RINTRAH–THE LION WHO WOKE TOO LATE: ME

02 Mar 2026 Leave a comment

by davidfekete123 in Uncategorized Tags: , , , ,

Rintrah slept most of their lives. Incarnated as The Dave for the last remembered time, The Dave never knew what to grow up to be–despite, at 18, asking everyone.

He is an Artist at 70, and 20th-Century America didn’t have aptitude tests for that career choice. Still doesn’t.

I came to Canada in 2006 to begin a new career as a Swedenborgian Christian Minister. I was un the middle of a drawing that I asked a female bass player to pose for, while I took some stills to work from. I loved the way she played upright, acoustic bass with her eyes half closed. I approached her after the show and she thought I was a musician (I was a memory of a musician, then), who wanted to jam out on her bass. “Our policy is to refuse . . .” she started to say.

When I explained myself more fully, she graciously stood and began to play, eyes half-closed. I snapped some stills with a disposable camera I bought at a drug store: there were no cell phones back then.

Among all my worldly goods, I brought my portfolio to Canada for a “real job” called Swedenborgian Christian Minister. After 3 years of never drawing, before Canada I had drawn THE BEST SKETCH I EVER MADE ALL MY LIFE. I do not understand it. No practice drawings. Must be my Muse awakened.
I took the Drawing to an art shop to have an Artist frame it. “Please take care! I don’t think I can draw like his again!” I exclaimed! It’s on a stand on the floor, next to my piano keyboards, in my temporary Government-Housing, man cave. No big-screen tv in my man cave, although I like movies.

MY FRIENDS, WHY DID I STOP DRAWING???!!! Tell me because I don’t know.

I quit Swedenborgian Christian Ministry June 18, 2023 and I believe believers resent me quitting, resent me. I still believe, won’t stop believing. Just don’t want the job of professional believing. The pay is bad.

THE UNIVERSE awoke me from my slumber with one eye awake. Probably because it was sick, sick and tired of the Art spectre I was haunting Artists I wasn’t.

ENIGMATIC DR DAVE ENTERPRISES, PRELUDED

I am 70 years old. I quit Christian Ministry at 68 years old. But that’s just me.

Isn’t it remarkable how free-flowing this narrative is, without systematic development, like my sermons or published Articles in University Journals. Artistic–eh? We say “eh” in Canada.

An Art photo from a Social Worker’s waiting room.

Fame

23 Aug 2018 Leave a comment

by davidfekete123 in Uncategorized Tags: , , , , , , ,

Fame and success are not always meted out in a person’s lifetime.  Some great artist were relatively obscure in their own lives, and did not know that they would be important later, after their demise.  All they knew was that their work didn’t catch on.  And they were unknown–and that, for their whole lives.  They didn’t make it.

William Blake was known to some of the Romantic poets, but achieved no real fame.  Shelley wrote these verses about his own life,

Alas! I have nor hope nor health,

Nor peace within nor calm around,

Nor that content surpassing wealth

The sage in meditation found,

And walked with inward glory crowned—

Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leisure.

Others I see whom these surround—

Smiling they live, and call life pleasure;

To me that cup has been dealt in another measure.

F. Scott Fitzgerald had fame and money, but failed to find critical acceptance as an artist.  His greatest novel, The Great Gatsby, didn’t sell much and went out of print in a few years.  Fitzgerald died thinking himself a failure.

Now we study Blake, Shelley, and Fitzgerald in literature classes, and all these writers are considered great.  Every high school student in the United States reads The Great Gatsby.

Hemingway and T.S. Eliot had fame all through their lives, and the respect of the artistic community.  Hemingway also had wealth.  Intellectual fashion is now debating whether they are still as great as they used to be, but I suspect the laurel wreath will not be taken away in the end.

But Shelley and Fitzgerald had respect among the community of artists in their day.  Coleridge and Wordsworth knew and respected Shelley.  And Hemingway was Fitzgerald’s close friend.  Even in Hemingway’s scathing stories about Fitzgerald in A Moveable Feast, Hemingway praises Fitzgerald as a great artist.

Fame may not be the best measure of a person’s worth.  Respect from one’s peers, self-respect, believing in oneself, and the joy of creation alone are not fame, but are abiding satisfactions in lieu of fame.  While an artist wants recognition, it is satisfying to enjoy one’s own creations privately, while perhaps also enjoying favorable reception from a few who matter.