Dissonance

Tonight for the first time in many years, a song made me cry.  Brad Paisley’s “Last Time For Everything” struck a deep chord.  I was unprepared for it, and perhaps that was why it took me unawares and slipped beneath my guard.  Anyway, I wanted to share that with someone, anyone. It’s a fucking awesome song.  Even if it’s country.

Why is our mis-spent youth coupled with verity?  I sit here, in luxury, with the finest whiskeys (Jameson Black Barrel at the nonce) and ponder the spiritual hunger that has been so recently slated.

A dear friend (grown dearer in privation) stayed at my home for a few days.  In the evening we talked and talked, our wives growing weary and leaving us alone.  In the mornings we talked and talked, our wives growing weary and proceeding about their days. The summer days were departing, but leaving an Autemnal glory in pale blue skies and incandescent mornings with the sun spilling over foggy valleys and into our cups of artisinal Keurig coffee.

Our conversation ranged across epochs and continents.  I learned far more than I imparted, and now have a treasury of “leftovers” to consume over time.  We connected not only as man to man, but as Christian to Christian and as father to (wayward) son, as healer to patient, Westerner to Missionary, Merchant to Prophet, and, most importantly, friend to friend.

In that latter mode, I found the most Etruscan sympathy, far beyond what might have been gained at our ORHS reunion.  I found a spirit who shared the experience of seeing Star Wars at 9 years old.  A spirit who had lived under the Cold War threat, and participated in the slow demise of “the Ridge.”  Fellow travelers, who, despite disparate lives before and since, were bound by the crucible of youth.

I recognize that my garrulous and self-righteous verbosity repels, rather than attracts, those who might otherwise be partners in that intellectual exchange which, outside of marriage and confession, is the most human of all endeavors.  And perhaps, the insistence of limited time poured fuel on the fire of a resurrected adolescent relation.  But, I cannot see as anything else but Providential, the meteoric days that my friend spent enriching my life. 

In amicitia, veritas.  In veritas, vita.  In vita, salus.  

Weight

I am not Winston Churchill - whom I admire.  So don't get me wrong when speaking of him.  There is an immeasurable gulf between him and I.  

Though a medal-hunter, seeker of glory, taker of risks, he was also a man who, by a certain age, had acquired a great deal, and supported it through effort.  When he embarked upon the purchase of his estate, Chartwell, he went further than his resources, and though it was a home he loved, until his later years, it was always at risk.

Now, here was a man who could (and did) sustain the weight of an empire.  But, beset by "The Black Dog", he was also a man who, by all accounts was incredibly difficult to live with.  His wife bore the burden of their marriage with stoicism (and apparently, adultery), while with his children, it was a mixed bag of results.

Was it worth it?  The man not only (again) sustained an empire (and, to be honest, the western world), but sustained the estate of Chartwell, with all its attractions.  But was he a joy to his family?

Tonight I sit by the fire pit, watching the embers shift colors and the logs char into the texture of mottled brain tissue.  Overhead, the stars shine brightly, and the earth pays for those stars with its heat, and the night becomes frigid - crystalline.  My estate looms about me.  Far off, a watch dog barks & bays, perhaps warning of the coyotes that haunt this dale.  The distant hum of the interstate, the glowing lights of far-off subdivisions, and the deep, dark, black of the wooded landscape all lie beyond the flickering light of the fire.

Turning back toward the house, magnificent and alit, with ceiling fans turning behind paned windows, and string lights glowing beneath the pergola, the eaves of the roof lit from below by LED brilliance, my family sleeping within... what do I feel but weight.  The weight of all this... property.  And I, insignificant, insufficient, to sustain it.

Now, this is a mood.

Months from now, when the weather turns, and I float in the pool, beer in hand, floppy hat concealing my face from the sun, I might not feel the weight.  I might feel at home, at peace.

Months from now.

But for now.  The Black Dog.  And joy withheld.

BEARMAGEDDON

 Two posts in one day!?!?  Well, this second one is cheating, because it's simple the opening act of:

BEARMAGEDDON

 

JACKSON G. & JOHN S.    

 

 

MAIN CHARACTERS:

 

R.GRANT HAWTHORNE III: Grant is the 48 year old CEO and PRESIDENT of DYNARANGE INDUSTRIES, a multinational corporation heavily invested in tech.  He is a 6’3” caucasian, with a lean body, salt & pepper hair, narrow cheeks and intense grayish eyes.

 

DANE CHOWCLOUGH: Dane is the 42 year old OWNER/OPERATOR of OUTDOOR SPECIALITIES INC., a sporting goods store specializing in hunting/fishing supplies, including a private range for guided squirrel hunts.  Dane is a 5’10” caucasian and overweight, but powerfully built.  He has ginger hair and a massive ginger beard.

 

TEAK GRISTLE: Teak is a 37 year old hairdresser at SUPERCUTS.  He is a 5’9” caucasian with an unexceptional build, abnormally strong forearms, a Roman nose, green eyes, dirty blonde hair, and a thin goatee.

 

DAMION HOPKINS:  Damion is the 38 year old WEATHERMAN for WRGH TV.  He is a 6’0” African-american with a fit build, and closely cropped black hair.

 

HARRY FONDDIEU:  Harry is the 29 year old BROTHER-IN-LAW of DANE CHOWCLOUGH.  He has short-cropped brown hair, a well trimmed beard, a square jaw, and brown eyes.  He wears a red checkered flannel shirt over a Hard-Rock Café / Las Vegas T-shirt.

 

NILS MCKRACKEN:  Nils is a 85 year old HERMIT.  He is a 5’5” Caucasian with pale blue eyes, long wispy white hair and beard, and a prominent red nose.

 

MEGA-GRIZZLY:  Mega-Grizzly is 11’ tall, 900lbs and scary looking.

 

THE GREAT WHITE MALLARD:  The Great White Mallard is a very large specimen of a mallard duck, but very pale in color (almost white)

 

 

MINOR CHARACTERS:

 

GEORGE SMITH: George Smith is the HELICOPTER PILOT for R.GRANT HAWTHORNE III.  He wears a black jumpsuit and helmet so you can only see the lower part of his face.

 

KARATE TOM: A KUNG-FU INSTRUCTOR, wears a white Gi with the insignia of his Dojo

 

COWBOY TIMMINS: A RODEO HAND and ACTUAL COWBOY, dressed like a cowboy, with six-shooters and a lever-action rifle.

 

BROTHER FRANK: A CAPUCHIN MONK, trained in hand-to-hand fighting, he wears a brown robe and carries a bo-staff.

 

CHIEF GREYHAWK: A CHEROKEE INDIAN, dresses in buckskin, carries a large Bowie Knife

 

DAVE RANDOM: A BEST-BUY CLERK, wears a blue polo shirt and Dockers.  Has no weapons.

 

GOODMAN O’LUCKY: An ABORIGINAL AUSTRALIAN, wears a loin-cloth, has paint-decorated skin, wields a boomerang and a digeridoo that can lull animals to sleep.

 

DONNIE BOTTICELLI: An ITALIAN HIT-MAN, dressed in a dark suit and fedora.  Armed with a snub-nosed S&W chief-special.

 

 

 

SCENE ONE:

 

A flyover shot of the Rocky Mountains – pine trees stretching endlessly, with a road cut through the forest.  Possibly stolen footage from THE SHINING.  Opening credits.  Music by Barry Manilow.

 

Camera pans-up from a gravel parking lot to reveal GRANT, DANE, TEAK and DAMION standing next to the lowered tailgate of a gray DODGE RAM 4x4 Crew Cab.  Various hunting gear is in the back of the truck bed.

 

GRANT: “Are you sure you can put us on the game trail?”

 

DANE: “Damn right.  I been guidin’ hunts longer’n this boy’s been snappin’ towels”. DANE gestures at TEAK.

 

GRANT: “Well, I’m not sure what that means, but you came recommended.  Teak, Damion, are you ready.”

 

TEAK & DAMION (Together) “Yeah!”

 

GRANT: “All right then”

 

GRANT walks around to the driver’s side door, where the window is rolled down and we see HARRY FONDDIEU.

 

GRANT: “Harry, just wait for our call and then pick us up on the old logging road”

 

HARRY: “You got it, Mr. Hawthorne.”

 

GRANT: “Oh, and, Harry…”

 

HARRY: “Yes Mr. Hawthorne?”

GRANT: “You might just bring along a 12-back of PBR… cold, mind you.”

 

HARRY: “Anything you say, Mr. Hawthorne.”

 

GRANT: “Let’s roll!”

 

GRANT, DANE, TEAK, and DAMION grab rifles out of the back of the truck bed and sling them over their shoulders.  DANE, TEAK, and DAMION are wearing camouflage, all are of different patterns (mossy oak timber, realtree, natural gear, etc).  Each also has a ruck-sack and a walkie-talkie.  GRANT is distinguished from the others by his high brown leather riding boots, tan-colored corduroy pants, and forest-green shooting jacket with brown leather patches on the elbows, and padded shoulder.  GRANT and TEAK get into one side-by-side and DANE and DAMION get into another.  DANE drives off onto a trail out of the parking lot and into the woods.

 

PERSONAL EXPOSITION: As they drive along, the men enter into conversation.  Despite the fact that we saw GRANT and TEAK in one side-by-side, and DANE and DAMION in another, during the following conversations, their positions in the two vehicles change from shot to shot.

 

TEAK: “It sure was nice of you to invite me on this hunting trip, Mr. Hawthorne.  I mean, it’s not often that a big CEO of a multibillion dollar tech firm will invite a guy hunting, just because he cuts his hair.  I mean, I guess I never even saw a big CEO come into Supercuts until you did.  Thanks a lot, Mr. Hawthorne.”

 

GRANT: “You might not thank me if we don’t see any game today.”

 

[both men laugh]

 

GRANT: “But seriously, Teak, you’ll find I’m not like other CEO’s of multibillion dollar tech companies.  When I founded Dynarange, it wasn’t just to make money, it was to make a difference.  And I find that, living in my mansion, I’ve lost touch with the regular guy.  The kind of guy that I used to be.  It’s like my grand-dad used to say – the wind can blow across an entire country, but it’s still the same wind.  That’s how I think of myself, Teak.  Like the wind.”

 

DAMION: “Did somebody say wind?  I see a cold front moving in from the plains and that’s going to bring in some fast moving air.”

 

[everyone laughs]

 

GRANT: “That’s what I get for inviting a meteorologist on this little hunting trip.”

 

DAMION [chuckling]: “Thanks for the compliment, Grant, but I’m really just a weatherman.  No high-fallutin’ meteorology degree for me.”

 

DANE: “Hey, a least you reckon’ you’re just a TV personality, and not one of them scientist people like that guy on the Weather Channel, pertending that he knows what the weather’s gonna do when we all know damn well ain’t none-of-em do.”

 

GRANT: “Slow down there, Mr. Chowclough – no need to ruffle Damion’s feathers.  I might take it a little more carefully – Damion Hopkins was the hardest hitting defensive back that the PAC-12 ever saw, before he became a weatherman.  I’d lay good odds that he could still deliver a mean tackle.”

 

DANE: “Hey, hey, no offense.  Look, I’m just a dumb old redneck running a sporting goods store and guide service.  If I wanna know the weather, I look at one of them wooly-worms or my weather stone.”

 

DAMION: “Weather stone?  I’d like to know more about that.”

 

DANE: “Well, ya’ see, I hang this rock from a tree branch and it tells me the weather.  If it’s swingin’ back & forth, I know there’s gonna be wind.  If it’s wet, I know it’s a rainin’.  If there’s snow on it, well, you can count on snow…”

 

[everyone laughs]

 

GRANT: “I hope you’re as good at finding game as you are at spinning yarns, Mr. Chowclough.”

 

MONTAGE: The side-by-sides driving down trails, up trails, through streams.  Shots of each of the four men stalking through the trees with their guns at the ready.  In some shots, they have deer-rifles, in others they have crossbows, shotguns, or assault rifles.  There is no explanation for why their weapons keep changing.  Occasional shot of DANE bending over, picking up some dirt and sniffing it, picking up a brown nugget of something and licking it, putting his finger in the air to sense the wind, sniffing the air, etc.  Time-lapse shot of the sun going past noon and shadows lengthening.

 

GRANT: “Well, Mr. Chowclough, you were pretty confident you could put us on our prey.”

 

DANE: “Dammit Mr. Hawthorne, I just don’t know what’s got into ‘em.  We oughta have seen a half-dozen on these here game trails.  I done all the trackin’ I could but I ain’t been able to find no signs that ain’t a week old.  It ain’t natural.”

 

TEAK: “Do you hunt bear often, Dane?”

 

DANE: “Not as often as other critters, but often enough.”

 

The four men have paused at the edge of a large clearing – apparently a meadow that has not returned back to the forest.  They have a clear line of sight to where the forest resumes, about four-hundred yards away, where the trees abruptly begin and climb into a range of mountains.

 

TEAK: “Do you think a call might help?”

 

DANE: “Whaddya mean, a call?”

 

TEAK: “Well, when Mr. Hawthorne invited me bear hunting, I went on the internet and ordered this Indian bear call.”

 

GRANT: “What’s this?  Where is this bear call?”

 

TEAK: “It’s right here in this package – I haven’t opened it yet.”

 

TEAK pulls a rectangular thin-cardboard box out of his rucksack.  Along one side of the box is written: “BEAR CALL.”  He hands it to GRANT.

 

GRANT: “Well, Teak…”

 

TEAK: “Yes Mr. Hawthorne?”

 

GRANT: “You were right to call it an Indian Bear call.  Right here on the box it says ‘made in India.”

 

[everyone laughs]

 

DANE: “Lemme see that.”

 

GRANT hands him the box and DANE opens it, sliding out a blue plastic tube that has been pushed through two slits cut into a construction-paper cutout of a bear.  The tube is about six-inches long and has a couple of holes cut in it like a flute.  DANE’s mouth drops open.  Everyone (except for TEAK) stares at it before bursting out laughing.  DANE slaps TEAK on the back.

 

DANE: “How embarrassing!”

 

DAMION: “I bet it barely works!”

 

GRANT: “If you want your money back, you’ll have to engage a barrister.”

 

TEAK: “Alright, very funny guys.”

 

TEAK picks up the tube from where DANE has dropped it in the dirt.  While the others are bent over with hilarity, TEAK lifts the tube to his lips and blows into it.  A high-pitch, awful sound comes from it, like someone playing a recorder-badly.  This makes the other three laugh all the more.  TEAK puts the tube in his jacket pocket.

 

TEAK: “Seriously guys?”

 

The others slowly stop laughing, and DANE stands up, wiping tears from his eyes.  Then he stops, looking across the pasture.

 

DANE: “Mr. Hawthorne,”

 

GRANT: “Yes, Dane”

 

DANE: “Look!”

 

DANE is pointing across the pasture.  At the far end, (roughly four-hundred yards away), the leaves of a single tree are shaking.

 

DANE: “Ya see – that there’s what them there bears go and do when they’re scratchin’ themselves on a tree.  I’d betcha dollars to donuts that there’s a bear there at the bottom of that tree, just a scratchin’!”

 

GRANT: “Well done, Dane.  We should start our approach by…”

 

TEAK: “Look there!  Another one”

 

To the right of the first tree, another is shaking, the silvery underbellies of its leaves flashing about.  

 

DAMION: “And another!”

 

DANE: “Damn!  All of ‘ems shakin!”

 

Sure enough, it is as if the entire forest has come alive.  Flyover shot of the trees across the pasture shaking as if a wind is blowing through the entire forest.

 

 

Six Years

It's been six years since the cancer diagnosis and the beginning of treatments.  I've just rediscovered this blog, not so much because I was thinking about cancer, but because I'm self-censoring my facebook feed, where it was my wont to dish out periodic political tirades amidst the family photos.  Also, as I slowly shut down my social media and limit my business with the big-tech censors, that particular creative outlet will likely go away.

My twitter account is gone, I've ended various Apple subscriptions, decided to buy a Garmin golf watch instead of a new Apple watch, cancelled Apple TV+, long ago cancelled Netflix and Hulu, and trying my hardest to do zero business with Amazon.  I can't quite figure out how to get back at Google (which owns Blogger).  I take my boycotts, and my buycotts seriously.  I haven't done business with Gillette since their "toxic manhood" commercials, try my best to avoid P&G due to their Rosie O'Donnell support about 15 years ago, and avoid Walgreens like the plague due to their support of certain noxious causes two decades ago.

It gets harder and harder to maintain principles in a world of mutual funds and investments, but speaking with our money is our second most powerful way of speaking.

The first of course, being prayer.   

Some might think that my reaction to the Amazon/Google/Apple/Twitter shut down of Trump & Trumper voices is somehow an endorsement of those voices.  Far from it.  But the speech most in need of protection, is the speech that is most offensive.  Ideas are dangerous.  That is why the thugs & bullies of both left and right seek to shut it down and make only certain ideas acceptable.  Fahrenheit 451, Brave New World, Animal Farm, Bread & Wine, 1984, Demons, etc., etc., all understand this and warn against it.  The ascendent violent statists, currently on the Left, know that the only way they permanently secure power is to prevent competing ideas from gaining attention & respect.  This is particularly true on the Left, because their ideas are so very, very bad.  Sure they package them in social justice, but that is a thin veneer over the vicious slave-world they are trying to build.

Anyway, their gates of hell shall not prevail.

The Deep

 As a child, I was not afraid of heights - I was afraid of depths.  My mother would sacrifice her summer mornings, as her winter mornings, summer days, winter days, spring days, autumn mornings, and the like, in endless hours of waiting in a pea-green Pontiac Catalina (preceded by a NASA-blue Dodge), while her children pursued one of any of the activities for which they were destined to be sub-par.  Tennis.  Football.  Baseball.  Dancing (not me, my sister), and of course... swimming.

In Oak Ridge, TN, lurks the silent, invisible force; the Municipal Pool.  Spring-fed.  Of legend, constructed by the same men who built the atom bomb.  But not, like the atom-bomb, to burn and destroy, but to freeze and destroy.

So many cold-mornings in July.  What was more terrifying?  The icy cold of the water?  The innumerable spiders and other unidentifiable insects floating on the surface of the water?  Or the frigid, unrecoverable depths of... the Deep End.

I remember standing in the shade of the south end of the pool - the Deep End side, where for some unknowable reason, the architects of that torture device had chosen to shade the coldest part of the pool.  There we stood.  Unreasoning creatures.  Listening, shivering, listening to instructions on the various strokes we were to take.  While below.  Cold.  Deep blue.  Glistening.  The bottom.  The bottom that you could never reach, for the pressure in your ears would become too much.  But the bottom that beckoned to you.  called to you.

The Siren.

I heard the siren again on a Norwegian cruise, sailing from Miami to the Bahamas.  As I walked the deck at night, while my wife played blackjack on the casino deck, and my dress shoes clicked and clacked.  I stared over the rail, saw the waves lightened by the ship, and so quickly turning to blackened nothingness outside the feeble lights.  How the ocean called to me.  How the depths called to me.  Terror and seduction.

So tonight, as I walked by the little pool in my backyard, in 46 degrees (F), with my Labrador by my side, I gazed into the preternatural light of the pool's LED's, lighting the vacuum robot that skims the bottom of the pool in an eldritch green.  Though only 8 feet, and not even a fathom, there were those depths.  Always calling, calling, calling.

Xanadu

Four years since my last blogpost.  Sitting here watching Olivia Newton John in one of the worst movies of all time.  A glass of Jack & Coke by my side.  America in flames, the pandemic raging.  A sudden end to my 28 year career on the horizon.  One child in college, one in high school, and two more in little girl ice skating pony world.  A faithful wife asleep in a spacious house in the neiderrhine of east TN.  A blackened soul, struggling toward the light, but a parched earth that rejects the droplets that might otherwise transform.  Each day a question, but that question changed with time from why to what.

There’s something about Xanadu that speaks deeply to man’s soul.  The blonde beauty of the 70’s, bright sparks flying from every corner, youth, hope, and the eternal expulsion of the preceding centuries.  It still feels real, from inside.  But through a more objective lens, from above, God... how sad, how empty.  Those pretty people.  Those bright colors.  Parquet floors and roller skates.  Dead now, or dying.  That ‘40’s juxtaposition of Xanadu captures it beautifully - the dirge of Gene Kelly’s world contretemps to the new wave flash-in-pan. Memento mori.... memento mori.