This weekend, after finishing my last paper of the semester, my wife and I drank a bottle of wine and painted a few canvases. Below is my sophomore effort, and the first painting I've done since my senior year in college.
A question while I take a break for writing myriad final papers: Would you rather have people consistently underestimate you or overestimate you?
I'm going out and getting a mongoose right now. It's a miracle I've survived the Africanized honey bees this long, and I'll be damned if I'm not prepared for the latest threat.
Today's question: Would you rather swap bodies with someone of another gender or another ethnicity?
There are a couple components that go into making Thanksgiving my favourite holiday. The season starts early for me with Fallstravaganza. Then comes family time on Thanksgiving day, followed closely by Lone Star Showdown Friday and Kill a Tree for Christmas1 in North Fork, CA. It's a rare occurrence when all these cogs fall into place; either the Ags loose their game or weather in North Fork is crummy or family is grumpy . . . there are just too many variables for things to come out perfectly. This year, however, has gone off about as well as could be hoped for. Fallstravaganza '07 went swimmingly, I had a very enjoyable Thanksgiving day with my in-laws in town from Dallas, the Ags beat the HELL outta t.u. and we got a sweet tree on an idyllic afternoon in North Fork. Check, check, check and . . . check. I hope yall had awesome Thanksgivings.
I was slumped up against several tons of luggage piled high in black military duffels like so many body bags testifying, the result of some great catastrophe. It was my second time to London in as many summers, and if I’d had known it would be my last for at least eight years I probably would have been out enjoying the experience. As it was, however, I had spent the lion’s share of my time in
There had been some discussion about how to pronounce Maryka’s name before she had made her way from comfortable suburban
A rangy, bow-legged kid from Anywhere, Georgia, Rosco was just Maryka’s type. “Howdy,” he drawled out impossibly long as he almost gracefully splayed his legs out in front of himself, dropped down next to Maryka and cocked his camouflage John Deer hat back on his head.
“Hey,” she responded, raising her eyebrows in a passable imitation of interest.
“What’s yer name?” he continued, seemingly unperturbed by the general lack of reciprocity so far in the conversation.
“My name?” she said, and I could feel her skating the razor’s edge. She chose grace. “My name’s Maryka. What’s yours?”
“Oh, I’m jus’ Rosco,” he said, scratching the back of his neck. “Muh r-eye kuh,” he strung each drawled syllable out to its extremity, a kid with their first piece of salt water taffy. “Say, Muh-reye-kuh . . . yer red hair sure is perty.” This just keeps getting better I thought to myself as Maryka swallowed a snigger in my direction. “It reminds me of that Anne of Green Gables girl, ya know?”
And then the three of us just sat there in awkward silence for what seemed like hours until Maryka got up and muttered something about how nice it was to make Rosco’s acquaintance and how she was sure they’d run into each other soon. Things continued on like that on our team for another three or four weeks; awkward approaches at flirting, coy ripostes and the gamut of stereotypical teenage intersexual transactions until something magical happened under the Mahajanga mango groves. For the first time in my life, for about six weeks, I stopped seeing people and started experiencing people. Mike and Simon and Tom became as beautiful to me as Bronwyn, Brandt and Debbie. There was no male, nor female. We were all Greeks and one another's slaves. It didn’t last for long, and it didn’t happen for everyone, but it happened for me and at 17 years of age it was a mystical experience to commune with the selves and not the personas.
The first time I clearly remember it happening, I was in World History summer school between my Freshman and Sophomore years, but I have a feeling I've been doing it my whole life. I zoopomorphize people; I see them as their animal equivalent. It's not that they even really look like the animal per se, but to me they somehow exude that animal's flavour, it's feel, it's impression. Odd, I know. In high school it was a girl from Clovis West named Caitlyn, and she was a sea otter. One minute I was gazing vacantly around the room and the next I was struck by the resemblance which would grip me for five more weeks until we went our respective ways and I was left with noting more than a colour coded map of Africa's several dessert regions. I can do it with most everyone if I try hard enough, but there area few that strike me and I see them more as their animal avatar than I do as people. Last week at the Gold's where I work out, while I lay panting under the bench press, Water Buffalo said to Lion, "Can you believe those f**kin' Dodgers?! They're gonna pay Torre 13 mil, and they're talkin' 'bout signin' A-Rod! F**k!" Lion, gloved paws on his hips, just adjusted his shades and shook his mane.
///////
Editor's Note: This post marks the 100th post on The Texafornian. Thanks to all of yall who read. May the next 100 be as random and relatively painless as the last!
///////
Taking stock of his impossibly limited options, Liam knew he didn’t have much time. The door to his suite had already sustained what sounded like an astonishing amount of punishment, far more he ever would have imagined the ragged portal could absorbed, and it was far overdue to buckle and admit his gentlemen callers. When it did, he was confident the proceeding pleasantries would be anything but. Sifting through the pile of loot from Cwik’s pocket, he quickly spotted what he was looking for. Liam flicked an opened Trojan condom wrapper aside and grasped the small but wicked looking knife. He opened it with a smooth *snick*, a whisper of encouragement against the cacophonous tribal beat upon the door.
With the pistol in his right and the small black knife glinting in his left, Liam pointed at Cwik with the later. “Here’s how this is going to happen, Ricky,” said Liam in a low, tense voice, barely audible over the drumming on the door. “You talk, you die. You bolt, you die. You cross your eyes, you get maimed. You say you know me, so you should know I’m not playing games here. When I cut you loose, you’ll stand up and wait for me to tell you what to do. You’re gonna be my lil’ puppet,” Liam finished, giving Cwik a mock jab under the chin. Working quickly and carefully, Liam stepped on Cwik’s feet as he cut the cord holding them, leaving his hands still bound. *THOOM-AArrrccckkkkk!* protested the door, and on the other side the shouts of two men became slightly more audible. Sliding the blade upwards along the side of Cwik and stepping back a pace in one quick movement, he instructed Cwik to stand up. Spreading his feet a bit, Cwik attempted to raise himself from his bonds and only half managed the feat before falling heavily back to the chair. Redoubling his efforts, Rick staggered to his feet as the door finally surrounded its courageous battle with the intruders and spat splinters into the room as it flew back with a loud crack and settled drunkenly on mangled hinges.
Two men in nondescript clothes piled after each other into the room, pistols drawn, and came to a crashing halt just a few paces from Cwik’s demonic scarecrow frame in the cramped room. The cool air now being gulped into the room reminded Liam he was still in his boxers, only increasing his sense of vulnerability and apprehension. Keeping Cwik between himself and the men as much as possible, Liam all-to-comfortably gripped his Berretta and knife in their respective hands. He couldn’t have been more than five paces from the other men, but with the furniture and people clogging the interior there was little room to maneuver.
“Ah, shit,” said the one in front after quickly surveying the situation. He was smaller and lighter than his counterpart, but not by much. He had small, hard eyes that seemed to be looking everywhere and yet nowhere at once. Liam could see those eyes efficiently search Cwik’s face, but what was said or what was understood was impossible to discern from his vantage. Both men now had their pistols up and leveled at Liam.
“Let’s just be cool,” said the other man. His eyes were malicious. Not quick, not stupid. Just mean, and Liam didn’t like them one bit.
“I’d be a lot cooler with you guys walking your asses right back out of my suite the way you came," said Liam levelly. He was shocked to hear the confidence in his own voice. Cwik stood swaying ever so slightly, but Liam still couldn’t see his face.
“Liam, man. You know we can’t let you go. Your pop’ll have our foreskins if we botch this,” said Hard Eyes.
“We’re both already circumcised, numb-nuts!” spat Mean Eyes.
“Well then his pop’ll grow ‘em back and cut ‘em off again, Charles! Only this time we’ll be old enough to remember the process!!” snarled Hard Eyes, now turning to meet Charles’ glare.
Liam reacted before he knew what he was doing. Cwik’s knife flew from his left hand and whistled past it’s previous owner’s right ear as it buried itself Charles’ right shoulder up to the handle, causing his pistol to drop to the ground with a clatter as he lurched back and gripped the blade now sprouting metallically from his flesh. In near simultaneous concert, Liam’s Px4 quietly exploded twice. One round grazed Hard Eyes across his left cheek and the other struck the clavicle just below and he reflexively squeezed off two rounds which bit into the walls as he spun down clutching at his marred visage. The bite of gunpowder and blood exploded in Liam’s nostrils as he spotted Cwik barreling out of the door, hands still bound in front of him.
Liam should now:
A) Chase Cwik and ditch the Eye Brothers.
B) Leave Cwik and interrogate the Eye Brothers.
C) Cut his losses with both and just try to get the heck out of Dodge.
D) Finish off the Eye Brothers and then try and track down Cwik.
The last quote from Johnson's Inner Work was a little weird, I'm the first to admit. I strongly believe there is something to this whole 'unconscious' phenomenon, but "Lady Ingrid" is a little much for even me. The book as a whole is challenging, bizarre and more than a little disconcerting at times, but I thought I would risk another quote which I found much more concrete and helpful.Ritual, in its true form, is one of the most meaningful channels for our awe and sense of worship. This is why ritual came spontaneously into being among humans in all parts of the earth. This is why modern people who are deprived of meaningful ritual feel a chronic sense of emptiness. They are denied contact with the great archetypes (ie. the Holy Spirit1) that nourish our soul-life.1Parenthetical mine
- Inner Work, Robert A. Johnson. pg. 102
It’s rare for me to encounter someone whom I deem wise; I could have two fingers bit off by a cantankerous Iguana and still count the number of wise people I know on one hand. Don’t get me wrong, I know a whole mess of smart people. I know a bunch of intelligent people. I am even fortunate to know a fair group of individuals whose insight far surpasses what one might call ‘normal’ (these are not the people to invite to poker night). There is a quality about a select few, however, which can’t be quantified and which I label ‘wise.’ It has something to do with living, something to do with loving and something to do with lamenting but I’m not quite sure on the recipe yet. I saw wisdom in my great grandmother. My great grandmother Della was somehow always much more substantial than her wizened frame would suggest, I imagine because the voyage from Colorado Springs to Houghson, California in a covered wagon imbued her with a grit which only showed through more clearly as the years inexorably striped away the insubstantial. By the time I remember knowing her she was always sitting, always covered by one of her homemade quilts, and always watching the comings and goings around her. I heard wisdom when she would crunch her kind face into a smile and say to me at 104 years of age, “Micah, don’t ever live to be this old. It’s isn’t any fun.”
This Thursday, I met another woman who seemed wise to me. Margaret Hudson is a sculptor, painter and passionate pursuer of life as well as a fixture of the
In her back yard, an overgrown collection of bamboo thickets, cottonwood stands and crawling ivy with an organic garden at its centre, I stood and listened to Margaret share her soul with our class. With one hand gripping a smooth, hard bamboo shoot I stood listening to Margaret speak and was struck by the dichotomy: the aged bamboo became larger, harder and smoother as it watched the years pass by. Those same years seemed to have effected the opposite for Margaret. That is, until she confided in us about her nearly impossible pursuit of God through the nightmare of loosing her son to suicide. In those interminable few seconds she was larger, smoother, firmer and more perfect than any Platonic bamboo as she nearly shouted with passion, “And all I came to discover was that I really don’t know much. But what I do know . . . I know that God is and that God is real and that God is real to me.” Her hands lifted to the sky in supplication and surrender and defiance and acceptance, she slowly lowered them and turned her magnified eyes back towards our rapt attention. We were 20-some-odd souls staring at another we suddenly realized was naked and unashamed.
I very much hope to one day be considered wise by others, but for now I content myself with being a witness to other’s wisdom.
It is best if we get acquainted with our inner personalities as persons in their own right before we start putting distance between us and them by using psychological classifications and jargon. You will get much closer to your inner feminine if you know her as "Lady Ingrid," for example, and think of her as a special and interesting being who lives inside you, than if you call her 'the anima' and turn her into a clinical abstraction.Just thought you should know . . .
- Inner Work, Robert A. Johnson. pg. 77
There’s something about the fall that makes me start thinking cinematically. The barometric pressure, ambient temperatures, and change in lighting angles seem to conjure up crisply framed scenes accompanied by poignant soundtracks in my mind for the most mundane of daily activities. The camera cuts to a strait overhead shot as I sit hunched, head in my left hand, shoveling oatmeal into my mouth in the semi-light of
Since the last film review post I have seen a staggering 10 films. They are, in chronological order:
Maybe it’s the serial position effect or maybe it’s my affinity for the taboo, but I’ve decided to give the feature to the most recent documentary I saw, F**K.
Carl Jung believed that we are all connected through a collective unconscious, and as such the Universe will tell us things that are, that have been and that will be if we pay attention. All week people have been randomly dropping the eff-bomb all around me, and last night (Saturday) I ended up watching
This documentary did three things very well. It let me know what Ice Tea thinks about the eff-bomb. It let me know what Drew Carey thinks about the eff-bomb. It also cleared up the urban legend that it is an acronym of some sort, which is a spurious urban legend according to the many distinguished linguists they paraded across the screen. Expecting a smart and well-crafted film about the history and utility of society’s most exciting and well-known taboo, the film ended up being more of a smorgasbord of famous opinions about the value of censorship and either idolization or vilification of the eff word, a la ‘I Love the 80’s.’
The movie was far from void, I don’t mean to give a completely pejorative vibe on the thing. It was generally well shot, there was an interesting cast of interviews from Sam Donaldson to Tera Patrick and everyone in between. There were some interesting segments over the linguistic flexibility of the word (it can be used legitimately as almost every part of speech), its history and the public debate over its use in several different contexts, and an honest effort to provide some contrast in opinion. In the end, however, the film ended up coming off juvenile due largely to some poorly constructed segments arguing for a categorical absolution of FCC regulation. Based entirely on Red Herring arguments about increasing fines under the Bush administration and some half-baked parenting philosophy pitched by Kevin Smith, it was 25 minutes of shaky rhetoric and shoddy diatribes that lost the film a lot of the luster it had previously garnered. It’s not everything I hoped it would be, but it’s a good film for everyone who’s ever muttered it under their breath after an excruciating exam or screamed it at a roommate after they ate your last lasagna again and took your calculator to study in the library when you needed it for a test.
Grade: B-
Scores and Highlights:
Born into Brothels: If someone had told me three years ago that it was possible to shoot an uplifting documentary about children born to generational prostitutes in Calcutta's red-light district, I would have had a hard time believing them. Zana Briski was able to manage just that in this stirring picture of the impact of one woman’s refusal to be content with moral outrage and instead commited her life to brightening an otherwise dark situation. Witnessing the change in how the children composed not only their photographs but also their lives was nothing short of miraculous.
Grade: A-
Capote: Phillip Seymore Hoffman is superb in this relentless film about Truman Capote’s pursuit of his groundbreaking non-fiction fiction piece In Cold Blood. The film didn’t do much for me other than give me an appreciation for the spent-uranium durability of the author and provide a fascinating look into the life of the midwife of modern American literature. The writing, acting, directing and pacing are all accomplished at the highest levels. So yeah, I guess it kinda did do a lot for me after all.
Grade: B+
Memento: I hadn’t seen this film in a long time and I’d forgotten how much I enjoyed it. I’m not sure if I’ve seen a film before or since as conceptually intriguing as Memento, and while the acting is a little stilted at times and the writing is more than adequately covered by bizarreness of the plot, the film is able to sneak a surprising amount of character development in among the twists and is thoroughly enjoyable to loose yourself in. It was even better the second time after a bottle of wine.
Grade: A-/A+++
Charade: I have a bias against old movies, and I’m not sure why it is. If a movie is filmed before 1985, I always end up looking at a movie jacket and thinking it’s going to blow. Well, after polishing off this smart action/comedy circa 1963, I had not only changed my tune about older movies but also found myself completely enamored with Audrey Hepburn. A charming and classy woman from another time and another place, she is something we could use much more of in contemporary cinema. Decently acted and cleverly delivered, Charade was good clean fun for the whole family. Random casting note: This was apparently the other movie Walter Matthau did before Grumpy Old Men.
Grade: A-
The Boondock Saints: This film is exceptionally violent, frequently obscene and almost entirely dark, and yet somehow manages to preserve an unidentifiable quality which would resemble hope if it wasn’t so grizzled. This film also manages to capture filial piety in a way that transcends acting, writing or directing, and I have always been impressed by that. My favourite scenes from this movie are the old Irish barkeep screaming, “F**K!!!!! ASS!!!!!!!!” and blinking apoplectically as a group of Nuns hurry past in a hospital hallway and the brothers conversing in five different languages with Agent Smecker. It’s not a flick for everyone, but if you’re in the mood for some film noire killing and maiming, this one’s for you. Best taken with a Guinness or five.
Grade: B
Grade: C-/D+
Grade: A-
Weird Science: What can you really say about this Saturday afternoon classic? It's basically a distillation of male juvenile primary processing, right down to the fecal troll Bill Pullman gets turned into, and it had been years upon long years since I'd seen it. Between the mutant biker gang, stealing the popular girls from Robert Downey Jr. and jaunting nonchalantly around town in Ferraris, it's a fun house of every Jr. High guy all dressed up in undeniably 80's threads. Not really intelligent, not really subtle in any way shape or form, but campy and random.
Grade: B-
Knocked Up: I actually enjoyed this flick a lot more than I thought I would when it came in the mail. I had heard rave reviews from several different sources over the months since its release, but remained skeptical. Partly because of my low expectations, however, and partly because most of the cast were strongly reminiscent of my friends in high school, I ended up appreciating the crassness and awkwardness captured so authentically in this film of trying to negotiate life between people who are so unalike. An enjoyable film as long as you don’t take anything too seriously.
Grade: B
*** This is one man's account of actual events that transpired on the evening of January 13th, 2000. For another man's recollection, please take a dip in the Language Pool ***
///////
It was the middle of winter; the time of year which on occasion leaves you thinking you’re late for bed before the
James had joined me in the ranks of adulthood just recently, and the Knudson brothers were the ones who first floated the idea. “Yeah, lotto tickets and smokes. Turning 18 just isn’t as exciting as I thought it’d be,” I said while Al Nunez desperately tried to redirect the group’s attention back to Galatians Chapter 2. “Welcome to the club anyhow, James.”
“You can buy dynamite,” Peter interjected. “Didn’t you know that?”
“Totally,” added his brother Nathan. “You’re adults now.”
There were some guffaws and ‘nu-uh’s’ followed by more ‘uh-huh’s’ before Al’s persistently patient redirections were effective in returning us to the text at hand, but the damage had been done; James and I were hooked. Dynamite was available for the purchasing and there was no way we wouldn’t be buying some.
After the study was over, James and I took council together. “What are we gonna use it on, though, James?” I said. Always the Bert to his Ernie, I’m thinking practically. “Heck, where are we gonna use it?”
“Can’t we use your house?” James asks, dead pan. A forgone conclusion.
“We’re not that far out in the country, James. And plus, I’m pretty sure my dad doesn’t want us blowing stuff up in the back yard with dynamite.”
“And the target?”
“Who cares? Even just a hole in the ground would be cool.”
“I wonder how much dynamite costs? For that matter, where do we even buy it? I don’t remember seeing it at Wal Mart or Target or anything, ya know?” I was excited about the project, but I couldn’t get myself past a few logistical hiccups. Like price per unit, and felony destruction of property charges.
“I betcha
“Yeah, I guess they’ll be our best bet.
The ride over was uneventful, James expertly spiriting his nimble automobile through, around and over traffic. “This is gonna be awesome,” he had said while down shifting and accelerating past an old Dodge Ram, screaming through an orange light. Caedman’s Call blared over the small tinny speakers in the car.
“Totally,” I had agreed, looking up at the patchwork of high clouds and the penumbral moon high above, face half smashed against the cool window.
We skittered into a parking stall under a guttering light near the front of Orchard Supply Hardware, the closest corporate equivalent to Mom & Pop’s Hardware N’ Things. If the parking lot was any indication, they didn’t get a lot of customers after six on a Thursday night. Piling out of the Metro and casting furtive grins at each other, we strolled through the automatic doors as they whooshed aside and we stepped into the mausoleum. The fluorescent lighting above hummed in subdued tones, harmonizing with Kenny Loggins who was politely crooning over the store’s speakers. The tang of galvanized metal and fertilizer was thick in the air and employees conspicuously thin on the ground as we began combing the store for our prized purchase.
“What aisle do you think they keep the dynamite in?” I asked James as we made our way past the impulse-buy stands, coiled garden hoses and E-Z Up shelters.
“Well, you can make explosives out of fertilizer, right? Maybe they’re with that?”
“Yeah, I dunno. I figure we can probably just go down every aisle and check it out,” I guessed. We still hadn’t seen any employees.
Fasteners? Not there. Drivers? Nor there. Lighting? Plumbing? Sealants? Paint? Nope x 4. We had worked our way through roughly ¾ of the store from left to right, muttering to each other about the odds of finding our target down this aisle or that aisle and ogling power tools when we found our first employee re-stocking the snail bait shelf in the pest control section. The boy looked to be about 16 with floppy hair and a slightly hunched posture, dutifully putting box after box of Ortho Slug & Snail Bait next to its kindred. His nametag informed us his name was Travis.
“Here we go,” James breathed to me and quickly approached the kid. I followed along in tow slightly slack-jawed and still very much wondering how the immanent exchange would go down.
“Hey,” James began, stopping at just the right distance from the employee. Not too close, not too far away. “I was wondering; do you guys sell dynamite?”
Travis’ hand, which had been methodically conveying box after box from his cart to the shelf, ground to a halt in mid air. It set cautiously down the box it had been carrying, and instead of retrieving another brushed his floppy hair back out of his face as he looked from the shelf to the cart and back again, conspicuously avoiding looking at James except for a quick glance between oscillations. “Oh – ah – uhmmmmm, yeah. Wow. Dynamite? No. Gosh, no. Wow, yeah. Dynamite? Yeah, we don’t sell that, I don’t think. I’m pretty sure, yeah, we don’t sell that, what do you need it for?” Travis was obviously flustered.
‘Shit!’ I thought to myself. ‘This is what I was worried about. Travers thinks we’re terrorists.’ I started looking for escape routes. Luckily James had no such compunction, and responded cool as a cucumber.
“Rodents,” he stated matter-of-factly, his face inscrutable.
“Oh, wow. Yeah. Gosh,” floundered the kid. “What kind?”
My stomach fell down my pant leg. ‘I wonder if they’ll give us cells near each other?’ I despaired. This wasn’t going as well as I had hoped. I thought I might have heard police sirens swiftly approaching outside, and every creak and groan of the store around us was the stamping of booted ATF agents. Still apparently unperturbed, however, James soldiered on.
Furrowing his brow just slightly and leaning towards Travis for emphasis, he replied “Big,” nodding slightly.
“Gophers . . . actually,” I found myself saying. “Big gophers. Making a real mess out of the place, you know?” I was trying to sell an Eskimo a refrigerator.
“Wow. Yeah, gophers. Gosh, ummm, yeah, must be pretty big. I guess they really can make a mess out of things,” Travis weakly agreed. I could taste his apprehensive skepticism. “What have you tried to get rid of em?”
“Just, you know, poison. Uh, flooding.” My mind raced through a conversation between my friend’s dad and another guy I had overheard about a gopher problem he was having. “The, uh. Um, well, the usual. Nothing’s really worked and my dad just wants ‘em gone.”
“Have you – uh -- tried, um, gopher gassers?” Travis asked. “I, um, I think they’re one aisle over. They usually, uh, they usually work pretty good.”
“Oh yeah?” At that moment I couldn’t have been paid any sum of money to stay in the store one minute longer. “No, we haven’t tried those yet but we will, one aisle over? Thanks, have a good night, see ya around.”
James and I turned on our heels and pushed the envelope for conspicuous walking speed, flashing wan smiles at a bored elderly lady slumped at the customer service desk as we strained towards the automatic sentries to freedom. Three steps from the door we both broke into a run and the Metro had started rolling before I had managed to fully shut my door. It wasn’t until we’d made it a block and a half with no lights in the mirror that we nearly died laughing ourselves to death.
It’s been a long time since James and I made Travis fill out an incident report on Orchard Supply letterhead; there are a million and three stories, jokes, and sorrows between then and now, and we still never have managed to procure ourselves any dynamite. In retrospect, it wouldn’t have been appropriate (metaphorically, not legally), but that’s never something you can know at the time. My relationship with James has never been centred around destruction, explosion or demolition. Instead, it has been a nearly 10 year history of encouragement, exploration, trust, intimacy (in a masculine way, of course) and growth which I count among my most treasured of gifts. I’m just glad I never had to shank him with a filed down toothbrush in the Big House for a carton of smokes and some lotto tickets during our 16 year stint for Conspiracy and Terrorist Threats.
Across:
I stumbled unexpectedly on koans while reading an incredibly dull book about cognitive behavioural therapy and borderline personality disorder; a flasher on the morning commuter train of my Thursday afternoon that has left me unable to get the idea out of my mind. A koan is a saying or story which contains aspects of Truth which are inaccessible to rational logic, but which are said to be approachable through a deeper wisdom. They are a tool of Zen practitioners used to move both student and teacher towards a deeper understanding of themselves and the world they inhabit. They cannot be answered by any power of intellect, nor apprehended through a purely emotional encounter. A koan may have many right answers and even more wrong ones. The koan is a mercurial thing, some would say a capricious at best, seldom retaining it's Truth for even the same person for long at all. The true interpretation of a koan is said to be found only in experiencing life. That is to say, I have been enthralled with the concept of coming to knowledge of something outside of reason and yet not based entirely on my own inner subjectivity since last Thursday at about 10:45 am.A monk asked Kegon, "How does an enlightened one return to the ordinary world?"And a famous koan from Chistianity:
Kegon replied, "A broken mirror never reflects again; fallen flowers never go back to the old branches."
For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it.
The world is vast and wide. Why do you put on your robes at the sound of a bell?
Uhhhhh, actually, folks, we're gonna have to call an audible on the previous post due to some unforeseen scheduling complications. Right now we're looking at perhaps the 10th of November. Email me back with an ideal date for you and your others, texafornian@gmail.com, and we'll try and accommodate as many people as possible.
The best part about that album cover: Disc II of Pipe Organ Extravaganza IV! I sometimes wonder how I haven't managed to release an album myself. There's obviously people out there willing to press, not to mention buy, just about anything (note the small script above the title!!!!!).
Alright, just kidding. I have no idea if cats actually even paint, let alone why. Nor do I know who would buy this book or why. What I do know is:
“Yeah,” quipped Liam, hardly cognizant of choosing his words before the tumbled from his mouth. “Long time no see.”
“Oh, so now you remember me? I knew you were full of shit, Liam. I knew it! Damn it, and now I’m payin’ the price for m . . .” but Liam stopped hearing the now constant and virulent stream of words erupting from his captive’s mouth. What was this guy talking about? What did he mean, now I remember him? Something tugged at the corner of Liam’s mind, an unsettled buzzing that evaporated with every attempt to bring it to consciousness, only to reconstitute again just past the fringes of his awareness.
Liam squinted away the confusion and raised the pistol he uncomfortably realized had fallen almost slack by his side. “Stupid stupid stupid! Stay focused here,” he thought to himself and he snarled and took a shuffle step towards the interloper in the chair. “Why don’t you just shut your mouth for a second. How ‘bout that, for old time’s sake?” And he pulled the hammer back with his thumb for emphasis.
“Sure, fine, whatev . . .” the stranger began again, seeming to gain steam with his mounting level of consciousness, but was swiftly clammed up as Liam lifted his pistol a few menacing inches. He splayed his hands up in a sign of contorted surrender from under the binding of the tape.
“Here’s how this is gonna work,” said Liam, now itching his temple with the dark muzzle of his borrowed piece. “I’ll ask you questions, you’ll answer. If I think you’re snowin’ me, you’ll get a matching set,” he finished, now gesturing with the pistol at the stranger’s duct taped forehead. The rumpled man grunted and rolled his eyes in resignation. “So first things first, champ. Who the hell are you.”
The man raised his eyebrows, questioning, until Liam waved him on with his free hand. “My name,” came the man’s low reply, “is Cwik. Ricky Cwick.” As the man began his response, Liam had began rifling through the small pile of the man’s possessions. He grabbed the wallet and flipped it open. The Nevada DL of Reginald Walker glowered back at him through yellowing plastic sleeve. Liam shook his head slowly, sneering as he stepped towards the chair and raised his gun.
“Wait!” yelped the prisoner, trying to maneuver his bound body away from the impending blow. Liam remained statuesque, pistol raised back over one shoulder ready to deliver a vicious blow. “Christ! You don’t think I carry my real ID around on me, do you?
“Remember you from where?!” erupted Liam, but as Cwik began to formulate his answer, Liam held up a finger. “One thing at a time. One thing at a time, Ricky. Who sent you after me?”
“Well that’s really two birds with one stone right there, Liam. You always were one for efficiency, weren’t you?” Cwik’s eye was crinkling into what appeared to be a grin, but the twinkle only managed to come out menacing in Liam’s estimation.
“So?” demanded Liam, pistol now back at the level, unwavering.
Cwik sighed and dropped his chin towards his chest, then brought his eyes back to meet Liam’s squarely. “Your father sent me here, Liam. Your father sent me to find you after what happened last April, and that’s how you know me. I’ve worked for your father and his family for 27 years.”
The buzz in the back of Liam’s mind got louder, but it was soon drowned out by a loud thud against the door to the suite. The door must have been sturdier than it looked to turn back the first assault, but the frame creaked and Liam saw the wall next to it shudder as a second blow was landed. It was evident the door would not hold long.
“Well,” said Cwik brightly, now apparently fully recovered from his stunning blow earlier. “They didn’t take long to show, did they? For all your efficiency, Liam, you do get bogged down in the details from time to time.”
Blood singing again in his ears, wild eyed, Liam scanned the small room and its contents past the barrel of his pistol. There weren’t many options.
Liam should now:
A) Attempt to barricade the door with furniture
B) Cut Cwik loose and attempt to use him as a hostage
C) Gag and hood Cwik, using him as ambush bait
D) Kill Cwik and use his body as a human shield while trying to escape through the unknown assailants.
I have earned a meager income for the last two years of my life working for a tutoring centre that tries to fill in the gaps left by our state's education system. I see lots of kids who don't understand the reading strategies employed by their teachers, kids who have yet to learn their math facts by 10th grade and kids that can't sit still for more than 83 seconds without climbing the walls and swinging from the ceiling. Some of my closest friends and my mother are also in the educational system, so when my professor recently assigned an article for my practicum cohort based on a lecture by a psychologist named Rudolph Dreikurs, I was extremely impressed by what he had to say. It has certainly given me material to think about as I tutor and work as a therapist. Here is the link to the full article, and below are some of the more exacting excerpts.I have found many, many people who try so hard to be good. But I have failed yet to see that they have done so for the welfare of others. What I find behind these people who try to be so good is concern with their own prestige. They are good for the benefit of their own self-evaluation. Anybody who is really concerned with the welfare of others won't have any time or interest to be concerned with the question of how good he is.
There is only one area where we still can feel safely superior: When we are right. It is a new snobbishism of intellectuals: "I know more, therefore, you are stupid and I am superior to you." It is superiority of the moralists: "I am better than you; therefore, I am superior to you." And it is in this competitive strife to establish a moral and intellectual superiority that making a mistake became so dangerous again because, "If you find out that I am wrong, how can I look down at you? And if I can't look down at you, you certainly will look down at me."
I feel that in the majority of tests given to students the final mark does not depend on how many brilliant things he said and did, but how many mistakes he made. And if he made a mistake he can't get a hundred regardless of how much he has contributed on other parts of the same assignment. Mistakes determine the value. In this way, we unwittingly add to the already tremendous discouragement of our children.
It seems to me that our children are exposed to a sequence of discouraging experiences, both at home and in school. Everybody points out what they did do wrong and what they could do wrong. We deprive the children of the only experience which really can promote growth and development; experience of their own strengths. We impress them with their deficiencies, with their smallness, with their limitations; and at the same time try to drive them on to be much more than they can be. If we want to institute in children the enthusiasm which they need to accomplish something, the faith in themselves, regard for their own strengths; then we have to minimize the mistakes they are making, and emphasize all the good things, not which they could do, but which they do do.
It’s common knowlege that chocolate is not good for dogs, so naturally my wife and I were concerned when we discovered my 11 lb. Jack Russell Terrier ate 12 brownies. It took us a while to put the story together, piecing together the clues. About 6pm, we noticed her little pink belly was taunt and distended. She refused dinner. She licked her lips a lot. We were pretty sure she’d gotten into something, but the list of what it could be was extensive; it wasn’t until dessert time that we discovered the batch of brownies had turned up missing. Quelle méchante.
Reba lounged around the apartment for the rest of the evening, legs pushed slightly askew by her bulging belly. So far we hadn’t seen the brownies make a reappearance. When we put her to bed around midnight, Reba yowled and cried in her crate. Fearing that she might detonate a shitstorm of explosive diarrhea and vomit if we kept her confined all night, I was moved by compassion and a desire to not clean up the mess. “Let’s just leave her out tonight, babe,” I said. “If she tries to get up on the bed, we’ll just push her off, it shouldn’t be a big deal.” And it wasn’t. Until about 5am.
Consulting the internet about chocolate consumption in dogs the next morning, we discovered that . . . “As time passes and there's increased absorption of the toxic substance, you'll see an increase in the dog's heart rate, which can cause arrhythmia, restlessness, hyperactivity, muscle twitching, increased urination or excessive panting.” That would explain the manic rampage around our apartment from the hours of 5-8:30am. After the fourth strait lap through our apartment, jumping on and over every piece of furniture we own barking like Bill Cower on Crank, I finally got out of bed and groggily held one end of a rope with Reba spasmodically clamped onto the other. 150 minutes later, she seemed to have taken a slight edge off. She has since been fed a mild laxative, squeezed out several piles of a gooey tar-like substance, and calmed down substantially though her small belly still shows signs of distention. While I am sure that chocolate consumption poses a serious physiological threat to my dog’s life, it’s nothing compared to the carnage which will be visited upon her if she pulls off a repeat performance tonight. Oh, and check out my nasty ankle!
1. This morning about 6h30 during a brief respite from Reba's rampage
2. 10h30 tonight, after working on the car all afternoon
3. Some context
I cried last night. I can’t say that it’s an unheard of occurrence; I remember one time particularly from my childhood when I had fallen off a ladder. It was the first time I had the wind knocked out of me. Sprawled on the ground in Osh Kosh B'Goshes and deck shoes, a fish out of water, the most terrifying part of the experience was trying to cry from the pain and finding the agency to do so had left with the forceful expulsion of air from my lungs. It wasn’t until they had time to reboot that I was able to give voice to my panic and pain. And voice it I did, clinging to my mother like a frantic baby rhesus as she patiently carried me back inside and smoothed my hair, accepting without question or protest the large damp spot on her Easter blouse where I buried my face .
It’s been a long three weeks for me since the beginning of my semester. Early mornings and later nights have taken their toll, so it would seem, on my psyche. I have doubled my client load at my first placement. I have helped a husband commit his wife of 35 years to a mental institution. I have stumbled upon the startling possibility that the reason I think my therapist is full of shit may in fact be because I think I am full of shit most the time I’m doing therapy. I have played 10 games of softball in two days. I have started academic work after a summer of solely clinical exercises. And last night after a particularly nasty sprained ankle in a fútbol match my team narrowly lost, the weight of this reality got to be a bit much for me. As I sat on the couch in the intermediary period before the ibuprofen took hold, frozen peas tied in place by my socks, the throbbing in my ankle kept time with the repeating third person replay of me landing awkwardly while trying to avoid the prostrate player. I make a small hop over a leg, take a stab at the ball, connecting tissues sue for breach of contract and the whole thing starts over again. Morgan’s face makes an appearance in my reverie: “They didn’t score, did they?” I ask, still clasping my lower calf with both hands and grimacing. He smiles a wry smile and cocks his head while he pats mine.
My tears were Pringles, impossible to stop after just one. This time it was my wife’s sweaty soccer jersey that absorbed my tears as she held me and smoothed my hair. I’m not embarrassed that I cried, in fact I’m glad that I did. It’s started me thinking: in a world rife with suffering and pain and hurt and sorrow as well as joy, celebration and ecstasy why do we laugh so much more than we cry? Or is that just me?
That I dug my key into the side of his pretty little souped up 4 wheel drive,
carved my name into his leather seats,
I took a Louisville slugger to both headlights,
slashed a hole in all 4 tires...
Maybe next time he'll think before he cheats.
