Observation – Page 2 – Carlo Centeno

Life Lessons

It’s been said that everything you needed to learn and know in order to get through a day was taught in kindergarten. That was the early-in-life primer, essentially a course in fundamentals: polite behavior, expressions of gratitude, common courtesy and common sense in all things you say and act upon.
Some life lessons around loyalty, unconditional love, patience, trust, kindness–among others–were influenced by my dog, Humphrey. Naturally, various experiences with family, teachers/professors and good friends added to that mix as well, as well it should.

Humphrey was a miniature cockapoo, but there was nothing small in his character or demeanor. Simply put, he acted like he was the biggest, baddest, dog east of the Mississippi. He possessed a radar that had a way of measuring and reading the nature of most grown ups, and of course other four-legged creatures [read: neighborhood dogs he didn’t quite like]. I’ve heard it said that the size of the dog doesn’t matter as much as the size of its heart. And that little guy had a huge heart.
Children were another story. He was comfortable around them. Humphrey was just as curious about kids, as the kids were with this little guy. Throughout his life, many thought Humphrey to be a puppy. In a sense he was that in many ways.

It makes sense to me that the weight and burden of grief that comes from the loss of a pet correlates to the amount and type of affection you gave the pet, and vice versa. Reciprocity at its finest. Quite frankly, that equation is the same for family, significant others and close friends. When you truly care about someone or something, you give it your all, certainly your heart and soul as a minimum.
MJ and I support each other in all of this. She did, indeed, have a big part in Humphrey’s life, as did our kids and grandkids. Those connections or bonds don’t disappear at death. Not surprisingly, we had thought about ways to extend Humphrey’s life, perhaps just a bit more care or special intervention would’ve helped, but time waits for no one.
Second thoughts arose wondering if any intervention for Humphrey could still help him. I think part of understanding what love is revolves around one’s willingness to let go. We’d like to think that as the end drew closer, that that pup knew he added so much to our days, and vice versa. Life lessons arrive from many points. From the smallest of vignettes to those large and complex, there’s something one can glean from experience and interaction.

Not surprisingly, other events or milestones reach out and overwhelm us, including one in particular. About a week after Humphrey died, one of our daughters and her husband added to the number of grandchildren. Their second child–and our fifth grandchild–was a welcome sight!

He was the salve to our sadness. The sounds and expressions of loss and affirmation differ. Death and grief are shadowed by life, not the other way around. That new baby dampened down some of the grief we’ve been carrying. The creation and arrival of a new life, affirms the reality that dying and being born are conditions each of us cannot deny. With one, comes the other.

Fate added another exclamation point to all of this. Just before the end of March, MJ’s sister suddenly passed away from heart failure made more complex by cancer. And just like that, death set us back yet again. Nostalgia, sadness, regret and second guessing returned in force. No sooner than when the new baby arrived home, MJ and I were thinking about an obituary and a funeral to attend in short order.

In all of this, I’m reminded of what MJ’s mom said about the passing away of loved ones: remember them on their birthdays, not just on the day they died. That notion has stuck by us for quite awhile now. With birthdays come celebrations, the gathering of family and friends, and an opportunity to reconnect with good times and the people who are and were a part of that. To auld lang syne, to “times that have gone by.” We can think of any number of experiences that raised a smile, a laugh, a few tears, but don’t mistake this as longing or living in the past. It’s really a time to be in the moment, a key one at that, to share recollections with those in attendance and in doing so, our connections to each other are again [or for the first time!] affirmed.

My take on all that’s happened is that our willingness to interact with each other can never be replaced with the efficiency of Facetime, Zoom Meetings, teleconferencing and any other present-day digital communication. The attributes of efficiency cannot separate us from emotions and empathy. There are lessons woven into experiences that can be shared, indeed as some should anyway. It’s what makes each of us a wholly unique, sentient being.

The peaks and valleys this past March, made clear that we need to nurture our connections to family and friends, to dogs and cats and pets, and to others outside our zones of comfort. Good or bad, joyful or sad, the confluence of your feelings shared with others enhances many of life’s lessons…

…and when that fog does lift…

Observation and interpretation of anything is very subjective though in commercial and advertising work, that which is deemed creative and acceptable are often determined by the art director, sometimes by the account supervisor on behalf of a client. Actually, the person who has the last word is often not the illustrator, photographer, videographer, writer–or in today’s parlance–the content editor. In my experience, the buck stops at the client’s desk….and oddly enough at a desk occupied by someone with a tangential connection to the project, perhaps rare, but it happens. “I think it’s clever, why don’t we run with it?’

Now, if the creators of verse and image are the clients, then the advent of blogs and vlogs have given these clients the control to post final versions of whatever is being created. To have complete creative control is nothing short of invigorating if not self-serving. Being both client and creator is double-edged; not surprisingly, creators can be the hardest of critics, at times being so critical of their own efforts and results that projects crawl to a stop. Paralysis-by-analysis, imposter syndrome, go figure.
So, when your creative fog lifts don’t meander thinking you’ll encounter an epiphany. Yes, at times that does happen when the creative block lifts, and you’re greeted by some nugget of an idea. If you’re the creator and the client, then it’s incumbent upon both personas to look at your product/content with equal scrutiny. Both minds, while driven by other factors, do have a common intersection. Think of 2 circles, one overlapping the other. In that small, shaded area is where the diaspora of sales, marketing, advertising and more are all blended together.

I think of that creative block, that fog, as a layer temporarily covering my creative line-of-sight. It does lift, so be ready.

Photographic Somnabulism: second stanza

Give credit where credit is due. The fine-art book, Somnabulist created by photographer Ralph Gibson in 1970, was where I first saw the word, somnabulist. His fascination with discovery and the realm of things abstract made for different if not interesting images. My take was when reality is cojoined with one’s dreams, it’s a means to an end: achieving success, finding calm, reducing stress, maintaining good health, nurturing family and friends and so forth. The following images are dreamscapes of sorts. They’re a far cry from Mr. Gibson’s B&W prints.
As in life—that is in being “awake”—light, shadow, colors and the dark all have a role in both dreams and living. One is allegorical, the other experiential. Or even both?

Photographic Somnabulism

Because the night belongs to….

Trompe l’oeil

Marketers and consumers share an underlying condition that produces second-guesses to decisions and even behaviors. In the realm of behaviorists, psychologists and therapists, this is often referred to as, cognitive dissonance.
Though the condition is often used in psychology/psychiatry, the right-brainers in marketing can take certain liberties in applying the essence of its definition to feelings and behaviors in our consumption-driven economy. What shapes your decisions and expectations when you buy something, work on a project or to make a single decision at a given time? What influences your “…on second thought, I better…?”

As I’ve noted in previous posts about marketing, it’s not what you’re actually receiving, but what you think you’re getting. This is a stretch, but at times I think some marketing is a form of trompe l’oeil. Are the cluster of lights actually on the bare trees?

Like a product attribute [example: price equates to exclusivity…though it can certainly suggest something else]. Do the light projections draw your attention? Or do you first see the small cluster of lamps in the lower left? Are the lamps somewhere near the building? Or suspended close to it? Clearly direct sunlight is apparent on the face of the building. Which light source peaks your curiosity?

There are numerous examples of classic trompe l’oeil art such as the one painted by Sameul Dirksz van Hoogstraten entitled, Still-Life. It’s a timeless piece, one that can feel more contemporary than its 360- year age might suggest.

courtesy: ARt and Object commons
*Still-Life,* 1664 by Dutch painter Samuel Dirksz van Hoogstraten

Marketing can, indeed, fool your eye. The pima cotton sweater I saw in a catalog looked like a keeper….until I tried it on. Fortunately, returns are the norm for many online purchases.

Bare Trees

The changing seasons has a way of rebooting my perspectives on life’s moving parts. It’s also an opportunity for me to find, even create, connections that could lead me to alternate choices about work and family, problems and challenges, as well as my own professional and personal goals. The fall suggests possibilities with a palette of colors where each one suggests a sentiment to whatever I’m feeling or thinking. More often than not, I make one, perhaps 2 attachments of color to an idea, an attitude, or even a condition that’s been entrenched in a mood of some sort which I cannot correlate or let go of.
However, when the maples, birch, oaks and other trees reveal their once covered limbs, I see a “wireframe” ready for a season of open air, of white space and a period of quiet and rest. Once again, it’s a reboot of sorts given the visual clues of autumn.

From a distance these bare trees take on an innocuous albeit familiar appearance. You realize that these wireframes silhouetted against a grey forest floor or an overcast sky has the potential to stimulate your way of visualizing beyond the obvious and the rote. Late fall and bare trees are midwives to modified or new byways to thinking and feeling.

Such possibilities make bare trees special. True, this past autumn the colors were fantastic, vibrant, even spectacular, more so than years past as far as I can tell. That festival of color has its own cathartic energy. Compared to just a few weeks ago, these now dormant, quiet trees are a type of dopamine, a suitable follow-on for my busy “monkey-mind.” There’s a levity and sense of calm with bare trees that’s akin to starting anew and refreshed.
The trees are steadfast and immobile and yet there’s a fluid-like form that draws your attention. And because you can see between the branches, openings of various shapes and dimensions become apparent. That white space becomes a cocoon for imagination and emotion, of things improbable that feel possible if only in theoretical form. What can you jettison from your mind into those spaces now in front of you? There are things each of us can let go of.

Many of the trees are straight up and down although the oaks and maples have a grace manifested by the sweeping reach of higher branches. The silhouette of these branches appear as arms with a soft curve, its ends like fingers gently reaching for the sky.

Late fall and bare trees are markers of change. In its most obvious forms, it means shorter days, cooler temperatures, fantastic light and shadow and a time change. The latter is likely the least wanted change this time of year. And yet the markers also remind us that still more change is to come. Some welcome winter [like me] and others can’t wait for spring.
In a personal way bare trees are anthropomorphic. They go through cycles of change just as we do with our life stages. And as in life, some of the bare trees will remain so in the months ahead. Just as some of us will, our own thoughts and feelings leaving our physical selves.
Bare trees can mirror our own life qualities season to season. Or maybe it’s the other way around; after all, trees have long existed before we arrived.

“Switch-Tasking”

Time, energy and focus are 3 KPIs [Key Performance Indicators] for mulitasking. And likely there are other indicators, and for those, I’ll need an ombudsman to help reset my already overloaded brain. In any one of these factors, you either have it, lose it or want it. For the most part, I’d say most people want them all, or to at least hold onto whatever’s in you.

However, multitasking is not really multitasking.

Ms. Nancy Napier, Ph.D. and contributor to Psychology Today identifies it more as “switch-tasking.” For decades we’ve heard that new electronics and computers and software are supposed to help make our professional lives much easier and faster, that’s rarely the case. Many of my marketing projects are open—actually minimized—on my screen. Perhaps “minimizing” those open windows and apps is in actually diluting the strength of your project[s].
Dr. Napier points out switching between projects is counter productive. In fact, it takes a good amount of time and energy to realign your mental details jumping from one open project to another. All of this creates stress [but we already knew that].

As Dr. Napier puts it, multitasking is mentally and physically rough on anyone. The mode of working start-stop-start-stop-restart becomes a catalyst for mistakes, inefficiency and time lost. As the saying goes, “Well, there’s 30-minutes I can’t get back.”

Did you happen to notice the bee in the first photo [the sunflower]? No, well, were you multitasking….excuse me, “switch tasking?”

Analogies

They’re all around us. Analogies are everywhere. This morning several analogies appeared after an overnight snow powdered trees, shrubs and bare ground. There is value in being part of your surroundings, and depending on your frame of mind and mood, the time spent can be cathartic. The morning’s analogies are fleeting, ephemeral. For the most part, the majority are short-lived.

My waking-up-time leaves much to be desired as I totally missed a fiery sunrise. From a window in the dining room, the bold orange and red brushed across the eastern sky is a familiar calling card for this anachronism with a camera. However, by the time I was ready, the sky instead gave me an anticlimactic pale blue. Gone in the blink of an eye.

I’m reminded of the proverb, “He/she [my pronouns] who hesitates is lost.” I had lost my opportunity earlier this morning when I failed to get outside to photograph that spectacular burst of color. This adage comes from playwright Joseph Addison’s play, Cato in 1712, and its adaptation is as universal as any other truism.
I’m not the least bit surprised at the lesson the saying delivers. In an attempt at action and decisiveness, there seems to be a lot of hesitation. And when one hesitates, that window of opportunity often closes in short order.

Hesitation can infer caution just as it can suggest a lack of confidence. For the former, it means we’ve avoided some form of discomfort or harm, as for the latter, I believe that having little confidence is what causes most of us to choose not to do anything. Hesitation–whether in avoiding some perceived element of danger or wanting some level of certainty and sense of purpose–means either choice denies us any affirmation of what could have been.

After several minutes, the snow started falling away. Pine boughs loaded with snow started lifting just as the snow fell. Clumps dropped from many of the trees, the branches were once again dark and monochromatic against the blue sky. It seemed the snow vanished in the blink of an eye. Ultimately everything appeared as they were before: familiar though dark, even mysterious.

The fast-melting snow was like time running its course in the last minute of a hockey game or any other sporting contest. Was there an opportunity early on to change the game’s outcome? Ultimately it comes down to an either or decision. Actually, the third action is not to do anything at all, but the complexity of choosing inaction is an essay for another posting.

I’ve lost count of the moments I hesitated making a decision. Similarly, that count is lost on the moments when I did not hesitate, only to wonder if my action was perhaps just too fast.

Many things go pass us with nothing more than a slight pause of time. Sunrises, sunsets, snow melting, a game played in overtime and so on. Time for me to do something else.

From a Distance

……From a distance
You look like my friend
Even though we are at war.
From a distance
I just cannot comprehend
What all this fighting’s for.
From a distance
There is harmony
And it echoes through the land
And it’s the hope of hopes
It’s the love of loves
It’s the heart of every man
It’s the hope of hopes
It’s the love of loves
This is the song for every man.
God is watching us
God is watching us
God is watching us
From a distance.

Excerpt from the song, “From a Distance” by Julie Gold ©1985*
*Songwriter Julie Gold composed this song when she was working as a secretary at HBO. She wrote during her free time. The song has been covered several times by other artists such as Nanci Griffith and Bette Midler.

On a recent flight home, 2 songs came to mind. An epiphany of sorts became apparent as I looked down on Springfield, Massachusetts and Ski Sundown in New Hartford, Connecticut.

Ski Sundown in New Hartford, Connecticut

In light of the Ukraine-Russia war, it’s not a stretch to understand the effect of distance when watching something from afar. Things are not always as they seem, but up close, enough details emerge to create a clearer picture.
Most of us see what’s happening from a distance, from the safety of our screens playing out “breaking news” of the terror and the maddening reality of one country imposing its incorrigible intentions on an independent nation.

At altitude, it’s easy to “not see” the actualities of what’s coming and going at ground level. And yet what impacts me the most is how the innocents and defenders suffer and die, of how the children struggle to understand this detestation that arrived from nowhere. Modern journalism can report events as visceral and undiluted, anywhere at anytime. In that sense, we see more than what we want to.

I leave this post with the words Enjolras sang during the scene At the Barricades, from the musical, Les Miserables.

Do you hear the people sing?
Singing a song of angry men?
It is the music of a people
Who will not be slaves again.

When the beating of your heart
Echoes the beating of the drums.
There is a life about to start
When tomorrow comes.

Les Miserables by Victor Hugo
Les Miserables, the London Musical, trademarked by Cameron Macintosh Overseas.

Cold Light

I am an odd person out. I’m certain I shared this in a previous post, namely that winter, the shorter days, the snow and the cold don’t bother me the way I know it really bothers a lot of other people. However, when freezing rain, relentless winds from the north and sleet show up, doubts perk up about my relationship with winter.
My enjoyment of this season is greatly enhanced by a few other small details: no biting insects, most nasty smells are frozen in place, it’s easier to layer up to stay warm versus shedding attire to get cool. Fireplaces are invaluable for the way they comfort our weary minds and bodies.
And then there’s the light. By late October, shorter days manifest that longing for days that end at 9:30 in the evening, versus 4:15 in the afternoon. But for me on any given day, winter light can be nothing short of amazing [well, to my eyes anyway].

For those enamored with snow, it doesn’t matter how you enjoy it, just as long as you get out to enjoy it. Snowshoes. Boards. Skis [alpine and cross country]. Insulated tie-up boots [aka “moon boots”]. Building snow forts, a snowman/woman/sculpture. Tubes, sleds, and toboggans. They all generate smiles at one time or another.

Even the most ardent worshipper of other seasons can understand why winter can be a favorite. There’s a sense of solitude, even in the busiest of urban environments. Indeed most folks are rushing—as it’s often said—to get out of the cold, to get inside to warm up. And yet there are those who look to get out to be invigorated by the cold air. When it’s cold, it’s only natural that you move to stay warm: motion generates heat and heat consumes calories and the consumption of calories means soothing cups of hot coffee, hot chocolate, hot soup, hot tea among other choices awaiting your selection. Admittedly, it is bliss having such hot consumables balance out the chill at the end of a day. The yin-yang of warm & cold becomes apparent.

A cold drink can bookend a hot summer day just as a hot toddy can on a cold winter day. This radiating cocktail of hot water, lemon, honey and a bit of whiskey is also hydrating, indeed soothing since it’s a drink perfect for sipping.

Cold light, winter light, is especially sharp when it reaches across a landscape as far as you can see. The shadows are longer and details stand out like bas-relief etched into tree trunks. On ski trails, the tendrils left by carving skis add to that dimension of depth, or even height, as if lengths of dark thread randomly lie atop the snow.

Winter’s light—especially later in the day—can feel cathartic and the sun’s warmth enhances this catharsis. A cup of hot chocolate, a banana, a comfy, large Maine Adirondack chair and a pit fire are all good company.

Cleansing Breaths

A benefit of changing seasons is precisely that: change. Here in New England, the 4 seasons do more than adjust amounts of daylight, colors of sunrise and sunset, the appearance/disappearance of flora, the transitions of both diurnal and nocturnal activities, owing in part to the amount of daylight/nightlight available for particular pursuits from tennis to star gazing. The change in seasons are as much physical as they are metaphysical, philosophical and experiential. The seasons are what you make them to be.

Often my cleansing breaths are interpreted as sighs of disappointment, or relief, a reaction to someone or something that gives purchase to both feelings. Since the arrival of Covid, I’ve made a conscious effort to use more cleansing breaths. I’m reminding myself there are far worse things to be disappointed with, and using some calming behaviors can make a difference.

The benefits of regularly using cleansing breaths has a way of taking edges off of things [vis a vis, the stress produced by today’s level of uncertainty]. Deep breaths and exhales do have physical and mental benefits. Gentle stretches [another cleansing breath, please] coupled with a proactive mindset that focuses on out with the bad, and in with the good has a lasting effect on our overall demeanor.

By extension, whenever I see a changing sky—especially one with clouds or on windy days—I attribute these shifts of clouds and air to cleansing breaths. However these are done by Mother Nature on behalf of our troubled planet. Earth is having a hard time rejuvenating much of what humankind has taken for granted, even wasted or destroyed.

Whenever I’m out and about, feeling that need for solitude and distraction-free thinking, I load up on cleansing breaths and allow myself the chance to attain “groundedness” a term, I believe, coined by Stephen Hayes, Ph.D., professor of psychology at the University of Nevada. To avoid any confusion, I’ll merely say that attaining a semblance of groundedness means accepting and facing the here and now [however uncomfortable], and to make a commitment or shift of working on things that can mentally/emotionally help you.

The simplest example I can think of is this feeling or acceptance that one’s worklife/career is a dead end and wouldn’t be a dead end if the company your worked for was “better.” There are a myriad of other reasons to choose from. Instead of losing yourself and using up energy on this discontent, nurture a way to make yourself stand out. This isn’t about writing the great American novel or closing on a stupendous sale; it’s more in the line of working from your known strengths to optimize your “here-and-now” going forward.

Now, before you do anything else, take that cleansing breath….