Tag: 2017

Longings

I hate myself on days like this.

I confess, I have longings.

Some are very simple and basic. Many will claim them as impractical and idealistic, even absurd.

Like, I have longings to be young again, and to have a nice cup of coffee with a pastry or donuts without worries about its healthiness or origins, longings to walk around, preferably on a warm, pleasant beach, smiling and nodding in friendliness to other people, who simply nod and smile back in friendliness.

I have longings for success, comfort, happiness, fun, and security in all its forms.

I have longings for freedom, equality, liberty and justice.

I’ll bet those longings are shared with many others.

I bet many people on the right and left share these longings.

I bet many politicians and CEOs share these longings, along with teachers, minorities, refugees, shoppers, consumers, teenagers, the elderly, the rich and the poor.

The nut is in the details of how we get satisfy these longings.

When the United States was founded, it was another step as part of a long walk to satisfy these longings, and the founders walked on the backs of many others. We’re shocked, angry and dismayed by their declaration that all men are created equal even while they were stealing land others already lived upon, deciding women are less deserving, and so are people who were slaves, because slaves were slaves; they were property. That was a compromise. A good one? Hell, no, I hear some shout. We’re still arguing it. It was a different era, with different values, views and principles.

I have sisters and friends who wish the protests going on in the U.S. to be over because, well, the elections are over, and isn’t that what this is all about? They have longings for a happier, more relaxed life.

But the protests and elections are part of a process. Both are symptoms of desires and larger arguments about what is right and wrong, and whether freedom, liberty and equality is even possible for everyone. Aren’t we humans simply animals at the heart of the matter, and shouldn’t it be that the strongest shall rule and take what is theirs by right of strength and power, whether it’s physical or intellectual prowess, military force, or the power of our gods?

These are arguments about longings and principles, perceptions, hopes, dreams, emotions and frustrations, resentments, hostilities and dreams that go back to separations derived from where we live, what we speak, our differences and similarities, all the way back to the most basic and fundamental questions of why we’re here, how we came to be here, and what we want to become.

I hate myself on days like this because I have longings. I want to go write. I want to enjoy my comfortable routine of writing fiction, dreaming of breaking out, working toward the horizon that I’ve created for myself to keep myself going while staving off bitterness, weariness and depression.

Some will read this and remark to their screens to me through their screen, you are a self-indulgent idiot.

I can’t argue that I’m not. I know too well the limits of my talents, intelligence and abilities. I tell myself that if I try harder and persist, promising myself, “I can do better,” and that, if I do, I can overcome my shortcomings.

Which is what these longings are all about, really. You understand.

And I hate myself on days like this, because others have longings, and I think of myself as one person but part of a larger body trying to make a difference. So I set aside my personal longings to take up the longings of others, those longings that were there long before I was born as an American, and march for what we believe is right against an agenda that we believe is wrong.

History will not judge us. History is written by the winners. It’ll be the winners who judge us. If we lose, we’ll probably be forgotten. Hell, if we win, we’ll probably be forgotten as well.

That’s the nature of being part of a larger longing.

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What I’m Watching

I’m not watching much.

Twenty seventeen has not started out great. I’ve seen ads for a television game show, ‘The Wall’, and think, surely this is going to be satirical science fiction. But no; it’s real.

Yes, it’s a lean time in television land, with reruns, award shows and sports dominating. That’s true even though I stream television through Acorn, Amazon Prime, Hulu, Netflix, Sling and others. Although I’ve cut the cable, as they now like to claim with marketing zeal, television is mostly an entertainment desert.

I’ve gone through ‘Sneaky Pete.’ I’m waiting for more of ‘The Americans’, ‘Orphan Black’, ‘Stranger than Fiction’, ‘The Expanse’, ‘Dark Matters’, ‘Goliath’ and ‘Travelers’. We worked through my wife’s mild infatuation with ‘Being Human’ and ‘The Librarians’. I’ve gone through all of the ‘WestWorld’, Ballers’ and ‘Cake Wars’. Nothing new and offbeat like ‘Miranda’, Gavin and Stacey’, ‘Pram Face’, or ‘Misfits’ is out there. No new ‘Foyle’s War’ ‘Happy Valley’ or ‘The Killing’. No Frankie and Grace. No Harry Bosch or ‘Justified’.  No Wire.

We’re left, basically, with ‘This Is Us’. It’s a good show, with interesting characters, storylines, and structures, well acted and produced. My one gripe is related to its location in Pittsburgh, PA. I lived in Pittsburgh until I was fifteen and visited there often after that. Mom and my sisters still live their with their families. The people on TIU just don’t have the brashness of voice and the unusual talking style I find in Pittsburgh. Pittsburghers don’t tend to talk in soft voices, awaiting their turns. They talk fast, and start talking all at once, which causes conversations to become louder and louder, and more chaotic. They also tend to end sentences with a rise, as though they’re asking a question instead of making a statement.

Well, maybe that was just at my house, with my friends and family.

On the movie side, I’ve seen just about anything that I want to see.

What about you? Anything out there you’re watching that you recommend to others?

Meanwhile, I’ll probably don my brown shirt and take up with Mal for a few days.

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I’m A PLAID

Have you told you that I’m a PLAID? I may have. You may have deduced it.

PLAID:

Progressive

Libertarian

Activist

Independent

Democrat

I’m a Progressive, believing that we should be moving forward in the arenas of justice, freedom and equality, along with protecting our planet. I’m also a progressive that leans toward socialism (perhaps making me a PLAIDS) because I don’t believe that making money off everything and the free market is the answer to every problem.

You can also say I’m a Feminist, but I consider that as part of the broader arc of being a Progressive. Equal rights are equal rights, equal opportunity is equal opportunity, and equal freedom is equal freedom.

I’m dismayed that technology has become so consumer oriented. I accept it with a large dose of regret, but I understand money makes money and fuels ideas. Being principled is challenging and requires courage. I often find myself lacking the courage to live up to my beliefs, and keep kicking myself in the ass to be more cognizant of what’s going on, to live up to my principles, and not be a sheeple.

Besides being Progressive, I’m a Libertarian. Government overreach does exist. Knee-jerk reactions are often embedded into laws that become destructive in practice. Once in law, removing it from the books is problematic, and it comes back and bites us in the ass.

As an Activist. I actively voice my politics through letters, donations, demonstrations and activities. I pursue knowledge and truth. Sometimes, too many times, it seems, I don’t like what I find. Then, weary, I withdraw from my activism to recharge, re-balance and start afresh. Change is a constant; as part of that, I must change. To do that, I need to be able to identify my boundaries and horizons. Otherwise, I can’t go forward.

And I’m an Independent. The I could also be for Idealist. I believe we should have principled leaders with vision who do not live in a protective bubble of privilege but serve us and endure the same problems and situations as as. But wealth and power has its perks, and most people succumb to enjoying the perks to the point that they’re taken for granted and ultimately abused, leading to greater abuses.

I end up as a Democrat, with a sigh, because our two party system dominates the system, writing and enforcing laws, customs and loopholes to protect their power and accomodate them. I wanted a black POTUS but did not believe Barack Obama was the best person to achieve that change. I watched and listened during his primary campaign as he pivoted from being a progressive to becoming a solid centrist. I understood that was politics to win the greater vote but also speculated that it could be more. I wondered where he would govern when he won. He described himself as a Reagan Moderate in later interviews and his actions and positions agree with that description. He is less of a leader and visionary than I wanted and more of a political manager.

Likewise, I believe we’re as long overdue for a female POTUS as we were for a black POTUS, but Hillary Clinton was not the person for that role. Neither was Jill Stein. I prefer Elizabeth Warren to both. She speaks to me more than Jill or Hillary.

There I am, in a complex crucible that barely begins to capture my politics and thinking.

0

The Changeover

I’d been paying a lot of attention. Obnoxious noise and behavior tends to cause that in me. Probably from hanging with cats.

This old, bewhiskered guy was weaving around the ballroom, bouncing off and over furniture and people. Shouting matches would explode as some took offense and yelled obscenities. Several fights almost erupted.

What the fuck? I kept thinking. What the fuck? I hadn’t seen the guy drink anything but he was stumbling and had become ‘the old drunk’ in my conversations with my friends and other patrons. He’d been doing it all night but it was clearly worsening as the hours progressed. Looking like a bum and smelling horrendous, personal demons surely stalked him. As I wined, dined, partied and danced, I kept an eye on him, creating his personal story from snippets overheard.

They were easy to overhear. From them, I decided, this is one who is without friends, someone unloved. He was clearly ‘down on his luck’. I figured, he must be unemployed and speculated, which had happened first? Drinking — or perhaps, drug — problems? Or the unemployment? Or something else, like personal loss?

“The worse,” he shouted at a late hour. “They think I’m the fucking worse. That is such bullshit. It’s bullshit.” Slumping back against the bar, he kept whispering, “Bullshit,” while staring at interior moments.

People had given him space. He was close. Strands of thin, unwashed gray hair hung off his head. His face, thought tilted down and shadowed, was etched against the lights. Snot dripped form his nose tip. His cheeks were weathered in the manner of fallen, worn oak. Poorly healed scars crossed that skin. A long gray and white beard, worthy of being described as withered brambles, drooped from his jaw and draped down his chest. I couldn’t tell his eye colors but those eyes were weary and bleary. He’d once been big but now he was shriveled. I wondered, what shrivels a person so? In that face and those eyes, I thought I also saw…hate…and indifference, a remarkable blend to notice in another.

A man in a white robe and hood went up and offered a consoling hand to the old drunk. The old drunk tried shaking it off, movement that caused him to almost fall over. He caught himself. The other tried helping. “I don’t need no fucking help,” the old drunk roared with sneering drunkenness. “I don’t need no one’s fucking help.”

“It’s almost midnight,” someone shouted. A ragged countdown began, gaining strength and harmony as the last five seconds were called out. As the clock struck the hour, a trio of security  guards scythed through the crowd and across the room to the old man. A human wall formed around the meeting. I jostled for space to see what was happening.

Tears streaked down the old drunk’s face. “It wasn’t supposed to be like this,” he said. His voice was hoarse. “What happened? What happened?”

Recognition came to me. Twenty-sixteen,” I said, disbelieving. He didn’t look anything like the year I’d met twelve months ago. I hunted confirmation. People were exclaiming, “Yes, you’re right, it’s the old year.”

“Time to go,” one colossal guard said, firmly gripping the old drunk’s forearm.

Shaking his head, the old drunk muttered. His head shaking seemed more like denial than it was protest. He was crying. His pain touched me. “Let him stay,” someone suggested.

I turned toward the voice. He was wearing a Cubs hat and jersey. “He’s not so bad,” the man said as others considered him.

 

Smiles of understanding flitted through the gathering. A film star stepped up to help the old drunk, followed by musicians, and then an elderly man with orange skin and blonde hair.

“Let’s go,” a guard said to Twenty-sixteen. “It’s time.”

 

Accompanied by a coterie of disparate classes, the guards guided Twenty-sixteen across the quiet room to the exit. The Cubs guy looked sadly introspective while that orange-skinned freak was grinning, an ugly look. Of course, I couldn’t see what the man in the white hood looked like.

Silent tension held  us until they were out the door and it closed. Relief flowed across the room like fresh winter air through an open window. “I’m glad he’s gone,” someone said. Others tittered.

The lights went off, dropping us into darkness. “Ladies and gentlemen,” an announcer said over the loudspeakers. “Please welcome the new year.”

The lights went up. Twenty-seventeen bound into the room like an unleashed young dog. “Teenagers,” people said, laughing and clapping.

“Looks like a greet year,” others said as Twenty-seventeen ran around the room, slapping hands with well-wishers. Cheers rose.

“I hoped they’re right,” I said into my drink, eager to finish it off and hop off to bed. But I chanced to look across the room in time to see the man in the white robes and the smirking, squinting orange-faced man enter, and I wondered.

An aura of dark satisfaction seemed to embrace them.

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