John Cage (photograph by Rob C. Croes, from the Dutch National Archives, made available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication)
One of the most memorable quotations I learned from John Cage was that the purpose of art was “to sober and quiet the mind, so that it is in accord with what happens.” This may be the best antidote for recovering from reading the daily news, which, more often than not, seems to throw the mind into a state of crisis, if not downright panic. Mind you, another one of Cage’s favorite quotes was, “Every day is a beautiful day,” another adage that does not hold up very well against news reports. Nevertheless, in my experiences of watching Cage at work (including hunting for mushrooms), I have come to expect that the words I live by are “We do what we can.” Fortunately, I can hold to those words through my activities on this site!
