It doesn't make my life, or my work, any better. IвЂ™ve thought about it a lot since, and it helped frame a lot of my current mindset.Д«ack to the initial part of this post, a major part of why I have backed away from spending time online is because itвЂ™s not what I want to pay attention to. That was one of those lightning rod sentences that made me sit up straighter. The sentence was: you are what you pay attention to. Something struck me recently while listening to a talk on meditation about a month ago. But I have to stress the second part of that sentence. IвЂ™m genuinely enjoying it! I love pushing myself, and feeling like IвЂ™m onto something new for me. ItвЂ™s been a real challenge, the biggest IвЂ™ve ever taken on. IвЂ™ve always used elements of them all in my projects, but not to this degree, and nowhere near this interwoven. IвЂ™ve been bitten hard by the art bug in three mediums over the course of my life вЂ“ the first was visual art, the second was prose and the third was music, in that order. If I were to quickly explain what this album is going to be, IвЂ™d say I have finally decided to truly combine all my interests. Even for me, and I never learn in straight lines. IвЂ™ve been making tons of headway on my next big project, called вЂњInto The Woods,вЂќ but it has been a strange path. I just might not see them for a while, and I apologize in advance if I donвЂ™t write back.Д«ut talking about what you are not doing isnвЂ™t very interesting, and all this peace and quiet has been far from idle. For those who send nice notes, thank you. Maybe it will rebalance in time and there will be some shift in digital etiquette, but I only check in very occasionally now. There are nice notes, too, but the see-saw tipped too much toward the problematic side somewhere along the way. Inboxes can quickly get filled by people who are upset at what you are, or are not, doing. But online behavior has deteriorated to the point where I largely avoid it. I think this is because I used to write to nearly everyone who bothered to write to me, and now I am feeling that difference. I say this in jest, but I have talked about it enough that I clearly feel some need to explain my abstinence. So now, for example, if someone asks whether IвЂ™m on Tik-Tok, I can say вЂњIвЂ™m fortyвЂќ, or simply gesture towards my body, and we can go about our merry ways. It feels like societal permission to do what IвЂ™ve been doing for a long time anyway. I like it, though, the idea of officially being middle-aged. I turn 40 next month, which for reasons I wonвЂ™t go into here, I never really thought I would make it to. IвЂ™ll post some drawings from my desktop, put up recordings when theyвЂ™re done, and send out some newsletters if I have anything worthwhile to share. When I poke my head out it seems noisier than ever, and I donвЂ™t see much point in adding my voice to all of that. Either way, my phone remains devoid of apps (not quite true, I use one for meditation). Maybe this is my tiny form of protest? Ha. I moved to the belly of the tech-beast to largely ignore it.

Since moving up here to San Francisco, IвЂ™ve found myself with even less interest in the digital side of life. ItвЂ™s been a while since IвЂ™ve written here.

The road to nowhere radical face