IV

V

1:44 AM - 1/2/2006 - comments {0} - post comment

If You really Knew Me You Would Not Like Me yadda yadda

I am filled with pain. Not the pains I covered a thousand pages of  dribble with twenty years ago, all that angry young man angst and "what you rebellin´ against...what you got" bullshit, but I am  filled with actual pain and suffering. The type of anguish that comes with age and decay and from drinking daily from a bottomless well of regret and doubt.

Boredom and frustration are the only colors on my palette. I cannot seem to gather myself and my moments in the manner I had always imagined I would... long before this time in life. I am forced into accepting the fact that I will never be able to change and that there is nothing for me to change into. I can, with work, make modifications. I can airbrush some glaring flaw to the point it is not so noticeable and embarrassing. But I see now that I will be this thing that I have always been.

I have to confess that I am not unique in any way at all. I have done terrible things and I cringe when I remember certain of my deeds and words. But I am easy on myself and I see another side to the history of it all now. I recall odd moments and shameful decisions. The sheer cold calculus of reason and the lava flow of feeling. Thinking and feeling and all the universe in a hug goodbye.

There were long years of obsessions and compulsions that ruined my life. And I am the only one responsible, and yet I somehow sense that I (what I define as "I") was not the only thing involved in all those dark moments. I was there and I was sane and sound, but I seem to feel some strings were pulling me here and there, and still they do.

Maybe I seek a way to excuse my mistakes and absolve myself of my "crimes." In fact I do not. I  faced the repercussions for my vain and self serving actions. I sufferd alone and I wish not to recount the terror I once knew day to day for years on end. I am not unique and my story pales in comparision I am sure. I am simply wondering what really was happening back then. What is happening now...tonight? The way fish are unaware of water, I wonder about the currents and forces that guide and determine my life.

I am sorry for the wrong things I have done and the people I loved but hurt and I wish forgiveness for those wrongs. But what am I to say and do tonight about the wrongs and pains I will cause tomorrow? I seem weary of not knowing my own heart.

12:22 AM - 1/2/2006 - comments {0} - post comment

Qin Nian Kuai Le

I am tired monkey eye

I am the water that leaks from long death

All waitng and wanting we

Milk the soft tissue of terrible desire

Dark oceans of cold night

Breath like melting ice

A million ways to beg for one more chance

I am long dead snake husk

I am forgetter and forgotten

3:38 AM - 1/1/2006 - comments {0} - post comment

Quick Updates on Life in General... a little on the edgy side

News Years approaches fast. Christmas went by and did not feel much like Christmas at all. This is a absolutely secular and Marxist culture and the religious element of any westrern holiday is absolutely missing. This may sound refreshing to many Americans who would like nothing better than to remove the spiritual aspect of Christmas form the day. I read that this year in Seattle it was really overboard in the area of businesses and offices banning that evil, spiteful phrase which incites such bitterness in people... Merry Christmas. While here, in this atheistic society, everyone wishes you a Merry Christmas and they do not worry about all the alledged baggage the term has. It had gotten to the point with me in Seattle I felt absolutely brow beaten. I was so mortified (even though I was an atheist and still do not believe in the virgin birth or any of the miracles of the Bible) to simply say Merry Christmas to some America hating liberal there who destested anythiing to do with Christianity on the basis of...what? I do not even know anymore and I am bored with the subject all of a sudden. All those bastards ought to quit their jobs and forsake their Volvos and come here and live and see just how a society bereft of any religious values whatsoever has excelled in all areas of life both morally, politically and ecomnically.

I am teaching a computer class now. Power Point. Nothing gets done as is typical and so I am killing time doing the same thing the students do which is typically anythng but the lesson at hand. So, for the next two hours I will sit here and surf the net and wait for a student to ask me something which is simply not going to happen. I have to come to accpet that there is some radical difference in the way Western people and Asian people learn, but I am not an expert on the matter and do not feel like speculating right now. Most of my students regardless of their age simply do not want to learn Englsih or anythng else for that matter. They want to play and waste time and become rich CEOs later. If I ask what is a CEO is and what one does they have no clue, but they are going to be one, and they will not even have to study to do that. They will come to class (or maybe not), play and sleep and talk on cell phones and then one day ebcome a CEO somewhere without ever having to actually work and "climb the ladder" to acheive that end. And that may well be true, if they have an uncle or friend who works in the upper levels of a corporation here. The whole system here is beyond my understanding. I never will understand it and any opinion I express right now will only sound sound cynical and xenophobic. So, I will let it rest.

In fact, I do not even feel like writing another word.

10:22 AM - 12/29/2005 - comments {0} - post comment

COMMENTARIUS PERPETUUS/ Delilah...Rotted Teeth... Spite and my fucking coat!

                                      COMMENTARIUS PERPETUUS

You have heard enough of your poor narrator´s babblings and weak apologies. It is my task to tell the story of a man who was neither great and was not an insect. And I fail at that task miserably. It is not a task I sought nor asked for. It was laid upon my lap by merciless destiny, and so please do allow me some meanderings dear reader. I think I will sip this fine wine and draw a puff from this opium I have held on since my stay in Sumatra last fall where I was paid to collect samples of petrified human excrement dating back to the stone age by a firm in London. But again, I digress and shift my focus from the duty that has befallen me, the duty of the telling the story of one man´s uneventful life. Let me close my bloodshot eyes and see what morsel slips from the dusty journal called Commentarius Perpetuus:

The weather here in Seattle is not suitable to my mood as of late. I am dreary and weak. I have some trouble with my neck and teeth. I have abscesses in my teeth, and there is blood all over my tooth brush each day. I took a pin and punctured the abscess and on my right molar and it secreted a foul puss and bile. I have no medical or dental insurance and so what can I do? I went to the public clinic and it was a farce. They gave me an appointment for three weeks in future, and when I missed the appointment from apathy they billed me anyway. The soulless bastards. How dare they bill me, when I am in pain and not in a rational state of mind, and have to wait three weeks for their fucking attention. What the hell do they expect?!!!, Maybe the puss and bile has leaked into my brain and nerve endings and has influenced my ability to make a sound decision.

My God. Why did Daniel not write me? Ask me for help? I am not rich, but I have a sum of money I earned from the series of books I wrote on the mating habits of preteen Japanese schoolgirls. My dear Lord. Let me suck on this pipe and swig on this bottle and see what else I find in the thick and worn volume of despair that will evermore be called Commentarius Perpetuus. Evermore.

I have not had a call from Delilah in months. What am I to deduce from that other than the fact that she hates my guts. Well, I always knew she hated my guts when she lived with me as my wife. The fact she would periodically tell me she hated my guts confirmed my suspicions. I wonder now day and night about why I married such an angry and vindictive female. Was it some masochistic impulse in me? Was it the fact that her angry energy was a fuel that I, a mere squeaky mouse, lacked? Well, in any case... that is all I will ever write or say in this sacred journal about Delilah. As Aleister Crowley said... SO MOTE BE IT.

And that is all I can find in this dusky tome as a comment on the twelve or more years Daniel shared his life with Delilah, whom I never had the pleasure or discomfort to meet. I heard she was bright woman of average beauty with a fiery and angry disposition, and one in conflict with Daniel´s rather withdrawn and lethargic melancholy. My good but reticent friend Daniel never spoke much of his turbulent days with Delilah and how he tried to raise her son Bobby Prometheus. But it was his way, and I never asked much and had he disclosed secrets I would feign share them here of my on accord. I am here to transcribe what is found in the tome known for evermore as Commentarius Perpetuus.

I am sure I have lost my mind. But what the hell does that matter. I have ceased to gulp done the cornucopia of drugs that the doctors say I need to maintain some balance. I can´t piss. I can´t shit. I can´t ejaculate. I sleep 16 hours at a stretch. But I am assured these drugs will make me a happy man. Am I a fool to be dubious? Doctors and analysts. Books and pills. Bottles and Bibles. I ask what do any of they portent when it is three AM and one can not sleep and can barely breathe? They all mean nothing... nothing at all. Maybe I am too bitter, too cynical and if I am so what? Maybe I prefer being a cynical and bitter man. And if anyone thinks the less of me for that then to hell with them. I am a broken and angry man with no compassion left in me.

            Of course, I lie. I do not know why I lie. I am not an angry man, nor broken, nor without compassion, in fact I cry over small things others would not notice. I worry over people and situations beyond my power to control for no other reason than I seem to care. Yet maybe I do not care. Maybe I think I care, pretend to care. Hope to be  a thing that cares and I try to practice what caring might feel like some day when it is really a a part of me. Maybe I am a heartless prick of a thing. But in fact.. I am not. Maybe I want people to think I am. Maybe I do good and decent things I never share.

            If I was to tell you one week ago I gave the coat I was wearing to a poor man in the rain would you believe me or care? No matter, as I had two ore coats at home. I really did not do such a good deed  because I would never give my only coat away. But what if I had three coats and he had not one? Can I not bear the rain until I get back home to my warm bed and wine? Very well... damn it... it did the deed and to hell with your judgments. Maybe you think I should let him freeze and suffer. If I do not give him my coat it will wake him up and he will be in Harvard next year studying law. So... curse me... I held back his career by my selfish deed. Maybe I did the deed only to confess it here and hope someday it will be discovered and someone will say "my, what a good man Daniel was." Well, I do not care one scratch if you think I am a good man or not. And I lied anyway, out of spite. I never gave any coat to anyone ever, and out of spite I made up the whole story and  pretended to reveal the true side of myself which is the one I am doubted of having. So what if I lied and made up a story. So what?. Did anyone reading this ever giver their coat to a cold and wet man? I think not.

            What is wrong with me? My God. Of course I gave my coat to that man. That poor, poor man.

My Buddha. I must rest my head and let the opium run its course. My God Daniel, I am not your keeper but I miss you old chum. And now I know what happened to that coat I loaned you. I must take a repose, and will return dear reader in due time with more from the moribund scroll to be known evermore as... Commentarius Perpetuus.

8:44 PM - 12/15/2005 - comments {1} - post comment

Concerning Being and the Exquisite Necessity of Suffering

Concerning Being and the Exquisite Necessity of Suffering

I

I Believe in God and yet I know that that does not establish the existence of a God or gods of any type. I have no proof that God exists and I feel my arguments to prove His existence would sound trite and worn. And yet, I choose to believe.

II

I do not believe I will be rewarded fro believing in the existence of God anymore than I would be punished if I chose not to believe. To believe or not to believe in some respects can be the same thing.

III

If I choose to believe in God there is no reason to try and convince another person of God´s existence. It does increase or decrease the nature of God if I argue my personal views with another person. If I choose not to believe in a God there is no reason to challenge someone who does and try to undermine their faith. Either course is vain and self-serving.

IV

If someone tries to challenge my faith or my lack of it changes nothing at all. The nature of God and of everything in the Universe stays the same. Nothing changes even if I do or someone else does. If I know the Truth or I am utterly confused, the nature of Truth and the Universe stays the same.

V

I do not believe God can be petitioned with prayer and yet I pray sometimes, and feel I should pray more. In fact, even if God does not exist I feel it is not unreasonable to pray. It is not even inconceivable to pray that God exists. In this sense one does not pray for a reward or to avoid a punishment. One prays for the hope that life is vested with some meaning after all. And even if life has no meaning and there is no God, it is really no different than if there were. Suppose we God say exists, and suppose we say He does not. When we look out the window the world has not changed one bit.

5:22 PM - 12/15/2005 - comments {1} - post comment

Commentarius Perpetuus Update...the horror, the horror.....

Dear reader, I must apologize from the depths of my alcohol rotted spleen about the long delay in reporting on the journal of my dear yet eccentric friend Daniel Williams. It is unforgivable, but the truth is that I have been chained up in a cellar in Nepal for the last month by Maoist rebels, and while there was beaten roundly on a daily basis and forced to eat rancid yak meat and drink soured goat milk at rifle point. I was sodomized with goat horns routinely and I have no regrets.In fact, I now have a goat, but that is another story. So,  I must again apologize that such a trifling affair would keep me from the responsibilty that has fallen onto my shoulders, and yet it is a responsibility that only I have the perscpetive to meet and convey to you, the curious and riveted reader. Allow me some time to remove some more splinters from inside my ear canal and open a bottle of brandy, and I promise that I will find a passage to make your long and tortured somewhat worth the distress. God help us all.  

12:10 PM - 12/13/2005 - comments {2} - post comment

Not a true confession entry. Still sick and not as artsy fartsy as I used to be

Lately it has been so cold in Beijing. Still not able to shake this cold. It has been almost three weeks. I am looking at the blog and the direct directions it has been taking. It is okay with me that this is happening although I am thinking of starting another blog, one that can focus on more serious writing and the practice of trying to write down thoughts in a detailed manner. I find the thing I can the least is really write about my daily life in an interesting way. I mean, how can I really do that? I am not so about to sit here and say I am going to keep some totally honest blog, and reveal my every thought and emotion, and discuss everything that I do in detail. I have been to some blog sites like that seem to take this approach... the "true confessions" approach and found them so lacking in real depth I was bored immediately. I do not see what a challenge it would be for me to lay out my sordid and dismal behaviors, or to rant endlessly about the shortcomings of my co-workers, friends or lover. I guess for some people this is all they have, this detailed description of all that is surface and superficial. It seems so... modern America. Not to say such writing does not have its place and value, and if well written it can be great. Henry Miller and Anais Nin made careers from such styles. But, I read some site about a gal who is desperate to get pregnant and she had a post on the various colors of her menstrual blood. It had been purple the week before and now it was a creamy red and she was all worried over her baby dream being compromised. She seemed to have no desire for a boyfriend or husband and any sperm donor would be suitable. I just could not see what the point of it all was. Not to say my site has a point, it does not. But is that really honesty? Is that what people see as being honest is all about? To try and simply shock the reader and in the process show yourself to be a "brave" person... brave here being the type of brave that defines a woman who had her picture taken without make-up early in the morning and then shows everyone the picture. Is that what brave now?

 Went out last night with Ivy and a teacher friend P_____ from NY met his friend M_____ from LA. We went and had pizza and I had some drinks but not too many. Enough to warm me in the cold and subdue my cough for a couple hours. We went to a small smoky club where there were poetry readings and performances, but I was not much in the right mood. I was tired and my head hurt from my cold. There was too much cigarette smoke and it was a bit too loud. Normally I would get something out of an event like that but I left feeling sick and weak. It was all strange really to be honest, and I feel not my cup of tea really. Too many people trying so hard to be artsy and different and unique. It was like some of the scene in Seattle really that I grew cynical towards. Maybe I am getting old and jaded is all. I would go back sure and try, and hopefully be in better health and more receptive to it all. Maybe someday participate in a reading, who knows.

 Ivy is on the sofa drawing away. She ahs been drawing so much lately and it is getting better and better. Some of stuff is appearing on her blog site and I will put some on my photo logs soon. I need to edit them someday, my photo logs. I am not drawing at all. Nothing, even thought the supplies she is using is supplies I bought for myself. There is something to that, but if I go into now it will just sound like one of those true confession bullshit blogs I was just crying about...so I will save that topic for another day.

5:43 PM - 12/11/2005 - comments {1} - post comment

CONCERNING BEING ANDTHE EXQUISITE NECESSITY OF SUFFERING

         CONCERNING BEING AND THE EXQUISITE

NECESSITY OF SUFFERING

I

When a person has lived most of his life not accepting the possibility that God exists in any form and then they struggle with the desire to believe that He does in some way his life becomes a world of new conflicts and challenges in regards explanations and reasons. A new category of questions emerges and he is forced, against his will, to try and define a thing he once argued was indefinable. There is no choice. Evil must be attempted to be explained now with a God in the background of it all. Does life continue or cease after death? How can he be sure of anything he thinks and has an opinion on regarding what is indefinable?

II

If you are driven to believe in God then you are consequently driven to give to God a character, a nature. You have are forced into assigning God attributes that seem dubious. How can I ever be sure that the attributes I assign to God are not simply the attributes I want God to have? If I say God is forgiving and merciful on what basis do I rest that argument. Not to say there are not brilliant arguments to give to support any statement we can make about God, but how can I ever be 100% certain that the conclusion I have reached is not tainted, poisoned by own limited intellect, my own corruptions and desires.

III

If I say God is a forgiving and merciful God, maybe all I am saying is that I want a God that will be forgiving and merciful with me. The whole situation becomes problematic for me. If God is merciful then will He not simply bestow mercy on me, or do I have to do something... jump though some burning hoop of fire... to receive that mercy? How can I, or anyone, be 100% certain that they have not erred and jumped through the wrong hoop? Some people have an absolute degree of certainty about their position, that the hoops they are leaping through are the correct ones. But if two people are diametrically opposed in their positions how can they both be right even if they are both 100% certain that they are correct? How can you verify the unknowable? Some people will argue that the unknowable can be known. If not with absolute accuracy they will say that they have concluded that 2+2=5, which is closer to the Truth than saying 2+2=8. But when speaking of God no one can truly make the claim that 2+2=4. You would have to be God Himself to make such a claim.

I want a God who is merciful and who will forgive me, or I want a system at least wherein there is some concept of redemption. A system where my life can be changed and I can become a new thing. But I ask with exhaustion, how can I know that the system is truly this thing, and that it is not simply this thing because I want it to be? Simply because I want or need God to exist does not bring a nonexistent God suddenly into being. So I am pinned on the horns of a dilemma. I can choose to simply believe in a God or a system of redemption for no other reason than I am driven to believe out of human despair and hope that in believing I find some consolation and comfort. Or I can choose to not believe and free myself of all the doubts belief generates (though not believing does not mean not doubting, else why would I have chosen to believe?) Yet, in not believing I am forced to accept the Universe as a cold and brute fact, and not thing possibly possessed of a higher and more sublime purpose.

V

2:09 PM - 12/8/2005 - comments {2} - post comment