The Daily {W}rite December 2019 wk. o4

Christmas Eve! Sorry I haven't written in a while but the cancer  . . . you know . . . in and out. Feeing really good at times . . . barely hanging at other moments. But that's not what I want to talk about. Well, not at all sure I want to talk about anything . . . and that's exactly why I need to. {smiles}

1.  Often enough is often enough for me. Now and then is . . . now I'm waiting for then to find the right combination to unlock my subconsciousness and allow all the memory pixies to fly about in a flustered rampage . . . there always need to me the center of my existence . . . Bastards.
2.  I shouldn't say this but I am naked, very naked while writing down these thoughts. Stop reading if you wish. I understand how unnerving to know you're reading the thoughts of a very naked man . . . no, not just my shirt off . . . You're probably wondering . . . is he ALWAYS naked, very naked when writing on his blog.?! No, honestly, this is the very first time that I have sat at the computer and blogged naked . . . really naked.
3.  Pulled a shopping cart out of the rolls of shopping carts at Target. Though it wasn't a BIG pull, a tough pull it winded me a bit so I stopped and leaned against the cart  . . . "Excuse me!" some lady shouted on my right. I was keeping her away  from getting a cart . . . even though there were three other rows of shopping carts she just had to have one from the row I was standing in front of! I wanted to say, "I got cancer, lady, give me a break!" But instead I just moved the cart a few feet and went back to letting it take my weight as I tried to catch my breath.
4. Got 5 out of the 6 Christmas presents I wanted to get. David hates Christmas shopping. A bad experience he had when he was a kid. He bought a Christmas present for someone and he/she hated it! Now he just gives money.

Wednesday, Christmas Day, December 25, 2o19
Well, Christmas day . . . still at home. Suppose to go to David's daughter's house for turkey and such. But David is having a bit of a hard time getting up. I hope we make it. I wrote a Christmas poem this morning:

Christmas Day (2019)

Christmas day sits on the windowsill,

tapping lightly on the window glass.

Should I let it in? I bought presents

this year for friends and for family.

Not much I suppose but as I've always

heard them say, "it's the thought that counts."

"They" always say a lot and we always believe

them because they are the people we trust:

mothers in their kitchens cooking dinner, pop

plopped down on the couch almost asleep

watching the demolition derby cars trash

each other on Channel Five. And the giant

Christmas tree in the corner a ton of

Christmas presents stuffed under its low

hanging branches. Yes, the Christmas tree

with its pinecone and fir tree needle odour

attacking the living room with earthy smells

of goodwill and joy and love for all mankind.

Yes, the tree spoke louder than anyone, and

we kids listened and understood every, single

word that rose from the angel that topped

the beautiful tree . . . that would, unfortunately,

be dead in less than two weeks. 

Merry Christmas!

Woodie 12-25-19

Thursday, December 26, 2o19

Went to see Cats today . . . begrudgingly. David wanted to see it even though the word of mouth on Cats  . . . it was a dog of a movie. But we went knowing that we could walk out of it (as we did with La-La Land after 10 minutes of the first number) and sneak into one of the other movies playing. 

But we didn't leave. the movie was beautiful to look at and . . . Jennifer Hudson singing Memory at the end of the movie? Brought me to tears. Really. It was just moving. And me being a bit sick . . . a lot sick, I guess I should say. I'm feeling a bit emotional about everything. But that aside, Hudson's singing was just so stirring.

1.  Black and White. White and Black. Night and Day. Do my eyes open wider when the sun opens them? Darkness sometimes says means things to me as I wander across it's starry face without direction or concern for anything that day may conjure up to surprise me.  

2.  My hands shake a bit as I type. They're not cold . . . I believe they're not. The rest of me feel just warm enough to smile. Hands are strange creatures. They can write poetry, create art, scratch your ass, pick your nose. I do not know if they have too much pride or too little. 

11:07pm 

Sometimes I see myself. In a mirror, a reflection in a storefront window, in the eyes of the cute, black haired girl at Starbucks who always seems so pleased to take my order and finds it some what cute  when I tell her my name is woodie  . . . spelled with an "ie" at the end. Maybe I'm fooling myself when I say her smile means she thinks I'm cute . . . for an old man.

I wrote a poem once about how it is that we individually go through life and never really know what we look like. I mean, yeah, we can see images of our individual selves like I said above but we really can't see ourselves as others see us. Even a picture isn't the individual . . . it's a two dimensional image of the person. Not him, or her, or they.

Saturday, December 28, 2o19

 A New Year on Its Way

A new Year creeping up on all of us.

I can hear this passing year whimper

as it heads for the memory graveyard

dragging its months behind itself as if,

as if the months belonged to it and not

to the years to come.

We sleep and dream and pray

this New Year will bring more hope

than hopelessness, less pain than,

than the boney legs of 2019 suffers

through. We beg that the memory

of years gone-by will melt away,

forgotten in the joy of this New Year

this new life rising from the pit that

the past left us in without a teaspoon

to dig our way out.

Be a kinder New Year, be powerful

but just and honest and loving.

Be better than the shadows of the past

that still hovers above us.

Woodie 12-27-19

1.  Watched "my team" have its helmet slammed into the dirt against one of the best college teams I've ever seen. OU 28 - LSU 63. Yep, LSU spanked them good and sent them home to mama.
2.  I hate pretentiousness in people . . . when it's aimed at me. Academic bull-shitters who just love to make you look stupid so they can feel superior. I've listened to them my whole life. What little I have left, I am not wasting any more time on assholes.
3.  I've been dreaming a bit, and remembering what I dreamt when I'd wake up. Not as vividly as I used to, but I remember . . . like an abstract painting, like absurdist dialogue . . . bits and pieces. Maybe a fragment of an image or the sound of laughter. Interesting to try and piece it all together with my conscious mind.

Sunday, December 29, 2o19

I've spoke of this before, pretentiousness. Bullying if that makes it clearer. I've been bullied my whole life by people stronger than me. Stronger physically but also those who think they are smarter than me. That's the pretentiousness I'm focused on. People who try to make themselves look smarter (than they are?) by putting other peoples' IQ in question. Like I said, I've been the victim of both mental and physical bullying. And it stops today . . . well, a few months ago when I unfriended so "friends" online who just feel they have a right to bully me, troll me. Well, they don't anymore.

1.  Fighting fire with fire burns the whole world down.
2.  Racism is a myth, a lie. Don't be a racist. Don't fight racism with racism. That makes you no better than the thing you hate.
3.  Strength and courage comes from years of finding out what the fuck all that means.
4.  I'm too tired to write a poem today.
     My brain has put out a sign, CLOSED.
     My fingers are no help either. They just
     twiddle themselves while my eyes stare
     at the wall seeing nothing but white paint
     and gray cobwebs left by some transient
     spider. Like dogs or lions they mark their
     territory with urine and scratch marks.
5.  And just like that; I do what I couldn't do.
 8:44 pm
6.  I don't like the term, "think outside the box." I prefer to think that there is no box. AND if I thought that there was no box, I would never have thought to say, "think outside the box." I'm using words, the words I've known forever and I'm using them, I think, in a way that anyone can understand what I'm saying . . . and yet . . . they don't seem to get it, they don't get me. So frustrated with being misunderstood that I even stooped to using on them, those who don't get me, the phrase: THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX! 

We were gentler once
like an early spring rain . . . once.
But as we aged we did not age
gracefully, our wine not sweet
more the taste of vinegar. 

When I get in this somber mood,

there's always a friend saying,
"Cheer up! You are only as old 

as you feel!" in that case
I must be a thousand years old. 

Tuesday, December 31, New Year's Eve 2o19

Pretty much slept all day again today. Am going out at ten to do a little New Year's Eve celebration. But not much. Lazy today, too. This lethargic feeling through my body is truly getting stronger  . . . Oh, well. Anyway, no new, New Year Resolution. Maybe try even more to keep myself from getting mad at people that really piss me off! {smiles} Happy New Year!

The Daily {W}rite December 2019 wk. o3

I'm waiting for the end of Watchmen to begin on HBO. So, I thought I'd get the third week of December started on the blog:

My eyes. Old enough.
Stone they've become.
My face. Dried up.
A creek no longer
running wet with rain.
This is me these days.
A remembrance, 
a whisper on the air.
.Nothing more than
nothing . . . these days.

Tuesday, December 17, 2o19

So, I'm up and about after a transfusion yesterday. Yesterday. We spend a lot of our consciousness reliving yesterday . . . I say reliving not remembering. I refuse these days to remember yesterday. . . I stand with legs apart daring yesterday to make a move toward my present self. Go ahead. Try something.

1o:o7am
The singer I thought would win on The Voice . . . came in third. The guy I thought would lose . . . won the whole show. I'm not a good judge of talent . . . or character.

This is where the dreaming starts. A head full of caffeine, a memory or two poking at a headache that's simmering inside my brain housing group. My eyes will have no part in this blog I'm typing out . . . so, my fingers perform a perfect brail counterfeit move and finishes this entry blindfolded.

Wednesday, December 18, 2o19

Spent all day working on a major, super secret project. It didn't take as long as I thought it would but I did work on it for 2 1/2 hours. Turned out pretty good too.

Feeling good. Wonder how I can buy Christmas presents for everybody with all the bills I got to pay. Well, it will figure itself out. I have a bout 6 presents to buy.

Tomorrow we (me and David) will go out for a while. Maybe I can talk him into doing a little Christmas shopping . . . he doesn't like Christmas shopping. He buys a lot of presents for people, but  a Christmas present? Too much of an obligation. I mean, what if he buys the "wrong present" or something?

Friday, December 2o,2o19

Yes, today is my best friend, David Slemmons' birthday! This is the collage of pictures I've taken of David from 2o12 to the present, 2o19, and that's not half of the pictures I've taken of David. Yes, David is my best friend. Sound strange? He really puts up with a lot from me. No, seriously, I am an angry old asshole who is mean to everybody. But somehow, someway David has remained my friend even when anyone else would have just walked or ran away. And he's been here for me during this cancer scare. He drives to the hospital everyday (sometimes five days a week, and more than once a day.) for the chemotherapy, the transfusions . . . he's the best. I don't deserve a friend as good as David. But I'm glad he's here. Happy B-day, David!

Saturday, 21, 2o19

1.  I leave the TV on all night so I might sleep and not have to listen to the ghostly whispers of the many mice I've killed in the bathroom.
2.  8:42 and nothing to do except breathe and dream of falling asleep and . . . dreaming some more.
3.  Words have become atom bombs, and we throw them at each other with such childlike laughter,     laughter loud enough to cover up the tortured screams of our cruelty.
4.  My shadow has nothing to do when I sit in front of the computer all night long . . . so, it takes itself for a walk leaving me alone. I hope he wore his winter coat. It's cold outside.
5.  I have forgotten how often I have loved. I can't recall one time when I actually said and meant it, "I love you." Perhaps, I've never felt love at all. Maybe I'm fooling myself . . . making myself appear more human to myself than I really am. It's difficult to be honest with yourself when you don't know the truth.
6.  Some friends of David's (well, I guess the are my friends too) surrounded me last nigh in Othello's to tell me how sorry they were about me being "sick," and that they both (husband and wife) had battled cancer and . . . if there is anything, ANYTHING I need do call them. At first, I felt a bit embarrassed at them closing in on me tight like they did with their bodies . . . then when I realized how sincere they were being . . . I about cried.
7.  Christmas is bearing down on me, the Christmas commercials almost up to my chin, and my cancer bills? You know in the first Harry Potter movie when the owls are drowning the Dursley's house with letters from Hogwarts?

So that's this weeks blogs, the third week in December. The new year is almost upon us. I promised myself a to top ten movie review lists. Hmm. Hope I can do it.  {Smiles)

The Daily {W}rite December 2019 wk o2

You know, don't you. That feeling you get, that strange chill through your entire body . . . Not caused by a draft drifting through the cracks of the sash, the rails of the west window next to your computer. It's the explicable unearthly chill  that rattles you, brings you into an awareness, a fearful knowledge  . . . something is wrong. Some thing is here with me in this the last stroke of midnight. Some alien thing  . . . inside me.

7:30pm
Long day at the oncology lab starting at 9am with the last appointment beginning at 2pm. Looks like they're setting me up for another round of chemo shots. Oh, well. A little discomfort with the chemo, ugly rash too but nothing I can't handle.

Monday, December o9, 2o19

Well, the day at oncology really turned out to be light. Just a blood test and then . . . the evil chemo double shots . . . two RNs on either side of my belly and a count . . . 1-2-3  . . . and they stuck their needles into my sides at the same time and slowly press the plunger down . . . It doesn't hurt as much as it just annoying! Like two bees stinging you at the same time . . . but at a snails pace.

11:42pm
So, the chemo shots are getting a bit annoying tonight. Starting to redden, my flesh is heating up in the areas where they gave me the shots. But have felt worse. So, far it looks like the "treatments" are helping me.

Tuesday, December 1o, 2o19
Up and about already even though my appointment isn't until 2pm.

There are too many voices inside my head since . . . well,

for as far back as I can recall. Multiple voices, screaming, singing, whispering into the inside of my ears. Political voices, the cowards of democracy, capitalism  . . . they are the hardest voices to silence. But music helps deaden their hatred their lies. I must listen to more music and lessen the hold those voices inside my head have on me, on my dreams.

10:30pm
I'm feeling a little sleepy. After a shower. Hm. Maybe that's the cure for my insomnia. A nice, warm shower. Anyway, not much I wish to write about tonight. I'll try tomorrow.

Wednesday, December 11, 2o19

Living within the moment in which you are within . . . a difficult task. We really don't know how long an actual moment is. According to Wikipedia: Although the length of a moment in modern seconds was therefore not fixed, on average a moment corresponded to 90 seconds. Hm. I tend to think of a "moment" as an actor might think about it: a moment is a unit of action, the amount  of time it takes to finish an action. So, in acting, at any given moment, you have an objective . . . something that you are trying to accomplish. Simple example: suppose your objective is just to enter a room. the "moment" is the time it takes you to enter the room. Once you enter the room that's the end of that objective and a new objective emerges: you want to sit down in a chair. Again, the moment is the time it takes to sit in the chair. Sometimes finding the end of a unit of action isn't as straight forward as the examples above. But the basic equation for the ending of an objective/action: When the objective has been won or lost or when the objective is put on hold. So, a moment in real life can be defined in the say way as we define a unit of action in a play.

12:53pm
My song lacks a melody. Well, not so much that a melody for my song does not exist. It's more like the melody that there is to my song is sharp, sometimes flat, sometimes the rhythm's off, the time way out of time with the music accompanying it. My song to most human ears is not a song at all . . . only noise created for the sole purpose of torturing the ears of the listener.

Friday, December 13, 2o19

Man. Last night and today . . . a very bad turn for me. I won't go into it much here. But do you remember me talking about how the chemo shots were annoying but not all that painful. Yeah, A bit of a rash that itched. That was about all. But last night after the chemo session? Man, my abs felt like someone used them for a heavy punching bag. Hurt so much I could hardly sleep. And to day . . . ? I could barely get out of a chair and walk even with the use of my cane. I cried because it hurt so bad and because . . . I just did, that's all. I cried.

Saturday, December 14, 2o19
My best friend, David Slemmons, is really a best friend. We went out today for coffee as usual . . . but I was still feeling a bit under the cancer weather today. But we talked, we laughed a bit and then went home. This guy does a lot for me. Yeah, a damn good friend. P.S. wish I could spell better.

Have been slipping in a few poems here and there on Facebook . . . mostly one a night. mostly. Let me see if I can come up with one more the blog:

He dreams of streams and raging rivers
and he never knows which he prefers.
He listens for the sound of ice breaking
and wonders if the world is dying.
He doesn't know what grown up means.
But he's sure he'd rather not be grown up.
Better to be young and naïve forever.
Forever walking through the woods.

So, this is all for this week. Thank you for reading.  {smiles}

The Daily {W}rite December 2019 wk o1

The 1st day of December. Today. In a month we will be into a new year. 2020. If I can carry-on existing in this storyline, I will be 72 years old in May. 72. Hmm. doesn't carry as much metaphorical weight as 70 years old or even 71. Not sure why. Just another year . . . hopefully not like all the rest . . . it would be exciting to start off the new year as a new life, a new moment, seeing with eyes and heart and mind for the first time. Life is often dull, boring. Why do you think so many people wish to die? It's because we create a worn-out path for ourselves from the beginning of life . . . to the end of it. Sometimes that path is so worn,  so deeply carved into or life's mind that we can't see above the rim. Not a good way to live, I'm sure. Seeing those walls of dirt that confine our souls . . . like . . . like a greedy grandma who wants you to sit on her lap and give her cheek kisses for all eternity.

Tuesday, December o3, 19

Had a long day yesterday. The blood transfusion to replenish my blood after the chemo is lasting about four days. And since the transfusion is administered on Monday, the effects of the transfusion begins to diminish around Friday. And that's the rub. Monday mornings before the scheduled transfusion is particularly hard. This last one . . . I just couldn't walk even from the car to the doors of Target. It was really difficult to do anything except sit in the car as David went shopping for a plastic chair for his apartment . . . couldn't find one because plastic chairs like he wanted are considered patio furniture, and patio furniture are considered seasonal, and since it was December . . . no patio furniture available.

The art/poem on the right is another found poem written in 2o13 and rewritten today. It says a lot to me, I guess, right now, I think. As fragile as my body is, my thought process these days tends to stumble about looking for a idea worthy of its time.

You wake up one day. You realize that you aren't you so much as you are everybody you ever knew. You take on the beliefs of the mother and father, of their friends. You become an illustration of them . . . not yourself. But you think you are you and not them, you go through most of your life being what "they" created. But one day, maybe someday you reach a point where you realize that you are not yourself but the creature created by your Frankensteinian parents. And you start the rehab, the change of self  to something that are not your parents. But what do you become? YOU?! Or do you  just become another creature without a soul created in the image of your friends, the preachers, the TV set? Can you ever be you, or are you now and forever lost . . . to be or not to be . . . someone else's delusion  . . . never free enough to create your own monster.

Wednesday, December o4, 2o19

The Adventures of Chemo-Man!

Out and about a bit today. 68 degree weather. Warm with a cool breeze drifting through the open car door window . . . Coffee first and then to the mall for a 2 mi. walk. Me in the surgical mask, my cane, walking like a beat up drunk. Taking my time. Hoping to stretch out the transfusion so I don't wind-up like last Monday . . . all most dead on my feet.

Anyway, the walk was nice. Took it slow and just enjoyed breathing hard to make seem like I am getting healthier.

The kid playground in the middle of
The Sooner Fashion Mall was empty and David took a picture of me on the stairs of the mushroom slide.

Saw an extremely colorful hoodie at Hot Topics . . . really cool but costing over $50.00. No thanks. Just received some more hospital bills totally around $600.00 plus. A bunch last week too . . . and the week before. So, we'll see how long my money lasts.

Thursday, December o5, 2o19

Storage

Where do dreams go when we wake?

Is there some kind of dream drawer

that my subconscious stores them in?

A surrealist closet? I'm sure I have

more than enough dreams to fill

a large dressing-room. Or maybe

dreams are just tossed out,

discarded by a fastidious mind

that wishes not to clutter itself

up with data that I won't

remember when I open my eyes.

Sometimes memory has a way of invading the mind at a time that is most inconvenient. A speech you're giving to a classroom full of students who have no interest in even learning about the beauty of black & white movies. Making love? Yes, that's a time you wish you memory would stay at home  . . . "I'm so sorry! This never happens to me." "Ah, Professor Woods, are you all right?" Asks the kid in the back row who I'm sure was saying something very important while my brain freeze took over my consciousness. Let it go!

Friday, December o6, 2o19
Well, hope I'm not causing a relapse by saying this . . . it's Friday and I feel good. No shortness of breath, pretty perky though I am NOT running around as mush (Ha! I typed mush instead of much. I won't change it.),  I'm walking around . . . cane in hand, steady pace. Usually, the Friday after the transfusion I start going down into the basement. A sort of Jekyll and Hyde thing . . . spry old man turned into a bent over less than energetic old man. Which is the real me? Or am I both?

The alien is back and roaming around in my image, my vestige, pretending to be me. Oh, it's not so much a take over. My mind is in control . . . no alien brainwashing going on. To be honest, I somewhat enjoy the intruder's company. He does tell me things. Points out the character flaws in my, our human condition. We are a terrible species for the most part. Yes, yes, there are those of our kind who have figured it all out . . . or at the least, they try to do the right thing for themselves and for others in out group of beings. Sometimes they get it right, or wrong but they are always trying, learning how to be better Homo . . . Homo . . . whatever we are suppose to be. Because the majority of we Human Things never attempt to be more than just erectus assholus . . . a soul-less creature that only thinking of itself.

Saturday, December o7, 2o19

1.  The last day in the week and I believe I've written quite bit even though I did miss one or two days.
2.  I'm through talking about cancer and dying and  . . . all that lifeless stuff. At least, for today. {smile}
3.  The days are warmer than in past years at this particular time . . . of the year. My sister prefers a  good snow during December  . . . especially important to her is having snow on Christmas day. She seldom gets that white stuff in Oklahoma. Yeah, sometimes we get a little. But nothing like what you would put on a Christmas card.
4.  I prefer dreams that I remember. Mostly? These Days? I can remember a bit, the gist, you know? Like whether or not it was sad, happy, scary! Last night I dreamed of being a football player . . . I think.

5. Thoughts often enough ripple through my brain. A mellow ripple today. Gentle, kind thoughts that flutter a bit . . . at times . . . more like a small sparrow winging through me. No rush of a panicky Tsunami wave crushing all the other tiny thoughts who were just enjoying a summer vacation away from themselves. No, my thoughts this day are nothing but a blush of curiosity.   How well I finally wind-up? My ashes sitting in a jar on my sister's living room mantel . . . if she has a living room mantle. And when she passes also? Where the hell then will we both go?