this business of music

[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY

after the rain

[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY

me and the kitties

above: the prodigals returned after weeks/months: BLACKIE & STARBABY...  and their photographer

below: the home girls- they dont stray anymore

BARBRA

DOMINA

[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY

imagining winter

imagining winter

this photo, even though shot indoors, in the hell of louisiana summer, has a dreamy winter 'feel' to it. it looks as if i am sitting by a window, reading; with fields of snow & frozen grasses or branches outside, behind me. i could even be on a train, riding through some frozen landscape... perhaps siberia... but the real setting? not so romantic... ahhhhh the magic of illusion

[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY

tropical depression

the days seem to be flying by and i seem to be getting nothing done. soon i will be leaving for europe and have a gazillion projects that HAVE to be done before i DO leave. granted, i have done some, but not nearly enough. there is so much to do that it boggles my mind [which isn't hard to do] and pretty much overwhelms me; therefore i'm like a deer in the headlights 1/2 the time. but the major factor is that it is just too damned hot to do anything that deals with 'outside'. jammering? maybe, but it IS brutal. too brutal for me. if it were cooler i would get a hell of a lot more done. 

but even the 'cleaning up' & 'picking up' indoor manic thing seems to have waned. too bad there's not a LITE version of 'hoarders/buried alive'- i might qualify for that. maybe it's tropical depression, on top of clinical depression.

whatever... i am sick of all of it. work, like Jesus said of the poor, will always be with us. amen

for some reason my sleeping patterns have lately become more like jet lag patterns- so maybe i am/my body clock is subconsciously anticipating Europe. or it could be the early awakenings i've suffered for a few days [something/someone waking me daily at 7AM!] like 4 in a row... so today i didn't even crawl out until 2- had coffee, sketched, yakked with my cousin on the phone, ate my oats & dried cranberries soaked in rice dream- and am NOW trying to prepare myself to deal with watering [which i MUST do] which means dousing myself with DEEP WOODS OFF before going out; then sweating like a field hand while out, till my clothes are soaking wet. [i hate that] then coming in showering& hibernating. i have not left the house for weeks, except to do what i absolutely had to. 

so... i've been waking and doodling on my phone, gtablet or laptop, w/morning coffee [instead of spending hours on Facebook= doing nothing] which entertains me, and keeps me in the cooler indoors- and, i DO accomplish something= art; the sketches also give me ideas of what i will do with the canvases i bought, when i do REAL TIME art, while in Europe. I'm thinking ink and oil sticks on canvas- maybe even use my caran d'ache crayons, and some pastels- and or even watercolors- just big mixed media things. and/or i blog until dusk before going out. i wish i could just be put in a medical coma for the length of summer.

I've also been thinking a lot about music. the older i get the lower my tolerance for pop music and pop culture. for me, music, needs to come from a deeper place; a more spiritual place. i think the majority of my past solo work comes from there; and i am happy with the 'new' traditional cd [covers of OLD blues, jazz, gospel and folk songs] depressing as it may be [lol]- and a lot of the improvised solo piano tracks [60 done in switzerland- 30 done here, recorded in the past few years] which i have not even revisited, much less, edited and chosen to either add lyrics to, [if need be] or for release; i like them because they are like my sketches, totally unplanned and spontaneous'; and sometimes, without any formal structure. sometimes, i just dont want to hear words... or drums! [no offense to all my drummer friends]-

with the band., we do a lot of jamming during songs; the more we play together the more comfortable and instinctual it is. we also have a lot of live recordings that need to be revisited and edited and released. the energy of live performances [even if it is live in the studio- i.e. like old jazz & blues records- which is how i record all cds now] is always preferable to me to sterile tracked & canned recordings. its about the inter play, the communication, between musicians, which is what, to me, playing music together is about; "going where no man has gone before..." 

so off to europe for musical and artistic adventures, soon... i'm looking forward to it. 2011 has thus far has been a very hard one. the hardest of my life. i need a temporary change of scene and some distance; which might give me the strength to come back and start over with new energy.

[C]2011 DOUG DUFFEY

mammoth sunflower- pine tree

the mammoth sunflower, the cut pine trees, barbra the cat & me 7.7.11

i woke @ 2PM and did drawings on my gtablet and phone while having coffee. balfour called & came out to have tea. he'd come & called @ noon & i didn't hear him [i always turn my ringer off by my bed] he went home and called after 2... then came back!

we went to lowe's and got malathion, hoses, and various stuff, so i could spray down all the pine trees around/between the houses; so as to prevent losing more to pine beetles. stopped @ mac's on winnsboro road for last minute supplies before coming back to the little houses on the prairie. surveyed the sunflowers progress and the pine wood left from the tree service. guess i'll have a nice BIG bonfire in october.

i climbed the ladder with hose & sprayer [probably mixing the stuff WAY too strong] and sprayed & soaked 7 or 8 big pines- up to about 16 feet up the trunk. JB spotted me & helped w the hoses. i hate chemicals but this is preventive medicine. i hate losing these big pines to bugs- and have lost many. don't want to lose more- or pay to have them cut down.

later i made dinner: some salad made of lettuce & mustard greens from the garden- and cabbage, onion, ceci, garlic, tofu in hot green curry sauce- w/ rice. 

jb staying over on the sofa, leaving for memphis in the morning to fetch ms ellie. if i didnt have a world of work to do i'd ride with him. we plan to go see elvis in little rock before i leave the building for 2+ months in europe

watching 'blackmail' alfred hitchcock. well, i am, jb's already conked out. barbra on his leg. keeping the girls in tonight so they don't get poisoned or murdered... life in the woods

jimmy balfour @ chez moi 7.7.11

barbra in the pinepile

duffey oaks

after hurricane gustav 2009

after hurricane Holyfield 2011

for as long as i have been alive this oak, and it's twin have stood guard at the entrance to our family home. there were more around the place, which sadly, are gone. there was one close to the fence where there used to be a garage [which, i believe, burned down]. i have fotos of my brother & sister & i as children with them [also smaller] behind us; photos of most of our family with them behind them. there was a chain in one, over a large limb, which grew into it; which my father said, as a teenager, he put there & hoisted up a car to work on it! when hurricane gustav snapped it in two, it snapped my heart in two.

i suppose i am entirely too sentimental, and romanticize about the past, which was probably not so romantic. i know it was a hard life back then. i only lived in the old home place house until i was five or 6; then daddy built a new brick house just down the field. but i remember as a child walking down to see my grandma, miss emma, whom everyone called 'mama'- and step grandfather, joe. my blood grandfather, claude, whom i am named after, died when my father was just a boy.

i would pick wildflowers and take them to 'mama'; i remember there being a little pool of water by a tree, mid way between the houses, 1/2 way through our 40 acre field, which was very mysterious to me; rather a small oasis; a magical thicket. i imagined salamanders to live there; or maybe they did.

i also remember life on the front porch; which seemed to have gone on forever. everyone was always sitting on the screened in front porch, talking; gumbo yaya, everybody talking at once- especially mama & joe. neighbors & family sitting in rocking chairs, drinking coffee, or creme sherry; maybe a fan on the floor going. sunday was always visitng day, but i recall people always sitting on that porch of an afternoon- having coffee with them.
i enclosed the porches [front & back] when i bought the place in the 1990s-and moved all my stuff back from new orleans. i needed more space [why?] and i couldn't deal with the eternal dust & pine pollen, which didn't seem to exist back in the day.


i asked for and got all grandma's old negatives from joe, when she passed, which were revelatory- she as a young woman, always finely dressed, or on fishing trips in khaki jodhpurs & boots; almost always wearing a hat; in a ruffled swimsuit on the beach in galveston. amazing things: little glimpses into a life i did not know. san antonio, where they'd lived, sounded so exotic. my father gave me a small notebook of poems miss emma had written; i had no idea she ever wrote poems; she was always just grandma. i treasure it.

i once recorded some of the porch conversations on a cassette deck- my mama and i had driven out from town to visit "mama" & joe. i regret that i didn't record more- and ask more questions. there was so much i wanted to know. when i asked mama, "where did your father come from?" she replied, "aw honey, i dont know... he came from the west..."

i've scanned all the negatives and poems for posterity; digitized the cassette recording, but, with all grandparents, parents, all aunts & uncles gone [save one: aunt katherine; my father's sister] many things will never be known. much of our family history is and will be forever lost. the duffey oaks witnessed everyone come and go, as i'm sure the remaining ones will witness me come and go, too. to my celtic soul, they are sacred.

digital drawing

witch doctor on break

[c]2011 doug duffey

i've always drawn and sketched for as long as i can remember. nowadays new tools make it possible to do so almost anywhere. instead of taking a pad and pencil with me, i use my small phone [samsung captivate galaxy s android] or bigger gtablet, then upload my 'creation' from it to picasa, or one of my email addresses; then download it when i get to my laptop, and further work on it, edit and publish it to the world. disco!  

it's an amazing world we live in- w/amazing technology- instead of drawing on a cave wall or a rock face [and i do love and am inspired by primitive art] i can do this... which will one day be the equivalent of that.

i blog, therefore i am

the idea of doing an all in one blog? actually, it was about my website, which became an unmanageable uncontrolled monster, like my 6 blogs & myspace pages. my friend Emi in switzerland suggested i just put everything on my website instead of links to links to links to links, which in this day and age does not make sense. everyone lives in clips & soundbites. unless one is REALLY interested, they do not want to read pages and pages of stuff- or paragraphs for that matter. [or probably this... but this is MY space]

as is, my website is merely the skeleton on which i hang my body of  links- click 'videos' to go to youtube- click my space to hear some music, etc. all completely too much to manage daily, when i have so many other ideas in my head and so many things to do. 

my life is not just about my career; nobody's is, unless they want it that way. i don't. and my career is not ONLY about music- although that is my primary work. it's also about art and photography and various other art stuff, and always has been. i began doing experimental videos, then realized, as michael rasbury once told me "life is too short for video"- it does take a lot of time and patience and concentration. it is a better winter thing to do; like baking. its on hold.

so, voila... yet a new blog. i will use this and begin slowly dismantling the others- although they are valid and do serve their purposes, they're a bitch to maintain. the vintage/found fotos/slides and such do need their own home; as does my artwork and some of my pohotography which lur each others lines and slip back and forth into each other. perhaps a monthly myspace update would be a good thing. 

as mary moses said, "facebook is like crack' not that we would know, but it has certainly taken up a lot of people's time- and usurped email. someone once asked me "do you LIVE on facebook" -because i posted so often and so much- to which i said "yes, i dont have a real life"- not true, but it sounded good at the time. i DO live a far ways from town! actually, so many of my friends are scattered all over the world, that facebook is indeed a wonder, that i can keep in touch with them. i thought so many lost; and yet reconnected decades later. but despite all the social networking, i/we have become almost non social. do i/we pick up the phone and call friends or even visit them wherever i am/we are? i think, if so, very seldom. it's not because i/we dont want to, it's just that our lives [?] are consuming damned near every minute of every day... so maybe i DO live in virtual reality; you gotta live somewhere

always being wordy and having hypergraphia i've always written [and drawn] a LOT [songs, lyrics, poems, letters, stories, journals, etc] since childhood. the diaries & journals & letters are private/personal, as is a lot of my 'real time' life... but a lot of my life IS lived in public. i share what i want to; but, i find both myspace and facebook too limited for my wordiness- and twitter? forget it. yes, myspace [which IS good for music biz] has its own blog- but i seldom update- MAYBE i can have my cell phone send me a reminder to update monthly.

now to go inspect my clean yard, make photos, and go to 'town' - and quit slaving over this hot laptop... but i WILL have my phone w/me

what a difference a day- and tree service- makes

as for yesterday, it was a wash. i got nothing done due to going to bed at 4AM, waking unexpectedly @ 8AM, and deciding to stay up in case the tree service came. they didn't. i went back to bed, w/my cats after sitting up till noon. 

but i made some digital drawings using my wacom bamboo & laptop, my samsung galaxy s android phone, and viewsonic gtablet. i drew some IN photoshop and imported some by emailing them to myself or uploading them to picasa then, edited in photoshop.

i also downloaded some new HD camera apps to my phone, which are pretty remarkable. took the phone from 1.3 M or whatever to 4 or higher- maybe 8M. 

i played with the phone/cam -experimenting- like the pic above- and got what i thought were some cool results. a certain party hates this look- but it, like everything in life [except death & taxes]is temporary. the hair will grow and the beard will go... and vice versa, as it has done over & over in life...

the tree service called & came today and cleaned up what would have taken me a lifetime, in maybe 2 hours- normally i just let fallen trees lie & let nature take its course. case in point, the oak which has been on this land for hundred[s] of years, which got knocked down by hurricane gustav years ago. i let our old yard man, willie, take the wood for firewood- either for his home or sale?- i didn't care, i just wanted it gone. after getting all the manageable pieces- limbs and branches- he broke his saw on the tree trunk and left it lying across the driveway, where it has lain until today. were i younger & stronger & more ambitious man, i could have cut & sold the tree as firewood- but these hands dont need 'to go there' they are for art and music, thank you. 

so voila. in one feel swoop, or as my friend thunder thighs used to say "one foul sweep" they cut the dying pine ready to fall on the house; one by the pond that was ready to fall, cut & moved the oak, then cleaned up everything... until i am amazed. i can see that there is a new garden spot in the making, where the pine was- closer to the house.

 AFTER

 1/2 WAY

  BEFORE

i haven't ventured out to make photos of the oak spot yet. i told them not to cut the semi stump that is still tall and standing, which might have been a mistake. BUT... earlier in the year it had green branches; due to summer heat... not now. i'll leave it as sculpture; and go mow where all the debris was this afternoon. to have a clean lawn again... priceless

AFTER HOLYFIELD CLEAN UP

patio container garden

July 5, 2011- a sense of place

although i went to bed at 4AM, i woke at 8AM, afraid i might miss the tree man's call; he's supposed to come & cut down a tall dead/dying pine beside the house, before it falls ON the house. 

yesterday evening as i was working in the yard, what looked and felt like a storm coming [dark clouds and high winds], instilled fear in me that the tree would fall before the man got here- or i got the mower in the shed and myself in the house. had it not been 4th of july weekend he would have come sooner. again, it looks like a storm is brewing. thunder rumbles; it looks dark & cooler outside; all seems right with the world, except for the looming paranoia that the tree might flatten both the house and me. so now the vigil. the wait...

i woke and let the cats out, made coffee and decided to stay awake, although i'd rather not. in sleep and work lie the only real peace i ever get- and 4 hours sleep is never enough. there is fog on the windows from the AC; but the day's eventual heat will change that. i turn the ceiling fans on low for now. i hear the sound of a train, in the distance, way past my woods, over by the river. a sound i have heard most of my life. a comforting sound. the sound of home. my roots. my anchor in this uncertain life. 

for the past several days, after weeks of complaining about the 100F+ heat, i have been waking late [around 2PM], guzzling coffee & chicory, chain smoking samson tobacco, writing in my journal [as therapy] until 4 or 5PM, then when its cooler, heading out to the yards and gardens to get much needed work done; working till dark, doing as much as i can. it's been a mania; can depression be far behind? for anyone who knows me the answer is yes. like my creative manic phases, this too shall pass... 

having lost my father and my mother, one of my oldest & closest friends, and our next door neighbor, ALL in this year, thus far, 2011 has proved to be a sad and dark one. it has not been easy to function; it has not been easy to do even the simplest things, at times. it has been a struggle to get up and put one foot in front of the other and go forward; sometimes that's not even been possible. i've found myself isolating- staying home, only going out when absolutely necessary; mourning and grieving alone, in silence and solitude, and only being able to 'work through the process' OF grieving by working.

as i have done since her death, i labor in honor of my precious mother; who spent so much of her life working on this land; and whom i feel connected to, when i do the same. she spent decades fighting back this jungle; tending and cleaning all this acreage: mowing, trimming, cutting, chopping hauling, burning, into her 90s. she was amazing, going out in the middle of the day or earlier, even in summer; working, sweating, until dark, or until she was 'give out'. her work, her love of flowers, nature & order is evident everywhere i look. i tend her plants, many that she rooted and or grew from cuttings, see her wind chimes & tree ornaments, 'see' her 'in my mind' on her mower w/her straw hat, and through SO many things here, which evoke memories, i feel her presence.


i also feel connected to my father- whose father built the family home which i bought in the early 90s after my grandmother [his mother] died. i also see and feel his presence in it [which he helped me work on, as did my late brother] but i also think of him working in his yards and gardens into his 90s. i remember him fishing out a huge cypress tree trunk from lake d'arbonne & making a picket fence from it- alone & in his late 70s!-which went around his whole yard! and it was a BIG yard. 

my parents were unbelievably strong; both hard workers, and never happier than when they were working. i think that's why they lived so long. they were tough. a different generation. i often think i do not have their strength; but thinking of them, as i go through my day, outside on this sacred [to me] family land, working, i feel their strength, as i remember them, which propels me forward.

it has not been easy- nor has it been easy to balance home and career for the past years-  it is even harder now. i realize for the last 2+ months i have been in 'suspended animation', according to the pamphlet hospice left me. i feel unsure of the future, unable to grasp being alone, OR of being free to do what i want when i want. unsure even of what i want, anymore. freedom is not always what you think it will be. 


i look in the right corner of my laptop and see it's 10:20- and i think of my friend, edmund  who is also gone [he & dennis had a thing about 10:20] - i think of him [and so many other friends & family who have gone on] almost daily; especially when i see dragonflies or mushrooms [which he often painted] in the yard. there are always so many reminders of my loved ones everywhere. as my cousin donna says, "love lives on..."


i go peep out the kitchen windows to check the weather [since i have 'aluminum foiled' all unshaded windows for the summer] and see the emerald green of all the plants and grass outside, see my two gardens, my pond, my forest; then my patio container garden, the newly potted herbs, vegetables, fig plant; mama's wind chimes & tree ornaments swaying; grandma's [my] house across the way, and feel a sense of protection and a sense of place. 


thunder rumbles again. the only other sounds are the whirring of my late aunt vera's vintage floor fan- and an occasional car passing on the road. i light another cigarette, sip more coffee, wonder if i should call the tree man, but doubt he'll come today. 



barbra, the cross eyed cat is sleeping on my bed; on one of the vintage chenille bedspreads i got from my friend debbie [to replace 2 i bought in new orleans ages ago, and stupidly sold in a garage sale]-and i am tempted to crawl back in bed with her, sleep and let trees fall where they may... it's in god's hands anyway. 

mama's daylilies

July 5, 2011- PRELUDE

Another day, another blog; as if i needed one; as if i ever kept up the ones i have already begun. as if Facebook didn't take up most of my online time as it is. But there is time and there is time; there is public time and there is private time. there is suspended time. there is everything and/or nothing lived in one day, or in one moment... or not. time is relative, as is life. life as i live it? more meaningless drivel spat into the omniverse? or my own parallel universe? something/anything meaningful to someone/anyone/nobody somewhere/anywhere/nowhere? does it matter? i blog, therefore i am.