Today in Colombia

Some days ago in political anger, I posted on Facebook a few intended insults at those who’s ideology I oppose. Since then I’ve deleted them, realizing that problems cannot be solved by creating problems.

I know to some my posts are opportunities for hurrah, while others will think I do nothing but stoke dissent or I am just wrong in my assessments; really the list for arguments on both sides are more plentiful than grains of sand.

Today in a tonier area of Medellin, Colombia, I spotted a man lying prostrate on the street corner, not an unfamiliar sight in most of the world. In fact my craft of photographing began in this way, taking instances of advantage by framing shots of those who lacked every pittance of self worth. As I have grown in my craft, I refrain from these pictures.

But today I want to use it as an illustration in the hopes that writing words in a thoughtful way will be more transcendent than angrily ranting at things beyond my control.

This past year I’ve had to recalibrate my life. I realize that for almost ten years I lived in a bubble, a foreigner entrenched in Italy, using that as a base to explore other countries, trial-and erroring my way through framing my creative spirit in words and pictures. I never worried about success. I instead thought it more important to follow muses instead of trends.

I am proud of all I have done. Every photo taken is a piece of me, every word written much the same. I don’t think I have superpowers of skills, I just have focus, and that focus helped me create, in a way, something that I call, the Jayverse. My own world. Complete with rivers and mountains and gummy bear infused chocolate cakes and— should we even go there— relationships. I lived.

I lost. I fell and got back on my feet. Repeat. I for the first time saw the mortal coil unwind as the threat of a cancer knocked on my door. I prevailed. I once again looked all about me and thought, now what?

I thought for a long time being in a relationship and helping someone reach their full potential was also the way for me to reach my own full potential. In fact I thought this so strongly I repeated this over and over again. Instead of growing I shrank. Instead of really taking advantage of my creative life I short-shrifted myself and made things more difficult.

I think the only person in the world that actually is 100% confident and complete in themselves is Dolly Parton. She is a creative force of course, but also quite comfortable in her Dollyworld.

So I took a picture of a man lying on the street days after the State of the Union Address on TV. Many eyes focused on a president who is already judged before saying another word, judgments in favor and against. And then I watched the debacle projected from the other side; once again, judged before a word spoken.

It made me think, after the initial anger passed, that we all are of the same fabric, the same DNA cells, the same skins prone to disease, the same minds that can grow or shrivel depending on environment and circumstance. The human in us always pulls us to absolutes, not the Kinsey Scale of moderation. The man broken on the street is not dangerous by design, instead he has been spun onto a level of being dangerous by desperation. There is a difference. Our attitudes about things and ideas share this fact. We fall into exclusivity because it is so much simpler than accepting the complexity of inclusion.

I don’t want to be robbed or hurt by someone living on the street, or tricked into something that leads to a kidnapping or even worse. But I don’t want to fear the streets. I don’t want to fear other people as I come across them. I want to be optimistic. I want to think that all of us, whatever social class we belong to, is  just a placeholder of reference, not a static label we can’t tear off.

What can any one person do to enact change? Not much, really. Our modern world pulls at us, our obligations weigh on us, we now contend with the constant insistent blather of 24/7 news. We have to have some faith that there are collectives of people who follow the core of their humanity and strive to make the world safe and secure against the tyranny of those who want control. Every 100 or so years our modern world is vexed by some global epidemic which then begins the process of religion waking up and selling doom and gloom; the only salvation— to follow a static path to a label that does not tear off. It’s easier to believe that a ravenous horde surges at the borders of our safety than to realize other people are DNA familiar to us.

I realize I prefer to live more towards the edge than secluded somewhere safe because I realize that there are so many degrees of the edges that still offer me the opportunity to be safe.

This past year, I’ve had to really look at myself in a completely different way. The skipidi-do-da Jay, I hope, will never leave me, but I know there is less time ahead, that I have to make choices in order to continue a creative path, live within my means, and do my best to stay relevant but at the same time not let my own beliefs be swallowed whole by others whose ideologies I don’t agree with.  And then the ultimate task! To not subsume myself into a miasmatic swamp where others are quite content to sling the mud of their hatred onto others.

So today, after deleting my few outbursts of (well in my opinion) nutrient rich mud, I am reminded as I am many times over the past twelve years of taking photos, that contemplation can lead to better thoughts which in turn could maybe find a way to better solutions.

I think this; we should not mock the leaders that mock us— us being that strain of chromosomes and autosomes which some god of scientific or faith ingenuity concocted into one human race. Those leaders of industry or political party who would rather string together sentences of destruction; we should know them. And then we should ignore them. And vote. Because they will always be our enemies. Even if we side with them. They will always degrade our ties to them for their own gain. God did make one human race. Science proves this.

Instead we should just turn our heads away from them and find a different course because they will never be our friends. They were always be our enemies. They will always take advantage of any weakness that we show.

I took a picture today. I sat for minute at a Starbucks and I colored the image with my thoughts. I realize now. This is not a man lying broken on a street corner. This is instead a metaphor. We can accept the desperate as wholly dangerous or we can see the dangerous fueled by desperation. The man unconscious on the street corner is all of us. We can let demagoguery divide us or we can see the harder way; the first day this man was a child and put shoes on for the first time.