My life was NOT Blood Moon and NOT Paul McCarthy yesterday. How come? And what does it mean for the future? First, this post would not have been written if I would have seen the total moon eclipse (Blood Moon) in the morning and would have gone to see the installation “Rebel Dabbel Babbel” of the artist Paul McCarthy at the main Berlin theatre institution (Volksbühne) on the last day. Easily overlooked aspects of decision making do rise here from the ashes of unrealised life-events: not knowing and not going.
1. If you do not know (the moon) or miss an opportunity to act you also cannot decide to still do it. Too late only means that this realisation will change your life through nagging thoughts and the aftermath agony of “I should have/would have/ought have/could…”.
2. If you know (the installation), but then decide not to go / join / take part in an event, you also never know if you would/could/should have liked it, you decide to NOT KNOW. Then, unfortunately the consequence of #1 could follow as well, you still dive into nagging thoughts and the aftermath agony of “I should have/would have/ought have/could…”, even though you decided NOT TO. What deems interesting is that even events which do not happen may have a significant impact on you lives course, in plain sight or not.
How could I miss this natural phenomenon? All the news were full of it for days, but I did not follow. Facebook streams are sometimes useless as interesting news and same day action does not get pushed through to your attention (you profiled me, Zuckerberg, so send me the things I want!!) How many of my friends did wake up and saw it? Some, many distributed over Europe. But nobody proactively reminded me or invited me to a local social viewing (the choir in this drama sighs). And those who were, were too late and thought it will be this night – one day too late. A common mistake e.g. in after midnight flight scheduling…
How could I miss an art installation in a theatre which deals with obscenity, film stars (James Dean, Natalie Woods), re-enactment and converting a well known movie (Rebel Without a Cause) into a space by an elder artist, his son and a young muse (Damon McCarthy and the infamous Elyse Poppers)? Well, first the price was 18 Euros, and no live actors. I am used to sit for the same price in a 5 hours play directed by Castorf…it´s the market, stupid! Exhibitions are usually half price in Berlin. Second, I read and heard about it too late and already planned my evening on Sunday. Not unchangeable, but a decision. Not always may consuming art be a top priority, like in real life in a post-industrial society…
TAKE AWAYS
It may be clear that getting up at 03:00 in the morning on the right day may change your sleep pattern and the experienced sight of the earth casting a shadow on our satellite, turning it blood-red with light coming through the halo of our atmosphere may change your attitude towards life the universe and everything forever. Sun, earth and moon aligns and peaceful sleep kept undisturbed – maybe you dream something extraordinary resetting your system. Who knows?
You wake up, everything in peace, until knowledge changes everything. But also not seeing it and obsessively researching it on the net on the following day is changing something. And longing for something gone and not repeatable. Well, until the next blood moon event. In the case of a total moon eclipse with blood-red qualities – the next options seen from Europe will be be in about 3 years (in 2018 and 2019)…maybe I will wake up early then, because of today… List_of_21st-century_lunar_eclipses
Paul McCarthy´s work in the space of the Volksbühne is definitely over and may not return. This is our life with events.
They are for a while and then they are not. Like us. 😉
Only pictures, words and memory remains…for a while.