Daily {W}Rite January 2o16 WK o4

Well, I sure started off the last week of writing for this first month of 2o16 with a whimper. I didn't get off the "sleeping" couch until 2 p.m. Okay, I need to get my sleep cycle under control. Man, staying up until five or six in the morning is not working for me. I want to get back to waking UP at 6 a.m. not going to bed then. I miss jumping out of the sack, taking a shower and going out onto the porch to watching the day begin.

And what makes things worse, David is off visiting his father. He'll be in Arizona (no, stupid, he went to Las Vegas, Nevada) for ten days or so. Again, MAN! David is my life line to the outside world. Yeah, he also drives me everywhere too. Without him around, I'm apartment locked, you know, like the phrase: land locked. I gotta start motivating myself to get the hell off the computer and OUT into the wide awake world! Damn, I'm wasting too much daylight, sleeping it away. Need to stop this nonsense now (he said at 4:30 a.m.).

Saturday, January 23, 2o16

My head seems to be thick with winter fog today. Hard to find a thought worth repeating onto the blank page. Blank page. My head is a blank, or maybe it dreams itself a question mark. A question mark? More answer for sure than there are questions . . . but we tend to worry about the order of consciousness  because we are told that the question always comes before the answer. You can't know a thing until you emphatically ask, "What the HELL is THAT?!" Names. everything living and dead needs a name. A name glued to your shirt when you enter a room filled with strangers, "Hello, my name is Woodie." A name printed on your underwear with indelible ink by you mother . . . never understood that. Was I going to lose my underwear . . . while wearing it? A tombstone must have a name: Here lies Robert Woods, Robert R. Woods, Robert Ray Woods, or maybe just Woodie, or even better . . . .
UNKNOWN. What an inspiring name! UNKNOWN. People, stranger people would stop and look at that! "UNKNOWN!" They'd mumble to themselves, "Who's that under the grassy knoll? A soldier, a bank robber, a famous actor . . .?" Sometimes a name makes the man; sometimes the man makes the name. "A rose by any other name would smell as sweet?" I don't know about that. Call a rose Shithead or Toe Jam it would effect the olfactory organ . . . as well as one's sense of taste.

Sunday, January 24, 2o16
Again, consciousness let me sleep in longer than I intended. But it arrived much earlier than on other days. When I finally got up (around 10:30 or so), I worked a bit on my Top 10/10 Movie List for 2o15. Didn't get a lot done, only two movies reviewed out of the twenty. I'm not writing full reviews on any, but it does seem to be harder to get anything down this year. But I'm determined to get it ALL done tomorrow. I was suppose to go to the movies with my sister tomorrow, but she wasn't feeling well so we postponed it.

A bit deep into the depression today. No big thing just the regular cycle. The regular crap crawling up from the mind cellar to raise a little hell with my self-esteem. I gotta give up the worry, the sadness, the ghostly memories that keep haunting my daytime and night time dreams. But some memories get etched into the ol' gray, and there seems to be no way of cutting them out or sanding them down just enough so that the thought of them is  harmless. I'm afraid they are there forever a permanent stain that no amount of bleach can make white again.

DAMN, I need to get out of the house, I think. I can't depend on others to force me out, push me out . . . I need to do it myself. Be my own best friend, my own sibling. Hard to do, though. Too Easy to just sit here in the gloom, to sit here and wait for night to come along and sweep me up into a sleepy pile of dreams . . . And when day arrives again? The same as the day before . . . and the day before that . . . reruns. My life has become a reruns. No laugh track, nothing but the quiet rush of air in and out of my lungs. My heartbeat is nothing more than a dull murmur these days. I give up the ghost of memory everyday. Unfortunately, the ghost won't give up on me.

Tuesday, January 26, 2o16

I took a dose of sleeping pill just about two hours ago . . . not working. So, I'm up until they kick in, until my eyes finally decide they've seen enough for the night . . . or morning.  I gotta figure out how I can get to the store tomorrow. Need some nicotine gum. Oh, man. I'm way too aware how dependent I've become on the kindness (and combustion driven transportation) of my friends.

But as sleep deprived as my spirit is I still have to smile a bit. I'm rather happy and energetic . . . enough to write a bit on the blog, anyway. I wish I had more to talk about in these blogs. It'd be nice to say something . . . profound. I know it's all an ego thingy . . . but it would be nice that I could say something that might . . . change someone's life after they read it. Yeah, I know, I know. A bit narcissistic.

A narcissistic sociopath is someone with a combination of narcissistic personality disorder and definitive behavioral signs of sociopathy. People with narcissism are characterized by their excessive and persistent need for others’ admiration and positive reinforcement. They generally have grandiose opinions of themselves and believe they are superior to other people. Narcissists are also frequently convinced that they are above the normal responsibilities and obligations of everyday life, so they usually have significant difficulties maintaining employment or relationships as a result. The narcissistic sociopath has this type of personality along with a noticeable lack of regard for the rights of others and a tendency to regularly violate those rights. -Truthlover5.com.

Okay, so maybe I'm not that bad. {smiles} But it would be nice to be able to help somebody, be worth something to someone else. I'm working on a new poem. This is just the rough draft:

Evening creeps up on the late afternoon,

a strangle hold around the dying light,
the clouds crowd out the last bit of blue sky.

In for the night is the sparrow's song.

And I don't suppose the crows care at all.
To them the world is always dark winged,
they scratch and claw through, the hollow scream
that the early morning train whistle makes
as it marks the territory for its angry freight.

I wish for more summer on my breath,

less frost on my leaves, my fingers’  death
carve shadows on the misted windowpanes.

But the coffee’s brewing.

There’s a rattlesnake rumble crawling
from the space-heater.

I sniffle a bit, my noses itches
envious of those whose allergies
have vacated the vicinity,
their personal space unfettered, or
at least, until a fresh spring arrives.

2:19 p.m.

I miss being in school. I miss the philosophical debates we used to have in some coffee house close to campus. I miss the sound of angry voices trying to make their points, cigarette ash flung across the tables as animate hands express their ideas about politics or religion or economy or art! It doesn't matter what the topic; I just mess the interaction with other people, the battle of wills between opposing forces. I found it to be exciting, fun and exhausting. And it can be enlightening. I mean, you can learn a lot about yourself and the other person when you are in that verbal fight for metaphoric life.

But these day, people are only out to WIN an argument. They don't learn anything because their minds are closed. They are right and, by God, nobody better say they are wrong! We've sort of taken the fun, the joy out of arguing. We get way too angry, too authoritarian, too addicted to the sound of our own voices.

Awhile back I watched a science show where Stephen Hawking defined existence of the universe as having started with the Big Bang, and that NOTHING existed BEFORE the Big Bang. "Therefore," he concluded, "there is no God." Weeeeeeell, I really thought that was somewhat arrogant. So, I wrote a poem to argue MY point of vie

Science

There are large islands of autumn leaves drowning

the driveway... cars rush by changing the physical
formations of all those burnt orange, dying things.
The Big Swoosh in action... nature selection changing
its underwear in a very public fashion.

It may well be the Big Bang Theory (that our twenty-first

century thinkers just love to gossip about) was nothing more
than a simple sneeze from God’s enormous snout. I’ve heard,
from reliable sources, it’s one of His best tricks, along with
burning bushes and angels with fire retardant wings and
pear trees that bear fresh, green fruits of original sin.

Charlton Heston stood on the mountain top
watching us drink wine and scurry about  

like drunken ants. Why didn’t he just turn around
and flee back up the path yelling and screaming to
God, “take me, take me now!”. I guess, like the rest of us,
he believed that life—no matter how filthy and disgusting,
how silly and dangerous, how broken and sad it can be—
is better than a heaven where’s there not much to do  
all day but pray... and occasionally sing... with the locals.

When I was twelve, science made it simple, “Don’t you dare

eat chocolate! It will give you pimples!"

At thirty-five science said, “We lied! Go ahead,

eat all the chocolate you want... just don’t have sex."

If science got chocolate.. and sex... wrong, how

can I trust Stephen’s mechanical whispers shouting,
“THERE... IS... NO... GOD...”
Woodie 11-17-12

Wednesday, January 27, 2o16

What an adventure. Got up early . . .well, okay . . . early for me. Got dressed (semi-warm), and almost ran to the Duck Pond to catch (I was hoping) a bus to Walmart! Yes, I was on my own, man against nature, against the mean streets of Norman, Oklahoma. Okay, maybe not that dangerous . . . BUT . . . I was on my own, going somewhere by myself . . . it was frightening! Anyway, found the right bus, and charged onto it like it was Bunker Hill and I was a lone soldier of fortune looking for . . .

Me: How close to Walmart east can you get me.

Bus Driver: (eyeing ME suspiciously) I'll drop you right across the street! Fare is seventy-five cents. (pause) Are you a senior citizen?
Me: (smiles) Yes. Yes, I am.
Bus Driver: (Even more cautious) Well, if you have an ID that says that, you can ride for thirty-five cents.

I chose not to show my ID. I was too excited to take the time to pull my wallet out and show her I was old. I just wanted to get on the road! Hit the street! My head was already filled with images of Billy and Captain America on their Harleys singing, "Born to be wiiiiiiild" as they headed down the open road to discover America! I grabbed the closest seat, and we were on our waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! And then . . . the bus broke down less than a half a block from where we started! Fuck! And the image of Billy and his bike crashed on the side of some hillbilly road, and Captain A.'s bike burning like a bond fire in a cow pasture . . . flooded my mind with despair.

Thursday, January 28, 2o16
Me: (cheerfully) Hey! You gotta  new truck!
Bus Driver: (Stoic) You mean bus?
Me: Yeah, I meant bus. So, did the other one break down again?
Bus Driver: Yes, it did. (pause)
Me: Oh, well . . .  (sheepishly finds a seat and sits down)

Often enough I try to make contact with the other beings who populate this place . . . this ground. It never works out well for me. I mean, I think I'm doing all the right things . . . I smile . . . I talk to them with a bit of laughter in my voice . . . proving that I mean no harm . . . but it seldom works. Sometimes I feel too alien. Sometimes I think that all this emptiness, all this lack of connection with others has turned me into something so foreign that no one I make contact with can recognize that I'm human . . . or at least,  that I once was a breathing, loving, feeling human being.

It makes no sense to me. I'm invisible to everybody, even to my friends. . . or if I'm not totally invisible, I'm at least transparent, a plastic wrap version of a man, a gust of dusty wind that's barely noticed by the trees, the grass, those humanoid shrubberies that walk about on flesh and bone legs. Pompous bastards.

Friday, January 29, 2o16

A winter's day, seventy degrees outside. The walk to the student union pleasant enough though the sidewalk  bordering Felgar Street is a little rough on my tennis shoes. My feet ache softly. There's a few dead leaves still clinging to their branches. A stiff but not unpleasant wind rips at them. They swing violently but can’t be torn away from home. Stubborn little bastards. Don't know when to give it up.

A sea of backpacks, students rushing to get lunch, a coffee maybe, before the next class. You have to be watchful, blend into the rush of bodies as fast as you can or be trampled by the stampeding youths in  jogging shorts, blue jeans, OU sweatshirts. It doesn't pay to be old. There's no "Pardon me sir" as they shove you, push you into the human river.

A senseless emptiness overwhelms me as I drop the bills into the post office inbox. I'm running out of the strength to take it all in. Understand it all. The shouts of music bouncing off the walls from the radio station housed in the union. And the students jabbering at each at the same frantic rate of speed that they walk at. I can't understand a word they say, even the ones speaking English . . . it all seems foreign to me, a mushy garble of syllables and vowels spoken at a frequency only dogs can hear. I don't belong here anymore, no more than those leaves on the trees lining Felgar Street belong here, in this time.

Sunday, January 31, 2o16
A blur of black and white, white and black. My eyes see but the brain can't seem to grasp the images being sent to it. No sound to help  . . . just an off beat clattering . . .clank, clank, clankity sound, and the bubbling murmur of . . . of . . . human things . . . talking? Yes, talking. It takes a few moments for thought and sight to get in sync with each other . . . there's something slightly warm in my hands . . . a Styrofoam cup of coffee! I'm sitting in a booth at the Old School Bagel Shop, sipping lukewarm  coffee and looking out the window at the traffic on Main Street. Hence, the black and white blur. The reason I can't hear the sound of rushing traffic . . . I'm inside, a thick bay window mutes the sounds of tires on asphalt, that whoosh!  speeding cars make.

The burger  at the Garage feel apart in my hands. But I'm hungry. A fork will do the trick. Mmmm, warm burger, cool avocado, lettuce, tomato, crisp bacon. Fuck it! The fork doesn't work, but my hands do . . .

David and I head for the car. "Look at that!" I squeal, a bit more of a girlish than I like people to hear. Fortunately, there's no one But David around, and when he sees it he lets out an astonished, "WOW!"

The sun's down going down on Main St. The dying light hits some windows (facing west) on the building's second floor, the reflection bounces off the windows and lands smack on the face of a brick wall across the street. Nice shot. I didn't know the sun was a pool hustler. Fast Eddie Felsen's got nothing on the universe.

We jump in the car and park down the street from the "sign from God." I grab my camera (hoping that I got enough battery left to get the shot) as David starts up the street toward the lights! Click, Click, Click! Man I get some great shots. Sort of made a rather uneventful day seem somehow . . . more important. Yes, I'm depressed and angry with the world today . . . but . . . this makes the rest of this awful time on Earth seem somewhat worthwhile.

And so ends this week's blog of gibberish. Yes, it's gibberish. Everything I write doesn't make sense. It doesn't even begin to explain the nasty mood I've been in this week. Hell, this whole year! But it does give me a tiny sliver of hope to hang onto. And that's enough to keep me waking up each morning. And I'll keep waking up, getting up, fighting the overpowering sense of natural gravity that drags at my body every moment of the day . . .and night. So, don't worry about me. I'm fine. Hey, I did write a poem some years ago that illustrates my point of view when it comes to ending this consciousness prematurely. Maybe my poems say more about me than my blog does. Or maybe my blog is starting to take the form of a poem. Hmmm, something else for me to worry about. {smiles}

'Tis True

'Tis true, 'tis true,

I am by nature an impatient man
demanding of my dreams, "show thyself!"
long before I’ve fallen off to sleepy-land!
I often sit a twiddling my thumbs
at an extremely agitated rate
or pace the floor and adjust my coat
while filling the air with unquotable quotes
when she decides to keep my spirits waiting.
What’s with all this hesitating?
She doesn’t see my agitation?
Can't she hear my mournful cries
belittling the darkest nights
while longing for her presence to arrive?

'Tis true, 'tis true,

mere blasphemy, some would say,
my cursing her and scorning her then all the day
hoping soon she'll smile my way.

But I'm a complicated sort of guy

who doesn't always try to reason why,

why this old world spins perpetually slower

when it comes to my desires.

Maybe I should retire from it all
with'a swift slit to the wrist!
No, that would be quite painful and harmful
to all those friends . . . who pretend to like me.

"Tis true, 'tis all true,

I love my misery far too much to give it up.
A dark, dank grave with no one to mourn
except those featherless crows, who heaven knows,
have forgotten the meaning of flight? No, not I!

But I have lost my train of thought. Where was I?

Perhaps I should take my dog for a walk
and clear this morbid rhyme from my mind.
Yes! I could walk my dog . . .  if I had one.
Woodie 5-23-08

The Daily {W}Rite 2o16 January WK o3

Evening creeping up on the late afternoon, a strangle hold around the dying light. Clouds crowding out the last bit of blue sky. In for the night the sparrow's song. I don't suppose the crows care at all. To them the world is always dark winged, they scratch and claw through the hollow scream the train whistle makes as it marks the territory for the oncoming freight. I wish for more summer on my breath, less frost on my leaves, my fingers carve shadows on the misted windowpanes. Coffee brewing, a rattlesnake rumble crawling from the space-heater, I sniffle a bit, my noses itches envy at those whose allergies have vacated their personal space . . . at least until spring.

I'm still aggravated by the stare down the other night. My hands are busy creating fists. Too busy executing their right to be hostile, they have a hard time typing out my pacifistic hums-and-drums, the beating of my heart slowing to a mild stroll, the blood smoothing to a gentle country brook . . . I wish the sparrows had not retreated for the night . . .I could lose myself in their cheerful chirps.

The last couple nights I've slept well. Hell, I even dreamed! I know! It's been awhile since I dreamt, or maybe its just that I when I woke up I couldn't remember that I had dreamed. Either way, it was pleasant to have dreamt and remembered dreaming. Even though the dream was a bit unpleasant. I was in a forest . . . no, an Eden with a group of loving Earth children when all of a sudden hot air balloons descended on us with Indians inside their baskets shooting arrows at us! The really sad thing about the dream? I knew why I had dreamt it! Damn you The Revenant!

Saturday, January 16, 2o16 A Facebook friend was wondering about what would constitute having lived a "full" life. I responded with a somewhat silly comment:

Well, a sort of unanswerable question, isn't it? If you survive the dream time and wake up NOT dead and continue that process day after day until you don't wake up anymore, that could be considered living life to its fullest. However, if living the full life involves accomplishing some great feat like curing cancer, ending world hunger, teaching Tom Hardy how to act, You may be disappointed. Maybe living a full life is only living it the best you can, treating each day as if it were an adventure, living each day as if it were the last day of your life. There's this scene from Oh, Coward! that I think may be relevant to the conversation:

Man and Woman dancing

Woman: I think life is for living, don't you?

Man: It's hard to tell what else you would do with it. -Noel Coward

Mmmmm, perhaps my "retort" was a bit sophomoric, but maybe we spend too much time worrying about whether an individual life is "full." I mean I have no idea what that means to live a full life.  A lot of people think it means that you love and are loved by other people. Some DO think that you must accomplish something worthwhile . . . AND . . . keep accomplishing until you die! Well, I've accomplished a few things in this life, but not sure anyone remembers any of it. I've lived in Norman a long time and artistically I've produced a few pieces that I felt  "was worth the effort." But I've also had my troubles too. Mostly dealing with other people. When I got back from New Mexico, all the things that I accomplished didn't mean much. In fact, most people had no idea who I was or what I had accomplished. However, the people that I offended in one way or the other? Boy, they remembered . . . not the accomplishments . . . but all the nasty things I did to them . . . and I remembered totally all the cruel moments that they laid on me! 

Is my life "full?" Yeah, it feels like it. Maybe it's full of mostly bullshit, but at the least it's full. I've lived a life, so to speak, and I will continue to live it for as long as whomever is in charge allows me to do so. {smiles}

Monday, January 18, 2o16
Yesterday

I've at appoint in my longevity that I no longer recognize age. I should have known by the shiny auburn ponytail, as thick and natural as winter wheat, that she wasn't much older than seventeen. Precisely seventeen she was, and she would graduate this year and go to college to

study neuropsychology. And that was enough to get me rambling on about the imagination. ME:  . . . "the imagination! Such an interesting thing . . . that doesn't exist . . . at least, that's what scientists say. But I say the imagination . . . is real . . . if there is such a thing as a soul, it dwells in our ability to imagine its existence!" She smiles pleasantly, raises her pen and booklet to right below her chin . . . "Are you ready to order." Walmart, an obstacle course yesterday. I think I'm drunk carting because I can't seem to maneuver through the isles with out bumping into every cart, every overwrought  mother bending over to pull her brat's greedy little hands away from the Cocoa Puffs before he rips the box opens and fills the already dirty floor with the brown, sugary guts of breakfast cereal specifically marketed to children under five.

Today

Every bit of dirty laundry that I've accumulated over the last . . . three years . . . may well be four! Four years of close stuffed inside a laundry hamper. Ants nested there for a while coming out only to sneak a sip of water from the leaky bathroom facet. They died, however, when the winter finally rolled in. Or maybe they just got bored with how filthy my hamper and bathroom had become. Anyway, a laundry basket full of pants and shirts--the laundry basket I bought yesterday at Walmart-- a giant red gym bag vomiting underwear and socks (some that hadn't seen the light of day for many years), more T-shirts and pajama bottoms which I always seem to get as presents during Christmas. Why is that? Is it my age? "He's 67 years old, for God's Sake!" Buy him a pair of pajama bottoms! Spider-Man pajama bottoms! Old men love that!" And off to the laundry where I spent approximately $25.00 on washing and drying and extra soap because I ran out of soap! Six washers full of clothes!  My God! Anyway, an hour and a half later everything is washed and dried . . . well not my t-shirts, of course! 100% cotton most of them. Dry them in a drier? No way. I'd be using them for handkerchiefs! Anyway, everything is done and David comes by and picks me up.

Thursday, January 21, 2o16

In freefall for the last three days and nights. I've finally fallen to the ground, like a rain drop falls to the ground. The clouds had been gathering for those last three days (and nights), rubbing up against each other, the larger clouds bullying the small, weaker clouds, the insignificant clouds, the ones that you pass daily on the sidewalk barely realizing that they are even there. Cold ice of the larger fluffs   smashing into the warmer drops of rain from the smaller clouds . . . and the inevitable lightning flashes that scream in tortured howls of thunder. All very natural, you see? Yes, nature is beautiful, but also very violent, uncaring, she takes no sides in this war of moisture. AND then come the rains, wet droplets bombing the shit out of what leaves are still alive on the trees (if there be any at all), smashing into windowpanes, committing kamikaze on the sidewalks that now bleed grayish wet from the mangled corpses of a million, a billion raindrops.  Again, and I can't stress this enough, it's all a very natural sort of thing. No malice on natures part,  no premeditation, no murdering of innocent raindrops, or ducks or old men who just unfortunate enough to be caught outside when the storm starts up.

Of Ducks and Old Men

The rain came in fast.
The old men covered their heads
with newspapers, hats, their hands
and began to run away from the natural
order of things, feeling lost, bewildered
by the sudden storm no one saw coming,
wondering why the weatherman had given
no warning not even a hint that the park
would soon turn into a lake.

The ducks were happy, though.

Floating about talking to each other
in that pleasant quacking sound they make.

"Son of the bitch!" Cried the old men

slipping and sliding their way to the parking
lot where their even older cars waited.

Sometimes it's better to be a duck than a man.

Sometimes it’s better to have feathers than hats,
newspapers or even hands. Sometimes it’s better
to enjoy the weather and forget that you’re wet,
forget that you’re old and not a duck, just... forget.
Woodie o8-18-12

8:43 P.M.

I think I'm finished for this week. Mush for brains lately. Thinking is like trying to run in lace-less combat boots through a Florida swamp. I don't know if the last metaphor works that well are not. To tell you the truth, I don't really care. I will in this last week of January . . . I'm hoping. But one never knows what one will or will not do.

Yesterday, David and I went to Walmart East, which isn't that much of a surprise. After buying our groceries, we started for the parking lot:
David: Do you remember where we parked?
Woodie: No.

David: Why not?

Woodie: (shrugs) Well, I didn't remember to remember to look at the row number we were parked in. So, I couldn't remember.

David: (pause) WHAT?! (pause) You need to put this conversation on your blog.Woodie: Why?
David: Because this makes you look like the idiot. Usually, I look like the idiot.

And he's right. My blog usually makes him look like the idiot. {smiles}

The Daily {W{Rite 2o16 January WK o2

Art Walk, January
The cold bit into me as soon as I got out of the car. Yes, I wore the thick winter coat Sister bought for me back in 1995 or so, a blue Cardigan that she also got me for this last Christmas and my sturdy blue sweat-shirt . . . NOT bought by my sister . . but none of it helped. Nothing could stop that bastard north wind which takes special aim at anyone over 60. So, we took an extremely quick walk out of the parking lot and into the "Main Gallery," which was at least 70 degrees so now I started to sweat and was longing for the winter that stood outside waiting on me.

The gallery was an artist patron's graveyard. Only the Art Walk purist were there as usual, sipping champagne or a glass of wine talking to each other about . . . well, I'm not sure what they talked about. Maybe they went on about the weather, the art, local or national politics. I never talk to anybody at Art Walk because I either don't know them or do know them and have a personal feud with them that prevents me from being friendly. David, however, knows everybody and feels friendly towards everyone and MUST stop to chat with each person he runs into, and even though there weren't many folk out last night, there was enough to keep him occupied for about 45 minutes. Me? I just walked around as I usually do looking at the art and taking a quick pic of someone--male/female, doesn't matter much to me. They just need to be interesting to my camera--who had no idea that I was taking their picture.

The Chainsaw Gang's Gallery

Okay, not really their name. I made it up. But these guys have a ton of statues they carve from found wood (mostly), and a lot of their work is done during Art Walk. Last night was no different. Though it was cold enough to make a polar bear shiver, one of the gang was out front of the gallery hacking away with his chainsaw, creating a beautiful wood carving of Yoda! May the chainsaw be with you.

The Stash
What the hell are we doing at The Stash?! Granted, the weather (which had just turned to drizzly rain) was getting to me. I was sweating and shivering at the same time.

Disgruntled and wanting to go home, I followed David into the backroom of The Stash to be greeted with an extremely loud singer and backup band  playing . . . what? the blues? Cajun blues? Well, it was good but so damn loud I started to develop an earache on top of the rest of my wintertime maladies.

Here, take this! David handed me a Styrofoam mini-bowl, a spork and two raffle tickets. What the fuck is this? My inquire was cut off  by David walking away to talk to somebody he used to go to school with or something, leaving me there to juggle a bowl, a spork and two fucking raffle tickets, as I tried to put my camera into its bag-- BUMP! Hey, some asshole bumped into me. I don't know why he did that! It's not like the place was crowed or anything. BUMP! Hey, the motherfugger did it again! AND BUMP! AGAIN. Enough of that bullshit. I glared at the drive-by bumper. He was dressed in an all yellow jump suit with a garland of fake, exotic flowers around his thick neck. A grizzly gray beard, and big, thick glasses (could see every crater on the moon with those bastards!) forced me to assume that he was an escaped mental patient. And he may have well been some nut job serial bumper . . . But I realized he was also the bass player for the band that was just playing. He glared right back at me, but I wasn't going to be intimidated. I glared even harder back at him. Who did he think he was messing with? Hey, come over here and try this! Fortunately for me David's shout disrupted my stare down contest with the bass player. I walk over to the table where David was standing, and I finally understood what the mini-bowl, the spork and raffle tickets were for. The Stash was

having a gumbo-fest of some kind. Each table had a big pot full of gumbo made, no doubt, buy the person stirring the pot and grinning like demented sous chef every time someone came up to their table. They were ladling out samples to give to everyone who stopped by, and the tickets were to be put in a basket (or jar) next to the gumbo you liked the most. Okay, so I'm kind of slow. But I finally got it.

Main St. Tattoos
The walk back to the car was even harder on my bones than the walk to The Stash. The rain was coming down harder and I was worried that my camera (even in its case) would get soaked. So as we walked I tried to sling it off my shoulder and under my coat without taking off the coat. Didn't work. But no worry. I ducked under the awnings along the way and kept both me and my precious camera from getting drenched. Last pic of the night was my favorite . . . Main St. Tattoo. They always have a wonderful collection of  . . . tattoo art on their walls. Come on, I'm cold. David was a maybe ten feet ahead of me. That was unusual. He walks slower than me . . . most times. So, I got a quick pic of the tattoo shop and headed off to the comfort of David's car. Besides, the bad weather and the asshole at The Stash, it was a wonderful Art Walk this month. {smiles}

Sunday, January 10, 2o16

I spent most of my Sunday wedged between two older ladies, both of them so small that I could've stuffed them into the left pocket of my Cardigan and still have enough room for my nicotine gum packet and my reading glasses. David was off somewhere in a seat extremely close to the screen but on the aisle. He likes it like that. Me? I can't sit that close to the huge screens at The Warren.

The Revenant  was extraordinarily good in spots, but the overall effect of the film lacked . . . something. And I'm going to get reamed by my theatre and movie business friends for this, but Tom Hardy is the most uninteresting actor in the world! No, in the universe! I know, I know. how could I possibly say that? He's the darling of both stage and screen. This evening on the Golden Globe Awards, Leo DiCaprio praised his acting, his dedication to the work and blah-blah-blah . . . Sorry, I don't see it. I'll give Hardy kudos  for one movie, The Drop. Everything else he's done is . . . well, mediocre at best.  After the movie was over, I swore to David that when we go to the next movie I'll sit wherever he wants . . . though I'm pretty sure, I won't. {smile}

Monday, January 11, 2o16 1:30 a.m.

The hour is late. Or early. It depends on your point of view. But it is that time of day in which the sun is somewhere else. It seems too often these days that the sun is always somewhere else, refusing to shine on me. I blame the clouds, they govern this time of year, and no matter the time of day clouds rule with a very stubborn hand. The hands on a clock. Shouldn't that be arms of the clock? They resemble limbs more than hands. Or legs running constantly around the face . . . the minute leg jogs, the hour limb strolls while the ever frantic second leg sprints . . . hops across the day from coffee break to coffee break . . . Time is crutch that we depend on to motivate us to do . . .  something, anything before Time runs out . . . stops in it's tracks . . . at least we perceive it as so. But Time does NOT stop, it's in continuous motion. It is we who end not Time. Or do we actually end? Perhaps our consciousness leaves us, but we, our being just transforms into . . . what? I did write a poem about Time once. Well, more than one to be honest. But this one (below) sticks to my brain like a wad of nicotine gum.

Time

Sometimes the day gets away from me,
running ahead of me like my big brother
who was always in such a hurry,
stretching his hideously long legs
out in front of his adult size body,
moving at what seemed to me
a million miles an hour.

And no amount of pleading,

"Come on, man, slow down!"

could stop his momentum.
He’d pick up speed and disappear
around the corner before I could catch him.

It’s not that we run out of Time,

but rather that Time runs out on us,
runs out of patience waiting for us.

We need to get on with it,

get after it with all we got
or Time will turn the corner
and disappear forever.
Woodie o5-1o-12 (rewrites o9-15-14)

4:37 a.m.
David Bowie died yesterday. I found out about it as I was writing my little ditty on Time. Bowie was . . . an artist in the best sense. No one was like Bowie. He created what he created without remorse or apology. The last song I remember hearing from him was the song Cat People (Putting Out Fire). Tarantino used it in Inglourious Basterds.

11:30 P.M.

I woke up at 1:30 this afternoon after staying up until 8 A.M. Damn. I gotta get to bed earlier tonight. I spend too much of my allotted daylight sleeping. There's poetry to write, blog entries to make AND I could spend more time cleaning up the apartment . . . washing clothes. But what can I do? I'm possessed by the demon SLOTH:

Sloth: is one of the seven deadly sins in Christian morality, particularly within Catholicism, referring to laziness. Sloth is defined as spiritual or emotional apathy, and being physically and emotionally inactive.

David left an IM for me on my Facebook page. It said: I'm sorry about Friday night. Yes, I know what you're thinking . . . WTF? My sister called me earlier today and asked if I was all right . . . again: WTF? It turns out both my friend and my sister have been reading my blog. David was referring (I think) to the drive by bumper at The Stash who turned out to be some Ph fucking D dude that David knows. So, I guess he was apologizing for something his friend did? My sister was worried about my health because she read an entre on my blog where I was talking about not feeling well. Hee! Well, it's nice when people worry about me . . . but it is a blog, and I tend to write about whatever is on my mind and I DO exaggerate  . . . sometimes. {smiles}

Tuesday, January 12, 2o16, 2:32 A.M.

Yes, I'm still among the conscious. Not for long I'm hoping. Took a sleeping pill (over the counter stuff, don't worry.) so I'm pretty sure sleep will come for in a half hour or so. But I can't count on it because my body is a rebel and it wants to stay up all night. My mind can't control my physical desire to watch the sunrise, to hear the garbage truck grind past my window which it does every morning at 7:00. Winter mutes the birds, though. But in the spring and summer they rise at 4 A.M. and gossip the whole bloody day long. I hate sparrows but only because I can't understand a word they say to each other. {yawn}

6:45 PM

I'm crumbling. Splintering. Bits and pieces of my existence hanging, clinging to the branches, to the logic that I'm just imagining this . . .  this . . .  existence? Oh, I understand. This frailty is too fragile to not be a fantasy. I'm wake dreaming all of it. All these lumps of dust gathering around me
masquerading as creatures capable of ration thought. Like he extremely short squatty piece of breathing Earth, the one leaning over the reception counter screaming in a leathery voice at a faceless secretary, her tongue a whip slashing to slobbery death a bastard echo of what might once, a long time ago, been the English language. "I'VE LEFT MY INFORMATION AT HOME. CAN I STILL KEEP MY APPOINTMENT?" My ears hate her, they wish she'd magically go mute. But it's not her fault that I can't stand her, this imperfectly formed stranger . . . I wonder sometimes what God is thinking. He too is on my list of annoyances today. Everything irritates me this afternoon . . .  myself included.

8:31 P.M.
 The last State of the Union speech from President Obama started thirty minutes ago.

 He speaks in a strong, hopeful voice about the future of America. More jobs, less Murder of our citizens, protecting the environment. And everyone listens respectfully, even those who are his sworn enemies seem to be more agreeable tonight. Why? Because they won't have to hear him deliver another SOTU speech ever again.

Wednesday, January 13, 2o16
An itch. An angry itch tickling my fragile amygdala. No one is safe. I'm in cave dweller mode. Every slight, every look every word a person says to me  . . . an attack on my primal being . . . and when it comes to my survival  . . .? What a tough guy.
Well, sort of, I guess. At least I talk tough. Yeah, I watched a lot Scorsese . . . Clint Eastwood . . . "Go ahead, make my day!"  Although, I'm really a wuss deep down inside, I do have anger problems. I've always had a tough time dealing with other people. Like that guy at Art Walk the other night. If he'd had taken the pushing any farther . . . I would have got my ass kicked! I'm too old for this "street fighting" thing. Hell, even when I was young, in my twenties . . . I was too old for that shit. {smiles}

I am learning a bit how to "go around" my anger at the world. Not an easy mission to complete. But I am working on it. Aged has helped. I'm not as angry as when I was young. BUT it is still there, still sneaking about in my sub consciousness.

Thursday, January 14, 2o16
Woke up this morning to the news that  Alan Rickman had died. I know, so what? I mean really, People and "actors" die all the time. Yeah, but Rickman? Special. Primarily a stage actor, he's really able to take that wonderful stage training and translate it into great movie performances. He was a dear man too. When the Harry Potter series was over, he became a sort mentor to Daniel Radcliffe. This what Daniel had to say about Rickman's death:

Alan Rickman is undoubtedly one of the greatest actors I will ever work with. He is also, one of the loyalest and most supportive people I've ever met in the film industry. He was so encouraging of me both on set and in the years post-Potter. I'm pretty sure he came and saw everything I ever did on stage both in London and New York. He didn't have to do that. I know other people who've been friends with him for much much longer than I have and they all say "if you call Alan, it doesn't matter where in the world he is or how busy he is with what he's doing, he'll get back to you within a day".

People create perceptions of actors based on the parts they played so it might surprise some people to learn that contrary to some of the sterner(or downright scary) characters he played, Alan was extremely kind, generous, self-deprecating and funny. And certain things obviously became even funnier when delivered in his unmistakable double-bass.

As an actor he was one of the first of the adults on Potter to treat me like a peer rather than a child. Working with him at such a formative age was incredibly important and I will carry the lessons he taught me for the rest of my life and career. Film sets and theatre stages are all far poorer for the loss of this great actor and man.

The main thing about Rickman is that he was always the artist, always working to improve the craft, always showing us actors what you could create on the stage, on screen. He's done a lot of work, varied character work, some of it in BIG budget movies, but a lot in smaller venues. My favorite piece he did was for PBS, The Song of Lunch, an epic poem written by Christopher Reid. It's a beautiful piece of TV/theatre. Rickman was an actor's actor. I wish that I could have had ONE acting class with him. But the truth is, everything he's done on film, on TV has been a master class in the art and craft of acting. Alan Rickman will be missed and cherished forever.

The Daily {W}Rite January, 2o16 WK o1

Monday, January o4, 2o16
Energy sucked out of me. My being a faint dream moving through the gym, a deflated balloon, pushed about from free weight to Nautilus machine by an air-conditioned breeze. A burning sensation flaring up in my  right bicep.  I think about where I'm at right now, the

10GYM, fighting off the desire to daydream, to transport what's left of me to some cozy memory about being in her soft grasp. SHE. I brush the thought of her out the door and reclaim the pain that IS annoying but is much more real than her ghost could ever be.

I don't believe in ghosts
and hope that ghosts 
don't believe in me.

These days I get too aggravated with the aliens that have invaded my Earth. I need to be more considerate of their three-headed logic as foreign as their brand of group therapy they keep yelling at me. So what if they don't think the same jagged but linear way as I? I pretend to talk their language, knowing all the while that they refuse to believe that I am capable of ever learning their complicated, nonsensical blabbering, those high screeching sounds they make . . . I really don't understand a word of it.   But I do pretend to and nod my head and smile as if they had actually said something very witty, something very charming, something . . .  I've had much deeper and more meaningful conversations with my kitchen Ficus.

Wednesday, January o6, 2o16

This side of the museum is darker than the rest. No direct sunlight on it. "You can take pictures, but you can't use a flash." I did ask why even though I knew the answer. "The flash from your camera can damage the pages." That fear is the same reason why the exhibit is protected from direct sunlight. I like the young guard. He seems so very proud and dutiful protecting such a delicate piece of art although there's not many folks to guard. Me and David and a couple of other old fogies. And to be honest, it's really not that impressive to look at.
There are a couple of used bookstores in Norman where there use to be at least twenty back in the 70s and 80s. Anyone of them have books that look like this: old, brown edged pages, the paper just thin enough that you might be afraid to touch. But what it looks like is not as important as what it represents, or who it represents. Supposedly this is an original First Folio.

David wants to go. But there's one thing I need to do. I read out loud.

To be, or not to be, that is the Question:
Whether ’tis Nobler in the mind to ſuffer
The Slings and Arrows of outragious Fortune,
Or to take Armes against a Sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them: to dye, to ſleepe
No more; and by a sleep, to say we end
The Heart-ake, and the thouſand Naturall ſhockes
That Flesh is heyre too? "Tis a consummation
Deuoutly to be wiſh'd. To dye to sleepe,
To sleep, perchance to Dream; I, there's the rub,
For in that sleep of death, what dreams may come,
When we haue ſhufflel’d off this mortall coile,
Muſt giue us pause. There's the respect
That makes Calamity of long life:
For who would beare the Whips and Scornes of time,
The Oppreſſors wrong, the poore mans Contumely,
The pangs of diſpriz’d Loue, the Lawes delay,
The inſolence of Office, and the Spurnes
That patient merit of the vnworthy takes,
When he himſelfe might his Quietus make
With a bare Bodkin? Who would theſe Fardles beare
To grunt and ſweat vnder a weary life,
But that the dread of ſomething after death,
The vndiſcouered Countrey, from whoſe Borne
No Traueller returnes, Puzels the will,
And makes vs rather beare those illes we haue,
Then flye to others that we know not of.
Thus Conſcience does make Cowards of vs all,
And thus the Natiue hew of Resolution
Is ſicklied o’re, with the pale caſt of Thought,
And enterprizes of great pith and moment,
With this regard their Currants turne away,
And looſe the name of Action. Soft you now,
The faire Ophelia? Nimph, in thy Orizons
Be all my ſinnes remembred.

Thursday, January 07, 2o16

Been sleep waking the last few days. I have a feeling that the frackers have drilled into my energy deposits and just sucked the physical life out of me. But the good news, I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow to check on how I'm doing. Hope they can give me something to get out of these "trance" I'm in. I've been staying up way late every night getting to bed at eight in the morning then sleeping until two or three in the afternoon. It sucks.

I think I am a bit worried about it. It feels like I'm ending, my physical and dream-self are slowly melting away. My being, my existence turning to shadow. I'm drifting away from myself. Or it could be that the new medications I'm on for my lungs are just to potent. My feet and my hands are alternating from swelling to cramping.  Yeah, it's probably just the medication they got me own. Get it adjusted and life will go measurably on . . . I hope.

11P.M.
There are no rush of words streaming through my finger tips. Ideas, big or little, meaningful

or useless are blocked by a soupy mush, a knot of thought that I can't untangle. I wish by the golden glow of my Walmart table lamp, I pray to King Coffee Cup for just a pinch of original thought. Poetry. Overseer of the written word. Twenty lashes digging deep gashes on the poet's pink flesh if he doesn't produce something worth the reader's time.

Gentleness, a warm gentleness cuddles my beaten dreams. The tortures of the day, the ballpeen hammer looks from total strangers, milky smiles that curdle into cottage cheese as it mocks the humbleness of my sweat stained shirt that strains, groans a bit as it tries to cover the vast waste land my abs have become. 

There are more, of course, more subtle stabs and flicks that cut so thin you barely feel the pain of them.  But why bother sorting through them at 2:15 in the cold, dark morning? A dream is texting me . . . wonders what I'll be doing for the rest of the night.