January 2009 Recently, I tried to expressing to my partner my sense of disappointed disinterest in writing online. And I couldn't. Somewhere in the midst of my grasping for a root cause, my partner asked (paraphrasing), "when you recently felt the need to write again, what was the motivation?" I had no answer at the time. But upon further reflection, all I cancome up with is that I sometimes feel I *should* be writing, just because I can, and because I've fancied myself a writer. That I'm obligated, in some way that I don't even want to try to understand, because I fear understanding it will annihilate my few - my only - precious drops of motivation. But it got me thinking about why I wrote in the past, even prolifically so. There were two reasons. The first was to motivate others to interact with me. The second was the belief I had knowledge few others had. I had an extremely unique point of view, which might be revolutionary should enough people grasp it. And I could be the one to finally make it more accessible. Those two reasons carried me for a couple decades (being an early online adopter). But it turns out the seeming ace-in-the-hole point of view has absolutely no value to anyone else. Indeed, it's scarcely comprehensible. Furthermore, the best I've induced in others when expounding upon it is confusion, and arguments based thereupon. (Don't you just love when others argue with you about something other than what you're actually talking about? And then they go on to think you're an idiot because you're incapable of understanding them, when in fact you understand both them *and* the fact that they completely missed your point?) And so the desired interaction has always been mostly frustrating. So now I sit with a love for writing. But my strong suit isn't in anyone else's deck. And, for the most part, when trying to reach others with my favorite message, their most likely conclusion is that I'm playing with less than a full deck, and that what's left of my deck is marked with childish crayon scribbles from the simpleton single row crayon box. My wide eyes are narrow slits. My bushy tail, withered. I'm slim and smart: hardly the physique of the happy. And while I'm not yet good at it when it comes to lottery tickets, I'm damned good at knowing in advance what happens when I drive free and easy down my favorite conceptual road. Damn.   December 28, 2008 ~ I Got a Handbasket for Christmas Another year prepares to give up its ghost, its animation, its being. And, of course, in reality, the year does no such thing: all the credit goes to time. Or, more specifically, to minds which believe in such - that is, which believe in a representation of an entity subject to a phenomenon called "time", which entity is none other than the "self" which - wink wink - just so happens to magically possess said mind. (Suddenly dogs chasing their own tails don't seem so silly, hey?) Come to think of it, is anything much as it seems? Years don't begin or end. Sun, moon, and stars don't rise or set. Dollars are a measure of faith, not value. The Beatles "Come Together" was written for Timothy Leary's California gubernatorial campaign against Ronald Reagan, and also led to a lawsuit, which compelled Lennon to eventually produce his "Rock 'N Roll" album as a favor of sorts details here . I get a little down when the magical becomes the all-too-easily-explained. Adding insult to aforementioned conceptual injury, my favorite childhood radio station (WOKY - Milwaukee, WI) changed to a country format back in September! Why would I bother worrying about the price of gas when Armageddon is so obviously ready to break down my back door with a giant, NASCAR-labeled corncob pipe, smoldering and sparking of fundamentalistically fiery brimstonic weed? My latest mailing from the Social Security Administration indicates that there's good new and bad news. First, the good. Since I live a rather frugal life, it turns out I'll likely be able to live on my Social Security benefits alone. However, the entire fund will be "exhausted" by 2041, 13 years after I'm eligible for full benefits. And, of course, my 13 year retirement dream assumes we don't have idiotic - i.e. G.W. Bushian - leadership from here on in, the kind that busies itself primarily with how to funnel the middle class's labor-produced wealth to the rich - or the Social Security fund will be gone long before 2041. It also assumes most people don't catch onto the fact that the dollar isn't worth that which emanates from dogs' asses, because then the fund will suddenly be worthless anyway. Wow. I guess I'm doing a lot of whining, here. I didn't mean to. I'm honestly extremely happy with, and thankful for, my life. But I'm more than a little concerned with how most of the world around me doesn't know its head from its berry-adorned sphincter, and is thereby frantically borrowing its way into a lifestyle better then mine, and thus will require my financial assistance one way or another (against my wishes/will/sense-of-fairness/etc.). It's especially disappointing, because I knew such would be the case as early as 1st grade, looking around and seeing what idiots I was surrounded by. (Please try not to dwell on my bitterness as I briefly recall that it was said idiots who always got the girl(s). Sigh.) But that's life. Or the life the honest, hard-working members of a species wind up with in a system that strives to "correct" natural selection by giving idiots the same rights as the intelligent, so that the idiots not only trample undeserved pearls into chickenshit toothpaste, they slap you upside the head and defile your daughters while laughing in your face. But, of course, if you asked any of them what they're doing, they'd simply grunt out something that sounds like "I'm just doing my job". Dang it, that's not how I wanted to see the majority of my fellow man/woman as my years became ripe. But I can't even drive 10 mph over the speed limit, anymore, without some yahoo driving 6 inches off my rear, doing that "drifting to the left" thing that's supposed to be telling me that I'm in their way, that I better move, "or else". I can't live in a 4 family building with shared entrances, without one of the dumbassed neighbors leaving the doors unlocked - or even wide open. Or smoking in the hallway, so that my dwelling becomes polluted. Next year I'm going to be praying for one of them ACME (apparently they're called "IKEA" these days) arks for Christmas. You know, the kind you build, and then enter with speedos and galloshes, two by two.... So, yeah, I'm happy and thankful and will be just fine if I can build a big enough moat, wall, and/or fence to keep these last couple generations of lazy-assed, ungrateful, undeserving takers away. But, of course, that's not how it will work. Instead, it'll be confrontation, and forced equalization. Dumb brute-forced might will define right. And I guess it's possible to believe it serves some higher purpose, but unfortunately I'm not high enough to grasp it, and, indeed, gave up getting that high a long time ago. Jeremy On the Path Jeremy walked slowly down the rain-grooved dirt road, his attention flowing evenly over his immediate world. Grasshoppers lept like the first few kernels of corn to pop. Tinny cicada communication sawed sonic northern lights through the humid haze. Ants waged war without sin. It’s so good when nothing special steals the lion’s share of attention, he thought. Damn her bangs and the eyes which exploded below them. Damn how she mattered more than everything combined when she mattered at all. He picked up a flat, dusty rock, and threw it side-armed toward the big oak, which stood like a magnet for filings of wood boards, remnants of makeshift ladders from neighborhood antiquity. The stone curved well before the the mighty trunk, disappearing in the calm pillow of tall grass, a single, white butterfly fluttering away from where the stone drowned forever. He started in the direction of its resting place, but held back. Let it go. And it wasn’t even the stone. It was the place. He needed to know where it came to rest, fix that image in his mind, possess the unique, intimate knowledge of that place. Thus did the world exist: so long as he remembered it. But it was becoming burdensome. So much existence to maintain. So many imputed selves. He turned and ran. She knew. December 2008 Very pleasant evening! A new song is being composed before my very ears. Cool rhythm, keyboard sounds, chords. Four lighted Christmas trees of varying heights to my right. This wonderful little Asus eee pc in my lap. "You can't beat having the vi editor in your lap",  is what I'm wont to start always saying. Supper was literally on the house, what with winning $60 at the craps table. My portion at Chili's was some sort of "big mouth" burger. I suppose it's a bit frightening in a way. But I love the comic book sort of feel to it. I'm not big on holidays. Maybe because most days are holidays to me? Holy days. Probably not per what you mean by "holy". But I know what I mean. So there.   INDIRECTION's Flashback of 2008 August, 2008 Radio coverage of a Yankee game from the phone slices a thin, frayed slit in the foamy whoosh of the central air. The keys of another keyboard scratch a digital EKG onto the surface of that sonic fabric. Train whistle blasts like screams from hell render it all irrelevant. So, too, will the reaper's call transform a coworker's maddeningly inexplicable behavior into simple meaninglessness. It's all degrees and timing. Today's ennui was yesterday's proof of enlightenment. Tomorrow's certainty, a slight rearranging of today's identically colored puzzle pieces. Two days ago I knew everything: today, I scarcely recognize my own handwriting. It's amazing how quickly God goes from existing to not. But it's lack of sleep and loss of meek, and that's why the earth is no longer mine. Rather, I'm its. Back to the recycling bin we go, so early in the morning of what could have been our lives. Pondering what might have been is as effective a narcotic against the present as is a camera, always the territory and map thereof dichotomy. But chewing bubbly gum on the outside looking in is the sin you get when you throw away the key. Bye, bye miss two decades old rye, drove my liver to the river 'cuz my shiver was high. But it's merely tea. Tea, and New Yorker cartoons. And tomorrow off. July, 2008 Flashback: that time I was driving alone, north on Route 9D, about to turn left on a road whose name I no longer remember, toward New Hamburg. Someone pulled yet another road shenanigan, a seemingly daily occurrence in the vicinity of yours truly in beautiful - albeit far-too-over-priced-for-what-it's-worth - Dutchess County, New York. My stomach digested itself daily over others' vehicular transgressions. But there I was, waiting to make that left turn, wondering how it could be that so many people were so pathetic behind the wheel. And then it hit me: I had no proof such mistakes were chronic. In all likelihood, I just happened to be there when an occasional person was making their one mistake in a few years. And they deserved every bit as much understanding as I hoped to receive when making one of my rare blunders. Sometimes it's a bit disappointing that I can't forget that realization. There's still no lack of opportunity to slap my steering wheel sideways while groaning - if not bellowing - out yet another cover of The Self Righteous Brothers' "Can You Friggin' Believe How Careless Others Are?" The lyrics flash through my brain like a right blinker preceding a left turn. But instead of category six hurricane winds, it's more a cool breeze with an occasional gust. The answer is indeed blowing in the wind so long as you don't try to capture it in your tiny little sails. Let them pass, those winds of change you, lest they rearrange and estrange you. And I'm talking mostly to me.