Not much to say

Conversation ten minutes ago:

Cleaner #1: "Good evening!"

Me: "Good evening. How are you tonight?"

"Yes!"

"What time are guys here until tonight?"

"Yes!"

"Do you understand what I'm asking?"

"Yes. Good evening!"

"Good evening."


Conversation two minutes ago:

Me: "Good evening!"

Cleaner #2: "Aaeeehhhy!"

"Right then."


Employing my remarkable analytical skills, I hereby deduce that the cleaning staff and I do not speak the same language.

Chicken Soup

This is my own recipe for chicken soup. It's none of your business but I just couldn't think of where else to store this information without it getting lost. I don't have a recipe box nor do I want one.

red onions, sauteed
chicken broth
tapiocca
mushrooms, sliced
BBQ chicken, skinned and whittled
half-n-half cream
sage, thyme, oregano,
celery salt, pepper,
tobasco, worchestershire
Labatt 50

Drink the Labatt 50, eat the chicken skin and dump the remaining ingredients in a pot. Simmer all afternoon. Inflict on unsuspecting guests.

Documentary: Food Inc.

Imagination

"Imagination is the one weapon in the war against reality."

I stumbled upon this quote from French philosopher Jules de Gaultier and was immediately put off. How morbidly unwise. But in learning that de Gaultier was an afficianado of Flaubert's Madame Bovary, We must interpret that he is referring to escapist imagination and the war against circumstance. As always, with our language of duality, what is true is also false - and vice versa - as you alter the context. This is why, when I find myself in a conversation bearing some hope for usefulness, I attempt to take it to the most universal of perspectives.

In my undeniable living experience I look at all that I once thought was reality and see that it is all illusion. All that I now experience to be true, I never would have discovered without imagination.

Imagination is absolutley key in the war of reality. But it is on reality's side; not against.

Self-fulfilling Prophecies

As I ponder the spectre of terrorism and the wildly intangible idea that it is threatening to steal our freedom; as I ponder the ludicrousness of speeches from the mouths of presidents and political leaders and how the quotient of propaganda and fear-mongering becomes ever-more obvious and detectable with the passage of time and the opportunity for informed reflection; as I ponder the mounting incontrovertible evidence of torture committed by the American military machine in Bagram, Abu Grayb and Guantanamo Bay; as I ponder the inconceivable numbers: 83,000 "suspected terrorists" abducted. Zero brought to trial for terrorist acts; as I ponder the joke in that idea that torture and the trampling of privacy and constitutional rights are somewhat okay as a temporary war time measure - oh - oh my sides - as if a war against ghosts is temporary - as if it will ever - ever - end; and as I ponder the incredible volume of hatred, outrage and the conviction that America is evil, surely held by the friends and families of each of those 83,000 detainees, not to mention those of all the dead who were at the wrong place at the wrong time when the war on terror came to town - I must ask myself:

Is the American military complex - so hugely financially profitable to all those individuals behind it, really out there hunting for terrorists? Or are they just manufacturing them?

Just asking.

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Seeing anybody?

I am endlessly amused by every one's fascination with my relationship status.

"Seeing anybody?" is one of the first questions I get whenever I encounter a friend for the first time in a while. To me, it's a silly question. How can you think you know me and yet ask something so inappropriate?

But I know why. People ask me this because they care about me and are locked into the assumption that this is some significantly relevant factor toward my personal happiness. People believe in their fundamental normalcies. In a society where things are labelled legitimate not because they are sane, logical and truthful but because they are the norm, few question the legitimacy of the Western world's marriage/relationship model, which truly, can not be said to be legitimate or not. To be truthful, you have to break it down into its many components and judge them individually.

I can not support this all-pervading relationship model for many reasons. The mandatory reciprocity component goes against my personal instincts. Some components create flawed expectations and demand phony behaviour to compensate. Some demand exclusivity which become barriers to maximizing the other relationships in my life. And mostly, it fails to incorporate what is to me the most profound kind of love in existence that I know of - the state of radiating lovingness.

Surely there are useful components to the standard model: Financial security; stability; a useful framework within which children can be raised; the promise that you will not be left alone. And perhaps most notably: The feeling of having someone or something special.

But allow me to play devil's advocate:

Unfortunately all these good things above are to varying degrees tainted when I view them from outside the matrix of illusions. The level of financial circumstance we think we need is unnecessary, greedy, corrupt and undeserved when viewed from the global, not national, perspective. Stability is a solution to a problem that is largely illusory to begin with, and on the balance, one that stems from the very mindset that suppresses organic love and promotes marriage to begin with. There have been cultures in which children were raised more by communities then parents. Akin to the superior health of cross-bred dogs, might not such children emerge healthier mentally; freer from the particular biases and derelict views of the biological parents and exposed to greater volumes of ideas and with a capacity for choice? No matter. The biochemical programming that binds parents to children is currently far too powerful to mess with. Let's not even discuss the illusions that stem from it.
With regards to the remainder of the pro-marriage list, let me offer my own living experience; that from a marriage-type relationship that failed in its thirteenth year. Yes it failed ultimately but it was a successful, non-failing relationship for twelve years; full of good times and bad times; loving, fighting, negotiating and compromising.

Yet these days I am less alone. I'm surrounded by special people. And I am more guaranteed to not be alone precisely because I do not put all my eggs in one basket. I do not live in fear that divorce will topple my life. And there is no jealousy present within my home to temper my adorations with-out.

People in healthy marriages feel they are so lucky, their partner so special, partly because - well maybe those partners are! But partly because of the barren emotional landscape they were accustomed to prior. We come from an ass-backward society that says No, you can't love her. She's not the correct age. No, you can't love him, He's not the correct gender. No, you can't love her because she's already obligated to a relationship contract. No, You can't love her because you're already bound to a relationship contract. No, she's too rich. No, she's too poor. No. Wrong race. Wrong religion. Wrong social class.

No! You can't love her because she doesn't love you back!

How much organic love is suppressed because of our mandatory reciprocity model? 95%? 99%? And where it isn't, where someone brave speaks out - well, they're just creepy. You're a creep if you love when you're not supposed to. Shame on you.

Well, I don't listen to those rules anymore. If you know me personally, you might just want to watch the hell out. I might just say I love you any time now!

Am I saying marriage is wrong? No. If you feel marriage is right for you and yours, go for it. I will gladly come to the ceremony and celebrate your love. I'll even surrender a wad of cash and be oddly touched by your in-laws' goofy speeches. But if you dare to put me on the podium you will receive from me a healthy dose of loving sincerity; not an embarrassing good-time anecdote.

What I'm saying is that marriage should be understood for what it is and what the sacrifices are and most importantly - that your marriage is yours to custom design. Allow for organic legitimacy. Don't demand to be the number-one partner for all of a hundred categories every day. Don't redeem your contractual promise to be loved every day. Instead, earn it.