I Am Sitting In A Room

Today is the day for right mindfulness, for with it we do not consider all things intellectually.

Two more cases of the omicron variant have now been detected in the U.S.  One was a man in Minnesota who just returned from a trip to New York.  Another was a woman in Colorado who just returned from a tourist trip to southern Africa.  

Omicron hasn't been detected here in Georgia yet, but with busy Hartsfield Atlanta LaToya Jackson International Airport (or whatever they're calling in nowadays) within the state, it's probably here already. But yesterday we had our third straight day with less than an average of 1,000 covid cases per day, although at 968 cases, we were close. 

Impermanence is swift.  One year ago today, Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, the president of France from 1974 to 1981, died from the covids.  The covids weren't involved, but yesterday, avant-garde experimental composer Alvin Lucier died at age 90 at his home in Connecticut.  I saw Lucier at a concert of his compositions at the Knoxville Museum of Art as a part of the 2019 Big Ears Festival. Here he is taking a bow at the end of the performance with (l. to r.) Stephen O'Malley of the drone-metal band Sunn O))) and composer and performer Oren Ambarchi.

And here's a 60-second snippet of the performance.

If you're interested in this sort of thing, Lucier's most famous work, I Am Sitting In A Room, has been posted here. It's long (45 minutes) but well worth your time ("this song will change your life").