WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 1986 5:20 p.m. Just returned from running. Three times around a course shaped somewhat like a rectangle. Ten minutes per lap. Yesterday, on Vroni's scale, I weighed 81 kilos. Some of that weight has to go, she says. My exam went ok. Only the hair is checked, although with a fine-toothed comb. She asks if any of my friends are sick, with hepatitis, for example. No, only a few colds. And I don't have anything at the moment. Went to bed about 8 or so last night. Didn't wake till noon today. Jet lag leaves me feeling spaced out. Niki picked me up at the airport. He works in the travel bureau. A uneventful flight -- if you discount all my disaster-in-midair fantasies. Fifteen minutes late at Vienna. A round structure with collapsing tubes is being built there. It will soon look like a real international airport. No more bus rides from plane to terminal and vice versa. The Costello is completely finished. I have my own room with a REAL bed and private bath. Deiter R's mother is living almost across the hall from me. He says it may be permanent. She is very enthusiastic about life here -- somewhat like people in the old days, and asks if I've any regrets about leaving (sometimes),and wonders if I think of moving back (sometimes). Dieter seemed almost a little embarrassed at her assertiveness with me, and a bit apologetic. But I understand his mother's state of mind. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 1986 late evening Weight today is 79 kilos. Got up around 11 a.m. Ate lunch. Wolle led the discussion, then Lisle. He talked about difficulties working with the children. Betsy translated. She is the best. It's loud enough, clear enough, and no holes in what is being discussed. After lunch helped Wolfgang install one version of MUMPS on the new Tandem AT. Ran three laps about 4:30. Missed Schlomo who left half an hour before me. Dinner? Don't remember. Went to visit Otto. Saw the Nero film today (or was it yesterday?) Ulricke and I watched the Richard Gerstil film. Interesting and funny. Till Otto started to do a Gerstil-style self-portrait. Nearly had a nervous breakdown. And another just a few minutes ago. Ulricke just left. We talked for some time here in my room. Mostly about all the things on my table. They are for people here. It's a bit nerve-wracking to have her so close -- and so far away at the same time. Everything buzzes. Not only do I like her, but this place heightens certain kinds of sensations and desires. Eva told Otto that my idea for her to stop all drinking, smoking, and run everyday, starting with 10 minutes the first day and adding half a minute each following day, worked. She was pregnant within a month or so. Her baby is one week old. Yesterday Otto called some old friends and acquaintances to invite them to an opening on the 23rd. Some were nostalgic, surprise, defensive. I've come back in, he said to one. EARTHQUAKE is the title of the exhibition. Disasters, accidents in the home, objects flying about. Bricks hitting people -- usually Flo, Nadja, Yael. The pictures are beautiful but about the destruction of the Earth -- how it is being destroyed, trampled. Meanwhile, I lie here longing for the woman next door, and wondering if she's at all aroused by my little noises. Wolle, during lunch, talked about what a difficult job it is to take care of children. He finds himself plumb tuckered out by day's end. He wonders about if it's right to come out with all his rages and frustrations. Somehow the next subject became how Otto does things in his life here. He is very much in the moment- as well as looking at many small and big things. He doesn't worry who may be watching him. If a person is all alone, and picks up a piece of trash, and doesn't think or bother to look and see who saw them do it, then they are on the right track. There was a question the other day about if FH has a philosophy, should have one, needs one, and what direction it will take. The big difference between FH and everyone else is that FH talks about philosophy (like everyone else) and does things, tries things, changes things. Free sexuality, the structure, common property, are not just ideas, plans, fantasies... they exist. For others, these things are just ideas or verbal images of a reality they might have thought about or tried to articulate, or had an opinion of when heard about. They exist. The future = f(x), where x is a description of reality. There must be something like a group mind on FH. I sense something like that. It is maybe related to the smell of everyone, everything here, rising into some kind of cloud that everyone walks in, breathless in, exhales into, ad infinitum. There are several clouds: actual odors, verbal, sexual, artistic, objects/physical reality, structure/relationships, etc. Otto asked me why I sat next to Katarina, who is several pregnant, and spoke with her briefly. Not much interest. Aike came in and sat nearby. A somewhat rough conversation began between them. Are you two still married, I asked. That caused her to get a little hot and move away. I asked Aike if my words caused trouble. No, he said, its always the woman who causes trouble-since Adam, he added. Later he helped Vroni fix me a bite to eat and said I would have to eat lots of bread for the difficulties he got from me. But he was only making fun of the situation, and all was forgiven. A new idea has come to me about the continuing trend of how a person's difficulties are dealt with here. There is a spectrum looking something like this: [ diagram of spectrum ] Most societies are off to the left sometimes. An individual can also go off towards that end. Most of the time society, and the individual fall short of that and reside between neutral and that horrible end. I have the sense of FH moving to the right, being, perhaps, somewhere between, near, suggestive and assertive. But those are not quite the right words as it's really on another plane. Also, neutral is not quite right, and, also, I don't know exactly what to put off to the right. I just have the feeling of being moved that way myself. Nobody is pushing me, but it's not possible to resist going that way. I don't want to be left behind. It's something like patience, but not in any passive sense, and also using everything that is/one comes across in a situation, but not in exactly an active sense. A sort of clearing a path down which one can move to keep oneself in a situation with others, but not carried off in some chaotic, rage blinded, crazy, obsessed direction. Not the manipulation of another, but the creation of new ways to go for oneself. Each visit here leads me to feel more at ease, less pressured, with lots of open doors for me to enter and find things to do. There was a discussion of how you must go deep in order to go up in the structure. You have to look into yourself and know your character, where you are good, what you can do. Some people want to go right to being important. So they think about what they can do to be important and not about being good. Something like that. I don't remember the exact sense of it - in addition to not being so well developed myself as to be able to understand the whole thing. I don't have enough experience here to make many of these things available or transparent or actual things for me. FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 14, 1986 Jim called me today, about business, at three. I wasn't around. Said he would call in two hours. Waited till six. Called Cynthia. She's having a good time playing my role with Jennifer, James, Jim. One crises after another. Asked her to call Linda. Haven't been able reach her since she left on Sunday. Called Sandy on Wednesday. That surprised her. Cynthia says the two of them had a long talk about last weekend. Jennifer and James have a little crises because of her interest in Eddie. But Cynthia managed to put that fire, and all the others, out. Yesterday I thought, for the first time, and early in a visit, to stay an extra week. I am feeling much calmer, less paranoid, and less pressured than other times. Perhaps that has something to do with Otto being laid up in bed with a bad back. Or my relaxed feeling could be related to how things here are getting better, more relaxed here, and I'm just enjoying the benefits. More likely is the latter. Otto made a tape for someone to carry to his group the other day. Lots of hello's to everyone, as well as a list of those in the room. And Little Richard from America who is here for his electroshock therapy, he said about me. Schlomo translated for me at lunch today. It's as though he's afraid to speak normal or loud enough for me. Betsy, from Norway, is still the best. Schlomo is doing much better than last January when he was thinking of leaving the group. He and Brooke have gotten divorced so a marriage to someone from Amsterdam can take place. Then he will be able to get a job there. The latest hierarchy: Claudia, Marlene, Eva, Lisle, Teresa. Schlomo tells me she had a crisis about two weeks ago and went down some. For those of you interested in such things, let me explain the few, random ink spots near the middle, just below the center of the previous page.... I was writing along and noticed a very small bug wandering across the page only slightly more randomly than this pen. So I attempted to catch it on the end of a pen -- finally managing it. The critter is now locked inside the cap of that pen for safe keeping till Vroni or Dominique has a chance to take a look at it. Someone told me that Otto's latest series of paintings came from an Andy Warhol idea. The idea being the painting of pictures from photographs. In Otto's case, however, it's people he knows and lives with. Wolfgang and I had some success today working with MUMPS and writing a program. We plan to start early tomorrow -- 9 a.m. My sexual longings are beginning to come up like the first hint of dawn and the rising sun. I am seeing all the women in my life, and a few still desired, come into my mind like figures out of a fog. They become almost solid flesh, or so it seems, from the accompanying sensations. Fortunately I won't have to contend with daylight as my current state of affairs won't last forever. And tomorrow I will ask Ulricke if she still plans to enter the group. If she's not going in then perhaps she will do something with me. SATURDAY, NO, SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 16, 1986, PAGE 1 A dream about life in my early to middle teens. In Wyoming, in car. My stepfather is driving. Too fast. I tell him he HAS to slow down for the situation. He always drove too fast. I was almost always frightened. He would look away from the road -- mostly at other people, and talk with them. That was always the most frightening time. He did this often. No matter what the traffic, weather, road conditions, situation, time of day or night. In my dream he finally slowed down when I told him he had to. At 5 a.m. a machine of some sort (perhaps a grain grinder), begins making noise. At 6 a.m. one notices the smell of freshly baked bread. At 6:43 a.m. (a day or so ago) the FH birds started talking. I met Les Weber today. Anthony introduced us. I've been reading your mail, he said, by way of establishing a mutual context. Anthony must be passing my stuff along to him. He is very sharp. Knows his business very well. Has a good, clear grasp of what he wants to do: Go after the European Yuppies using the American marketing model. He is not moralistic about this. He looks at his market like a wolf at a herd of deer, or a hawk from high up at a rabbit. I proposed a new marketing approach to him. He cut through it very easily. And I could easily see his point of view (although internally I could feel some emotional resistance to having MY idea so easily trashed and discarded). Perhaps it will be possible for me to supply him with some European names of computer owners and users. His current list of about 50,000 names is maintained by a service bureau not connected with his company. I was surprised at this, but he says there is not enough expertise within his company. Overheard a brief conversation where Otto may be trading one of his paintings for an original Warhol. The dealer from Italy, who handles Warhol, and came today with a younger man, decided to take the earthquake, three grandmothers, plus baby picture, for showing in an exhibit with the theme... Earthquake! Anthony and Wolle proposed an art fund to Les Weber. He objected with what seemed like very good counter-arguments. While they seemed to be pushing the idea at him, it wasn't excessively so, and they did back off once he had given all his explanations (which at that moment were simple, clear, and made a lot of sense -- although I can't remember any of it now). Earlier today I thought I saw Peter Kotitchka and his sister walking around FH. Later, on seeing her, she said yes, indeed, it was him. He left the group shortly before me. Came back for an hour a year ago. I don't know how long today, but he's now gone back to Vienna where he lives and studies agriculture at the university. I don't know how it's possible for people to stay away from here -- not even to visit -- especially when they live so close! An irresistible and constant force is always pulling at me when I'm not here. Yesterday I thought of living in the group again. It kept me awake most of last night. There's the thought to do it, then the fear of not being acceptable, then the fear of having to give up "everything" I have on the outside, then the fear of what I'll do on the outside if I leave again, then the fear of not being able to make use of what's available inside the group: a paradise. Which would turn into a real hell on Earth. Well, maybe not so bad. But why risk getting a little less then everything one wants? Why not stay in a clear situation where it looks certain you won't so there's no chance of failure. Schlomo came by to visit me today. He likes to look through all the things I've brought with me, and talk over old times. He is doing much better than last January when he was well into a year or more of thinking about leaving the group. Then he told me the biggest things were problems with women and personal security. These would be his biggest problems on the outside. No problem here, however. Then I hear about the time, in his 20th year, of taking a book about Marxism, Reichian therapy, and Eastern mysticism, and just himself and a sleeping bag, plus a bag of oats and rice, into the mountains for a week, where he would decide on one of these as his future direction in life. He couldn't take it after the 5th day and returned to Vienna, and some friends, where he talked constantly about his situation for some days. After several attempts at living together with several people who are still in the group, he met Otto and decided to move into his group. Also, he had met Brooke and seduced her with Viennese culture. The American girls were always the ones for him. I would say that his contact with me has more to do with his interest (still) in life outside the group, than anything else. That is, he still thinks of living outside, but not strongly as on my last visit. He objects to the harshness of the yuppie-types who are younger than him, but higher in structure. There was a discussion at lunch the other day about the instinctual responses of children versus socialized responses of adults, and how adults have lost most of that instinctual part. This followed by a talk by Aike about a movie from Iran. A congratulatory telegram is sent to a mother when her son dies in the war. It is cause for celebration and happiness in the family. The object of the film-makers was to learn, to see, if the mothers were really HAPPY, or was it just a public position they take to protect themselves against the government. Aike told how it was similar in Germany during the last war. A mother would express a particular emotional response in public. Being around, although young in that time, he knew the private reality was different. Although I can't remember exactly how he described the responses of the Iranian mothers, one could, I could imagine them burying their instinctual response: grief, crying, hatred of the government. Now I remember. The mothers were stern and resolute. But I suspect they learned this as the most appropriate response for their situation. They wouldn't be far wrong, I suspect, to imagine the government might imprison, torture, or kill them, or have them put in mental institutions, all for responding instinctually or "naturally." I remember how us young boys would try to hurt each other -- then attempt to hide how it felt -- to be cool and unmoved. This is what we did. Similarly, responding, stoically, with no outward signs of emotion towards one's parents, towards my mother especially, when I thought she treated me badly, and having private, murderous thoughts and intentions for her. Telephone call to Cynthia today. Things are still holding together. She talked with Linda, who thought last weekend was weird, and though she's not in favor of monogamy, still thinks people need one person who is most important. I'd agree with that -- although I suspect Linda wants to keep a firm grip, FOREVER, around the SAME neck -- whoever that might be! This is probably true of everyone who can't really allow who is most important to change naturally and dynamically. There have been times when it wasn't possible for me to do this. As to Iran, I think life is, for everyone, simply a variation on the theme of responding to a situation in what one has come to believe is the most appropriate way, or respond in a way that will cause one to have the fewest problems. How can a person respond to the loneliness, confusion, chaos, decadence, perverseness of modern life? Certainly not by admitting to those things. Everyone sees themselves as standing above the crowd -- and recognizes, clearly, that everyone else is largely faking their own standing out from the crowd. Often this is what I find myself doing. Often I can only admit it in retrospect. Seldom do I admit it at the moment -- although seldom am I not aware of it. I am amazingly like everyone else -- except perhaps with the qualities of patience and generosity with my time and materials. Consciousness is when you are only doing what you are thinking. One is not conscious while doing one thing and thinking another. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 1986 A thick fog covered all of FH today. You couldn't see much more than 50 yards. Just returned from running. Dark and foggy. 5:15 p.m. Dinner time. But I am not changed, along with feeling a bit asocial, and so eat, alone, in my room, and do some writing. A telex from Cynthia today. She says Sten is back in town with three people from Bauhutte. They will be driving to the Arizona desert to find them. They will take a Casteneda book with them. Lots of luck, she says, to them, with a touch of satire, sarcasm, cynicism -- but not too much, I think, as we all wish them well, although a bit skeptical of their concept. I showed Lou the telex. Told her about Sten's tendency to sit around with a glass of hard liquor in his hand and play the romantic as he watches the sun set from a balcony. She says he was that way before the group. An alcoholic's haze in his future. I'm going to course, in the back of my mind there is a bit of jealousy and envy of his upperclassness, ways, and women. But I can see it hiding away there -- trying to cut it off from my "objective" opinion of him. Trying to pretend it's not a part of my "objective" opinion, would be more to the point. Werner showed me a time-lapse 8mm film he made of FH over the last year. He made it into a nice piece with music. The best part was from the Spring when he showed the trees and bushes going from bare to fully covered with green leaves. He showed the whole thing to Otto in the last few days. We got this idea from you, he explained. On my last visit, January, I suggested he do something like this. There were scenes of the countryside and clouds, the Costello and clouds, the setting sun, people swimming in the lake, an SD evening, red square, main entrance to the Costello, and so on. Les Weber was saying yesterday that it's very difficult to fire people in Europe. There is a probation period -- but after that people tend to relax and take advantage. That wouldn't happen with FH people, who are reliable and guaranteed, on the average, to constantly improve themselves. The inside of my head has raced ahead of the part that writes everything down. And so severely that a paralysis has had hold of me for some minutes. Everything was thought out and displayed, written on the fog tablet that hangs from the inside of the top of my head.... And then it disintegrates -- like everything written on a sheet of fog. But I have to write about my new theory of post-ape, precursor- man, John Molloy's Dress For Success book and his experiments with self-confidence, and Schlomo's question about why we have such difficulty staying in the group. It has to do with the need for illusion. There has been, I would speculate, a need of this sort in humans for a long time. I think of how young males, from their teens to mid 20's, have the feeling that they are invincible. My theory is that this comes from an ancient need of humans. Imagine yourself living a million years ago. You are sitting around a small fire and wondering where the next food is coming from. There's a mastodon stamping around and bellowing just outside your cave. A 19 year old jumps up and says he's sure it's possible to dinnerfy the truck-sized meatloaf outside. Some of his pals, because they don't want to be shown up, decide to give him a hand. They manage to do it. Maybe somebody will get hurt or killed -- but not all the time. And the women will probably want children just like that. Or maybe they don't know where children come from -- but know men like sex, especially the guy with the nerve to start something. Either way he is likely to be propagated into the future -- along with his tendency to imagine he can do anything. Thus arises the invincible teenager of today and the need for illusion. As to John Molloy, and his Dress For Success book, there are some experiments he performed. He asked men, professional actors, I believe, to go into a variety of social situations and behave arrogantly. Women in the situations, who were unaware of the experiment, consistently described these men as self-confident. NOT as arrogant. Thus arises the need for illusion in humans. In the woman's case there is a need to feel that the man can handle their mutual situation. She believes he can when he's self-confident. On the other hand, it's unlikely that early humans had any rational basis for thinking this. So this existential drug came to be a part of the human fabric. Or so I have imagined. AAO INTERVIEW 1) What is AAO 2) What is FF, MM 3) What is Actions Analysis 4) How did you find it 5) How has it changed 6) What happens on a typical day 7) What do you want to tell the world 8) What's next 9) Why did you invent this thing TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 1986 Interview with AAO children. Actions Analysis Organization. How did you get that name? There's the original AAO, 74-78. Short AAO revival now. They are very poor. They want to go to Gomora. The old AAO couldn't buy AAO. The newer AAO can now protect themselves from dangers. Some dissension as they can't decide if it's a game or real. It's to live themselves out. What is Action Analysis? When we can play small children. And your hate and all feelings that can't be shown in the normal day, can be shown. Live out means.... what? Young man gets in the middle to shout out some frustration. We were very vain, nuclear family-like, and thinking about what to do. Another: we live good. All people need this AA. You get better by doing it. The best would be when everyone did this. 86 AA) is charlatans. Still, one child says. Not wanting to go in the middle. Why not? Want to go in the middle, but.... Someone do an SD and another will translate. They go in the middle to shout and say what they think of their parents, each other, and their weaknesses. One is ironic about the others. The next criticizes the previous. Then several others for not coming in the middle. One can't dare. Many come in the middle to pretend to beat up the reluctant ones. Lucifer is his name. he is e.even years old. He was born in the original AAO. He has some difficulty in the middle. The group has him on the ground, pressing his stomach and so forth. Normal day: get up at 6:15. Breakfast. School. English, biology, music, others. Lunch. Palaver: children come together and talk about who was bad and good. Then a big came shop, sport, cooking, etc. Dinner. Family SD's. Homework or project like lamp making. Saturday we have an SD evening. No school on Sunday. The family. all children are divided into families. Five or six in a family. Four families. Upper grades. They live in 2 or 3 rooms. One for work, sleep, SD. Why do the AAO again? How like the nuclear-family? Jewelry, vain, show offs, bragging, wanted to be like Marilyn or Elvis. Some were depressed, crying, love stories. It was very bad. Everyone separated, secrets, parties. In the rooms they listened to Elvis. Older teens were doing this. Pierced their ears. things from society brought bad moods, boredom, little playing, girls in their rooms just writing in their diaries. I played a New York Times Reporter, telling them the story would be in the magazine section two weeks from now. Then all of America would know them -- or at least some thousands of the most intelligent, well educated, important, influential Americans. Brooke took me in the middle for a short AAO -- style SD. Letter from Cynthia today describing the Gloucester weekend and her problems. But she admits to them and that helps to keep her on the right track. Also, Joe the rat! Should be Joe and Rise Rat! They wait till all their respective competitors are out of town before showing true colors. Avery productive day on the computer with Wolfgang Sohst. We have made a lot of progress learning how to use MUMPS. He solved one last system problem. Today we have a working language translator. It will go to English to German or German to English. I will give him assignments to refine the program. He is anxious to move on to a big system problem -- probably the cataloging of Otto's paintings. But he has this tendency, which I feel inside myself, which is something like (or perhaps like) being at the wheel of a very powerful, fast, elegant vehicle, with the open road ahead, to get very excited, and imagines that his new computer toy will win him fame, fortune, and the love of beautiful women. The panacea syndrome. He, and other computer users, tend not to have a broad enough base for solving general problems. The big pictures fades away under the glare of pressing immediate problems here and now. On the other hand, one could argue that in favor of the here and now as FH. on the whole, has profited from this approach. But then he tells me of how the name and address list for the art office was lost not too long ago. Their current database management system was blamed. But failures of that sort happen to lots of computer systems -- then the users suffer. But it's a problem that professionals solve with a backup system. A new baby, Jupiter, was born today (or yesterday). Gisela is the mother. it was done by a Kaiserschnitt (cesarian-section). Other recent arrivals are: Eva's baby (who hasn't been named yet), Achilles (from Doris), Nike, Hannibal, etc. Schlomo tells me that people get a lot of gas her because the bread is so fresh. I have never had so much in my life. One advantage though, is that it doesn't have a strong smell. It seems (at least mine does) to be more or less neutral. Harti tells me he is going off to lead the Amsterdam group. Shit computer! You bloody bastard, he says to me, adding, to me and someone else listening (Wolfgang perhaps -- as he was worried about the same happening to him),, how I would come by and finish him and/or his latest project off -- pointing out flaws, problems, or the general wrong directioness of the whole thing. I'm getting a reputation for putting the kibosh on some things here. But on the whole I would say its improved productivity where computers are used and stopped some rather useless projects from being pursued. I wish it had been possible for me to more strongly impress some people here in April of '85 with my suggestions about preparing for radiation accidents. It still makes me burn that mo credit has come to me for that! Today was a pretty good day for me, overall. Not a bad feeling. More thoughts of living in a group -- or at least working more towards one in Boston. On the other hand, about this credit thing, I feel really stupid about bringing it up. First, it was so long ago. Second, that I failed to really make a good case or strong impression with my opinion. Schlomo and I talked the other day about mysticism, and how it seems to be making a comeback. It's popular again. As it gets to be every 20 to 40 years. It doesn't stick, I tell him, because there is no reproducible product that comes from it. No product that works without a true believer at the controls. There is no Visomatic (as James called it) that allows you to see into the future. People think about, imagine, try to guess a lot of things about what will happen. Some of them will prove to be right. But we once thought a universal product would come out of FH, he said, and added that, so you think we are mystics, right? Now I've got you! Well, maybe for a moment -- but mostly because he has a tendency in that direction. But it is true that no universal model has come from FH. On the other hand, the first post-apes/pre-humans, probably had little appeal to the apes living in their neighborhood. FH is probably something for the far future of the human race. However, I am reminded of a science fiction story entitled Methusala's Children, by somebody-or- other. I must remember to suggest that FH build up a special guest area, perhaps with a kitchen, and laundry room with washer and dryer. Aike went away yesterday to get remarried. For tax purposes, he said. Returns tomorrow. The children are dancing on my nose. Wolle said that about his new job. Taking care of children. It's a way of saying they are really getting on his nerves, giving him a hand time, a run for his money. The 6 to 8 year olds, I think. His nose is being tweaked. Nearly 12:30 in the morning as I walk back from Otto's room. A sign on the door of a child's room says something like: there are monsters and other strange creatures around here -- so you better be quiet. Immediately I begin to feel a bit nervous, then paranoid, and check behind the door on entering my room. Just spent the last hour or so watching a video tape of Otto's recent work. It's with Yael and Flo. They are his two most frequent models at the moment. Alberto takes photos. Werner is on the camera. The two young girls, about 15 or 16, are two really gorgeous chicks, naked, and posing in a variety of ways. First there is a series on vomiting, gagging, then shitting, then having water thrown on them in a shower. One sees a certain decadent element in each of these three sequences, but they (the girls) are so nice to look at, and so much humor is injected into each sequence, that one really can't help but enjoy it. Perhaps my low opinion is formed, to some extent, by the magnitude of my jealousy. Sigh! Besides, I can hardly wait till I manage such a situation for myself! WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 1986 Just returned from and SD evening led by Claudia. I was afraid of being there and going in the middle the whole time. REALLY anxious! But not as bad as it has been. It's a much flatter, diffused sensation. Not as sharp as in the past. Imaging myself in the middle, on the other hand, and thinking out various scenarios, depending on what's happening at the moment. Two people, one being John Baptiste, are in the middle trying to outsell each other. the other guy is a bit more successful and steady, but John is more dynamic, somehow. Then they reach a stalemate where neither can sell the other. Claudia steps in and sells them both in an instant. and I continue to be nervous about being called, but it doesn't happen. It's a relatively short evening. Maybe an hour long. A drawing class was in progress when I got there. Claudia arrived a few minutes later. Brooke kicked me out of Otto's room. Schlomo volunteered to escort to the SD room. We played a game about who would go first. I let him. He tries to get behind me. He goes first as long as I follow. And now, afterwards, there is a bit of regret in me at not having done something. It's always been that way for me. Well, not always. But most of the time. Anxiety about doing something followed by regret at not having done something. There is an almost continual two-direction pull on me. One direction is to come back and live here. The other is to start something on my own -- fantasies about starting something on my own. Where I have money and other means of getting women around me. But I know that is such a primitive way of managing it. No more intelligence or consciousness than a stallion is required. I can't see the way to a compromise. There is this idea that my problems will all go away once the right situation exists. There is just too much pressure here, i think, for my real qualities to come out. I want to put all my inabilities behind me and jump ahead to what I suspect is my real potential. Unfortunately, I suspect there is not much up there in front of all the things I can't do! My face is still burning a little from the SD evening. Especially from when Schlomo was in the middle. He pulled out the old AAO bag of tricks. There was, in me, a constant sensation of uncomfortableness, as well as that he wasn't quite managing to pull it off -- the things he tried, like playing stupid, vain, aggressive, etc. Made me feel self-conscious, a little awkward. Saw a video of some Americans at an art gallery in Vienna. Rudy Vallee style. One imitated his singing style. They looked those times. They sounded those time. Forced. Intellectual, serious, sincere explanations for what they were doing. A little forced, tried-too-hard. Typical Americans. Virginia was wearing a piece of tape over her mouth this evening. Maybe it had something to do with lunch yesterday where she was criticized for making an inaccurate report of an event. the report got another person in trouble. She ran off to her room. Otto said it wasn't good to run away when somebody criticizes you Then he asked who would like to be his new housekeeper. Everyone raised their hand -- even me. But he wasn't totally serious about a new one, just yet. Unless she has made several other big mistakes in the recent past. Some others, like Wolle and Dieter, got to move up in the structure because of recent good works. There are several rounds of voting about who should go up or down. Otto sometimes pretends to be for one person, watches people raise their hands to agree with him, then reverses himself. This explanation doesn't do the process justice, but it is very funny to be in the middle of it, as well as interesting, educational, and thought provoking. I have in me, at the moment, two contradictory feelings. One is that there are only a few more days left to this visit. The other is that there are so many days left to this visit before I can go! I'm leaving too soon and not soon enough. I want to stay and can't stand it here. If only there were some way I could stay longer and also to escape immediately! No wonder you can't find a beginning or an end. Why do I have the feeling of.... not being.... so appreciated or wanted on this visit? It's been a long time since my previous visit, for one. Second, I've not managed to do anything really new for a while. Third, there is a very strong trend towards art at the moment (at least it seems more so to me), and not as interested to have me around or talk to me. Or maybe I'm becoming less of a special guest and closer to being a group member. Maybe it's some kind of plot to turn me into one by treating me like one? Normally I would number the top-right-hand of each page of my FH writing with consecutive numbers from 1 to however many are produced during each visit. This time I never even thought of that until just now. And just yesterday I noticed that Otto has not been signing and dating his recent series of paintings, and even though Brooke remarked something like, isn't that remarkable, I am amazed at how great minds so often think alike! THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 1986 Some talk today about Joseph Boyce, who died last January 24. He bought, had objects that were very expensive. Like a box of cookies worth $1 from East Germany. He signed the box and now it is worth $200. So it has been decided that a collection of things owned by Otto will be started, with him signing each item. His underwear, for example, which will have to be changed several times each day. Or the women he has slept with, who will be signed and later put in a museum. Andy Warhol has sent his greetings to Otto as a result of the visit form Amilio, the Italian art collector. Andy and Amilio are colleagues, Amilio being a dealer of his work. Today I got something of a sense of the meaning of otto's latest work. The pictures are very beautiful -- especially of the girls. The other side is the fear everyone in the nuclear family has. A brick flying at your head, or an earthquake is something to cause real fear. But he means to represent the unreal fears of every day life for the typical person. Just returned from otto's room where I traced the picture on the next page. Left to right it's Flo, Yael, and Nadja dressed up in a combination 1940's and 50's New York punk. Maybe? I will have to ask an expert, Erika perhaps, on returning to America. Some days ago I asked to have a copy of the photo for Erika. Ha! they said, you really want it for yourself. Ok. I confess. It's true. Earlier in the evening I had the sensation of my brain changing. But this I mean to say that something was being learned. It became known to me almost in the sense that one can become aware of a small spot on your skin being touched. But this was not as superficial. It was both a physical and [ traced picture from Otto ] consciousness sensation. Quite unusual and something I've never felt before in just that way. This morning I got up thinking how people have not been paying much attention to me and not saying hello or having no more than that to do with me. Leaving my room to go see someone, and still ruminating about that, it seems as though everyone tried to make up the deficit. Toni says her mother left this morning. She comes here often and enjoys it, but always has to say something against Otto. Like how come everyone always paints like him, or how come the paintings of nobody else hang on the walls. Or why is he first in the structure. She is a democrat. She equates hierarchy with Fascism. London was her home during World War 2. A better place than Vienna for a Jewish woman. Toni tries to explain how it works but the meaning, the mechanism, is invisible to her. A lot of people don't see it. Another example of talking to apes -- not in the sense that these people are not intelligent, normal humans in most ways, but they lack, somehow, have lost, somehow, the ability to sense a kind of order here that one knows exists on the outside, but which is never really talked about. Every day life on FH is art. The only problem her is how to do everything in the course of the day artistically. This came up around the time of a discussion about a doctor who visited with his wife and girlfriend. It's the thing now to be very relaxed about your relationships -- on the outside. He wants to do experiments with the FH community. Nobody wants to be his Guinea pigs, but may it will just be passive experiments. Nobody said, though. Some things noticed while tracing the picture on the previous page: 1) the whole picture kept disappearing on me as I worked ok each line, 2) lots of tension while doing the simplest of lines, 3) anxiety about the line veering off somewhere, 4) in one way not a relaxing exercise -- but I notice a definite shift in that direction after finishing. Toni asked me if I ever thought of moving back into the group. Yes, all the time, was my answer. All the time, she repeated. Yes, I replied. Brooke and Virginia are always two good measures of how things are improving here. not a single sarcastic response from Brooke - - twice, maybe, a little smart-aleck tone in her voice. And Virginia has left me feeling rolled over even once. Earlier Bernd Kurt stopped by my room to talk for nearly an hour. A lot of people are dancing on his nose to produce computer solutions to the groups data management needs. He gets a bit carried away and begins stabbing, with his finger, at everyone's list of demands. Less bread at meals, by my choice, in the last few days. Less gas the last few days. A dream last night about how I am to get married soon. Myself and three friends go to a picnic-like area to clean it up for a party connected with the wedding. Two of them start. One walks off with me while discussing my reservations about the whole affair. These three people, and others in the remainder of the dream, are almost caricatures of what I imagine most normal people to be like. Furthermore, there doesn't seem to be much difference between them and me. Next I'm in a scene, at MIT, with my betrothed, where she works. Some coworkers are there with her. Her appearance is worn and tired. Someone just going along because they are too weak to resist the momentum. We get a check related to our impending wedding and go off to cash it. But it's all become too much for me, and I say how we have to talk about something. There is a pause and then a response, although not direct, that leads me to believe we are thinking the same. I tell her it's not possible to go through with this. We know each other but have so little real connection. We've gone this far with the thing but further makes no sense. She agrees. But all the time I am feeling myself as being no different from anyone else. Another dream about being in bed with a very young woman. There's an open window at street level. Somehow she falls out the window, sort of, and I catch her as she is just touching the ground with feet, back to the building, and no clothes! I am holding her from inside the window but looking from a position, just outside on the street. A very young, but very well developed body. For some reason her head is not visible to me. Another about FH people and myself inside a room with an earth colored floor. Very brown, almost chocolate -- maybe shit. Sections of the floor, almost squares about 5 or 6 feet on a side, have been passed or carved out of the floor. The remaining strips of floor, parallel and at right angles, are about a foot wide. Actually, they fluctuate in width, my impression of their width on either side of a foot wide. People are lying and/or sitting on these cross pieces. I have a small toy shovel, or some kind of digging instrument, and am carving patterns or steps as a way out of this odd predicament. It seems odd, now, and in the dream. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 1986 Vienna airport. I can't believe two weeks have passed. It seems only a moment ago -- my arrival here. I'm going but have a vague feeling of not wanting to. Next time you come stay a month, two months, three months, or longer. And bring a woman with you, Otto said to me last night. Spent nearly three hours, till just after 2 a.m., in his small studio. John Baptiste showed his latest designs for the new house. Also a paper model. Back and forth it went about exactly how the thing was to be built, how it would be used, what's wrong with the present buildings, new ideas, and so on. Many things got thrown into the stew pot here. Then modifications to the present design, followed by many new designs completely (in some cases) discarding the present well developed plan. John Baptiste alternates between describing one thing as no problem and a sinking look on his face that says he can't really accept some new idea. Claudia talks to me near the very end of the evening. What a touch that woman has! It comes down to the thing that's bothering me. What is it, she asks, sex, money, you want children? Do you have one? I tell her about Cheyenne. She suggests bringing her here, then changes her mind -- they don't need more girls. Today's rain reminds me of my last flight into Zurich. Didn't think the plane would make it. But rain and clouds doesn't mean it's windy or like this in Zurich. Pistachio nuts, dates, other nuts, from Gomera. Nearly ruined my fingernails opening the pistachios. Well, although I'm going, there is an odd sort of reluctance pervading my flesh. I almost can't believe myself to be leaving. This is like a dream. Someone asked me if I had developed any on this visit. Something happened. But my finger can't on it exactly be put. Yesterday was the big opening for Otto's latest series of paintings: Accidents In The Home. A kind of criticism of life in the nuclear family where catastrophe is always just around the corner -- if not right on top of you. Uneventful landing in Zurich. Purchased some chocolate and, to soothe my conscience, toothpaste. A long talk with Aike yesterday. He especially enjoyed the article about khadafi as it gave him a completely different view of the. What did it was the female journalists who described his clumsy attempts to seduce them. Aike had only read propaganda before that. I go into some detail about the increasing nuclearization of the nuclear family, and how many bad things continue to strike people everywhere in spite of the high level of material development. One doesn't see destroyed relationships, child and spouse abuse, alcoholism, and similar family problems on FH. Everyone is too well taken care of. Well, there is a price for not having all those problems, or the economic struggles that one has in daily life. Then we go on to my theory about the biological need for illusion in human history, including the post-ape, pre-man thought experiment, Molloy's experiments, and how even the children on FH have a tendency to drift into a world of imagination where they can be more, or something other, than is possible in everyday life. He wants to know if I ever write or lecture about ny theories. Who do I tell them to? No lectures or writing at this point -- although I will have to think about it now. But then I can imagine the liberal, conservative, feminist, etc, reactions to some of my ideas. Only on FH can one find an audience for these kinds of ideas -- but now I am speaking before really trying some of them in a new form. So why do humans, in groups of various sizes, rise up to some high point (Roman Empire, Third Reich, etc), and then come crashing down? Or, like the eskimos or kung, have an apparent history of many thousands of years without such horrible, self- inflicted catastrophes. I can think of three possible explanations. First, slowly some kind of way that balances the material and emotional needs moves around some "way" of life that meets these needs and is self-correcting. Second, in the case of Eskimos and Kung, the physical reality doesn't provide enough surplus material for aggressive behavior to the individual or group. Third, that some unique individual, with extraordinary talent and sensitivity came to some new view of the world. This is how I see Otto. As to whether his way goes on after him, is a question that will be answered by the future. But history is already full of examples of individuals who created new directions, unknown to them, not anticipated by them, and unless as comprehensive as Otto's model, almost guaranteed to begin swinging wildly, in one direction or another till a catastrophic point is reached. While here I read Cordell Hull's book, STRATEGY. It's about the indirect approach in war. Where a direct battle is always avoided in favor of psychological attack, faked attack, or, in the last resort, the most advantageous attack where one has a clear chance of coming out ahead. The only successful practitioner of the direct approach, the direct attack, in my opinion, would be Alexander the Great. And this because he would be the one to lead a charge, straight to the enemy, full speed ahead -- although he had an uncanny knack for finding the enemies weakest point and defenders. In any case, I would say that Otto's attack on the question of life is very indirect. Of what use is art in everyday life? Painting, for example? But all the ideas coming out of art get tried in other areas. And his approach is comprehensive. There seems to be nothing that is excluded. Perhaps someone might say religion has no place on FH. But one can also say that it's simply another approach to life. Aike brings up Marshall McLuhan and how he came out of nowhere to become very famous. He had a sponsor. Aike thinks that is the secret to his success. I thought more that, 1) he had a person or institution that wanted to use his ideas to attack someone, and, 2) the ideas themselves were superficial, harmless enough, but interesting enough to appeal to a wide audience that would use these ideas to make themselves visible as people who know something, have a new point of view of the world, yet would be able to see themselves as developing, as on the vanguard of advanced thinking, but who would be able to maintain the illusion of these things. He gives me another 10 years to become famous in that way. Then a question about if I think Warhol is really self- confident and satisfied with his life. No. One woman tried to kill him. He nearly died. At least one other committed suicide. I don't think it's real self-confidence. It's arrogance. His real, everyday life is a wreck. Aike was not aware of these things in his past. He looks destroyed. Maybe he even has AIDS. It's possible with scene he's in. Mostly I think it's just exhaustion. Someone tells me Amilio is going to invite him to FH. They should be very careful of this guy and his scene because of AIDS and their past experiences. To me he has the smell and taste of Hollywood . I think they will see it if he comes. I am tempted all the time by that kind of fame. I imagine it to be the way to get what I want: a luxurious life with all the women at my disposal. It is not a very social image. It is in a battle with the other impulse: to have a life, in a group, more like FH. But I don't want to let things get out of my hand. And so it goes the other way. The fantasy in that direction makes me think of Charles Farrell. Not a bad life -- but I can see the limitations. Man has the capability to go in the wrong direction and not Know it. It's so for an individual couple, family, clan, group, society, country. I can recall examples of each constellation that has gone in the wrong way. But at the bottom of going the wrong way is, I propose, some kind of genetic mechanism that is slowly being weeded out. Perhaps Otto is a good example of someone with a natural ability to avoid the wrong way. I think it's possible. His discrimination in all kind of events and situations is extremely refined. My own abilities are not advanced enough to make any criticism of him. Except for last might when I said he MUST get rid of some pounds before he can expect improvements in his back and leg. Several days ago I hid in my room and refused to answer two knocks on my door. How to describe the sensations that kept me under cover? No words at the moment, but events like this, on this visit, have made me much more aware of how most of the people I see hold back, and how they must have a similar feeling. It is a combination of wanting someone to come to me, and to keep doing it to prove that what moves them is real and deep! I think it's something like that. Brooke asked me to stay and take over her English class for the next five years. She really wants to move on to something new. I can understand her position but my first thought is that the children will immediately begin dancing on my nose. They will begin by dancing on a single hair on my nose! The only picture that comes to my mind is that I will fly into a manic rage and strangle one of them -- then throw the lifeless body out of a window. But then thoughts of how to control them came to mind. For example, to bring a gun and shoot the first who makes any trouble. Or a direct phone line to Otto's studio. Or tell them they have five minutes at the beginning of each day to dance on my nose. Or I tie the first troublemaker to some kind of torture machine for the remainder of the class. Or I videotape them. Or I tell them they have to reserve all their nose dancing for outside this class -- that there will be another, extra, separate class for doing that. But then some other ideas came to me. One was to have them make up cheering routines for sporting events. Then thoughts of looking around for all kinds of materials and ideas that I can send to Brooke -- with even the hint of trying some of them myself on my next visit. But first the trouble spring full-blown into my mind. I can, however, imagine them subsiding, and even getting considerable support for trying something like this. Maybe I will even write Brooke a letter before my next visit proposing this. But a large, strong person should station themselves in the classroom with me so as to prevent me from doing in someone. On the movie screen in front of me is a picture showing this plane just past the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Speed is 859 km/h, altitude is 10,060 meters. Newfoundland is straight ahead. Aike tells me that the biggest recent change has to do with organizing the group in a new way. Along structure/hierarchy lines, as opposed to the family. There is a new emphasis on competitive confrontations, dealing with real, concrete situations. Selling as a variation on confronting and overcoming ones parents. But this may not be exactly right as it's not really clear to me. Also, he said there is increased emphasis on giving people further down in the structure more opportunities. Many people have surprised everyone by going out into the real world and becoming successful salesmen. Franz came back from Gomera on Saturday night. FH can't buy the property directly as the local government requires someone from Spain to own 50%. So now they look for a Spanish partner. The property is about 1000 acres, a seashore, some lush jungle, then surrounded on every other side by jagged, steep hills. It's very dry. Warm, with not too much humidity. No snakes or mosquitos. Many kinds of tropical fruits and other things will grow very well there. They will probably make their own electricity and drill for water. The Gerstil film was very well received at the opening. I liked it quite a lot except for the music, at the beginning, which was a little too loud and sharp. The audience, from my impression, responded more positively as it went along. So I would conjecture the thought like me. It left me VERY stirred up at the end. Aike tells me he has about two days awareness, and never more than two weeks. That's why he couldn't tell me what happened since last January, but he could elucidate the most recent development in the group. Everything is very much now, this moment, oriented. But long-range planning is not left out. Many kinds of therapy are oriented towards making behavior and consciousness work together, or now. But the emphasis, I propose, is that the individual do this for themselves, oneself. Somehow that seems like a contradiction. Let me see what I mean... There is mo mow without other people. You need others to do something with. By yourself you must either dwell on the past, speculate about the future, or spend now fighting off the constantly descending curtain of these two other possibilities. Having others present, in reality, makes even being occupied with those two things something that is going on right now. Alone one goes off in unreal directions, dreaming, hoping, longing for something that was or will be. I go off on sexual fantasies all the time. It would be much better to have it, really when it was wanted, instead of just the neurological sensation of it -- although those sensations can seem very real. Or is my going back to the "real world" causing me to go off the deep end? Austrians went to the voting box on Sunday. Some of us watched the election results. The two big majority parties lost some ground. The conservative/rightist party gained ground, and the Green Party became the fourth party in what was a three party system. They have never been represented in the Austrian parliament. Of special interest was the advertisements. They seem very funny in the FH context. Why don't we have Chappi (a food product) Otto said. It was very funny -- especially once I tell you it was a dog food ad. Again there is this question in me about where did the last two weeks go. It seems like only a short time ago that I was on another plane, in January, flying back to the United States. Encountered John Baptiste on leaving Otto's room last night. We walked back to the Costello. Is your room near mine, I asked. Indeed it was! He has the top two floors of the Costello. The very top room is his office. Just below is his private room. We go up and have a beer and talk about old times. He came to FH around the same time as me -- except that he had left the group after a year and came back as a guest. Then it occurs to me that it was just 8 years ago, on almost exactly this date, that I first came to FH. My first FH writing began, I believe, on the 25th of November, 1978. And this is the end of my tenth visit. Here comes the stewardess with the food! I tell her (Ms. Graf) that the food is so good it's making me fat. Her response is to suggest more exercise. To which I reply that could she request that the cargo hold of this plane be converted to a gym or swimming pool. She's going to pass my suggestion along. Aike is not working in the school now. He tells me of how he could only really manage a good class 3 or 4 times out of 10. He describes it as a situation where he lost his nerve. The students can then smell and taste this -- and that's the moment a class is lost. He came to this realization just as we were talking about it. He thinks it may explain what happened to cause him to give it up. Why don't you ask Otto what he thinks, I suggest. He doesn't have the nerve to do that, but will ask Claudia. A sensation of having stepped through some kind of hole just came over me. Now the hole into reality is closing up and I am back in another world. Like Alice in Wonderland. In a few hours I will be back with Alice, The Mad Hatter, etc.