Along the rivers of your mind I saw the ever changing plants and trees (The Rumour)

Zen garden number 3 is now pretty much completed.

This time we've gone for a zen stroke patio stroke dining stroke relaxing area - combining garden furniture, Buddha, potted plants, sail, paving, cap cod chairs and screens.

All sitting happily outside ART (Abbey Road Three) and bathing in the luxuriant soundssssssss.

View from ART

SWMBO water blasted and painted the screens we found by the potting shed, we put up the sail, moved garden furniture around and tried various combinations of plants.

Jerry wants to say he 'helped' too.

It all looks pretty cool but even better that that it works. I spent an hour today in Zen 3's shade while listening to a Brian Wilson album playing in ART, and reading Mojo. 

Bliss.

Love and peace - Wozza

I'm thinking about a-this whole world (The Beach Boys)

I am Brian Wilson. 

Well, actually, I am Warren Purdy but the 'I am Sparticus' joke I tried to weave in there didn't want to work.

I've just finished I Am Brian Wilson (start of week 39, book 42) and it's a really good title. I feel like I know him a little more than I did before.

That's a pretty cool thing to say about someone's autobiography.

The Beach Boys have long been an obsession - I own all their albums, even the pretty duff ones with Mike Love 'leading' the lineup like Still Cruisin' and Summer In Paradise. I'm not sure why I own those ones. I'm not a fan of Mike Love.

But I love Carl Wilson, Brian's music, and I love the idea of Dennis Wilson. Given there is a lot of stuff about Brian in the public arena, I have never really thought much about Brian Wilson the person. 

Until I Am Brian Wilson.

I have no idea how it was written but the whole thing sounds like Brian. And Brian is very candid about his voices, his relationships, and his music.

It's real, is what I'm trying to say. And real is rare.

Love and peace to you Brian - WNP

It's my birthday too, yeah (The Beatles)

'Tis my little brother's birthday (18th of Rocktober). He turned 58.

I'm pretty sure his knees don't look like that anymore but who knows - I haven't seen him in shorts for decades.

We used to be close - as in we did everything together for many years. I would say until I hit Manukau Intermediate for two years and he was still at Royal Oak Primary. I think it started about then.

Although going into separate bedrooms at 18 Korma Ave. about the time I started school at Royal Oak Primary may have contributed as well.

Whatever, increasingly, we got different friends, our interests more radically diverged, we didn't share stuff and I entered boy teenage fog at Mount Albert Grammar. I don't think he did. He's always been finely tuned.

By the time he caught up to me at MAGS he was my young brother who I didn't need to look after as I'd done at Royal Oak Primary.

Then we went to Auckland University. Me first, of course. I went into the arts, his path further diverged into sciences.

Our belief systems changed along the way. I became aware of social injustice. Our motivations changed.

I left home first. We lost touch more and more.

We met and fell for very different women.

I got married first, started a family first. Moved around the world.

It's now been a long time. We've grown apart, as many brothers and sisters do. But he's still my brother, he always will be, and I miss those years when we were ignorant of our differences and were close. 

Love and peace and happy birthday Ross Graham Purdy - Big Brother.

I've got everything, like a moving ground, an open road, and everything (Deep Purple)

Holidays mean time for reading (usually while waiting for SWMBO in the car around Whangarei).

It's the start of week 38/52 for my reading goal. Book number 39 was a DC Comics collection called America At War. 

I picked it up from The Piggery after waiting a few months for it to reach a half price special. I'm not normally that patient but $44 seemed steep for a second hand comic book.

The main draw card for me was the inclusion of a few of my favourites - pre-eminently, Sgt. Rock!  

While browsing at Real Groovy I found book 40 - Ian Gillan's autobiography - Highway Star. Gillan being the lead singer for Deep Purple off and on since the early seventies. 

It's okay and kept me interested for the most part but he often pulls his punches in an annoying way - especially on his bandmates in Purple. So it's a little superficial at times and becomes focused too much on his 'solo' activities with the Ian Gillan Band and Gillan for my liking.

Current book (41) is a thriller of sorts - Chris Bohjalian's The Guest Room. Early days - page 22 but I'm already absorbed and impressed by his style.

Love and peace - Wozza

Met my friends all in the material world (George Harrison)

A Facebook message from Noel Forth,  an old mate (old as in I've known him for yonks), reminded me of my mid seventies silk screening activities.

I began via mucking around in art classes at MAGS during my second year fifth year (1973 for those keeping score); someone was impressed and asked me to screen print shirts for the rowing squad.

Hmm, I thought (to myself) - I could do this at home!

So I made my own silk screens and drew stencils to create some fan art.

Some designs for stencils

Noel in Adelaide had been a pen pal for a while and so, in a quid pro quo deal, he sent records and I sent bespoke screened T shirts. 

Which he wore!!!!

Collection of my fan art from 40 years ago

Some of the screens were really huge - the Lennon print is a mitre square!

Anyway, at the time I printed a copy of each shirt design onto a piece of material and squirreled them away into my keepsake suitcase.

And here they are...

And here's Noel modelling them (in legendary aussie bands Tortis and Vertical Hold) with Mick and Jim...

I know, only a glimpse, but clear proof. The last one is my Paul and Linda McCartney shirt - here's one of my prelim sketches for that stencil... 

And to finish, only Noel will appreciate this, but what the hey - I came across this in my treasure trove with the stencils: not sure why I did this - Noel may have the answer:

Love and peace - Warren Ono Purdy

Yes, it is, it's true (The Beatles)

The happiest man is he who can connect the evening of his life with the beginning - so says Dante!

Okay - don't want to get too dramatic here. I've only turned 60 years old. No big deal. But...

I have found myself reconnecting with aspects of my youth all my life: my vinyl obsessions, and often a return to albums from the sixties and especially the seventies - my period; Look and Learn magazines; books/TV shows/movies that I've loved before, are some examples.

And I think I know why.

Far beyond childhood, when one recalls being read to or told a story, there is a renewal of the sense of being cared for. That positive emotional state can resurface throughout one’s life when narratives are heard. 

In addition, hearing the same book repeatedly allows the brain to seek its own intrinsic rewards. The brain’s response to making a choice or prediction that turns out to be correct is a release of dopamine, triggering a feeling of deep satisfaction and pleasure.

This extract is from an Edutopia article - The Neuroscience of Narrative and Memory.

It's a good thing. Yes, it is, it's true.

Love and peace - Wozza