2011

I started 2011 with a standing ovation from my direct supervisor, colleagues, even the president of my company.  I had completed the $12 million project on time and under budget.  I had saved the company, nay, been the instrument to launch it to a new level of prestige in the security industry.  They were giddy with glee.  I went on to manage two other projects successfully – projects that were shockingly poorly planned and handed to me to fix.  Which I did, with dozens of hours of my own personal time.

My oldest son that most of my readers know, Zach, re-embraced his Christian faith after a 2+ year wandering from the faith.  He had also spurned his private school (with much pain to his parents) and enrolled in public school.  And then after only 7 weeks, was happily back in the old private school.  Two wonderful events for me and the family.

There are two equal and opposite catastrophes with which we end 2011.  The company that was hailing my bright ascendant star in January laid me off in October.  It is December 30, and I am nowhere near having a job.

The other catastrophe is in the form of two dogs that we got back in August.  This is no joke – I am actively looking for a new home for them.  Please contact me if you can provide them a home.  We cannot keep them.  They have destroyed so much property, we may never recover.  They are very friendly and sweet.  But everybody has heartbreak over some item they have chewed to bits.  Shoes, electronics, cash.  Our back yard looks like the third circle of hell.  They have chewed up our living room carpet, baseboards, siding.  They have destroyed the fence to the neighbor’s yard.  They are a close second to my losing my job for “worst thing that had happened to our family on 2011” and in the top 10 list for Worst Things Ever.

However, I think Zach coming back to his faith overrules all other events in making this year a “good” year for our family.

Stupid questions writers ask

1. hello?  is this microphone on?
2. Am I a writer?
3. Should I adopt a name that sounds more authorial?  Should I just use my first two initials like J. K. Rowling or C. S. Lewis? 
4. Does drinking really affect my writing as Barton Fink says?  Should I abstain while I write for the sake of my art?
5. Am I really a writer?
6. Maybe I dont need insurance after all.
7. Is there a muse?  Where was she last week when I needed her and turned in her absence to drinking?
8. Does anyone know who I really am, on the inside?
9. What if they find out who I really am, on the inside?!
10. Am I a writer, because I dont feel like a writer.  I feel like a dork wanna-be who occasionally can turn a phrase but really should just settle for quiet desperation and be happy when the end comes because I have too many obligations and everybody knows that you cant make a living as a writer unless you are Danielle Steele or Cormac McCarthy or one of the other twelve writers in the world who lives on the proceeds from their writing, thanks to the Big Book Industry Publishers to whom they sold their souls for $0.75 royalty per copy while the fat cats get rich – oh, not the editors.  No, they get their $64k and pension.  Im talking about the top dogs who moderate Board meetings and give themselves 2.6million bonuses and disappear when the company goes bankrupt and thousands of employees lose their retirement.  for what?  So that rich middle-aged Barbie dolls can have a book to read next summer on the beach at Acapulco or on their husband’s yacht?  Is that what I do?  Because I might as well sell the lower half of my body to a college junior on spring break in Las Vegas because I am not willing to be a whore for The Book Industry.  If that’s what it’s come to, forget it.  I am holding out for the few hundred worldwide who read a book looking for a space to think.  And that’s what a book is – space for a serious man to think.  And that number drops by 17 every year due  to attrition, while 5 more are added.  So that our numbers are dwindling.  in the twilight of our age.  God help us.

An interview with John Common

At the suggestion of another blog I read, I am going to interview myself as an aspiring writer to try to get at some of the knotty questions about who this guy, John Common, is and what is the nature of his quest as a writer.

Me:  In your last blog post, you revealed that you had started a new book, The Former Hero.  Can you tell us a little bit about it?

John Common:  Sure.  It is similar to the movie Magnolia or Crash in that there are 4 or 5 narrative threads and the action develops from one to the other throughout the book.  One of the threads deals with a man who used to be a superhero, but he has lost his super powers, and is in a hospital trying to figure out how to get them back.  Another thread deals with a honest detective in a corrupt police force – a would-be hero against insurmountable forces.  Another is about a woman who could use a hero – her daughter has been abducted.  All of these characters relate to one another in the book.

Me:  Hm.  Sounds complicated.  Are you sure you can pull this off?

JC:  By no means.  And yes, it is quite complicated.

Me:  Well do you have it all mapped out in your mind, have you outlined it to the finish?

JC:  I have a vague idea of how it will end.  But no idea how Im going to get there.  Im making it up as I go.

Me:  You’ve got some kinda balls, Mister.  Who do you think you are, Dostoyevsky?

JC:  I secretly believe that Im writing under the influence of the Holy Spirit.

Me:  Under the…  You have to excuse me.  You’re starting to creep me out.  You’re basically saying that you are special, that your work is…well, let’s just say it…inspired by God.  Should we add it into our Bibles, right after revelation?  Just staple it in there?

JC:  Well it’s got a lot of vulgaries and blasphemies in it, so I dont think the 2011 version of the Council of Carthage would accept it.

Me:  OK, you bring up a good point.  Are you a Christian?

JC:  Yes, if that’s what you want to call it.

Me:  Well what would you call it?

JC:  Im a seeker of the truth.

Me:  What’s wrong with “Christian”?

JC:  A lot of people who might respond to the truth are turned off by the word “Christian.”  So-called Christians have done much to embitter the very world they want to win against themselves.

Me:  You’re a self-righteous prig.  Alright, so what have Christians done, and what gives you the right to judge them all, and separate yourself from 2000 years of tradition?

JC:  We’re straying from the point here. 

Me:  Alright, so whatever you are, you are some variety of believer in Jesus.

JC:  Yes.

Me:  Then why do you use so much bad language in your writing?

JC:  There are several things to say here.  Firstly, as a writer, you have to be free to write a character as he/she really is.  You wouldn’t write a military drama with the soldiers all avoiding vulgar language.  Just because a Christian writer has a character saying vulgar things doesn’t mean that those words are in the writer’s mouth.  They are in the character’s mouth.  This is one of the mysteries of fictional composition – the characters must take on a somewhat independent existence from the author.  You may say that’s impossible because the character comes 100% from the author.  But therein lies the mystery that Christian non-writers frequently dont get.  Though the writer is responsible for every word the character says, the writer gives the character something of an autonomous existence in his mind.  He lets the character go in his imagination.  And if the character uses a blasphemy in the writer’s imagination, the writer’s obligation is to have the character be true to himself, and let the character speak the blasphemy, even if the writer himself would not say such a thing.

Me:  You realize this sounds like nonsense.  If it comes from your imagination, then you have a filthy imagination.  You can’t get around responsibility for the blasphemy – no matter how you slice it, it comes from you.

JC:  I said it was mysterious.  It is very much like the freewill/predestination debate.

Me:  Or maybe you just have blasphemous words in your imagination and you see a way to say them, so you write them in someone else’s mouth and wash your hands of it.

JC:  What sorts of blasphemies are you talking about?

Me:  Im certainly not going to say them. 

JC:  OK, allow me – God damn, Jesus Christ…what else?  Come to think of it, there aren’t that many.

Me:  The word ‘hell’.

JC:  That’s not a blasphemy.  Jesus said ‘hell’ many times.

Me:  OK, but when you say those other things you take the Lord’s name in vain, a violation of the 3rd commandment.

JC:  Paul said “Jesus Christ.”  And Jude tells of Jesus saying to Satan, “The Lord rebuke you.”  Which is basically the same message as “God damn you.”

Me:  Yes, but Paul and Jesus didn’t say it in a flippant way.  Paul spoke with reverence about Jesus.  And Jesus was speaking truthfully about damning Satan.

JC:  I can’t imagine the intent behind the 3rd commandment to be that no one should ever say one of these two thing flippantly – God damn and Jesus Christ.  Sure, you dont want to go around randomly calling down God’s judgment on people or things.  But what about when it’s appropriate?  What if I said, “Get that goddamn pornography out of this house.”  Would you be offended?

Me:  It would shake me up to hear it, but I guess I couldn’t complain.

JC:  That’s because instead of having the 3rd commandment at heart, we actually have a cultural convention at heart, a habit of polite speech.  It’s in our evangelical air.  You just dont say goddamn.  Ever.  But God’s name isn’t even ‘God’.  God is a noun, like “king” or “Mr. President”.  If someone said, “may the King of England throw you in prison,” we may think it was a rather odd saying.  But we wouldn’t be offended that the King’s name was smeared.  The king’s name is not “King”.  And the king himself would have no cause to be offended.

Me:  Ah, but haven’t you called upon his office, his kingship, to serve your private little annoyance?  If you said, “May the King send this stale pizza into eternal prison,” you have summoned his office and his severe judgment against something as trivial as pizza.

JC:  Dont you think the king himself would find such a thing humorous?

Me:  We can’t know what the king might find amusing, and it is safer to err on the side of caution.

JC:  No, it is not safer.  That’s the way the Pharisees lived, by creating a legal code to safely ensure they didn’t cross any lines of the law.  God was not pleased with that.  He is more honored when we use our minds and mouths intentionally.  If a thing like pornography deserves to be damned, then we should say it:  God damn pornography!

Me:  Ok, but what if your character says “Shut your god damn mouth?”  That is clearly summoning God’s office as Almighty God for a trivial matter.

JC:  Not if the words someone spoke truly should be damned by God.  And even if they were trivial, they may be true to the character, and therefore should be said, or run the risk of being false.  And if they are false, they are bad art.  And if they are bad art, they are ugly.  And since God is the author of beauty, it would contrary to the essence of God’s beauty to have a profane character speak in a way that is false to this character.  It would be tantamount to calling good evil and evil good.

Me:  Im going to have to think about this for a while.

An Excerpt from “The Former Hero”

This is an excerpt from my current novel project.  To those with more traditional sensibilities, mainly my mother, I warn that this book contains vulgarities and deity references often considered blasphemous.

A little context.  Mary’s daughter has been abducted and her husband has left. The city government is corrupt and police force was unhelpful.  She goes berserk and attempts suicide.  Taming her emotions with anti-depressants, she hits the road to look for some way of finding her daughter.  She hitched a ride with a guy on a motorcycle and drove to town.  She then spent the night in a homeless shelter.  On waking unmedicated, she cannot cope and again attempts suicide while waiting for more pills to kick in.  Through the veneer of suppressed emotions, she goes on. . .

When she stepped out through the thick metal doors at the front of the shelter, the streets were wet and dirty, and cold moist air gusted through the streets of the city. She hefted the duffel bag across her shoulder and shoved a free hand into a pocket and began walking, walking just to be walking, only trying to keep on the leeward side of buildings as she walked, but with no other direction or purpose. The previous night's rain had been enough to make the discarded newspapers and coffee cups soggy and the general grit and soot stick to the dumpsters and parking meters and leaves, but not enough to give the sort of the bath that the streets needed.

She found herself walking in a circle, around the block, and finally back in the direction she'd come the previous night, toward the diner. She slowed her pace and glanced into the front window at the patrons, huddled over their coffees in the half-light of the overcast morning. There were no policemen and no men in the eastern hats. The same fat motorcycle she'd ridden on last night was parked on the street in front, and there at a booth in a corner was the rider who had helped her.

He had a bandana tied around his skull and his tattered denim jacket was pulled close around his neck. He looked like he hadn't slept well, and he stirred cream and sugar into his cup mindlessly, a plate of uneaten toast to the side. When she stood beside his table, he looked up and gave a long sigh.

“Oh, for fuck's sake.”

She slowly slid into the booth across from him. He stirred his coffee. “I see you made it through the night.”

She nodded.

“I'm fresh out of cigarettes.”

“I'll buy you some more.”

“That's great. So. You need another ride somewhere?”

She thought, not really sure of what she wanted, not sure why she sat down, not sure what he could do for her. She simply gravitated to a familiar face. Still recovering her senses, she could not think of anything to say to break into his morning solitude.

“How are you doing?” She felt stupid.

He nodded to say he was fine. “Didn't find your family yet?”

“No,” she rasped. They sat in awkward silence. She reached into her bag and took out the flask and took a long drink. She handed the flask to him and, before he could make a comment about the hour of the morning and her substantial pre-breakfast nip or his own preference for coffee before 10am, she spluttered out “Mary...my name.”

He took the flask and held it there looking at her.

“Mary. That your real name?”

At least he was talking to her. She met his eyes. “It is now.”

A waitress appeared and asked for her order while noticing him with the flask between his thumb and forefinger. He looked away and shook his head.

“Coffee,” Mary said.

“Cream?”

“No.

“Anything to eat?

“A hard-boiled egg.”

“You sir?”

“I'm fine thank you.”

The waitress left. Mary pulled her hair around her neck like a hood and folded her hands between her thighs. He pushed the flask back to her.

“Look. Mary. I hope you know there's nothing I can do for you. I'm just a guy. I ride around. I work a job when I need a little money. Then I quit and spend it all on whiskey and pussy. And poker. When it comes to locating a misplaced family I’m about as useless as a hatfull of broken assholes.”

“I'll pay you.”

“To do what?” He looked at her as if she had just said she was from the future.

What could she say? to drive me around, to be my bodyguard, to get things for me? She shivered. “To stay.”

“Look. I’m not sure I ready to start going steady. We just met.”

“That's not what I meant.”

“I told you. I’m not exactly a safe person to run around with.”

“You did?”

“Yesterday. I told you I'd done bad things. You seem like a nice person and all...”

“But you told me you weren't going to do anything to me.”

“That was yesterday.”

“All bets off today, then?”

He leaned forward and lowered his voice. “I got no cause to hurt you. No plans. I’m just saying, I'm a man. Not a nice man. And I think you could probably find a better...chauffeur, or whatever. Detective. Case worker.”

She leaned against the table. “Look. Jack. I'll call you Jack since you hadn't told me your name yet. I understand men. I'll throw in the benefits if that's what you want. But I got nobody. You said yourself you had more to be afraid of from me than I did from you.”

“That's not really working in your favor.”

“I promise I wont hurt you.”

“Thank God. That's very reassuring.”

“What have you got, some business lunch to get to? Stay with me a few days, til I can find something out. Then you can go about your business.”

“Suppose we do find your husband. Then what.”

“Then you can help me kill him.”

“Not if I'm already dead.”

“It's not really him I’m looking for.”

“Your daughter?”

“She was abducted.”

“Maybe he took her.”

“Maybe.”

The coffee and hard-boiled egg were set down in front of her. She took a sip and started to peel the egg. Then she cut it in half and salted it and took a bite. He watched her fiddle with the egg and drank his coffee, thinking about the husband and the girl, convinced that this would not end well, seeing no hope of finding an abducted girl and no desire whatsoever of finding the husband who had abandoned his family.

“This ain't my line of work. That's it. I'm sorry I can't help you.”

“What is your line of work, exactly?”

“ Shit. Arc welding if you must know,” he shouted. “It ain't being some hero saving lost children and rescuing damsels in distress.”

“I'll get you the things you want, and payment too. Not much I can do about your poker hand though. Starting right now, if you want a better breakfast than that. Ma'am, could I get a menu...”

“No, stop. I don't want anything to eat. I want you to stop being such a crazy bitch and come to reality.”

“You don't have to be a hero. Just stay with me. Give me a ride to a few places. Be my guard dog, you know? So I’m not such an easy target. I'll pay for all your gas. You can just sit and watch. I want to find a certain man, this detective guy McCarthy. I was told he might help. Two hundred dollars a day, and all expenses paid.”

“This is fucking nuts.”

“This is a paying job to do shit.”

“I make two hundred and fifty welding fucking I-beams and shit together all day.”

“Two fifty then.”

“Christ almighty.”

“I'll take that as a yes.”

bullying solution

So, if you’re listening to one particular narrative in our culture, you’ll hear a new social problem.  Apparently it has led to a number of suicides, which in spite of what I have to say below, I do care about.

I was in a public school recently.  Decking every single wall like a bill-postered wall in a London ghetto are signs denouncing, not drugs, not teen pregnancy, not rebellion, not evil

not blood-thirsty video games, not gangs, not binge drinking, not cuttings, tattoos, body piercings, implants, not bulimia/anorexia, not tanning,

not racism/sexism/ageism, not over-eating, not masturbating, not skipping school, not failing to do your homework, not polluting the environment,

not water-boarding, not pole-dancing, not transcendental meditation, not cock fighting. 

But bullying.

Friends, is there any real difference between bullying and natural selection?  Ironically, the same public schools that are fighting to teach evolution, fighting in some cases against anti-evolutional cultural forces, are also denying the real world evidence of that biological megatrend in their own context.  Natural Selection, in which they trust, could be happening unhindered, if they would simply let it.  Validation of science classroom dogma under their very noses.

There are a few kids, fewer say, that the number of people killed by shark attacks, who have committed suicide in the wake of a bullying incident.  Who knows.  Perhaps they were bullied for months, years.  It may have been a 24-hour-a-day situation.  It may have involved the Internet.  And these helpless victims, did they do anything about it?  No.  Fight back?  Oh, they tried.  After nobly walking away the first few times, they engaged in a scuffle or two, perhaps left some nail scratches in an arm, or a juice stain on a blouse.  But it didn’t end.  Until, it ended for real.

Of course, we all can imagine that feeling, perhaps we remember it too well from when we were 13:  “I’ll just KILL myself.  Ha!  Then they’ll feel bad.”  Yes, well, that is some epoch-making logic there, friends.  I’ll be dead, but then they’ll be really sorry.  And the winner of that little standoff is….?

So, my favorite American state, New Jersey, has enacted a zero-tolerance bullying policy.  Counselors are brought in from around the world.  1-800 hotlines are established.  Lectures in the school amphitheater are scheduled, with MANDATORY attendance, or by-golly, we will kick your ass if you dont attend.  And give me your lunch money.

So.  On one hand, we have Natural Selection, a process striving manfully to do it’s job, to thin the herd, to improve the gene pool.  And on the other hand we have the Bible-literalist-Creationist-inspired, “nobody should ever have to bleh, bleh, bleh.”

Once again, we are in a smackdown between faith and science.  Only this one seems to have no thoughtful resolution based on dispassionate consideration of the facts as they relate to one’s <scrunch nose> Wirld-vyoo.  Secularists upholding values of compassion, friendship and community, and me the Christian, wondering what ever happened to Survival of the Fittest?

I say, let the wimpy kids learn to MAN UP.  Let the bullies do what they have done since cave man times.  Challenge the wimps.  Spur the runts to either make it in this tough world, or fall to the fickle hand of consumption, distemper, or winter.  A little butt kicking at school, and they’re ready to commit self-immolation?  Good grief.  Maybe Daddy didn’t do his job at home when little Reginald was growing up – teach that boy some self-respect…no, just plain BALLS.  Defend thyself, or feel the sting of my blade.

How about going and punching that bully in the nose?  How about school hallway posters that say “Kick a bully’s ass today!”  “Show a bully you got a pair!”  “Stomp dat bitch what’s given you dookie!” 

What’s wrong with that?  What if that bully insulted your mother?  Would you just wither like a lily in the noonday sun?  No!  Go and fight.  Defend your mother’s honor!  Protect your sister from jerks and their cat-calls.  Since when did niceness overrule all civilization?  This attitude led Hilter to power in 1933!

Sorry you didn’t reach your dream, but what were you thinking?

There are probably more than a few like me who have to wade through chest-deep apathy to think for a moment about Diana Nyad, the 61-year-old woman who yesterday tried and failed to swim from Cuba to Florida. And when those like me look up from our busy lives at this ever so fleeting spectacle, and when we hear the details of the story, we are gripped with piercing awareness of the sheer underwhelming nature of the whole thing.

In short, she’s 61, has shoulder trouble, and a lifelong condition of asthma, and she’s attempting to swim 100+ miles.  She did make it half way before rough seas, acute shoulder pain and nausea led her to call it off.

I think it is interesting to note that she had kayaks with shark-deterring sonar padding around her, and a boat carrying medics and family members drifting alongside.  What a production.  The hook was that she was doing it WITHOUT a shark cage as other’s have attempted.  ooooh.  drama.

If she had made it, we would all say, “Wow.  That’s really something,” and instantly forget about it.  She seems like a nice lady and all.  “The swim was in me,” she said. 

The swim.  Im not sure what that means, since apparently it wasn’t.  One wonders, did she practice this first before buying the equipment, enlisting over 30 supporters, overcoming international bureaucratic obstacles, calling press conferences, and gathering her family in Cuba for the trip across to Florida? 

She reportedly swam 12 hours a day for two years to prepare.  But did she try swimming 103 miles at some other, convenient location, where after 50 miles she would have presumably remembered that she has asthma?  That she failed 28 years ago (that’s right, attempted and failed at 33)?  That’s she’s fodder for AARP?  Might she then have decided to age more gracefully, accepted her mortality, spent more time with her family, and avoided the tens of thousands of wasted dollars to appear on international television as the not-very-surprising, crestfallen Icarus that we all now know her to be?

So now anyone who has run a marathon thinks I’m the biggest jerk for saying this.  But I say, Fraah!  Why must we know about these things?  These are awful, tumultuous, apocalyptic times.  We might as well see her denouement as a metaphor for the nosedive that western culture is currently in. 

What?  Forget anything so lofty as culture.  We are all in a socio-politico-econo-religio-psycho-ecologico-hyper nosedive.

That’s what really bothers me about this already-forgotten average person.  There’s just too much else to think about right now.  Go away, ridiculous people.

I wrote this yesterday, but didn’t post it. Her story already seems a million years old!  The stock market!  The Middle East!  The election!  The bunnies!  the bunnies!  The bunnies!

10 reasons it’s worth it to pay the extra $20 when considering a hotel

1. Broken things never fixed.  Examples:  the shower curtain – it’s one of those curved-out kind, but it’s been pulled down and the mounts in the sheetrock ripped out of the walls.  What’s going to happen when I take a shower?  The soap shelf in the fiberglass shower insert is smashed off, the interior wall exposed.  Gouges in faux wood furniture.
2. Color theme:  No joke.  Lime green, Buddhist orange and several shades of black.  Three random, non-matching, non-related Garden Ridge surplus pictures on the wall.  Carpet is utterly hideous, like something from Grendel’s lair.  Antique gold finished lamps and fixtures.  Eeeww-r
3. No coffee machine in the room.  Ok, I can live without.
4. Floor tile in the bathroom shows that the room is actually a trapezoid.
5. The desk and chair, which I use every time I have to travel:  uncomfortable, not really made to sit and do work.  Vinyl.  Sharp edges. Undersized.
6. Slow unsecured internet.  Am I sharing this wide open, 9600-baud internet connection with the trailer homes across the street?
7. Hallway smells like a blend of bleach and asparagus pee. 
8. Ever tried drinking bourbon from a styrofoam cup?
9. Clock radio from 1974
10. Continental breakfast of Fruit Loops, bruised bananas, and bagels.  Froufrou coffee.
11. Toilet paper made of recycled Ethiopian burlap

Computer Funk

There are a couple of things I do by habit when I sit down at my computer, which is several times per day.  1) check to see if I have any new emails  2) look at the headlines at MSNBC or CNN.  The problem with checking email is that I almost never get any.  On my home email account I only receive things I have subscribed to, which includes various newsletters, the Word of the Day and Quote of the Day, from which I reap little gems like this:

All God's children are not beautiful. Most of God'schildren are, in fact, barely presentable. 
   -- Fran Lebowitz

I dont get interesting email at home, and at work 80% of emails are bearers of complaints, billing errors, and new rules.  And advertisements of course.

And the problem with reading the headlines should be fairly obvious.  But today, I am especially hostile toward all the news sources’ combined glee at reporting to the world about a particular traffic jam in Los Angeles.  As if this were something new, as if we all didn’t get stuck in traffic jams from time to time.  But if LA has highway repairs, we interrupt the budget talks.  What is this – traffic jams of the rich and famous?  A reality TV show is in the making right now, bet on it.

And accompanying my hostility at this journalistic solecism, this breech of reporting judgment, this insult to the rest of the disinterested nations, this insinuation that the fruitcakes in California are beset with burdens too great to be borne and the rest of us should pay attention, to add injury to insult is the unimpressive, not humorous, little word someone invented for the event - ‘carmageddon’.  Ha ha.   Yes, someone was just too clever when they thought of that one.


So, a big highway in LA is getting some repairs, and the residents are panicking like the arrival of a Blue Letter in the Hudsucker Proxy while the rest of the world is adding another reason to avoid Los Angeles to their long lists, and the hopelessly myopic news community is pooping out clever little attention grabbers, comparing traffic delays of LA commuters to the eschatological battle between the forces of evil gathered together in the Valley of Meggido against the Jesus Christ returned to earth for final judgment of all nations.

Just an ordinary day.

Thoughts on those filthy Yankees

I just finished watching the Academy nominee film The Fighter.  You know what my first thoughts are?
Northeastern culture – New Jersey, Massachusetts, and those states like them – is the SCUM OF THE EARTH.  Lower than the remotest Asian, African or Eskimo culture.  A distance of EPOCHS behind the Australian Aborigines.  Centuries behind Sumerian civilization, even tribal cultures.  Trailing far behind, say, the Incans in art, speech, literature, cooking, dress….but excelling ALL THE GLOBE in application of hair products and self-congratulatory, head-bobbling, palm-upraised, what-did-I-say?, you-talkin-to-me?, ham-tongued, never left the 50’s, gangsta hip-hop, dancing with the stars, American Idol wanna-be, fennel cake eating, chest pounding, cleavage showing, gaudy flamboyant colored, arched eyebrow’d, teeth-bleaching, artificial-leather sporting, fat-concealing, slimy warmed-over Sicilian stepchild outcasts!
Starting with their simian, guttural, sleazy accent.  Why is it that whenever you want a character that sounds sleazy, you bring in someone from New Jersey?  “Yo!  Bitch, where’s my hot pocket?  I woirk all day installin’ window tint, and all you gah fuh me is a bowl of frickin’ apple jacks?  Whad izzit aroun’ hea?”
Why is Jersey Shore such a spectacle?  One comedian said it best:  when I want to feel good about myself, I watch Jersey Shore.  It’s like watching National Geographic.  Those people are from an island in an undiscovered ocean.
…and moving on to their general filthy appearance…
…their obsession with the lowest levels of commercialism…
…their ugliness.  Dang!  Those people are so ugly!
My next thought is that I probably shouldn’t be blogging at this hour immediately after watching a movie. 
But Jiminy Christmas!  What a bunch of losers!  What a slimy, manipulative, self-serving, Neanderthal bunch of apes! 
[deep breath]  Ok.  Wait.  I’m sure they’re not all that way.  I…   I was hasty.  No, there are probably some very descent people there.  There.   Up there.  Way up there, in NEW JERSEY!!  In the septic tank of America, the vortex of social decline!  Fraah!  I need to take a shower!  I feel as if I’m about to start saying, “ya know?” after every sentence.  Ya know?  Hey.  Mickey.  Come on.  Im ya brother, right?  Mickey?  Hey come on.  What?  Ya gonna treat ya family this way?  Hey?  Come on.  Mickey?
[sanity restored.]
I would like to humbly request at this point that some director of films, some Ingmar Bergman or Cecil B. Demille of the modern theatre, an artiste, someone with a venue, someone who can tell a story, make us break out in joyous song…
with all haste, make a new film.  A movie that will redeem that far away repugnant land…
someone with means to produce a movie, yes, a celluloid rendition, a motion picture that would help me…
…just…a film, a receptacle of cinematographic artistry, sensitive, enlightened, human,
Sir, I need you to help me.  You see, right now, I hate everyone in that land.  I can think nothing but the worst kinds of thoughts about them.  And I know that is not tr…
…that is probably not true. 
It could be.  But it’s probably not.  And with a nice redeeming movie about noble deeds…involving a rescued virgin, perhaps a grail…
transpiring in our country’s founding lands… You see, I dont want to despise them, I really dont.  But I need your help – make a film that will restore my…OUR faith in those little states.  Those tiny, little, highly influential states, up there.
They are so awful.  Please show me a narrative, in film, yes, a narrative that will show them in all their gentleness, eloquence and magnanimity.  In their quest for knowledge, hungering after wisdom, eschewing fashion and the praise of men.  Lest I hate them forever.

An excerpt from an abandoned writing project

“Well, first let me say, your daughter’s eyes are probably going to be fine.”  Silas dropped his chin to his chest. Marianne grabbed his hand and they fidgeted with relief.  "It’s probably just a blocked tear duct or allergies. Does she have any other symptoms?”

The condition that began in Poet’s eyes, that had brought her the curious glances of strangers was the incessant glistening of tears gathered around her eyes and dripping into whatever she was doing. When she played with Solly, chattering in the pretend world under the thick leafy branches of the neighbor’s magnolia, her eyes watered. As they sat at the table eating scrambled eggs and apple slices the tears stood in her smiling eyes. Staring expressionless at high soaring birds circling far away as she held a handful of goldfish crackers, drips splashed on her wrists.

When Silas tucked her in at night the tears streamed down the sides of her head. How many times had he asked her, “What’s the matter sweetie?” and she would answer, “Nothing, Daddy,” and wipe her eyes on the sleeve of her pajamas. Then she would smile at him authentically and say, “See?”

“Were you crying before?”

“No.” She sighed, becoming tired of this repeated questioning.

“Are you sad about anything?”

“Only about sad things. I’m always sad about sad things.”

“What sad things?”

“I dunno,” she said looking bored and wistful. “Sometimes I have sad dreams,” tears running into her ears.

“I know, honey. Everyone does.”

“Sometimes my sad dreams are about you.”

“About me? Well, yes I think I remember one last year.”

“Yes. I’ve had it lots of times” He didn’t want to ask about the dream, but it seemed unavoidable.

“Do you want to tell me the dream?”

“Oh… I dunno. No. It was just a dream,” her moist eyes smiling reassuringly at him.

“Sure there’s nothing wrong?”
 
“No, daddy, it’s just my eyes.”

Besides the dull pain in her eyes, the other symptom which took some time to figure out from Poet’s description was that she frequently saw halos. The doctor said it could be something common like allergies, although there was a very small chance that it portended a rare condition that, after a roundabout technical explanation, ended in the prognosis of blindness. At home Poet laughed and played with dolls while droplets splashed on the Barbie beach cruiser. “Let’s go play on the swing!” She pushed Solly on the swing with pathetic streams running down her cheeks like rivulets of the woe of the disconsolate.

It became difficult to tell when she was really crying. Her parents learned to cautiously ignore the tears. If she was not sobbing, they did not know if she was upset. At times when she truly shed tears of calm sadness without huffing and bawling as most children do, they offered no comfort, unaware that there was a problem.
One Saturday afternoon Silas found her sitting on the curb shedding copious tears. She had something cupped in her hands and held close in her lap. Haloes glowed in her watery vision. Silas hauled hoses and sprinklers around irrigating the shaggy pile carpet of grass. He plucked weeds in his frumpy old shorts, glancing at her occasionally. She hung her head. After a lengthy period of letting her be, not wanting to nag about her eye problem, he finally approached her. He sat down next to her with a contented stretch and a sigh of one taking a well-earned break.

“What a beautiful day.”

She sniffled. He looked at her sideways.
 
“You really are crying this time.”

Her head continued bowed, dangling brown curls hiding her soggy eyes. Without a word, she gently held out her cupped hands to reveal a dead bird. Silas gasped.

“I prayed that God would bring it back to life, and he said OK. But it didn’t come back to life.”

She turned and looked up into his eyes darkly, and he grimaced at the broken animal freshly fallen from the sky. It was still supple and moist from the steady flow of her tears, sprinkled on the bird in hopes that it might aid the healing like a magic potion, or prevail upon God’s sympathy, or merely anoint it for burial. He backed away from her coughing and warbling about germs and filth. At last he persuaded her to put it in a box and wash her hands. They buried it dutifully and stood by the gravesite in silence for a moment.

“Do you want to say a prayer or blessing or anything, sweetie?”

“No. I don’t want to pray.”

Leaving Las Vegas

The way I came to find myself in Las Vegas again is,

my company is creating a partnership with Cisco, and we must have a Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA) on staff to qualify.  That’s me.  We must also have a CCDA (D for Design) on staff, and I am again in Sin City to endure a class which will attempt to fill the water balloon of my head using a fire hose of information.

With this additional certification, I will be the Cisco kid, so to speak; the key to lots of new business for our company.

But the part that is blog-worthy is the surreal nature of the entertainment district of Las Vegas and the swirling entropy that encompasses the frenzied vacationers.

Where else does an ambulance whiz past my hotel window every 20 minutes?  Where else are there so many pools of vomit on the sidewalks?  Where else can you be accosted by hordes of Mexicans hawking flyers for prostitution services?  Where else can you find such fabulous shows as Barry Manilow, Gladys Night, and Cher? or all-male dance troupes, like one the called “Thunder Down-Under” featuring topless, chiseled presumably Australian men with tousled hair and oh, so serious eyes.

How odd I must look:  a single middle-aged man in something other than a captioned T-shirt, reading a book over dinner.

How taken-aback are the faces of fellow bus travelers pumping their fists, women stretching down their necklines, giddy as children on Christmas morning, when I tell them I’m not planning to gamble, and in fact never have.

The people I can simply pity.  But what is more malaise-inducing to me is the institutionalized paltriness, not so much the helicopters constantly circling overhead giving tours over the city such that I cannot make a phone call outside, but the stretch SUV limos, the flat-bed trucks with lighted marquees of girls in mid-remove of their narrow patches of bikini, the $100 per plate dinners while homeless people (illegally) sit shabby and silent in the dark corners.  One has the sense that everything here colludes to fleece the willing despoiled, to shut out the quiet desperation of everyday life, hiding from the darkness in an even greater darkness, and eviscerating many good earthly gifts in the service of the basest passions of the unimaginative, overfed, heedless, feckless, reckless middle class.

A Narrow Repertoire

Does anyone else feel like Pachelbel’s Canon in D is the only classical piece anyone knows anymore?  Sheesh.  I heard it at a wedding.  I heard it at a movie about a wedding.  I heard it at work emanating from a colleagues' cubicle played through cheap tinny speakers.

Look.  If it’s time for classical music, go out and get a copy of Brahms’ 2nd piano Concierto and learn to live again.  Remember why you are human.  Be sure and get the right one, that’s all I can say.

Listen to the Eroica of Beethoven, or the Pastoral.  Listen to the Requiem Mass of Mozart and weep like Mary Magdalene at Jesus’ tomb.  Tchaikovsky, Handel, and so many others.  Shoot, just get the Amadeus soundtrack and that enough will migrate your soul to the next level.  Please, just get it.  I know it was my passport to a new humanity.  I still have it on my ‘current listening’ shelf.  My prayers of gratitude for Neville Mariner and the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields.

But I will go on record here, out on a limb I’m sure.  I’ll offend my sparse readership now.  I am sick of Canon in D.  I suspected it was pabulum from the first time I heard it, and every repetition convinces me further.

If you think the Canon is the cat’s meow, the bee’s knees, and you are an adult, then I humbly submit that you may have a shriveled and enfeebled soul.  That came out wrong.  I'm sorry.  If you like Pachelbel’s famous piece, then please, please enter further.  Move on to more, to greater, to higher.  You made a nice start.  You picked the low-hanging fruit.  But be patient as you listen to Mozart.  Listen slowly.  Wait.  Easy.  Stop.  Get it.  Feel your conscience wash away in the mystery.  You will never be the same again.

Believing in Dreams

I am going to begin assuming that my dreams are communications to me from God. No more are my dreams merely random or silly. No more are they simply my brain working out the problems of the day, as I heard some dream researchers say. When did we start assuming they were meaningless? Why did ancient kings assume their dreams were divine communications and call together the wise men the next morning to suggest interpretations? In their cases, they were real prophecies or warnings or advice.

All my life I have ignored my dreams. I’ve thought so little of them that I forgot them by the time I was stepping in the shower. I treated them as modern biology would suggests we should. What a concession to the godless 20th century and the as-yet-uncharacterized godless 21st century.

Are we or are we not meaningful beings, seeking meaning in life and finding it? created in God’s image? recipients of special revelation? A skeptic may counter, “Animals dream.”  Yes, of course. “Do they dream of the future or receive warnings from God about approaching predators?” Well, maybe they do. So what? Do you raise this point simply because it sounds foolish to modern ears? Maybe the world and the animal kingdom is more filled with mystery than you thought.

Nevertheless, I have started paying more attention to my dreams lately. And they are no longer meandering, ridiculous farces. Since I started looking and listening, and believing in their substance, they have become less random, and more suggestive.

One that I had a month ago was about me wandering in my underwear, through the house of Derek McCollum, assistant pastor of my church and RUF minister at the University of Texas. I was searching through his house for a Bible. I couldn’t find one. It was early Saturday morning, the sun was filling the house and the McCollum family was still asleep. Mrs. McCollum woke first and came down to find a strange man rummaging through the kitchen looking for a Bible. She screamed and ran away as I tried to explain to her who I was.

Then last week I dreamed I was asked to fill in preaching at a church. I accepted. The service started in a few minutes, and I thought I would just pull up an old sermon on the computer, print it out, and go. But the computer wouldn’t cooperate. I couldn’t find my manuscript; the start time came and went. I was unprepared. When I finally went out to try and wing it, I found that someone else was already preaching and I was too late.

I take all this to mean something unsettling, though I dont know what. I need to gather the wise men together to give me an interpretation. If you are wise, feel free to offer one in the comments section, in typical 21st century fashion.

The Wrestler

I finally get this movie. It took me about 4 viewings, but I finally get it and like it. I bought it after it came out on DVD, after Mickey Rourke and Merisa Tomei were both nominated for Academy Awards. This movie was written by Robert Seigel – not the NPR reporter, but the former editor in chief of The Onion. That’s a little strange, but  encouraging evidence that satirists can also say something important.  AND of course – the reason I bought the DVD - Darren Aronofsky the director:  a guy who is not satisfied until you are on the dirt, fetal, trying to get your breath back, stuffing your eyes back in their sockets, and wiping the boot-print from your xiphoid process. I’ve enjoyed his other films; after I recovered, that is.

Seen it? Should you see it? It is probably necessary to overcome any hang-ups you may have with boobs and stripper culture before you watch this film. I guess boobs are not such a big deal to me any more. Really. I can’t argue with many women who wonder, Why are western men so delighted by boobs? ‘Western’, I say, because we all know that many tribal cultures view boobs in an udderly utilitarian way.  But, back to the film…

Item 1: the title - “The Wrestler”.  Probably the lowest-hanging fruit of this film. Get it?  He’s a wrestler, but he’s wrestling with life and relationships and stuff.

Item 2: seriously, you have to come to grips with the ending. Many (most?) viewers will be asking “What!!? Is that the end?” “Why?” “Huh?” “Ack!” “Ooer?”  and other incomprehensible utterances. I’m joking, but here’s what you have to understand about art films today:  happy endings are mostly dead in art films. Because, in real life, the hero doesn’t really get the girl. The wounded horse doesn’t really win the race. The rag-tag band of brothers doesn’t really take that hill. We all know this. We used to like movies that told us beautiful lies, such as, they’ll get back together, he’ll turn back to good side, Rex will wake up just in time to save the children from the fire. But we all know, it didn’t happen that way in our own lives. We had a moment of truth, some peril or other, and no superhero came in our window, we didn’t stand up against the bully, we didn’t overcome our wounds to love again, we gave in to cowardice, the beautiful girl didn’t change her mind and come back, evil won, our charm didn’t save us, we weren’t quite good enough in the end.

So, happy resolution rings empty for a growing number of viewers. It sounds like a lie. Princess Bride? Yeah, it’s funny. But when my own personal epic struggle was going on, it didn’t work out that way. The growing populace of jaded failures want stories that say what they feel to be true.

But what about the happy ending, you say? What about feeling good? Life is bad enough – I want to feel good after paying $8 for a movie, you may say. On the contrary, those of us dealing with a lifetime of regret would say, “I dont want to be made to feel artificially happy at someone else’s staged triumph. Movie inspiration fades quickly. I want to know that I’m not alone in the world, and that I may have my own sad but attainable vindication.” That’s why art films dont have happy endings today. And those films dont make much money. That’s why Disney doesn’t make art films.

But I watched it again today, and I have to say I get it. I like it. The  Wrestler was, in the words of his daughter, ‘a fuck up’. But in the end, you were glad that he went back to wrestling. It’s where he belonged, though we knew it was dangerous for him. The chance at redemption he might have had with the stripper was just part of the exquisite agony of his plight. It was too late. And all he could do is make that last jump from the top ropes of the boxing ring, and go out in a blaze of glory – you knew, right, that he died at that moment? Yes, in case you missed it, that was what triggered a full, fatal heart attack. Artfully, the director didn’t show it, but that’s what happened.

And for those of you who haven’t seen it yet, if this review hasn’t scared you away, just buy it and commit to watching it a few times over the next 10 months if you really want to understand. Get yourself bored and immune to boobs and stripper sensuality. Be sure you are dejected and alone some night. Watch it after a few drinks at the end of a hard day. Watch it after you have thought deeply about how to speak the language of this generation, how to create art that matters, not just how to make everyone feel good for a few minutes.

Two Women

Two women worked in a field - one was diligent and the other was known for taking frequent breaks. The diligent one was praised by everyone and gained a reputation with the farm owners and among the markets. But the other woman was known as inefficient in the market and had only a few friends.  By her hard work, the diligent woman raised her standard of living and became established. She moved into a bigger house in a quiet suburb and bought many fine things to enjoy. She bought a 55" television, for example, and she would fall asleep in front of it after a hearty balanced meal every evening. But she almost never was able to finish her program.

While at work the diligent woman was single-minded. She developed new ways to increase her production, and her eyes stayed fixed on the work of her hands unlike the other woman, who seemed distracted by the birds and the clouds which took the shapes of elephants and sailboats.  The distracted woman had to stand up frequently and stretch her back, and she would watch as the cars drove by or listen to some musician play who stopped as he walked by, and she would listen as travelers told stories about far away places. One traveler had come from a poor land and told stories about the thin children there.  "Here," she said, "here's a hundred dollars. Buy those children some food next time you go there."  "Idiot," shouted the other woman from across the field, not raising her eyes.  "You'll never see that money again, and neither will any hungry children!"

There were many days when the diligent woman was alone in the field. She was there working when the other woman arrived, and she stayed past dark working almost every day, because she had developed a system of lights that strapped to her forehead and shoulders, and it was as bright as day beneath her lamps. Meanwhile, her 401K grew large and she diversified her portfolio. She drove to work in a Lexus SUV and wore a breathable black exercise outfit with pink stripes down the side of the legs, and drank power shakes from a backpack with a tube that she gripped in her teeth.  The distracted woman wore the same clothes every day, and stopped work for breaks every couple of hours. She had a three-legged stool that she brought to work, and she would eat carrots and celery sticks on her stool and watch the migration patterns of the birds. When Daylight Saving Time was on, the diligent woman scoffed at her because she left while there was still three hours of sunlight left, but she replied that she just wanted a cup of tea and to watch the sunset with her baby. Not surprisingly, she had a hard time making ends meet, and her growing family made it more difficult with each new addition. And she was thin, even without going to a Pilates class, which the other woman attended at 5am before work.

One day in the field, she glanced up at the angle of the sun and saw it was time for a break. She opened her little food satchel and started fixing some saltines and cheese whiz.  "There's supposed to be a big storm coming through," she said to the other woman, loud enough to be heard across the field.  The diligent woman bustled more fervently as if to silently retort that the distracted woman had better worry about the financial storm that was going to overtake her soon. In the mid-afternoon, the distracted woman had another break and turned her face to the cool wind blowing from the east, and she ate her saltines and drank grape juice from a box. She saw clouds building in the northwest and instead of returning to work after her break, she sat and watched.  The clouds came closer and were a sick dark gray-blue. She noticed the birds had stopped singing, and wind was changing. As she picked up her stool and skittered away toward her bicycle, she shouted to the other woman, "Better get inside. A storm's comin'!"  But the diligent woman never raised her eyes. "Well, now I can work in a cool shade for a change. There is no storm, just a more pleasant work environment. Thank heaven for the clouds."

When the rain started, the diligent woman's attitude changed, "Oh, great. My cool breeze has turned into a real mess. It will pass through as it always does; and I will not let a little rain interfere with my goals." The rain grew stronger and tornadoes came and carried her away, and she never raised her eyes from her work. But the distracted woman trembled and pitied from the reinforced window of a dry storm cellar with other distracted sorts who had seen the storm coming.

The Break In

I suppose it's part of living in the vale of tears that you occasionally get burglarized, right?  I guess it was our turn. It was a week ago yesterday that thieves opened the unlocked front window of the house and walked in. 

They took the one-week-old 47" TV (it was too big anyway), two laptops and my wife's Christmas present - a spunky pink Dell Netbook.  Also, both of our wedding bands and some cash.

Everyone is so sorry.  I've heard it several times. But I would almost have paid someone to steal the Xbox, which is also gone.  The silence around here since its disappearance has been golden.  Of course, one of my kids who most cherished the Xbox has been wandering around dazzed, lost, incredulous, mournful as Mozart's Lacrymosa.  My daughter, on the other hand, asked me to please not replace it.  So its three against three.

So, friends.  Possessions.  What about them?

There is this scene in C. S. Lewis' Perelandra, in which the devil (Ransom) is tempting Eve with a lovely coat or shawl of some sort.  She admits it is lovely, and agrees with him over its great workmanship.  He gives it to her to hold, and after a moment of enjoying it, she drops it on the ground and wanders over to smell a flower.  Surprised, Ransom picks it up and runs after her.  Here, you can have it, he says.  She responds that she doesn't really understand what he means.  You know, keep it, hold it, to enjoy again later.  She replies with a laugh, why would I want to do that?

Aside from the Xbox, the absence of which has been like a tree of life in our midst, or more apropos, like a successful polyp removal, the stuff we enjoyed was just stuff. I almost dont remember it now. We pulled our old TV out of the garage and set it up again. I got out my old laptop gathering dust in the closet since the new one arrived last year, and here I am typing on it.

The only thing we really miss is the writings and papers that cannot be recovered. The wedding bands and a few other personal items of little worth pinched.  Both bands have Ephesians 5:25-27 inscribed in them, so I hope the Holy Ghost will haunt anyone who tries to buy them from whatever pawn show they end up in.

But the shock of having the house ransacked has passed (we gave it a good tidying up after that), and the stuff was really...forgettable.  I can't speak for the rest of my family though.

words etc.

There are no adjectives left.

Great, wonderful, terrific, fantastic - cha! our grandparents were wearing out these words years ago.  "Incredible," after being misused, became so overused as to be meaningless.  "Awesome," was a giant that fell hard.  The culture, mainly writers for magazines like Atlantic Monthly or New Yorker or Slate or Salon, the hundreds or thousands of writers desperately wanting to break out, to distinguish themselves, have bastardized every emphatic or superlative in the English language; snatched them from on high and remolded them, cheapened them, yea even prostituted them, for their common momentary need.

Take the word 'epic.' This word, a superlative of sorts, is applied commonly to pizza, monster trucks, intestinal gas, smartphone apps.

'Gargantuan' was used for a while in the 80's, but was considered too clumsy.  Lollapalooza may have the same fate, as it seems to be used only by marketeers.

Oh, there are so many tiresome others.  Massive. Radical. Kick ass. Tubular. Way. 

I read about the snow storms in the northeastern states last week referred to as 'snowpocalypse.' And one may read about someone having their first encounter with an iPad as an 'apotheosis.'

What's left?

You know what this is?  Consumerism, applied to words. We are consuming these words, sucking the life/meaning out of them, and then tossing them aside. For example, who can use the word 'radical' anymore? or 'incredible'? No one even knows what incredible means anymore.

Not only are we consuming the words, we are effectively banishing them from the common vocabulary, like Tamar kicked out of Amnon's bed of rape. Goodbye, 'extreme', 'intense', 'perfect', 'divine', sweet'. Done with you, now get out.

I started on this trail, because I was trying in vain to think of an adjective that describes my feelings about parenting. The sense that I have regarding the task of parenting, the ultimacy of the task, the burden on a father's shoulders, the responsibility...

the realization of what I've said that cannot be undone,

the likelihood of failure in today's social climate,

the singularity of purpose that exists in parenting, as if nothing else mattered in comparison, the sense that everything I do is really because of my children - the reason I work, endure insults and disappointments, endure business attire, advocate healthier food, buy a bigger house and car, the reason I scrape pennies together to put in a savings account, wear socks with holes, sweaters eaten by moths, the reason I dont buy myself a new computer or cooler car or take vacations alone with my wife, 

the reason I do battle with them - daily nagging them to do their homework, to do it well, to improve their handwritting and watch out for careless errors, insisting they get off the computer or the Xbox, setting and enforcing curfews not only for being out, but for cell phone use, jousting with them over dress code, parrying with them over sarcasm, thrusting, blocking, reposte-ing over grades, shoes, toothbrushing, belching, being tardy...

The adjectives no longer exist to describe my feelings about this, the sense of eternal moment, and the sense that I am an utter failure at my greatest, and only remaining calling.