John Swinburn

Just over a month has passed since my 72nd birthday. I still find it difficult to believe I have lived that long. And, for the immediately foreseeable future, I will continue to live. Unless, of course, I don’t. That’s the kind of unexpected turn of events that can completely wreck one’s plans. To avoid that level of disruption, it is best not to make plans that could be ruined by one’s death. So, no gala parties that would have to be cancelled on short notice. No appointments for haircuts, pedicures, visits with doctors, lunch meetings, dinner meetings, breakfast meetings, speeches given to Congress or the Pismo Beach Garden Club, and so on. And, of course, no birthday parties; a birthday party for a dead celebrant is apt to be something of a downer. I have not had a birthday party thrown on my behalf (except one) for as long as I can remember. Nor have I held one for myself. Most of my birthdays have been acknowledged by small numbers of family and/or friends. The only party I recall was on my 50th birthday, when a couple of employees decided to surprise me. I was surprised by that surprise party. And I was genuinely grateful for it. Nothing like it happened on my two subsequent “milestone” birthdays. I doubt my next “milestone” birthday will be appropriate for celebration, though if I’m around to celebrate my 80th birthday, I won’t try to dissuade anyone from making plans.

+++

Music binds the wounds we sustain in our chaotic battles to achieve tranquility. Music is more effective than the salve of artificial sympathies, whose sources have little depth. In the right circumstances, even loud, percussive music can intervene on behalf of serenity, as if the turbulence of its sound is capable of smoothing and softening the frenzied nature of emotional disruption. But not everyone is able to slide, invisibly, into a musical cocoon. For them, certain music can simply aggravate an already stressful experience. Listening to a funeral dirge, for example, can trigger emotional waterworks. So-called “sad songs,” though, sometimes help lessen the intensity of the moment by bringing closure to an upsetting episode in one’s life.

+++

What happens to a close friendship that falls into disrepair and distance when, in spite of  time’s healing powers, efforts to resurrect the relationship fail to recapture lost informality? Can the comfortable, casual connection, once so powerful and so natural, be restored? Is the closeness that once existed gone forever, a victim of the irreversible and unnecessary mistakes that caused the rift to form?

+++

Owls in the trees near the house made their presence known last night by calling out to one another, “Who Who Who.” Though similar, I could tell the two “voices” of the owls I heard came from two different birds; perhaps having an avian conversation.  I have seen only one owl relatively close-up since moving to the Village, I think, almost twelve years ago. But I hear them frequently.

+++

I believe Amazon and Facebook listen to me. They pay close attention; if I mention anything available for purchase either or or through either platform, they take action, presenting me with offers to buy that product. Amazon, obviously, is listening at all times; it is obvious because the Amazon devices respond immediately when I say “Alexa.” And sometimes when I say something else, the devices think I am interested in having a conversation. Not infrequently, the devices—mistakenly think I am fluent in Spanish—launch into tirades that I find unintelligible except for occasional words or phrases, like “suero de la leche,” “mermelada de fresa,” “mujer con un corazón negro,” or “falsa bravuconería.

+++

I think it’s time for another espresso. Ideally, the espresso would accompany some fresh papaya, half a grapefruit, and a piece of fresh, hot sourdough bread. I would be satisfied with salt potatoes, though; a friend posted a simple recipe for the dish, identifying it as one of the most satisfying foods she has ever eaten.

“Too much” suggests there is a lesser measure; “enough.” And still another; a measure of inadequacy: “Not enough.” The same can be said for “too many.” But the other end of the spectrum for “too many” has another variable suggesting insufficiency: “Too few.” Although “not enough” can suffice in that situation, as well.  When I read or hear the words “too few,” my mind tries to comprehend the meaning, but my brain locks up. That combination of words tries to force me to understand a concept that is foreign to me or, at least, a little awkward: “an overabundance of scarcity.”

+++

The leaves on one of the visible branches of the bush just outside my window attracted my attention a few moments ago. The rest of the bush—all the other leaves on the remaining branches—were still, but that branch and its leaves shivered, as if shivering from the cold or trembling in fear. I could imagine my body shaking, had I been standing outside and reacting to temperatures in the lower 50 degree range. But that bush (and, especially, that branch) has experienced much colder temperatures without complaints. Fear could be responsible, I thought, but only if that little branch had the ability to experience that emotion. I ruled that out, despite the fact that none of truly know whether plants have the capacity to feel fear. I decided to investigate. When I looked down at the base of the vibrating branch, I saw it: a chipmunk or ground squirrel, busily gnawing on something near the base of the plant. Perhaps the shrub was reacting in fear, after all. Or pain.

+++

I cannot understand how some people can so readily pick sides between Israelis and Palestinians; voicing fierce support for one and loathing for the other. From my perspective, both are instigators and victims of violence. I feel compassion for each when the other side inflicts on them incomprehensible violence and pain. Yet I condemn each when it is the aggressor. Perhaps I simply have never fully understood either side’s claims of victimhood or their justification for wanting to expunge the other from the face of the earth. But, then, I would rather not join with those who classify either side as demons, or as heroic victims.

+++

Last Wednesday’s chemotherapy started imposing its side-effects on me yesterday; mostly in the form of causing me to need to sleep quite a lot. After several days of feeling energetic and ready to break out of living for months in a cocoon, I seem to have returned to my more subdued self. Damn. I was SO enjoying those several days of normalcy. But I hope that period of engagement with the world will return again soon.

+++

The United States never ratified the Treaty of Versailles, which ended World War I; perhaps we’re technically still at war?  The US withdrew from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty with Russia in 2019. Our country ratified the SALT II Treaty in 1979, but withdrew from it in 1980. Among the treaties made with Native American tribes, but broken or repudiated or never ratified were the Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868); the Treaty of Medicine Lodge (1867); eighteen treaties (1851-1852 California Treaties); Treaty of Washington (1855); The Treaty of New Echota (1835), considered fraudulent by many Cherokee people. The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) [officially, as I understand it, not really a treaty], was entered into in 2015 to place limits on Iran’s nuclear program, but the US withdrew in 2018. The Paris Agreement, an international treaty adopted in 2015 to combat climate change by limiting global warming, was entered into in 2015 and abandoned by the US in 2019. “Our word is our bond.” Uh huh.

For a short while, we expected we would go to Bentonville to hear Barrack Obama speak on December 1 at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. Tickets for members (which we are) were to be available, free, to members as of 10:00 a.m. yesterday. Mi novia attempted to get two tickets for  us. Unfortunately, on her first try—literally seconds after the tickets were to be available—she was disconnected from the system. Already, though, she was number 3000+ in line to receive tickets. When she immediately reconnected, she was number 7000+ in line. In either case, it was apparent we would not get the tickets. We were quite serious in our attempt. I was willing to postpone my PET-scan and the subsequent follow-up appointment with the oncologist. I reasoned that I could avoid spending much time in close proximity to people with potentially infectious diseases (though I had not decided quite how to accomplish that feat). We had decided to drive up the day before the event and remains for two overnights in a hotel. Barack Obama’s popularity was the undoing of our plans. I envy the people who will get to attend President Obama’s talk. Despite my occasional misgivings about some of his actions, I admire the man. I will always be at least marginally suspicious, though, of anyone who runs for and ultimately achieves election as the President of the United States. I forgot, in my formative years, to develop presidential ambitions; they still elude me.

+++

Power is both real and imagined. Strength resides not in the muscles, but in the mind. Responsibilities always accompany real power; the artificial stuff is accountable to no one. Similarly, fiction owes no debt to truth, and reality is not obliged to support the manipulative lies of dishonesty and falsehood.

The word “disease” sometimes seems accusatory, as if the person whose condition warrants the word’s use is knowingly responsible for allowing the affliction to emerge.

+++

I am cold and tired, that latter due to too few hours of sleep last night. I cannot pin responsibility for my insomnia on anything. I slept when I slept; I was wide awake when sleep eluded me. There was no balance between the two, just a random experience, like thin copper strands twisted around one another in a struggle to build strength from inherent weakness.

+++

I wonder how I would cope, if I were put in prison? Not well, I suspect. My reaction to incarceration might be to reject all fear and replace it with enough rage to cleanse the the place; all the way down to bare steel and studs. I would rather not be in a position to verify my response.

My body was built for a temperate climate; a place where daytime temperatures would range between 73°F and 83°F and nighttime lows would drop into the low to mid 60s, giving me reason to wear light sweaters or jackets. My personality, on the other hand, was built for the desert; where inhospitably hot weather, scorpions, poisonous snakes, and thorny cactus tend to cause people to keep their distance. In spite of my construction, physically and mentally, I am reasonably adaptable. With the right clothes, an efficient air conditioner and heater, and a nice fireplace, I can adjust to both hot and cold weather. Similarly, I can reconcile with low humidity, stinging winds blowing sand in my eyes, and the threat of injury inflicted by unfriendly flora and fauna…provided I have a swimming pool that is maintained by a professional pool person. Like most people, though, my adaptability is not as limited as the previous sentences might suggest. I have the ability to cope with a much wider range of conditions. My ability is not the obstacle. The issue lies in how willing—or unwilling—I am to accept circumstances beyond the limits of my comfort zone. We’re all like that, I think. Though we might think living in a hot, steamy jungle full of venomous creatures would be intolerable, for instance, plenty of people do. They do because, for the most part, they have no choice. They adapt. I could, too. I could live in a one-room house with a dirt floor and a leaky roof and cracks in the walls that allow wind to blow hot or cold air and sand inside. I would not want to live there, but I could. If my choices were to live there or to plunge off a high cliff to the rocks below, though, I might have to weigh the pros and cons of each before deciding which to choose.

+++

A Bedtime Story for the Little Ones
Little Bobby Jones did not know how his adventure would end. He knew only that the allure of the cave entrance was too powerful to leave, without first exploring what he might find in the darkness inside the mountain. The entrance to the cave looked innocent enough; just another crack wide enough to allow him to slide in and—if he were lucky—get to see beautiful stalactites and stalagmites. Bobby did not give a thought to the possibility that, beyond the entrance, he would encounter something so terrifying that his blood would run cold. He did not expect to be trapped, with no way to escape. When he realized he had been lured into the Gates of Hell, though, it was too late. For the next 500 years, Bobby would experience the immeasurably hot flames of Satan’s den and the agony of demonic creatures ripping at his melting flesh with sharp and slimy teeth. It was just that kind of danger that his mother, Susan Jones, had warned him to avoid. But Bobby did not heed his  mother’s advice. And the penalty for ignoring his mother was 500 excruciating years of the most horrific experience he would ever have. Until the 2nd stretch of 500 years, which would be tens of thousands of times worse. The moral of this story: if your mother warns you to stay out of caves, the choice you make in response to her admonition may have unfathomably monstrous consequences. But it is your choice to make.

+++

It’s back to the oncology clinic this morning for another infusion of IV fluids. Then, on December 1, I return for a PET-scan, after which I go back to review the results of the scan on December 3 with the doctor. The seemingly never-ending saga of treatments for terminal cancer. Terminal, though, has an indeterminate end-point. I am hoping for seventy-two more active and comfortable years, but that may be unrealistic. I would happily take 10. Or 5. Or whatever…within reason.

+++

Can the sky be meretricious?

Several years ago, I ordered what I expected would be a VHS tape of a television show I had enjoyed a few years earlier. When I got the tape, I discovered that it was formatted for what I learned was the European PAL standard, not for the NTSC standard in use in the USA. The show, Overdrawn at the Memory Bank, was a futuristic science fiction television film shown on PBS. I do not recall what happened to the tape, except that I never received an NTSC version. Apparently, I was never able to watch the program—which tarred two now-deceased actors, Raul Julia and Linda Griffiths—again. Am I the only person in my familial or social circle who remembers it? I have no doubt that I’ve written about it before; probably years ago. It pops up in memory occasionally; I have no idea if that’s just random, or whether something specific triggers the recollection.

+++

Dr. Anna Yusim, an executive coach and psychiatrist, is Clinical Assistant Professor at Yale Medical School (as a volunteer) and author of a book entitled “Fulfilled: How the Science of Spirituality Can Help You Live a Happier, More Meaningful Life.” She is quoted in an NPR Life Kit online text adaptation of a podcast, written by Ruth Tam (the title of which is Curious about exploring your spirituality? Ask yourself these 4 questions). When discussing the pursuit of “something greater” than oneself, Yusim said, “For some people, that’s God; for others, it’s collective consciousness or values like faith, love, trust and perseverance.” Tam explains the meaning of Yusim’s comment by saying, “This means that spirituality can be felt by both religious and non-religious people. You might believe in a religion, but not necessarily feel spiritual. Likewise, you could be very spiritual, but not religious.” Hmm. Finally, a reasonable, non-woo-woo way of expressing the legitimacy of the concept of spirituality outside of religious beliefs. The text of the NPR Life Kit was published online in late February 2025. Though I would not call the piece a “must read,” I found it sufficiently interesting to warrant a mention. I may decide to personally explore the 4 questions in more depth, later.

+++

Peering only at the ground outside, I would have expected to see only denuded branches when I look up into the surrounding trees. But the thick coating on the forest floor represents only the first serious round of Mother Nature’s efforts to strip every twig of its dead and dying leaves. Last night’s howling winds and heavy rain stripped a significant portion—maybe half—of the remaining leaves from the trees, but the storm’s power was not enough to leave the trees bare. I expected the loud cracks of thunder, alone, would have been sufficiently powerful to jar the limbs of the trees; to loosen the grips of the remaining hangers-on from their holds on the. But, no, the trees were not willing to let all the leaves fall; not just yet. Time and additional fierce weather will force the twigs to release most of the rest of the more persistent ones to give up.

+++

I dreamed I was in Dallas, at my old house, with my two older brothers. The younger of the two had parked his car on the street next to my house. He wanted to drive someplace, but he was worried that the car was nearly out of gas, so the three of us took a gas can from the garage and went in search of a gas station. The neighborhood where I lived had changed; some houses had been torn down and replaced by new, more architecturally pleasing ones and others had been remodeled to look more modern. After we walked through the neighborhood and made our way to retail and commercial areas, it became apparent those areas, too, had changed. I did not recognize them anymore. Once empty fields were now jammed with upscale retail stores. Gas stations I recall from the time I lived there had been transformed; pumps that required us to follow complex instructions to access gasoline had replaced the old ones. A man on a motorcycle helped me insert my credit card properly to start the flow of gas. When we left the station with a full canister of gas in hand, we discovered crossing what had years earlier been a busy street was now almost impossible. The traffic moved much faster than I remembered—at excessive highway-like speeds—and the signals that had helped pedestrians cross were gone. Whether we crossed the street remains an unanswered question; the dream apparently ended before it was answered.

+++

Well-made AI videos can seem almost (or, to me, entirely) real. That is more than a little concerning, especially in light of the fact that high-quality AI videos are capable of altering our perception of reality. I wonder how many videos I have watched, initially thinking they were real, only to discover they were created with AI? And how many might I have watched, generated by AI, that I still think were real? I wonder how many politicians I might think are human (but act inhuman) were created by devious, behind-the-scenes manipulators of enormous segments of the population? As I travel down this deeply disturbing road, I cannot help but wonder whether humankind long-since became extinct, replaced by AI replicas, including me. Is my confusion about life in general an outgrowth of the fact that I have never known actual life…was my experience as a living, breathing human being artificially created for the entertainment of electro-magnetic sadists with nothing but time, and real people, to kill? Of course I realize the likelihood is small, but…

+++

The merger of reality with fantasy may yield one of two things: realasy or fantality. Or it may not. The title of this post is neither, nor both; not either, as well.

American crows live 7 to 8 years, on average. I wonder how many of the crows around our house have lived that long? How does one tell the age of a crow? According to Google’s AI, a crow’s age is revealed in its eye and mouth color, feather quality, and behavior. But those attributes give only a range of age; a limited estimate, at that. My curiosity is not strong enough to merit any more vigorous research, so I will leave it at that. Is there anything that interests me enough to utterly and completely capture my interest, pushing me to seek answers to my questions in favor of food or sleep?

+++

Is California really “safe and warm?” Were the Mamas & the Pappas truth-tellers, or did they sing their hopes and dreams, abandoning reality in favor of comfortable fantasy? Fortunately, my life does not depend on getting a reliable answer to those questions. But what, then, DOES it depend on? A miraculously capable oncologist, perhaps?

+++

The population of Hot Springs Village, when I moved here in 2014, was said to be around 13,000. This week’s Voice newspaper reported the population is roughly 17,000. That population increase of 4,000 (almost 31%) is readily reflected in the volume of cars on Village streets and roads. New home construction seems to have been following the same pattern since the COVID-19 pandemic ceased being an immediate existential threat. Anecdotally, based entirely on my unscientific observations, younger non-retirees appear to constitute a greater portion of the population today than in 2014. The future is impossible to accurately predict, but I suspect growth will continue; probably at a higher pace. The cost of living—especially the relatively low cost of housing and the low property tax burden—enhances that likelihood. Housing prices in the Village have climbed steeply since the pandemic, but not as much as in Dallas, where I lived before moving here. We sold our house in Dallas in 2014 for $331,000; today, various estimates put its sales price at $640,000 to $676,000, around double. When my first house in the Village sold around four years ago, it had risen in actual value (per sales price) by almost 56% from the time I bought it, seven years earlier. That increase was propelled in large part by lower interest rates and high demand, brought about in part as a consequence of the pandemic. What, if anything, does all this mean? Hell if I know. But I know this: I am glad Dallas is not in my future.

+++

Late yesterday afternoon and into the evening as darkness fell, we sat outside on the deck, sipping wine. It was the first time in many, many, many months that we took full advantage of our location overlooking the forest; well over a year, I think. Sitting outside in a quiet, peaceful, beautiful setting as the sun dropped beneath the horizon was incredibly calming; relaxing in the extreme. The unseasonably warm temperatures, coupled with the fact that I felt an unusual and long-lasting burst of energy, made the experience feel absolutely delightful. But much cooler weather will arrive around Thanksgiving, according to forecasters, so I might not feel inclined to try replicate those moments; at least not in the immediate future. I am glad we let yesterday’s circumstances inflict such pleasantries on us. Today’s chemotherapy treatment is apt to rob me of much of my energy. The probability is high that I will again soon feel uncomfortably cold in an environment in which temperatures drop below 80°F. There I go again; allowing anticipation sully the appeal of the present. I must train myself to fully engage with the moment, when the moment is so refreshingly pleasurable!

+++

Card games have never held much appeal for me. In fact, I actively avoid playing them. Games far more to my liking include Wordle (very similar to the 5-Letter Word Game my mother taught me to play and enjoy when I was a child, but juiced-up by technology), Words with Friends (WWF), Sequence (which I haven’t played in quite some time), and (on occasion) crossword puzzles. Lately, I have been spending far too much time with WWF, sometimes playing six or eight “hands” simultaneously with a single opponent, then moving on to several other opponents with each of whom I am playing a similar number of “hands.” The games keep me occupied, though I tend to get annoyed with WWF when its creators refuse to accept perfectly legitimate words. My annoyance grows when those same game stewards willingly accept completely bogus combinations of letters as “real” words, for which their in-game dictionary conveniently has “not yet” included a definition.  And that exhausts the subject.

I had a rare burst of energy yesterday afternoon, enough to send me outside with my battery-powered leaf blower, where I cleared the driveway and the street in front of the house, as well as the circle at the end of our little cul-de-sac. Though I loathe the noise leaf blowers make, they make it possible to do the work of ten people with rakes—in a fraction of the time. Thick layers of leaves on the forest floor are appealing, but leaves on hard surfaces quickly become dangerously slick in wet weather; my rationale for tolerating and contributing to the noise. By the time I finished clearing the leaves, my store of energy was depleted. But it began to return after a brief break, so I continued to take advantage of it. I blew leaves off the deck, washed some clothes, shredded a pile of paper that contained personal information, vacuumed the areas of the living room that needed it most, emptied Phaedra’s litter box, and otherwise took advantage of an unusual store of energy. By the time mi novia returned home from her weekly Monday card game, I was ready to relax with a little wine—and to overindulge in far too many Oreo cookies. I haven’t had so much energy in months…literally months. If any of it remains, tomorrow’s chemotherapy session will likely sap it. Not pessimism; realism. The photo—unrelated in any way to the energy of yesterday afternoon—popped up as a “memory” on my computer monitor unexpectedly. I remember taking the picture of morning glories I had planted years ago in Dallas.

+++

We finished watching The Beast in Me last night. I was impressed.

+++

My nephew and his wife sent us an unexpected package full of edible goodies a few weeks ago. Included among numerous other wonderful surprises was a package of Dutch caramel-filled waffle cookies called stroopwafels. I had never heard of them before we received the package, but I now consider myself an aficionado. After wolfing down the stroopwafels they sent, I went online and bought some more. The treats have given me sufficient reason to travel to Denmark in the event they become unavailable in the USA.

+++

MacKenzie Scott’s enormous wealth is not her only distinction. Her approach to philanthropy is equally remarkable. It is my understanding that she tends to make large philanthropic gifts with the expectation that recipient organizations are best equipped to know how best to leverage the gifts to accomplish their aims. While I know very little else about her (other than she is a novelist and was married to Jeff Besos), what I know is enough to make me think she is the kind of person I admire.

+++

Under the right leadership, the United States, Russia, and China (and probably others) could join forces to accomplish enormous good throughout the world. Simply by retreating from unnecessary competition with one another (and away from enormously wasteful defense spending and military posturing), their resources could be redirected toward solving countless problems and threats. Encouraging other countries to join an active coalition of nations dedicated to peace and uniform prosperity, they could lead the world toward a far brighter and more satisfying future. I realize, of course, such ideas are considered by many (and probably most) as impossibly optimistic and utterly unachievable. But only by ignoring the staggering opposition to collective solutions to world problems can the long shot become a likelihood. The “right leadership” would involve people who are diplomatic, compassionate, charismatic, intelligent, optimistic, and willing to take big risks in support of creating a true global force for good. Though I usually am more than a little pessimistic about the future of humanity and humankind, when I think of the possibilities such collective efforts could accomplish, I am cautiously optimistic.

Overnight, the kaleidoscope of early Fall colors in the forest surrounding the house seemed to change. Trees that had been full of yellow and red and bright orange leaves changed into a nearly-uniform palate of brown and muted orange. More light now filters through the canopy, thanks to fallen dead leaves forming a thick coating on the ground. I am reminded of a place I have never been, except in my mind; a forest refuge hidden deep in a distant, almost inaccessible, part of the rural upper mid-west or New England. But I am here, in a spot I do not have to let my mind create. My mind need not conjure an imaginary place in a previous time. Yet I allow myself to use this real experience to invoke artificial memories of others that have never taken place. I wonder why that is? Does it suggest a longing to be somewhere else—somewhere like this but in another place or another time? Or is it simply a natural reaction; a response not unlike anyone else in my position, in my circumstances, might have?

+++

Soon the bright red berries on the bushes outside my windows’ study will attract birds, especially cedar waxwings. The birds seem to get drunk after they start eating the berries. Their speed when they fly increases and their flight patterns become irregular. My assessment—that their behavior suggests that they are inebriated—may well be an illegitimate anthropomorphic attribution, though. God, I love those big words!  🙂

+++

My visit to the podiatrist this morning was far less unpleasant than I expected. I barely felt the numbing injections in my big toe. After the toe became numb, I did not feel anything when the doctor cut the offending ingrown nail. Whether I will feel pain later, when the local anesthetic wears off is yet to be known. I suspect, though, the pain I have long-endured as a result of that nail soon will be just a memory. I will return to see the doctor in about two weeks, when he will apply some sort of chemical to the edge of my toe with the intent to prevent the nail from growing back in that area. I should have had this procedure done years ago. Unjustified fear can interfere with positive progress. That is true of physical as well as political and social matters.

+++

I just lit another cone of incense, the scent of this one called “forest.” Some of the cones with other scents—patchouli, cinnamon, sandalwood, aloe vera, dragon blood, full moon—have been mostly or completely used up, signaling the need for another purchase. My favorite, still, is patchouli, I think. Variety, though, keeps us from stagnating; getting stuck in a ritualistic rut. The potential for allowing one’s existence to become too routine and too predictable is one of the reasons I try to vary my activities, both physical and mental, at least slightly. I do not burn incense every day, partly for that reason. While following rituals can help anchor us to reality, overreliance on rituals can blind us to changing circumstances, leaving us struggling to adapt to the realities of a changing world.

+++

Last night, a character in a Netflix series we are watching (The Beast In Me) expressed concern about an urge to jump when she is in a high place. I identified with that fear; it has arisen in me many times over the years when I have stood at the railing of a tall bridge or near the edge of a high building. This morning, I searched for information on that phenomenon. An article in the February 2012 issue of the Journal of Affective Disorders calls it The High Place Phenomenon. The authors say it is a common phenomenon among people who are suicidal and those who are not. In fact, it “may reflect their sensitivity to internal cues and actually affirm their will to live.”

+++

Confronted with—and acknowledging—the inevitability of death changes one’s perspective on life. Gut acceptance of the reality that one’s own life will end can make taking existential risks less appealing; less thrilling. Many of the more mundane aspects of life that once may have bordered on boring can become intensely appealing. The attraction of broad social engagement can decline considerably, leaving one more interested in spending time with a smaller cluster of people with whom one is, or want to be, extremely close. But people being who and what they are, some people have the opposite experiences. They become more gregarious, more outgoing, more open to risk, and more interested in seeking new adventures. Then there are those who vacillate between personalities;

• The gregarious misanthropic hermits who refuse to stay inside shark cages while seeking opportunities to swim with great white sharks.
• The unsocial extroverted socialites who shy away from the dangers of gambling more than $2 in a poker game.

+++

Where do you go to avoid being crushed when the building blocks of civilization crumble around you? How do you escape the outcome when empires fall? Who do you turn to for comfort when the whole world abandons you? When do you acknowledge defeat when clocks and calendars no longer have meaning?  Why did the sinking ship invite passengers to board?  Is the atrophy of hope a communicable disease?

Data encoded onto reel-to-reel magnetic tape and expressed in the form of sound were expected to replace black vinyl discs that performed the same function. Similarly, machinery dependent on more modern magnetic tape recorded video images, then displayed on electronic monitors, were thought to spell the death of plastic film that captured “motion pictures.” Reel-to-reel magnetic tape recordings were made almost obsolete with the introduction of eight-track tapes and cassette tapes. Equipment that allowed video to be physically projected onto a screen (along with accompanying sound delivered through speakers) was all but replaced by even more modern video equipment that decoded magnetically-recorded images directly onto monitors. These newer, more modern, technologies reached their peak in a matter of just a few years, giving way to audio and video recordings on compact discs (CDs) which, a little later, were also were made obsolete by technology that permitted all kinds of data to be recorded on miniature magnetic media that could be stored on “thumb drives” and later made available through online streaming. “Old” technologies, once hailed as the wave of the future, limped into oblivion, superseded by ever-more-astonishing developments.

The same kinds of advancements that led to streaming video, cellphones, “smart” appliances, and other developments that seem closer to science fiction than to reality are likely to continue into the future, but at a much faster pace. Social media, one of today’s ubiquitous modern miracles, is apt to fall victim to the same creativity and technological advancements that gave it birth. Facebook, America Online (AOL), MySpace, TikTok, Instagram, Threads, and others seem embedded in our culture today, but a host of factors are likely to drive  their replacement or demise. The dark underbelly of social media, which is in part driving the erosion of civility and the consequent erasure of reliable streams of information, ultimately will create sufficient backlash to provide an engine for revolutionary change in the social media landscape. Most, if not all, of our modern marvels will fall victim to their own inadequacies; their own failure to properly prepare their eager consumers to use them intelligently, responsibly, and in a relatively sophisticated manner. Whether their replacements will follow the same path remains to be seen.

These matters have been on my mind for quite some time now. In fact, I expected the likes of Facebook and X and so forth to have faded into oblivion by now. It appears that Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk and their cronies are more intimately knowledgeable about the longevity timelines of their creations than I. That notwithstanding, I stand by my assertion that their products either will evolve into something far more sophisticated or decay into embarrassing memories of humans’ unsophisticated gullibility. So, too, will technologies evolve. If I had money and a reasonable expectation that I will live long enough to see the results, I would bet quite a lot on being right.

+++

The future of Time is impossible to predict. Time cannot exist without a future, but neither can the future exist without Time. The past, on the other hand, is immutable; with or without Time, the past has already taken place, so it is not subject to adjustment in the same way that the future can be modified. But the past once was the future, so Time must have shaped the past as surely as it shapes the future. How can the past, though, be independent of Time, yet be irrevocably tethered to it? Just as yesterday is the past tense of today and the preamble to the future, the past and the present are the preambles to tomorrow. Tomorrow cannot exist in the absence of Time. Is Time dependent on activity? Or in the absence of activity, does Time cease to exist? Why do we need Time? Is Time a necessary concept? Could humans get by without acknowledging the existence of Time? Time cannot be tasted, seen, touched, smelled, or heard, so it is generally not considered one of our “five senses.” But if Time can be experienced, how can that be in the absence of a sense to detect it? Perhaps our five senses can exist only in the presence of Time? How, then, does Time relate to smell or taste? Maybe Time is a required in order to experience any of the five senses?

+++

I missed my connecting flight last night because I lost my boarding pass. Janine and Carol must have made the connection, but I was delayed because it took so long to get the customer service agent to produce a replacement and because the gate agent would not hold the flight for me. I might have made it, had the departure gate not been so far away and had the gate agent not ignored me for so long and had I not been so naive as to show a man my new boarding pass. My flight was to leave from gate 5; I was at gate 51, which was next to gate 5, but gate 5 could be entered only from the other side of the people mover. The people mover was very slow and had to circle the entire airport to get to gate 5. The man, dressed in a jacket that looked different from other airline employees, asked to see my boarding pass, then put it in his breast pocket and said he would go check it out. He did not return. I was embarrassed that I kept not evidence that I have been given a replacement pass and that I must have given my boarding pass to a stranger who was not connected to the airline. I was resigned to the fact that I would be fired because I missed the flight; but also because I had not turned in expense reimbursement requests for dozens of other flights. I awoke this morning in a state of intense stress.

I drank my espresso this morning from a small, colorfully glazed ceramic cup made in a Central American country, a gift from a friend who recently returned from there.  Though I am not—unfortunately—one of them, I admire people who make a point of bringing little gifts to their friends from their travels. The gift itself, though nice, is incidental to something far more meaningful; the fact that the recipient was on the gift-giver’s mind. In the case of my gift, its meaning was amplified because it demonstrated my friend’s knowledge that I am especially fond of espresso. Gift-giving has never been a strong suit for me, though I often wish I were more thoughtful. I attempt to justify my empty hands by saying I do not know what to give to people, but that is a poor excuse. The value of a gift may be enhanced when it illustrates a personal connection (as with my little ceramic cup), but the core of its value lies in its giving. Mi novia often shows a person who is important to her is on her mind when she gives a gift she knows the recipient will find especially meaningful. Is the absence of such behavior in me a “natural” trait of males? I doubt it. It is simply a personality flaw; evidence that I lack one of the characteristics usually found in caring, considerate people. Perhaps I can train myself to be a different person; a better person.

+++

Prime rib, freshly-grated horseradish, mashed potatoes, Yorkshire pudding, and steamed asparagus are on my mind at the moment. Though that menu is a Christmas tradition with some families, my family (when I was a child) had turkey and dressing with an assortment of trimmings on Christmas Day; a repeat of our Thanksgiving Day meal. After I left home, I changed the Christmas tradition. Prime rib sometimes, when I could afford it, but more frequently, meals in Thai or Chinese restaurants. Or, on occasion, frozen burritos purchased from the freezer case of a small-town gas station. My late wife and I liked to experiment with non-traditional holiday meals, especially at Christmas time. I vaguely remember having Korean food once, when the waiter tried to convince me not to order something she Americans hated. Whatever it was, I enjoyed it…despite the fact that I learned it was grilled intestines from a farm animal. It might have been sheep or cow or pig…I’m not sure. This year, we’ll play it by ear. My preference would be to take a long, leisurely drive on both holidays. But in the absence of reliably good Asian restaurants within driving distance, we might even return to prime rib. I am not inclined to seek out frozen burritos this year.

+++

Soft-boiling an egg is not particularly difficult, nor is it time-consuming, but it is apparently more demanding than I would like; because in spite of the fact that I enjoy soft-boiled eggs, I rarely go to the trouble. “Trouble.” It’s not trouble. But it’s more involved than I would like. And the clean-up after the fact does not appeal to me in the least. Until a few short years ago, I did not find soft-boiling eggs especially onerous. Frequently, I soft-boiled two eggs for breakfast, which I accompanied with a small glass of tomato juice (enhanced with the juice of a freshly-squeezed lemon and a few drops of Tabasco sauce) and a sliced tomato. The loss of that ritual may have followed the loss of a kitchen that seemed particularly well-suited to soft-boiled eggs. Yet it could be something else, given that about the same time I stopped engaging in my daily habit of drinking that glass of tomato juice and its companions. The timing of the change in my breakfast habits might have coincided with my return to chemotherapy, when I detected a noticeable change in the flavors of food. If and when the time comes for me to stop chemotherapy (maybe even before), I will give soft-boiled eggs and tomato juice another go. I miss that morning ritual far more than I would have guessed I ever would.

+++

Flesh-colored is not a color. It is the reflection of a white person’s beige skin and an assertion that persons of color do not have flesh.  But people get around its racist underpinnings these days by claiming it is the color of any person’s skin tone, regardless of lineage.

When I lived in the Dallas/Fort Worth area (the “Metroplex”), I often wanted—or, perhaps needed—to escape the density and frenzy of urban life.  More than occasionally, I got relief by retreating into the rolling hills and plains of north central Texas. Driving two or three hours west and northwest, the rural and semi-rural environment helped me decompress. Experiencing rural and semi-rural environments felt softer and more welcoming than the constant pressure of dealing with city life. The routes I drove took me through pastureland and small towns, where I assumed people lived at a slower pace and could enjoy a more leisurely lifestyle than in the city; the pressure-cooker that defines urbanization. Getting away from freeway traffic and offensive billboards and reports of non-stop violent crime and road rage kept me from joining the ranks of the dangerously and incurably angry. I envied people who lived in sparsely-populated areas, where I thought—I fantasized—were largely immune to big-city problems. But, that was just wishful thinking.

Thanks to an Associated Press article I read this morning, I was reminded that my thinking was delusional. The article related the plight confronting the people in and around the town of Olney, Texas, where the hospital is no longer able to deliver babies. Financial woes, state politics, federal regulations, and economic dislocations have forced the Olney Hamilton Hospital to stop offering the level of maternity care required to allow it to continue its 100-year-history of providing a place for pregnant women to give birth. The hospital in another nearby town, Graham, stopped delivering babies in 2015, citing the fact that it was reimbursed only 39% of the expense per birth.

Tom Parker, head of the town’s economic development corporation, is quoted in the Associated Press article as saying, “If you don’t have a high school and a hospital where you can have babies, that town’s not going to get up off its knees…It might have been something once, but if you don’t have youth, if you don’t have new babies, you don’t have hope.”

Having never been interested in having children, I don’t think I have ever considered that the absence of maternity services in a community is likely to result in a community’s stagnation and, ultimately, disintegration. While this may not be a “big city” problem, it certainly qualifies as equal in scope to—perhaps even greater than—threats facing cities.  Still, the relative peace and quiet of a rural or semi-rural environment is extremely appealing to me. But the reality that big cities do not have a monopoly on stress and existential challenges has found its way into my idealism. Humanity, no matter where  or how sparsely settled, faces challenges all its own.

Next Monday—roughly 60 years, I think, after the inciting incident—I will visit a specialist who, I hope, will repair the damage done when my bare left foot slipped off a bike pedal and slammed perpendicularly onto an asphalt surface. The outcome of that unfortunate event, a perpetually ingrown nail on my hallux (AKA “big toe” or, in medical parlance, “great toe”) remains visible and painful all these years later. My memory of the original experience still causes me to wince, even after so much time has passed. When I jammed that toe onto the street, the nail broke cleanly across the base at the matrix, where the nail joins the toe. The nail lifted completely from the nail bed at the lunula, but stayed barely attached, all the way to the end of the nail. During the ensuing week or two, the nail detached completely, leaving the nail bed completely exposed. Eventually, the nail grew back, but the injury must have significantly and permanently transformed the growth pattern. I have coped the with intermittent pain of an ingrown nail for about 60 years, but the discomfort has worsened recently. Certain shoes that once simply exacerbated the pain now make the experience far worse. The prospect of a painful intervention to resolve the problem now seems more tolerable than the likelihood of allowing the situation to become even more excruciating. I realize, of course, I should have dealt with the matter many years ago; that would have saved me countless hours of intense discomfort. Apparently, I am capable of fear-driven idiocy.

+++

After yesterday’s appointment with my oncologist, we drove the few miles down the Scenic 7 Byway to Jessieville for lunch at The Shack, a dive of a diner across from the Jessieville school district building complex. My club sandwich was messy but extremely satisfying. Mi novia expressed a similar level of appreciation for her patty melt on buttered white toast. The Shack used to be mentioned frequently in conversation among people in Hot Springs Village with whom I spent time. For some reason, though, I rarely hear it mentioned much any more; perhaps it’s because I do not get out much nowadays. It may be that my aging cohort of acquaintances has grown far less likely to go out for hamburgers, among the most popular attractions of The Shack. Or it could be the prevalence of flies buzzing around inside the big picture windows where the booths are situated. I find the flies more than a little annoying but tolerable when encountered only on rare occasions.

+++

Speaking of my oncologist, she plans to schedule me for another PET-scan within the next few weeks. It may be just my imagination, but her demeanor suggests to me that she thinks the procedure might reveal an acceleration in cancer development. I hope it’s just my imagination. What, exactly, is hope? Here is a definition I encountered online: “the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best.” The word is then presented in an example in that context: “to give up hope.”  When I mentioned my recent night-sweats to my oncologist (which she calls “nocturnal diaphoresis” in her visit summary), she decided she wanted to do a “blood culture” test to determine whether bacteria, fungi, or other microorganisms might be present in my blood. She explained that the blood used in the test must include blood drawn from a needle in the arm…not blood drawn from the infusion port. After five tries, the nurses were able to draw enough blood for the test; they apologized for the multiple “sticks,” though I know my veins have become difficult to tap, so I did not blame them. I mentioned my ingrown toenail during today’s session; she documented it as “onychocryptosis.” Back to the cancer clinic in one week for follow-up.

+++

The female cardinal outside my window, with her orange beak and her black mask, cannot hide her suspicions about what lies on this side of the windows. She would, if she could, hold me at gunpoint while she and her flock of aggressive companions ransack the cupboard, looking for seeds and nuts. But cardinals have not yet devolved the way we have, to the point of relying on weapons to persuade their intended victims to willingly feather their nests.  Crows, on the other hand, clutch concealed knives under their wings, prepared to defend their right to harass interlopers who dare to challenge them for airspace. Roadrunners, with terrified snakes dangling from their beaks, dash in and out of mountainside desert topography littered with unexploded land mines and live grenades. Storks, carrying human babies wrapped in cloth diapers, attempt to escape the turmoil by nonchalantly gliding above low clouds. Hummingbirds, their tiny wings buzzing like angry wasps high on cocaine, plunge their long beaks into trumpet vine flowers, while English bulldogs observe from a distance as they smoke fat Cuban cigars in celebration of the cremation of a particularly ugly, dangerous, and disgusting American politician. The pungent, unmistakable smell of the last of the old-style camera flashbulbs popping as photographs are taken signals the end of an era. “Touché,” the artists shout, as their palettes dry in the suffocating heat. The birds respond with noises cannibals make, just as the curtain closes and the audience raises their gin gimlets in salute.

+++

Absurdities often paint pictures otherwise hidden among melancholy shadows dressed in green eyeliners and black lipstick.

Sometimes, seeing or hearing or otherwise observing someone else’s mental anguish—even if that someone is a stranger or a person with whom one’s connection is faint or weak—sparks a powerful response. Their pain becomes personal, as if their suffering has invaded one’s own experience. Neither sympathy nor empathy nor compassion is quite the right word to fully describe that sensation. Rather, the experience is more like being consumed by the invisible flames of a distant emotional firestorm.

+++

My curiosity concerning the source of the images of carved peach pits about which I wrote yesterday has been satisfied; the grandfather of my sister’s childhood friend was the carver. That explanation prompts more questions about when and why and how he carved the little peach pit baskets. Answers to those questions now seem within my grasp. The next time I speak with my sister, I’ll try to remember to ask for more details. Thanks, Libba.

+++

I imagine gazing up at a brilliantly clear blue sky. Not a cloud in sight. My eyes fixed on that uninterrupted emptiness, extremely dim grey cracks begin to appear; cracks like those that appear on mud flats that have dried after days under an unforgiving, bright sun. The grey cracks grow darker as I continue staring upward, finally becoming jet black. A piece of the blue sky, surrounded by black cracks, breaks away and falls to the ground below. Behind the piece of sky that fell is pure black, exactly like the cracks. The blue chunk, which floats to the ground, contrasts sharply with the dull tan earth. Another piece of blue sky drops from above; like the first one, the piece that drops leaves a black wound. More and more irregularly-shaped blue scraps plunge to the ground, leaving behind them the same empty blackness that was behind the other pieces. Before long, the ground is covered in brilliant sky-blue; solid, with no cracks between the fallen pieces. The sky is black; no stars, no moon, no sun. Just vacant black space. As I glance at the ground, I see reflections of alligators swimming through the black emptiness above me. But they may not be reptiles, after all. They may be memories, covered in an irregular pattern of small, square scales.

+++

Flattery is, too often, a cesspool filled with lies. But when it’s true, it should be given freely.

+++

I’ve taken to thinking in random, nonsensical bursts of revelation. For that reason, I would like to have a tailor come to visit me with samples. A grey tweed jacket, casual in style, perfectly fitted casual slacks, and complementary shirt (plus a nice pair of shoes, from the cobbler’s own specialty shop) would be nice. Bespoke is beautiful.

+++

Another visit to the oncologist in less than an hour. Will it ever end?

Buried deep among my scattering of inaccessible childhood memories are images of peach pits, carved in the shape of miniature baskets. I am not sure how I know they are peach pits—perhaps that knowledge is buried even deeper than the images themselves. Regardless of why or how I am certain of what was carved to create the little baskets, there is no doubt in my mind about their origins. I imagine peach pits would be quite difficult to carve because they are very hard and their small size probably would challenge even the most accomplished carver. Beyond my recollections of seeing the little carved baskets, I vaguely remember holding them in my hands, fascinated that something so common and mundane—and so small—could have been transformed into what seemed like such tiny toys. A cursory search on the internet this morning suggested carving fruit pits originated as Chinese folk art, a now declining form of artistic expression. My fragmented memories sparked my curiosity about who carved the ones I recall from my childhood. I doubt I will ever be able to satisfy that curiosity. But I may explore what else I can learn about them, anyway.

+++

Eidetic memory—the ability (typically found only in young children) to at least briefly recall an image from memory with great precision—differs from photographic memory. Photographic memory is said to be the ability to recall pages of text or numbers, or similar, in great detail. While eidetic memory apparently is recognized as a “real thing,” literature suggests there is no reliable evidence that photographic memory really exists. I do not know whether to accept the skepticism about photographic memory. I have come across a number of claims that some people on the autism spectrum have what amounts to photographic memory. I do not understand why photographic memory is subject to strong skepticism if, indeed, so many people ostensibly possess it. On the other hand, the “reality” of photographic memory would be sufficiently exciting that the idea might prompt false claims about it. I know this: I have neither eidetic nor photographic memory.

+++

Leaves. Outside, everywhere I look, leaves whirl through the air. Fall has fallen.

The concepts of bending time and space seem far-fetched but fascinating; intriguing, but beyond the ability of my mind to comprehend. The origin and the end of time are beyond my grasp, too, but my feeble intellect continues pushing me to attempt to understand the mysteries embedded in the ideas. Despite the extreme unlikelihood that I will ever get plausible, comprehensible answers  to my questions about time and space, I remain deeply curious about such matters. Yet my curiosity apparently is insufficient to drive me to delve deeply into learning physics, where—if they exist—there may be answers. I gave up on mathematics and physics before I finished high school; maybe even earlier. Unlike other school subjects, which were easy for me to grasp, those two presented challenges I was either unable or unwilling to meet. In recent years, my interest in them has grown considerably. But not enough to spur me to invest the time, energy, and commitment to revisit them with the intensity of a student truly hungry for knowledge. I justified my failure to make the necessary investments by saying to myself, “it’s too late, now…if only I had developed my interests much earlier…” That justification has kept me from exploring the subjects for years and years. “If only” is an over-used excuse, just an explanation used in place of acknowledging laziness.

+++

In connection with my fascination with time, deep in the clutches of a recent unforgiving night, I had an epiphany about time’s origin. Unfortunately, the night’s absence of mercy prevented me from capturing that revelation in memory. I wonder whether that epiphany, if examined in the light of day, would retain its relevance? Or would it dissolve into a flimsy interpretation of a theory based on magical thinking? I am inclined to believe it would wither under the glaring light of intense examination; like so many of my “epiphanies” usually do.

+++

The roof of the house is white with frost. Yesterday, the red berries on the plants outside my window were green, I think. Bright sunlight is intensifying the kaleidoscope of colors in the changing leaves. Acorns and leaf litter usher in the first real evidence of the coming winter. Every day, the scene in the forest surrounding the house changes enough to be noticeable. Before long, filtered light will replace the dense darkness of the forest floor. A friend posted a photograph on Facebook, showing a pile of acorns on a two-square-foot space on his lawn. He says this is a “mast year” for acorns. According to an AI-created explanation, “A mast year is an irregular, synchronized event where a population of trees produces an unusually large crop of nuts and seeds, known as ‘mast.‘”  Mast is the the fruit of forest trees and shrubs; a mast year helps ensure adequate food for wildlife and enough seeds to replenish forest vegetation. If there is a correlation between a mast year and the intensity of winter weather, I suspect this winter may be an especially brutal one.

+++

Last night, I had been engaged in a long, stressful dream when I woke in a pool of cold sweat (again). The dream was bizarre in many ways; some elements I remember:

• I checked in to a motel and left, then later realized I did not know the name or location of the place.
• I walked for miles, looking for the location of a place I thought I knew, finally realizing I was looking for a place in Dallas, but was attempting to follow a route I remembered from Corpus Christi.
• I tried to text for an uber, but the bulky cell phone I was using did not have the right plug-in.
• Two men who asked me for a ride to their hotel did not have an address for it, but we drove around north Dallas looking for it for a long time before they mentioned the hotel was in downtown Dallas, 20-odd miles south.
• While looking for a restroom, I went inside a crowded Mexican restaurant, where a homeless woman stopped me and asked me to lend her $1.
• The road I thought would take me onto a freeway ramp took me, instead, to a railroad track on a sweeping overpass built on wooden stilts.

This latest episode of night-sweats will be the subject of an inquiry I will make to my oncologist…to learn whether there may be something of concern I need to address.

+++

If the universe consists of an enormous globe, within which billions of galaxies exist, what is beyond its outer limits? If the universe is limitless, there is no beginning and no end to it; an idea that is impossible for me to grasp. But, then, so is the concept of “something” external to the monstrous globe of a limited universe. Prior to the “big bang,” how big (or small) was the “thing” that exploded? What was it that blew up? Did anything exist outside that “thing?” If “nothing” surrounded that “big bang,” how far out did/does “nothing” extend? I recently read that scientists (somewhere or other) have evidence that light-speed can be (and in fact has been) exceeded, suggesting that “warp speed” may really be a thing and that time travel could, theoretically, be feasible without breaking the laws of physics (which is punishable by hefty fines and eternal incarceration in a galaxy far, far away).

“Consent of the governed” is the concept that the legitimacy to impose state political power over the members of a society is subject to the consent of the people. In theory, the idea is sound and seems reasonable. In practice, though, it gets a bit messy. At what point can “consent” be claimed? Consensus? Approval by a simple majority? An overwhelming (defined as ???) majority? Universal acceptance by all members of the society? The extent of power granted to government, too, is open to question. Even if all the members of a society were willing to accept/give consent to a government demand that everyone stop breathing for five consecutive minutes, the “willing consent” of the people probably would be judged to be coercive or otherwise unnatural and, therefore, not given of free will. In the event that a majority of the people give their consent, must people in the minority simply acquiesce to the wishes of the majority? How must dissent be treated? An enormous number of questions emerge when considering the practical consequences of relying on the concept of “consent of the governed” to justify a government’s moral authority to act on behalf of the governed.

+++

The temporary ruling to pause implementation of the SNAP program, issued late yesterday by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, surprised me. It wasn’t the ruling that surprised me so much as it was who issued it. My immediate reaction was that the liberal minority of Supreme Court justices (of which Justice Jackson is a member) had shrunk even more with her decision to “support” the administration’s emergency request. But I cannot say I fully understand the processes used by the Supreme Court in deciding such cases. Though I am relatively sure Justice Jackson does not condone the suspension of SNAP benefits, I suspect she made her ruling with an expectation that an appeals court will give a more thorough (and possibly a more favorable) and lasting ruling. Laws become as complex and as contradictory as we allow them to be. I am in favor of requiring the “consent of the governed,” though at times I might be willing to consent to progressive, caring, authoritarian rule. Increasingly, my consent to be governed is given grudgingly. Frequently, it is not actually given, either, but lent. Too often, my consent is assumed when, in fact, it is released without my approval and without even a shred of cooperation on my part. That is, over my objections to its release. Unwilling consent may be the proper term.

+++

Once again, my night was interrupted, off and on, by brief periods of sleep. Between those periods, I experienced an episode in which I woke in frigid, perspiration-drenched sheets, made bearable by covering the bottom sheet with a beach towel. I gritted my teeth and coped with a cold, damp top sheet. I do not know the cause of this second experience of its kind in a relatively short period of time. My most recent chemo treatment was a week ago; I doubt chemo is to blame; at least fully. Whatever the cause, I want it to stop. Immediately.

+++

The original entrance to Hot Springs Village is about fifteen miles west of the newer entry on the east end. The road between the two is lined on both sides by forests, intermittently interrupted by signs of civilization like golf courses, lakes, tiny eruptions of rare commercial enterprise, and roads and streets leading to residential areas. Mostly, though, the traveler from west to east is exposed to a thick mix of deciduous hardwoods and pine trees. This time of year, the leaves on the deciduous trees are in the midst of change, displaying a stunning mix of colors: red, yellow, orange, brown, green, and more. The most eye-catching trees are the ones whose collections of leaves now are entirely bright, phosphorescent yellow. But the contrasts between tall trees with bright yellow leaves and those with incredibly intense red leaves are breathtaking, as well. The first time I drove those fifteen miles, I fell in love with the scenery. I marveled at how the trees on both sides of the road created a sense, for me, of being in the middle of a massive forest; the trees masked “civilization” behind the woods. Getting away from the Village, though, puts me in an even better frame of mind; the world’s problems vanish, replaced by serenity in every leaf.

+++

Perhaps I would have slept much more soundly last night if I had driven onto an isolated, seldom-traveled forest road, parked, and reclined in my car seat that could have become a safe, unreachable cocoon. Instead, though, I tossed and turned for most of the night, unable to slow my mind enough to fall asleep. It was not a single thought that kept me from sleep; hundreds of unrelated matters crowded my consciousness spun through my brain. Each one, when it departed, left me with little scraps of thought-wreckage; fibers of vague worry or discontent that simply would not leave without depositing some of their remains as reminders. My attempts at sleep were sabotaged by frayed and worn memories of experiences I cannot recall.

+++

Leaf blowers…loud, powerful, disturbing…have taken hold of my consciousness. Their noise is too invasive to ignore. I loathe the commotion they create in an already-chaotic mind. But we decide between the temporary cacophony they bring and the tangled mass of layers upon layers of leaves and acorns that linger so long in their absence. Life is full of such choices; between swallowing razor blades and dousing oneself with gasoline before striking a match. We hire and pay for this disturbance, opting to risk deafness and insanity rather than willingly accepting forest burial.

+++

My decisions are not made in a vacuum. They take place in a space full of pressurized air and focused experience. And randomness, sprinkled with certainty, ambiguity, and precision.

+++

In an environment once thick with wind or water and rock, sand is evidence of the confluence of time and energy. Evidence is not proof, though; only a defensible suggestion.  A suggestion of what what constituted “here and now” when “here” was “here” but “now” was “then.” The defensible suggestions are endless, but the assumption used to select one upon which to use as evidence is Occam’s Razor, or the Law of Parsimony—i.e., the simplest explanation is the most likely.

+++

Depending on one’s innate (or learned) biases (which inform one’s assumptions), Occam’s Razor can be used to argue for or against the existence of God. But that is not the purpose for which Occam’s Razor is intended; it is meant to serve as a philosophical tool for choosing the explanation with the fewest assumptions. In that context, truth often is determined to be just one of many possibilities—the one that can be explained with the fewest possibilities. The strict application of Occam’s Razor would, in my view, give us a radically different understanding of the world from the ones upon which we rely.

+++

Political posturing in this era of of civic madness offers evidence that Kool-Aid is thicker than blood, which adds an element of uncertainty and confusion to the aphorism that “blood is thicker than water.” The ingredients in Kool-Aid then must include thickening agents, which change the composition of water, causing me to disseminate this advice: before accepting a blood transfusion, get assurances that it is free of Kool-Aid or other thickening agents.

+++

Sometimes, when the lyrics of songs I like pop into my head unexpectedly, I ponder what might have caused them to show up when they did. Occasionally, the reasons are immediately clear, like this example from a post I wrote three-plus years ago illustrates:

My late wife and I used to laugh hysterically when we talked about her misunderstanding of a lyric from a John Prine song, That’s the Way the World Goes Round. Here’s the correct stanza:

That’s the way that the world goes ’round
You’re up one day, the next you’re down
It’s half an inch of water and you think you’re gonna drown
That’s the way that the world goes ’round

But she heard:

That’s the way that the world goes ’round
You’re up one day, the next you’re down
It’s half an enchilada and you think you’re gonna drown
That’s the way that the world goes ’round

That’s how we should react to worry; just laugh it off. Easier said than done, of course. Worry does not subscribe to Occam’s Razor.

+++

I wonder what people think of my superficially absurd writing? Plenty of it is deeply superficial, indeed. But some of it is intended to spur much more serious thought. Generally speaking, the evidence suggests either I fail spectacularly or readers are reticent to approach me with questions about my sanity.  Occam’s Razor suggests…

My blog posts were, are, will be, aren’t, or never were. They cannot be should, because judgments are shaped differently than simple facts. Simple facts opt not to expose themselves to being shoe-horned into a mold that looks more like “sparkle” than “vodka.” Mysteries are like that, too. If they are “withhold with the final paycheck,” the word used to describe that compensation for employment just might be a bold prediction of the future. Hard to fully understand, but oddly prophetic in an analytical, math-like way.

+++

I watched a Netflix documentary last night about hospice care, specifically the care and conversations between a few patients, their families, and their doctors and nurses. Unavoidable grief was on display, along with worry and confusion and uncertainty. On one hand, seeing the way palliative care help the patients and their families deal with terminal cancer was heartening. On the other hand, though, and despite the utility of end-of-life discussions and decisions, it was almost impossible to watch the program without becoming acutely aware of how the topics can trigger torrents of tears from everyone involved.

+++

Not yet 6:00 a.m. and I have handled several of my tasks for the day. But I have plenty more obligations and implications to address today, so devoting even a minute to frivolous tasks would be irresponsible.  I am capable of being lazy, so I have to watch myself closely and take any and all actions necessary to exercise control every time I turn my head. That notwithstanding, I tend to use chemo days into a crutch for my indolence, so this will be especially demanding. Therefore I should be gentler on myself than I deserve.

+++

Zohran Mamdani’s win in the New York Mayoral race yesterday was a widely expected surprise. Some voters and pundits called the race tight, but gave Andrew Cuomo odds of winning a tight race. Others forecast that Mamdani’s background and progressive philosophies were too liberal for the majority of New Yorkers. His win may indicate a surge of left-leaning philosophies are gaining  support in the Democratic  Party. It also could mean the “average” voter has decided to discipline the Republican Party, after Trump’s embarrassing style of management during his horrifying first ten months in his second disturbingly successful attempt to turn the  U.S. presidency into a carnival midway act. Voters’ selection of Abigail Spanberger, Mikie Sherrill, and Zohran Mamdani to move forward it their respective races illustrated the effects of higher-than usual voter turnout and public sentiment about the diminishing ability of moderate or conservative policies to address problem facing urban political landscapes.

+++

The efforts between politicians to make progress in this country have become weak and sickly, almost as if the planned progress has been diverted into storm sewers where damaged culverts release bubbling explosive methane gas into housing where kids play with self-igniting kitchen matches. For that reason alone, a large proportion of the housing is at three to five times capacity. Fire Chief Anderson Gladewater, in his most recent report to the resident assembly, announced that high density housing in which insulation for physical structures consists of bone-dry pine saplings and saltpeter has successfully ignited dozens of small fires and an occasional inferno within the last year. “We’re making progress, folks, but we need to gentrify at a much faster rate. I recommend we displace up to 1000 families annually, turning their homes into soulless metal closets selling burner phones and packs of illegal cigarettes.” “That,” Chief Gladewater continued, “is the only way the badly contaminated older population can ripen in peace. It’s them or the kids, people. And it’s a lot easier to replace children than to replicate adults.”

+++

More than a month ago, I wrote a very short vignette, in which I used names I concocted for characters who belonged in other places and times. The names: Perfidia Adebayo, Insidia Aaberg, and Ephemera Foreva. The first two names slipped into my head while I explored a place in which I was judged to be an inappropriate presence—I was far too old and had not received an invitation suited to someone  so lacking in age and experience. In addition to that, my thoughts were foreign to the two names that found me profoundly objectionable. Oh, yes, those names read my thoughts as evidence that I was at that moment an unwelcome intruder. I was not a danger to them, but their observations about me said they believed otherwise. They suggested, quite forcefully, that I should leave immediately. The third name intervened on my behalf. That name belonged to Ephemera Foreva, who invited me to stay; to sit and make myself comfortable. And that I did. But I wisely decided to hide my presence from the two unfriendly identities. From that point forward, I called them the causticacians when I wanted to refer to them. I decided the need to refer to them was uncommon; rare in the extreme. One day, I may explain how and why I came to that conclusion. In the interim, I ask only that readers trust my judgment. Failing that, readers should expect intellectual blindness or ocular deafness.

Ephemera has asked me to cease, for now, my inadequate attempts to describe the experiences I have been attempting to describe. I will respect her request. This temporary cessation is only a pause; not a permanent stoppage.  Refusal to follow her guidance could cause the bones in my hands to break into thousands into tiny pieces of skeletal structure, damaged irreparably into memories as transparent as shattered glass. Shattered glass and crushed bones would be of no use to me, so I will refrain from behaviors that could lead me in that direction.

+++

It is no longer close to 6:00 a.m. and no longer dark outside the windows. More than 1.5 hours have passed. The day is aging even faster than I am getting old. While the morning remained dark, I doubled up on espresso and foods that exist only to quell starvation. Not quite suddenly, but certainly not at the speed of a tortoise, I screamed silently at the disappearance of darkness. I imagined emptiness…no breathing, no air circulation in my lungs, nothing visual to stimulate my consciousness because my consciousness was gone. There was no darkness; neither was there light. No awareness. No aching muscles. No difficulty calculating multiplications between two or more 20-digit numbers. No memories, no hopes, no desires. No empathy, sympathy, or hostility. An utterly unaware experience…without an activity in which I am unable to compare joy or terror or eternal boredom, because they do not exist, either. They once did, of course, but by the time I begin to understand that “not being” is impossible to understand (in the same way that the distance to the sun cannot be compared to the aroma of fresh-cut ginger), existence will be real only in the form of former and future lives. Life and death are identical to one another in the same manner as light and dark are different, but only when Schrödinger’s cat is neither alive nor dead, but both. In some cases, one’s imagination is more concrete than water is visible.

It’s not beyond the realm of possibility that I may have created a new written language while consciously dreaming. I was disappointed that the English language was so damn complex; so hard to learn. But it wasn’t hard to pronounce; just hard to write. Now, for example, you and I pronounce “horse” as hawrs, as we did back then. Before, though, we spelled the word that we pronounce as hawrs this way: fourfootedanimalwithamaneandhooves. The spelling of every damn word was like that! Imagine sitting down with a quill and ink and writing a letter to your grandfather’s uncle’s first grade teacher…what a nightmare! One morning, while enjoying a bowl of haggis and alligator ceviche for breakfast, a man knocked on our farmhouse door. I opened the door and he handed me a hand-written note. The first sentence of his missive was eleven pages long. I was illiterate, of course; I could not read his mass of incomprehensible letters. But then he said “hawrs.” Suddenly, it came to me! We should stop using the confusing blather; we should write words sort of like they sound. I wrote “horse” and showed it to him. He wept openly when he realized what had just happened. Within hours, he had earned his Ph.D. in Spelling. What a joyous occasion!

+++

When too much power—and a lust for even more—is concentrated in just a few nations and people, humanity begins to unravel. Both humankind (the species) and kindness (the characteristic) succumb to the overwhelming desire for dominance, which transforms cravings for strength and privilege into an incurable disease. The afflicted leaders, though, claim concentrated power will convert suffering into an indescribable, impossible utopian dream. And they insist that efforts to dilute such power justify any and all steps taken to silence their opponents. Those steps, they say, will reward people who conform to authoritarian leaders’ expectations and demands. Explosive insurgencies may be the only tactics that have a chance of ending what amounts to the dissolution of freedoms and all the horror that accompany such madness. If nothing else, sedition may be the final, heroic expression of humans’ collective desire to substitute freedom for slavery.

+++

The future, which present circumstances suggest will become only slightly more dystopian than the past, will remember only what newscasts and official government propaganda allow. Already, we have “learned” that the Holocaust, Slavery, the Moon Landing, and the Great Depression were video games triggered by the gradual cooling of our planet…made into films shown in Omnimax Theaters owned by Betty Friedan and Pablo Picasso’s youngest teenage daughter, Formalda Hyde, who just celebrated her fourth birthday. Down the road a ways, just around a bend on a switchback littered with marbles and ball-bearings, truth will be bottled and canned in patriotically-themed packaging. We now celebrate “strategery” as one of a thousand reasons we prefer George Bush and Genghis Khan to Kash Patel.  But what will tomorrow bring?

When dictatorship is a fact, revolution becomes a right.

~ Victor Hugo ~

Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.

~ John F. Kennedy ~

A revolution is a struggle to the death between the future and the past.

~ Fidel Castro ~

You can kill a revolutionary but you can never kill the revolution.

~ Fred Hampton ~

Both the “cost of living” and “the cost of staying alive” tend to increase over time. While the rising “cost  of living” initially places negative pressure on meeting “needs” (which often are used interchangeably by people who are financially secure with “desires” or “luxuries”), growth in the “cost of staying alive” is far more consequential from the outset.  Too often, though, policy-makers, economists, and the beneficiaries of simple good fortune dismiss such matters as either overblown abstractions or the deserved results of indolence. Some of the same people who judge recipients of public assistance as unworthy of support try to hide that callous insensitivity by, begrudgingly, engaging in philanthropy. Because they know their attitudes toward the poor would paint them as uncaring, unkind, and unable to feel compassion, they hide behind artificial evidence that portrays them as benevolent and empathetic. Other people who share such hard-hearted coldness seem to revel in publicly refusing to engage or support charity—as if they relish their reputations as aloof, self-centered, and judgmental. The number of people who believe poverty, or even temporary financial hardship, is well-deserved punishment for inadequate drive or innate laziness sometimes appears overwhelming; so large that overcoming their influence on society at large may be closer to a fantasy than a hope.

+++

Saturday disappeared in a day-long and night-long fog of sleep and near-sleep. The one-two punch of gemcitabine (Gemzar) and navelbine (Vinorelvine) apparently lived up to its reputation for side effects like weakness, fatigue, nausea, vomiting, chills, etc. This morning, though, I feel moderately alive; sleep, though, may be offering an appealing invitation. Yesterday’s food intake was quite modest: an Ensure and espresso and water. Today, so far, I have replicated yesterday’s meal, with the addition of a banana. My SIL arrived a short while ago, bearing what she called a spicy dish (a soup?) of pumpkin and sweet potato; I will give that a shot in a while. If Friday’s chemo side-effects are like the other ones, I should be approximately human by tomorrow or Tuesday or Wednesday. Already, I am better than yesterday; considerably better.

+++

Humans define intelligence in other creatures in ways that compare and/or contrast with human intelligence. I understand why, I think, but I continue to believe we may be utterly off-base. I have said it many times before and I will, no doubt, say it again. We cannot process the concept of a kind of intelligence that differs radically from our own. We cannot successfully interpret the communications that take place between a lion and an antelope during the fury of a battle between a predator and prey. The remarkable ability to translate between French and Japanese speech does not carry over to enable us to understand the communications between an octopus and its hatchlings. We can hazard guesses as to the “meaning” of a cat’s meows in the presence of humans, but those guesses are based on our human interpretations of the animal’s sounds, not on the basis of actually understanding the noises or physical movements the cat makes. Birds communicate, we think, but the substance of their communications is unknown. For all we know, a crow’s caws might signal the bird’s desire for a bacon and tomato sandwich—the fact that the crow seems satisfied with a peanut we offer, instead, does not necessarily prove that we “understand” that the crow is hungry…it may signify only that the bird thinks we will realize that its acceptance of the nut is an expression of politeness in the context of human-crow interactions. Ants communicate (we think) with pheromones. It’s entirely possible, though, that pheromones comprise only a small portion of communication; tiny, very low decibel voices might combine with the odor of ant juices to convey completely different meanings, depending on the context. “Sting that bastard!” That could be what the ant is saying (expressed in human English), versus what we think it is saying: “Turn left to reach the sugar, Honey.” Or, possibly, “Turn left to reach the honey, Sugar.”

+++

Today is my late sister’s birthday. Time robbed us of conversations that could have taken place. But time no longer exists for her. Is she the one who was robbed of those conversations, or am I the one? Or, in the absence of time, is the idea that either (or both) of us were robbed of conversation utterly absurd?

+++

When I was a teenager, I went fishing with friends in Corpus Christi Bay, where our primary intent was to catch speckled trout. Looking back, I wonder whether I ever counted the number of “speckles” on a speckled trout? Do they all have the same number of speckles? Whether they do or not, is there some significance in the number?  I have had similar questions about other, unrelated, things. Like, what is the range of the number of leaves on a twig from a red oak tree? If so, why? If not, why?  Why do we say a bark is one of the sounds a dog makes AND bark is found on the exterior surface of tree trunks? Are the two barks related in some way? And why do we call the exterior protective layers on humans and animals “skin,” but we call that protective layer on trees and shrubs “bark?”

+++

Some questions belong in nurseries…some are better-suited to asylums.  Answers float like helium-filled balloons until goose quill feather pens with sharp brass nibs pierce them, causing infants and the insane to erupt into high-pitched laughter that lasts for days. But the questions remains: who smuggled helium into the psych ward and who took feathers into the natal intensive care unit?

+++

My hands and feet are almost frozen, a sure sign they belong under the covers, where the rest of my body will feel more comfortable, as well.

+++

He felt very young and very old, as if he had been born yesterday to the originator of the English language as it was spoken in the 16th century. His birth was pre-Guillotine, but post-Halifax Gibbet. His death occurred the moment his airplane crashed, head-first, into the Salar de Uyuni, in Bolivia, the largest salt flat on Earth. It was impossible to accurately estimate his age, due to the fact that the date of his birth had been cleverly scraped off his femur, probably with a gas-powered chainsaw, by Hercules Fernandez, who died more than a century before the crash. Clever, yes, but eerie in its own way.

Mystery. Unknown. Secret. Hidden.

+++

The SS Edmund Fitzgerald, which sank in Lake Superior during a monstrous storm on November 10, 1975, was among the largest of an unknown number of ships lost to the Great Lakes. The Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum estimates 6,000 ships and 30,000 lives lost have been lost since the 17th century, while Mark Thompson, author of Graveyard of the Lakes, estimates the number exceeds 25,000. The causes of many of the shipwreck disasters are unknown, though severe weather is blamed for many of them. Weather almost certainly contributed to the loss of the Edmund Fitzgerald and its crew of 29. The fiftieth anniversary of the Edmund Fitzgerald’s disappearance will be marked—but not celebrated—ten days from now. John U. Bacon, author of The Gales of November, has said the Edmund Fitzgerald’s global fame is eclipsed only by wrecks of the Titanic and the Lusitania. The deadliest shipwreck on the Great Lakes claimed almost 400 people aboard the Lady Elgin in Lake Michigan in 1860. Gordon Lightfoot’s 1976 ballad, The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, is credited with widespread knowledge of the catastrophe.

+++

Yesterday’s cancer treatment again (finally) included two chemo drugs, after an extended period in which only one of the two was administered. My oncologist had been hesitant to administer both at the same time because the two together, according to the doctor, had caused me to experience more intense side effects than she thought were appropriate. I suppose I will know fairly soon whether yesterday’s combination causes the same results.  Last night, I was surprised to feel quite fatigued early on. Then, during the night, much of my body felt achy and uncomfortable. I can tolerate those effects, but the doctor apparently is not convinced I SHOULD. I do not want her to weaken my treatment just to reduce the likelihood that I might experience some moderately unpleasant side-effects. But I probably should rely more on her expertise than on my gut feel.

+++

For some reason, I always remember that Maggie’s birthday is today, November 1. Maggie was my first real date—the first of a very small number—when I was in junior high school. My father drove Maggie and me to a theater in downtown Corpus Christi, where we watched Fantastic Voyage. Somehow, I mustered the courage to invite her on that date, but I did not have the nerve to ask her out again. The fact that, shortly thereafter, she transferred to a Catholic school may have contributed to the fact that we did not have additional dates. But I did have occasion to run into her on occasion after our one date. It was on one of those occasions that I learned she preferred to be called Maggie; until then, I had called her Margaret, the name which was introduced to me. Many years later, I came across her again, when I learned that she had become a lawyer, was married (and divorced, I think), had a daughter, was an Assistant U.S. Attorney General, and identified as politically conservative. Perhaps I remember her birthday because my late sister’s birthday is tomorrow, November 2.

+++

A small bird (something like a sparrow I think) discovered that some of the seeds in the bird feeder outside my window are still edible. Shortly thereafter, a cedar waxwing of roughly the same size as the sparrow(?) bullied its way in to take over the buffet. When the waxwing slipped away to swallow its seeds, the other bird sneaked back in to get more food, but left when the bully returned. The waxwing seemed to have no compunction about pushing its competitor off the feeder’s perch, even though there was room for both of them. After watching this back-and-forth for a while, I put out a call for a mediator. A few moments later, an albatross and a bald eagle offered their assistance. I judged both of them unsuitable, figuring their considerably larger size would intimidate the two smaller birds. The larger birds, offended by my decision, left in a frenzy of feathers. Almost immediately, though, an African lion and a gazelle took their places. Despite their sizes, I decided to give them a chance to work out the conflict between the birds. I left for just a few minutes, returning to find the gazelle lapping up blood from the mangled corpse of the lion. How could I have known the gazelle was a rare carnivorous antelope? Apparently, the fatal dust-up between the mammals frightened the birds away; I haven’t seen them since. Hmm. I might find enjoyment in writing children’s books, based on hallucinogenic interpretations of disruptions of the natural order.

+++

Feed the young barely enough that they will grow into weak, feeble adults. Adults who are better-equipped to understand the use of starvation as a political tool. A tool employed as an instrument of power and control only slightly less jarring than whips and chains. What better way to introduce people to unrestrained cruelty than to expose the population to the barbarism of deliberate famine—using children as pawns in an eternal battle in which conquest at all costs is the sole ambition? Compassion has no place in this crusade. Animosity is the only acceptable emotion in this clash and greed is the principal motive. No one can watch this struggle as an impartial observer; neutrality is tantamount to complicity with the aggressor.

+++

She sewed sequins to her skirt to start the celebration.
He finally finished the festival on Friday, when fertilizer fueled the fire’s flames.

+++

When sunlight finds its way through dense masses of branches high in the trees and illuminates a small cluster of pine needles, the color of the spot highlighted by the sun’s rays seems to be lime green. But broadening one’s focus to encompass a wider view, those chartreuse leaves appear gold. Like everything else in the universe, color is contextual…when viewed through my eyes, at any rate.

+++

In 1971, Leonard Cohen released an album (Songs of Love and Hate) that included a tune entitled Diamonds in the Mine. Among the lyrics for that song were these:

Ah, there is no comfort in the covens of the witch
Some very clever doctor went and sterilized the bitch

Later, near the end of the decade, Cohen sang a live version of the song with some additional lyrics:

I told you all about it in the days of Vietnam
when your poets marched for Uncle Ho
And your sons for Uncle Sam
But which side you’re gonna take now,
which song you’re gonna sing?
With the mega stench of corpses that is blowin’ in the wind

Now, so many years later, I am finding references that suggest Cohen was both anti-war and anti-abortion. That discovery does not damage my appreciation of his music nor his poetry. But it causes me to consider that logic and emotions can comfortably conflict with one another in the same brain. I wonder whether I would have stepped in to save his life if I knew for certain Hitler would have discovered and shared with the world a cure for cancer…if he had lived just one more year?

+++

Every so often, I absent-mindedly let my morning Ensure get warm before I drink it.  When that happens, I am startled when I finally take a sip and discover it feels like warm chocolate milk and has a slightly metallic-chemical taste.

+++

Once again, fragments of time have disappeared, leaving me to wonder who and where I was while it happened. Three hours have simply vanished since I woke, leaving a stretch of vacant emptiness on the morose face of the digital clock. The crows outside have noticed, too, alerting me to the fact that bright blue dye was sprayed all over the grey sky during the absence of my awareness of time. Snow drifts, some of them several hundred feet deep, could have covered Central Arkansas while I watched time erase all evidence of the bloodshed involving African wildlife and domestic songbirds. But snow was not in the forecast, so people are crawling out of their storm shelters and into their canoes, anxious to check their trotlines to see whether the Mona Lisa and her elves left any Halloween eggs or gefilte fish meatballs. Over the years, I have assigned categories to many of my posts here, but no longer. If I were to do that, still, I might classify this one as Absurdist Fantasy. That might reduce the likelihood that I could be committed to a psychological ward for observation. Depending on your perspective, that could be an appealing outcome.

The seasons of deception are descending on us. Halloween is almost here, a moment when we encourage people to hide their identities by assuming the physical appearance of other…people, animals, monsters, things, places, ideas, etc. Then we have Thanksgiving, when real and artificial turkeys are on display. At this time of year, pumpkins are mercilessly attacked with knives and razors, carving them into jack-o’-lanterns and placing burning candles behind their psychopathic smiles. As early as May, Christmas decorations begin to be displayed, with a focus on Santa Claus, Joseph, a manger attended by wise men and donkeys, Seven Dwarfs, Sinbad, Santa’s Elves, Christmas trees, Snow White, Cinderella, and the Little Engine That Could. Merchants, who have been led to believe we will spend more money on gifts if we detect the aromas of cinnamon, bourbon, and a wood-burning fireplace, lure us into toy stores and gun shops with scented candles, open containers of Maker’s Mark 46, and Jack Frost roasting over an open fire. Between Halloween and Thanksgiving (US version), Dia de Los Muertos is solemnly celebrated in some places, with face masks that look like skulls a favorite physical disguise. Dozens…maybe hundreds…of other holidays are available for us to openly express our superstitions without being judged as superstitious.

+++

Sweet mercy is nobility’s true badge.

~ William Shakespeare ~

+++

Time sometimes disappears, hours at a time, when I give my mind freedom to explore without insisting that it express what it finds and record it. The same thing happens when I focus my attention on what my eyes see, versus what my camera might capture. In both cases, I get lost in a world outside myself…or maybe it’s just the opposite. Suddenly, though, my interest—which had been so precisely and intensely focused—all but dissolves, leaving only a hint of whatever it was that I found so appealing. Perhaps I simply retreat deeper into myself, consuming time as sustenance. Whatever the root of it, either  circumstances absorb time or time is somehow extracted from experience in some fashion. This is not something new, by the way. I may remember thinking, as a fairly young kid, that time could be “tamed” in some way—made docile and obedient through training to enter a hypnotic, almost comatose, state. But that could have been a memory created to explain the inexplicable.

Tiny pebbles disguised as simple ideas create ripples of thought. Thrown into a lake with a surface as smooth as glass, they create ripples of thought—surges of misshapen thinking—that become either tsunamis of creativity or corpses of concepts starved for attention.

Acorns litter the ground, evidence that seasonal change is afoot. Wind, rain, and cooling temperatures contribute to the transformation, as do hardwood trees, beginning to shed their leaves. Soon, more of the green canopy will have disappeared, allowing more filtered daylight to reach the forest floor—sunlight will be kept at bay for a while longer by a protective shield of clouds. The coming weeks and months will strip most of the remaining leaves from the trees, allowing every crack and crevice on the ground to be touched by the sun. The leafy darkness of the woods in the other seasons will give way to Winter, when the shady understory is bathed in direct sunlight.  Daylight differs from sunlight in that daylight tends to be somewhat reserved—sometimes even introverted—whereas sunlight exemplifies an almost garish extroversion. Yet sunlight in Winter differs from sunlight in Summer, as if they are identical twin children of unrelated parents. And daylight, regardless of the time of year, seems to have emerged from the consummation of a union between the seasonal equivalents of a concert pianist and a jazz trumpeter.

+++

I continue to notice that my once-plump hands seem more than a little skeletal, as if they have been preparing for Halloween. As I stare intently at one of the many visible blue veins in my right hand, I notice that movement causes it to stretch just enough that I can see the tendon beneath it. And that tendon appears to hide other tendons, along with bones and muscles and, probably, connective tissues.  All this supposition… for what purpose?  Nothing compelling…strictly unchanneled curiosity.

+++

This rain on this cool, overcast, dark afternoon is not especially heavy, but it is relentless. Today’s weather could have been imported from the countryside outside a village in England’s Lake District, where people are unafraid of getting wet. At the end of a day’s work, villagers trudge along narrow, hedgerow-lined roads—barely wide enough for two cars to pass on another—as they make their way to country pubs that serve locally-brewed ales and stouts and bitters, ideal accompaniments for steak and kidney pie or bangers and mash or curries introduced by Indian immigrants. I remember experiences that time, in all likelihood, has rendered stale and outdated, though. The pubs I recall from numerous trips to England in years past may have disappeared, replaced by American-style fast-food restaurants that serve bottled beer. The noisy chatter among neighbors sitting at the bar probably has now been drowned out by deafening music and the unregulated volume of people speaking loudly into their smart phones.

I think I was born in the wrong place at the wrong time. Had I had known fifty years ago, what I know today, I might have extracted myself from the irrepressible influences of modern-day America, opting instead for a culture better-suited to people who deeply appreciate certain attributes of the past; people who are relics, like me. Advancing age and retreating health, though, unfortunately have joined forces to make such an option unwise today, if not impossible. I realize, of course, that the passage of time tends to brighten recollections of happy times and soften or dim the recall of difficulties and struggles. That notwithstanding, I believe certain aspects of life in different times and different places appeal to me in ways that “here” and “now” cannot successfully imitate. The best alternative might have been to re-create, to the extent possible, attractive historical settings and to appropriate cultural practices to match them. Cultural appropriation is viewed negatively by many people—who consider it offensive thievery. While I will not argue that such theft can occur, I would argue that given proper implementation and attribution, it is not theft but, rather, an expression of appreciation that demonstrates esteem and high regard.

+++

This afternoon’s post may be an attempt to atone for the flippancy that drenched significant portions of the one I wrote this morning. My excuse, as flimsy as it is, for the impertinent frivolity of this morning’s message is that I was quite tired, after spending eleven hours in bed and rising very early at around 4:15. Though I remain tired, I think I have erased most of the whimsy that contributed to my detour into only-slightly-controlled madness. It wasn’t just whimsy and frivolity, though. It also was an attempt to combat an unexpected and surprisingly fierce episode of feeling depressed. That sensation is no longer as powerful as it was, though I can almost feel pieces of the remnants ricochet off my brain every so often.

+++

Today was my first doctor’s appointment of the week, an annual follow-up with a urologist. I have another chemo session scheduled for mid-day Friday, which probably will steal much of my energy within a day or two afterward. Maybe that’s what triggered the feeling that I had stepped into a bottomless canyon—another several days of wanting to sleep around the clock. That’s one of the more challenging aspects of ongoing chemo; once it starts, it’s like stepping into another dimension in which time simultaneously accelerates to the speed of light and decelerates to a thousand times the speed of darkness.