The Nymph and the Oak

Once upon a time there was a forest that was inhabited by nymphs. The nymphs took pleasure in hopping from tree to brook, from plant to fungus, from animal to insect, bringing inspiration and vitality to each and every thing. We could say that these nymphs were the soul of the forest, and their shape-swapping dance somehow seemed to play a part in its fragile balance.

Now, whilst most nymphs found joy in their hopping about, it would sometimes happen that a nymph would tire of his dance, preferring instead to to choose a suitable form in which to come to rest. It is with one such wearisome traveller that our story will concern itself ...

Our hero had for a long time played his part, hopping from one thing to another. He had come to notice, however, that he was never more comfortable then when within the sturdy frame of an old oak tree. And so it was that one day he decided to quit his jumping about, choosing the oak as his resting place, his "form of forms." He grew close to the tree, and began to understand its rustling and creaking, its slow and steady breath, its silence. As time passed the two grew ever closer, and our hero began to forget where the tree started and he ended. "I am a proud oak," he thought, "these branches are my branches, these roots my roots." He forgot what it was like to have been a nymph, to have hopped from one form to another. His tree seemed to him his natural form, and any thought of dancing and hopping had long since vanished from his mind.

There were many things that our hero liked about being a tree. His sturdy trunk was immune to the strongest of winds, and provided a stable resting place for the weary back of many a traveller. His thick canopy provided shelter from storms, and his strong branches a home to birds and insects. His bark was rough and durable, and his roots reached deep into the earth. Yes, it was a fine thing to be a tree, especially one as proud and powerful as he!

As the seasons went by his leaves turned a lovely shade of orange, and eventually found their way down to the forest floor below.

Many seasons went by, and as they passed the inhabitants of the forest began to notice a change in the old oak tree. Where once its branches had reached far into the sky, rustling and chattering along with the other trees, they were now cast downwards, and had become gnarled and rigid, indifferent to the breeze that flowed through them. Any birds that had once made their home here had long since disappeared. Not only that, the bark of the tree seemed rougher, full of jagged edges, and no travellers dared risk their backs against its trunk. Where once the oak had seemed at the centre of things, it now stood alone, the life and energy of the forest passing it by.

It so happened that one day a pre-occupied young nymph, reveling in the newly discovered joys of bird-form, alighted upon the twisted branches of our oak. No sooner had he landed than his thoughts were back with flying, and he readied himself to take off. As he spread his wings, a strange noise caught his attention and stopped him in his tracks. He cocked his head and listened intently. Sure enough he heard the sound again - it seemed to be coming from the tree that he was perched on. Bringing his head even closer to the tree he began to make out the very faint sound of weeping. How strange! A crying tree! He'd heard of Weeping Willows, but never Weeping Oaks.

He hurried off and quickly convened a group of his young nymph friends. "I think someone is trapped in that old oak tree! Its branches are so twisted and rigid that it cannot talk when there is a breeze, like the other trees! Its bark is too thick for hopping through, and its trunk is so sturdy and its roots so deep that we can't possibly move it! What is there to do?!"

Another of the group spoke up. "I've heard tales that there is a nymph within that tree, and he's been there for many a season."

"Perhaps he has been there so long that he has grown tired of being a tree," spoke another.

"Perhaps he is lonely," spoke a fourth, "And that is why he is weeping."

"We must do something," said the bird-nymph. "We can't leave him in there, sad and alone".

And so it was that our young nymphs formed a plan.

The bird-nymph flew off, collecting the seeds from as many trees as he could find. Upon finding one he would fly back and drop it near the lonely old oak. Another of the nymphs would hop into the seed, and within no time a shoot would break through the soil. After a while a fine collection of young trees had began to appear around the oak, their energetic rustling and chattering filling the air. Whenever a breeze came by, they would bend their flexible trunks, reaching their branches toward the oak and caressing its rough surface.

Other nymphs hopped into the brook, and when the sun shone down upon them they travelled up within the water droplets toward the clouds. In no time they were raining down upon the oak, drop after drop, soaking its leaves and branches, tracing the furrows of its trunk, and tickling its roots.

It was in this way that life was brought back to the oak.

Having made his nest within its branches - not the most comfy of spots, but nest-worthy none-the-less - our bird-nymph listened carefully day after day. To his relief he could no longer hear any weeping. Only the soft music of the wind, as it made its way through the forest.

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Widen Your Horizons

Suppose one man likes strawberries and another does not; in what respect is the latter superior? There is no abstract and impersonal proof either that strawberries are good or that they are not good. To the man who likes them they are good; to the man who dislikes them they are not.

But the man who likes them has a pleasure which the other does not have; to that extent his life is more enjoyable and he is better adapted to the world in which both must live.

What is true in this trivial instance is equally true in more important matters. The man who enjoys watching football is to that extent superior to the man who does not. The man who enjoys reading is still more superior to the man who does not, since opportunities for reading are more frequent than opportunities for watching football.

The more things a man is interested in, the more opportunities of happiness he has, and the less he is at the mercy of fate, since if he loses one thing he can fall back upon another.

[Bertrand Russell]
The Conquest of Happiness, p.111, 112

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The things that we dislike we'll try to get ourselves into. Then not only do we have another thing that we get to like, which makes life a little bigger, but we also have one less weak thing inside of us.

[Andrew W.K.]

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[...] as that which contains the potentials for change, the genome of the individual organism is what the computer engineers would call a bank, providing storage of available alternative pathways of adaptation. Most of these alternatives remain unused and therefore invisible in any given individual.

Similarly [...] the gene pool of the population is nowadays believed to be exceedingly heterogeneous. All of the genetic combinations that could occur are created, if only rarely, by the suffling of genes in sexual reproduction.

There is thus a vast bank of alternative genetic pathways that any wild population can take under pressure of selection [...]

[Gregory Bateson]
Mind and Nature, p. 196

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New Look

Three years ago, I had a nightmare that I cut off all my hair. Ever since I'd started growing out my hair at 17, I'd vowed that I would never cut it. As a teenager, I always felt skinnier and younger than anyone else, and somehow the extra hair made me feel bigger and more adult. Soon, I came to see my hair as a reflection of my integrity and personal steadfastness, and later, as the symbol of my identity as a rock-and-roll performer.

The year after I started growing my hair, I moved to New York to become an entertainer. I wanted to combine all the things I enjoyed most - music, performance, art, philosophy - into an experience of heightened fun. I fashioned my image accordingly. I associated long hair with freedom of spirit and rebellious living, and I wanted to harness those associations to entertain people.

So I transformed myself into an archetypal frontman, a character I could lose myself in. Onstage, my long, unkempt strands created a sense of additional craziness, amplifying every head bang, every body slam. My stage uniform was a white T-shirt, white jeans, running shoes, and a watch, with my hair obscuring an unshaven, dirty, sometimes bloody face.

The idea was to create a basic silhouette that would stick in people's minds. I wanted children to be able to draw me using just a few basic visual elements, like a cartoon superhero. I grew up drawing comics, and the idea of being able to represent a persona with just a few basic elements seemed almost mythic to me.

My hair was the envy of many women, even though I washed it only four times in six years, and sometimes it smelled so bad it made me sick. I wanted to get reactions out of people, to push the idea that I was wild and free. Abandoning personal hygiene was one obvious strategy. Sometimes, I even used fake dirt to make my clothes look as if they were covered with sweat and human waste. I was amazed by what a primal response filth could elicit from people - women in particular.

So the dream about cutting my hair made me think I'd lost everything. My entire identity was caught up in those oily locks!

But then I woke up. I leaped out of bed and looked in the mirror. It was still there - long and flowing. I felt like I'd been given a second chance.

The I started thinking. What if I did cut my hair? Would I look ridiculous? Would people think I was a sellout? Would my dance moves lose their power? Maybe my subconscious was telling me to shake things up. Had I become too safe, too predictable? Did my persona take all the risk out of creativity?

If I really wanted to be crazy, then maybe I needed to let go, since holding on to anything as superficial as a hairstyle was going to keep my real wildness from riding free. I wanted to shock myself. I wanted to do what I most feared, just for the sake of doing it. I wanted to embrace the idea that I could only discover myself through fearless living.

I called up an old friend and told him what I was thinking. "Are you crazy?" he shouted. "Do not cut your hair! It's career suicide!"

That was all I needed to hear. Thirty minutes later I was in a barber's chair. "It must have taken years to grow your hair so long," the barber said. "Why cut it now?""I had a dream that it would be the worst thing that could happen to me," I told him. "So I figured I better do it."

He began to snip. I watched in the mirror, expecting an unrecognizable face to emerge. But all I saw was me. Realizing that my identity transcended my aesthetic choices was liberating. But it was scary too. For so long I had maintained a fixed conception of myself, never considering that there were countless other possibilities, each one just as valid and real.

Offstage, people stopped recognizing me - not just fans, but also friends, business partners, even ex-girlfriends. People speculated that the "real" Andrew W.K. had been spirited off and some imposter had assumed his identity.

And in a way, people were right. I'm not the same Andrew W.K. anymore. Since I cut my hair, I've begun actively challenging many of the other assumptions I've always had about myself.

I used to think that I didn't want to make music with other people. So I started looking for opportunities to work with other musicians, and I wound up producing Repentance, the new album by Lee "Scratch" Perry. I used to insist that I would never participate in organised religion, so I began making friends who believed in God and went to church, and I even joined a church.

These decisions might sounds like contradictions, but I've never felt lost or uncertain about them. Instead, I feel more and more that I have nothing to be afraid of. No matter what I do, I can only be myself. It's the only choice I have.

[Andrew W.K.]

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