A Snowman in the Heart

Definition of a Cynic:

“A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.”

-- Oscar Wilde 1854-1900: “Lady

Windermere’s Fan” (1892)

It was a kind of old snow man built in his heart. And yes, he may have thought he wanted to melt it, but that was about it -- a thought. It wasn’t something others don’t experience, but his outcome was different.

Introspection is tough when you keep seeing a mirror. That’s what we do, and it can’t be helped. You see what you know and know what you see. And there’s the rub. The real question is, given that we’re trapped within the limits of our own knowledge and experience, how does change happen? For some it doesn’t. Miserable dispositions see unhappiness as the norm. They rue healthy companionship, dog the manger, and rain on every parade. So why doesn’t it matter how others perceive them? Does creating an atmosphere of confused unease and mutual trepidation provide them their favorite kind of attention? Were those times they experienced feelings of kindness, compassion, and empathy insufficient to their spiritual growth?

He probably got glimpses of these qualities in women he had known; but just as probably wondered why they had left. At least he wasn’t public in his misanthropy. He lived in solitude, his cynicism directed at a past no one could remember. The hermetic life will do that: make time a frozen synchrony where memory locks into a particular period or moment un-moored from all chronology and context. When you live in a vacuum, the way it was is the way it is. Reality is a tableau of how you last remember it, not a dynamic condition of change and flux. The person, place, or atmosphere in or of a situation you experienced, say, five years ago, remains the same in your mind. In some ways – contrary to the idea that having no access to a computer or the internet should spark creativity – the recluse suffers from a profound lack of imagination. They can’t fathom change. They live on a road with unmarked signs, having no way to know where others have been or are going. Still, better they stay to themselves than infect others with their ill will and negativity.

It’s understandable, then, that someone like this can’t understand when something greater stands before them. The degradation of time blinds the recluse to their mortality. And thus they can’t imagine the characters in their drama as finite entities. For instance, the idea that a certain endeavor might have nothing to do with the implementation or display of certain skills or talents is beyond their ken. They are incapable of sacrificing their principles to a higher purpose aside from their own concerns. Reclusion from social contact is really nothing more than selfishness in isolation, which is arguably a good thing. But even the highest principles, when applied to a morally flawed decision, are worthless at best, and tragic at worst.

At present, our circle of musical friends has been contemplating a reunion of sorts to bolster a sick friend’s spirits. Which is a good thing. There is a fundamental communication problem, however, that may nix this idea: one of five of us can’t digest the idea that this is NOT, I repeat, NOT, a musical project.

Odd, you say. Not really. Our performance would be about the teary gleam in an old friend’s eye at knowing he got the boys back together one last time; about watching Bill DeBroux work the crowd into a salubrious lather, sure to carry Mcgee into the realm of the cancer free; about seeing Mingay, the ultimate transplant man, smile knowingly at seeing the awe and wonder of the crowd as they marvel at the Olympian costumes he’s provided the Walrus dancers; about seeing Davey Perkins regaling Floyd Maki with Left Banke stories of Blue Cheer and chocolate mescaline; about seeing that zany Cathy dancing the middle of the floor; about Lunker, and Dunker, and Billy Mallette; about the Base and Gwinner’s coming in to share memories of Mr. Sherry, Hare Pye, and the Modeltowners; about Robin Labby’s excitement at helping us; about Cashmere Funk showing off for Julie, Cathy, Kay, and Bonni; about Roger, Screech, Jose, and Joe coming off a roof and heading for the soiree; about spear-fishing for Pike and Suckers with Mr. Skip; and last but not least, hearing all the loyal Walri fans singing “Murder in My Heart for the Judge” while Hogan fights off those nay-sayers who said it couldn’t be done. Who cares about second-hand smoke, volume, and other small concerns, in the face of performing a task conducive to the material, physical and spiritual benefit of those we hold near and dear to us?

While past Walrus projects have put music at their center, this performance would not be about the music; it would, rather, be about the social conditions that made Walrus happen: the people in and around the historical context our group arose from.

Love - Randy

Kristine Moran (2), dAli, Kandinsky, Wax Lips, & Mapplethorpe

I like Images.

Love - RT

Rear Admiral Frances Penis-Gunn

“I have never yet seen anyone whose desire to build up his moral power was as strong as sexual desire.”

-- Confucius 571-479 BC: “Analects”

Poor Tiger, he’s suffering from “hypersexual disorder.”

“Mavis Humes Baird, another therapist familiar with Gentle Path, said Woods would have been separated from family contact for weeks and forbidden masturbation, pornography, contact with female fans or anything else that might engage his sex drive….Treatment 'is in its infancy,' Dr. Krueger said. 'Chemical castration' with testosterone blockers, as has been used on some pedophiles, is inappropriate in such cases.'” (NYT – McNeil – 02/23/10)

Trust me folks, I know what Tiger is going through. A popular myth surrounding this affliction has to do with the idea that it’s harder on the wife or girlfriend than the sufferer. Nothing could be further from the truth. Until you’ve felt that unholy compulsion to have sex with whomever will have you, you couldn’t possibly know the meaning of misery. And for what: A big stinky pile of guilt that gnaws at you like a bagged badger. Who needs it? With all this crying about the one cheated on, everyone forgets the poor cheater. He’s the one slighted. We can only admire Tiger’s courage, and enter him into that pantheon of Sainted Sex addicts who, like John Edwards, that intrepid, stalwart of a mate who confined his infidelity to seminal emissions during only remissions; and President Clinton, whose profoundly unconscious love for his wife, and tormenting guilt at his actions, thwarted his every attempt to come in The Big Lewinski’s mouth, or is it, Lewinski’s big mouth. Shame on you, indeed, who cannot feel Tiger’s pain!

Think of the people you come in contact with in the course of a day and consider this:

“Arizona and Wyoming lawmakers are considering nearly a half dozen pro-gun measures, including one that would allow residents to carry concealed weapons without a permit.” (NYT – Urbina – 02/24/10)

Imagine, if you will, everyone having a gun when they have anything to do with attending vehicular matters that involve going to a Michigan Department of State Office. How about parking? The common reference is road rage, but I say parking rage is much worse. You’ve got to teach at 10AM. You’re circling the block like a frozen Pelican, a bunch of hung-over students driving dinged up Lexus’ and SAAB SUV’s are surrounding you. Would that their fuel injectors stick and their unpaid parking tickets bring tow trolls, these UGG wearing text-twits who don’t know the difference between an epigraph and an epigram. It’s 9:57 and you can’t find a place. And then there he is behind you, the kim-chee dude from VA Tech, driving a focus with an “Imagine Whirled Peas” bumpersticker. Yikes! Yeah, so imagine that. Or, how about sport’s bars at the peak of the NFL season? The drunk guy with the Rae Carruth sweatshirt isn’t happy about the Guy with the Ray Lewis cap, who is intermittently hurling into an empty pitcher and screaming “Go Ravens, Panthers Suck.” And, of course, there’s nothing like a gun-toting academic at a tenure decision meeting. Add to this, the candidate has a progressive mental condition, and you have a cozy place for a concealed weapon. Another situation in which a gun in the robe might come in handy is the arena of family conflict. After all, what better way to guarantee mutual assurance that no one will get out of line. If you can’t trust your own son or daughter with a gun, then who can you trust? Face it. It’s simple. Guns equal peace.

“The demilitarization of Europe — where large swaths of the general public and political class are averse to military force and the risks that go with it — has gone from a blessing in the 20th century to an impediment to achieving real security and lasting peace in the 21^st.”

Robert Gates, as quoted in the 02/24/20 NYT)

God-damned, chicken shit Euro-trash can’t even get it up when it comes to killing for peace. Why can’t these cowards understand what it takes to win? “Averse to military force.” What the hell’s the matter with them? Why the hang-up about killing? You kill dudes and there’s peace in the valley. It ain’t rocket science. Sure, the first one might make you feel a little bad, but after that. It’s easy. Ya killed one, ya killed a million. You see, what they don’t understand is that peace right now is just a big illusion, it’s “lasting peace” we’re looking for. Ya see, it may seem peaceful right now, right this minute, but now, ask yourself, do I feel real secure, I mean real secure? See what I mean. You don’t? You’ve got deep seeded insecurities, get it, insecure. You could have a heart attack. How about a stroke? You could even have a lethal, incurable cancer inexorably shortening your meager days of existence! See. No “lasting peace” and no “real security.” And that’s why we need “military force,” and, of course, more guns. There are, however, moral imperatives that are far more important than fostering militarism, there’s the ever-present homosexual menace looming over this great land.

“WASHINGTON — The top generals from the Army and the Air Force expressed deep concern on Tuesday about moving rapidly to lift the ban on openly gay service members, saying it could make it harder for their forces to do their jobs while fighting two wars….’We just don’t know the impacts on readiness and military effectiveness.’”

The only thing worse than yellow frogs are pussy-assed queers you can’t trust in a foxhole. Don’t get me wrong. I’ve had homosexual relations before; but I knew it was wrong. I just enjoyed it way to damn much. And that’s the problem, we start allowing people of the same sex to spread their fornicating ways to the rest us and we’re all gonna end up like Tiger Woods. Sure, it left a funny taste in my mouth, and the KY jelly was hard to get out of my undies, but that wasn’t the real problem. All of a sudden it hit me like a medium sized twig, no one gets pregnant when you do this. Then that blood curdling word just sorta jumped out of my cerebrum right into my mouth – ABOMINATION! No way I’m basing my sexual orientation on not having babies. No way! So, just when I thought the generals got it right, some fag Navy General, Admiral, whatever, piped in this crap:

“’No matter how I look at the issue, I cannot escape being troubled by the fact that we have in place a policy which forces young men and women to lie about who they are in order to defend their fellow citizens.”

“That’s all Folks” -- Randy

Granny & the Volcano

Dear T:

I think your suffering sometimes leaves us -- at least myself, I know – at a place where words lose their meaning. Think not link; think chain. You are the chain. You are strong as the chain is strong. That will never change. You’re right, how could one know how they might react to profound suffering. Our duty, you too, is to ease the way when the way’s not easy, along the big journey that never ends; that trip we who love you are all a part of.Danny Cook sent me a recent painting of a sailboat setting out on Gitchee Gumee in the early morning. Very beautiful. Fear, apprehension, grinding, it sucks. We love you.

-- Randy,

PS: Make our strength your pleasure, not your worry.

Such a thing, the internet. My sick pal has a carepages blog that keeps family and friends posted. Over the course of his illness the blog has served as a social network where people that haven’t seen each other for 40 years are suddenly reacquainted around the common theme of an ailing comrade. What’s most profound about this, as a pragmatic genre, are the conventions of sympathetic and empathetic expression specific to both my friend’s posts and his readers’ comments. Which is a fancy way of saying the carepages is not entered into as a social network as much as a window through which my friend and I can look to one another for consolation.

The pane is the pain.

And so we viewers suffer from a lack of knowing what to say, what to do, how to act, and where to look for an end to our suffering, and his pain. Out of this shared affliction of concern comes good: like small reconciliations and belated foregivenesses. My friend, S., came to me and apologized for once punching me at the Music Manor. “No worries,” I told him, “You’re” forgiven. And you, my friend, have my gratitude for reminding me what a wonderful thing it is to ask forgiveness and be forgiven.

NEW TOPIC

Haven’t blogged in a while but I have to do something to get that last depressing post out of my sight. Funny how seeing people suffer around you produces a certain cynicism about humankind when coupled with hearing about a university wide directive that pretty much forbids U-M physicians from prescribing medical marijuana. No doubt this has to do with its federal and corporate ties. After all, we wouldn’t want an effective medicine that the pharmaceutical arm of the new world order can’t economically exploit to fall into the wrong hands, like the suffering masses that need it. Only today, the news broke that hordes of baby boomers are re-headed for their bongs. Turns out the Zig-Zag man quiets Parkinson’s.

Fire up the lava lamp and get out the clapper, we’re getting high, Granny.

“Now Granny, I got a question for ya. Everyday you been goin to them infernal tea bag, or, tea party, meetings, wassup wid dat?”

“Well, you know how I like Glen Beck, and how I hate Progressivism; and how I can’t stand them poor people feedin off Uncle Sam’s tit; and how I loathe them welfare women using abortion for contraceptives; and them death panels determinin when we’re gonna die; and O’Biden telling us we can’t have nice doctors like we used to; well, I decided to go see Sarah Palin speak at a tea party.”

“Come on, Granny, get with it ironsides, look at those Jiffy-Mix-Transplant-Wheezers. Those dudes look like they’re a major disease about to happen. These twinkie hounds should want all of the free health care they can get. Starting with AED’s (automated external defibrillators), oxygen tanks, and Flomax machines at every rally. Heard Palin’s mad about the Down Syndrome kid on Family Guy. Like Andrea says, Palin, ‘Chill Out.’”

“Just coz I got a vaporizer don’t make me no liberal.”

“Amen, Granny.”

“Cool it, and go make some brownies, Granny. And don’t forget to get Mcgee’s special malted shake mix ready.”

Where was I. Oh yeah, U-M’s decision special directive. It seems to me there should be a certain amount of physician’s autonomy that allows a doctor to determine what’s in a patient’s best interest in terms of treatment. I’m sure it’s less about how effective or ineffective pot is as a medication, than how to prevent access to it until the powers that be find a way to profit from it. I suppose the facade of public good and propriety the university puts forth can’t allow simply charging patients $100 a pop and pocketing the windfall. I suppose further, the U.’s insatiable greed hasn’t gotten to the point where it can feels comfortable being the biggest pot dealer in Michigan. It’s not about suffering; it’s about money.

Love - Randy

HaVe a nIcE dAy!

“Happiness is a warm gun.”

-- John Lennon 1940-1980: title of song (1968)

I suppose I should write about something, anything: Perhaps the perils of singing, “My Way,” on the Pacific Rim; or progress in Helmand Province; or that Malaria killed King Tut; or that the Winter Olympics are on. I don’t want to say I feel depressed but I’m taking up the Luge. The Tutster also suffered from Clubfoot and Cleft Palate; even Bonobo monkeys know better than to inbreed.

It’s Fat Tuesday. I’m fat, ugly (at least today), unfit (yes, fat people can be fit), and old- age-infirmed (it crept up on me like a thief in the night). What is old-age-infirmed, you say. It’s when you see S.A.D. as a symptom rather than season.

Read about a new documentary on BIID, “Quid Pro Quo.” Noticed my old pal, Sean, commented that it’s fairly interesting. Why not want to cut your arms off in a world as inhumane as this. It’s not your fault - it’s psychic imprinting, or your mom, or rising sign, or smegmic legacy. It’s not that you’re a nut-job with to much time on your hands, if ya still got ‘em.

Reads the paper; learn new words. Nicholas Kristof writes, “One is “autocannibalism,” coined in French but equally appropriate in English. It describes what happens when a militia here in eastern Congo’s endless war cuts flesh from living victims and forces them to eat it. Another is ‘re-rape.’ The need for that term arose because doctors were seeing women and girls raped, re-raped and re-raped again, here in the world capital of murder, rape, and mutilation.”

Allow me to exit with a few cheery quotes for the day:

'My nerves are bad tonight. Yes, bad. Stay with me.

'Speak to me. Why do you never speak. Speak

‘What are you thinking of? What thinking? What?

'I never know what you are thinking. Think.'

I think we are in rats' alley

Where the dead men lost their bones.

-- T. S. Eliot, from The Wasteland(1922)

The small god of the world will never change his ways

And is as whimsical--as on the first of days,

His life might be a bit more fun,

Had you not given him that spark of heaven's sun;

He calls it reason and employs it resolute

To be more brutish than is any brute.

-- Goethe, from Faust

"There is no happiness in comfort; happiness is brought by suffering. Man is not born to happiness."

-- Dostoevsky, from Notebooks: Idea of the Novel

Psychology knows that he who imagines disasters in some ways desires them. But why do they come so eagerly to meet him? Something in reality strikes a chord in paranoid fantasy and is warped by it. The sadism latent in everyone unerringly divines the weakness latent in everyone. And the fantasy of persecution is contagious; wherever it occurs spectators are driven irresistibly to imitate it. This succeeds most easily when one gives the fantasy a helping hand by doing what the other fears. 'One fool makes many'--the bottomless solitude of the deluded has a tendency to collectivization and so quotes the delusion into existence. This pathic mechanism harmonizes with the social one prevalent, whereby those socialized into desperate isolation hunger for community and flock together in cold mobs. So folly becomes an epidemic: insane sects grow with the same rhythm as big organizations. It is the rhythm of total destruction.

-- Theodor Adorno, from Minima Moralia(1951)

Peace - Randy

The Main Vein

“To find a friend one must close one eye. To keep him – two.”

-- Norman Douglas 1868-1952: Almanac (1941)

Dear All:

The bad news that one of our band-mates (see yesterday’s post) has a medical issue, AAA (Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm), makes any considerations of reunions, and such, small potatoes. The good news is that this is not a disease as much as a condition. His situation reminds me of the time Miss Brigitte underwent open-heart surgery for the removal of a benign growth (Fibroelastoma) in the upper left chamber (atrium) of her heart. In her case, as with AAA, fixing the problem is quite simple, as medical procedures go. The problem concerns the locations where these conditions arise. In B’s.case, the growth protruded from the left Atrial valve in such a way that the contracting heart muscle might randomly loosen it, at which point she would suffer a brain or heart aneurysm and die. Concerning AAA, most people know what the aorta is as it pertains to the heart itself, but are less familiar with the fact that the aortic vein, which is the largest blood vessel in the body, extends down between the kidneys and deep in the thorasic cavity where it eventually divides into two branches that supply blood to the stomach and lower extremities. An aneurysm constitutes a weak length that appears as a bulge on the scans used to detect it. In terms of symptoms, the bulging vein put pressure on the surrounding areas, the kidney for example, and causes pain. The danger is this: if it bursts, there is little hope of containing a severe hemorrhage and sudden death. Ouch! The solution is to replace that portion of the vein with a Dacron or Gore-tex stent that reinforces it. However, the delicacy of the surgery is such that it requires the kind of highly trained surgical specialist that can only be found at large research hospitals typically located near large metropolitan areas, like Madison Wisconsin. The good news is that unlike heart disease, cancer, and other chronic illnesses, once the aneurysm is fixed you’re as good as new.

Speaking of medical matters. Lately my esteemed partners and I have been developing an enterprise aimed at helping those in need of pain relief. My role in our endeavor is, what else, producing professional written materials regarding our project.

Hence the following:

HEAVENLY HERB

Mission Statement

To provide prompt delivery and affordable access to reliable pain management and palliative care by facilitating the delivery of the highest quality medical marijuana to those afflicted with acute, chronic, and intractable pain related to a variety of illnesses and disabilities. Heavenly Herb’s overarching ethical agenda is to ensure that all who suffer debilitating diseases and conditions are provided with compassionate, expeditious pain relief regardless of racial, ethnic, aging, gender, and socioeconomic factors. We seek to achieve these goals by maintaining and implementing rigorously monitored state of the art cultivation strategies that guarantee our product will be at the cutting edge of medical marijuana pain management.

To improve and addend the common understanding of how best to alleviate, relieve, and remedy the myriad symptoms of illness and disability as they relate to overall health and pain management.

To enhance the quality of care for persons who may be differentially vulnerable to the pain experiences by understanding the subjective and objective nature of pain and suffering.

Vision Statement

To be the preferred medical marijuana provider for those compassion clubs interested in studying and furthering the development of successful pain management outcomes.

To expand the general public’s knowledge of the personal impact of pain and provide a better understanding of the role medical marijuana can play in its alleviation.

To explore the many variables that influence the quality of pain care as it pertains to the accessible procurement and application of medical marijuana remedies.

To encourage the idea that compassion clubs and medical marijuana dispensaries be used as forums for the exchange of ideas as well as discussion arenas to promote pain education.

To foster an environment for the study of pain related to health disparities to improve the health and well being of our patients, families, communities, and nation.

Sleep Tight - Randy

Goo Goo Goo Joob!

"The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget."

-- Thomas Szasz 1920-- : "The Second Sin" (1973)

Dear Tim & Friends of Walrus:

Because of your genuine interest in seeing us play together, I thought it only fitting that we respond to your wish. I say we because I’m going to try my best to make this an informational as well as positional post. First off, absent Mcgee’s illness we wouldn’t be having this conversation. As most of you know, as the band goes, Bill and I are closest to Tim. Tim moved with us to Ann Arbor in 72 and was, for all intents and purposes, a part of the band. And so now, these many years later, Tim, as well as the group from which, in some sense, the Walrus arose – we friends who grew up together and were caught up in the swirl of the late sixties zeitgeist – would like to see us play again. And what is the forum for this collective request? Mcgee’s Care Pages, where a wide array of old friends and acquaintances have renewed connections that might never have been made under less trying circumstances. Thank you, Mcgee, and thank you fans! Where was I? Oh yea, informational and positional. The situation is this. Mckelvy and French are somewhat out of the loop in terms of the reunion web dialogue. Although Bill and I haven’t spoken in a while, the rest of us speak with each other quite often. I suppose there’s a certain irony in the fact that perhaps the two best instrumentalists in the band, Kuhli and French, are least concerned with philosophical issues related to our musical direction. For me, a reunion would be less a musical endeavor than a gathering of people who care deeply about one another, and who are moving into, shall we say, the autumn of their years. Implicit in this attitude is the idea that we have nothing to prove, which for me would mean adhering to a self-commitment that this gig be a tribute to you, Tim, and those who care about you, many of whom are Walrus fans. This would also make it an easy thing to do. Requiring no re-invention of the wheel; no pressured rehearsals to showcase new material (come on, how often does anyone see us); no side issues like which combo best represents the “original” Walrus (who cares!); and no obligation that we try to re-create what we perceive the audience to have witnessed almost 40 years ago (they can’t remember anyway)! If these considerations seem sensible, that’s why they won’t work. Simply put, this would be a Twilight Zoney pitch to the stars that would be different than any gig the Walrus has ever done, and we would be great. The reason: because for the first time IT WOULDN”T BE ABOUT US. And that’s why it probably won’t happen. Oh but if we could adopt this attitude; but collectively, I don’t think we can.

Love – Randy

Dear Tim:

“Metaphorically speaking, to open a can of worms means to inadvertently create numerous new problems while trying to solve one. Experts disagree on the origin of the phrase, but it is generally believed to be a Canadian or American metaphor coined sometime in the 1950s. Bait stores routinely sold cans of worms and other popular live baits to fishermen, who often discovered how easy it was to open a can of worms and how difficult it was to close one. Once the worms discovered an opportunity to escape, it became nearly impossible to keep them contained.”

A last word on your worm liberation campaign: I imagine just a modicum (token amount) of drama is good for your circulation. As Dr. Olson says, be sure to get outdoors, a bit of fresh air, vitamins, and other salubrious activities are prescribed, as well as a rest cure pilgrimage to Fatima, Lourdes, and the Ontonogan coast.

David Martin, brother of Gary, son of Hoot, thanks for the Mcgoostock props, but there can be only one Mcgoostock. It was a singular event, in a small northern village where people gathered from far and near to drink, dance, and party in the name of the Teaker (Consider the fact the Bud Wheeler showed up looking like he just stepped out of an Easy Rider party at four and a quarter). Also, sweet Bonni from S.D., and Michael Stadler from S.F. represented the Left Coast contingent.

However, this does not mean that our overarching mission, helping the Mcgee family meet the bills, would not be a part of any Walrus reunion.

In case the implications of my last post slipped under the radar, any profits garnered over and above our assisting French, Kuhli, and Mckelvy meet their expenses would be given to Tim, hence the phrase, “It wouldn’t be about us.”

Finally (yeah, right), while Bill may have his own good reasons for not wanting to do this (which we should all respect), the philosophical obstacles I brought up in the long Walrus post, let’s call it the “worm can,” have nothing to do with Bill’s attitude. These are considerations Mike would have to wrestle with were he to give this any serious thought.

Love - Randy