is passionate about tolerances of hybrid substances in super cold environs.
The lessons of distraction are all about mastering what you are passionate about when. Not IF you are passionate, but when you are passionate. Delaying gratification, putting aside the stimulating distraction (or getting rid of it altogether).
That is the battle, isn’t it. What are you distracted by, and how do you combat it? Or do you? Is there something to be said for the element of distraction in life? Can it be a good thing?
Drawing © Marty Coleman
Lyric by John Sebastian of The Lovin’ Spoonful – Did You Ever Have To Make Up Your Mind? 1965
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by Marty Coleman | Mar 25, 2010 | Harold Fricklestein |
Does this look different? Ok, it’s an experiment! I am working on creating an video of a napkin actually being created. I thought I would start in Photoshop and use the ‘actions’ feature to record me drawing one using my Wacom digitizing tablet. It didn’t work. It drew the whole thing only to find that it recorded each color change I did, just not the actual drawing! Oh well.
A good lesson for all you budding artists out there. Do NOT expect to have good results for quite a while when you try a new medium, whether oil paints or a Wacom tablet. I am showing mine anyway, so you can see my progress (if I ever try it again, that is). My next attempt will probably be to use my actual camera to record each stroke as I make it. I expect that will take me a long time.
But I am not tired of thinking nor have I reached a conclusion!
Drawing and commentary © Marty Coleman
“A conclusion is the place where most people just get tired of thinking.” – my variation on one by Harold Fricklestein
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by Marty Coleman | Mar 24, 2010 | Michel de Montaigne |
What faults are those? Of others? Yes. Your own? Yes. If the fault you are angry about was an actual box, what would you find if you unwrapped it? What would be deep inside? Something you fear perhaps? If there is anger, fear is lurking behind it.
Drawing and commentary © Marty Coleman
“Faults seen through anger are like objects seen through a mist: the appear larger.” – Michel de Montaigne, 1533-1592, French writer
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by Marty Coleman | Mar 23, 2010 | Winston Churchill |
I know a lot of people who say politicians are all crooks, the system corrupts them even if they start out with good intentions. They think they are different than the rest of us. They have sold out, they are open to the highest bidder, they have no conscience of their own. They are all controlled by special interests, etc.
For the most part I don’t believe this to be the case. I think they are driven by the same things most anyone else is driven by:
Self-preservation
Gathering some degree of wealth and security
Having people like them
Having a good reputation
Wanting to do something good in the world
Not wanting to be misunderstood
Wanting to be given credit for hard work
Within those desires people make all sorts of choices. Some are governed by fear of losing an election, fear of losing power. Others are governed by gaining security and wealth more than other elements on that list. Depending on their ethics and courage to withstand pressure, they may or may not be open to being corrupted. They might even search it out. But honestly I do not think most politicians are like that. They are just like you and me, they fear dying, whether in their political career or their life. Sometimes they mistake one for the other.
Drawing and commentary © Marty Coleman
“Politics is more dangerous than war, for in war you are only killed once.” – Winston Churchill, 1874-1965, British Prime Minister 1940-1945, 1951-1955
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by Marty Coleman | Mar 22, 2010 | George Carlin |
The country I am from, the US, has a long history of this separation. It is constantly being questioned and sometimes people want to rewrite our history to say we don’t really have this separation, but the truth is we do, and it’s always been there. I believe it is a good thing.
What about those of you in other countries? How does it work where you are from? Do you like it like that or would you like a different system?
Drawing and commentary © Marty Coleman
“I’m completely in favor of the separation of church and state. My idea is that they both screw us up enough on their own, so them together is certain death.” – George Carlin, 1937-2008, American comedian
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by Marty Coleman | Mar 21, 2010 | Mark Twain |
It was 70º ƒ and sunny with a mild breeze friday evening as I ran my 4 mile training run. 12 hours later it was 29º and sleeting with a 25 mph winds and our long training run was cancelled. Tomorrow it should be 50º and sunny and we will run, dag nabbit!
People here in Oklahoma have a saying, ‘If you don’t like the weather, wait an hour, it will change’. And indeed that often is the case, especially in spring. Being connected to the world via blog, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn you realize that that same saying is used in many parts of the world, not just in Okieland. People take a perverse pride in how screwy their weather is.
I was born and raised on the beach in California. The popular imagination of the world says it is always sunny there. but in truth through much of the year there are early morning low clouds that create an overcast grey sheet along the coast. It burns away by 10-12 and it becomes a beautiful day most of the time but San Diego even has a saying for one of the summer months, calling it the June Gloom because of how much cloud cover there is, lasting for days at a time.
Don’t get me started on the other places I have lived; Connecticut, Ohio, Michigan, Massachusetts, Maryland and Virginia. Actually they aren’t that bad, I just wanted an excuse to list all the places I have lived.
Where have you lived and which place had the screwiest weather?
Drawing and commentary © Marty Coleman
“In the spring I have counted one hundred and thirty six different kinds of weather inside of four and twenty hours.” – Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens), 1835-1910, American writer
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by Marty Coleman | Mar 19, 2010 | Jay Silverheels |
And more people would admit their mistakes if they didn’t get completely trashed and condemned because of them. A good lesson for parents to learn. You want your kids to admit and learn? Then treat their mistakes as just that, mistakes. Teach them how the mistake might have been avoided, but don’t denigrate them as if they meant to do it, or were stupid for doing it. They are kids, remember?
Drawing and commentary © Marty Coleman of The Napkin Dad Daily
“More people would learn from their mistakes if they weren’t so busy denying them.” – Harold J. Smith (Jay Silverheels), 1919-1980, Actor. Played Tonto in The Lone Ranger television show.
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by Marty Coleman | Mar 17, 2010 | St. Patrick's Day, William Butler Yeats |
Happy St. Patrick’s Day to you all!
I don’t subscribe to the ‘abiding sense of tragedy’ idea. But I, as well as many others of Irish descent, do share a great sense of irony about life. It might be because I know that bad things will happen. I know that disease will come somewhere, accidents will come somewhere, heartbreak, loneliness, betrayal, setbacks, plans delayed. All that happens in real life.
I have experienced it many times, from being blown up when I was 18 and burned on 70% of my body to my mother almost dying from a brain hemorrhage and spending 9 months in the hospital to a divorce to a family member having serious emotional and mental issues. But what family doesn’t have tragedy? I am not unique in any way in that regard.
What I think the quote is really saying is that tragedy doesn’t destroy me. I know it will come and I take it as it is given, as part of life. I don’t like it, I do my best to avoid it, but I know I ultimately can’t, just as I can’t avoid the ultimate step in life, the end of it.
The great thing about knowing this is that it allows me to face reality head on. I am not afraid of it because I am familiar with it. It’s not exactly a friend, but it is an acquaintance I am on speaking terms with. And as a result I can go about my business with my other friends and acquaintances; love, joy, happiness, humor and passion in confidence, knowing tragedy isn’t my only companion.
Drawing and commentary © Marty Coleman
“Being Irish, I have an abiding sense of tragedy which sustains me through temporary periods of joy.” – W. B. Yeats, 1865-1939, Irish Poet. Winner of the 1923 Nobel Prize for Literature
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