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My Bed

James Broughton's "The Bed"

A mattress made of horse hair—historical, flammable.  A grandmother’s hand-me-down but she was not my grandmother.  There was no sentiment to keep this ancient artifact when it began to deteriorate.

I tossed it out for a Sears mattress, three times as thick as grandma’s with a pillow top and an equally high box spring to match.  It proofed to be somewhat a mistake.  The old bed frame was a tad too narrow for the new boxy-box so four planks were lain widthwise to keep the whole thing from tipping.

Compare this delicate balance to James Broughton’s short film, The Bed, upon which various vigorous activities were performed:  Broughton’s bed rolled down a hill, was used as a trampoline, a celebratory altar of love, sex and its progeny.  The bed is a place for birth and death, the womb we go back to every night,  a magic carpet that takes the sleeper into the dream world.  I think of Broughton’s bed when I go to bed. Sometimes when the planks are out of alignment and the mattress tilts it might well be that it is taking off.

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The Education Of…

A passage from Henry Adams’ The Education of Henry Adams:  “From cradle to grave this problem of running order through chaos, direction through space, discipline through freedom, unity through multiplicity, has always been, and must always be, the task of education, as it is the moral of religion, philosophy, science, art, politics and economy; but a boy’s will is his life, and he dies when it is broken, as the colt dies in harness, taking a new nature in becoming tame.”

James Broughton’s memoir, Coming Unbuttoned:  “Although I was born cheerful, my mother did her utmost to beat the cheer out of me.”

If I had read these passages when I was a young parent, I wonder what my attitude would be toward my children.

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“Adventure — not Predicament”

Four in the Afternoon, a film by James Broughton

To have a life of adventure is a dream.  To make it come true takes guts.

Society’s dictum is tried and true.  The “I” is always a problem when it decides to go on an adventure.   All kinds of hurt and failed relations are the usual suspect.  What price is “freedom”?  What price is “adventure”?   It is important to remember the “price” often has nothing to do with the person who has stepped out of the circle, but the ones who prefer to stay in the predicament.

Poet and film maker James Broughton’s gravestone reads: Adventure — not Predicament.

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