Rainy Days

I like rainy days. I don't particularly care for gray days, or just misty days, but straight rain I like. I want the weather to commit to a climate and stick it out. Rain to me says confidence. Mist is some kind of uncertainty that I just can't respect.

It's rainy days like today that made me wish I could sleep in late in a hotel room in Europe somewhere. Get up, and have a long lunch under and umbrella, or next to a window. I don't want to do anything, but I want to be able to see outside.

-cjfer-

Retraction

I had wrote in my last blog entry that the guns were purchased illegally. This information is incorrect. In fact, the guns were purchased legally. So, take that for what it's worth. Oh, and don't get your info from borderline racist early morning sports djs who don't know any better themselves.

-cjfer-

The Incredible Sadness

All I can feel, in regards to the murders yesterday, is incredible sadness. It's a tragedy where, for me, there isn't the obvious hatred. With 9/11, there was a clear outlet for rage and anger - terrorists everywhere. We can be mad at the dead killers, but there's a finality to it. There's no one left to pursue. With terrorism, there are still terror cells. With acts of singular violence, such as yesterday, there is no one left to go after. It happens at a moment in time, and then it is over. There's no one to prosecute. I don't feel helpless, I just feel sad for the victims, and their families. It's an unmanageable situation. Now is a time for love, though it always is. Only love is stronger than death.

I think there will be some, not a lot, but some talk about gun laws in this country - but it's important to remember that the guns were obtained illegally. So, no tougher law could have prevented it. If anything, it should somehow further the discussion of gun violence in the country, and shed light on the murders that happen every day in every city. I'm not a supporter of guns, for any reason. I can't find a reason to justify it. Even in the case of hunting, it still seems wrong to me. I don't understand hunting. I don't understand that need to kill an innocent animal in the wild from hundreds of yards away. If you need to kill an animal for food, in order to survive, I understand that. But most hunters hunt for the prize of killing a less intelligent animal that can't defend itself. You want to kill a deer? Karate chop it, then we'll talk. While I don't support guns for any reason, it's important to remember that the vast vast majority of gun owners abide by the law. Just like the vast majority of Muslims aren't terrorists. Still, I don't get it. I don't get the cheap value we place on life, be it human, animal or the life of the environment.

-cjfer-

The Greenest Generation

More for David than anything, the hippie. Great NYtimes article about going green. But as Kermit Said, it ain't easy bein' green.

Read it Here

-cjfer-

I'm bored so I wrote something

whatever.

When it rained last Saturday, I thought nothing of it. Typical early spring weather. The elegant droplets, fleeting in their season, and infinite. The beauty of the thing is in the sound. That quiet reluctant simple form.

William died last October. Broken by disease and time, we sat for one final time on the cold sand of Windy Beach as we watched the sun sleep. Some sweet portrait of two lovers, false in the perception, and a promise unfulfilled. I remember the clouds made the sky low, and it got dark early. A fair sized black dog leaping in the wind, as if he’s never heard the words cancer, or aids, or global warming.

We all envy the dead – for their contributions and their sense enough to get out while they still could. They were smarter not to have lived to see such days. The agony of the future of space ships, cargo and business. The Earth cruel, the people worse.

William died last October, and the partings and quiet longings of young men have gone unnoticed as the sadness is still too near. It’s not that he’s dead, it’s that he’s gone. Like a young love, soft and malleable, now a wall. You never move on. But if you don’t move, you become a statue in a rainy Roman courtyard.

When I woke up last Saturday, the house was empty. The girls and gone out, and Marybeth flew home to Minneapolis for the weekend. I didn’t put on my contacts, and I stayed in my pajamas as I stared out the glass slider to the memory of a Japanese morning. The rain fell delicately, unintentionally. Just enough to be noticed. I’m healthy and have no allergies. But looking out that Saturday morning, made my body hurt. Why is it that such sights fill us with a sense of something lost? We need the darkness, and shadows. Yet we’re afraid of it.

I don’t know what happened to him. Where he went, where his soul flew. Whether he capitulated to emptiness and the unconscious black, or if he’s resting with a God and perfect, infinite eternity. I don’t know why I opened the glass slider. I don’t know why I walked, no shoes and socks, into the backyard. My skin tightened with the cold, my breath visible. I don’t know why I stood there, or for how long. I don’t know why I could see myself standing in the house, through the glass slider looking back. I don’t know why I disappeared.

-cjfer-

Is your car gay?

well, is it?

-cjfer-

10 What ifs - series 2

I was watching an episode of the gilmore girls online the other day and it just so happened that it was subtitled in French. Lorelei said to Luke "I'm ordering a pizza" but it was subtitled in French as "Je Commande une pizza" - which translates back into English as "I'm ordering a pizza." What's funny about it that, is that the meaning is different when translated back to English when you think about it. When someone says "I'm ordering a pizza" they mean, I'm placing an order for a pizza. When you use the word commande - which looks like it does in English, it's more like "i'm ordering my soldiers." So it sounds like "I'm ordering a pizza to get my a drink. March Pizza March!"

Now, the hit list you've been requesting. My famous list of Ten What Ifs?!!? Version 2 - TV what ifs.

1. What if Pizzas were slaves on the gilmore girls?
2. What if Jack Bauer Cried after he killed someone? Would American still embrace him?
3. What if West Wing cast members had to wear scuba equipment on the set?
4. What if the Desperate Housewives suddenly went Blind?
5. What if the CSI: Miami Cast Members melted throughout the course of an episode?
6. What if the Black Donnellys were actually black? Actually, they might be, I don't know, I don't watch.
7. What if the Lost island had a ball pit in the center? Or a Chuck-e-Cheese?
8. What if the crew of the Battlestar Galactica suddenly had claws for hands?
9. What if the cast of Grey's Anatomy had real patients? "This man's dying...why are you taking off your pants...?"
10. What if a model hosted Deal or No Deal and the cases were held up by 25 Howie Mandels?

peace in the middle east
-cjfer-

Heat Vision and Jack

Probably the greatest TV show (singular) ever created.

Heat Vision and Jack.

-cjfer-

Old Emails

I think there's always something interesting about delving through old electronic messages. What I find most interesting about it - and mine go back to August 2001 - is the writing. The writing as I see it, is the same as it is now. In other words, in casual messages such as this, I, and others tend to write in the same way - the same style, word choice, and etc. Obviously the things we're writing about now have changed. I always look back on them as an insight into the past - but although it's 5 years ago, it's interesting to see how little has actually changed.

Which brings me to my larger point. In some degree we're always changing, thinking and evolving. But also, at some point, we kind of are who we are at a certain point. I don't see the way I write, act, or talk to people casually changing in any significant way in the future. I don't see myself taking on a different style or different beliefs. I think if you looked at things I wrote when I was 18, they will look like things I write at 28. Granted - things like essays, school work, and creative writing have changed a lot, and will continue to evolve at a much steeper rate. However, the way we talk to people, at least for me, hasn't changed. I obviously know more, I've been college educated, but the general, who I was, is not different at all. Is that good or bad?

I think when you read about things like the "alpha girls" or you see 17 or 18 year old kids who are very smart, it might cause one to be a little depressed. Certainly I was smart, but not as well versed as some of these kids today are at their age. I didn't know the facts that they knew at that point. Or, I did, but I forget now. But I don't think I did. I like this saying, whether it's true or not. In high school I learned facts, in college I learned ideas. In trying to recall the facts I learned in college, I'm hard pressed to name too many. Granted, I took humanities courses. But I think, in terms of my education, I certainly learned better how to think effectively, and how to approach different situations analytically.

I think one of the biggest things about college is the emotional education. So, in terms of things changing, the joy of getting older, in some respect, is that fewer new emotional experiences happen to you. Not that I mean that in a negative way, I mean that as a positive. It's easier to deal with things if it's your second time or third time dealing with it, rather than it being the first. I don't have any useful skills, but I have a well-built infrastructure.

not my first rodeo
-cjfer-

Life Watch

As it turns out, I might actually survive this job until its natural conclusion. I'm off life support baby!

-cjfer