9/12

No real need for a 9-11 post this year. The Florida fool didn't burn any books. The Manhattan community center debate has gone so virile that it has become passe to mention it. I object to many thoughts, debates, expletives and explanations around the World Trade Center blogoverse but mostly the politics. Both sides, hell all sides, just take too much liberty with the facts of that day. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?

I did catch a documentary on the 9-11 Truthers last night. I did a little investigation on them earlier this year when the carpet cleaner gave me the seventy minute version of their thesis. The problem with all of these conspiracy theories is that they use a selective filter; facts, inferences and extrapolations that support their view of the world are truth, anything else disappears in a haze of "they did it" verbiage. Plus people who are determined to be right at the top of their lungs and in my face, have no chance of convincing me of anything and a greatly expanded potential of needing medical attention.

But like I said, no 9-11 blog yesterday, no need. Today, 9-12 is significant to many if only as someone's birthday or wedding anniversary but in the world of events the 12th has been fairly quiet. Sometimes it seems that we could use a lot more of these uneventful days when we can fill in the significance for ourselves.

September 12th - Adopt a Kitten Day. I'll bet no one would care that the litter box is two blocks from People's Park.

Stuff

Every increased possession loads us with new weariness. -John Ruskin

For me it began in 1999, I was moving from San Francisco to Ann Arbor. I had lived in the Haight-Asbury section of the City for a decade and while I had not accumulated a lot of new stuff there, I was still living with the detritus of my profligate years in L.A. Besides I was moving to a fully furnished house in Michigan and there was simply no place for my stuff.

The living room went to a couple of friends who had just returned to the City. The kitchen I still visit in Sonoma, there was a lot of divestiture and donation. But still a load went by moving van to the midwest, far less than had made the L.A. to S.F. move a decade earlier but I still was burdened.

After six years in Michigan I uprooted again, this time for Las Vegas. Once again, I tried to untether myself from more of the stuff of life. I gave up my 15 yr. old platform california king and my wide wooden desk of 25 years. I managed to depart for the desert with only a car load of personal items and three boxes shipped ahead. I was feeling lighter.

Three years in Nevada and I was even less encumbered, the memorabilia box was ceremonially cremated, the family album was sorted and parsed. I do still have a half empty storage closet up in Sebastopol waiting for my next surge of dispossession. 

Since moving into the Berkeley apartment I have acquired the high mag. binoculars w/ tripod, which break down and fit under the back seat of the car; one rotating fan, which will be donated to a forever overheated friend and one blow-up bed. I really, really don't want stuff. I have also learned that actual baggage is much easier to put down than the psychological leavings of a life. Real permanent things truly do make me weary. The head stuff -- well that's what wisdom is all about.

Dis-Ease

Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.

-Albert Camus

Today a little vignette to illustrate my point. About twenty years ago, I knew a lady, perhaps she was a client. Marnie was 36, had three kids and a husband who traveled for work often. She worked full time, kids were in school - 9th, 6th and 3rd grade; family planning don't you know. Big comfortable house that came with a big uncomfortable mortgage. The office where she worked was about fifteen miles from home, not a long commute but not right around the corner either. Dean, the husband, worked in the city a solid 40 miles one way and he was out of town two weeks a month though not always for the full week each time. Enough frequent flyer mileage that airport travel and big winter weather patterns were a family concern, at least for the adults.

Money was not tight but they did spend what they made. They did not want for the stuff their social standing required but without any real savings they were precariously perched on the lowest rung of the upper middle class. There was no marital cheating, no heavy drinking except perhaps at the two or three major social events of the year. Sometimes they had sex but mostly they were too tired. The kids were everything and as Marnie said at our first meeting: "Our family is everything and that's not enough."

I had scribbled in my notes: "middle class malaise" - a pithy but accurate diagnosis.

A couple of months into our conversation I had a vacation coming up and Marnie joked about patient abandonment. When I returned there was a cancellation for her next appointment, so we had a interlude of nearly a month between sessions. When we met again, she had a new plan for her family. There had been an accident, four of the neighborhood boys were in the car and one was killed. He was the son of one of Marnie's neighborhood friends. He was one of her son's friends but David, her son, had been at a weekend soccer meet and not in the fatal car. 

Marnie and her family were past the trauma, it had been over three weeks since the accident. But her plan came out of the realizations of that loss so close to home. She and her husband were about to tell the children that they were going "slow down the treadmill" -their imagery not mine. No more designer clothes, no more new gadgets, more home cooked meals, more family time. Eventually, dad was going to cut back on travel. Basically, they were going to stop living up to some ideal that Madison Avenue was promoting, again their language. Oh and -- no more therapy.

If you will, try to put yourself inside Marnie's body before the life changing accident. Feel the pressure of keeping up, get a sense of the frustration that comes out as "it's just not enough." Imagine the stress of each child, not one not two but three, the husband, job, bills, the future and the path that stretches in front of you. Got it?

Now take all of that angst, pack in all into one big amorphous blob; detach the family, the job, the entire external world. All you have left is the feeling of dis-ease, of not being calm or content or quiet or relaxed or at ease. Now stuff that big gob of unsatisfactorness into your body, your heart, your spirit, your soul. And wake up every morning feeling without ease. Nothing to attach the feeling to, not a job or a bad relationship or too many bills. The feeling of dis-ease exists as an entity unto itself and unto yourself.

There are people who have that experience every day of their life.

Sure there are degrees, sometimes you can control the darkness with strength of will. Pharmaceuticals work sometimes too, of course, what suppresses the anxiety also damps down the joy. Then you get to add in life, you remember this dis-ease comes fully formed without the everyday anchors of work, money, relationship, health care, Iraq, hurricanes or oil spills. No you get to start your day already burdened by the grey of greys, now stir in what the "normal people" call life and prepare for the big overwhelm.

The point? 

Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.

Don't be a nobody [or be a nobody, wait reverse that].

Writer's Block

When your imaginary friends won't talk to you.

No I don't have writer's block. Since the time when I first considered myself "a writer" I have never experienced a lack of or a loss for words. Oh sure there might be a piece I had to set aside for a day or an hour but blocked -- never. I do remember the experience from my undergrad days. Back then I didn't understand the craft of writing. Not only did I not get the whole concept of outlines and paragraph structure but I lacked what fortunately I now have in abundance - inspiration. So many stories, so little time.

I do use one technique on the order of a cheat sheet, which is simply that I have a lot of projects going at once and more often than not have the luxury of choosing what I want to work on each morning. Deadlines do come around, but I am generally ahead of the curve on the ticking clock issues. There is a little trick I stumbled on when I sat down to finish my dissertation. Back in 1999, I had just left an all consuming job in Silicon Valley and needed to complete my P.D. dissertation I had put on semi-hold; twas time to close a life chapter, which required a check mark next to the grad school experience. I had continued to do weekend research on my topic: Exploring the nature of qualitative research: Assumptions, attributes, definitions and antecedents. But I was not producing text or content. So my first day back at the desk, I did a little sorting and pencil sharpening before producing the updated outline of the entire project. An introduction, five chapters and a conclusion.

Then I broke each chapter into sections and those sections into sub-sections. When the parsing was done I had ninety three little pieces, some done, some drafted, others outlined and a few with just notes or question marks. Then the process was simple, each morning I would drift through the list and find something that interested me to start the day. Slowly the list of potential bits became drafts, drafts were polished and finally there was just the task of stitching the quilt together and fixing the then's, than's and that's.

Today I know as soon as I hit publish on this post, I will be working on a query letter for a novel (Grey Angel) that has been back-burnered for several months. Inspiration struck in the wee hours this morning, my bedside notepad was full of restart ideas when I rolled from the covers a short time ago. I am both inspired and infused with a new direction for that story. Another project, also fresh from several months in a temporal cul-de-sac surfaced this past week, that will be project #2 on my list; unless, of course, we experience a muse war, in which case I will offer up another blog post.

Facts, Family and Distortions

Parts of my far flung family have been reconnected via several social networks and while keeping up with the relatives adds some flavor and spice to life, there is the matter of conflicting politics. In particular, what passes for truth. Now there have got to be several hundred quotes about truth and politics repelling each other like opposite poled magnets. Just turn on any news talk show (Fox, CNN, MSNBC, LSMFT), the plot goes like this. The anchor names a topic. A question is asked to the talking head from one side. They respond not to the question but with a talking point, which attacks the other side. Anchor steps in asks for a response from the other "guest", who then does their own talking point counter attack. To this point nothing has been said about the actual topic. The gritty anchor then offers up another question that can only be addressed with a fact, which let's the audience know we have now moved into phase two which means we are about to hear a huge distortion of reality, not fiction but distortion. But let me clarify a bit for those not used to logical, empirical debate.

Fact: The sun rises in the east.

Actually "sun" is a label by which we mean the large yellow star around which the solar system we inhabit more or less revolves. "Rises" is also inaccurate since the sun itself is stationary with regards this planet we ride upon. So, in fact, the rotation of the planet and the orbit around the "sun" causes what appears to be a "rising" of the "sun" each morning. Of course, it is the "sun" causing the morning and not the morning heralding the "rising." Finally, "east" is another construct we have created to mean "over there" or "that way." What is "true" is that if you stand facing the arbitrary direction we call west, you won't see the illusion of sun coming up. So as qualified as it is, there is at least some discernible truth in the statement: The sun rises in the east.

On the other hand, what politicians, talking heads and unfortunately many citizens, including my relatives state as "truth" is in fact opinion generally based on "distortions" of the truth. For instance:

Distortion: They want to build a mosque at ground zero.

"They" want to exercise their property rights to build within all the local codes. Fact

It isn't a "mosque", it is a community center. Distortion

"Ground Zero" is near Alamogordo, New Mexico where the first nuclear explosion in history took place. Japan also has a fairly strong claim to not one but two "ground zeroes." In New York City, the former site of the World Trade Center is several city blocks from the proposed community center. You need a map to find it and once you did, you would have no idea you were anywhere near the current construction site. Distortion.

When I as in Oklahoma City, we visited the memorial to the domestic terrorist bombing. My reaction was not meant to be cynical but honest. I thought that if they built a memorial to every attack in Israel the entire country would be one big memorial and since you can't allow people to live on such hallowed ground, the Middle East problem would be solved. Israel would be one big memorial to human hatred. Guess I am not an advocate of memorials to terrorism, doesn't it just encourage them to commit more acts of violence so they can be memorialized?

Now there are some other WTC/mosque distortions as well. Not all of those opposing the building are bigots. Fact. Some of them are. Fact. But generalizations are generally soft facts. You know like there actually were some African Americans who voted for John McCain, which proves nothing other then human beings have free will. But let's look at some hard facts that don't seem to be useful to either side of this false debate.

The World Trade Center terrorists were all males. Well we can't really condemn 49.4% of the planet's population, even thought they do start all the wars and commit 93% of the murders, 99.9% of the rapes and cause 99.4% of the urine splatters in public restrooms.

The World Trade Center terrorists were all citizens of Saudi Arabia. Now there' s a nice big fact that no one really wants to look at. There are 1.5 Billion muslims in the world but only 25 Million Saudis. So why the focus on the religion and not the country of origin? Best estimate of the number of members of Al -Qaeda, you know the group that actually admitted to being behind the WTC attack - best guess at the high end is perhaps 150 Thousand members. Seems like a better investigatory or military strategy to focus on 150,000 instead of 1,500,000,000. But that's a number thing and you know how numbers tend to be all factual & focused.

Today's conclusion. Think for yourself, whether you are on the right, left or middle. Stop quoting politicians to me, it simply cannot be true that "your guys" are truthful and honest and the "other guys" are liars, socialists are fascists. It can't be true because I have friends and relatives on the "other side" who send me internet propaganda that says exactly the opposite of what you send me. Its called free and open debate but I am really only interested in what you have to say, not what some paid talking head as vomited up in a sound byte.

Pass the chocolate and don't forget to take your meds before the family reunion.

Orçamento, tatuagem Flor de Lotus

"Olá pessoal,

tenho vontade de fazer uma tattoo nas costa, então vendo site de vocês, adorei essa tattoo que está em anexo. Se possível, gostaria de saber mais ou menos qual o valor para fazê-la em tamanho grande nas minhas costas (meu tom de pele é branco).

Fico aguardando resposta."

Carolina: carol_chinchilla@hotmail.com

Backwaters of Time

August, die she must

The autumn winds blow chilly and cold;

September I'll remember.

A love once new has now grown old.

-Simon & Garfunkel, April Come She Will

Autumn is my favorite season, not so much in California and not at all in Las Vegas but I do get nostalgic for the midwest come autumn leaves. This year I will have a different perspective, not only does my apartment aerie have a grand view but I look down on about ten square miles of Berkeley and this city does love its trees. Granted there are a fair number of evergreens and I can even see a few palm trees, not the brilliant maples and oaks of my dappled memories but color is acomin'. Already the greens have muted and dulled or begun a subtle yellowing. The trees are withdrawing their life force for the winter, more a seasonal ritual here than a freezing winter necessity.

So as fall in Berkeley plays out, I thought I would ponder and muse about where life doth wander. Time has been on my mind often lately. My high school friends gathered last weekend for a 45th reunion, the pictures from the pavilion at the legion made we wonder. I placed a couple of calls to olde classmates from those days and wondered even more. Facebook has put me back in touch with several college friends, many of whom I saw last fall at our 40th class reunion in Kalamazoo. Makes you think, OK makes me think and then write.

I am going to devote September to all of this nostalgic meandering, mixed in with autumnal musings from my perch, I might have to toss in some musical references not only because it was the sixties, but I've also just received six new remastered CDs that will occupy my ears for the near future.

Come October I shall be ready for something new. A leaping off or a vaulting over but this month, well this month we shall laze in the backwaters of my times.

A final word to those readers who never click thru my linked offerings out onto the wonderful world wide web. Try it this month, I promise at least two or three delectable surprises. I will turn one hump day into a super special link day and include several other hidden gems for your amusement and bedazzlement.