A Memory that Sees Everything New by josie j

On Monday April 18, 2022 at 10 am my service dog in training and I headed on the first leg of our voyage to Flowering Tree Permaculture Institute. 

I must first tell you where we have been so far, if I do not I will not remember where I have been.  If something is not written or a memento not taken I have the tendency to forget. Possibly the memory is recalled by a smell that can not be pinpointed.  This builds a strange character in which one feels like all is new.  Possibly a leftover coping mechanism that disables me from remembering important details.

Currently I am in Flagstaff in an overly detergent room…I can not tell if my headache is the result of the smoke, dehydration, or the smell of this motel room at Du Beau.

The plan was to head to Joshua Tree and stay the night.  To prime us both into the groove of traveling.  I filled my glass jug of water, my truck was loaded the day before so this was the only thing I needed to do the day of the trip.  Timing was great, no traffic.

Being a nervous traveler I like seeing the familiar roads and shops along the way to J Tree.  This was a quick run. The only stop I made was in Redlands.  A small park caught my eye on the maps.  It was perfect for my pup.  It had a small dog park with two pitties which wanted nothing to do with her and two ponds with ducks she is still learning not to chase.  As much as my pup does not mind the car rides, she just sleeps next to me…I try to get her legs stretched as much as I can.  I will skip the condition of her leg till later.

Even though I take that route to Jtree often, when I am getting close I always feel like I have made a wrong turn or that I missed it…I think it's just the nervous traveler in me.  The plan was to get to a cafe that is very popular by the main gate then head to the park.  When I got to the cafe I ordered a green juice, complemented the cashier on her freckles that matched the color of her eyes, made small talk with her and waited till they called my name.  It felt like a while. 

During that time I could not help feeling like I was in LA.  Many yoga pants and work out gear that hesitated a simple hello…cordial hellos,  a common thing when you are in an area of travel.  Also the many chic desert dresses that make one feel like they are settlers in frontier land irritated me as much as made me laugh.  Lucky the desert rats still inhabited the area making sure the place kept weird. One complimented my dog, he was a heavy set fella who breathed just as heavily but was sweet with his presence.  Another couple drove up. One got out with skin, breast and dress hanging off her bones worn from time, to pick up her groceries from a store next door.  My pup spent the time eyeing the birdies she is still learning not to chase. Once we had some time to hydrate and sit in the shade I decided I did not want to spend 30 dollars to enter the park and hightailed it to KingsMan Wash at the border of Nevada and Arizona, on the AZ side.   

I like Kingsman Wash. You just show up and drive 10 min into desert wilderness with no gates, no service , just miles of red, white, green, gray and yellow rock.  You can explore on foot or tear it up on  an ATV. It is beautiful but unforgiving.  Once you arrive at the wash it is always a sight, especially at sunset.  

One road to Kingman Wash that I am not sure I took last time was…, maybe we did, now it is starting to sound familiar,..the 95…on this road there is a dedication to many wars 1 mile apart.  Excerpt I found describes it well-

Kingman Wash is also riddled with glass and pokey thorny things.  But you can drive straight up to the water or just run from your campsite and jump in.  You set up anywhere you please.  Last time I was there it was busy. Many trucks, trailers, small cars that somehow got in.  This time there was a bus, and two cars.

This was the first time my pup was there.  I made the unfortunate mistake of having her off leash as I set up my truck tent.  As I was doing this I turned and saw her fixated on something, that something slowly approached my dog. At first I thought it was another dog as I got closer I wondered if it was a coyote…It finally came into focus…it was a wild donkey. This pup is still working on her prey drive so when I made a quick motion to get her she rushed the donkey.  The donkey did not fear her at first…I was surprised.  My dog barked and barked getting closer and closer.  The donkey backed away but when my pup did not stop he started to cry and move away.   I soon noticed there were a few donkeys and realized I had to get my dog quickly before she got kicked by one of them.  Calling her failed so I had to get between them.  I had to run in my sandals into the rocky desert terrain to give chase like a wild man.  I finally got between them.  I know once I do this my pup listens.  I told her to go back to the camp and she did.  I scolded her some more but later realized these donkeys don't give a shit.  

One of the camp sites across from me kept shining their head lamps in my direction.  I finally got annoyed and asked them to stop.  They mention that the donkeys had invaded their campground and they were trying to chase them away.  It happened twice: once at night at other sites and in the daytime at the first site.  The campers started to honk their horns to try to scare the donkeys…on reflection I think my pup was just standing her ground.

It started to get windy at Kingsman Wash…really it started to get windy everywhere.  I decided to not stay another night. We did a small hike and dipped in the wash a few times. My pup likes water but she is still developing her confidence. We headed to Flagstaff and tried to shoot for Sedona.

I will not bore you with the many gas station stops and looks that my dog and I got, and the many well timed potty breaks for both of us.  I did get a I love boobs mini mug, for a current lover I have, saw a Trump fortune teller machine, ate some instant ramen…

In Flagstaff we explored historical Flagstaff.  Walked around, had a beer and played at the park.   

Speeding down from Flagstaff to Sedona I was waved down by a cop.  He asked if I had noticed the signs saying slow down…obviously I had not.  He asked if my dog was a malinois. I said no, she's a dutch shepherd mix…Cops love Malinois…complimented my dog and set us on our way.  

I knew there was a fire north of Flagstaff and the winds were not dying down so I thought it was best to head to Sedona.  As I got into Sedona The air was smokey I thought it was fog but when I opened my window I got the smell of a wildfire.  So I drove back to Flagstaff and rented a motel.

And here we are.  One or more days till I get to the Institute.

jj April 19,2022



On Conspiracy Theories and the Chinese Made Genetically Altered Triple Set by josie j


If you know me or if for some odd reason have been paying attention to my interests you may know I think imagination and play are important. For me the potential is the forecastable future setting in cement. If it be,...how can I access more opportunities for art or how does this emerging technology set up possibilities that may come to pass.  

For this reason I have since childhood enjoyed ideas on Bigfoot and UFOs.  I find it disheartening that the CT term is now flagged and has been co-opted by people trying to cause harm,  But then…conspiracy theories have always been used to misdirect. 

Despite this I still believe in allowing the mind to look into the dark void of potential.  Weaving theories for creativity sake and safety sake. Yet I am starting to feel not all thoughts should be thought.  Who knows how powerful the mind can be…It can possibly construct the thing you wish to avoid.

I have many thoughts that I like to share with the close people around me (I thank them for their patience for sometimes I paint a dire picture).  I share with them possibilities and reasons I believe things are happening or potentials to look out for.  It is part of my practice, an extension of the creative mind.

Recently I thought of the term Scientist Monk to kinda describe what I am really about.  But labels do a dis-service, anchoring concepts that are ever changing… So let's discard this as soon as it makes an image in your mind…

I say all this to set up a simple and silly idea that occurred to me the other day.  

Why are the first genetically altered children females? Why the first twins?....

A disturbing thought popped into my mind.

The answer, a higher yield.

First, twins have a higher yield for the first try.  

Second, females because from this you can receive a higher yield for your super soldier army.  Mixed genes from altered and unaltered genes may have better results. I leave that for you imagination to decipher.

Of course this is just me thinking out loud, no evidence to suggest this super soldier theory, but…

I say this and the important part to take from this thought is…

This is the future that is not only coming, it is already here.  All we needed to do these alterations to the human race we have had for the last 5 years or more.  On top of this the powers that be have had all the reason and intention to do this.  

In closing this muse. Don't fear emerging tech.  It is our choice to choose the path emerging tech will take.  Don’t avoid the decisions we must make collectively because others will choose for you.  Emerging tech is not an unavoidable and set course. It seems that way because many have invested in this path.  I hope the collective catches up with the concepts of the possible future world.  Collectively engaging in constructing the future we all want…not leaving the construction to the select few.  

jj




 



30 Dance Offerings: In Remembrance of the Human Experience by josie j

In remembrance of the human experience.

I have spent days scrolling waiting for the thing that will happen....happen.

What a life of a dog. I watching my dog looking at the beautiful sunset through the bars that prevent her from launching herself off the stairs, taking the full last 4 in a leap like most pups would do. But today this pup seems to have a bit of problems with her hind legs. I suspected so much when I got her. It was hard to tell with the floppiness of shepherd pups.

What a bummer to be told to slow down at the moment when your being is wanting to spread in all directions that allow.

I see her and her friend the pitty taking in the sunset. What a dogs life to see this as eventful as days go by in the same space. As I scroll think what a dogs life when you notice your dogs have more taste in this natural existence.

This allows me to remember and watch the lighting storm passing through. A lovely sight in LA.

This human experience how out dated it is. The messiness of the body, the confusion of the emotions, the navigating clumsily through space. Why do I feel like the simpleness of existence is too simple for our simple attention. Why do I feel the more I find understanding, the place I came from looks dark and shaded like a checkered brain of dementia. Loose footing, grey memories.

My practice is to up root what blocks me. These offerings are in remembrance of the human experience…how precious and simple it is. How simple we are…how simple I am. How much we place in experience when we construct it ourselves but somehow experienced with others. These offering are to up root what blocks us from finding our true humanity, a sprinkling of everyone’s crazy ideas.

jj

Post Road Trip Extentions and Offerings by josie j

Before the lockdown I had a steady course I felt my soul to evaluate. Primary objective was to socialize in group more often. Not to much to be said of this collective conceptual isolation the lockdowns brought. Attempting to truly stay isolated I still found ways to met very beautiful and influential people in my life.

The deadening experience of zoom meeting and streamed performances has further made me reach for a less filtered experience…aching for the real.

I feel in Butoh the real is the only answer even when the real can be transforming as you speak it. Leaving no space for solidifying or rhetoric building. The new replaces the old but the old is still connected to the new. In inquiring we awaking the spirit allowing new formations.

In my practice I don’t see my body when I am being witnessed as my own. After offerings/ performances I am more interested in the way it is seen. In the way the viewer makes the story. In this I see the practice and the working result as alive. Further breathing life in others minds helping them solidify something they needed support in.

Yes I have very hard beliefs. If you knew me personally you would know that. So how can Me with such hard lines be a vessel for a collective reflector. I don’t really know if it is possible... but I do feel that in my hard lines what activates them are the strong belief in playing, questioning, inquiring…in these are the spirit of knowing, a willingness to accept the thing that seems to fit what is needed.

How are we to know what is needed. I think we don’t. I think we just do. The collective sprinkling of many and of many conflicting beliefs we find what is real…and needed. It is just a best guess scenario hoping for knowing the full extent of this experience. A guess built on a sub structure of belief in the experience as an echoing of reactions started long ago.

One aesthetic in my practice that has always been there is the ripples in the fabric, the errors in my ways, the way there is room for error. This is my best guess. I feel a call to try my best and to actively see the mirror to see what it is in me that builds whats around me. My practice is a collective of us all wanting to do this but unable to.

I see due to ever shifting tectonic plates I feel the call to present my intimate practice of being me. The act of keeping a practice alive in a mass extinction of beliefs and practices... I present the practice as documentation, as word, as experience, as a creative endeavor heading to its only possible out come.

For a 30 days I will present a dance a day for all of human kind in respectful omission of the many things we are blind to.

This endeavor will allow me to connect with many beautiful artist I respect and love. In the last few years my abilities to engaged socially has diminished due to health and external forces. This has disconnected me to many artist I respect. This offering is also a prayer to amend all the blocks that prevent us from seeing the whole experience we need to see.

In this work I offer you and my self a drive to see the many LA public spaces.

An Offering a Day: Various LA by josie j

Due to unending turn of events of events I feel its time to present an offering a day for the fall time.

Every day for a month I will present an offering in the Greater LA area.

Dates and locations will be present as they appear but a few days in advance to set the pace of the spontaneous.

All locations outdoors. Dates will also be announce a few days to hours to create an intimate affair.

Send email (might miss a lot of hour to- events)

Send text (immediate performance location only text.)

Send Instagram (will do my best to be up to date.)

…to receive info. info@razethewhitebox.com

More info soon….

Marfa Open- Road trip Canceled by josie j

More and more doors are closing for me…Just like small business, artist like me are being pushed out.

My belief is if you have a policy that worries about liability then your policy is not about health.

This is the state we live in decisions are made just due to lack of accountability and fear of liabilty.

I feel I need to find another way to share my practice or just change my practice…find something that is less symbolic and more directly influencing the world I feel we desperately need.

More and more I am being press along the edge. more and more I see the edge not so threatening and welcoming it.

Road trip -Marfa Open by josie j

I’ve decide to return to my blog…an ancient way to expel the voice that desperately wants to be heard.

On this full moon I will confess that Present time is challenging my fullness with very few for reserves. Its all the same since this is where I seem to exist.

I have a new companion. A little blade of whats seems to be wild dog with a wanting mouth to chew. Seems a Dutch Shepherd mix. I will confess something else tonight under this full moon, that I have an aversion to shepherds. The working breed that out lived its full use and has difficulty adjusting to this contemporary experience. Too smart and sensitive for this pulsing world of dings and booms I kinda stay away from the shepherds of the European specifically.

We prepare each our own for this drive to Marfa, Texas. I prepare by crossing my fingers and loading what I think I need to survive a week stranded in my truck. Details will wait for the full disclosure book past current times when details are only useful to the fringe of interest.

She prepares by growing by the minute making me worry she will out grow the passenger seat she sleeps in when we drive…. Or worse, ride awake the whole drive, lit wanting to rage in a field.

Must remember the dog food…she is eating much more that the small kibble keeper in the truck is looking too small and thinking where will the large container in the kitchen fit.

I have never had a shepherd as a travel partner…Are shepherds in the spiritual sense good navigators?

On this trip I reflect on the thin line I hold connected to being a working artist. An artist with a place to share what many see as a necessary process for our civilization. As in my personal the struggle to not drown in the fringe is oh so present in my art practice. From dividing lines of have and have nots to imaginary lines drawn on imaginary fabric I feel the squeeze towards the outliers.

Grateful for the moment towards something. One more chance to share my practice. Grateful for the trip to Marfa..

In my practice I like to have a conversation with something universal. A time to feel connected, what is presented is much more yours to bask in than for me to explain it to you. In your words I see that I am part of this wholeness. I dont think what you see is any part me…I feel this at this moment. It is much more gracious than I am.

My want is to do an offering every day, in Marfa. Fully and presently. I would say 1 hr min daily. I think I will need a day to set my first location, and the rest will present themselves. I hope I pick the options that provide me with the growth and nourishment I need. Canals building leading to something deeper, I hope. A source tapping into what I am. Releasing, echoing an action not of me but of what we need.

This is the want but the feel is of a distance, a fogging, sinking or tightening. An external force sitting occupying.

An offering a day will def rid this feeling for at least the ride back to LA.

On this full moon I casually prepare the list of what to bring…

Makeup?

the multicolored shall…I use often and love its aliveness

Pedal effect and mic??

loop pedal

Texas things

swim suit?

things I can’t find in texas

A sense to know better but try and find something better

As Hiroko Tamano once pointed out ….You have your body…then you are ready to dance.

To Many Joes by josie j

Imma put my fear of arrogance aside.

To find a flow that deciphers what I am feeling

What I am experiencing

So many have we allowed to give us advice on the things some of us know well

Our own body

One thing is to feel

the other is the intelligent to go beyond this and verbalize it

With Latin text or without

words are strung together to make a reasonable facsimile of what is truly going on

In modern times we do have access to knowledge

Possibly watered down by empty words

Knowledge no less

sits there for us to digest

I have come to a bitter and somewhat awkward feel that I am smarter than the average Joe

Joe may have qualities that I don’t have

and I respect that, Joe

But

I feel like we have to many Joes playing doctor

It is not enough to fly on Adderall past all your courses

if your heart does not open

as much as you slice open that flesh

search around

I believe you will not understand function

I will not deny the science

Just like art

the scientific method is older than we would like to believe

Seekers have always wandered into the unknown

be it with in or with out

There will always be exceptions

Incredible people come from all creeds

Not to often from the same pile

I believe

This flow is about my body

not a political stance

not an epidemic

a pandemic

its about a universe I have existed in and explored mostly alone

with very few navigators

But solid ones to speak of

With help from this and that I have scrutinized my existence

presently and until my blind eye takes charge

I think we get locked in routine

Every river rock looks the same when flying over the river in a chopper

burning fuel

If we all we have is a hammer

It is hard not to want to smash every rock

in hopes of changing the shape

In You I See Me, in Me I Experience You (Tells of the Two 2021) by josie j

Let me see my Self in your nakedness

The willingness to give yourself to me freely

In this I see my weakness to take

I take in tenderness with a heavy hand and firm choke

This you ask for

I only take that which I find special

My mistake to say the honest words of human emotion

confusing, messy, honest but convoluted

The mix of what I say what I don’t say what I hear is the language of two hearts colliding

The landscape I paint for you is a colorful watercolor of bile

This is because my human heart knows only confusion

My soul knows better but how can this be clear if you don’t know the language

still…I try

In my attempt to connect

My attempt to bare

In my attempt to be human I leave a mess on your pale skin

This is utterly confusing

There is much to hide in calm and quiet

I can paint any picture on this canvas

I can fool myself that I am navigating this boat

A simple boat just for two

Some how has space for three

In my attempt to be my honest self

I accidentally become your mirror

It was not me that I was taking to the shore but you Navigating to the place you wish to see

All along I was speaking for many

Crucifying myself with words of another

Owning what belongs to us and the other you pulled in

To make this make sense I added another

Never Realizing your painting you never showed was more vivid than mine

Your attempt to ask for more scrambled me to change my image

This lesson I did learn of the strength of my human intuition

I am fine with leaving it all alone and settling on mud delusions

In wounding my heart, in mending my heart I know my Self better

What can I say but thank you

For letting this immortal soul get a taste of being human

a price to pay for a little space forawrd by josie j

I understand that the world does not seem to provide you with the calm you seek.

But of course if you continue to slither on your belly to get ahead,

feet will continue to step on your sores that are open.

As open as your need to find fault in others to stand higher above the rest.

You find comfort in your perversions, only because you can’t escape them.

In panic you lash out forgetting you are deeper in the filth than the ones you point fingers at.

Like the ones that came before you, you have a space in my heart.

Like the ones that came before I saw them naked…

I accepted what I saw, I ignored the sharp things that you carry

the glass in your heart.

Your words are of a child with nothing left to do but to break things.

I have empathy for you but I also have respect for myself.

Your actions are your word.

Malice, misguided and tormented.

I don’t mind, I saw them before they left your mouth,

trapped in your belly unwilling to compromise, unwilling to be soft and gentle.

But that is all anyone has given you since that’s all you know.

When you thought I was being judgemental I was just watching to see

how you unravel by your own accord.

Jacob Jonas The Company - workshop work by josie j

Goodness...first day of Jacon Jonas The Company Digital Intensive...

Excited to put myself in some challenging situations. Coming from a non-dance background I struggle with phrases...I forgot the roll in this one. Truth be told...I'm tired and it feels good.

Music: New Age Killer- USA Girls

------------

You pull me down just to raise me from my heart
In my misguided joy you bind me to the earth
Swimming in this confusion, long legs rejoice

I still have my say, I break away

Jagged hearts fit together
My head splashes to the earth
Even in this chaos I melt in your arms
Yet again I start over

#corporealreformation #jjtcworkshop #butoh #art #roses #lost #pulled #conflicted #LA #dancer #grow

Tuesday Night Post: Current States by josie j

There seems to be a collective feeling of instability. Tuesday Night Post have always been about instilling stability to my practice. Or at least giving myself a day to reflect on the practice…if it even for a moment of stillness.

I find my freedom in my practice. Even tho at times that work is hard to get to and sometimes the last thing on my mind.

Last Tuesday I played some Dr. Martin Luther King Jr speeches on the Tuesday Stream. These are some I have in my collection that you can’t upload since they are under copyright. Dr. King was a big influence on my life. Hearing these speeches tell me how elevated in thought Dr. King was. Including his esoteric understandings. Talking about Dr. King’s non violent approach as an example of how one should handle a particular situation glosses over the violent way Dr. King was taken from us. Assassinated with not much protest from officials. Such delicate times offer a opportunity to be sensitive, calm, and alert…How can these things co-exist? Can they? I like to imagine this is what its like for our kins of a different form, a wolf in its prime., a sloth navigating tall trees, a deer running in the woods. Connection on the one to one. No delay but no hast. I truly wonder.

It is hard during these times of intensity to go to the practice…or in my case further into the practice. Only there do I find myself. A self of service to life experience. Hopefully if honest a service to my fellow home, my land, my peoples and my neighbors. But of course with a very much Me flavor. Can that be avoided? Is it a foolish goal to think what I do is anything else then just what I do. In any case it provides a peek into something greater something I myself feel and can not see. The whole experience of what is happening, phenomenon.

This Tuesday June 09 2020 7pm pst will feature Suzy Hernandez and possibly a semi live collaboration.

Tuedsay Night Stream: divinebrick artist by josie j

1.jpeg

Tuesday Night Stream will include multi-disciplined artist, divinebrick.

divinebrick makes self iconoclast research, searching for the sacred primordial being.

They do not have direct experience with their Pipil heritage but proposes..."if a structure of a person could cause colonizers to remember a fear, a mistrust in that other, then that other must recall the memories of their own blood being brutally destroyed...possibly".

To divinebrick identity is fluid, art is an ancient craft that all beings engage in, autonomy is sacred, and play is one the most sacred action, letting us get close to phenomenon.

"Salt the Air" is a quarantine work in progress. Finalized to a certain point for Soundperdo.org on June 6th 2020.

divinebrick name is a place holder for an idea that the self is a divine phenomenon holding and care taking the grander whole. This brick is soil enclosed in a square shape. Decolonizing the self is remembering the soil the self is made of.

Tuesday Night Post: Now I am on Video by josie j

Friends,

Stream on www.twich.tv/divinebrick

in these I set the mood for a folded bird to relive memory.

-josiej

Folded wings on ecstasy.

I don’t want to live on video.

Nothing changed for you and me.

You can’t see my breath on video.

Left behind i become undressed

Will you come visit me on video?

Will I happen to experience death?

I make my own fantasies on video.

Leaving chance for you to give

I was raised by video.

Tuesday Night Post: Seabirds are K-Selected by josie j

Friends,

Today my hopes was to present a little sample of work process.

Theses words came from research and meditation, they will expand to create a world in which to move in. A colorful landscape about birth in numbers one at a time.

Sun kissing on my shoulders

Bright rounds rolling down the feathers

Jagged Cliff sides a nest for us

K selection our fruit of choice

A multiplication that benefits the youth

Why count the numbers as clouds become truth


Tuesday Night Post: Seagulls Have Eyes Too by josie j

Friends,


Thank you for the ones that came out to the stream tonight. I usually post the words before the stream but I spent a lot of time trouble shooting the audio coming out from obs to twitch this session.

The stream like the Tuesday Post of the old (dbrp.blogspot.com) are open studio creative sessions. Most of the words posted in the past have been free flowed that day. The stream has a similar temperature. Open honest and lots of times surprising and new to me.

Today’s Tuesdays have a theme. Maybe it’s not so apparent… I am not sure it is necessary for this work.

The theme is based on reflections I am having, on the chronicles of a seagulf. Reflecting on memory of lands forgot because it does not exist…but longed for deep in the being.

These are my thoughts.

-josie j

* * *

Travels slowed and expressions grew, limiting the hast. 

I trace my place as the memory it gives.

A box filled with all I need a remembrance of grace. 

Built with a shrill, a grey slender youth.

To remember the mobility of fresh.

They get upset when they eat the waste

that defiles them.

Policing our messes on the thickness of smog.

Freedom in the picking at our trash.

This is so often seen in piles, our sour flight becomes less

Screen Shot by Suzy Hernandez

Screen Shot by Suzy Hernandez

Tuesday Night Post: Returns by josie j

Friends,

A heavy mood. Being grateful for the beautiful people that had patience to listen to and love me. I am excited for change. I want to welcome it with no fear. I wish to.

These meditations that will happen on Tuesdays, April 28th-May 12th, 7:30pm pst, are realized sketches. These later will be unified to a finished work for Soundpedro June 6th, 2020. More to come on that.

Second half will be a presentation of another work and/ or artist

These sketches are contemplations regarding a seagull.

These words correlate to movement on a live stream on www.twitch.tv/divinebrick

There is more but I would like you to enjoy the beginnings.

Thank you for your time.

-josie j

* * *

Woke up in a mood

What to make of this urge to fly to my favorite point
to look far into the distance at the place remembered.


Folded in a space that leaves enough space to pace in my memories. I am here now.
I can still taste the salt suspended in the air.  Riding the cushion over a plane of mercury.


This jogs a memory of a greater place of one not yet known, these sources plausibly my own. Wind between my tested genes.


Travels slowed and expressions grew, limiting the hast. 
I trace my place as the memory it gives.
A box filled with all I need a remembrance of grace.