Weblog 49

January 14, 2007~ 7:45pm



Above, you'll see my vision of my life as I see it: no luxuries, no mechanization that makes for lighter labor, no glitz -- just determination, persistence, and plenty of elbow grease. "My Life As A Pump Car" could very easily be the name of my autobiography someday, though I'm not really the sort to write such a book; no, what I do is use a pinhole photography method of jotting down daily poems that are like minute synopses of mood and condition, philosophy and belief, experience and my ruminations on it.

but yes......here is the way I get through the day



this one is actually more like it. Bright red -(like the original apple, for those of you into psychoanalysis and symbolism- but also seen as some sort of happy toy at the same time: something onerous, for sure, but something you can turn into fun should you take it into your head to do so.)

And back to the original picture here......don't such old sepia photos just haunt? Where are those fellas now, but moldering away under some old flint, chipped tombstone in graveyards where there aren't even family members left to mourn them or put some snapdragons on their markers. All those pursuits, all the sweat they must have produced by the bucketful- all their dreams and desires, their fears, all are gone. Over. Forgotten like the sound of an old train whistle at night after it rounds a bend and disappears-- yes-- even that handsome devil on the far left-- could have been a moviestar. Could have had young, proper ladies passing out in the aisles with that one killer smile, but even if he had, he'd be tucked away now in a place like Forest Lawn, with other heartthrobs like Valentino. Gone, gone.

The only thing worth it is the ride itself-- that pump car and how well you keep at it, and the click-clack of the effort popping in the ears like corn on a burner, lively and real. Effort is all. The one foot in front, the no stopping so long as you don't lose interest- that forced march to stay alive- stay on top of it.....sweat. Tears. Laughter. None of it lasts- all of it, irreplaceable. And all of it... the morning and the evening star...not just some...all.


January 16, 2007~ 5:15pm
After getting to work today (the first sorta snowy morning in western Pennsylvania- well, sleeting anyway) I again succumbed to some sort of a stomach virus and came back home and was back in bed by 11:00 am. I am up now and still queasy, but not as badly as this morning.

I swear it's this weirdly warm winter. Their are two major flus making the rounds, and countless minor viruses. You never know if you've picked them up from a light switch, a door handle, some short order cook's germy hands, or what. It's frustrating to have come down with something so similiar in a little over a week.

At least the heating bills will not bury us. But the germs may....

My late winter issue of The Blue House is just waiting in the hopper to come out at the end of the month. Procrastinator that I am, I've found a way to stay 2 issues ahead so I never feel any sort of pressure or 'deadline syndrome'. It's all pure joy to me. I started that last Christmas when I was off for a few days and had the extra time. It's amazing how creative you can be when there is nothing pressing about it. Images, feelings from the poems themselves, ideas for editorials- it happens so effortlessly when it's simply recreation and not work.

And Lord knows.....there's nothing toney or high-brow foolish about Blue House- it's just a collection of sincere writers who love to see their work online, displayed in a nice venue. I myself have "submission issues" when it comes to sending out my own work due to the terseness of rejection letters, as well as the 'hoity-toity' (what a phrase...LOL!)- yes, HOITY TOITY announcement emails whenever this or that ezine is published on the web. "Published?".....lol. Look. A person with some html skills or who has Dreamweaver or some other software program types in some coding. That's all folks. No magic.........no snobbery........pure entertainment. Or it should be. Ok, lecture over. Back to my very real nausea here.

January 17, 2007 8:30am
Another day at home, bowels in a uproar, as my mother says. LOL! Whatever's got hold of me is not letting go. And all the while, I still feel the strangest joy just beneath the surface- who knows- maybe it's from being so 'emptied out' and nothing in my stomach to speak of for two days, but if this is 'fasting'- viva la fast! I feel an almost childlike trust of my feelings- of life in general for the past 2 days, despite looking at some pretty terrible news stories, etc. It's like I'm standing at the beach, like the little guy below, and just shouting, "I CAN TAKE IT!"- I'm persistently alive here....





And of course, as always, there's my sweetie to talk to....who sends this sort of happy thing to make me smile:

"17 January. Feast Day of St Anthony, patron saint of pigs. In 1474 a cock was tried in Basel for having laid an egg. It was condemned to death, and both cock and egg were burnt at the stake on a hill called the Kohlenberg, with all due ceremony, witnessed by an immense crowd. The fatal cockatrice, which was supposed to issue a cock's egg when hatched, could be used for contacting the evil spirits, so the cock which gave it birth was dreaded as dangerous purveyor to His satanic Majesty. Animals were frequently executed for various offences in medieval times."

...shortly followed by this...
...and a one-word description....

"SMUG".



***

(Return To Weekly Archives)