dreaming

I tend to bask in these seasons when my nights are filled with vivid dreams I remember in whole or in parts when I awake. It is another existence in there, in my dreams. It’s extra life.

Years ago after reading a science magazine article, (Omni?) on the subject of ‘lucid dreaming,’ I took to suggestions from the article designed to help one take control of their dreams. For a couple of months I went around reading things in public places, on walls, billboards, menus, then reading them again. The idea is that a thing read will never read the same twice, in a dream. So, if one could make a habit in wakeful life of reading things twice, the read thing which changed would trigger the dreamer into knowing they were dreaming and hence, being able to take control of the dream, “lucid dreaming.’

It worked for me. I was in Japan on an Air Force base and I volunteered to coach youth sports while I was there. One day I was driving my ’81 Celica around on base when I got into a collision with the mother of one of my players. (The kid actually played for me three seasons in a row, soccer, little league baseball, then soccer again.) After damaging the family VW Beetle, I followed her and Todd back to their house on base and when I saw Kevin, (Todd’s dad,) he got angry about the car. He fretted and fumed a bit then he started acting like he was going to punch me.

I looked at his t-shirt, which said “Brooklyn Dodgers,” across it. Quickly I looked away and looked again. It said only, “Yankees,” the second time. I was dreaming and the dream immediately faded.

I was in a nowhere place for some moments as I pondered the fact that I was sleeping yet aware of my thoughts. In my dream I moved slowly about in an ether. I recalled the point of this lucid dreaming, and how the article had talked about the exhilaration of flying in one’s dreams. It had specifically suggested one could work toward flying by taking giant steps like they were on the moon, intending to float, which I did. I never did fly but I did take the giant steps though I don’t think it was in that specific dream. I engaged in lucid dreaming for a few months after which, I think I got tired of reading things twice in the daytime.

The floating was truly thrilling. I remember pushing off the earth and floating up and out and being amazed at what I could do and how it felt to my normally limited body.

More recently I have had a recurring dream wherein I levitate. Usually I am in a group of people and out of the blue I begin to rise into the air. Often I entice others, who did not know they could do this, to join me. No one is ever baffled at my ability in my dreams, rather they casually look then return to whatever they were doing.

Last night I dreamt I was writing a piece of fiction. In my story a 10-year-old daughter was telling her father the family should take certain steps, engage in conservation projects or write letters to soldiers, in order to support the war. The father was incredulous and asked his daughter what war she was talking about.

“The war on terror,” she responded.

“There is no such thing as ‘The War on Terror,’ dear,” the father chided.

He went on to explain to her that the war on terror represented a propaganda campaign and that people who fear will more readily support the side who both puts them in fear and purports to protect them, and that in fact, the definition of war was in flux since it had formerly implied troops were engaged in battle on a battlefield as opposed to the idea governments were secretly collecting information to thwart otherwise unknown would-be attacks and similar activities.

This was all just me, sitting at a keyboard, writing, in my dream. The idea stuck with me though, somehow. When I woke, I thought I had happened upon that one idea, the one I’ve been looking for, the one that will help me write fiction, the one that will help me finally write a cohesive story with a plot and narrative and a hero with an arc and redemption awaiting him in the end.

Yes, I have had the idea I had this idea innumerable times. Sometimes I think I am the idea of me longing for the idea, (while reading Lao Tzu, perhaps.)

I have often thought I do have one great idea, one great work in me. Less from ego and more from the need to feel like I have helped humanity, I long for this to be true. I think I want it to be true so badly I will happily sacrifice any notoriety or wealth that could conceivably come from a great work of fiction. I imagine it manifesting so late in my life, there is no time for me to enjoy it, or perhaps the work comes to light after my demise.

In reality, perhaps I merely need this idea to impel me through the everyday rigors of life. Maybe I need this specter of a higher calling realized constantly near me in order to change diapers and take customer service phone calls. I would be most pleased to be able to help, however meager. And I admire the men of one work. I love the greatest Mexican novelist ever, Juan Rulfo. (I know Gabriel Garcia-Marquez would never have existed without Rulfo’s inspiration.) I love Ralph Ellison, the invisible man of letters who painfully tried to make it happen again in his lifetime but could not, (or if he did, that second great work was destroyed in fire.) I would rather read one book, full of meaning and ideas and life, by a one-book genius, than 50 pieces of Stephen King tripe. (Apologies to King, he merits mention unlike many others on the popular landscape.)

Maybe I have this work in me? One would never know it today, based on my habits and my station in life. I do not have the ability to write fiction today. I am an expert letter writer. I correspond with the best of them. I write first person journal entries with some skill. (If you’ve gotten this far I will say I’ve proven that much, recognizing there are likely two or three of “you.”) Occasionally I can write something funny, a sarcastic essay or two but mostly, my efforts towards fiction have been flat.

Still, I have not yet said “uncle.” I try, sometimes. Maybe I will try with this material from my dream. It seemed much better while I slept. I saw it as such a great jumping off point. This idea would impel me through pages and pages, I thought. Before waking I saw myself working backwards from that conversation to the beginning, to the family, who they were and why the reader would look at them. I thought of the larger story and saw the arcs of the characters and bits of plot like stardust shuffling through my field of vision.

When I woke, it was mostly gone. I still see the moment. I understand I have some idea the girl changes from naïve to one who calls out the emperor for running around naked. I suppose the dad is heroic in a way, for enlightening his little one and maybe that makes the daughter Terra and the father me and maybe all dreams are fantasy. Or maybe I just need to learn how to dream more often when I am awake.

andre agassi

andre agassi will be missed, not because he is the last american to ascend to extraordinary heights in the tennis world, (with no others on the horizon,) but because he is and always was the epitome of class.
agassi has chosen a great time to retire. At 36, his athleticism is waning and it shows on the court, though not so much he is not competetive. he merely has not been able to play at his highest level, which he reached about six years ago. his knees and back seem to be troubling him some and against nadal, in his farewell to wimbledon, agassi did not even chase some balls he surely would have hunted down and returned with fury a few years ago.
such is life. the fact is agassi outlasted every single one of his contemporaries. when agassi lost the 1991 french open final to jim courier, it looked like he might never realize the potential he flashed as a brash youngster.
michael chang appeared to be headed for greater heights. courier was unbeatable for a season and wowed the french crowd that afternoon with a gracious victory speech in their native tongue. pete sampras was bigger and more powerful and possessed a serve and volley game that combined roscoe tanner's fierce serve with john mcenroe's touch at the net. mcenroe himself was still playing and despite technological advances in the game, he improved his serve and exhibited a grit that retained the hearts of american fans. even patrick mcenroe or todd martin seemed like they might have greater staying power based on their respective, obvious work ethics.
agassi, however, obeyed life's golden rule and stayed true to himself. it was ironic in 1992 when he finally broke through and won his first grand slam at the hallowed grounds of wimbledon. he won in five sets over goran ivanisevic and dropped to his knees, his hands at the sides of his shaggy head in disbelief. in that moment, tennis became cool - cool, rock and roll tennis, with flea and anthony kiedis in the umpire's chair and the nike swoosh pulsing around the tv screen in unison with the beat of andre's wicked ground strokes.
the work ethic agassi became known for was not evident in the early part of his career. the media and some of his peers questioned his desire to win or his desire to join the pantheon of tennis greats he undeniably belongs to now. but this was agassi being true to himself.
what 21-year-old kid wants to be so utterly dedicated to something he loses the ability to enjoy himself along the way? not to suggest andre was partying 24/7, but the comments he made in the press were off the beaten path.
when he disdained wimbledon because of the dress code, he did so because his youthful sensibility wanted or needed to make a statement about clothes not making the man. it was a quixotic thing to do but andre had some power as a draw in those days and his absence dulled the luster of the tournament albeit slightly. (wimbledon, being wimbledon after all, just carried on.)
after losing at wimbledon a few weeks ago, agassi said he looks forward to this next stage of life. he realizes he will not have the opportunity to spend as much time with some people as he has in the past, but he also realizes in this tennis pro stage he is departing from he never had the chance to spend vast amounts of time with his wife and children. (of course he did not have kids until recently but the point is,) he does not rue getting older. he embraces the present, which is perhaps the truest quality of any champion.
andre agassi has been one of the best role models in the sports world. as much as i agree with charles barkley that it is not the athletes job to be a role model, it is still a nice thing when they are, and i will be happy to tell my children some day that agassi was a class act. no more, no less, but one of those few examples of celebrities one feels comfortable making that determination about.

freedom realized

this morning i picked up the phone and dialed 10 digits and my brother answered, “what up?” as if this was an every day occurrence.

for the past six years I have had to listen to a disclaimer about receiving a collect call from an inmate at a colorado state correctional facility before I could speak to tommy. those calls were limited to about 25 minutes-today we spoke for nearly an hour. today he was at his girlfriend’s house when we spoke. my nephew, (little tommy,) was nearby watching star wars episode 3. tommy had never operated a dvd player before and certainly had not seen one in a car, which he did when he was released from prison yesterday.

we talked about what he will be getting up to, job opportunities and such. we talked about my daughter, whose name tommy tattooed on his neck but whom he has yet to meet in person. we talked about my recent wedding, which prison kept him from attending. we talked about the child Faith carries in her womb, who that little person will turn out to be. we talked about little tommy and the challenges big tommy must face to help him steer clear of the mistakes his father made. we talked and talked.

it is hard to imagine how good tommy must feel. I guess he is worried some, too. i hope he values the thing he was deprived of more than ever.

i love my brother but that love has manifested itself to me in a way i would not have previously comprehended. people say they love each other and there are certain motions we can all be seen to go through, we stay in touch and talk about the weather, life’s travails, people, events, occasionally ideas, but there is and has been implied in most of my relationships, a distance born of insecurity.

my brother and i are men. there is a stoic, machismo-oriented sense about our interaction that feels like an unbridgeable divide. i sense it and i try to overcome it by speaking my mind but it is as omnipresent as the underlying pain and love we share.

tommy has lived in colorado for many years now, three times as long as this incarceration, i think. but the distance of free men is not comparable to that of one who is shackled. i visited him perhaps four times during the past six years and on one of those occasions, i traveled only to be denied access on the basis of a prison lockdown associated with an outbreak of violence inside.

life is not static. i was living and evolving and changing while tommy was behind bars and despite the constraints, tommy was doing the same thing. i know he does not hold it against me i did not visit more often. i know he appreciates the many books i sent him these last years. i can hardly wait to see my brother even though there is not a plan at present. it will happen.

the correspondence tommy and i have shared is an amazing thing. had he not been imprisoned, it never would have happened. in the letters we sent one another, we rarely practiced small talk. there was little in the way of weather discussion and only occasionally did we turn to what would normally be our favorite fodder, sports. (i should have known he would be paroled in a year when his beloved steelers won the superbowl.)

instead we talked about the big picture, about ideas and ideals, about raising a boy from prison, (or not raising a boy from prison,) about violence and racial tensions and revolt. in some of tommy's letters i saw him regress. i saw him put on his gang mentality like a cloak of invincibility, like a raging boy's defiance. other times i could see the man tommy nuzzling up to the truths i continue to see him embrace.

on his last night in prison he wrote me a letter, (mailed on his way out the next morning.) he wrote about an eerie feeling as if he was walking out to a death chamber. he wrote about the other men inside, men who would never ever leave those confines. he mentioned his tattoos and the state of mind he was in whenever he added one. it was fatalism he felt when he imagined he would never leave the institution.

tommy takes some pride in having endured. he is confident in his ability to convey his experience to others and in that, he feels special, and positive. in this letter he speaks of authenticity, of not portraying himself as someone he is not. he wrote, "...men like me, thugs, gangsters, beautiful losers, inmates, convicts and fathers, well, authenticity is of utmost importance to us."

i read that this morning and the urge to sob welled up inside me. he went on remembering having read about men who attract people by their way of life, ('beautiful losers.') i'm almost certain he is conjuring leonard cohen. my brother, the knucklehead, quoting leonard cohen. the power of art never ceases to amaze me.

tommy recalled his early days of incarceration and how devoid he was of any tangible sense of it ever ending. he contrasts that with the intensity of the light he sees at the end of the tunnel on this his last night of confinement, and how it mixes with images of his son and beautiful women and other things he has been deprived of.

as he readies to walk he reminds me i walk with him and he calls me and others his angels. he says we have accompanied him always. he says he has love to leave and love to receive.

this is my favorite letter ever. and the best part is how he signed it. i thought it represented a certain humility i think he will need. he wrote,

"Tommy
Parolee"

democracy?

i caught chomsky on charlie rose the other night and as usual, he said some things that got me thinking. first off, he mocked our democracy, saying in this country we were given a choice between two guys who went to the same higher learning institution, were members of the same elite, secret society, which grooms its caste for these positions of leadership, and who avoided talking about the issues that mattered most to the people, (and that this is consistently the choice americans get to make every four years.)

when asked of where there was a better democracy in the world, (as if rose's fill-in host could stump chomsky,) chomsky implied virtually all of them by saying we should look to the country who had the most recent elections in our hemisphere; bolivia. he said bolivians recently elected a leader who represented them, (as opposed to being from an elite class,) and that they voted on issues, which they had been fighting about for years and which affect the people, and that their voter turnout and participation dwarfs ours.

chomsky cited several polls and studies which have pointed out the fact that americans consider health care among the most pressing issues politicians should be involved in, and yet, none of ours talk about it. they don't talk about it because they are able to run for the office because of corporate donations and the corporations, (especially the health care ones,) do not want any sort of health care reform. and so, they dictate the agenda.

i listened and sheepishly thought to myself, 'duhhhhh.'

Bush Go Home

well there i am, in front of the casa rosada, buenos aires, argentina, by a makeshift fence on which someone spray-painted the message: BUSH GO HOME.

i saw similar graffitied messages several times while in buenos aires and always i was reminded of that view of the u.s. as the large dog in the small room whose every movement is felt by virtually everyone else in the room.

why i drink

i am thinking about someone who got drunk at my wedding and i wonder if they are chagrined by the fact. i sincerely hope not. i think the act, in and of itself, (the act of getting drunk, that is,) is often one of giving.

i think people often drink when they are nervous. in the social setting that is a wedding, where strangers are brought together to dine and celebrate, the mixing can be a daunting affair. perhaps the person i am thinking of got drunk from nervousness, wanting to impress or to avoid embarrassing, wanting to feel at ease and be at ease, wanting to be cool and easy-going and friendly? thank you for drinking at my wedding. i appreciate that you came.

in a similar vein, people often drink to lower inhibitions and allow themselves to come out a bit. perhaps this person drank because they wanted to join in the celebration and do so in a somewhat less inhibited way than they expected they might have otherwise?

i am like that. i like to drink but i don't necessarily like the effect alcohol has on my body. i tolerate that for the greater benefit as i see it. when i drink i find i feel more freedom to engage people in conversation, to express myself openly, and i enjoy that effect.

when it comes to others, i am frustrated by my own inability to connect with some people.
it bothers me that at work, i cannot speak my mind. instead, i am reigned in by social mores and boundaries of political correctness. so i enjoy opportunities to drink with people i work with or others who might be inhibited to speak frankly about just about anything.

i do not mean to glorify a vice, but i like to drink and i like when others drink. pirandello said we all wear masks and we are always wearing masks. i consider alcoholic beverage the best mask remover. if people did not wear masks. . .

if i could speak as freely at work or even around my friends as i am able to do in a bar, i would have no use whatsoever for alcohol. but in my time, that is a fairy tale. around my very best friends i am free to speak as i would. when they disagree with me they tolerate me because we are friends and we see this as a key component of our friendship. around other friends, i am forced to honor certain limits. if we disagree, it must be handled like a business transaction. there is an unspoken rule not to offend. it is implied that every person's opinion is equally valuable and so, one cannot speak with too great a force or too much passion lest another feel overwhelmed or slighted. it would be rude to make someone feel like that. (this may or may not be a backwards thought.)

in public life, at work or in business, the restrictions are even greater. i do not feel free to speak of my religious convictions at work. i cannot breach the subject of politics with a stranger at a ball game.

when i was younger i did not have much to say. i was more interested in listening and learning. at the same time, i admired those who did have something to say. i appreciated those who spoke with passion. it seemed the most natural state of things. in applying logic to it all, i figured this was the example of the pebbles in the sack polishing one another and i figured the strongest ideas and arguments would come to the fore not by being the most blustery but rather by the sheer strength of the substance. that may sound optimistic but i've seen jerry falwell yelling and screaming from a pulpit on tv, filled with the most passionate intensity and righteous rage, and i've read another preacher, ralph waldo emerson, whispering to me from a page, the quiet sage, and there is no compare.

after i had gained more experience in the world and gotten a bit more comfortable, i gained stronger opinions about the world around me. these opinions were often rooted in my experience and so, i became enamored with conversation and this may very well be where my fancy for drinking began.

i remember taking a college psychology course and the instructor went around the room on the first day and asked us all what we enjoyed doing with our free time and feeling emboldened by the fun nature of the question i said i enjoyed staying up late drinking with my friends and discussing philosophy and ideas. the instructor laughed and said 'we all enjoy[ed] that.' and i think that is true. deep down, i think we all do enjoy that. i mean, we all enjoy the freedom to express ourselves however we want. in our world where political correctness has gained sway, it has a fantasyland appeal to it.

i think of the homosexual closet and all those who want to get out and run around freely expressing their innate desire to interior decorate something. i think of those who live in north korea or elsewhere where fascism dictates their ability to express on any number of levels and i wish for them the freedoms they do not feel. i think of the girl who had the abortion who feels like she cannot speak about it for fear of being judged and i ache for her because i know she is not evil and i know she meant no harm and i know this inability to talk it out, not with counselors but with her peers, her aunts and uncles, her coworkers and such, the product of which is the inability to find closure, to understand what may have been wrong in her actions or thoughts and what may have sprung from ignorance or whatever other psychological condition, is destroying her.

in the bar i see a lot of people who have found the place because they needed to speak freely. i see marks and lines on their faces indicating hidden traumas. and sometimes these things come out of them and i listen and wish they did not have to put on a show all day every day acting like they are the joneses of the world, just as good as you but really just as insecure as you, and maybe this too is my story. i had a difficult childhood and like everyone, i have pains in my life, in my family.

i wish we could speak freely but we can't. it's just not the world we live in. we need contact with people more than we need to speak.

still, i drink as a respite to this condition. i think a functioning anything is a plus and, i like beer. i drink so that others may feel more free. i drink so that i may feel more free.

(dont cry for me,) im in argentina!

i heard it called a 2nd world country and i suppose i can see where that comes from but mostly i have seen argentina as a cosmopolitan city of world class status.

faith and i are having a great time visiting this city. our hotel is european-the room is small but comfortable. the city. . .

to me the city seems bright and hopeful. it seems the cow is the national animal of argentina and i coudl not help but compare that to our beloved bald eagle. yes, ours may be cooler, but more interestingly, it is fitting. the bald eagle is a bird of prey. the cow, by contrast is a kinder animal, a provider, and argentina is certainly a place where one can get a good steak.

i especially enjoyed speaking to the people of buenos aires. i found virtually everyone i met to be friendly. they did their best to understand my broken spanish and they used whatever english they possessed and i was able to communicate and nothing could have been more rewarding about this trip than that.

i should preface all of this by saying it was our honeymoon and faith and i surely celebrated our love and our union, but here i mean to address this foreign land.

i am officially, and accidentally, a fanof the futbol club river plate. their are basically two club teams in argentina, river and boca juniors. i went hopingexpecting to embrace boca, if anything, but when i inquired about seeing a game i found boca had already won their league and the game they played on the sunday i was there would be meaningless. the major, (corporate sponser name here,) tournament going on had already seen boca's elimination but river plate was alive and doing well and playing libertad, a team from paraguay.

a local business called go futbol picked us up at our hotel and delivered us along with several other tourist futbol enthusiasts to a stadium filled to the gills with rabid fans. 80,000 people, according to my guide, were jammed into a stadium which has a capacity for 65,000. they do not sell alcoholic beverages at these games. (it would just be overkill, believe me.) no one ever left their seat from what i could tell. the fans light fireworks in the stands. their were huge homemade signs paying homage to the players all draped all over the edifice. they wore river's jersey and colors and waved flags and unfurled flags that covered entire portions of spectators. they sang at least five different songs that everyone in the stadium knew. and they lived and died with every rush into opposing territory, every crossing pass, every header in the zone. when something went bad, i never heard such free-spirited but thorough cursing of the play and players. (i have always been adept at the curse words in spanish. special thanks to my neighbor, mexico.)

especially intriguing was one section of the stadium in the upper part of the bowl and in the corner. it had abut a 10 foot high chain link fence around it with curled barbed wire adorning the top. in it were the fans of club libertad. the team from paraguay scored the game's first goal too. from the top of the goal box a libertad player got his foot on the ball and sent it high to the right side of the goal about 40 feet out on a 45 degree angle from the goal. the libertad striker caught it coming straight down out of the sky like a drop of rain in mid-air and sent it on a line past the goalie who dove but had no chance. it was an amazing kick and when it happened i gasped in admiration but also with some anger, (it was against my new favorite team.) the gasp was audible and everyone around me was silent. i thought i might be in trouble so i added a couple "damn!"s on the end of my gasp and turned to look at the libertad fans. they were jumping up and down in ecstasy as the scorer came to that corner of the field and pumped his fists in unison up towards them as if to thank them for cheering him to such heights. wow.

the game ended in a 2-2 draw and when the world cup is over, the tournament will continue with river plate travelling to paraguay to play libertad on their turf. i hope to be able to follow that outcome somewhere in my local press. i purchased a river plate jersey a couple of days later and will wear it proudly around monrovia and see if anyone recognizes it.

faith and i caught a tango show, (which included an excellent steak.) i got a tattoo at about one quarter of the price i would have paid for it here. i brought home some "special," cigars and felt good about contributing to the economy of the country from whence they came. we saw the casa rosada and took a lot of pictures, all the stuff you would expect from americans abroad, but that status notwithstanding, it was a great trip and a truly beautiful country. i'd recommend it to anyone.

terra smile

you see, she doesn't really know what to do with herself when the camera is pointed at her, (and who could blame her?) so what she did on this occasion was, she forced a smile, of sorts, kind of leaned into it a bit like something i might see one day several years hence in a yearbook photo she will be chagrined by, and contorted her hands in an attempt to mask her uneasiness. cute, isn't it?
i love it.

where's antonio?

may day monday will see two major marches in los angeles protesting the various referendums to reform immigration policy. no city in the united states will be more impacted by whatever policy comes out of the coming elections and no city has a keener interest. but the mayor of los angeles, antonio villaraigosa, (he claims to be a latino but i'm not so sure,) will be out of town. apparently he needs to arrive a day early for tuesday meetings concerning the nfl's return to the city of angels.

the truth, of course, is that the mayor prefers absentia when caught between his identity as a latino mayor and the outcome he expects on immigration. he is playing cat and mouse in order to play politics and it's a bad policy to leave town on such a big day.

too often these days politicians do not speak their minds because they find it easier to let people fill in the blanks themselves. they understand the issues can be thorny territory while just shoving money into a campaign, smiling for cameras, kissing babies and spin doctoring when necessary is the path to election. that is a shame and we the people of los angeles, we the brown, white, black, red, or yellow people, should take every opportunity to let our leaders know we will not stand for this behavior.

i hope villaraigosa's absence tomorrow is noted and produces a serious backlash.

nothing is worth anything if it is not worth something

it seems the only way the moon is going to receive anymore visitors, is if she can produce something corporations can make money off of.

this is capitalism run amok. there was an obituary article on the front page of the times today for john kenneth galbraith. this harvard university professor argued that the free market economy was a myth and that the 1,000 largest american corporations dominated both our economy and our social life.

Giant corporations essentially operated free of competition, he said, often turning out frivolous goods for an increasingly consumer-minded society, while the capitalistic economy ignored more pressing social needs. "Americans still have an extraordinary capacity to ignore poverty," Galbraith told an interviewer in 1983. "I am struck by our superb capacity to manufacture consumer gadgetry. including electronic games, versus our capacity to produce schools."

glabraith's most noted work was "the affluent society," which was published in 1958.

now we see the only way we can run a space program and increase traffic to the moon is if we can find a way to make it profitable for corporations? That is pathetic, don't you think?

Loose Change

I remember waking up on the morning of September 11th, 2001. A guy on sports talk radio mentioned something about how a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center and now possibly the Pentagon, also? In those days, I could listen to the radio for an hour without being compelled to actually rise and begin the day but on that day, this news was enough. I went straight to the living room and turned on the tv.

I sat on my couch, my back to my main window, watching the tv and wondering if I would hear bombers or bombs coming down into the San Gabriel Valley from over the tops of our mountains behind me. Unlike others, I believed. I believed everything I saw and like everyone I knew, I was sad, but for different reasons.

I was sad for those who were dying behind the smoke in front of my eyes on my television screen but also for the bad omen this "attack," represented. President Bush had cozened his way into office. This at the very least, (on the back of an antiquated electoral college system,) considering even he agreed he lost the popular vote. I knew this event would grant him license.

I am not a genius for realizing this-I know many understood it immediately, (though we were all kind of silenced in public about it.) But I knew the fear this event would place in the hearts of my countrymen, and men the planet over, would pave the way for an agenda of greed and corruption the likes of which I guessed the world had not before seen.

My thoughts at that time were conjecture. The manifestations of those thoughts today, are fact. (I could enumerate the evidence but in the interest of limiting this entry, I'll trust you either know or can find plenty of evidence at most any news or information outlet.)

All of this brings me to the idea of conspiracy theories related to the events of 9/11 and the obvious question, is a conspiracy theory by definition a falsehood? Noam Chomsky has said the phrase "conspiracy theory," is used most often to discourage institutional analysis. The idea that a thing could be a conspiracy theory is meant to dismiss that thing, render it on some acceptable level impotent.

If you click on the words "Loose Change," at the top of this blog entry, you will be directed to a site where you can view the movie Loose Change.

This movie is a documentary about the mother of all conspiracy theories. (Credit to Mark Morford of the San Francisco Chronicle for bringing it to my attention.) Loose Change has the audacity to more than suggest the crime that was 9/11 was perpetrated by people other than those we were told executed it. And, the movie has merit.

I can't know what theories presented in the movie may or may not be true so personally, i don't see a point in taking a definitive stand on its veracity. Rather, I recognize what is important about the movie. It quite clearly illustrates and points out the fact that our government has become far too secretive, (secrecy being the cornerstone of all tyrrany.)

This movie, and indeed all that we know as "9/11," needs institutional analysis. Not like the Warren Commission wherein the findings remain secret even after they were scheduled to be revealed, (the secrecy being in the "national interest," in the first place.) There can be no national interest in this case greater than our need to know, our need to find a way to trust our government, again.

Totalitarianism in the USA

I’m not sure if the United States’ government is fascist or if the San Diego Padres’ owners and management are fascist or if the World Baseball Classic organizers are fascist but something smelled like stinky fascism last night at the World Baseball Classic championship game.

I left my office and drove down to the game from Pasadena before 2pm, arriving at 4:30pm in the vicinity of Petco Park. (Knowing I had to be at work by 6am the next morning, I was thankful for the 6pm start time.) Because it was the inaugural championship game and because Cuba was playing, I wanted to be there.

I read a biography of Che Guevara about seven or eight years ago, (Companero: The Life and Death of Che Guevara, by Jorge Castaneda.) That book, more than any other I have read on related topics, gave me a clear understanding of the Cuban revolution as well as the roles played by Che Guevara and Fidel Castro. I came away from that book understanding the basic, corrupt nature of the Bautista regime Castro and Guevara took part in toppling, and the basic ideas around Marxism and guerrilla warfare the Cuban campesinos in the Sierra Maestra espoused in fighting back and taking over their country for the people.

My personal views on the relationship between my country, (the USA,) and Cuba contrast with the views of most of my countrymen. I believe we have been choking that country economically since Castro took over through embargos and what can only be seen as, mean-spirited, un-christian like policies and behavior. (One example of this would be our refusal to sell steel to Cuba. Birmingham, Alabama, [once known as the Pittsburgh of the south because of its steel mills,] could have continued to produce steel and sell it at a profit to Cuba but government policy caused the industry to dry up in that area of our country.)

As I came to understand some of these dynamics between the two countries, it became necessary for me to ask why we would demonize Cuba. The answer could either be the military threat Cuba posed or the ideological threat they represented by choosing a different economic system than the one we chose; capitalism.

Cuba is a small country of limited resources. As a military threat, they can only be so frightening. On the other hand, Cuba played up to the Soviet Union during the cold war in order to gain protection from us, which worked. Since the cold war was real and given the hysteria generated by the likes of Senator McCarthy, as far back as the ‘50s, it is understandable we might consider the tiny island nation more formidable a foe than the reality of it all.

Still, isn’t it just insecurity on our part to paint communism the embodiment of evil? Communism, after all, is merely an economic system. It is not fascism, nor is it totalitarianism.

fas·cism
Pronunciation: 'fa-"shi-z&m also 'fa-"si- Function: noun
1 often capitalized : a political philosophy, movement, or regime (as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition
2 : a tendency toward or actual exercise of strong autocratic or dictatorial control

to·tal·i·tar·i·an·ism
Pronunciation: (")tO-"ta-l&-'ter-E-&-"ni-z&m Function: noun
1 : centralized control by an autocratic authority
2 : the political concept that the citizen should be totally subject to an absolute state authority

I got into the stadium at 4:45pm. I found my way to a place selling “Randy Jones’ pulled pork sandwiches,” and “Little Slugger” hot dogs that made the dodger dog look like a small pup by comparison. Adding a Coke, I found my way to my bleacher (obstructed view) seats. From my spot in right center field I could not see the corners of the outfield. No matter, when I got to those seats at 10 minutes after 5pm, the atmosphere was already electric and I was excited about the baseball game ahead.

I was two bites into my little slugger when two stadium security representatives approached me and my buddy as we ate. The man who spoke informed me he was slightly remiss about having to ask me to either turn my t-shirt inside out or take it off and check it upstairs.

My friend, (a French Canadien from Montreal,) asked the man if he was serious. He was. The security agent demanded an answer of me and I stalled by asking what the consequences of my refusal would be. He said we would need to go up to security to talk about it and if I refused, they would have me arrested.

My t-shirt has a picture of Che Guevara on it. Nothing more than the classic image of him, unshaven, wearing the beret. (Granted it is as famous an image of him as it is because of the remarkable way in which the photographer captured the intensity in Guevara’s eyes.)

I wondered if the security agent, (whom I put in his late 50s to early 60s,) knew Che Guevara was a doctor. He was likely a teenager when Guevara with Castro successfully fomented a revolution among the campesino, peasant farmers and country folk of Cuba. Was this man aware the CIA had gunned an already wounded Guevara down in Bolivia, as he tried again to assist an oppressed people of a corrupt regime to stand up for themselves and fight for their country? Did the security agent know Guevara was from an upper middle class family in Argentina and that he joined these revolutionary movements from pure altruism, (even going to the Congo to lend aid and support after Cuba was finding its way with Castro in charge and his own stint as representative to the United Nations was over?)

al·tru·ism
Pronunciation: 'al-tru-"i-z&m
1 : unselfish regard for or devotion to the welfare of others
2 : behavior by an animal that is not beneficial to or may be harmful to itself but that benefits others of its species

This human animal, afflicted by asthma and having survived the Cuban revolution and his stint in the Congo, took to the mountains of Bolivia, (after traveling in disguise,) to handle a rifle once again in order to help the oppressed peoples, knowing it could, and likely would, die. (“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you, for greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for that of his friends.” John 15:13-14) Che Guevara’s life fits both of the above definitions.

The security agent reiterated that I could simply turn the shirt inside out in order to comply but I refused to do that. It seemed worse to me than removing it, disrespectful.

My thoughts as all this was happening bordered on self-loathing. Too many times I have taken the easy road. Too many times I have chosen convenience over standing up for what I believed in. I thought of Cindy Sheehan and men setting themselves afire in protest of policies and acts they had virtually no power to stop or change. I thought it was time to get arrested. It would have been inconvenient but it would have ended the self-loathing, for a season anyway.

Instead I took off my t-shirt and folded it neatly into a square with Che on the inside, unable to see me cowering in the name of convenience. My friend had been kind enough to drive us down to San Diego. My fiancé and my daughter had graciously allowed me to go, knowing I would be out until midnight. I had just begun dinner and the teams were warming up on the field in front of me. Of course there are many excuses for my behavior just as there are a million excuses for why good people do not know better than to restrict freedom of speech or endorse oppression.

The security agent said the reason for forcing me to remove my t-shirt was because the San Diego Padres were my hosts and they would not tolerate any political statements.

Immediately after I removed my shirt and the security personnel left me to my hot dog, three guys filed into the bleachers dressed as Castro, complete with fake beards and olive drab fatigues. They screeched whistles and hoisted a Cuban flag with the words “Cuba Libre,” written across it. (“Free Cuba.”) They were never accosted by security. Rather, they were given free reign to move front and center to the right centerfield fence and pose for pictures, whistle out to the warming up Cuban players, and suck on their mock Cuban cigars.

I was honestly not sure if these men meant to free Cuba from Castro or from US oppression but it seemed the only political statement being subdued was that which clearly endorsed Castro and what he, and Che Guevara, stand for. This, in the land of the free, where the constitution guarantees the right to freedom of speech?

foxes; not so bright

October 02, 2003
A new study based on a series of seven US polls conducted from January through September of this year reveals that before and after the Iraq war, a majority of Americans have had significant misperceptions and these are highly related to support for the war in Iraq.
The polling, conducted by the Program on International Policy (PIPA) at the University of Maryland and Knowledge Networks, also reveals that the frequency of these misperceptions varies significantly according to individuals’ primary source of news. Those who primarily watch Fox News are significantly more likely to have misperceptions, while those who primarily listen to NPR or watch PBS are significantly less likely.

this study is 2.5 years old but it is still relevant.

how does that old saying go? if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything. i can hear malcolm x saying it again today, were he still alive.

if you don't stand for truth in journalism, you'll fall for anything.
if you don't stand for honesty and integrity, you'll fall.
if you don't stand for taking the individual responsibility of being a good citizen and doing at least enough homework to understand what is going on in the political process that affects your friends, family and countrymen, then you'll fall for any old despot that comes along.
if you don't stand for ethical behavior, you'll fall for unethical behavior.

so many have fallen. in fact, based on the last election, it seems a majority of americans have fallen. they've fallen for a fox news network that has cozened them into believing their point of view is viable. and it isn't. just because they say it with a straight face and take themselves seriously does not mean i do, should or would.

it is not that i merely disagree with bill o'reilly or rush limbaugh, as they would have you believe about those opposed to them. it's that i do not take them seriously. i do not consider their perspectives in any way shape or form serious, learned or insightful. instead they are obnoxious, derisive and self-serving.

so how did these guys get on tv or radio? how did chris mathews become the hardball guy? i mean, it's hardball right? we're supposed to take him and his show seriously. it's top echelon political fodder. but, it isn't. i don't watch or listen to the shows of these guys i've mentioned often but when i have, it is not difficult to spot the moments when lies are presented as logic or the truth is relegated to rumor.

i know a lot of people who think the fox news is a viable outlet to get their news, if not "fair and balanced." i can't say that these people are idiots, (though occasionally that impulse may strike me.) rather, they've been lulled into an odd and sinister sense of security. from what i can tell, they tend to think most things are okay in the world around them. from that sense, they have become complacent and shed any sense of personal responsibility for their government. they may bitch and moan about it but by and large, they do not study the facts, (in fact, they may avoid them to avoid confrontation.) they don't try to stay informed nor up to date. critical thinking is a college course, nothing practical.

and this is how we got here. click on the title of this entry above and read the story about the study. deny it if you will. infer some bias if you need to avoid the confrontation w/ yourself. assume the university of maryland or the world public opinion is not to be trusted or part of some out of touch, liberal academia as o'reilly might characterize it in order to dismiss the substance of the message. or, just admit that you haven't necessarily lived up to all of your responsibilities as a citizen of this free country we live in and make some changes in a positive direction so that in the future you will be better informed, you will care a bit more and not choose the path of least resistence as a matter of course, and men of dick cheney's character do not end up in high office.

big or bad, shot

from the “left wing talk radio can be just like right wing radio at times,” department, I had to switch off a radio station because the callers on ed schultz’s air america show persisted in questioning the particulars of the dick cheney shooting incident.

the thing is, I don’t care which direction he was facing or if the sun was behind the victim, how the ground sloped or what quail do as they fly in relation to the ground. i don’t care if cheney was drinking before, during or after the incident. accidents happen. i accept that and i doubt cheney intended to shoot his friend on the ranch of the woman who hired him to run halliburton some years ago.

the problem is in the cover-up and in the expressed posture of cheney as vice president being somehow above the law.

Main Entry: ar·ro·gance Pronunciation: 'ar-&-g&n(t)s Function: noun: a feeling or an impression of superiority manifested in an overbearing manner or presumptuous claims

in the united states of america we pride ourselves on a perception of justice as being blind and on the idea of all men being created as equal. of all people, our elected leaders should embody these values. instead, dick cheney has, at every turn, exhibited arrogance. he has questioned those who would question him and the actions and/or motives of the administration he is a key member of.

when asked recently if he regretted saying the people of iraq were in the final throes of insurgency, (a statement clearly seen as false today,) he said 'no.' he could not bring himself to admit an error and this is the behavior that pisses off so many regular americans.

the fact that cheney and his accomplices in cover up did not quickly report the incident and act like law abiding citizens, and the fact cheney did not follow the ambulance to the hospital, are two reasons to believe he likely was hiding something. (something like his being intoxicated.) but, the cover up was successful and now the incident is merely old news.

and this is how our current crop of leaders behave. they do not speakup and are not forthright in any way, shape or form. when questioned, they become indignant. they often ask us to trust them. they out covert cia operatives then refuse to answer for it, relying on the best attorneys and our legal system to wiggle out of answering for their actions. they practice cronyism to such a degree, one would think they have the market cornered. whistle blowers who formerly worked on their side but have come to criticize their policies and their work, are routinely subjected to campaigns of slander. on and on it goes.

"Secrecy is the keystone of all tyranny. Not force, but secrecy ... [sic] censorship. When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, 'This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know,' the end result is tyranny and oppression, no matter how holy the motives. Mighty little force is needed to control a man whose mind has been hoodwinked; contrariwise, no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything —you can't conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him." -robert heinlein

the curious case of kobe bryant

Bill Plaschke wrote a piece on Kobe Bryant this week and while I usually do not care for Plaschke's work, and in this piece I think he was perhaps friendlier than necessary, I agreed with the main thrust of the piece. Kobe has been paying dues for a few years now and if I am, mad at him or disillusioned for his public mistakes, perhaps it is time to let bygones be bygone.

Plaschke's article was an excellent piece, (for an LA Times Sportswriter.) He may go a bit far in his love of Kobe, but at the same time he is right in proclaiming everyone else hard on him. The tricky thing about Kobe is the fact that the criminal justice system has either forgiven him, exonerated him or excused him, depending on how you want to look at it. That being the case, the Lakers and the NBA were/are only too happy to have him back on the court increasing the value of their product.

The tricky spot to be in is ours. For fans, this situation is a bit like knowing someone who has committed a murder, (let's just say,) but for whatever reason we are forced to live with this person and every single day, the person is just as nice as can be. The murderer is cordial and chatty, a good listener who gives of himself, has a sense of humor and is warm. In other words, we would be inclined to like the guy in every other way were it not for the fact he killed a person. But as time passes, and the nice input of the everyday interaction grows into a mountain of personal experience. . .(I guess it may be like the prison guard who grows close to a convict,) I think we forget or forgive or simply lose identification with the sin we still know of.

Kobe goes to work every day and he plays for my favorite basketball team. I see him doing his best all the time. I think he probably raped that girl in Colorado a few years back, (or at least had intercourse that was not concensual,) and that is unforgivable. I don't know for certain-it's just my feeling. I would never consider him a role model for myself or anyone else. I do find him to be immature on the whole. He lacks a certain grace, perhaps it is humility, actually.

I remember Jordan putting 63 up on the Celtics one year, (and if memory serves, it was in the playoffs.) I was living in japan so it had to be '86 or '87. I was stunned. I was wearing his shoes but I was still stunned. 63 points?! In this era?! Wilt was a physical specimen in his era unrivalled, but 63 points against a team w/ bird and mchale and parrish?!

I missed the game the other night. I had been watching sports earlier and had to give up the remote to maintain relations at home. (By the time the game against Toronto was on, I believe I was watching a movie called Hitch w/ my fiancé. Imagine the bullet contacting my chranium, shattering my skull and boring into my gray matter.) Bummer I missed it but I did get to see the highlights the next day on Sportscenter and as Kareem said, the variety I saw on the tape and in the box score is amazing. 7-14 from the 3-point line? 60% shooting from the field?! 18-20 from the line?! (Those are from memory so if there's a slight error...) that's 18 more points than Jordan scored when he impressed me so. 81? Yep, 81. 81!?!

I don't know if Jordan's performance was more impressive because he was playing a great team and it was the playoffs or if Kobe's was because he went for 81!?! I'm sure Kobe's field goal percentage was higher. I know Kobe is easily the closest thing this league has seen to Jordan since Jordan, and that is primarily because of his jump shot and the elevation he gets in order to shoot it. He is not Michael Jordan. Not today anyway. Then again, at 27 he may just be entering his prime. And with three championships under his belt and a lifetime of experience to draw on, I am closer to believing he could eclipse Jordan today than ever.

So it's hard to hate Kobe these days. He keeps showing up for work and perhaps thanks to Phil, he is getting better, (light years better than last year.) In my memory, he is likely a sex offender, but still, every third night or so, he is there, entertaining me while I eat dinner or play with my daughter. There is no one guy in the NBA who can stop him from scoring. Only a few teams have shown successful strategies for limiting his game. He plays defense like a mule: work, work, work. His shot is like chocolate. His sneer is fun to watch and his late game game, is unparalleled in the league today. He's so entertaining they should play scott Joplin when he walks on the court every night. And I can't help myself but re-embrace this guy.
To err is human and in so much as we have seen his errors, unlike just about any private person, he is super-human. Maybe having him in our faces every night doing daring acts of do on a basketball court is a lesson for us to know that even a sex offender can earn pardon by avoiding more trouble and being a responsible citizen in the time after the sin was committed? I don't know.

Native American tribes had very little crime in their midst in the days before this continent was invaded. When a man committed an undesirable act, he faced utter ostracism. I understand he could win his way back into the tribe but it took a considerable amount of time constantly showing regret and making amends. Because of that process and because of the consistency of treatment within the tribe, offenders were rare. That is not our world.

Our criminal justice system is set up to favor the wealthy, which explains why Kobe was not locked up and the key thrown out. He greased the machinery of justice plenty and while he still has endured much public derision and surely some personal problems, he avoided jail and a conviction. So maybe from Kobe we glean the essence of a dysfunctional system and we understand the nature of our society and its need to trade on commodities? I don't know.

Still, I think it is worth considering the duality within myself. I disdained Kobe both for the likelihood he committed a major crime, (a reprehensible act,) and for an immaturity evident in many of his public acts. And now he is in my face. And now he had a brilliant night, one for the ages. And now I find myself rooting for him more and more. And now I am supporting him for the MVP award, (stipulating the Lakers must make the playoffs.) It's not like suddenly I adore all things Kobe, but all things considered, I find I am rooting for him again. I don't know if this makes me a hypocrite or an ignorant or a dullard, I mean, I feel like a reasonable man, but I am, I'm rooting for him again.

freedom!

i've known for nine days now. tommy got parole.

he is still on the inside and said it could be up to two months before he is outside but he had three years lopped off of his sentence and i am ecstatic about that. he called me that evening and said he had talked to my dad but asked him not to say anything to me as he wanted to reach me and tell me himself. and he was excited. i could hear it in his voice.

he sounded like a reprieve. he sounded like the tommy buried deep down, the one not allowed to come out in prison, the goofy kid who used to tickle himself under the arm to make me laugh, just a little. i think that tommy is surfacing now. headed up. coming for some fresh air and so much more.

and i could not possibly be happier for him and for little tommy and for irene and for myself and for my dad. . .

i have spent brief times in jail in my life. the four days in los angeles county nearly killed me, or at least it felt like that. it wasn't simply the freedom restrained that felt bad, it was the cave mentality that was so utterly disheartening.

in jail, (at least in our jails and prisons in this country and i doubt they get much better elsewhere,) man can be seen going back a few centuries in time. as we evolve, we unevolve when conditions change. in jail i saw people hiding contraband in their rectums. i saw the world change from this big-brained man's world we live in back to the big man's world of yesteryear. there is no reasoning in jail. their is only muscle, power and brutality.

so i hope tommy did not lose himself. i hope the part of him that was buried deep down makes it to the fore and allows him to warm up, to warm up to his son and his family and the strangers out on the streets and the cops and the robbers and the homies and the man.

and if he wants to talk about it, henry shared a coldplay song with me the other day after reading my previous blog posting, i am here and would love to talk and help and be helped.

talk (by coldplay)

Oh brother I can't, I can't get through. I've been trying hard to reach you, 'cause I don't know what to do.
O brother I can't believe it's true. I'm so scared about the future and I wanna talk to you. Oh, I wanna talk to you.
You can take a picture of something you see. In the future, where will I be?
You could climb a ladder up to the sun, or write a song nobody has sung or do something that's never been done.
Are you lost or incomplete? Do you feel like a puzzle you can't find your missing piece? Tell me how you feel.
Well I feel like they're talking in a language I don't speak. And they're talking it to me.
So you take a picture of something you see. In the future, where will I be?
You could climb a ladder up to the sun, or write a song nobody has sung or do something that's never been done. Do something that's never been done.
So you don't know where your going and you wanna talk. But you feel like you're going where you've been before.
Tell anyone who listens that you feel ignored. And nothing's really making any sense at all.
Let's talk, Lets talk. Let's talk, Let's talk

parole

my brother sees the parole board today. everybody is optimistic. everybody is guarded.

tommy has been away for five years now. he has has missed 6-11 of little tommy's life. (he has missed 2-16 of his older son levi's life, but that is another story.)

don't ask me what tommy did to end up in prison. i don't know. i know about the running from the law and i have some idea about some past activities and i know what he was incarcerated for in nevada but i don't know why he was extradited back to colorado after serving two years in the silver state. i don't want to know.

in the past i have asked tommy what got him into trouble and he has himmed and hawed and looked away and smiled, exposing a mix of shame and pride and reluctance to share. and that was that.

for me what's done is done. i want tommy to get out of prison and to become a positive force in the lives of his sons. i look to the future.

the parole board will know exactly what tommy did, why he is imprisoned. when they look at him they will see the tattoos and the hardened exterior. in his file they will see his gang affiliation and perhaps his status within the gang.

i have no idea what criteria the board will use in determining tommy's fate. i guess they will consider his record since he has been on the inside. i suppose time served will be a factor. i assume they will take into account his original crime or crimes.

i hope they will be fair. i hope they will consider their own sins of the past. i hope they read the letter i sent them and i hope they appreciate how i shortened it out of respect for their busy lives.

here is the letter i faxed to tommy's parole officer last week to be presented today to the people who are to consider paroling him.

January 4, 2006
Faxing to (719)555-4168
Esteemed Members of Parole Board,
I have condensed a much larger letter into the following bullet points to entreat you to consider my brother for parole. I appreciate your consideration on Tommy’s behalf.
· Tommy has been absent for five of the most fundamentally important developmental years of his son’s life.
· It will be a challenge for Tommy to reassert himself into Little Tommy’s life and effectively parent him again so that Little Tommy can avoid the mistakes of his father, but it is important Tommy gets home and gets involved and becomes a force for positive change in the life of his 11-year-old son.
· Tommy has assured me he will do his best regarding his family and abstain from committing any acts of crime in the future and I believe him.
· My trust does not come easily. Tommy takes it seriously. I have never written a letter on his behalf, nor would I again if he were to let my nephew down.
· I am 40-years-old, (five Tommy’s senior,) and I have a 14-month-old daughter Tommy has not yet met, and I am getting married for the first, (and hopefully only,) time of my life on May 6, 2006, in Claremont, California, and I am hopeful my brother can attend this occasion and meet his niece; Terra Tresina James.
· Tommy and I have never met our biological fathers and our mother spent her life incarcerated before dying of a heroin overdose when Tommy was 15-years-old. This is no excuse but I hope you recognize statistical likelihoods and will consider giving Tommy the chance to change the direction of his life.
· I cannot guarantee Tommy’s future behavior but I promise you I will do my best to influence him positively as it relates to abstaining from his former ways. I am always available for my only brother and I mean to help.
Thank you so much for your time and consideration. Please feel free to contact me for any reason at all.

Sincerely,
Michael J James

i hope my letter helps.

mi ninez loca

terra is 14 months and it is odd to realize how deficient her long term memory is at this point. soon, she will lose all recollection of this time, of these first three years or so, really. (Ah, but i will remember.)

this and a friend's blog entry have had me thinking about my earliest times of consciousness, specifically what i remember and how different the world was through my eyes.

when i was three and four i lived with my grandpa and his next wife after my grandma, lupe. lupe was from mexico and for all intents and purposes, she was my mother figure from 3-8.

i remember spending my days at lupe's feet. wherever she was in the house, i tended to play on the floor near her, and this was usually in the kitchen. the smell of albondigas and menudo and pozole were so familiar to me i thought something was wrong when i would go into someone else's house and it did not smell the same.

i remember holidays, how i had to get up early with lupe and go from one end of la puente to the other to aunt virginia's house so they could start making tamales at 4:30am. aunt virginia's tv seemed to only get channel 9, which in those days was known as khj, so i would get a blanket and curl up on the floor in front of shows that were not cartoons and held no value to me whatsoever, (but everyone was sleeping and the outdoors was frosty so my choices were limited.)

i remember my cousin rudy eventually waking up on those holiday mornings and emerging from his room for me to pester. he was a bohemian, i think now in retrospect. i mean, he fits all the criteria. he was never in good standing with his family. he played the guitar. he was smarter and more insightful than everyone else as far as i was concerned. i remember years later when he moved to el monte and we visited him once and his tiny apartment was overrun with clothes and junk and food wrappers and how everyone verbally chastised him for this behavior. i think his mind was on higher things than tidiness.

rudy taught me how to play chess. he taught me well, too. we played virtually every time i showed up at his house, on east prichard street, and i remembered all through my adolesence and still play and have taught others. i read somewhere that chess exercises the brain in such a way it allows certain synapses to remain working substantially later into life than what happens in the brains of those who never played the game.

thank you, rudy. what ever happened to you? my inner child misses you.

i remember wrestling with lupe's youngest son, the only one who was still around for me; luis. everyone in the family called him squeaky-i do not remember why. it is a sad thing to lose memories. it is not so sad it makes one want to cry but it is sad. you feel as though you didn't care so much to have lost your grasp on the handles of factoids, to have let these little treasures slip away when you weren't paying attention.

luis used to torture me affectionately. he'd pin me and tap my sternum until i thought my head might explode. he'd let loogies drip out of his mouth and dangle over my face before sucking them back up, (usually.) in addition to pendejo, cabron, puto, dont-do, and chinga tu madre, he most definitely taught me how to say "tio?!"

relatives tell me i was fluent in spanish when i was four and five, but i don't recall that. i remember being comfortable with certain words for certain times of the day or certain events but both of my vocabularies were fairly limited in those days.

my best friend on greycliff avenue in those days was raymond, who lived down the street and was one year younger than me. no one in his house spoke english except him so when i showed up at his door, there was always a limited conversation of recognition and fetching raymond. i think he learned his english from me and he never could say lupe. for some reason he called her snoopy.

there were twins a few houses up the street from me named rafael and gustavo but they were two years older than me. still, they were good friends to me and i wonder what happened to those guys.

i loved that neighborhood. years later i moved to downtown la and lived there and in hollywood from 9-11. my mom's husband was mexican and the neighborhood was mexican and all of our friends were mexican but it was different from la puente. puente trese was like a street gang on training wheels compared to alpine, the members of which were ubiquitous in my life during those years. some got shot, some went to jail, but always the turnstile of people arriving and leaving and when those years concluded and i moved in with my uncle mark, he had just bought the house on greycliff avenue from my grandpa so lo and behold, i was back in la puente. back at del valle elementary school, (except on thursdays when i bussed to nelson school for an extra learning period.)

but lupe was no longer with me. she and my grandpa had moved to montebello. i came to a startling conclusion when i returned to my old neighborhood, i now lived with white people. to compensate for such misfortune, i did everything i could to look mexican. i begged for a black pair of hush puppies and i tried hard to wear an outfit with a button-down, blue shirt that i most identified as the uniform of my people.

to the kids in la puente, i wanted them to know i had came from la. i wanted them to know i had done time in mclaren hall in el monte. i was 11, this was the 6th grade, and i needed to out-mexican these kids by being harder then them. sure enough, with an attitude like that, i started getting into a lot of fights. i beat up a white kid named mark and two days later his older brother and another kid pummeled me but good. (i had to make up a skateboard accident to hide my new tendencies from an aunt and uncle i needed to impress.)

the culmination of all this was a fight with the school bully, a kid named jimmy who was seriously a foot taller than me. he had stalked me for about a week and i got tired of looking over my shoulder so one day after i school i tore of in his direction, sprinting from across the playground and screaming at the top of my lungs too. he turned and adopted an odd look. he was surprised and it was like he didn't know what to do. he put his hands up as if to box and braced himself and i remember jumping up on him, clasping my legs around his torso, (we fell,) and i started punching him on both sides of his grotesque chranium. it didn't last long. the screaming and the interminable sprint attracted much attention and i was pulled off him quickly but he had a bloody nose and was crying, literally, crying, in front of everyone who was there. i was still raging but i can remember the recognition that he was crying making me feel like quite the little champ.

not long after that a kid popped me in the eye and i had to tell my uncle it was from a fight. i painted myself the victim and wasn't punished in any way but i think my aunt and uncle moved us to covina in part because they thought the brown neighborhood was a little rough. . .

and it was in covina i lost my mexijo. (my mexican mojo.) covina had maybe 20% mexican families but the other 79% were white. white like dirt bikes and boats and long hair on boys and baseball not beisbol. white like led zeppelin-these people had never even heard of the chi-lites. the vitalis, ricky ricardo flip i had in the front of my hair was suddenly out of style and i'm pretty sure i was voted on to covina people magazine's ten worst dressed list.

but then one day i realized, i really am white. i really am, and was. the 25% of me that is of filipino descent may have given me a skin color similar to that of my mexican brethren and i suppose the white kids identified with me even less than the mexican kids, but 75% of me is white. (mostly irish with perhaps a bit of either german or english or welsch, or all three, and possibly a sliver of native american cherokee a few generations back on the white side but basically, a big mix of paleskin.)

i adapted quickly. i ran for class president, (basically as "the new kid,") and lost by 3%, (to the white girl i had a crush on; sally.) i played little league baseball and because of my own personal development, everything was just getting better in those days.

my little chicanito self fell away from me like a favorite coat that suddenly lost its lustre and just didn't quite fit anymore. in my heart, it remained; my love of the mexican culture, (as i knew it.)

i often tell people today i was mexican from 3 to 11, or that i was once a mexican, migrant farm worker. i cherish the memories i retain. i hold on to the idea that as a 6 or 7-year-old boy i lived in a mobile home in nipomo and bussed into santa maria to go to school and we picked strawberries when they were in season and potatoes when they were, and my uncle george dug for clams at 5am at pismo beach and how ricky went off to the marine corps and suzy drove a little blue karman ghia and how connie used to take me to the beach with her and the smell of fresh tortillas and authentic mexican foods and the sounds of their rolling r's when they would refer to the barrrrrio or when luis taught me to say viva la raza and the 'r' was hard, rolled like a taquito, and 'z' sounded like the 's' in style.

i don't miss it. i only cherish it. i miss my people, the ones i lost contact with because of the behavior of ridiculous adults.

i heard both uncles and one of my aunts all succumbed to diabetes. both my uncle manuel and uncle george lost limbs before ultimately dying. my aunt aurora is supposedly still living in santa maria, likely in the same house right across the street from the park with the rocket with the slide in it. i hope she is well and i hope robert and isaac, my once "cousins," are also thriving.

i have not seen nor heard from connie nor luis nor any of the others in close to 20 years.

in my 30s i remember looking around one day and realizing all of my friends i hung out with on a day-to-day basis were mexican and it did not surprise me.

my mexican friend who writes like garcia-lorca and who wears his mexicanness right next to his heart on his sleeve like a badge of honor, takes me back with his writing. (every time.) and i have to say, it's good to remember. it's good to have a history even if it is just your own and not that of a race of people.

persons of the year?

"For being shrewd about doing good, for rewiring politics and re-engineering justice, for making mercy smarter and hope strategic and then daring the rest of us to follow, Bill and Melinda Gates and Bono are Time's Persons of the Year."

i am not clear as to how i feel about this situation. on the one hand, i have adored bono for years. i like his music and i like his positivity, (for lack of a better word.) i also like my pc. i was pried away from my mac by lower prices, the business world and compatibility issues but i have adapted and i enjoy the modern conveniences and nuances of the information age.

on the other hand, i do not care for the wealthy class and clearly, these two cats are as wealthy as it gets. time calls the three of them, (melinda gates, bill's wife, being included,) "good samaritans." this is the news magazine passing judgment, (and it may be correct.)

still, just the other day i saw something on tv while watching a football game about how much cash the nfl and its partners have donated in charity this year and i was disgusted, completely and thoroughly disgusted.

i am sick of corporations lauding themselves for their charitable donations. i don't care if it is microsoft or general motors or the nba.

i don't give money to charity and i am not apologizing for it. i barely get by as it is. i would love to give money to charities i deem worthy of a donation but as it is, corporations are constantly trying to gouge me to increase their own profit margins and pad their coffers.

fuck them. fuck the corporation. it is time for us to get a grip on these institutions used to hide small, evil men.

when i hear about the massive donation this or that corporation made to some charity or another, (likely another entity not to be trusted,) i imagine the profit margin that allows for such a gift. it is the same with marketing campaigns.

marketing costs money so when i see a company spending a lot of marketing dollars, it pisses me off. imagine that profit margin. imagine how much they are over-charging you for their product. fuckin' creeps. (at least bono and u2's only royalty for their ipod commercials was in exposure and to mac's credit, they did not pay a whopping amount of cash to the artist.)

most people i associate with cannot go to a ball game, (nba, nfl, and the mlb, specifically, with the nhl and mls not far behind,) because they are priced out of the market. (forget season tickets.) i rely on gifts from the corporation to go to games.

i love to see a game and will enjoy most sports but i cannot afford to purchase my own tickets. my company has season tickets for the dodgers and i usually get those four seats 2-3 times per year. (the people i invite received the gift from the corporation just like i did.) i have relatives who often kick me down tickets to go see games that are paid for by their corporations.

i would like to buy myself a ticket to go see a game but by and large, i can't afford it. from all this i deduce the profit margins of corporations are too high.

so is bill (and melinda,) gates the good samaritan or the richest man in the world and are these mutually exclusive clubs? he got that rich by having a healthy profit margin, even though i love my yahoo music engine i listen to on my pc with windows xp. he has certainly spent a lot of money in advertising, (and paid the stones at least a couple of times.)

is there a rationale that suggests he needed to spend the advertising dollars to crush his competitors so he could be in the position to be the good samaritan? would the same sort of rationale exist for the profit margin? in order to grow the business, does the corporation have to behave in the ways we have come to expect, (i.e. high profit margins, large advertising budgets...)?

surely u2 and bono could have behaved more altruistically by demanding smaller profit margins for their records. but how reasonable is that? i think it is fair and reasonable to want to get to a place where you do not have to worry about money, or, that is, to worry about paying bills. I don't begrudge anyone who wants to work as hard as the guys in u2 do for making more money than me.

i like that u2/bono started www.one.org. it gives the individual both a chance to give to charity and a chance to "act locally," (as they say.) further, i trust this particular charity more than i do others because of the people involved. his work with data and jubilee 2000, (to say nothing of the live aid famine relief efforts,) is wonderful stuff. bono is truly a good samaritan. further, he works so hard, that is, his time is in such high demand, i admire his dedication.

bono has become the stuart smalley of crusading rock stars. he seems to lack the ability to offend. and i think back to when he was the young, angry rock star and i realize his anger was always against something everyone could agree with him on, (except perhaps a handful of north irish, protestant, terrorists.) i would this aspect of him were different, but then, he would not be bono.

it pains me he does not rage against agents of injustice, especially gven his position. but then, woulld he be in his position if he did? (that is a rhetorical question. no. he would not.)

i wish bono's reaction was not this big "i am so humbled," thing. it seems faux to me, which is oddly often other's complaint about him and something i am apt to defend him on usually. but this time, it is as if he is claiming to be unaware of who he is and what he does, as if there are a host of others in the world who are as effectively doing good in so many areas. then again, he has been so effective at controlling his image, i feel like i'm demanding perfection by being even this slightest bit critical.

so time's criteria for person of the year is based on who has affected the world most in that year. i remember the year it was the ayatollah khomeini, which reminds me the person is not expected to be admirable. w/ that in mind, i come full circle and can agree that time has made reasonable choices. cheers to these three and time's momentary diversion.

class warfare

i’m reading a really interesting book; a people’s history of the united states. it’s said that history is written by the victors so what howard zinn did in writing this book is he rewrote the history of the united states from the perspective of the masses, based on any reliable documents and sources he could find.

it is completely fascinating stuff. i’m only so far into it but it is amazing to see the same thing was happening then that is happening today. class divisions were the same. the white middle class was involved in politics etcetra but in reality was controlled by the upper classes. The masses of people of color were used as slave labor and such in order to increase the wealth of those above them. this is all happening today.

so from columbus landing on haiti and in the course of a few years destroying the indigenous arawak population completely in the name of stealing their gold and spices and whatever other natural resources they could take from the island to sell back in europe, to the slave trade in which ships were stocked with africans taken against their will and brought to north america, (a trip that often killed up to 2/3 of the slaves aboard the vessel, who were made to endure the trip in coffin-like conditions,) essentially because capitalizing on slave labor was the only way people could get ahead in the new world. . .to the indian wars and all the efforts and tactics used to suppress slave uprisings and rebellions like bacon’s or shay's, to the doctrine of manifest destiny when our government copied the old european catholic church and their divine right of kings in declaring that it was our obvious, god-directed destiny to push on to the other coast and rule/own the land, (in the name of manifest destiny we killed the indians and mexicans of california and arizona and took their land adding them to a long list of populations leveraged to the advantage of the few, the white, the wealthy,) the uppermost class can be seen in their fullest, most pronounced, powerful glory.

the book does a great job of outlining the policies that were put into place to protect the minority ruling class and this phenomenon happens today but the truth is, the masses are simply too ignorant to address it despite the power inherent in their numbers. in fact, it is often a combination of ignorance and a feeling or desire to be one of the wealthy, which keeps people in the dark as to the nature of the big picture and what their role or place in society really is.

many republicans today are on the short end of the stick, being taken advantage of regularly, but they have a belief that they, too, can and will be rich one day, (which is so unlikely they have to be viewed as buffoons to some degree.) we the people can talk about campaign finance reform until the cows come home but in fact, it is unlikely to happen and if it did, the rich would find other ways to make their money influence power. we sometimes talk about discarding the electoral college, a device ridiculously outdated and unnecessary, but likely to stay in place for a long time still because it is a tool which may or may not be used [by the wealthy] to take advantage.

did bush win in 2000? no. we are even privy to this information that he lost the popular vote but it is said that the rules are in place and we value fair play above all else, which is of course a joke, but the fooled do not like to admit they’ve been snookered.

did he win in 2004? unlikely. more likely true is the side that won cheated. i won't go into issues in ohio and elsewhere, related to the counting of votes and who was allowed to vote, etc., that make me think it is at the very least, plausible that these guys cozened their way into power that time, too. we were told bush won the popular vote this time, and while i have my suspicions i hate the idea of being marginalized by someone who would throw around the word "conspiracy."

i have to admit, it is strange to me we [the people] cannot see and evaluate these things in time’s big picture and simply get together on the idea that we will not be oppressed any longer.

marx predicted the ruling class would need to go overseas for cheap labor and that is happening today. wealth is being concentrated into the hands of fewer and fewer individuals every day, though those who are wealthy are wealthier than ever. In the u.s., we manufacture less and less. labor is cheaper elsewhere and that is where industries go in order to prosper. our economy is becoming one based on consumerism. how long do you think that can last?

so far, we’ve been, (or rather, the wealthy class has been,) especially clever at keeping the masses basically satisfied and at bay. but think about it. in the ‘50s one man provided for a family of (let’s say,) five. that family likely had a nice big cadillac and a house in the suburbs and everything the joneses from next door had.

to maintain that very same lifestyle today, both man and woman have to work. and even then, it's just a lifestyle. how far are they from poverty? two months? if a stock market crash occurs, who will weather the storm with grace? not 99% of the people who live basically check to check and have outstanding debts.

(as for me, i've been thinking of taking an extra, part-time job. i am not making ends meet.)

we still make some cars and some other stuff but not much. jobs are going overseas in record numbers. and speaking of overseas, china has a very interesting experiment underway. they are allowing for a wealthy class within their otherwise socialist structure. the difference from us is they do not let that minority class of people set their policies and ultimately rule them.

(we do. one good example would be the way we can pass legislation like legalized medicinal marijuana then stand idly by as the ruling class uses the federal government to intercede and maintain the prohibition.)

speaking of how clever our ruling class has been at keeping us basically happy and at bay, they have turned incarceration into an industry unto itself. in our capitalistic society, one either works or they end up in the hospital or the prison or on the street. that is basically true.

laws like three strikes (and you’re out!) have created a booming industry. prison guard unions have become some of the most powerful unions in the country and as you might imagine, having so many peers right on the other side of the fence has legitimized the entire process and policy. (we incarcerate at a higher rate than any country on the planet. why do we put up w/ this?)

people are good at seeing black and white and apt to see things that way. in the future, when people look back on us, they will see the creative ruling class pitting us against one another, by criminalizing consensual crimes, by emphasizing differences in belief systems so that people in the lower classes would feel superior to one another and fight with one another rather than turn their attention onto those who oppress them, in order to occupy us and keep us from questioning them and their tactics.

this stuff sounds like the vitriol of class warfare but I promise you, I am not interested in that, (per se,) however, it may just naturally follow that what I would change would look like class warfare.

what i have learned from zinn's book is that we americans have been taking advantage of others for a long time. and of course, this is what capitalism is all about. we arrived as european emmisaries and we took advantage of the indigenous populations and the land. we took advantage of a race of people by enslaving them.

now we are the mightiest nation on the planet and we are running out of groups to take advantage of. those we took advantage of based on their skin color have revolted and gained their freedom. those we took advantageof based on their gender have pulled themselves up to equal status and protections under the law.

today we take advantage of peoples from other, (less affluent,) states, (namely mexico.) we yell and scream about how they are in our country illegally and how important it is for us to make stricter immigration laws while failing to recognize the blow our economy would suffer if they were suddenly all gone. food first, a group intent on eliminating malnutrition, considers migrant farmworkers the modern plantation worker. (i suppose they find use of the word 'slave," unseemly.) http://www.foodfirst.org/pubs/backgrdrs/2004/sp04v10n2.html

i say we are running out of people to take advantage of but in as much as that is true, there is an entire globe of people and places out there.

it is (not so) funny to see how the various presidents placed themselves in the role of "father," to the various groups we mistreated, telling creek and seminoles their "father," cared about them deeply and would protect them if they would just move west, only to pillage and plunder and indirectly abuse them at every turn. when voices like lincoln and thoreau and emerson can be heard speaking out against our tyrrany, they were marginalized in much the same manner the voices of today are. (how shocked i was to hear no less than walt whitman urge us on in our conquests.)

but here is this book of zinn's presenting the facts, and the heroes, those whose words will ring true forever, are these men of justice, while the names of presidents like jackson and van buren and polk fade into obscurity. history truly is a great judge.

i am anxious for the second half of this book and all that i will learn. and maybe one day i can write about what we can do today to hasten our own evolution, stop repeating the crimes of the past and move toward a more balanced view of our lives and our species.