Thursday funny

Spring and All

Spring and All
by William Carlos Williams
By the road to the contagious hospital under the surge of the blue mottled clouds driven from the northeast-a cold wind. Beyond, the waste of broad, muddy fields brown with dried weeds, standing and fallen patches of standing water the scattering of tall trees All along the road the reddish purplish, forked, upstanding, twiggy stuff of bushes and small trees with dead, brown leaves under them leafless vines- Lifeless in appearance, sluggish dazed spring approaches- They enter the new world naked, cold, uncertain of all save that they enter. All about them the cold, familiar wind- Now the grass, tomorrow the stiff curl of wildcarrot leaf One by one objects are defined- It quickens: clarity, outline of leaf But now the stark dignity of entrance-Still, the profound change has come upon them: rooted, they grip down and begin to awaken

Wednesday funny

perspective

Tuesday funny

mania (excerpt from "Highways Of The Heart")

... There have been times in my life when I’ve been lucky, or blessed, to find myself on a road which becomes brighter and brighter as I walk. I have walked, struggled, out of foul depression many times, answering the call of the chemical imbalance in my blood and neurons as it rights itself for some period of time. I celebrate these times like a man who’s been walking the desert for days celebrates the sight of a clear river just up ahead. The river of light greets me like a long lost brother as I dive in and revel in its quenching, its healing. I slake my thirst for the light, and sometimes, often, I take far too much in and make myself sick. This amorphous river can and often has turned into a rubber room and a needle in the hip, and a slowly dawning awareness that yet another manic episode has snuck up and bit me on the ass, taking away my control, my sanity, leaving me gibbering and drooling and walking along hallways trying not to fall flat on my kiester from drug overload. It’s been the price I’ve paid, many times, for embracing the good feelings far too hard after living in misery for so long. It’s been a hard lesson to learn that when I start feeling good I have to share this feeling with a doctor, and risk having it taken away in the interest of retaining my grip on reality, no matter how tenuous.
My manic times. So many stories that can’t be told for lack of words to describe the magic that is mania. My last time in psychotic mania, well over four years ago now, was the last time I experienced personal apotheosis, that state of mind in which I was convinced that I was the Messiah finally returned to make everything better. I convinced myself, in the space of a week or less, that I was Jesus and had been in hiding until just the right moment, just the right time to reveal myself for who I truly was. Timing became all-important, and it became very difficult to hold everything in until the cosmos gave me the signal to stand and declare myself. By the time I was given the opportunity, I was absolutely crazed and stumbling around the halls of the psych ward, trying to bum a cigarette from the patients and heal those I came into contact with at the same time.
Always, in full-blown mania, I experienced on one level or another this amazing Messiah trip. I have been the Messiah a half-dozen times, feeling the power flowing through my veins to help me save everyone, correct all mistakes that have been made. It’s called psychosis, delusion, and it’s treated by drugs that are the chemical equivalent of a frontal lobotomy, in an attempt to rip the delusion away from me before I could hurt myself or someone else. I recognize the need for these all-invasive drugs, these massive doses of anti-psychotics, anti-manics. My, what if a manic episode was allowed to run its course? Permanent damage, I’m sure, but then fifty years ago, psychotics were everywhere in sanitariums and mental institutions, living out their fantastic delusions. And there they stayed, sometimes for their whole lives. I’m living in a time and place where I can walk free and interact with society, even though I’ve been convinced a few times that I was Jesus Himself returned to save the world.
I’ve met so many people while a patient in one ward or another who were on some sort of spiritual quest. Such a mind-set is so common among disturbed people, be they bipolar, schizophrenic, paranoid, narcissistic, or some combination or mixture. I’ve read that we are all born with an unconscious awareness of God, and it seems to me that this awareness has a marked tendency to manifest in those who lose touch with reality, and are, whether they’re aware of it or not, trying so hard to get back to bedrock sanity.
I’ve touched on those times when the light gets far too bright, and I’ve failed to react rationally. That’s part of my reality, my life. As I get older, I suppose I get wiser, confirming the old axiom. I’ve caught myself at least twice in the past four years starting my spin upward to the roof of the world, and was able to stop the trip before psychosis and delusion set in. Way back in my mind a small voice says, “And too bad you did, man, look at the fun you missed,” as I type ‘able to stop the trip’. That’s the penalty I have to pay for maturity, for sobriety. I have to stop having fun, or at least the kind of fun that involves delusion and insanity. One can only play these games for so long, before reaching the point of no return. I came so close to reaching that point, I think, a few times - it was like a drug, like a Nirvana that I just had to get back to, regardless of the consequences - back to that dizzy world of mania, where anything was possible, any prize was attainable. Oh, my, there are stories, but none that simple words can touch.
I’ve started to soar again, just a bit over the last few days, and I will have to watch myself as I continue to take that new anti-depressant. I find myself at my word processor, actually writing something original, and not re-writing some tired old short-story outline for the tenth time. My experience in the woods a couple of weeks ago was an indicator that my mind is opening up somewhat, not having felt quite that way in a long time. I feel hopeful that I may be coming out of depression and crossing over to the manic side, but there are old warning bells going off as I think of the transition, or the possibility of it. Despair is a sticky old bastard, and can’t be shaken off so easily. I wait, and I beware. I beware the return of despair, and I beware the return of that fast elevator trip to the top of the world.

Monday funny

Sunday funny

Beauty 1, 2, 3

for the kiddos...

prison of personality

Spirits of my past shine from my children's eyes, reminding me, glaring at me, showing a picture of me when I was their size. Some nameless rage wells up - how much like them all I was before I fell, my personality woven through them, so like me in so many ways; but all shades of gray of themselves where black and white is all I see... one in quiet, violent withdrawal - Beauty: another in stoic confusion- Brilliance: and one, perhaps, crash-bound in excess of joy- Love. My children, and that nameless rage at myself hitting gut-level, for helping make them what they are, not knowing they'd suffer so. Call that rage guilt, call their love for me forgiveness, call their mother and I a quilt, a cover that surrounds them - and call their similarities to us sharp things to use to cut themselves free from this prison of personality.
Love them back, because that's the quintessence of Being, living and breathing: the Love that seeks a return of love. God take care of my children. I do love them so.

August 1996

on this date in 1951...

happy birthday to me
happy birthday to me
happy birthday dear Perry
happy birthday to me.

At least I remembered :-))

Saturday funny

Friday funny

Thursday funny

Global Personality Test Results

Stability (63%) moderately high which suggests you are relaxed, calm, secure, and optimistic. Orderliness (40%) moderately low which suggests you are, at times, overly flexible, improvised, and fun seeking at the expense of reliability, work ethic, and long term accomplishment. Extraversion (50%) medium which suggests you are moderately talkative, outgoing, sociable and interacting.

Take Free Global Personality Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

found this site while blogsurfing. Pretty accurate, I think.

Wednesday funny

Excerpt from "Win A Whistle"

... I graduated in the middle of the class in 1969, with pretty Sherry there in her leathers, ready for the bike after the ceremonies. She was the pretty sister I mentioned earlier, and we were together for a year and a half, until I joined up and she stayed behind, “to wait.”
I had started smoking grass and hash, along with the whole frigging world, it seemed, right around the time I graduated high school, and headed down to Maine for a summer at Rose and John’s, and a job in a shoe factory, Auerbach Shoe Co., if I remember right. I visited the Dragomirs, and was very put out to find that Kristy had moved to Rhode Island with a guy from University. Because of the job, and a little bit of common sense, I didn’t hop on the Scrambler and follow her down there. I knew I’d never forget her, that I’d carry her in my heart all my life. I simply loved her; she was the first girl I actually ever loved, and I was sure even then that I’d probably never find anyone that I could be so in love with.
But, life’s for learning. That summer was my early education with mind-altering substances.
On the weekends, I’d get together with some old high school friends, and Jayney and I took up where we’d left off, having some good times driving around in John’s excellent old Cadillac, with lots of room in the back seat for those times when we were all mature and excellent with one another. A guy named Joey introduced me to LSD one night, and the top of my head came off, and I watched as the skin peeled off Jayney’s face to reveal gristle and blood and bone.
I didn’t go home for three days, and Rose was frantic, even to the point of having the cops look for me. Where’d I go? Well, Woodstock, of course. Six of us got on three bikes and set out for this rock concert we’d heard of not too far over in New York state. We cut through the White Mountains, and were there in no time, stoned, all of us, on good clean Columbian. I’d come down from the acid trip, and was having a bit of a hard time smoking the shit and biking, so I got Jayney to drive most of the way. She was okay at it, and stayed straight for the most part. I never thought to phone Rose, I was a big boy and had no obligations. Good God, I was so stoned...
We were among the bunch that crashed the fence and got in for free, and got wet and starved and dropped a lot of acid and just got off on the music, the people, the atmosphere and the absolute certainty that we were going to live forever. I vaguely remember walking down through a million or so people, in filthy jeans and bare chested, with Jayney the same way, toward the stage and someone, maybe Alvin Lee or, more probably, one of the guys working what passed for security, throwing Jayney a shirt so she could cover up and stop shivering, and damned if I can remember much more, day or night. I watch the movie sometimes, and secretly say hi to Wavy Gravy, who saved me from an awful freak-out sometime in there, telling me, “Hey, man, it’s a trip, it ain’t no more real than you want it to be.” Smoking grass with Arlo Guthrie, in awe and talking about his father. Shit, I was there, for Christ’s sake.
We lost a couple of people, and crawled down the highway and home without them, in paradise withdrawal and paranoia recoil. Going home - Rose kicked me out, and then called me back as I walked down the driveway, saying, “You ever do that to me again, asshole brother, and I’ll kill you.” She didn’t believe me when I told her where I’d been, and I didn’t bother her any more with details, most of which I’d left behind anyway.
I went back to Moncton and spent the rest of ‘70 in college, turning on as many people as I could to acid, dropping out in January when I came close to being busted. That scared me enough to take me home to the family, and sit quiet for the remainder of the winter, finally joining the Forces in March of 1971, and heading to Winnipeg and preliminary training with the super-spooks, my drugging a secret I shared with no one for a long time. Discipline got me past any ghosts in my mind for quite a while, and I learned to fight and defend and shoot, and I got rock hard and able to take down anyone twice my size. I graduated basic trades training at the top of the class, and was promoted two years early, while I was in Washington, on attachment with the Canadian Embassy.
And that was how I became Mr. Super Spook, absolutely fearless and too young to appreciate anything but my next orders. If not for my love of alcohol, which became my drug of choice, and my inability to deal with the effects, I might have had a very good career, retiring at forty and all that normal stuff.
It didn’t happen. As I look back, I recognize that it wasn’t supposed to happen. The cosmos had other plans.

Tuesday funny

I have a pretty good family physician taking care of me. He wants me to quit smoking and lose 15 lbs. That's like saying, "go bake an apple pie, and when it's cooled down some, feed it to the dog."
Or something like that.

need

people stand and stare
as an old man falls.
going to him, I help him up
dust him off
his wife taking his arm and thanking me.
I stand in the concourse
as these people move on
these who stopped
standing and staring, a momentary distraction
in straight line lives.
I whisper to them all as they pass -
would you leave this man to founder
leave me alone to see
the truth
the wonder
the power so naked
in one old man's need? -
these people
the standers
the starers
oh, how much you have missed
in this moment; power, truth, wonder,
all mine now
all mine.

monday funny

family tree

My Dad's a backwoods New Brunswick boy and my Mom is pure PEIslander. I was born in Moncton, and my 5 sisters and one brother were born all over, Dad being in the Air Force and getting posted every couple of years. I grew up in many places, Edgar, Mont Apica, St. Bruno, Barrington, Topsham/Brunswick, Maine (and a lovely place that was), an amazing place called St. Margarets, full of magical and life-altering places and people, Winnipeg, Ottawa, Summerside, the beautiful Annapolis Valley NS, and presently Dartmouth/Halifax. Jeez, I actually lived in Egypt for 6 months. My ex wife was born in The Valley, and was in the Forces when I met her, me a burgeoning drunk with a dearth of ambition and her a pretty sandy-blond with enormous blue eyes. We spent 14 years together, a tumultuous but successful marriage that saw the birth of our 3 kids. Theresa and Jenna were born in Ottawa, and my good boy Jeff started his life in Summerside. They were the most blindingly beautiful creations I'd ever seen. I have remembered over the years to thank God humbly for them, for allowing me to participate in bringing such beauty into the world. They've given me gifts... grandchildren, a chance to watch them grow, participate vicariously in their gifts and talents. And, they're very patient with my eccentric and often incommunicado self. I once labeled them as Love, Beauty and Brilliance, with those labels freely interchangeable. I love them most because they're absolutely real and genuine people, each so different from the other yet possessing common qualities that link them so closely. And, of course, I love them because they love me.
And that's how it all works. Love needs an object. The reciprocality of genuine love is never so strong as it is with immediate family. And I wouldn't want it any other way. Thanks, my beauties, and thanks especially to my ancestors, who seemed to know just how to stir the pot to get the best results.

Perry

daily funny

kissin' Liam Perry

Imprinting...

i and I - constant dialogue

oh yeah
I see you're here too;
maybe you can tell me
just what happened.

did you just decide one day
to get lost?
did you hate me when you left?
and whoever in the world
said it was all up to you?

tell me what you did
what you saw - what you said
and where you went.
did it scare you?
did it make you shrivel up inside?
Jesus, man,
you stupid stupid man -
whoever in the world
told you to go alone?

you left me bereft,
unutterably alone and angry,
a prisoner out of time.
don't talk to me yet,
you'll get nothing but static from me...
I don't think I love you anymore.

just sit there,
you sex-crazed
ego-behemoth asshole,
while I figure out what to do with you.

but i digress...

space is a box in which we live
or a sphere -
I've never known for sure -
and in this space
we all at the very centre
(yeah, space Is a sphere)
tied to infinite time lines
that don't exactly exist
and we
on some ethereal treadmill
pulling these timelines from
ahead
above
below
behind
all streaming from the inside
of our personal spheres
and discarding used time-strings
like exhaust
back into the space inside -
outside us
working the treadmill
or trying to rest...

sphere
individual universe -
the space inside
time perspecting
streaming or sitting stagnant
treadmill
ambition
fear
joy
nightmare
and we in the centre
pulling
pushing
grasping and discarding
until of its own accord
the sphere collapses
engulfing us in the maelstrom
of exhausted time -
the chaos
the unknown outside our spherical time-spaces
rushes to fill
the void we've left behind
as we compress
in concentration
life
starting anew.

Springtime

we've just gotten here and looking around
some bland faces
some cheer
raucous
speakers and old songs for sound.

you wonder, just low beside me,
under your breath, "how long has this been here?"
"for friggin ever," i answer, "didn't you know?"

walking here and there then stopping
to chat with you
and You - such a diplomat!
precious forbearance
my girl and i
perfect attendance
as ghosts float by.

easy in
easy out
a small smile and a lump in my throat,
sunshine and flowers
April showers -
all out of time
and time
to get back to those bells
all around us

chime, then,
chime.

my father's woods

quiet voices
in that oh, so quiet clearing
deep in the trees,
where our father had built
a room in a tall oak
a room to watch for deer
and enjoy that solitude he loved.
we three, first born,
stood and talked softly
of scattering Dad's ashes here
in this quiet place in the trees
when the time came -
where he'd hunted
and sat quietly.
the air was soft
with breeze and birdsong
and small tears from my sisters
while I looked at the ground,
listening to the trees sing low
sympathetic with our pre-grief;
our own mortality
peered shyly at us
from behind these trees
in my father's woods
as I stood and tried to feel
my father still alive and strong
as he is
as he is.

monster

if, in blind judgment
I find you lacking
just keep talking
please, keep talking,
paranoia makes monsters of us all.

if, in your hearing
of my overconfident self-appraisal
you should think me wrong,
then shut me up
do it quickly, for a monster ever have I been.

if I, in manic schizophrenic delusion,
should tell you the world is flat,
close my eyes
lull me to sleep
take me to the moon
and point to your world -
maybe I'll understand.

if, finally, I lose myself,
be kind to me
for it's not a monster
but a healer
I've forever wanted to be.