November 2007 archive

As some of you may know I’m still an active member of RedState.  The subject comes to mind because in addition to all the Candidate Crap I spent a little time in a diary about RedState that I found uncomfortable.

The diarist was amazed that they could be ‘wasting’ their time talking about anything but politics.

I pointed out that the blurb is “Conservative News and Community.”

Now the reason I still survive is I don’t go there much and never if I disagree about politics.  I talk about sports mostly, I grieved with Streiff about the passing of the F-14 because in Harpoon Phoenix missiles kick ass and you can never have enough.  Leon thinks I’m unserious because I supported Online Integrity, but then again Booman thinks I’m an ass clown so there you go.

You can’t get hung up on civility.

Now by community what I mean is what I was seeking when I joined dK, a place where I could express myself without worrying about pissing everyone off if I happened to let slip that I thought W was an asshole (I have since amended my judgment to war criminal).  I never intended that every waking minute be devoted to that opinion, just that it shouldn’t disqualify me from being an ok person to have it.

At the same time I have the experience to understand that communities are complex structures, and ambition and jealousy and struggles for power are just the way monkeys interact in groups.  Smart monkeys learn to pursue their own banana.

My guiding principle is this- there are no bad opinions, but there are bad actors.

“It is the madness of folly to expect mercy from those who have refused to do justice.  Even mercy, where conquest is the object, is only a trick of war.”- Tom Paine

It was a cold windy night in Albany, a parking spot was available right outside the Empire State Plaza, a rarity indeed, a quick dash across the smooth marble promenade reveals the Egg uplit, mirroring the shape of the moon above.  Once inside the crowd was happy and energetic, bouncing around, finding friends, or buying a CD or two.  Unbeknownst to me a warm up act was playing called “American Babies”, I guess they are a mix of emo and blues but I didn’t get a chance to hear much.

The lights came on and the stage was prepared for the main act.  A lot of couples, some college kids, many musicians and some neighborhood locals made up the crowd.  This is the most packed I have seen the main theater at the egg.  Energy started to build…the lights dim…out they walk.  Cruising right into a number that most other guitarists would save until they were warmed up Derek did not disappoint. He played rhythm, lead and slide all without a pick. He used the volume button as his only effect, try that at home kids.  

You’ll recall that in late October and early November the state of Tabasco in Mexico had huge floods.

Women in Villahermosa covered their noses on Sunday because of the stench from the receding flood waters.

The flood, which was very briefly noted in the traditional media, and has faded from the traditional media.

And now there is a serious concern about an outbreak of dengue.

Country Joe and the Fish

Love

The tonic chord of the last line — that’s our topic.  The tonal and thematic closure of a literary episode found with the right string of words.  The well-struck final sentence of a well-structured novel or essay or even film brings a session of the reader’s consiousness to a close.  Within a definable portion of one’s finite existence, the last line marks the cessation of a who and a when and a what that was spent with a piece of writing.  

Meaning does not stop with the final line, of course; that’s not my claim.  The life of a lived work does not stop when we close the cover for the first time.  A piece of writing is alive after it is read, learned by heart, sometimes, though it need not be learned by heart to live, and then it is alive in us until our death, if it meant a lot to us.  We may return to the work even if we never see it again.

Rather, when I say that the final line, if right, brings an end, what I mean is that an aesthetically, even ethically comprehensible finitude has been created in the space of life.  A mortality in miniature, a totem is there in the soul where before there was none; an object round on all sides (or jagged if that is the author’s purpose) to be studied, kept in one’s spiritual pocket, remembered, cherished, or perhaps disquietedly revered.  A thing with meaning.

Airplane – Encore

Somebody to Love