Autumn is Coming in the Door

Fall comes to Virginia suddenly. Within a week, it is noticeably cooler in the mornings, and there seem to be less birds singing. I wonder if some have already started their long flight south?

Perhaps it is my imagination, but in September the light seems to change to "fall-light", and  there is a hopefullness in the air. I don't really know how to define this feeling better than that, especially when it seems that there should be some sort of mourning or sorrow for the free days of summer, more of melancholia perhaps. Yet, there is a fullness, an autumnal ripeness that descends like heavy apples from trees with coloring leaves. Fall marks a harvest time, the point of the year when maturity still has its virile strength. Later, in the darkness and cold of winter, it will transition with feeble steps to a maturity identified by finality.

But the pleasure of the fall! A gentle breeze, the rattle of leaves down the street in the evening, the golden light in the Sunday afternoon. I am researching my Gilgamesh/Steampunk novel while sitting on my deck. Books on Zeppelin Airships, Illustrated Encylopedias on Sailing Ships and Steamboat are stacked in tumbled disarray on the glass table top. I pause and sit back as a breeze sweeps through, and suddenly leaves are drifting over head. The oak tree drops acorns regularly, and I can see hawks wheeling overhead while a crow scolds them with a gutteral cawing. When winter comes, that "caw-caw" will be a lonely sound that echoes through bare trees and fields of snow; for now, it is simply a vulgar herald of shorter days and the increasing smell of woodsmoke in the air.

My neighbor's garden is beautiful across the lazy street. The flowers will soon fade, but for now, they match the growing orange and redness of the leaves.

It will be a good week, and I look forward pulling the box down from the closet filled with my sweaters.

Sharpening my verbal fangs

I am being tortured right now. The Individual Concept of Support is the capstone event of my Captain's Career Course, and I am trying not to crash and burn. A concept of support is an English guy's worst nightmare. It is a synchronized compilation of all the logistic considerations supporting a military operation. Massive amounts of math, time-rate-distance, straight line computations between multiple points. Rigorous, strict and disciplined thinking.

Ugh.

So, I took particular and uncharacteristic pleasure in taking my daughter to the doctor during this exercise. While there I did some reading in a great book, The Transitive Vampire. It is a book difficult to define, and since I have only read 15 pages of it, impossible for me to review. I will say that from what I have read so far, it is fascinating.The writer unleashes a maelstrom of a vocabulary composed of articulate witticisms that are uniquely expressed. I believe the purpose of the book is pursuit of grammar for the pure joy of reveling in the dance of words, but with a poetic creation of free-wheeling sentences for the hell of sheer fun. If I am ever an English professor, this book will be on the reading list. There is definite innuendo dancing and a gothic influence to the work- as if the Addams family collaborated on a English Grammar book for their future generation of eclectic misfits. Here is a brief sample:

A compound predicate, or compund verb, is the happy issue of two or more verbs that are joined by and, or, or nor and that belong to the same subject:

The recluse groveled before the mannequin and

kissed the hem of her slip.

She wriggled in acknowledgement or writhed in

uncalled-for shame.

The debutante squatted and pondered her

meaningless life.

The werewolf howled piteously and sought

comfort in the lap of his wife.

His huge, calm, intelligent hands swerved

through the preliminaries and wrestled with

her confusion of lace.

It neither soothed the unrecorded regrets nor

averted the impending doom.

Simply too much fun, buy it from Amazon.com today:

The Transitive Vampire

Deliciously evil- a grammatical delicacy akin to verbal frog-legs.

The Artist's Prayer

I was reading Nina Paley's blog today, and in one of her posts, she scribed/quoted this poem:

Inspiration (a.k.a. Artist’s Prayer)

Our Idea
Which art in the Ether
That cannot be named;
Thy Vision come
Thy Will be done
On Earth, as it is in Abstraction.
Give us this day our daily Spark
And forgive us our criticisms
As we forgive those who critique against us;
And lead us not into stagnation
But deliver us from Ego;
For Thine is the Vision
And the Power
And the Glory forever.
Amen.


Awesome.


Here is a link to her site: 


Nina Paley's Blog

A Moment of Quiet

There are times in the early morning, when the house is silent, that I think time is almost paused. A simple moment of unadulterated existence with the rising sun and a simple breeze. I am struggling to understand why I don't get to feel this more often. Why do I have to wait for labor-day weekend? Although, at the precise moment I typed those words, my sense of gratitude for the little things reminded me that 7 years ago, Labor Day at the Steinmart Shoe Department would have been one hell of a busy work day. Or, that 3 years ago, I would have not even noticed a day off at all while I walked to the chow hall in Iraq.

I do have a choice every day though. It is either to stay on the treadmill of modern life, or get the F- off by simplifying things to the bare basics. Family, a few friends, the pursuit of a full and rich life- that is the focus. Unfortunately, we get so caught up in our societal conditioning that we pack our lives full of action that we forget how to simply "BE".

Life runs us after a while, and it runs us into the ground.

Just the other day, my nine year old daughter Emma had a gloomy expression on her face. When I asked her why, she explained that her best friend told her she would only be able to play on the weekends during the school year because of her busy schedule. Between dance lessons, ballet, music lessons, swim class, and horseback riding, their friendship would have to be on hold from Monday to Friday. This saddened me. Her friend is an amazing little girl, but I see her being carved into that sad American mirage of success. Maybe I'm just not wealthy, and I don't understand that truly successful people need all this formation to reach their dreams in their mid-thirties, but I think it is a Pyrrhic victory. Aren't the late thirties and early forties of  most upper middle-class Americans the time of mid-life crisis and when most people find a regular therapist? Maybe if they spent a little more time "living" than pursuing their goals they would find that the act of truly living life "awake" has rewards that far exceed any "fast-track" gain.

All this is temporary.

I almost quoted the Bible, but I decided paraphrasing it in the colloquial might have more punch: The guy who owns the world at the expense of trading in his soul is one stupid motherf-er. I was going to add in the adjective "sad", but when you buddy-f yourself, than there is an automatic exemption of sympathy for people who stick it to themselves because they choose to.

He's stupid because he bought something worthless by trading the only priceless thing he had. It would be like selling your living body forever into slavery in exchange for a portrait of yourself as the king of the world. Stupid. He is a motherf-er by defaming his life's purpose- why should his mother suffered her pain at childbirth if he is to trade his life away in casual indifference for insignificant and transient gain?

We all grow old, we all retire. Every one of us is replaceable. Even folks who seem to possess eternal fame like Alexander the Great,Queen Elizabeth I, George Washington, etc.- they are but the personalization of myths and archetypes  of generations, figureheads for the yearning of countless individuals who have struggled towards inaccessible satisfaction. Despite the achievements, their hands shook when they died, and two days after death their bodies had a terrible smell. When you consider the millions of people who have lived and whose names are forgotten, our egg-shell lives become very precious to us. Making a good, rich life is all that should matter to us. We should exist for the pure sake of living a beautiful life and passing that legacy to our children.

On a personal note, this entire conversation with Emma took place in a fantastic fort that Emma created with sheets, safety pins and every article of furniture in her room. From the doorway, it looks like a bomb went off, but if you get down and crawl through the secret doorway, she made a house within a house, creating a posh Persian princess two room suite. I might not have Emma running on the American Success treadmill, but if she comes up with such magnificent creativity, I think we are on the right track.

In the end, my life is what I make of it. True, I live in this house of cards society, and since I have a family, we must affect a compromise with the gods of society to survive. However, I can choose to throw a football with my son after school rather than immerse myself in the television. I can jump off the tree on the rope swing with Emma rather than immerse myself in Facebook. Ultimately, I have a time account that is topped off every night with 24 fresh hours, only 8 to 10 of which are dedicated to working. In regard to the others, they are my own.

If you want a unique view of this, read "How to Live on 24 hours a Day". Great little book. Here is the wiki link: How to Live on 24 Hours a Day

As Paul Harvey said, Good Day!

The Slow Decay of Eternity

What is the real life?

What is smoke and what is solid?

Where is the golden jewel that shines with nuclear majesty?

Cradled amid silver twigs with blood of molten suns

That small and sacred spark shudders with a heartbeat

A surge of breath into a muscle devoid of wonder

So that meat is galvanized by electricity.

This smoke drifts and curls

I follow it in dreams

Sitting in my chair behind my desk

(My brain awake)

I watch it dance and I see clearly.

In the night, though clouds are heavy

I see with rare sight.

I have walked in this world’s streets

Tasted a dreamless sleep

The vacant eyes of people walking

Not awake

Not dreaming

Drifting like flotsam in the sea.

Their faces are worn smooth and their eyes are blind.

They cannot see.

An old man left his village to climb a mountain.

He said he went to see the face of God.

He climbed over jagged rocks

Trudged through bitter snows

Shivered in cold winds.

But he continued through the night

Passing through clouds and up the last steep slope;

In darkness he ascended the spire.

Morning came, and he clung to the pinnacle

Ablaze with brilliant light.

Early evening, he returned to the village

He could not see, his eyes were blind, but his face shone with light.

No one ever knew…

And no one asked…

Was it the fierce sunrise, unfiltered by dust and haze

Or did he see God’s face for a single shining second

Before the frail organs of perception shorted in spiritual sparks?

Yet the old man was not unhappy.

Children, even men and women

They gathered around him, sat and listened.

 He told and retold the story of glimpsing the light of heaven.

He would lean forward, raise a finger, whispering, “The Light! The Light! I have seen it!”

In his blindness he would whisper, “I see it still! All I can see is light.”

Jumper

I'm listening to one of my music mixes tonight from several years ago. Hadn't jammed to Third Eye Blind in a long time. I have strange connections to this "flash in the pan" band from the late nineties. Do you ever listen to a song and suddenly a string of associative memories streams through your head like a stream of clattering marbles? Well, this one had just one memory, but this one was a bowling ball through my front window. Made me laugh just to think about it.

First time I heard Third Eye Blind, there I am, standing in the Abilene Mall, strategically positioned next to a clothing rack in the BUCKLE, a new salesman waiting to rush on the next hapless juvenile entrusted with Mom and Dad's credit card. The BUCKLE was the only time in MY LIFE where I walked out on a job.

Initially, I thought it would be a good deal for a twenty year old single guy: high dollar clothes, cool looking store, salespeople with an uber-high cool-factor, a lot of cute female co-workers, and a huge employee discount. The assistant manager took my application and set up an appointment for me to interview with the manager. She gave me a heads up on some things. First, a BUCKLE salesperson may only wear BUCKLE clothes, so dress like an Abercrombie and Fitch commercial. Second, the manager is a super-bitch- "Don't be too assertive with her" she cautioned. "She had her first baby a couple months ago, and she hasn't been able to loose the extra pounds. Don't judge her, she used to be really skinny." Then, she reassured me that I passed the appearance test, and when I looked confused, she explained BUCKLE employees had to be clean-cut, good at least to amazing looking people. I looked at her- "Okaayyy... well thanks for telling me I didn't break the mirror." Internally, I was wondering, "What the hell is this place??...". 

Holly the manager had a pinched mouth, hard eyes, and didn't smile. I was a mildly interesting farm animal with reasonably good teeth. She glanced over my application, told me I was hired, and warned me that my hours were dependent on my selling ability. My salary was primarily based on my commission. I accepted my name tag and joined the sales floor. 

When you work at the BUCKLE, or at least that BUCKLE, you discover in a commission-only sales environment, no one is your friend. You have to corner a customer, and then sell your soul to the gods of Abercrombie&Fitch, Lucky jeans, Billabong and compatriots to pester nineteen year kids to buy two shirts to go with their jeans, and while they change in the dressing room, invade their privacy by laying accessories over the curtain, "How about this belt that Usher wore in his last music video? Or this graphic tee shirt?". 

Seriously. If you didn't, Holly would materialize from behind a clothing rack and scold you with a long red-painted claw. When I protested that people didn't want all a that extra stuff, I was informed it was BUCKLE policy. I wound up using reverse psychology, 'Man, I don't want to, but I have to show you this other shirt or that scary looking lady over there is going to lecture me for thirty minutes on my sales technique. Can you pretend to look at this for a second?" Actually, several people bought the accessories- although I couldn't figure out if they felt sorry for me or were they actually that species of "consumer sheep" who ate whatever mercantile carrot was dangled in front of them. 

Anyway, it didn't matter. By the end of the day, I had lost most of my dignity. I trudged to my car in the wide parking lot in a state of dejected degradation. By day seven, my sales percentage had dropped, and Holly batted eyelids matted with mascara, reminding me in an icy voice that I needed to "Show her the Money". (That was when Tom Cruise was still cool). The other male salesmen laughed nervously and distanced themselves from me, smoothing their AmbercrombieFitch haircuts and smiling for no good reason. Proto-type metrosexuals. They definitely did not have my back.

I was standing there in the late morning, hiding from Holly, watching the old men and women power walk in the mall. The song JUMPER from Third Eye Blind came on. I thought to myself, "This is a Damn good song." I stood there jammin' to the song, nodding my head, especially in the part with the guitar solo and the guy says "yeah, yeah- YEAH!". 

Of course, at that moment, Holly decides to ambush me. "I don't pay you to stand here and listen to music. You have to move around and generate movement in the store."

I guess my look to her said, "Screw you"... but what I said was, "Well, considering you don't pay me a lot anyway, this is pretty reasonable." She made some other remark I don't remember exactly but something to the effect I was paid what I deserved. Whatever it was, it was the last straw.

"You know Holly, I quit." I turned around, walked out of the store and never went back- not even for my meager 52 dollar check. 

I never regretted that decision. Or the frozen look of affronted disbelief on her face.

Guess the song kind of helped me out, although I totally jumped off the ledge and it felt great.

I think she understood. I just wish I had added the caveat, "Go to hell!".

JUMPER- Third Eye Blind

How stand I then?

Tonight, I feel like I am running with wings strapped to my arms, but I can't get any lift. I'm not complaining, and I'm not whining. It's just the way it is.

We start out free-ranging ships, eagles with unlimited sky. Somehow, over time, the world becomes a committee of penguins who convince us that we are not ships aiming for the golden thread of the horizon- no, not stallions, nor eagles. No, we are iron locomotives fed black coal so we can chug forward indefinitely along a single track line. We must eat the coal or the "true death" comes. This is not a eye-widening explosion wrought by a sharpened stake, but a death by rust, by slow lethargic consignment to a decay of momentum into a twilight junkyard of oxidizing iron. 

Perhaps my subtle leanings towards a gnostic view of the universe have worn some callouses on my brain. Or perhaps, I have read a little too much of Philip K. Dick's Exegesis and taken him too seriously. And then maybe a Shocktop would take the edge off. I could laugh, shake my head and go back to blowing my train whistle while the autopilot light quietly blinks on. Whoo Whoo!

Right.

Last time I checked, I was still alive. I still have breath going through my bronchioles and Mike Burns ain't no consumptive coughing into a bloody handkerchief. Playing Doc Holiday, the "Dying Hamlet Hero" is tempting, but I'd like to keep it real.

But this transition and death seems inevitable. Can we fight it? When it comes at me, can I clock it in the head with an aluminum baseball bat? *KRUNG!*


When that damn angel grabs hold of me, judo-chop that dude to the ground and full-nelson him until I get a blessing? When Mr. Smith kicks me in the chest and holds my head to the train track saying:

"You hear that, Mr. Anderson? That is the sound of inevitability. That is the sound of your death."

How about getting back up to do a Kung Fu "come to daddy" move and with the cool little hand motion beckon, tell Mr. Smith where he can stick his "inevitability".

So Fuck that locomotive. 


I'll fight to keep my wings. My Kung Fu is definitely stronger than any damn penguin committee.

Earlier this evening, I watched a short film (only 25 minutes) that captured the correct mental state and outward action I think we should all aim for. 

Kurt Vonnegut's "Harrison Bergeron" (Read the full text story here online: 

http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/harrison.html) is an unforgettable short science fiction story that I first read in High School English. The year is 2081 and everyone is forced to become "truly equal". 

The "Handicapper General" ensures that all citizens are "equalized", to the detriment of individuality and repression of the extraordinary. Yet one man defies this tyranny and challenges the establishment to a unique stand-off for a surprising objective. Someone spent a lot money to produce an almost perfect dramatic rendition of this in the form of a short film. 

Brilliantly executed. They nailed it, and I was touched.

Watch it below; I think we should all strive to say Harrison Bergeron's Creed: 

"I am an abomination of the able. 

I am an exception to the accepted. 

I am the greatest man, you have never known." 

2081- Harrison Bergeron

Death to the locomotive. 

Long live open seas and wide skies, 
and Harrison Bergeron!