Montana mountain goats will butt heads so hard their hooves fall off.
I don't know if that is a true statement, I read that last night when I came across a long list of trivia.
A pinhead chunk of a neutron star weighs a million tons.
Just crushes me.
What else? Oh, blue whales get to be four Greyhound buses long.
That's phat.
I want to tell you why I wrote the Squirrel War story. It is a loose account of what happens to us in a world gone crazy. Now, I realize that the world itself is doing just fine, I refer to a process, called ?progress?. Loosely, it is the story of my town and the decline in civility, as I see it. For some reason I am flashing on some unknown old lady that approves of the new malls paving over farm fields because the malls look so good. She spends all her time at home and comes out only to do weekly shopping. The slickness of the buildings is appealing. The landscaping, the colors chosen, the big parking lots, all canspire to give the feeling of order and ?progress?
(Canspire I just made up by mistake. It seems to refer to a bland-ening of the American landscape such that no matter where you are it looks like anywhere. In some circles it is referred to as the MacDonaldization of the Nation. I do not hang in those circles, neither do you. I may not have slept enough last night.)
I realize that I may be a Luddite. Or getting to be an old man. Or am railing against my own unconscious limit setting. Certainly, I am just as corruptible as the next guy. Given a ton of money, I would change. Actually, far less than a ton of money would do it. I am cheap.
So, I do not judge, or if I do, I judge with leniency. Would Judas have kissed Jesus for less than 30 shekels of silver?
The changes in this town have come with considerable controversy. Here we have a division of people that is loosely defined as the "viable" vs. the "liveable". The viable want bigger and more. The liveable want community. I am witnessing the "Carmelization" of La Conner. It is becoming cute and cuter. Obviously I want community. I am not a real estate speculator, nor have plans to sell for a million bucks and move to a gated retirement community. Due to my slacking, I am stuck with the life I have and have to plod along as best as I can. My time here is limited, as it is for everyone that lives here. It is, at best, a pyramid sceme.
What chaps my hide, is that we can't afford a cafe. I have been in some poor towns in Mexico but not so poor that they didn't have an informal gathering place. It is a conundrum. Maybe it is the weather. Blame it on the harsh winters. I think it is a matter of civilization. We are stuck in a mode of isolationism, cut-off from our communal roots. Are all these people here as depressed as I am? Defeated, numb and lost? Medicated? Televated? Maybe. The thought that I am alone is overwhelming.
About Me
- roberto kiam borderlineartist@gmail.com
- I live in a quaint, little town, plagued with the specter of speculation and commerce. I am trailer trash,with wishes for good dishes. I shoulda died long ago, but like a rescue dog, didn't. I am indescribably scattered. I speak three languages. I walk a tenuously, true path. I am lucky. For myself, for others. God, it is said, protects orphans, widows and the innocent.
3 comments:
i found your today blog very interesting because in the course of reading the squirrel war, i found myself starting to lose it; get pissed off that is. i couldn’t keep up with it finally. i felt like i was on a carousel that was never going to slow down. or a runaway train. i just wanted it to derail so it would at least stop. i wasn’t sure whether i needed to start over from the beginning and that maybe i had just been too distracted in my reading. at least now i am relieved.
i don’t think it has a thing to do with growing old, it has more to do with growing wise and wondering if we still have any power left to turn the ship around. we are hell bent heading into the perfect storm it seems.
it doesn’t really matter what happens to the earth in the sense that we have so little power to stop it. after all we are just one wizard with one lever and usually that is our pisser if we are guys and if we are girls, we are usually looking for leverage.
and yet it matters greatly. i mean really, no one likes to see a cake go flat. we have to every single day maintain as positive an attitude as we can muster. and we have to take the very best care of ourselves to the best of our ability. but not to blame ourselves when we fall short. this is all that god asks of us. we cannot control others; we can only set an example through our choices.
i am so happy that you are in my life. i prayed and prayed before i went to la conner and i believe this is why i was led to la conner. i need someone god, a peer, or i don’t know how much longer i can hold out here; please connect me up; beam me up scott tea.
it is so difficult to see something we love end or to lose something we love. and the most frustrating part is that until we give up grieving we cannot really integrate the experience or the loved one into our psyche. it exists as some beautiful sparkling river racing by us and we always trying to catch it. we are running faster but it is light and we are bound by our clumsy bodies.
yes it is sad about the café; and it will keep you at loose ends and nomadic. i do believe that necessity is the mother of invention; and even all that silver lining crap. for some reason the café has been suspended and maybe the silver lining is the sheer discomfort of such a reality and what it elicits from the exiled patrons.
only with a feeling of gratitude for the flashes of joy and the moments, can we connect with the wider circle that is always always waiting for us. i am so glad that i had this. but rather, we long and grieve and want it forever. i know that i do at least. please don’t go. please stay. the spirit can only appear outside of the material. the material must dissolve itself to make way for the fruit. it may be a beautiful fruit or it may be very wormy.
gida you must always, always work to set a gooder example, i am hearing kwan yin reminding me even this minute. however i am not in the least dismal within myself when i slip and slide and fall and roll and even explode. well i am dismal but than i get bored with it. i am a hedonist so i don’t like to be dismal for long.
what happens to a dream deferred asked langston hughes. does it dry up like a raisin in the sun or does it fester like a sore and than run. does it sugar over like a syrupy sweet? or does it stink like rotten meat? maybe it drags like a heavy load. or does it explode?
i know that i can always do better on a personal level and i am always painfully aware of this falling short and sometimes shorter. out and about the world can get very vile and all of us critters and creatures need to contend with the vileness that seeps into our very pores. still we can only realize that we truly are in dire times and that we are still very much on the brink. we can gentle ourself into loving spaces.
my sense is that this tiny golden thread is beginning to weave itself across and throughout the planet rrrr. it is so subtle, like the breath of a butterfly, but it is present amidst the chaos. robert you are right about working for the small change within and about.
there are ways to stay happy within and always to be with god and with sananda. call on them and they will fly to you faster than the speed of light. they are always always with me and i with them. it is so tempting to think that god has abandoned us; how seductive. why would we jump to such a conclusion just because we are adverse to cleaning our rooms. i am a pig; i admit it. but i like pigs.
i recognize that i have to work daily with my temperament which is conditioned in this lifetime to be very hot; very fiery. however, this is antithetical to my nature. i am passionate but i am not a hothead by nature. however, i have had serious training in the school of hot heads and i must attend to the disease to be more free of it; entirely free of it if possible. the shaving of my head is wonderful. i love it; it is emancipating. when i first shaved, i met with a colder reception. why? because i was more skulking; more self conscious. now i am comfortable with my head and very few react negatively. cept my mom of course.
i think instead of armor, we should wrap ourselves in the breath of god. understand that god can only do so much and the world is a vortex and every human being must become a vortex. god is depending on us and not just us depending on god. we think we need god but what about god? doesn't god grow weary and lonely. every inward spiral must become an outward spiral says rudolf steiner. and that everything performed as a vortex is magic.
the world is an insane asylum. that is the reality. we cannot change this overnite. we may not be able to change it ever. but we can connect with our wider spiritual roots to help us contend with what is on our plate. it is like a young soldier going off to battle. where would he be if he had no one to write home to. our home is not the earth. the earth is only one little tiny playground in a much larger hood. and this little playground is filled with rough necks. did i say red necks mister foxworthy? we are here for a visit. it may be a long visit wherein we change suits over the millenia.
so we have to find new games by inventing new games. here is a game. p is for apple.
yes what i most learned in the looney bin was to enjoy the confusion because it is not going away. it is only going to come closer and closer. boo!
i recall yelling at a printing press when i was a freshman in high school. i was given a summer job with my buds where we sat in row and each attached our page to the belt zipping by us so that a pamphlet would be the end result. the machine was so very loud; crazy loud; deafening; louder than any buzz saw. i had six weeks of this inferno to go!! i began to call it the shut up machine. in time and in unison we all began to yell: shut it up; shut it up; shut it up. loudly we yelled. we did this for maybe five or ten or even fifteen minutes and paused. a half hour later just when we thought we would lose it, someone would re initiate the chant: shut it up; shut it up.
life hasn’t changed much for me. sometimes my daughter and i are talking on the phone and she yells shut up and i yell listen. we go on like this for maybe five minutes and then we reverse roles with me yelling shut up and her yelling listen. we refuse to obey.
we were never very adept at obedience.
we are not after all dogs and look, they aren’t very obedient either, unless they live with nazis. i really know very little about dogs. i fell in love with a dog named rufus a few years ago. his owner/master put him to sleep a month or two ago because he lost sight of his dogness. that is the owner lost sight of his own dogness. and pretty soon his dog was not allowed to be a dog and rufus went crazy. he stored his owners craziness. now that his owner has killed off his craziness that lived in his dog; he will get a moments release and soon he will be looking for another receptacle. will it be me? i think not. i’m not storing his craziness; i’ve got my own to manage. the last time i saw rufus he was totally wonderful and he told me that he was about to go off because of his owners mental state. i told rufus that i well understood because i only came to visit him and i tolerated his owner but i felt mostly like smashing his skull with a shovel. still i showed his owner patience and kindness as best i could. soon after i heard that bob put rufus down. i couldn’t stop talking about it and my friends started to ask me to stop. there was no squirrel to speak of but there was the squirreliness of bob, a man who had gone fuckin nuts. i’d like to tell you why but i’m not sure shy. i’m going to speculate. he was too much of a problem solver. he was the most ordered person you can conceive of. he had firewood arranged by size. that is a whole cord of wood would be coded by size right down to toothpick size for kindling. it was squirrely. spooky actually.
here is what i think is happening robert. you are missing the café and you are face to face with you own insanity. the café kept the full recognition slightly at bay. you are not mentally ill. you are insane. just like the rest of us. now that you know it; you can let go of the fear. i’m going to say it again; you are way beyond mentally ill; you are insane. people who are mentally ill are fragmented people who have not accepted their wholeness otherwise they would identify the missing piece that i just named: insanity. oh yes, that fits perfectly. right here in this little space that is shaped like a squirrel; the crack in the cosmic eggo. last nite was a full moon; don’t worry, there will be one next month if we are all lucky. ow ooooooh. people who are mentally ill are amateurs. people who are insane know damn well they better learn to manage it. we are all insane but some of us are too afraid to admit it; hence it is wildly mismanaged and it only creates more chaos. come on who wouldn’t be insane, squeezing through that tight little straw that we call a cervix.
oh my god, my head my fucking head what the fuck!!!!!!!! turn down that fucking light you moron. opps, sorry doc.
Jeezuz b weezuz, what a mirror-cle when the comments are better than the blog. rrrr
i'm older than you and where i come from elders keep growing. it is actually an desirable, in fact an honor to be an elder. beings in no way dread aging. they dread becomeing old and so they choose the alternative. to let go of unnecessary illusions and age like a lotus opening in the moonlight.
by the time you are my age, you will be accepting your 2nd pulitzer rrrr.
gida
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