Ambrose Ambles

Twelve Caesars.

Book four..

Discourses on the 12 “Stations” of Christopher Corridini.

Part.. four.

Seventh Station; Jesus falls for the second time.

On the complicity of enemies to unite when threatened.

The Cabal of Complicity.

 

It has been remarked upon recently that how is it that the member for New England, after all his bad-judgement, all his family, spouse, community standards betrayals and not even mentioning the many reported rorts and deceptions he has played out on the State, he still is supported by both his party and his community.

There is a curious double standard inherent in these regional communities that goes way back to the pioneer days and has its roots (no pun! no pun!) deep in the soil of “old family / old traditions” loyalty. Sure and it is a misguided loyalty in these times as those same “old families” have been long watered down by new systems, new blood and new technology that has swept away the old work-ethic creed and community morality standard.

But old habits die hard .. but when they DO die, they have the habit of completely falling apart and going down like a screaming bag of shit!

It works like this .. :

Every regional community has its' number of "old families".. "long-time residents" .. "long-time employees". Every single one of these people over the years evolve to become part of a strata of acknowledged hierarchical status, ie ; They are allocated their place in that community. Some have a leadership place, some have a "drone" place, some have the inherited if unearned respect of an influential family, while others are what you would call "floaters" ; in and out of favour at some time or other ... The perfect example of the Peter Principle .. Then there are the "blow-ins".

All of these "old" regional communities seem to thrive on a social diet of rumour, envy and schadenfreude. There are short and long-term feuds, niggling, petty hates and overall the cautious, suspicious envy of what the neighbour may have that you have not .. and if they do have it, how did they get it!

The level that these petty trysts achieve and are operating on can be seen by the state of beauty or disrepair of the township. Those towns in a greater state of turmoil show little regard for their environment, or for the general civic repair or beauty of their town, being more concerned with their feuds than their civic obligations.

BUT! .. but, strangely, all these communities, no matter how divided within , will unite against what is perceived as a common outside threat. This unity of concentration is called ;

The Cabal of Complicity.

There are, of course, the age-old bigotries against race, religion and politics ... Then there are the new hatreds .. : Environmentalists seem to fill the void for a common enemy, as do refugees, strangely as most who came to this country and particularly those regional communities were refugees of one kind or another and there is that lovely old standby distrust .. : The Indigenous Peoples.

Curiously though, there is another "player" that comes into the picture about now, he is a "blow-in", a newcomer, but he is saying all the right phrases that appeal to the local prejudices ... He pushes all the right approval buttons. This toady targets the most influential to his station and needs. With astute flattery and sycophantic conversation, not to mention the strategic "on me" beer, he soon becomes accepted into the cabal as a "friend of the community", he "legitimises" local opinion as being "in-tune" with the broader population and is often privy to a host of secrets, while juggling conspiracies and confederacies. He is a strange animal and in most cases a reject of the more cosmopolitan world of city-life.

This “strange animal” adopts the dress, the language, the scepticisms and the inherent suspicions against that universal political generic : “The head office” … The Guvverment . There being no easier audience to find applause from than that who knows already and shares as their own ; your every story, every joke your every prejudice.

To enter such communities and hold views in conflict with the status quo (listed above) is to court social pariahism. For although you may be of the opinion that you have just had a "heated discussion" with only one member of the community .... because such a member "went to school with ... ", "grew up with ... ", "played football with ... ", "drank with ... ", "did a season shearing with ... ", "works with ... ", or just plain "is related to ... " , it won't be long, regardless if the culprit is despised, hated, reviled or spurned by nearly every other single individual in the entire cabal ..... YOU will "have the problem".

Because the one grain, perhaps the only grain of carved-in-stone knowledge in such communities is that its very weakness is its' strength, so each is complicit in backing-up, right or wrong, innocence or guilt, with silent dismissal or wilful disdain, its' "in-house" member.

It is the strength of their denial, it is their unifying fear of "divided they fall", for each individual, lacking a worldly confidence, distrusting worldly knowledge, has no solid footing, but is fixed in the matrix of all .. it is the age-old maxim of “honour among thieves” .... so take on one, you take on all!

It is The Cabal of Complicity.

 

 

Eighth Station; Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem.

How some men look upon the behaviour of women.

I’m worried about you ladies.

I was there giving my glasses a bit of a clean with that stuff supplied from ‘Specsavers’ .. you know .. that stuff that smells like those dentists surgeries of old … that stuff you spray on the lenses from a little misting bottle … much like a scent bottle that women spray onto their wrists at the cosmetic counter .. and then smell the sample of scent … their eyes following their thoughts up as they deliberate … I know this because I watch women … not in a purvey sort of way .. just the little mannerism as they go about their purchasing of things .. for there is an intricacy of behaviour within every psyche that gives clue to their cultural ‘acclimatisation’ … while MY partner is also there deciding on stuff .. I’m looking … just watching..

Men, in general .. I am afraid to say .. do too much perving and not enough observing of the opposite gender.

You see .. it’s important to watch people .. you learn. People have asked me what would be my favourite place to go for a holiday and are suspiciously surprised when I say that I would like to be left undisturbed, sitting for as long as I want, on a resting bench in the middle of a busy mall of a busy city shopping arcade … just looking at the passing parade.

Even now, as I accompany my good lady when we are at the Central Market, I watch and wonder where all these people come from and go to at the end of the day .. I know they go to a residence somewhere .. a “home” .. and they take their shopping there and go about their domestic duties and such …… but there are so many of them! .. and there must be others outside the realm of the shopping complex that are friends or family and wait for them to come home .. millions of them all making their way about city or suburb .. shopping .. and what of the thousands of tonnes of produce shipped into the supermarkets and then purchased and taken away every day?

And so many of those shoppers in percentage are women.

I have reached that age and appearance when I can be considered a “harmless old bloke” … an ; “old timer” … who can talk to and be seen as “non-threatening” by the ladies and I can be sometimes amusing .. in my own way .. and when I look at some of those young lasses with the tats and cropped hair like a Rocker of old, I reckon they could flatten me with their left-jab! ... and so I can sit on the ”pensioner’s bench” over the walkway from “Goodies and Grains” down at the market and just do a bit of casual observation of all and sundry who walk past … But it is mainly the ladies that interest me.

Blokes are not that interesting .. I suppose having grown up inside of one, I have no inclination to get to know others .. and besides .. they really only come in three different types .. : The Pretentious .. ; suited, with that self-important air and fashion-of-the-day haircut and shoes, striding briskly like they have an important appointment to keep … when really we know they are longing for the end of the day so they can have that beer or mixed drink and talk themselves up a bit down at their local …. The Worker …. “fluros” and steel-capped boots or shoes on his lunch-break .. a cluster of keys jangling from their hip-clip and stuffing a pasty into their face while clutching a carton of iced-coffee in their grubby hands …. The Slob …. with the arse of their jeans hanging down so you are glad they have a hoodie or open puffy jacket of some kind hiding their arse-crack replete with the red spotted pimply bulges of top-end bum from your gaze .. they have nothing going on in their lives and their sliding “potato-cocky” footsteps reveal a lack of intention to apply for anything either … and good luck to them too! … pensioners like myself in public if certainly not in private activity, I dismiss as generally innocuous spectators on life.

But the women .. Now there .. is a different kettle of fish. Just to see them sitting at a table eating their purchased healthy lunch of lentils, salad and vegan meal wrap is an education in itself … but to do it while reading a magazine or punching in texts on their mobile and without spilling a bean-sprout from the bread-wrap denotes a skill of style management par-excellence. THAT in itself I can admire and wonder at … but then the way they sit at the table … not slouched like men .. ; hands in jacket pocket(even when gesticulating lazily) and sliding off the seat in a wonton display of disgusting slovenliness …. No .. there is a delicacy even with the most casual gen ‘Y’er … aware as they have been since teenage years that their whole body is on display whenever they go out in public, there is style even in lounging over a magazine at table while making genteel small bites at that vegan/salad wrap … the tucking with delicate finger-tip back in between the lips of that sprout shoot that attempts to evade consumption … then a quick flick of the magazine page or a swipe left … marvellous!

And walking on those tiled malls .. Tell me … are women’s shoes deliberately designed to make an extra loud sound as they walk .. perhaps with the subliminal IN-tention to attract the A-ttention of any suitable mates to them .. much like the humming warble of many female ornithological species when calling to “sound out” suitable partners? ... Because I can hear a woman’s step a long way away .. their rhythmic tapping of heel to tile a sort of Morse-code cryptology to my ears .. even those slips of Asian women with sandals have a way of “slapping” their sandals, no matter how soft-soled, on the tiles so that a sharp clap is snapped with every step … I have experimented with the observed style and ; yes .. there is a knack to making that sound … I put it down in some cases to a walk developed from striding on uneven surfaces where the sandal has to be “snapped-back” to the foot with a natural clamping movement of the toes … to keep the sandal from slipping off in uneven terrain … but that is only a theory of mine.

Dress sense is another thing .. sure, there are a number of the suburban “trakky-dak” connoisseurs, who seem to have abandoned any concern for style or taste and flop about in public like a beached   Delphinidae …. but these are in the minority … Oh, don’t for a minute think that I deny any right for such to dress or flounce as they please .. go right ahead, flounce Away! .. I am but observing and reporting .. But for the most part, even the aforementioned casual vegan-wrap eater, there is consideration taken to “mix ‘n’ match” to a certain demanded style, be it ‘street’ , ‘summer’ or ‘environment concerned’... so that even the lotus-style sitting on a café bench-seat ; al-fresco, is a couture’d delight! ... then there are the “dressed for executive impress” ladies who have gone the whole rack on expensive looking clothes and shoes … with the full Max-Factor as well! ... There are those who along with the precise intention of the fashion also adopt facial expression sternly suited to the picture … emotionally impervious to public gaze, serious to the eye and thoroughly professional in the deed at food stall or shop .. their grip on purse as tight as the same on a career direction.

But it’s the voice that most draws the male sense of desire toward the female of the species .. any species where a male is concerned. The musicality of that XX chromosome gender when they speak is more than just music to a heterosexual male’s ears, it is the primaeval call of the wild … And a sudden burst of laughter from a group of women will draw the immediate attention of every male within earshot .. their “women in vicinity” antennae honing in like a guided missile. Good reason that the most successful woman singers deliver their songs in a coaxing, soothing croon … like Billie Holiday tempting the senses with a vocal velvet caress, even when singing of dreadful things .. .. or Piaf, with her coarse shivering tremolo, creating a certain undeniable hunger or want in the male psyche.   And too, the Germanic guttural harshness of language melts on the tongue of a skilled vocal fraulein, into a temptresses lure to desire … I think of that alluring number by Lale Andersen : “Lilli Marlene”  …

I have often wished for and certainly been envious of those males who possess .. sometimes undeservedly … a deep bass-baritone voice .. for I am certain that such vocal harmonies hummed in such a low masculine tone are an almost irresistible initial attraction to the female of the species.  A friend’s son has such a voice .. even from a young age, and some of her female friends have confessed to keeping him on the phone with contrived enquiries when ringing her up just to hear his voice … and I don’t wonder that Sean Connery’s : “James Bond” had Miss Moneypenny obliging his every stationary request with her stenographic skills … I just wish!  

Yes .. I worry about you ladies .. For I wonder if all this astute attention to small details you do in walk, talk, dress and style is appropriately appreciated .. NOT that it is only directed AT or FOR that section of the male fraternity, whose unfathomable and deluded vanity seems to heed not the wise sayings of the sages of old … : “A house without a woman is like a lantern without light.” So they proceed stumbling blind to all womanly beauty, into the lonely darkness with neither clue nor idea of direction nor destination … I weep for them .. : “Perfume of embraces all him assailed, with hungered flesh obscurely, he mutely craved to adore.” ..as Joyce wrote..

But what I most worry about is that there is a confederacy of people .. mostly middle-class idealists and zealots who wish to take control of any conversation about the relationship between women and men and steer it away from mutual affection or admiration .. EVEN allowing for the massive blunders of emotional, sexual and physical misdemeanours that have blighted so many relationships and brought so much hardship to so many .. and they want to steer the conversation to a dark and lonely place, isolating each from each other by focusing on the eternal and predictable violence and conflicts between the genders .. an absurd and bizarre denial of the unstoppable and natural impetus that pulls a man toward a woman and through all its faults creating a connection that is physical, emotional and spiritual the like of which cannot be matched in a knowing intellect toward each other .. no matter how much we want to fool ourselves .. by any other relationship in the natural kingdom on this Earth .. The joining of man and woman is but a start of a long journey toward adoration.

For my part … till the day I die, I will adore thee ……

 

 

Nineth Station; Jesus’s clothes are stripped away.

How the work of the artisan becomes a work of art..

A Work of Art? or; The Art of Work?

The motivation for this essay came from four packets of ladies’ cotton lace handkerchiefs. I had bought them some years before at a garage sale for the princely sum of fifty cents each. One was from Northern Ireland, two from Switzerland and one from China. Looking at them in their flat boxes, with the delicate lace folded into diamonds and squares, the brilliant whiteness and small embroideries of flowers, folk images or other set-patterns around the edges and in the corners, I thought they were too, too beautiful for their intended use so I made four frames and placed those “art of work” behind glass to be admired rather than soiled. I could imagine the girls and women (for that would be the reality) sweating over those pieces of cloth . Pieces of work became pieces of art, hence the title of this essay.

Another excuse for this article, comes from a dispute I am having with a writer on the whys and means of artistic licence. In my calculation, the presumption of “art for art’s sake” is a modern affectation that cannot be justified except in the market place for commodity exchange…the historical creation of what we call ; “art” was once the work-a-day depiction of cultural hopes and activities. The coincidence that such hieroglyphic imagery has a pleasing appearance to human senses and sensibility is more accidental purity of line and length combined with colour and pleasing perspective.

Certainly, there were some plundering tribes that made use of cultural depiction to amaze and frighten the opposition and then in the more sophisticated societies , the wealthy commissioned artisans to depict statuary and icons for decoration. But these were restricted to the wealthy and state propaganda, the rise of “art for art’s sake” was still a long way away.

I, am an artisan (tradesman carpenter), my father was an artisan (stone mason-bricklayer), the people who made those hankies were (or are) artisans! A multitude of people producing, constructing, molding, knitting and on and on and on are artisans (from the French : ‘without art’). Getting back to my father the bricklayer (you were wondering why I put him in?) . My father came to Australia from the north of Italy before the 2nd world war. Back in Italy, he was a stonemason, out here where there was not much call for ‘stonies’, he worked under the more familiar nom de plume of bricklayer! But in his employment around the city and suburbs, he built quite a few stone walls and such. One was the long weather-wall along the foreshore at Glenelg . He told me years later that if I was to look at a certain place on that wall, I would see, shaped within the stonework, a map of Italy with all the provinces in varying shades of stone built cunningly into the wall (a stunning…. ,no; a cunning stunt!)….Artisan becomes artist!

It stands to be proposed: When and who stationed “artists” and “artisans” in their prospective environs? What are the boundaries of these environs, ie; when does artisan become artist and vice-versa? Who adjudicates on works that can be either? What can be done to redress the problem of “artistic” excess?

Perhaps the first true “artist”, that is; the first person who deliberately constructed a feeling for the sheer pleasure of it, was, perhaps, the person who, seeing the drabness of the cave so depressing, went outside and gathered up a handful of flowers, took them inside, placed them strategically and well, the rest is history! Many a person has gilded their drabness with a “bouquet of lilies”….and received just reward for their initiative!

There is another boundary, a rather more insidious thing a political thing….a class thing , hardly more ‘enforced’ than now, at this point in time, where the “artist” must be “educated” into the hierarchy, or be politically “in tune to the current needs of the populace!” This has polarized creative works into ; “Creative art” and “Marketable art”.

This combination of evils, being class-controlled by nurture, locks the more industrious of the producing class out of the race, being, as their ancient forebears, too busy “gutting the mastodon” to have time to become illuminati-ed into the “mysterious paths of creativity”, it has come to the point of my mocking, it’s just that I cannot abide the pretentious waffling of the “artistic” clique that claim unique ability to sway or impress upon the collective desires of the populace such mundane predictability.

There are no boundaries.. “art” does not exist in itself, but rather as an adjunct to physical experience and cultural existence!… it is not a separate construction of the imagination, if it was, every wicked deed, every insidious act must also be construed as a “work of art” alongside sublime desire! No longer do we aspire to the heroic deed or moment as depicted in Odyssey or Aenied, easier to descend to the lowest common denominator. Elitism in “art” has created a dearth of imagination in the population. So now we are indoctrinated to accept an ” “image” of the “artist”, the falsely constructed behaviour, the “fop”, the contrived personality ponceing around with those two inseparable companions: angst and ecstasy!

Art has a social obligation…a social objective , but it has been perverted by a market mechanism. There is a serious distortion of our perceptions of achievement within the realms of creativity once we accept the lie of “art for art’s sake” , this is a postmodern prescription and debasement of a noble act. We have given over both riches and recognition to those who ill deserve and abuse both and we receive (unlike our caveman ancestor) little or no representations of our collective struggles in return. The progression to true artistic depiction is a one way street: The artisan has every qualification to aspire to true art (by “true art”, we mean; creative art, including that which is esoteric or aesthetic) because of their connection with physical activity or cultural ambition. The skill needed to envisage, conceive practicalities, collect materials and thoughts and then to “mold” all this plasma into a cohesive design, makes experience in the practical work-fields an essential qualification for the undertaking of an artistic project. That and the emotional trysts of success and failure, strength and weariness , love and loathing of the work involved, gives the artisan all the training needed for creating a “work of art”. The “artist”, conversely, rarely. very rarely, becomes artisan they just do not have the skills.

Which leads us to ask; who judges on what is a ” work of art’? Who indeed! This leads us back to my statement concerning class boundaries. Invariably, it is in the interests of a certain class to maintain “ownership” and therefore set a “monetary value” on pieces of “art”. The judges, therefore, tend to be those who collect, contract, earn a living by, or just generally set commercial boundaries to : “Objets d’art”, whatever material they be.
This narrow-minded presumption confines the creation of beautiful objects or imaginative constructs of the mind again to those “qualified” to create!

A parable : A builder engaged in the construction of a room decided to enhance a window with a little ‘Australiana scene ‘ carved from wood and fixed on the surface of a window so that when the sun shone through it formed a “three-dimensional-silhouette” a rather pleasing effect! A visitor, admiring this scene asked the builder (ignoring the possibility that they could create such a work )..

“Who made the carving?”

“Oh, we got a bloke in to do it”. the builder replied.

The visitor then asked the owner;

“Who was the person that did the carving?”

“You’re looking at him!” the builder said.

The visitor raised one doubting eyebrow in query and had to be reassured by the owner. The insinuation is there. And that, I presume, is where the artisan is expected to remain.

 

Tenth Station; Jesus is nailed to the cross.

Whether social tolerance is the correct way to judge a community.

“For your eyes only…”

There’s a phenomenon perhaps not unique to Australia, but is particularly noticeable in regional Oz..esp’ around these parts of the Mallee, where you can see the material progression of the process toward the almost inevitable “Third Generation Syndrome”, where you see the original pioneers pine and daub shanty, followed some years later after some modicum of farming success in “The New House” and then finally to the much later triple-fronted brick-veneer showpiece of the farm’s success story…

Then comes the next generation…the third generation syndrome where all that hard work gets “pissed against the wall”.

This breakdown with the family structure is jealously guarded from outside eyes and sometimes only the most intimate members of the family, even right up to the one parent knows of the inevitable collapse..I have heard of wives continuing on their merry way, involved in this or that community group..the bowls club, the local op-shop, even the choir group..totally unaware of the stalking of Nemesis until the fatal blow falls and then the shock of total destitution stares them and the family in the face..Some never recover their equilibrium and go on in a kind of continuous methodology of habit..like the setting of one foot in front of the other as in walking.

Many times it is not anyone’s particular fault..The produce  market might collapse just when they are most vulnerable with a loan, or an accident may befall a family member or members plural..or health issues etc….But in the saddest cases, it can be gambling (perhaps even “pre-selling” of a crop) or the drink that does the most damage..and when that is the cause of the family breakdown, then truly within the group, it really is ; “For your eyes only”.

It was booze that done for the next generation of some of my family, booze mixed with the stagnation of life progress in a dying district. A district that was once a booming area with all the bountiful residuals of a virgin land cleared and cropped for several generations until…until the ground water started disappearing or becoming too saline…before the top-soil, held together for many millennia of Mallee bio-forest was clear-felled to every fence-line and then grazed almost to bedrock and the dirt-farmers became chemical farmers and that was alright while the rain was predictable and of a certain measurement…..until..

THEN…then we see the breaking spirit, the breaking health, the closing businesses and the loss of population drifting away from these “sad shires”..friends, family, networks, transport capabilities and the final straw ; the :”free-market” that destroyed many agricultural boards and guaranteed buyers..then comes the drink…

I saw it here when we purchased this property from an obscure Aunt..Obscure to me, because I had only heard of her mentioned in vague conversations…as “Aunt..X”..I never met her till we came to inspect the property that was on the market..I didn’t even know it was HER property..and when we did purchase it, we were pressed by those who bought OUR own property to move out and yet my Aunt had made no move at all to vacate her place. I had to recruit my other relatives up here to please intercede to assist the aged Aunty (their aunt as well!) to move her to her new unit in the Barossa. It was curious that there did not seem to be much enthusiasm on their part, until after I moved here and discovered some awful truths I was not supposed to know.

I won’t reveal those “truths”, as I suspect many regional families have lived their own situations that have for a short time at least wrought havoc onto their lives. Sufficient to say that it was a third generation syndrome moment that resulted in extreme trauma for the family of my Aunty..may they rest in peace.

But sadly, this generational thing is exactly identifiable in the behaviour of the right-wing governments of this nation these last decade or so..We are ..what?..three generations from the second WW. , where militaristic discipline shaped social structure and obedience to such a degree that the imposed impossibilities placed on society caused the social upheaval that resulted in the huge changes in social welfare and health commitments of the preceding Labor governments..But the Liberal / National parties still cling to those perceived halcyon days of the Menzies era as the yardstick for measuring industrial , social, financial and status capacity in a world that is ploughing forward at a pace they completely fail to comprehend..and so the resulting chaos we see in day to day running of the nation could very easily be recognised as that same “Third Generation Syndrome” collapse that is going to leave the nation so vulnerable to what is akin to a family collapse.

With the by-election in New England, we are seeing a person totally incapable of viewing the big picture of the national needs and totally unsympathetic to any other electorate outside his own..If he is re-elected and given back the water portfolio, it WILL be akin to the near-do-well son making his way to the front-bar of the local until in a drunken stupor he writes himself and the family’s future off in a wreck of his own making..The voters of New England would be wise to consider if they wish to be joined with or cast adrift from many of their “near relatives” with such selfish representation..They would be wise to consider this risk, for  joined with a country-wide community, they could contribute with others to build the next “house”, while on their own they will, for a time flourish, but it will be by spending their accrued assets and good-will capital..a capital that is heavily invested in a person and a party that has in the recent past squandered resources and capital investments to what could be a criminal conglomerate. Look to your “house” ,New England…because WE further down the river catchment are looking at you!

So the nation must soon consider if these people now in govt’ have the honesty, the capacity and the integrity to lift the nation from one level to the next to promote community growth and prosperity, or will they do as has been done so many times in a once hard-won successful family and piss it against the wall?...and if they set about doing the latter, will WE be satisfied with standing by and witnessing the sad, long, debauching of our nation and our children’s future with the pathetic explanation to those inheritors that it was done in the interests of…

“For your eyes only”.

Jacta alia est.

 

Jacta alia est..; The die it is cast.

Caesar quietly mumbles the words,

Mixed with the tumbling Rubicon’s waters,

And when he whispers his secret,

Who does he direct his knowledge to?

What lines do the poet place on page?

Is there those who will like the rhyme,

But curse the metre?

Will like the idea,

But curse the action?

Jacta alia est..; The die it is cast.

But there is no-one left

Who knows what chance is.

None want to take the risk.

So he says it quietly..under-breath,

And leads the dumb and blind

On to their deserved death.