Category: of affairs

  • The emergence of patterns and when will we ever learn?

    The emergence of patterns and when will we ever learn?

    Here lately, the humans on this planet are really showing their bad side.  Like bored kids with big IQ’s, they are up to mischief that in their dreams will enable them to reach some sort of world domination type role – and it is beginning to look like a video game turned real-life.  I will say that it is starting to really fence me in, as we say here in The West, as in “Don’t Fence Me In”.  I don’t like this at all.  I don’t like the implications.

    This is a very badly written video game…

    Let’s look at this in very abstract terms:

    1. These people have an “evil plan” (judging from the outside).  So, what’s new?  Let’s look at ancient literature.  This “war” has been going on for centuries – one could say, “since the dawn of mankind”, and they wouldn’t be wrong.  At least, anecdotally, and in the historical record, there is good evidence to point to the fact that “tribes” or “clans” of humans go to war (e.g., throw stuff at each other, shoot things at each other, set things on fire, blow things up with: projectiles, things that go boom, things that zap, things that just basically do damage to whatever/whomever it with which it makes contact.  You might even consider that stuff laced with poison of some sort, or disease spores, or whatnot is considered yet another form of waging war human vs. human).
    2. The plan is to reach some sort of “goal” at which time “YOU WIN”, and the other guy loses.  The winner becomes “Master of the Universe”.  Yeah.  Just like in the cartoons. 
    3. The declared winners are also “master blasters”.  They are “destructo-man”.  Maybe they destroy the other guy entirely, and everything around him that they possibly can.  Maybe they destroy everything attached to the other guy:  where he lives and works, his family, his stuff,  and everything around him.  Maybe they are  indiscriminate destroyers.  They just blow stuff up and kill people to make a point.  Yeah.  That’s what kind of humans that they are. 
    4. Maybe it’s that they “enslave the losers and their families, and friends, and everyone around them that supposedly believe like they believe.  They then make “them” subscribe to their beliefs, “or else”.  The “or else” could be anything bad. 
    5. The “winner” might even declare to the world how serious they are about their mission, by chopping off body parts, or killing some of these humans, and video recording this – and putting this on YouTube, so that everyone with a mobile or desktop computer can see this.   This is called “claiming responsibility”.  It’s all the rage in the “best practices of world domination”.   At any rate, they are making certain that everyone knows — because “it’s all about THEM”, right?  If it was really religious, it would be about the religion, but the authorities of the religion say that in its philosophy, this is not a part of the true religion, so that means that these “winners” are being labeled as “extremists” or “radicalized” – and that puts them in the “bad boy box”. ) This is part of that psyche of “Being the “master of the universe”.  Yeah.  Movies are made about this kind of stuff.  These humans just bring it into “real life”.
    6. The point of what they are doing is trying to get the whole world to freak out.  They enjoy this.  It’s part of the “thrill of it all”, the “self-endorsement”, the notion that “you are doing something important”.   Congratulations.  They are now official bad-guys – part of the “bad guy affiliate network”, fully indoctrinated into the “bad guy hall of fame”.  This makes them even angrier, no doubt, so that the energy derived from this anger spurs them on.  It’s that “ah-ha!  See!  Everyone is my enemy!”  To them, this makes it OK in the mindset of rationalization, to continue on the destructive path… The road to nowhere.
    7. What ends up happening is not that they are celebrated, but that they are hunted down.  Maybe they like this part, too.  Maybe it is all a part of the “thrill” of the chase, playing this game that they may have thought up, because they were bored, or somebody made them feel badly, or any number of reasons for feeling disenfranchised –  and because maybe their IQs are so high, they used their gifts for this kind of “game”.  Or maybe, as they claim, “this kind of religious belief”.  Driven by God?  What God?  What mandate?  This is that which most of the rest of the world cannot understand.  It is bent on destruction — of the world as we know it, and it is happening bit by bit, incident by incident. 
    8. It doesn’t end well for “winner or loser”.  Bottom line, it’s a wasteland – of lives, of resources, of energy.  The anger is fed, and the anger grows.

    This is a very sad state of affairs.  This game is not a game.  It is very real.  It is like a cancer, with a treatment that is ineffective.  The side-effects are bad.  The resulting anger on all sides, contributes to the inevitable destruction of the host — planet earth.

    It is a part of an illness of our human race.  It is not going to end well.  The seriousness of concurrent events appears to be driving us to some sort of brink.

    Are we living out the predictions of many prophets and scholars who have forecast that this type of situation would occur?

    Who knows the answers… time will tell.  But heavy praying and making small changes every day in how we live might help – and it doesn’t matter who you pray TO, so long as it is praying for the peace of the world.  It’s coming on that time of year – primavera, Easter, Passover, and all the other renewal holidays and celebrations of new life.

    The mourning dove is cooing outside my window…

    More discussion in “Modern Problems

  • waiting for the second that something will change or maybe not.

    waiting for the second that something will change or maybe not.

    Blade Runner.  Great movie.  Classic.  We saw it again recently.  A reminder of the perceptions of life that we hold onto as we cruise through it.  Maybe not in a futuristic vehicle, but maybe it is – if you time slice automobiles from the time you were born, to now – hey, by the time you are my age, they do look futuristic.  They still don’t fly through the air, except in bad circumstances

    That’s another story. Chaotic.  Strange.  Wake me up when this movie is over

    But sometimes things happen and you can’t wake up from it, and you can’t get away from it.  It just is how it is.  I have experienced that.  More than once.  Yeah, life sucks sometimes.

    Disease, divorce, death – the three “D’s” that you get told by counselors that say these are major deals in your life.  Of course your own death isn’t likely to affect you in a big way, just other people who are left behind.  And that is yet another story.  Been there, done that.  No amount of experience prepares you.

    Things get put on your radar that weren’t there just a minute or two before.  Stuff like that.  That is when we don’t want change to happen.  It is a “please, just let me BE” kind of appeal.  I’m not ready for the great up yonder yet.  We don’t get to decide that, Silly.  Haven’t you figured that out yet?  So, nobody wants to face that, but yet we face it every day.  We just send it under the gray matter.  Fear of “it” in any representation.

    the clown

    Clowns.  Monsters.  Deep space.  Any abyss – beings and places you cannot know simply because you cannot see or touch what is within.  Let’s take clowns.  Underneath all of that make up, wigs, baggy clothes, big shoes and those big red noses is something you cannot understand.  Oh, and yeah.  There’s the teeth part.  Big teeth.  “The clowns are waiting, I cannot sleep.”

    Thanks Stephen King.  Master of bringing you your worst nightmares in print.  You are compelled to NOT put the book down until you get through to the end.

    I think that if a dark future is defined for you, and you are told this, it makes you realize that you are not in control here.  You are definitely NOT in control.  Sometimes you go down the river in Egypt – de Nile.  Or your mind chops it up into itty-bitty pieces.  At some point, the removal of the perceived control makes you angry.  It makes you lose it.  Yeah.  Lose control.  Oh yeah… never actually had it, did you?  So, get pissed off, get over it and call me in the morning.

    Living in the past lately, for some strange reason I call it studying the past.  Suddenly, the 1960’s are fascinating.  Maybe clinging is a better word.  Maybe not.

    Photo - 010Day to day, for comfort, we delude ourselves into thinking that everything is fine.  It’s a self-protection, this calm of the moment.  A womb.  We sit in it and watch the world go by.  Then the tap on the shoulder. 

    Imagine riding along on I-10 one minute, and crunched between vehicles the next.  Split second.  Bastante.

    Don’t forget.  Joy happens, too.  Learning that you will be a parent, then waiting the appointed time before that actually happens. 

    The split second you see the new little person, made of 50% you, emerging into the world – now that’s joy!  Let’s not think of other possibilities.  Be in the moment.  It’s important.  Let’s just think that things will be fine and the miracle of life will be right in front of our very eyes. 

    Experience teaches us lessons of dubiousness and as we have more of those experiences, we get more dubious.  It’s as simple as that.

    Photo - 007I have been accused of being “negative”.  Maybe when I am speaking with people who are close to me, it is the fact that I feel that I can speak freely.  Well, maybe I can’t as much as I thought.  Live and learn.  There was innocence before the fall.

    My life experience unfolds every day.   Everyone on this planet experiences this as long as they are still breathing. 

    Revisiting what I did once, thinking back about it, I felt like I was wandering in the forest, to be honest.  I look at these old photos and wonder what happened to these girls who were friends back in 7th grade.

    Mostly, I was afraid of my mother.  I was always trying to escape her grip of control.  She didn’t want me to wear shoes with no socks.  She did not want me to wear make-up.  She did not want me to shave my legs or arm pits.  For God’s sake, I was looking like a baby gorilla!  What a dork – wearing socks and clunky shoes (oh  yeah, she didn’t want me to wear cool shoes – only those that were “supportive”).  No make up, no eye liner, no lipstick – Frosted Malt or Sugar and Ice – the two popular ones at the time so you could look like “Twiggy”.  Right.  See me in that dress.  I absolutely did NOT look like Twiggy.  I had curly hair, when styles were straight.  My mom kept cutting my hair, when I wanted it long.  What did we agree on?  Not much.

    We finally had it out when I was in seventh grade.  Yeah.  She took a slap at me and I caught her hand in mid-air.  I said, “Don’t do that to me ever again.”  Line in the sand.  That was the day she realized that I was bigger and stronger than she was.  And she didn’t physically do that again.  She used her mind instead… oh yeah, and her voice.  Boy could she scream and yell.

    Photo_035

    She was kind of a “Dr. Jekyl – Mrs. Hyde”.  But eventually, we knew the relationship boundaries and we got as okay as we could — and she did rise to help and support at grim times, when she was most needed.  She could behave like a normal human being if she put her mind to it.  A real normal one.  That was what perplexed everyone about her.  But underneath, she was a normal person, trying to stay that way.  It was probably clowns that drove her into her spells.

    So I digress.

    Childhood.  Adolescence.  Adulthood.  I guess all I wanted was some credibility.  Well, here I am. 

    I’ve been so trying not to repeat history, that it hurts.  Maybe I have gone a bit too far, but then, you are never sure.

    We have those moments in our lives that we will look back on, embarrassed, but knowing that it was the best that we could do at the time with what capabilities we had and being what people we were, we can take comfort.  We were children.   It’s okay.   Photo - 004We can’t go back and change this.  Only in the movies, but then it gets complicated when this happens, as we have seen.

    But we had fun and we did crazy stuff.  We snuck out and rode around, and met boys at the movies, and made out in the dark.  We probably did a lot of things that millions of other kids did around the world.  That’s why I love that movie, “The Boat that Rocked”  AKA “Pirate Radio”.   It captured how we were – on the brink of something revolutionary.  It was great!  The British Rock invasion… The Soul Train… Girl groups – yeah, Lezley Gore – It’s My Party and I will Cry if I Want!  Love it!

    One thing, though – we can’t go back.  Would we want to go back?  No, not really.  Some of those days weren’t so much fun.  But what I think is that we should appreciate every day.  I know it’s hard for people facing tough times.

    We can’t magic away the tough times.  But if you are just needing to change your attitude, then you really should think about it.

    I am.  Every day.  Every day.


     

  • Airport Walks…  What You Think About.

    Airport Walks…  What You Think About.

     

    Going to the airport is a routine now ahead of these trips up north. I’ve taken up this habit of walking my wait for boarding my flights lately. I do this because of my back, and because sitting just isn’t great in contiguous segments. I am required to sit on the plane. I am not required to sit while I am waiting at the airport to board. I just need to show up when required by the time on the ticket to board.


    It’s my time to put on the “phones” and go into a space, walking and watching. I swear, I could tell you more about the state of the airport and its inhabitants than anyone, except those like me who are roving people watchers… I haven’t spotted THEM yet, because if they are moving, it makes sense that they might be difficult to identify. Right?


    So, I observe. I absorb. I think about stuff. My mind loosens, and the creative juices flow. Oh my goodness, do they flow. A recorder could attest to free associations… but, that’s really my brain on exercise, stormin’ and zipping around to those thoughts that bubble up most.
    Thinking of things, in my “thingish” way, that Winnie the Pooh perfected long ago…


    People…


    People from different places and walks of life… People who look like other people in certain ways… People who look like they are on a mission, people at rest in the very quiet “D” terminal… which is a huge contrast to the very busy and congested “C” terminal… “E” is moderate, as it has lots of vertical space and lots of long hauls – the people are less compressed into small spaces…


    Distance…


    In about an hour I can cover almost three and a half miles – likely, if I race walked it, I could do more – but I don’t want to get that sweaty… Especially before a flight…


    I compare this to walking to our local park and back, plus about a half mile more…


    Art…


    There is cool art in the “D” terminal. The “E” terminal has vast spaces and “premium” restaurants and shops… The “C” terminal is trying to catch up, but there is no “art” there – just redesign of the existing – to get it out of that “90’s look”, but “C” always will be the busy domestic hub for North America – all seem to be majorly “United” controlled except for the “D” terminal that has the other airlines who fly overseas. The non-alliance airlines are banished to “A” and “B”, or God forbid, “Hobby”, across town… Umph… Silly that we even have this perspective – pushed by “corporation” power-plays… I do NOT ♥ United… I do long for the old Continental…


    “Hometown Houston”


    Used to be that this was okay – Continental, being the hometown airline, it was a hometown airport. Not so much now. Its weird. Its complicated. It is still, the large corporate merger, working itself out.
    Houston is a proud city. It does not like to be taken over by Chicago.


    Its citizens rebel in passive aggressive ways, but if you want to fly anywhere, you kind of have to forbear the resentments. United. You complain, knowing that you are rebelling against a corporate giant the size of a small city. Ugh. Bad food, reducing comforts, and the expense… “Shall we beat you whilst you give us your money for the experience?”. Right.


    But with this airline, there are the almost 40+ year employees, still there, flying and working the ground, who began work as soon as they graduated high-school and became eligible…


    The “stewardesses” (now attendants) – inflight “coordinators” – etc., names of job roles change – they were, at the beginning, likely, svelte and curvy at the same time, as it was, back in the day, the habit of hiring – before the ERA of ’72 kicked in and discriminatory practices began changing like “la unda” (the wave)… No more that. It’s okay if you are my age, in not such great shape, and of reasonable temperament – well…at least not ranting….


    Most of this is on the pages of the travel experience “opinionators” who wax on about this program vs. that one, but then this one does this and that, and if you put a spreadsheet to it, well… at the end of that evaluation, this one really is better…


    Yeah, I get it… Good and bad with a happy paper and ribbon to tie it all up, and someone is still making money… That is what it is all about, right?


    So, I digress… It was about the walk? Right? Right.


    Each time I do the walk it gets more interesting. I think, really, it is more about my perspectives driven by the walk – and it is never the same… I don’t let it be one of too much binning and categorization, although, we humans tend to do this… I now look for the outliers. I think about the comparison to walks in years back and the sporadic periods of time spent in airports… over the years… before 9-11, when people smoked and things were still spinning from the glorious age of commercialization of air travel… Barely experienced in my teens… it was so very different then…


    My first flying experience was flying from college home to spend Christmas holidays


    Getting there was not as hard as returning without a ride from the airport – a boyfriend soon to be ex was a no show… Reached out in desperation to the roommate who lived not far, and the parents who rescued me… Caveat was that I had to stay over at their house, which was a bit weird, but I was okay, and accounted for, not hitchhiking, as my parents likely feared…


    I was seventeen.


    Not yet an adult, fully qualified, as that was being debated at the time… it was Vietnam war times… If you were old enough to fight, you should be old enough to vote, and drink, and get married… but not all the states thought that this was a good idea, and this came in spurts… like all other changes, from the left, and right to the middle… California and New York leading as always, the change waves…
    Flying then was quite a different experience…as was life for us at that point…


    It was during the interesting time – of Fleetwood Mac, and Rolling Stones… The Who, and David Bowie… Moving fast into the seventies… Before CBGB… Endless opportunities if you didn’t die in the process… Keeping ahead of the waves of revolution and transition, so as not to get run over by it was the trick – avoiding those situations that could get you into big dimensions of trouble… all of us had to navigate through these times in some form or fashion, it seemed…


    But the quality and character of this has changed. Now, the dimensions of danger and violence in our world has moved to a level that for most of us, borders on out of control. Scary to those of us who live in what we think is a modern and civilized world that there are others among us who want to drag us backward and limit us to living in that hand-to-hand existence where someone or someones are in charge and stuff explodes to remind the world of this on an erratic basis just to keep this notion in the forefront of everyone’s minds…
    And then there are the zombies. Thank goodness we have our own “house zombie” for protection… Halloween is coming at the end of the month… Must find a new suit for him! The girls will no doubt want photos again this year!


    Again I digress…


    As I roam, I think also about that Tom Hanks movie where he “lives” in the airport, his life and friends become that of those who occupy it 24X7, and they know him – and join together to be on his side – he is the “permanent” denizen of the environment and the perspectives reflected are those of a resident, as his evolves…


    I can see how this could transpire, and imagine what it would be like…


    So often, the employees are congregated to socialize, discussing what they did the night before, their boyfriends, their families, and the normal stuff you chat with co-workers about…


    It probably is a tiring place to work for some. I see people resting in the quiet parts of the airport.


    I look at the art that probably 95% of passengers that travel domestically out of this airport do not even know is on exhibit. It is beautiful stuff – highly modern art in genre and some very interesting works. Introducing art into spaces where people have to wait is a nice thing in a normally unpleasant and stressful environment. Every little thing helps…

    Me, I am just trying to not sit around too much, keeping active, doing my steps, burning calories, in anticipation of the long sit that awaits me on my flight…