I’ve learned to live with the fear, with the paranoia of what’s really going on in the world today. I’ve learned to take it into myself and transmute the lead into little bits of gold here and there. But I have been getting worried lately. Hours before the alleged “Do Your Attacks Now” note was made public, I felt my chest tightening up, my heart crawling into my throat. I didn’t know why until I woke up and heard the news.
Tensions rise. Blood boils. Right on cue. It’s hard to hold it down when the ocean itself is increasing. Yesterday morning I dreamt one of those dreams that takes place over months and months - a story of a community giving birth to itself, struggling to survive where it couldn’t and shouldn’t. Eventually forking off into its own parallel universe…
It started out as a few friends in a couple of tents in the forest. It gradually grew into a hodge-podge of hand-crafted buildings, a shantytown of rigged-up living, away from the wars and lies and bullshit of the world we left. But we had to be quiet and careful or else the world we left would come gunning for us. Nature itself assaulted us. A hurricane beat us down, tried to wash us away but we were resilient. A lawyer came to threaten the man who was letting us live unmolested on his land. People were murdered, but I don’t remember why.
We went occasionally on foraging expeditions to the local town, to the “real world” that continued on around us. But that world was slipping away from us as we grew stronger and more plentiful and more established. The universe itself was forking off to protect us, to lift up our experiment so that we could start over again, having learned the lessons of the dying world. I had one last chance to go back, to gather supplies and say goodbyes.
A friend and I entered covertly the world we had left. We passed through it like ghosts, increasingly insubstantial in its presence. I remember stopping by someone’s house who had joined our world long ago. We needed to pick something up there but ran into his girlfriend who still lived nearby. She’d heard rumors of our settlement where we were starting over again. She missed him and wanted to come with us. We weren’t supposed to bring anyone back or tell anyone where we’d come from. But everyone who mattered already knew. Her parents came out to plead with us, saying they couldn’t afford to give her the life she deserved anymore, and couldn’t we just take her with us? They knew it would be hard there too, but they didn’t care. It would still be better.
We sat there as the sun set against broken down blue buildings. Her black hair streamed in the wind as she faced away from us. Suddenly from out of nowhere began playing what my mind understood to be a “lost” John Lennon song. I can still remember the tune (it’s seared into my brain), though not all of the words. “You don’t know / all the good / you can do / in this world … Don’t sacrifice tomorrow / for today.” I looked at my friend and began weeping uncontrollably. I knew then, finally, that I couldn’t just run away and try to start over someplace else, couldn’t let the universe branch off and disappear into itself.
My fight was here. I woke up.
- END -
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17 Comments
well, here`s the thing. i am seperated from the mother of my children. this week i move to my new place. the house is sold and the lawyers will chew over the corpse and spit out the scraps for us to pick up and go our seperate ways.
that`s all fine. i`m o.k. with that.
i met a girl six weeks ago at starbucks and we talked and smiled at eachother and, well, you know. feelings began. we see eachother every tuesday and we really like eachother but it`s not going anywhere. to much stuff that we haven`t dealt with individually.
the problem isn`t her. she doesn`t owe me anything. it`s the crushing pain i feel wen we are apart. it has got better now that i`ve realised what is going on but it still rears it`s head occasionally and i`m sick to my guts.
i have seperated out the girl from the real cause of the agony. the abandonment issues of my youth and the disfunctional family life etc. but it doesn`t stop the pain. looking into the root causes and letting them go does. i take responsibility for knowing that a beautiful girl right in front of me could in no way be the cause of this agony. so i don`t react to it that way when i`m with her.
it takes all my resolve and training mind you………….
the point is that we cannot remove ourselves from the beautiful now because of feelings dredged up form the past……otherwise we will miss the joy and love that this life has to offer.
turn the t.v. off, stop reading the newspaper and create the ideal life for yourself by your work, your play and your friendships.
Ok.
Powerful post. Something I think about a lot. And alstair’s comment makes good sense. But.
Let’s do something.
What am I missing? Seems backwards. We have today. We are not guaranteed a tomorrow. There is nothing new under the sun.
The Beatles sang:
You say you want a revolution
Well, you know
We all want to change the world
Seen this one?: http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/manson/mansonbeatles.html
What is good? People see what they want to see. People see what they need to see. Maybe it’s the same thing. The world’s insane. We’re just along for the ride. Yeah, sometimes it’s bumpy. Sometimes the scenery sucks. Sometimes the best thing to do then is nap. Once in a while we zoom over a big hill and feel like we’re soaring. The drop gives us butterflies in our tummies, it does.
Agnes
o.k gary…..what should we do? run screaming and yelling across the whitehouse lawn with a sign saying stop the invading of foriegn countries and killing people for fun and profit?
our lives are made up of what we think about. these thoughts go out and come back as people, places and things………i don`t know how it happens or why……but i goes on and on doing it. it`s almost as if our minds are movie projectors and the universe is the screen.
what are you projecting?
and gary, don`t take offence to my reply………..if i could do something i`d stop the killing and pollution and rape and lies and everything else too. but one has to ask one`s self……….if you had that much power………..would you?
what would you be if you had that much power?
No offense taken. I was thinking along a different sort of line. An extension of what you suggest. Something I have been mulling over.
Simplisticly, I was thinking of a quote from the film “A Giant Leap” in which an Indian Guru guy says “Make happiness.”
In making happiness I can fight the system, stop some killing, reduce some pollution, expose some lies and minimize some rape. I’ll post some more shortly - I just got up and have to walk the dog and stuff.
All the good we can do in this world is…a lot of good. A tremendous amount of good. Like the Beatles said, “It’s easy.”
Hi Tim,
I’ve been lurking around your blog for a while now, and just have to tell you this is an exquisite piece of writing and a thought-provoking post.
Pax.
Kimberly
well, i like to “make happiness” by choosing good feelings for no reason. the feelings generated then knock you out of the conflict relationship that most are in. that`s the good i can do.
i smile on the highway driving. people zoom in and out and around me and i watch………and smile. some wonder what`s going on but…….the secret is that i`ve got the led zeppelin on. really loud. the more happy moments we string together and pass along to the next person, the less other things happen. that`s the good i can do.
alstair, the next step. Let’s make happiness together.
A lot of us.
I’m in, Gary.
It’s waht the world needs; people who care, and are willing to do something about it. Those kinds of people are far too few these days.
I believe Alistair’s point is, that we ARE doing it together if we are doing it individually. Because, what do u mean exactly when u say - let’s make happiness together. Can we sit down and write out an action plan and then get a lot of people to buy our plans and implement them… believe it’s been tried in some way…
U can’t really do that in an organized fahsion. You and I sitting in a room together and espousing all kinds of plans for a happiness team might not make each other “happy”, even if we both had common goals of becoming “happy” (it might well do also, but that would be a fluke or something connecting in individual personalities). However, just not being a dick to the person beside you, like em or not, will make you, if not happy - then at least not angry or aggrevated. And it may brighten the other persons outlook as well, who knows. Then it can be passed on. -> then we’re doing it together. Until every freakin last one of us bastards is happier than a pig in shit.
Here is a quote I came across right after writing above:
You must be the change you wish to see in the world
Sums it up pretty well.
Alasdair, that is AWESOME.
I need to further this idea of mine. A lot of what I am thinking has certainly been tried. But I am interested in solutions not failures so I am willing to retry things.
I think working individually the odds are stacked way against us. Working individually we have five chances:
1) Slim
2) None
3) A chinaman’s
4) A snowball in the devil’s own furnace and
5) Maggie, bar the door and get the gun.
Seriously though, I think the first thing to do is realize something about an internet community. My whole life (and I mean entire life) I have always wondered where are the other people like me. I thought when I went to college I would finally meet some like-minded people - I thought that must be where they are hiding or at least congregating. Boy, was I wrong. Us optimists can be naive.
For a while I despaired - some similarly minded people I found were either loners, or not craving company at that particular junction in thier life or already crushed by outside forces.
But then, in 1997 or so the internet electronically sauntered into my scene.
Without wanting to sound like an ego-maniac I think all the good I can do (in fact all the good a lot of people can do) is, well, a lot. A REAL lot. I think alstairs idea of stringing happiness together is beautiful and appropo.
I am not optimistic that working alone is the most good I can do, however. I have to keep digesting this. It is far, far from thoroughly thought out.
But let me drop this tidbit so, I hope, people keep reading Tim’s comment section -
part of the oppression of modern times is the idea, (whether it has nefarious or simply matter fact origins), that the way we live now is the best we can do as a society. People just accept this wholesale. Ideas like the “’60’s” failed and that is it. There is no “better way” - no one is seriously espousing new philosophies (at least in meaningful, applicable ways) or trying them in a large format. There will never be things like a “war on poverty” or a “war on hunger” or a “war on depression” or a “war on loneliness” or whatever.
I disagree with the idea that this is the best we can do. Something needs to be done. Or at least discussed. But I am not really interested in hearing naysaying - there are no problems, only solutions.
Little islands of happines like alstair, and I like to think myself, have made are too easily over-run by the hordes of selfish fools that run amok or at times just by circumstance.
Like minded people who so desire it should get together. We live in a culture that produces isolation in tremendous quantities - even within families. The first step, I found, in making happiness flow is countering that tendency towards isolation.
I guess, substance m, what I am talking about is a plan of sorts. The world seems to be filled with an awful lot of miserable people. What we are doing is not enough, it would seem - anecdotedly anyway. But, yes, a plan is what I am talking about and I disagree with the idea that a plan would not work. Just talking about the plan makes me happier. I also disagree that you can’t organize things to help make happiness. In fact, I disagree whole heartedly. In order for me to have a happy family has taken considerable effort on everyone’s part. You can’t be happy just sitting around waiting for it to strike like a bolt of lightning. Maybe it can’t be organized but it ABSOLUTELY can be facilitated. That is, I guess, in part what I am thinking about.
By the way Alstair, Led Zepplin makes me happy, too. I think that as those of us who can and want to come together we are going to find we have much more in common than we have different from one another.
I don’t think I can do what I plan alone. In fact, I know I can’t. But I can search for those who share a similar vision. They seem to be popping up now with some regularity.
Can you hear what all the little fish are saying?
Well, listen I don;t want to rain on your parade and I am rooting for u anyway.
I just don’t think that there is a concrete and particular “something” or things that you can do that will make EVERYBODY happy. But go for it. I’ll help if I can.
Sweet substance m! One thing I have learned about happiness in my short time is the only people I want to make happy are the ones that want to be happy. More soon. Maybe I will offer my idea to Tim’s mag… but the constructive criticism of those who frequent this site will be sorely needed…like Substance M’s.
You goddamned hippies!
Tim,
You may say that we’re a dreamers
But I’m we’re the only ones
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will be as one
haha i tied it back to the article!
oh yeah, gary, like i said, i’m all in