AND THE LORD GOD MADE MAN FROM THE DUST OF THE GROUND

“I have of late, but wherefore I know not, lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this most excellent canopy of air, look you, this brave o’erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire – why, it appeareth no other thing to me but a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What a piece of work is a man! How noble in reason, how infinite in faculties, in form and moving how express and admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god! The beauty of the world, the paragon of animals – and yet to me, what is this quintessence of dust?”

                                                            -Hamlet

           I’ve heard that dust is an ancient thing. I think about just how ancient it is as I notice a thin layer has settled on the cherry-wood bookcases in front of me. I glance at the titles of hundreds of books; philosophy books, novels, biographies, historiographies, and anthologies; pretexts, post-scripts and prefaces. No doubt the dust is nestled atop the thousands of pages in front of me, but the words within these books do not care about the dust; they have passed unscathed through the natural world. From the mind of their creator, to the print, to the press, to immortality, the words are but frequencies now, bouncing off the heavenly bodies above, blanketing space and time. IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE WORD, AND IT WAS COVERED WITH DUST.

 Poets tell us that to write down an idea is to immortalize it:

            “One day I wrote her name upon the strand,
               But came the waves and washéd it away:
                 Agayne I wrote it with a second hand,
                 But came the tyde, and made my paynes his pray.
            “Vayne man,” sayd she, “that doest in vaine assay,
                 A mortall thing so to immortalize,
                 For I my selve shall lyke to this decay,
                 And eek my name bee wiped out lykewize.”
             “Not so,” quod I, “let baser things devize
                 To dy in dust, but you shall live by fame:
                 My verse your vertues rare shall eternize,
                 And in the heavens wryte your glorious name.
             Where whenas death shall all the world subdew,
                 Our love shall live, and later life renew.
                                              -Edmund Spenser Sonnet 75

Spenser wanted to immortalize his love object; he wanted to protect her from the inevitability of becoming but dust, so he wrote a sonnet about her, and once recorded in the memory of the universe it becomes something that can’t be un-known.

           I’ve heard that household dust is in large part human skin. This information might sound disturbing to some. It doesn’t bother me. Of course, dust is made up of various other things, too: dirt, hair, wax, bug parts, animal parts, people parts, planet parts, star parts, and so on. As I think about this, I scan the cherry-wood bookcases and a large purple spine catches my eye; The Astronomy Encyclopedia. I pick it up, brush it off, and flip through it until I find INTERPLANETARY DUST PARTICLE. It turns out that many forms of interplanetary dust particles exist and along with them many names for the various particulates: INTERPLANETARY MEDIUM, INTERSTELLAR DUST, INTERSTELLAR GRAIN, INTERSTELLAR MATTER, INTERSTELLAR MOLECULES, MICROMETEORITE, et cetera: “For the fate of humans and the fate of animals is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They all have the same breath, and humans have no advantage over the animals; for all is vanity. All go to one place; all are from the dust, and all turn to dust again.” – Ecclesiastes 3:19-20.

 This isn’t such a bad thing.

Though no adequate words exist, this is my tribute to you, Guy Daniel Parnell. I did not know you that well, but I sat next to you for two semesters. You affected my life. Rest in peace.

A "Response" to a "Letter" that I "Received" in the Mail.

To whom this may “concern”:

             You must be hurting for business. I wonder what type of business you might hope to attract, offering me, a “neighbor in our community,” (though I am not really because the home of your dealership is “2910 White Settlement Road, Fort Worth, TX 76107”) a $1000.00 savings card in the form of that most iconic of Western monetary metaphors: the credit card. Exhaustive first sentence, am I right? Well, there is a lot to be said, so buckle up.

             When I open your “advertisement” and read, in Bold and in Blue it says Congratulations! When I read the fine print it states that I should “Immediately remove the attached $1000 Savings card and place it in your wallet. This card is valuable and may be applied toward the purchase of service, parts and accessories. Card is valid at all Autobahn locations.” Now, I wager that if I were to ask that the $1000 dollar savings be applied directly to the bill of exactly $1000 dollars you would regret to inform me that the advertisement clearly implies something else, and I would have to agree, but only because I have been desensitized by the sheer multitude of advertisements employing fraudulence and “implication” in their marketing strategies. And, that’s precisely what you have done here. You have implied that I have $1000.00 to spend on a vehicle while also implying simultaneously that said $1000.00 dollars is a percentage of the cost you would absorb on a much larger bill. But we all know that you really wouldn’t absorb anything, you just wouldn’t profit as much as you would on a pre- or post-Savings Card day, (then again, if I were to fall victim to your ploy, maybe your salespeople could wiggle their way into my psyche and get me to add on a few “extras” in order to cover the pseudo-absorption that you so tepidly “suggest” above, though I do pity the fool who wanders into such a psyche. It’s like four-thousand people playing Chinese checkers in a hybrid world that can only be explained as a Jackson Pollock/Salvador Dali lightshow and buffet). To the untrained eye, (though I’m not sure such eyes still cast their impressionable gaze upon the world, because, like me the rest of our culture has also figured out this so-called “strategy”) you suggest that the recipient of this “letter” has received a special privilege; you suggest that some “lucky individual” has gained an advantage. Can you not see the artifice here? Can you not see the imbedded lie? Must you be reminded that at its very core a lie is not such a distant relative of suggestion? Perhaps you should evaluate your strategy and stop lying not only to your intended audience but to yourselves. But, this is a utopian idea; I know that you will do what you must, for you are a “business,” and the end goal of any business is to profit. Romantic ideals notwithstanding, perhaps you employ a different “strategy,” one that might include integrity and honesty as its foundation. Maybe you would attract a different crowd. In fact, I think that such traits are actually more profitable in the long run of things, whether in business or in general. Nevertheless, this is merely my suggestion.[1]

 The “letter,” the one sheet of paper, the smidgen of ink, the envelope, the postage, (and the time) cost me roughly 50 cents. I am curious just how much your “advertisement” cost you? How much did the research and development, the paper, the ink, the plastic, the very production, and the postage really cost you? But, a completely different question can be and perhaps should be asked by replacing the “How” with a “What.” Perhaps the more appropriate question, then, is thus: What did sending out such an advertisement really cost you? I will be candid: I think it cost you credibility. And, for a “business” such as yours this is the most damaging and damning of consequences. All I can say is that you did it to yourself. Congratulations!

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[1] Note: One might pay particular attention to the numerous quotation marks and italics used throughout this “letter.” It should be pointed out here that said literary devices are symbolically significant and as such are full of all sorts of implications.

 

Insight.

Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.

-Proverbs 22:6

 

Of course, this proverb is universally applicable. Drug addicts, criminals, sexual aggressors, and the like also bear the yoke of inculcation, for time and repetition are the inimitable friends of routine, just as routine is the inimitable foe of freedom. We hear the cliché that children are innocent and it is true. But what is innocence if not the relative of naiveté, ignorance, impressionability, and vulnerability? The ancients understood that to introduce a habit into the early life of a child is to impress upon him or her a life-style. Well, what if in those impressionable years the wrong message was sent?[1] What if the wrong habit was exercised by the child’s confusion and the world’s disinterest? What does this say about choice? About free-will? What if this habit became a source of some distorted form of pleasure, a pleasure which should have been fostered properly and handled with care but instead was neglected and mal-handled. Idle hands are the devil’s playground, and idle minds craft megaliths. The search for that source is unending, whether it be an attraction to the process of searching, or a magnetism to the façade of a skin-deep objectification, this is a learned thing; it’s some distorted form of training.

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[1] Let’s not get bogged down by unnecessary narratives. Let’s not ask questions like “what is wrong and what is right?” These questions are not beneficial, for those born within the superstructure are its very byproduct; even the counter-culture is a part of the dialectic.

Ouroboros: the Tale of a Tail.

 

 Here we are, trying by way of echolocation to find that which has haunted us from the beginning of recorded history: meaning. We open our mouths and send out signals sonar-like to learn about the world through the reverberations. What does this mean you ask? Well what does anything mean is what I respond. But we are choking on our own tales and becoming desensitized to the vibrations and frequencies we ourselves spit out just a short time ago. little animals with big brains, confused about why we act a certain way, why we see things in a specific manner, why we hear things with a particular ear; we’re all screaming—screaming by way of conscience and consciousness and conscientiousness—bemoaning cosmic moral imperatives and vast cultural superstructures, weaving through the fingers of that great lightning, and dragging the stone over the scales of that awesome monolith; the dragon-mountain: the episteme.

episteme

 

But that ironed-scaled dragon-mountain eats its own tail; it has always and will always devour itself. And so will we. So will we stretch our pouting lips over our own heads and swallow. This is our process, our nature, our destiny. Or at least we tell ourselves such a story. After all it seems right and it feels good. However, it’s not completely fulfilling: that great mental massage. Though we are placated from time to time, it never lasts and we are never truly satisfied, so we must squeeze harder and rub faster in order to reach that seemingly out-of-reach pinnacle, the spark’s origin, the scorched mountaintop. At least we have the hymns of ancient lords to hum while we climb. At least we have the ancient traditions to guide us through lightning’s splintered fingers. Thank the heavens for discourse! And, if we do not like any of it we have new ones too! Like technology and progress. We will find our way yet! But don’t we already know what’s going to happen? About what you ask? We’ll just come back to that original haunting question—you know—the one about meaning. After all, the dragon does eat its own tail.

Apophasis/Apostrophe

          D’you recall ever having a great Idea? An idea so potent as to send chills up your spine? But then you think of it again and again, and you really and truly start to consider it; you start to parse it out. D’you ever think that you’re unique, that you’re idea is fresh, like you have something to offer the planet other than a narrative, (not to mention a narrative that has been told countless times before: you’re born, you live, you do stuff while live-ing, you die)? Does that feeling of uniqueness ever come back to try to persuade you, try to make you a part of its team; team unique, teamU. There is no U in team. I had an idea once, but I’m not going to tell you what it wa(i)s. I’ve removed it, like a crumpled up memory tossed into the wastebasket of my mind; it’s gone. But I’ve made you stare at this paragraph, and I should tell you that it’s a puzzle, a myth, an idea.

Rush Hour Existentialism.

Where am I going?

 

Nowhere. I am going nowhere, stuck here in my own specific superstructure of time, space, history, energy, and culture. Sitting here in traffic, watching the other side of the highway; watching cars chase each other in that psychosexual Freudian-accordion dance of mechanized war. Where are they going? Somewhere. Somewhere other than here.

 

What time is it. It’s not a question. It’s a feeling I get while sitting on the exit ramp; a state of mind I enter while staring at the pink sun-eating clouds on the horizon, watching as a white Suburban flies in front of me, watching him, her, whoever move up one car length and advance a millisecond in the space-time continuum of rush-hour exit-ramp pole-position, watching the oblivious gaze of the driver who I see now is a fat man in a football jersey, a man who has just maneuvered into twenty-seventh (instead of twenty-eighth) place in line at a red light: that perfect analogue for the end of one’s life. Do you see it? Let’s pack it in folks, sit impatiently, inch forward ever so slightly, and sigh in that especially touristy way over the performances of artifice you only hear on drive-time radio.

 

The light turns green and you realize that a third of your life is gone,

(if you’re lucky).

Don't Axe, Don't Tell

I Don’t Sleep Well in Cuba

                I woke up this morning breathless, partially due to the amount of combusted carbon I’ve inhaled since arriving in Cuba, and partially because I just had a nightmare. I had just witnessed a vivid and dramatic axe-fight in my dream. I’m not sure what started the whole incident, but the results were undeniable: a group of men began fighting with large axes. The dream was extremely graphic, too. I won’t go into detail here, but just know that I saw a very detailed type of gore and brutality.

                This dream was significant for a couple of reasons. After seeing a man get the side of his cheek smashed in with an axe, I immediately felt the urge to run. In the dream with my mouth open and heart pounding, I began backing away. Unfortunately, (or perhaps most fortunately) I didn’t see what followed because I woke up right after this, but the notion of escaping doom was so real I could taste it. In fact, my jaw is still sore due to its crocodile-like, vice-tight clench. As I emerged from the very real sounds of metal meeting flesh and bone, (which can only be described as having that same wet thud that one might experience if he or she were to chuck meat-filled-water-balloons from atop the Empire State Building) I started thinking about the Vikings, the Samurai, Native Americans, the machete wielding Cubans, and a swath of other groups that would have most assuredly done battle with such metallic implements. Then I started thinking about modern warfare, which, of course, includes everything from bayonets to bombs to Bouncing Betties. And then I started thinking about the countless dead. There are lots, vast lots.

                So, there I was lying in bed, thinking about axe fights and war while listening to Havana awake from a very short night. Then, in that special way in which my pre-morning, pre-coffee, pre-conscious, and precluded mind is wont to operate, I began to flesh out this idea a bit further. I started thinking of my detachment from violence. Sure, I’ve seen some documentaries, but I’ve never experienced soul-raking violence first hand, and for this I am grateful. I started thinking about the dichotomy which exists between eras of war; between civilian soldiers and professional soldiers. I started thinking about the concept of sacrifice. Of course, in war exists a sacrifice much deeper than physical; it’s spiritual and psychological along with the physical—but this is a dumb cliché, so I’ll retract.

                Regardless of the sacrifice, we (and I say we as those who have never experienced this sort of violence) have been taught that this is the price for freedom, but such a primitive sentiment has morphed over the years into a sort of motto, a militaristic mantra. Nonetheless, I think there is a more fundamental truth in this idea of sacrifice. What is the meaning of sacrifice if not the selflessness of one for the selfishness of others? In other words, one self gives his or her life so that other selves might have, well, selves. Whether or not my dream was due to something I saw on T.V., an idea inculcated, or the result of a stomach full of rich and hard-to-digest Cuban food I cannot tell. Nevertheless, it was still pretty compelling.

                I think about conversations I’ve had in the past with my friends. We’d puff our chests while consuming multiple adult beverages and boast about our unflinching ability to do what was necessary to protect ourselves and our loved ones, when in all honesty I’m not actually sure what I would do if I was confronted with such a thing. But, if my dream is any indication, and if the perpetrator wields an axe, a sword, or a machete, then you can bet your bright little behind that the only thing anyone will see is my behind making its way fast and furious in the opposite direction.

          I tried to kick up some dust in Hemingway’s hotel room today, but it had been cleaned, meticulously. It was sterile in the most counterfeit of ways, replicated ineffectually with museum-esque forgery. Hemingway might have stood here once, but the aura is gone now, and all that remains is the perfume of a tour guide.

                                                                                     * * *

        I’ve been in a handful of gift shops recently and I’ve noticed an abundance of Hemingway memorabilia in each one of them. This is tourism at its most recognizable; it happens everywhere and Cuba is not immune: the commodification of some regionally important (insert noun here). In this case it’s Hemingway’s aura that is being commodified. This is sort of another glimpse into capitalism, which is, I opine, even more ironic in a country like Cuba because it reveals another basic human characteristic: the desire to be profitable. Hemingway has been idealized and commodified in Cuba, which is no doubt something that he would have hated, (though he also would have probably predicted with a superb fatalism). As I pick up a postcard with Hemingway’s bearded face on the front, a woman behind me says “one CUC.” That’s expensive for a postcard.

I buy it anyway.

          It’s still sort of magical, though. That is, Hemingway’s aura. At least it felt that way when we visited his house in Finca Vigia. I gazed into his extra-organized house and noticed it was eerily well kept. Thousands of books were aligned perfectly on shelves and bookcases, which is curious to me when I think about it now because Hemingway was a writer, and writers tend to have books scattered everywhere; it’s almost policy. I wonder what he would think about what they’ve done to his hotel room, his house, and his beloved Pilar. I stared in through an open window: a military uniform was positioned just so, and a half dozen decapitated and taxidermied heads overlooked the hotel-like-made-up-beds and the ghosts of Hemingway’s cats. It cost five CUC. That’s cheap for aura.

06/13/2012

A Storm of My Own Making

                I’m pretty sure that a large brick is lodged somewhere in my midsection, which is an extremely regrettable thing to have happen in Cuba. It’s regrettable due primarily to a noticeable and significant lack of toilet paper here, (not to mention a significant lack of toilet seats!) I’ve been stuffing my face with rice, beans, and some form of meat for nearly two weeks, and I’m quite certain that most of it is still chillin’ out somewhere in an intestine. At least twice a day I enter into a state of emergency, eyes searching for the nearest place to unleash hell upon a porcelain god. I have yet to unleash anything except numerous beads of sweat and weightless grunts of frustration. Apparently, though I guess quite fortunately, the brick in my stomach is taking its sweet time making its way to the exit in the rear. The down side to my predicament, of course, is that I am terribly uncomfortable: my pants don’t feel or fit right, both my stomach and back hurt, and I’m becoming increasingly irritable. The problem is compounded every day that I don’t purge: food, food, and more food is piled atop an already incapacious arena, and gravity is no friend to this situation. I think about the food shortage again. I think about how well off I am as an American; how spoiled I am. I think about how easy it is to get toilet paper back home; it’s everywhere. People even use it to decorate trees. I think about how easy things are for most of us back in the States and it sort of makes me sick. Whatever. Two things are certain at 5:04 p.m. of June 13^th: it looks like it’s going to rain soon, and I’m finally starting to understand what it means to shit bricks.

Curveball

              I turn on the television in our hotel room and land on ESPN. This is my nightly routine: winding down to Sportscenter en Español. I watch the baseball highlights of the day and see players like Alexi Ramirez, Yeonis Cespedes, and Lyonis Martin, all of which are Cuban defectors. I can’t even imagine what a transition it must be to go from Cuban baseball to American baseball, to go from making virtually nothing to making millions. Then again, I’m American: I’ve been programmed to assign the idea of value to that of monetary worth. It’s hard to break bad habits. Or is it?

               

              I threw a baseball to a young child earlier today. While I was standing outside, waiting for the rest of our group to gather for dinner, this young boy was walking home from school with a cluster of friends. I was tossing a fairly new Nike baseball up in the air, reminiscing back to when I was a freshman in high school, a starting pitcher on the varsity team. The boy spouted something in Spanish that I didn’t quite understand, that is, until he raised his hands. It was clear that he wanted me to toss the ball to him. So I did. He caught the ball and moved a few steps away from his group. He immediately fixated on the ball, eyes staring intently at the words “Nike Official League.” I’m not sure that he understood what he was looking at other than a baseball, just like I’m not sure that the words “Nike Official League” mean anything other than that this baseball was made by Nike. After he quickly showed his friends the ball, he raised his arm to throw it back to me. I said, “No. Keep it.” He didn’t totally understand, that is, until I raised my hands and gesticulated in that universal way that the ball was now his. I can honestly say that this particular second in time was probably the most valuable of our trip, at least for me. When the boy made the connection that he had just been gifted a Nike Official League baseball, a slow yet overwhelming grin crept across his face; it was slow for him and overwhelming for me. I’m thankful that I was wearing sunglasses. From ear to ear this boy looked as if his face was made of shiny gums and brilliant white teeth. Immediately, when the rest of his group understood what had just happened, he was mobbed by his friends. He hid the ball with a joking selfishness then trotted in front of the group with the bravado that most children are innately equipped with. It was magical. We shared something during that second, and I’m not exactly sure what it was, but it was potent. Memories from my youth flashed by, an enchanted time where the mythological was still very much a part of my reality, where gods still walked the earth and blessed the most worthy of mortals, and I remember, for that brief second when the boy realized that the baseball was now his, I felt that magic again. Though the boy ended up with a fairly new Nike Official League baseball, he gave me something so much more incredible, so much more valuable. Without overly appealing to sentimentality or sounding too cliché, I have to say that though I gave this young boy a baseball, the gift was totally mine.

Havana Realism

Perro Means Dog

                There is a distinct sound made when the rusted fender of a ’55 Pontiac Star Chief meets the skull of a medium-sized dog. This happened five minutes ago on one of our daily trips to Case de la Alba, and the sound still reverberates in our minds, our souls.

                We’ve walked the same way every day so far to our lecture meeting place, and during these morning journeys we always see a smattering of feral animals. Well, today, about five minutes from our destination, we walked past a kitten and a young dog; they looked like friends, half grooming and half playing. As we walked by, I attempted to communicate with the kitten via that Universal Kissing Language that humans seem to assume all animals understand—though I must note here that I have to be careful because that kissing sound is a Cuban form of greeting, and one that on many occasions seems to have subtextual sexuality imbedded within it. The last thing I want is to make that kissing sound and piss off a Cuban; I don’t want them to think that I’m mocking them. Moreover, I also don’t want anyone who reads this to think that I’m comparing Cubans to animals because I certainly am not. I’m the animal here; I’m the foreigner, and just as I finished making that kissing sound I noticed an elderly man glaring at me. So, I had to tell him in English “No. I was talking to the cat.”

                As cats are wont to do, the baby blue eyes of this three-or-so month old tabby barely moved, looked at me with an oblivious innocence, sized me up, and decided that the absolute best course of action for this particular situation was to lick its genitals with a specific kind of feline ferocity. The dog, a young, light-brown Labrador mix, though with a noticeably more compact frame, turned with its tail wagging and its tongue flapping and walked. I’m not sure, but I don’t think the dog was following us, just like I’m not sure that it was inspired to walk because of my use of the Universal Kissing Language.

                It was a hauntingly hollow sound, like slamming the door of an empty washing machine, and it cut straight through the cacophonous sounds of a bustling Havana. When I first turned to locate where the sound came from, it didn’t register, nothing did. I saw the ass end of a red ’55 Pontiac Star Chief, its brake lights blaring as it hovered over what appeared to be a dog, one horrifyingly similar to the dog we just past. The dog looked as if it were trying to wake up from a nap in the middle of the street: it lay on its side with its tail still wagging, though with a new, pathetic energy. Its left leg was kicking, trying without success to run away from the Star Chief, from the concrete mattress where it lay, from the jumbled confusion of what just happened. The rest of the dog was statue still, save for the shallow rise and fall of its emaciated rib cage. It became immediately clear that the dog was broken; it was trying to flee because that’s what dogs do. This dog could no longer flee, and the distraught look in its eyes revealed to those of us still staring that such a fact was excruciatingly unacceptable.

                I couldn’t help but stare. I couldn’t help but watch as the dog kicked with its only functioning leg, laying there with the rest of its mangled body motionless, no doubt searching for some dog-explanation, some dog-meaning as to why it could no longer move the way it had just seconds before. That’s when I heard the miserable, heart-stabbing wheeze-slash-whimper, a knife that cut through horns, birdsong, idle conversation, and the souls of those who stared at its origin.

                My initial reaction was to run to the dog. If the dog was suffering, then I had to put it out of its misery; it’s my duty. Was it suffering? It sure as hell looked that way. I mean, wasn’t it my duty? Wasn’t it my obligation to immediately end the dog’s life because letting it continue to suffer was inhumane? Torture? This is not the type of thing I’m familiar with. I didn’t even know how I was to go about doing it if I indeed had to. Did I have the necessary tools required for such an undertaking?

Contents of backpack: baseball, baseball glove, mechanical pencil, plastic Bic pen, an umbrella, and a common Spanish phrasebook. What if I was wrong in my estimation? I mean, the only veterinary experience I had up until that point was changing kitty litter and overusing that Universal Kissing Language. I pulled out the Spanish phrasebook as if therein was the answer. Nothing. Maybe if I used the Universal Kissing Language and the dog responded in a somewhat normal fashion, then I should try to save it, I thought. But the dog did not look normal; it was still kicking the air and the wheeze-slash-whimper had just been accompanied by a wet gurgle. Oh God. I fingered through the phrasebook for something like “Hurry! I need to kill this dog!” It wasn’t in there; this book’s for tourists, and that’s exactly the way I felt as a tall, dark Cubano trotted disinterestedly out to the dog, grabbed its erratically kicking leg, and dragged the dying animal out of sight. This was the best of all possible solutions as far as I was concerned and I’ll tell you why:  the only other option I had was to pull out the Bic and frantically stab the dog to end its suffering. This was a terribly frightening proposition for the dog, any spectators, and for myself, its improvised and exponentially inadequate executioner: I am a naïve foreigner; a dumb animal. I am just a tourist here and they certainly don’t make pens like they used to.

Text Messages: It’s More Complex Than You Might Think.

       The world is full of conversation; it’s full of moving mouths and noises. The world is full of sounds, zounds, politically motivated paroxysmal outbursts, homiletics, burps, and whistles; it’s full of opinion and monolithic  grandiloquence, symbol, adulation, and hyperbolic forms of verbal flatulence so potent as to blow one’s head clean off his or her shoulders. And here, before us (the viewers and listeners) is this vast visual and sonic landscape of purported fact and conscripted meaning; a horizon so infinitely complex and convoluted that it makes the tautological nature of the dictionary (that which is used to define) seem, well, tautological, circular, and reckless. So, while you (the readers/viewers/listeners of my conversation) are deciphering the above hypercomplex paragraph, let me just add some other variables to this equation.

       Rene Descartes is probably most famous for his cogito ergo sum, that is, I think therefore I am. Most of us have heard this phrase even if we aren’t totally sure what it means. In a sort of simplistic truncation of its idea, cogito focuses on that of one’s consciousness. What it means is this: since I have a consciousness, and since I have given myself the title “I,” then surely I must exist apart from other “I”s, and regardless of whether or not I can truly know that this separation exists, at the very least I can claim that I can think about it. I wonder why such a phrase became so popular?

       Let’s return to my first paragraph. The conversation I’m referring to is indeed complex, for it happens not only between humans, but it happens between everything else as well: rockslides (gravity and erosion), falling leaves (seasonal cycles, gravity, weather patterns), rising and falling tides (lunar cycle), meteorological systems (rising and falling of barometrical pressure), compost (chemical composition and de-composition), et cetera. Of course, without human consideration, these “conversations” have no inherent meaning. One must try to come to terms with the fact that “meaning” and “function” are disparate concepts, (though they often get linked together and influence each other, and both are a sort of discourse with their own, unique vocabulary). Function and meaning are constructed; they are both forms of impression, i.e., of narrative, and they find their domain within a specific semiological system: the signifier, the signified, and the association between the two: the sign. 

        But, it is hard to decipher what is fact and what is fiction, or what is fact from what is fiction. After all, does not everything fit snugly into a sort of fictive framework, especially when considering how these conversations are developed within the human mind? Information enters the senses (sight, sound, smell, touch, etc.) which must then be translated into a language that the brain understands. We gaze upon the American flag and see the colors red, white, and blue, and (unless of course colorblind) one can see that these three colors are quite vivid and salient. This is a language that the brain understands, that is, the abstract conceptualization of what is actually a quality of light and the organization of such information. But the concepts of both color and light exist within a scientific discourse, and discourse is just a euphemism for a symptomatic system of beliefs. Scientists will certainly disagree with my previous claim, and this doesn’t surprise me, for their job is to observe and argue. But here is my point, and it hearkens back to the idea of cogito. Just like every other discourse, be it a theological, philosophical, scientific, cultural, and/or societal, each discourse is confined within its own semiological system. In short, even if two very different discourses operate within the same language, (say a debate in English between an Atheist using a scientific discourse and a Theist using a theological discourse) both entities are using their cogito, that is, their own consciousness as an affirmation of truth when in fact all they are arguing over is a belief or a system of signification. Though the two discourses exist within the same language, they are not equal; they are not talking about the same things. Consider oil and vinegar salad dressing: you could shake it for 2000 years. And, as soon as you stopped what would happen?

         Belief requires an extravagant suspension of dis-belief, and some of us have not this specific kind of capacity. We look back at the American Flag what do we see? A piece of cloth. But it’s not what we see that is true in this case. And this is my point. When looking at the flag we don’t see what it is but what it represents, and this, of course, all depends on which side of the pond we’re on. The whole world is like this. The world is a teleprompter: an image not so much fixed as it is fixated upon, a sound stuck in our ever-present ears; an evolving sensation that becomes true when in fact truth is much more complex than most give it credit. Nietzsche said that “Truth is a mobile army of metaphor, metonymy, and anthropomorphism,” and this sentence is, well, seemingly true. However, though I am drawn to this sentence for many reasons, the idea that I cannot escape from is that his sentence is only a metaphor; it is a metaphor for humanity and by humanity, and it reminds me of my favorite paradox. But as such a beautiful paradox is wont to operate, it’s a sentence that both mesmerizes and sends the brain into a special kind of meltdown. Ready? Ok, here it is:

This sentence is false.

                                                                         Just like this essay is a lie.

In Defense of Escapism or An Essay on the Realization of the Fact that One Day YOU ARE GOING TO DIE

           Of course, as cliché as the idea is, and as uncomfortable as the topic might be to think about, it becomes painfully obvious as you get older that one day you are going to die. There is no way around it. We are all plummeting with terminal velocity towards that inevitable end. One day, out of the blue, “like a thief in the night”, and unexpectedly, (though it should be totally expected, since it is absolutely unavoidable) you will close your eyes for the last time, or you might keep them open, (that is to be determined in the future, whether near or far, by the unique circumstances of your specific wrestling match with the Reaper). Here’s a fun fact: according to the 2007 U.S. Census Bureau on World Vital Events, every single minute 105 people expire. On average, that’s 6,300 deaths per hour, 151,200 daily, 4,536,000 monthly, and 54,432,000 deaths in a year; (probably more now seeing as there are more people on the planet than there were in 2007). Nevertheless, it is making its way to you, or maybe you to it. Death is like jumping out of an airplane midflight: the better you can see the ground the closer you are to it. Make no mistake, the ground rapidly approaches, and there is nothing that you or anyone else can do about it. Nothing.

            Or maybe there is. I can’t help but think: life is about death. Life is about thinking about death all of the time. Isn’t it? I mean, even when we don’t think we are thinking about death I’d wager that we are. Sitting in a movie theater or watching sports or driving to work is no exception. Neither is playing video games, colon-cleansing, nor mowing the lawn, et cetera. This is a concomitant characteristic of being self-aware creatures. We are aware that we are alive, and we are aware that one day WE ARE GOING TO DIE. Other animals aren’t self-aware in the same way humans are, and this is obvious. They don’t ask themselves “hey, do you ever think about death?” Animals have a more unique understanding of death (I think). Of course I’m not talking about a scientific or philosophical understanding. I am thinking more along the lines of intuitively and instinctively. Like (most) every other being on this planet animals don’t want to die. In fact, most animals freak out at the slightest, out of the ordinary sound. E.g. the other day a UPS delivery person dropped off a package at my front door and then rang my doorbell. This happens a lot because I electronically order lots of stuff from various websites. Nevertheless, as I got up to fetch my goods, my emotionally compromised felines made severe haste for the nearest fortified hiding place, (which, since this is a frequent occurrence, is often times ridiculous: slamming kitchen cabinet doors, or flattening out to the size and shape of what can only be described as that of a flying squirrel, only to then—with extreme difficulty—slide under the Lazyboy® and hide, et cetera). My cats don’t think about the noise; they don’t even think about what they’re doing while freaking out because of the noise, which is why they slide across the hardwoods, slam into walls, stumble, flip, and flop awkwardly, and eventually flying-squirrel-like launch over obstacles in order to escape said noise. Instead, they react to what the noise might signify: possible harm and/or death. This reaction is natural. And hilarious.

            Think about the deer. Think about the deer that hears the gunshot and becomes immediately aware of a coincidental blazing and piercing pain in its side. The deer is not trying to link the two events. The dear is not like “well, hey. That’s curious.” The deer is not trying to deduce what the two events have in common in an associative manner. No. The deer bolts; it launches itself full speed into escape mode while trying (in vain) to outrun impending doom as if someone or some-thing had just lit its furry little butt on fire. All one can hope is that the shot is clean and that the deer hasn’t the time for anything other than an immediate and swift expiration. (Editorial aside): This is why I don’t hunt; I’m too emotional, and I’m too Buddhist-like about sentient life; (take note: I am not a Buddhist). Though I am undoubtedly aware of its necessity, that is, hunting, I understand that my ancestors had to hunt for survival. I also understand that the deer population has exploded, exponentially. But, baiting a small, square acre of land and sitting in a “blind,” all the while holding a high-powered, high-speed, and high capacity phallic-shaped dispenser of metal certainly is not hunting. Placing what the deer can only gather is a large, heavy, and clamorous botanical mystery that scatters some irresistible grain at specific intervals in the middle of their stomping ground is not hunting, either. Listen: I’m not making any moral claims here; don’t take it that way. I’m just trying to differentiate between what is hunting and what is baiting, (and there are certainly masters of both). However, I’m pretty sure that Ted Nugent hunts. So, for measurement one might consider directing one’s gaze at the Nuge for mastery over such ethical conundrums, (at least as far as sustainable and morally appropriate hunting is concerned) ← And, of course this is all assumption. 

            Speaking of hunting, (still) I gather that hunting is cathartic for some much like any other related sense-activity is as well. Loosely defined, sense-activity is any activity where one, well, uses his or her senses towards some end, particularly as an escape method for coping with that ultimate realization noted at the very beginning of this essay: that one day YOU ARE GOING TO DIE. But there are all sorts of various sense-activities, of which even reading, writing, and thinking are also a part; (without getting into a Freudian hermeneutic regarding the idea of Displacement or Sublimation, I will note here that said terms, very simply put mind you, mean to trans- or dislocate a volitional drive thereby placing, channeling, or combining one activity on, through, or with another. Confused yet? Excellent). In short, we are all afraid of dying on some level or another, and we all try to escape this fear via catharsis, which is literally a purging (by way of displacing) that which is harmful to productive living. Whether a cat or a UPS delivery person; whether a deer, hunter, or a flying squirrel we are all freaking out, and we are all searching for the comforts of our very own Lazyboy®.

            Living room furniture notwithstanding, (though I cannot help but consider the phrase “living room” to be both ironic and apropos) this is what life is about: stuffing stuff into the time we have while gravity pulls us ever-so-faster and ever-so-closer to an indifferent patch of dirt, all the while being fully aware that we are alive and that one day we won’t be; (please keep any Cartesian comments to one’s own self as such comments might muddy up the already swamp-like conditions of this here essay. Also, swamps can be a good place to hunt). Don’t forget that Time is stuff just like Experience is also stuff. Too, Displacement and catharsis are both ways to cope with the fact that one day YOU ARE GOING TO DIE. So, spending time doing stuff is also stuff, and there are all kinds of other stuff to be considered: sentimental stuff, theological stuff, philosophical stuff, material stuff, aesthetic stuff, spiritual stuff, et cetera; it’s all stuff, really. It’s just different forms and flavors of stuff, and it all has to do with thinking about and coping with one’s own personal plunge towards planet earth. And it is here that we have finally reached the dénouement of this entire essay: that a person can only truly and totally be free if he or she eliminates all of the stuff that zooms past during freefall. But here’s the question: why would anybody want to do that? So, to do otherwise, that is, to detach oneself from what it truly means to be free is to realize that one day YOU ARE GOING TO DIE; it is to be helplessly and hopelessly attached to a universe that is constantly trying to hit the Eject Button mid-flight. Pay attention because here it is: This is what it means to be alive; this is what it means to live. So lift your nose to the air and take a deep breath. Stretch out your arms and legs flying-squirrel-like and realize that life is about that brief microsecond that you are allowed to fall. Listen to the wind batter your eardrums, and taste the rushing air as it fills your lungs. This is what it’s like to live, and there are no parachutes.

Some Haiku from me (to you).

Haiku is something everyone should try at least once in their lives. Not only is it fun, but it is also quite simple: the first line has five syllables, the second has seven, and then the third has five. Of course, the more traditional Japanese Haiku was a bit different, (that is, it was longer, usually written in conjunction with other poets, and it dealt with environment, Buddhist principles, seasons, et cetera). Nevertheless, the Haiku principle remains the same. Listen to the Haiku bellow (bellow as in roar, not below as in beneath [because that has one "L"]):

Fingernail clippings

Scattered on the hardwood floor

Look like little smiles.

Turn the faucet on

Wash my hands until they’re clean

Turn the faucet off

Dead armadillo

Scattered all over the road

Probably a Ford

Cold wind numbs the face

Hot wind parches the senses

Where does it come from?

Flowing through the veins

Blood is the river of life

Cells are tiny boats

Fifteen minutes left

Until the sun sets again

Same as yesterday

Birds chirping outside

Singing in sweet melodies

Makes my cat hungry

Playing my guitar

Moving up and down the frets

Wonder what’s for lunch

Everyone can write

Some just better than others

I wish I was “some”

Poem:

Lunacy or This is Just a Fancy Way to Describe a Sunrise

I saw

in her moonlit eyes

the tears

of the stars,

the ocean

of a scattered sky,

and the desire

to stay here, forever;

eyes fixed

upon that which cannot be measured,

waiting for the epic poem of Life

to fade from Virgin Violet to Ochre.

A One Week Journal.

Patch of Earth: A One-Week Journal in Early January (to be read all at once, or not).

                I’ve decided to fix my gaze upon a small patch of earth just outside of my home. For seven days I will visit and revisit the same three foot by five foot swath of earth in order that I might (if only for a microsecond) catch a glimpse of what this patch actually looks like. Why? Because I walk over, by, across, through, and in it every day.

 January 1^st:

          I see you, tiny ant, but I thought you were supposed to be sleeping right now. What a dead and rotting forest you have wandered into. Each blade of grass is a wire-brushed monument to be conquered. You have such a vast expanse before you; but where are you going? You only have to repeat this process a thousand times more. How long do you live? Can your hair-thin legs carry you so far? They are peculiar; those fuzzy alien-like appendages.
          I would have considered you a cliché to both Poetry and Nature before your microscopic legs carried you onto this patch of earth. How many poets have written about ants? How many poems are about ants? As many as there are ants to be sure! But what new history do these ant-poets strive to get across to the rest of the colony? Whatever it may be I say it is trite, for we already know that we’re small, and we already know that life is a struggle full of ups and downs, full of mountains and valleys, full of obstacles and oases, full of storms and calm, full of (enter cliché descriptors here). Indeed, I would have considered you a sorry metaphor, but I now see that it is you who propels the earth, and I am the cliché here.
          You are distracting me, tiny ant. For, though I am drawn to your liquid black body and your tantalizing, spiny legs, I am supposed to be watching this patch of earth, and I am to watch it that I might see what it actually looks like. I see you are struggling, tiny ant, just like that tired metaphor suggests; you and your minute entomological narrative. But, do not progress too much further, tiny ant, or else you will wander off of my patch of earth and cease to exist, for you tread ever-so-closely to the very edge of my focus and, just like every other poet-being on this planet, I am a narcissist and a pedant, and if you venture out of my line-of-sight you will disappear.

 January 2^nd:

          I’m sitting here inspecting the parched maw that is my patch of earth. The knife blades which were once lush and emerald are now tiny brittle fingers; fingers that yearn for drink, reaching for wisps of dew that will never quench; shriveled hands extended. Dusty wind combs the little brown wires, and cracks part the dirt, exponentially. Though I do notice that some sign of life does still exist here, for a faint hue of green; a diluted, muted shade of Pea tries to make its way through the burnt January veins, and a soft arpeggio of birdsong rides the dancing alabaster wind.

 January 3^rd:

          How wonderful it is to see a squirrel on this patch of earth, though I feel that it too might think I’m a cliché. It immediately finds an acorn; a tiny, improbable jewel woven into the winter-grass. So busy are its quick and delicate hands that it looks as if the squirrel is untangling a miniature, nut-brown ball of yarn. I wonder what it’s weaving. The squirrel hasn’t seen me yet because I have not moved from this spot, though as I pick up my pen it scurries ten yards; a safe distance for this particular type of bearded threat. It stands on its haunches, this small squirrel, with a muscular and silken sand-colored fur glistening in the bright midday rays, and it carries with it a potential oak tree. At this point in time the notion occurs to me that I have never seen a squirrel urinate or defecate. It also occurs to me that saying or writing words like urinate and defecate seem pompous, and I’m not entirely sure why. But, these words are accurate, for I cannot say that the squirrel goes to the bathroom, because it doesn’t, which isn’t to say that it can’t because it very well could; I’ve just never seen it.

 January 4^th:

          It’s night, but that great flashlight in the sky casts its ghost beams upon my small patch of earth. Jupiter hangs out just below and to the left of the moon, at least for now. I scan the ground and think how strangely things appear in diverse shades of light; everything is skeletal. It seems that different luminosities proscribe different awareness-es, that is, certain perceptions of things, different motions, and different visual frequencies. The once brown wires of grass are now seemingly opaque. They appear as if the glass hair of a dying elder: so brittle, yet so full of wisdom and experience that you would certainly try to avoid crushing it with your feet.
          I also seem to think differently under the satin black sheet of night. I feel more attuned to my insignificance. Everything is painted in melancholy; a shade of loneliness that only owls can sympathize with. The cold waft of wind is the sighing earth, and the billions of stars are really just pinhole-punctures; they’re breathing holes for those of us trapped in this colossal cosmic box. The light comes from the outside: we hunger for it, and we can only see it at night. But, then again, this is night; this is when souls are meant to flutter in dream, i.e., in phantasmagoria. This is when souls are meant to sleep. To be sure, there is definitely a sense in looking at my patch of earth, but I am mesmerized, for there is a greater sense in looking at that hovering, black-canopied ceiling while wondering if this is all just a dream.

January 5^th:
          I walked across my patch of earth today and paid it no mind, which is something I do more often than not. I don’t really see what’s there; I only drag across it with an oblivious and predictable gait. I am distracted by the camaraderie of commerce. I am occupied by the beatitudes of busy-ness, rather than nourished by the renewing solicitude of Nature. I have a short and incapacious memory, but how can one not? Shiny things are everywhere, and sirens hypnotize us. Honestly, the only reason I’ve paid so close attention to my small patch of earth thus far appertains to poetic obligation. I feel as though I see this patch of earth better in the framework of my own imagination: a representation of the real tends to be more pleasing than the real per se: the imagined real is more real than the real real, (whatever that means I’ll leave to the imagined reader, really). But, this tangent proves my very point! I am distracted too easily. I guess I’ve become complacent. I guess I should go back and pay my respects to that patch of earth; I imagine it would want me to.

January 6^th:
          It’s another day that the eyes of the sun burn through us puny earthlings. I can feel its lasers on the back of my neck. It’s no surprise to me that my patch of earth seems etched and desiccated, for what relief that has come seems mythical at best. Though I find myself at least optimistic: rumors of precipitation hang in the balance, albeit delicately.

 January 7^th:

          The grass is still dormant, and cracks still wander the ground, for life is stubborn; it takes its own time to recover, (or to develop). But this should be no surprise, really, for such is the progression and sustenance of the natural order of things, each element of which depends upon its antecedent; a cog in that great, mystical, universally-varied, and mechanical hierarchy we call Nature.

 January 8^th:

          I’m not sure how one could ever get bored of looking at things of nature; it is so creative and industrious. The parched ground in front of me cracks so that even infinitesimal traces of moisture can reach the depths, and the roots there are thankful. Nature is a wonder. But this is a complex idea. Is my patch of earth really nature? I mean, I’m not sure if this grass is even native to the area in which I live. Just because a thing of nature exists within or utilizes a network of artifice does not make the thing itself natural even if it is behaving, well, naturally. We have corralled dying ships to rebuild dying corals; this is not natural. Nature does not preserve herself in this way. Or maybe she does: is guilt natural?
          I take my eyes off of my patch and glance around to other houses nearby. I see a variety of species of different grasses. Is this natural? Or is this just a human byproduct: trying to organize and reform that which was once natural. I understand that this entire area was long ago a massive grassland, but such a vastness confounded the narrow vision of humanity. If humans see no pattern, then pattern must be created, just like one looks to the night-sky and sees a lion here or a triangle there. But these things do not exist, not even in nature; they are just ideas impressed upon celestial dust, and it is only when these events or ideas are given names that they truly exist, for it is here and only here that such events and ideas are called into being, (ex Nihilo, Nihil fit).
           I look around and I see grids and squares of grass, which, in all honesty, are just larger versions of my own small patch of earth. Is this natural? Is human nature natural? Maybe. As I walk to my mailbox I cross my small patch of earth. This is my small patch of earth, and I’m not sure what it really looks like, but I do know that we all live on small patches of earth, just like the earth is a small patch of the universe. I wonder what it looks like.