John Swinburn

Imagine yourself out for a run, or a walk, through the forest. A mile away from the nearest house, you spot a raccoon in the trail in front of you. Though it’s an unusual sighting in broad daylight, more unusual is the animal’s response when it sees you. It bares its teeth and charges at you. Brambles and vines and rocky bumps in the path ahead and behind make it impossible for you to outrun it. It leaps toward you and, as you attempt to push it away as it lunges, it clamps its teeth on your thumb. You scream and try your best to pull the animal’s jaws apart, but your strength does not match that of the clawing animal. As you wrestle with the biting, clawing, scratching beast, you notice a puddle of water at your feet. In a desperate effort to make this nightmare end, you thrust the beast under the water and push with all your might. You hold the animal under for what seems an eternity. Finally, its legs go limp and its grip on your thumb loosens. You’re able to release yourself from its clutches. Almost paralyzed with fear, you run back down the trail from which you came and reach your house. Some of your housemates call 911 for help, while others take to the trail to find your attacker. They find the drowned raccoon, bag it, and  take it to the authorities, who determine it was rabid. You must now get a series of injections to save your life; without them, you will surely die. But the nightmare is nearly over, but not completely. You will live to tell the tale. The authorities caution you, and everyone nearby: when there’s one rabid raccoon, there will be more. Beware the forest trail.

[This may sound like something I’d make up, but it’s actually pretty faithful to a story I read about yesterday in an online newspaper in Maine. Today, the internet is alight with stories recounting the horrible encounter.]

We tie ourselves in knots made of sinew and sweat, stress and seclusion, sincerity and suspicion. Nothing is its own thing anymore; everything belongs to something or someone else. Community, insatiable in its allure, topples the towers of individualism, releasing the utopia that togetherness promises to bring. Together, we promise to think and act and wish for the greater good, the genuine sublimity of ego erasure. Egos were meant to be fed a steady diet of hunger; fed, not starved. The starved ego recoils at communalism, for it represents famine; the hungry ego clings to community, for it offers opportunities to partake of readily shared sustenance. Individualism is self-responsibility taken a step too far, a step beyond non-reliance into selfishness and penurious thrift. Where, then, is the proper balance? Where does the individual end and society begin? Every answer is a truthful lie, hidden inextricably inside a kernel of truth sheathed in a web of deceit and ignorance.

A river of light sits just beyond the dark edges of the unseen horizon, poised to burst into morning. Before long, I expect light to flood through the windows. That river of light, spilling from the sky, will flush darkness downstream. But then, as dawn matures into mid-morning, the darkness will crawl back, bringing with it air so thick with tears of the gods that the sky may cry like a wounded water-bucket, its galvanized bottom riddled with holes inflicted by an angry child armed with an ice pick. Clouds, acting like demonic prisms, will amplify the sun’s heat in a conspiracy designed to turn good cheer into beads of sweat and angry curses. The cool breezes of bygone days have left for more charitable climates, leaving us to bake and broil like food for discerning vultures. Those gentle breezes that soothed our skins and our souls may one day return. When the pumpkin shivers, we will know the time has come. We can only hope the pumpkin will, indeed, shiver again.

The shooting in Washington, DC today pierced my heart. It showed me that even people who share my political and social perspectives can be just as monstrous, just as vile as people I’ve labeled demonic and uncaring. I condemn the bastard responsible for today’s attempts on the lives of Republicans. Regardless of how much you hate their politics or their positions on social issues, you have absolutely no right to gun them down. Doing that, aside from its deviant sociopathic elements, gives credence to the same deviants on the conservative side who decide to do the same. Are we not civilized? Are we not decent people?  I will readily admit to hating—truly hating—Donald Trump and his zealot supporters. I think they are psychotic. But I do not condone assassination. I do not condone violence like that done today. If today’s actions have any positive effect, it will be that we, as a society, will take stock of who we are and what we’re doing. We should step back and realize that we are tearing our country apart. Neither conservative nor progressive will “win.” We will achieve success only to the extent that we persuade the “other side” to consider our perspectives and, on occasion, concede that they offer the best course of actions.

Only if we collectively condemn violence, lies, manipulation, and monstrosity, will we progress. I need not retract my condemnation of Trump (I think the man is an affront to civilized thought and deserves to be jailed for crimes against humanity), nor do opponents of Hillary Clinton need to change their hearts and express undying love. But we need to accept that differences of opinion are valid. The hard parts will be the issues that create the most heat; abortion, health care…what else?

If my conservative friends and acquaintances will stop calling for Hillary’s imprisonment long enough to talk about decency in social discourse, I’ll stop insisting on Trump’s imprisonment for crimes against humanity (but I will require him to relinquish the Presidency). 😉

It’s silly to allow a person I find irrelevant, yet offensive, to get under my skin, isn’t it? Yes, indeed it is. But I’m silly in that way. I react to his remarks, obviously intended as provocations, as if they’ve accomplished their aims. And, of course, they have. And that is especially annoying; I’ve fallen into a trap I could feel coming from a mile away. I simply couldn’t wait to see if he would fall into it first. If I had to select, from among my countless faults, the flaw that most frequently results in misgivings, it would be the lack of discipline. My inability to simply wait and see how others react to an overt act of “bull in china closet syndrome” causes more grief than it should. But it does. With some frequency, I find myself learning and relearning a lesson, only to unlearn it; that gives me the opportunity to learn it again, later. I make mistakes of that nature with regularity. I’m trying, I suppose, to get really good at making such mistakes. I want my mistakes to be perfect. In reality, I know before I react that my reaction will simply add fuel to the fire already smoldering in my head. I realize, from the outset, that I’m attempting to smother a forest fire with gasoline. Yet I move forward, deliberately and with the knowledge that my reaction is likely to cause a blaze of equal intensity, though perhaps hidden from my view, in the mind of the irrelevant, offensive instigator. Perhaps that’s why I react. Even though I know my reaction is unlikely to achieve positive forward momentum, at least it may light a fire of rage that may, if the world is just, consume the barrier to progress, leaving it a heap of ashes easily swept aside. My demonic metaphors, this morning, are too brutal even for me. So I’ll attempt to return to a state of quiet contemplation; where is my little desktop copy of The Essence of Zen? I may need that to spur my tranquility.

This is post number two thousand three hundred and fifty. That’s a boatload of posts. I’ll readily admit the vast majority of them are meritless drivel, thought spilled from the mind of a man who’s confused and uncertain, manic and depressive, and philosophically challenged. That having been said, I am just as certain, if not more so, that I have written some pretty damn powerful words here in the years I’ve been posting to this blog. I’ve expressed joy and pain and I’ve written stories that draw me to tears. So I know my writing here, at least some of it, has value. When I read something I’ve written and find my eyes filling with tears, I know I’ve written something that moves at least one person to the edge of an emotional precipice. So, in spite of all the crap, all the throw-away whimsy and drivel and useless words, there’s material here among the detritus that means something. I seem to have a love affair with that word, detritus, don’t I? Yes, I do. I sure as hell use it a lot in my writing. And that’s one of the things I find absorbing about writing here. At least I amuse myself. And that’s important if we’re to stay, or get, sane.

A while ago, as I sat on the screened porch—eating my dinner of a sardicado sandwich on pumpernickel bread, accompanied by a Shiner Bock beer—I watched a storm brew in the distance. Angry clouds stirred in the distant sky and moved with impressive speed in my direction. By the time I finished my sandwich, I could see a wall of rain move right to left across the forests and fields in the lowlands below. To the left of the moving wall were forests, every tree distinct in its greenery. To the right, a grey tower of rain obliterated everything. The wall moved quickly across my view, closing in not only right to left, but distant to near. Soon, powerful wind gusts bent tree branches just a few feet in front of me and shook the limbs of the trees violently. When the plastic cover of the smoker, anchored by a heavy stone, flew up and attempted to free itself from the stone, I knew the time had come to go inside. In a matter of minutes, the storm was gone. An enormous rainbow appeared out the window, its right-most end touching the ground just below us, maybe a quarter of a mile away. Using my smartphone camera, I took poor shots of my sandwich and the rainbow.

I returned to the screen porch with my notebook computer and add-on keyboard and mouse (I loathe the touch-pad and built-in keyboard) to write this. And to think. And to marvel at the enormity of the sky and beyond. As I sit here—my eyes watching the trees and fields and birds and scanning the sky more often than they scan my screen—I reflect on how fortunate we are to live here, in these troubled times and in this poverty-stricken state. I complain about it all, but my complaints are embarrassments when contrasted with the appreciation expressed by people who have only a fraction for which to be grateful.

All right, emerging from that little dip in mood, I now recall my morning, which was spent in a critique group at the  Garland County Library. It was useful. Though only three of us were there, we went through one another’s pieces in great detail, each helping the other with comments and questions and suggestions. I liked it.  The piece I’ve submitted to the group is the same one I’ve submitted to my “home” critique group, which will meet Thursday. It will be interesting to compare the comments and suggestions. This piece of mine is not as “deep” as most of my writing. It’s more action-adventure, with a bit of psychological thriller and love story thrown in. I’m not sure, frankly, it’s me. But I’m trying it. I enjoy character more than story, I think. This piece is more story than character. But I will see what I can do to bring the characters and their unique traits and characteristics to life. And make their stories more interesting for who they are, than for what they do. Maybe. We’ll see.

The temperatures this morning were almost unpleasantly warm. I’ve been used to upper sixties and low seventies; this morning felt warmer and wetter. The blushing beginning of summer is becoming rosy red-cheeked, the surly beast that causes parents to leave on vacation and to send children to summer camp or, even more punishing, vacation bible school. Ach! I just heard turkeys in my side-yard. Must go find another beer!

Last night, after an early dinner at a nearby restaurant, we sat outside in the screened porch. We heard turkeys and various other birds. And we heard the song or call of a bird I did not know, but which I hear every evening in late spring and summer. Our friends identified it as a whippoorwill. I’ve never seen the birds making those unmistakable sounds, but I hear them without fail. I looked for information online this morning and discovered that the birds are rarely seen. From a website, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, All About Birds, I read this: Made famous in folk songs, poems, and literature for their endless chanting on summer nights, Eastern Whip-poor-wills are easy to hear but hard to see. Their brindled plumage blends perfectly with the gray-brown leaf litter of the open forests where they breed and roost. At dawn and dusk, and on moonlit nights, they sally out from perches to sweep up insects in their cavernous mouths. Last night, the moon was full and the birds serenaded us into the late evening. We stayed outside until the moon had risen sufficiently high and move sufficiently west in the sky to see it in its entirety.

Today, we will smoke the brisket our friends brought; the he of the pair had brined it and lathered it in a delightful rub that smells of coriander and rich spices. After smoking the brisket for several hours, we’ll steam it for a couple more to make pastrami. I’ve never known much about how pastrami is made. I’m thrilled to have the opportunity to make it. He brought homemade rye bread for sandwiches. The she of the pair asked us last night if we realize how fortunate we are to live where we do, here in the forest. We do.

Now, if I can keep at bay the damn cold that seemed to have taken hold last night, all will be well. A day of smoking brisket and, later, drinking milk stout to wash it down, is a day to be captured. And I’ll capture it, both in words and in photos.

Maybe it was an epiphany. Maybe it was just a conscious acknowledgement of something I’ve known all along. Whatever it was, it changed the way I looked at the world for a moment. I sat outside, inside the screen porch, sipping on a bit of gin flavored with fresh lime juice. The songs and calls of birds were loud. Their sounds were so different from one another, I knew they had to be sung by multiple birds of different families. And they were close. I strained to see the birds in trees quite close to me, but the leaves hid them. The birds were there. They were so loud they could not have been in the trees further away. But they hid behind leaves or blended so well I could not see them. I was at once frustrated that I could not see which birds were making what sounds and awestruck that I was sitting in a forest with birds so close I could probably touch them if only I could see them. And then the epiphany hit me: if I had the patience, I could learn the calls of every bird in the forest. If I had the patience, I could allow myself to absorb the lessons of nature in its own time. Just wait, I said to myself, they will show themselves. And they did. But my impatience bubbled to the surface because, while I could tell which birds made some specific sounds, I could not tell others. If I’d waited, I would have learned. Let nature teach you what you don’t know. Wait for answers. Seek them if you must, but be willing to wait if you cannot find them. Today, I understand the lesson. Will is stay with me? Probably not. I’m not one to believe all lessons apply to me. Only after too much time and too much emotion, I will learn the lessons, based in reality, are teachers.

It’s taken me only ten minutes to write this. I’ll now return to the porch to seek lessons. Or maybe I should simply let the knowledge I seek drift slowly into my brain. That’s an option a patient man would welcome. If I could be patient, I’d celebrate that state of being. Off to the porch, maybe even out into the open air, closer still to the trees that harbor birds unwilling to readily identify themselves as the vocalists.

The internet leveled the playing field. It gave the unhinged and deranged equal access to tools of mass communication, enabling those monsters the unfettered ability to share twisted philosophies with their brethren. Their virulent ideologies spread, infecting those who had theretofore been simply innocuously stupid—turning erstwhile nitwits into dangerous carriers of the contagions. The diseased dogma—spouted by people defiled by the sickness—crept out of the ether and into the streets. Mental violence morphed into physical attacks. Victims and would-be victims responded with rage and violence of their own, spilling pools of animosity and waves of fury into the thought-supply, suffocating decency and decorum under an impenetrable blanket of hate. Only through the development of a deadly ideacide, something that works in small doses like super warfarin on rats, will society expunge deadly, mutant philosophies from our midst. The ideacide, embedded in a concept as bait, will entice the miscreants attracted to poisonous ideologies. Those deviant reprobates will consume the bait and slowly but surely wither and die for lack of malignant sustenance.  Until the glorious day when a hate-specific ideacide is available for general use, we’ll either have to wear ear and eye protection to shield us from the plague or sharpen our tongues and fingers to fight tainted doctrines. Utopia, I’m afraid, exists only in our minds; and it’s different in each and every mind.

He clothed himself in invisible shackles, bands of doubt that tethered him so tightly to the lack of belief in himself that he could barely breathe. He spent his life searching for keys to the locks that kept him chained to insecurity, fearing he might one day find them and disrobe to reveal a naked emptiness so vast it would swallow his entire world.

This morning, the sky merges with the earth in a grey vapor, the air damp and heavy. The atmosphere appears to be struggling to move, the clots of fog moving in slow motion, as if deliberating their next move. Will they fly away or collapse into raindrops, washing the sky and brightening the day? Perhaps it’s neither. Perhaps, instead, this drab day will linger a while, doing its best to suffocate good cheer. People tell me Oregon is wonderful (and I know it is), but the repeated days of grey skies and rain can take their toll on the psyche. I’ve only experienced Oregon with blue skies and crisp air. Even with rain, with clouds blocking the sun, what I remember of Oregon would, I think, still be beautiful. It’s odd that I don’t have the same sense here, where I live. When the day is dark and the sky is dull—not menacing, just dull—I tend to find my mood slipping. Today, though, I won’t permit it. Today, I will forge through the fog, head high and mind clear, and embrace opportunities to enjoy life. That’s the attitude, isn’t it? Indeed it is. Just as I write this, I look out the window and see more light. The fog is thinning and the leaves of nearby trees are turning from deep, forest green, almost black, to lighter shades that beckon birds and smiles. Yes, the day will be just fine, and so will I.

[Even I, the writer of the dark, need an occasional saccharin thrown into the mix.]

I read a Facebook post that moved me almost to tears. “Almost” is a slight exaggeration. The post was made by a woman whose seventy-year-old father had served in Vietnam. Her father and another soldier broke a host of rules and left their base for several days of  unapproved rest and recuperation after a period of horrific, intense experiences in battle. Her father never saw the other soldier again and has wondered, all these years, whether he made it out of the hell-hole of the Vietnam war. The woman who posted the note was looking for her father’s savior, the guy who joined him in an unapproved time of peace in a monstrous time of war. I shared the post, in the hope that the two men will be able to reunite and share their experiences. Maybe they can bring closure to a time of their lives that was unimaginably ugly.

I wonder why it seems so hard for the average American to come to grips with the fact that the Vietnam war was an embarrassing stain on our nation and its history, yet simultaneously appreciate and honor the men and women who fought that unjust war? The people who went to war did not go because they wanted to fight. They were ordered. And many of them did not have any idea of the genesis of the war; they did what their country asked of them. They knew what they were told. They responded to the draft or to urgings to join up to “serve your country,” without fully understanding what they were being asked to do. And it wasn’t just them. The rest of the country, save a loud and ultimately victorious group of anti-war activists, blithely accepted the “need” for the war.Why do Americans feel compelled to be so black and white about everything? It’s either “love this country or leave it,” or “my country, right or wrong.” What utter bullshit. People who love their country fight injustices that would sully the name of the country. People who love their country do not blindly accept that its every action is right and just. People for whom rabid, unchecked patriotism is an absolute requisite for citizenship are horribly, insanely misguided. Disagreement with a policy does not equate to dismissal of the people who are required to implement the policy.

I am biased. I am biased against willfully stupid people. Willfully stupid people belong in cages, where they are watered, fed, and treated like livestock. Incidentally, I am in favor of humane treatment of livestock. I’ll happily feed and water them, but I won’t ask them to make public policy or contribute to society.

That having been said, it’s on to other, more positive things. In just a few hours (after I sleep and then wake), I will pick up a group of fellow writers and will drive to Little Rock to participate in the Arkansas Writers’ Conference. I’m looking forward to hearing the speakers, talking to other writers, and learning whether any of my several writing contest submissions are recognized with prizes. Frankly, I think my odds are low, but I would love to be surprised. After the conference, a group of us are going to dinner at Macaroni Grill; I haven’t been to a Macaroni Grill since I was a mere child (or close). One of our contingent is a fan, so we’ll  happily visit the restaurant; it will be an opportunity to be together in a social setting. I’ve said for a long while that one aspect that’s missing from our local writers’ club is the opportunity for frequent socializing. Writers can’t be writers without the company of other writers and a little wine. Or beer. Or hard liquor. Or…well, you know.

Just so I won’t forget to document my day, dear diary, I want to go on record as saying a guy came by today to look at the deck. He says I’ll hear from him Monday with separate bids on the following: 1) replace all deck boards; 2) replace deck ballustrade with new railing, using metal spindles in place of wood; 3) power wash, replace expansion boards, and seal driveway; 4)repair woodpecker damage on rear of house; 5) power wash, paint, and finish entire house. All I need, I’m sure, is a cool one hundred thousand dollars to pay for all this. We’ll see. At least I will have a bid. (Though I’m still waiting for a bid from a guy who came out last week and said I’d have a bit in “a day or two.”)

Have they legalized preemptive euthanasia yet? I know of some candidates.  (This slipped out without my knowledge or consent.)

Some friends will visit a week from Friday (just passed). They will bring beer, brisket (as in home-prepared corned beef), homemade rye bread, and an unquenchable desire for pastrami. The idea is that I will smoke the homemade corned beef brisket, which will result in pastrami. I trust my friend to know what to tell me to do. I am delighted to have the opportunity to do this! And, in anticipation of this fabulous taste-fest, I’ll head over to a local brew-pub later this week to buy a few growlers of ale and beer and such. Next weekend promises to be a wonderful experience of (as the female component of the friend pair says) “Men, meat, smoke and booze! What a weekend!!”

For those of  you for whom this is appropriate, I wish you an absolutely orgasmic  weekend!

Oh, yes, indeed!