Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)
‘Drawing Hands’ by MC Escher*
Being in what appears for all the world to be the writing mood equivalent to walking into the classroom after a night of not studying and waiting for the words “Pick up your pencils and begin…now” I thought it would be best to let the rogers at wikipedia describe the photo.
“ Drawing Hands is a lithograph by the Dutch artist M. C. Escher first printed in January 1948. It depicts a sheet of paper out of which, from wrists that remain flat on the page, two hands rise, facing each other and in the paradoxical act of drawing one another into existence. Although Escher used paradoxes in his works often, this is one of the most obvious examples.**”
*College Dormitory Decorator’s Guild motto: ‘god, if it weren’t for Escher we would have had to come up with more ‘Hang In there, baby’ cat posters and beautiful scenery photos with sweet, encouraging and totally truncated Fritz Perls quotes. whew!
** whats with the ‘tude!? was it me, or did that last line have a bit of a sneer in it! hey wikipedian! chill… lets see you come up with something as simple, yet original… keep ya sarcasm for reality TV ‘talent’ shows…
Being Saturday, the theme (of Doctrine posts), sheers off from whatever off-the-pavement-through-the-cedar-post-wire-fences-and-straight-damn-across-a-farmer’s-field-of-half-grown-corn trajectory that we enjoy during the week and settles into a more sensible, if not predictable path. The Road to TToT-ville.
Fun metaphor (or allegory, can never keep them straight), the projection of this bloghop into a real, imagined place does allow the intent of our host (and before her, the founder, creatoress, Lizzi O’Ryan*) to manifest in as real a fashion as a hammer dropped on the foot.
Josie Two Shoes provides the place and the atmosphere for all those inclined to submit a post composed of Ten Things of Thankful (or some approximation thereof**) It is a not inconsiderable task, but as is often the case, those who have within, the qualities they encourage, she makes it look easy. And that is a gift in and of itself. And it provides an environment that’s totally comfortable for those of us less able to express the subtler and, to many of us, loftier qualities of the human being.
Enough with the charm. I’ll leave that to the rogers among us. (reminder: clarks think, scotts act and rogers feel)
On with this here post here!
1) Una. 52.4 pounds of Chodský pes She is currently sitting on the bed in the room where I word-rassle
2) Phyllis (roger with significant clark-like secondary aspect and moderate scottian tertiary), bridge constructor and keeper of the hearth
3) The Graviteers
4) zoe and joules and the Six Sentence crew (now, I am, in fact, going to ask that you take hold of your visual cortex and totally imagine the writers that participate each week in zoe’s bloghop, in total gangster look. thug, to a man (and woman)…. no, I’m totally serious!)
5) the Book of Secret Rules (aka the Secret Book of Rules). Somebody say, “Hey! There are always exceptions and allowances in any practice, exercise, or bloghop-with-a-theme-thats-innvariably-beneficial-to-all-participants. So what’s the big deal about this Secret Book (aka Secret Rules)?’ Two words: hypograt (from hypogratitudiness, n. hypograt. (a hypograt is an Item (included in a TToT post) that represents something that happened or a person encountered or pretty much anything you think of that, no matter how hard you try, you cannot feel grateful for (or to, or even, at). The BoSR/SBoR allows: ‘…when something simply sucks, but persists in the landscape as one writes a TToT post and no amount of spin or alternate perspective transforms the toad into a beautiful princess/prince, provided it insists on sitting there, like the moisture-ring on the dashboard of your car that nothing seems to remove, it may, with appropriate notation be considered an Item for that week’s TToT.‘
6) the Wakefield Doctrine, my online sine qua non.
7) the writing jones that I so whole-heartedly picked up and strapped to my back. ‘Home and Heart‘ (A Sister Margaret Ryan novel)
8) Sunday Supplement
(Tilted) Primary Colors Sunday
A rose, a dog, sunflowers
Landscape format: the left half is immediate and shows a rose bush (at the top of the left half) and three sunflowers (at the bottom of the left half) The right half of the photo is centered by Una who is sitting with her back to the camera. She is looking to her left enough that we see her snout pointing to the left. The line from the tip of her nose travels up towards the top of her head with slight indent, followed by a small, squared prominence that lets us see her eyes, even though we can’t see them in the black on black coloring.
Where was I?
Una is sitting, which in a dog is a remarkably ‘prepared’ stance. Her back legs are bent and her forelegs are straight. This posture is stable, allows her to relax while still maintaining optimal awareness of her surroundings and, because of the position, (of her legs), she would be in motion a second after detecting the need to move.
Una (and most dogs) are my total (and near-hopelessly out of reach) role models.
The grass is green, ripening into white.
The leaves of the rose bush are totally angular, like the stegosaurus of garden plants, all sideways and pointy. As if the thorns weren’t enough of a ‘you talkin to me?!’ the color is …well, rose colored. (Sort of red sitting alone at the bar after everyone else has paired up and left together).
Now the sunflowers… man! talk about yer scottian flowers…. stem (straight green tubes) middle thing a black cue ball shiny enough to show a little window-pane-shaped light spot where it’s reflecting the light from above) and the petals! Yellow. As in…
‘HEY! Hey!! over here I gotcha nectar right here!’
9) Garden photo (raining out …. hey, lets see if I can find a video to place mark for us here, with the theme of rain. I know just the one, if I can only find it… got it! at the bottom of the page.)
10) Secret Rule (SR) 1.3
*not, ‘actually’, her real name. Thing is, as fans of SOC (I’m looking at you Kerry) will attest to, sometimes rhythm trumps sense (or correctness). Lizzi O’Ryan has a roll-off-the-tongue-quality, so, I guess we’re stuck with it. At least for the tenure of this post.
** the bottom line requirement for participation is ‘good intent’. Numbers are good, Ten is fine. Less than (or more than) is acceptable, provided the intent is good. Plus…. plus! there is the Book of Secret Rules (aka the Secret Book of Rules) see number 5 Tell me how anyone out there in the blogosphere has anything that comes anywhere in the general vicinity of being imaginarily close to the TToT.
Click here and join us on the TToT!
About clarkscottroger
I’ve always loved Escher’s “Drawing Hands”, much to contemplate in that. When it comes to writing a TToT post, I’ve found that no matter how much my mind protests the getting started, I have no problem rambling on for ten or more thankfuls, which always comes as a surprise to me as one who once believed that there was truly nothing good or positive about life. It is the undertaking of the exercise itself that leads to contemplative efforts in recalling the little things that are the big things that give our lives meaning. If attitude was quantifiable, my measure at the onset and completion of the TToT exercise would be markedly different, and I suspect this is true for most of us. It’s that classic “redirect” psychology.
“Rogers feel”, well that does throw a Roger aspect into my Clark perspective, because indeed I most often find that I feel too much, too deeply, and pay the price for that. Yet I have often been accused of being unfeeling, which always makes me smile inside, if only they knew me well.
The SSS crew as gangsters, now that is a fun stretch of the imagination. Though we must admit at times we are dismayed by some sweet thing’s ability to dash off a righteous horror story!!! :-)
The writing jones is a big thankful for you, from what you have said before, writing and also connecting in the blogsphere because of it, has had a powerful positive impact on your life, as both writing and reading has on mine. I think how different I would be without the blogging interactions that have taken place, and the opportunities to express myself in fiction form as well as bio/essay. You have serious writing skills and I’m impressed that you constantly strive to improve them.
I love coming back each week to check on your reply and the garden update pix or whatever the Sunday feature might be. I hope your corn grows and matures prior to the onset of winter freeze. Have you enjoyed the gardening project?
Love the Jimi Hendrix song, wishing you a peaceful, pleasant, and productive week ahead!
I agree about the undertaking of the exercise being, in and of itself, the actual benefit. (For me) it’s the fact that I must exert a change of perspective (in order to write a TToT). And it’s the ability/capabilty/capacity to deliberately see the world from a different perspective thats the key to it all. Self-developmentistically-speaking, of course.
‘the rogers feel’ (along with the other two aphorisms) is useful in illustrating the radical foundation of the Doctrine. We maintain that we all live in a a reality that, to a certain degree, is personal. We also find it relatively un-difficult to accept that we, all of us, grow up, develop and experience the world from the perspective of one of three characteristic worldviews, that of the the Outsider, the Predator and the Herd Member.
Where it gets trickier is when we consider what it means to live in a reality that is of thought or action or emotion. rogers feel (in contrast to think or act) but that is entirely appropriate as their world, the reality is one of emotion itself. not thoughts comprised of objects and verbs, propositions or outcomes, consequence and redemption. emotions, feelings, a non-rationale world that works (for them) just fine in getting through life.
Where the Doctrine gets totally philosophers stone on the thing is when we consider the question of ‘how does a person who lives in a reality of thought effectively communicate with a person who lives in a world that is manifested in emotion?’
totally fun and effective.
Thanks for the thought provoking comment.
I am thankful for my hands which allow me to write my TToT posts, for SoC, and for hypograt as a thing when I am stuck for more. I manage to reach ten items mostly though. Your attitude for this Ten Things project every week is a great motivator and inspiration to me.
yeah, those hypograts… they were seen (imo) as a way for an emotionally-challenged person to deal with the overall exercise of a gratitude bloghop while contending with the very real annoying and negative elements in life. Not always possible to turn a frown upside down, so I like the idea of a hypograt being a legit TToT Item. In what I’ve seen where people have taken advantage of the BoSR/SBoR loophole on this matter, the Item looses a lot of the negative energy that it has for the person and for the rest of us it becomes an opportunity to identify with others (and thats never a bad thing).
I so enjoy your thankful posts as somewhere, at some point comes the smile and the head nod in acknowledgement and identification. I for one….wait, maybe I should save it for a TToT! :D
So to be clear, you meaning gangster or gao ngsta?? lol.
I too am thankful for your writing jones as I look forward to, patiently wait for, your imaginary characters to surpise me with drama, mystery and intrigue!
Who in the world does not like M.C. Escher? :D
It is nice that Una ranks #1. The world is as it should be (LOL).
true
it’s good to have some certainties in the world
Nice list of thankfuls, especially Una and Phyllis.
Thank you (and I concur)
So glad you mentioned the Graviteers. I can not thank you enough for the ‘atta girls and words of wisdom as I plod along on that project. You encourage me more than you know!
The Gravity Challenge has been very helpful for me (and enjoyable, too)
Primary Colors Sunday. Excellent :D
Hey, hey! They stole the vid. We know it exists…..