DREAM WRITING

rock face

Trip to town for a periodic doctor visit, had blood pressure read, interesting talk about blood. I like to arrive a few minutes early and have to wait some. Today I took glasses and a book, thinking I was prepared to sit for fifteen or so minutes in a room of chairs lined around the walls. Right behind me came somebody who wanted to talk. We talked about donkeys. He had a donkey and a horse. We had a good visit like people who knew each other. He was called to his appointment. A woman walked in I slightly knew about ten years ago. We had a good visit talking until I was called to my appointment. In the next room I was weighed, aghast at what I saw and not caring at once, Answer a few questions. Went prepared to pay and wasn't asked to pay. Told by doctor to buy a blood pressure mechanism and keep track of it at home. Evidently, this is a new recommendation from AMA, that people read their blood pressure at home. He said in a doctor's office one's blood pressure is unnaturally high. I told him every time I return from a trip to Sparta, I collapse in bed and sleep for awhile. It is such a pattern that I plan for nap time after a trip to town. Maybe it runs my blood pressure up to drive there and back. Maybe it's the psychic energy of so many people in town. I like driving less and less. Next stop, drugstore. I was glad to see they had blood pressure devices with digital push-button reading. The kind with a dial to read on the needle's descent I'm no good at. I've never been able to figure it out. I've tried it so many times I don't ever want to try it again. Frustrating. The digital numbers are the key. The thing cost twice as much as the old style, but I was willing to pay three times as much or four. 

rock monster

I was so anxious to return home, I forgot to go to the grocery store for carrots and the hardware store for sweet grain. If I wake early in the morning, I may run to the grocery store before carrot time. I don't see myself doing that, but for the donkeys I would. After the nap, I took grain out to Jack and Jenny a bit later than usual. They saw me and Jack came running and braying. I stumbled on a stick and took a quick step to catch balance. The gesture, merely a change of rhythm in my walking. Jack turned quick as a polo pony and started to run away. It was like he drifted the turn. I said, "Donkey Jack," he drifted a turn again and ran to me for the grain. Jenny was walking behind. She saw me pour the grain for Jack and she started running. I poured it in her place. Jack came over to see. Jenny snorted, ears back, diving at him with her forehead. Jack's chin over the top of the fence, he followed me back to his pile of grain. I made a gesture like I was pouring the grain and he went to eating. Jack is a bit out of sorts recently. He's wanting to be frisky with Jenny, but she's pregnant and doesn't care to mess around. I saw her give him a good thrashing with her back knees earlier in the day. He stood firm and took it like a tree. I see him with his dinger hanging down fairly often recently. Jack is psyched, ready to go and Jenny is having none of it. He's been absent minded recently, explaining him leaving his grain to go after Jenny's. I always put hers down first, she's so demanding. I wondered if feeding Jack first fried his circuits, rattled a habit pattern. 

rock monster and raven head

Back in the house. Recalling a dream I woke from just before writing the post of two days ago, Patterns Of Chance. I'd been in town and had a nap upon return at six. Slept til twelve and had one of the most curious dreams of my life. I was writing. Wrote one sentence at a time from the first one onward, pausing between sentences like usual. I sat in this seat, fingers on keyboard, monitor showing the sentences and paragraphs. In the dream, I knew what I was writing and what I was thinking. From time to time, I'd read over something I'd written and think, this is it, this is pure surrealist writing. It went all over the place, from one sentence to the next, sometimes making sense subconsciously and sometimes no sense at all. I allowed it not to make sense. I said it has its own sense that I don't need to understand. Every sentence, I wrote a word at a time, concerned about it making sense and not. Having a good time. Though it didn't always make sense outside myself, it made clear sense in the writing. In the dream I was enchanted to be writing pure surrealism inside a dream, knowing while writing it was a dream. I knew the whole time I was writing in a dream, let it flow and watched to see where it would go. Two and a third paragraphs into it, I woke up. Coming out of the dream, I thought: Oh no! I haven't finished. I wanted to see where it goes. I wanted to run it through the printer. I knew I'd forget what was written if I woke. Too late. Wide awake, I remembered the theme and some of the sentences for a few seconds and it was gone. I regretted seeing it go away, wanting to see what I wrote in a dream. 

rock monster and raven head again

The dream seems to fall in line with the dreams that interact with awake awareness by something missing from its place, or something in a place by surprise it would not be. Two weeks ago, I bought an impulse toy in the grocery store for Vada. It was some kind of stretch plastic, a line maybe ten inches long with a hand at either end. It stuck to things, it stretched, was pliable as a rubber band. It seemed like something Vada would like. I never saw it again after bringing groceries into the house. I have searched for it until I gave up looking. Sunday, on the way out the door to see the race, I paused a moment regretting I couldn't find the thing. One place I had not looked. Where I was standing, I put my hand down between the reading chair's cushion and armrest. There it was, quietly waiting to be found. Great relief, something to give Vada. I do like grandpas do, always bring something for babydoll. Having a child friend in this time of the life is ideal. She's so fresh and alert, so one with her feelings, so inventive and uninhibited, I see in her my ideal human being, a pre-school child. Her spirit has not yet been trampled by experience. She lives in a world of people who love her and want to help her learn to live in this world. I'd been at the house an hour or more watching the race. We had been stretching the toy. She'd wrap it around her fingers and wrist several times. She looked at me, her eyes had the same look she looks at her mother with, round, smiling big, and said, "Are you glad to see me?" I said, "Yes I am glad to see you." It tickled her. She cracked me up, made me laugh and she laughed. We went on pulling the toy as far as it would stretch.    

rocks talking

photos by tj worthington

*

GRUMPY OLD BASTARD RANT

constantin brancusi, sleeping muse

I've been in a spin all day, a minor rage, a backed into a corner rage and no recourse. A call that woke me up this morning telling me whatever BigPharma the doctor's office gets their blood-reading strips from has recalled them all over the country. Now I have to go to the hospital, pay I can't guess how much to have blood drawn. Do they take Medicare? Answer: Maybe. Should. Two of the most meaningless words in the language. The part that pist me off was the expectation. Somebody calls at 8 in the morning, tells me to go to hospital and pay them money I don't have and go to the doctor's office for a blood pressure test with money I don't have, the doctor's office an eight dollar round trip. This is happening too much. I get notification that some corporation wants my money because they say so and the announcement they want my money is wrapped in a very articulate threat. I could not say what I wanted to say, talking with the woman in the office I like and know she has no motive beyond what she's told to do. The one telling her what to do is saying it from somebody else, on down the unaccountable line of absence of interest in anything but getting the money. I've had so much of it, people expecting me to give them my money because they say so and I have no recourse. So I have made up my own recourse. I did everything else I planned to do on this trip to town and beyond, bank, drugstore, grocery store. Then came home and went to bed at the time of the doctor's appointment. Didn't even call to say I wouldn't make it. Took a three hour nap. Whatever the repercussions, I don't care. I'll take whatever comes my way like Jack the donkey, stand still like a tree and say, Is that all you got, punk?

constantin brancusi, sleeping muse

The laugh on me is that I'm taking the situation personally and there's nothing personal about it. Except me, and I don't figure. I'm the one paying. And it's wrong of me to take it personally, because it's not. It's about money, not me. They want my money, I give them my money. I don't give them my money, they get all shittin. Threats. The Law. Individually, they don't get it that it is a constant assault of this attitude: I want your money--give it to me now or you'll REALLY pay. And it's not like debt money. A BigPharma corp screws up, has to recall their product, then I'm told to go pay a hundred dollars I don't have for something I don't want to do. Asked why I didn't want to do it, Because I don't want to. That's not a legitimate answer to anyone, but it is the most valid answer I can give. I'm not looking to pass a test, but to answer a question. If you don't want to hear the answer, don't ask the question. It was the expectation that got to me. It's never a matter of it will wait until next day when I can get some money together. It has to be now, or whatever constitutes else. Else, in the case of the electric corporation is cutting off electricity and charging $40 to turn it back on. Same morning, before leaving, I wrote some checks, one of them to the electric corporation, Blue Ridge. I saw on the bill I'm being charged $40 for being late plus $5 for being late. Everything was fine between us until winter came and my electric bill quadrupled due to electrical use increasing and rates raised. It threw me a month behind getting that first one paid, then the next one the same, on and on through winter. I pay first day I'm able the month before last hoping to catch up when rates recede somewhat in summer. I'm being threatened they'll cut off my power and charge me $40 more to have it turned back on. What do I do? I talked with the man at the desk when it started, Oh that's ok. Evidently, he's the only one that thought so.  

 

constantin brancusi, sleeping muse

 

Here's where the grumpy old bastard that I am kicks in. It was not like this thirty years ago. In that time, the "membership co-op" treated us like "members." Now they treat us like a corporation does. Zero tolerance. Then, the co-op gave evidence it liked its people, its members. Now, give us your money. Straight face. Understanding not an option. Listening not an option. Caring, don't even go there. I will pay the damn bill, and I will not forget this experience. It will be an anecdote in many a conversation from now on until everybody I know has heard it at least once, and you know how old people are; they'll tell you a dozen times. The power corporation has turned off my trust and turned on my anger. Believe it or not, there is community here. The people that work for the co-op like that we are a community. The office acts now like they're headquartered in Houston. Today I broke. Too much. It's worse here now than it was in the city when I left urban existence 35+ years ago. My very first Sparta experience popped into mind and gave me the needed laugh. I was brand new, first days. Did not know the road to town. Old man Tom told me how to get to town and told me to go to Wilco for gas. OK. Whatever. I went to Wilco. Then, the fall of 1976, Wilco was only pumps and a little island among the pumps with a white closet-sized space standing, an opening in the Plexiglas window to pay through. I didn't even see the man. A hand came out, took my money and went away. I thought of the black box bank with the slot for a coin and a white plastic hand that snatches it. I had thought I was going to a rural place where everyday life would be a little more personal than in the city. I never saw anything like that in a city. Never returned to Wilco. I can't really say the anti-personal attitude toward money is new in Sparta.

 

constantin brancusi, sleeping muse

 

Another one of my first experiences in Sparta, my friend Pat was visiting, we went to town to get some things. Ran out of what money we had and still needed a skillet. Oliver Sidden, then manager at Smithey's told me to take it and pay him when I'm able. He'd never seen me before. Of course, I took the money to him first day I had it. Some years later, I came to know Oliver, the man, and have a great respect for Oliver Sidden. He was a good man, good as they get. People said of him, Oliver likes to drink. So what. I respect a man that likes a drink. It means to me he likes to take his head out of his ass and look around every now and again. Sure, it's addictive. Ignorance is addictive too, and nobody has a problem with that. Of course, I'm talking about people of sensible behavior. People who destroy themselves on liquor would destroy themselves some other way if necessary. Everybody has their own way. And that's the beauty of an earth experience. The world around me grows increasingly anti-personal when I have sought all my life to live personally with the people around me, to regard the other as a valid human being and to be regarded same in turn. The people I spend time with are people I have such personal relationships with, like know them all their lives, whose parents and grandparents were my friends. The people I call my friends, I have deep personal associations with them where trust, respect and backup are concerned. My hillbilly family of friends are not guided by corporate-think, one of the many aspects of them I love. They don't think about the stock market. An exurbanite I used to know told me I was a fool for not following the stock market. I saw in my mind's eye three fingers pointing back at him. And I remembered what Jesus said about don't be calling somebody a fool. Not that I'm holding him to Jesus, just that I see the sense in it. It told me this is not my friend. In the first place, it was stupid. I have urban friends who followed the stock market and got ripped off big-time without recourse by the Bank. I trust former friend lost a fair amount too. I didn't get ripped off. But I do get ripped off by my own membership co-op at home. Gloryland looks better every day.

 

constantin brancusi himself

 

 

*

 

 

    

DR DAY

Today was doctor appointment day for old man Wiley. That's Jr's other name. The appointment wasn't until 3, giving him time to get used to it being a day. Today the Hospice nurse came by for whatever it was she did having to do with a patch for a bedsore on his left hip, which he got from lying on that hip bone 23 hours a day. I sat on the porch talking with the woman from Hospice who came with her. We talked about all sorts of things, Jr's care the focal point.

It's truly refreshing for me to talk with these women involved with Hospice. They're all people who think about things. They've all come to a crossroad in their lives where they chose to take the road to giving genuine comfort in every kind of way, physical, emotional, mental, spiritual, to people in the hardest time of their lives. They understand why I have committed to stay with Jr all the way. They understand it is not a sacrifice on my part, it's just that this is what I choose to do during the days and nights. Time would pass at home just like it passes at Jr's. I don't feel put upon in any way. On my part, it's what I want to do. That's all. I really do have what it takes to help someone in my world, who is an important figure in my world, someone I respect in very real ways, not idly.

In the martial arts, taking it has equal importance with giving it. If you can kick somebody in the chest, you also have to be able to take getting kicked in the chest. Jr has taken it like Job all the way along. Today in the Dr office waiting room while I was waiting, looking at the Winston-Salem Journal, in walked an old friend of Jr's last wife, a woman I've known since before then. I'm sure she was thinking how odd it is, just like I was. I'd not seen her in a lot of years. She didn't get to see Jr, and I was glad, because I had a pretty good idea there'd be an email or a phone call before the end of the day.

I was glad to see her for herself, though it threw me into a complexity of feelings I was uncomfortable with, like Spider Woman and what she did to Jr that broke his spirit as a man, as a human being, in front of everyone he's known all his life, family and neighbors, humiliated him down to the ground, pushed his face into the dirt. A man who was already humble as a natural man can be, humiliated to the Nth degree. One of Tom Pruitt's sayings: I don't mind you shittin in my face, I just don't like you rubbin it in. I see this broken man in a wheelchair, his mind gone, dependent absolutely on people he can trust, friends who will not allow him to be abused further by institutions and thieves. The man has taken enough.

On the way out the door from the Dr office was Judy Halsey, one of my favorite people and Jr's too. They worked together at a Massey Ferguson dealership, them in the parts department, for several years. It was where the Pines new location is. Jr had not seen Judy since then. She didn't recognize him and he didn't recognize her. When she recognized him, tears about jumped out of her eyes. He caught onto who she was when she reminded him of the tractor place. They talked a little bit, and I was happy for Jr, because he liked Judy an awful lot. His mind was a blank most of the time, but he was aware of who she was and it did feel good to him to see her, though he wasn't particularly happy being seen in a wheelchair. I was happy for both of them. 2 of my friends run into each other after at least 20 years and I'm happy for them. Makes me feel good too.

Jr and I did pretty well as a team getting him in and out of the car. We took our time. No hurry. Then I had to make 4 stops to pick up various things like a prescription for him, and every place I went I found a parking spot in shade. First stop was the library where I saw Sherry, Doug and Debbie all at the same time. I had only one minute, so felt like it was good timing seeing them all three at once. If you want some examples for what I mean by real people, they're all three good ones. When you're in touch with them, you're in touch with who they are, not some fake image they want you to believe about them. They don't need for you to think they're way high up. If Jr could have stood it, I'd have liked to have wheeled him in there to meet them, but he doesn't know them. It would have been torment for him. Maybe. Maybe not. He would have said no if I'd suggested it.

For the drive home, I went out 21 to Bledsoe Creek Road and took it to Spicer Mtn Road and it on back to 18 and the house. It's all been paved and changed totally since he saw it last, esp the Cuban subdivision the water pipe from the river made possible.

At this moment I'm hearing Thelonious Monk's album from about 1962, Straight, No Chaser. Charlie Rouse plays tenor sax. Monk on piano. It is the perfection in jazz to my ear. It's like hearing an abstract expressionist painting by Willem DeKooning. There's something pure about it, like Tommy Jarrell and Fred Cockerham playing together. It's pure. It's art. It's the real thing.