George's anchor

It was good, as George put it seated on his throne, that the moon rises in the east and sets in the west. In fact, he was happy to surmise, it so happens that the sun follows this pattern also. And when he was out and about, away from the lights of his town which allowed the conspirators to follow him on his nightly missions, he felt the whole cosmos wheeling around him, those stars far beyond who never lost their places year after year, on this great nightly rotation always from east to west. Once when he had climbed down a well to hide from his neighbour's dog, he had watched with wonder for hours as stars moved from east to west across the tiny opening far above, in the middle of the afternoon. Somehow this land, this earth was anchored in the sea of space and all remained constant. In a land of conspirators and prejudiced dogs, it was something to hold onto.

George's mind had an anchor too, somewhere behind his eyes. It made little matter how the conspirators tormented him or how the dogs would sneak up and bark the bee jeebies out of him, his immutable anxiety always remained rooted there, anchored in the back of his skull. Even in the times of calm when he could scorn the invasive forces with succulent tribulations from the safety of his throne, he would watch the visions circle around inside his head, always from east to west.

There had been a time long ago when as a young lad George had felt a kinship with his mates, as if they were all on the lake each sailing their little craft, watching out for one another in the stormy world of adult rationality. They would throw their anchors out together in the shelter of a little bay, away from the winds of discipline and float freely together entertaining the warming sun. But life turned from east to west also, and as the sun got higher on his days his mates had become conspirators, many had dogs, and they had turned their quest to power and prestige, their dogs remorseless in these undertakings. And so George had departed the world of commerce to establish his own private castle, nondescript as it was, with his throne facing west so he could see what lay in store. Not that it worked.

There was a time when he had wandered off and lost himself for several years, ending up with a hornswoggle carved from a stump. He had even found a mate and made an attempt at commerce, carving little hornswoggles for sale on that avenue which cut north and south, a latitude in the longitude of life. He still had his hornswoggle, seated in the midst of his castle, his cat was old and rather hairless, and his mate had abdicated her throne for some fool with a dog, a dog who had lifted his leg on his hornswoggle. He had retreated from the thrills of commerce back to vantages of misanthropy, them and their dogs.

George had thought long and hard on egalitarianism which evolution had endowed upon humans. It was doubtfully doubt which gave us the capacity to respect the views of others, a doubt in our own beliefs, so he remained a little apprehensive of the moon rising in the east and setting in the west just so he would not be too prejudiced. That way he could smile and say hello to everyone he met when he was out and about, even their dogs, though the response was seldom reciprocated. This even-handed approach to life was far from the dominant quality in most humans and their institutions he found. Dominance and conspiracy seemed to play a crucial role in humanity's day to day functioning, policing and punishment typically administered by the most dominant individuals. Somehow the humour of most situations was lost upon these stewards of the establishment and their dogs. It was good to have an anchor to hold onto, even though he must view it with a degree of incertitude.

So George continued with his life, attempting to thwart the conspirators with dispassion on his nightly missions, and took to carrying a bag of dog biscuits to tempt impartiality in their dogs. Sometimes it worked, and he could peacefully watch the cosmos circle above him, from east to west.

Song of woe

We call on the Lord Musum in our distress, and he answers us. Hail with thunder and lightening rains down upon us. Save us, Lord Musum, from lying lips and from deceitful tongues. What will he do to this throng of wayward swindlers, and what more besides to their deceitful tongues? He will punish them with a god's humour, scourges thick with allegories. Woe to me that I dwell in the land of Manitou, that I live under a bridge in Winterpeg! Too long have we lived among those who hate peace. We are for peace; but when we speak, they are for war. Save us all, Lord Musum.

This throng of courtiers, prying our good wife from the joys of obscurity, into the wars of biblical interpretations, rejoicing in the wrath of the god of gods, they have absconded with her into the depths of biblical studies in a room far removed from the comings and goings of the common sinners within her care home. Took us the better part of an hour to track her down, it did. There she sat, sandwiched into a self-righteous throng of devotees of who knows what mixture of evangelicals. We sneaked in and seated ourselves silently in the corner and chuckled in smugness when our wife gave us a big wink and nodded towards her plate of cookies and milk. She knew what she was up to after all, our concern unfounded. As the closing prayer ended with “God bless us all,” we could not help ourselves but to add quietly “And the martians too.” Our dear wife spilt her milk.

Dementia has it's perks it would seem, and humour is not lost upon it. Our Lord Musum we thank you as you seat your splendor before the screens in the magnificent halls of the Ziggurat, thwarting the wayward swindlers with your remote. Cookies and milk are no match for the fallacies of the sanctimonious, short term memory loss not withstanding. Into the halls they disseminate, the absconded, filled with cookies and milk, tummies full of love, dissertations on the good book lost in the synapses of minds with a much more direct link to mother nature and the reality of self-gratification. Our Lord Musum, they thank you with lewd song and dance as you feed them lavishly, your rapturous proselytes, may their sentience sweeten your acrimony, your scourges thick with allegories.

But woe is us, who must leave the halls of the care home, and return to our bridge by the lanes and pathways beleaguered by hoards of swindlers who without milk and cookies impose themselves on our lostness to vindicate themselves from the depths of hell with their good intentions. Guide us, our Lord Musum, with your remote, that we may return innocent of salvation to our safe haven under our bridge near to the ramparts of your Ziggurat. Save us, Lord Musum, from lying lips and from deceitful tongues. Punish them with a god's humour. We honour you unceasingly, Lord Musum, our King!

Under our bridge

Communication is this process of bettering one's otherness with one's chivalry. It would be quite useless if oneself and one's otherness both perceived everything the same. It is useful when attempting to warn the otherness of potential calamity such as “There's a wasp on your earlobe,” or attempting some humour such as “We should tighten our Canadian borders to keep those shoddy made in the USA products off our shelves.” Now it behooves us as to what exactly it is we are communicating to our dear wife who is luxuriating in a swanky care home in freedom from philosophical concerns when we tell her about our life living in the comforts found under our bridge.

Yes we live under a bridge, on the River Red, the Lord Musum presiding, with our cow named Bessy and our two cats named Moses and Blacky, the two names she remembers not remembering ours. We sit in front of our air conditioner to keep cool on the hot days, which she thinks is plain ridiculous but makes her chuckle, and our flat screen tv has no picture because the cable company won't take 'under the bridge' as a reliable address. We scrub our clothes on the rocks by the river and hang them to dry on lines tied to the pillars.

We tell her this tale because we do not wish to remind her of the comforts of Deathrock Apartments, and the shooting and gang warfare which is a nightly affair and might instill a nostalgia from her memories, this sonance being such a lulling experience much like a mile long freight train with four whistling locomotives which puts oneself to sleep at night when one lives near the tracks under the bridge. It makes us ponder though, why do we have to make up a fantasy life at all? Could we not just discuss the weather and watch the ants hard at work on the sidewalk? But no, we must live under a bridge.

It seems a product of lethargy, utter boredom at the thought of sitting there together, contemplating the great universe with twisted tangled memories, popping childhood friends into the rompings of adult misadventures. Better to make up a new life, free from reminiscence so she can tell the workers “This is my husband, he lives under a bridge.” Gets us looks of anxious unease and a helping of tuna sandwich and purple juice at snack time. Not sure if they vacuum for bugs after we leave, but the muddy footprints have all but disappeared by the next day, our wife being more keen on this than we are.

Communication would seem therefor to behold itself as something more than imparting transient information. It's the vibes that matter, so to speak, the tears and the laughter, the joy of meeting and the anguish of parting. The Lord Musum must be proud of us. In his benevolent generosity we have not had a flood this year, on the River Red, and our bridge is high and dry. We'll take it as a sign from the Ziggurat, rising from mighty ramparts on the River Red above our bridge. We will take comfort in his revelations as he lights up our flat screen tv every evening allowing us to ravish in his princely divine powers. Oh Lord Musum we await your chivalry.

Old white geezer

The Bilderberg conference is discussing our existence this week. In light of new scientific evidence that when the proverbial tree falls in the forest it does not fall at all unless someone hears it, the big bang did not occur because there was no one to hear it. The flip side to this amazing new evidence is that our minds actually create the universe we live in, a rather subjective thing it is, and our wildest fantasies about it's construct are actually the parameters of it's construct. Of course the Bilderbergers are doing their utmost to ensure the ideals of the trickle down economy will be embedded forever in our imaginary DNA till our imaginary hell freezes over.

That police force one helicopter flying over Winnipeg every night makes me cringe. The police knock at my door and give me a hard time when they're looking for someone else. Yes, I live in Winnipeg's west end. I have to beg the caretakers of our Deathrock Apartments to turn on the heat when we have a cold spell in spring or fall and I have to be very diplomatic because they can make life miserable if you give them any friction. I'm on CPP pension and by the time I pay for my wife's nursing home I don't have much choice about where to live. Walmart type places is where I shop when the dumpsters are bare even though I despise their practises. We increasingly live in a society where pressure motivated by ideology is used to force us to fall in line so the slightly advantaged can strut their stuff.

This ideology somehow sidesteps the fact that we have the resources and people power on this earth to create a sustainable infrastructure and to feed and house everyone. It's just that this thing we call money, that undefinable entity by which the market places a value on everything, gets in the way. We can no longer blame aristocracy because it's these utopian, anticommunist credos which are saving the world. Meanwhile they are desecrating our mother earth. And aristocracy now claims it's the poor victim of the market place forcing upon them all this wealth and they're doing us a good turn by keeping the pyramid rising.

Our governments are held hostage by a banking system which claims to channel currencies for the good of humanity. The rules are established for the survival of big corporations. For the whole system not to default we must have growth, and this growth means people must purchase commodities which are not essential to their survival or happiness. This growth is not sustainable when it uses up earth's resources, we cannot eat our cake and have it too. A model for sustainability will be either forced upon us, or we can opt to develop it before dire consequences force it upon us or extinguish us all.

Some call it the degrowth movement. It is questionable whether our capitalist or socialist systems or stews thereof can bring about this change. It would seem to need an almost spiritual fervour in which the corporations and other criminals would lay down their swords and police force one would not need to roam the skies. Material things would become valued things to use with humility, to share and take care of. It is our elected officials who have the most power to investigate these pursuits, and to forge different models. Not one of us seven billion has all the answers, but we can try.

Our dreams about this world can become a reality. It does take time. Not all will be convinced today, some still believe the earth is flat. Our minds actually do create the world we live in, our state of sanity. Human consciousness is a force to be reckoned with. In all it's disparity it carries us along like the the mighty galactic winds, blowing us to galaxies far beyond our present dreams. We can make our present habitat, our wee solar system, a remarkable place in the star dust of the gods.

The elevator

The biggest question we have is why. The best answer so far is because. My wife and I blame everything on the Martians when I visit her, it seems a noncontroversial way of dealing with the why's. We both know it's a flippant way of dealing with our emotions. Words won't come out to express her real feelings about most anything, and words I might use to express my feelings always end up in a quickly changed subject. So we resort to the Martians, an allegory for the unspeakable.

She rides the elevator sometimes, my wife. She sneaks on when “the workers” aren't watching. They know where she is actually, and let her have her fun till it stops on her floor and they pull her out to save her from the perdition of forever roaming the universe in a limbo. She always tells me she'll never do that again. Runs into strangers who are always asking “Who are you,” or “Where are you going” and she must always answer with a shrug “I don't know.” That elevator is the highway to everywhere though, China if you ride far enough down and heaven if you ride it up to it's heights. Those buttons inside have a secret code to all these places and only the very wise know how to push them right. She knows I know the secret code to the bridge that I live under, like a troll, jumping out and scaring people. The Martians make me do it.

That elevator is the portal of life on this nursing home floor. Everyone has come here on it, everyone will leave on it. Furniture, beds, sheets and blankets come on it. Steaming hot meals come on it, from who knows where. That elevator can be stopped on this universe by pushing the buttons. It's a gathering place for restless souls, by the doors, where they gather to push the buttons to peek in and catch fleeting glimpses of strangers and interesting miscellanea headed off to different universes. Sometimes it stops on it's own and a familiar face will emerge from the limbo to be greeted enthusiastically with warm welcomes.

It is the Martians of course who control everything. Those buttons are the armament against their trickery. Apparently Martians are too short to reach them so their omnipotent presence can be somewhat subdued by lighting up the little arrows pointing either up or down. They make a lot of noise, those Martians, when the elevators are in limbo. Clanging and singing away they labour ceaselessly bringing wondrous cargoes to worlds far removed from the reality of this universe.

So off we are today, out from under our bridge. Was a windy damp night it was. We'll push the buttons here, and when the doors open we'll step into limbo, we know the secret code to our wife's universe. On the way there we'll peek into different universes as the doors open and close. None of them knows “why” either. They all exist just “because,” peeking into the limbo as the Martians sail it by.

Foey

Once upon a time in a far far away land there was a princess named Foey. Now there exists an entire world which is the totality of untruths, to which we have access with our minds, just as a world of physical reality exists, to which we have access to with our bodies. Foey had been conceived by a mind which we may name Vater von Foey, a lonely mind admittedly, prone to bursts of euphoria as it contemplated nourishment.

There also exists an entire world of truths, to which we are denied access with our minds, just as a world of physical reality exists, to which we have access to with our bodies. We dare not venture into this world because it is reserved for the gods, a forbidden world, far removed from our human nature. It's a world in which time is an emergent phenomenon for us internal observers but absent for our external observers and which was therefore intriguing to our lonely Vater von Foey.

So it came to be one fine day that Vater von Foey gave an apple to his sweet Foey and said “Here my dear, take a bite, and may the truth be with thee.” Every culture on our earth relishes their own untruths and the culture in this far away land was no different. Foey took that bite. She became reconciled as the truths were released into physical reality. She would bare children. She would grow old. Vater von Foey cried on the floor. “What have I done, what have I done? I have doomed my dear conception to old age and bitching.”

It would be nice if we could think outside of the human condition, the untruths. Those constraints of purpose and meaning left inside the box, no need to attribute the unknown to the gods. But we are stuck with our curiosity and it drives us into depths of madness where we perceive a soul in everything. Reality prevails. It's nothing but cold stark atoms, remoulding themselves as they get sucked into the depths of nuclear furnaces, spewing out in reformed substances to cling together in a frenzy of dispassionate forces creating fodder for the black holes which gobble everything in sight. Just as coldhearted it all is as the kid on a freeform bike, wagering life and limb against the cold hard concrete, mindless revenge against the urban forces which shape his will.

Vater von Foey put himself and his dear Foey on a bus, one of those city buses which take weary workers to and from distant locals. It had been many years since he had been away from his sanctuary of aloneness and he disembarked the bus with Foey in a neighbourhood which he thought was where the nutrients of life flourished, but his memory proved him wrong and they began walking through a series of streets and alleys filled with grime and dirt from generations of industrious fabricators of every useful tool known to man. Discarded and broken remnants of these coldhearted soulless implements littered every nook and cranny piled high in intricate entanglements of rusting obscurity. Foey laughed fondly at her creator and sustainer as he frustratedly searched for some way out of his misshapen memories. Cheered by her lack of resentment they together began looking for an escape route.

They saw it together, another bus, this one used to take workers to and from the dungeons in which they laboured. The driver, a weary father, was taking a scattering of other drivers back to refuge where they could fritter away the hours till the next loads of thankless, dirty beasts would board the buses and return home to delicately stewed steaming hot meals of mush. The driver let them on with a nod and off they rode, the scenery changing from an ocean of metal clad foundries to a sea of smoke clad hovels with dirty children uprooting every possible inch where green life might flourish. The bus came to a standstill next an oily riverbank overflowing with overladen barges and puttering tugboats. Vater von Foey now knew where he was. They could follow this river.

Sucked in we are to conceitedly think our universe would betray it's virtues to mere animals, animals who pilfer the austere outer crusts of wee planets, no more noble than vile crystals ordered by the dispassionate forces. It is by luck that we have religion to give us meaning in our fleeting appearance in these miserable confines. We send our messages in bottles to oblivion. DNA sequences sent out with one in quadrillion chance of being found by other life, and if they did find our bottle in the oceans of star dust they'd disparage of decoding it, it would hasten their own demise, refuting their own gods.

We will yet find a message in a bottle. It will say “Smile, you are doomed. Give up now and please yourselves. Life is a dead end path to nowhere. Smash your heads into your concrete monuments. Be reckless as the depths that surround you. It is a freeform place we inhabit, no love lost. Live for your passions till you crash.” And so it was that Vater von Foey and his sweet Foey continued on this journey sticking as close to the riverbank as the lanes would allow. Upstream they were heading and as time wore on the land developed a hue of green, sparingly at first, and then becoming lush with leaves and grasses. They took a rest on a little oasis by the river edge, and Foey saw it. A bottle, sealed with duck tape, floating peacefully in the reeds.

Inside that bottle was a note. Luckily it was engraved on a parchment of brass because the duck tape had leaked a wee bit. “Divulge not unto others what you would not divulge unto yourself” was what it said, either an oxymoron or a good reason for suicide one might surmise. Whether Vater von Foey who saw this message as an untruth or Foey who saw this message for it's truth viewed the message similarly is unclear but they rejoiced at it's finding as most humans and their conceptions do when finding messages in bottles. They journeyed on a little more optimistically, fathoming a culture upstream with duck tape.

They came upon an orchard, an orchard of apples. Now it was Foey's turn. She picked an apple fresh and red ripe from a branch and said “Here my dear, take a bite, and may the truth be with thee.” Well Heavens to Betsy, as Vater von Foey chewed his nourishment the poles of his earth reversed. The untruth became the truth. Foey was no longer a conception, she became an inseparable part of her conceiver's being. His loneliness vanished. He had filled his pockets with red ripe apples before he realized his urge to bitch. It was too late... that message in the bottle hit him hard. He had divulged his urge unto himself and was free to bitch at anyone and anything around. Something gnawed at his thoughts as he sat with his pockets full of nourishment. He felt the spirit of sweet Foey inside him saying “You don't have to bitch.”

Vater von Foey wandered the earth for many years into a ripe old age and smiled cheerily at everyone he would meet. And he always had a red ripe apple for them, as he bid them to venture into a forbidden world, far removed from our human nature, in his bursts of euphoria which he shared with Foey.

Demented morals

Shshshsh ... listen ... is that Wagner you hear? Shucks anyhow, it's just those frigging Martians. They're playing with the elevator cables again, does sound like an acapella choir though, not? That tenor must be a real live one though, thinks he's in the shower.

They run that nursing home, those Martians. Play with people's minds they do. Got my wife stealing pastries from the nice couple across the hall. Always hungry she is, sneaks across the hall when the nice lady goes to the john and hubby's not looking. Probably better to be a thief in this day and age than in Jean Valjean's time. Hasn't got found out yet anyway, my wife, hides the proceeds in her dresser. She confides in me though and we laugh and laugh. Jean Valjean would have been proud, those poor malnourished residents. Those Martians know a thing or two about treating the elders. My wife was scared of them at first, but now she looks forward to their visits every night when the lights go dim.

We tried in vain to talk some sense into her. Said we “They spend their hard earned money on those pastries, our dear. Now they're hungry and starving, look what you've done.” She looks rather puzzled at us and knowingly asserts “He steals them from the pantry every day after lunch, that little sneak, and he eats the food off the plates of the people who sit next to him, he's not hungry.” Seems those Martians have got the whole place a thieving. We talked to the staff about the whole affair, not wanting to be the devils advocate here. An attitude out of Mark Twain seems to prevail here, those Martians were craftier than we thought. It seemed watermelon obtained by art was somewhat tastier and it saved them from distributing snacks every evening if we got the gist through their snickers. Also something about thievery keeping them out of trouble. Now that's our kind of perspective after catering to our dear's whims for the last three years.

Maturity is seeing our worlds for what they really are, quoting from the Martian Book of Knowledge as we cipher our wife's oracles. As we age, it would seem, we loosen our grip on indoctrination and subjectivity and the universe becomes this vast playground of formation and reformation. All things are possible and it becomes impossible to judge as the basis for all is infinitude. Seems Martians cater to nursing homes because that's where they find the highest levels of this maturity. Who knew?

So we're planning the great escape, our wife and us. We figure in summer when it's warm we can stash away lots and lots of food if we make a big bag to hang on the back of the wheelchair. Then we'll sneak off one evening and we can push her down the Trans Canada Highway all the way to Vancouver. We can eat blueberries that we'll pick on the way too. The Martians have told her they'd sneak her into any nursing home on the way so we could have a good sleep and stock up on pastries. It gets kind of obvious how the Martians enlighten the less mature of us, using our best intentions for our loved ones to teach us how to play gleefully in our universe free of indoctrination and subjectivity. We're starting to hear Wagner most everywhere if we sit quietly and listen. It always carries this expression of the world's essence, namely, blind, impulsive will.