Monday, September 14, 2020

130920 - Extinction Chronicles ·

One can almost reach out and touch the misery of our world - an entirely unnecessary misery because so much of our want and solutions to that depravation have been well described by authorities · So why now 20 years into the “white man’s millennium” are we facing extinction? We know that people are happy when they are fed, but we feed them poisoned food because it is more profitable than promoting the happy preparation of wholesome food. The commercials we watch on media show opulent kitchens with happy couples surrounded by sumptuous foods, but the reality for most is a 7-11 minimart with a 3 day-old hot dog and a spongy bun, and we buy it - ‘cause we’re hungry, not for the food, but the convenience; why is that¿ We witness on our newsfeeds happy romance and giggling couples, but turn to porn when our mates shame our sexual appetites; why is that? We yearn for connection and sangha (community) but surround ourselves with sycophants who nod agreement with our confusion; why is that?


I have ideas and think about my own selfish loneliness more than is healthy, not to deprive you of any happiness you have found, but to demonstrate compassion to the “little boy” in me who suffers still about the question of life. “Suffers” is a strong word, one who is trying to pay attention would be more accurate. Oddly enough i am little different than the confused 3 year-old surrounded by bigger siblings, and ignored by harried adults, except for the fact i love still and have faith in the power of something i’ve only glimpsed through the windows of my upbringing and sampled with the limbs of my sometimes aware being. I like it, i like love, i like the feeling of being seen and appreciated, and even better i enjoy the feeling of loving another - the miracle of touching another with my own ability to love.


Not the dominance depicted in so much modern lore - that painful romantic thrall we all suffer from when it goes, but the happy face of a woman coupled with someone of whom she can take care. It is in our nature, i cannot count how many stories of women, i've gone to bat for faced with disrespect of men i knew naught of. Sitting here now, knowing how often i’d been “traded up for,” i feel kind of stupid - a lot stupid · but still willing. It’s all a mystery to me, and i like it like that. I realize this writing is as much about my passing unnoticed from the face of our planet; down to and including being prompted by an AI thug to include the possessive apostrophe just above in “its all a mystery to me.” How fucking goofy is it that an algorithm designed by techno-nazis who’ve adequately demonstrated their contempt for mankind in general, and human agency in particular is dictating syntax.


This morning, as our “surreptitious” eye-in-the-sky well knows, i communicated with the widow of a school-boy chum: when i say school-boy, i mean kindergarten, and i am now 65 turning 66, you do the math - it was more than awkward, for my friend has been dead less than 3 years, and he and i haven’t really known of each other, save a brief encounter where his younger sister was employed as a serving-wench at a dislocated meal at the house of my step-father’s mother nearly 40 year’s ago. I know that i learned at that time he was making his way refinishing furniture, a lucrative, but inherently dangerous occupation that apparently led to his early demise and my sad, short text exchange with his widow. I anticipate more, than not awkward exchanges in my own march toward death.


It is sad, because her husband Joe DiNatale was the kind of spirit one would want as friend in today’s dying world. He was deemed “incorrigible” and entrusted to the more stringent Military Academies popular at the time of our young upbringing. As i sit and reflect on the boyhood conversations in front of the sanctuary that was my childhood home about this dubious strategy of open revelation, i regret not possessing the strength or resources to say, “Joe, we will fight this together” - my cowardice, my shame · i am sorry Joe, i was only 9 but feel sorrow at your conviction. I am glad to learn from your widow that you enjoyed 30 years of happiness prior to your demise, but i gotta tell you, even in our last conversation in your mother’s garage about the success of your furniture re-finishing business i had grave doubts about the chemicals you employed to become rich - whether your lethal brain cancer correlates, we’ll never know, but i applaud you for running through the “consumer minefield” in search of happiness for you and yours - a loving friend from afar · 


jts 13/09/2020  

http://stoanartst.blogspot.com

reprinted with permission - all rights reserved

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