Bon matin, Je suis Henrik

Ok, I'm awake that's a good start, I appear to be alive though my head is screaming at me that I am at least close to a near death experience. However, I do not appear to be at home, which is a bit disorienting. I am in a bed, just not my bed, also a bit of a puzzler. As I try to piece together the jigsaw puzzle of the last 12 hours, I notice that not only am I not in my bed, but I seem to have a companion in the bed I am occupying. Until my eyes gain the focus that my mind seems to lack, all they are is a vague, womanly shaped lump on the far size of, what I can only assume, is their bed. Think! idiot. Think! You went to the bar, no surprise there, you got drunk, again no shock, you saw a girl? You talked to a girl? You went home with a girl? These last three items on the list of my evenings "to do list" seem a bit hazy. Surely the memories exist, it is just a matter of finding the right neural pathway, kicking it open, and accessing them. Hopefully, before my companion wakes up, and starts asking what, I can only assume will be, some very embarrassing questions.

"Live a life of sin," he says," life is no fun in a boring office pushing paper and people around from one inbox to the other" he says. Fine, It seems I attempted to follow that advice a little too vigorously last night, and am now about to pay for the wages of my sin. And as the morning light begins to limp into the room of the girl I don't remember, would probably like to forget, but happen to be lying next to, those wages seem a bit on the high side, and I am not sure I am going to be able to pay them, not all at once at least. A small groan escapes my lips as I shift myself slightly further away from my latest playmate, and a returning moan/snore/grunt emanates from her in reply. She probably has a name, she probably told you her name, and she is sure as fuck probably expecting you to have remembered that name, pity that you don't. It is probably going to cause a few awkward moments of conversation before she hurls insults at you, and then you, out of the door. Susan? Ann? Katie? Jane? no, no, no, and no. Maybe Allison? Allison's a common enough name right? Right, it's Allison. Peering over to look at her, I see blond hair, and a not unpleasing shape, that's encouraging, but blond? I'm not much of a fan of blonds even drunk GI knows this, is this a way of adding some flavour to our life of sin? The bastard should be here to sort his mess out for himself, but no I had to wake up sober. Pity that.

Well, she looks a bit like an Allison (with two L's), whatever Allison's are supposed to look like, therefore we will go with Allison, unless of course I can somehow extract myself from her bed, and her house (located gods know where), figure out how I got here, and how I'm getting home, without waking her up. Hmm, all that seems a bit unlikely, and would require the luck of the entire fucking Republic of Ireland. Pity that I'm also not Irish. Luck, which may or may not have gotten me into this mess, has probably left the building, and forgot to take me with it in its hasty departure. The good news, if there is to be any good news, is that sleeping in my contacts has at least left me able to see, the bad news is I think my eyeballs may fall out from the experience. If you can see, you can find your pants right? If you can find your pants, you can make a quick and dignified exit right? Let's hope Allison is a deep sleeper, or still drunk. Either one will serve.

She seems to be deeply drooling the drool of what will soon become remorse, into some brightly coloured pillow of will become the pillow of regret, and fortune favours the brave, this seems a good time to collect my wits, and my clothes and get the hell out of here. Quietly, and quickly, for the this isn't the first time I've gotten dressed in the dark, I find the majority of my clothes, enough to pass as decent if not respectable, and start trying to navigate the maze of the house that I need to escape from, and sharply.  Allison, or whatever her name is, groans a couple of times, and shifts a little too much for my comfort, like a woman coming dangerously close to waking all the way up, and expecting me to be by her side in some happy state of mutual bliss, rather than the bounder standing next to her bed with his shoes in his hand, ready to hare it the fuck out of there like some thief that just nicked the good silver, and is headed towards the nearest pawn shop in hopes of a payday that will fund a lovely day at the races.

"Back to sleep, Allison" I coo reassuringly, like some parent trying to coax a baby with the colic to calm down, and let me get some bleeding sleep as well. Thank fuck it seems to have worked, she rolls back over and nestles deeper into the bed, and seems to be asleep for the duration, or at least the duration I need to get out of here. Out of the bedroom down the hall, a longing look at the bathroom because I have to piss like a rushing racehorse, but can't risk all that noise.  Wait, what the hell was that noise? Stop, take a listen, and a deep breath. Figment of your over active imagination old boy, no noise coming from the bedroom. Allison is sleeping the sleep of the dead, or the dead drunk, whichever either one is to my advantage. Wait, godsdamit, that was a noise, it's coming from some other room. Jesus, does Allison have a roommate, or a child, or maybe it's just a dog. That's it a dog, she seemed the type to have a dog.

Laughing at my own overly developed sense of paranoia, I continue my stealthy escape from this sticky situation, and head for what I hope is the back door, a person in my position should leave by the back door, show some respect after all.  Back doors are my type of fellow's friend, and I eventually figure out which direction to head, and hear more noise. Fuck me that was no dog, unless Allison possesses a dog that can sing, in which case awesome, but highly unlikely. This has to be a roommate right? Not a child, please jesus not a child, that will be way too difficult to explain, or not some elderly aunt that came over to cook her a surprise breakfast, also very tricky to explain to her who I am, why I am here, why I am leaving with my shoes in my hand, and why I don't like my eggs over easy.

It dawns upon my, not quite fully functioning, brain that I am now trapped. Trapped between "the devil" that is Allison and her bed, and the "deep, blue sea" that is the unknown person in the kitchen blocking my access to the back door. Back doors love them some kitchens.  Ignoring the "better the devil you know, than the one you don't" theory, I attempt to redirect my escape route to the front door, knowing that my odds of success have been drastically reduced. Still hope springs eternal right? Stranger thinks have happened, I mean they made 7 Fast and Furious films right?

Sadly, the little luck I had retained from last night decided, at this unfortunate moment, to run out, and not take me with it. For that was the moment that the occupier of the kitchen, the singer of morning songs came around the corner coffee mug in one hand and wearing nothing but their mortal sins for cover. "Jesus Christ!  Ladislaw!!! What in the ever loving fuck are you doing here? What the hell happened last night, I thought you had climbed out of a tart's bed and wasn't returning?" Before Ladislaw, looking very bemused could reply, Allison (which as it turns out that not her actual name) came around from the other corner, and said "well, hello lovers, glorious morning isn't it? Oh, excuse my rudeness Ladislaw this is Henrik (pointing at me)." Henrik, this is Ladislaw."

Ladislaw, that glorious bastard, stuck out their hand and with a wink as broad as the Mississippi River said "Damn glad to meet your Henrik, I'm afraid that I had rather forgotten your name in all the confusion, and err stuff last night." And that is how not Allison, to this day, thinks I first met Ladislaw. It certainly wasn't, but that is a tale for another time. So much for waking up with no one to answer to, and nothing to apologize for.

St. Christopher is Lost

I was given a specific assignment for my next blog post, and I appreciated that since my last one was mostly about how difficult it is currently for me to come up with ideas. Thankfully this assignment was more of a vague question and less of a demand for an exegesis, so you'll all be spared my less than brilliant literary analysis.

"Now I lost my St Christopher, now that I've kissed her."

The Inquisitor takes a more optimistic view of this line than I do. St Christopher is indeed the patron saint of travelers (as well as of poor mortals suffering from a toothache as well, but that's a subject for another day...). Inquisitor likes to think that the poet doesn't need the St Christopher any more because he has found someone to take its place. But the poet of the song didn't abandon his St Christopher or it lay aside, he lost it. Its not tucked safely in the top drawer of his desk. It is lost.  Which leads me to believe that he too is now lost. If the St Christopher was protection during his travels, then he no longer has it and is adrift on the tide. Being lost, as Inquisitor says, has its own kind of reckless appeal. There is a great deal to be learned and experienced when one is lost.  It is the stuff of fantasy... to get in your car, leave your life behind, and drive as far as you can go. New people to meet, sights to see, food to eat.  The desire for those things is one that most of us don't lose, in fact it seems to get stronger with age.

However, I have spent a great amount of time actually lost. Like, I took a wrong turn on the way to a place I've been seventy-five times and now I'm in Mississippi, lost. My sense of direction is bad enough as to be almost a disability. GPS directions on the iPhone have been an absolute life saver for me, not to mention salvaging my dignity from the scrap-heap of having to call my father repeatedly and try to tell him where I am so he can talk me through getting home. So, unfortunately, I know all too well what getting lost feels like.

The difference is that Inquisitor is lost on a solitary and exciting adventure. He is lost on purpose and with a purpose.  I'm usually lost and therefore late to wherever I'm supposed to be and panicked because someone (my mother or my friend or my child) is going to be upset about that. Lost, for me, brings no adventures and no lessons... It brings stress and anger and too many gray hairs. So I envy Inquisitor his ability to get lost and embrace it.

And maybe that is why I read that line so differently. Our poet has kissed the girl and been spun out into space by it. And it is a Romantic (Capitol R) idea that she may take the place of his St Christopher and now anchor him to earth. But that sort of cataclysm holds no appeal for me. I see only that his former anchor is gone and he is lost... And all of the accompanying stress and anger and gray hair that go with it. More than likely this girl is nothing special and will leave the poet high and dry when someone with a steady paycheck comes along. Then he'll be, without her and without his St Christopher, well and truly screwed.

The line is beautiful and heartbreaking, like most of my favorite poems. But in life, unlike in poetry, I prefer to turn on my GPS and not take the wrong turns. Wrong turns do tend to lead us to tarts' beds on occasion, and as I have climbed out of one in order to write this, I'm going to stay out.

You and I

I suppose I should start with an apology for drowning, it seems odd to have to do, but for reasons that I somewhat understand, you seem to be holding a grudge against me for drowning. Trust me, when I slipped into the W____ River that night 19 years ago, I had no intention of drowning. It was not a suicide, it was a lark, a spur of the moment decision that tragically turned into the last decision I ever made. I drowned that night in Memphis, and it took nearly 5 days for my body to be found. I took my voice, and my talent out of the world, but it was by accident. We live in a culture that kills artists, it wants them to die, people that talk poetically are devalued, and while culture didn't kill me that night, the river did, it was bound to happen sooner rather than later.  Therefore, I apologize for drowning, I hope that you accept this letter as a mea culpa, and as our 'last goodbye.'


I was an artist, and I carried a light that you refused to carry yourself. You admired me and you let it stifle your art. We all do it, I did it, and you will do it again with someone else, but your art, while not music like mine, is still art. You let me carry the light that you were afraid to carry yourself. But, I drowned, and now it is up to you to pick up that light, and maybe carry for yourself. If you are lucky, and I hope to fuck you are, then you might even carry (if only a little way) for other people as well. Be the inspiration you wanted me to continue to be, you are still alive, and can do it much easier than I can. There are people who tell you regularly that you are a writer, you scoff, and pretend you're not, and maybe you believe that deep down in your soul. People tell you that it must be a terrible place inside your mind, and I get that. I understand that it really is a terribly confusing place inside there. There are these half-formed ideas screaming at you like backbench members of British Parliament trying to shout down the Prime Minister's speech that they disagree with. These ideas aren't arguing with you, they aren't fighting with you, they are pleading with you, "write me DOWN, godsdamnit.."

I understand you try, you do what you think is your best, when we both know you could do far, far better. You let the critic's stones and arrows wound you too deeply, and retreat into sullen silence, and refuse to write. By doing that you let them win, they silence you, and the light you need to be carrying is extinguished. Here's a little quote that explains it much better than I could, not that you didn't already know this, but sometimes we all need reminding of the obvious.

 "In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little, yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read. But the bitter truth we critics must face, is that in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism designating it so."

 It is like abusive parent, that adore the oldest child, but give them the worst of their behavior, be prepared to get it, accept it, and move on. It is one price you are going to have to pay, if you want to express yourself poetically, and try to create art.  It is not the only one, there will be others, and you will have to pay them as well. Maybe, all your art is just a dream your soul is having in order to reach out to other people in order to communicate with them from a safe distance. You are going to have to close that distance, and get close to a few of those people, and it's going to hurt. They are going to love you, adore you, and then condemn you, but never truly understand you, and that's fine. That is called living, and you have to do it, because I can't, I drowned.

Don't stay with me under these waves tonight, the river that took my life is mere miles from where you live right now. The city that was the last stop on the tour of my life, is where you are living yours. I just happened to get there about 6 years earlier than you did, you walk the same streets I did.  You have, I am certain, taken the time to find the places that you know I hung out, to visit, and ponder, in your anger, why I am not around to carry that light for you anymore. Don't give yourself up to the desperate trend of hero worship. I was no hero, and neither are you. But you can try to be, and maybe you will be to someone like I seem to be for you. More than likely, you won't ever be as "famous" as I was, and that's ok, you don't really want to be. You don't create mass art, you create personal art, don't want to be famous without content, that is as awful as awful can be. You don't use your physical voice, but you still have one. People have told you that when they read you, that they can hear your voice like you are talking to them, that my friend, is a quality to be admired, and exploited. If you are in their head, then you are halfway into their hearts.

Don't let those slings and arrows wound you too deeply, that you reach for that gun. There will be someone who finally loves you for real, when you are out of fuel and understanding, unfreeze your heart, and go get her. She won't just dawdle there in the middle distance waiting for you to get your shit together. She will be worth having, but you have to not be afraid. You might die a little in your art, and that's fine, art is, in many ways, dying in a very public, very poetic way. You will climb into an empty bed far, far too many nights, but those lonely nights will be worth it, they will teach you the value of the nights that she climbs into bed with you, if you are lucky. You will create many an artistic moment with her. Spend nights making love, stripping your ego down, expressing yourself wordlessly, collaborating on a moment that is inspirational in a way you can never imagine.

Pay the cost for the life of sin that your art (in many ways) forces you to lead. Good stories, like good songs, rarely come from working some office job for the majority of your adult life whilst shuffling paper, and people from one inbox to another. Don't let the fact that the rent is due deter you from living the live you art is going to demand of you. It is a demand, and it is a price you are going to have to pay, whether you like it or not. The rent, in the grand scheme of things, isn't.  You are certainly going to have to keep body and soul together, but don't sacrifice one for the benefit of the other. Of course, this is easy for me to say/write, for two reasons. One, I'm dead, I've felt the soil falling over my head and the cares of this mortal coil are no longer of any concern to me, Secondly, I had talent, and the guts to try to live by it. I am not so sure you do, and that, dream brother, is your tragedy to live, I am sorry for you and for it, but there is fuck all I can do about it. Even were I alive, and I know you really wish I was, we would have never crossed paths. Therefore, any help I could have provided you would have been minimal at best. This is, at the end of the day, your burden you are going to have to bear it.

As you stand there in the half light looking out upon the river that took my life, I hope you understand that you will never happen unless you choose to happen. Let the sea (river) take me again, say your last goodbye to me, let go of the resentment you have at me dying, go kiss her out of desire, not consolation, and carry the light I dropped in front of you. It must needs doing, and I can only hope you choose to do it. The risk is worth the reward, and when you die, and trust me you will, and it will be much too soon, someone like you might just look back upon your (wasted) life as well spent, look down at the light that you have dropped, pick it up, and carry it forward for you, for me, for all of us looking for a state of grace in our art.  

your dream brother,

JB

Lost, one Saint Christopher

Now I lost my Saint Christopher now that I've kissed her

My musical tastes were once described by someone who knew them well at the time, as being of two types, death music and hate music. I am not exactly sure they aren't the same, but after some careful consideration, I figure that assessment was pretty close to the mark.  I like to think my tastes have, unlike me, matured over the years, but they probably haven't. I would maybe tweak the variety to add "thinking music" but that probably still falls into the former two types as well.

The above quote is from a song called Tom Traubert's Blues by a fellow by the name of Tom Waits. It is a lovely song, and you should give it several listens, it's imagery will make you wish you had one hundredth the talent of M. Waits. I lack even that much talent, but I can still appreciate the song, and the story it is telling with such amazing power. My collaborator, Ladislaw, from what I have been able to tell during our brief time as collaborators, has musical tastes that border on the awful.. I did not like the idea of attempting to impose my own taste upon them, but some times people need saving from themselves.

One of the first songs I recommended to Ladislaw was Tom Traubert's Blues or as they know it Waltzing Matilda (it's other title), they loved it (as if I would recommend a bad song), and we've had several listens to it since. I explained that I had a favorite line in the song, what that line was, and how one day I should write something expanding on it. Well, that has never happened, and it may or may not ever happen, but the theory is sound. Ladislaw chose the above quote from the song as their favorite line, and this post is a small, terrible tale about what that meant.

I am a card carrying cynic, and a bit of a brooder by nature. I have been called gloomy by a few people, the few people that actually know me, and I figure that they would have a pretty good idea. It has has been said of me that "he doesn't like a lot of people, but those he likes, he likes." A pretty good summing up of my view on the world. Trust is a very valuable commodity, and I do not trade in it particularly well or often. However, once you obtain it (like some sort of knighthood) it is pretty much yours, barring some unforeseen disaster, for life. It is not given lightly, nor should it be received lightly. It is just the way I operate in the world.  The "truthful slander" of pessimist has been hurled at me by quite a few people, and in the main, I don't believe it was intended to be a compliment. I am a huge (not just in size) fan of Arthur Schopenhauer. Herr Schopenhauer is not for the faint of heart, and one of the things he is known for is the idea of "cosmic pessimism." It seemed brilliant when I first read about it decades ago, and nothing in the intervening years has happened to change my opinion of it. I will leave it up to the curious among you to Google it at your leisure, if you so choose, if not well then you are just reinforcing the theory. It need not detain us here.

Since we had nothing of any real importance to do, Ladislaw, and I discussed what that line meant. I am of the opinion that since St. Christopher is, among other things, the patron saint of travelers, that the fellow in the song lost his St. Christopher after kissing "her' because he has found love right in front of him, and no longer needs to wander. Wandering is a lovely thing, and I have been known to take a good, solid wander from time to time. Some times in the hope of finding something, some times in the hopes of just getting lost. Being lost is, in many ways, both a terrifying, and wonderful experience. Terrifying in the sense that, you've no clue where in the universe you are, and no real idea how to get back to where you think you belong. If you belong anywhere at all.  Being lost is a lot harder to do in this day and age, but I highly recommend it. Get lost, but do it properly, by that I mean get really fucking lost, get lost at night, get lost at night in a rainstorm, and get lost at night, in a rainstorm, in a shitty part of town. You will, if you are sober enough to form the thought, start to think that being lost isn't exactly what you had planned in the first place, and you might even want your mother, or at least some other warm, welcoming companion.

However, being lost can be, if done correctly, a wonderful experience. Lost can be freedom. If done properly, lost is the lovely state of having no one to answer to, and nothing to apologize for. No one knows (or likely cares) where you are, and no one will come looking for you to add the weight of the world to your wandering shoulders. Lost is a very personal thing, and you can choose how lost you want to be. Do you want to be lost to the entire world, or just a portion of it? You can with the push of a few buttons give your location to whomever you chose, or at least a general idea of where you think you are. Your last known whereabouts given to the right person, can be a lovely starting point to a wonderful, shared, and exciting time.  Or, do you just want to be lost to a certain group of people? Your boss, your annoying as fuck co-workers, the bank, the student loan people, wives or husband (your own or other people's), crazy ex-girl or boy friends who stalk you even whilst saying they hate you, or that group of clowns that beat you up in grade school. There are an infinite number of groups or people that you prefer to think of you as lost.

The word planet comes from some impossible to pronounce or type Greek word that loosely translates as "wandering star." I like to think of all of us as wandering stars, and it is upon our wander through the universe of life that we encounter other wandering stars. Some we like, most we probably don't, some we have to try to avoid collision with, and some that we attempt to wander in the same direction as for as long as possible. It is your wander, it is your Saint Christopher, and hopefully (if you are very, very lucky) you get to lose your Saint Christopher after you kiss her (or him), and get to wander a lot less for a while (maybe a good long while, but nothing is written in stone). Enjoy that wander, but remember you are, in many terrifying and wonderful ways still lost.

P.S.   I was going to expound upon Ladislaw's theory, as told to me, about their favorite line, but decided to let them do it for themselves. After all, it is their theory, and they are quite capable of writing it themselves. Therefore, Ladislaw, when you climb out of whatever tart's bed you are warming for the nonce, and get sober enough to form what passes, for you, coherent thought, you are now welcome to write your reply. I am sure our vast readership awaits with bated (not wasted) breath.

A new first time

Introducing ones self to a group of strangers is always awkward, no matter how clever you are. And I'm not very clever, but rest assured that I am a real person, despite allusions to the contrary, and not a figment of anyone's imagination. The hard work of introduction was already done for me in a previous post and expectations were set intimidatingly high, so it's probably past time for me to contribute something. 

I had no intention, when I volunteered my services as a grammar nazi, of being recruited for actual material. But once the invitation was extended, I couldn't resist. In a past life, I wrote every day. It was therapy and expression and entertainment all rolled into one and I loved it. But then I got a real job and a real life and got distracted by them. So it has been a long time since I was in the habit of gathering and storing up ideas to write about. But like a fat squirrel hiding nuts for winter, I'm hopeful that the instinct will come back to me. Ideas for poetry have always seemed the easiest. One image or a single idea can get you through a whole sonnet. And you only need half of an idea for anything shorter than that. I've written some truly terribly poetry in my time, but I maintain that the ideas were good. And ideas for fiction are pretty simple too. Just make something up and run with it as far as it takes you. None of this guarantees that the end result will be worth reading, of course. It only means that something does get written. I've never written anything like a blog, so my apologies in advance if my contributions bring down  the atmosphere of this establishment. If I wait for a good idea to strike, we'll all be a thousand years old before I write anything. So I'm just going to tell a story and let you decide if it's any good.

When I graduated from high school, to have called me a nerd would have been understating things dramatically. I made Anthony Michael Hall look worldly and sophisticated. And in the course of my sometimes-painful nerd trajectory, the July before I went to college, I was awarded a trip to Arizona for super-geek summer camp called The American Academy of Achievement. It was a week of lectures and seminars given by speakers who had supposedly accomplished something noteworthy. Most of the other participants skipped the speakers and sat by the pool sipping fruity drinks. But I was a geek among geeks and never missed a lecture. The guest list was a little bizarre in retrospect... Who thought it was a good idea to put Laurin Hill and several five star generals on the same agenda? I don't remember much about any of the speakers except that one spilled his coffee all over the podium. However, on the last night, there was a banquet. We all got dressed up and had assigned seats at fancy tables. There was a speaker, of course, and some other presentations to conclude the week. When I finally found my assigned seat, I remember glancing around and the names to the right and left of mine. The name card next to mine read "James Earl Jones." I looked frantically around to see if there had been some mistake, but sure enough, he was walking towards his seat. He was instantly recognizable, if heavier than I'd seen him in movies, and he was breathing hard when he sat down. I introduced myself when he did, but I didn't have the nerve for much conversation. Mostly i just listened to his voice as he spoke to other people. It's been a long time, but I specifically remember what it sounded like when he laughed... That deep, warm chuckle that I've heard so many times in movies but sitting right next to me. When the dinner was over and everyone said good night, he shook my hand and said, "It's been my pleasure, Lucky." Now this blog is semi-anonymous, but my name is not Lucky. Not even close. I'm not sure how he came up with that, but I didn't have the heart to correct him. So I just said "Goodnight, sir." and went on my way. But now when I need encouragement on a particularly shit day, I just remind myself that James Earl Jones thinks my name is Lucky.

And if you say so, Mr. Jones, it must be true.

Deus ex machina

In those horrible (or is it horribly) brown eyes, I can see the past, the present, and the future. The past we didn't share, but are beginning to spin out like a spool of cotton candy at the fair. Wrapping our pasts around each other, trying to explain the things that make us the people we are today, and trying to figure out if those two people will ever have a mutual past. Your past, that does not contain any large R romantics like me, and my past that is littered with the graves of far, far too many failed attempts at expressing that Romanticism fluently. The past that is somehow managing to haunt us, even though we haven't fully explored it yet. The map of our past consists mostly of places marked with the designation terra incognito. Undiscovered areas of each other than can only be revealed by asking the proper questions, and the giving of open, honest answers. Honesty, like teamwork, is essential. It allows those blank, scary areas to become vistas that we want to revisit again and again. There will surely be things in both of our pasts that we will be terrified to reveal, but that shouldn't stop either of us. Nothing has stopped us yet, and simple things like "someone we used to know" shouldn't stop us now.

 The present, the day to day conversations that probably go on for far too long, and monopolize our time to the exclusion of others. The excluding of others because when you are in the room, it doesn't matter how many other people are there, you are, for me, the only person in the room. The present that has exploded upon our placid existence like a flight of Savoia bombers blasting Barcelona into submission during the Spanish Civil War. The present that consisted of my awful alarm clock blasting me awake far too early in the morning for this shit, and as I pound the snooze button into submission, my first coherent thought is about you. Wondering what you are doing, wondering how you are, and wondering if you are doing any wondering as well. The present that consists of "all our yesterdays" and is right here in front of us, demanding our attention like a four year old child that really, really has to go to the bathroom. The present where I really want to start one of those overlong conversations with you, but won't because (for me) the last one ended so poorly that I am not sure how to make it better, or even if I can. The present where I want to make things better, but am realizing just how difficult that task is, and how inadequate I am for it.

 The future that we are trying to negotiate like it is the Treaty of Versailles, fraught with all sorts of boundary disputes and obstacles. Some we are making ourselves, some that are seeming insurmountable, some that merely dificile (the French word sums it up much better), some that are tricky, and some that are like "dreams in stone" seemingly hard, but really just constructs of our fevered collective imagination. Daring to dream, but dreaming in stone just to be on the safe side, and tethering those dreams to a glass ring that we keep beside the phone for just such a purpose. The future where I have climbed down from the mountain of seclusion that I was busy scaling to its peak, and turned away from the "five year" plan I had carefully constructed to meet you somewhere in the middle of the plains, where I begin to make new plans that are struggling to include you, and to keep pace with the radical shifts in both our moods. There has to be more than one plan, because there are many possible futures in front of us. The four futures that I have already envisioned, and the multitude of them that I have yet to ascertain. Lacking a TARDIS to project myself into the future, and to see if there is a future that exists where we are together as I think we should be, I have to resort to my rational side, and begin to concoct  the dark plans that involve me killing the large R romantic side of me that got us into this awful, but great, situation in the first place.

The problem that the murderous rational me faces is that he has also looked into those horribly brown eyes as well, and sadly sees the same thing as the foolish large R romantic in me sees. That, as far as we have been able to tell, has maybe happened one other time in our collective, but separate existence. We have yet to find the Deus ex Machina that will allow us to solve what seems to be a unsolvable dilemma, for that what Deus ex Machinas do, they solve the unsolvable problems that people like me create by being a special kind of fool. However, the mad man in this tale doesn't have a box that allows for time travel, all he has is you (for the nonce) and however loose that grasp may be, he is going to try to hold on for just a little bit longer in the hope that past, present, and future come together into one moment of pure luck. 

Noir et bleu

Everyday, if you search hard enough, is an anniversary of something, or some one's birthday, or sometimes both. There are way too many things, and way to few days for it to be any different. Some of these things or people are important, and some are only important to one, or maybe (if you are lucky) two of you. Some of the occasions are happy ones, some are sad, some are tragic, and some just really should never be celebrated again. Today falls into the latter category. Thus, the image above. It is, quite obviously, a cemetery a place where things, usually people are buried. However, cemeteries can be useful for the burying of all sorts of  other things, and they don't all have to have a physical address. There exists cemeteries of the mind, places in the dark corners of your brain that need never to be explored again. Wastelands that would made T.S. Eliot proud. Doors that the part of you that still likes to pretend you are sane have locked, and hidden the key in a far, far away place. And speaking of Mr. Eliot here's a bit of his "The Waste Land" just for dramatic purposes.

The awful daring of a moment's surrender
Which an age of prudence can never retract
By this, and this only, we have existed
Which is not to be found in our obituaries

Of course, that is said much better than what I have to say, but I am going to say it regardless of my lack of skill. Most things undertaken in a moment of awful daring need not be found in our obituaries. Some of those moments need to be written out of our (shared) history, and never spoken of again. Life is, in the main, a series of unfortunate events, with the occasional flash of brilliance to keep it from being entirely as black as Monty Burns' heart. Sometimes the things we can't remember suddenly become the things we can't forget, and the gloom descends even further. But, and it is a rare occurrence, sometimes those flashes are just as bright as the summer son of York, and they rehabilitate the gloom

I have written about cemeteries of the mind before (see "The Third Time"), they are places in my mind where the past, failed relationships of my life are buried. There are many gravestones in that cemetery, and each has a name, and some dates engraved upon them. The dates are tricky, sometimes there are four dates. The date I first met the occupant of the grave, the date we first decided to hitch our wagon to each others star, the date that it all went terribly wrong, and the date of the actual burial. Sometimes those dates are the same, or very close in time, sometimes they are years apart, sometimes there aren't four dates. The fourth one is the hardest one to engrave, and many times I avoid doing the engraving due to a combination of moral cowardice, and foolish hope. But as with most things it must needs doing, and the time always comes where the fourth date has to be engraved in stone, not merely penciled in, in the vain hope of some Lazarus like resurrection of a dead relationship.

Therefore, like Antony, I have come to bury you, not to praise you. The praise I gave you was mostly ineffective anyway, let us hope the burial has more sticking power. Not to say you didn't have praiseworthy qualities. You were fond of saying that when I "looked at you, it made you feel as if you were the only person in the room." And that wonderfully lyrical statement, so unlike your usual prosaic view of the world, was spot on true. During the time between the second and third dates, you were the only person in the room, even when you weren't even in the actual room. The first date, and the last date on your particular gravestone are quite far apart, and that speaks volumes. It speaks to both the foolish hope I mentioned earlier, and to the "large R" romanticism that afflicts me. It was that romanticism that made second date possible, it was the over bearing usage of it, that made the third date happen way too soon. Now it is the realization that the monopoly on my romanticism that you once possessed has been broken by another, that makes engraving the fourth date necessary.

The ground in the above picture looks hard, baked by the sun and as tough to dig in as concrete. It was soon to receive a wonderful, softening rain, but that came too late for the burial that I was there to do.  I know all of this because I took the picture with just this burial in mind, and was later drenched to the bone by the softening rain. However, just because something is hard to do is not a reason to postpone or cancel doing it. In many situations it is the opposite, because something is hard it needs to be done, and sometimes it needs to be done with all deliberate speed. The spadework had already been done, shared between us like the partnership that we once were. You dug with real determination once you came to the realization that we needed to be buried. All that really remained was the lowering of your figurative body into the yawning hole in the ground, and some talented soul to say a few remorseful words as the band played the pipes and the chorus.

 But, maybe that is where I am missing the boat, maybe the graves in my cemetery contain not just the memory of the second party in my relationships, but maybe they contain a little piece of me in them as well. Maybe in the neat little row upon row of (mostly) silent graves there is the sum of the parts of my soul buried as well. It is a soul made black and blue by the bruises you so skillfully placed upon it, when you were inspired, and I did inspire you (at least in this context.,You could make someone (i.e. me) feel very, very bad about themselves. Flaws that seemed to be merely quirks of ones personality, became the San Andreas fault line under your careful, painful tongue lashings. Those remain, in many ways, the most enduring memories of the history of "us".  The fact that, no matter what I tried, it didn't seem to be either the right thing, or good enough. I eventually realized that was your fault not mine. It wasn't that I couldn't make you happy, it was that you didn't want me to make you happy, and that made all the difference in the world. Figuring that out is a painful memory.

That particular brilliant insight was not easy to come by, and it took more than the three wise men or four horsemen to help me to obtain it.  Some considerable thought, and distance both of the physical kind, and the figurative kind were necessary to allow me the sense of depth to make  this decision.  Things begin to look smaller as they fade away into the distance, and as you put more distance between us, you eventually reached your vanishing point. You didn't flee out into the night after some turbulent argument, and leave me staring off the balcony after you. No, your disappearing act was both more subtle and more obvious than that. Some doors, in spite of our best efforts, just aren't made to slam, they just click with what is (when you think about it later) some awful finality.

It is blessed finality that I desperately seek as I pile the last sod of dirt upon your grave, and  as I hammer the fourth date onto the tombstone that bears your name. I seek the finality that will allow me to dust myself down, and not have to reopen this grave anytime soon, or maybe ever. That is clearly yet to be determined, because one day's resolution is sometimes followed by the next day's weakness, and a third day's folly. Finality is as hard to obtain as zen, and it remains a struggle (mostly uphill) that I fear I may have to fight for a long time to come. It makes no sense, nor is it going to anytime soon, but it's just the way the world seems to be working. Time causes as many wounds as it heals, but it is time for me to close that cemetery gate, and face the fact that it might be time for someone else to have the chance to wound me, hopefully they won't, or hopefully that won't as badly as you have, but without me closing, and locking the gate to your grave they won't have the chance, and that is unfair to them.

When they come to write my obituary, if they can be bothered to do so at all, I can only hope (at least for now) your name is not even mentioned in passing. I suppose the timing of the obituary may have something to do with whether it is or not, and truth be told, I'll be dead, and passed caring. I rather suspect you feel the same way, and look back upon this all as a mistake, a rather large one that you rather wished you hadn't made. We may be able to bury each other in mental cemeteries, and whitewash ourselves out of each others history, but full blown erasure is not really possible. Whatever stage upon life's way we reach after this funeral, and I figure you are a stage or two further down the road that I am, there will always exist an us (even after we stop existing). This cemetery may become overgrown from neglect, and the sands of time may wear away the tombstones, but the graves are eternal.

Therefore, I will, with as little regret as I can manage, lock that gate, and turn away to face whatever future awaits me. That is yet to be determined, but the good news (if there is any good news) is that as I walk away so hurriedly from this relationship graveyard, I am not exactly alone. However, that is a story for another day. A day that you won't be around to celebrate. I am in many ways, truly sorry, however I am also, in many ways, blessedly relieved to have reach this stage upon my life's way.  Bon chance.  

 



 














 

Collaboration

The sharp eyed among you will notice an addition to this blog. The few of you that still read it might care enough to wonder what the story is behind the addition. This simple little post will be an attempt to explain that addition, and to keep me from falling asleep at work. Dual purpose blog posts are the best, and if that line contains some foreshadowing, all the better.

The addition to this blog is a collaborator, not in the Vichy French sense, but a fellow human (I made sure to check), that will (hopefully) from time to time lend their writing skills (of which I am also hopeful) to this blog. Christ knows it could use some real skill. My collaborator (if it is another person, and not just my literary personality fragmenting), is a bit of a grammar Nazi, but not the Himmler kind, more of the Speer type, i.e. the "Nazi who said he was sorry." They correct my numerous mistakes, but do so without the regular disdain, and overbearing conceit practiced by the majority of their ilk.  Content is sometimes rather important, and this particular grammar Nazi (again if it is another person at all) understand that, and is willing to take on some editorial duties around this dump as well. More power to them, if they can track down all my typos, and other sins against the English (and sometimes other) language, and repair them enough to make them coherent, then maybe they deserve the Iron Cross, or whatever medal grammar Nazis hand out to each other in their overdeveloped sense of smugness.

They (if there is a they) have chosen the nom de plume of Ladislaw, taken from the novel Middlemarch by George Eliot. The classically  educated among us (of which I used to count myself) know exactly what that means. At least I didn't make the mistake of confusing George Eliot with T.S. Eliot. But every once in a while, being clueless is not as terrifying as it seems. Sometimes ignorance is actually bliss. Knowledge is power, but usually in the obtaining of knowledge you have to give a little knowledge in return, and that can be much scarier than is strictly good for one's heart. A little mystery is good for the soul, and if you don't believe that then ask your mechanic a whole lot of annoying questions the next time you take your car in for service, and if they answer you, see how you feel having certain mysteries explained to you. Mysteries come in all shapes, and sizes and sometimes even in boxes. Whether you choose to unwrap them, or wait for them to be revealed is your personal choice. If Ladislaw ever decides to reveal their (possibly separate identity) that is their decision, and one you (and possibly me) will just have to accept.

The hope of this collaboration is more content, actual readable content would be a bonus, but we are not going to get our collective hopes up too high. After all, as of yet Ladislaw has yet to contribute anything (or maybe they have).  Being the prole type, and rather egalitarian we have decided that this collaboration does not have a leader. It is a more partnership based upon a mutual disdain for the rest of the human race, and a firm belief that if no one is in charge then the blame can be firmly placed on each other equally. Teamwork (that bane of modern society) is essential, when things start to go wrong, it allows you to blame someone else.

Introductions, like acceptance speeches, should be short, and this one has probably wandered into the overlong category. Therefore, I will merely end it with a hale, and hearty welcome to Ladislaw the new person to blame when shit goes horribly wrong.

Pie for Porn

To steal a line from the poet "I gave her gifts of the mind." She gave me pie. I like to think I got the better of the exchange. After all, anyone who knows me in the illusion we call "real life" will quickly tell you that I am obviously a lover of pie, and they won't be talking about Maths. As a very disgruntled receiver of some fairly awful gifts, I try to do better with the few gifts I bestow upon people. I try to figure out something that will push the simple "joy of getting a gift" button, and I try to make it a gift that defines what they mean to me at the time of getting the gift. Sometimes that is a very, very tricky proposition. A gift that will tell them this is something you will enjoy because I've taken the time, and put in the thought to figure out the type of stuff you will enjoy. That is why I gave her porn, which I consider to be, broadly speaking, a gift of the mind.


To be fair it wasn't the DVD  of some donkey show in Tijuana that I may or may not have filmed (or made) while I was struggling to pay the bills in college. It was what she labelled as "antique" porn. Porn of the literary type. Porn that was written long before the Internet obliterated the written word as a way of delivering quality porn to a generation of awkward sods. It was porn that was commissioned by a "collector" some fellow who just wanted to have his own personal collection of porn to have a private wank to when he felt the need, and had the money to find someone to write it for him. It was written in the 1940's, and not published until after the author's death about 30 years later. It was written for a dollar a page, which I guess was close to the going rate in those days, and far more than I will ever earn for anything I write, pornographic or not.

Unlike the poetry that I had given her, this was not designed to help the wooing process. It was written by a woman who referred to herself as "the madam of this snobbish literary house of prostitution, from which vulgarity was excluded". I must confess that I read it a million years ago, and had forgotten most of it until I decided to gift it to her.  I casually re-read some of it, and was scandalized by page 5, it caused to briefly rethink the idea of giving it as a gift, but fortune favours the brave, and if she likes this, and I am fairly certain she will, then I believe we have a future in the gift giving business together. I mean all she has to do is buy me more pie, easy enough.  Sometimes things are just as easy as well, pie.

Not that she was in any shape, form, or fashion easy.  Like most things in my life, she was difficult like an unbroken filly that doesn't  have time for my usual brand of bullshit.  Headstrong, stubborn, and just a bit wild if given her head.  Nothing wrong with any one of those qualities, but taken together, they made things quite a challenge. Then again, I doubt I would have given her porn if she wasn't all three of those things rolled up into one very pretty package. She was a racehorse built for speed, and I was more than willing to see how fast and how far she could "run".  I am a fellow that  loves a challenge, even if I generally fall at the first hurdle. However, that is usually my own fault, since I am generally the one that sets the height of the first hurdle. There have been times in my life where I had to be coaxed over the first hurdle by brazen acts of obviousness that Mr. Macgoo would be hard pressed to miss.

She wasn't obvious or even brazen, she was as understated as a well tailored Savile Row suit, freshly made for a fat man made skinny by the worries of the world. Which was a risk because, since I considered her about two hundred miles out of my league, I would have never guessed her interest if she hadn't been clear. It is possible to be clear without being obvious, it just takes talent, and thankfully, she had talent. I would have merely wandered through my days in her occasional presence, clueless as to the potentially wonderful thing that was directly under my nose. Oblivious to the fact that this wonderfully talented woman was looking at me with anything other than indifference. I had shopped in the "eye candy" store before, and found out to my cost that sometimes pretty things are just more expensive, price isn't always reflective of quality, or something that I am willing to pay.

 Often times, new relationships (using the term very broadly) never really mature past what I call the "new car syndrome". New cars are fantastic, and you immediately want to show them off to your friends, drive it around town, test all the features, and generally treat it like you have discovered the cure for cancer. Well, you haven't, and it is best to not attach yourself too firmly too quickly,  because after a few thousands miles you start to realize it might be the exact cure you were looking for. You bought it, and it was wonderful, but you were so busy enjoying the new, that you didn't learn the intricate details that it possessed, and now suddenly you feel bored. Boredom, and over sudden familiarity are very dangerous to new relationships. The Scylla and Charybdis of the relationship pleasure cruise in a manner of speaking.

  However, people aren't horses, and they sure as hell aren't cars. Cars, if you possess the means, can be traded fairly easily, people are a mite more difficult. You can't just drive/walk them back to the lot, and say to the dealership you can have it back it's defective. People "dealerships" do not exist,and I doubt frog marching someone back to their mother would be an effective method for getting shed of them. Also, you cannot just stop making the payments, and wait for the repo man to come and drive it back to the bank. The "new" will, if you are lucky enough to stick around long enough, wear off, and then it becomes incumbent on you to have forged something more solid that just simple newness. Either that or you are back where you started which is alone.You just have to make sure, and making sure is very, very difficult, that you do not allow the new to cloud your judgment overmuch.

It will cloud your thinking a bit, that is just the way of the world, but the world, when it is not trying to kill you, has a way of evening things out if you are careful. And I resolved to be careful with her, many a relationship had foundered on the rock of my impatience, and that (at least) was not going to be an issue in this case. Patience was going to be required because she was fond (overfond in my opinion) of telling me that my odds at achieving the final goal were long at best. "Better than some, but still about _%" (that percent never left the single digit mark).  Long shots are fun to bet, because when they pay, they PAY, but the problem is they rarely pay. Either way, I resolved to at least put down my bet, and see how the race was to be run, after all she was lovely.  Lovely enough that, without even seeing her undressed, I told her she was in danger of becoming my muse. She replied that "muses usually wind up naked, and your chances aren't good" and then proceeded to tell me my single digit percent chance again. She liked to throw the occasional bucket of cold water at me, just in case my hopes got too high. I was too busy shaking off that cold water to reply that Petrarch never saw his muse Laura naked, but I also figured she already knew it.

I was merely hoping for her to become a positive muse, naked or otherwise (obviously I had my preference as to which). Too many times in my life I have chased what ultimately became negative muses. Some people would claim that I write my best (using that term broadly as well) when I am sad, but those people didn't have to endure that sadness, I did, and it generally was not the most pleasant experience.  I have, when particularly sad, made people cry with these lines, and even made a grammar Nazi cry, and forget to look for mistakes in a post, it was a very happy moment for me. The idea that sadness makes (for me) great prose is all well and good, but sadness generally sucks, and sometimes has an annoying habit of sticking around and making itself a general nuisance.

All of this is to say, that perhaps my massive readership of four might see some posts that pass as "happy'. Of course, happy for me is probably a little different from the classical definition of happy, but who's to quibble. If the quality of my writing declines, which I find unlikely, then I hope the reader won't begrudge me the reason. It seems more than a fair trade to me.

You, of the Sixth Part

This blog is like most things in my life, neglected and in want of a retouch. It is a sad thing to realize that not writing becomes a habit almost as quickly as writing. The "I will do it tomorrow" approach rarely ends with "it" (whatever it is) being done tomorrow or the next day. Suddenly you find yourself on a streak of non-activity (whatever the activity may be), and you are in a rut of laziness that deepens with each passing day. There exists no real, definable reason for my lack of writing, I still have the occasional (for me) brilliant idea. I still compose lines, and blog posts in my head before sleep, and sometimes remember enough of them the next day to recreate them, I still can't type for shit, and my grammar is going to get me stood up against a wall, and shot by some local, thuggish grammar Nazi (of which I am honoured to know several). However, I have decided to take that first dramatic step, and attempt a new blog post for the two people (if I am lucky) that still read me, and hopefully still think I have something beautiful to say. Without further ado, and for your reading pleasure (I hope), I give you the latest dross that stuck around in my head long enough from last night's adventure in thinking.


You weave in and out of my life like some sailor made drunk by the combination of hard drink and dry land, staggering down the forlorn alleyways of my memories intent on the destruction of my sense of self. Granted, you aren't singing any bawdy songs, I've never heard you sing, but I doubt you have any particularly bawdy songs in your personal play list.  No, your songs are more melancholy, songs that are designed to make lusty men of every nation forget their happiness, and look out to sea, remembering all that it has taken from them. You seem to be content with your occasional berth upon the ship of my soul. Taking your rare turns at the helm, and seemingly attempting (with varying degrees of success) to steer it into the shoals of a personal disaster from which I would be unable to recover. You do this with both the ease of Picasso painting a picture, and the glee of a child turned loose in a candy store with a freshly minted pile of money that is dying to be spent.  You don't seem to mind the rain that your presence inevitably brings, soaking the sails, and making the decks slippery as a ski slope in December (at least in this hemisphere). It seems to invigorate you, driving you on to take even greater risks/liberties. Where the sailors before you would at the very least reef in the topsail, you call for more canvas, and steer into the wind causing as much havoc as you possibly can.

If there were torpedoes (and who's to say there aren't)  you would damn them like Admiral Farragut, and sail full ahead into whatever disaster that lurks just over the horizon. Disasters do love to lurk, hiding in the shadows waiting for people to make a wrong turning, and come into their wheelhouse. But not this ship, not with you at the helm. No, this ship under your malicious (it has to be malice doesn't it?) steers directly for those disasters, daring them to "come out and play" almost pleading with them to combine and do their worst. Perfect for you, after all, you won't be around when the actual worst hits. You chart the course, you ignore the warning signs, and you steer, purposefully into as many disasters as you can humanly find, and then "poof" you are gone. Like some incompetent magician performing a trick that he's never been able to get quite right, YOU disappear, not the lovely assistant that you picked out of the audience, but YOU. There isn't even the customary puff of distracting smoke. You just calmly, gleefully desert the wheel, leaving it spinning like a child's top and the ship lurching drunkenly towards whatever doom you've selected in your own mind.

You do this with the knowledge, and I would suspect the faint hope that, in spite of whatever disaster you have found for me, I will recover steerage, and sail far enough away from the storm you've found and/or created. You are convinced I won't be scuppered by the event, just slightly swamped, with just enough water below decks to slow, but not swamp me.  Certainly you expect that I will try to sail away unscathed, but that isn't a part of your plan. Just as certain is the fact that you won't be around to repair the damage. No you aren't a healer, you prefer to wound and then watch your victim bleed, content in the knowledge that the wounds you've inflicted aren't fatal, and positive that it will provide a learning experience for your victim. Victim is an almost fatally charged word, and I don't use it lightly. You would say, it you could be bothered to comment at all on such a triviality, that I am a willing victim. You might even say (with some small degree of justification) that I am more of a co-conspirator, a willing actor in whatever disaster we find. After all, you would argue, again with some degree of justification, that I allowed you to sail into waters too deep, and did it too soon. Knowing that neither I, nor my ship was ready for the deep ocean voyage to the lovely climes where the sky is just a bit bluer than it should be. You will claim that I am not a victim at all, but someone who should be standing in the dock beside you to answer the charge of willful destruction of his own soul.

Often as not your weapons are words, and you use them with almost surgical precision. Cutting away just enough flesh to make it hurt like hell, but leaving enough for the scar to form and not be too terribly noticeable. I think this is based upon the theory that, on the off chance, I find another pilot to attempt to steer away from you, they won't notice the damage until it is too late. Realizing that when they do, I will sail limply back into your port, sails slack and in tatters, asking for another trip to parts dangerous but at least semi-known with you.  Not surprisingly this has happened before, and since I am as predictable as a summer squall, you take out your sextant and beginning plotting me a course for those dangerous parts with the grim determination that would make Captain Ahab proud.

I remain convinced that eventually I will mutiny like Fletcher Christian, and put you, my own personal Captain Bligh into a long boat with just enough supplies to provide you with a slow death, and retake this ship that you sail around like a plaything, and sail it off into the glorious sunset without you. Without a glance back to check on your progress, or hopefully lack thereof. It is probably a bridge too far, and I realize that if you were to be piped aboard, I would allow you to order the anchor raised, and stand almost idly by, as you begin to chart my course into another purposeful disaster.  

H1 B37

"You are going to be a lot of fun to write." I said with the false bravado that a man feels upon entering a bout of fisticuffs with a tree disguised as a man, hoping against hope that this man-tree will have the common courtesy to fall down when you hit him, but expecting that he won't extend you that courtesy.  Which is a damn shame, because you rather suspect that once he lays a limb upon you, you will be so polite as not only to fall down, but you will extend the courtesy by not bothering to get back up again. Polite to a fault, that what they (whomever they are) have always said about you in the bars and alleyways where they mention your name.

Of course her reply was straight out of the cruelty handbook, which I can only assume she had been reading since we'd met. "The one that gets such critical acclaim?" "Yes, that one, however, it gets way more critics than acclaim." was my arch reply. Which is another damn shame, but one that does not overly concern me. Of course I get critics of this dross, grammar Nazis that kick in my proverbial door, and drag whatever post they feel like off to the death camps to be picked apart like a roasted fowl at a Christmas dinner for fat men.  With their oxford comma armbands, their exclamation point like jackboots, and their mustaches like dangling participles, they (again whomever they are) take a perfectly poorly written blog post, and turn it into a crime against humanity. And maybe it is, maybe this entire blog is my own personal crime against humanity, decency, the baby jesus, and all the other holiest of holy things that make me want to sail away to Singapore, and never, ever look upon my native soil again.  Arthur Rimbaud did much the same, when at the tender age of 20 he took ship to Africa, and never wrote another word of the poetry that was his trademark. Running guns, slaves, and coffee in the dark continent does not exactly appeal to me, but then again neither does another trip to the grammar Nazi concentration camp.

Perhaps my crimes are the result of a lack of writing ability (which is my opinion), or perhaps they stem from a lack of attention (also true), but regardless of their origin, I don't believe they rise to the level of a crime against humanity. Though I am far far away from being a fan of humanity, I do not think that by reading a sentence fragment is like getting hit by a fragmentary grenade. That is to say, it may sting a bit, or make you wince and bemoan my lack of talent or attention to detail, but it is (sadly) rarely fatal. I've never yet read of anyone, grammar Nazi or not, that has died of sudden run on sentence syndrome. Although I remain cautiously optimistic that one day an entire herd of them will die a slow, painful death from some misplaced semi-colon. (a side note blogger, and/or my computer is such a POS that spell check has just quit working, so read on at your own risk).

 For the most part, this blog is written for exactly one person, me. If anyone else gets any sort of joy out of it, then that is a bonus. There exists a school of thought among the "self motivate" group ( a group with which I have little in common) that a person needs "to be the star of their own movie." A motivational thought that drones on about taking charge of your life, and living it by your own rules. Sounds great doesn't it? The major flaw that I have found in that theory is that very rarely are we given complete creative control over the "movie of our life." We are not Robert Bresson, or Stanley Kubrick, directors that could tell producers to go fuck themselves (in a variety of languages) if they didn't like their vision of the film, or they could find some other second rate director to bend to their will.

No, rarely can we throw down the director's horn, storm off the set, say fuck the world, and reboot the entire project. Even more rarely is the case where we have complete responsibility coupled with complete authority. Generally the responsibility is given to us free of charge and gladly, but the complete authority is withheld from us in some sort of not so clever trick to make us "act right or else."  Therein lies the rub, how can we be the star of our own movie (or the hero of our own novel), if we lack the true authority to control its ultimate direction? Throwing it all up, to visit all 59 national parks, or visiting all the countries of the world in alphabetical order sounds a wonderful plan, but who the fuck is going to pay for it? Your maiden aunt that has more money that the emir of Dubai? Unlikely since, sadly for you, she doesn't exist, and those letters asking for "just a couple of million dollars" from the Emir have gone unanswered. It's not like the bastard would miss the money right?

The other problem that I have noticed with the "be the hero of your own movie/book" idea, is that unless it is a character study with just one character (i.e. you) in it, then you have another problem. The same problem that I alluded to with the first words of this post. "You're going to be a lot of fun to write." I said that to an actual, living, breathing, human being, not to a dog, or a robot. A person, one that I am certain has her own opinions about my (lack of) heroic qualities. I know this because she has mentioned on several occasions the varied nature, and numerous amount of my, quite severe, character flaws. How does one "write" her? Is one true to her nature, and her acerbic tongue? Faithfully recording the multitude of barbed arrows she flings at one's tender psyche? Does one include the quite obvious lies she has beguiled one with?  Or, do you "pretty up" her comments both to make them PG rated, and not quite as painful? Seems that approach is a dishonest one, but it is my movie/book right? I don't like to read or hear things that distress me overmuch, but they did happen. Even though they might (or might not) have been honestly meant at the time, they are still an episode in this book/film are they not?

Heroes (or villains, or anti-heroes) do not exist in a vacuum, the Good still needs the Bad, and the Ugly in order to make a film. Does one allow this person input into the project? If so, where does it stop, she is one of many co-stars in one's life. We all interact with a virtual shit ton of people throughout the day, the week, the month, and our lives. Does each one get some sort of input into this film/book? For that matter which ones get a mention even in passing? What is the threshold for being mentioned or not? Do we name them, or give them nicknames in order to protect their identity? How angry do we expect them to get if we say an unflattering thing or two about them? It is our movie right? Don't we get the final edit? What gets left on the cutting room floor, or is wiped out by the blue grease pencil of the editor? Who, other than us, is qualified (or can be bothered) to edit this shit show?

These unanswered, and in many ways, unanswerable questions put paid to the idea that we are the hero of our own movie/book. We are, if we are lucky, more likely to be someone's co-star, or antagonist. Do we really feel that we possess such star power that we can carry an entire film? Few do, the lives of quiet desperation that most of live are not worthy of the Academy's consideration. It is that home truth from which our actions must grow. Those actions, rather than the entire film, are the things we can control. Instead of directing our lives without the complete authority we require, perhaps we should just act them instead. Meet our marks, say the lines expected, or written for us to deliver, and hope that one day we merit the attention of a larger audience that will appreciate our quirks, and not mind the fact that sometimes we flub a line or two.  

Je suis, William Sans Amis

The "mate" of mine who decided, without my permission, to tell my story has, after a stern talking to, allowed me control of this space to actually try to explain the truth. Although the truth is as elusive as a greased pig, I will try, within certain parameters, to tell the actual truth.


My "mate" is correct in saying that I told him my "story" over many a pint. After all, lies come out much more smoothly when the way is paved by liquid refreshments. It also is a plus that the hearer of your lies gets a little tight as well. That way the memory starts to fade in and out when they are trying to piece together the details of the long story you told them the night before.  The story that my father killed my mother and then himself was absolute bollocks. My father was quite simply a spy. He was not Sidney Reilly or some James Bond type of fellow, he was just a clerk in the foreign service that had a gift for languages and lying. Gifts that he passed on to his only loving son, me.  The horrible accident that my "mate" relates was the cover story that I was told to repeat if I was ever asked about my parents. The man telling me to relate this story was dressed in a pinstriped grey suit, and looked very calm as he related to me that it was "more likely than not that both of your parents are as dead as dead can be."  It seems that my father's gift for lying ran out before his gift of languages, and some Eastern European country had decided to offer him "a place to stay for a few years" while he learned how to tell the truth. My mother, who was with him at the time, was extended the same generous offer, but her quite place was hundreds of miles away from where my father was "vacationing."


I've yet to find out, or unearth exactly what happened to either of my parents. The respective prisons they were sent to are not the type of places that answer polite inquiries as to their "guest's" welfare or ultimate fate. It is probably safe to say that I, at some point, did become the orphan that my "mate" thought I was, but as to the exact date of my orphan-hood I am not entirely sure. I do have hopes that perhaps with the "thaw" in the relations between my country and the country that so generously provided a vacation spot for my parents, that I will one day be able to at least know their fate to some degree of certainty. For now, as I was told then, I figure they are more than likely dead, and have been for decades. It is not a particularly warming thought, but one has to move on with ones life at some point, and let the lost be lost.


The "uncle and aunt" that I was shunted off to live with were no relations of mine. My actual  relations hardly knew of my existence, and it was certainly too late to spring me upon some elderly aunt, and tell her that she had a new ward to take care of in her declining years. "Uncle and Aunt" were two former colleagues of my father who had "played the great game, and then got the fuck out whilst the getting was good." They did not love me, and nor I them. After all, I was a stranger to them, as they were to me. They were also retired spies, people who had spent the majority of their lives neither trusting or loving anyone with any real conviction. It was unlikely, and proved true, that they were not going to suddenly take a shine to some awkward boy of a presumed dead colleague. They raised me because the Service "asked" them to, and then paid them handsomely for doing it.  Money is not a magic cure that makes you really love someone, and my "uncle and aunt" only saw me as a walking supplement to their retirement income. They provided for me, and didn't let me starve, but as for affection, well affection is not needed to keep someone from starving to death.


The stutter that I developed when I learned to talk, was probably and outgrowth of the sterile environment in which I was reared. It was not some Oliver Twist like upbringing, but it was not far off, and the children should be seen (rarely) and not heard mantra was something that my adopted family followed like it was the golden rule.  Who was I to tarnish that by actually trying to talk to them?  The part that my "mate" doesn't know (at least until he reads this) was that it was actually a medical condition that caused my stutter, and by the time we were sharing those pints, I had long since had the simple operation that corrected it. That was why he says drunk me stuttered less. After a few pints, I sometimes forgot that I was supposed to stutter, and began to talk like I normally would. A mistake that fortunately he was too drunk to realize I was making. 


However, before the operation that fixed it, my stutter was fairly pronounced, and did cause me to have an extremely awkward childhood (aren't all childhoods awkward?).  It did provide me with the convenient excuse for not making friends, which was fantastic as I discovered early on in my life that I, for the most part, absolutely loathe people.  Which is why following in my presumably dead father's footsteps made sense. Spies don't have to love the people they are defending from the Red or White or Green Terror, they just have to do their job. In fact, being a spy, even if it wasn't the James Bond swashbuckling type, gave me free rein to lie, cheat, steal, and otherwise be an absolute prick to almost every person I came into contact with. Since I rarely came into contact with any person that could be described as "innocent" (even using the term very broadly), I never felt a twinge of guilt when I gave them a fake name, told them I did really love them or that the dress they were wearing did not make them look at all fat.

Once my stutter was surgically repaired, I discover my ability for languages, and quickly thereafter my ability to lie in several languages. It proved a useful thing to discover. I still affected my stutter to people because it is a great way to be ignored. That was useful in two ways. One, it allowed me to observe things without the burden of having to make "small talk." Observing it a very important skill to have, and when people think you can't talk or that talking to you is too much of a burden, you get unlimited time to observe. Two, being known as a stutter also was to be mistaken for an idiot. People, those rat bastards, seem to think that just because you can't complete a sentence smoothly without stuttering, you must be mental enfeebled. Nothing can be further from the truth, but I never felt the need to explain that to anyone (well maybe to a few members of the fairer sex).  This core misunderstanding of the nature of stuttering generally meant that people underestimated me, usually to their cost.  On many occasions, the urge was great to tell whatever miscreant that was getting the bracelets placed on him that the idiot stutterer was the cause of their downfall, and to express a wish that they enjoyed prison. However, that was never possible because the Foreign Office still had uses for me, and to gloat as a spy is to die.

Besides to gloat when someone get the bracelets is to tempt fate, and while I didn't tempt fate the fickle bitch still had unpleasant things in store for me. I will never forget the day in Zagreb at the seedy little outdoor cafe when the unshaven man in the cheap suit leaned over, tapped me on the shoulder and said " Mr. W__________, to put it in terms you can understand, you are nicked."  And I was nicked, caught as bare assed as new born babe with no excuse, and no means of escape. My "mate" wasn't exactly correct it wasn't a Turkish prison that I spent some time in, it was a Croatian one. I hear the Turkish ones are nice by comparison.  Stone walls, and iron bars make a pretty decent prison, and damn if those iron bars weren't cold, but I had long ago decided that I was too pretty for prison, and had determined to do whatever I needed to do in order to make my stay as short as possible.

I resolved to tell as many lies in as many languages as possible, even perhaps mixing in just enough truth to make it easy to swallow to get my ass out of this cold prison.  The HMFIC, came on my second day to inquire if my stay had been as pleasant as I had hoped, and to see if I had anything I would like to share. I told him that I certainly did have things to share, and "that it would be a mistake to let me die."  This piqued his interest, and we had many a sit down chat about things I knew, and the things that I made him think I knew. I am no hero, I am not willing to have my fingernails pulled out with wire pliers if I can help it. I detected early on in my life that I had an allergic reaction to physical pain, and since the old methods die hard, my captors were certain to apply the "old let's beat the shit out of him until he talks" approach. That was a bit of distress that I wanted to avoid, so I talked. Sure I talked, and talked and talked. I told some astounding lies, and some half truths, and I even brought back the stutter in the hopes they would get tired of listening to me try to talk. The stutter helped it kept the talking going on longer and longer each time that eventually the beatings stopped. Possibly because after each beating I made my stutter that much worse.

Eventually, my captors figured that I was a well that had run dry, and they were faced with the three major choices that happens in that situation. To kill me, to turn me, or to exchange me. I was vehemently opposed to the first, and therefore resolved to allow them to think they had accomplished the second in order for them to do the third. I was exchanged for some other poor sap from the other side who had the same shitty luck that I had, on a desolate road outside of some nameless city on the Hungarian/Austrian border. I was flown back to the mother country, taken into the office of some fellow I'd never met before, and asked "how compromised are you?, for as you know a compromised spy might as well be a dead spy."  I wasn't sure exactly how to answer that question, and it took a while for the powers that be to figure out that I wasn't entirely useless to them, but that I was going to have to take a rather long vacation somewhere quite for the world to forget about me for a while. The good news, if there was any good news, is that once that sorted out what I had told those Croatian bastards was more lie than truth, they gave me my second nickname. Which after consideration is probably why the the first nickname of "Billy No Mates" is still true. They dubbed me, with considerable pride and just a bit too much glee, "Billy Liar."

Forteresse autour de ton coeur

NB:  This post was "written" while slightly drunk on NyQuil, and under some under trying circumstances. I apologize for it in advance.


The sporadic information that the few returning scouts have given me led me to believe that the fortress I was delegated to take was a redoubt of some strength, and it would take more resources than I had to hand to reduce it in the time that I was allowed.  I am not a spectacular war leader. I am no Caesar, or Napoleon. I am a middling ranked, barely competent fool that received his position by attrition and a whole lot of luck, and a fair amount of misfortune.  The good news, if there is any good news, is that I am acutely aware of my limitations. Even better news is that if, for one second I get ideas above my station (i.e. thinking I am actually competent), my second in command, Wilson, is there to remind me that I am mortal.  Not only does he remind me of my mortality, he takes what I consider an excessive amount of glee in doing it, but that is another story for another day. That day will be the day I have to, with many regrets I am sure, put Wilson against a wall and remind him who is in charge of this outfit.

The answer to that particular question is me, I am in charge of this outfit, and for better or worse that's how it is going to be until the day Wilson figures out my plan for him, and puts a rattlesnake in my camp bed. Not that I haven't had worse bedtime playmates, it just they usually don't try to kill me right away like the snake would. Being in charge means responsibility and with responsibility comes authority, even if you have to take the authority. Because responsibility without authority is hamstrung from the start, like a cracker that has lost its cheese. It was now my assigned task to reduce this fortress.  A task that I foolishly volunteered for, in the vain hope, and with the wild idea that I would succeed in some brilliant fashion. It was, in hindsight, a very foolish idea to expect that a quick victory was to be won on this battlefield.  And make no mistake about it, this was a battlefield, this was war, this wasn't some Hatfield and Mccoy type of pillow fight that eventually just got out of hand. No, this was war from the start, and war to the finish. Simply put, there could be only one victor. A great, rousing speech to give to the "troops" right? Except that my "troops" weren't complete idiots when it came to odds. They are gamblers to a man (part of the reason I picked them), and they can do amazing maths in short order, and see the odds were not particularly good for our side.

Hope springs eternal, even forlorn hope, and it was up to me to break down those iron bars and stone walls that were keeping me from obtaining my goals. Goals are very important things to have, be it on the football pitch, or in real life. A goal is a wonderful thing, it is even more wonderful if it is scored/obtained in some majestic way (i.e. a 30 yard volley from your lummox of a central defender's weaker foot), but they count the same, no matter how they are met /scored (i.e. off the face on the bounce from your striker who may still be slightly drunk from the night before).  However, goals have to meet reality at some point, and sometimes it is not a pleasant introduction. As I stared up at those massive walls and those miles upon miles of barbed wire, all I could think was "fuck me how did that lot build THIS."  Followed quickly by my second thought (two thoughts in one day, a banner occasion) of "fuck me how do they expect me to take that down with THIS lot." Luckily, I was able to internalize both of those thoughts so as not to demoralize the lot that was expected to perform this miracle of modern warfare. Worn out from all this thinking, I went to bed, careful to check for any rattlesnakes before I turned out the lights. No luck, tonight I would be sleeping alone. It was something that I felt I was going to have to get accustomed to.

Luckily for me, in the group of reprobates that I had the pleasure to "command" was an engineer. I never asked why he had hitched his wagon to my star, because I don't like asking questions that I figure the answer will cause me distress. I don't think he was a star among the engineering group, and he was certainly no Vauban, but he was the best I had, and by that I mean he was the only person I had that could be reasonably expected to do the math of siege craft as opposed to the math of the ponies.  I found out, much later, that whilst he wasn't a superstar of the engineering world, he did "invent" an object that almost everyone uses in their day to day life. However, that is getting ahead of the story. After my rattle snake free sleep, and upon being roughly jostled awake by Wilson (does the man ever sleep?), I awoke and looked again upon the edifice that was to be either the pinnacle or the nadir of my career. Or maybe, if I was incredibly unlucky a little bit of both.

It was certainly big enough, if you are into obvious displays of power, wealth, and hubris. Tall too, who did they think was coming to call, an army of giants? Even on a glorious fall day without a cloud in the sky it still managed to sit there like a drunken man darkly brooding over some real or feigned insult on his corner bar stool muttering about his revenge. This place didn't need to mutter, it fairly shouted "come and get me boys, if you think you can!"  As I stood there just far enough away to take in all its majesty but still close enough to have my mood affected by its shadow, Wilson sauntered up to me, and after my startled response (the man is a master sneak), asked. "So, my captain, how do we take down that monster? Charm?"  "Well, Wilson we both know I'm only charming when I am drunk, and I don't think there is quite enough booze in the world for me to be that charming." I replied as I pointed to the massive bulk of the fortress looming menacingly in the distance.  "No, I suspect we will have to pour our one engineer out from what ever bottle he's climbed into, and try a more considered approach."

"But, first things first, let's show these bastards who we are. Corker, unfurl the standard, let those bastards know we are here." Corker, our slightly retarded standard bearer replied "Umm sir, who are we to these people?" It was a fair question, our company had a name for every occasion, multiple standards, some captured, some actually bestowed upon us, and others just simply made up on the fly. We  have had many names, and very few places or people actually knew our "real" name. "Oh, I don't know who haven't we been in a while?" Corker thought a moment, which for Corker takes some real effort, smiled and said "I've got just the one sir." "Alright son, well don't keep me or that lot in suspense any longer, unfurl it and let them know."  Corker, with the usual stupid grin plastered to his face picked his banner, and with all the ceremony he could muster strode forward to the safest distance possible and slammed in with authority into the ground. We all waited for the necessary gust of wind to catch the cloth, and let both our enemy and ourselves know who they were up against. As the wind caught it, the banner snapped out with at least an attempt at majesty and proclaimed us to be "Gjudarnsson's Friekorps".  "Oh, good, we haven't been that one in a good long while, and last time we were, we got our ass handed to us at Petersonburg" "Well it's too late now" I said, 'we might as we try to redeem poor Gjudarnnson and his Friekorps slightly tarnished reputation. Even though I knew that both were long since dead as dead could be, and their bones were mouldering on another continent. It would not have been my first choice of a banner to fight under, but what do you expect when you have an idiot for a standard bearer? That last bit may have been uttered aloud by mistake, for Corker gave me a hurt look as he took his place back in line.

"And speaking of idiots, what great fucking idiot put THAT bloody river THERE." I said with some resignation, for I knew that the ever faithful Wilson would have his usual laconic, but caustic reply. Sure as the rain comes on your birthday, he replied "God? Sir." "Wilson, someday remind me to put you up against a wall and shoot you." I rasped. "In the mean time would you be so good as to sober up our engineer, give him my compliments, and ask him if he's ever learned how to build a fucking bridge?" Wilson scuttled off to find, and hopefully, dry out our engineer while I stood there just out of range of this terrible, brooding fortress with an ever increasing sense of dread growing in the pit of my stomach. How, from where I started, did I ever end up here I asked myself. Having no one around to provide the refrain, I answered it myself "step by step." If ever there was a time to reflect upon my poor life choices, this was it, and I stood there wondering how things would have been if she had said yes.


However, she said no, and said it emphatically, and since she was just as educated as I was, she said it in the 3 languages we both spoke just to make sure that her intent was clear. It was clear, convincing, and utterly soul crushing. It was also, just a bit unexpected. I had thought, which shows you how great a thinker I am, that things were going as smooth as goose shit on glass. I was wrong, not for the first time about her, but for what would be the last. It was never the gentlest of relationships, she had a tongue that could cut glass, and I tried my best to reply in kind, but it was still the high light of my relationship career. Which is either a sad reflection upon my previous relationships, or a glowing recommendation of the challenge she presented me. Truth be told it was probably a little bit of both. It was not a pleasant ending to what had been a pleasant (most of the time) relationship, and when the gendarme became involved, I decided that anywhere but here was a place I needed to be. Being a strapping lad, I decided to learn the mercenary trade, and see if being killed from the front was as bad as what she had done to me from behind.

I packed most of my important belongings into one bag, and headed south the the bustling port city of Nova Lerma, to find the first ship out of the backwater in which I lived. It didn't take long for me to find a group of like minded people, and I quickly joined Claudell's Marines. A rag tag lot of complete reprobates as ever attempted to call themselves a mercenary company as ever existed on this or any continent in the world.  It was an eye opening experience, and also a tale for another day, I didn't last long with Claudell's Marines mainly because Claudell's Marines did last very long, being pretty much obliterated as an organization at the Battle of Hester's Reach.  That battle, which I was present for, taught me a lot of things, but it mostly taught me that losing really stunk, and being a prisoner of war was not exactly something I was cut out to be. It would be the first time, but not the last time, that my loyalty became a commodity available to the highest bidder.  Loyalty, I figured out very quickly, was like class. The more people pay you for it, the more they expect. That was a very important lesson to learn, and one that I tried to never forget during my travels.

Those travels, and the lessons I learned, most of them the hard way, had led me to this, standing outside the fortress of Tessenow, and pondering a change of career. Was it too late to take up architecture? Considering my lack of drawing skill, and my age, probably so, but it was at least worth a thought as I stood there wondering how I was going to reduce this fortress to the rubble that was my assigned task. The fellow that hired me, and the newly re-branded Gjudarnsson's Friekorps, was not especially forthcoming on the how or the why that task was to be completed.  Of course, that wasn't his job, his job was to provide the money, a lot of money, and  my job was to make sure the task he paid for was completed, and to try to stay alive during the process.

A few more seconds pondering the mysteries of the universe, I decided to go to bed, and hope that maybe Wilson had finally decided to provide me with a fatal bedtime playmate. No such luck, and I awoke the next morning with all the same problems that I had went to sleep to avoid the night before. Eventually, Wilson did turn up with our freshly sober engineer, a extremely thin fellow named  Jackson, who despite looking a bit worse for wear, looked as well as I had seen him look in a month. I turned to Wilson and asked "I see you found, and sobered up Jackson, and may I ask why he looks like the cat that ate the canary?"  Wilson who also had a smirk on his face, but that wasn't unusual so I didn't remark upon it replied "well sir, I think this might just make your entire day." "Wilson, it is barely 9 a.m. if you are going to make my day can you do it early, so at least I get the most benefit of it?" Wilson snickered, and said "I'll think it best to let Jackson explain sir. After we sobered him up, and that took a while, he finally put two and two together and sorted out where we are in the world." "Well that's a relief, I mean I'd hate to have our erstwhile engineer not know the name of the place he's expected to blow off the map."

"It's better than that sir," Wilson replied, "wait until you hear him out." "Well, Jackson, stop standing there like a piece of furniture, and spit it out man, what is the great news?"  Jackson, grinning from ear to ear said "well, sir. I am not sure if you know it or not but I'm from a small village about 5 miles from here." "No Jackson" I said "and since I'm not writing your obituary, yet, I don't especially care." Jackson winced at my rudeness, but then gathered himself and said, "well sir, being from around here, and an engineer, one of the first projects that my mentor, Mannheim, allowed me a great deal of input into was designing that." Saying this he pointed to the looming bulwark of Tessenow, and a silly grin split his slightly goofy face. "Therefore, I can get you in as easy as pie, sir."


"What makes you think you can do that Jackson, I am sure it is still as tough a nut to crack as it looks, no matter what half trained asshat designed it." Jackson took a deep breath and said "well, sir. The thing is, I was young, and my mentor was past it. He didn't care much about the design he was old, and knew it was probably his last real commission, so he let me have my head a bit." "Which turned out to be a great learning experience for me, but at the same time, I was young, and I made mistakes." "Mistakes that I seriously doubt that lot have been arsed to repair." I replied, "and what about that fucking river, Jackson?" "Did you make some great deal with Mother Nature that we are unaware of?" "Oh no sir, that river's just there to scare you, which seems to be working, so I guess my half-training paid off." "No the key to the whole fortress is that chasm there." he said pointing to a large chasm about two miles upstream. "That's the key to the whole place sir." Jackson said, and smiled deeply. "Today is the 8th, I can have in the citadel and in possession of the entire town by the 11th if you will let me sir."

I smiled the first real smile I had in weeks, and said "Jackson, if you were a woman, I'd kiss you on the mouth, even if you were as ugly a woman as you are a man." "Get to it man, Get to it!' I shouted, and off he bustled to hopefully make my fame and fortune.   TO BE CONTINUED.