It’s almost never easy to fill these things out. My legal name is Paul Kerollos and that’s where the ‘PK’ bit comes from. My earlier online pseudonym was ‘plzcallmebabe’ and that’s where the ‘dababe’ suffix / appositive / descriptor comes from. What am I about? Who am I? Answering that is something like sticking a flag in the ground saying, ‘I AM ___’ and vowing to never change on that statement. I’m sure there are things I could say that I’m quite confident will remain true for the rest of my life I guess: I am creative, curious, an intellectual who’s interested in abstract ideas, kind of silly and unassuming at times, someone who loves to be out in nature.
I guess those things are true about me forever. I think. Do they have tests for that?
Someone who I think is really awesome and brilliant said I was ‘perspicacious’ [per – spi – kay – shuss] which means “having a ready insight into and understanding of things”. Not to be confused with “perspicuous” [puh-spi-kyoo-uhs] which means easily understood. I guess the latter one depends on who’s doing the understanding. It’s really hit or miss with me. I think.
The Greek philosopher Heraclitus who died around the 5th century BC was very interested in the flux of things, and change. He would’ve loved differential equations. One of his central philosophical ideas are the ‘unity of opposites’.
It’s a different take on the ‘yin and yang’ concept I guess. That something can’t exist without the other, always existing in a state of tension.
You might have heard his quote about rivers:
True stability is but an illusion, he says. The person stepping into the river changes with the water in the river, and the movement of water erodes the riverbanks and causes lakes to form.
Centuries later, we find out that virtual particles are constantly popping in and out of existence. Even the hard vacuum of space is in a state of flux!
I guess in a ‘Ship of Theseus’ kind of way, I am unsure what to write about myself, as the components of my vessel are constantly in a state of flux.
But I can say that I do strive to continuously, and authentically convey my evolution as an artist, and as a person, through my art. And hopefully if you read a line or listen to a tune, or come to a show, it might help you too.