Faux Western

Has it really been three months since I wrote something?

Time flies. Yeah, I thought I'd have something better than that too.

One thing that did cross my river was going to see True Grit; the Coen brothers new film; and it got me thinking, given our recent political shout-about. Omnipotent government versus the ideal of the rugged individual as epitomized by western lore. A lot of mouth breathers and self aggrandizing shouters have festered the channels of communication with invocations of our impending doom as we slip slide into the abyss of the mommy state. Better to invigorate our national soul with the comfort food that is the idea that life and it's immediacies are significantly improved when our individualism trumps our need for community and it's inevitable propensity towards socialism. Better to starve than be sapped of our vigor. Certainly in the abstract, as a barometer of character, it may have it's virtues, as we may all seek to be glorious in our devotions to the cause, but as a workable solution to the good life, and THAT, my dear readers, is the crux of the problem, for the good life has no single measure; only the desires of each who dreams of it, and are inextricably bound up in the prosperity of community.

The movie, a remake of the John Wayne pic, and based on the novel by Charles Portis, is, as I find most Coen brothers films, unsettling in a good way. I don't note that as any objective critique, only that I respond that way when I watch their films. This is primarily due to their recognition of human supidity and hubris and the manner in with they allow it to inhabit the tone of their work. Again, that's simply my reaction and part of why I enjoy their films so much.

The premise is simple enough, after her father is murdered by the skeevy Tom Chaney, our heroine, Mattie Ross, seeks revenge through the capable, albeit drunken, one eyed Rooster Cogburn. Cogburn, as is wryly conveyed in the film, is not know for bringing men in alive. This renders the notion of Mattie to see Tom hang more bluster than a call to justice. In fact, justice is in short supply in this tale. So is morality and any abiding sense of community. Townspeople are, as often is the case in the fictionalized Hollywood version of the old west, scared selfish town dudes and their shrewish wives. There is no invocation of God other than of his grace and it's seeming randomness. Life is hardscrabble and apt to end at any moment. Only the hard and determined survive on their own. The rest huddle in town to be controlled by corrupt land barons, sheriffs, politicians, or marauding thugs. Makes you wonder how anyone managed to live through it.

The actual West was anything but what is presented on film. Community is what settled the West. Towns were not gunslinger heavens, and killers were not heroes venerated by the locals. Justice could be swift, and given human predisposition, occasionally misguided, ending in the wrong neck being stretched. It was community that kept people alive; allowed them to prosper. Posses were lawful associations charged with bringing the lawless to justice rather than the mobs the name is associated with. Saloons weren't gun club central as most towns required gun to be checked in when coming in to town.

This is where the films head off into symbolism and myth. In truth, if Tom Chaney did commit murder in town, he would have been arrested or chased down. That, of course, isn't very exciting and does nothing to perpetuate the western myth. It's nice to believe that the virtuous man ( or woman ) is immune to the clarion call of social depravity resting in the eyes of town folk; will stand up to all evil,and in the end carry, however uncomfortably ( thank you, Clint ), the banner of the good. True Grit subverts this. Vengeance is vengeance. There is no speech in the end of noble actions, only the cold turn of self righteousness; I did what I felt was right and no amount of argument will dissuade me of my belief. That her crusade nearly killed her is the price you pay for your vengeance. Perhaps God will sort things out in another life, but not in this one. Justice has no place because justice is a social construct that requires adjudication, the application of rights, burdens of proof, and the application of law. These are the hallmarks of community not individuality. Revenge carries no reveries of right, but the absolute of hate.

Mattie Ross got what she wanted and became what she sought.

Ode to the word processor

Churn as the world might; much of it diffuse and ill conceived, some things come along that are a Godsend. For me, it's the word processor. the nifty program I'm using now. Sure there are bigger things; the wheel, mathematics, movable type. One might also throw in cultural, industrial, and political advancements, but in truth those are slowly turning us into anonymous cogs in a machine we can't control.

But I digress.

The methodologies, if I may use such terms, of the past involved hand writing, block printing, presses, typewriters. All improvements, but all geared best to those who can put words to paper with a minimum of editing or rewriting. For the rest of us; an awful lot of work to get out what we mean to say in the manner we wish to express.

Word processors changed all that. Now you can put every little thought down, to be edited, rewritten, rearranged, purged, reformed, re-imagined without the need for reams of paper, cartridges, ribbons, whiteout, and the like. No more settling for OK, or doable because the prospect of rewriting drowns you in barrels of self loathing and pity. No more retyping an entire page due to a spelling or grammatical mistake. Instead corrections are made quickly and easily. Spelling and grammar can be checked by the program. Words, sentences, paragraphs; entire portions of texts moved or reconfigured by a keystroke.

For someone like me; sheer delight. As much as I like to pontificate; writing was a drudgery akin to counting peas on a plate. I found no joy in going back over texts to check for typos, grammatical errors, or misspellings because I knew I would find them and then be tasked, when I could be doing something else; anything else, to making things right. I don't like my work to appear malformed or lacking in a certain level of commitment, so, inevitably, my fastidiousness would be my undoing and I would be compelled to redo it.

The other problem I encountered was the willingness to accept mediocrity rather than execute another rewrite. It's good enough; it'll pass. Yeah, I'd really like to change this up, but it's due tomorrow, and I've spent enough time dealing with the production of the paper, and that's what we're talking about here, and I don't want to go through that again. Consequently, what could have been better, or maybe, even sublime was lost to my unwillingness to go the extra mile. Now I can carry on and on with no sense of proportion or decorum. Life's little pleasures indeed.

Naturally, there a few caveats; a few downsides. Hard drive might crash. Website might cease to exist. Clouds do blow away. Some programs are far more cumbersome than they need to be, and have so many features that to actually learn to use them would eat into valuable writing time. But all things being equal, for this writer, a wonderful thing.

To be a commodity

In this country we talk a good game about our individualism; about how we stand apart from the rest of the patsies walking this cruel world. You can see it in the resolute faces standing up to all the forces that would consume them. Shouting. Complaining. Venting their spleens as all good Americans have done in our two plus centuries of existence.

But it is ephemeral.

Unlike the pioneers who came before us, there are no more frontiers to run off to when civilization cuts too close to the bone. Our option, in this the twenty-first century, is go off grid, as the euphemism goes. Growing our own crops, building our own mud huts, and being eaten by bears. It's a nice idea, much like our rugged individualism. It's not reality, but who cares. We can foster any delusion we choose to. We're Americans, dammit!! We've got our first amendment rights. We're packing heat; so all you pointy headed bureaucrats watch out or we'll..............., well I don't know if we've quite got that figured out, but we're armed to the teeth. We'll throw down the government, retake the country, and remake it in whatever Hollywood vision suits us. I don't think we'd actually want to go back to the halcyon days of yore, after all people died young, worked six, seven days a week, didn't have refrigerators or McDonald's, and actually feared being eaten by bears. Business was ruthless, and labor ( that would have been most of us ) took what they could get, because the option was starvation. Think I'm kidding? Look it up.

Sure it all looks good through the gauzy haze of make believe, but it's not realistic, any more than giving the great plains back to the Lakota is, although the Lakota would probably be quite pleased.

No, our great conundrum, my little droogies, is that we are or have become a commodity, and that's what bites so hard. Historically, there have been the rulers and the rest of us. Those of us bathed in the glow of middle class suburbia would have a hard time reconciling ourselves to the position of landless labor, serf, or slave. Most of us would delusionally see ourselves as Caesars, kings, and marauders such as the great Genghis. But that's unlikely. More likely we'd be cannon fodder, servants; of the house or of the land, maybe craftsmen if we belonged to a guild, or merchants, which might or might not be a good thing depending on the age. Maybe you'd could be in the usury business, but those folks were universally hated, much as they are these days.

So where does that leave us?

At work you are a resource to be managed, utilized, outsourced, reorganized, or downsized. It isn't personal; it's business. It's important to be clear eyed about these things less ye be fed to the bears and left for dead. This is the land of opportunity just so you know. Any number of sages will assuage you of your fears and send you down the road of enlightenment once you buy their latest book, or CD, or pay your subscription to their website. These are the same thoughtful souls who promised you could make millions flipping houses with no money down. That circumstances, social position, and luck might play a part in success is of no matter.

When you're sick, you're a customer; a value based on what your insurance, if you have it, your savings, or that charity care will provide. Think insurance companies dwell on poor Jimmy's plight or intrinsic value to society when deciding whether to pay for that coronary bypass? Doubtful. It's an expense to be balanced against revenues, and as we all know no business stays in business when expenses exceed revenues. So if instead of a new heart you get a shot of morphine and "you've lived a good life ". Don't take it personally; it's business. It's your turn to go.

Makes you want to go out and buy something doesn't it? Good. How the hell else are we going to dig ourselves out of this mess. Consumption, conspicuous or otherwise, is what we do. It's what our economy is geared towards. perhaps a few boobs go on about a better world, or making the most of the time we have, but, come on; that ain't gonna happen. There's no money in it. We're on this earth to buy stuff whether we need it or not.

Feel better? Some will, and some won't. Some will accept their fate and be laconically washed out with the tide. Others will bray at the horror; the horror, stomp their feet, scream and yell, make threats, and then vote in some moron who tells them what they want to hear. That the moron won't deliver is politics as usual. After much exhaustion he too, will be pummeled and washed out with the tide. It's all too beautiful.

Don't take it personally; it's just business.

Systemic overload

Understand systems?

If not, you're doomed. Everything we do in this world, unless your a caveman, or more prosaically, a third world man; and even then in this day and age, is systemically controlled. Our government. Our businesses. Our politics. All. Everything in human history related to our social organization, which is a fancy way to say our lives, are systemic. From loose tribal associations to nation states; from bartering to multinational corporations; from feuds to world war and nuclear annihilation. Everything is a big interconnected system.

Some of us have accepted this as the way it is; for better or worse. Some of us, remarkably, seem to be surprised that they have very little say over the events of their lives.

Surprised that the government would focus on big financial institutions over the average smuck lost in the dross of our ever depressing recession? Why? We are interchangeable parts, easily replaced. We are all, to one extent or another, waist deep in the whirl of systemic developments beyond our puny control. We are not important players whose function is necessary in order to continue our march along civility's trail. It is the price of our inextricable march towards being the Gods we so believe we are. That our machines and systems will swallow us is to be expected. That we are doomed is our destiny.

The farce, of course, is the umbrage we see on all the blue, bug-eyed faces shocked, SHOCKED, that they do not have any real control over their lives, and all those papers they signed without reading do, in fact, bear indelibly upon their now miserable lives. Beyond retreating to the caves of our forefathers, there are only two things we can do: accept our doom in all it's glory, or gather and use the impact of our mass ( God bless physics ) to exert some means of influence on the systems that be.

Nominally, the government is the agent of the people. Naturally, that means that some care has to be exercised in the individuals sent to participate in it's administration. Any entity having business with the government will apply whatever pressure it can to sway those in government to it's line of thinking. The bigger you are the more your words have purchase. Some see this as corrupting; thus the moral outrage at the shills of DC trampling the unwashed masses. BUT, those representing us are sent there by us, and as such, speak for us. This is basic civics. It's also a lot of hard work in addition to everything else that occupies our time. This is why when the perception is that the money is coming in, we trollop along in gleeful ignorance. That we're not actually in the money, that it's all inflation and debt, is someone else's problem so long as we feel no impact on our daily lives. Now that that little bubble has been deflated and the hardscape has left us bruised and bloodied, we want answers, answers.

We just don't like the answers we're being given.

Sorry, but there is a reason for education. For all the talk of elites callously shivving the masses, and the wisdom of the common man made plain by the media deceivers enraptured by the sound of their own voices, the angst emanating is that of ignorance butting up against the walls of reality. Maybe we all should have been paying attention to the way the world works; to the interconnectedness of government, business, and finance. To the intricacies incarnate in such affairs we should be aware, but for so many of us school is a social function, and as knowledge leeches out of us over the years our ignorance leaves us supine in the face of those who are. The sputtering of impotent rage notwithstanding, what are we to do?

We can elect morons promising to dismantle the world as we know it, but they won't because the institutions are too strong for that, besides do any of the morons advocating such things have any idea what that would entail? I doubt it. Mostly it more sound and fury signifying nothing that substantive. The answers are there; there simply isn't the will to do it. It's not glamorous, nor will it advance the putative machinations of our national parties as they continue to out asinine each other. Morons all. As Nero fiddles goes the saying.

Which leads us back to systems, all of which have a strong instinct to self preservation. So while we strut and fret upon the stage of outrage and indignation, the systems, and those who care for them; you know the ones who were actually studying and paying attention, will change as they need to in order to survive and perpetuate.

We're mostly just along for the ride.

The grimness of our resolve

I added a forgotten point in this revision.
Now that my hiatus is over; having just returned from a refreshing immersion into primal scream therapy, my imprimatur to wax poetic on the vexing problems of the day is once more at the fore. Rejoice dear readers, your moonless nights and cascading darkness now welcomes the breaking dawn.

Ah, such narcissistic virtue! Anyway,

It is apparent that though winter is traditionally our period of discontent, I find our great nation in the throws of its summer of discomfited discomfort. Poor economic news, wearying bifurcated trudging in our many overseas adventures that seem never to end, political gamesmanship to the detriment of the country's well being all in the name of which dysfunctional party can further lead us into gridlock and decay; not to mention the BP debacle, all in the midst of blue skies, warm weather, BBQ's, and interminable family vacations gone bad.

God bless America. Hell, we could be Greeks, for christsakes.

The application of common sense is sorely needed. That, and a bit of historical perspective.

But that requires though and rumination; qualities not presumed to have any real benefit in this age of screamers and provocateurs. There's no money in it. Better to hyperventilate, cry, agonize, sweat profusely, blame bogeymen and foreigners rather than deal with the problems of the day with any kind of reasonableness.

So here's a few salient provocations from Mr. primitive:

Don't like abortion? Don't have one. Live as an example, not as a mouthpiece. Talk is cheap.
Worried the government is going to take your guns? Please. Have you been paying attention. Gun rights are not diminishing in this country. To the contrary, they're expanding. The perversity, of course, is the idea that more guns provide more personal protection, but statistically, nearly all gun violence is perpetrated by someone you know, not by strangers. And many times your own gun will be used against you. So, buy as many as you like.
Don't like what's happening to the country? Then get involved. Just recognize that you're not the only voice and that it's a messy affair that requires due diligence and compromise. Really.
Don't like foreigners taking our jobs? Then feel free to work in the fields, clean other peoples houses, dig ditches; you know, all that manual labor stuff you and your children have absolutely no interest in.
Don't like the government? Too bad. Without it there's be chaos and lawlessness. Whether you understand the government in all it's bureaucratic glory, whether you recognize all the systems we, we being the humans who've populated and created or allowed to be created these systems, have to work with and are controlled by, the ugly truth is we're stuck with what we have. Make it work. Make it better.
Fiscal policy? It's simple; save when you can. That means when the times are good save for those times, like now, when they're not. Tax appropriately. pay for what you need and want and don't just think of yourself. There's nothing more dishonest than saying the government should pay you but not the other guy because then it'd be too expensive; you deserve it; he doesn't. That doesn't work. It's amazing how many people don't understand how our entitlement programs are funded.
Pay for education. Stupid and ignorant does not a country make. Nor does it bode well for the future. Knowing how the systems that affect us work is far more beneficial that ranting and raving that life's too complicated. it is. Get used to it.

Think you can turn back the clock? Good luck.

Be as mad as you want because you weren't paying attention before and now you're paying the price for your ignorance and fear. Trying to go back never works.

You'll see.

The perverse nature of personal organization.

I recently accepted that the notions, or perceptions, I have, as related to my personal organization, are perversely; as I once considered them, not necessarily in my best interest. This is an amalgam of my personality traits, emotionally speaking, that override my rational or intellectual desires. More plainly stated, all my efforts to minimize the time I spend on drudgery; those tasks necessary to produce the environment I prefer ( I'm a known slave to a place for all things, and all things in their place ), done to maximize the time I have for the things that bring me pleasure, inevitably produce the time I desire which I then spend on all the things everyone( we'll leave those names out for now ) else needs from me.

I noticed this after a recent trip. In the half hour after I returned home, I had reduced all the detritus generated on such journeys to their proper place; trash, hamper, closet, etc. I'm like that. Have been for the majority of my life. I like, very much so, a clean orderly home. I do not like to clean. This has been the source of much misunderstanding for those around me. On my own, and this is the BIG key to this whole sordid exercise, I arrange my things in such a manner as to make cleaning up as quick and painless as I can. This allows me the most bang for my buck as to my free, non cleaning time. The problem arises when I live with others, and as someone who likes being a family guy, sociable, that means most of the time. Others are not as cognizant of this tension as I am. They are, however, acutely aware of my dislike for disorder, and I believe, more than willing to use this against me for the purposes of getting out of doing their part to maintain the social order.

This, of course, is my fault. While one the one hand, striving to keep the place orderly and thus easy to clean, on the other, I don't weather those who are less inclined to putting their stuff away in a timely manner well. Consequently there is a frisson that continually animates my relationship with others. It has also; and this is the perverse part, rendered my free time, or what would have been my free time, time spent taking care of those things that I should make the others take care of themselves. I hope that makes sense.

The irony is that it took me how many thousands of years to accept this. Fool, heal thyself.

The question then becomes whether my proclivities are doable in an environment filled with others who may not share my sensibilities on this subject. If I strive to fulfill my destiny will I then end up nothing more than a bitter old troll no one wants to visit. That's probably a tad dramatic, as I am generally; at least in this my old age, more sanguine about the nature of my fellow humans and their disregard, whether willful or not. Still, I do dream of my utopia, free of the maelstrom of pilers, droppers, agitators, malcontents, slobs, the mal-formed, and those predisposed to the messy disorganized life. A land content with order and the freedom that provides; even if I'm the only one who appreciates it.

I'm not sure what the future holds, but I can dream. Can't I?

And we're doing this because...........

The sun is out, shining down upon the multitudes. White, billowy clouds drift across the horizon, having nothing better to do. The sea laps up against the shore calling with it's cool enticing refreshment.

And you're stuck inside doing what? Paperwork? The same monotonous tasks you perfunctorily perform day in/day out for the privilege of collecting a few bucks to do what? Go home, go to bed, and do it all over again. Perhaps you're more than some cog in the machine: you're important, driven; a man for his times. A man destined for a short blurb in some magazine ( assuming such things still exist in the future ) on his contribution to the archives of human history, a brief summation of many years of toil and whatever else you accomplished before dying. And the rest of us?

You've got to wonder.

Let's step back for a minute. All of us have a finite period of time on this, our mortal coil. Some die young; some live to old age, but all of us perish one day. And the days in between? What of them? They are the sum of our existence, of our experiences, of our time here. Yet how many of us spend those days doing what we like? How many of us delight in a sunny day, the first snow falling softly, the grays of autumn, and the colors of spring? Probably most of us, yet how many of us take the time to do nothing more than revel in it; glorying in being a part of the universe's majesty? Better to spend our time pushing paper, layering the bureaucracy of perpetual motion that seems endemic to business as usual. Assembling obsolescence; to see your labour as no more that throwaways to be ground up in the church of consumerism. To collect and consume, to gather and hoard so that one day our life's joy is disgorged as a collection of things to be disposed of by our children, or worse, by disinterested unknown faces. Are we all manifestations of Charles Foster Kane with our life's possessions thrown into the furnace, afterthoughts of nothing more than objects acquired and now forgotten.

This is not to suggest that everyone is toiling away is obscurity, doomed to a meaningless life. Many people enjoy what they do, and feel their life important and productive. Many, however, do not. Many butt heads with the commercial nature of life in a capitalistic society. Not everyone pines for the all mighty buck. Not everyone finds virtue in having a bigger house, car, fortune, personality, or in the status symbol of the month. Our current economic woes stem from over consumption and massive debt needed to support that consumption. And for what? The fear of losing it all, or being able to make basic payments, or being able to maintain a certain lifestyle, or the illusion of that lifestyle. We've moved from creating things of substance to things of illusion to be discarded when the next big thing comes along. We're judged on what we have, rather than who we are. We don't like to acknowledge that, but it much more prevalent than we'd like to admit.

The punchline, naturally, is; it is what it is. We are the products of our time, as well as the progressions of industrial and personal consumption. The quest for a better life inculcates itself into our subconscious as the norm as we plod through life as we consume as we burn precious after precious minute looking forward to a golden existence of leisure and harmony apart from those obnoxious types who muck up the view. That we work harder, longer for that leisure and harmony into the gray days is an inconvenient truth. Mutterings that our golden retirement will be nothing more than flipping burgers, greeting the fine folks at Wal-Mart waif sweetly on the air. Noting darkly, the dank of hubristic investment bankers wasting our hard earned dollars in complicated scams meant only to enrich the few, the notion of a golden retirement is nothing more than window dressing meant to hide the machine.

There is no idyllic. There's only the days we have. Maybe our caveman ancestors didn't have the greatest of health care option, and no one id thrilled with the idea of being eaten by a bear, but life at it's own natural rhythms has it's charms.

The bane of our existence.....

Let us return, gentle reader, to the stone age, to our caveman ancestors squat upon the savanna, kicking back after a hard day of hunting and gathering; collecting their thoughts on the meaning of life, and the next big thing.
One would think, believe, that survival; eking out a life of subsistence, would naturally be at the forefront of any particular discussion between individuals of their day. Danger, disease, exposure all lurk out in the great expanse of the land between the sky and the sea.

Yet, were a modern man to be set amongst the greatest of grandfathers, could he comprehend the distance humanity has travelled in so short a time. I'm speaking geologically, astronomically, archaeologically; not in the vain spacial sense that we existing humans tend to think of as time passing. 30,000 years out of millions is small potatoes. Still, a human is a human is a human, is he not? Would not a modern man be able to commiserate with gramps on the sometimes woeful state of being a dude?

In light of these mostly cogent thoughts, the following questions/concerns come to the fore:

Like, is it possible to be a total dude without showering regularly? Does covering ones self in mud mitigate other perceived short comings such as male patterned baldness, which I'm certain cave dudes had to contend with, or a lack of teeth? This also speaks to the importance of oral hygiene, halitosis, and the need for breath sprays or strips. It is through such insights that we begin to discern the truly wrenching live our caveman ancestors had to endure. Without the necessary creams and lotions, not to mention multi-blade shavers and aftershave balms, how is the average cave dude supposed to compete with the elites of his day, be they physical or intellectual, in order to properly slay the cave babes? There is more to life than scrapping by on berries and the occasional rabbit, no, man must also propagate the species, improve the bloodline, and get jiggy with it! There is no greater challenge be ye an important historical figure, or merely an anonymous troglodyte.

Then there's the question of ability, or lack thereof in the man department. Thanks to incessant advertising, we moderns are fully aware of the need to talk to our medical professionals about the dangers of impotence, or as it's now called; erectile dysfunction. Imagine two total dudes out and about after a hard day tracking an antelope, or gazelle, boar, maybe even the notorious jackalope, then heading back to their man caves ( man, how time have changed, eh boys) wondering how they're going to explain not only their lack of success this day, or that Bob got eaten by a bear, but what about the pressure to perform when it's a struggle to pitch the tent. Life's tough enough when you're living in a cave, much less alone. Yeah, maybe there's no need to sweep now, or move those rocks like you promised; you even have time to finish that cave painting you've been talking about for years, but the motivation is lost. Pity the lonely cave dude.
So the next time you're desperately dousing yourself with Axe body spray, or which ever one causes the ladies to jump all over you ( this is assuming that's a good thing and that they are not, in fact, attacking you for that odious scent you insist on fumigating yourself with ) in order to avoid another lonely night, thank god for the chemical companies for allowing you to foolishly believe you're any better off than that lonely cave dude.