...And The Dog Ran Away With The Girl

This morning while still laying in bed  I began mentally mapping out my day. Far more often than not the whole 'mapping out the day thingy'  ends up being an exercise in futility.  Even so, in my eccentric corner of the world  I live on this lilliputian land of 'Perpetual Hope' and this little crumb of magical thinking is what allows me to make plans.

This morning's ritual ushered in something that I was completely unprepared for. I don't know how any one could have been prepared for such an episode. Even as I lumbered through residual sleep I am mentally penciling in the days agenda. I prioritize by the order of importance, from most important to least important. I do this because my mind is far more ambitious than my body.   First in order of the day is to go to the nursing home to visit with my mother.

I don't quit know how to describe this other than it seems like my mind has a mind of it's own. First I'm thinking about visiting my mom then my mind starts inching away, at first it was real slow and sneaky-like so I didn't take notice. Then with an abrupt jolt it just took off,  dragging me behind like a cartoon drawing of a sixty pound kid hanging on to a leash attached to the collar of a two hundred pound Great Dane, a Great Dane that's in hot pursuit of cat. There's just no stopping that dog. Oh how I hate that.

This damned dog dragged me through  bristles and briars to a place that I never wanted to go to again.  The fallout from this, well, let's just say,  I'll be spending the next few days pulling thistles out of heart & soul.   If only it were possible to kill a memory.

Some people should never be allowed to have children.

Betrayal, Through The Eyes Of An Eight Year Old

The year is 1963.   She is eight years old.  The songs over the airwaves were;  Johnny Cash's  'Ring of Fire',  The Beetle's 'I Want To Hold Your Hand' ~and~ 'She Loves You' along with  the black & white images of The Clydesdale Horses trotting  to the 'Budweiser Jingle'.  Those are the sounds that dominate her memories of that year.  Today when she hears one of these songs  her whole body reacts to it. Her muscles tense,  she can feel the oppression from the heat and the thick, heavy air that makes it difficult to breathe.  The first sensations to arrive are heightened anxiety and a sense of danger and then the unwelcomed memories start to punch their way to the surface. That's the sequence and it always seems to be a sneak attack. What's so puzzling to her is that she finds herself both drawn to and repelled by those melodies at the same time.

The place was Tampa Florida.  She even partially remembers the address; 11004 61st Street,  but she can't remember the zip code.  She  remembers the first three numbers of their phone number,  988-.    It was a place were grotesqueness and exquisiteness existed simultaneously and she often wonders how that's even possible.  This is the place where all of her nightmares, creativity and love of nature was born.  She both loves and hates this place at the same time.  She's pretty sure this paradox is where she came into being.   Her life,  such a contradiction.

They lived behind an Orange Grove.  The Grove was a place of haunting beauty. From the branches of orange trees hung  silver-blue moss. It was a kind of beauty that's indescribable, especially in the early morning when there was a misty fog floating on the air giving the grove an air of enchantment.   The moss looked like what she imagined the hair of a fairy would look like.  Long blue-grey strands with silver highlights  twisted and curled around each other.   If you looked really close you would see tiny, almost microscopic ruby red bugs scurrying up and down the strands.  She remembers thinking that they in themselves were beautiful and she was absolutely fascinated that creatures that tiny even existed. How in the world could something that small be alive?

This particular day was oppressively hot and the air sickeningly thick.  Just over yonder there where dark, angry looking storm clouds gathering,  physically and metaphorically.  Before the storm ever reached their little green colored aluminum house the air inside began to feel as though it were popping with static electricity that was being generated by her mother's anxiety.

 Her mother was terrified of  lightening.  She was so terrified that she was willing to sacrifice her child to electrocution to save herself.  When a storm was  in progress her mother would seek the safety of the corner of the long blue sofa furthest from the big picture window in the living room.  From the sofa the girl's mother would instruct  her to go around the house to first turn off at the switch all of the electrical appliances, the television, radios, lamps, etc.  and then to unplug all of the cords from the outlets.

The girl wasn't  afraid of the storms and at the tender age of eight she was oblivious to any danger.  Oddly enough, none of her mother's fear & anxiety ever influence her as far as thunder & lightening are concerned, not then and not now.   She does remember loving the arrival of thunderstorms because it always meant that she had her mother's full attention, so, she was quit happy. Obviously, in the girl's childish mind she didn't know at the time that her mother was using  her as a distraction, that it  never was about being a mother-daughter bonding activity.

On this particular day during this particular thunderstorm her mother taught her a song. The girl thought it was hilarious because it had a bad word in it.   "Oh the monkey wrapped his tail around the flag pole to see his ass hole" and those words were sung to The National Emblem March and the girl and her mother sang it over and over again, giggling until the storm past over.

It was just a matter of moments later when the girl's father came home unexpectedly for lunch. This was a very confusing period in her life because as much as she wanted to love her father  she was terrified of him at the same time, and for good reason.  But she was still giddy from the excitement of the play time with her mother and so she ran up to her father and threw her arms around his hips and hugged him. then she said:  " Listen to this song Daddy", and the girl then sang the funny song that her mother taught her during the storm.   In her childish innocence she was fully expecting that he would join in the fun because after all,  he had hugged her back when she hugged him,  but instead he was enraged and the she did not understand why. Instantaneously  fear and anxiety spread over her like a pall.  To this day the girl can still see his face. The hard lined around his mouth, lips pressed tight, cold steely gray eyes, she can see the tiny beads of sweat on his forehead, she can smell the Vitalis hair cream in his hair & the faint scent of Old Spice lingering on his starched white shirt that had his name embroidered in red thread on the left breast pocket.  Forty Three years later her stomach still knots up when she relives that day in 1963.   He siad: "Where did you learn that?"  She said: "Mommy taught me".  His  head snaps up and he looks towards her mother and he said:  "Did you teach that to her?" Her mothers said:  "No,  I didn't teach her that, I don't know where she learned that from, she's lying, she's lying."  By now the girl is terrified and sobbing, trying to catch her breath while repeating her father over and over  again that mommy taught her that song as he's slapping and shaking her demanding that she tell him the truth.   Her mother, still sitting  in the safety of the corner of the long blue sofa furthest from the big picture window in the living room, watches in silence as her eight year old daughter receives a severe beating for singing the song that she herself taught her daughter and then lied about it.

This was not to be the last time the girl's mother would sacrifice her.

About eight-ten years ago the girl asked her mother why she lied to her father about teaching her that song and  why she sat in silence and watched as he gave her such an awful beating.  Her mother's response was:  "Well, I didn't want the beating". And she laughed as she said it.

Some people should never be allowed to have children.

Word Drivel

I admit, I am utterly devoid of talent when it comes to writing so I'm  going to apologize in advance to anyone who decides to stick around and travel down this twisting, winding road of 'word' drivel.

I've been in a Fibro Flare for the past several weeks so my morning ritual goes like this:

• Struggle to get out of bed.
• Go pee.
• Grab cell phone, book bag,  Miss Molly McGee (dog) & take the stairs one at a time down to the first floor.
• Boot up the MAC.
• Put the coffee on.
• Put Molly on her leash.
• Take Levothyroxine then wait one hour before taking other meds & having breakfast.
• Read HuffPost & get pissed off (Part B) Tweet on a separate Twitter account created specifically for Politics and articles about Law Makers that have pissed me off.
• Let Molly back in, by now she's jumping, scratching & crying at the door (she has issues).
• Break away from political news before I spontaneously combust due to anger & hostility, moving on to a poetry or (literature <--- I am in shock, I can't believe I spelled that right. Give me just a sec. to bask in this rare moment of achievement).  sorry.

And today while surfing the Net I discovered a site dedicated to Victor Hugo, so reread one of his poems that I adore, Veni, Vidi, Vixi.   I've read it several times yet every single time  something new stands out  (probably due to my dyslexia since it's not written in a pattern common to me).

Veni, Vidi, Vixi

from: Contemplations by Victor Hugo

Translated by: Henry Carrington

I have lived long enough, since in my grief
I walk, nor any arm to help is found;
Since I scarce laugh at the dear children round,
Since flowers, henceforth, can give me no relief.

Since in the Spring, when God makes Nature crave,
I see with joyless soul that love so bright;
Since reached the hour when man avoids the light,
And knows the bitterness that all things have.

Since from my soul all hope has passed away;
Since, in this month of fragrance and the rose,
My child! I wish to share thy dark repose;
Since, dead my heart, too long in life I stay.

From earth's set task I never sought to fly:
Ploughed is my furrow, and my harvest o'er.
Cheerful I lived, and gentle more and more--
Erect, yet prone to bow towards mystery.

I've done my best: with work and watching worn,
I've seen that many mocked my grieving state;
And I have wondered at there causeless hate,
Having much sorrow and much labour borne.

In this world's gaol, where all escape is vain,
Unmurmuring, bleeding, prostrate 'neath the shock.
Silent, exhausted, jeered by felon mock,
I've dragged my link of the eternal chain.

Now my tired eyes are but half open kept,
To turn when I am called is all I can,
Wearied and stupefied, and like a man
Who rises e'er the morn, and ne'er has slept.

Idle through grief, I neither deign nor care
Notice to take of envy's noisome spite.
O Lord! now open me the gates of night,
That I may get me gone, and disappear.

April 1848

Wow.  Just. Wow.

I'm in awe (and admittedly with envy) when I read pieces like this written generations ago when there were no computers with dictionary, thesaurus & spell check software nor ridiculously easy access to great works from great writers.  I am  astounded, Victor Hugo strung ordinary, unremarkable words into this stunning arrangement creating this astounding work of literary art and he did it all from his own genius.

I can not write my grocery list without the aid of my computer, never-mind  poetry or prose... not even bushwa poetry or prose.


sigh.

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A Philosophical Question:

Yesterday I read an article in The Huffington Post about The Rapture. The now  89 year old Harold Camping prophesied that is was to occur on  May 21, 2011 at 6:00 PM. I left a comment on that article because it got me to thinking. And once that ball starts to roll there just ain't no stopping it -so-  I did what I always do, I gave in and rolled with it.

The Rapture,  once again conspicuous by it's absence was also predicted by Harold Camping back in 1994.  Does he believe what he saying?  Who knows?  I don't profess to know what's in this man's head but having been enmeshed in a few Evangelical, Fundamentalist Christion Churches I can guess.  I admit, I'm an opinionated woman so of course I have an opinion for this particular incident and this particular biblical prophecy ......

Below is my comment (I've expanded on my original comment because I have no character limits here):

“I don't understand people & I suppose I never will, I've stopped trying.  All evidence points to there being little to no love or respect for God (if there is a God).  If I believed in God I would be terrified of meeting him after trashing his planet and killing his creatures.  Look at what we've done to the planet.   Look at what we do to animals and look at what we do to each other.  If one loves and respect 'God' one would not harm, destroy, kill or exploit  His creation.  If we loved God there would be no poverty, no  hunger,  no homelessness and we would be taking great care of each other because, after all, we are all God's creatures.  Who would even think to destroy The Mona Lisa?  Isn't God a greater artist than da Vinci?  Yet we think nothing of spilling oil into The Gulf annihilating millions of Living, Feeling Beings all of which were supposedly created by God.  Isn't the Gulf a greater work of art than the Mona Lisa?

If the Bible truly is  'The Inspired Word of God' then we are obviously cherry picking what we are going to obey. After all Jesus did say: Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, care for the sick, the widows & the orphans. I don't see much of that happening. So, maybe, just maybe  there was no rapture because we are not worthy of redemption or Harold Camping is just another false Prophet -or- both.
 
I have to say,  Biblical Prophecy no longer matters to me  because I can't believe in God.  I can't bring myself to believe in a God who would intentionally create creatures as vile and horrid as 'Man'.  We kill for pleasure and we kill for profit.”   There are of course always exceptions to the rules and there are some very wonderful, altruistic people who walk gently on the earth. They trying to do what's moral & ethical, but the sad reality is that they are vastly out numbered by the wicked, the greedy, the power-hungry who feel it's their 'God-Given right' to exploit of their fellow man, to exploit  nature and her resources and  kill, maim, torture the non-human animals "  Just my opinion.

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A Crisis of Faith

NOTE:  After years of His silence I just had to ask......


Where are you?

Where are you on sun splashed days
and moonlit nights?

on cloudy days
and starless nights?

on rainy days
and stormy nights?

And where were you during my longest days
and my darkest nights?

P. Najafabadi
2003

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