Of Course, I’ve Got No Idea What To Say. Not A God Damn Thing. This Is Just Another Monday Survived.

Midweek in lieu of more imaginative title

I haven’t been reading over my words too much lately. I often do while in the course of writing them but it’s pretty rare that I revisit them after the fact. I think that probably needs to change. I read over the words I wrote yesterday about faith and lack thereof. Things were more lucid and interesting than I initially thought but there was more awkwardness and lack of clarity than I’m comfortable with. Things that read clumsy get on my nerves. Unfortunately, it seems to me that I’ve got a knack for that sort of thing. It’s frustrating. It pisses me off but it’s not like I’m trying to make a living here. Language that is just functional bothers me. I like it to have flair, swagger, style, musicality even. I guess it can’t always. I guess it depends on what the hell it is you’re trying to do. Maybe I’ll get on firmer footing with this. It has been awhile since I’ve actually tried at this. Of course, I’d contend that I’ve never really tried.

There are things I don’t want to do. There are places I do not want to go with this.

I don’t want this to degrade into pounding out “hot takes” on current events. I’m absolutely nobody. Nobody cares what I have to say about the horrors of the age. Of course, that doesn’t mean I’ll never comment. I’m not above breaking my own rules. If somebody shoots up a school or some other place like probably happened today somewhere in America (Fucked up, right?), do you really need me to tell you how awful it was? Do you really need me to ruminate about how surreal and terrifying life in Trump’s America is. You don’t. You’ve got people with more expertise and talent than me to do that. The other thing is I’m invariably going to read an issue of Current Affairs (look that one up. Good magazine.) or listen to an episode of Chapo Trap House or Citations Needed (Great podcasts. Listen to them.) and my take is going to be influenced. When I had short-lived podcasts of my own, it essentially became this frustrating exercise in “hot takes” on current events. I definitely delivered them in my own style but it felt very derivative and pounding out “hot takes” is exhausting.

It seems pretty inevitable that I’m going to re-tread ground I’ve already been over. How many times can you read that I just don’t want to go to work? That I’d rather chill in a dimly lit room? That pretty much describes every single day since I’ve been conscious.

Of course, I think maybe I’m catching myself engaging in “market thinking.” I’m under no obligation to make this interesting in the least. I’ve said that this is not my diary or my journal but it essentially functions that way and I’m some weirdo that has inexplicably given the public access to my inner thoughts. It does not get more non-commercial than that. Still, if this gets boring or tired, just remember that you’re getting what you paid for.

Half naked. 

Arms raised like some prophet preachin’ what nobody wanted to hear

but I bleed for ‘em 

so they love me

Get punched. 

Get kicked. 

The more it hurts 

The more they feel it 

that stuff people think is the holy spirit. 

Tightness in the chest 

need bed rest 

but the show must go on 

the roar of the diabetic souls 

that in the night 

tell me not to mix those two things 

gets me through another one. 

Fly to victory 

and then the waiting room. 

I get lost in the night's machinery

with nothing to see but what there is to see

synthetic angel glow and Internet Protocol that never sleeps

keeps me company

and that troubles me

There is a church in Indiana that put Jesus, Mary and Joseph in detention. This has gotten a lot of love on progressive-ish Twitter. 

I get it. I appreciate where that is coming from. 

I’m definitely someone who is interested in socially conscious interpretations of religion, particularly Christianity since Christianity had a big part in shaping me coming up in this Empire. I’m not sure about God or the supernatural or the efficacy of prayer or anything like that but I cannot deny that Christianity had an impact on me.

Here’s the thing. 

I’ve never known conservative Christians to see the humanity of The Other in Christ. I traveled in those circles. I was in that orbit for a long time and I just ain’t seen it. That just is not something they do. 

In fact, the humanity of Christ is a tricky thing. Set aside the humanity of The Other (undocumented, gay, indigenous, lots of other categories). I don’t know that they really see too much humanity in Christ period. He’s this righteous messiah character and not much else from where I find myself standing.   

The blank space and the blinky-blinky. 

Fan blowing and gettin’ down to the slow beat only they can hear. Move its head to the right. Move its head to the left. Do oscillating fans get together and have raves? 

I’m a straight man. Sometimes I don’t even know what turns me on anymore. I mean, I do but not really. 

I have an appointment with a therapist on Tuesday. This time I’ll go to the right address. I don’t really know what to say to him. 

So, what brings you in? 

Scream my lungs out. 

Or punch the wall. 

Or throw something. 

Sick Dogs and Our Bad Conscience

I spent a bunch of time with a sick dog this weekend. I’ve known this dog since she was 8 months old and rowdy as hell. I really thought that she might die. I cried buckets. It looks like it isn’t this dog’s time though. As a result, my emotions are still pretty raw. I ain’t got tears to cry but I’ve still got plenty of feeling. 

Compassion that moves me to anger. Furious anger. Righteous anger. I don’t know what it is about the drive home from work that makes me think about all the big picture stuff. Big picture stuff? Shit. That’s so inadequate but I don’t know what else to call it. It’s burning anger about all the injustice that’s bigger than me. The injustice that happens while I watch a clock. It’s monstrous shit. It’s shit for The Hague. It’s shit that gets Meryl Streep Academy Awards for starring in fucking movies about it. It’s shit that grieves my fuckin’ spirit but at the end of the day doesn’t even really inconvenience me because of the accident of my birth. 

My country puts little brown children in concentration camps. They cry for their mommies and daddies. These facilities are often run for a profit and the guards go home, drink beer, watch the game on occasion and probably beat their wives and then promise to never ever do it again. They can do what they do and then they can go to Home Depot or Cabela’s and never give a second thought to what they are doing to earn a pay check. Banality of evil. They’re just doin’ their jobs. Maybe they’re all grim about it. Maybe they’re tormented. Maybe they lose sleep over it. I know some of ‘em enjoy it. They are having the time of their lives.

Yeah, immigration cops are bastards. It’s a popular thing in certain circles to say that all cops are bastards. I didn’t use to believe that but I’m starting to. I got a relative who is a deputy sheriff. I’ve watched him joke about running over protesters. I’ve seen his buddies mock African American Vernacular English. I’ve seen them drink a beer while rockin’ a Punisher skull on their chests. They’re bloodthirsty, suburban warrior fascists. They are the soldiers of this sad apocalypse. 

The enforcers of this shameful order are one thing but then there are the people on the sidelines. There are people who see the pictures of weeping children behind chain link fences and are thankful. They smile. They could not be happier. They are seein’ America become great again. They are seein’ people who are not like them suffer. They are watching a man who says the vile shit they say in their taverns and their country clubs in front of the whole nation proudly and without any shame at all. They got a man leading the country who has given permission for the demons that lurk inside them to run wild. 

I sit here at my desk and pound my keyboard and I got no idea what to do. I wish that I could tell you what to do. Tomorrow I’ll go back into work, the machine will grind on and I kinda hate myself because anything I might do or say is ineffectual in the face of this grave evil. 

Here’s what I’m going to do. It’s not much. All I can think to do right now at this moment is to tell you the truth as I see it. It is that bad. My country is engaged in a great evil. If there be a God and that God is just, he must punish us. I do not know if there is a god. I do know evil though. We’re seeing it. I don’t give a flying fuck about flags or anthems. I care about what’s true. 

God. Damn. It. 

I will never forgive the people who perpetrated these atrocities. As far as I am concerned, names like Trump, Miller, Sessions, Kelly and the whole Satanic cabal of them deserve to live in infamy. They should be hauled before a court and sentenced for crimes against humanity. 

In some kinda half-asleep state some time this morning or last night, it occurred to me that life is a trip. Yeah, I mean trip in a similar sense to a trip one might take on psilocybin mushrooms or LSD. Life is the trip. It's all a trip. That sounds like utter bullshit but I mean it. I'm being completely sincere here.

I knew at some point I would touch on my exepriences with psychedelic compounds. I just didn't really know it would be today. I am not a veteran psychonaut by any stretch of the imagination and it's not something I ever thought I'd do. If you told me a decade ago that I would develop an interest in psychedelics, I would have thought you were quite insane. My experience at this current time has been exclusively with psilocybin mushrooms which are popularly known as "magic mushrooms."

The first thing I became aware of even at relatively low doses of psilocybin was my personality coming apart. Basically, I would become aware of all the parts that make up me. All of these parts are distinct.

There is a part of me that freaks out almost instantly and is basically a slave to fear. I was acutely aware of the sound of this part's voice, its presence.

There is another part that is calm, analytical. It speaks in soothing tones. It's wise. It says, "Hey. You're just tripping, dog. It's okay."

There is yet another part that is suave, ultrasexual and rarely seen by anyone really.

I can also recall being aware of the words I was saying internally being audible as a whisper in my head or something similar.

It's almost a given that I'm going to cry during a trip. I don't mind this much.

Visual hallucinations really don't intrigue me that much. It's about the thoughts that come to me.

I'm barely scratching the surface here.

I'm typing this on my phone at work. I'm trying to not look as idle as I actually am. I'm playing the part of the dutiful employee. In less than an hour, I plan on sneaking out of here. There isn't jack shit anyone can do about it.

I managed to get an appointment scheduled with a therapist on Monday.

I guesss I'll end on that note.

Me. Haven't posted regularly in years but this is me.

Hey.

It's a weird life. That's all it is.