It's time

to go home

This is my first attempt at a concert review. As I once remember Jerry Garcia stating in an interview that a review of a concert was limited to that particular person's experience of it, than this will be my experience of the February 18, 2007 concert I experienced at Montbleu Resort in Stateline with headliner Spearhead and opening act Keller Williams.

The beginning of the experience started when back in December I went onto the My Space page of Spearhead and saw that they were going to do a show in Tahoe. Living out this way, we don't get a lot of groups out here that I generally like, or want to pay the price to see. I went through a phase earlier on that allowed me to see 120 Grateful Dead show, 30 Phish shows, and an uncounted amount of local experiences with groups in San Diego like the Cardiff Reefers, so that I was getting to see a large amount of live music in my younger days - particularly in my 20's and early 30's. Since then, and since the monumental event of Jerry Garica's passing, it has cut down a bit, especially after my daughter's birth - and since moving to the Reno, Nevada vicinity I have been to 3 concerts (not counting those lame snoozer groups you see in the park that are an amplified sleeping pill) - and those have been Los Lobos, Maria De Barros, and now this one. That is quite a drop off. When my own music is working for me and I can get past the inevitable out of tune notes that come out of my mouth and my guitar, I can get into quite a nice state of mind, so I think in my older age it has not been as much of a need in my life. Earlier on, especially in my single days without a family, the Grateful Dead was my church and religious gathering. I know some people will never get it, but for those who have experienced it - when the group was really on and the sound was right, it was like a collective state of ecstasy that came closer to an experience of God than anything I had ever known.

Before this concert ever even happened, planning and coordination took a lot of time. Since I was in the process of switching employers, I had to make sure I had accumulated enough time to take a day off, as I knew the day after was going to be exhausting. Also - on a Sunday night, knowing you have to be at work the next day has a way of distracting from the present experience. So once I got the go ahead there, the next task was figuring out where Sara was going to stay. Our friends in north Carson City seemed like the first logical choice, but since she has been getting along with their daughter less and less of late, and has never made it once a full night away from home (and then the issue of who would watch over the animals here) it finally made more sense to fork out the equivalent of the cost of another concert ticket to have a baby sitter camp out for almost 8 hours here instead. I think her home surroundings were a comfort to her, and that turned out to be a great call - and credit my wife for that one.

The next task was planning out the weather - as it was supposed to snow that night - and I gambled on taking the temporary rental not equipped to deal with the snow - and that was a little bit of a regret on the drive back home when the "chains and snow tires required on 50" sign was flashing, but it turned out going slow and driving in a state of agitated paranoia was all that was required there. I also had to drop off a piece of artwork for evaluation for my job on the way there, but that turned out to be okay. For whatever reason, the time before a concert always makes me a little nervous. I want to get there, stake out my "spot" like a dog stakes out territory and get a feel for the venue, where the bathrooms are, where the concession stands are - just the way I am. The time before a Grateful Dead show was always a great state of agitation for me, for anyone like Mr. L knows who has attended one with me. We got there at 8 - right when the opening act was supposed to come on, saw the "sold out" sign at the will call, and we found a place pretty close to the stage on the next level from the floor, a little closer to the left speaker than I would have preferred, but one that enabled Victoria to see the stage and that made her happy. I saw my favorite local radio host there "Anthony Postman" who does the reggae show on the PBS radio station every Thursday night, and we also ended up near the people who sold me my valentine tie-dye shirt that I wore and had bought at Earth Day in Reno about 2 years ago.

So 8 turned to 8:30 before Keller came on, and it was a little ominous to hear him say I will be with you for about an hour, because doing the math, that meant it was going to be a pretty long night. Initially, he reminded me of Leo Kottke, a guitar wizard, and he had the hippy beard and shaking head that appealed to all the hippies who were in attendance. This crowd came closer to matching a Phish crowd than any show I had seen for a while, and the familiar smell of marijuana filled the air - and although it has been close to 8 years since I have inhaled or even wanted to, I still find it to be a comforting aroma that I associate with the Grateful Dead (speaking of which his version of Saint Stephen was the first I ever got to experience live). I would have liked it if he stuck to the guitar, but it was when he tried to get fancy and do numerous tape loops to get a band sound going that he bordered on irritation pretty quickly. Other than Saint Stephen and a pretty decent version of Hendrix's the Wind Cries Mary, it got to be redundant quickly. Honestly, I have never been down with the whole idea of an opening act - all my Dead and Phish shows for the most part did not have one, and I come to see the headliner anyways. I think the headliner should have 2 sets of music, but instead we sat through it and looking over at my wife's face, I started to notice that she looked pretty damn miserable, like someone had just wiped dog-crap on her cheeks. One more thing - anyone who whistles through a speaker system may think they are cute, but the effect it has on the ears is up there with fingernails on a chalkboard. This guy actually gave my wife bad dreams later that night. So I snuck out at the end of his set to get some soft drinks, including my Red Bull which was going to get me through the evening since I am way too old to stay up late unassisted any more.

They had an interesting contest where 3 people came up and read letters in front of Michael Franti criticizing the president and the war, including a lady whose grandson had died there. It would have been nicer if it was not at 10:20 when the last letter was read, only to here him say we will come back in a "few minutes" for some music, meaning the first song played by them - and listed as a title here "It's Time to Go Home" came on at 10:40 at night, when it really felt to an old man like me like it was time to go home.

As far as Michael Franti goes - he is a great performer with some very inspired songs and he did about half of the songs from "Yell Fire" which I think is a great album, mixing criticism of war with a plea and urge for human beings to live together in peace, love and tolerance. He jumped around - and got the audience to follow him jumping in a lemming like fashion. All of his band was pretty talented. The sound system was a little on the muddy side as close as we were, and it was much easier to understand him when he just went acoustic and turned down the volume a bit. He had the audience participation song, where a heavy set hippie who looked like she was bra less came out of the audience to sing lead vocals at Franti's request and then about 30 people danced on stage, before they were politely thrown off of it for the next one. I liked the effect of "Light up your Lighter" (I posted the lyrics here earlier on a few months ago) - when the lights went dark and all of the pot head hippies had there lighters on as a tribute for the troops to come back home - I thought that worked well. There was one about the stars that light your way home, with the improvised "Tahoe" word thrown in. I would have liked to see one called "One Step Closer" which I still have running on my My Space page, but that was not to be and we left before the encore anyways - but overall - it felt good to be at a hippie show again, he has a great stage presence and charisma, and Franti really seems alive up there while performing, when you know after over 20 years of doing this and repeating songs night after night he must be a little burned out - it certainly did not show.

So after making it home in the snow and unwinding, and letting the Red Bull wear off, I got to bed at 2:30 and had interrupted 4 hours of sleep, which left me predictably feeling like a zombie the next day and paved the way for the cold I caught. I was out of it during the week - I left my camera home on Tuesday, left the dog food I had purchased at the vet sitting by my car the next day - and it is clear that late night shows get harder and harder to take the older I get. I wrote a thank you note to Franti's My Space page, which apparently was not good enough to actually be posted or get a response, but such is life - not everyone who performs is like Maria De Barros - who actually wrote back to me twice - the two e-mails I sent her - I guess not every musician can take the time to do that, which makes it all that much more appreciated when it does happen. Over all - even though I enjoyed it - it was a relief to be done with it - a relief to unload in the urinal the piss my bladder was holding in for the entire show, a relief not to be herded in with a bunch of sweaty, drunk and drug infested hippies - a relief not to have to play offensive line blocker with everyone who intruded upon my space in the middle of the concert. In other words - even though it was fun, the older I get, the more of an ordeal it seems to be. At a time past midnight, at this point in my life, it really was long overdue as a time to go home, and now writing this from home, it is good to be here.

Nobody's fault

"My mother she taught me how to read, my mother she taught me how to read
If I don't read my soul gets lost
Nobodys fault but mine"

Once in a while somebody makes the comment that I am a "know it all". It is one thing to have a response to grade school level name calling, another to claim that I know everything, which in fact, I never have done once. When it comes to the amount of information that is out there in the world, I would be surprised if I knew even one millionth of it. I like to think I know myself, but considering how much there is to the psyche and unconscious, I am barely scratching the surface. The fact that I have an opinion, which I share here, does not mean I know everything. I guess when somebody can't make their point any other way, they result to name calling. And when that doesn't work, go the "kick your ass" card - and then volunteer someone else to do it. The best way to get me to "shut up" is to not read what I write. Chances are if you read this enough, it is bound to offend you in some way or push a button. That is not what I intend - but I am not going to restrain my thoughts in order not to do that. There are millions of other places to go if this is one of the places that upsets you. If you continue to read here and be pissed off by what you read, that is your problem because it is none of mine - as a dude named Pigpen once said. Personally if something doesn't interest me, I don't read it - which is why again - I don't read other blogs because I have yet to find one that does.

My wife thought my expression on my dislike of cruises was in poor taste, considering the circumstances. Well - I will say it again - the concept of a cruise to me is nauseating. That doesn't mean I have any problem with anyone who enjoys going on a cruise, fishing, heading to church, or doing anything that I don't choose to do. All I am saying is it is not for me. Whether or not I choose to subject myself to a week of hell for the benefit of others at a future time, I still have time to mull over.

But now to the subject matter at hand - the two words "nobody's fault". I had a girlfriend who I lived with about 12 years ago - she may not be the one who posted the brilliant name calling comment a couple posts back - although it sounded like her - but anyways - circumstances were - we came together in a state of mutual desperation. I already had read enough of her letters to me to know she was troubled, but we had a connection, both mental and physical - from the beginning. Victoria often comments that it is too bad we could not stay together - but it all comes down to this - my ex put on an unknown amount of weight after moving in with me - she says 60 pounds, but it might have been closer to 100 - I don't know. If I had complained about it - which I never did - she would have accused me of not liking a heavy person. But instead, I was accepting and supportive of her - and what she ended up doing was blaming me for putting on the weight she did put on . That is why I did not last with her, and nobody has - and as long as she thinks this way - nobody will - because everything that happens to her is somebody else's fault. Like my favorite radio show host - Jim Rome - said about golf player Colin Montgomery (he blamed America for his weight gain) - nobody crept up on him and put a gun to his head and demanded he put twinkies down his throat - he did it himself. I have struggled with weight, so I know it isn't easy - but I can't blame anyone else for it.

I am not saying I have never thought this way. When I saw a shrink around 1992 after my "Heather-gate" work incident that almost got me booted from my job - he had me convinced that my folks were some of the worst ever and in response I got very angry, stopped speaking to them, went around just fuming with rage at everything they had subjected me. I believed my mother's influence appeared to be sending me into relationships with domineering women that would not last, and then back into times of being alone where I was lonely and miserable. I believed that this was their fault and I hated them for it. I do not deny there is a link between the way we are raised and the life we live. Even now, I still believe we marry our opposite sex parent, and Victoria in my mind is a lot like my mother, even though both of them will never exactly be best friends. I do believe the way I was raised shaped and affected my personality - so that if my parents have issues with how I am or any of us are - they need to look in the mirror and see their contribution to whatever they have an issue with now.

All the same - whatever demons are there now - whatever insecurities, lingering neuroses, fears, depressions, confidence issues - they are my deck of cards now. They are the hand dealt to me. It serves me no purpose to blame my parents because blaming them will not change the present situation. I can look around and try to blame others in my life. Marital partners are always a prime target for what is going wrong in one's life - the only problem there is even if I have an issue with my wife, I chose her. If I don't like what she is doing - and most of us are not going to change too much - I can choose not to be with her. But if I stay with her, that is my choice as well. She brought home a can of "Peanut Roca" that I ended up mostly eating - and probably gained a couple pounds in the process. Is it her fault that she brought them home, or my fault for eating them?

Then there is the issue of self-blame - and that is counter productive as well. That is when you go ahead and say - all right - I was a god damn pig and ate the candy - it is my fault. What I am doing is creating this entity in my head - that I call me - and beating myself up for doing something - and then in blaming there as well, I get down on myself, don't like what I am - and then continue to make bad decisions and behave badly because that is the end result of not liking myself. So that is why I like "nobody's fault" because once fault is out of the equation, it is a matter of just - here it is and how can I deal with it.

Now time for the spiritual spin on this. I have too many bad associations with Judaism to continue practicing it - and I respect and admire those in my family and outside of it that still do - if it works, do it - and it does have an influence on my thinking - I just am not limited to it. I really like the archetypal idea of Christ being on the cross, even if I am not a Christian. I like the notion that our suffering leads to our exaltation, that no matter how bad it is or appears to be that there is an eventual rising that comes through with perseverance. Tie this in with the notion of karma - which is also a favorite of mine - and this is how I see it - everything in life, but particularly our challenges, tough times, struggles - is part of an individual karma. I don't really get too much into the past life thing - just because I have no way of relating to it. Maybe I have had a past life and maybe I will have a future one, but to me when I think of karma I think of it as a life lesson. I don't see it as punishment. If somebody beats you up or rapes you, it is not because you deserve it - nobody deserves it. But once something bad does happen in your life, whatever it is - and maybe it is something ongoing, there is a way to turn it into a positive, just like the torturous suffering of crucifixion becomes a positive rising in Christianity.

I personally believe - that where I am - right now - this very moment - is where I am meant to be. Maybe it is an unpleasant situation. Maybe I want to be somewhere else. Maybe I am looking at where I am standing and am convinced that my surroundings suck, that the desert landscape is ugly, that I don't like the people around me - that I want to run from them - that once I get somewhere else everything will be better. The cities of Seattle and Chicago come to mind for some that I know. Who is to say - maybe that is the case. Still - as long as you are standing where you are, then that is your reality now. Maybe you would like to run away - that notion is appealing to me at times - no more responsibility, worrying about what fund I am going to borrow from next to keep up with the bills, no worry about impressing people or holding a job to keep up with the mortgage - I will just take off somewhere and never come back. But where am I going to go to? And most importantly, if it is part of my karma/life lesson to face all this - than is running away the answer? Probably not. Personally - I see the desert as a beautiful and inspiring place - but that is just me.

I know life is hell at times - mine certainly has been and continues to be at times. At the same time, I am not a starving displaced refugee in Darfur living in constant fear of genocide either. If I am sitting at a computer in front of me, with a light on, electricity, food, running water - I already am blessed right there to have that - in a world where many don't even know if there will be enough food to eat that day. I saw a picture of these refugees on the news yesterday - they didn't look too happy.

There was an athlete on the Jim Rome show - unfortunately I don't remember his name, but it is an amazing story. He started as an athlete who had an accident, then he was a paraplegic after an accident, but overcame that and won many events. Then he had another accident and now he is a lifelong quadriplegic. He did become a drug addict, but overcame that. And when you hear him interviewed - and he really believes this - he is grateful for every minute alive, even though he is wheelchair bound and often in constant pain. His philosophy is we are all cripples in our own way, in our own wheelchair and he makes the best of what he has while he is here. He believes there is more to life than what his body is. If someone like that can come to this conclusion with all he has to face, than why can't one of us do that as well?

I believe a lot of our suffering comes from a notion of believing that something is supposed to be this way - we have a pre-conceived notion of marriage based on all the bullshit in the media, especially around this time of Valentine's Day. We have a notion of how it is supposed to be to raise a child -or believe once we provide our childeren with the things we did not have, they will be eternally grateful and thankful. That is when over there starts to look good, somebody else's marriage, somebody else's child, somebody else's life. At that time we become our own worst enemies, because we can't see how lucky and blessed we are to even be alive at all, even if it is a life spent facing a very difficult and consuming life challenge. Here we are at home, our child is sick, and she is a terror when she is sick - we are low on sleep, exhausted and irritated. Nobody said it was going to be easy. But still - the smile on her face, times she gives me a hug, her innocence and playfulness - that can make it all worth it. Maybe she is not an easy child, maybe I was not either, maybe it is my "fault" as a result - or - maybe it just is the way it is. A neighbor down the street has an autistic child who has screaming fits - I really don't know how she does it. But we make the best of what we have, unpleasant as it is or may be at times.

Well - I have run out of steam here, and probably offended a few more people along the way. Still it is nice to know that some people - mostly friends and family - read this on a semi-regular basis - when obviously there is a choice to read something else. For the most part, the feedback is positive so it is always good to hear from those of you who seem to like what I have to say - even if they are "miles" apart from those of you who don't.

Going back to spirituality, to conclude - I want to steal a line from Michael Franti - who I will be watching tomorrow night in person - reflecting my belief that all of us (not just one) are the sons and daughters of the God and Goddess:

"Every bit of land is a holy land and
Every drop of water is a holy water
Every single child is the son or the daughter of the
One earth mama and the one earth papa"

Suzy Suzy Suzy Suzy

Suzy Greenburg

Nice meeting her grandfather here..

I have my fears

But they do not have me

I would encourage anyone to read the words to this song as it delves into the subject of fear and the notion of overcoming it. I would not pretend to have reached this point myself, but I must say I am closer to it than I was "half of my life" time ago. Thanks to my ex-girlfriend for her last crude projecting comments of cowardice in my last post. If it is not her, it is certainly her spirit and her writing style, and her denial that is her in fact tells me nothing. Nothing like using terms like "pussy" and "vagina" to get a point across - I mean - what greater insult than to accuse a man of being a woman - our prejudiced notion of an apparent frightened woman stereotype that our primitive culture has bought into. Try delivering a baby and let's see who the braver sex is. The fact that my ex is indeed - a woman - at least technically speaking - just indicates her own self-loathing even further. I don't want to knock her too much - I mean I did spend a year of my life with her, thankfully no more than that, but as I chose her, she must be a part of me - especially since she has continued to stick around in my life like a bad case of dandruff - even if she is thousands of miles away. Some day that will change - and maybe that some day has arrived finally. I put up with a lot, but at some point even I have a breaking point, as my last boss found out. I will thank her for taking the time to read my "entries" and one of these days I may get around to reading her stuff as well - I just never seem to get around to it..

But enough about that. I believe the author of the post was describing herself more than me, and if you ever want to find out about someone's personality, just see what aspects of their personality they project onto someone else. Let's start with the word "pussy" - obviously a twisted notion of a cat, crudely used to describe a woman's sex organs, and at the absolute lowest sense of the word, a real insult to send the dagger through the heart of someone. They are fighting words for some, although I am not much of a fighter. Nobody is going to accuse me of being Rambo or John Wayne, although I really have had no need to fight except for one time years ago in 7th grade. We live in a world of fear, documented by Michael Moore in Bowling for Columbine, but how many of us actually get mugged, beat up by thugs, or assaulted? Never has happened to me yet. I am sure a self defense class wouldn't hurt, but never a priority. If you look for fights you find them. I don't own a gun. Let God/dess protect me and if it is my time for my ass to be kicked, "Bring em on" as our brilliant leader says.

Pussy implies cowardice. So what is a coward anyway? Is the anti-thesis a person who has no fear? Well - that is not really fair - if you have no fear to begin with, than it is not that hard to do something that inspires fear for others. The ladder you see above - placed upon a building over 20 feet high - many construction workers would see that, jump right up on it without a second thought - and be up at the top of the building in 10 seconds flat. As for myself, overcoming my fears, stepping one step at a time upon a swaying ladder that seemed to go on forever - and slid slightly at the top edge - took a great deal of courage on my own part as someone who has had to overcome a terror of heights out of necessity. So - what about someone who is born into this world - such as myself - with a lot of fear. Are you a coward based on something you are born with or not born with? There is a lot of fear in my family - all of us inherited it - both genetically and then re-inforced in the way we were raised. And this applies in turn to those that raised the ones that raised us. There is a contrast to some degree - in that my father could walk through bad neighborhoods without a second thought, while my mother was terrified of parking her car in broad daylight at an outdoor mall in Palos Verdes. As I spent the majority of time with the present parent in my life as my mother, which one rubbed off on me? Take a guess. I grew up consumed in fear - fear of failure, fear of asking out a woman, fear of not being able to succeed, fear of just about everything. When the sum of my fears came crashing down upon me, I was afraid of being alive and facing a world that I did not think I could survive in. I was more afraid of living than dying. I did not have much confidence, a common theme in my family.

20 years later - a lot has changed. It is not that my fears have gone away - when I have my anxiety attacks that are less frequent lately, but not gone by any stretch - I am reminded that my fear will always be a part of who I am. Yet I do believe that I have overcome a lot of them. I can't tell you exactly how I have done it, but I know one thing - at some point you have to face them head on and just immerse yourself in them. I had the choice of either doing that, or living my life helplessly dependent on others to take care of me. I credit the faith I developed in a higher power and ultimately in myself for overcoming some of them. And I also have to credit something else - illegal drugs. I think they saved me.

I am not big on crystal meth, heroine, alcohol, or recreational drugs. Psychedelics can be used for recreation - and in some ways that is their draw - but at the most intense expression of them, they turn your world upside down, send you into a terrified state of exposure to your deepest fears, demons, and internal monsters. This happened on more than one occasion for me - during my mushroom and LSD experiences, but the one that will always stand out for me as a turning point of sorts was my Irvine Meadows experience. It was when the pre-historic creatures started swimming around in the out-house that I realized I was starting to lose touch with the world I was familiar with as "reality" and running into a wall of complete orange suggested my senses were disconnected too. Despite the unfortunate consequences of the police involvement and my parents losing a night of sleep, I really see this as the emotional boot camp event in my life that made me believe in myself again. I knew that if I could get through this death state, a state where I had gone onto the next alien existence state and had my world as I know it shattered for what appeared to me to be a permanent forever notion, I knew I could do such intimidating things as going on a job interview.

And when it was time for my first interview, I was a stuttering nervous wreck. It took a few of them to slowly overcome that lack of confidence, and I did get better as I went on. Every first experience of any kind, from the first time I tried (unsuccessfully I might add) to make love, the first interview, first time on the job at JC Penney, and then again at my last employer of 18 years - I always faced a wall of terror that I had to get past. It was never easy, but the more I was able to get through it, succeed in the wake of all my fears and insecurities, the more I could re-program myself to believe that I in fact could do something. When everything inside me had always told me I could not do it, and it was that notion of not believing in myself that scared me so much to begin with, I found out to my surprise that I could do it. Real life experience showed that my life time programming was wrong, I could survive in the face of the failure I believed myself to be. I slowly started to see that who I thought I was, who I had been raised to believe I was, was in fact quite different from what I could be in reality.

Getting back to that ladder - symbolically and literally - the climb freaked me out beyond belief the first time I had to get on a roof. I was shaking, I was terrified, I just wanted to get back down. Than the more I got up on one story homes, the more comfortable I was, but two story ladders freaked me out. I had sweaty palms and was shaking when I had to go up one in Incline Village. I had to do a two story ladder 6 times in one hour at an apartment complex in Carson. Again, the more I did it, the more I realized I could and the more I saw that my fears did not have to consume me. And don't think the ladder you see in the picture didn't scare the hell out of me - it did - but one shaking step at a time, I did it, and I am still here to tell about it.

How does the notion of driving 50 miles into the dark night to meet a described psychotic and paranoid truck driver sound to you? I had to do it. When I met him, his eyes were popping out of his head. It was my own fears that I had gone through that made me feel empathy for him, rather than fearing him - and I got him to calm down as I did my task I was appointed to do - and I got through it. Would the person who wrote the last comment fared as well in my shoes - I highly doubt it.

So although I don't engage in psychedelic experiences any more, some times the voices of doom and fear consume as they did during my sleepless night before my wife left town. I had very strong thoughts in my head - as I did 20 years ago - that my life was too much for me, that I did not have what it took to face it and succeed - that my new job was going to blow up in my face, that I was going to fail and let my family down. When those dark thoughts consume your head, they are very real and very persuasive. But once I get to the next day, I again realize I have survived my own darkness and I get a re-gained sense of confidence. After that night, I was able to drive her to the airport, do my best to be a single Dad facing a new job without a computer. Having immersed myself in the fear and then come through, I had a new sense of confidence - and I took charge - talked Victoria into staying with her original flight, and I had no problems during the time she was gone, despite being the apparent babbling psychotic maniac the night she was leaving - just to get on her good side anyways.

So when I hear about medication - I am divided. I don't believe in needless suffering, and some times anxiety serves no purpose at all except to provide complete discomfort. But other times, re-uniting with the fear at an intense level, can be inspirational and confidence inspiring. I don't always want to avoid an experience like that. I did not choose my Irvine meltdown, it chose me - but I will always be thankful for the experience, as hellish as it was. It may not be for everyone - but for me - it helped me - some of you cannot understand that - but trust me - it did. Despite my fears and doubts, I have been able to succeed in a competitive field where burn out and exhaustion are common. I have been able to take care of my family. I am not Mr. Adventure - as the post points out - and I do not have a desire to travel the world as some do. I would do that for my wife's sake if she wanted to. I would even subject myself to the Cruise to Hell if that would be what she wanted and if she was there too. I might not do it enthusiastically, and I might take every prescription drug available first - and then shout out for doses while on board - but if it would please my wife, I would do it for her - because that is as much of a "pussy" I am. I am really doomed now - if I go I am caving in and I am a pussy, if I don't I am too much of a pussy to face it. Well - if that is the way it is - what the hell - bring it on.

Text in full - courtesy of Peter Gabriel:

Darkness

i’m scared of swimming in the sea

dark shapes moving under me

every fear i swallow makes me small

inconsequential things occur

alarms are triggered memories stir

it’s not the way it has to be

i’m afraid of what i do not know

i hate being undermined

i’m afraid i can be devil man and

i’m scared to be divine

don’t mess with me my fuse is short

beneath this skin these fragments caught

when i allow it to be there’s no control over me

i have my fears but they do not have me

walking through the undergrowth, to the house in the woods the deeper I go, the darker it gets

i peer through the window knock at the door

and the monster i was so afraid of

lies curled up on the floor is curled up on the floor just like a baby boy

i cry until i laugh

i’m afraid of being mothered with my balls shut in the pen

i’m afraid of loving women and i’m scared of loving men

flashbacks coming in every night don’t tell me everything’s alright

when I allow it to be it has no control over me i own my fear

so it doesn’t own me

walking through the undergrowth, to the house in the woods

\the deeper i go, the darker it gets i peer through the window

knock at the door and the monster i was

so afraid of lies curled up on the floor is curled up on the floor just like a baby boy

i cry until i laugh

Hey Mr. Spaceman

Hey, Mr. Spaceman
Won't you please take me along
I won't do anything wrong
Hey, Mr. Spaceman
Won't you please take me along for a ride

Well - I am officially writing from a computer at home today. And with that in mind - I want to start by jumping right in and saying now is not a time to be proud to be a human being. I just watched An Inconvenient Truth and I am convinced Al Gore does in fact deserve to win the Nobel Peace Prize he has been nominated for recently. I always want to believe there are two sides to any story, but after watching this, I believe that anyone who does not believe in global man made warming is on the same camp as those who believe the Earth is flat, the holocaust does not exist, the biblical version of creation - the one that says we are a full 6,000 years old - in other words - I don't know how clear it can be. I am torn in believing that there has to be some hope for us vs. believing in complete and utter doom - but it seems we pretty much brought this upon ourselves and have to live with our own consequences of massive consumption and greed. To think we might have had a prayer in actually reversing this if Gore was elected, when in fact we chose who will probably go down in history as the utter worst ever for not one but two terms also makes me somewhat ashamed to be lumped in the category of human beings.

I know I am one. I look in the mirror and I see a hairy frumpled human being staring back at me. To survive I need food and water intake, I urinate, defacate, and have been known as a male member to even ejaculate. I for one have had many differences with my human beings I have known and associated with for such a long time that I have often wondered if a little green man came down from the sky that I would finally feel re-united with long lost brethren.


Let me now start with some individual specifics. Today I will be watching the most watched TV event of the year - the Super Bowl - with some actual interest, so that makes me somewhat linked to my fellow humans I guess. But let's start with the newest proposed topic in my family - that of attending a cruise. The article I linked may seem a little harsh, but it gives 10 solid reasons why I would never in my human life want to go on one of these. Maybe when I am older and the population on one will be more within my age group - I might decide to be interested, but that is hard to imagine. I just can't for the life of me understand what would ever motivate one to get on a large crammed boat and choose this as a means or method of enjoyment. I know others do enjoy these - and I can respect that. Some might say I have never done one, so how would I know I hate it so much. Well - I have never been submerged from head to toe in sewage either, but it is pretty clear to me that I would prefer to avoid this as well. After pondering, the concept of a cruise sounds wretched to me. Blame it on The Love Boat - probably one of the worst shows to ever hit the TV screen - a show which I watched in my childhood and may have caused permanent damage to my psyche. Everything about this show is so wrong, starting with the captain shown on this link, who clearly should have never moved on from his more natural role on the Mary Tyler Moore show - to the whole perverted western concept of love which I once bought into, in part because of this show. The idea of being stuck on a boat just makes me nauseous before I even get seasick. I think the appeal is to those who like to drink, who can get bombed without having to worry about driving home. Then if you are sick, you can always just heave off the side of the boat. I also understand there are tons of food on these things, so you sit around and eat like a pig the whole time - sorry - don't need that either.

Combine this with the proposed notion that this would be a reunion of my family. I know I previously had written about theories about why my family is so distant - but forget that for now if you can and let's just say it speaks for itself and it is what it is. Geographically - other than the two parents who live in the same house, nobody else is within 100 miles of each other. Parents in LA suburb, brother in San Diego, sister in Monterrey/San Jose vicinity, I am here in Northern Nevada, brother in New York. Our natural state of gravitated inertia suggests we are pretty comfortable away from each other. At times we have had our camps - the So Cal camp, the No Cal camp - but overall - the further from each other the more comfortable we are - which is why we are where we are. It is not a natural state for our family to be together. The last time it happened at Mammoth Lakes I couldn't sleep and had nightmares. I don't have claustrophobia literally - I can crawl around in crawl spaces during home inspections and be quite okay with it. But part of that is because I know I can get out eventually. My family makes me claustrophobic though. It is so utterly against our nature to be in one place together, that everything screams out against it, and then when we act like it is a natural event it seems even more unnatural. Combine that with the close quarters of a cabin on a ship described in the cruise link above, and I think I would have an urge to jump ship after the first day. There would be no escape, no way out - HELPPP!!! I would have to bring along seasick pills, anxiety pills, maybe finally even get on anti-depressants to survive that week of torture. All the while creating needless pollution upon our ocean mother so a bunch of us can go for an intoxicated joy ride. Sorry - but life is too short for that for me. Thankfully life is short as I will not fully live to see the consequences of global warming. I wish I could say the same for my daughter.

I know - families are suppose to be close - another reason I think I am really an outer space alien. People actually enjoy cruises - I don't - chalk another point. I think about the things people like to do around the area I live:

1) Go to church - to listen to some boring sermon by a certified religious authority who can tell me his or her version of what I am supposed to believe in based on a book written thousands of years before I was born. Yawn. No - not for me. I like to believe I am spiritual, but for me organized religion has never been consistent with spirituality.

2) Go skiing - go racing down a hill in a terrified state with the goal of reaching the bottom without falling over countless times. Once you get there, your reward is to do it one more time and get up that chairlift. I really tried to do this at once. I understand knee and wrist breaks are quite common. I will pass.

3) Fishing - Sit around bored out of your skull, and then feel the sudden excitement hours later - if at all - of watching a fish thrash and fight it's way to a painful death. Uggg.

4) Gambling - Go into a smoke filled den to piss away the money I have on some ominous sounding series of slot machines playing demonic music while zombies stare into the screen in a possessed state of hope that they will get the money back they lost. Even if the resolution has been passed to take away the smokers - pretty depressing.

5) Head to Las Vegas - I was just there for training and I had this image of all those casinos and buildings, draining resources, having water diverted to them in a drought situation - and pondered the notion of what it would be like with all the electricity shut off. It could happen. People think electricity is an automatic thing - but with the world's resources in question - don't count on it. Think of a scene out of Road Warrior. All of the building there seems consistent to me with all the greed and excess that are driving us to the state of global warming to begin with. It is a city - like our state - built off people blowing their money in casinos. Or you can pay 100 bucks or more to see a show. Every time I leave that place I am so glad I don't live there. Good food - but that's about it for me.

So long story short - I may be a human, but based on association with my fellow humans, this is not a time to be proud to be one. I apologize for my present lack of optimism. Mr. Gore seems to suggest that there is hope for us at the end of the movie. I remain unconvinced - and I realize I am part of the problem as well - every time I commute close to an hour to get to work - I am part of the problem. As one of my brilliant professors once said in a lecture "species come, species go". Maybe we are just another species sealing our own doom. If that is in fact the case, than we had better make the best of it while we can, as it is only is going to get worse. I still believe there is some hope - as I cannot help believe that - but at the same time, I am not really sure why I believe that. Hopefully we can vote for someone who is actually going to get off his ass and do something about it. Maybe our brilliant ologopoly corporate leaders may finally figure out it is in their best interests to act now instead of suppress and manipulate information. To their credit, some of them are - even the evil empire Walmart from what I understand.

To quote Jim Morrison here

"I just want to get my kicks before the whole shit-house goes up in flames."

We had better appreciate life and what we take for granted around us every day before our own actions seal our own doom.