BOYCOTT BP

There really isn't a whole lot else to say.

BOYCOTT THE PIG FUCKERS AT BP!

Much-Needed Input

So I was playing guitar for my 4-year-old boys before bed the other night, and I was messing around with a very simple pick pattern in B-flat (new song). A couple of strings stay open and ring through the changes, and it gives (to me, anyway) an impression of space, or expanse.

The kids asked me why I wasn't singing it, and I explained that I hadn't written any lyrics yet. They then asked what the song was called, and I explained that I didn't have a title yet either. They continued to ask, and I said (somewhat shortly), "I don't know yet. Why don't you guys come up with a title?" They both got quiet, and Max tilted his head to one side and answered, "Day on the Water." Will actually started shyly singing something that was more or less in time and more or less in tune.

We play guitar and piano quite a bit, and they always sing along, but I have to admit that it's pretty amazing and fulfilling to me that they're already participating in the songwriting process. "Day on the Water" is really the name of the song, and if I can can figure out what's going through Will's head, I'll try to incorporate it as lyrics.

Of course, Will later tried to re-title the song "Circle in the Wind That Breaks into Someone's House and Steals Their T.V.," but I think he was just kidding.

much peace,
tjb

Resignation and a Little Hope

Ugh. Kids. Catholic school. Guilt, shame, and anti-intellectual worship of the supernatural. Frightening and depressing simultaneously. I hope someday the three of us can raise a glass to the death of God. Until then, it's half-truths and mythology.

Six Ways from Sunday

Screwed.

No public option, no Medicare buy-in, no re-importation of drugs: what's left of this alleged "health care reform?" A neverending goddamn gift to insurance companies and big pharma, that's what. Let's break it down.

1)The bill as it stands would require that you buy insurance.

2) It would require that insurance companies cover you regardless of any pre-existing condition.

3) If you could not afford the premiums, the government would provide assistance.

4) It would NOT establish any limits on what insurance companies can charge.

5) It would NOT provide any substantive change in regard to the insurance companies denying specific care on the basis of what they deem is "reasonable" (ie, what is profitable).

So the insurance industry would gain 30 million new customers, and both they and health care providers would have all the incentive in the world to send prices skyrocketing. People needing specific procedures could still be denied based on what is most profitable for the insurance company.

This farce would be almost an exact duplicate of the goddamn bank bailouts: an enormous transfer of public funds from the middle class to a handful of extraordinarily wealthy corporations, and no sanctions to encourage said corporations to conduct business fairly and ethically.

I must add that watching that slimy piece of insurance cartel dogshit Joe Lieberman simper and grin about once more fucking his constituents, and all of us, right in our un-lubed asses, has sent me over the top. I really hope that falsely pious pile of chickenhawk pig vomit dies of a brain aneurysm.

not feeling peaceful,

What Happened?

I pulled out some pictures from my trip to Peru eight years ago, and while Craig looks much the same, I scarcely recognize the slimmer and more vibrant version of me in the photos. I am now, perhaps, 20 pounds heavier than I was then, and my face has settled into a softer and weaker rendering of masculinity. The hard lines of my jaw have all but disappeared these days, and the eyes in the mirror no longer communicate the unfettered joy and danger that, for good or ill, defined that young man in Peru, or hell, the young man who left and came home.

So what happened?

I blew my knee out a couple times and fell off the workout wagon, I guess, and stopped treating my body like a temple; and I had to quit school before the boys were born. The absence of concentrated and violent intellectual challenge has had much the same effect as the absence of concentrated and violent physical activity: the product of both being an overwhelming and near-fatal ennui.

I guess I fell out of love with myself, or stopped trusting my own instincts. I don't know, it's not as though my instincts have ever brought me any kind of tangible benefit or long-lasting contentment. I remember, though, waking from my midafternoon nap in the Ishinca River valley and being so slain by the mountains and the river, and by the benediction of a walk with my Friend, that despite my fatigue and rotten altitude sickness, I hiked and sang up the side of the mountain (I did stop singing at about 12,000 feet when I had to throw up about every 20 yards). From the outside, it sounds like mawkishness, a silly response to situational inspiration, but I know better. It didn't just happen on the side of the mountain, or on holidays or special occasions. I routinely allowed myself to be moved, to not take things in stride. I don't know what happened, or what changed, or what now seals me off from that dynamic experience of the world, but I need to find it again, desperately. I know I must in many ways be serious and solid these days, and I am, but if I don't find some way to reconnect to that vitality, I am pretty sure it's absence will eventually kill me.

much peace,
tjb

I Am Not Clever

...but this song is a little, or what I have of it thus far.

Spaceman

Out into the ether, where the stars collide
and flash their long-dead smiles through the cavernous night
Good old spaceman won't put his helmet on again
He's out in the cold and the ghostlight wearing nothing but his skin

And beneath the sweet physicality, there's closed doors in our minds
We're miles apart in your tiny bed, and I'm leaving you behind

I'll choose the vacuum, where there's nothing I'm required to feel
Yeah nothing but want and wanderlust and a nagging urge to breathe
Into the outside through a blue-white picture frame
I can't see your face from outer space, I can't remember my own name

And to shed the false solidarity and barely murmured lies
There's a skylight above us, and I'm leaving you behind...

(Copyright 2006, Thomas J Burbach)

much peace

Untitled in Progress

Maybe you'll finally make that mythic run south or
prove your repentance with a gun in your mouth
but you always lose your nerve
in the shadows' evening length
caught in your private hell between weakness and strength............
(Copyright 9/2009, Thomas J Burbach)

much peace