CHANGING THE CALENDAR

 

trees in the rain

 

An image of John Lennon just now ran across the movie screen inside my head. I recalled seeing a headline a week or so ago of his son by his first wife telling the world John Lennon was not a nice man at home, that the kid never saw any love in him. John wrote songs about love, but didn't live the love he wrote songs about. Therefore, he was a hypocrite. What does that have to do with anything? King David wrote the most beautiful songs about love ever, period. He was a rogue. John Newton, who wrote Amazing Grace, was a slave trader. I read in John Berryman's Dream Songs and see video of an interview with him, I don't see all his poems in him. I see just a man whose mind pieced together with words and rhythms some amazing compositions. I don't see suicide in his poems when I read them. I don't see suicide in Robert Lowell's poems either. How they ended their lives is as irrelevant to their art as the brand of tires on their cars. I felt a degree of sorrow for the kid who tried to be a star with his daddy's name and it didn't take. He sees his half-brother, Yoko's son, bathed in luxury, privilege and wealth as son of John Lennon. Julian was left out, never made it to stardom and evidently turned bitter. What a dreary old man he might be, "I'm the neglected son of John Lennon...he was a sorry-ass hypocrite," in the pub night after night.

 

 

 

The last two evenings being year's end and year's beginning, another turn around the sun, I decided to see my favorite movies. Last night's choice was Hero, a film by Chinese director Yimou Zhang. Hero is at the top of the list of the most beautiful films I've seen. This was the fifth or sixth viewing. It is billed an action movie starring Jet Li. The action is choreographed martial arts ballet in flowing clothes of colors that sound like a Chinese violin. It is an historical drama given a touch of fairy tale. Then today I chose to see another favorite film, King of Masks, a Chinese film by director Wu Tianming. A good Chinese story, a gentle roller coaster ride of the emotions, of an old man and a child he bought in the market to be his heir. He was the last to carry the traditional art of the mask, an entertainment of changing masks seemingly by magic. He needed an heir to pass his art form to and bought a little boy. Turns out he was cheated, the boy was a girl and he did not want a girl, the art could only be passed on to a boy. From there it goes round and round to a tear-jerker happy ending Chinese style. A story of everyday life realism with the sense of a fairy tale. Exquisitely beautiful photography in both films. 

 

 

 

Didn't do anything else to acknowledge the change of calendars. Haven't even put up the new calendar. Aimed to walk the dog today. Justin stopped by on his way to his deer stand and brought some hay up from the barn in his big pickup. He advised staying out of the woods today. Jan 1 is the last day of hunting season. Everybody was out. I said we'd stay on the road, in that case, and he advised blaze orange if I want to walk the road. Decided to let it go. Lead won't be flying in the woods from Saturday onward. A week ago, Justin killed the big bear living in this area. He estimated it 425 lbs, said the "cape" was 150 lbs. He wants to make a rug to hang on the wall. For a hunter, it's a good trophy. This was the bear he'd said earlier was going about in daylight. He said it means the bear was getting brave. A good one to cull from the sloth. I saw it on the back of his pickup within twenty minutes of being shot. I have a hard time with killing. I have no judgment of hunting. It's necessary, I know it, just don't care to participate in it. I also know my attitude about not killing is a minority of one. Justin knows I'm not a killer, he also knows I admire his skill with a bow and a gun. He brought the bear down with one shot. He said the bear came into view just as it turned dark, "A black bear is hard to see through a scope in the dark."

 

 

I've known Justin since he was a baby. We were friends in his childhood the same as I am friends with his baby, Vada. Vada is a feist, just like her daddy was. It's like the same kid, one a boy, one a girl. Vada is becoming a rowdy little kid. She and her daddy play rough and she loves it. It's in her horoscope. She got in trouble in pre-school; when she fights little kids her size, she hurts them. Her dance class had a recital a few weeks ago I'm sorry I missed. She ruled in it. Vada was the star performer and did it like she was born to the stage. Crystal told me after their trip to Disney World, Vada dressed up as Elsa was to walk behind Cinderella around a big circle of people clapping. Not Vada, Crystal said, Vada doesn't follow anybody. She walked around the circle holding Cinderella's hand. I would so love to see Vada grow up. She'll be out front in whatever she does. She is a balanced blend of her mommy and daddy. And her daddy will go crazy when he sees her drawn to rowdy boys. By the time she's in high school, she will have as many deer kills as the best of the boy hunters. She'll make all A's, be head cheerleader, play baseball and be homecoming queen.

 

 

photos by tj worthington

 

 

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BARBIE MEDUSA

gray day

 

More rain, more overcast sky, more fog, more mud. Dense fog on the mountain today. Low-flying clouds cross the mountains along this stretch, crawling over them south to north like big white snails. The first five miles were opaque in dense fog and I took a detour over a muddy road that was a beautiful drive. Trees in fog are misty like a fairy tale. I drove out of the fog and it was another t-shirt day in late December. Wanted to see Carolina beat Atlanta in football, but that's not what I saw. At the beginning, Justin said Carolina would lose because they've lost their magic. I told him I'd said to friend Carole on the phone earlier that I want them to win too much, afraid I'd jinx them pulling for them. Not many years ago I went to a nascar race in Charlotte with Justin. He'd got a couple of free tickets. First car I pulled for was the M&Ms car because I like M&Ms. He was the first to blow his motor. Next I pulled for Jr Earnhardt. He blew his motor. I quit pulling for anybody. Nobody else blew an engine. When I'm watching a race on tv and feel like pulling for Joey Logano, I back away, not wanting to jinx him. I watch games and races with dispassion to keep from jinxing anybody. I know it is absurd to think I have such power, but too often it looks that way. I pull for Danica Patrick and she wrecks.

exit

I, too, suspected Panthers could lose, for the reason Justin said, they've lost their magic. Last week they came too close to losing. And I knew Atlanta would come back full force after their humiliating loss to Carolina the last game they played. The tension of Panthers going for their fifteenth straight win and Atlanta determined with all their power not to let it happen, made a good game. It was a tight game. Both teams struggled for every inch of ground. Atlanta won the play of the game with a stupendous Hail Mary pass and an equally stupendous catch. The quarterback had been hit hard three times before the play. The moment the ball left his hand he collapsed in agony. It took everything he had to throw it so far, so accurately. The receiver had three guys on top of him. The ball went between the hands of one of his blockers and into his hands. Beautiful throw, beautiful catch. I appreciate a good play, whichever team does it, and exclaimed, Great play! Justin said, Harrumph.

coyote with apple in its mouth

 

It was more fun seeing Vada than the tv. Upon arrival, as soon as we'd done our greeting hug, she took my hand and told me to go with her to her room. She wanted to show me her new toys. I knew her grandmother had given her a Barbie house and was curious to see what it could be. My first thought, it would have to be big. And it was. Three floors. About four feet high. Pink Beverly Hills post-modern neoclassical kitsch architecture. Something you'd think Paris Hilton might live in. I noticed there were no stairs. Of course, I thought, Barbie is about playing pretend. I asked Vada, Does it have an elevator? She said, Yeah! I'll show you how it works! It is a simple mechanism looking like it will go on working beyond the first two weeks. It has a garage with a mini Mustang in it and a swimming pool. A mermaid lay on her side in the pool having an underwater nap. She has half a dozen Barbies and several decapitated Barbie heads she plays with as much as the whole Barbies.

speeding car

 

One of the Barbie heads had long black hair. The new puppy dog, an "English cream lab," found it in a puddle of water in one of Vada's toys on the deck, floating face up. Dog picked up the head, brought it toward me, got in trouble and had to drop it. The wet plastic hair looked like the Medusa's head with blacksnakes writhing from her scalp. It was very peculiar to look at. Barbie Medusa with painted-on eyebrows and eyes, ruby lips. For a moment I thought I was watching a Derek Jarman film. Throughout my time there, the puppy curled up at my feet. I realized it had felt my gentle touch when we met and was drawn to it. I said it smelled dog on my shoes and pants, which it surely did. There came a time daddy scolded the dog for not curling up at his feet. The little dog is already afraid of him. He thinks he's training it, but for now he's only keeping it scared of him. It will grow up with his martial teaching and become a martial dog, which is what he wants it to be. We have different ideas of a dog's value. He will make a companion of the dog, Gus, to go places with him in the truck, be obedient and fierce, a protector for Vada to grow up with. It is a charming puppy and will make a great dog. In her room I called her Vada Tomata. She said, Don't call me that. I'm not food.   
  

prays for dogs

 

 

 

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NEW DOG FIRST DAY

dog in a new world

 

First full day with new dog was an event from beginning to end. I can't call her Kutra any more. This is not her name. Zero resonance with this dog. Maybe for a pit bull. For now, I call her Dog  for absence of a name and I like it for a name. It means canine, which is high praise for me, like calling mountain people hillbillies. To me, hillbilly is a name of high praise. It means beautiful, wonderful people, which I've learned from experience. For me, even calling somebody a dog is high praise. Calling her Dog, I feel a warmth associated with the word dog. She is a silhouette of dog. Silhouette (sil-a-wet), good name possibility, easy to say.  Could spell it Cilawet, avoid the long French spelling with the weird H. Sounds like Lil Bit. They would rhyme in a song. Seems to me in this time of no moral or ethical center in hairless primate society, we'd do well to build the new society following a dog's nature, now that we've learned human behavior is no model to live by. Like you-better-not is absence of morality, control by guilt indicates absence of ethics. Even wolf packs take care of their own. Dogs are known for automatic forgiveness, for loyalty in the absolute, their way of communicating in silence, adding a squeal or a bark for emphasis. A dog will give its life for a human friend without thinking about it first.

 

cat eyeballs dog

note the batman shadow on the armrest

a projection of sofia's self-image

 

Dog nature is not all sweet and gentle, similar to ours. They fight and exhibit jealousy without restraint. First night new dog was here, Martha from next door dropped by. Dog saw her out the window and wanted to meet her. I questioned it. Martha is a naturally gentle, good dog, but that's not all. She's dumb as  rock, never ever learns. Every time I arrive home in the car and she's here, every time, as soon as I open the car door she starts climbing inside while I want to climb outside. Every time I have to struggle with her, put up my leg to stop her, grab her collar, pull her back, and all the time she's struggling with all her might to get in. It takes yelling at her in the loudest voice I can fathom to get her attention. She only responds to yelling and screaming. At the house, Martha outside the door, I hesitated, but dog inside was excited to meet her. I did not know if Martha would be friendly or attack. It was about fifty-fifty in my mind, while considering jealousy it was more like zero-one hundred. The moment they made eye contact, Martha attacked in her full fierceness, and she's a powerful dog. I had to decide in a nanosecond how to handle this moment.

 

every experience is new

 

I kicked a 45-yard field goal with Martha's head. Yelling would not break the state she'd gone into, nor would hitting, threatening, anything. Even cold water could not have stopped her. I needed to distract her attention instantly, no time to think about it, do it now. I realized in the moment it was my role to show my new friend that I am her protector. She will be loyal to me and I will be loyal to her. I've told her she is safe with me and this was my first opportunity to show I mean it. The kick deflected Martha's spell enough to get her attention. She looked at me with eyes that said so clearly I could read the subtitles, "Did you do that on purpose?" I looked at her with eyes that said just as clearly, "Yes I did." I closed the door on Martha and turned off the outside light. This morning I took dog out for bathroom and carried the walking stick for a weapon. Martha came creeping toward us, aggressive eyes on the dog. I pointed the walking stick at Martha like a magic wand the way Vada does it when she's playing Elsa from the movie, Frozen. Martha tucked tail between legs and turned around. I thought, Good, she at least understands magic wands.

 

portrait of good dog martha

 

Today's adventure with dog was riding in the car. It felt good to have a dog beside me again, especially the very image of Aster, herself, even the red collar. Aster has been gone for eight years and I miss her the same as if it were eight days. Dog wanted to be on me the whole time on the road. At first, she thought I was taking her home. I put the armrest/divider between us. It helped. She was anxious, nervous. Her balance was good on the car seat. The continuous curves back and forth, changes of speed, took her a few minutes to get used to. Needed car inspection to renew tag and registration. Crystal's dad is the car's mechanic. She and Vada were in Crystal's shop next door and met the dog. Vada was enchanted. Dog squealed nonstop. I read it for needing bathroom activity. I walked her for it but she did not. Later, I walked her again. It turned out she needed to find the exact spot and she didn't know where it was, had to search until she found it. She was desperate to go and couldn't let herself do it in the car or indoors. Thank you, wonderful dog. The squealing ended. She uses the leash to pull me. She chokes herself pulling me, and keeps on pulling. We look like a cartoon.

 

 

 

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BAT MEDICINE AND PLAY

neighbor gary chauffeur of trees and sky

 

Brought more hay for donkeys up from the barn before the rain. I can fit three bales in the trunk of the car with lid up. Park beside the road and roll the bales down the hill to the place I stack haybales. A blue tarp protects them from the rain. Donkeys have a ball when I deliver new hay. Jenny and Jack stand at the corner of the fence ready to watch, like me waiting for the mailman, expecting a new book in the mail. It alarms them slightly, the bales rolling down the hill. Jack jumps and frolics in a small circle. Jenny stands back and watches. Neighbor Gary came down the road in his PT Cruiser and stopped. I stepped up the hill to the road to visit for a few minutes. We talked about baby donkey and I noticed a red bat flying up and down the road, cavorting, playing, up and down, in circles. It looked like the bat was indeed playing, putting on a bat dance in the air for me personally. It flew back and forth, about a hundred feet up the road one way, then about a hundred feet down the road the other way, this way, that way. I couldn't stop watching it. I'd never seen such a demonstration of bat flight in the past and knew I never would in the future. I gave it my full appreciation.

 

find the bat

 

Attempted to take some pictures of the bat, but none of the still pictures worked out. The camera focused on the trees in the near distance, putting the bat out of focus, it's in swift motion too, I could not find the bat in the still pictures. Made a brief video in which  the bat, a speck, can be seen flying for maybe two seconds. The air above the road along there is a channel for air flow between my trees and the bank across the road. The bat flew from one end of my trees to the other, leading me to believe the open air along that stretch of road is a good place for a bat to find flying bugs. I googled red tree bat, found a description, notes about their habitat and how they live. And red tree bat is what they're called. I had several good looks at it flying by. Can see it clearly closing my eyes. I asked Gary to step outside the car to see it, billing the flight a once in a lifetime moment. A time came I was impressed by the bat's stamina. It flew for so long we stopped looking and went about or ways. Birds need rest after extended flight, but the bat kept on flapping wings, cavorting, diving, circling. It looked like it was putting on a show, though I doubt it was aware of being watched, though an observer does change things. 

sofia observes the primate

 

In the house, I went to Jamie Sams' book, Medicine Cards, to see what bat represents. The book came with cards, each having a picture of a form of wildlife, like bear, dragonfly, hawk, deer, skunk, 52 of them. It is a form of consulting chance, like tarot, I Ching, and others. In the Native American way, medicine means anything that improves one's connection to the Great Mystery and to all life. A few pages in the book tell the spiritual gift of each animal, bird, reptile or bug. Once, a hawk flew above the hood of my 78 Toyota pickup for about a tenth of a mile, looking back over its shoulder at the primate through the windshield. At home I looked up hawk to see what the hawk might be saying. One of the aspects of Hawk medicine is a message that I should circle above my life and examine it from a higher perspective. I take a visitation by one of the animals for the same as drawing one of the cards. It felt so much like the bat was telling me something, I looked it up. In every case, Bat signals rebirth of some part of yourself or the death of old patterns. Bat represents what is called the shaman's death and rebirth. Rebirth is the main theme of the bat. 

miss ed says this is different

being a donkey

Two strong cases of rebirth came into my life lately with a kitten in the house and a donkey foal in the meadow. Reading of bat I felt recognition that rebirth, a change of patterns, was in the works. Before kitten came into the house, I was feeling fairly glum. Caterpillar was gone and my heart was mourning her. Jenny kept on expecting. I faced Jenny's expectation with sorrow, hoping, daring not to hope, her baby would live and be in good health. I did not want Jenny to suffer again her grief from losing her first baby to premature birth last year. I still miss Caterpillar who lived here eighteen years, though sorrow turned to joy when Sophia entered the house. Old patterns going away. Caterpillar leaves her old cat body, Sophia new in her cat body. The successful birth of Miss Ed turned sorrow to joy like bringing Sofia home.  Feeling a renewed sense of my own life. Sophia has taught me how to play. We have play time every day. Noting the value of play courses through my mind. I play better with four year old Vada from awareness of play's importance, and how to play, not just in child development, but all along the way.

 

vada

 

 

 

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BLESSINGS THESE DAYS

donkey jen's blessing miss ed

Day after day I see on facebook people posting an announcement of being blessed by having some feel-good experience. Most of the time I feel like barfing because it drips with oozing sentiment like fart putty. Sometimes I agree, it was indeed a blessing. Then I question what the word blessing means and why I never say it. It's like the word luck. We make our own luck. In like manner, we make our own blessings. I think about times I've called something a blessing, I find that I feel more blessed having whatever it is that makes it possible to notice a given experience as a blessing. It's there whether or not I receive it a blessing. My friends Crystal and Justin had their baby girl, who I consider a major blessing in my life. I've slowed way down and lost interest in an awful lot, become so disappointed by civilization, I've indrawn to the world of my home, my mountain glen in the beautiful Blue Ridge among my four-legged friends. I only see people I care about who care about me. I've let go of associations with toxic people. It really makes a difference when they're gone. And it makes a difference when a vibrant baby enters.

 

miss ed's fifth day in a donkey body

 

Over the last few years I've alienated three people I thought of as friends, because they wore me out. Constantly telling me what to do, what to read, what to, what to, sentences all starting with you needta, you gotta, you oughta, you should. Can't we just sit still and talk about something, like have a conversation about something having to do with something besides measuring how deficient I am as a model of you. They got on my last nerve to the point I had to shake them off, never felt a pixel of guilt. I hear Patti Smith in my head in her Babelogue intro to Rock n Roll Nigger, "I'm an aMERican artist, I feel NO guilt." So Patti Smith. The times I see tv, this is what I see, continuous you-oughta. I amuse my friends talking back to commercials, saying things like, "No, I don't think I will." Nationwide is on your side. "Not." It's a blessing not to have so-called friends in my face missionarizing empiricism to me, what's right.

 

miss ed one ear up

 

I used to think it cynical of men my age laughing at me thinking principles important in my youth. It wasn't many years ago I came to I don't give a shit about what's right, it's so subjective. Because it works for me is no reason it would work for somebody else. Our karmic make-up must be at least as complex and specific as our DNA. I'm of a mind that it's ok guys have long hair, girls have blue hair, both have tattoos and dress imaginatively. Somebody says to me, "the kids these days," in a disgusted tone of voice, I make a case for the kids these days by telling a little bit of what I've seen getting in among the kids these days and finding they are incredible people. I like all the kids-these-days I know, like them a lot. I don't bore them too badly because I'd rather listen to them tell me what they have to say than be the one talking. I'm a good listener because I really do want to hear what they have to say. They're good people. They have beautiful things to say. Going by the kids these days I've known, I feel like their generation is closer to the heart than my generation

 

jenny and her five day old baby

 

The day after going to a show of Daniel Biggins' band, The Seduction, waking up next morning, taking carrots to donkeys, I feel blessed. The experience of a small place playing rock n roll the way I want to hear it feels to me like a blessing. The blessing part in it, in my subjective case, is that I am able to receive an experience as a blessing. It is, indeed, a blessing that I have three babies in my life that I love with all my heart, and one long-distance. A kitten, a donkey, Vada and Teddy. I feel buoyed up by the new energy right here, one inside the house, the other just out the door. Kids these days. I pay attention to all the kids I know, from babies on up, find them, every one, interesting people. I value their humanity, their lives. It's been known about me for years in a big group of people they can find me among the kids, listening to them and watching them play. I just sit in a chair or on a step and watch. I've watched Weird Al videos with a roomful of kids laughing, all of them kids I'd known since they were born. I feel the same among the animals I've learned to know. Sometimes I stand at the fence and watch the donkeys in their lives together, sometimes go out and sit in the meadow among them, listen to them graze, tell them I'm happy they're in my life.  

 

miss ed watches mama eat her grain

 

 

 

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A DONKEY NAMED EDIE

baby edie and mama jen

 

Today, Wednesday, I took carrots to the donkeys in the morning. All three were out in the meadow. Jack came running. Jenny and baby walked. Every time Jack arrives first for carrot, he's difficult for Jenny, won't let her near the carrots. Jenny stood a ways behind Jack and I tossed the carrots to Jenny over Jack. He gets weird when he's the first one at the fence. He will not let Jenny near the fence. When she's the first one, she's fine with Jack at the fence and Jack is not a problem toward her. Both are unreasonably jealous when they're eating. Sometimes eating his grain in the afternoon, he turns so jealous he snorts and growls at me if I am too close to his grain even the other side of the fence. Jenny, the jealous natured one, won't let Jack near her grain, but is fine with me nearby. It seems odd every time Jack acts up over his food, he has no apparent jealousy in him. Only eating. Jack backed up a little too close to Jenny at grain time, she popped him on the rump with a back hoof, and he popped her in turn. The baby stepped a little too close to Jenny and she popped it on the rump. Baby wobbled and looked around like to say, What was that?

 

one-eyed jack

 

I thought when baby was looking bewildered, You'll get used to it, baby. This is your donkey lifetime. The kicking has begun. Baby came to me at the fence. I touched the top of its head, rubbed it's neck, talked to it. It's first touch of the human hand. Like all animals the first time they're touched and rubbed they think nothing of it. We train them to let us pet them. I leaned my head down close to the ground to look up between donkey's legs. Saw nothing but white fur. Lifted the tail and saw nothing. So I figure it's a girl. Her name now is Edie. If it were a boy, the name would be Ed. I did not know what to do for a name and decided to ask the youngest person I know to name the baby. Lucas and Judy Carpenter's girl, Meredith, I've known since she was a baby, has a three year old baby, Teddy. Teddy is a sharp little kid. Judy talks with him on the cell phone regularly. I asked her to ask him if he would like to name the baby donkey. He was taken aback by the suggestion unto stumped. It was like a whole new concept for his child mind to be asked to name a donkey. He said, "I'll have to think about it."

 

two hours old

 

Three days later, he gave his answer: Mr Ed if it's a boy and Miss Ed if it's a girl. I can't quite see myself calling a donkey Miss Ed, though it is a fun name. I decided to go with Edie, the same as Miss Ed in one word. I wondered how a three year old child in San Francisco knew about Mr Ed the talking horse. It puzzles me. He's been in Montessori school at least a year. Maybe they show old movies like Ma And Pa Kettle Go To New York, movies I saw in childhood. I doubt he knows about the Little Rascals. I checked out some Little Rascals videos from the library earlier this year. It's a sight how politically incorrect they were, sexist and racist unbelievably from today's perspective. They were so insensitive, even I, repelled by political correctness, was sometimes wide-eyed over what I was seeing, my grandparents' generation. The little black boys pushed the little white boys in wagons. The little white girls were pre-pubescent sex objects. The kids were even a bit unsettling in that regard. Of course, they were directed and scripted by adults. 

 

jack rolls in a dust circle

 

I was watching a movie a little while ago with Sofia on my lap, thinking how fun it is now with a kitten, a baby donkey and Vada. In my advanced years, suddenly I am lured into play every morning with a wide-open kitten. On Sundays I see Vada. This last Sunday, she took hold of my hand before I could take my coat off, wanting me to go with her to her room and play. She wanted to show me her toys. Later, during football, she brought out her hand-puppet turtle, wanted me to put it on my hand and let her feed it fart putty. The turtle acted like it was chewing the fart putty. Whenever Vada would look away, I'd take the flattened chunk of fart putty out of the turtle's mouth and hide it under my leg. The turtle swallowed and Vada gave it more fart putty. This went on until the fart putty ran out. When she looked away, I stuffed all the fart putty I'd collected into the turtle's mouth and said to Vada, "Turtle's not feeling good. He's gonna puke." Mouth opened, a glob of fart putty fell out. Vada squealed delight and began feeding the turtle again. "Make it puke." At home, I flip a string for a kitten and soon will be playing with a baby donkey. I did not foresee that in my seventies I would learn how to play. 

  

vada

 

 

 

 

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THE JOY OF PLAY

the shadow line series by tj worthington

 

Went to visit friends Justin and Crystal to see the day's race, and watch Vada play. She played like a kitten the whole time I was there. I told Crystal I have my very own Vada now in the form of a kitten that plays all the time. Vada makes everything into play. She picked up a small package of her daddy's, what looked to me like, earplugs. She said it's candy, let's eat it. I said I don't think daddy wants us eating his earplugs. She said it's all right, and she acted like she picked one up and handed it to me to eat. I acted like I ate it. She asked if it was good. I told her it was and she pretended to eat one. Later, she had some blue play-dough (sp?) and stuffed it into a plastic tea cup. She pressed it to my mouth, the play-dough, and said, "Drink." I pretended to drink. She said, "Was it yuckie?" She then smelled my lips and said "It smells yuckie." I was laughing inside the whole time I was there with Vada playing while the tv was going, giving me a fun distraction from something that gets a bit monotonous after a few hours.

The last 80 laps are the most interesting for me, though the earlier part of the race is important, too, to see how the different drivers are doing, who is having a good day and who is not. I love about the races that they are unpredictable. I hear announcers talk about who is favored to win and what's gonna happen and I think, Shut up. There is no knowing who will win, sometimes right up to the finish line. I've seen a win by a few inches and a win by a quarter of a lap. I've seen a big pile-up at the finish line where a dozen cars crossed the finish line wrecking, sideways, backwards, tires smoking. I've seen the winner run out of gas with a quarter lap to go and have to coast to the finish line to come in second. It is bound to be big betting business in Vegas and underground gambling all over the country and around the world. It's such big money, I think some people are looking for ways to rig a race for betting, though I can't see any way it could be done. Seems like football and basketball would be easy to rig, but a 400 mile and 500 mile race seems a bit more difficult. Where money is happening, a way will be found if it hasn't already.

We watched the last quarters of several football games, saw a few good plays, mostly quarterback sacks. Not an exemplary day for football. Vada played with her mermaid doll and danced around in her fairy dress, not a tutu, but a long nightgown type dress with pictures of animation girls from a kids movie. I asked who they were. She said, They're fairies. I thought, interesting. How many years has it been since I've heard the word fairy? It seems like it just about left the language and some kids movie brought it back. I found a word, reading Orwell's 1984, published in 1946, that has fallen out of the American vocabulary except as a product, tang. Orwell used the word in its original meaning before "the drink of astronauts," Tang, came on in the 1950s. Tang the drink put an end to tang the word. Vada kept me in good humor the whole time I was at the house, playing nonstop, stream-of-consciousness, one idea following another in a flow that went as the wind blows.

 

Though Sophia was back home, I felt the same spirit with Sophia as with Vada today. Both are relentlessly entertaining. Vada kept Sophia in my mind, and now Sophia is keeping Vada in my mind. Seeing Vada today, after a couple weeks living with a kitten, it charmed me to see human baby and cat baby loving play so similarly, stream-of-consciousness play from one thing to the next with no transition between the two but their random sequence. It's what the living do in childhood, play and learn at hyper-speed. I find it curious that our first interaction with the world, growing into it, humans, the four-leggeds, birds, I don't know about fish, but they probably play too, we play. And, like Vada and Sophia, we play nonstop thinking nothing could be more important than the moment's play. We adults continue to play, we just do it in more twisted forms. The games adults play are games like one-upmanship, the one I find most tiresome. We gamble, get drunk, get high, race cars, shoot guns, listen to rock, continuation of play into adulthood. It's good to have Sophia and Vada in my life in a time when I'd about forgotten play. It's fun right now with kitten crawling all over me. 

the shadow line series

by tj worthington

 

 

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PATRIOT DIVIDED

george segal

 

I saw a picture of a cop dressed in orange, charged with sex acts with a two year old. News items tend not to get me emotionally concerned, but sometimes they do, like the Sandra Bland story. It makes me want to be the one to deliver karma in person. Unrealistic thinking.  This guy with the two year old, just seeing his face and the headline caused my whole being inside the ribcage to want to explode in rage. I thought of my baby friend, Vada, who is four now, but I loved her when she was two as well as now. It's a protective and a giving love, not a taking love. I couldn't even say something to Vada to hurt her. I see news photos of a Palestinian daddy carrying his dead baby two years old, him splattered with her blood, and I think, How can you live with this, man? To myself I say this is half way round the globe, another world, another culture, another language, another way of life, none of which I understand, leave it alone, it's not mine. Mine is here where I am, my world. My impotence to help in any way makes me sad and callouses my heart. I see myself carrying baby Vada covered in her blood, dead, age four, and I want to deliver karmic payback with my bare hands.

 

george segal

 

I remember my friend Chad, when he was fifteen, his mama's husband beat her mercilessly, Chad stood him up on his toes and told him if he ever hit his mama again, he would beat him to death with his bare hands. Chad could do it, oppressor knew it, his mama was never hit again. I respect Chad for doing what he had to do, that's a hard decision for a kid. I told him of my respect, congratulated him on having what it took to do it. I don't see Chad a lot, but when I see him, I see somebody I respect in a big way. If a smart-missile from an American military drone in this time of police state were to kill Vada, and me near enough to see it, I would lose it for the rest of my life. I would join the forces that oppose American military involvement in my homeland to become an active enemy with purpose. My life would change that instant. I would be a warrior rebel from that day onward. I imagine a large part of the purpose behind the missiles is to create new enemies and to harden old enemies to keep never-ending war going, corporate profits up, shareholders paying their bills, the politicians in the right country clubs, the stock in mood-enhancers rising steadily.

 

george segal

 

It tears me up, with Vada in my life, to see a child hurt or killed in news photographs. It's what emotional news photographs are meant to do. Nonetheless, I know several people loved that baby with all their hearts the way I love Vada. And they're the people left to bury the baby. I don't like that the government of my country is killing babies all around the globe, even at home, creating such intense misery for corporate profit. It tells me the human condition in this time is the ethics and morality of money, God is dead. Not that God can die, but the American way of life that truly worships money acts as if God were, if not dead, absent. Conscience is something to laugh at now. War is evil. It's obvious. Seems to me a country with an economy rooted in war would, itself, be evil. There is no indifference like the American so-called Christian indifference to the poor and the down and out. None of this is new. It's been like this throughout my lifetime, different faces and names in the news along the way. 
 

george segal

 

American wars are geography lessons in locating the poorest countries on earth with the least defenses, to rob their resources and destroy them further. Shameless is what it is. But it keeps the economy going, the television flickering, the smart-phone charged, the laptop open, our inebriates available, gas in the car. Now it's looking like a necessary evil. Who is going to give up a cell phone, television and computer to stop American jets from bombing more Middle-Eastern defenseless cities? In the poorest parts of the world, my country is known as death from the sky and death squads on the ground. I've not been able to find a way to look at this aspect of America with anything but shame. I can feel pride in American art since the 1950s, pride in American rock n roll, pride in American poetry since Ezra Pound, pride in American writing, in a country where none of it is honored. Maybe it's best that way. Keeps the sentiment in greeting cards and television, where it belongs. I can be nationalistically proud as one of the American people, who are an incredible people. However, our government has turned on we the people, and I can't find nationalist pride in that. This explains why Bernie Sanders appeals to me as a candidate. He appears to have the potential to be a Little David kicking Goliath's ass again. We'll see.  

 

george segal himself

 

 

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VADA'S NEW FART PUTTY

air bellows drive-thru art museum

 

 

On the road home from seeing the race, I'd made a mental note passing through the Air Bellows Drive-Thru Art Museum to stop and get some pictures on the way back. The light was good. I parked out of the way. It is a natural law that if I were to stop inside the tunnel and get out to take a picture, the first thing to happen would be a car to come along. As it was, as soon as I stepped inside the tunnel to view the two walls, here came a red corvette, a blond babe driving it and a man my age sitting in the passenger seat, out on a Sunday ride with his trophy thangs. I stepped outside the tunnel to wait for them to pass through. He looked at me with disapproval. I looked at him unimpressed. I walked around in the space between the two walls like a Joan Mitchell was on one wall and a Cy Twombly on the other. I was feeling what I feel in museums standing in front of something by Anselm Kiefer or Adolph Gottlieb, the presence of Art. Real art has the presence of a living being. Inside the Air Bellows Drive-Thru Art Museum, I feel the presence of walls as though alive. It helps to be in love with the random and chance. I see the art of chance, pure chance. Chance in colors, chance in words, chance in images. A collage of a lot of different people with no design in mind, only making a mark, adding a color, a name, a word, a phrase, a sentence, whatever happens.

 

 

air bellows drive-thru art museum

air bellows drive-thru art museum

 

I was in a groove, it's the same as the Museum of Modern Art for me, making photographs in actual awe of what I was seeing. My pictures are composed, sort of, level, featuring something interesting, not random. Next time in there, I'll focus on making random photographs. The ideal would be to have Vada in the museum with camera and ask her to take all the pictures she wants. I'd like to take a panorama camera in there. I was flowing in my groove when a mini-SUV appeared, new middle-class model, a woman my age with a coffee house disapproving eye, a flatlander. She stopped at the entrance to wait for me to get out of there so she could drive through. The place is wide enough for a truck with big side mirrors to pass through easily. I backed up to the wall, the one above with Sydney on it, facing the wall above it with the pink heart, holding camera. I was not going to leave so she could drive through. It's a long tunnel and I did not feel like walking the distance out of there and back. She kept on waiting and I kept on standing. I thought, if you can't drive through here, you can wait for me til I'm done. She looked at me in disgust and crept by. On the back of the car a Ben Carson sticker. I thought: you're dumber'n you look. It hit me by total surprise. If I'd had to guess what republican clown sticker would be on the back of her car, I'd have never guessed Carson with a dozen chances. Cracked me up.

 

vada poses

vada dances

 

I arrive at the house. Vada is playing on the kitchen floor. She jumped and ran to me holding a clear plastic cylinder of purple goo. She held it up for me to see. "I got some new fart putty!!!" She was excited as only a child can be. I said, "Fart putty?" She said, "Yeah!" She pushed her fingers into it and it made a fart sound. She giggled like a child. She pulled the purple gom out of the container and it made a long string stretching to the floor. She made a bracelet of it and it slowly slunk to the floor oozing to a small purple circle. She called it cow poop. She wanted me to make donkey poop with it. I wadded some into a ball about donkey poop size. She wanted to hold it. I put it in her hands and its inclination toward the floor began, flattening in her hands, stringing to the floor. She watched the whole process in awe of this stuff that acts like it's alive. She had it in small circles on the floor around her, strings of it like skinny snakes on the tiles, enchanted with this purple ooze. She had a plastic doll six inches or so high, a dress-up doll in underwear, Elsa's friend Anna. Vada shaped the fart putty into a dress on the doll. Immediately, it began the ooze process, and while it oozed, the dress became more and more interesting. She packed it onto the doll, covering the doll from neck down. The oozing created the dress by clinging to the doll while oozing. It was like a dress in a Munch painting, the color too. I didn't think to make a video, it was so spontaneous a moment, Vada so fascinated, so focused, dressing her little plastic dolls in purple fart putty. I did not want to spoil the moment with a camera.

 

vada dances

 

 

the new mancave theater curtain

Settled into the mancave to watch the race at Watkins Glen. Good race. They ran hard. I was pulling for Joey Logano this time. I always pull for Joey Logano. He's a good driver and drives a beautiful car. Kyle Busch has had his share of attention lately. Another driver I like is Keselowski, but his car couldn't keep up today. I like the way Logano smokes the tires after a win. Once, I saw him burn the tires off the rims. Justin watched the race with disinterest today, because Kyle Busch has been winning every race and Jr Earnhardt couldn't do better than fourth and fifth. He doesn't like Logano, doesn't like either Busch, the drivers I like. He doesn't know I'm partial to these drivers, I never speak it. I'm happy for every one of them when they get a win. It seems to me a commendable achievement to outrun all the other cars handled by good drivers going pedal to the metal, fast as the road allows, snapping at your heels. It is a long time from beginning to end. Vada, the natural-born entertainer, danced for me, posed for me, kept my attention from going into stasis gaping at cars and commercials on tv. She likes to pose for picture taking. She likes me taking pictures of her while she plays. A time will come that she'll say, That's enough, and she's done. Persist and she'll say, Stop it! She danced for the video camera, saying at the beginning the redneck's famous last words, Watch this! She danced and danced in her Elsa dress until she'd performed enough. She wanted the camera, took it out of my hands and made video of me. I told her to get her daddy who was stretched out on the couch in semi slumber. She made an abstract portrait of daddy, something director Lars von Trier might like, mostly way out of focus, sometimes sharp focus. Vada was the star of the day.

 

vada dances

vada dances

 

vada and daddy

 

 

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