Form: Diary

( If I haven’t said it lately, love you all. Nothing special today. Just makes me happy to share the universe with you – cheers.)

Curt Doolittle updated his status.

—“Are there certain things you miss about the US, living in Ukraine?”—

Actually. Not that much. I can list the things, but I can also offset them with what I love there.

– Movie theaters. On the other hand, I would have seen precisely three movies in the theater this year – so that’s not serious.
– Italian food. Mexican food. supermarkets where I can read the labels with some degree of efficacy. Shopping in general. It’s easy to spend little money there. Shopping is impossible.
– Ukrainian and Russian humor finds self deprecation ‘stupid’ and so I’m not funny here like I am in the states. It bothers me. I’m not that funny in the first place. I understand their humor and its origins but it’s not an intellectual humor so much as a poetic and wisdom kind of thing.
– I have a large vocabulary, and like to play with words, and can use neither here. I cannot ‘signal’ in the Ukraine like I can in english speaking countries.
– Everything to do with money works in America: banks, cards, cash, contracts, the courts. Nothing works at all in Ukraine. Seriously. Keep an out of country bank and use it.
– Ukraine has a 100% tax on import of cars and domestic cars are shit so ukraine is second only to Cuba in the age of its vehicles. So you know, being a car nut is … difficult.
– Commons. Not that the left hasn’t but destroyed them all by now, but we still have remnants of parks and lakes and such that haven’t yet been overrun by uncouth semi domesticated animals. 😉 Ukraine was once beautiful but it is falling apart. You can still see the remnants of soviet parks in the east, and great european style parks in the west. But … the commons is literally falling apart.
– The roads in Ukraine are … let us say, medieval is understating it. There is one good road that goes from one side of the country to the other (Lviv to Kharkiv). And one road that goes from north (Kiev) to south(Odessa). Those two are kept relatively well even though they turn into two lanes for most of the width of the country. Ukraine is a big country for europe. It’s just about the size of texas or alberta canada, but is like living in say Ontario or Quebec (cold in winter, hot in summer). Imagine getting around Texas on MAIN roads that are so full of frost heaves and potholes that. When you’re in ukraine (a) slavic male overconfidence, (b) slavic predisposition for alcohol, (c) slavic predisposition for driving while both smoking, and talking passionately on the phone, (d) slavic disposition for assuming what they don’t see is vacant rather than containing a moving vehicle, (e) a large number of vehicles with poor stability, bad tires, and useless brakes. So yeah. All that stuff.
– High culture. There is almost no high culture left in the USA, it will disappear with my generation. But in some areas a few crumbs remain. Ukraine has culture. Moscow has high culture. But Ukraine has very little high culture outside of Kiev. It has demand for it. The people appreciate it. But there is no way to fund it. You need a big middle class to do that. And ukraine’s upper class is all gangsters (really). You know the hot blonde in the jewelry and the mercedes that looks like a princess, and she has her entourage? Organized crime. Or mixed government organized crime.
– Family. Family most. Christmas.

That’s all. Seriously. That’s it. Literally everything else in my opinion is better. And in that sense I mean, daily life is just better. It’s better because if you have a little money you live like a king. Why? Personal income is so low (as is personal debt) that human beings are affordable throughout the economy and provide service in ways the west can no longer afford to except for underclass immigrant labor.

Curt Doolittle updated his status.

FAVORITE ARTISTS
I don’t have favorite artists. I prefer certain periods like anyone else, but pretty much love good craftsmanship in any of them. I have a very clear want of line, so I prefer ink, etching and mezzotints. I have generally purchased small sculpture when possible. If I could own and live with anything substantive it would be a Rothko, or one of Bruegel’s peasant celebrations. If I could collect anything it would be life size portraits of nobility over the centuries – it would be like living with them. The contemporary work I like most is either quite technical and illustrative or the monumental portraits and portrait sculpture. I dislike photorealism (projectors) and mass market abstract and mixed media (intensely). For my own, I have generally preferred many small pieces to large pieces so a home or office has variety rather than to invest in a single. I personally worked on nudes and prefer the human form, the human form as landscape, and landscape. If I worked today I would do ‘wall sculpture’ using large numbers of woven human forms. I have drawn out and planned to create monumental theatrical dioramas. In my next place I will use a large vertical monitor to just rotate through pieces randomly selected by software from the internet and rotating every minute or three.