Curly Tail Panther

Just back from the Rock Art Foundation's annual Rock Art Rendezvous at the White Shaman Preserve on the US-Mexico border near Comstock, Texas. 

Here is a mini-clip of my visit to Curly Tail Panther, one of the several (yes, several) marvels I visited this past weekend (1 minute 49 seconds):






According to the Rock Art Foundation's website:

"The Curly Tail Panther site is high on the cliffs with a breathtaking view of the Devils River valley but accessible only by a very narrow ledge. Such settings were conducive to the visionary experiences that are the core of shamanistic belief systems. Two large mountain lions flanking an anthropomorphic shaman, typical of the Pecos River style, dominate the scene but Red Linear, Red Monochrome, and geometric designs testify to the enduring appeal of this shallow overhang with its spectacular vistas."

Mosey on over to Mary S. Black's blog for an interview with Dr. Carolyn Boyd on her jaw-dropping research about these sites and in particular, White Shaman. 

More, indeed, waaaaay more, anon.

Gifts of the Ancient Ones: 

An Interview with Greg Williams on the Rock Art of the Lower Pecos Canyonlands

Rock Art Adventure in Far West Texas

Mary S. Black interviews Yours Truly 
about the Marfa Mondays Podcasts (and More)

Writing and (or?) Digital Fun

I may be an old-school literary writer and die-hard fan of paper books, but ever since I started my webpage in 1999, I have been enchanted by the empowering and creative possibilities of digital media. 

BLOGGING: I started this blog, Madam Mayo, in 2006, and have kept at it steadily ever since, although the why of it has undergone significant evolution.

[Writers Blogs (And My Blog): Eight Conclusions After 8 Years of Blogging]

PODCASTING: In 2009, I started making podcasts with Apple's GarageBand-- and now host two series, Marfa Mondays and Conversations with Other Writers.

[Listen in to my podcast about how I started podcasting.]

DIGITAL PUBLISHING (KINDLES): Shortly thereafter I wrangled my way through an open-source program called Sigil and made some Kindles. 

[Here is everything I can tell you about that particular odyssey.]

VIDEO: And I took up making videos with iMovie. Apart from a few book trailers and whatnots, I mainly think of my videos as a souped-up GIFs, that is, visual appetizers, meant to enhance a text. 

My two latest videos are Scenes from the West of the Pecos Rodeo (3 minutes) and of Calera, Texas (1 minute 20 seconds), a Trans-Pecos ghost town that, surprisingly, has a nicely kept nondenominational chapel. Both videos are apropos of my book in-progress about Far West Texas.






IN SUM: HUH? Yes, making these pages, posts, podcasts and videos is more fun than playing with Play-Do. Yes, my blog, podcasts and videos bring me a larger audience and more visibility for my books. And yes, these endeavors steal time from writing. 

Instead of making two videos the other evening, I could have worked on my book. But just when I am about to feel crummy about that, I remind myself: if you're going to use GarageBand and iMovie, it really helps to do small projects on a frequent basis, or else you'll get rusty and lose the ability to do any at all. 

Or is that just a pretzel of an excuse?

On the other hand, I really do believe it's crucial for me as a writer to be able to handle digital media. (I've had it on my to do list for over year to make a proper trailer for my latest book, Metaphysical Odyssey into the Mexican Revolution and its Spanish edition,  Odisea metafísica hacia la Revolución Mexicana. And I really should put my Marfa Mondays podcasts onto YouTube as well. Oh, and... suffice it to say that it's a long to-do list that's just getting longer there in my fat little FiloFax...)

In sum, after more than two decades at this "business" of being writer, I'm still figuring it out. 

OH, AND SOCIAL MEDIA: At least I got off FaceBook. (It's been a few weeks since I deactivated my account and whew, that is still a palpable relief.) 

I still haven't made my mind up about Twitter. Most of it strikes me as drivel. But I don't find it as addictive as FaceBook and once, maybe twice a week something blink-worthy does happen in there.* (Follow me @cmmayo1.)

*For instance, I tweeted that I loved the cover of Cluff Hudder's book, so he sent me a copy! Here are my writing assistants with Pretty Enough for You. (Yep, I tweeted that.)

> Your comments are always welcome.

30 Deadly-Effective Ways to Free Up Bits, Drips & 

Gimungously Vast Swaths of Time for Writing

Why Aren't There More Readers? 

A Note on Curiosity, Creativity, and Courage

More Resources for Writers

Cybreflanerie: Four Vital Videos of Feldenkrais and Anat Baniel Method for Writers (and Other Desk-Bound Dreamers)

New to Feldenkrais? Check out these three videos: Chrish Kresge provides an informative introduction and a bit about frozen shoulders; Gary Waskowsky introduces Feldenkrais in about 7 minutes; and Annie Thoe explains the three principles in 5 minutes.

A few helpful and inspiring videos:

TO LOOSEN UP THE NECK

The 2-Minute Feldenkrais Miracle" to Free Up Your Stiff Neck, 

with James Speer

TO LOOSEN UP THE FINGERS AND HANDS

Gary Waskowsky teaches Feldenkrais hand movement 

TO RELAX THE EYES AND IMPROVE VISION

Feldenkrais Practioner Annie Thoe Demonstates Palming

TO GET MORE VITALITY AND CREATIVITY

"Move into Life" with Anat Baniel. A trailer for her book, also gives an overview of the ideas behind her Feldenkrais-inspired methodology. 

(Baniel was one of Moshe Feldenkrais' early students in Israel).

"If you know what you do,
you can do what you want."
-- Moshe Feldenkrais

Your comments are always welcome.

StandStand: One Highly Recommended Way 

to Remain Standing While Writing

The Arc of Writerly Action

30 Deadly-Effective Ways to Free Up Bits, Drips 

& Gimungously Vast Swaths of Time for Writing

Cyberflanerie: Inspiring Videos and Podcasts Edition: Krista Tippet, Margaret Dulaney, Tyler Cowan, Lord Whimsey et al

Andy Howe's "In Cloud Light III"


More of Andy Howe's kinetic sculpture

Parkinson Dances
A British documentary.

Krista Tippet ("On Being") Interviews Mary Oliver
Mental foie. Intense.

Erika Funke interviews Normal Mailer's biographer and archivist, J. Michael Lennon
And more podcasts with J. Michael Lennon about Norman Mailer.

Margaret Dulaney's "Listen Well"
Always a pleasure.

Tyler Cowan podcast interviews
One very articulate and original economist.

Eckhart Tolle interview 
About an hour long, very now.

James Howard Kunstler's conversation with artist "Lord Whimsy"

P.S. Couldn't resist: Jenna Marbles' Hello Young People, I'm Hillary Clinton.

P.S.S. I'm just back from Pecos, Texas; two new and very fun podcasts for the Marfa Mondays Podcasting Project to be posted soon.

Rock Art Adventure in Far West Texas

The book in-progress about Far West Texas is turtling along.... meanwhile, I've posted a few new videos from the travels. All my videos are extremely brief, edited, and with soundtracks. The idea isn't to be the next Ken Burns --though I do love that "Ken Burns" option in iMovie-- but to simply illustrate the text. (Think of them as a pirouette up from GIFs.)

From a recent outing with the Rock Art Foundation (to a site about an hour from Comstock, on the banks of the Pecos River):


LEWIS CANYON PETROGLYPHS




BANKS OF THE PECOS RIVER; 
LEWIS CANYON PETROGRAPHS AND TINAJA




MEYERS SPRING





Sound tracks on all three are courtesy of English composer Ergo Phizmiz.

Listen in anytime to my interview with Greg Williams, the director of the Rock Art Foundation, "Marfa Mondays" #15

 All Marfa Mondays Podcasts

About the book in-progress

 More of my mini-videos of Far West Texas

A TV news clip about some of the fascinating cutting edge research going on at the Shumla School in Comstock

Your comments are always welcome, and I also welcome you to opt in to my every other month-ish newsletter.

A Batch of US-Mexico Border Mini Travel Clips

Just posted a batch of what I call "mini travel clips," that is, super brief videos, nothing fancy (taken with my iPhone), but edited and with audio—in these, by that jaw-droppingly prolific clangy-bangy soundmaestro of Bridport, U.K., Ergo Phizmiz.


FAR WEST TEXAS MINI CLIPS

Casa Piedra Road, Far West Texas 
(with a view of a fire in Mexico)
(1:06)




> Listen in anytime to my podcast. "A Visit to Swan House." Swan House, a unique adobe teaching house inspired by the legacy of Egypt's greatest architect, Hassan Fathy, is on Casa Piedra Road.

> Read my article in Cenizo Journal, "A Visit to Swan House."


Over Burro Mesa and Into Apache Canyon 
(Big Bend National Park)
(1:06)



> Listen in anytime to my "Marfa Mondays" podcast, "Over Burro Mesa / The Kickapoo Ambassadors"

> Read the essay, "Over Burro Mesa."


Pecos River Crossing (Highway 90, near the US-Mexico border)
(:41)
West of the Pecos is Far West Texas. The end of the video is a gaze south into Mexico.

And I did some slight edits on a video I had posted a few weeks ago, Descent into Eagle Canyon (:53), near Langrty, Texas— Eagle Canyon flows into the Rio Grande on the US-Mexico border.




> Listen in anytime to "Gifts of the Ancient Ones: Greg Williams on the Rock Art of the Lower Pecos Canyonlands."


AND AWAYS YONDER WEST

Finally, almost the border (well, a two hour drive) is Joshua Tree National Park in California (2:24). Herewith my mini travel clip of that:




> More mini travel clips here and
> Mini clips of Far West Texas (apropos of my book-in-progress) here.

> Watch Ergo Phizmiz starring in "I Am the Music Man," a video by Martha Moopette.




>Your COMMENTS are always welcome.

At the US-Mexico Border, Descent into Eagle Nest Canyon

Back in December I went with the Rock Art Foundation down into Eagle Nest Canyon, which drains into the Rio Grande just past the Pecos near Langtry. There was rock art to see, of course, and the second largest buffalo jump in North America. This mini-travel clip, an edited 50 seconds, shows only the descent into that spectacular canyon. 







> More mini-travel clips 

> Visit the Rock Art Foundation at www.rockart.org

> The music is by Ergo Phizmiz under a creative commons license. P.S. Ya'll check out Ergo From the Factory.

> Listen in to my podcast interview with Greg Williams, director of the Rock Art Foundation: Gifts of the Ancient Ones: The Rock Art of the Lower Pecos Canyonlands

Your COMMENTS are always welcome.

Rather Good, These Peculiar Little Videos

Ham Bikini

Parsley Expansion
(wonder what he smoked before doing this one)

Eggs in Peril

The Internet is Made of Cats
and... drumroll...

Viking Kittens Reveal Lyrics to that Led Zeppelin tune

VidLit Monday

It's both a new art form and a new PR tool: the book trailer, a subspecies of "vid-lit," so called after VidLit, a company that makes videos for books. Here's an example of a book trailer (not by that company, as far as I can tell), for James Howard Kunstler's novel, World Made By Hand, which certainly encourages the idea of a "movie based on." And here are several more examples of book trailers. Less-slick are Steven Hart's Thrill-a-Minute Skyway Cam video, apropos of his book, The Last Three Miles: Poltics, Murder and the Construction of America's First Superhighway and Gayle Brandeis's video for her new novel, Self-Storage. As I have a novel coming out next year, I'm interested in the form, but I'm also enchanted by the possibilities of incorporating sound and image (both still and moving) to fiction itself--- especially flash fiction. It's a very different concept than dramatizing the work, as in a movie-like trailer. Neither is it anything like an almost purely visual feast (e.g., Tufte's video about his sculpture, "ZZ Smile"), or even, as Internet film-maker Nick Askew does, a series of mini-documentaries on www.soulbiographies.com.
P.S. Here's some ancient history: the 2005 National Public Radio piece on vid-lit.