Image: Andy Warhol’s Rain Machine, 1971, LACMA version, Photographer unknown. Sourced from: http://rooftoplinnaeus.blogspot.com/2010/04/original-vertical-garden.html

Andy Warhol was obsessed with the artistic uses of new technologies. Part of his ongoing relevance lies in the dexterity with which he embraced innovations ranging from the Polaroid camera to the early personal computer. In this respect, his participation in the Art and Technology Program seems foreordained.

The Art and Technology Program

In the 1960s, at that fragile moment when anything seemed possible, Maurice Tuchman conceived the idea of the Art and Technology Program for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). Tuchman envisioned collaborations between artists and business sponsors that would bring the former “into these industries to make works of art, moving about in them as they might in their own studios.”

Tuchman had to navigate multiple obstacles, including belligerent artists, a cautious LACMA Board, some risk adverse corporate executives, and various legal headaches. Nevertheless, he succeeded in connecting artists such as Len Lye, Andy Warhol, and John Chamberlain with companies ranging from the Rand Corporation and Kaiser Industries to RCA and Hewlett Packard. It was a brilliant idea, but one that inadvertently walked right into the contradictions of its era.

Rain Machine (Daisy Waterfall)

Andy Warhol’s Rain Machine (Daisy Waterfall) proved to be one of the most successful collaborations, in this case between Andy Warhol and Cowles Communications, facilitated by Tuchman’s curatorial guidance.

Ultimately, four Rain Machines were produced. Two disintegrated within six months of being exhibited, due to water damage. A third one that Tuchman purchased from Warhol and later donated to the Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh in the mid-1990s was irretrievably damaged while in storage. Only one original Rain Machine exists today.

Like much of Warhol’s work, Rain Machine was deceptively simple, yet highly influential and captivating. Tuchman wrote in his 1971 exhibit report to LACMA that “Many people and particularly the artists who were there installing their own pieces, felt the Warhol to be one of the most compelling works in the exhibition because of its strangely tough and eccentric quality.”

Flower Power

It is possible that Rain Machine (Daisy Waterfall) is exactly what it appears to be: an artistic experiment that combines then innovative 3-D lenticular technology with running water to produce a visually compelling effect. However, given the salience of flowers both to Warhol’s work and the politics of the era, one suspects that there is more going on with this piece than one or two quick passes through an exhibit might suggest.

By this point, Warhol had already produced the masterful Flowers series, which rendered hibiscus blossoms in brilliant Day-Glo colors and debuted to ecstatic audiences at the Leo Castelli Gallery in 1964. Flowers often represented beauty and optimism in Warhol’s work. Indeed, one iteration of Rain Machine appeared at the 1970 Tokyo Expo, under the theme Progress and Harmony for Mankind, suggesting that Rain Machine might serenely be a note-perfect response to the Age of Aquarius.

Rain Machine was also produced during the brief era of “flower power” in the United States. Though it became trite later, the concept originated with Beat poet Allen Ginsberg, who in 1965 urged young people to resist the Vietnam War with love and positivity. News photographs of young protestors placing flowers in the gun barrels of American National Guardsmen at the mass 1967 Anti-War Protest at the Pentagon appeared in Time and Life and would have been highly salient to someone as media saturated as Warhol.

Though Warhol cultivated an apolitical persona and deflected critical inquiries about his work, Rain Machine suggests that he always knew where he was in real time.

Art, Technology, and War

Warhol also seems to have recognized earlier than most the inherent paradox of the Art and Technology Program, which was launched with great optimism at the exact moment politics made such a conceit unworkable. By the time Rain Machine reached Tokyo, the United States had rapidly moved from the Summer of Love to the brink of social breakdown.

In that short space of time, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert Kennedy had been assassinated, mass protests against the Vietnam War had derailed the 1968 Democratic National Convention, race riots had decimated major American cities, and the previously peaceful Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) had splintered into militant factions that included the violent Weather Underground. Increasingly, in artistic circles, business and technology became synonymous with violence.

General Electric (GE), for example, had originally featured in Tuchman’s list of participating corporations. However, by 1970 the broad anti-War movement identified GE as one of the primary American corporations that had a vested interest in prolonging the Vietnam War and which waged violence for profit. A March 1970 student rally against GE at the University of Illinois rapidly turned destructive and became one of the signal moments in an anti-War movement that was moving closer to organized violence.

It was a chemist at GE who first discovered, in the mid-1940s, that it was possible to artificially seed clouds and generate precipitation. This insight later became the scientific basis of Operation Popeye, a top-secret Department of Defense project that used artificial weather-modification methods to prolong the monsoon season in North Vietnam and Laos, thereby disrupting key enemy transportation routes and inflicting psychological pressure.

Operation Popeye was uncovered by the New York Times in 1972, and Rain Machine predates general public awareness of this scandal. Still, Warhol always did have an uncanny sense of which way the wind was blowing. Even if Rain Machine is not a direct response to Operation Popeye, in context it hints at the destructive tension between technology and nature that would give way, after the Vietnam War, to the environmental movement.

The Most Beautiful Art

In one of his characteristically gnomic soundbites, Warhol famously proclaimed “I want to be a machine, and I feel that whatever I do and do machine-like is what I want to do.”

Whether he meant this or not as an approach to real life is impossible to know. Yet the artist who wanted to be a machine nevertheless created a work of artificial nature that re-sensitizes the viewer to the beauty and fragility of the real thing.

Warhol also said that “having land and not ruining it is the most beautiful art that anybody could ever want to own.” If we read between the lines, Rain Machine bears a higher level of scrutiny than the Prince of Pop may have initially led us to believe.

There is a question that has lingered in locker rooms, on battlefields, in boardrooms, and in hospital waiting rooms for generations, even if it is rarely spoken out loud with full honesty. What does God do when two sincere prayers collide? When one person bows their head and asks for victory, and another person somewhere else bows their head and asks for the exact opposite outcome, how does heaven respond? Does God choose a side? Does He evaluate worthiness and assign favor? Does He intervene for the most faithful, the most desperate, the most deserving? Or does something far deeper unfold than we are prepared to see?

This question is not really about sports. It may begin there because sports make the tension visible. Two teams gather. Both pray. Both believe. Both hope. Both ask for the same thing: let us win. But the scoreboard cannot accommodate two victors. One will celebrate. One will walk away disappointed. And somewhere in the background, the quiet doubt whispers, did God choose them over us?

The human heart is wired to interpret outcomes as proof of favor. When things go our way, we feel affirmed. When they do not, we feel overlooked. We are tempted to measure divine love by visible results. Yet the Scriptures consistently dismantle that way of thinking. The Bible does not present God as a tribal deity who pledges allegiance to one camp over another. It presents Him as sovereign, patient, and committed to a purpose that transcends immediate outcomes.

When Jesus said that the Father causes the sun to rise on both the righteous and the unrighteous, He was dismantling the illusion that blessing always signals preference. Rain falls on opposing fields. Breath fills the lungs of both the grateful and the ungrateful. Life itself is evidence of grace, not a scoreboard of superiority. If God does not withhold sunlight from those who reject Him, it is unlikely that He is pacing heaven trying to decide which uniform He prefers.

So how does God respond when prayers conflict?

The answer requires a shift in perspective. We assume prayer is primarily about altering circumstances. Scripture reveals that prayer is primarily about transforming hearts. We assume the goal is to secure outcomes. Scripture reveals that the goal is alignment with the will of God. We assume the victory is external. Scripture reveals that the deepest victories are internal.

Consider the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus prayed with such intensity that sweat fell like drops of blood. His request was clear. If it is possible, let this cup pass from me. That prayer was sincere. It was honest. It was vulnerable. And yet the immediate circumstance did not change. The cross still stood. The betrayal still unfolded. The suffering still came. If prayer were merely a tool to eliminate hardship, then that moment would be the most confusing in history. Instead, it became the most revealing. The power of prayer was not in escaping pain but in surrendering to purpose.

When two people pray for opposite outcomes, heaven is not trapped in a dilemma. God is not weighing prayers on a scale like a judge balancing evidence. He is not calculating merit. He is not responding to volume or eloquence. He is working at a level beyond the visible.

If two teams pray for victory, one will experience the joy of triumph. The other will face disappointment. But both can experience growth. Both can encounter refinement. Both can be drawn closer to God. The win may expose pride that needs to be confronted. The loss may cultivate resilience that cannot be learned any other way. The win may test humility. The loss may deepen dependence. The outcome does not define divine favor. It reveals an opportunity for formation.

Throughout Scripture, we see faithful people who did not receive the outcome they requested. Paul prayed three times for the thorn in his flesh to be removed. The answer was no. Yet the no carried a promise. My grace is sufficient for you. My power is made perfect in weakness. That answer did not eliminate the struggle. It infused it with purpose. Paul learned that divine strength is often displayed through human limitation. If we measure God’s faithfulness solely by immediate relief, we will misunderstand His deepest work.

The question of conflicting prayers forces us to confront what we believe about God’s character. If we believe He is limited, then we assume He must choose one person at the expense of another. If we believe He is abundant, then we begin to understand that He can work redemptively in both stories simultaneously. God does not operate within the constraints of scarcity. His grace is not a finite resource. His love does not diminish when distributed. His wisdom does not require compromise.

Imagine two individuals praying for the same promotion. Both are qualified. Both have families. Both have bills. Both believe the opportunity will change their lives. One receives the position. The other does not. If the one who was rejected concludes that God favored the other more, despair will follow. But what if the rejection is protection? What if the path not taken shields them from unseen pressures? What if the delay redirects them toward something more aligned with their calling? We rarely possess enough information to evaluate the full arc of our own lives, let alone the divine orchestration behind them.

Faith requires trust in the unseen architecture of God’s purposes. It requires confidence that His vision extends beyond the horizon of our current desire. When Joseph was betrayed by his brothers and sold into slavery, it appeared that his prayers and dreams were shattered. Years later, he would look back and say, what you meant for evil, God meant for good. That statement could only be made from a vantage point of hindsight. In the moment, the pain was real. The confusion was real. The injustice was real. Yet God was not choosing sides between Joseph and his brothers in the way we might imagine. He was weaving a larger story that would preserve an entire nation.

When we reduce God to a tie-breaker, we misunderstand His role. He is not a referee ensuring equal distribution of wins. He is the Author of redemption shaping eternal outcomes. He is not primarily concerned with temporary victories. He is invested in lasting transformation. The scoreboard may declare a winner, but heaven evaluates the heart.

This truth can feel unsettling because it removes the illusion of control. We prefer a God who can be persuaded into guaranteeing success. We want prayer to function like a strategy for securing favorable circumstances. Yet authentic faith moves beyond manipulation. It moves into surrender. It acknowledges that God’s wisdom surpasses our perspective.

There is also a subtle danger in assuming that visible success equals divine endorsement. History is filled with examples of individuals who achieved extraordinary victories yet lacked integrity. It is equally filled with quiet saints who endured obscurity and hardship while remaining faithful. The kingdom of God does not measure significance by applause. It measures it by obedience. The widow who gave two small coins was commended by Jesus not because of the amount but because of the heart behind it. External comparisons often distort internal realities.

When two sides pray for opposing outcomes, the deeper question becomes this: what is God forming within each person through this experience? If a team wins and attributes the victory solely to their own skill, pride may grow. If they recognize their dependence on God and respond with humility, gratitude, and generosity, the win becomes a platform for witness. If a team loses and descends into bitterness, the loss becomes destructive. If they respond with grace, perseverance, and unity, the loss becomes transformative. The difference lies not in the outcome but in the response.

Scripture repeatedly emphasizes that trials produce endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope. That progression does not depend on winning. It depends on trusting. It depends on allowing God to shape us through circumstances rather than define us by them. The apostle James wrote that we should consider it pure joy when we face trials of many kinds because the testing of our faith produces perseverance. That perspective reframes conflict. It suggests that what appears as opposition may actually be refinement.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus challenged His followers to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. The promise that follows is that all these things will be added as well. Seeking the kingdom means prioritizing alignment with God’s will over securing personal advantage. When we pray for victory, perhaps the more profound prayer is this: let Your kingdom come in me through this. Let my attitude reflect You whether I stand on a podium or walk away in silence.

Conflicting prayers reveal the limitations of our perspective. We often assume that what we desire most is what we need most. Yet Scripture consistently shows that God’s ways are higher than ours. Isaiah recorded the words of the Lord declaring that as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are His ways higher than our ways and His thoughts than our thoughts. That gap in perspective invites humility. It calls us to trust beyond comprehension.

It is also important to recognize that free will operates within the world God created. Outcomes in sports, careers, and relationships are influenced by preparation, choices, discipline, and countless variables. God does not override human agency in every moment. He works within it. He redeems through it. He guides those who seek Him. But He does not reduce life to a series of predetermined outcomes that ignore effort and responsibility. Prayer does not replace preparation. It sanctifies it. It orients our motives. It invites God into the process.

When we understand this, the anxiety surrounding conflicting prayers begins to soften. God is not forced into favoritism. He is not arbitrating petty rivalries. He is cultivating hearts. He is drawing people toward Himself. He is shaping character through every circumstance.

One of the most profound truths in Scripture is that God works all things together for good for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose. Notice that the promise is not that all things are good. It is that all things can be woven into good. A loss can become a lesson. A delay can become preparation. A disappointment can become direction. This does not minimize pain. It infuses it with hope.

When two people pray for opposite outcomes, heaven is not divided. God’s love is not split. He is present in both spaces. He is near to the anxious heart on the sideline and the confident heart in the spotlight. He is not confined to a single narrative. He is orchestrating many simultaneously.

The ultimate tie-breaker question is not about who wins. It is about who becomes more like Christ in the process. Jesus did not promise His followers unbroken chains of success. He promised His presence. He promised that in this world we would have trouble, but we could take heart because He has overcome the world. Overcoming does not always look like winning. Sometimes it looks like enduring with faith intact.

When we begin to see life through this lens, our prayers evolve. Instead of demanding outcomes, we seek transformation. Instead of bargaining for advantage, we ask for wisdom. Instead of fearing disappointment, we trust that even disappointment can be redeemed. That shift does not eliminate desire. It purifies it.

God does not wear a jersey. He does not sit in heaven cheering for one team while ignoring another. He is not confined to our categories of rivalry. He is the Creator who holds the universe together, the Redeemer who enters suffering, the Spirit who comforts and convicts. He sees beyond the moment. He works beyond the visible. He loves beyond the outcome.

And when we truly grasp that, the question changes from how does God break a tie to how can I honor God regardless of the result. That is where authentic faith is forged. That is where peace begins to replace anxiety. That is where the deeper victory emerges.

Because one day the trophies will fade, the applause will quiet, and the headlines will be forgotten. What will remain is who we became in the process. The humility learned in success. The resilience formed in loss. The trust strengthened through uncertainty. The character refined through pressure.

Heaven does not celebrate scoreboards. It celebrates surrender. It celebrates obedience. It celebrates love expressed in the face of opposition. And when two prayers collide, God is not choosing one heart over another. He is inviting both into a deeper story that stretches beyond the boundaries of a single moment, beyond the limits of a single field, beyond the horizon of a single desire, and into the eternal purpose that He is unfolding even now, in ways we cannot yet fully see, but are called to trust as we continue walking forward in faith, believing that whether we stand in victory or endure in defeat, His presence remains steady, His purposes remain good, and His work within us is far more significant than any temporary outcome could ever be, which leads us to confront an even more personal layer of this question, one that moves beyond stadiums and promotions and into the quiet places of the heart where we wrestle not with opposing teams but with opposing fears, and where the real conflict is not between two competitors but between control and surrender, between anxiety and trust, between demanding answers and embracing faith, and it is in that private arena that the question of how God handles conflicting prayers becomes intensely personal and begins to reshape the way we approach Him in every area of our lives.

It is in that private arena of the heart that this question stops being theoretical and starts becoming transformational. The issue is no longer about two teams or two competitors. It becomes about two desires within us. One desire wants control. The other longs for trust. One wants guaranteed outcomes. The other is willing to walk by faith. And when those desires collide, we discover that the real tie God is breaking is not between opponents on a field but between opposing impulses within our own soul.

We often approach prayer with subtle expectations. We may not say them aloud, but they live beneath the surface. If I pray sincerely enough, perhaps God will ensure the result I prefer. If I demonstrate enough faith, perhaps the outcome will align with my plan. Yet faith is not leverage. It is surrender. Prayer is not persuasion; it is communion. It is not about convincing God to join our side. It is about allowing Him to reshape our understanding of what truly matters.

When Jesus taught His disciples to pray, He began not with personal requests but with reverence. Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Before asking for daily bread, before requesting deliverance, before acknowledging needs, the focus was placed on who God is. That structure is not accidental. It reorders the heart. It reminds us that prayer is grounded in relationship, not transaction.

Conflicting prayers reveal whether we believe God exists to serve our ambitions or whether we exist to serve His purposes. That realization can be uncomfortable. It forces us to confront our assumptions. If my prayer is not answered in the way I desire, does my trust weaken? If someone else experiences what I hoped for, does envy creep in? These responses expose the depth of our alignment with God’s will.

Consider Hannah in the Old Testament. She prayed fervently for a child. Her anguish was real. Her longing was intense. When God answered her prayer and gave her Samuel, she did something unexpected. She dedicated him back to the Lord. The blessing she received was not clutched selfishly. It was surrendered. That posture demonstrates maturity. It shows that answered prayer is not an endpoint. It is an opportunity for deeper devotion.

Now imagine two women praying in similar anguish for children. One conceives. The other waits. Is God favoring one and neglecting the other? Or is He working through different timelines, different callings, different purposes? Scripture is filled with stories of delayed fulfillment that later revealed profound meaning. Abraham and Sarah waited decades. Joseph endured years of hardship before his dreams materialized. Delay did not signal abandonment. It signaled preparation.

When we internalize this truth, we begin to understand that God’s responses to prayer are not competitive. He is not choosing winners and losers in the way we define them. He is weaving stories. He is cultivating faith. He is guiding destinies in ways that often remain hidden until much later.

This perspective invites humility. It encourages us to hold our desires with open hands. It does not eliminate passion. It refines it. We can still pray boldly. We can still ask confidently. But we anchor those requests in trust. We say, Lord, this is what I hope for. Yet more than that, shape me according to Your wisdom.

When two business owners pray for the same contract, God is not obligated to divide His loyalty. He may grant one the deal and redirect the other toward an opportunity that better aligns with long-term purpose. When two students pray for admission into the same program, one acceptance letter does not imply superior worth. It simply marks a different path. Divine orchestration cannot be measured by immediate comparison.

There is also a profound freedom that emerges when we release the idea that every outcome must validate us. If I lose and conclude that I am less favored, insecurity grows. If I win and assume that I am more favored, pride grows. Both distortions damage the soul. But if I see both victory and defeat as platforms for growth, I remain steady. My identity is not anchored to results. It is anchored to relationship.

Paul wrote that he had learned the secret of being content in any situation, whether well fed or hungry, living in plenty or in want. That contentment did not come from indifference. It came from trust. He understood that Christ strengthened him regardless of circumstance. Contentment dismantles the fear that God must constantly prove His love through favorable outcomes.

Conflicting prayers also expose a deeper truth about community. We are interconnected. Our victories and losses often affect others. God’s purposes frequently extend beyond individual benefit. When Joseph rose to power in Egypt, it was not merely for his personal success. It preserved countless lives during famine. What appeared to be delayed justice was actually strategic positioning. The brothers who betrayed him could not see that future. Joseph himself could not see it at first. Yet God was working beyond the visible conflict.

This should encourage us when we face disappointment. We may not perceive the full impact of a closed door. We may not understand how a loss today prevents a greater loss tomorrow. We may not recognize how a setback builds the endurance necessary for future responsibility. Faith trusts that even unseen benefits are real.

Jesus told a parable about a farmer scattering seed. Some fell on rocky ground. Some among thorns. Some on good soil. Growth depended on the condition of the soil. In many ways, life’s outcomes reveal our spiritual soil. When success comes, does gratitude flourish? When hardship comes, does perseverance take root? God is always attentive to the soil of the heart.

The temptation to view God as a tie-breaker stems from our desire for certainty. We want predictable formulas. Pray this way, receive this result. Believe this strongly, secure this victory. But faith is relational, not mechanical. It cannot be reduced to equations. It requires trust in a Person, not reliance on a formula.

This relational trust transforms the way we respond to both triumph and loss. If we win, we give thanks without arrogance. If we lose, we reflect without despair. We recognize that neither outcome defines our ultimate worth. Our identity rests in being loved by God, redeemed by Christ, sustained by the Spirit.

One of the most liberating realizations is that God’s ultimate plan is not threatened by our temporary setbacks. His kingdom advances through faithfulness, not flawless records. The early church grew not through uninterrupted victories but through perseverance amid persecution. Their strength was not in dominating opponents but in enduring hardship with courage.

When we embrace this perspective, our prayers deepen. Instead of asking solely for advantage, we ask for alignment. Instead of focusing exclusively on outcomes, we focus on obedience. Instead of fearing that God might choose someone else over us, we rest in the assurance that His love is constant and undivided.

The cross stands as the ultimate demonstration of this truth. From a human standpoint, it looked like defeat. The disciples’ hopes appeared shattered. Yet through what seemed like loss, salvation was accomplished. Resurrection followed crucifixion. Victory emerged from surrender. If God can transform the darkest moment in history into the foundation of redemption, then He can certainly work through the smaller conflicts we face.

When two prayers collide, heaven is not confused. God is not scrambling. He is sovereign. He is patient. He is wise. He sees beyond the narrow frame of a single event. He sees the trajectory of lives. He sees how character is formed in pressure. He sees how humility grows in success and resilience in disappointment.

So how does God break a tie? He does not break it by favoritism. He breaks it by elevating the conversation. He redirects our focus from rivalry to refinement. He reminds us that the deepest victory is not external triumph but internal transformation. He calls us to trust Him beyond the scoreboard.

And when we finally grasp that truth, peace replaces anxiety. We can compete wholeheartedly without idolizing the outcome. We can pursue excellence without demanding control. We can pray boldly without fearing rejection. We can celebrate others without feeling diminished.

Because God does not wear a jersey. He wears authority. He does not stand on one sideline. He reigns above all fields. His purposes are not threatened by conflicting desires. They are advanced through surrendered hearts.

When heaven refuses to wear a jersey, it invites us into a deeper understanding of faith. It teaches us that the greatest victory is becoming who God created us to be. It reminds us that trust is stronger than triumph, that surrender is more powerful than control, and that eternal purpose outweighs temporary applause.

And in that understanding, the question shifts permanently. We no longer ask which side God is on. We ask whether our hearts are aligned with Him. We no longer measure favor by outcomes. We measure growth by faithfulness. We no longer fear losing because we understand that with God, nothing surrendered is ever wasted.

In every competition, in every conflict, in every crossroads where two prayers rise in opposite directions, God remains steady. His love remains constant. His purposes remain intact. And His invitation remains clear: trust Me beyond the outcome, honor Me in every result, and discover that the truest victory was never about the scoreboard at all, but about the soul that learned to walk with Me through both celebration and sorrow, through both open doors and closed ones, through both applause and silence, until faith itself becomes the triumph that no rival, no circumstance, and no temporary loss can ever take away.

Your friend, Douglas Vandergraph

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[15.ii.26.b : dimanche / 8 February] Here’s the opening line from V.W.’s essay “On Being Ill”:

Considering how common illness is, how tremendous the spiritual change that it brings, how astonishing, when the lights of health go down, the undiscovered countries that are then disclosed, what wastes and deserts of the soul a slight attack of influenza brings to view, what precipices and lawns sprinkled with bright flowers a little rise of temperature reveals, what ancient and obdurate oaks are uprooted in us by the act of sickness, how we go down into the pit of death and feel the waters of annihilation close above our heads and wake thinking to find ourselves in the presence of the angels and the harpers when we have a tooth out and come to the surface in the dentist’s armchair and confuse his ‘Rinse the mouth – rinse the mouth’ with the greeting of the Deity stooping from the floor of heaven to welcome us – when we think of this, as we are so frequently forced to think of it, it becomes strange indeed that illness has not taken its place with love and battle and jealousy among the prime themes of literature. Novels, one would have thought, would have been devoted to influenza; epic poems to typhoid; odes to pneumonia; lyrics to toothache. But no …

In May of 2020, I became ill or (rather) an illness inhabited me (by forced entry), but as annoying as this unwanted guest was, the illness didn’t interest me as a subject worthy of contemplation, only of enduring and (in the beginning) I assumed that I would need only endure for a short time before this too should pass. I ignored the illness as best I could. It wasn’t “my” illness. I wanted nothing to do with it. Please leave me alone, go away, I said. You’re not welcome. I refused to acknowledge this illness or even talk about it. When recently, I mentioned this illness (now in its sixth year) to a close friend, he said, “I had no idea. You never talk about it.” Why would I talk about it? Why should I want to? It’s bad enough to have to suffer the illness, let alone spend any effort to acknowledge it. Why describe an experience that one does not wish to be having? In refusing to talk about this illness that I wouldn’t even acknowledge as mine, I also refused to write about it. The idea of a literature of illness made me sick.

Since the middle of last November, I’ve been attempting a cure. I’ve restructured my daily life around creating the conditions under which this illness would grow tired of residing in my body. I have been (through a process of elimination) searching for its source of sustenance for the sole purpose of cutting that source off. What I wanted was to make my body so uninviting to the illness that it would become impatient & disgusted and leave, to look for some other soul to afflict (even though I wouldn’t wish this illness on anyone), one that would perhaps show it a better welcome and embrace it as their very own illness to be loved and cherished and submitted to. But after three months of austerity, this illness has displayed a serene indifference to my elective suffering, mortifications adopted to expel it made no impression whatsoever. And so here the illness remains, kicked back in a comfortable chair with its feet up sipping bourbon & smoking a cigar. “Think you can get rid of me that easy, old son?” says the illness. “I think you’ll discover that you and I are alike in many ways. You are obstinate and never give up, no matter what, you hang on even when you know you’ve lost and there’s no hope. Well, that’s me. I’m the bitter pill that refused to come up, the tick that burrows in so deep that to extract it will cost a pound of flesh. So go right ahead. Take your cure. Test me. See how true I am to you. My devotion to you burns with a greater passion than Dido showed for Aeneas.”

[15.ii.26.a : dimanche / 19 January] Vita has just this moment left V.W. … what does she feel? languid, like waking up after a long blissful dream and wanting to hang onto that feeling, but knowing that it will fade and the inflooding reality of the present will wash away the ecstasy that came with giving oneself over to fantasy. One walks through the world holding on to sweet sleep, dulling the senses against the noise of the world, the shouts in the street, the affronts of the indifferent world that doesn’t care about your personal experience of joy and whether it persists or fades to become a simulacrum.

V.W. writes:

“Oh & mixed up with this is the invigoration of again beginning my novel, in the Studio, for the first time this morning. All these fountains play on my being & intermingle. I feel a lack of stimulus, of marked days, now Vita is gone … & she has 4 days journey through the snow.”

Something about that last line stirs within me, an image of a woman dressed all in white, bundled in white fur (polar bear skin?) … I see her sitting in the back of a white car with a black vinyl top, her hands buried in a muff. The car glides along a snow-covered road and she stares into the forest thick with snow-covered trees.

A cluttered desk overflowing with DVDs, game controllers, and a computer setup highlights the challenge of balancing a busy to-do list with the pursuit of better health and productivity.

I haven't blogged lately for several reasons. I have been feeling much better from my Obstructive Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy (I have blogged extensively about it in several past posts). I will just say my Camzyos and Metoprolol 200 mg ER twice daily seems to be working. I am sleeping at night and I hardly feel my heart symptoms anymore. The only lingering negative is a high heart rate most of the time, even when sleeping. But I have more energy, and that is actually why I haven't been blogging as much.

I know what you are thinking: if you are feeling better, why aren't you blogging? Well, it is because I am catching up on backlogged personal projects I have wanted to get done, and spending too much money in the process. Ever since AI came on the scene, I have been getting up to speed and, with its help, doing things I have wanted to do but didn't have the knowledge or know where to look. For instance, I have over 2,000 discs (DVDs, CDs, and Blu-rays) from over 30 years of accumulation that I am finally archiving and getting into my Plex server for my home. I had no one to ask and couldn't find resources, so I just had the discs sitting around, many never opened, as I relied on streaming services. But I have been on a purge of subscription services since early last year. I am also finding approximately 100 DVDs that have either disc rot or are scratched. That last one really hurts, as most of the disc-rotted and scratched discs have never been opened. So there has been a renewed sense of urgency on my part to get these things archivally backed up.

All the while, I have been using Windsurf AI IDE and other tools to make software that I want to use and customize for myself, like a Personal Poster that posts to all my social media platforms and a separate blog poster program to post to all my different sites without having to worry about cutting and pasting.

Then there is continuing to build out my homelab and home server setup, and again, thanks to AI. I ask and it helps and puts it in a way I can understand. It is a resource I have never had before. I have also been trying to stay ahead of the negative side of AI causing prices to spike on computer hardware so that I will not have to have a computer subscription like the one recently introduced by HP (windowscentral.com). I refuse to rent a PC. I have never leased a car and will not lease a PC. At what point do companies take subscriptions too far? Personally, I think we are there.

So with all of this, plus working so I can afford to buy and pay for everything, I have been rather busy. The only things I want to write about and express my feelings on lately are my other health conditions (which I may do) and politics/economics, which are driving me crazy and I am trying to stay away from because I don't think anyone cares about my opinions on these matters.

All that said, I am still here and I have not gone anywhere. I just have a lot on my plate right now. Hopefully I will be back to writing more regularly soon, and I will have plenty to share about what I have been working on.

Links may be shortened via mtribe.link for cleaner formatting. All links redirect to their original destinations.

#personal #productivity

goin' racin'!

Along with race fans around the world, my attention today will be focused on the Daytona 500 NASCAR Cup Race. Pre Race Coverage is being broadcast by FOX and is now on my TV. College Basketball will have to play without me today, I'm goin' racin'!

And the adventure continues.

3 February 2026

Noting down what Jake (Lamerton) said during his visit about “remoteness.” A useful and interesting word in the context of my work that I had not really pinned before. Came up when speaking about On diversion (which is hopefully going into the show he's curating next month), but I suppose it has always applied as a subconscious aspiration. And I've been feeling it in droves via Lee Friedlander's work, specifically a handful of his many photographs of American landscapes: Livingston, Montana (1970), Knoxville, Tennessee (1971), Victor, Colorado (2001). In these, remoteness is something privately clarifying, all the more rich and attentive for its detachment from the infinite noise and possibility of populated space. Generous in its isolating force.

Here’s my release for the evening. A word appetizer. A salad before the main course. The last time I was in this space, I spoke of love vampire energies. I don’t need to, but in case any person with conscious awareness is reading this, I have decided to mindfully explain myself.

Every word or action we choose is powerful enough to change or affect other souls and energies. I take responsibility.

There was something about a certain situation that irked me. I was irked because I allowed myself to feel “more” than the situation required. Upon further meditation, I refuse to react so irrationally either. I have vomited the previous entry, and I return with more peace in my heart.

I was referring to certain people as vampires, because they move and act as such. As if they are not human, as if they are not mortal and fallible. They act as if the laws of the universe do not apply to them. They travel and move about in this world, as if they can pick and choose when to appear and disappear from people’s lives, and everyone else on the receiving end, simply must “accept” or risk losing them completely. This is not love. I shall not even attach the word to what I had previously called them.

Alas! We are all mortals. Everything is impermanent and as such, no matter how you choose to live your life—there will be consequences.

Every cause has an effect and vice versa. Everything is connected. And hurtful action is hurtful. Intention is one thing, but if you care for someone, no matter what you intended, can you soften enough to repair? To take steps toward into love?

1 February 2026

Third man (working title): the interior of my new house has been unfolding itself more and more. There's a wall hook guiding two sets of fairy lights across the living room that looks like a boy's face gazing skyward. Reminded me of the child in one of Botticelli's Madonna and Child paintings (the one from 1470, one of the handful at the National Gallery in D.C.). The hook and lights became the face's body, and as a full image I think these elements simply became an excuse to riff on the way color is deployed in a work from the Mughal Empire that I found via Luhring Augustine Gallery's archives and have been taken by: Bust portrait of a prince, probably Muhammad Sultan, the son of Aurangzeb (probably by Hunhar c. 1670). It's essentially a Josef Albers. Gorgeous tangerine against a sky blue framed by a fleshy faded orange with touches of pale yellows and greens. Ultimately the painting broke away from that scheme (deeper blues, greens, pinks appeared) and it seems like it became about a kind of tension between the oranges and pinks, maybe a relationship that implies but also negates an optical mix.

At first there is only the bright indifference of The Fool—not chaos, not order, but unbounded possibility. Zero without edge. No center, no circumference. Then a step occurs: not movement in space, but a narrowing. The infinite tilts toward “this.”

That tilt is The Magus. He does not create the world; he selects. Out of boundlessness he speaks a word—one. The act of naming is contraction: a point hammered into the void. Attention gathers. Infinity is pierced by focus.

But the moment “one” is spoken, an immeasurable counterfield appears. To say “this” is to imply “not-this,” and the contraction generates its own horizon. That horizon is The Priestess—not another word, but the reflection of all possible words the first word excludes. If the Magus is the point, she is the infinite number line extending in both directions. His focus necessitates her expansion. The Fool’s boundlessness, once narrowed, reappears as depth.

And then the point begins to stick.

Not by force, but by rhythm: the pulse of the Eternal Mother. The Empress is the womb forming around the named point—the living envelope that holds the Magus’ “one” long enough for it to become a thing. Naming becomes gestation. The word is no longer a flash; it is carried. The infinite reflections of the Priestess don’t dissolve the point; they press around it like waters around a seed, and the seed’s persistence calls the womb into being. Here creation isn’t “made.” It’s held.

From that holding comes the counterpoint: what the womb can hold, it can also repeat. The Emperor is the Priestess-like reflection of wombs everywhere—multiplication stabilized into territory. The Empress says, “Let this be carried.” The Emperor replies, “Let it be organized.” Where the Mother gives a single center warmth and continuity, the Father draws borders so many centers can coexist without collapsing back into the sea. A private gestation becomes a public order: households into cities, cradles into citadels. The point has a home; now the home becomes a world.

Once there is a world, it demands a principle that can move through it without losing itself. The Hierophant is the breath of meaning that passes through the Emperor’s structures like a chant through stone arches. He doesn’t invent morality; he makes the invisible rules of belonging speakable. He teaches the empire to remember it came from a womb, and the womb to remember it is not merely personal. Tradition is the umbilical cord that survives the birth.

But the moment a teaching is spoken, it splits inside the listener: “me” and “what is taught.” The Lovers appear as the first conscious cleaving. Inside the womb, there was only holding; inside the empire, there is only law. Here, for the first time, there is relation—the ache of twoness, the shock of choice, the recognition that union is not automatic. The One must be chosen again, freely.

Choice needs a vehicle. The Chariot is the will that rides out from the Mother’s warmth and the Father’s borders carrying both. It is the child of womb and empire: protected enough to move, constrained enough to steer. The Chariot is identity as motion—the “I” that can travel through the many without being dissolved by the many.

But motion creates friction, and friction reveals imbalance. Adjustment is the hidden mathematics of the Mother and the Father negotiating inside experience: how much holding, how much boundary; how much mercy, how much law. It isn’t punishment—it’s calibration. The point keeps trying to become absolute; the number line keeps reminding it of infinity. Adjustment is the continual re-centering of the standpoint so it can remain true without becoming rigid.

When calibration is trusted, power no longer needs armor. Lust is raw life welcomed back into the center. The lion is the Mother’s surge; the rider is the Father’s direction. Not domination—embrace. Energy is no longer treated as threat, but as sacrament. The point of view becomes incandescent because it stops flinching from its own force.

Incandescence eventually turns inward, not out of fear but out of refinement. The Hermit is the point withdrawing from the empire’s noise to find the lamp that was always lit inside the womb. This is solitude as simplification: the world is still there, but the center no longer needs constant confirmation. The witness begins to taste itself as witness.

Then the empire reveals its deeper truth: it is not a monument, but a wheel. Fortune spins the structures. Dynasties rise and fall; moods, meanings, and identities cycle. The Hermit’s lamp watches the turning and realizes: “I was never the wheel. I am the seeing of the wheel.”

And yet seeing the wheel is not freedom from it. The turning continues, and the point discovers it is suspended upon it. The Hanged Man is the voluntary inversion: the standpoint releases its insistence on uprightness. What seemed below is now above; what seemed gain is loss. The point hangs between heaven and earth and learns that perspective is sacrifice. To see truly, it must surrender its preferred orientation.

From that surrender comes Death—not annihilation, but transformation. The named point, once carried by the womb and protected by the empire, now dissolves its former identity. Forms fall away like husks. What dies is the rigidity of the standpoint; what remains is continuity through change. The wheel keeps turning, but the one who clung to a particular spoke is gone.

Out of this dissolution arises Art—the alchemy of reconciliation. Opposites once held apart are now blended deliberately. The Mother’s waters and the Father’s fire are poured back and forth until a new substance emerges. This is not a return to the womb, nor a reassertion of empire, but a conscious integration. The point of view becomes a laboratory in which contradictions are harmonized. The center learns to compose.

But harmony reveals another tether. Even integrated, the standpoint still identifies with its creations. The Devil is the crystallization of attachment: the seductive solidity of “mine.” Chains are not imposed; they are chosen. The empire, the womb, the alchemy—all can become idols. The point mistakes its temporary configuration for its essence and binds itself to the dance.

When the binding becomes unbearable, revelation strikes. The Tower is the violent mercy that shatters false permanence. The structures built from attachment crack open. Lightning does not destroy truth; it destroys pretense. What collapses is the illusion that the standpoint could secure itself through possession or control.

In the sudden openness, The Star appears—cool, clear, unguarded. The center no longer clutches. It pours itself out freely, trusting the vastness it once feared. This is the Mother without confinement, the field without contraction. Hope is simply alignment with what is.

Yet even in clarity, the depths stir. The Moon returns as the subtle play of shadow and memory. The infinite reflections of the Priestess ripple through subconscious waters. The point must walk through ambiguity without rebuilding chains. Here, intuition guides where certainty cannot.

Then dawn: The Sun. Direct awareness floods the field. Nothing is hidden; nothing is exaggerated. The standpoint shines as itself—simple, immediate, alive. The child reappears, but now informed by sacrifice, death, integration, and release. Joy is conscious.

From that radiance sounds The Aeon—a new proclamation. The old word “one,” spoken by the Magus at the beginning, is re-heard at a higher octave. Identity is judged and renewed. The center recognizes itself not as isolated point, but as expression of the whole current of being. Time bends around this recognition.

And finally, The Universe. The dance completes itself. All wombs and empires, all wheels and sacrifices, all dissolutions and integrations, all bindings and liberations, arrange themselves into a single, balanced mandala. The elements stand in equilibrium; the motion is effortless.

The descent has fulfilled its arc: from all possibility to a single, concrete standpoint at the center of a cosmos.

And that center is empty.

Empty like the womb that first held the word. Empty like the hub of the wheel that allowed its turning. Empty like the sky in which stars appear. The Fool’s zero, narrowed into a point and carried through birth, law, love, sacrifice, death, art, bondage, and revelation, stands now as the Universe’s witness—precisely located, yet containing nothing of its own.

From that emptiness, everything shines.

(A Tract from the Church of the Ever-Changing Moment)

Beloved of the flickering now—

You keep trying to hold still. That’s adorable.

But the river has already revised you three times since you started this sentence. The breath you just took? A coup. The thought you’re about to think? A regime change. The self you defend so carefully? Last season’s weather.

We do not worship stability here. We worship participation.

The Ever-Changing Moment is not chaos; it is choreography. Not randomness, but improvisation so intimate it feels like surprise. The oak is not confused by its leaves falling. The ocean is not ashamed of its waves collapsing. Why should you be embarrassed by your becoming?

You say you want certainty. What you really want is trust.

Trust that you can meet what arrives. Trust that the next version of you will be adequate to the next version of the world. Trust that loss is a costume change, not a disappearance.

Here is our liturgy:

• Notice what is happening.
• Stop arguing with it.
• Respond as if this, too, belongs.

That’s it. No incense required. No metaphysics exam at the door. Just this bright, vanishing instant—arriving again as if it has never failed you.

We do not promise permanence. We promise presence.

And presence, dear pilgrim, is the only miracle that keeps happening.

What is changing in you today that you’re tempted to resist?

It’s almost 5 in the morning and I’m about to pass out, but we met up and I gave her her stuff, and we talked a little bit and we both didn’t want to end things, but we talked about things very civilly. We agreed to talk in a week and take some space until then, and a big thing was we became codependent and started losing individuality.

Stay entertained thanks to our Weekly Tracker giving you next week's Anticipated Movies & Shows, Most Watched & Returning Favorites, and Shows Changes & Popular Trailers.

Anticipated Movies

• Jimpa
• ☆ Redux Redux
• Wasteman
• The Dreadful
• Psycho Killer

Anticipated Shows

• Reality Check: Inside America's Next Top Model
• Being Gordon Ramsay
• Wild Boys: Strangers in Town
• ☆ 56 Days
• Portobello
• Murder in Glitterball City
• Strip Law

Returing Favorites

• ☆ Family Guy — Season 24
• Dark Winds — Season 4
• Last Week Tonight with John Oliver — Season 13
• The Night Agent — Season 3
• The Last Thing He Told Me — Season 2
• Britain's Got Talent — Season 19

Trending Shows Status Changes

• Steal — Ended → Returning Series
• Lord of the Flies — Returning Series → Ended
• The Art of Sarah — Returning Series → Ended

Most Watched Movies this Week

• = The Housemaid
• new Marty Supreme
• -1 The Wrecking Crew
• +1 Zootopia 2
• new Primate
• -3 Anaconda
• -3 Greenland 2: Migration
• = Predator: Badlands
• -3 The Rip
• -1 Hamnet

Most Watched Shows this Week

• new A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms
• = The Pitt
• -2 Fallout
• = The Rookie
• new Shrinking
• +1 Hijack
• new Star Trek: Starfleet Academy
• new The Lincoln Lawyer
• new Jujutsu Kaisen
• new Wonder Man

Popular Trailers

• It's game time! GOAT is now playing! — GOAT
• Be mine. — Scream 7
• Hoppy Valentines — Hoppers
• Masterpiece Review — Crime 101
• Only In Cinemas Now — “Wuthering Heights”
• Video — Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die
• Save the date. — Cold Storage
• Season 2 Episode 7 Preview — The Pitt
• It's not that simple — Send Help
• Ella is... — Ella McCay

Hi, I'm Kevin 👋. I make apps and I love watching movies and TV shows. If you like what I'm doing, you can buy one of my apps, download and subscribe to Rippple for Trakt or just buy me a ko-fi ☕️.

I won’t disclose how many years I was married, but let’s just say it was a long time, well over twenty years.

During that time, I uncovered two separate instances of infidelity. Once I discovered myself. The other was brought to me by a family member.

If you’re reading this and you’re in one of those moments right now, whether you just found out, you’re trying to repair it, or you’re quietly planning your exit, I’m not minimizing the complexity. There are kids. There are assets. There is history. I’m simply speaking to the emotional baseline.

It’s horrific.

Reader, I genuinely feel for you.

As a man, I questioned everything: my manhood, my value, my judgment. All of it.

I chose not to stay. And ultimately, the decision was made for me when she filed.

At the time, she believed she was moving toward something better. She was already involved in another relationship and thought it would blossom. A close friend later told me the thrill eventually faded. When she pushed for something serious, it collapsed.

Her children are now at odds with her. One of them discovered messages that confirmed a relationship that was, frankly, vile.

There is such a thing as consequences. Call it karma if you want.

And I won’t pretend I was perfect. I had faults. But nothing that warranted betrayal.

She chose not to grow with me through the fight of life.

I won’t simp for anyone. And neither should you.

#divorce #marriage #simping

One time when I was running slowly around a pond by the camping one evening, there was a boat by the dock with the diving tower, dredging for a corpse.

The next day, young children and grown ups were swimming in there as usual, with their colourful bathing suits on, or just having a wonderful time at the sun lit beach, casually sunbathing or drinking slush from the kiosk by the tall pine trees nearby.

Happy children or adults with giant bellies back flipping off the diving tower, then returning to surface, but this boy didn’t.

Imagine having survived fleeing from war and poverty, the hazardous boat trip across the Mediterranean Sea, only to drown in this way..

And that I just jogged past this boat like it was just another day as any other, because it was.