The Daily {W}Rite March 2o16 WK o4

Wednesday, March 23, 2o16
My eyes aren't quit ready to shut even though it is 4:30 in the morning. The air conditioner is keeping me awake, the bastard. It's bulldog growl keeps ponding at my eardrums. I'd turn it off, but then it

would be too warm in my small apartment. So, I just wait and write while I wait for my brain to click off . . . and then turn itself on again, switching to the dream channel for a few hours. I don't sleep much anymore. I'm told that old folk need less sleep than when they were young. I believe it's true. I've been reading up on time, how time has changed over the years. Interesting read. David doesn't think so, though. On the drive back from Walmart I told him all about how people once believed that nighttime was the time diseases like cholera and the black plague would travel from person to person if they were unlucky enough to be outside. the called the phenomena the Miasma theory. He laughs. Doesn't believe me. He sometimes makes me think he believes I'm a little stupid. Naw, he's probably just kidding.

Anyway, my eyes are starting to cross. That's their single to me that it's time to go to bed. I'm such a slave to my eyes. So, more tomorrow about this . . . this . . . this existence I have been forced into living by a person or persons unknown. Goodnight. P.S. I think Miasma would be a good name for a horror or fantasy character. What do you think? {smiles}

10:35 P.M.

Wow! Energy abundant! Rushing rivers of it drowning my hands and fingers, flooding pouring out of my fingers and flooding the key board with words, words, words. I did sleep most of the afternoon away because I didn't get to bed before 8 a.m. I woke about two hours after I went to bed . . . well, wasn't really awake . . . more like Zombie Consciousness! Anyway, cut a few more Zs and finally bounced out of bed around 2 p.m.

David and me kind of jousted on the Facebook today. Was sort of fun:
ME: So, I'm starting to see these
trailers for the live action movie of
Warcraft? Anybody psyched up for it?
David: I think it is the same as that other comic book one - "Batman vs Superman: Civil Warcraft" only Scarlet plays Lara's sister War - or is that Croft... They had to cut the Jimmy Olson/Robin scene. I heard it isn't as good as the others because Groot isn't in it and the CGI of the pegging scene isn't as good as Walking Deadpool. So I guess I have to take you to see it Friday because your bicycle isn't fixed. Warren or Regal? Is it supposed to get lots of Oskies?

ME: Warcraft is NOT Batman vs. Superman. Civil War is the soon to be released third movie in the Captain America series. You have learned nothing from me, Grasshopper. AND yes! Batman vs Superman, Friday at 11pm . . . but if you don't want to go . . . I can go by myself. {fake cry}
David: Wake-up at 9 then?
ME: Sounds good to me!

Thursday, march 24, 2o16
I've no friends as constant as the air around me. And it is created by artificial means, a wad of interconnected wires, red, white, blue . . . I wonder what that lone, purple No. 2 AWG  wire that goes so deep into the brain of my air-conditioner . . . I wonder what's it for? It must be hooked up to the memory. Yes, that's it. It connects the outside world to its memory. Hmm, interesting enough hypothesis can lead only to a much darker question:  Do machines think? They must. Of course they must. How else would my Mr. Coffee, coffeemaker know to begin brewing my coffee at exactly 6 a.m. each morning? My electric razor remembers the shape of my face, I'm sure of that. How else could I get a perfect shave each and every morning if  my razor did not have a consciousness? Because I'm pretty sure that I don't wake up until 11 am and my face is always clean shaven, so, therefore, someone or some thing must have performed the operation because I sure as hell didn't.

Unless, of course, I'm also a robot, a robot thing like my air-conditioner, like my Mr. Coffee, 12-Cup Coffeemaker . . .  or as the handbook calls it: Cafetera de 12 trazas. Perhaps, I'm less human than I am aware of. I, Robot! But no, that's been contemplated way too many times in way too many bad Sci-Fi movies. I'm not a robot, I just act like one. And while we are add it, about Sci-Fi, why is it robots want to be human so much? Why when a robot finds out that he is a robot and not a "human bean" he/she gets all sad and stuff? What the hell? Being human is an asshole job. Being a toaster, at the least, does something worthwhile . . . making toast!
But I'm ranting, like a Scarecrow wishing he had a heart . . . or is that the Tin Woodman? But does it matter? I am human, I have the faults all humans carry with them . . . granted, maybe more than most, my sins are many. But alive I am.

Friday, March 25, 2o16
Retreads. I stepped on sticker today and I felt it on my foot. My shoe's sole is thinner than an old man's skin. The heals are worn-out also. The shoestrings once white are now a chimney soot gray. "Toss them out," I tell myself, "you have three more pairs that are in far better walking shape." And it's true. Yet, we've traveled so many miles together, in the snow, the rain, that one day through a muddy bog down by the Duck Pond. What a mess that was. And how many sweaty summer trips did we make to the Regal to see some dumb-ass movie nobody with a car wanted to go see with me? Nicotine gum runs to Walmart, kicking at some crazy ass dog that chassed us. Maybe not always a fun time with these shoes. But when you share a life for as long as I have with this faded blue pair of Chucks, it's hard to let go, to say goodbye.

Saturday, March 26, 2o16

I sat down in front of the computer and wrote a movie review, a whole movie review without stopping except for a lunch break and  quite a few bathroom breaks . . . the coffee was already made so all I had to do was walk to the kitchen and pour me a cup. But other than those few necessary breaks, I wrote straight through 'til the end of paper. I don't do that often sit down and just write.

The other day a person from the university that I've known for a few years Facebooked me and ask a simple, straightforward question, "Do you believe human beings are basically good or basically evil?" My answer was, "Yes." The friend understood what I meant without asking more questions. It's probably best to go through life thinking people are basically good . . . however, always leave room for the possibility that you are wrong. {smile}

I busy myself. Poetry, my mind on politics, writing the blog, watching a favorite movie, I busy myself. I don't fight the end of light, the dark in night, I accept my single minded dreaming. Drift through the oil slick as if it were cleansing waters. I do not drink from it, that is a certainty. The stink is enough to warn my lips that that way is toward the infinite, the dreamless dream saved only for the security of the grave. I don't think on it. I don't stomp around inside it, splashing its mud on my shoes, in my eyes, I don't think on it. A numb buzzing around the inside of my balding head. A whispering hiss from the plastic, metal monster behind me. But I don't worry on it or about the cyclops perched on the corner table. He never blinks never takes that one red eye off of me. Most times I don't pay attention his scornful gaze. Now and then I do place a red scarf over his lidless orb. Sometimes my skin screams, it's bright stare burning me. But I do not mind it at all.

Sunday, March 27, 2o16
Watched Easter movies all day. King of Kings, Barabbas, The Silver Chalice. Thought a bit about Christ, about my religion and how pretty much I must be big disappointment to . . . I don't really try to be the good Christian. I keep promising Jesus that I'll do better, every night in prayer I asks for forgiveness of my sins, and as soon as I wake up in the morning I repeat the same sins that I promised Him I would NEVER do again. Hmm. Well, I keep trying with the hope that sooner or later I'll get it, get the whole holiness thing.

I can feel the sleep fairy rubbing the back of my neck, my shoulders, her breath on my eyes making the lids slowly close. So, it's off to sleep, I hope. Don't want another night like last night where I didn't get to sleep until 9 a.m. Wish me luck.

Monday, March 28, 2016
1,000 miles an hour. That's how fast and how far the Earth spins. Okay, from the equator but it still spins almost as fast in Norman, Oklahoma. Some times I can feel that spin. My head notices now and then that it's dizzy. I have to sit down until it passes. No, that's all an illusion. We really don't feel the earth move . . . I think. But sometimes, I'm pretty sure, Do you ever have those days or moments where you just keep bumping into things or you do weird, physical actions that  you've never done before like shutting the door to David's car and not realizing until you try to take your camera out of its pouch to take a few traveling picks that the lanyard you keep your keys on, that you usually wear around your neck, but today for some godless reason you put around the handle on your camera bag, that the whole lanyard didn't make it into the car and your KEYS are dangling outside the car as you drive at 70+ miles an hour to Oklahoma City?
Me: Fuck! My keys are outside the fucking car!
David: What?
Me: My fucking keys are swinging in the breeze, I closed the door without realizing that the strap I carry them on . . . oh, hell! Just read the description above, David!
David: You want me to stop?
Me: No. We'll be at the hospital soon, right?
David: Yeah.
Me: Naw, don't stop. If they're gone, they're already gone!

Wednesday, March 30, 2016

Politics. The murderer of my peace of mind. No. Not really. Just my excuse for NOT allowing myself to be peaceful, to not fight, to relax and let the world churn in its own gravity. I want to explore without thought this existence. With out labeling it I want to smell and taste and touch and hear and imagine this consciousness adrift in a sea of consciousness. There are so many other entities wondering in this ocean of air. So many shapes, sizes, colors. Every now and then one of those ocean creatures sparks your interest. Its gravity drags your attention towards it. And you watch as it moves to the register, smiles at you hands the coffee you order. And you pay it and smile and it reacts with a smile that turns into a blazing galaxy of light.

But politics. I need to stop thinking about it. I need to allow the universe to unfold all by itself. I keep thinking that my gravity can change the momentum, the trajectory of the other things who are just like me. I think that my thoughts can somehow lasso their beliefs, change them, brand them with my symbols of right and wrong. But it never happens. I can't change existence.

11 p.m.
All day the weather stations has been warning us: a powerful thunder storm traveling through Oklahoma. And parts of OK have been hit. Rain, lightning, and a few tornados all around us. But not IN Norman-town, at least nothing bad . . . yet. Too far south, I'm guessing. JUST heard a rumble! No, a train passing by! Ha. I'm fearful of a stormy night. And yet, I long for the storms to come. An interesting dichotomy within the soul, to fear something an event and at the same time long for it. All of my existence has been filled with horror and delight to a point that it's difficult to tell sometimes which is which.

Thursday, March 31, 2o16

My eyelids whimper a bit, well,  as much as eyelids can whimper. The fingers on my left hand scratch gently at my forehead. Body warped into a question mark, the legs shaky. Each "last day of the month" is a small funeral for my physical being. It's like my body's aware that the end of the month signifies one more step towards that eternal darkness. Maybe my eyes don't recognize Big Daddy D marching slowly in front of them, but my nose can still (even in old age) sense him  smell him . . . just up the road, just around the bend he walks, and too soon my feet (and the rest of me) will catch up to him.

The Daily {W}Rite March 2o16 WK o3

My battery running low. Just enough energy to open my eyes. Just enough desire to move out of bed and stagger to the kitchen. Coffee on. All I need to do is press the "brew" button. Done. Bouncing off the hallway walls to the bathroom . . . done. Life in mud. Thick cold mud. This body shivers a bit, its bones would cry if they had voice enough to do so. It's ending. You feel it ending. The climax of this play came and went a long time ago. Nothing left but resolution.  Just a tying up of the loose ends. No extra bow, no encore before the audience disappears and the stagehand drags out the ghost light and shuts the doors. Darker than night the closing of a show.

Random thoughts:

Machina
The Robots had taken over.
One by one the humans gave in. Those who did as they were told were sold into slavery. Yes, even the Robot Kings needed someone to change their oil pans once a month, dust off their internal workings (easy enough to do, human hands being quite tiny). Besides, humans were cute, particularly the smaller ones, the ones they called "babies." And if any of the walking "water bags" got of line, easy enough to dispose of them. The robot authority had no qualms about offing any Flesher who defied the will of their metal superiors.

Death Light Saving Time

Hmm. The news just reported that when Daylight Saving Time kicks in on Sunday "old" people's chances of having a heart attack increases by 23%! Damn you, DST! Damn you to HELL!

Dog Freedom
We make mistakes. Hopefully we learn from them. Sometimes we keep repeating ourselves, the same response to an action. Others find fault in our limited ability to ever "get it right, damn you," but have even less respect for us when we do change. Ignore them. That flip-flop congregation: "Thou shalt not change. And even if you do, we will treat you like dog." I'm tired of being the dog. Scratching at a gang of flees who I can never, ever please. I break the leash you strapped on me. I run free, free through this wilted word. You will never catch me again.

Sleep Herder
A sheep herder's sun, its hooves pounding out dusty clouds of desert sand as it rounds up the strays that gather haphazardly along the dreaming river, red with sleep. My mind won't comply tonight (or is it already morning? What does that matter.) running free upon the muddy banks running wild through the brush, the grass where the sparrows roam and the crows stampede whenever they are startled. You cannot tame my mind, break my mind.

Restless

Oh, I hate the rowdy memories that always start rattling around inside my head right before I've decided to go to bed. Too much life cluttering my thoughts. It's a wonder that I can recall anything at all that didn't happen in the distant past. My bicycle pump, my wallet and sunglasses! I lose them all the time in the apartment because my elderly mind is too busy remembering that lovely day in 1984 when we got caught-up in a hellish Oklahoma spring rain two miles away from home. We didn't run, we didn't bother to cover our heads with our hands, we just strolled along laughing and dancing just like Gene Kelly in that movie you always loved. Funny. I can see all that with great detail as if it happened yesterday. . . and still I can't remember where I put my damn house key!

Wednesday, March 16, 2o16

Trapped in the house, in the apartment for three days. Afraid to look out the window, afraid that if I pull the blinds up, the world will have disappeared, vanished as so many friends have in the past when I didn't pay proper attention to them. Hell, Rapture could have happened and I'd never have known it. Afraid to raise the blinds and stare oblivion in its black, cold face. I don't know why. I lived in a void of my own making for the last three days! Why is this nonexistence that I created for myself less disturbing than the one I imagined just outside my door. My door. Too many doors in my life. Too many keys to carry, too many steps down the stairs to the white, freshly painted portal that leads out into . . . what? Time has caught up with me. Time forces me to think in ways that defy the natural order of things, of life. Time is a demon that sits on your shoulder from the day you are born. Time is a circling vulture waiting for its moment to strike.

Thursday, March 17, 2o16 4:00 a.m.

I've accepted this late hour in same way that I have accepted that of the matter. Yes, matter doesn't matter anymore or less than it did before I decided to not sleep. As young man I feared sleeping. Not so much did I fear the idea of going to sleep and never waking up. My youth could not conceive such a thing. Death, dying was something old people did when they grew to tired to wake anymore. No, that wasn't my reason for hating sleep. I was just afraid that I might miss something. A party. A chance to see, to experience something . . . grand and glorious. Life was such a wonder when I was a younger man. I know what your thinking. Be positive. Life is what you make it. There still wonders to be experienced. I'm sure you're right, you are always right. Maybe that's why I can't sleep. Sometimes I feel that punk kid inside me desiring to recreate itself, take charge burn the fucking candle . . . no the cigarette at both ends! Hell of a way to try and smoke. Smoking! I miss smoking. Yes, I've gotten use to the nicotine gum, I grown accustom to the lack of stink my fingers produced when I changed smoked my way through time. BUT I still miss it. I miss holding a cigarette between my fingers, letting the grand ghostlike smoke drift up into my nose . . . inhaling, exhaling . . . yes, I miss it. The whole ritual. The friendliness of tar and nicotine.

And I do miss love. Or at least, what I thought was love. Yes, a very bad bringing up from parents who never cared much for each other. That's probably not fair. They loved each other . . . once. Drinkers they were. Met in a bar somewhere in Long Beach, CA during WWII or just after it. There was a portrait of my mom and dad taken when they were very young. Mom's red hair was blinding, dad in his sailor suit. The portrait had been touched up a bit, the colors added after the picture was taken in some studio, close to my father's base. But they were beautiful. Children of the '40s. the "Greatest Generation." I shouldn't be too hard on them. They lived their lives the best they could. Besides, that my life sucks or doesn't suck is due only to my actions my way of thinking. It has nothing to do with my parents.

Friday, March 18, 2o16

There's a beautiful eeriness that Bowie's last album, Dark Star, hits me with. A Fist of Sound made even more powerful with the knowledge that it was Bowie's last album and that it was released on the day of his death. Bowie, quite the showman to the end.

I've come to a cosmic conclusion about my existence. You've heard it before from someone, somewhere: "I am what I eat." I know, don't get all over me about it, it is a cliché. But saying it and realizing that, for me, it's totally true, well, that's two different things, isn't. Just recently I found out that I feel better, have more energy, am clearer in my though process IF I eat "light." No burgers and fries, no fried chicken, no ice cream, no heavy, heavy food intake. A salad (light on dressing) makes me feel better. Apples, pears and other fruits are just good for me, AND veggies, lots of veggies. A little yogurt is okay, but like potato chips . . . I have a hard time just eating a little.  Popcorn is actually okay as long as I don't use butter OR oil with it. A little salt is also okay. So, the thing is can I make this adjustment to "healthier" living through "healthier" eating? We'll see.

Saturday, March 19, 2o16

A cool breeze almost knocks my Porkpie hat off my head. I shouldn't wear it. It's a little small for my head these days. My Bowler has suffered the same fate. Sad, they are really good hats, I paid a lot of money for them. I'm hoping that my wearing them will stretch them out a bit. I'm pretty sure that they have tightened up a bit since I bought them, and It's not that my HEAD got bigger. I need to find a hat stretcher. But if it is my head that got bigger, maybe a headshrinker. {laugh}

Anyway, a good day. Finally got David out of his cave and we drove around a bit. Every time the girls at Old School Bagel see David come through the door they head off to get his "special order coffee." They don't ask him. I feel jealous. They always wait for me to tell them what I want even though I always have the same thing, toasted bagel, pimento cream cheese, toasted and a large cup of coffee.

Like I said, a cool breeze today. I wore a long sleeve shirt and a hoodie. The sun not too bright. We ramble along Main St. stopping at Sprouts to get David some muffins. After that we head to the Speeding Bullet Comic Bookstore. There's a local artist there hawking his computer created comics, $5.00 a pop. I buy four. "Do you want the author to autograph them?"
the teenage cashier asks. I look back at the author and he smiles a giant comic book smile and, yeah, I want him to sign them.

Monday, March 21, 2o16
Last day of the third week in March, and I haven't written much that's worth much of anything. Sadly, the imagination is taking a ghostly holiday. The Muse too has gone abroad to find another writer to bless. Damn them! To hell with them! I still have fingers, I still have consciousness, I can write without the gaudiness of an imagination, or the sexual foreplay of an artistic Muse. I can write, damn it!

Had the weirdest dream last night! Yes, I had a dream! Well, one that I remember, at least. I was at this mansion somewhere talking to a kid (18-20) that (I'm guessing) lived there. And I'm trying to talk him down . . . about what? I don't know . . . well okay, me in the dream knows but "I" the dreamer hasn't a clue. Anyway I'm saying something like, "Look, if you're having problems, you can always talk to me . . ." He slams the door in my face, I start to walk away and then the door opens and the kid I was talking to has a handgun and he starts shooting me and I'm yelling, "DON'T!" and waving my arms in front of me trying to swat the bullets away before they hit me and at the same time I'm kicking at the gunman and . . .!  I wake up, my arms and legs flailing about! I think I actually said, "DON'T!" out loud.  Scary? For a moment, maybe. But I started to laugh uncontrollably! I haven't had as vivid a dream as that in a very long time.

So, his the end of my blog for this week. I'll try to be better at this next week. You know how it is. You write and write and write some more, and like that monkey at a typewriter, sooner or later you'll write "Hamlet." [smiles}

The daily {W}Rite March 2o16 WK o1

Thursday,
There's a glitch in the Matrix. I felt its sting yesterday. A sort of snapping sound like a winter branch breaking. A crunchy, unpleasant sound. I don't know who he is, this thing that lives inside me, dwells in some dark, quite place inside me. A secret me that now and then raises his voice, demands to be heard. And man, does its voice carry an impact. So loud, so strident it is that everybody can hear. Every person around me can hear him speaking in my voice, and of course, everybody believes that this foreign voice is me. Why shouldn't they? His toxic sounds are vomiting from my mouth, using my words in such a way all my friends think he's me. And though I'd like to tell them different, "No, no, that's not ME talking like an insane idiot, that's HIM, not ME," they know as I know  . . . WE two are the same person, the same alien, the same stranger that has always haunted this flesh. This flesh. This breathy life, this sand wet with age.

Saturday, March o5, 2o16

The trees are beginning to bloom . . . do trees bloom? I don't know. How can I write about  anything if I don't know about trees, or ducks or man or life? Anyway, the trees just outside my front room's window have begun to sprout leaves and flowers. Not all of them, of course, some of them are stubborn. Well, they are forced to change at least four times a year, and just when they get use to the winter or the fall or spring or summer they are forced to change again! So, it's not unreasonable to expect of few of the older trees to be grumpy about  change . . . "just when I got comfortable in this winter sleep, that asshole sun wakes me up."

The suns pleasantly warm today. Soothing to the skin which is glad to be outside the confines of a sweater or my dirty Levi jacket. They can breath again. That don't care that before too long the sun's brightness will force them to take shelter under a thick "coat" of white sunblock! Not much better or more comfortable than my Aran sweater I received as a present this last Christmas. Aran sweaters are another good reason to love the Irish!

I don't want to talk American politics too much on this blog. However, I am infected with it this year. Yes, politics is a disease, ESPECIALLY this season. I'm not a Republican. I'm maybe more aligned with the Democrats, but I'm not really one of them either. I don't like those kind of labels. If I need one, I would rather be called an American citizen who truly believes in the Constitution of the United States. Yes, I know, everybody says they believe in the Constitution. Not many do, though. Oh, sure. They believe in their personal rights granted to them by the COTUS. They believe in the Bill of Rights for themselves and the people who are just like they are, who think like them, talk like them, have the same religious beliefs as them. But the other guy? The American citizen that doesn't have any common bond with them? They don't count. The Constitution isn't for those people, it is only for "us." That's why I'm voting for Hillary. She is the one candidate that said, "The only way this country will work is if we All come together and make it work."

Tuesday, March o8, 2o16

I'm late writing the last post for this week. I know. I said I'd get this stuff out on time. I'm a failure. Hee! I am bummed out because I'm talking politics (mostly on Facebook) with friends who I can't at all agree with. It's not so much that they support this person or that person as much as it is their reasoning to support this person or that person. Their reasoning is usually off. They believe what they want to believe without taking anytime to figure out if their reasoning is right-on or all screwy. Why is that? Because their reason for supporting a certain person is just an excuse because they are going to support the person no matter what. NO MATTER WHAT! One friend of mine posted, "I am neither young, unemployed or Muslim. I have also kept the same job for nearly 18 years. . .and I am a Bernie supporter. I am neither young, unemployed or Muslim. I have also kept the same job for nearly 18 years. . .and I am a Bernie supporter. Your memes mean nothing to me." I have no idea what that means or why a person would say this kind of . . . hell, I have no idea what this phrase is. And by the way, the phrase, "Your memes mean nothing to me" is a bastardization of  a line from  the movie Manhunter. But most people don't vote for a person because this person or that person  really IS good for the country, they vote for them 'cause some how it makes them feel . . .cool. Yeah, cool. You see, picking a POTUS these days isn't based on "what the person can do for the country, but what can that person do for me." But I'm tired of talking politics to my friends and to myself and to you.  It's giving me a headache. I'll see you next week. If there IS a next week. {smiles}