Last night, being bored, even despite having read some rather interesting, exciting chapters in "The Guns of August," I decided to boot up and suit up and go outside, despite what I thought were chilly temperatures and steady precipitation. I guess my original quest was to clear off my car and then shovel the walkways and driveway of my residence.....but as it was raining, and warm upon my first entrance outside, and as the crap that blanketed my driveway was more slush than snow and as that shit is especially heavy, I decided against the second half of my self-imposed list of tasks and set about opening my trunk, getting out my ice-scrapper/snow-brusher thing and set about clearing off my car.
Yet, some of the portions of it, primarily the hood and the trunk, were especially stubborn, with the snow clinging steadfastly and indomitably to the steel of either portion, so especially as it grew cold and I grew wet and tired, I chose instead to enter my car, with it's lovely, plush maroon velour interior and start it, and use the heat of the engine to melt the last remnants of stubborn snow off.
So, I sat down, extricated my key from amongst the grand, clanking panoply of other keys I had on my keychain/carbiner and turned on the engine. Then, I listened to the radio, switching at intervals between four or five different stations programmed into my radio. Mostly, I listened to classic rock or music of the 1960's-1980's, but there were occasional, momentary sidetrips to other genres of music, but mostly just different subgenres of rock.
So, ensconced comfortably but not yet warmly in the plush cabin of my car, I sat there, listening to music and gazing out of the window and listening to the tapering patter of the rain. Eventually, I turned the heater on and was rewarded with continuous blasts of anhydrous, almost equatorial heat....yet the heat of that ilk did not arrive for quite some time.
I looked out at the whitish expanse, broken here and there by mass accretions of grey slush, that was my snow-covered driveway and dooryard and front yard. The sky was some odd shade of bluish-grey and black, and some very slight orangish tints languished just along the horizon line.
Through various revolving momentary sentiments and sensations borne along by and occasioned by whatever I was listening to, I gazed at all this and wondered, thinking my thoughts, which at times turned to the past and the good times/bad times and regrets I had of that time.
It was an introspective time-not so much when I grew up and the period I was thinking about, but rather last night, out in the car, waiting the storm out.
So, as I sat there, listening to various music, I toyed at whiles with the various lights and features of my car, and in the course of my idle playing about and tinkering with things, I came across the lights flanking either side of the vanity mirrors set into the driver's and passenger's visors, and furthermore discovered, and in doing so nearly blinded myself, that you could greatly increase-or decrease-the potency and brightness of these vanity lights.
It was not long after that that I concluded I was bored anew with the things therein and resolved to venture back outside. This I did, but should probably not have, given the moisture that suffused and engulfed my boots, as I trudged along the curved, snowbound, slushy river that was our driveway, soaking up more and more nival moisture with each plodding, heavy step.
I ventured out onto the street, which was a vast, moist ribbon of black in the twilight. Eventually, as the wind increased and became ever more buffeting and gelid, I tired of the outdoors, though there was an indescribable, adventurously romantic beauty to them, and there was great pulchritude and sentiment and power even in the lonely, steady harsh whistling of the buffeting winds that tossed the treetops like corks in a turbulent sea. At times, I suppose I even imagined the sea, or at least the more oceanic aspects of littoral Kittery and Kittery Point, and wondered about them, and the picturesque sight that they must have made amid all that wintry, potent wonder.
Regardless, I adjourned, repairing inside and eventually, after unwinding by watching some movie, I went to sleep, only to wake up to quite a different scene than the one I saw last night.
But such is ever-changing nature of days, I suppose.
Thursday, February 28, 2013
Concerning My Three Four Novels: An Overview
To wit, I would like to give a brief review/overview of my three or four completed novels, most of which were written between the period of 2002-2004. That being said, let me do that, then.
I). Concerning "To Taren With Love": This novel is a bit of a Stephen King/"Carrie" parody all about a young man named Jonas who is tormented in high school by excremental bullies, who use several tricks to get him in more and more trouble, and test his resolve about things, until the coup de grace in which they trick him, using a popular girl he likes, into burning down the town where she lives. He goes crazy and she perishes in the vast, town-engulfing flames and smoke...it sounds like a strange, short, minimalist novel, and in many ways it is, but it really brings home the point of torment and torture in our public schools and what that causes and how it needs to be rooted out. So, in essence, this seeming homage/parody novel is also a social upheaval/activist novel (as in a way, all my satires and novels are).
II). Concerning "His Supposed Father": "His Supposed Father", which is, I think, one of my finest, funniest, most interesting and truest novels to date, in fine primarily is a parody/satire of the managerial/supervisory hierarchy of your average supermarket, as it chronicles what is essentially one day in the "life" of it-of a supermarket. Yet, it is so much more than just that. It is also a satire on the average whimsical, know-nothing, demanding elderly customer; and one on the average donations-collector who sets him or herself up on the sidewalk/landing of your average store; and it is especially a parody of the sometimes slavish relationships between the supreme sovereign, the store director, and his lowly assistant. And yet it is parody of even more than just that. It is my longest and most ambitious completed novel to date. It revolves mostly, but not entirely, around the relationship, trials & tribulations, reversals, fortunes/misfortunes, and ultimate changes between Ackerman, the sovereign, the supercilious and deified being; and his assistant, Kohler, who is in charge of and responsible for everything that goes on in the store. And, many, many hazards befall them both on that fateful day...yet many are comical. Yet this is not a comical novel, it is more seriocomic or tragicomic than anything else. But the day in question in which takes place the entirety of the action in this novel, mostly revolves around the donations-collector and his request to see Ackerman and to request a foothold at his threshold. Finally, though this a novel of change and upheaval and absurdity and weirdness, it is a social commentary and it is a parody, finally, of all the known departmental/hierarchical relationships within the average store, as I myself worked in two or three supermarkets for quite a while, so I would know, better than anybody...and, here, all I did was mock every aspect of them.
III). Finally, Concerning "The Businessman's Revenge": In describing this last of my trio of novels, two of which were written not only in the same year, but within 2-3 weeks of each other-that is, I finished one, and immediately began the next-I have only to say that it is essentially the story of 60 years in the life of a businessman, and it traces his humble beginnings in Boston, as a street-beggar, to the riches bequeathed him and his poor, struggling family by a generous, lovely, charitable lady of Boston, one of the "ruling class" who takes pity on and shelters them; to his attendance of Harvard and the collegiate newspaper rivalries that end with the tragic burning of the chemical lab; to his beginning his career in New York, working for a man named Clausen; to his political career; to his becoming a very wealthy and powerful man and inflicting horrid but deserved vengeance on his enemies, mostly those who he thought drove his family to streetbound poverty. The novel begins at the end, is mostly a long flashback and ends with a horrible irony. It is, in my opinion, a masterpiece, and it is hard to tell, even this early on in my novelistic career, which of the two novels written in late 2003/early 2004 is my magnum opus. All three of my novels are ambitious, but I would suppose that my last two are the most ambitious finished novels I've ever written. Even though, sometime between 2000-2002 I wrote 280 pages of a novel that boasted the longest chapter I've ever seen, 100-150 pages, which in itself could be considered a novel or novella; yet this story was ever finished and was part of a much larger work. Also, it was fantastic, in that it was fantasy...these last three novels named and summarized here are my most adult, real, true and actually-possible novels.
I). Concerning "To Taren With Love": This novel is a bit of a Stephen King/"Carrie" parody all about a young man named Jonas who is tormented in high school by excremental bullies, who use several tricks to get him in more and more trouble, and test his resolve about things, until the coup de grace in which they trick him, using a popular girl he likes, into burning down the town where she lives. He goes crazy and she perishes in the vast, town-engulfing flames and smoke...it sounds like a strange, short, minimalist novel, and in many ways it is, but it really brings home the point of torment and torture in our public schools and what that causes and how it needs to be rooted out. So, in essence, this seeming homage/parody novel is also a social upheaval/activist novel (as in a way, all my satires and novels are).
II). Concerning "His Supposed Father": "His Supposed Father", which is, I think, one of my finest, funniest, most interesting and truest novels to date, in fine primarily is a parody/satire of the managerial/supervisory hierarchy of your average supermarket, as it chronicles what is essentially one day in the "life" of it-of a supermarket. Yet, it is so much more than just that. It is also a satire on the average whimsical, know-nothing, demanding elderly customer; and one on the average donations-collector who sets him or herself up on the sidewalk/landing of your average store; and it is especially a parody of the sometimes slavish relationships between the supreme sovereign, the store director, and his lowly assistant. And yet it is parody of even more than just that. It is my longest and most ambitious completed novel to date. It revolves mostly, but not entirely, around the relationship, trials & tribulations, reversals, fortunes/misfortunes, and ultimate changes between Ackerman, the sovereign, the supercilious and deified being; and his assistant, Kohler, who is in charge of and responsible for everything that goes on in the store. And, many, many hazards befall them both on that fateful day...yet many are comical. Yet this is not a comical novel, it is more seriocomic or tragicomic than anything else. But the day in question in which takes place the entirety of the action in this novel, mostly revolves around the donations-collector and his request to see Ackerman and to request a foothold at his threshold. Finally, though this a novel of change and upheaval and absurdity and weirdness, it is a social commentary and it is a parody, finally, of all the known departmental/hierarchical relationships within the average store, as I myself worked in two or three supermarkets for quite a while, so I would know, better than anybody...and, here, all I did was mock every aspect of them.
III). Finally, Concerning "The Businessman's Revenge": In describing this last of my trio of novels, two of which were written not only in the same year, but within 2-3 weeks of each other-that is, I finished one, and immediately began the next-I have only to say that it is essentially the story of 60 years in the life of a businessman, and it traces his humble beginnings in Boston, as a street-beggar, to the riches bequeathed him and his poor, struggling family by a generous, lovely, charitable lady of Boston, one of the "ruling class" who takes pity on and shelters them; to his attendance of Harvard and the collegiate newspaper rivalries that end with the tragic burning of the chemical lab; to his beginning his career in New York, working for a man named Clausen; to his political career; to his becoming a very wealthy and powerful man and inflicting horrid but deserved vengeance on his enemies, mostly those who he thought drove his family to streetbound poverty. The novel begins at the end, is mostly a long flashback and ends with a horrible irony. It is, in my opinion, a masterpiece, and it is hard to tell, even this early on in my novelistic career, which of the two novels written in late 2003/early 2004 is my magnum opus. All three of my novels are ambitious, but I would suppose that my last two are the most ambitious finished novels I've ever written. Even though, sometime between 2000-2002 I wrote 280 pages of a novel that boasted the longest chapter I've ever seen, 100-150 pages, which in itself could be considered a novel or novella; yet this story was ever finished and was part of a much larger work. Also, it was fantastic, in that it was fantasy...these last three novels named and summarized here are my most adult, real, true and actually-possible novels.
Having, At This Time, Little Else To Write About: The Reason For The Name of My Blog
I. The Reason for the Title of This Blog (Short-Version): I bet most people who visit this blog wonder why it has such a strange and ultimately misleading title. I confess that I created it as a means to try to lure the average blog-reader in. Yet, even so, my original title for this, which I used and practiced for several months, was even weirder and more misleading...this "new" one is, in many ways, a downplaying of that original outlandishness that suffused the title of the "original" blog, which was largely founded due to a suggestion to do so given to me by a former classmate and Facebook friend...yet that has little to do with anything.
II. My Luncheon Menu For Today, etc: Now, I would like to prove to the public how very Ishmael-like and digressive I can be, as I say, just briefly and largely discursively and tangentially that for luncheon on this, to borrow a line from a song of mine, "proud and sun-streaked morn" (though, in reality, it is pretty much neither, though it is a bit sunny, but it is certainly not the morn), I am feasting on a chicken sandwich, but made from choicest chunks, cut right from the very body of it myself with a knife, of roasted chicken, oven-roasted chicken, storebought oven-roasted chicken, such as you might purchase at a supermarket such as the regional comestible bastion, Market Basket or some such other place. Also, with it I am having, to borrow a line from a movie (1967's "The Odd Couple") "a high-calorie cream soda", another partial lie, for I don't believe this is that high caloried of a high-calorie soda.
III. Final Summation: So, there you have it, the totality and reason for being and purpose of this three-part, three paragraphed blog. Thank you and enjoy your day.
II. My Luncheon Menu For Today, etc: Now, I would like to prove to the public how very Ishmael-like and digressive I can be, as I say, just briefly and largely discursively and tangentially that for luncheon on this, to borrow a line from a song of mine, "proud and sun-streaked morn" (though, in reality, it is pretty much neither, though it is a bit sunny, but it is certainly not the morn), I am feasting on a chicken sandwich, but made from choicest chunks, cut right from the very body of it myself with a knife, of roasted chicken, oven-roasted chicken, storebought oven-roasted chicken, such as you might purchase at a supermarket such as the regional comestible bastion, Market Basket or some such other place. Also, with it I am having, to borrow a line from a movie (1967's "The Odd Couple") "a high-calorie cream soda", another partial lie, for I don't believe this is that high caloried of a high-calorie soda.
III. Final Summation: So, there you have it, the totality and reason for being and purpose of this three-part, three paragraphed blog. Thank you and enjoy your day.
Wednesday, February 27, 2013
Three Or More Thoughtful Paragraphs (Name This More Succinctly, Poetically, Comprehensively If You THINK You Can)
I). My Car: On this day on which I have seemed to demand of myself no less than three posts, the only other thing that I can think of to write about would be my car, which I will not even here go into great detail about. Rather, let it suffice to say that it is among the fanciest, nicest and most luxurious, opulent and plush of all the cars I have ever owned and I have owned a Cadillac and a Lincoln, among others, so you can see how plush the plushness of this particular car-in which I, punnily enough, have yet to hear the STP song "Plush", a favorite of mine of theirs-truly is. Yet, though the wine-colored hue and tone of my car and it's upholstery is a fine and fair and fit story, it is a probably boring one, and one that I will not go into here...though it is an observation and a truth of mine that, with the possible exception of one or both of my very first cars, every car I have yet owned has had at least a tiny portion of wood-paneling in the interior, which I, if only for the very homeyness that it imparts, love and enjoy and admire. It is not just the homeyness, but also the opulence and the tranquility, and the beauty and especially the anachronism and the respect and homage to the things of yesteryear that I appreciate and revel in in these cars.
II). Weather Report and Meteorological/Locational/Sentimental/Observational Desires, etc: Yet, let us now, for here within I am the supreme maker and controller and observer of all things, and I need not feel ever helpless, oppressed and/or hopeless (as I sometimes do elsewhere in my life where other people, institutions, groups, businesses or things have-or seem to-all the power and control and do not exert it kindly nor in a remotely just or humane manner...or so it seems)....withal, let us now turn to the weather report: Outside the window, from which I am viewing all this, the field is niveous and piled with snow, from the whitish-grey sky cascades the muting flakes. I say "muting" for, as any of you may have noticed, the snow, in falling upon the ground, has a hushing, blanketing, muting effect, thus shutting off or dampening most ambient sound. And, all this reminds me that I would very much like to go to Kittery, land of my childhood and 75% of my schooling, and see what the snow is like, especially at night, and especially in the most urban, littoral and cluttered sections of it, like around the portion called "Kittery Foreside" which surely some amateurish and painfully immature, sex-obsessed waggish teenagers no doubt, at some time in history, dubbed "Kittery Foreskin" which of course makes no sense. Yet I would very much like to see what that sight would be like.
III). Hoped-for Sojourns to Past Places-Peregrinational Wishes/Hopes/Goals/Desires: And, finally, if I must put forth my hopes and dreams and wishes and desires and peregrinational goals, then let me say this: One, I would like to return to Funtown, in Saco, Maine, to which I have not been since June 1997, thus it has been about sixteen years since last I was there, though for the past two or three years I have wished to return there. And, two, I would very much like to; perhaps in the same year, the same month, hell even the same week, though I doubt the same day is possible, though that would be neat, too; return to Bear Brook State Park, located roughly around Allenstown, New Hampshire, where I, in June 1996 (seventeen years ago) went for a seventh-grade fieldtrip, and at which I and most of the whole of the seventh grade camped for three days and two nights and it was quite a time and a place...and I occasionally miss it.
iv). The Summing-Up of All Things Within: So, there you have it, in three sections: My car, the weather/meteorological desires vis a vis Kittery and Kittery Point, Maine; and finally, my hoped-for sojourns to past places of pleasure, delight, wonder and fun.
II). Weather Report and Meteorological/Locational/Sentimental/Observational Desires, etc: Yet, let us now, for here within I am the supreme maker and controller and observer of all things, and I need not feel ever helpless, oppressed and/or hopeless (as I sometimes do elsewhere in my life where other people, institutions, groups, businesses or things have-or seem to-all the power and control and do not exert it kindly nor in a remotely just or humane manner...or so it seems)....withal, let us now turn to the weather report: Outside the window, from which I am viewing all this, the field is niveous and piled with snow, from the whitish-grey sky cascades the muting flakes. I say "muting" for, as any of you may have noticed, the snow, in falling upon the ground, has a hushing, blanketing, muting effect, thus shutting off or dampening most ambient sound. And, all this reminds me that I would very much like to go to Kittery, land of my childhood and 75% of my schooling, and see what the snow is like, especially at night, and especially in the most urban, littoral and cluttered sections of it, like around the portion called "Kittery Foreside" which surely some amateurish and painfully immature, sex-obsessed waggish teenagers no doubt, at some time in history, dubbed "Kittery Foreskin" which of course makes no sense. Yet I would very much like to see what that sight would be like.
III). Hoped-for Sojourns to Past Places-Peregrinational Wishes/Hopes/Goals/Desires: And, finally, if I must put forth my hopes and dreams and wishes and desires and peregrinational goals, then let me say this: One, I would like to return to Funtown, in Saco, Maine, to which I have not been since June 1997, thus it has been about sixteen years since last I was there, though for the past two or three years I have wished to return there. And, two, I would very much like to; perhaps in the same year, the same month, hell even the same week, though I doubt the same day is possible, though that would be neat, too; return to Bear Brook State Park, located roughly around Allenstown, New Hampshire, where I, in June 1996 (seventeen years ago) went for a seventh-grade fieldtrip, and at which I and most of the whole of the seventh grade camped for three days and two nights and it was quite a time and a place...and I occasionally miss it.
iv). The Summing-Up of All Things Within: So, there you have it, in three sections: My car, the weather/meteorological desires vis a vis Kittery and Kittery Point, Maine; and finally, my hoped-for sojourns to past places of pleasure, delight, wonder and fun.
An Enjoyment of Mine Which Does NOT Include, But Rather Exclude, the Adjournment of Diurnal Writing
It is a pointed fact of my life, and especially more so the adult portion of it that I like to write. That I enjoy writing. Perhaps it is only some sense of the reportorial, or the absurd, or the necessity to report the dull, crazy, wrong, unjust and absurd, or to tell the truth, or tell of my life, or tell stories, or to stroke my ego vaingloriously or all or none of that, but not only do I love to write, but I wish to and want to on a diurnal basis. That is, a quotidian schedule...that is, daily. And there is a certain flexibility there, among the path and the field of inflexibility, for I am an undisciplined, free one, and writing, while fun, seems to me, even at the best of times, to be work and imprisonment and discipline....all things which my worship of truest and fullest freeness rebel against and cringe at.
You see, the flexibility of writing is dominated by, simultaneously, the very inflexibility of the exact same thing.
I would wager the gross national product of nations that many people do not notice nor realize this abundantly true fact.
Though this may seem to have nothing whatsoever to do with this or anything (so that it is in fact apropos of nothing), I have noticed an odd, silly, absurdist, lighthearted wit present at times in the body of Barbara W. Tuchman's "The Guns of August" a book about the prehistory/causes, outbreak and first month of battle of the First World War. It is strange that sometimes she describes something or someone (mostly someone) in this off-color, silly way that, at the very least, generates a sly smile on the part of the reader...certainly I have smiled, if not chuckled outright at these little unexpected witticisms.
Yet, the work is also deadly serious, as it should be, given it's intense subject manner...yet even at times the grotesque horrors of war she mocks, and does so in such a way to make a true sarcastic and lover of comedy proud....it is her style, in fact, that I hope to one day employ in a historical/biographical or autobiographical or essayistic work of my own, for it is an interesting device, and it makes the work more intriguing, more thought-provoking, relatable and palatable, yet she also describes scenes of carnage, warfare and artillery bombardment with an intensity and sangfroid that bring you right there, right to the scene of battle, and you feel as if you are witnessing it and a part of it.
It's amazing, truly, and though I have yet to read many works of history, especially military/political history, I would have to say that her unique style of pointed truth is among my favorite of this genre.
Still, that has very little to do with the point that I was laboring to make about diurnal/quotidian writing, something which, other than in correspondence or electronic messaging, I do not live up to. With regard to essays, history, opinion, story, fact, truth, fakery, comedy, tragedy, parody and everything in between (including even poetry) I do not always live by the writer's essential discipline of quotidian labor.....yet, what with my job's sudden reduction in not only the hours but the days I work, I am not living by the discipline or code of the laborer's quotidian sense of labor, either! Though that is a joke, it is true....and as good a place as any to end this oddity of mine.
You see, the flexibility of writing is dominated by, simultaneously, the very inflexibility of the exact same thing.
I would wager the gross national product of nations that many people do not notice nor realize this abundantly true fact.
Though this may seem to have nothing whatsoever to do with this or anything (so that it is in fact apropos of nothing), I have noticed an odd, silly, absurdist, lighthearted wit present at times in the body of Barbara W. Tuchman's "The Guns of August" a book about the prehistory/causes, outbreak and first month of battle of the First World War. It is strange that sometimes she describes something or someone (mostly someone) in this off-color, silly way that, at the very least, generates a sly smile on the part of the reader...certainly I have smiled, if not chuckled outright at these little unexpected witticisms.
Yet, the work is also deadly serious, as it should be, given it's intense subject manner...yet even at times the grotesque horrors of war she mocks, and does so in such a way to make a true sarcastic and lover of comedy proud....it is her style, in fact, that I hope to one day employ in a historical/biographical or autobiographical or essayistic work of my own, for it is an interesting device, and it makes the work more intriguing, more thought-provoking, relatable and palatable, yet she also describes scenes of carnage, warfare and artillery bombardment with an intensity and sangfroid that bring you right there, right to the scene of battle, and you feel as if you are witnessing it and a part of it.
It's amazing, truly, and though I have yet to read many works of history, especially military/political history, I would have to say that her unique style of pointed truth is among my favorite of this genre.
Still, that has very little to do with the point that I was laboring to make about diurnal/quotidian writing, something which, other than in correspondence or electronic messaging, I do not live up to. With regard to essays, history, opinion, story, fact, truth, fakery, comedy, tragedy, parody and everything in between (including even poetry) I do not always live by the writer's essential discipline of quotidian labor.....yet, what with my job's sudden reduction in not only the hours but the days I work, I am not living by the discipline or code of the laborer's quotidian sense of labor, either! Though that is a joke, it is true....and as good a place as any to end this oddity of mine.
Newest of the New of the New, New, Newer, New Posts
I notice that it has been quite a while, indeed, nearly two years, since last I posted hereon. As I am a writer and an obviously prolific one, that is a tragedy and travesty without question and without end-just as that is a flagrant, flamboyant exaggeration without question and without end. Still, it's been a while, and even longer in writerly terms, and in the writerly terms of writerly time. Time passes different for writers and writings, and I would think the yellowing of the average manuscript in record time would indicate that. Withal & all jokes and sarcasm and self-mockery aside, I am belatedly back, a returner and appreciator of all that is good and abundant....I guess.
I want, however, to merely deliver a slight "lecture" on a certain kind of free speech-suppression that is going on these days, especially for the private citizen who, like myself, fancies himself or wishes to be a writer or has some reportorial or writerly bent to himself and his inner-workings. That is, I have found that I can not say whatever I wish on my blogs, and to be truly protected from the possibilities of obloquy, censure, restraint and the negative effects of legality/litigation/legislation, I must either be as general as possible, or omit outright, or indulge in that seventeenth century pastime: journaling. That is, I must write all my most private and specific things in a journal. Which, with regard to privacy, makes sense, but specificity is a different matter and true reportage regarding myself is an issue, too.
I am involved in a situation now, about which I can, for my own safety, mention nothing, that proves to me fully the impotence of myself vis a vis the public and the monstrous machine of justice, forensics, etc. Justice, as it seems to me, is lacking greatly in this (once-) great republic of ours......especially is justice lacking for one of the most truly oppressed groups, which the vast intolerance of the hypocritically, "in-name-only" tolerant will not allow to be published here or elsewhere, for they are intolerant and fractious and liars and hypocrites. Thus, due to their assumption of an undeserved and outrageously potent (almost omnipotent) power, one must keep silent about certain plaguy, rubbishy trends...trends that stink and are rank and foul and mean to overthrow the last resisters to the irresistible rule of collective madness and of media-manipulation, truth-manipulation and inveracious corruption, but also of invasiveness, of infiltration, of falsity and the prevalence and distribution of that. The vast hideous apparatus of those who seek to come to full, unquestioned power, and a global triumph, as it seems; this apparatus has revealed itself.
Regardless of my current victimization at the hands of various people who mean to distort the truth and suppress the full freeness of free speech, and the liberty that I mean and deserve to exercise as freely as I wish under the aegis of the law, but not all law is wholesome, true, right, just or libertarian...still, regardless of that, I have no idea what else to say, this post being largely extemporaneous and as such, not subject to overmuch self-censoriousness or expurgation.
Yet, some of this year, and some of this month, this waning, dying month, have proven to be one of my worst-yet, and the worst also, apparently, for all lovers of truth, rightness, freedom, justice, TRUE perception, reality, logic, and liberty...not to mention free speech. Normally, only specific and dangerous physical threats, slander or libel constitute measures by which to suppress and infringements of freedom of speech that are legal. And, those being especially hideous, that is fine. Yet, the impossibility of mentioning certain things due to a markedly worshipful respect that others foist on one that borders on not only insanity or fanaticism, and is, in this case, wholly illogical, but also that appears to be the modern foundation of false worship. Especially, it is a hideous, coercive form of worship that enslaves the unfortunate victim and makes him (but very seldom her) the thrall and pawn of it. It is the worshipfulness foisted on some by the state.......and, if I may ramble on and digress, what is the essential, key difference between a "state" and a "province"? This I began to wonder last night. And thus does one have an example of the fluid, subject-changing, whimsical, stream-of-consciousness style in which I, especially in various nonfiction writings, heartily indulge, yet rarely employ half as much in fictive writings. Well, I don't know what to say beyond that, the whole point of this post being to update my blog and keep it fresh.
I want, however, to merely deliver a slight "lecture" on a certain kind of free speech-suppression that is going on these days, especially for the private citizen who, like myself, fancies himself or wishes to be a writer or has some reportorial or writerly bent to himself and his inner-workings. That is, I have found that I can not say whatever I wish on my blogs, and to be truly protected from the possibilities of obloquy, censure, restraint and the negative effects of legality/litigation/legislation, I must either be as general as possible, or omit outright, or indulge in that seventeenth century pastime: journaling. That is, I must write all my most private and specific things in a journal. Which, with regard to privacy, makes sense, but specificity is a different matter and true reportage regarding myself is an issue, too.
I am involved in a situation now, about which I can, for my own safety, mention nothing, that proves to me fully the impotence of myself vis a vis the public and the monstrous machine of justice, forensics, etc. Justice, as it seems to me, is lacking greatly in this (once-) great republic of ours......especially is justice lacking for one of the most truly oppressed groups, which the vast intolerance of the hypocritically, "in-name-only" tolerant will not allow to be published here or elsewhere, for they are intolerant and fractious and liars and hypocrites. Thus, due to their assumption of an undeserved and outrageously potent (almost omnipotent) power, one must keep silent about certain plaguy, rubbishy trends...trends that stink and are rank and foul and mean to overthrow the last resisters to the irresistible rule of collective madness and of media-manipulation, truth-manipulation and inveracious corruption, but also of invasiveness, of infiltration, of falsity and the prevalence and distribution of that. The vast hideous apparatus of those who seek to come to full, unquestioned power, and a global triumph, as it seems; this apparatus has revealed itself.
Regardless of my current victimization at the hands of various people who mean to distort the truth and suppress the full freeness of free speech, and the liberty that I mean and deserve to exercise as freely as I wish under the aegis of the law, but not all law is wholesome, true, right, just or libertarian...still, regardless of that, I have no idea what else to say, this post being largely extemporaneous and as such, not subject to overmuch self-censoriousness or expurgation.
Yet, some of this year, and some of this month, this waning, dying month, have proven to be one of my worst-yet, and the worst also, apparently, for all lovers of truth, rightness, freedom, justice, TRUE perception, reality, logic, and liberty...not to mention free speech. Normally, only specific and dangerous physical threats, slander or libel constitute measures by which to suppress and infringements of freedom of speech that are legal. And, those being especially hideous, that is fine. Yet, the impossibility of mentioning certain things due to a markedly worshipful respect that others foist on one that borders on not only insanity or fanaticism, and is, in this case, wholly illogical, but also that appears to be the modern foundation of false worship. Especially, it is a hideous, coercive form of worship that enslaves the unfortunate victim and makes him (but very seldom her) the thrall and pawn of it. It is the worshipfulness foisted on some by the state.......and, if I may ramble on and digress, what is the essential, key difference between a "state" and a "province"? This I began to wonder last night. And thus does one have an example of the fluid, subject-changing, whimsical, stream-of-consciousness style in which I, especially in various nonfiction writings, heartily indulge, yet rarely employ half as much in fictive writings. Well, I don't know what to say beyond that, the whole point of this post being to update my blog and keep it fresh.
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
Letter To The Editor-Objection And Correction, etc
Dear Editor/ Mr. Larry Favinger, Staff Columnist,
I am afraid, sirs, that I must take some grave exception to Mr. Favinger's article in volume 7, issue number 35 (Friday, September 2, 2011 edition) of the Weekly Sentinel, entitled "York Hospital Celebrates Groundbreaking in Kittery". Now, generally, in most respects, the article is largely correct...but it is correct only in the PRESENT, in it's cataloging and reporting of the present circumstances that grip that once-vacant lot.
It is in it's reporting of the past that the article errs-and errs rather significantly. I, being a former Kittery resident-having lived there for 13 years and been schooled there for ten; from 1985-1998; and 1988-1998, respectively-know all too well how gravely Mr. Favinger has erred in that portion of his article.
Therefore, I intend to enlighten you as to what stood, once upon a time, thirteen years ago and more, on that once-sullied spot.
I, ............ (for such is my name), wrote a memoir/essay/article in June of 2010 exactly about what was, albeit briefly and incorrectly, slightly touched upon in Mr. Favinger's wonderfully well-researched article. Before I append that article to this missive, I intend to just briefly and without much detail tell you about what once occupied that spot: I, unfortunately, do not happen to know what was there before 1993-98, but during that period (though perhaps it was longer or shorter) a place called The Sparkle Spot stood there. It was, as the article in question (Mr. Favinger's) reported, a "long-gone car wash" but, especially as I remember it, it was so much more than that. Principally, it was a convenience store, which may have had the same name as the mini-plaza entire, and it was to that portion of it (though it was multi-chambered and housed different stores, including a laundromat...of that I am sure) that I as a lad so often repaired.
Now, having dispensed so formally with that slight synopsis, let me here include and append my original essay/memoir/article of June 4, 2010 (culled from my online blog), entitled " A Short Description and Vicarious History of What Remains: An Outline of the History of The Sparkle Spot in Kittery".
Without further introduction or ado, here it is:
"A Short Description and Vicarious History of What Remains: An Outline of the History of Sparkle Spot in Kittery
(A Description In Short of What Remains: Being just that, a Literary Description of a Landmark)
Where once the Sparkle Spot stood, now there stands nothing. Just an abandoned lot, with a few cars occasionally sitting there, and a gigantic hill of gray dirt and gravel.
The sun often shines down too viciously on both, and bakes the area, turning it into something that even more so resembles and defines a desert than anything else. Yet, greenness in all it's verdant, vernal glory grows in abundance all around it...even in the lot itself, for some few green weeds poke their heads somewhat tentatively through the crumbling asphalt, and amongst the grand, rocky leavings of the gravel itself.
But here, in the midst of downtown Kittery, where mostly all is alive and verdurous, there is this barren, empty spot. Where once was the Sparkle Spot. And just what was the Sparkle Spot, you say? Well, I'll tell you: Besides being a major landmark and even haunt and harbor of my childhood in Kittery, it was a building, a complex, a shop, a store.
It was some kind of modern equivalent to the local corner drug store (not to say that we didn't have at least one of those in the Kittery of that time, and indeed even in the Kittery of now; even if it is a pharmacy that is quite different from the large, exciting, cavernous, multidepartmental Osco's Drug of my youth), but it was more than that, and yet less than that, for it did not sell any sort of pharmaceuticals-at least, not that I can remember. It sat rather close to the road yet in the center somehow, of the lot...and who knows what stood in that lot before the Sparkle Spot came to town? It was a strange, almost hexagonal building, that was squat but rambling, probably consisting of only one story, though it loomed large in the mind of the child that I was then. It was tan or at least it had tan siding, with white trim, but the tan was more of a motley yellow than a true tan...but at least that white, that was real, that was white.
Yet it was the segment of the building that was a convenience store (one that I think also sold and made fresh sandwiches and pizzas and such...but I can't really remember all that clearly) that I was most interested in, and that was the portion of Sparkle Spot that I went to the most. Unless of course you count the time when I accompanied my parents down to the Sparkle Spot while they washed it in one of the three or four garagelike carwash bays that were the main feature and reason for being of Sparkle Spot: for it was, first and foremost, though most people used the convenience store part of it more, a car wash, and I believe, also, a laundromat.
It was a little tiny plaza that had almost everything a small city, big town like Kittery could want.
Yet, though I was not exactly ever a fat or unfit child, I went there primarily for the treats that one could obtain from the convenience store, Hostess brand cakes like Twinkies and Ring Dings and such. Of course, I didn't often have enough money to go down there and buy them, so I often abstained (somewhat against my will) from that store and those treats.
And now, it doesn't matter.
About at least ten or twelve years ago, it was torn down, and in an infinite insult, replaced by nothing. It is not even blessed with the dignity and prestige of being Kittery's one public parking lot..and if it is was one, too, it would be one of tremendous size, able to fit at least 100 cars, conjecturally easily. For the lot is gargantuan, at least by Kittery standards, where most parking lots and lots are small, cramped, and narrow.
This one, however, has great breadth and size and covers at least, I would say four or five acres if not significantly more. Since it was torn down, long ago, I have not been to the site of the Sparkle Spot much, for I, as a very curious and exploratory child, whose adventures took him all around Kittery at one time or another, have been to gravel pits and back lots before. I have seen them and stepped over their massive, hilly piles of gravel.
I have picked my way across the ridges and slopes of great gravel hills. Indeed, there is a large gravel pit not far from that place, on whose mountainous sides I once trod. I could tell you all more about that, but it is not the subject of this entry, so I will save it for another time. Let it suffice to say that sadly, the Sparkle Spot is no more. It was once an oasis that has since been turned into an urban desert, where things grow in truest profusion only on the fringe.
It is ringed with greenery, with trees, fields, hills, grass. But in the center of that ring, that oddly shaped ring, is nothing but gray dirt and loose stones, with grayish dust often blowing in between and settling on them, like infinitesimal gravelly dandruff or microcosmic debris and sandstorms.
It is deserted, except for a few cars in the northern half of it, it is a desert. A desert."
So, there you have it, sirs: My article that, to the best and fullest extent of my knowledge, describes and details what I know about the prehistory of the lot on which now will stand some York Hospital outpost (one of what is already far too many, spread like parasitic spores throughout our fair county of York), of the Stonehenge that once occupied that plot of once-retail land.
Well, sirs, I thank you very much for your time and if you should ever like to print and publish either this letter or the quoted article (mine) within it, you have my due and express permission to do so, gladly. If you should, for whatever reason, like to contact me, for the time being, on here is best, so do so at: ................... Thank you once again and goodbye.
~.........
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