There's TMI in Attics

(If you feel awkward about getting personal, or if you happen to be a member of my family, you would do best to exit now.)

Here's another typical artists' concern (there I go again, calling myself an artist. Still don't think I've earned it yet.). Is it editing or self-censorship?

I've already engaged in it my first night out. That debut post read that I'm seeking solace for a broken heart but then I changed it to “depression”. There's a delicate balanced to be maintained. Audiences want to connect on a personal level, but there's a risk of causing them to b uncomfortable with the things that are painful or boring them by being hopelessly miserable. Thing is, one of the reasons this blog exists is as a relief valve. I also hope she'll read it at some point – 'her' being my alienated friend. That's not an easy juggle. Communication has been the biggest issue of my life. I am not broken, but I am brokenhearted.

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When I was little I was forbidden access to the attic over the garage the longest time. I can no longer recall what fascinated me at first when I was finally allowed up. Boxes of this or that, old photos maybe. At first it was good just to gain entry to a place that had once been forbidden. That's a drive, for me...in Vallejo just outside of San Fransisco we'd lived at the edge of a desert. You couldn't see it from my backyard, as the yard ended with a rise that blocked the expanse from view. I was never allowed to climb that incline but I kept trying. I was maybe thee years old. One time I fell in the attempt and my face came down on the rake, causing a cut to my nose and nearly putting out an eye. It didn't matter how often I was told there was nothing there for me, the thing was to find out for myself.

Later I would find adult magazines up there. Playboy, Penthouse, Oui. The first thing that struck me was how innocent and playful a lot of it was. That's my first impression of sex, with the tease of primetime TV of the '70s with sitcoms teasing nudist camp plotlines or dramas like Room 222 talking about gays and discrimination...I just...didn't get the hangups. They still baffle me today. I've developed a natural love of human sexuality and a fascination for the prejudices that failed to instill themselves in me.

Why do I relate this? It's a pivotal influence. It's one of the things I would like to be known for in my work if not my self. Sexuality itself, the female body and face, yes, and a visual aesthetic...I remember a Playboy pictorial on the lingerie of the 19^th Century that was wonderful for it's baroque textures and interplay with the body. More than that, though, the values it re-enforced in me and my view of this vitally integral aspect of the human condition. Humanism, love, passion, empathy, compassion, trust. I may find my way to producing that, I may not. We'll have to see where it takes me. I will have to be careful with self-censorship as well, and know that by sharing my values I may lose some of the friends who will not want to accompany me there.

In my last year of high school, with no plan what to do with my life, I seriously considered looking for work in porn as an editor. With my body there was no consideration of performing, and I'm no good with a camera. Editing I think I'd be good at, given enough training. In time I might have directed. Not a lot of people would have back me on that call, but I should have done it. If you ever find yourself denigrating people in porn simply because they are involved in adult movies, that's who you're looking down on: just anybody, just regular people like me.

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We each find our own voice. I've always wished that I weren't so damn literal. I remember in 1^st or 2^nd grade, we were given an assignment that writing about what we would daydream sitting on the back porch. We were also to draw that scene in crayon. I was the one who drew a picture of myself sitting on a porch.

Surely communication has to be more than that.

How do I draw the smell of a hot attic in Summer? How do I visually put across the potent memory - the heady brew of dry air, cooked dusty webs, the rich aroma of old magazines, the scents of hot skin and sweat and cum? How do I covey the sense of discovery, of...of vindication, I think I felt, in finding this celebration of humanity as a sensual treasure not to be shunned or vilified but explored and understood, and nurtured?