This is a paper I wrote about my ‘faith’ such as it is, I’m putting it up here simply because out of all the stuff I’ve written recently, I am perhaps most proud of this.
Without Symbol
On a shelf in my apartment, in a small box which depicts a gargoyle perched on a sarcophagus, I have a pendulum in a black velvet pouch. It sits among the other tangible mementos of those things that defined my life, and represents the closest thing I have ever known to faith. It was my mother’s.
Being that it had been a goodly long time there that the ol’ jester didn’t have a computer, that meant that it had been a very long time that I wasn’t really aware of all these new and almost unbelievable advances in the field of internet pornography…
Damn this shit will make you sad.
Are we cool enough as a species to make it? I mean this seriously, because the impression one can get from surfing certain arenas of the internet, or if one is unfortunate enough to own a television set, there is a lot of stuff out there that can lead quickly to the conclusion that well… maybe we deserve to join the dinosaurs and await a new half-life as odd museum peices… our bones put together just slightly wrong enough to make us interesting for the next wave of life to take a shot here.
I was having a conversation with an old friend last night and he posed this fascinating question to me…
How do you rebuild a ghetto? And I mean funky ghettos, not government housing projects.
We were talking about the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, which is how this idea came up, but it set the jester’s mind to thinking. How do you rebuild a ghetto? Because you can’t, a ghetto exists for a thousand reasons; you’ve got the cheap rents in old buildings that have fallen into a state of disrepair, you’ve got shop-keepers who offer that eclectic selection of staples and oddities that the community residents somehow manage to live on.
“That is so weird.”
Ever hear anybody use this phrase? Do you know what it means? I thought I did until recently. Found out that the definition might not be what you expected.
I always am actively searching for these little tidbits, so I’ll post them as I come across them.
In the grid-lock of shopping carts, a man with only a basket is free. I do enjoy a good exercise in cart dodging, especially when you’re wearing a jester hat and have no problem vocalizing the stream of conscious-nonsense that rumbles in a brain totally befogged by last-night’s heroic intake of scotch.
Did you know that the definition of sophisticated is ‘overly complex’?
What does that say about our culture? What do you mean by that?
So i gotta ask. Why on earth don’t we celebrate Ark Day? I mean seriously, the guy personally responsible for saving the entire world’s species, versus a dude that told us to be good, and treat each other with kindness? C’mon, its a no brainer. My vote is for Noah.
Never underestimate the contribution of one man. After all, an amateur and his three sons built the ark, but an enormous team of professionals built the Titanic.
ok, this is Draft Three of a school paper, with the suggested audio track for enjoyment of same… give it a whirl.
Artistic Integrity
It’s been snowing for a long time now. I’ve been up for all of it, peering out from between the slits of my window coverings to watch the flakes as they spiral down through washes of street-light. According to the dictates of the digital clocks that sporadically show me their faces, it has been thanksgiving for a couple of hours now.
