Beware the Vapor Lock of the Mind

Beware, the vapor lock of the mind.

If you insist on being merely human, with its ordinary program of choices, then you must accept that fleas-biting-your-knees, and pigs-rushing-to-slop also have their own personal agenda.

A City Philosopher was once out-a-musing, “Ah, the temporary, and unsatisfying nature of force.  You may subdue a people today, but you later must subdue them again.  And later still, subdue them you might, but conquer them, never.  Ah, alas.”  An old Major passing by thought, “Alas, my khaki knickers, what do these civilians want from life?  At least the muther-fuckers would be subdued.”

One amateur City thinker said, after a heady bout with certain “problems,”  “My brain feels like it was rode hard, and put up wet.”

Even with as much leeway as I try and give ‘em in the City, can you believe there are still those who want to raise a stink about famous people “lying” in their autobiographies?  Can you believe that?

J.

Right Now is "It"

The past is a horrid thing to remember.

Regarding a comment he had just heard about a particular incident, a chap exclaimed, “Jeeze, that’s depressing,” and a passer-by added, “Hell, EVERYthing’s depressing.”

If the rich were truly rich, they’d have more minutes in an hour than anyone else.

Let us never forget that historic case, that great legal precedent, upon which we base our right to abandon the City, the case of the State vs. Whoopee.

The Revolutionist has never “seen better days,” or, “known better times.”  Right now is always “It,” (or at least as near as the present can come to it.

Hint: If you come in second, don’t give interviews.

J.

Guilt - The Ultimate Feedback

“Well,” admitted one ole lackey, “I guess I can find it acceptable to be marginally congenial.”

And now, today’s lesson in the surrealistic measurements and executions of City logic and its unresolved entanglement with unaccounted time:  Things must surely be improving, day by day, year by year.  Do you notice how few new cars you see immobilized by the highway, but how many older models are so?  And, note the dates on headstones to realize how many more of the elderly are in the cemeteries than the young.

I recently ran across an elderly man who was sitting with his head in his hands, and softly moaning.  I asked him, “Crying over opportunities missed?”  “No,” he whispered.  “Tears for youthful dreams not realized,” I queried.  He shook his head.  “Ah, then,” said I, “regrets that life caused you to ultimately abandon your high ideals and made you ‘sell-out’ to the highest bidder in the crass marketplace?”  “No,” he groaned, “I was just thinking that HAD life ever noticed me, how cheaply I COULD have been bought.”

Guilt:  The ultimate feed-back.

I heard this one on the bathroom wall of that new City joint:

“We’re the boys
who make the noise
to suit our private ends,
and there’s the ass
who rose too fast,
and gave his brain
the bends.”\

J.

Logic

The “thing” about Bush-logic is that it is absurd.

Revolutionist consciousness is somewhat like a symphony conductor in that what he appears to be presently doing is not all THAT important; the REAL work was all done in rehearsals.

Would a Revolutionist attract any recruits were he to say that the point of all this was to, although being middle class, common and ordinary, not to care?

May we not either “hear it for” or, have a “moment of silence” for those in the City who would verbally, and intellectually dissect an abstract painting.

In times of great political stress and social upheaval, Men will right-off accuse others so as to divert attention and suspicion away from themselves.  Nope, no personal significance whatsoever.

J.

Chance

The Safe Statement Award for 1988, given posthumously to he who first said:

“After all, SOMEthing must be left to chance.”

Over at one of those City Houses of Still Repute, I heard this rather poetic prayer of relief, (at least I think that’s what it was), and it went thusly, “God knows I’m not what I should be.  God knows I’m not even what I COULD be.  But thank God I’m not what I once THOUGHT I was.”

“Specialization,” declared the gentleman, “specialization must be the proper approach to things.  General knowledge just couldn’t be of much real value, or the military wouldn’t have it.”

You could guess bricks, blocks, or poured concrete, but you would still have missed it.  The most common foundation is fear.

The Dead rise slowly.

J.

Death

Criticism, even hostility, from the People is praise indeed.  Just their indifference can almost bring you to tears of joy.

Another semi-old sorehead noted, “Doesn’t really matter who you marry ‘cause you end up with someone else anyway.”  Yet they still expect one plus one to equal the predictable. Ha!

Efforts and funds can certainly make crooked roads straight, but without them, crooked roads ARE still roads, and they will still take you somewhere.

Anyone who believes that “great deeds are done,” and “history made,” when Men struggle with other Men, have not the slightest suspicion of where the real conflict lies.

“You know,” said he, “death is just a pencil without an eraser.”

J.

Molecules that Talk

From his view atop a bar stool in the City, a stone cutter can scoff at the proclaimed significance of art and literature, and deny any pertinence thereof to his own life, and yet, without the esoteric odes, and the abstract musing of the distant poets and painters, the mason’s beer would not be so rich, his perch so stable, nor the bar top so smooth.  (I could ask you again, “Is that weird, or what?”  But what’s so strange about the skeleton of Life?)

If you only rely on a form, then almost any form of justice may be less than correct.  If you merely treat people as they may obviously seem to deserve, you may be doing less than a Real Revolutionist should.

Man:  The Creature with molecules that make noise…molecules that talk!

Truism Update #34:  Genius is one percent perspiration, and ninety-nine percent everything else.

In the City, I’ve heard painting denounced as being merely “decorative.” Well, if it’s not serving the purpose of covering a hole in the wall, what do City folks think is the alternative?

J.

Selective Memory

It is a case of “mis-speak” for Men to decry “short cuts,” when what is actually referred to is imperfect short-cuts, for no one, including Life itself, can fault real efficiency.  Life LOVES efficiency…Life fully embraces all increases in efficiency…well, it does most of the time…well, okay, some of the time…

Which of the two following alternatives should be the rule of etiquette, for a really civilized Man: “Never kick a cripple in is bad leg,” or, “Never kick a cripple in his good one.”  Wait just a second, think about it once more.  Think about it as though you are the kicker AND the cripple.

Under certain conditions, it would not be totally unthinkable to hear a Revolutionist shout out, “Hell, I’d rather do without than be moderate.”  Being merely moderate, at times, can be like being “nearly close.”

Even if the train has left, or was even late beforehand, rely on this: A Real Revolutionist remembers ONLY that which serves his purpose.

The past is a terrible thing to use.

J.

Beware the Linoleum of the Mind

For a Real Revolutionist, nothing can be completely useless.

If a thing, an anything, has any deficiency, then its opposite must be equally flawed.  (You do know what this implies regarding the City sense of right and wrong, good and evil, etc?)

While a blatant, disturbing example may be properly kept waiting-at-the-door, a mere theory, a pleasant precept, or a proverb, is always welcome in the foyer.

Beware the linoleum of the mind.

No matter what their priests may sing, no matter how fine may read their chamber of commerce welcome signs, tarry not in a land where the people dress up their vegetables like little children.

J.

Nothing and Everything

C, D, and E are always engaged in a fight for temporary domination, and thus the façade and face of so-called “evil” is always shifting.

Out in the Western section of the Bushes, I heard one ole Revolutionist take a City axiom and turn it just right.  He would sometimes say, “It may be hard, BUT, it may be right.”

The kind of person who furrows up their brow, and seriously says, “I just don’t understand how I can get so angry,” is the same sort who can’t quite figure out if UFO expose’ books are a joke or not.

A fellow defending himself in response to the accusation that he is emotionally “one dimensional,” says, “Not so, I can be pissed standing up, and pissed sitting down.”

Nothing proves nothing.

But, nothing also proves everything.

J.

Patience

Patience is to genius, as butter is to Velcro.  And aggression is to Art as time is to perversion.

With the ordinary, curiosity ends up as alum to the mind.  The continuing mis-diagnosis-of-interests.

“Be careful, dearest, and do not step on a small historian.”  “Mindful now, my darling, that you do not rush out into the street and trip a car, or damage a lorry.”  “Wait up, my sweet bon bon; do not go into the public library and stick out your tongue at Dr. Johnson’s writing.”  “No, no, my little pleasant one, do not speak of your fellow man with your mouth full of adjectives.”

From one unusual, but useful view, a wild animal IS domesticated if there is one person he doesn’t bite.

The duty of the patient is to wait.

J.

New Excusions of the Universe

What I offer are new excursions of the universe; not the mere external one, but the important one, the fun one, the universe of the consciousness.

Why is it that in City literature, villains can be allowed no redeeming qualities?  Is it that ordinary consciousness cannot tolerate or comprehend C and D in too close proximity?

And for those suffering from acute cockiness, and insufferable perkiness, I have it on pretty good authority that the likes of you will have to continue your daily exercises even after you’re dead.  Ghastly, eh what?  Oh, and if that don’t make-your-day, or eternity, as it were, then there is an extra; you must write your authorized biography, and then read, and re-read it ad infinitum.  Speaking of Ghastly times.

Obviously relieved, I heard a City cosmopolitanite say of a recent dinner companion, “Well, at least he was all style, thank god, and no substance.”

A Revolutionist, in regards to his portion of necessary City existence, might live in E, plan in C, and protect himself in D.  First Variation Thereon, Koechel Listing #20:  In a “Fictitious-Revolutionist-City,” he in charge might have his Philosophers residing in C; his tutu-attired Generals quartered in D, and all of his supporters, opponents, priests, politicians and everyone else housed in mobile E units.

J.

The Short Version

From a certain quirky, non-geometric view, the history of a thing IS the thing.

It is only the dead what don’t complain, (but just that possibility makes me sweat butterbeans).

There was this City person who evidently believed he had the final answer to the quandary of mortality.  He simply proposed that only those actions be labeled, “immoral,” which were physically impossible.

A Revolutionist has no REAL courage until he can freely kick the dead.

Over near the Southwest Sector of the City, I heard an ole sorehead’s grandfather say, “Seems like I came and went before I really had time to look around good.”

Then there was this guy who had a single guiding motto in life; one thing he would always say, “Yeah, yeah, gimmie the short version.”

S

The Past

If you can’t laugh without feeling superior, you can’t laugh correctly.

If you begin to feel that even just everyday life is lacking a paradigm, you may be onto something.

The past is a horrible place to be.

If mere “happiness” is the aim, then where is the weapon, and who has the ammo?

If you entertain any dreams regarding what the future may say about you, you might as well go on back the City, they’re probably ready to name a street or sewer after you.

J.

Up to Speed

How can a City-ite know they’re finally “up to speed”?  When they begin to fault the present, fear the future, and adore the past.

Heard one pointy nosed City dude claim that life had “trashed his mind,” but I don’t really think his little room was ever all that neat to begin with.  (Don’t keep calling room service if they’re gonna keep sending up that chemical engineer who’s deaf and dumb.  I can get overheated and blow up all by myself.)

Without real, sincere flattery, the verbal hierarchy of the City would be in peril.

A certain City General, in addressing a crowd, once stated, “A State should have no habitual hatred, or habitual fondness for any other State, for such animosity, or affection, can lead one to act against one’s own best political interests.”  And a chap standing over by a fig newton tree thought to his ole’ self, “Hey, he should have been one of them mind doctors.”  And the General thought, “No, the battlefields would be much too small.”

When animal elections end, tyranny begins.  Oh, I’m sorry that should be, “ANNUAL elections”…no, I was right the first time.

J.

Universal and Local Conditions - Part 2

Even whilst the price of understanding remains beyond the grasp of most, stupidity continues to be a penny a ton…Local conditions told one guy, "Hey, life knows what it's doing!"  And life suddenly walked up and added, "Yeah!"

One man thought, "This stuff continues to be so confusing that I can barely tolerate it." And just out of his hearing the future chuckled and thought, "Yeah, but when you finally realize how simple it is you'll likely wish you were back to thinking how confusing it is."

Would-be mystics still of simpleminded persuasion always believe that Istanbul is some way off: maybe pretty far...or maybe not, but certainly of some distance....If you're waiting for a punch line to this, you're one of the ones still waiting for a train to take you to that mythical city.

J.

Though the ordinary believe that things should be different, here are the facts:

first is the obvious fact that no one sees,

(which is that) everyone is just as they must be;

and secondly, the fact that a few can be otherwise.

Mental Workbook

The stance of the mystical warrior is neither positive, nor negative, but someplace in between.

Everyone talks to themselves, but only a few ever learn from it.

(For long do most believe things

                 more complex than they actually are.)

A man reached the place where he stopped and pondered, "Is 'The Secret' something you discover through mystical effort, or is it the discovery of the proper effort?"

 (For long are men unclear that

the effort is the aim.)

  Do note: The original mind can be educated, but not enlightened.

 For those of you who do still prefer your descriptions occult and mysterious, perhaps the most telling of all possible verbal comparisons is to call man's ordinary state of mental awareness Local consciousness, and the achieved consciousness Universal....(But even as "otherworldly" as this may sound, the reality of it still quite Earthy and everyday.)

The mystical warrior has no home, no nationality, and is stateless, except for the one true one.

J.

So, Here We Are Again, Anew

As you hear and consider my latest series of communiqués, I remind you that just because something makes you laugh does not mean that it’s a joke.  Even my stories and comments that seem most immediately humorous and obvious have another intent, and do offer normally unused measurements regarding the height, width, depth, and times of Life.

Some of my notes could be 4-D satires on Man’s apparently correct beliefs, while others might be involuted parodies on the seeming incorrect.  I may directly speak for ordinary Man and express His accepted “truth,” then again I might offer up the same fare in a manner both inside-out, and outside-in.  All in all, I may reveal the silliness of the obvious, and then again, expose the transparency of the silly.

So, even though you may receive pleasure on the aural surface of my comments, remember such acts as hiding poison in the rats’ cheese, and stuffing vitamins in the dogs’ yummy treats.

 There are some things you would probably never have heard were it not for the felicitous availability of me as a right-angle-mouthpiece.

                                                       So, here we are again, anew.

J

Sleepwalkers (Holiday Edition)

A City feller noted, “Don’t know why war has such a bad and bloody rep; peace kills LOTS more.”

There must be continual – even insignificant – efforts made.

Although certainly not seen as such, the City’s idea of Man’s “freedom,” is a form of supreme sleepwalker.

Overheard in a nearby City neighborhood: “I act with the blessed assurance of a sleepwalker.”

Beware, the condensed versions of the mind.

J.

Appearances

Talk about your wasted efforts, in this case, even by City standards…  It’s like this, there was a guy who spent years asking people if they “knew what they were doing,” and then realized it doesn’t make the slightest bit of difference.  I guess the least we could do in recognition of this somewhat inverted achievement is propose a Law drawn there from, and it goes like this:  “It doesn’t matter whether you know what you’re doing or not.”  So there.

When you hear it said of an ordinary person that they had, “certain personal experiences, the scars of which they still carry,” you can fairly assume that that’s about all they DO carry.

Heard of a man who was such a disciplinarian, that whenever his son was naughty, he forbade him to dream that night.

In the City, knowledge can apparently be vain about what it knows, so out in the Bushe,s I try and speak of perception and awareness to infer a counterpoint to City knowledge, one which harbors no unseemly pride in mere possession.

If you describe a person by what they wear, or how they look, you don’t really KNOW the person all that well, do you?

J.