Blast Off

Seems to me that it's all good versus evil. Every government considers itself good. They arm themselves to "defend" from the governments with different philosophies, the bad ones. Every penny spent on weaponry is a penny wasted. Money that could be spent on education, health care, public housing, the environment.

Keep in mind that there is no such thing as collateral damage. That is a term invented to rationalize killing human beings other than warriors of opposing governments.

Every act of war is a crime. What organization, coalition, alliance has the audacity to make rules of conflict? What power gives rights to maim and kill?

If God is on your side in your war, maybe you need a new God.

The Intersection of Art and Commerce

Decisions have never bothered me. It's all been destiny for as long as I remember. I'm just along for the ride. Some kind of weird, bright light has shown a path for me.

What I know you could put in a thimble. What I feel fills my heart.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

Crackpot Logic

It's all about patience, isn't it? We're all waiting for the same thing. Peace of mind is the most valuable  commodity in town and it's free. It seems to come in fits and starts but it never shows up when you're thinking about it. I suspect it's elusive to the saints but they'll never admit it.

My heart is quiet but my heart aches.

React with love. That's about all I have for you.

Peridot Choker

Can we drop the "We're better than this," line? We are this. Let's roll up our sleeves and open our hearts and make a better world while we have a world.

I don't know about you but I'm glad everybody's not like me!*

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

*Look, Panama, I know very well that it should be the subjective case. The sacrifice is necessary for art's sake.

Their Crooks, Our Crooks

Who would have guessed that the drug cartels in Mexico would feel threatened by the huachicoleros, the gasoline thieves. In the good old USA we have our own gasoline thieves. You can trace them back to 1863 and John D. Rockefeller's entry into the petroleum industry. Standard Oil and the cartels who followed realized long ago that the surest way to protect their interests was to buy the government.

One surprising element of the oil barons owning the government was the birth of the military industrial complex that President Eisenhower warned us about. War is now our biggest industry. Our "defense" budget exploded, pardon the pun, moving to perpetual war in the middle east to protect the petroleum industry's interests.

Now back to a comparison of the Mexican problem, we have our own drug cartels, too. The major part we refer to as the pharmaceutical industry. It's more about creeps with suspenders in their shiny beamers and peroxide blondes with their samples than it is scientists in lab coats.

This, of course, brings us to the healthcare industry and begs a mention, at least, of the insurance racket.

Don't get me started on securities and banking. Music business, either, in fact and certainly not churches.

Where we make organized crime our own is to control it all through what we refer to as government.

Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Seems so simple.

                                   

Nothing To Be Ashamed Of

Maybe I should have been more careful what I've wished for. Life, for me, has been a genie from a bottle granting me every little whim. Holding on to it, well, boys, that's a far different story.

You don't learn loss in school. Until your first grade teacher is no longer your teacher. Until your pretty little friend, Lynn, misses a few classes. Next thing you know, the class goes to her funeral.

It's all about love. Until it isn't. Then it's all about loss.

Oh, I've got shoes in the closet that have gone in and out of fashion several times. 

It has taken a very long time for me to understand that lust fades but love is forever.

Her Own Toys

Well sir, it's getting to the point where I can make it almost all the way around the block without crying my eyes out. Jamaica's been gone for more than six months now. Every step, in every direction on the sidewalk, breaks my heart.

We had a period, about a year ago, when she found a stuffed toy on nearly every trek. She discovered giraffes, cats, whales, elephants- pretty much everything that you can think of. Oh, she was always so very proud of her newest treasure.

On most days I was able to dispose of one or two shredded carcasses while she played with the new find.

This morning is our first Fall day. I walked our favorite route. I passed two stuffed critters of indeterminate species, about twenty or thirty paces apart. I left them there for someone else to find.

 

Hot Stuff

Funny, the older I get, the more I seem to be the kid that I was when I first began to figure out who I was. If my priorities ever changed, they have certainly changed back. 

Here are my resolutions: 

Read the best books, not the newest. Keep loving. Listen to the music that makes you smile and the music that makes you cry. Read the news that inspires. The date doesn't much matter. By the time you read it, it has already happened anyway.

You're probably thinking that it's nowhere near New Year's Day. See! It was. It will be.

Lower Standards

Maybe it's time to consider conceding the near future. The earth's heating up. We all know that. Well, most of us know that. There are folks who would like to remind us that it will eventually cool back down. Of course that's probably gonna take two or three million years. 

Hold your horses! We haven't finished heating up yet.

As my sand settles to the bottom, I take a longer view. You know- two or three million years. We probably won't have tigers or sharks. We darned sure won't have elephants. The harder part to accept is that I won't have any relatives here. You won't either. It's all the same old stardust, though.

Here's to us. Here's to love.

Let's make oil.

Goose Egg Soup

What was that word for "nothing left to lose?"

You try hard not to get used to being picked last. Faith and hope have always resented Paul's preference for charity. I'm working diligently to make peace with myself.

Heaven? I think maybe I figured it out this morning. As long as I can picture them there waiting for me, two legs and four, it exists. For me, at least. Now, of course, the tears start. That's okay. I wouldn't trade these memories for anything.

As a magnet for good fortune, I wish you peace of mind and peace on earth.

Pardon My French

Francophile? I probably don't qualify. I do love all things French. Citroens, baguettes (diamonds and bread), Peugeots (bikes and cars), berets and Brigitte Bardot. The nineteen year old Brigitte Bardot. Oh, don't give me a hard time here. In my dreams of the nineteen year old BB, I'm twelve. 

This is probably where my French thing starts.

To speak French was always a dream. I didn't have the nerve to take French in high school. It was pretty much all girls. The nerds took German or Latin and the rest of us took Spanish, hoping to eventually order at the Columbia in an urbane fashion.

When I started college, I knew it was time to re-invent myself. To be honest, in my case, invent myself. In my first year I took History of Canada, Idea of Utopia, Logic and, that's right- French.

To my delight and my panic, my professor was a lovely, young French woman. Imagine that! I struggled for a couple of weeks. By my standards I worked hard. 

When the time came to converse in my new language, it would have been difficult to miss the fact that my teacher, who I was madly in love with by this time, had to turn her back to the class every time I spoke. Her trembling was a strong clue that she may have been laughing.

I had to drop French.

When I took the drop slip to my professor for Logic, he begged me to stay. He said that I was the only one in the class who knew what was going on. Heck, I had assumed that something called Logic would be about logic.

Of course I realize that I have wandered off subject. I did fine in Idea of Utopia.

Parlez-vous français?

Built For Speed

Somewhere between the promise of the future and the horrors of yesterday, we sputter along. When I sit down to write, I go instantly to the dark. Somehow I think of myself as an optimist. A glass half full kind guy.

Maybe that's why I don't write more.

Give us peace on earth and end this dreadful, dreadful war.

Jet Age

The word, revolution, terrified me as a kid. I worried constantly about tooth decay, nuclear war, the economy collapsing, polio, I suppose I grew up anxious. Of course, some of my fears were real. I agonized over rust, I lost sleep fretting over calypso replacing rock'n'roll. Damn you, Harry Belafonte!

Not to be confused with wisdom, resignation eventually sets in. Teeth do decay. The economy collapses on a regular basis. We pretty much wiped out polio, at least for white children in first world nations, only to be confounded and cursed with acute flaccid myelitis. War isn't nuclear, it's perpetual- our major industry. We never win. We just never admit defeat.

Now days, I like rust. Yeah, idiots will pay more for jeans with holes in them and guitars with the paint worn off. You would think I would be fashionable with this gray hair and this old man shuffle!

Rock'n'roll died of old age and Elvis kicked the bucket at forty two- just like he knew he would. Harry Belafonte is still standing, one of our last heroes from his era. 

Were any of you ever picked for kickball? Any of you girls ever asked to the prom? Did anybody out there ever figure out how to make the love stay?

Asking for a friend.

                                      

Running After Crazy

Fall is here. First day in the 60's here after a record-breaking, brutal summer. I brace myself. Autumn fills me with melancholy. I've read that my situation is common enough to have a name. I just don't remember what it is.

This will be the first one without Jamaica. I don't really understand if I'm no good at grieving or if I'm just too good at it.

Don't ever let anybody tell you that there's no such thing as too sensitive.

Influences On Fragrance

With these miles, this old heart could use an overhaul. I probably should have taken better care of it. In other news, my knees are good and my liver seems to have weathered the worst of it. I've never been a real drinker. I picture myself alone, draped over a Kir Royale, with a classy barkeep, feigning indifference to preserve my solitude.

My drinking is sorta' like my piano playing. I understand the piano. Like a guitar without schizophrenia. In my mind I can really play the thing. There it is, in black and white, offering itself up for rhapsody.

My excuses for low achievement in life seem to center on an aversion to practice, a distaste for re-write, a disinclination for supervision. I should probably apologize for my indolence. Oh, well.

                                      

Stormy Weather

Take your joy when and where you find it. Love without expectations. Celebrate impermanence. Start by drinking that "good" bottle of wine that you've been saving. There is no reason to impress anyone. On the other hand, everyone deserves your respect. Paint your walls the color that you like.

If nobody took you to Sunday school as a kid, read the bumper stickers.

Nobody is more important than you are and you are no more important than anyone else.

Some things are right and some things are wrong. War is wrong. Don't waste your time arguing the obvious. Hate is the worst form of cancer.

Hold hands. Life is better that way.

How Nice

People tend to be leery of a person who comes across as "too nice."

"What's he up to?" 

"What does she really want?"

There's no such thing as "too nice." We start teaching little boys to "take care of themselves" before they reach puberty. All of these phrases are in quotation marks because they don't really mean what they say.

Bullies think their victims are chumps. Politicians think we would all do the things that they do if given the opportunity. Oh, I could go on. I could trash my banker friends. 

If laziness were not an issue, I could write a book on the subject. Changing the name of the War Department to the Department of Defense would surely rate its own chapter.

Well, sir, as I was about to type, "Don't get me started," I realize that I've started. 

Kindness brings happiness. That's a fact. I work hard to get back to where I was at four years old.

My Peace

You probably know that nothing that I write here, nothing that I sing about, in fact, nothing that I holler from my front porch is meant as advice for anyone. Oh, sometimes I title these things "advice" in some form or another. That's my idea of a joke. That's my sense of humor. I'm no comic.

In fact, I am a frail human being trying my best to get through.

No political party will ever reflect my views. No church will ever address my faith. Not to my satisfaction. Somehow I seem to make me sound sanctimonious, self-righteous. I surely hope that's not the case.

In fact, I'm a simple man. I believe in the golden rule. The power of love. I don't believe in war. Hate. Greed. I like to think of myself as honest but if you ask me a question today, you're likely to get a different answer than I gave you yesterday. I change my mind.

Like most of the people around me, I have been drawn into this terrible division in our culture. I quit.

Oh, I will vote. I will participate in the system in place. Sometimes I will compromise. In fact, most times I will compromise. As always, I will offer my services and my time for the best side that I can find.

I will not, however, be convinced to hate.

In real 'rasslin' when two villains meet in the ring, the loser has to leave town. My worst nightmare is to have two parties of hate battling for political power.

All you need is love.

Gasoline Rainbows

Maybe I should have studied to be a semanticist. A linguist. As it is, I know just enough to know how little I know. I have periods where I'm pretty sure that "it" can all be explained with physics. Sometimes the secrets all seem to be hiding in biology. Or chemistry. Geometry. Maybe poetry.

Without language, written and verbal communication, we're all mad men. Your concept of love and life and death would be as valid as the next cave man. Imagine Einstein's theory of special relativity or Beethoven's fifth symphony in such a world. How on earth would we ever know what spark plugs to put into that gol darned internal combustion engine?

As it is, we bumble through with five senses. Arrogant. Haughty.

What we don't know could fill a universe.

Ponder your existence without words.

I may have just taught you to meditate... and dance.

Card Games and Midnight

Let's do a little inventory here. I broke my arm once. Well, I didn't break my arm. My cousin, Jimmy, wrapped the chain from the swingset around my ankle and pushed me over. He broke my arm.

Pursuing manhood, I was lifting weights in my bedroom. As I strained to lift a hundred pounds over my head, my cousin George and I began to laugh. That's what we did. Still do. The right side of the barbell fell first. The doctor at the emergency room used a candy cane and a sledge hammer to describe the situation with my foot.

Resenting my bossy attitude, Hardy punched my lights out while loading in at a New Year's eve show in Birmingham. When the young intern argued that my nose wasn't broken, I advised him that it had previously pointed straight ahead, a direction that was now and evermore abandoned. After taking my money and waiting all night for x rays, the next shift doctor gave me the news- my nose was broken.

Other than that, it's my heart. Six hundred and thirty seven times. I should be more careful.

A Cowboy Never Walks When He Can Ride

All the best memories are just smudges on glass now. The idea, I know, is to make new ones. Sometimes I try. Half-heartedly. Loss seems to be cumulative somehow. Living is what I do for a living and I suppose I'm pretty good at it. Not to brag.

There are concepts that finally make a bit of sense for me. Money. Love. Oh, I don't claim to be any kind of expert. I don't have much interest in one and I seem to obsess over the other. I'm appalled that the two are so intertwined in our culture. 

My mother taught me to balance a checkbook. 

She was a hopeless romantic. She loved.

On The Ghost Bus

From here out I will treat this reality show as just that. An expensive one with collateral damage. To be drawn into this fake milieu is to play along and I will not do that.

My love is free. You can't buy my hate.

                                       

Ronny's Advice To Mothers

Here's to the ones with the most important job in the world. Most difficult, too. I bow to every mother. I don't really have any advice and, if I did, I would know better than to offer it.

Oh, I suppose that if you're doing a good job, you probably make it look easy. If you're lucky, yours has a true heart. A loving nature. Everybody's unique. Some kids are really special. Really special. You know it. They know it.

Their success is pretty much guaranteed. Measured in gold records, nobel prizes, money and fame? Maybe. I'm pulling for you.

Seems to me that the good ones might burn through money, gigs and romance. Some of that will be hard to watch. If they come out of it with their innocence intact and a heart full of love, you won't be surprised. They're not like the rest.

Here's to both of you.