The band we're (0DFx, that is) playing with on Friday at Square Records in Akron is Whornz not Horns as I previously stated. In their flier they correctly state that we were punk rock when the lizard me ruled. Damn lizard men. Such a pain in the ass they were.Yesterday I started writing two new articles. One for Suicide Girls was about porn (again, sigh). That'll go up on May 26th. The other one is about being famous. I'll probably try and place that in a magazine. If I'm successful, I'll let you know where it shows up.
I'll paraphrase the second one briefly. When 0DFx played Pat's in the Flats last weekend, this drunk guy came up to me in the toilet going, "You're Brad Warner aren't you? You're famous!" He seemed angry about this. "I should be famous!" I thought he might try to piss on me, but he didn't. "What's it like being famous?" he sneered. I was tempted to say, it's like having some drunk guy harass you in the toilet in a bar.
To the extent that I'm famous, which is not very much, it's generally a pain in the ass (like those lizard men). People you thought were your friends suddenly turn on you. I had one "dharma brother" tell me, “I wonder what you have been up to on your tour of TV shows and magazine articles as a minor celebrity over there in the US, sitting around in your bright golden robe and waving your stick around.” Another one said he was going to, “go public with every resource I have privately and on the internet to make you a laughingstock, to tell folks what I think of you, to embarrass you. I will speak out, you embarrassment to yourself, our teacher, (and) all of us associated with this.” Jealousy is fun stuff.
Yet jealousy never makes any sense. It's the idea that I ought to have what he's got. But that's never true. Whatever someone has achieved they've achieved, not through random chance or through the unfairness of life, but through their own efforts. Not only that, but they now have to deal with whatever it is they've achieved. And you probably couldn't deal with it.
This whole "I'm going to expose the truth about you" thing is a recurring theme. Considering that I've made a career out of exposing the very worst of my self to public scrutiny I really have to wonder. I mean, did my "dharma brother" (drama brother, more like) think he could do a better job of turning me into a laughing stock than I'm already doing? Go ahead and try.
So far I've gotten all of the downside of being famous without any of the perks. I'm not rich, I don't get offered good seats in restaurants, no one yet has thrown a pair of panties at me during a book signing or lecture. Yet all kinds of people expect me to live up to whatever image they've created in their minds about what I ought to be. That's what it's like being famous.
Buddha and Dogen both cautioned against pursuing fame and wealth. Some people think this attitude of caution was born of some profound and mystical insight into the hidden nature of reality. But actually both Buddha and Dogen were celebrities in their day and I'm certain they were speaking from personal experience. Fame and wealth are held up by society as some kind of panacea that will cure everything that's wrong with you. People pursue them thinking that once they achieve the proper degree of notoriety and money everything will be solved. Ain't gonna happen.
Anyway, that's the general thrust of the article. I'll let you know when it gets published.
Here's the remaining gigs:
On Friday May 9th Zero Defex will play an in-store show at Square Records in Akron's Highland Square with Whornz. Starts at 7:00.
Saturday May 10th at 7 PM I'll do a book signing and talk at Visible Voice Books in Cleveland, Ohio’s Tremont neighborhood.
On May 17th and 18th I'll lead a 2-day retreat at the Milwaukee Zen Center.
I'll be one of the teachers at this year's Great Sky Zen Sesshin August 9-16. Check out their webpage for details.
The annual Dogen Sangha retreat in Shizuoka, Japan will be September 20-23.
