Cántico a la Vida que, a pesar de todo, brota a tope

La planta en los fotos abajo es un especie de Datura, será algún pariente del estramonio; lo inusual es que es tremendamente gorda! El estramonio, una planta medicinal vinculada a la brujería en varias culturas, crece normalmente en la naturaleza europea en el formato de una hierba. Este aquí tiene un tallo casi leñoso, alrededor de un metro de altura, y las ramas corren extensamente en todas las direcciones. Está repleta de frutas espinosas: la mitad todavía verde, estilo las bolitas de los castaños en el Retiro; el resto maduras, doradas, abriéndose para sacar la carga de semillas negras venenosas de su vientre. Visto desde lejos, las ramas parecen ser la continuación tridimensional de las grietas marcadas en el barro fino reseco, lo cual es su sustrato; por cierto también bastante venenoso. Trocitos de plástico y basurilla de todo tipo se asoma dispersada por la superficie del suelo y colgando de las ramas, pero nuestra planta esta que chuta; resplandeciendo de tenacidad; un monumento a la vitalidad insistente en una microclima hostil para la vida en la mayoría de sus formas.

 A unos metros corre el río Manzanares; le falta ya poco para desembocar en el Jarama. El colorcito no deja dudas sobre su rol poco glorioso como alcantarilla del metrópolis Madrid: negro negro, como si de gasolina fuese y a rachas desprendiendo un olor nauseabundo de podredumbre. El corriente lleva una pedazo de poli-span; la masa blanca pasa flotando majestuosamente con el verdor frondoso en la otra orilla y los cortados de yesos como telón de fondo.

Por vía área vienen y van libélulas, mariposas y otros insectos coloridos cuyo denominación no me lo se. En el cielo pasan bandadas de garzillas blancas, siguen el río un rato y salen por un tangente bruscamente justo encima de mi; más arriba circulan cientos de cigüeñas formando dos remolinos que corren en dirección opuesta. Los últimos se nutren del vertedero de Valdemingómez, los primeros del Parque Regional del Sureste.

El lugar es la más extraña mezcla de naturaleza salvaje y deshechos de la civilización; un espectáculo absolutamente surrealista de biodiversidad y bazofia.

 

 

Datura on the shore of Manzanares

Text to these picutres / texto perteneciendo a estas imagenes: HERE / AQUI

Intro a los cuatro dibujos / The bellow four drawings

I have chosen the bellow four drawings from those I have done since last summer.
They were all good exercises in the art of viewing.

De lo que he dibujado durante el ultimo año he elegido estas cuatro; tres de los motivos son del campo en la Comunidad de Madrid, uno de un pueblo en León.
Han sido excelentes ejercicios en el arte de mirar.

Enebro subido a roca

Juniper tree climbing on a rock

Galapagar, Madrid; 2008

Valla tradicional de rocas metamórficas.
Gargantilla de Lozoya, Sierra Norte de Madrid
Marzo, 2009



Traditional dry stone wall of metamorphic rocks. Gargantilla de Lozoya
(a village approx 70 km north of Madrid)

Puerta de Santiago, Valderas, León. Agosto, 2008

Puerta mudéjar sencillo y bonito; formas y técnicas tradicionales.

Además era un ejercisio curioso de reproducir la alteración durante siglos en distintas superficies.

Medieval city gate of Valderas, village in Leon (northern Spain), typical mudejar style.

a study in reproducing the surface alternation of different building materials, 2008

Root of Cedar tree, with fungal attack;

mountains of Madrid, Eastern 2009

Raíz de Cedro volcado, atacado por hongo;

Sierra de Madrid, Pascua de 2009

inscripción: ((Eine Menge wohlbekannter Pfäde führen von diesen Worten aus in alle Richtungen)) - Wittgenstein

fechado: “Pascua de resurrección, 2009”

Presentation of “La Cuesta de Moyano”

Tales from the streets of Madrid - Part I*

The small white Seat parks in front of my stand. Right behind the driver’s door there is a round sticker from the NASA, towards the rear a gigantic dent. Out comes Patxi, a tall and almost bald, middle-aged guy, wearing shirt and a thin black tie with a small tight knot. With a few energetic steps he approaches my board loaded with second hand books, greeting me with his usual broad smile. While his hands and eyes are actively searching, I receive a kind of verbal raid, a heavy monologue built like practically one long sentence without full stops.
“No no, this Pope is definitely not ordained by God; Lefebvre is right, yes he is; the Second Vatican Council eliminated the spirit of the Church; terrible, terrible and look around, nobody is aware of it. But thanks to the providence I have found the place, here in Madrid, where Mass is still celebrated in Latin.”
After entering in more symptoms for the decadence of the Roman Catholic Church, Patxi wish to pay the three books he has chosen; he is bargaining a bit, but only for the game, it is obvious that today he has money and comes to have the mayor kick of most bibliophiles; the activity superior to reading: buying books.

My client continues screening our present offer, while the Spanish word stream with the characteristic singing Basque accent continues: “...no more honor and dignity in the army, well not even in the Legion any more. I offered my services but they did not take me because I only obey orders in line with my own principles. Yes, yes my friend, I am a man of firm values. Nowadays soldiers are only mercenaries without principles... so in these conditions I can not be a soldier, but I am life-guard.” Quickly he shows me the card documenting it. Whether it is in the local swimming pool or in some more exotic sense, I did not catch it because the “life-guard” subject was immediately swallowed by the following one.

Again he wants me to charge him the 10-15 euros for the next few books, and the show goes on: “Two meteors will come, two; destroying this sick civilization; we will return to the Stone Age, the only knowledge remaining is the one in the printed books. I am choosing selected books that contain the secret knowledge, then I will leave my personal library in a bunker; this will be my legacy to those dark ages to come...”

We are at “La Cuesta de Moyano” in Madrid, the biggest year-round daily market of second hand books in Europe; the summer like weather is typical for September in the Spanish capital. It is eleven thirty in the morning on a normal Wednesday.

Working on the street, expose you to a broad range of different characters both from the city itself, and in the case of Metropolises from all over the world. This is true independently of your occupation, but in high degree if you are selling something on exactly the same site every day of the year, and the panorama gets even heavier when the products sold are second hand books.

In spite of his suspicious opinions and the fact of being so open with them, Patxi is a nice fellow; I would say he is only slightly more nuts than the average. He is always extremely polite, never stays too long, and he even buys books from time. But still, I never gave him my personal mobile number when he repeatedly was asking for it, and it is very little probable that I will read a book inspired by his recommendations.

Only by varying the few parameters regarded in my last paragraph, we get a bunch of different characters, and as you, my dear reader, probably already has guessed, you will have rich occasion to meat them all in the chapters that will follow in the Tales from the streets of Madrid.

To respect the personal space, I have changed all the names, except the name of the King and of the Heroes. For me a King is not necessary one with a crown, and his power might be fairly limited, but he posses a doubtless authority; respected or hated but everybody knowing him are aware of the weight of his actions.
A King is a public character; no need to hide his name.

Finally, regarding the identity of a Hero: It might not be obvious for everyone knowing him**, but his authority is transcendental. When the time comes, I would like to discuss in more details what these words signify for me.

footnotes:
* All the Tales from the streets of Madrid are dedicated to JM, close friend of mine.
The tales have been maturing in my mind for almost six years by now, but it is mainly thanks to him that I finally begun to write them down.

** Most Indo-European languages require specification of the gender when using pronouns in third person singular . Every time I write "he" I mean “he/she”, and the reason is not to be politically correct: Several of the few heroes I have met personally in my life were women. I refuse to write "he/she" because of the clumsy visual aspect.

The metaphor of “crystallization”

(Scientific metaphors in everyday language - Part I)

In his now classic work “Metaphors we live by”, George Lakoff has awakened the general awareness regarding how much our linguistic landscape is under the influence of experiences from the physical world; As the start shoot for this blog I will analyze metaphors from natural sciences widely used in modern language. In the present entry that of “crystallization”, an excellent metaphor in the concept-complex of “expressing-ordering-creating”. In a later entry I will look on the metaphor of “DNA” used as picture related to ideas around “coding-control”; a usage in fashion nowadays in the business world, but in my opinion extremely problematic.
Let us start then with the goodie, the world and idea of “crystallization”.

First of all we must have it clear: the crystal is not a practical metaphor of “perfection”. This idea is mainly spread by New Age shops filled with purple smoke and by crappy science fiction B movies from the seventies. Those who have tried to search for real crystals in their original environment, smashing rocks with hammer in a quarry and getting dirt under the nails, know that most crystals in nature are very far from perfect. It’s pretty seldom to find crystals like the idealized ones on textbook drawings. (and new age shop windows) Usually the grows of crystals is unequal in different directions, and they are often intergrown with their neighbor crystals, the visible faces and edges presenting a mess of small shining plates; The identification of the forms present being a complex puzzle, a challenging mental exercise. Similar considerations apply to the inner structure, the crystal lattice. To summarize, crystals are full of imperfections, both outside and inside, hence the world “crystal” is not more apt as metaphor for “perfection” as the words “raindrop” or “cow”.

What could it then be used for, the concept of the crystal?
Well, to illustrate ORDER, and the process of crystallization express “ordering according to a principle”.

The atoms and molecules in a liquid solution, for example a glass or salty water move up and down and in all directions in a highly chaotic manner. During the process of crystallization the matter is organized in a concrete solid structure determined by the nature of the materials involved and by external conditions such as temperature, pressure, time available etc. As indicated above, the result of the ordering will never be perfect, but compared to the initial state, i.e. the liquid solution, it is absolutely meaning- and powerful to talk about the crystallization as creation of order.

In a mental dimension the liquid solution corresponds to a state where all kind of ideas and associations flow around freely in the space of our consciousness. During “crystallization” the ideas in turbulence are settled down to form a concrete argumentation, a stable plan of actions, that is something solid enough to be exported from our mind, to be communicated for others.

I would say the analogy to organic growth, such as that of germination of a seed or the development of a fetus, is much weaker. These processes need constant metabolism, i.e. exchange of energy/matter with the outer world; while both in physical and mental crystallization the potential result is already there, it is just a question of ordering the elements present to reach solidification. Note that crystallization can happen very suddenly in an oversaturated solution – just like the sudden grasp of an idea.

I will conclude that the physical process of crystallization is an enriching metaphor for the mental process of settling ideas because 1) the physical process has a clear interpretation 2) there is a meaningful analogy between the two processes even if they are in totally different areas.

In a later entry I will show why this is not the case for use of “DNA” as metaphor for coding and control. (=>HERE)