There may be those who wonder where all this US Constitution critique is going? Well, there are elemental principles such as freedom and order, seemingly poles apart. In a universe of invariable spin, they are connected.
The primitive and primal is always seemingly simple, but it contains opposites. A spiral is not pure order (logic) nor is it pure freedom (chaos), but it contains both in the sense of proportion.
Spirals contain number, but their elaboration is such that they are not contained by number. First or elemental principles are always going to be a type of reality, and it's fooling ourselves to pretend otherwise. A town which is built on proportion will always be subject to order, but it will also tend to have grungy areas and cesspits which organically appear in nooks and crannies.
This is the type of reality depicted by Milton Caniff (see Shanghai TofF2 - and of course Hyboria HB20.) Nooks and crannies are a consequence of proportion; they are not entirely ordered and neither are they entirely clean.
Again, cleanliness is poles apart from filth, but the two are connected by proportion. There was the quote from Fuller's Earth, by Robert Robertson (P36) that urine and mud were the first detergents.
A detergent has to be strong, and dirt contains minerals and acids that are strong (corrosive). Mud for washing was generally gathered on river banks, and you could say a river is something that has intrinsic proportion in its banks and its flow (the Ganges).
This sounds relatively Oriental.
The ultimate destination of Bruce's journey was peace of mind - the true meaning of life. I feel confident that because Bruce chose the path of self-knowledge over accumulation of facts, and the path of self-expression over image-enhancement, that he did reach his destiny with a peaceful mind. (Linda Lee Cadwell, Preface, Artist of Life)
The ego evades following reality so that what appears convincing is simply a convincing illusion. To the West, numbers and logic are the reality, but this evades the primal reality of proportion (body).
In Ukraine, Russia and the West are locked in conflict which is purely technological and evades the fact that each city (historically) has its independence and ability to self-govern and therefore rebel. Technological conquest is the convincing illusion of modernity (see Afghanistan, prev.)
Rebellion is the occurrence that is often sweaty and grimy - as with Tatu, prev - and is the human-oriented activity that both sides evade. Freedom within order (the Church) is something of a medieval concept (neither the Pope nor the Orthodox are siding with Ukraine despite the human situation.)
Lee's first Hong Kong movie (actually shot in Thailand), The Big Boss, is a case-in-point. The work of shovelling around ice-blocks is grimy enough, while the settings are scenic perfection of jungle glades, knotty wood enclaves and grass pavilions.
The film is elemental in that action comes before words; there are short and sharp exchanges with almost pantomime gestures.
Stance and stoicism are the key. In the elemental situation, the sultry girl gathers water by the river and is pestered by one of the ruffians. This type of episode gradually builds up tension to the climactic fight.
The elemental atmosphere is both grungy (fairly filthy) and clean like the water, soil and plants of the forest, going the opposite way to modernity.
Going through a local shopping mall, I saw a kid doing cartwheels. That's cool enough, but it occurred to me the type of action that's increasingly rare - spontaneous and exuberant. The modern world is going somewhere but not via cartwheels. Not via the physical awareness of action, more like a sort of electrical headware. Everything, be it cartwheels, riding a ploughshare or throwing a discus contribute to a physical area and hence the psychic calm that results (see scene towards beginning of Le Mepris of Palance throwing a discus, Lang responds "Now you understand Greek culture.")
The total efficiency of electricity contrasts with the evaporation of sweat from active bodies. Electricity inhabits the variable time of one's and zeros (GPS machines), while sweat inhabits the cyclical time of Earthspin (free and wild as the ocean.)
Total efficiency is an invention of variable time (of machines) that tends to put the psyche (awareness of physical reality) to sleep. Somewhat like The Midwich Cuckoos, the next generation is an xenogenesis that is happy to 'sleep with the machines' (Kantner lyric).
The dingy chicken runs and country dances (see HB210 to P200 via HB209, invariable time) are needed to wake people up again, to plunge into the wildness that is under constant 'protection'.
It struck me that investment in environmental spaces by such as Bill Gates and John Burton (the World Land Trust) are not going to relate the physical land (of active empowerment with a mule) to psyche. All the investment in the world is not going to change the total electrification of reality.
