Hope?

Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable... Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

When I was a teenager I loved to debate or spout off or hear myself talk. Not chit-chat but substance, important things. They were dramatic times, before and after 1970. We didn’t have formal debating at my high school like my father did—he told me about his days as captain of the Stockton High debating team—but plenty of schoolyard arguments occurred. Logic and rhetoric pitted against logic and rhetoric in a duel to the death. Yessir.

And one of the major questions we discussed, or that I subjected my friends to was/is: Is humanity progressing? Is society improving? Are all the efforts of good people succeeding? Generations dedicating their lives to making a better world, is it working?

Often it doesn’t seem so. We can see the power of a tiny match to destroy a car, house, city, forest pitted against the slow, hard work of building, planting, nurturing, reaping. The symbol of our times is the suicide bomber. Peace explodes in an instant. Back then it was the atom bomb, which destroys without even going off, except twice.

And I still remember my answer: yes, the world is progressing. And I still remember my supporting evidence: because in the 19^th century there was a movement against human slavery, many of my relatives were involved with, and it was finally victorious. Human slavery was abolished, erased from the world, our dark past immorality cancelled to allow a brighter future for all, free and equal!

That was my adolescent argument. Now? Now I wish I still believed that. I need to believe that. Why work if not for a better world? For one’s own belly? To keep trudging along towards the hole you can’t wait to jump into? Why hope for better lives for your children? Is yours better now because of your parents’ and grandparents’ sacrifices? It should be or you’re dishonoring their lives.

There’s bad news. Terrifying news. Human slavery is back. It may even be worse now than the African slavery of the 1700-1800’s because it is worldwide and often sexual. Human trafficking doesn’t just reduce people to machines but reduces the bodies of women and children to scorned objects to use, abuse and toss away. It could involve 30 million slaves. It is a devastating scourge.

I'm sure there are many organizations fighting hard against slavery and some governments that take the problem seriously, though most seem silent, that is, acquiescent. Yet the one that's most visible to me is the CNN Freedom Project. It seems courageous compared to every other network that rarely reports on the topic and then only to say it exists, doing nothing about it. Can a news organization get  involved not only in informing but in contrasting such a horror? Guess so. Good luck to them. Want to help? Check out the website. It's not pleasant viewing, but we need to know and act.

Yeah, but what does that do to my theory of 40 years ago? My symbol of human progress has turned worse than ever in only one generation. Maybe all our other hard fought successes will be brutally overturned and crushed. Smallpox pandemic coming up?

It’s all about quality of life, right? Think yours is high, low, good enough? Overworked, stressed, burnt-out, depressed? What’s the root cause, anyway, of sexual slavery, narcotic drug addiction, war and violence everywhere? Deep down, what’s wrong with us? How did we get to be a world of prostitutes, junkies, and killers? I don’t buy human nature as an answer. We can choose. We can be better. Something in the system has failed.

In Italian the expression is: hope is the last thing to die (la speranza è l’ultima a morire). I’d say if you don’t hope you’re already dead, alive but with nowhere to go. So hope? I hope.

Happy trials, Martin

Mutt: Did you know, my friend, that research tells us fourteen out of any ten individuals likes chocolate.

Jeff: For the love of Mike, please practice safe eating.

Mutt: How so?

Jeff: Always use condiments.

Mutt: Did you ever hear of Dijon Vu?

Jeff: No, you?

Mutt: Sure it’s the same mustard as before.

Jeff: And a hangover is the wrath of grapes.

Mutt: And a boiled egg in the morning is hard to beat.

Jeff: And bakers trade bread recipes on a knead-to-know basis.

Mutt: They do, but do you know what is small, red and whispers?

Jeff: ‘Fraid not.

Mutt: A hoarse radish.

Jeff: Do you know what turns without moving?

Mutt: ‘Fraid to ask.

Jeff: Milk. It can turn sour.

Mutt: And where does a jellyfish get its jelly?

Jeff: Go on.

Mutt: From ocean currents.

Jeff: Okay then, what do you call cheese that isn't yours?

Mutt: Give.

Jeff: Nacho Cheese.

Mutt: All right, last one. What kind of coffee was served on the Titanic?

Jeff: Go for it.

Mutt: Sanka.

Jeff: And what kind of lettuce?

Mutt: Uh, oh, uh oh, I can hear it coming … ICEBERG!!!

Neal in the Members Only Club

Or ‘Neal Plays the Organ’, ‘Neal Bites the Wienie’, ‘Neal and Little Peter’, et cetera.

This is a true story. It’s embarrassing, like most of Neal’s life, but I think both males and females can relate and empathize. Maybe something similar has happened to you.

Neal was having a birthday Saturday. His girl-friend Mitzy wanted to surprise him. What better than a surprise birthday party with about twenty of their best friends? But Neal would suspect, he’d be on guard all day. Friday he wouldn’t be around all day because he had a seminar at work, one of those boring things where you sit all day and drink coffee while some jerk talks about ‘Toyota-style high-efficiency’--in English ‘working harder’--at the company which just cut your pay by 10% for the second time, so that they could save people from lay-offs during the economic crisis without, naturally, cutting pay or benefits for the owners and stock holders. In sum, a day of unbearable hypocrisy.

So Mitzy’s bright idea was to have the surprise birthday party on Friday night. Sounds pretty good, huh? For someone who doesn’t get bright ideas very often, this was a winner. Neal got up and left for the seminar saying he’d be back around 7 or 8 o’clock, suspecting nothing. Then Mitzy and her friends Babs and Jan went to work. They made a devil’s food cake from scratch about two feet high. They made hors d’oeuvres. They mixed punch and arranged colored napkins in circular patterns. Babs brought Martha Stewart magazines for inspiration. They drank the spiked punch and laughed even when there was no joke. It was a beautiful girls day together waiting for Neal. Pop radio on, dancing in the kitchen.

Excuse me, reader, if I interrupt my own story, but have you ever noticed what you never see in films or on television? Unless they’re European or pornographic? Well, you see almost everything, but you rarely see female nudity, lots of tits and asses but little in the genitalia category. That’s fine. Children and the oversensitive might be shocked. But the male apparatus? Ever seen one outside of “Boogie Nights”? Not often, in any case. The penis is alluded to and suggested, but you don’t actually see one hanging there. So my first answer would be the elusive male member. But there’s something even more secretive, more dirty perhaps. Unimaginable but true. Enough suspense already? Breast-feeding. A human mother suckling her young. What perverted morality finds breast-feeding something to hide? Most actresses have done it in real life, but I’ve never seen them do it in a film. Me never.

In Europe and elsewhere, outside the U.S., women will open their blouses and unhook their bras and offer the teat to their babies with no shame or ill-ease. What is it with America that they hide this most beautiful and natural of operations behind a curtain shield or go into a separate room or feel so horribly uncomfortable? I’ve been to parties here in Sicily with mother and child both doing their thing and smiling. It’s nice. That’s what the mammary gland is really for, you know?

Anyway, I digress. Neal is driving home and realizes that he has an urgent need to urinate. It’s nearly unbearable, and he squeezes his legs together to attempt retardance. He’s afraid when he parks under his apartment that he might lose his bladder control while getting out of the car one leg at a time. He squeezes his pants hard enough to cause pain and then carefully steps out. Then he walks on stiff legs and short strides to the door, but can’t find the key. He finds the key. It won’t go into the lock. “Come on, come on, I gotta pee.” He opens the door and gets into the elevator to go up to the fifth floor. “Gotta pee, gotta pee, gotta pee BAD!”

Neal attempts mental distraction, but cannot think of anything except relief. He attempts his theory of absorption, which is that you can use mind-power to command the urine to flow backwards, until, to quote his high-school buddies, “your back teeth are whistling ‘Anchors Aweigh’.” Nothing works, it’s so bad it hurts. He suspects permanent penile damage unless the situation is reversed in the next few seconds. He opens his apartment door, saying out loud, “Gotta pee, gotta pee, gotta peeeeee!!!” Neal unzips his trousers to save time as he takes the last twenty steps toward the toilet.

Now, my friend Neal is, um, let’s say, well hung, endowed. He has above average length, quite substantially above average. When we were younger and took showers together at the gym, all the males would marvel in envy and yearning for what was probably our double. Or more. Aw, that’s not important. Forget that.

So Neal is walking through his front room with his extensive penis outside his pants, actually squeezing with thumb and forefinger to prevent premature leakage, when the lights flash on, and Mitzy, his beloved, and twenty of his friends, including some colleagues from work, scream on command: SURPRISE!

Neal stands frozen in space. He looks at them looking at his penis. They are as shocked as he is. Finally, he whispers, “Today’s not my birthday.” And runs.

Whether he made it or not to his final destination is not essential to this tale. The point is that what was seen was what should have been seen and is never seen because deemed obscene. Next, a story about breast-feeding, but, unfortunately, Neal will not be the protagonist.

Happy trials, Martin

Mutt:  I was having dinner with Garry Kasporov (world chess champion) and on the table was a checkered tablecloth. It took him two hours to pass me the salt.

Jeff:  I went to a seafood disco rave last week and pulled a mussel.
Mutt:  I know how Christopher Columbus really financed his trip to America.
Jeff:  How?
Mutt:  With the Discover Card.
Jeff:  If you know so much why is Saudi Arabia free of mental illness?
Mutt:  There are nomad people there.
Jeff:  Okay, which president was least guilty?
Mutt:  Lincoln. He is in a cent.
Jeff:  Well, you know everything. Show me where Stalin's buried …
Mutt:  And I'll show you a communist plot.
Jeff:  Have you heard about the lawyers’ word processor?
Mutt:  Of course. No matter what font you select, everything comes out in fine print.
Jeff:  Have you heard about the pharmaceutical company that developed a new drug which, when administered to women, compels them to go join a convent?
Mutt:  I know all about it; the FDA refused to license it, though. Seems it was habit-forming.
Jeff:  You do know them all.

Mutt:  I wrote them all.

Curmudgeon’s Joy

Ranting can be a true source of enjoyment and self-entertainment (you thought I wrote this blog for the readers?). My mother used to call it, ‘getting on your soapbox’, and I never miss a chance.

After ringing phones, what other pet peeves can I go on and on ad nauseam about? Hmm, I know, fireworks. I strongly dislike fireworks. I don’t revile them; I’ve watched fireworks many times and enjoyed them occasionally. They are extremely common here in Messina, almost a nightly, certainly a weekly occurrence. The best fireworks show I ever saw was midsummer in West Yellowstone, Montana, right over the airport where we parked and laid down on the car hood. It seemed like we were part of the explosive color spectacle. It went on and on, wasting money for tourism. The worst was in Hermosillo, Mexico, where they shot them straight up over the crowd of thousands and they came straight down, starting fires and killing people right in front of me.

What is the point of fireworks? Nothing. We shoot rockets that blow up just to watch them. They can be beautiful or terrifying, if, for example, you, like me, saw the Challenger explosion live. Exploding stuff is an extremely popular form of entertainment for most people. Entire films are based on it, mere excuses to blow stuff up.

But not everything that blows up is fun. I was in Zimbabwe during the Civil War, as you can read about if you scan down about a year, and every day we heard bombs going off and machine gun fire, grenades, small arms and land mines, out in the country, over the copse, just outside our compound. On the one hand, I was too young to feel as frightened as I should have, we had assurances from both sides that we were in a safe zone, but, on the other, I got the disturbing sensation of hearing a war being fought within a mile of me every day. It shook the earth.

Then I went to Angola. I didn’t want to, but I had no choice. It was 1975 during the violent transition of power from the Portuguese to the African government. All factions against each other and all against the Portuguese who just picked up and ran. It was bloody chaos.

I was flying from Johannesburg to Rio de Janeiro, and the pilot announced we’d be stopping briefly for humanitarian reasons, to pick up refugees, Portuguese and foreigners escaping for their lives. Flying low over Luanda, we saw fires and battles, smoke and destruction. The city was being rocked and shelled, as were we.

They took us off the plane; we were scared we wouldn’t get back on. I looked out on the runway and saw a man offering a bag of cash to a small plane pilot who had bullet holes all over his plane. In another section of the terminal, thousands of people were pressed to the glass hoping to get onto our plane. We only had about 8 or 10 empty seats. After hours listening to the shelling around us, we got back to our places and took off and flew over the Atlantic. Safely.

Then I was in Israel or Palestine a couple years later, aware of the conflicts without understanding the exact dynamic. I was camping by myself on the Sea of Galilee, not far from the border with Lebanon and somewhere near Syria and Jordan. I slept under a lone tree by the water, knowing there were armed adversaries all around me. In the night, bombs awoke me. This time I was stunned because I didn’t know whether to get out of my sleeping bag and which way to run to get out of the middle of the battle.

Maybe this was the end, I was in or near the middle of a series of explosions I couldn’t identify or understand. It was pitch black. I imagined Israelis and Palestinians shooting machine guns over my head. The bombs or grenades almost blew my ears out. My eyes focused in the dark. I saw a boat on the water near the shore. Coming at me? Are they all trying to kill little ol’ me?

After straining my eyes and sleepy mind, I finally got it. I’d heard about this but never seen it done. The middle-of-the-night fishermen were using dynamite to kill or stun all the fish in the area and scoop them up, easy but disastrous for the future of fishing in that giant lake. Oh man, you guys scared me to death. Damn dynamite. Damn Galilee fishermen.

So, having been in three wars already, without fighting myself, I hear those thuds and booms and am reminded every time of the real thing, not the simulation. Flowers of sparkles in the dark sky is a nice idea, but it is just too similar to the sights and sounds of war, pain, death.

Anything else I can bitch about? I’ll let you know.

Happy trials, Martin

Mutt:  How about this weather we’ve been having?

Jeff:  Everybody complains, but nobody does anything about it.
Mutt:  If a farmer raises wheat in dry weather, what does he raise in wet weather?
Jeff:  An umbrella?
Mutt:  Question: What kind of coat can be put on only when wet? Don’t know? I’ll tell you. A coat of paint.
Jeff:  What do you call a frightened skindiver? I’ll tell you. Chicken of the sea.
Mutt:  Good one. How can a leopard change his spots?
Jeff:  Oh, I don’t know, by moving?
Mutt:  Very good, my man.
Jeff:  My turn. What day of the year is a command to go forward?
Mutt:  Huh?
Jeff:  March 4th.
Mutt:  What did the razor blade say to the razor? No guess? Schick 'em up!
Jeff:  I don’t get it. Uh, what has four wheels and flies?
Mutt: P.U. A garbage truck.
Jeff:  You like the old ones, huh?
Mutt:  Okay, what goes up into the air white and comes down yellow and white?
Jeff:  I know this, but can’t remember.
Mutt:  An egg.
Jeff:  Oh yeah.
Mutt: What four letters could end a game of hide and seek?
Jeff:  O. I. C. U. You still play hide and seek?
Mutt:  With my wife I do. All right, here’s a great one.
Jeff:  Really?
Mutt:  Yeah. What is the difference between a cat and a comma?
Jeff:  No idear.
Mutt:  A cat has claws at the end of its paws, and a comma has a pause at the end of its clause.
Jeff:  Did your English teacher tell you that?
Mutt:  My English teacher has no sense of humor.
Jeff:  They never do.

That Sound, That Sound!

In August I spent several days in the mountains (as if you didn’t know). I had a new $19 cell phone to let my loved ones know I was still alive when I emerged (Did they care? I pretended they did.). I charged it in the Valley and kept it turned off during my Mountain walk to save the battery. It wouldn’t have worked anyway. Luckily, there are places where ‘back to nature’ means no phone service. Places where if a tree falls on you in the forest no one will have to hear the crack of your skull. Or film it for the seven o’clock news.

So this dumb little phone sat in my pack waiting its turn. I made it to Quincy and turned it on. We have power. Then I realized I had no one’s number with me and none in my head. I hadn’t saved them in the new phone; I’d never called anyone. I thought I knew one number but was only unsure of a couple ciphers. Good job, Odd Job.

Days earlier, I would sit by a babbling brook in measured bliss and recognize in the water sound something mistakable for a cell phone ring. As I reached a paved road, cars would whiz by (nobody picked me up) and the engine could make a slightly ring-ish tone. I got closer to town and the sprinklers on the lawns did the same. A radio in the distance. Little bells to keep away the birds.

Then I really got into town and there really were cell phones. They were ringing all around me, or was it the ice-cream truck, or was it the traffic light signal for the blind, or the electric beeper when you enter a place of commerce, or somebody practicing the hurdy-gurdy? It wasn’t my phone, it wasn’t even turned on, I checked a couple times.

And even when the ring wasn’t the same as my phone, which I didn’t know, I’d hear one ring and pull mine out of my pocket, like a quick-draw artist. I did this for many days wherever I went. The washing machine can make a similar sound occasionally. Better check. Or there’s a mystery chord on the guitar that sounds phone-ringing-ish. Checked.

No one could have called me as no one had my number. But a couple people texted me anyway with odd messages about sleazy encounters. Did I get a dead man’s number? Did I get a death row convict’s number he wouldn’t need again? I don’t want these calls. I don’t want any calls. Later, I slightly changed my stance on that, but just out of the solitude of the high elevations I really couldn’t stand that ding-a-ling.

The shopping centers, supermarkets, airports, when you get back to earth in the hot little tram waiting to chug down the runway and everyone’s cells go off at once like an electronic conspiracy. And the worst, by far the worst, wanna guess? is television. When phones are ringing all over every hour on every channel, but they’re not in the room, they’re fictional. Better check your own phone just in case.

In case of what? How many really important calls do you get? I don’t get any. The last one I didn’t answer, then he called back. Calls from relatives of the old and sick. But life-changing joy-producing business over the phone? What we’re all waiting for, but does it ever come? “Hello this is the Publishers Clearing House, congratulations …” That never happens. Isn’t it more like, “Wanna do lunch?” “Can’t. I’m meeting my other mistress.” “’Kay, seeya.”

Take my blood pressure and heart rate and see the earthquake jumps every time a real, imagined, fictional, or flowing mountain stream phone rings. So I ask why and I get an answer I don’t like. DO NOT ASK FOR WHOM THE PHONE RINGS, IT RINGS FOR YOU.

Happy trials, Martin

Mutt:  Are you stressed out too?

Jeff:  Not me, I’m a man of leisure.
Mutt:  I’m a man of Topeka.
Jeff:  Want to hear a good joke?
Mutt:  No, I want to hear yours.
Jeff: One day a Czechoslovakian came to visit his friend in New York. When asked what he wanted to see, the Czechoslovakian replied, "I would like to see one of the zoos in America." To his delight, the New Yorker took him to the zoo. While they were touring the zoo, and standing in front of the gorilla cage, one of the gorillas busted out of the cage and swallowed the Czech whole. Shocked, his friend from New York quickly called over the zoo keeper. He explained the situation and asked the zoo keeper what he planned to do. The zoo keeper got an axe and asked the man, "Okay, which gorilla did it, was it the male or the female." Pointing out the female as the culprit, the zoo keeper quickly split the female gorilla open and found nothing of the Czech. With which the man from New York shrugged and said, "Guess the Czech's in the male."
Mutt:  Oowah.
Jeff:  Another?
Mutt:  To get the bad taste out?
Jeff:  Recently a guy in Paris nearly got away with stealing several paintings from the Louvre. However, after planning the crime, getting in and out past security, he was captured only two blocks away when his lorry ran out of gas. When asked how he could mastermind such a crime and then make such an obvious error, he replied: I had no Monet to buy Degas to make the Van Gogh.
Mutt:  Abba dabba, abba dabba, that’s all folks.

What Goes On In The Squaw Valley?

You drive on roads that split the granite mountains. You pass through a stone railroad bridge tunnel. Very suspicious. You follow a non-visible river then turn right off the main road, past the sign advertising an event in 1960. There you enter the Valley. It all seems normal enough. The people riding bicycles are smiling. Why am I so edgy?

On your way to the far end of the Valley, you pass luxury golf-n-ski resorts, luxury in middle-class terms, that is. You pass summer homes designed by architects and a few older ones built by the folks who discovered the Valley generations ago. The original Squaws? Is this thin air safe to breathe?

I walked inside the big hall, took a second to get my bearings, this long-hair comes up to me and, grinning, asks: Did you find yourself yet? Okay, so that’s the way this thing is going to begin. He meant did I find my information packet. Oh, not a philosophical question. Well, yes, that too. I already doubted everything anyone said as possibly metaphorical, double-meanings would be everywhere this week.

Soon the calliope started to play and the mirrors spun right, colored lights flashed, and everyone jumped on a horse and the carousel moved us all forward towards somewhere no one knows. I'm not sure we were truly going in circles. Some folks rode unicorns, which should be imaginary animals, but in Squaw Valley are real. Some grabbed at the rings; I never got that part figured out. Maybe I was on the wrong horse. In fact, it wasn’t a horse at all, or a sea monster, but a darling deer. Highly symbolic.

Just so nobody tries to take my clothes off and pour bourbon down my throat. Wow, I’m dizzy anyway, where's the blur? And as the week progresses a few people start floating off into gravity-less space like the words spinning off in all directions. The big words. Lovely language goes sailing away into the air like eagles, like freed elevators sail in space. Pictures seen with closed eyes fly dangerously outwards too to, presumably, ricochet against the Valley walls.

The merry-go-round is so thrilling, so electrifying that we all laugh for a week. We join hands to dance the hokey pokey while we twirl. And there are voices amidst the circus music. Voices of words you read back inside and outside of Pleasure Island, where we all have come to become proud donkeys. We all bray, but still hear the voices. Familiar as mothers, reading fairy books aloud, putting us to bed, thank you, sleep tight.

I hated leaving the Squaw, the Valley, the Cradle, the Nest. I never wanted off that ride. The voices will always echo in my head and grow like sunflowers up from the words (Ron’s, Karen’s, Gerry’s, Brett’s, Amy’s, Alex’s, all the others). And we can always be donkeys together, I guess, because we put on our disguises when we left the Valley, covered our long ears, noses, tucked in our tails, but we all know each other’s secrets now. That's what it was all about, I think.

You might suspect the lemonade was spiked in order to subject a group of eager scribblers to a giant mind-bending experiment, but you’d be wrong. We brought our own bentness. We subjected ourselves. And it was glorious.

Happy trials, Martin

Mutt: Okay. Here’s the best joke I ever heard.

Jeff: Shoot.
Mutt: A woman goes to the zoo and is completely taken by the beauty and power of the gorilla. She cannot take her eyes off him. He is sleeping against the bars of the cage, and even though a sign says not to, she reaches her hand in to stroke him. Instantly, he awakes and goes berserk, tearing the bars of the cage open to get at her, mauling her to within an inch of her life. Finally, the zoo personnel manage to hit him with the tranquilizer darts. The woman is taken to an ICU, barely alive, but slowly, slowly she pulls through. After four days she is finally allowed visitors. Her best friend arrives. The woman can barely open her eyes. “God, you look like you’re in a lot of pain,” the friend says, and the woman sighs. “Pain,” she says. “You don’t know pain. He doesn’t call, he doesn’t write …”
Jeff: You stole that from Anne Lamott, didn’t you?
Mutt: Word for word, buddy, word for word.

Report Card, Summer Aught Eleven

I’m back, back, back on the streets again. (Sounds like I just got out of jail … no, sounds like Tower … of … Power) Whatever it sounds like, truth is I spent the summer in Californ-i-a, and I heard some live music, studied some more and even made a little. Not always sweet music, it was a hard summer personally, but the savage beast was tamed on several occasions.

            Ditty Bops: the girls were adorable, cute almost to a fault, but the songs they sang in such a happy style were often sad love songs. Something amiss with this duo of married women? They were funny and coy, delightful to the end. Then it happened. They skipped off-stage and the crowd went wild for an encore. But they never came out. They didn’t even come out to sign CDs later. Very bad form. Left a sour taste.

            Neko Case: free concert in Stern Grove (the park in the Parkside District, I grew up a couple blocks from there). Last year we were thrilled to see Jovanotti there. Great venue but get there early. Well I knew they didn’t open the park until two hours early so I was there, but I must have missed the memo that said they’d open much earlier this time. The whole place was packed with thousands of fans, so we had to sit so far up on the hill that we couldn’t see or hear anything. I think it was a good concert and that she’s a good singer/songwriter, but I wouldn’t know for sure.

            Sourdough Slim: we drove up in the hills to Fiddletown, not really believing that a Fiddletown existed or that we’d hear fiddles there. At Scofield Ranch we walked into a Western movie set complete with cowboys and cowgirls chatting us up, sitting us down and welcoming us to the best barbecue chuck what am. Then the fun continued with the great Sourdough Slim, relaxed, funny, nostalgic, expert singer and musician, funny, warm and wise. I know I said funny twice, he’s that good. I bought his latest CD and we talked until he had to go back on stage for more. A thrilling evening of joy, even for us not-cowboys.

            Eddie Vedder: I thought Eddie Vedder was a pro. But he was having such a good time in Oakland at the Paramount that he wouldn’t shut up. Not that anyone wanted him to. He played on and on; we almost missed the last Bart train. Ukulele songs, Into the Wild, Pearl Jam, other stuff, it was incredible music against all the rules. One guy, acoustic, even a song without the mikes (chills), warm and fun, the Surfer did an encore that lasted an hour. I told you he just wouldn’t stop. Hope he never does.

            The Producers: this was by far the best musical I ever saw. And I write the things. But only Mel Brooks could put this many laughs in one show. What impressed me even more was the direction at the Music Circus and the acting, which was outstanding. Some people I overheard weeks later were raving about it, saying Sacramento better than Broadway. The unknown protagonists better than the New York stars. I agree. Great. Unforgettable. If I had any mystery disease going in, I laughed it away in there. A shot of good health.

            42^nd Street: this was a local Stockton show, amateurish and barely worth the effort. The tap-dancing was weak, the acting, the direction, the playback music, even the theater ain’t nothing special. The protagonist was great however, she was the only star in the sky. Danced, sang and acted like a pro. UOP student, of course.

            Billy Elliot: I was psyched, then what happened? This was the big San Francisco hit of the season. Maybe I was hyped. It didn’t thrill me, even though the dancing and singing was fantastic. No talent show stuff here, these were top professionals displaying their skills. Maybe I couldn’t get into the story, English miners on strike, or maybe I was bothered that the kid, who was a brilliant dancer and perfect singer, was an Asian boy from Los Angeles with a spot-on North English accent. Yes, that did bother me. He’s acting a part, okay, but you don’t get Denzel Washington to play John Kennedy. It stuck out. I didn’t want my money back, it was a pleasant evening, but I felt perplexed.

            Dan Hicks: finally, the moment I waited all summer for. The Hot Licks, the Lickettes, the Lick Men (deal with it, he says). Great band, weird songs, but the star is Dan the Man, droll as a rock in Death Valley, dry as the funniest man on earth alone on a rock in Death Valley. Dan Hicks is so good, such a charming wit, that you could only not laugh if you didn’t speak English (like my seat-mate). I was rolling in hysterics for two hours. I love this whatever-it-is music, but my face ached afterwards from my smile cracking (some people think I am incapable of smiling, they’re wrong). Thank you Dan Hicks. I’ll put you in a book sometime. Oh, already did. Never mind.

Happy trials, Martin

Mutt: A Polar bear walks into an English 'fish and chip' shop and says to the person taking the order, "I'll have a Cola and ............................................................................... large fish and chips ." The order taker asks, "What's with the big pause?" The bear says, "I dunno, I've always had them."

Jeff: Did you subscribe to Boy’s Life as a child?
Mutt: No, but I do now.
Jeff: Let me tell ya, if you want to make money as a comedian you gotta have the cents of humor.
Mutt: I don’t get it.
Jeff: Read.
Mutt: Once there was a mad scientist who worked by himself in his laboratory. Stop me if you’ve heard this.
Jeff: Get on with it.
Mutt: He was so lonely that one day he decided to clone himself. Everything worked perfectly except that the clone had a very foul mouth. The scientist worked with the clone, but alas, he could not make the clone clean up his language. He got so tired of the clone's language that one day he pushed him off the edge of a cliff. A policeman rushed up to him, and yelled, "You are under arrest! You are under arrest!"
"What for?" the mad scientist asked.
And the answer was …
Jeff: I can see it coming.
Mutt: For making an obscene clone fall.
Jeff: Okay, got one, and it’s a true story.
Mutt: Oh goody, I love true stories.
Jeff: It seems there were three monks who enjoyed raising plants and were trying to keep a flower shop running, selling unique and exotic plant life. One day some children were playing behind the shop and were eaten whole by an extremely rare man-eating plant. The parents, needless to say, were outraged and demanded that the friars get rid of the dangerous plant. The friars refused, so the parents and the people of the town tried several ways to get the friars to consent, but finally they had to ask Hugh, the town blacksmith (undoubtedly the strongest man around), to run the friars out of town.
Mutt: Hmmm.
Jeff: The Moral of the Story, my friend, is : "Hugh, and only Hugh, can prevent florist friars!"
Mutt: Good night, David.
Jeff: Good night, Chet.

Walk Away Towards

Walk away quietly in any direction and taste the freedom of the mountaineer. Camp out among the grasses and gentians of glacial meadows, in craggy garden nooks full of nature's darlings. Climb the mountains and get their good tidings, Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves. As age comes on, one source of enjoyment after another is closed, but nature's sources never fail.  John Muir

I took a tiny music player on my PCT section hike this summer. Very few people were on the trail. I went several days without seeing another human, which was nice. I’d just spent a week at a big meeting (more later). The other hikers I met were friendly and spaced out on what we were doing and where. No one had much to say. One thru-hiker guy, giddy after his first 30-miler, just spread his arms, “Isn’t all this just … the greatest?!”

Why would you want to be anywhere else? When I got back to Tracy, I had no phone, no television, no computer, no radio, and I was alone in the house for several days. It wasn’t the liberating solitude but claustrophobic and weird: reading books, eating ice cream and checking the clock; it was okay but wrong. I wanted to be back up there in the higher altitudes.

My feet needed a break, but my spirit was still flying. I was proud of myself, something that doesn’t happen all the time. I liked myself, something I wish would happen more often.

You want ecstasy? I know where you can get some. Hard work but huge rewards that last. Not so hard that I should see only a handful of people in 10 days. Where were you?

Here are two of the songs that I listened to over and over, walking tunes. At the beginning of the trip, I was more into the long bluesy tone of the Dylan song, but as days went by the Greg Brown elation took over as the dominant feeling, the yahoo off the mountaintop. Anyhow, two great songs from Further In and Modern Times. Listen.

Two Little Feet  Greg Brown

Two little feet to get me 'cross the mountain

Two little feet to carry me away into the woods

Two little feet, big mountain, and a

Cloud comin' down, cloud comin' down, cloud comin' down.

I hear the voice of the ancient ones

Chanting magic words from a different time

Well there is no time, there is only this rain

There is no time, that's why I missed my plane.

John Muir walked away into the mountains

In his old overcoat a crust of bread in his pocket

We have no knowledge and so we have stuff and

Stuff with no knowledge is never enough to get you there

It just won't get you there.

A culture exploded into knickknacks and memories

Eagle and Bear trinkets, I don't think it's good

Old man what am I trying to say it's a

It's a messed up world but I love it anyway.

Two little feet to get me 'cross the city

My little hand to knock upon your door

My little thing for your little thing

And a big love to lift us up once more to the mountain

Lift us up.

Tumble us like scree let us holler out our freedom like a

Like a wolf across a valley like a kid lost in a game

No time no name gonna miss that plane again

And I'm gonna stay here with you baby and kiss you to a good dream

I'm goin' kiss you

Kiss you like you like it.

I got two little feet to get me across the mountain

Two little feet to carry me away into the woods

Two little feet big mountain and a

Cloud comin' down, cloud comin' down, cloud comin' down.

Ain't Talkin'  Bob Dylan

As I walked out tonight in the mystic garden
The wounded flowers were dangling from the vine
I was passing by yon cool crystal fountain
Someone hit me from behind.

Ain't talking, just walking
Through this weary world of woe
Heart burning, still yearning
No one on earth would ever know.

They say prayer has the power to heal
So pray for me, mother
In the human heart an evil spirit can dwell
I am trying to love my neighbor and do good unto others
But oh, mother, things ain't going well.

Ain't talking, just walking
I'll burn that bridge before you can cross
Heart burning, still yearning
There'll be no mercy for you once you've lost.

Now I'm all worn down by weeping
My eyes are filled with tears, my lips are dry
If I catch my opponents ever sleeping
I'll just slaughter them where they lie.

Ain't talking, just walking
Through the world mysterious and vague
Heart burning, still yearning
Walking through the cities of the plague.

Well, the whole world is filled with speculation
The whole wide world which people say is round
They will tear your mind away from contemplation
They will jump on your misfortune when you're down.

Ain't talking, just walking
Eating hog eyed grease in a hog eyed town.
Heart burning, still yearning
Some day you'll be glad to have me around.

They will crush you with wealth and power
Every waking moment you could crack
I'll make the most of one last extra hour
I'll revenge my father's death then I'll step back.

Ain't talking, just walking
Hand me down my walking cane.
Heart burning, still yearning
Got to get you out of my miserable brain.

All my loyal and my much-loved companions
They approve of me and share my code
I practice a faith that's been long abandoned
Ain't no altars on this long and lonesome road.

Ain't talking, just walking
My mule is sick, my horse is blind.
Heart burning, still yearning
Thinking about that girl I left behind.

Well, it's bright in the heavens and the wheels are flying
Fame and honor never seem to fade
The fire gone out but the light is never dying
Who says I can't get heavenly aid?

Ain't talking, just walking
Carrying a dead man's shield
Heart burning, still yearning
Walking with a toothache in my heel.

The suffering is unending
Every nook and cranny has its tears
I'm not playing, I'm not pretending
I'm not nursing any superfluous fears.

Ain't talking, just walking
Walking ever since the other night.
Heart burning, still yearning
Walking until I'm clean out of sight.

As I walked out in the mystic garden
On a hot summer day, a hot summer lawn
Excuse me, ma'am, I beg your pardon
There's no one here, the gardener is gone.

Ain't talking, just walking
Up the road, around the bend.
Heart burning, still yearning
In the last outback at the world's end.

“It’s a messed up world, but I love it anyway.”

Happy trials, Martin

Mutt:  Pressure’s on after a season off.

Jeff:  You mean we have to be funny again?

Mutt:  Again?

Jeff:  Okay, remember the time we were at the theme park. It was an extremely windy day, and the area sweeper (you know, the person with the small dustpan and broom you see in parks sweeping up the litter) was that small woman, Mary Lou (4'10", 90 pounds), who joked that she would have to put rocks in her shoes when she went outside to work.

Mutt:  Yeah, she used to say, “Now I weigh me down to sweep.”

Jeff:  Was that the same pert and perceptive young lady whose boyfriend is currently prospecting for oil somewhere in the Middle East?

Mutt:  The very same.

Jeff:  I heard she sent him a 'Get Well' card.

Mutt: And did you hear about the constipated composer?

Jeff:  Yeah. He couldn't finish the last movement.

Mutt:  Question: If you dream in vivid colors, is that a pigment of your imagination?

Jeff:  So what happens when you play country music backwards?

Mutt:  I know this, I know this. You get your wife back, you get your house back, you get your job back, you get your car back, etc.

Jeff:  Did you hear about the optometrist who fell into a lens grinder and made a spectacle of himself?

Mutt:  You know, my friend, I’m exhausted from doing nothing.

Jeff:  Me too. I get enough exercise just by pushing my luck.

Night Journey by Theodore Roethke

Now as the train bears west,
Its rhythm rocks the earth,
And from my Pullman berth
I stare into the night
While others take their rest.
Bridges of iron lace,
A suddenness of trees,
A lap of mountain mist
All cross my line of sight,
Then a bleak wasted place,
And a lake below my knees.
Full on my neck I feel
The straining at a curve;
My muscles move with steel,
I wake in every nerve.
I watch a beacon swing
From dark to blazing bright;
We thunder through ravines
And gullies washed with light.
Beyond the mountain pass
Mist deepens on the pane;
We rush into a rain
That rattles double glass.
Wheels shake the roadbed stone,
The pistons jerk and shove,
I stay up half the night.
To see the land I love.

Happy summer trials, Martin

Neal’s Protest March

A small blond girl named Sandy was in one of Neal’s classes at State. He dug her. She barely even looked at him. One night at the end of the semester, Neal hatched a plan: invite Sandy out. The details were not very clear to him, that is, what he would say after “Hi,” but it was a good plan nonetheless.

As the teacher was explaining the format of the final exam, Neal leaned toward Sandy. It wasn’t the right moment perhaps, but his courage (or lack of) did not allow him to choose—now or never.

“Uh, Sandy?”

“Shhh.”
“You wanna, like, um, you know …”
“Quiet!”

Oh no, he’d blown it, his one big chance at happiness. Neal was a disaster, he’d picked the wrong moment, the wrong girl, the wrong strategy. Everything he did was a mess. His life was ruined.

As he sat slumped in his seat, rejected and dejected, the bell rang. Rush off to your next class everyone. That was it. He’d missed the bus.

But then Sandy came up to Neal with a surprise. She handed him a pamphlet with a smile, a knowing, winning, sexy smile like she wanted to eat him. He just said, “thanks.” And she was gone like a zephyr.

The pamphlet said: March for Indian Rights! and had a date and place. Neal got there early because Sandy had given him a date at last. As the march started and colorful people chanted and drums and musical instruments played and megaphones shouted, angry people around him loudly protested, Neal was searching everywhere for Sandy. He pushed to the front of the long crowd, he wove his way against the flow to the back, he cut down the side to get ahead again. The whole day Neal spent in a demonstration of thousands of passionate folks looking for his lost love, never to find her.

When he went home and lay in bed that night, Neal wondered. Had Sandy stood him up? Had she been unable to attend because of an accident, a death in the family, or was she in bed with some guy on the football team? Would he ever get what he deserved? And one final question especially perturbed Neal’s sleep:

Was that a march for Asian Indians or American Indians?

Happy trials, Martin

Mutt: "Doctor, doctor! Birds keep building nests in my horses' manes! What should I do?" "Sprinkle yeast on them and call me in the morning." "But why?" "Yeast is yeast and nest is nest and never the mane shall tweet!"

Jeff: You’ve got to be kidding.
Mutt: "Doctor, doctor! Some days I think I'm a teepee, others I think I'm a wigwam! What do I do?" "Relax, you're two tents."
Jeff: Rerun.
Mutt: Have you got bills to pay?
Jeff: Yep.
Mutt: If you do, please give it back. He looks silly bald. Ha, ha.
Jeff: P.U.
Mutt: A male snake charmer married a female undertaker. Their bath towels read "Hiss" and "Hearse".
Jeff: I’m warning you …
Mutt: A man hit another on the head with a pop bottle, killing him. In court, he claimed he was influenced by the song "Let's Get Fizzy-Kill".
Jeff: That does it. I’m calling the cops.

Who's On First?

From memory:

Orlando Cepeda is on first
Chuck Hiller at second
José Pagàn shortstop
Jim Davenport at third
Felipe Alou in right
Willie Mays in center
Harvey Kuenn in left
Willie McCovey, Matty Alou, Manny Mota, Ernie Bowman reserves
Tom Haller catching
Juan Marichal pitching
or Gaylord Perry
or Mike McCormick
or Don Larsen
Alvin Dark in the dugout managing.

I left some out or got some wrong, but remembering the 1962 Giants lineup (when I can't remember last night's film) is very self-impressive. This is when my love of baseball started. These were my guys. And baseball must be good for you because many of them are still alive. Alvin Dark's around 90. So I post this in memory, from memory, to the memory of my favorite shortstop, José Pagàn, who died yesterday.

Happy trials, Martin

Happy What?

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.  (from “Desiderata,” Max Ehrmann)

My first hero, along with Captain Kangaroo, before Willie Mays, was Roy Rogers. He would shoot the guns out of the badguys’ hands, then do some trick-riding on his best friend Trigger, then sing a duet with his perfect wife, Dale. Roy Rogers always knew the right thing, did it, and won. We need a role model like that, don’t we?

When, in high school, I became a letter-writer (guess I liked my friends (especially female) at postal delivery arm’s length, less threatening, you know). And I ended all my witty epistles with Roy’s salute (and ‘60’s hippie expression): Happy Trails! I even learned the song on my ukulele.

Then I turned world-traveler, hiker and hitchhiker, and it meant all the more to me. Happy Trails. Then I aged. Several of my friends died (car wreck, cancer, drink, cancer, car wreck, AIDS), my first marriage died, my career died, my professional music experiment died … some of my dreams, a bit of my health, a lot of innocent people in the world, enlightened principles, the good earth – it seemed like all humanity slid downhill … AVALANCHE!!!!!

Kids too scared to go outside to play, people afraid to talk to Arabs, fear of food, phones, travel, ill health, being alone, fear of losing a house, a job, a family, a love. Fear of bad stuff that hasn't even happened yet. As they say, the worst thirst is when your well’s NOT dry.

My slogan became “Happy Trials.” Okay, trials, tough luck, bitterness, got it, but why happy? Because in these hard times (in any times) it’s way too easy to be a pessimist! I want a challenge, something difficult– not to have a mindless smiley face, but a conscious, conscientious attitude of hope, a balance to achieve.

If I believe this is it, we get one go-round, then I don’t want to spend my 70-year allotment with a scowling heart.

Natalie Merchant said, in her masterpiece, “Life is Sweet”:

It's a pity
It's a crying shame
Who pulled you down again?
How painful it must be
To bruise so easily inside

It's a pity
It's a downright crime
But it happens all the time
You wanna stay little daddy's girl
Wanna hide from the vicious world outside

But don't cry
Know the tears'll do no good
So dry your eyes

They told you life is hard
It's misery from the start
It's dull and slow and painful

I tell you life is sweet
In spite of the misery
There's so much more
Be grateful

They told you life is long
Be thankful when it's done
Don't ask for more
You should be grateful

But I tell you life is short
Be thankful because before you know
It will be over

Cause life is sweet
And life is also very short
Your life is sweet.

Can I do it? Can I look on the sunny side? Will I live it like Roy Rogers?

No, I’m not succeeding yet in seeing the silver lining (rather than the dark cloud) in this world surely full of love, joy and beauty but teetering on the brink of disaster, immeasurable pain and violent despair, HOWEVER (as McMurphy said) at least I’m trying.

Happy trials, Martin

Mutt: Get it? The man said, “happy trials.”

Jeff: Happy isles, happy crocodiles.
Mutt: Happy smiles, happy argyles.
Jeff: Happy juveniles, happy exiles.
Mutt: Happy miles, happy gentiles.
Jeff: Boy, that was fun.
Mutt: Really?
Jeff: Two cows are standing next to each other in a field. Daisy says to Dolly, "I was artificially inseminated this morning." "I don't believe you," says Dolly. "It's true, no bull!" exclaims Daisy.
Mutt: If lawyers are disbarred and priests defrocked, doesn't it follow that electricians can be delighted, musicians denoted, models deposed, tree surgeons debarked, and dry cleaners depressed? (Teachers, of course, would be declassified!)
Jeff: English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race (which, of course, isn't a race at all). That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible. And why, when I wind up my watch, I start it, but when I wind up this joke, I end it.
Mutt: Thank you.

Nobel Prize for Bob Dylan

I’ve thought about this. Only one living American deserves the Nobel Prize for Literature: Bob Dylan. If you think of the protest singer cliché proposed by superficial media (the 20-year-old Times are a-Changin’ guy) you miss the point: Bob Dylan is an exceptional writer. His production is mammoth in quantity and consistent quality. Don’t get sucked into dividing his work in periods (Folk, Electric, Gospel, etc.), and don’t, of course, react either way to his other skills: guitar, harmonica and keyboard playing, singing, music writer, producer, his rock star personality and general mystique—forget all that. Lastly, don’t be influenced by the songs that are famous hits because they got more radio play. Read the lyrics.

Read the songs as songs. Songs are songs with their own rules. Dylan has respected and violated them all. Songs are cousins to poems but are not poems. Bob Dylan is not a poet. Sharon Olds is a poet. Dylan is a writer, a song writer. [Actually the texts can't be divorced from the music and performance, but I'm making a point here.] He creates literature more enduring and significant than most. He’s affected the lives of millions. I dare say no American writer ever has had the raw impact of Bob Dylan. Who? Twain, Whitman, Dickinson, James, Hemingway, Who? Dr. Suess? Matt Groening? Who? Hundreds of thousands of boys, for example, are named Dylan in honor of this literary/musical giant. Lives changed. The whole world changed. And his imitative effect on other song-writers …

In high school, Dylan dreamed of being Elvis. They both made musical history (and beautiful music, if you like it), but Dylan also made literary history. From Freewheelin’ to Together Through Life, Bob Dylan has consistently written fine literary lyrics. “Like a Rolling Stone,” “A Hard Rain’s a-Gonna Fall,” “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door,” “Just Like a Woman,” “Love Sick,” “All Along the Watchtower,” “Shelter from the Storm,” “Not Dark Yet,” “Forever Young,” “Hurricane,” “Blind Willie McTell,” “Gotta Serve Somebody,” “Working Man Blues,” etcetera. Hundreds of ‘em.

Get all the forty-some records of original material and listen to them all (you masochists). Instead of the highs and lows that everyone talks about, I hear a master at work throughout (which doesn't make every work a masterpiece). I hear writing so hard it seems easy. I hear a child making nonsense rhymes in the playpen combined with Grandpa giving precious advice on living. Contemporary rock 'n roll (teenage fans filling stadiums for a 70-year-old?) combined with ageless tradition, rich oral-musical-literary tradition. Bob Dylan knows his stuff (music and lit.): listen to his fantastic radio show (Theme Time Radio Hour on XM Satellite Radio), you’ll see.

So to celebrate Dylan’s seventieth birthday, May 24, 2011, I officially propose he be given the 2012 Nobel Prize for Literature. Sweden, are you listening?

Plus, a student of mine told me today that her favorite song is “Bowling in the Wind.”

My three favorite Dylan records (you tell me yours):

1. Oh Mercy

2. Modern Times

3. Time Out of Mind

Happy trials, Martin

Mutt: How nice to see you again, my friend.

Jeff: How nice to be seen at all.

Mutt: Got a story.

Jeff: Can I stop you?

Mutt: A frog enters a bank looking for a loan. He approaches the loan officer, Patty Black, and makes his request known. Taken somewhat aback, she tells him the bank doesn't normally make loans to frogs.

"But please," says the frog, "I really need this loan."

"Do you have any collateral?" asks Ms. Black.

"Only this," he says. And with that, the frog pulls from his pocket an object and hands it to Ms. Black. Not knowing what it is, but being too embarrassed to say so, she takes the object to the bank manager and explains about the frog and his request for a loan.

"Sir, I don't even know what this is, but it's all he has for collateral," she tells him.

The manager takes the objects, looks at it for a moment, hands it back and tells her, "Why, it's a nick-knack, Patty Black, give the frog a loan!"

Jeff: A musical funny?

Mutt: Yeah, in honor of His Bob-ness. This old man is rolling home.

Jeff: Whatever.