Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for the ‘Opinion’ Category

Enduring

Posted in Advice, Current Events, Music, Opinion, Quote, tagged , , , , , , , on October 23, 2020| Leave a Comment »

“To those human beings who are of any concern to me I wish suffering, desolation, sickness, ill-treatment, indignities—I wish that they should not remain unfamiliar with profound self-contempt, the torture of self-mistrust, the wretchedness of the vanquished: I have no pity for them, because I wish them the only thing that can prove today whether one is worth anything or not—that one endures.”

― Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will to Power

I paused a little bit before using this quote from Nietzsche this morning. The use of anything from a philosopher whose work, and the book from which this excerpt has been taken, had been appropriated and distorted to justify their own ends , by the Nazis is a little risky, especially in this time of rising authoritarianism here and around the world. For many of us, just the title, The Will to Power, immediately conjures up imagery of invading Nazis goose-stepping through conquered cities in their quest for more and more power.

People naturally assume that that the power to which he is referring is ultimate power, ruling power to be  exercised over others. That is how the Hitler and his ilk interpreted it. But Nietzsche was talking about two separate forms of power which are expressed in German as the words Kraft and Macht. Kraft refers to brute force, both physical and mental, while Macht refers to true power. Kraft is the animal force, that primal element that is possessed in all of us. Macht, on the other hand, is the power to control one’s own kraft and use it in positive ways.

Macht is the overcoming and controlling of the kraft within us.

And that’s where we are now. We have two elements within this nation, one who see the power of this nation as pure animal power, and another who recognizes our power– our kraft— but understands that it cannot solely guide our actions and future. It is unsustainable. History shows that clearly. 

So, the question is how do we emerge from this? Do we have the fortitude to endure this tug of war between these two concepts?

Though I have my doubts on some days, in the long run I think we do have the ability to endure, actually.

And as Nietzsche expresses above, perhaps this struggle is just what we need to really move forward. Maybe we need some real hardship and suffering to understand the responsibility of our power. Maybe we need it to finally recognize that we must at some point sacrifice something of ourselves to a greater good, that our bounty does not come without a price.

Many of us have never had real hardship. I am not talking about normal loss and suffering that comes with being a human being. I am talking about widespread hurt that runs through the nation and touches most every citizen. Most of us have never had to sacrifice much for anyone.

Maybe we need the hurt and the humbling. While nobody wants to willingly take on great suffering, there are lessons to be learned from it. Perhaps that one can overcome and endure great hardship is the greatest of these. That and allowing more of us to develop a greater sense of empathy with those who continue to suffer around us.

Maybe we need to simply learn that we can endure.

Maybe then we can cross the divide between us and work together for some greater good.

Let’s hope, okay? 

Hey, here’s some old Canned Heat from about 50 years back with a fitting message for any time. It’s Let’s Work Together. Now, have a good day.

Read Full Post »

Grateful In the Plague

Posted in Current Events, Favorite Things, Music, Opinion, tagged , , , on October 17, 2020| 2 Comments »

“The Quarantine House” – Now at the Principle Gallery

“But I must go back here to the particular incidents which occur to my thoughts of the time of the visitation, and particularly to the time of their shutting up the houses in the first part of their sickness; for before the sickness was come to its height people had more room to make their observations than they had afterward; but when it was in the extremity there was no such thing as communication with one another, as before.”

― Daniel Defoe, A Journal of the Plague Year, 1722

I see that we, as a nation, had over 70,000 new cases of covid-19 on Friday. It made me think about how this time has changed so many things in daily lives.

So much isolation, which I know is so difficult for so many of us. Economic pain from job losses and businesses closing. And those that do have jobs continue along with the nagging fear that they are putting themselves at risk every day. 

And that is without even mentioning the actual virus and its effects on the afflicted and their families.

It made me wonder how this compared to other times and other pandemics. I did a little skimming of A Journal of the Plague Year, written in 1722 by the author of the better known Robinson Crusoe, Daniel Defoe. It tells in journal form the story of a man’s life in 1665 in London when the bubonic plague, the Black Death, ferociously struck that city. That particular episode of the Black Death killed over 100,000 Londoners which was abut a quarter of the population at the time. And that was not even close to being the worst case of the Plague. It literally killed hundreds of millions of people throughout Europe and Asia in the centuries when it was at its peak and it still persists in places where conditions allow it to continue. No herd immunity here, folks.

But looking through Defoe’s book and reading sections made me think how horrible it must have been at that time. To be afflicted often meant being boarded in your home. There would be no contact with the outside world. No internet, no cellphones, no Netflix or Instacart or Door Dash deliveries. You would be completely cut off and alone with your painful imminent death as your companion.

It’s a terrifying prospect. I don’t mean to bring you down with this but I just found it interesting. It made me realize how fortunate we are to have the technological connections that we have. I don’t say that easily because I often find myself damning the persistent and invasive nature of the technology even as I use it.

At least now we can get information, as poor and misinformed as it sometimes is. But imagine being ill, sitting in a dark, boarded up home without any idea what might be taking place outside those walls. No news of possible cures or therapies. No idea of whether this would ever end, that relief might come before death. 

I have a hard time imagining the horror of that situation. Nothing in my life, nor in probably most of yours out there, has prepared me for that.

There was another paragraph that sounded familiar:

“But it was impossible to beat anything into the heads of the poor. They went on with the usual impetuosity of their tempers, full of outcries and lamentations when taken, but madly careless of themselves, foolhardy and obstinate, while they were well. Where they could get employment they pushed into any kind of business, the most dangerous and the most liable to infection; and if they were spoken to, their answer would be, ‘I must trust to God for that; if I am taken, then I am provided for, and there is an end of me’, and the like. Or thus, ‘Why, what must I do? I can’t starve. I had as good have the plague as perish for want. I have no work; what could I do? I must do this or beg.”

It made me think again about those folks who have no choice but face the possibility of infection, about those business owners who are at risk at losing everything they have worked much of their lives for. It also reminded me of the foolhardy people who think they are somehow beyond the reach of the virus, that they do not have to concern themselves with the welfare of others. 

I am sure there were those same fools during the Black Death.

I don’t know that there’s a point here except to say that I am grateful for being able to ride this out in this era with our technologies, connections and conveniences rather than any of the pandemics from the past. All things considered, we are fortunate. Maybe not too smart but fortunate.

Perhaps two hundred years in the future some person going through a new pandemic of that time will look back on this in some digital archive and say, “Man, I am so glad I didn’t have to live back then!”

And hopefully, they will also be grateful for their own situation.

Be grateful for what you have and have a good day, folks. To that end, here’s a little William DeVaughn with one of my faves.

 

Read Full Post »

Creeped Out

Posted in Current Events, Opinion, tagged , on October 8, 2020| 2 Comments »

Now this is just my opinion, okay?

I don’t know about any of you out there but I was more than a little creeped out watching the vice-president*** during last night’s debate. 

I don’t think it was dull, studied and almost psychotic drone of his voice. Or the ease with which he gave voice to lies and misinterpretations of popular opinion. Or the doughy pallor of his face that gave him the appearance of a undertaker who seldom leaves his basement workshop. 

I bet he smells like formaldehyde. 

I don’t think is was even that weird pinkness around his eyes, particularly that thing on his left eye.

Or even the fly. Oh, that pesky black fly that found its way to his head and perched prominently there on camera. Like it had finally found the motherlode of all cowpies.

But even that fly couldn’t take more than a couple of minutes of that crap.

No, it was even the fly. I don’t think it’s not any one thing about him that gives me the shivers. Maybe it’s his totality that you see in the coldness of his eyes. It’s there even when they take on a pink tone. 

And maybe coldness is the wrong word. Maybe hollowness would fit better. There is a quality of emptiness about him. And that can be a scary thing because it means that this space is not filled with goodness or grace or mercy. It lacks such things.

It is just a cold and dark hollow space beneath that corpse-like face.

Bone cold and dark.

And I–and again, I point out that this is my opinion– find that creepy as hell.

I used Norman Bates from Psycho to illustrate this post. Maybe I used it because we are in the month of Halloween.

Nah.  It’s there mainly because I see the VP*** as the Norman Bates of VPs. If I were checking into a motel and the VP*** was behind the counter, I would get back in the car and head down the road. But beyond that, there is also a fly connection that seems to fit. Take a look.

Read Full Post »

Hmmm…

Posted in Current Events, Opinion, Quote, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on October 3, 2020| Leave a Comment »

It was all very careless and confused. They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made. . . .

–The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald

I came across the bit above and immediately knew that I was going to use it to illustrate the effect of the current president***, someone who has crashed every aspect of his  life with reckless abandon and carelessness. He always leaves behind a trail of destruction — and now, death– in his wake and like Tom and Daisy Buchanan, lets other people clean up the mess he has made.

This sense of hubris and selfishness was in clear focus yesterday as the covid-19 virus swept through their ranks, finally taking hold in the Oval Office.

He** and those around him have known the risks longer than any of us, even as they tried to downplay the danger of it as over 210,000 Americans died from it in a little over 6 months. They have been told by the highest authorities how to best combat the spread of this virus. They have incredible access to information and resources– medical equipment, testing, doctors and treatments– that would be unavailable to almost all of us. They have the ability to control their environment and reduce risk factors in a way most of us cannot.

Yet, with all of this, they practically thumbed their nose at it all. They refused to wear masks. Refused to stop gathering in groups or maintain any social distancing. Many refuse to quarantine properly. And with the virus running through their ranks, they continued to go out among the voters.

The sheer selfish disregard for others and the willingness with which they put others in peril is astonishing.

As one Secret Service agent who has put their lives on the line in protecting this person** stated, “He’s never cared about us.”

That’s a quote that should remain in the minds of the voters when they go to their polling places or mark their mail-in vote.

“He’s never cared about us.”

Like Tom and Daisy and others like them, he** only sees people as resources to be used for his own benefit and pleasure.

Folks are seen as either as steps to climb up or obstacles to be kicked out of the way.

Kindling to be burnt to keep him warm.

So, as he** remains in Walter Reed getting better care than any of us could ever expect, excuse me if I don’t show a great deal of compassion for his plight. If our situations were reversed, he wouldn’t go out one inch out of his way to express concern.

If I were on fire on the side of the road, he** wouldn’t stop to piss on me to put it out. That is, unless there was something in it for him.

And you know why? 

“He’s never cared about us.”

So, don’t ask me to care about his health now.

Maybe that sounds a little bitter this morning. Well, it probably is. My dad’s death and how our response to it has been tempered by the virus, the sheer folly of the covid outbreak at the white house, the recent surge of covid cases in my local area– these things and so many more have me a little on edge. Plus, the first thing I saw this morning was an announcement of the death of my greatest childhood hero, Bob Gibson, at age 84.

A legendary pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals, Gibby was it for me. He was always the toughest guy out there on any field, a smoldering force whose competitive fire bordered on sheer hostility toward any opponent. With Gibby, it wasn’t that you were trying to best him a game. It was more like you were trying to take something from him. Every inning was an existential exercise. And he most often prevailed. He was so dominating as a pitcher that baseball changed the mound height because they felt the hitters needed help since he was practically unhittable.  I read his early autobiography, From Ghetto to Glory, numerous times and that made him an even bigger hero to me. He was eloquent and college-educated, a rarity for ballplayers of that era, and his story was compelling. He spoke out about issues of the day with intelligence and passion, like two of my other great childhood heroes, Bill Russell and Muhammad Ali.

And as the case with these three, Bob Gibson remains a hero.

Rest in Peace, Gibby. And say Hey! to my dad if you see him around. He’s new there, as well.

Have a good day.

Read Full Post »

The Caring in Despairing

Posted in Opinion, Quote, tagged , , on October 1, 2020| Leave a Comment »

“Never Alone” – At the West End Gallery

“When a man is in despair, it means that he still believes in something.”

― Dmitri Shostakovich

One of the things I worry about as I get older is that there may come a day when I don’t care anymore. That there might come a day when I would lose all interest in those things that once sparked fires within me.

That I won’t be moved by the emotion of the moment.

That I will lose the ability to feel love and joy.

And despair and grief.

How awful it must be to not feel those things?

They represent the high and low moments of our lives, marking our existence here. We experience both poles of emotion simply because they come from our caring for something.

And to not care anymore signifies a loss of believing that we have any sort of purpose here on this planet or that we owe nothing to its future.

It’s like an old person not planting a tree because they won’t be around to one day see it in its maturity. They don’t see that the simple act of planting it is a sign of belief in the future, that their nurturing of the young tree is a symbol that they still care about that future.

It is ultimately an act of caring and kindness.

I think you will find that those folks who plant trees when they are really too old to dig a proper hole have a great love of life, that they care deeply for what happens to the world around them. They laugh loudly and cry heartily. They know joy when the world is right and despair when the world is wrong.

And in their despairing of these wrongs, they seek to make the world right once more.

Because they still care.

I feel despair on many days lately. But I also find myself gladdened by knowing that it is a result of still caring, that I haven’t thrown in the towel and just given into the virtual death that comes with a life lived in not caring.

That beyond despair there remains the hope of joy once more.

 

 

Read Full Post »

The Fraud

Posted in Current Events, Opinion, tagged on September 28, 2020| Leave a Comment »

Whoever commits a fraud is guilty not only of the particular injury to him who he deceives, but of the diminution of that confidence which constitutes not only the ease but the existence of society.

–Samuel Johnson

Come on, you knew he* was a fraud.

A grifter. A con man.

It was always out there for us to see if we took the time to look and weren’t distracted by the gaudy golden letters that screamed out his name being plastered on every surface of his properties. But a lot of us didn’t take the time to look deeper and some were indeed mesmerized by his branding.

I pointed out four years ago that one bit of evidence of his ineptitude as a businessman was to be found in looking at his Atlantic City casinos. His casinos were part of a publicly held corporation from 1985 to 1995. It was the only time he was answerable to shareholders and he failed them in a most spectacular fashion. You have to realize that in that specific time period, almost every company and stock affiliated with gambling and casinos were highly profitable. Yet, his was the exception, somehow managing to go bankrupt after ten years.

In fact, if you had invested $10,000 in his corporation’s stock in 1985 you would found yourself with a nearly worthless pile of paper. It lost 96% of its value in the ten years and your 10G’s were worth a measly $400.

$400.

All that was left after a 10 year investment of $10,000 in a booming industry at that time.

Yet, people continued to call him a great businessman. And it continued even as his every venture went boots up or were implicated in some sort of fraud litigation. His self-named university(!) and his ridiculous steaks or bottled water, for examples. The fraud even extended into his efforts to appear as a charitable benefactor.

His charity was disbanded and he and his family of grifters are prohibited from operating any charitable foundation in NY because of his illegal handling of the funds.

They actually stole money from a children’s charity, for chrissake.

He hasn’t done anything in the four years that changes any of this (and there is so much more that I just don’t feel like documenting here this morning) and the swampy, corrupt deals he continues to make every single day only enhances the truth of what he is– a fraud.

And maybe that is the only time you can use his own brand of narcissistic hyperbole and say that he is the greatest at anything.

He may be the greatest bad businessperson of all time. He certainly has perpetrated a fraud bigly.

And you know something? I don’t hold it against him that he is a shit businessperson. There are plenty of them out there who do little lasting harm.

Hell, I was and might still be a shit businessman.

But I hate that he has parlayed his failures, through shady deals with foreign interests and a deepening and broadening of the swamp that is public corruption, into a position where he has eroded all public confidence in nearly everything that binds us together.

His fraud, even if you can somehow dismiss the criminality of it, has put our entire system of democracy at risk.

It must stop.

But he is shielded by his enablers in the Senate and House, who only serve now to perpetuate the fraud.

The only way is to stop this is to Vote Blue in huge numbers up and down the ballots.

That is the only thing that can end this fraud.

 

Read Full Post »

A Defining Vote

Posted in Current Events, Opinion, Quote, tagged , on September 24, 2020| 3 Comments »

It’s your life — but only if you make it so. The standards by which you live must be your own standards, your own values, your own convictions in regard to what is right and wrong, what is true and false, what is important and what is trivial. When you adopt the standards and the values of someone else or a community or a pressure group, you surrender your own integrity. You become, to the extent of your surrender, less of a human being.

–Eleanor Roosevelt

I read a comment by someone on social media that tried to defend their possible vote for the president*** in the upcoming election by saying that who they voted for did not define them.

In normal times, I might agree with them to a point. I know plenty of folks who voted for Nixon, Reagan, the Bushes along with John McCain and Mitt Romney  and their values were not so different than my own. We shared some beliefs on some things and had different viewpoints on others. But we didn’t live on different planets, didn’t hold beliefs that were against every fiber of our moral selves.

However, these are not normal times, as you may have noticed.

Things are spiraling quickly with a deadly pandemic.

The forests burn, the rivers flood and hurricanes wreak havoc as we experience more and more dire climate crises throughout the land.

The streets are filled with protesters fighting for justice and racial equality. Opposing them is an armed legion devoted to open white supremacy that we are finding extends deeply into law enforcement.

There’s an economy that is staggering from job losses and business closings along with an exploding budget deficit.

Forgotten immigrant children and families are still in detention centers with allegations of sexual abuse and forced sterilizations coming out in recent months.

Our longtime and sworn foes around the world openly interfere in our elections.

I am sure I am missing some awful aspect here but none of it is normal.

And leading us is a man*** who seems almost pledged to making every one of these situations worse. He refuses to take any responsibility for his actions or inactions.

He has no plan for dealing with the pandemic. There was a plan early in the pandemic but it was set aside for political purposes because they believed the virus was only affecting the more populated Blue states. He then refused to take all the actions available to him because he felt that by passing responsibility for action on to the governors, they would be held accountable for a virus he knew was deadly even as he publicly said was not much of a threat.

A man who refuses to criticize our longtime enemies even as they pay bounties, on which he also refuses to comment,  on the heads our troops. The are the same troops he calls “suckers” for serving and “losers” when they are captured or killed. In fact, he fawns over despots and dictators, often subjugating himself and our nation to them. All of this while he spurns and alienates our longtime allies.

A man who openly foments racism and uses it as a pry bar on our population. Who refuses to criticize the white supremacists even as the FBI and other agencies point out that they are the most deadly and dangerous terrorist group at play in this country. In rallies, he talks about the “good genes” in states that are homogenously white and uses racial buzzwords when describing people of color. This racism extends to his immigration policies.

He has openly invited foreign interference in our elections and in recent days has set the stage for creating a crisis around the election, negating the ballots and sending the election back to state delegations that would be allowed to set aside the actual votes and choose the president as they see fit. His campaign has called for an army of able-bodied patriots to volunteer to surveil polling places during the election.

He speaks openly of ruling after a second term, much like his Russian mentor.

His actions are those of a dictator.

He is corrupt. He is dishonest. He is immoral. He is a racist. He is hateful and vengeful. He is weak-willed. He is beyond selfish. He is loyal to absolutely no one and no country.

There is no gray area here this year.

You are defined more than ever by this year’s vote.

In this election, if you stand with this man***, those are the values you are adopting.

I will forever define you by your vote this year.

If you vote for this man***, I will forever see you as racist, as morally bankrupt, as dishonest, as weak-willed, selfish, bitter, mean-spirited and stupid as the man*** you chose. That is the definition you choose.

You may think that is wrong or harsh or that I am somehow being hyperbolic.

Maybe so.

But I stand by it. Especially in this year, this terrible mess we call 2020. Nothing I have seen in the past four years has given me pause or proven me wrong. You have had more than ample time and evidence to see what he truly is.

If you can’t see that, I can live with this judgement. Both mine of you and you of me.

There is a line in the sand. This is a binary election. Yes or no.

Yes to America. No to Trump.

Our future depends on it. Try to have a good day and keep this in mind: this might be the best chance you will have to have a good day if he*** is somehow reelected or subverts or outright steals the election because it will never ever get better with him.

So, remember that today might be as good as it gets for a long time to come.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Read Full Post »

Saps, Suckers and Losers

Posted in Current Events, Opinion, tagged , on September 4, 2020| 3 Comments »

*********************************

“On Memorial Day 2017, Trump visited Arlington National Cemetery, a short drive from the White House. He was accompanied on this visit by John Kelly, who was then the secretary of homeland security, and who would, a short time later, be named the White House chief of staff. The two men were set to visit Section 60, the 14-acre area of the cemetery that is the burial ground for those killed in America’s most recent wars. Kelly’s son Robert is buried in Section 60. A first lieutenant in the Marine Corps, Robert Kelly was killed in 2010 in Afghanistan. He was 29. Trump was meant, on this visit, to join John Kelly in paying respects at his son’s grave, and to comfort the families of other fallen service members. But according to sources with knowledge of this visit, Trump, while standing by Robert Kelly’s grave, turned directly to his father and said, “I don’t get it. What was in it for them?”

— Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic, 3 September 2020

***************************************

There is a new article in The Atlantic from Jeffrey Goldberg that carries the heading Trump: Americans Who Died in War Are ‘Losers’ and ‘Suckers’ that I urge you to read. It details a host of incidents over the last several years under our current president*** where this creature displayed a total lack of respect for the service and sacrifice of those who have seen duty in our military forces. The reports in this article have been subsequently corroborated and verified by multiple news agencies and their sources.

Without going into all of the details of the article here– again, please read it for yourself– he calls those American troops who were killed overseas and are buried in the military cemeteries in those places ‘losers‘ and ‘suckers.’

It aligns pretty much with his words for the late John McCain who he claimed wasn’t a war hero because he was captured.

There was another incident during talks concerning a potential military parade, one of his fixations, where he asked that the parade not include wounded veterans, particularly amputees, saying, “ Nobody wants to see that.”

This man sees everything as being transactional. You only do something for something in return. The idea of doing anything out of a sense of duty or honor is a foreign concept to this creature. After meeting one high ranking general, he is said to have remarked to aides that this general was a very smart guy and wondered why a guy with that kind of smarts went into the military. To him, if you have the ability to enrich yourself, sacrificing that ability in order to act in service to others is a sucker move.

I was watching The Godfather 2 not too long ago, having not seen it for a number of years. There a scene near the end, a  flashback to most of the members of the Corleone family along with the family attorney (Robert Duvall as Tom Hagen here but think of Michael Cohen, okay?) sitting around the dinner table before a birthday party for patriarch Don Corleone. Future boss Michael ( Al Pacino) reveals that he has enlisted in the Marines in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor.

The responses from his brother, Sonny, and Hagen were illuminating. People who do something for strangers were ‘saps.’

You only do for yourself and family.

Sound familiar? It has been said that this president*** operates in much this same way as a mob family, right down to the attitude that you only help those who can help you in some way. The others are all saps and suckers and losers.

You might ask why this matters. It is important because it shows that he sees everything around him in terms of how it serves him. The military and its veterans are seen as props and pawns to be used. I believe that if he had to sacrifice dozens or hundreds or even thousands of troops in an action that would help him stay in power.

And this extends to law enforcement, as well. He sees cops as a tool to be employed on his behalf. And even then, he only sees cops who are willing to compromise their oath or break the very laws they are charged to enforce as being capable of helping him. A good cop, someone who entered a dangerous field with relatively little financial return, would fall under the category of sap or sucker. Or even loser if they were to call out the bad cops among them.

You may not care.

You may not give a shit ( excuse me for my plain language here) about his constant lies and deceptions. Or maybe you don’t give a crow’s fart for his total refusal to accept any responsibility whatsoever for the citizens that he is supposed to represent during a worldwide pandemic. You may not give a tinker’s damn for the 190,000 dead from covid19 and find these numbers, no matter how high they climb, somehow ‘acceptable.’ You may not care about the damage being done to our future economies by his fiscal policies. You may not care about weakened position in the world, one that makes the world much more dangerous for all.

You just might not care. You got your stupid red hats and your confederate flags and Fox News. And your own beliefs, however misguided and misinformed they might be.

But make no mistake about it, this creature is the ultimate looter and he’ll burn down this whole shitshow to stay in power and to keep from ever being held accountable. If you or me or a million other saps, suckers, and losers have to die, it won’t bother him one damn bit.

And unless enough of us stand up now and vote him out in numbers too large to be disputed, I believe that is exactly what he will do.

So check your voter registration. Vote early.

And vote like your life depends on it because this might be the one time in our lives when that is actually true.

In the meantime, read the article in The Atlantic. And, here’s that scene from The Godfather 2. See if it sounds familiar to you, as well.

*******************

Read Full Post »

A Year of Augusts

Posted in Biographical, Opinion, Quote, tagged , , on September 1, 2020| 4 Comments »

pablopicassoskeleton******************

Your willingness to wrestle with your demons

will cause your angels to sing.

—August Wilson

******************

Aah, September 1, 2020.

In most years, this would be a day where I begin to feel some sort of relief from the grim cruelty of August, my least favorite month. That is putting it mildly because, truth be known, I hate August. It’s something I’ve written about before here on the blog, as seen in the enclosed posts below. It seems to seep out every five years and since its last appearance there have been several more other awful Augusts to further make my case against it.

The funny thing is that this year I wasn’t even cognizant of my deep hatred for August. Oh, it was as difficult and stressful as all Augusts are for me. Instead, I realized that my recognition of it was hampered by the fact that this entire year has been comprised of Augusts. Every month has been filled with the same sort of tension and uncertainty that normally mark Augusts for me.

March was an August, April was an August and so on.

So, though we have passed the threshold into September, I don’t feel the same sort of relief it might bring in a normal year. This is obviously no normal year. It might say September on the calendar, but this year it’s just another goddamn August.

Man, what I would give for a year with one August. Or better yet, none.

From August 12, 2015:

As the post below from back in August of 2010 points out, most years I struggle with the month of August and this particular one is no different.  The doldrums set in and I am filled with an anxiety and a stifling restlessness that combine to create a sense of desperation within me. If I hadn’t experienced this before, this feeling would seem unbearable.

But it’s not something new so I realize that it’s just a matter of hanging on and letting it pass, all the while trying to pull something from it that will show itself in my work. I have found that such keen desperation is often the source of great work, much as playwright August Wilson —a fitting first name!— points out so eloquently in the quote above. So, while I find myself fighting through the cruel days and demons of August, I do so as I listen for the song of angels to begin.

And from experience, I know they will begin soon enough. Sing, angels, sing!

From August 18, 2010:

This print from Picasso [ Above] very much sums up my feelings for the month of August. 

I have never been a fan of August. Memories of the so-called dog days of summer spent as a child. Hot from a relentless sun. Bored. Burnt grass crunching underfoot. The coming school year hanging overhead like the sword of Damocles.

August has always had a faint aura of death around it for me. I remember the death of my grandfather in ’68. My beloved dog Maggie years later. Several friends over the years, from a variety of causes. Elvis. The bright glare of the August sun seeming to taunt the grief of the moment.

August.

We were watching something on television the other night, perhaps Mad Men– I can’t really remember. Anyway, the character in the scene that was on said, “I hate August.” 

It made my ears prick up and I couldn’t help but mutter, “I’m with you there, brother.”

August.

Well, I’ve got a lot to do this August  morning. It takes a lot of work to keep busy to ward off the cruelty of  August…

Read Full Post »

Morning Terrors Nights of Dread

Posted in Music, Opinion, Quote, tagged , on August 31, 2020| Leave a Comment »

******************************

“The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.”

―H. P. Lovecraft, The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories

******************************

I have things that have to be attended to this morning so this will be short. I have watched the first three episodes of HBO’s Lovecraft Country and am still trying to decide whether I like it or not. I am not a horror aficionado nor a big reader of H.P. Lovecraft so I don’t look at it from that aspect. But it has been interesting enough to keep me coming back thus far. So we’ll see, I guess.

That brings me to the snip above from Lovecraft. It sort of reinforces my own belief that most things– civilizations, technologies, movements, etc– eventually evolve and grow until they reach an untenable point, Basically, that comes down to meaning that there is a beginning and an end to everything.

Nothing lasts forever.

Lately this thought fills me with dread and it may be that this feeling comes about because my fear of our desire as a people to enter into, as Lovecraft put it above: flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.

I was hoping to not be around when that happened again. Bad timing, I guess.

Anyway, this is just a prelude to sharing a song from Shilpa Ray, who I introduced here last week singing Pirate Jenny with Nick Cave. Here’s her song, Morning Terrors Nights of Dread. It caught my ear and the video has a cheesy appeal for me. I have caught myself humming the tune every so often this past week so I figured it must be worth sharing. Give a listen and have a good day. Got to run  now. Bye!

****************************

Read Full Post »

« Newer Posts - Older Posts »