Writing With One Hand Clapping

"There are stars in the Southern sky
"And if ever you decide
"You should go
"There is a taste of time sweetened honey
"Down the Seven Bridges Road"
One thing I hate about this blog is I feel it gives off a false impression. Like, I’m sane or something. Writing here is like writing in the center of a hurricane. I have to put out all thoughts of what’s around me, what my future – immediate or long term – might bring and then find the drive and passion and energy to get my inspirations to this page. A lot doesn’t make it, lost in the whirlwinds of this world. Funny part is, it may be that only by traveling to the nether world of my imagination that I stay alive.

"Somewhere in the distance I hear the bells ring
"Darkness settles on the town as the children start to sing.
"And the lady 'cross the street, she shuts out the night
"There's a cast of thousands waiting as she turns out the light."
So yeah, you’re seeing me here at my most lucid. Other times I’m so angry I could kill, so lonely I could die and so paralyzed with despair I literally cannot move a bone of my body. Sometimes my imagination rescues me and I dream of films or art or blog posts to create, most of which never makes the light of day. Instead, I feed off it to make it through the crisis time. Once I start to move again, it’s lost. I’ve messed up my personal life so badly I’ve become a vampire to my own art.

"I dont know how this whole business started
"Of you thinking that I had been untrue;
"But if you think that we’d be better parted
"It's gonna hurt me but I’ll break away from you."
So please appreciate the massive amount of energy and willpower it takes to bring you these sort of sideways peeks into my particular genius. Had I made my film and book, it would all be different, my words would be seen in a different light (that sounds so self-serving, doesn't it!). Instead, in trying to break the world’s heart, I broke my own. Here you can read the remnants of a shattered soul for as long as I can hold out. All I have to do is write with one hand clapping, one heart pining and one life waiting.

Oh, and don’t forget to write a fucking witty bird comment to top it all off.

The False Parsing of History

“The right thing done for the wrong reason still ends in catastrophe.”
- Me, as I watched the statue of Saddam being pulled down after the invasion.
Through the virtual library of Half Price Books (buy a book, read it, sell it back and get another!) I’m reading a detailed account of the Russian Revolution of 1917, from its root causes to its shifts in movements along the way to the final implosion into authoritarian rule. The book is truly an enjoyable and fascinating read and it’s clear the author did his research with an open mind and critical eye to the facts. But what he does lack is perspective, and for whatever reason that usually seems to be the case with most historians. Here’s a passage where it’s most evident:

“Yet the course of history is full of unexpected turns that can only be explained by the actions of great leaders. This is particularly so in the case of revolutions, when the tide of events can be so easily turned. The October [1917] seizure of power is a good example: few historical events in the modern era better illustrate the decisive effect of an individual on the course of history. Without Lenin’s intervention it would probably never had happened at all – and the history of the twentieth century would have been very different.”

Completely, utterly and patently false – but it makes for a dramatic read. I’m not a believer in fatalism or that events are predetermined in any way that makes free thinking irrelevant, but I do believe the motives behind a movement’s actions will come to light regardless of any decisions made along the way with those same motives. People love to look into events of the past and play the “If only…” game. E.g.: If only Hitler had kept bombing the English airfields instead of switching to the cities he could have taken England and perhaps put himself in such a strong position as to be virtually unbeatable. It’s myopic observations such as these that leave out the fact Hitler was a psychotic madman bent on the destruction of both himself and his country. “The outcome of WWII was determined before it began”. (Harry Homeless, The Art of Warts)

Choose the form!
1917 Russia was the same way. It was (is?) a childish country begging for an authority figure to worship in awe. The only question was what form their demise would take. There was never any hope or chance of democracy. Previously, I talked of the Danton Principle: that there are two kinds of fighters against a king: those who fight for freedom from the king and those who fight to be the king. Both fighters use the same slogans, but it is the motives of the movement as a whole that give rise to the individuals who will come to power. There were monarchist voices at critical times of the American Revolution, but no one remembers them now just as no one remembers the voices of democracy in revolutionary Russia.

Historians will be saying the same thing about our occupation of Iraq. It’s started already with the recent mini furor over the decision to disband the Iraqi army and what a devastating effect it had on creating an insurgency. I’m sure there will be other fingers pointed at the endless string of stupid and self-serving decisions we’ve made along the way. But the whole thing never had any hope of succeeding. We went there to rape them and plunder them, not to help them. You can’t make good decisions on helping people when you don’t have good intent to begin with!
 
All this parsing of history is not really an attempt to get at the truth, it’s an attempt to parse responsibility from one’s motives, that somehow good things can come of ill will. Amazing how much philosophy and other bullshit is an attempt to portray just that false hope! For morality is the only true form of intelligence.

O.J. Should Have Gotten the Chair

But not for double homicide. But just so we can all be spared the endless fake outrage of the white man over his every perceived transgression. “OJ Farts While Playing Golf. Club Members Riot”. Next time you see a white man on TV talking about O.J., just put it on mute and watch how red his face turns with anger. From the look on his face you’d think O.J. had just fucked his wife with his big, black dick.

And since everybody propagates their motives as being the same as God’s own, I just had to ask one of the “outraged”: Why so much anger against The Juice? Why was I not surprised when the answer I got was the root of the white man’s rage was due to his “love of justice”. Now that’s just goddam funny! You sure you wanna go with that? Love of justice, huh? Let’s just take a closer look at that (after I stop laughing).

For a detailed expose of the white man's love of justice, try watching “The Trials of Darryl Hunt”. Never heard of him? How can that be? We love justice so much! An outrage like this just has to be known across the land! But since there actually may not be some justice lovers out there (shocking!) let us recount the facts of what happened:

In 1984, Deborah Sykes, a young white newspaper reporter, was assaulted, raped, sodomized and stabbed to death just blocks from where she worked in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Though no physical evidence implicated him, Darryl Hunt, a 19-year-old black man, was ultimately convicted of the crime and sentenced to life in prison.

At this point, we insert the usual excuses of “People make mistakes”, “I’m sure they were honest devotees of the truth”, etc, etc. Whatever.

Six months after this brutal crime, another woman was attacked with the same M.O. but she was able to fend off her attacker. Police, however, convinced her not to follow through on a complaint. Because if she had, it would have exposed their wrongful arrest of Darryl Hunt since her attacker was the true criminal in Hunt's case. Prosecutors continued the deceit in court when they used the eyewitness testimony of a former KKK member and an obvious plea to ignore the lack of physical evidence and to concentrate only on the viciousness of the black on white attack. These were not “honest mistakes” but cold, hard decisions to lie and then frame an innocent man.

Fortunately, true justice lovers persevered over the next twenty years to exonerate Darryl Hunt and he was awarded 1.65 million dollars in compensation for his wrongful conviction. So where’s the outrage? Where are all the hard feelings against the police, the prosecutors and the justice system who knowingly fucked this guy? We should be hounding their every step and wailing in moral outrage over the good and free life they lead when these same people denied such a life to another.

Yeah, I know what you sorry fucks are gonna say. Christ, you’re predictable! “That Darryl Hunt guy, he musta dun sumpthin’. Did’ncha say he was black?” “Hey man, you got the facts all wrong! I know so cuz I don’t believe any of that!” “Even if it is true, that’s just one isolated case in a million.” Sorta like O.J.? If only being a redneck cocksucker could be made illegal…

Some will actually admit defeat though when presented with the facts. “Oh yeah, that makes me mad too,” they calmly proclaim. “Now if we can only get that O.J. fucker!!”

SLUT on the Butt

     She hadn’t felt this kind of excitement since she was a teenager. “Illicit but moral” was how she had sold herself on the idea. Step by step she watched herself to see if she would actually go through with it. First was the internet posting, safe and anonymous. “Bad girl needs punishment”. The thought of being tied up with a paddle smacking her bare butt was driving her to the breaking point. She had to face her frustration for a forbidden fantasy.
     “Is this my beginning or is this the end?” she wondered to herself as she undressed in the hotel room. Maybe she was opening the door to a whole new type of freedom she’d never had before, an outlet for these forbidden fantasies that could actually help her to appear more secure in her daily life. Tucked away in a hotel room far from her home she could face her torment and control it. What an incredibly appealing thought!
     As she neatly placed the clothes on the chair she recounted for the thousandth time the chain of emails between her and her punisher. Not just any paddling would do, it would have to come from someone who understood. He would see her as she truly was, punish her to make it better and give her freedom from the lies sapping her soul. Her punisher had seemed to read her mind: that he knew of bad girls such as her and knew exactly what they needed – and deserved. Such was the person she need to show up.
     The bad girl got into position for her punishment: face down, nude with her head stuffed into a pillow. It was dark in the room as she had very carefully closed the drapes for secrecy. She could feel her heart pounding with excitement, imagining the pleasure the sight of her nude body would bring. At last she could drop the pretense! God help her if he was late, she just might burst in the meantime.
     Then came the knock on the door.


     Shaking, the woman as a little girl ran to the door, slipped the room key underneath and hurried back into proper position. It was at that moment she knew she had made the right decision. It was like losing her virginity all over again. Her body trembled as she awaited his reaction.
     “Goood. Good girl. I think this will go well. I truly think I can make you the good girl you want to be.”
     She wanted to scream out, “God yes!” but instead gave out a very enthusiastic, “Thank you, sir!”
     “Are you ready for the final preparations?”
     “Yes, sir, I am completely ready.”
     She heard him unzip a bag and tingled in anticipation as he first grabbed her feet and then her hands, cuffing each of them in cold, hard steel. Obediently – and sure to please – she stayed stretched out as he took the chain and pulled it taut under the bed, making her completely immobile. Anything that happened now could not be her fault as she was entirely helpless. It was exactly the position she wanted to be in.
     He was authoritive: “As I told you before, first I want to talk. I need to find out exactly why you’ve been a bad girl and what we should do about it.”
     If only she could get her husband to say those words! Most of the other responses to her ad talked only of how they would paddle her and make her beg. But he was different, he wanted to explore her and release her cravings. She would confess all.
     “Are you married?”
     “Yes, sir.”
     “Where is your husband now? Won’t he see the marks?”
     “He’s on a business trip all this week.”
     “To where? What does he do?”
     “He’s a bank vice-president and he’s overseeing the opening of a new regional center.” This is perfect! It’s just like I’m tied up for interrogation and I have to answer or I get punished!
     “It sounds like you are very proud of him.”
     “I am, sir! He gives speeches in the industry and is highly respected.” She was afraid she sounded too much like a brochure there.
     “But what about you? What do you do?”
     “I stay home now and help the children.”
     “What about before? You had a career?”
     “Not really. When we were first married I just worked as a receptionist. Once he moved up in the bank and the kids were born I started staying home.”
     “Didn’t you go to college though?”
     “Yes…”
     “So you are pretty much useless in the real world, aren’t you?”
     A secret thought revealed. “Yes, sir.”
     “I mean, anyone can be a nanny and raise children. Are they of school age?”
     “Yes, but I’m still quite busy with all their activities.”
     “I see. Let me ask you. Where would you be without your husband? Could you keep your house?”
     “No. There’s no way I could do that. It’s a large house.”
     “You have a maid?”
     “Yes, we hired a Hispanic lady to help me clean. She’s not full time,” she added defensively.
     “I bet it feels good to be the lady of the house, doesn’t it? Living in a fine neighborhood and never feeling the pain of poverty.”
     That had always been a secret little guilt but her punisher let her confess all. “Yes, I have to admit it does feel good. When the maid pulls her old car up in the driveway I’m always glad I’ll never have to drive a car like that again.”
     “That’s a normal human reaction, isn’t it?”
     “Yes, who wouldn’t want to drive a nice car? But I’ve driven crappy cars before and I know I can handle it.”
     There was a pause and she wondered what he was thinking.
     “Where did you meet your husband?”
     “At bible college.”
     “Have you ever lived on your own?”
     Another secret guilt. “No, sir.”
     “Was it love at first sight?”
     “No, I actually didn’t even like him at first.” She loved recounting her own myth of their love. “But then I grew to love him and we make a great team.”
     “You’ve never loved another?”
     Now it was her turn to pause. No way was she going to confess her true crime, of the feelings she ran away from. Those must remain dead and buried at any cost. What importance had they now? Fuck him if he thought she’d talk about her personal shit. “No, sir. I’ve been only with my husband.”
     “And I take it you’re a person of religion?”
     “Yes, sir. We go to church every week and are very serious about it. I clean and iron the linen for the altar.”
     “You really do want to be a good girl, don’t you?”
     “Yes, sir, I do!”
     “Shame you don’t measure up.” The jolt soothed her and she felt her body relax. She was ready to do anything for him now. The bondage of the chains freed her from the bondage of her spirit. He knew this as he continued. “Let me ask you something, have you ever been secretly excited? Say when your husband has his friends or business partners over and they discuss important affairs, do you feel silently stupid?”
     “Yes, I do. I’m just a girl.”
     “When you see a man put down a woman, does that also secretly excite you?”
     “Yes, it does. There’s a movie where the hero puts down this slut girl by saying, ‘I can’t believe you still eat with that mouth.’ I think of that all the time and pretend he’s saying that to me.”
     “Do you have fantasies about giving oral sex?”
     “God, yes. I want to put on a French maid uniform with my bare butt sticking out and serve my husband and his friends. They would order me around to serve them drinks and everything then I would have to get on my knees in front of each of them and give them head.” She could scarcely believe the words came out of her mouth. She was catching herself talking like a little girl but it as if she were a different character.


     “But of course, you have never done any of this.”
     “No, sir. Not even with my husband. He forbids it as unholy.”
     “What of your parents? Are they in approval of your life and marriage?”
     “Oh yes, sir. I have always been the good girl in the family. I was homecoming queen and cheerleader. In their eyes I’m an angel.”
     The voice turned suddenly sterner. “So they don’t know you fantasize about being a slut?”
     This was her first real feeling of fear. Had she told too much? She did not know. The cup of freedom was too tempting not to sip.
     “No, they do not.”
     “Then you should be punished for such a lie, yes?”
     “Yes, sir.”
     She was curiously happy to be at last facing her punishment. With these first few swats behind her, she would be that much closer to redemption - and release.
     But he did not swat her. “I have here a black marker. And in large letters on your buttocks I shall write the word “SLUT”. Afterwards, you shall thank me. Understood?”
     “Yes, sir.”
     Such joy did she feel as the lines of the letters were stroked across her bottom. She wished the whole world could see her now, free of all the facades and the weight of always having to be perfect. Here I am world! See me as I truly am!
     When she thanked him, she truly meant it. She wished she could lie there forever, unchained and honest but still not committing the mortal sin of adultery. She wasn’t like those dirty women who have affairs and end up on TV talk shows hanging out their dirty laundry for all to see! What possesses those women to do that? She would get no diseases or worry about an unwanted pregnancy or who the father was. With this outlet she could receive her punishment and become clean once again.
     “There are many institutions set up in our society to insure moral goodness and proper behavior. Are you aware of this?”
     “Yes, sir, I am.”
     “The police, the justice system, our churches – all these things have been set up to help us to become better people. Do you believe that?”
     “Yes, sir, I truly do. I believe in doing what I’m told. I believe they are sent by God to do God’s work. I am a most conservative person, sir, and I proudly hand my life over to them in their wisdom.”
     “As you do me?”
     This was it, the final ecstasy! She would surrender totally and without reserve, worshipping his firm hand and resolve. After this she would be clean and no one would know the difference. Each time she strayed from the path he would come to set her right and never would she have to lie again. Who says you can’t have your cake and eat it too??
     “Yes, sir. Do as you see fit! Thy will be done!”


     As he got up from the bed, she imagined what she must look like in his eyes. Not an inch could she move and the rebel jezebel was branded with SLUT on her butt! Spank me, daddy. Spank me hard! I’m not the good little girl you think I am. Release me from this prison and I’ll be the good girl everyone wants me to be – and demands that I be.
     “First I need to put this tape over your mouth. You may cry out and we don’t want any interlopers in here do we?”
     This was the real deal now. “No sir, we don’t.”
     After taping her, he walked over to the window and opened wide the curtains. “You know what you are? You are what's known as a Conservative Christain Cunt - a whore for God! In the bible you say you love so much, it speaks of all things coming to light. It’s inevitable, it says. I wonder, did you somehow think you were going to escape that?”
     Her mind short-circuited with panic. What does he mean? Why is he opening that curtain? What in God’s name is he going to do?
     “The last woman I did this with was a career woman. Highly successful too. I wonder if it’s any solace to you that a successful career woman had the same feelings as you. Her guilt came from suppressing her maternal desires.” He stopped to peer at her. “I speak of her in the past tense because six months afterwards she committed suicide. I suppose she didn't believe God already knew the truth.”
     Suddenly, she felt sick. All her instincts told her to get clothed and get out – now! But it was too late, dear God, it was too late!
     He bent down and placed a small recorder on the nightstand so she could see it. “Yes, I recorded our little talk. It will happen like this: I’m going to take the drivers license out of your bag and place it in the small of your back. Then I will take several instant photos and leave them beside the recording. This is what the housekeeper will find when she comes in here tomorrow morning. I wonder if she’ll be an “Hispanic lady” like your maid.”
     The tape was effective in muffling her screams. Vainly she tried to move but the cuffs only cut her in exasperation.
     “This poor, foreign housekeeper will undoubtedly be unnerved at the sight of a wealthy, domestic white woman tied naked to a bed. By the way, those cuffs are police caliber and she won’t able to release you even if she wanted to. No, she’ll have to go and get help. Probably the hotel management, men in suits staring at your deliciously bare behind. Your fantasy come true at last!”
     She stopped wiggling as despair numbed her mind. “You will listen as they talk about you and decide how they should proceed on freeing you. Talk about getting to feel silently stupid! Are you turned on yet?” Her stomach merely churned. “Since you won’t be able to dress with the cuffs on, they eventually will have to turn the matter over to the police. Meanwhile, news of your dilemma will spread like wildfire among the housekeepers and other hotel staff. How many bellboys wouldn’t kill to see you now!”
     Tears flowed down her cheek. “The police – your heroes doing God’s work – will continue in your humiliation – all in the name of God, of course. They will confiscate the pictures and tape recording, a report will be on file for the rest of your life and beyond, and every male officer in the city is going to get an eyeful of your ass! But I’m sure that doesn’t bother you! I can only imagine what will go through your mind the next time you’re pulled over!”
     Nightmare. That was the word for it. This cannot be happening. He cannot be serious! Please get me out of here! I swear to God I’ll never be true again!
     He let her twist and turn until finally the pain cut too deep. The walls were closing in and escape drew further away. “Humiliation you wanted, humiliation you got! One of these pictures I’ll keep and send to your pastor. He needs to know of your troubles and I’m sure his holy soul will forget the image of SLUT on your butt as he’s counseling you. Never will you hear his giggle or the whispers of your forgiving fellow worshippers, I’m sure.”
     Now she was all tears and fears. “Of course, a copy of the police report – complete with a transcript of the tape – will need to be sent to your mommy and daddy. They need to know angel has lost her wings and her fine life isn’t the dream she has led them to believe.
     “What will all those people think? From your maid to the cop on the street, from your husband to all your known family – what are you going to do when you can’t lie to them anymore? What’s going to happen after the divorce and you have to live on your own on a receptionist’s salary? Who knows, maybe your maid has a car she can sell you. The real problem is going to be getting the judge to give you access to your children when you’re obviously such an immoral woman. The police are going to give him some hellacious pictures to gawk at!”
     Overwhelmed, stunned with grief and regret, she remained limp as he committed his final act. Sitting nude atop her butt, he climaxed on her back. “You’re one hot woman!” he yelled but never had she felt so unsexy. She had been a willing object all her life, a being who chose to count her feelings as less worthy than others'. With the years of corruption, her rot had become the driving force of her life.


     Now it was gone in one hellish afternoon. All the carefully crafted veneer, the religious shrouding, the glee of a self-proclaimed superior life – vanished into the light. Every fiber of her being she’d devoted to keeping her lies alive – her lies were moral, they kept all the good things she wanted in her life. But in the end, truth is never cheated.

Fool on the Hill

"Day after day, alone on the hill,
"The man with the foolish grin is keeping perfectly still.
"But nobody wants to know him,
"They can see that he's just a fool."
Every con man is a coward at heart. That’s what makes it so easy for him to spot human weakness. But no matter how much he may delight in the joy of the con of the moment, in the end he knows the biggest con is on himself. Guess who’s cheated himself out of his own future?

As I sit here in the night scribbling paper tiger words rarely to be read, I find myself in an unenviable position. No home, no family, no career – what is the redeeming value of my life? I can only hope that somehow I contribute to the communal consciousness, that my thoughts and realizations are heard in ways I cannot see.

"And nobody seems to like him,
"They can tell what he wants to do.
"And he never shows his feelings..."
So I am the fool on the hill, dreaming of a life that’s not my own. No one wants to hear what a man who has no stake has got to say. A man without allegiance is trusted by few. But if one’s allegiance is not to the truth then one’s allegiance is not to one’s self. Only truth stands the test of time.

So I’ve been thinking about this country of ours: how it’s doing, where it’s going and why. The war is killing us. It will stay at the maximum sustainable level until the end of this term. Each day we’re in it we dig the hole a little deeper. My, my how we lie to ourselves. But whoever inherits this war inherits a sewn in disaster. It’s easy to take shots when you’re on the outside but once you’re on the inside things look a whole lot different.

"Well on his way, his head in a cloud,
The man of a thousand voices, talking perfectly loud.
But nobody ever hears him,
Or the sound he appears to make."
So terrified will that person be of being associated with an historic meltdown on their watch, they will do anything to put off that day of reckoning. It may be in altered form, but the war will go on until it bleeds us dry. Prove me wrong, America. Prove you can admit when you’re in the wrong. Show me what you’re made of. Show me some of Tom Barkley’s guts!

The con man justifies his evil deeds by saying you can’t cheat an honest man – or an honest country. You see, America, I know what the future is when you run away from your own truth. It won’t be pretty and I can already hear the finger pointing. It’d be funny if we didn’t need you. So this fool on the hill just keeps asking: Tell me again why love won’t work.

"But the fool on the hill,
"Sees the sun going down.
"And the eyes in his head,
"See the world spinning around."