annoying

Sometimes, my caffeinated, borderline Aspergers mind gets stuck on a simple rhythm and today band names wouldn't stop running through my head, so I decided to join the two. See if you can continue the rhyme and rhythm scheme with band names not mentioned? *taps on table with pencil annoyingly* The Eagles and The Beatles. Led Zeppelin and The Who. Pink Floyd and The Ventures. The Kinks, The Cars, U2. REM, The Cure, The Pixies. Black Sabbath, Steely Dan. These are just a few of all the reasons I like bands. Crosby Stills Nash and Young. Van Halen, Grateful Dead. Blondie, Gary Numann, The Replacements, Talking Heads. Captain Beefheart and Frank Zappa. INXS and Simple Minds. Billy Joel and Billy Idol. Motörhead and Patsy Cline. Waylon Jennings, Johnny Cash, Ryan Adams and The Doors. Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Janes Addiction, Gary Moore. Iggy and The Stooges, MC5 and Elton John. David Bowie, Queen and Devo. The list goes on and on..

running

I used to run
My feet fell light
Strong and
Strong
I ran for reasons I didn't understand 
But I ran
Farther every day
More clarity 
More ownership of me
And then
Then somehow

I went for a run
And my feet fell against the earth 
Like great slabs of fat
Slapping and hurting
Harder and harder with every step
Every joint rattling
Flesh sloshing 
Brain bouncing
And the mind saying
This is something you can do
It's just harder now
Keep going
Keep going
Keep going 

My knees hurt when I walk

guitar

John Vice In wintertimes past, my thing to do was to wait until everyone was asleep, and go to the garage. I'd take my cigs and beer and my guitar and spend hours drinking, smoking, and playing in the cold. Actually looked forward to it. I haven't done that since I quit smoking, and while I don't miss cigarettes, I miss that one facet of my smoking days. Oct 14, 2018 10:03pm Kralc NodrogI smoked And drank coffee And played my guitar until it rattled And my voice never broke And I never made it To the edge I never got it done That song was never written That song got lost In Women And drunkenness And a loss of vision. Never again All noise now All frail attempts at Imitation ...

notebook

I sat your stupid notebook 
By the door
The one you bought me
When you thought 
When you wanted me to be
A douchebag
When you thought that
The most expensive thing
Was the best
And it was so sad
Because
I don't write
Unless it doesn't matter
You always saw everything
So
Fucking
Backwards

courts

Trump will likely pad courts all the way down to Ashland with judges that can shut down legal challenges to legislation that could do things like remove the separation of church and state, outlaw any form of abortion or birth control, allow employers to lower wages, deny overtime and remove accommodations for protected classes of people, remove restrictions on predatory behavior by all manner of capitalist venture, give increased military authority to law enforcement, institute conscripted military service, remove regulations governing the behavior of for-profit prisons, private "security firms" and hate groups, remove term limits for elected offices, increase the power concentration in the executive branch (war, torture, persecution of political dissidents), defund public education and all other public safety nets, remove educational standards, require religious affiliation, criminalize criticizing elected officials or government organizations...pulling out of innumerable international agreements that stabilize whatever peace exists in the world today, ignoring the Geneva Convention, etc etc etc. This is potentially very very bad.

walls

There is so much good writing happening right now about the election. One of my favorite sentences so far is "If he builds a wall, I will raise my children to tear it down." I like to think that i and other progressive- minded parents have raised and are raising our children to rail against and tear down walls of ignorance and intolerance. I like to think this, but there is much work to be done. My son at 18 is a wonderfully intelligent, serious, careful and worried young man. We have had several conversations in the past couple days about the past, the present and the future. I lecture, explain, preach and listen, but I don't have good answers for him. I do know that he wants to move forward, to understand, to read and to engage as much as he can with the cause of the oppressed (in addition to writing songs, playing music and having fun of course) And he will. As for my daughter, she's heard Ian and I talking about very serious ideas and I have had some age -appropriate conversations with her about everything from japan to the election. She at 8- is becoming a rather serious little girl and I think that- much like my son's early life was spent under the Bush regime, she will be spending the next four (less?) years hearing-at least from me- why most of this society is a mess and how to not be devoured by it. I think though- this election sends a new and very specific message to parents of girls- especially fathers. I think it is time to get a little more serious with my silly, smart little girl. I think it is time to start raising a person that will tear down walls.

45 again

America has spoken. Its slack-jawed, toothless and barbaric yawp has been heard across the globe. And lo, darkness did fall upon the people of the west, for they had become dim and thick-browed, electing empty, vain and violent strongmen to their highest offices. As their schools closed and their scientists and thinkers closed their books and fled and the walls of their churches strained against the masses of hungry and desperate coming to praise an imaginary and false god, their enemies circled like hungry wolves, waiting for the once great people to sleep.

ugly

We are aged prematurely and our countenance beaten into snarl by anger. 

It chisels us into wretchedness, deep furrows in once youthful skin appear. 

Smiling feels foreign- an awkward pose, forearms sore from bar-leaning, jaw muscles and teeth sore from rage. 

The alcohol dissolves our organs and we sink deeper into decrepitude, catching a glimpse of ourselves in a passing window- shocked at the crumpled failure seen there. 

A stranger, trudging off to the soft thud of pallid flesh against an early grave.

Tax revenues are down. Because huge corporations and obscenely wealthy people don't pay their share. Because they don't think they should have to. Because they think the money is going to brown people who don't want to work. What their tax money does is build infrastructure and schools. "We don't care", the rich say. "We can build infrastructure better anyway- in a manner that better serves our needs exclusively and keeps the hungry brown people away." Tax revenues are down. Gonna have to cut social programs and infrastructure. "That's good." say the rich. "We'll take over all your schools and public works. We can do it better. After all- we're rich and you're not- that proves we're better at things than you are." Well- you'll have to fund social programs too or people will die in the streets, crime will increase and society will decay further. "That's ok." the rich say. "We will eliminate all social programs and the weak and sick can fend for themselves in the urban food deserts we've created with our big-box retail business model. That means our labor force will be more desperate and work harder for less and be more accepting of a decreased quality of life. How much do you want for the school? We're going to tear it down and build a church where we can teach people fear and control."

Are we anesthetizing ourselves to the pressures and influence of a toxic culture, so palsied by the anesthetic that we can't crawl out? What keeps you in the wrong place? Where does the inspiration go when there is no internal audience? Who cares? Hate is the great destroyer. I know this now. I can look back at a few key experiences and say "Yes, that was where the lava started seeping in. That is the chink in the heat shield that caused the reentry disintegration." It wouldn't have mattered anyway. The haters circled like wolves, panting, salivating, hungry, relentless. They shot, their darts poisoned with their infectious bile- a brew so potent it converts its target into a monster that tears itself apart piece by piece. Now, every time I seek to reach with one of those hands for the instrument that was my soul, a useless stump wiggles pitifully. I am handless, armless- made this way by hatred. The haters sit proudly in my mind, resplendent in their joy at my impotence. They will never leave. They have captured the kingdom, staked a claim never to be refuted- they simply point to the silence as proof. So, we trudge on- day after day of blue jeans and job, car and dirt, flesh and sleep. Perhaps without the anesthetic, the wretched world will come in to such stark relief that my eyes will be burned from my skull, my ears sealed over. "If i can't sing my soul, I can only speak my mind." - John Lennon " Julia.

I want to say a heartfelt Happy Mothers Day to all on the adopted mothers in my life- specifically Teri Debellefeuille, Valeria Huddleston Morgan and Paula Ott . You three have been able to sense correctly- at different stages in my life- that I was a motherless child and didn't know no right from wrong- and was in need of the right kind of motherly love. Your friendship, guidance and truly unconditional love has kept me alive. Thank you. Mothers are the strongest people on the planet. We all love you more than could ever be said. :)

Those most angered by progressive thinking are the ones most in need of its effect.

evil

I've said it before and I'll say it again: the idea of a god that rewards, punishes and controls gives power to some people over other people and is the highest atrocity that has ever been perpetrated on life as we know it.

water

Dreamt of water
Waves like moving mountains
Too high
Too big
This can't be real 
But it was
The water moves in us in ways we don't know
In the dream there was a country store floating on the waves
Old signs, wooden building
Startling and comedic
Like some beacon of safety
But the waves never stopped and the store didn't last
The waves moved like nothing i'd seen until I saw footage of rough seas on the open ocean later-and then I knew about the ocean. Then I knew that we are water.

terminator

There is no "Republican Party". There is only the action arm of the financial elite. That's why nothing it does seems to make sense excepting that all actions it takes seem to be motivated by either increasing wealth and power for those who already have it, dividing a population so that it might be more easily controlled or squeezing more profit out of an ever more desperate working class. It has no face, it has no soul. It has only purpose. It is The Terminator.

YOUR RELIGION

Your guns are a problem. Your religion is a problem. Your xenophobia is a problem. Your adherence to a mindset that celebrates ignorance is a problem. Your lack of respect for women is a problem. Your lack of respect for people of other races is a problem. Your denial that consumerism is making humanity and the rest of the biosphere sick is a problem. The fact that you find weakness disgusting is a problem. Your fetishization of power is a problem. Your celebration and exaltation of wealth is a problem. Your inability and/or steadfast refusal to understand, experience and act on feelings of empathy is a problem. Your gigantic rebel flag flying on the back of your gigantic truck is two problems. Your refusal to acknowledge that gay people are not a threat is a problem. Your refusal to understand that access to safe, legal and free abortion is something a decent and sensible society does is a problem. Your religion is a problem. Your religion is a problem. Your religion is a problem. Your religion is a problem. YOUR RELIGION IS A PROBLEM.

facts

Fact: fewer guns means fewer crazy people waving them around. Fact: legal and safe abortion means fewer unwanted children. Fact: legalized gay marriage has ZERO net negative effect on society. Fact: allowing any religion to control anything other than the internal spiritual life of individual citizens brings about measurable and real net negative effect on a given society. Fact: the concepts of private property, corporate personhood and profit allow for defacto enslavement of a given population. Fact: fear, anger and paranoia as primary motivation in policy making results in a measurable net negative impact on a given society.

"We're all godless. The difference is, some of us realize it."

grow up

In the days before the internet if you had stuff in your head like "the moon landing was faked" and "there was a conspiracy to kill jfk" and you managed to corner someone and let some of it out, people didn't really listen to you. You were what we called, um- stupid? Insane? Now- you think everyone has to listen to you and consider your insane ramblings (truthers) as legitimate, reasonable thought just because you're capable of sitting down in front of a computer, pounding out a few words and hitting "post". It doesn't make you any less crazy or stupid or any more credible- it just makes more people realize that on the spectrum of human intellectual agility, you exist down around zero. Prior to the Internet we didn't know about you. We could go about our daily lives and maybe only have to deal with you every once in a while rambling on in 7-11 at 3am or shouting from a street corner. Now- you're everywhere. The only thing I can think is that more information and more "audience" has pushed more and more people over the edge. No, 911 was not an inside job. No, sandy hook wasn't staged. No, Obama isn't a Muslim. The moon landings were real. Also, there are no such things as ghosts, angels, demons, gods or devils. The world, compared to the one you've cooked up in your head is actually pretty boring- unless you find people and life and the universe amazing as they are. If you can manage to wean yourself off your addiction to thinking you've got it all sussed out- that you've discovered that everyone is lying and you and your buddies on your Internet forum are the only ones that really know whats going on- if you can manage to stop freebasing ignorance with fear and then mainlining paranoia, you might actually bring about some meaningful change in your life and the world. Shave off the goatee, cut off the ponytail, step away from the computer and wipe the Doritos dust off on your sweatpants. It's time to grow up.

fargo

One of the problems with authenticity is that the world does not value it - the world rejects authenticity. The world wants a smile - the world wants to hear what it wants to hear. The world wants to be told that it is pretty and smart and funny and that everything is going to be ok. "Perception is everything." No. Complex thought and true engagement with life is everything. Authenticity is everything. We are becoming a society that acts rather than lives. We are becoming a society that thinks Seth Rogen is funny and authentic and that The Bachelor, The Voice and all the other myriad bullshit competition and "reality TV" shows are valid ways to spend time. We are a society that gives people what they want to get what we want. We are a society of socially manipulative political game-players. We are frauds. The world is a lie. Marketing is a lie, television is a lie - even most popular music is inauthentic, fraudulent garbage. Where is there truth? Donald Trump is enjoying success with his base because his base shares the same atrocious opinions and - like them - lets them come out of his mouth. He is atrocious and his opinions and ideas are atrocious. Is he authentic? No - he's another pandering fool feeding red meat to a bunch of angry, starving dogs made crazy by years of prodding and intellectual overdose on anger and fear. There is no authenticity and the world is full of mindless media junkies, entertainment addicts and stupid people giving birth to more stupid people. I value my little enclave at the edge of nowhere more and more these days - and as soon as I watch the finale of Fargo, I'm gonna get up and change everything.

45

Let's talk about this in a way Christians will understand. The devil has arrived and he's carrying a gun. He is the anger and the rage and the hatred that has been stoked by you and your ilk for hundreds of years. You've called him here with your disapproval and disgust and just plain nastiness at anything that isn't you. So- here he is- your precious prodigal son with the horns and the forked tongue and the hooves and the fucking weapons. Congratulations. Your insanity has been made flesh. Fools.

david foster wallace

didn’t know him. didn’t read his books. but i know him, he’s the voice that has been inside me since i was 16 saying “do something special. do something. do something before you’re fat and balding and boring AND STUPID.” well, welcome to the future, inner voice. i did read a piece -something about a county fair from “A Supposedly Fun Thing” that focused on the grotesque spectacle of consumption and entertainment that a county fair is - how disgustingly american it is. i was struck that these were simply the standard observations of a depressed person. the difference was that the observations made it to the page through the fog of depression. dfw was allegedly on meds for 20 years before he hung himself at 46. 20 years. his father said “they made it so he could be productive.” all of my life i have thought “you know something - you can see something most people can’t see..” and it was complete bullshit. everyone sees the same thing. everybody knows. nothing is special. there is no unique, only some desire to be loved and there is nothing unique about that. there are lives that bloom and die, arcs of accomplishments and failures, children, grandchildren and friends - and they all end at the ground and at the end they are simply information for the rest of the world to forget. the problem is that while we ARE alive we are forced to deal with the world as it is or change it. we have to get up every day and do something to get food, find somewhere to shit and wonder what the dream about sleeping on the couch in the middle of the shopping mall with the pretty blonde meant. we HAVE to deal with THIS life. or die. those are the choices. the dfw mind in all of us screams “rage against the dying of the light!” and makes us want to burn down all that is insincere in the world and be authentic in all deeds, words and actions. bukowski had a similar message. they make us want to give up on all material things and live a life of ideas and passion and observance of what is, to not be distracted by our inner animal, our base desire to be liked and loved and fucked. they push us toward some kind of pure life as they observe the atrocity that is daily american life and call bullshits on all of it. what now? i’m a graying, balding, ever fatter, rotting from the inside personification of failure itself, sitting in my tiny house, pecking away at my shitty computer on a shitty, narcissistic website. at 44 (call it 45) there are things that are just plain old gone. they dont matter anymore. dfw described his book Infinite Jest as speaking to people - men mainly- between 23 and 44 - that we are focused on success and failure and that existential angst and crises are most acute in that window. he’s right. after about 44 we really kind of stop caring about most things that drove us mad in the previous decades. we have become the things we most feared we would become and we have to choose to either be them or not. there is no change now. the tracks are laid, the train is built and it has been up and running now for a few years. you can throw the brake, but it wont stop. might as well hit the throttle. if dfw and bukowski offered insight into how destructive consumerism is to the human soul, no one listened. no one gives two shits that we’re dissolving in the belly of the beast. we anesthetize ourselves and plod on through - throwing drugs at the cavities in our heads and forgetting about the hair loss. we have been told that we are immortal - all of the information around us reflects that - everything and everyone is beautiful, everyone is happy and everything is fine, you just haven't figured out the right combination of possessions and substances that make you happy. keep trying - keep buying things and eating things and trying to be obsessed about something. you’ll get it, fatass. don't mind the chest pain, get the gigantic fucking burger for lunch. so, machines. we seek only entertainment and distraction. lets go ride something, play with something, build something, tear something down, watch other people do “amazing things” or laugh when they fail. lets dissolve. there is no other way. you can run as fast as you want, you can hike as far as you want, but you WILL come back to this. you WILL have a dvd played at your funeral that scrolls through pictures from your “life” while some awful MUZAK sounding soothing garbage plays. people WILL say how “nice everything was”. people WILL lie about you and say that you were a good person and that they loved you. maybe not. the only real way is to not allow it. to ‘rage against the dying of the light’. DO SOMETHING. even if it’s awful and you get shouted down and accused of fraud. DO IT. do it because it’s better than dying.

boxes

My dad left boxes
Boxes of paint 
Boxes of tape
Old boxes, indescribably small
Filled with myriad wonders

She bought him
A big toolbox
But he didn't really use it
He used cardboard
Boxes
Boxes for tools 
Boxes for parts
Boxes for no purpose 
Other than
That's a good box

He built boxes of wood
With smooth, accurate corners
Lids beveled to fit one way
And one way only
Or sliding in a slot
Tight
Right
Done damned well
That's a good box
Sitting there
Waiting to be filled

Maybe a smaller box would feel more full.

mysticism

So, here's the thing. When you wade into the arena of myth and superstition and give any of it anything but an entertained chuckle as consideration - if you actually believe that there are ghosts in the trees and that a lunar eclipse means "HITS END TIMES!", you set in place a psychological foundation for the belief of all kinds of crazy shit. If you actually believe that there is an afterlife and that there is a god and that there is heaven and hell and all that mumbo jumbo, then you abandon your ability to exist in the rational, real world in a meaningful way. You now exist in a fantasy land where anything is possible and the laws of the natural world only apply to those who don't think like you. Furthermore, you and those who believe like you will become over more frightened of the real world and all of it's glory because it seems to fit some scary story some crazy man in the desert told a bunch of dehydrated, malnourished refugees 2500 years ago. When you abandon rationality and allow fear and superstition to dominate your thinking, you doom yourself to an internal world where you have no real control over yourself, your life or anything else. Why would anyone want that? Why would anyone want to descend ever more deeply into a morass of mental illness, irrationality and just plain-old textbook insanity? Are you that bored?

random

Did you know that C. Roger Lewis invented the telegraph? It's true! In his book The Bionicles of Narnia, Lewis foretold of a future in which men flew without wings, communication between people was instant and highways stretched millions of miles into space- all this thousands of years before it actually came to pass! AMAZING!

mow

In the morning sometimes I remember the music-created from sheer vibration of soul, from pure need to sing, an urge as powerful as any elemental need. 

Early on the mystery was great, each chord a new idea, each line a new paradigm. 

Repetition a mantra, over and over again until something shone beneath the outer layer-something. 

Maybe nothing. 

Now- coffee in the rain as the dogs beg to come in. 

Snippets of the radio world swirl round and round in a cacophony of marketing jingles and love songs written before the creation of antidepressants. 

There are noises there? 

There are unsaid songs? 

If the guitar would stay in tune. 

If it didn't sound weird. 

If if if. 

If I had more coffee and it wasn't raining I'd mow the yard. 

Sure needs it.

god damned christians

Apparently there is a push from christian persecutionists to brand the Charleston murders as indicative of an attack on religion. Although you might think that connecting this horrible act to your precious victim status machine will help your fallacious cries of persecution, it isnt going to work. This was an attack on black people - as was stated by the killer himself. No one is coming after you because of your religion. People are coming after them because they are black. You chose your relgion, they didnt choose their race. How offensive and atrocious to even suggest such a thing.

empty

There was a time when morning meant coffee, perhaps a notebook and a few scribbled lines. Now it's this infernal device I'm addicted to, scrolling scrolling scrolling, looking for some entertainment, some inspiration, some message from the outside world and finding only endless mindless blathering of myriad others wandering, aimless and ever more empty from being filled with the mundane details of the lives of others. Today, coffee and a notebook even if it feels forced.

kids

Wisdom sometimes does not come from age or from experience, but from a purity and a clarity of vision- a sense of self and an innate knowledge of the true nature of love.

child

"When I was a child I spoke as a child I understood as a child I thought as a child; but when I became a man I put away childish things." "In childhood the mind, pleased with every trifle and void of care, vacantly pursues its little pleasures, and, blessed with ignorance of the ills and disappointments of life, looks forward with sanguine hopes to fairy scenes of happiness; while the bright and tearless eye, resting on the outside of things, sees a paradise in every lawn and grove. A recollection of these childish delights is often cherished with rapture in future years, while the man, forgetful of the frettings and whining of childhood, indulgently inquires, Why were the former days better than these? But he does not ask wisely concerning this. A virtuous manhood is much more to be desired than the state of children. It is capable of far nobler pursuits, of knowledge, enjoyment, and action more congenial with the ends of our being. The child has no high and manly aim, no cares for great and dignified things, little thought for his future well being either in this life or the life to come. His understanding is feeble, his knowledge is small, his pursuits and pleasures are useless to the world, his years are trifled away in pursuing airy visions, and he is a stranger to elevated and substantial happiness. He speaks as a child, prattling unconnectedly of his little concerns; he understands as a child, superficially and contractedly; he thinks as a child, incorrectly and inconsistently; but when he becomes a man he puts away childish things. His taste relishes nobler objects; his conversation is more dignified; his conduct and pursuits are manly; his views and knowledge are enlarged. Spurning the shackles and toys of babyhood, he becomes perhaps a philosopher. His unrestricted fancy, not confined to the policies and interests of kingdoms, wanders among the stars, and delights itself with the numberless worlds which revolve above his head."

pool

sleeping
stumbling through this
half alive
half awake
sacrificing the dive
for fear of the bottom
when we should be demanding a higher board
and a deeper pool

traffic

As if a great weight were laid on his head, he walked through the city, through the neighborhoods, past the shops and out into the traffic. 

The cars swerved around him, horns blaring, tires screeching but he walked as if through rain. 

The weight was compressing his spine so he became smaller with each step - ever smaller until he was only just as small as he actually was, which was not small - he remained fully and painfully in the world. 

On the other side of the road another man stood holding a small canvas bag and staring into the woods beyond.

"The weight." said the first man.

The second man turned to look at him.

Deep in his eyes were oceans, stars, a universe and then blackness. 

The man with the bag turned and walked into the road. There was no traffic.

trainwreck

Well, look at that. Where has the time gone? No, I really must be going. I'm truly sorry about the mess but these things happen. I'll send someone by for the spare parts, the rest will have to be scrapped. It couldn't be helped; when something like this starts it is bound to end in a steaming pile. I've tried wrapping my head around it this way and that and there simply is no clear understanding - only a misstep that was repeated until you see what you have here. Again - it is time. Let us not take joy in the whatever the next word in that sentence should be, but revel in the absolute pointlessness and abject, heartbreakingly intense failure that lies fore and aft. If this hand could write I'd say to it that these things happen.

lioness

So, there's a lion in a cage and there's a lioness outside the cage. The lion used to not be in the cage, he used to be outside the cage with the lioness, but then...cage - but the lioness insists on standing near the cage - even taunting the lion with her charms...and the key to the cage, but never opens it. The lion's roars finally scare the lioness away...and the cage disappears with her

cage

So, as a i pace around this empty house like a bull in a cage it occurs to me that i'm impotent; there is no power here - i'm inside a box, i'm on some kind of path or loop...a treadmill. A hole - like a wellshaft. I have these memories - these flashes of people saying "youre digging yourself a hole" and i was dismissive - but it turns out they were right - a DEEP one. Like a well. Steep sides - rock. I can see a little patch of sky, but thats it. It is dank, dark and cold and I'm the only one here. Well no - thats not true - there a couple kids here with me, but there are ropes for them - they're just not sure if they're ready to leave me here yet. It won't be long. They'll see soon that I have no arms and am far too heavy to carry...and that the water is starting to rise. They'll go soon - and I'll feel better then - watching them climb out - as long as they don't stop on a shelf and look back we'll all be ok. We'll be ok. Keep going. I feel better already. Peaceful, in fact. Sleepy. Goodnight.

shutup

Put an antenna up so you can get the radio stations in. Buy a better couch so you'll be more comfortable. Get a better car so you can make the commute to work. Save money. Get insurance. Work harder. Go to bed earlier. Drink less. Exercise more. Be more spiritual. Eat better. Smile more. Read more. Read better. Build something. Grow something. Say something. Smile. React. Open up. Give in. Give up. Get up. Shut up. Man up. Fuck up. Get beer. Make beer. Make love. Make babies. Shut up.

crazy

You're allowed to be crazy about things - right up until the very second you die - and maybe after. You're allowed to be crazy about people and music and cars and the way the creek hugs the road. You're allowed to love beer and to be nuts about simple things like Sriracha and new bands that are 20yrs younger than you and sound 20yrs older. You're allowed to buy a new jacket and fix an old car and get a haircut. You're allowed to write songs and get so drunk you don't remember anything past 7 o'clock. You're allowed to speak your mind and you're allowed to tell people they're being mean - and you're allowed to be mean. You're allowed to be in love. Don't let any poor bastard tell you different. You're allowed. You're allowed to spell things wrong and write bad stories. You're allowed to be mad about politics and you're allowed to be wrong. You're allowed to be an atheist and you're allowed to cry when you get saved. You're allowed to remember everything - EVERYTHING. You're allowed to remember everything - everything that has ever happened to you that has anything to do with anything - you're allowed to think about it. You're allowed to be ok.

mtns

So I've come to the conclusion that without some real real real hard trying or total cultural assimilation, small communities - especially appalachian ones - simply will NOT accept outsiders. Unless your name is entwined with the last 50-100 years of the social fabric of the community or you completely cop their culture and "become them", you will be excluded. They may give lip service or a nod at the store or a perfunctory wave in traffic, but you will be judged, discussed and observed and then excluded from anything meaningful about the community. They are like trees and the outsider is a nail - the community simply grows around the outsider. The problem is of course that the outsider isn't a nail - the outsider is a living, breathing person - and when a living breathing person is isolated from the community in which they live one of two things happens - they either leave or get sick. I am of course talking about myself and I am of course talking about Morehead. I'm so tired of this backward mountain bullshit i could spit fire. Maybe that explains why I've always been so angry here. Nothing here makes sense to me. Exclusion never made any sense to me. Ostracism never made any sense to me. If social situations are complex, you have conversations and you deal with and work through the situation. Not mountain people. They just shut down and shut up and act like the situation doesn't exist - and go on on with the next smile - no matter the source and no matter the cost. Avoid reality - that is what the underlying mentality is here. Don't deal with problems - go hunting. You'll feel better. Don't work out your problems with your wife or husband - go immediately to another person and start a new relationship. Deal with the other person only when they show up screaming drunk pounding on your trailer door in the middle of the night. Worry about the garbage only when it impedes access to your front door and even then make only a narrow path. Drink anything and everything you can find and consume any and all mind-altering substances as often as possible and hope you die in your sleep. I am so fucking sick of this region - literally. And I'm getting sicker. I do not love the mountains. I hate the mountains and I want to live somewhere where more people are college-educated than not and where the number of bars is higher than the number of churches. I want to live somewhere where experimental music doesn't involve a banjo, fiddle, mandolin or upright bass. I want to live somewhere where people are required to have all doors attached to their vehicle at all times. I want to live somewhere where public art displays involve something other than quilt squares. I'm just sick of it. Give me streets full of people doing things - even if some of the things are questionable. Give me building after building of apartments with myriad lives and stories and situations and needs to commune with each other and understand the stranger next door. Give me people who walk past the fear of each other and try to understand first - and understand that they risk only denying themselves enrichment by not reaching out to the people around them. We see study after study about Appalachian areas being the "unhappiest" or "most stressed" - you know who is filling those surveys out and answering those calls? The poor bastards that are stuck here trying to have some kind of sense of community with these people that invariably ask "Now, what's your last name again? How long have you live up there?" The locals sure aren't. They won't answer the damned phone if they don't recognize the number. Of course I'm being too harsh, but I didn't grow up this way. I wasn't scared of outsiders, I wasn't scared of non-whites and i sure as hell didn't care what your last name was.

Bivouac Screenshot

Poem In Five Chapters by Portia Nelson

Chapter I

I walk down the street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I fall in. I am lost ---- I am helpless ---- it isn’t my fault. . . . . It takes forever to find a way out.

Chapter II

I walk down the same street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I pretend I don’t see it. I fall in again. I can’t believe I am in the same place ---- but it isn’t my fault. . . . It still takes a long time to get out.

Chapter III

I walk down the same street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I see it is there. I still fall in . . . . It is a habit. My eyes are open. I know where I am. It is my fault. I get out immediately.

Chapter IV

I walk down the same street. There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. I walk around it.

Chapter V

I walk down another street.

ryan adams

i will watch
from here
while you do that
over there.

roiling and boiling
like so much
biology

the world lives

slipping here on this couch
the channels flicker
bad signal
no signal
boring
give me something i can use
an analgesic
an antispetic
an anesthetic
an abortifacient
i. dont. care. anymore.

i see patterns
habits
like old grown wood
the same feeling
the same things said
the same needs unmet
the same conclusions
deeper still seated
in a mind growing tired
of trying

so i call the number on the screen
30 day supply
pay only shipping
why not
substances are everything, right
right
money better spent on dental floss
or a haircut
or food

here's what happened
a long time ago i missed out
when they were passing out hearts
i thought they said hearts
and i missed it

nobody built this
it grew here
and here it will die

modern times

need to shut down the still and the sparkmakers for a while i think. let the dust settle. look around and maybe pick a few things up. wash something, fix something etc. probly need food. done got rid of a whole mess of shit. and there's the kids. they don't know who the hell i am anymore i don't think and it aint cause i been workin too much.

only about 2% of people on the planet have red hair, but thats out of somewhere around 6 something billion.

i dont like rocks specifically but i'll deal with em if they get in my way. couple years ago i might've said different but there's a few thousand gallons and about 15 grand between then and now and i just dont know how all this is gonna work out.

the car is worn out. i like it that way but im worryin. the front end has a chaos random shimmy from bad metal. i'll fix it. probably. before it fails in a corner passing a truck. probably.

my heart aches. hurts too.

fuck 50.

im not going to make fun of idiots in bad clothing at the bar anymore. they're just kids and i shouldnt be there anyway. not in this town. not at that bar. not here. not anywhere.
who cares.

modern times.
modern times started about 2008.

yeah, time to throw your drink in the floor and walk out, old man.

before you really do fuck something up right good and solid.

diplomacy is the ability to understand and communicate with people you hate or that hate you.
good luck with that shit actually going down in any meaningful way.

i won't do this again.
more and more things are this way - not being done.

meh.
never should have bought the goddamned place.
shoulda run with a pack on my back like the bum i am.
the proper end would've come by now.
jaco knew how to die;
get your head stomped into the sidewalk after running your mouth in a bar.
thats the way to go.

here


here
while you sit
stalled
knocked backwards
wounded and stunned

i will be the one to hold your hand
and tell you that you
are still you
who(m)ever it is that you are

while this sickness creeps over you
every day
darker
one day bright
the next a fog
this time final

i will stay with you
and make sure that you
find someone when you look

and as is my want
and my lot
when you are healed
i will remain integrated
into the base of this hole
where we now sit
healing and trying to laugh at the night
i will sit
and watch as you walk away

like a service station attendant with a free tire and a cold drink
on a cross country trip
no, you won't be back this way
but sure, pay me then.
it's fine.
I'll be here.

Medicinal fap. Bring on the wam wam. Gruba gruba. We make bongs. I'd like to spare you the expansive description. Dare you to make me a meat suit sandwich. Here, hold this. I gotta go beat a Weave Troll's tank filler cousin. Ish.

Watch me slap you.

I'm boring.

Can we teepee?

Link this.

Shit me wisely.

Suffer from inflamed crankules.

Like most, the master took himself seriously out for seriousness explained.

I enjoy a good kerosene ever so often.

Long LONG lines at the takeout again. Shuffling feet, humming singsong.

Time for you are magic. When it happened again lifting things we showered together. She came. Twice.

Here, watch this.

*splash*

Cramming is like a soft, yellow paste.

Did you try really hard? I didn't. I didn't try at all. Who built this?

Clocks are like tiny little machines that are one letter away from cocks.

I'd like to smoke some pot but you dont have any. Come over here and sit on my hand.

Lick my Listerine.

Can we spell this? I made a big castle out of razorwire and empty promises. You wrote the script for everything. Up for coffee? Call me.

Tona tona tona. Tona. Tona tona tona tona tona. Neither snow nor rain nor gloom of night shall stay these couriers from their appointed rounds.

When the going gets weird i make steel.

140 characters is too much; make a grunt app

Fuck me.

When did you grow those? I was watching closely.

It's not just the big words. There are tiny little demons in everything. Brightstar Makepattern calling. You have no idea. If you're under thirty and not my my kid eat a hoho and call me in 20 years.

Bleak my maker

Got it? Clear water.

Yes, it's like this here. No one is standing behind me. Beneath me. All societies are secret if you want them to be.

When did this thing try to be more real? LUUUUUURRRRVVVVVVVEEEE.

Put out the nuggets and love it.

So one fucking word and I'll rip your throat out. Right now, right here.

And later the cookies. It was simple. Shining, reflective nature. Big quiet. Heat, sugar, etc. Simple.
You missed it i guess

thats just the way it is

i come in late
get out of the car
lookup at the stars
down at the old dog
that is standing there
when there's no mail
he's standing there
"i've been laying in the road."
he says
"i know."
i say
"it's warm there and the cars go around me."
he says
"i know."
i say
"i've been waiting for you."
he says
"i know."
i say
"you should feed me."
he says
"i know."
i say
"how you doin, j-bear?"
i say
"you should get your shit together."
he says
"its getting late."
"i know."
i say
"its hard."
"bullshit."
he says
"try eating a bunch of deer skin and bones and then throwing it back up and then trying to eat it again."
"i guess you have a point."
i say
"if you're not going to feed me I'm going up in the hills to hunt frogs."
he says
"okay."
i say
"i'll probably feed you in the morning."
"that's fine."
he says.

this title free

I have never chewed on life
the great things i have known
the true depth
the real meaning
always got by me
if i could not devour
i could not eat
like a dog with bread

i am under here
and all is above

great diamonds and jewels of art and spirit
made by other men
i was holding
in a greasy pocket
picked up on the way
like a pretty rock
waiting to to be given to a pretty girl

i find i am one of bukowski's demons
one of his hated
empty
normal people
i seek only base
food
sleep
sex
alcohol
and the chance to scream
and break everything

i forget the power of the laughter of a child sometimes

i grow uglier with age
perhaps somewhere along the way
i will be truly
wretched
and what is in here
will match the way i look
people tell me i look young
and inside i hang on some tiny chance
that i can keep getting by
on some little blip i see in people
when i wear a nice shirt

i would rather be ugly
and full
than beautiful and empty
as it stands
i look ok
and have mediumness as my pet
and no credibility

i'm going to set this pile of shit on fire
and watch the free rhythm of it
die dessicated
never having chewed
only swallowed whole everything i could

I am not a wooden indian
or a rock
this heart lives
and though i'd kill it if i could
i will age with it
and we will ossify
and harden to a cinder
together
me and this heart
we are not wooden
but rather
like earth
trod
sodden
and flowing slowly

song of youth


there were paintings in the trees
and poems in the water
the flowers held songs
and all the world was a stage

every piece of light was life.

We grow like trees
Layers of self covering wounds
experience
personality
understanding of reality

layers
the old ways sometimes
so deep we can't feel them
only hints of an old love
memories of a wordlview
like wounds in a tree

we sometimes go back to the last love
like the scene of a crime
like the last time we saw ourselves alive

not so much places
as times
but there are markers
and there are places
things
songs
memories
but the time is gone
it being all we seek

dig something out of yourself
something that you made
something you were
and hold it up
like a gem
and see if anyone notices that you've already done it once.

i used to play the guitar
it was an act of brutality
and sometimes
like touching a beautiful woman
and sometimes
both

i could feel
the thing in me that just knows life
that thing would play the guitar
and then it would go hide again

but i still feel that guitar
when i pick it up
and it is mine
it gives itself to me
and just holding it feels like home
maybe the only home i've ever really known

i used to sleep with it
just stop playing and roll over and sleep

i didn't mean you
when i put myself out there
with my great taste in music
and my love of art
i didn't mean you
i didnt mean that you were supposed to hear

i thought
someone else would notice
someone with more depth
someone more powerful
someone more important
someone larger.

but your insignificance
will not keep me from being beautiful

sometimes its just quiet

winter is coming again. i say, "it's all bullshit. j-bear. bullshit." to the old dog every time i get out of the car. he seems happy to hear it. stretches in front of me and makes that yawning sound.
i tell the cat to fuck off. get back. no.
i have a bottle of wine.
i wonder about the old mountain voice that this place drives into you.
i can hear it - the old man.
see him.
he is me.
he has given up on everything except exactly what matters to him in the now.
there is nothing else and external attempts to punch a hole into him draw back nubs.
he stumbles around the place, feeling hips move and muscles slide around.
his skins grows coarse and loose and tough.
sleep where it is time to sleep.
eat whatever is there.
drink.
his genitals fall away into rancidity and pointlessness
though some rare nights he still awakens with an erection and some vague memory of a woman. soon enough it passes and he is able to get back to sleep.
he rots from the inside out. everything takes longer, matters less except the old ground.

no money can fix this.
only a restart.
this old house needs everything again.
the land just sits there and knows endings and old lives.
and people who didn't hate their neighbors.

reckon i'll rip the top out of that little house out here in the winter
make a little room for the boy maybe
put a little heater out there
little mattress.
couple of years he'll appreciate that place
way from me and the other kid

you can't mean that.

and what of this time
that stretches out
runs from us
makes it so we type and not
write

so what
we age
we die
we drink
so what
this is all so much NOISE in the day to day


beauty. of fair beauty i say
she seeks to undo me and make me...nothing
and yet everything i am is for her

i scream in these tiny times
all things saying
"it is your lot that they should go" eh
so be it

i have run this thing ragged
tried to erase that memory file that still plays
and thinks

but you know
just the other day, i smoked some pot
and drank some fucking wine
GODAMMIT
and just forgot all manner of self
and at least
did not remember what i had typed only moments before

IT IS THAT RANDOM AGE I SEEK
i piss on myself and i am free of you
proof i am a man
you cannot take this base thing
this only thing i know



women.

Bivouac

bivouac

we will camp here.
the fighting seems to have stopped
for now
i carry the little one in a sling on my chest made from a jacket found
her wounds worsen
when awake, she cries
for her mother
for milk
i have neither.
i feed her water and scraps of food i can find
if she'll eat.

the boy's fears and anger get to him
he cries tears of rage
and then sleeps
the morning usually
we see the chipper child he is
for a while
and then as the day wears on his mood darkens

we hear the planes
the bombs
the guns
but we cannot see the smoke
cannot smell it
this hollow
they don't care about us.
the only strategy here is hiding
and there is no hiding now

i am not a good person
i will crumble in fear if confronted
i will not do the brave thing
i will run
i am a coward
a failure
and i carry these children
and we are the same
save that i am 'father'

we will camp here
others were here before
they have left things
shelters
a well
a cellar
the remains of a house
crumbled and rotted now
bleak when new
perhaps the water in the well is not poison
perhaps there is something canned in the cellar
no
nothing but dust.
but the water is good
we will huddle here in a corner
i have heard animals
perhaps i could build some sort of trap

i will not stumble in the mud of breathless iloveyous

and i will lay here
in the thisbroken place
until they come for me
but you will not
you will stand
crying
at the edge of this ocean
and watch
---
when did this
become a problem
why
when did you become
important
because this was over
before you ever existed
bent
spent over
more than anyone expected
more debt
more waste
no one could have imagined
but i will roll it up
in a package
and in the end
fail
and it will seem to be
the rightest thing
the most natural
'we always knew'
---

never love a poet

a poet sees your heart

finds it first and talks to it

knows what makes it move

and does what comes naturally

right or wrong

never love a poet

for he's been to the dark places

and knows the armor that love is

against death

never love a poet

for the instant you do

he will stop his song and dissolve

into you

but its ok.

you can love me.

i'm not a poet.

i will stumble through this part
and fail
as giants rumble behind me
noting
manifest this
you won't make it back

building a cage takes time
take care
the bars must be strong
and made to look like doors
windows
walls
time

the chemicals aren't mysterious
anymore
they know themselves
and are weak

i awoke to her wordless demand
"i want..."
nothing here. change this, whatever it is.
so a blanket on the floor is better than a mattress.
sleeping on the couch in a fetal position is starting to get hard on my knees.

these times are hard
all people gathering in some easy denial of dysfunction
like nothing's wrong
like this is completely normal
they're all on drugs.
no one is clean
it is why they smile
when you feel so awkward
either that
or they're insane

its about 5:30
the birds are waking up
maybe i'll go outside
and imagine its winter
and watch coffeesteam while the cat begs
and the dog stretches
saying
"hey there. you make me happy."

there are women in my dreams
lithe, beautiful things with pageboy cuts
of calm, honorable demeanor
and dangerous hipsway
stepping partially out of doorways
eyes saying
yes and
lets get there

they are there
and i awake again
to the memory
of The Girl in the Green Sweater
and she is made real
and i am supposed to write her a poem
book
song
Life.

well

on the edge of this windblown cliff
i climb back to you
and you wait
the wind moves your loose and dark curls around you
you use the extra length of the sleeves of the old sweater to keep your hands warm
bunched in
held tight
hugged
your arms wrapped around you
Hugged
quickly, one hand is freed
in a quick, graceful , second-nature circle
brushing hair out of your face
tucking hair behind your ear
quickly the arm goes back
around you
and i know as i climb to you
and i see your eyes
and your smile
so much is said there
as you watch me and wait

you were a little cold waiting for me

i know
that i bring to you
only everything
and i seek only everything
and only to climb back to you
with some small gift
i descended to obtain
and i would move the earth
for one small gift
for you

i write sometimes.
its just writing.
its for you and because of you but its no obligation.
i'm happy to be awake and writing.

thanks, yo.


thinking

it isnt so bad.
inside this thinking
i still see you.
in fact
i find you when i think
because i think
you're thinking too

this IS simple
and we ARE supposed to just be
you're right
you're RIGHT.
we simply are.

maybe, though
you're ahead of me several years
and places, classes removed
from where i am
this little boy
still playing
still wanting fun
so late in the game



girls like you
i always talked to you
but you always
dated baseball players
that drove fast cars
but sometimes
you'd talk to me
during lunch
and you'd let me carry your tray
or something
your book
something
anything
any little window for a moment
and it wasn't bad
short
genuine
and independent of the cliques

It's Over

I've been feeling this phrase lately. So many things seem over. Obviously, the year and the decade (depending upon how you count), but so many other things.

It is my opinion that the 60's weren't really over until 1995 when Jerry Garcia died. Maybe it was Woodstock '99 that stomped on the burning corpse, but Jerry "checking out" as Bob Weir once put it in a radio interview, was the true end, I thought. Phish was weakening and all things hippie just started to become less interesting to the world after Uncle Jerry was gone.

The 70's have not yet ended, from what i can gather. They've not come back, they've just never gone anywhere. They were in the background though the 80's (porn, big cars, big, swaggery schlock-rock) and even Freedy Johnston observed in 1995 that the "Seventies Girl" that had found his old girlfriend's suitcase in the attic wasn't staying over. The 70's will probably never be over. I'm ambivalent about it. I rather liked the 70's. They're full of yellowed linoleum, big stereos and my brothers and sisters, mom and dad. I was a kid and music was on the radio. It was not a bad time.

If you listen to the economists, The 80's didn't end until the crash of 2008. All of the heady gambling that was born in Brett Easton Ellis's characterization of the facade of the 80's ran straight through until the housing bubble burst. Even through the gay 90's, 80's style guys still smirked from the sidelines in their v-neck sweaters and fratmullets. They were there and they didn't truly think (or care - probably still don't) that wealth had an image problem. They probably are still un-ironically and back-slappingly piling out of Hummers in the parking lots of strip clubs with pockets chock full of coke-sprinkled fives.

As an aside or perhaps an addendum to the previous paragraph, i'd like to say something about rock groups like Poison, Cinderella, Trixter, Poison, Motley Crue, Poison and Poison. It is NEVER going to happen. The world will never be nostalgic enough to let you make a comeback. EVERYONE is embarrassed that they listened to your shit in the 80's. Stop trying. Stop poking your head in the room every few years with your devil hand flying and your tongue flicking. You may not reenter the party once you've exited.

I can't even write about the 90's. I'm still there. I still drive down the road and look up at these hills and have this sort of weird St Elmo's Fire-meets-Slacker-meets-Singles-meets-hiking-in-the-mountains-while-simultaneously-attending-Lollapalooza feeling. I'm not sure the 90's are over because I'm not really sure they even completely happened with any definable clarity. Of course, from the vantage point of some 20-somethings ('Cuspers' as some pop sociologists have dubbed them), the 90's are "Oh, so very over". I guess the absence of Jane's Addiction, Nine Inch Nails and to a certain degree, Pearl Jam on the national stage gives a sort of "over" feeling to 90'sness. Maybe. Probably. Maybe the 90's really ended when Kurt Cobain pulled that trigger in that sad, empty little gardener's hut in Seattle in 94. Maybe. I'd be happy to let the 90's end there. It sure felt like an ending. A gigantic, blood-splatter of a full stop, but there were years to go. We had to pick up all the pieces. We had Frank Black to hear and the Foo Fighters and and right towards the end everyone suddenly wanted to be Gram Parsons via Ryan Adams.

So, decades are over. Now a new one is over. "What the fuck was that?", is all I can say. One of you kids can write about it, I don't care. Paris Hilton? My Morning Jacket? Coheed and Cambria?
What. The. Fuck.
Good things about the past 9 years - pissed off, 30-something comedians. Patton Oswalt, Doug Stanhope, David Cross, etc. Even Jack Black - if you are into the fat, ADD-suffering, narcissistic metal-head in the corner that won't shut up until you let him on stage at the open-mic, but i'm not. I have two words for Jack Black - Brian Posehn.

Anyway.
"It's Over."
So much is over.
My 30's are over.
Another relationship - a marriage this time (What_the_fuck.) is over.
Elementary school for my son is over.
Being "A Musician" is over. SO over.

So much is over.
Myspace has been over for a while now.
Facebook is over.
Twitter is over.
Social networking via a computer as a phenomenon itself feels over. Who wants to sit in front of a computer anymore? Do it from your phone. Do it while you're driving. Do it when your date goes to the bathroom. Do it when you go to the bathroom. Better yet, don't. It's not really that much fun anymore, is it? I mean - everyone is out there and if they really wanted to see you or talk to you, you'd be talking to them or seeing them in person, right? Right?!

You know what else is over?
This note.

One thing that is not over is this snowy snowday. Maybe the boy and I need to go back to the Walmart lot to see if the e-brake 360's are as easy to do as they were last night.

Oh, and there's still some coffee.

this might seem vain, but it feels like the best way to explain this to many people at once.

I've been talking about "becoming a teacher" or "getting qualified to teach" for a couple of years now. i was on path towards the MAT for middle-grade science here at MSU.
I did not arrive at the conclusion to teach lightly, but when i did decide, there was a sudden firmness to the decision that even i was surpised at.

the more i am exposed to teachers, i find that the best ones have a few qualities:
1. they have wanted to be teachers since they were small
2. they stay in the same community or school for long periods
3. they are very nice, nurturing and loving people with huge hearts.

The only thing i have ever truly wanted to be was Jimmy Page.
Tried that, didn't work.
The second thing that i wanted to be was "something in social science...maybe anthropology or law"..
This vision materialized in high school.
I never tried. I got to college (undecided), roomed with an environmental science major and declared the same major the next semester. I had joined this program not for scientific reasons but for idealistic ones.
Wrong.
The word "science" should be in all caps. I didn't have the background or aptitude to be a science major. I got the general stuff, but BIO171 stopped me at the door to real science.

Fast forward a million years to 2008...when i get this flash of "I can teach!" along with a severance package which landed me back here in school, which is a great place to be.
The thing is, the more i know about teaching and the more teachers i meet, the less excited i am about it. A friend said recently "I have wanted to be a teacher since as far back as i can remember, and its really hard for me to want to stay in it sometimes."
If i am coming to the profession with mediocre enthusiasm and sketchy core knowledge, what kind of a teacher will i make?
A frustrated one, is what i envision.
Is a bad teacher better than no teacher?
I don't think so. Bad teachers break hearts and spread disillusionment.
I don't want to do that.
Whatever i end up doing until my body and mind start completely falling apart here in the next 20 or 30 years, i want to do it with at least enough interest so that i don't screw up people's lives...and end up even more bitter, jaded and pissed off than i already am.

So, law. The old first track.
I have thought about law school since high school.
The thing is, my grades are bad and my life is complicated (kids, house, etc)...so i start to balk after an entrance meeting.
I have been looking at the bulletin board outside the legel studies dept in Rader every day for weeks.
"What does a paralegal do?"
Well, some say "glorified legal secratary".
Maybe.
Thing is, I'll be near something that i think i love more than teaching...and i won't be mediocre.

Also - i can still go back for the MAT if i want...and law school won't seem so far off with a paralegal undergrad.

The point of this is to counter anyone's impression that i was insincere about teaching. I can do it - i just don't think i'd do it very well...which would be painful for everyone. Especially me.

these years go by
and we waste them on anger
and we waste them on politics
and worrying over
what
will happen
if

when we should be laughing
and spilling coffee
and making love on the floor

and we change
and our children grow
and
and
and
nothing moves faster
but we fear
that we understand time now so well
that unwatched it slips away
like the reins of an old horse
that is really just plodding along
pulling us home on the wagon

sleeping
stumbling through this
half alive
half awake
sacrificing the dive
for fear of the bottom
when we should be demanding a higher board
and a deeper pool

these families
no one made them from clay
we are happening now
we are messes
and simple sunshine
and tears

i know these things
i KNOW them.

and yet, i pull my hood over my head
and trudge through
with my eyes on the ground
numb from pain
stumbling and empty
careful for fear of falling
when it is the fall
and only the fall
that can free me

you always rocked, man.

you rocked before anyone else did.
and then you snuck it to me.
best shit ever.
rock.
"check this out"
cranks the knob on the right farther than YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO DO THAT

but then it starts and
it HAS TO BE THAT LOUD
for you to understand
that you should move the floor
in the very beginning of Children of the Sun
big old 70' shit.

Marantz.
Pioneer.
JVC
Klispch.

big stereos
"yeah, now see: that's a perfectly balanced stereo signal."
and it looked like an amorphous blob on an oscilloscope screen..but it sounded like the intro to "Hot Summer Nights" off of 5150.

you brought the rock.
you brought it back on tape from Oneida.

remember when we visited down there and me and my brother visited you and you introduced us to your friend -another long-haired dude. looked like a rock star? like you, man. you were a fucking ROCK STAR when we were kids.

but freaked out, didn't I?
i was little.
they thought we were the same me and my brother.
they had us wear matching sweatsuits.
remember?
the were bright green with a blue stripe down the side.

she had shaved our heads the week before
me because i would get up and go to school without brushing or washing anything.
i think we both got it at the same time
but it was my fault.
my brother had '-pretty much-' straight hair
but my hair was a fucking nightmare.
it was harder in the morning, so i gave up for a while.

but she fucking shaved it.

remember when she did yours?
i do.
i wanted her dead.

so.
we're there
at Oneida
to see "Brother"

and this dude kneels down
when i am just beaming at you
like i was at from whicheth cool flow
freaked out to be at my big brother's school

BIGFANLOVEYOURWORK

dude says
"hey little dude, whats up?"
and puts out his hand at me

i thought the you had introduced me to this guy as a guitar player
...to a dude that was in your band...
and a i freaked out

and i looked at you
and then at him
and i knew i'd never be that cool
and i started crying


because - cool hair, man
COOL HAIR.

VERY IMPORTANT FOR ROCK DUDE IS COOL HAIR...and here i was....NO HAIR...too much.




i was like 9.
10.

i was fucking BALD.


i was trying to be cool.
i was trying to be you


just like my son is trying to be me.

i'm never going to make him cut his hair again.
i'm serious.
ever.


The Rock, man.
you gave a great review.
its still a model.
when we all play together, there is nothing more true.

I'm in the back of a car.
75 Nova or similar.
We're moving.
Joints keep coming.
The Budweiser between my legs has a conical top.
Journey's "Send her My Love" blares full and clear and loud from the speakers in the deck behind us.
I swim in the song, my head nodding forward.
Night. Midnight or later.
We're on a country road moving fast.
I nod and rock with the movement of the car, jostling against the girl next to me.
Joints keep coming.
They're smaller.
I take a sloppy pull from the beer and fumble for cigarettes.
I get one good one from the crushed pack and throw the rest in the floorboard.
My jeans are tight.
Ash in my beer and forget.
Another pull from the beer.
I put my hand on the girl's knee.
Her jeans are acid-washed.
She moves my hand off her knee and on to mine.
I try to look to my right to see her, but she's a blur of white billowy cotton, tanned skin, gold earrings and brown curls.
I can smell her a bit through the smoke and beer.
She smells good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LL3vmVjYjBQ&feature=fvw

It rather blows to be alone.

Sometimes it's good. Sometimes, if you really actually want to do something alone, its good.
Like read or write or play an instrument.

Or other stuff.

Generally though, it blows.

It blows to know that there probably isn't someone somewhere having trouble getting you out of their mind.
It is not a good thing to be left to only your thoughts and desires..and responsibilities.
Sometimes you just want to go back to bed.
Or drink.
Or both.
Or just sit there and keep clicking and clicking and clicking and waiting and wondering.
And getting fatter and older.

I think I'm going to go to Wal-Mart and I'm going to go to bed and drink.
Not necessarily in that order.

i knew a woman once
we danced
so slowly almost
not moving
but just enough
her head on my shoulder

the song was long
and i thought to joke
and moved
just enough to send the message
that if she was done
or felt awkward
i was okay with that

but no
she stayed
and i held her
and we danced
and we stepped
and turned around
moving
holding
we were there
and then
the song was over
and it was like waking
from a dream

Out here on the east end ain't nobody none too bright. There’s the Stevens boys what owns damn near everything and who knows what else. All kinds of characters roving around in jalopies looking for work and liquor. Somebody’s feedin em that chopped ham, keepin em regular like I reckon.

I should've left for the city bout 15 year ago but got turned around and stuck behind this plow for damn near ever. Hold a second while I take off these goddamned boots.

Can’t trudge around out here without a decent set of boots. The mud gets so thick in the spring it'll choke a mule. I ain’t never seen a mule.

When they make the wine they dance around on it and can’t stop till it’s all juiced out and what with their feet like they were dancing a clog or a jig.

I don’t need time for anything. It’ll just slip on anyhow and there just ain't no sense in trying to do nothing. I get up on the hill sometimes and just look and watch. It’s like that, the hill. You just want to stand there and feel it - where it is and what it’s saying about what you done to it.

Those goddamned vines can’t stand up to this kind of pressure. I’ll stop on the road and hack em out of strangers' land I hate em so bad. They’ll kill an oak or others but the poplars just drive right through em like a ramrod...lest the vines catch up and they do.

You leave a log laying any more than a few weeks out here in the spring and big thick green coils will start sproutin up under it -that’s them goddamned vines. They’ll grow a root bigger’n a hog leg if you let em.

But I got em chopped out. Went up there with a machete and an axe and run through two decent mowers takin em out.

Goddamned vines.

I can walk around wherever I want up there now - cept a couple steep spots I was feared of rollin the mower down. I left everything that was oak or bigger than 3" round. That old dead pine is bound to fall this year. Its about 30" at the base and I reckon bout 25 30 foot. Been dead for years and is loaded with early pinecones. Reckon she just gave up right during a big spring push and never dropped em. Still got most of her branches what the snow strips more of ever year.

She’ll go this year probly and take down Hamilton’s power line and his fence probly too. I can’t see no other way to fell it without some real manpower what I ain’t got and cain't get.

My saw's down anyway. Reckon a bad coil and no baffle and what with Stihl parts a steep as they are a feller’s well on to just do without.

But I’ll just stand there and look and smell the morning sometimes. Especially after a big rain with the brooks are running high and its just rush rush rush. Everything clean. Everything downstream. Everything somebody else's problem.

I’ll walk the perimeter, crossing over onto Hamilton’s place where he pushed his fence line over a couple feet into me over the old fencerow. That’s what a fellow does when he's trying get every cent that he can out of everything he knows around him. My granddaddy was that way. I know the type. You just let em take. They’ll stay within the law mostly.

Its tough back where the reservoir pond is. That terrain weren't meant for walkin and the barbed wire crosses the creek and makes it damn near impassable. But I’ll go back there in my slippers with a cup of coffee and get dew soaked just to make the round. Done it three times in about 6 year I reckon. Just want to walk back there and see what is.

See what is.

Reckon I’ll pull on this bottle a spell.

We were little boys. We went to elementary school together. We stood by the fence at the field house at Paris Elementary, hooked our fingers on the fence and watched the cars. We estimated horsepower. We knew some cars didn't have "pickup" while musclecars always did. We gave them voices as they passed. We made sounds. We laughed. We were little boys. We were friends.

We imitated the intro to The 6 Million Dollar Man. A crushed Mountain Dew can was Lee Majors; "WE CAN REBUILD HIM!!! {uncontrollable laughter} WE HAVE THE TECHNOLOGY!!!
We were genius.

We were pals, me and my buddy Jeff. We didn't give a shit what the other kids were doing. We kicked a can around or explored the boundary of the track and field area - the places where the other kids weren't. We were explorers.

My buddy Jeff got big in high school. I was a thin, sickly little drunken pothead and a smoker, but he got "thick." He told me once it was "Quit smoking, get thick." I was too much of a rockstar by that point to buy it. Smoking and being fucked up was more important than any physical attribute, but he knew. Him and his buddy Chuck knew.

I transferred to Bourbon County mainly because the white trash kids and then later the black kids were beating the shit out of me at Paris Elementary and then moreso at Southside. Jeff and Chuck had nothing to do with the bullying and were always friendly towards me, but i think they sort of watched from the sidelines. They just were somehow naturally immune from ridicule. I think nobody fucked with these guys because Chuck was bigger than everyone else and Jeff had this crazy brother that everyone either looked up to or was scared of. I also had a brother like that and he had a gaggle of friends that were just...i don't even know how to explain them. Nobody fucked with them, i know that. Between Andy J, Mike W and Mark K, nobody messed with these these cats. Mike was a computer genius, Andy was just menacing and Mark was crazy. My brother Dan and i used to taunt the other neighborhood kids, "You can bring the Army, Navy Air Force and Marines. Fuck it, I'll bring Andy J--------."
They always knew we'd win.

So, i jumped from Paris to Boco in 7th grade. I had begged my dad to switch me, since i was getting kneed in the gut during lunch and constantly fucked with between classes by the white trash and some black kids. I was this timid little knot-haired white kid. I was a natural target. He finally acquiesced and i came to Bourbon County Jr High in my second round of 7th grade, which i already failed once at Paris.
While at Boco Jr high i had my first girlfriend, Marsha, which i stupidly dumped for my second girlfriend Alicia and i then i discovered pot and Metal.

Metal.

Black Sabbath.
Iron Maiden.
Judas Priest.
Ozzy Osborne.
Alice Cooper.
Led Zeppelin.
The Scorpions.
Van Halen.
Motley Crue.
Etc...

Metal.

Around sophomore year - maybe 1987, Jeff and Chuck showed up at BCHS at the same time - having transferred from Paris. These guys knew more about intimidating other people than any kid in the school. They could laugh at anyone and didn't need to be with the 'in' crowd to be popular. They just were just somehow automatically the coolest guys in school. They dated sisters, the most beautiful girls in the school. They were unstoppable and me and my brothers were on the inside because we had all already been getting stoned together for years. Besides that, my older older brother Charlie and Jeff's older brother Mark had been friends. We smoked a lot of pot and drank a lot of whiskey and mostly laughed at Mark, who just seemed to be several steps ahead of everyone. Mark made a party. He was just fucking crazy and and we all just laughed or were scared.

So, Metal changed everything.
Everyone started trying to play Metal. Chuck was an amazing drummer because his dad had played forever - allegedly having toured with Rod Stewart and others. I got a guitar (My buddy Will traded a legendary broke-down, ragtop 71 Plymouth Satellite for two guitars which he later gave me before he went to the Navy because he was so tweaked on acid he was afraid he'd destroy them) and started to play some Metal. My brother Charlie had been to Oneida Baptist Institute where he had learned, via a list distributed to students, which music was prohibited at this boarding school in Clay county, Ky. It of course included

Black Sabbath.
Iron Maiden.
Judas Priest.
Ozzy Osborne.
Alice Cooper.
Led Zeppelin.
The Scorpions.
Van Halen.
Motley Crue.
Etc...

Charlie brought all of these tapes home and I learned.

Jeff learned too.
He and his buddy John bought some equipment - a Big Monster Peavey halfstack which Jeff would use to play The Metal and John played The Bass.
They tried.
They mainly pissed Chuck off. He was so advanced that no one could catch up.

As i said before, Jeff and Chuck dated sisters. Lisa and Tammy. They were the top of the heap, these girls. They all seemed like rock stars to the rest of us, though my brothers and i occasionally would run into our old peers and ..get stoned, jam, whatever. Maybe cruise around in my brother's 68 Chevy or later in Jeff''s 69 Camaro.

I think Lisa and Tammy both had Nissans. Tammy''s was white and Lisa's was red. Lisa's was a Pulsar i think. I wish i could remember what Tammy's was.

Anyway, rumor has it that Jeff and Chuck were racing each other in the sisters' cars on Hume Bedford Road one night when they came around a right-hand corner that was -and still may be- banked to the left. Chuck and Tammy made the curve, but Jeff and Lisa didn't. The red Nissan went tumbling through the fence and off into the field off the side of the road.

This was extremely fucked up.

I remember noticing Jeff's weird, bruised and blackened eyeball and Lisa's teary, quiet reverence while they gave school presentations on how fucked up and wrong drinking and driving can truly be...in the lobby of BCHS..during lunch with pics of the wreck everywhere.

They were sober after this.

Sometime after this, while walking in town I somehow scored a single joint -probably from "Hog Jowls" - and sought out my old friend Jeff. I was giddy. I had "bought pot". I Never "bought pot". I thought "If there is anyone I 'd dig getting stoned with , it'd be Jeff." so i stopped by his house. He was home alone. This was maybe midday on a Saturday. Maybe it was summer.

"Hey man - smoke this joint with me." I said, after hanging around for a few minutes.

"No way, man." he said. "I quit."
"Yeah?" i said.
"Yeah. Stone cold."
"You sure? Really? Come on."
"Nope. Clean. "
"Well , shit. Ok.

I pushed him a few more times that day to smoke this special joint with me.

He refused, though so we just hung around, watched MTV, listened to music, got Mark's Strat out and ogled at it. We never smoked that joint.

A few years later he showed up at the house one winter Saturday in that dark blue 69 Camaro. There was about a couple inches of snow on the ground. We took a ride - me, both of my brothers and Jeff in his car and we smoked that joint.

I got so high my face hurt from laughing. Jeff got so high he damn near wrecked the car on the way back from Lexington.

That was the last time i saw my buddy Jeff.