Author Archives for Ellen

Que Sera Sera – Doris Day
When I was just a little girl
I asked my mother what will I be
Will I be pretty will I be rich
Here’s what she said to me

Que Sera Sera
Whatever will be will be
The future’s not ours to see
Que Sera Sera
What will be will be

When I grew up and fell in love
I asked my sweetheart what lies ahead
Will we have rainbows day after day
Here’s what my sweetheart said

Que Sera Sera
Whatever will be will be
The future’s not ours to see
Que Sera Sera
What will be will be

Now I have children of my own
They ask their mother what will I be
Will I be handsome will I be rich
I tell them tenderly

Que Sera Sera
Whatever will be will be
The future’s not ours to see
Que Sera Sera
What will be will be
Que Sera Sera

The title of this post is still uncertain. First it was Whatever will be will be. Now, at the time of writing this, it is Moon River. Both titles are titles of songs. The song Que Sera Sera has a three stages structure, going from a young girl asking her mother, to a young woman asking her lover to a mother telling her child.

Moon River is more difficult for me to analyze. On the wikipedia page there is the following quote by Robert Wright from The Atlantic Monthly:

“This is a love sung to wanderlust. Or a romantic song in which the romantic partner is the idea of romance.”

This was not how this post started. Today, Tuesday, a link was posted from Brainpickings to a 2013 post titled The Psychology of How Mind-Wandering and “Positive Constructive Daydreaming” Boost Our Creativity and Social Skills. I have written about daydreaming before. Sometimes embarrassingly. Some things i would like to hide from you, my dear reader, for ever. But i told you, and it is there for you to find these little secret hiding places in this website. Out in the open.

This brainpickings post is about the 1975 book from psychologist Jerome L. Singer The Inner World of Daydreaming.

Singer described three core styles of daydreaming: positive constructive daydreaming, a process fairly free of psychological conflict, in which playful, vivid, wishful imagery drives creative thought; guilty-dysphoric daydreaming, driven by a combination of ambitiousness, anguishing fantasies of heroism, failure, and aggression, and obsessive reliving of trauma, a mode particularly correlated with PTSD; and poor attentional control, typical of the anxious, the distractible, and those having difficulties concentrating.

Looking at these three different types of daydreaming, i definitely fall in the first category. A lot of wishing, a lot of romance, very vivid. Yes.

Living in the now is a popular way of being for i’d say the past forty years or so. Fifty years even, or more. It has its value. I will say that those moments when you are present in your current time with all your attention towards it may be your happiest moments on this world. But i don’t think this is all for us. We need to position ourselves towards what we have done and said in the past, we need to make plans for the future.

Singer explored the relationship between daydreaming, personality, divergent thought, creativity, planning, problem solving, associational fluency, curiosity, attention, and distractibility. Singer noted that daydreaming can reinforce and enhance social skills, offer relief from boredom, provide opportunities for rehearsal and constructive planning, and provide an ongoing source of pleasure. In later work, Singer describes those who engage in positive constructive daydreaming as “happy daydreamers” who enjoy fantasy, vivid imagery, the use of daydreaming for future planning, and possess abundant interpersonal curiosity.

Last Sunday was a Bonfire evening at the Peace Garden, the Vredestuin. I talked for a while with Matthijs. About his travels, what made him feel happy, the love he felt for people. Later on, a few hours later, we talked again. This time i told him about my life, a bit. The things i make for myself: my toothpaste, washing liquid, body and hand cream butter. How i was working on a recipe for falafel, which is still not right. I also talked about me living my life mostly by myself.

Later on i talked with Anne, who i had only met that day, the weeding queen! I talked about my work. This website and my previous website, lfs.nl. What i was doing there. And that i could imagine myself living anywhere else. Or London. I didn’t agree with her when she said i lived here in Rotterdam for the past thirty years and that i would spend the rest of my life in here. I don’t think that is true, not for anyone. But i was a bit all over the place. I am not used to talking about these things so openly with people i have only just met.

Yesterday i was a bit tired. I had to think about the night before, about all the things i had said.

Today i first had an idea of making a post about doing my nails. But later on, after i had come back from the market, i started to think about another post. About what i wish for myself, what i hope for, what i want. But also that i felt i couldn’t grab it, i couldn’t want want it. I have written about this earlier, in earlier posts.

What next?
Please
The world is terrible
Work

I need to find a way to make myself money to live off. This house, the water i have, the gas i use, that all costs money. My two cats, they cost money. I have only enough for the next two to three months.

And i don’t want to work in this world, here in the Netherlands, here in this current time, here with these rules on how we deal with each other. I don’t want to do that anymore. I have done it enough.

I have said it before. This website, ellenpronk.com, is my work. It is how i want to earn my living. I see only one way. I need to become famous. Now, i know, nobody else will do that to me. Nobody else will say that they like what i do and that i should be famous. Nobody.

But me.

But who will listen?

Well, there are many different ways of being famous. And i don’t need to be all worldwide famous right from the start all at once. I can start smallish. Actually, i have already started. With this website. With lfs.nl even. I can set up a Patreon page. Hmm, i should do that quite soon.

So i can not predict my future. I have only dreams, which are changing all the time.

But this Monday, while i was thinking about the night before, i noticed different daydreams. I noticed a change in myself. And i do know i’m living my life right now, taking one step forward each time. And i’m not going back. But i do need to really think about where i am, and where i want to be in a couple of months.

So yeah, i may daydream part of the day, part of the night. But i also need to really think about my life and not take for granted everything will be just fine in my life. I do need to do certain things, need to write about certain things, need to make certain things. Not let the dreams take me away in their soft arms and let my life drop below me. I need to take charge.

My way.

Of course.

Moon River – Breakfast at Tiffany’s
Moon River, wider than a mile,
I’m crossing you in style some day.
Oh, dream maker, you heart breaker,
wherever you’re going I’m going your way.

Two drifters off to see the world.
There’s such a lot of world to see.
We’re after the same rainbow’s end–
waiting ’round the bend,
my huckleberry friend,
Moon River and me.

58. Tui / The Joyous, Lake

This hexagram, like sun, is one of the eight formed by doubling of a trigram.
The trigram Tui denotes the youngest daughter; it is symbolized by the
smiling lake, and its attribute is joyousness. Contrary to appearances, it is not
the yielding quality of the top line that accounts for joy here. The attribute of
the yielding or dark principle is not joy but melancholy. However, joy is
indicated by the fact that there are two strong lines within, expressing
themselves through the medium of gentleness.

True joy, therefore, rests on firmness and strength within, manifesting itself
outwardly as yielding and gentle.

THE JUDGMENT
THE JOYOUS. Success.
Perseverance is favorable.

The joyous mood is infectious and therefore brings success. But joy must be
based on steadfastness if it is not to degenerate into uncontrolled mirth.
Truth and strength must dwell in the heart, while gentleness reveals itself in
social intercourse. In this way one assumes the right attitude toward God and
man and achieves something. Under certain conditions, intimidation
without gentleness may achieve something momentarily, but not for all
time. When, on the other hand, the hearts of men are won by friendliness,
they are led to take all hardships upon themselves willingly, and if need be
will not shun death itself, so great is the power of joy over men.

THE IMAGE
Lakes resting one on the other:
The image of THE JOYOUS.
Thus the superior man joins with his friends
For discussion and practice.

A lake evaporates upward and thus gradually dries up; but when two lakes
are joined they do not dry up so readily, for one replenishes the other. It is
the same in the field of knowledge. Knowledge should be a refreshing and
vitalizing force. It becomes so only through stimulating intercourse with
congenial friends with whom one holds discussion and practices application
of the truths of life. In this way learning becomes many-sided and takes on a
cheerful lightness, whereas there is always something ponderous and one-
sided about the learning of the self-taught.

My earliest memory is the one where i am around a year and a half old. It is warm. My hands are on stones. Warm stones. In front of me is my mother. She points to something behind me. I look around. It is my dad, with a thing in front of his head. He uses his finger on it.

This memory came back to me in a dream, when i was around twenty years old. I found the photo. It was strange. I remember the feeling of the warm stones under my hands so well. My father taking a picture of me and my mom. I felt happy. And i was looking at this photo and seeing myself and remembering the feelings i had when i was so little.

I did loose the photo. I looked for it several times over the years, but nothing. Still, the memory is ingrained in me.

It is a very structured situation. Me, my mother and my father. My mother pointing at my father. My father hiding his face. Not being present. Looking through the lens. Clicking.

Taking care of the cats of friends, in 1985, while they were on holiday in Turkey. In the centre of Rotterdam. A side street of the West Kruiskade. He had just bought Cupid & Psyche 85, the album of Scritti Politti. I was hooked. Later on i reread my old Vinyl magazine collection. There were two interviews in it. One in 1982, the other in 1984. I must have read them. Why didn’t i buy Songs to Remember? I don’t know.

The three or four weeks i stayed in that house, i was playing Cupid & Psyche almost continuously. The music, the lyrics, i was in love. When my friends came back, i apologized to him, saying i played it so much, i was sure there ticks on the album. He didn’t mind. I bought the album for myself. Yay! I also bought a 12″ from The Word Girl. Loved it too.

Only later i bought Songs to Remember, in February 1986.

It was on a Tuesday. I went to Haddock, a record store in the center. There it was. I remember buying it. When i got home i put it on. I remember hearing the sounds of The “Sweetest Girl” for the first time. I don’t know why, but at that moment i threw coins for the I Ching. Well, i did throw them a lot in those days. I got the thirteenth sign Fellowship with Men with a changing nine on the fifth place.

Life leads the thoughtful man on a path of many windings.
Now the course is checked, now it runs straight again.
Here winged thoughts may pour freely forth in words,
There the heavy burden of knowledge must be shut away in silence.
But when two people are at one in the inmost hearts,
They shatter even the strength of iron or of bronze.
And when two people understand each other in their inmost hearts,
Their words are sweet and strong, like the fragrance of orchids.

I still don’t know exactly what this means.

I do know this has got to do with me. With how i lead my life. With what i am working for.

I had written my very first published html page. A week after, a good friend came by and i showed it to her. She asked me, why had i stopped? Why hadn’t i continued working?

I felt so silly.

The day after i published my next page.

The early days of then home.luna.nl/~ellen were great. The things i made then were a mixed bag. I stopped working on those pages in December 1997. The next year i worked on homebase. I collected images, old works, new works and munched it all together. A maze.

I was asked to participate in a exhibition de Kunstvlaai in the Westergasfabriek in Amsterdam. I prepared some bits. When i was there, i knew i had to change it. So i decided to make a page which would change the whole time. A free day. 14 May 1999. My first present.

This electrified me. This felt great. I don’t even know if people were really watching. Just working on this the entire day, making all these shots, doing my own make up, doing my own hair, it felt huge! I loved loved loved it.

1999 stood out. Flash was a great discovery. I worked almost every day.

2005 stood out. I remember the end of 2004, something happened to me then. I started going to the gym in January 2005, lost around 10 kilos. I felt good.

But it was a last sprint.

From 2006 until 2014 i hardly ever worked on lfs.nl. I worked in real life. In 2011 i started working for myself as an independant front-end developer.

Looking back on that time, i realize now it was a hard time. There was only work and gaming. And television. I hardly saw my old friends. I had stopped trying to make that all work. I saw my life falling apart and nothing much was left over. It seemed.

This year, 2016, i went to London for a Scritti gig in the Roundhouse. I went there with a purpose, to give my drawings to Green Gartside. I had talked about it here, on this site. I remember talking about doing this ten years ago with friends. They advised me not to do this, that it would be awkward. I think they were right.

But this year it felt like the right thing to do. So i did it. After a long wait, having some doubts, having more drinks, i did give them.

It was different from what i had imagined. But it was real. I will not forget.

I hope Green likes them. I haven’t heard anything since, but that is ok. I’m still working here. Enjoying myself. Leading my own life, as i should.

The past two years of my life are extremely important to me. The way i fell in love, the way it disappeared. That i suddenly got back working on lfs.nl. A miracle. No difficult things i needed to do. Simply add a new present.

The time i realized that i was about to make my last present, in January 2015. About.

The time i started working on this website, ellenpronk.com. I haven’t missed a day yet. Apart from a week off between Christmas and New Year. I actually have given myself five weeks off. Like a proper job.

I know this place is not visited that much, but i do hope visitors will appreciate what they get here.

On this website i write about my past, about the current day, the food i eat, the stuff i think about, the garden, the work i have done, the songs i sing, the video’s i have made.

I love this place.

Working here means everything to me. I can still feel new future uses. I do see certain categories slowing down, others coming into existence. I love how it flows.

I love this place.

I will keep on working on it. Until it is time to stop. Not anytime soon!