.........................................................................................................................................................
"Thought
is loyal to itself only when it moves against the incline." [P.
Clastres, Society Against the State. New York, 1989.]
Listening
for the hum of
a mountain bike careening downhill, unseen until the last
moment, a sharp wind blows in one ear and out the other. Looking
ahead, the path's acute angle is somewhat depressing. I abruptly
recall Gary Snyder clambering
up Mt. Tamalpais one breath at
a time; Allen Ginsberg chanting
his way higher; and a silent Phil Whalen listening
for a distant skakuhachi.
"Is it not possible
to grant the path an acoustic dimension? The 'singing
path' enchants the passerby.
Suffice to recall the
action of enchantment, from the Latin incantare,
originates in the song, the canto. Thus, it would seem a
common thread through
the songlines, the sacred ways..." [R. L. Castro, "Sounding
the Path: Dwelling and Dreaming." In A. Pérez-Gómez
and S. Parcell, Editors, Chora Three: Intervals in the
Philosophy of Architecture. Montreal,
1999.]
For our ancestors, cave
walls sang, along with flutes and
whatever served as a drum. This was not the music
of complex compositions, or bubble gum tunes. Music was
a path toward one's initiation. Now, too, "According
to the shamans of the entire world, one establishes communication
with spirits via music."
The path walked today is
not the one walked yesterday, or tomorrow. Each way leads
to risky
brains that are much riskier than the brains of other mammals
even,
even more risky than the brains of chimpanzees, and that
this could be partly a matter of a few simple mutations in
control genes that release some of the innate competitive
talent that is still there in the genomes of the individual
neurons. But I don't think that genetics is the level to
explain the
making of a home in a world of symbols and signs.
.........................................................................................................................................................
Mt. Tamalpais: See, T. Killion
and G. Snyder, Tamalpais Walking. Berkeley, CA, 2009.
according to the shamans:
J. Narby, The Cosmic Serpent-DNA and the Origins of Knowledge.
New York,
1988.
risky brains: "The Normal Well-Tempered Mind." A
Conversation with Daniel C. Dennett: www.edge.org/conversation/normal-well-tempered-mind
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