What sort of fruit would the ‘Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil’ bear today?
© 2025 Marty Coleman, who used to think the little floaty things I got in my eye as a kid were atoms that I could see.
Quote by Leonard Louis Levinson who, it seems, wrote quotes.
INFURIATIONS
This sentiment, ‘every past is worth condemning’, probably infuriates you as it did me when I first read it. I am often the one in arguments about history to defend the past era and the decisions made then. I don’t mean I approve of them, obviously I would not make many of the same decisions now. But that’s the point; I am in the present, not the past. Just as you have to take into consideration the age and mental capacity of your child when you react to what they say and do, you must do the same for the people of the past. They knew what they knew and as a result they said and did thing based on that knowledge, not based on our knowledge. So, I typically am against condemning the past, even if we now can say we don’t approve of the actions they took.But after reading this simple sentence over a number of times I am starting to see the value in it. By condemning the past and how they acted we are saying that we have learned, we have grown, we have gone beyond their understanding. That of course can be a two-edged sword. Not all knowledge from the past is wrong and often we find ourselves as a society moving back to past practices because we have found that our ‘progress’ really wasn’t so progressive. But plenty of knowledge from that past is worth condemning.
RATIONALIZATIONS
We don’t need to reexamine if slavery is something we should bring back. It has been condemned as wrong and we will not return to it. We don’t need to investigate if the subjugation of women is something we want to reinstitute. We know they are equal to the male of the species in every way and we are not going to return to the days of them being condemned to a lesser life. We condemn that attitude and any and all rationalizations, however valid they may have seemed at some point in the past. We know now they are not valid and we will not let them be used again.THE PAST AS PRESENT
The last point about women brings us to a dilemma. The past isn’t always in the past. We have subjugation of women going on all over the globe as I write this today. They are not allowed to vote, to drive, to own property, to have their own money, to participate as an equal member of society. The societies that are perpetrating this are still using the same arguments we once used not so long ago (don’t forget, less than 100 years ago women did not have the right to vote in the USA).We can also find it with us today in the US and other supposedly enlightened western countries. You don’t have to go much farther than the headlines of the last week over Rush Limbaugh’s disgusting statements about one woman in particular (and be inference virtually all women in the US) to know we still have a long way to go to move past some of those same rationalizations we thought we had left behind.
© 2025 Marty Coleman \ napkindad.com
Quote by Friedrich Nietzsche, 1844-1900, German philosopher
I sometimes get distracted easily. I work at home so it might be like today where I heard a bang up in the attic. Investigating I found that a christmas box had compressed a box below it, sliding down enough for a box on top of it to fall off. Nothing harmed and I was thankful it wasn’t a raccoon or alien, or alien raccoon.
But while I was up there rearranging it I noticed another box in a funny place so I moved it. I also brought up some empty boxes and made room for them, then I came down into the kitchen and wanted coffee and realized my milk is almost gone which I was going to replace with a new carton yesterday but was distracted on my way home from running by the report on the radio which I switched to during a commercial that I was going to switch back to the other station but forgot and while in the kitchen I noticed the dogs want to go out and while letting them out I realized the wind had blown stuff around so I picked that stuff up and then I realized I needed to get the mail and put the trash out for pick up and then I wanted a snack and then I remembered to get back to my office and start writing this a half an hour later but when I got back I had an image in a directory showing and I remembered I needed to edit it which I did and while I did that I realized I forgot my coffee in the kitchen and then decided to change shoes and then I wrote this.
Luckily the merging of my character and circumstances didn’t lead to a nuclear holocaust or falling down a sewer pipe. But it could in the future so I really need to get a grip on this attention span thing, which I will right after I go get milk…
© 2025 Marty Coleman, who just saw a pretty bird in the back yard.
Quote by Donald Creigh….oh wait, TWO pretty birds!
Why are histories about the same era written again and again? Gibbon’s wrote a multi-volume history of the Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire. Why isn’t that enough, why more books on the same topic? Why so many books about Lincoln, World War II, the American revolution, China, technology, wars? Why is there such a long history of histories? Because our prejudices are fluid over the generations and our histories will always be updated to fit our prejudices.
What are our historical and present day prejudices? Just ask yourself what you believe in and that will tell you. The belief might blind you to the truth, as is the case in certain branches of Islam or Christianity where they do whatever they can to keep women down. They go so far as to create and then perpetuate gargantuan lies under the guise of history to validate and support their prejudices against women being equal. They are driven by fear and they call it ‘truth’.
I read a synopsis of Hegel’s idea of ‘the Dialectic’ yesterday. No, I don’t really understand it, and no I haven’t ever read his actual work. (Ask my daughter Rebekah if you want to talk to someone who has actually read it and understood it). I read it in a book called ‘Eureka! – What Archimedes Really Meant and 80 Other Key Ideas Explained.’ It essentially is this: Thesis, Antithesis and Synthesis. We start with an idea, the opposite of the idea comes up to challenge it and eventually the two ideas combine to some degree to create a synthesis, a new idea. That idea/thesis in turn is the starting point for a new antithesis to challenge it and on it goes.
That is how we can see our fluid history. A way of looking at a series of events is put forth, let’s say about the American Civil War. Someone writes a book saying it was fought over slavery. Then someone else challenges that it was about slavery and writes that it was instead about state’s rights. A third person writes another book that says it was about both. That leads to yet another book that says it was about neither but instead was about cotton. And on and on it goes. The positive side to the idea of the dialectic is that it should lead to ever increasing knowledge and understanding. In practice, while I do believe we make some progress in society and life, I also believe that fear and vested interests keep society and individuals from moving forward towards a better life for all.
© 2025 Marty Coleman, who would always choose ‘history’ on Jeopardy!
Quote by Mark Twain, who was born 4 years after Hegel died.
Drawing by Marty Coleman, who doesn’t. Except for the parts he does.
Quote by George Bernard Shaw, who had a LONG beard.
I skipped last week because I was on the road visiting our daughter at Baylor in Texas. This week we resume with another great California painter, Wayne Theibaud.
Wayne Thiebaud – Lipstick – 1964
You probably know Thiebaud’s work as a west coast variant of Pop art. And indeed, it is all about the Pop. But funny enough, his inspiration to become a master of the rich, sensuous application of paint came from one of his best friends, Willem De Kooning, the premier Abstract Expressionist of the 50s and beyond.
Thiebaud – Ice Cream
It might appear to be about the subject, Ice Cream. But look close and it’s just as much about the thick lusciousness of the paint. the brilliant saturation of color and the beautiful richness in the shadows. I learned all about color and shading by studying Thiebaud’s drawings and paintings. Do you see any gray or black in the shadows? No, and you won’t ever see those colors. His shadowed areas are the most brilliantly colored of his paintings.
Thiebaud – Nude Woman in Purple Hat
Thiebaud didn’t do many nudes that have made it into the public sphere, but I love the few that have. This one in particular is exquisite. I love the brilliant, rich orange shaded area on the right of her breast and the periwinkle blue squiggle that is both shadow and reflection on her arm. Best of all is how he anchors her to the edge of the canvas by using the perfect ellipse of the hat shadow on the right.
Thiebaud – Bird
Thiebaud – City – Drawing
And of course, since I am primarily a draftsman more than a painter you know I would likely find that his drawings are incredible as well, and so they are. The texture and richness are just out of this world.
Thiebaud – Landscape
Thiebaud – Steep City
Thiebaud – Ocean City – 2007
Most of America, if they know of Thiebaud at all, know of his cakes, ice cream and other luscious dessert paintings. But it wasn’t until I saw his cityscapes and landscapes that I understood what a brilliant artist he was. Just as we saw with Diebenkorn (a friend of his), Thiebaud kept growing as an artist. he became a professor at UC Davis in the Sacramento River Delta area. The landscape of rivers and farms and small towns became a focus of his work. He was also not far from San Francisco with it’s incredible hills and city scenes. Both enthralled him.
Thiebaud – New Yorker cover – 2011
If you ever want to see his work, it’s usually on the cover of the New Yorker magazine a number of times a year. It’s one of the reasons I subscribe.
Woman in a Wayne Thiebaud Painting
You might be wondering, who is this woman and why am I putting her in this post? We visited Cape Cod in 2009 and as the sun set we had dinner at a harbor restaurant on Martha’s Vineyard. The sun was hitting the hostess just right and I considered asking her if I could take her picture. Then I saw the Wayne Thiebaud painting in the background and that sealed the deal. I asked and she said yes. What you say? They had a Thiebaud painting in the restaurant? No, the world had BECOME a Thiebaud painting right before my eyes. The rich, bright, beautiful color of sunlight with the cool deep blues and green shadows all perfectly combined in geometric and curvilinear glory took my breath away.
One of the best, most precious benefits of loving and studying art is that it will forever allow you to see art in the real world. It is never not there, you only have to look for it. Where do you find art?
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Fall/Winter 2016
Winter/Spring 2015
Summer 2014
Winter 2012/2013
Winter 2011/2012
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Quote by Kanye West
Dear Mr. West,
Yes, that is exactly what America wants you to do.
It is confusing, I know. You get messages from every self-help guru of the last 100 years to excel, to be great. You are shown images, videos, books and TV showing people being great. You are told stories of people overcoming incredible odds to become great. You are encouraged to be great by your mother, by your father. Your teachers tell you you can be great.
You go out into the world and pursue your dream. Those capable of influencing that dream; those who could hire you, fire you, produce you, promote you, direct you, invest in you, pay you – they all encourage you to be great. They all praise you when you are great. The people following you; your fans, critics, fellow artists, they all say you are great. You become one of those people who are used as an example of someone who overcame to become great. You are a poster child for becoming great.
Then you make the mistake. Then you do the worst thing you could possibly do. Then you say you are great.
Why can’t you say that? Didn’t the entire world do everything in its power every step of the way in your life to tell you that you could be great and praise you when you did become great? How could it then be wrong to say you are great?
Here’s why: Because in traditional, historic America the most important aspect of being great is being humble. The final proof of greatness is in the great person not being aware of it. Just as the final proof someone is a hero is when they say ‘I am not a hero’. Just as the worst thing a beautiful woman can ever say is ‘I am beautiful’.
Where did this come from? Look no further than the pew. While in every other aspect of American culture we are told to be great, in church we are told we can never be great. We can’t be great because we are fallen, because we sinned, because we have evil in us. We can aspire to be better people, but it is not approved to go too far. Going too far means you have pride. Pride goeth before the fall. If you have pride in yourself you do not understand your true nature. You do not recognize that you are a fallen, debased creature unable to redeem yourself. Trying to be great means you are trying to do that. SAYING you are great means you think you did it, and on your own. And doing it on your own of course means you do not need God. And there is no worse sin than thinking that.
Truth? I think it has often been gigantic, manipulative untruth that has been told in the sanctuary. I think arguments about pride and humility and being fallen have been used as a weapon to keep people, genders, classes and races in their ‘proper’ place. And it has been successful in doing so. I am always happy when I see that element be exposed for the evil it is.
But here is another truth. There is something to be said for understanding self. And understanding self, TRULY understanding self, means you know that you have SOME greatness in you and you have SOME work still do to. It means you understand that you did not achieve this greatness on your own, and that you need to acknowledge and give recognition to those who have helped you on your way. It means you know that it can be taken away from you.
But most of all, over all other things, you should know that no matter how great you become in the eyes of the world seeing you at a distance, it is how you display greatness to those right in front of you that matters most. It is how you love your child, your wife, your husband, your parent. It is how you minister and care to those who depend on you, those who mentor you, those who need you.
When you do that, when you are that, then you won’t be thinking about telling the world you are great. You will just be. And you will be happy and humble when you find others telling the world that you are instead you having to tell the world yourself.
Enthusiastically,
Mr. Coleman
I fancy myself a pretty good thinker. But considering almost all my napkin drawings start with a quote that I myself did not make up, it would be disingenuous of me to say I come up with nothing but original ideas.
However, I do like to think I am unique thinker. A unique thinker isn’t someone who thinks up something out of the blue. Instead it is someone who takes these ideas from others and combines them, mixes them, bakes them into a uniquely stated idea. Not necessarily a new idea, but an idea that has been thought through by one unique individual and come out the other side with something no one else can give it, the perspective and expression of that one person.
I think a lot of young people who are unformed in their own identity don’t understand what this means. I see it all the time on reality TV shows like American Idol. The judges say to the young person, ‘you have to just be yourself’ or ‘you have to put your own spin on it’ or ‘you just need to find your own voice’. And the least mature of the singers look blankly back at the judges, having no idea what it is they are talking about. They don’t know yet how to take another idea, (another song in this case) and make it their own because there is no ‘own’ there yet. They are doing their best to imitate a great singer but they don’t know yet how to become a great singer themselves.
The originality of your ideas isn’t what you should have pride in. It is what should endow you with humility. How you take what is given to you from the outside and transform it into something uniquely yours, THAT is what you can have true pride in.
Drawing by Marty Coleman, who reads in bed.
Quote by Ralph Waldo Emerson, who also read in bed.
It is paradoxical that those who are most self-conscious, seemingly the most insecure and with the most damaged ego and self-esteem, are often the ones who are thinking about themselves the most. They are worried about what others think of them. They are worried about being disapproved of. They are concerned they aren’t lovable. They are thinking a lot about themselves, perhaps in a skewed, inaccurate way, but still they are thinking about self. The more someone does that the less they think about others, right?
The question then becomes, who is the bigger egotist, the one who is supremely confident or the one who may not be at all confident but is thinking about themselves all the time?
Whatever the case, a smart reading of humility would include this idea; that when you aren’t thinking about yourself you are able to think about others and act on helping them, nurturing them, protecting them, feeding them.
Humility is more about other-awareness than self-awareness.
By the way, I like this quote so much I have used it twice. The first time was with a drawing of a woman looking in a hand mirror while a person in the background helped a man who had fallen out of a wheelchair get back in it. The drawing was pretty lousy actually.
Drawing and commentary © 2025 by Marty Coleman
Quote by C. S. Lewis, 1898-1963, Irish writer
If it pleases you, today I am serving up napkin #2 of Humility Week.
A lot of people don’t mind serving, but they hate the idea of being a servant. It harkens back to days of slavery, indentured servitude and being in an inferior position where you are taken advantage of.
But the funny thing about really truly being a servant to another is that if you are doing it right you aren’t thinking about yourself. You aren’t thinking it’s unfair to you. You aren’t thinking someone is acting superior to you. You aren’t thinking about you at all. You are thinking about how to serve the other person. If they are a bit rude, so be it. If they are a bit thoughtless, so be it. They aren’t there to stroke your ego. They are there because they need, want or are paying for you to serve them in some way.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying a person in a serving role should be abused. I am just saying that as a servant you will come across all sorts of behaviors and your primary response is not to judge whether you like that particular behavior or not. Your response is to do the best you can in serving that person. Obviously we have our limits and people who abuse should be stopped. But that is a separate issue from going into a serving situation with the right mindset and the right heart.
The humility of serving does not equal humiliation.
Drawing and commentary © 2025 by Marty Coleman, a waiter on and off for 28 years, 1971 – 1999.
Quote by Anonymous
