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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THE DAY AFTER THE SUPER BOWL

 



photo by rob carr/getty images

There's no yesterday's news like the day after the Super Bowl. Like Christmas, when it's over, it's over. Christmas is over the moment the last present is unwrapped. Big hype, big expectation for weeks. Then it's over. Poof. Gone to the zone of memories. The Super Bowl game was a truly memorable game for me. The story of the brother coaches, the parents and entire families there for the game, were the real story of this Super Bowl. The worst for the losing brother was this was the first time SF lost a Super Bowl, evidently. SF's last play, fouls committed by opposition overlooked by referee, set the SF coach to wringing his guts. Had the receiver been able to catch ball, both his feet would have landed out of bounds and the pass ruled incomplete. From coach's perspective at the sideline a long ways off looked one way; it was different from the perspective of the camera in close. Hearing news people make noise about the overlooked passer interference turns my ears off like hearing Donald Trump wanting to see the president's birth certificate.

I enjoyed every minute of the game. The best was when Reed ran the ball 108 yards to touchdown. It was the most beautiful run I think I've ever seen. He ran through a channel that opened in front of him as he ran. Ran through the opposition and then outran his lone pursuer. Simply outran him. I enjoy seeing two people running all out and the one in front pulling away from the one chasing him. I believe this was Reed's last game too. Beautiful video to have of that run in his last game. I was pulling for Baltimore, because my friends I was watching the game with were pulling for them. It was important to them. To me, it was White against Red. I could have pulled for the Red as easily as I pulled for the White. The game did not have many good plays at the line, not many runners wiggled through the line. Line defense on both sides was tight. It looked to me like most of the advances were made through the air. I say "looked to me" because if I'd see stats of the game, they would probably say the opposite of what I thought I saw. The teams were so tight that the driving force and the inhibiting force were equal, making for a steady back and forth rhythm.

Baltimore setting out like they did, making the score at the end of the first half 21 to 3, if I remember correctly (I'm sure I don't), did not get my hopes up the least little bit. I was remembering about a month ago seeing Atlanta subdue SF first half to the same degree. Second half, Atlanta didn't score anything and SF caught up with and surpassed them in the second half. They came close to repeating that performance. There was even the time with four minutes left in the game I figured SF would score for certain and win. They were down to the 2 yard line with four downs. Baltimore defense held them in place. SF chose to go for the touchdown on 4th down and it didn't work. Tight game. I like a tight game like that. I also like a loose game. There is something about tv football that satisfies a liking for seeing something different every time, like watching a flame in a fireplace. Years ago, I asked Ted Stern how he could watch tv games, football, basketball and baseball all the time. He answered, "The same way you listen to that music you listen to." I got it. He couldn't have answered it more clearly. It told me he understood that I was hearing something that's equally satisfying to me.

It's the skill I like to watch in the players. I believe that applied for him too. I'm learning a little bit about strategies, though I really don't care to know. I'd far rather listen to music than watch football, though I like to watch football too. Of course, we like to think the games are not "rigged." Yet, considering a Super Bowl game is the biggest money tv event of the year, where it's important that Beyonce NOT lip-sync, and trillions up to be won or lost by gambling enterprises all over the world. Where that much underworld money is involved, it is hard to believe some big money is not drifting around under the table, too. The Super Bowl is about money and nothing else. Four million for a half minute commercial, tells me advertisers know the power of television. In cogressional hearings, they let on like they never heard of television having any influence on anybody. When you can watch films and tv shows about killing around the clock without even trying, the influence on our society is becoming more obvious every week on the evening news. Our tv is about slap-stick comedy, sports and killing. Sports amount to subliminal killing. It is ours to learn to immunize ourselves to the influence of solving problems by killing, every day of our lives. Like everything else that requires an effort of awareness, few will bother. So it's not a solution for the whole, only for a few.

None of us watching the game believed the power outage occurring when it did was anything but sabotage. Before the game, Justin told me the "odds" favored SF in the gambling arena. The lights going out came when SF needed their turn-around that the half-time gave them before. I've seen over and over the half-time change the dynamic of a game. After the 2nd half started, SF had not made the turn to take charge of the game. It was the same momentum as in the first half. When the lights came back on, the dynamic had shifted. SF came out swinging. I saw something today making reference that Louisiana being a "work free" union free state, no electrician union standards were met by the electricians there working the lights. My thought then was that without the union, it would be easy to send somebody in to do one thing in particular and disappear. It has nothing to do with unions or not unions. Offer some working class guy a house on the beach at Waikiki and a million a year for life. His tongue would be hanging out and dripping. He'd be saying, Tell me what to do, boss. Tell me what to do. I was glad to see the ruse was just a few minutes too late for the time SF needed in the second half.

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