Reflecting on Creation/Discovery

In The Science of God Gerald L. Schroeder tells us that the verbs used in the Creation story have a connotation of discovery; God does not simply will things into existence, but finds them and shapes them, calls them and molds them.
-
I was on set a few months ago working on Dustin Supencheck's zombie romance Hostility, having a conversation about the ennui of people my age (about 20). The malaise a lot of us have is the concept of identity. This is nothing new, but it has an ever-growing context, especially in an art school such as Columbia. Couple this with the fact I was speaking with an actor, it was pretty engaging.
It was posited to me that travel is the way to discover oneself. I like the idea of having a walkabout around Europe, eating interesting foods, drinking interesting drinks, sleeping with interesting women; all those European things. The idea I like. As I told the actor (Kai Young), I didn't buy it. My difference was rooted in my understanding of identity's nature.
-
I wondered aloud if the facebook "About Me" quiz could, if completed, be used to recreate a person. My friend Marc said it couldn't, making me realize how much goes into a person beyond a preference for root beer over cream soda.
-
I told Kai I thought the real definer of a person was rooted much more in the act of self-creation. I told him, I'm working on myself, making myself into something. Explaining my position, I told him I'm looking to change, that at 22 I'm far too young to believe I'll stumble upon some heretofore unknown "me" and that'll be that: Brandon achieved!
-
"Do you think the things you're interested in will change?" asked my directing teacher.
"God, I hope so," I answered.
-
I've been rethinking my denial of self-discovery. I'm not into most dualities. I don't buy into mutual exclusivity. Check it: you can be pro-life and pro-choice. Sorry if I just blew your mind (though I doubt I did). Realizing I had made a false distinction in this instance, I had to reconsider my position.
To be clear, it is a false duality (then again, the overwhelming majority of them are). Being an artist, I discover as I create. I write this sentence, choosing words and crafting syntax and this sentence leads into the next. I discover a desire to say, to tell you, to realize who I am in this writing and what this writing says about my context.
-
In Christopher Nolan's Inception, Cobb (DiCaprio) tells Page's Adriane that dreams are a process of discovery and creation feeding into one another.
Dreams, art, Homer in that one "Treehouse of Horror":

They all feed one into another.
-
In my life, I've been dealing with some questions of how I relate to people. I've been thinking about whether or not I could be physical with a man. I'm not opposed to the idea, to be sure. I don't even think this is a question of identity (you aren't who you fuck). Even so, I don't think I've found a man with whom I'd want to be intimate. I don't believe people choose to be gay, but I also think I might have the capacity. The bottom line is, I don't know if it would work for me.
I'm looking at my art these days and considering what my characters make, and what I find in them.
At least in my art I can find a universe to help me create my place in this larger reality.

Intaglio

by
Brandon L. Sichling

The blank does not intimidate me
Because I know better, shrewdly,
Than to show it any fear
Other than of the failure
On which I’m about to embark.

I know the blank’s dimensions
And I know my materials (how)
And I know what I want to say (why)
And I am flabbergasted if I know (where)
They intersect.

When I am dead I hope
This rune will speak for me
To those I leave behind.
I hope it will strengthen me
To explain myself before God
Almighty.

While I am here I will fill
The blank with the idea
In my heart, pulling
It in and staining it with my inks
Pumped by desire and desperation
To create.

I know it will only leave me when I’m through,
Even though my signature adorns it
And makes it my responsibility.
Almighty will raise this point
And my void cast onto another
Will give me the will
And negate the inclination
To apologize.

An Apartment Window on Congress, Near State

I can only see the back of the canvas
And wonder of the other side.
Even though the Easel is lovely,
I'd love even more to know the Image she constructs.

Does she paint the street as she sees it from her perch?
No. How could she?
How could one bear to reproduce the
Homeless beggars and wide-eyed youth,
Preparing for college, together?

Possibly, I almost hope, she paints the street as
She she sees it from her mind:
Clean, quiet, bustling, free,
A tollway whose charge is kindness.
I'm sure she does not
If only because I'm sure that from where
She is, the problems seem so small as to not be
Worth the fixing. Or ignoring.

She could, if she had any sense,
Be painting something neither here nor there.
She could just be making something up,
something redeeming, wonderful.
This is unlikely, as
Most artists need models, and there are
None handy to show a tolerable world.

Or maybe someone else's painting
Rests on the easel. Possibly it is
Merely decoration.
It would be a shame, but the easiest one with which
To live.