"...Life"

The life of nations. Change. This Republic is about change...slow change. The Civil Rights Act took 100 years to pass. Even then there was push back. Marginalized peoples have come far in my lifetime. Equal opposite reaction kicks in against near 80 years of social progress. Jim Crow falls arts and sciences progress. Obama elected different orientations accepted Women progressing even gender itself re-examined. An era of primal pushback was inevitable. In particular to unintended consequences. Both sides make mistakes. We don't see history while we're living it. When it sometimes literally knocks on our front door. However, history continues on its asymmetrical course.

Have patience be brave be kind. Life goes on. Days go by.

 

A real life Uncle Sidney Adventure.

Once upon a time it was the early 70′s. I wore bell bottoms but drew the line at platform shoes. During the periods while being of out then back in college I had assorted jobs. Among them a Girl Scout a church technician a grunt in da copy department of a gum company. All this thanks to my being a ‘Holly Girl’. A pal Holly Allison had a temp employment agency specializing in getting gigs for unemployable art types...which was and is me.

‘Girl Scout’...perhaps I should clarify.

I worked at the NYC headquarters for da Girl Scouts USA. I fit right in. I show up sez I’m a ‘Holly Girl’ no one bats an eye. I loved it there. Swell folks. It was all clerical stuff so learning to read write came in handy after all. That and I raised and lowered the flags every day...serious old school. Worked during the holidays...them gals did Yule right.

After my Scouting days I ended up in an office across from da U.N. Building. The job was a blur...just typing and files...yeah, I can do that. My Holly Girl superpower. Btw ask grandma what a typewriter is. Thing is I had a desk with a view of what we thought was the hope of the world. The bleeping U.N. Building. Sue me I’m a romantic. That thing never got old.  

There followed a blizzard of mini gigs. Some lasting days to a few months. With 70′s temp gigs ya never knew where you were going or what your position would be. They could have been companies that made the ‘handle with care’ stickers for Hydrogen bombs. I had no idea. Nice t-shirts though.

Just remembered...that copy department thing was in da mix. My being an artist lay about. Holly thought it would suit me. It did. While on da job I asked and was given permission to print up some of my little projects. Prose poetry chapbooks all that noise. Learned printing and organizational skills. I later used these when I did Indie-comic books in da 80′s. 

Life is learning and opportunities. Remember what I said about my time in show biz? If you’re offered a part in ‘anything’ ...Take it! You got talent and smarts.  “Eh sure I can speak Croation...and ride a horse”. Ace da the details as ya go along. I got shows that way.

Then I went to church.

Specifically Riverside Church on Morningside Heights Manhattan. Good grief. Wadda place. If the 12th century constructed skyscrapers, they would have looked like ‘Riverside’. Stayed there the longest. Was assistant to their engineering department. In da 90′s they’d have used a PalmPilot now a phone or Alexa...same thing. Back then they used me. No experience whatever. My broadcast engineering days were years in the future. 

They taught me much but mostly it was the vibe. 

There was a general calmness of attitude. They were working not for the now but for the ages. So aware of where they came from where they were and where they were going. It’s 100 years ago but despite the chaos and static of my years them times and folks is a remembered eye in the storm.

I was a seriously dumb kid. So I’m grateful to Holly Allison. This for kicking butt into the real world by making me a ‘Holly Girl’. Being in so many places, so many different kinds of people and directions I began to see patterns. All those lives and circumstances interconnected. Active living Zen stuff in everyday work. I’m grateful. A few years later my broadcast life began. That’s another saga for another time

Why can’t life be like in da movies. Maybe I should clarify. Why can't they be like happy movies. Most of what ya gets is stupid Zombie, vampire postal workers or surreal stories about depressed rich people driving around in 1938 Bugatti's. 

Nah, I wanna live in one of them hopeful Frank Capra fantasies. The kind where some yokels go through assorted contrived whooie from central casting villains. But in the end, all's well. I want to be the crusading Teacher, Pastor, or Reporter. Capra always has one of them swell folks. Wearing a cool hat and fighting for the innocent. Like some old guy losing his farm or a bunch of cute depression era kids are about to be dumped into an evil orphanage.

The farmer will get turned into dog food, and the kids end up as slave labor for a Kansas City pinball machine company. Somewhere in all this I gets to make this passionate speech, or sermon or editorial. This always saves everybody in the end. In the final scene gramps is gleefully dancing on his farm knee deep in pig shit, and the kids are back on the block stealing stuff, and breaking windows. 'All happy as junkies that stumbles onto 50 kilos of China White. (...uncut.)

The music swells, and the credits roll. What could be better. That, and no one has to see the messy contradictions of the film's characters getting on with da crappy business of everyday life. The lights come up, and you go out into the dreary hell of your real life. This is why we love movies so much, and why I wants to live in one. The dream world these flickering phantoms live in. Their universe is one that has never, 'ever' had a backed-up toilet. That or a dead guy in face down in a bowl of cold spaghetti. Eh...mostly

 

I imagined that all my life was a dream. A dream I was having as a child. I awake. I’m in my bunkbed. My brother John asleep below me. Winter I can see snow in the back yard. I’m nine. It’s January 1960. I dreamed in detail a whole history. A long lifetime. I hear my dog “Brownie” padding below. My dad getting ready to go to work. School. I have to go to school. I have the experiences, memories of over 60 future years. Who to tell where to begin. 

"...Oh Fuck"

I am on the wrong fucking planet timestream and tax bracket. ...and so are the other Eight Billions of us. I need to write this. Hints of circling the drain. The upside of being near my primary care doc and his clinic...two blocks and the drug store...one block. Is that now I know what's going on with me. The downside is that now I know what's going on with me.

Let's see, ...cardiac stuff cataracts extreme diabetes did I mention danger of kidney failure. The latter is where my major symptoms come from. I'm always dizzy balance shot hell. I'm good for a quarter of the day...sleeping or nuts the rest of the time. 

Bottom line Serious Shit. 

Did I mention they want to cut off my food again...I'm called for an interview. They're pissed I haven't died yet and will probably ask me to hurry up. I'm doing the best I can.

There I said it and I'm glad.

We're entitled to freak out and do pity party tangos now and then. It keeps us laughing. 'Told them nice folks I'm refusing dialysis. If cancer forget about chopping me up. I've seen both floorshows up close front row center for family and friends. 

No thanks.

In both cases I'll have pain management please. In da kidney case I hear there isn't one so that adds to the fun. Otherwise, I'm swell.

"...My Penn Station"

I was little, but I was there. It was like the grand palaces in story books.

Vast. Went on forever. Corinthian columns that soared to the clouds.

A sky of glass above, and so many people.

All kinds. A sea of them quickly going this way, and that.

Voices thundered announcing trains. Uniformed porters' newspaper stands full of comic books.

Rich ladies with small dogs...as in old New Yorker cartoons.

All this, and sound of trains bellow.

The rumble beneath my feet my mother tugging me along.

That was my Penn Station.

We're a species of stories. Beings of stories. Once upon a time...My first experiences of wilderness as a child. A world of singing trees scented breezes and dragonflies. Flying jewels. Hunter gatherers knew this place. Though harsh and brief their lives were spent in paradise. Tooth and claw at every turn yet they lived amid wonders and mysteries. They were were they needed to be. 

We're edging out of Black History Month. So while there's still time I read up on being Black. I forget things as I like to think of myself as just a person...life is complicated, but ya know. Read an essay on "White Flight". For me and my generation Jim Crow is not history. We lived it in all it's too interesting and seemingly unending details.

My white playmate's folks fled...taking my friends with them. I wish they'd left them with us. We'd have raised them as our own. All I remember is one day they were just gone. I still remember some of their names. I've wondered if they remember ours. I may write a story about this.

I've read that white parents often told their kids not to let their colored friends know they were leaving. Wonder what my friends thought of that. Did they understand what was happening? Did they care? To me it was a mystery. My folks wouldn't speak about it....my friends were just gone. Art by Kadir Nelson.

“...Advise and Consent.”

Congressperson George Santos is living in a world of his intimate fantasies. Folks do that but don’t run and or stand for Congress on it. Which makes him unique. Not lying all politicians do that. Rather he weaved a life of fantasies which came and went moment to moment. Which given our times no one noticed.

'Walter Mitty' comes to mind or the character ‘Chance’ in the film “Being There”. Santos Mitty and Chance have in common a kind of innocence. Chance had the emotional development of a child. Which no one realized so they elected him, President. Mitty’s leaps from reality to reality was a source of comedy.

Santos should be viewed outside of our current political chaos. He is neither Republican nor Democrat. Fantasist Party would come close...moderate. His various worlds are the point. There are reasons for each. Santos perhaps experiences fact from fantasy not as a wall but a suggestion. Being one that has a deep fantasy life. I am fascinated how he got so far and the nature of his assorted realities. 

Was at da Clinic watching him interviewed on the screen. Waiting room reacted with humor at the oddness of it. There was no anger...none. He was seen as a being of the digital era. Santos seems not to have an overt agenda. Other than what he dreams next.

He played with digital fire. He tickled the dragon’s tail of our times the technologies and the whims of people. So every medium is giving him hate. Watching I see mockery and bullying which could be how this all started for him.

"...Watch the Skies"

Like the opening scenes of a science fiction movie. Rumors of odd stuff in da skies. Turns out just Chinese spy stuff. Then more talk of things looking like them Tic-tac’ things that buzz our Navy ships. Gets better. We shot one down over Alaska next day another over the Yukon. Today yet another over Lake Huron. Three more and we’ll have our first space war aces. Takes six for the title.

This is new. We usually let them be. They might shoot back. ‘Wonder what’s changed. Platforms are burning up with folks saying they’re seeing them things all over da place. Which is all true since it’s illegal to lie on da internet. 

I used to say things is so bad that an alien invasion would be good news. Perhaps I spoke too soon. Above #10 of the ‘Mars Attacks’ cards we collected in da early 60′s as kids. Never got the whole set. Now I can watch it in real time.

“...February 11th”

I’ve been reading the history of Ocean Springs Mississippi. The town where my Salves ancestors were held in bondage. It may be...found conflicting dates that on this day in 1864 the Army of the North landed and eventually freed the Slaves there including my great-great grandmother ‘Tempy’. The ‘New Orleans Weekly Times’ on March 18, 1864: “On Tuesday, February 11th, the gunboats, USS Narcissus and the USS Cowslip, went on an expedition up the Back Bay of Biloxi in command of Lieutenant Commander W.F. Fitzhugh. At 10 o'clock A.M. they put to port at Ocean Springs.” ...Family history sez Union troops entered the town. No stories of fighting. After some days the Union commander read a proclamation declaring all ‘Bondsmen’ within the township and surrounding areas were “...forthwith emancipated.” My family was free.

“...38 hours later”

Quiet days. Sleeping much. Listening to the sound of my heart. Ears deep in my pillow amplifies the beat...life's rhythm. Music. "Oh, life you are so strange so wonderful, and so brief." Want that on whatever urn they dump my fried ashes in... I'm good at cooking up prayers. Maybe they'll let me do comic books in Paradise. We are beings of stories the sum of our stories.

Our species gifted at pattern recognition. The mosaic of all. Going through my words recordings photos drawings I see patterns. My patterns. It’s the same for us all. Our patterns. Those stories’ rants fantasies.  Our codes. What we are and aspire to be. Multi-layered life codes. The DNA of our Souls. All being deciphered by each other for each other. Days go by.

"...Bonjour"

I continue drifting unstuck in time

It's Thursday.

I thought it was Saturday. 

Thought it odd all the Jewish shops were open.

 

"...time and again"

I’m remembering we buried a time capsule in 1961. Me, and two friends Steve and Richie from school. I know exactly where it is. At the foot of the only Pine in our local park. They say the Pine was there before the park. 150 years? See above. It’s 2 feet below the tree in a plastic jar. We put in a baseball. They were were ‘pink’ and called Spalding. A comic book...Batman. Weird stuff we wrote to the future. We figured spaceships robots and less school. All three happened. Steve put in a polaroid photo of us digging the hole. He “borrowed” his dad’s camera. I visit the site sometimes. It’s become a marker for my friends now passed. I may bury another capsule so my friends can catch up on what’s happened.

"...days go by"

(I got into trouble on another page for being incorrect by not letting my life revolve around just my skin color or orientation. I’m a person that’s all. See above. Me my own self at the start of my adventure. I've lived into an era when many in this troubled republic use ethnic identifiers or some other arbitrary construct to rule their lives. Here’s my response: ...)

What would you be if you were Free?  ...mean just that. Who would you be what would you wear what would you like to eat or what music would you listen to? How would you express yourself if you were not a target? If you were free from birth just to be a person. If you could walk down any street oblivious blameless a threat to no one. Just a person.

A free person not having to obsess on identifiers forced on you. Free to create your own life, and at peace with all. I’ve been told this is impossible. Tribal walls are the only defense.  No. I refuse. Some of us have tried to live free despite a whole world saying we can’t. We try to live it now in our lifetimes. Not just dream it for some remote far future. 

I’m a radical. I insist on my personhood my freedom. My right to just be me not representing anyone or anything. I have opinions but they’re just that, and only that. We all walk the same deadly gauntlet, but in our souls we’re free.

"...apple'a day"

Some guys on my kitchen counter this morning. Got up early went in for sonograms. Still not pregnant. Walked about later. Chatted with neighbors. Masked but tired of them. However, we’re all of an age. Tho’ Uncle Joe sez it’s all clear by May. My FB pal Rudy just got it a second time. We take this day by day. The sky deep blue the morning bright winds chilled. Loves ya.

"...all in a row"

My FB pal Rudy sez there's a data breach on Android phones. Beware. Your entire digital life on iPhone culture started just as I was about to retire. So I never hooked up. Thanks to my radio pal Sharon I have an Elder Phone. Which is a "Telephone' a clock a camera...period. Takes cute pictures. So far so good.

 

 

"...ice nine"

Though brief the Arctic Vortex will take temps in the Emerald City down to 9f/-12c.

With our warm winter locally, we're not acclimated.

So stay in. If you must go out dress in layers.

You won't know you have frostbite till after you get it. ...been there.

Loves ya.

 

"...no eggs"

Tomorrow night it'll be 9f/-12c. Two days later near 60f/15c.

Climate is Planetary and tending warmer. Weather is local and tending...erratic.

This due to warmer oceans which effect the winds. Sometimes in extremes.

The hot summers that burn down the western forests' ...sudden hard rains...floods.

Random great blizzards in some states...with a near lack of winter in others.

Climate warmer...weather chaotic.

On the other hand as everyone knows it's all a liberal hoax.

 

"...dreams"

 

Playing with my toys.

 

"...My life so far"

I’ve had stitches seen Niagara Falls da Mississippi River...had pizza in Chicago. Was down with Chicken Pox Covid and plenty in between. Lived through three Pandemics four wars one attempted coup. Failed tests yet graduated. Never broke bones but had surprise operations. ...several. Never been skiing but had jury duty. I punched a few bullies…with cause. Been drunk, but not when I punched anybody. Was never divorced…or married. I swam in the ocean flew in a DC-3 drove cars been on an ocean liner. Stung by bees. Though not in the ocean. 

Had racist and homophobic shit happen my whole life. But I still love everybody...mostly. I like cake. Was almost a priest no dice white only back then. A lucky break. Saved me da trouble of leaving. I worry about the ants. Watch dust motes.  Been to other countries. I got beat at demonstrations by cops. Was in a race riot in hippie be-in things and Queer parades. Saw UFO’s and ghosts. Though not at them parades. They wouldn’t let me in da Army ‘cause they thought I was Queer. I was but wanted in. Wanted to be with my brother in da war. Thought I could help.

When he came home he told me I was “...well out of it”. 

Was in love out of love back in and still at it. A gal pal said my problem was “...you’re in love with love.” Loved my folks my family helped raise up my nieces and nephews care gave for elder relatives was on da radio published comic books laughed a lot was always broke. Had dogs’ cats, and a turtle. I think we had a rabbit when I was little. There’s other stuff, but this is what I’m putting on my application to the Angelic Civil Service. If Sister Alice, my 4th grade teacher who I guess would be 110 now. If that neat gal is around and gives me a nice recommendation. I might get in. Think I should leave out that stuff about wanting to be a Gangsta’ Samurai Geisha

 "...hot stuff"

Dusting of snow after mid-night. Out at dawn to walk.

Radio said the sun would melt it in minutes...and it did.

Spring coming but this counts as our first snow of the whole winter.

We've had the longest snow drought here in 50 years.

A warm winter has kept our grass so green.

Had to go for a dawn walkabout in the snow.

Might be the only chance this season.

My snowshoes among fresh grass sprouts from our sultry winter.

After a January in the 40's and 50's.

A sudden Arctic Vortex on its way to NYC.

Planetary changes is chaos which is what we got.

Hang on it's getting interesting.

After brief' light snow. 'Skipper' looks forward to Spring.

 

My new passport picture.

 

"...Clips"

(This story based on a notion by my dear radio pal Peter Cedric Rock Smith...no relation I know of. He mused what he would do if he woke up and it was the 1930′s again. So I put myself in his position. The trick is to protect the timeline...or try to...good grief!)

“Back and forth and forth and back.” Put another way...NYC the 125th Street subway platform. It's January 26th, 1937. The ‘A’ rain pulling in wakes me. I’m a science fiction fan so I know what’s happened. Fuck! I’m near 90 years in the past! Serious temporal disorientations. I wander my great grandmother’s hood for days maybe weeks. Think a speedball crack and whiskey crash. FDR is President Dick Tracy is on da radio and it's the Great Bleeping Depression. Best time to appear. I can get lost in this chaos.

I end up in a Salvation Army soup kitchen. Looking for possibilities I tell them I went to a Negro college and could tutor. Tutors white only but with a lucky connection I get a quarter-time gig at the local library...as a porter. It’s 1937. With the job I get a small room and make plans.

Winter passes. In summer I notice a small Harlem machine shop. Just the right size. I introduce myself to the owner. Seems a decent guy. I later hear he’s in the closet. I tell him its cool love is love and don’t worry about it. Anyway, I put an idea to him. A small item that everyone uses that he could very cheaply make. ...and sell. Desperate times so he's game. I show him my designs...paperclips. I was thinking Velcro but too game changing.

I didn't do an exact copy from the future. Rather blends of types any of which ‘could’ have been designed in the 30′s. Strips of metal and cheap tools are all that's needed...history is safe. We haggle over details become partners...sort of and get to it. Business slow but they’re cheap look cool so catch on. Towards da Holidays orders is coming in through the ‘gawddamned’ windows to paraphrase Holden Caufield. Whose book I hope isn't butterflied away.

The machine shop is now our business office/factory. Slowly we hire more help. I insist on gender equality. My pal thinks it nuts but goes along. Planting seeds. Orders from local stores later direct to business. Sure there was problems. Corrupt cops, mob run unions to pay off. That and personal bullshit but fuck it life is fun. For a few years it’s a somewhat profitable sideline for us both.

1939 the Board of Education gives us commissions later bulk orders. This followed by other City departments. Mayor Laguardia aka ‘The Little Flower” ...my grandma spoke well of him. Well, he’s throwing FDR’s cash around to help small businesses...which is us. First time the government ever really helped me, and I had to go near 90 years into the bleeping past to get it. Figures.

Holy fuck...so much for laying low in the past.

Which reminds me. I'm from the future which means I played Monopoly and saw several post-war mega-recessions. Lesson one: Don’t expand before ya ready. My pal wanted to open two large tooling and fabrication shops with a zillion employees. I talked him down to 25 and one medium shop. Smart because the bubble burst...we stayed in business. That and we happily banged along issuing paychecks. An upside I saw the Great Harlem artistic Rennaissance in person.

Still, I know the war is coming. This is a world with Hitler and Stalin running around loose. Did I mention our own Nazis and a powerful Klan? Anyway, in my only suit...double breasted like grandpa wore. I angle for federal orders. I get a few small nibbles Then all hell breaks loose. December 9th, 1941. War comes two days late and orders with them. Thanks to my temporal shenanigans.

Uncle Sam is kicking the crap out of that Nazi fuck Hitler and his pal Tojo. And is doing it with our durable flexible rust-less paperclips. Did I mention our Army is integrated we already have the fucking B-29 and the P-80 jet fighter...all these five years early. All because of cheap cool paper clips and two smart colored queer guys...one from the 21st century. Fuck da timeline...in for a penny in for a pound.” I finagled a meeting with that Einstein guy and tells him about microprocessors. Stay tuned.