Just a single Strich from the persona to the personal! But what a difference. The entire subject bundled up in a single stroke. The goal: to embrace the impostor, however imposing it might seem.

Twice is coincidence. Thrice is fate (jokes, religion). The critic
tries to find fate in something that doesn't even happen once.

On Costumes

There are two kinds of children at Halloween: those who put all their effort into their costumes, making sure that every part of their costume is right, becoming the character; the other kind knows that all they have to do to get a bag of candy is to put on a wig, maybe with horns; they keep on their winter jackets to keep warm. The latter become successful businessmen, comfortable in life, the former become artists and teachers.

Cannibalizing Cannibalism?

Tobias Schneebaum died 2 years before I saw his biographical documentary on his life. To use cannibalism in the 60s as a way, perhaps, to gain publicity, I wonder if he could not stop the machine that he started. Being forced by producers and directors to return to Peru at the age of 78, where he ate human flesh once 45 years before, he admits at the end that he does not see himself as a cannibal, "but then one always looks at oneself quite differently from the way other people see you."
He also admitted of living hand-to-mouth. He never had money and never will have money, and prefers it that way. Only at 50 did he finally come to terms with life. What strikes me with all this is that he does not feel like he needs to conform to the way people see him. There is a certain contentment in his life, one that I am searching for in mine. It's not a love of life - one cannot sustain that feeling - nor a fascination with it, but a connection to life that is inseparable from one's desires. He's gay and always wanted to be a painter. The way he lead his life was always directed in fulfilling those desires.