If we are ever going to have peace again, we will have to hate war for some better reasons than that we fear to lose our houses, or our refrigerators, or our cars, or our legs, or our lives. If we are ever to get peace, we have got to desire something more than reefers and anesthetics - but that is all we seem to want: anything to avoid the pain.
It is terrifying that the world doesn't wake up to this irony: that at a time when all our desire is nothing but to have pleasant sensations and avoid painful sensations, there should be almost more pain and suffering and brutality and horror, and more helplessness to do anything about it, than there ever was before!
-Thomas Merton- June 25th, 1940
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
shoes on the road
when i see shoes on the road it disturbs me.
it isn't that someone threw out a pair of shoes, or that someone lost a pair of shoes.
it makes me think that there was some sort of accident there and that someone died,
and all that was left was their shoes.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
some recent happenings . . . some are true, some are lies. you figure it out.maria was recently trapped in a bathroom during a blackout.
i discovered that i have five nipples.
my ears have been plugged for about a week now.
maria and i gave a drunk woman (she was drinking gin and juice) a ride to nowhere in particular.
a snake bit maria and i sucked the poison out of the wound . . . at least that's what i told her.
maria was stung by a bee and peed on in the span of about an hour.
a lamp was given to us.
every sunday i have to take Peptobismol because i get nervous poops.
maria quit her job and is now a flight attendant with Southwest Airlines.
i quit my job and took a job from someone else . . . sucker.
maria and i watched the Ricky Gervais stand up special twice since we bought it.
i now understand the meaning of life . . . and i am not going to share it with anyone.
i want to get a shark tattoo.
i should probably go to bed.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
an excersise in futility
i was going to write an angry blog about how much i hate McDonald's coffee commercials. after i had written part of it i realized that there really wasn't any good reason to do that. so, instead, here are some funny pictures of pug dogs. enjoy.
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Love's as warm as tears: by C.S. Lewis
Love's as warm as tears,
Love is tears:
Pressure within the brain,
Tension at the throat,
Deluge, weeks of rain,
Haystacks afloat,
Featureless seas between
Hedges, where once was green
Love's as fierce as fire,
Love is fire:
All sorts--Infernal heat
Clinkered with greed and pride,
Lyric desire, sharp-sweet,
Laughing, even when denied,
And that empyreal flame
Whence all loves came.
Love's as fresh as spring,
Love is spring:
Bird-song in the air,
Cool smells in a wood,
Whispering "Dare! Dare!"
To sap, to blood,
Telling "Ease, safety, rest,
Are good; not best."
Love's as hard as nails,
Love is nails:
Blunt, thick, hammered through
The medial nerves of One
Who, having made us, knew
The thing He had done,
Seeing (what all that is)
Our cross, and His.
Love is tears:
Pressure within the brain,
Tension at the throat,
Deluge, weeks of rain,
Haystacks afloat,
Featureless seas between
Hedges, where once was green
Love's as fierce as fire,
Love is fire:
All sorts--Infernal heat
Clinkered with greed and pride,
Lyric desire, sharp-sweet,
Laughing, even when denied,
And that empyreal flame
Whence all loves came.
Love's as fresh as spring,
Love is spring:
Bird-song in the air,
Cool smells in a wood,
Whispering "Dare! Dare!"
To sap, to blood,
Telling "Ease, safety, rest,
Are good; not best."
Love's as hard as nails,
Love is nails:
Blunt, thick, hammered through
The medial nerves of One
Who, having made us, knew
The thing He had done,
Seeing (what all that is)
Our cross, and His.
Sunday, December 21, 2008
The Pursuit part III
The Pursuit part III
Arty stood in the entry way of the church waiting for the funeral service to be over. It was a bright fall day. The sun pierced through the dying trees and made them almost glow with color. Bright reds and oranges burning against the blue, cloudless sky. His wife stood next to him, although she would have rather been in a separate room. It was Arty’s fault that her son was left to die in the woods. She couldn’t believe that he would just leave his son like that, how he could be so careless. But there was no point in making it known to everybody how she felt. It was easier to pretend for the time being. She would never tell Arty what she thought either; she would just become more and more distant. That would be his punishment, an increasingly miserable home life. Maybe he would die next, that would be true justice.
Arty knew if wasn’t his fault, but couldn’t help but feel that it was. Had they stayed at the cabin a few days longer instead of going home maybe they could have found him. They stayed two weeks longer than they had planned. Everyday they went in search of his son, trying to find any sign of him. Search groups had been called in. It felt as if they had searched the entire forest. In reality they only covered a small portion. The experts had made a graph and created boundaries. “He couldn’t go any further than this,” they would say. He knew they were wrong. Graphs can’t account for reality. Anything is possible. The closest they came to finding him was a deer carcass that looked as though it had been gutted with a knife. It may have been the deer they had been looking for in the first place.
“Whenever you’re looking for something you always end up finding something else, and it’s never something better.” Arty mumbled to himself as he walked out of the church. Everybody else had gotten into their cars and waited to follow the hearse holding the empty casket out to the cemetery. Arty stood alone under the fire red leaves of the trees outside of the church. His wife sat in the car crying quietly, waiting for the husband she couldn’t forgive to drive her to the cemetery to her son’s grave. The casket was hoisted into the hearse. Arty made his way towards his car. He wished they would have at least found the body. At least then he could have said goodbye.
He wasn’t sure how long it had been since he had burned the maps. After it had rained everything was wet and the only thing he could find to burn was the paper in his bag. It had started burning when he realized what he had used to start the fire. Panic set in, he tried to grab at the maps and he burned his hand. They were useless now. He was as good as dead.
He didn’t stray far from the deer at first. It was a source of food, but he couldn’t bring himself to kill it. He needed to wait for it to die. He would have had no trouble shooting it from yards away, but up close, it was too real. The deer stared at him with fear in its eyes. It shook and tried to get up. This creature was so strong not very long ago, but now it is helpless. It felt wrong to not give it a chance. So he waited. Once it died he took some meat and stood over it. He wondered how old it was, if it had ventured very far from this area of forest, and if it understood what was happening to it once that bullet hit. He imagined that it didn’t.
After the maps had been burned it was day after day of looking for a stream or any sounds to follow. He didn’t know what to do in this situation so all he could do was try something, anything, to find his way back. At night he would try to find the North Star, but the clouds covered everything. It was black. It was hopeless. Try as he might he could never find what he was looking for. It was always one ravine after another, surrounded by inextinguishable landscape. Everything blended together, and worked perfectly together. He was amongst the perfection of nature, but he struggled because he was not part of it. He no longer understood how it worked and so could not participate in its perfection. The only way he could contribute is in death. His body would bring life to the undergrowth by decaying. He continued to search for home.
He ate whatever he could. It was not long before he was out of ammunition and could no longer hunt. He drank from tiny streams and rain water. He was able to step into nature every once in a while, borrow what he needed and become an outsider again. He could still never be a part of it. He tried all he could to learn from it.
Eventually he found the way. He could not say how.
He stood outside of the cabin where his father had worried and cried over the loss of his son. He stood outside of the cabin and saw that there were no lights on. No one was there. Just an empty box buried deep in nature. A human attempt at becoming a part of the perfection. He stood outside. He knew there was a phone inside. He would go in, pick it up and call home. “I’m going to be fine.” He’d tell them.
Arty stood in the entry way of the church waiting for the funeral service to be over. It was a bright fall day. The sun pierced through the dying trees and made them almost glow with color. Bright reds and oranges burning against the blue, cloudless sky. His wife stood next to him, although she would have rather been in a separate room. It was Arty’s fault that her son was left to die in the woods. She couldn’t believe that he would just leave his son like that, how he could be so careless. But there was no point in making it known to everybody how she felt. It was easier to pretend for the time being. She would never tell Arty what she thought either; she would just become more and more distant. That would be his punishment, an increasingly miserable home life. Maybe he would die next, that would be true justice.
Arty knew if wasn’t his fault, but couldn’t help but feel that it was. Had they stayed at the cabin a few days longer instead of going home maybe they could have found him. They stayed two weeks longer than they had planned. Everyday they went in search of his son, trying to find any sign of him. Search groups had been called in. It felt as if they had searched the entire forest. In reality they only covered a small portion. The experts had made a graph and created boundaries. “He couldn’t go any further than this,” they would say. He knew they were wrong. Graphs can’t account for reality. Anything is possible. The closest they came to finding him was a deer carcass that looked as though it had been gutted with a knife. It may have been the deer they had been looking for in the first place.
“Whenever you’re looking for something you always end up finding something else, and it’s never something better.” Arty mumbled to himself as he walked out of the church. Everybody else had gotten into their cars and waited to follow the hearse holding the empty casket out to the cemetery. Arty stood alone under the fire red leaves of the trees outside of the church. His wife sat in the car crying quietly, waiting for the husband she couldn’t forgive to drive her to the cemetery to her son’s grave. The casket was hoisted into the hearse. Arty made his way towards his car. He wished they would have at least found the body. At least then he could have said goodbye.
He wasn’t sure how long it had been since he had burned the maps. After it had rained everything was wet and the only thing he could find to burn was the paper in his bag. It had started burning when he realized what he had used to start the fire. Panic set in, he tried to grab at the maps and he burned his hand. They were useless now. He was as good as dead.
He didn’t stray far from the deer at first. It was a source of food, but he couldn’t bring himself to kill it. He needed to wait for it to die. He would have had no trouble shooting it from yards away, but up close, it was too real. The deer stared at him with fear in its eyes. It shook and tried to get up. This creature was so strong not very long ago, but now it is helpless. It felt wrong to not give it a chance. So he waited. Once it died he took some meat and stood over it. He wondered how old it was, if it had ventured very far from this area of forest, and if it understood what was happening to it once that bullet hit. He imagined that it didn’t.
After the maps had been burned it was day after day of looking for a stream or any sounds to follow. He didn’t know what to do in this situation so all he could do was try something, anything, to find his way back. At night he would try to find the North Star, but the clouds covered everything. It was black. It was hopeless. Try as he might he could never find what he was looking for. It was always one ravine after another, surrounded by inextinguishable landscape. Everything blended together, and worked perfectly together. He was amongst the perfection of nature, but he struggled because he was not part of it. He no longer understood how it worked and so could not participate in its perfection. The only way he could contribute is in death. His body would bring life to the undergrowth by decaying. He continued to search for home.
He ate whatever he could. It was not long before he was out of ammunition and could no longer hunt. He drank from tiny streams and rain water. He was able to step into nature every once in a while, borrow what he needed and become an outsider again. He could still never be a part of it. He tried all he could to learn from it.
Eventually he found the way. He could not say how.
He stood outside of the cabin where his father had worried and cried over the loss of his son. He stood outside of the cabin and saw that there were no lights on. No one was there. Just an empty box buried deep in nature. A human attempt at becoming a part of the perfection. He stood outside. He knew there was a phone inside. He would go in, pick it up and call home. “I’m going to be fine.” He’d tell them.
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