The IRA

Gena was a real woman. She had a flair for fashion, because her husband worked for a notable clothing store chain. She was able to buy clothes at a substantial discount. Not far in the distant past in America, fashion was in. The venue of pop music was the stage upon which fashion statements were broadcast. Fashion was and has been a major tenant of the music business, because without an appealing image people have difficulty relating to you. They need a tangible image to connect them with your music. This is why advertising has always been important in America. Cheers to the forthcoming movie “Ad Men” for recreating some of that nostalgic Americana. A “logo” is important for selling a product, because it becomes part of the product. Music the same way cannot exist alone. It needs things to augment its message. Whether it is an “Achey Breaky Heart,” “Friends in Low Places,” or a “Billie Jean,” music needs a stage upon which to present its drama. This drama is a necessary part of music’s existence. The shallow sexual imagery of today’s pop music is nothing but an aural suggestion for partying. Is this an accurate representation of our youth culture, or is it like television has done in the past influencing our youth? No matter what anyone says television like no other public medium has influenced our children. It has set trends. It has made stars. It has provided inspiration and fellowship. Today it is breeding Generation Jihad. If an ad agency wasted a minute summing up the client of Al Qaeda, it would be represented by towel-headed, AKG toting, lunatic fanatics. American culture and music is at a loss understanding, integrating, or representing these Extreme Islam ideals. It is more difficult than Viet Nam, because of the higher likelihood of getting killed. For this reason popular music is being stymied, because even if it wanted to, it would be difficult to characterize Jihad. Until an artistic medium confronts this bizarre movement, we will continue to be its prey. Although Hip Hop originally dealt with urban violence, it pales in comparison to the extremist movement of the Iraq. Even the sonic angst of Speed Metal can not compete. For popular music to continue it has to get its head out of the native American sand and approach issues that face everyday Americans globally. In this way only shallow, self-serving, glam escapism will have relevance. How can citizens continue to watch children produce soft core pornography in a vacuum? Folk music was bred in the l960’s when sociopolitical movements were powerful and volatile. If anyone took the time to look around, these times are becoming every bit as volatile. The firm groundwork that was laid in the Clinton administration has been systematically dismantled by a nihilist presence that is operating on two levels. One is Extreme Islam, because it is attempting to overthrow U.S. world domination by rejecting our value system using terrorist acts. Consequently this dramatically has effected our entire country’s belief system. What used to be solid, tangible, philosophies are being torn apart by self doubt. If Time magazine ventures far enough to publish an article questioning the existence of God, then there is a nihilist philosophy at work. When a major corporation mounts an advertising campaign to contradict global warming, then there is a nihilist philosophy at work. If media continues to capitalize on Extremism, then we as a country will move further away from our own ideals which constantly need to be reinforced by being seen and heard. The culprits of Extremism are all ready embedded in corporate America and our government, and The War on Terror has become a smoke screen to divert our attention. Why else would corporations continue trying to buy the country? Citizens must organize and protest publicly what we demand in our country from our government, and elected officials must begin legislating policies to ensure these demands are met. Its seems a coup is imminent. Americans like the Irish just need to be briefed on who the enemy really is.

Confused Extremism

As you grow older the availability of women becomes more complex. In many other countries that are more liberal than the foundling United States, tribal customs allow more diverse relationships. The puritan rules of our conservative society pale in comparison. Grandparent-aged men and women are allowed to court and wed teenagers. The prospect of an older man marrying a younger woman in the United States today still remains a high profile media extravaganza. Why is it America has cast its roots in such limiting philosophies, and the models of Victorian England still stand? Society replete with its Cotillion and emerging debutants casts its looming shadow over the freedoms of our people. European traditions of court mandate parents choose their children’s spouses based on the prospect of economic wealth. The rewarding element of experience in romance is that over the years you have had the opportunity to enjoy many types of relationships. The key is time. When one looks back and remembers love, each incident occurred in a different time period and at a different age. Who is to say which type of relationship is best? Can the feelings in an adolescent relationship sustain into adulthood? Is there a specific age when one becomes an adult, so that frivolous mannerisms in adolescence become extinct? Can an adult relationship be based upon the animal chemistry of young love? When becoming an adult does the mind take over and decide cognitively when to allow the physical body to be in love? Many seem to think a soul mate, one with a similar emotional profile, is the basis of love. Because someone feels what you do doesn’t necessarily mean you have to love them. As a man becomes older all of these factors are at play in acquiring a mate. An older man should be more adept adjusting to different women, because he has had experience with a variety of age groups over the years. Is the thought of resuscitation of adolescent “puppy love” a forbidden fruit? Is this the allure of youthfulness? Depending upon your personal experiences one could have had pleasing and satisfying relationships or dysfunctional ones. Certainly the thought of budding young nubile women suggests sexual bliss, but is this really love? As in Christina Aguilera’s case how can a woman of so few years suggest she knows anything about the art of love? Her proclamation a few years ago accompanied by a sordid magazine pictorial did nothing but harm her career, because a proclamation of infidelity ultimately is perceived as a character flaw. Who cares if you are loose? Many young female singers have tried this ploy to promote their careers, and unfortunately this has become most important in pop music. Mariah Carey started as a shy girl from a burrow in New York barely showing any skin in her early videos. After her divorce from Tommy Lipuma she became liberated, had breast implants, and let it all hang out. Tony Braxton chose a particular dress to wear on the Grammy’s that shocked the nation. She looked beautiful and sexy, but those characteristics can not substitute for professional song-writing, a crack sound engineer, talented musicians, and a savvy producer. Although the recent trend of female sexual abstinence until marriage is a little over the top, conservation of one’s sexuality for personal enjoyment is wise. Why would any family dress their child up in a cowboy outfit with make up and send them into the pageant arena? With stiff penalties for pedafiles and much of that being fueled by the internet, why would a family want to contribute to the delinquency of depraved men? Recently when a guest aboard a cruise ship upon which I was working began taking pictures of a shop keeper’s buxom cleavage, she was surprised. The only reason you wear such clothing is so people will notice you. If you have stellar physical attributes people can’t help but notice. If you don’t want people to look, than don’t dress that way. The courtship ritual in America has become tainted with immaturity. Television’s bad examples are not helping our youth’s morality. The steady decline of our public education system is a contributing factor. With either a single parent or two parents working, our youth have been abandoned to the internet as a guide in growing up. This is not an acceptable method of rearing children, because analysts all ready have said if new jobs did appear, there would be no work force available to take the jobs. Dick and Jane are too busy text messaging, playing video games, and watching television shows which offers a false hope of becoming America’s next pop star. It seems the Republican party is incapable of beginning to empower a new generation of Americans. Old money is proving to be a stumbling block for the survival of our country. As our economy has turned away from a stable and substantial manufacturing base and toward moving money around in the market, who is going to carry the torch for the traditional infrastructure of the United States? All our youth have is predictions of when Social Security will be bankrupt. Daily television news can only report on which next mega merger will blow a stock market bubble which will surely pop in a few weeks. Have we become a country of only smoke and mirrors? Is this a responsible representation of the world’s greatest superpower? The guilds of the Middle Ages once were influential to the infrastructure of America. Why have these and other viable traditions been abandoned? Is it that we are too lazy to value our own products manufactured with integrity, pride, and the Protestant work ethic? Is it that cheap Chinese imports replaced our need to produce goods? We are experiencing the downside of that onslaught of unsupervised importation with tainted dog food, lead-ridden paint, and diseased produce. “Can you ask for anything more,” as George Gershwin’s song says? I think we can and we should, and other periods of prosperity can serve a guide to a more fruitful and enlightened society. I am having a hard time justifying the continued pursuit of music, because the Extreme Islam terrorist faction is spreading vitriol laden with guilt. Anytime someone in the Iraq tells a joke, listens to music, or dances they are tortured or shot. We can not continue to allow Extreme Islam rituals to influence our culture. Gabriel blew the trumpet in exaltation of God’s presence. Time and time again in the Bible, not the Coran, Jesus said dance for joy. The arts are meant to lead us away from ignorance, violence, and immorality. There is no reason our society should feel guilt for pursuing enlightened subjects of the humanities and sciences. They represent God and the Renaissance and were provided for us as such. A focus upon such things will strengthen the idea of God, because no scientist could be so vain to proclaim these miraculous disciplines were created by man. They were created for man by our God. Any religion that erroneously prophecies suicide as a vehicle for sexual bliss with virgins is depraved, and its followers should be treated as criminals. Historically our world has suffered from these atrocities before. The fall of the Holy Roman Empire and the Great Schism are examples. How is it that religion, that which through Christianity offers brotherly love, mistakenly has been cast as corrupt? Maybe a religious pilgrimage is imminent in the United States, citizens marching in search of a more appropriate representation of our Deity. It is time God made a second coming and put man in his place.

Gena

I first met Gena when auditioning for a society band in Columbus, Ohio while working on my doctorate. I received a telephone call from a woman musician who was seeking a good keyboard player for a band. Somehow she had gotten my name through the grapevine from a few other Ohio State musicians. The voice of a woman seeking a musician has always been far more powerful in persuading me to want to be a part of the band. In some situations it has been the only reason I have become involved in a musical project. Music is romance, and without the male/female relationship represented, the band experience is shallow. The prospect of getting laid is always an added incentive. I knew from the beginning something was going to transpire. The chemistry was right, and I knew it. Because she was married she did not readily admit there was going to be an affair. It took a little persuasion, but with patience, love, and true fondness a relationship was founded that lasted over a year. Not surprisingly the qualities that provide a good foundation for a romance were present. There were common interests among one which was the love of music. This we shared, and its common bond fueled the romance like good music should. Gena was a better reader of written piano music than I was. She was classically trained both in voice and piano and began at an early age. She had a masters degree in vocal pedagogy, and consequently was articulate in defining the physical processes necessary to produce a good singing voice. She knew about the various muscular groups, breath support, and vowel and consonant pronunciation. It was a turn on to hear her talk about this musical process and even more of a turn on that she knew how the vocal cords and oral cavity worked. Later it turned out she had a fetish for use of the oral cavity in a variety of situations. Fellatio was our first foray into intimacy, and it was instigated by her. One morning when she dropped by at nine a.m. with good coffee, orange juice, and croissants my penis ended up being her desert. Suddenly and without warning simply she pulled down my white pee-stained sweat pants and began sucking on my penis. Who could complain? She seemed to enjoy having my manhood in her mouth, and although she wouldn’t swallow my ejaculate, she did allow me to expel it in her mouth. Comically and with some disapproval, she then would stagger to the bathroom where she would empty her mouth of my morning protein shake. I thought this was odd seeing as most women say semen has little or no taste. Conversely many porno movies have been made about traveling semen. Allegedly in urban mythology rocker Elvis Costello and his extremely sexual jazz singer/pianist wife have engaged in the somewhat depraved act of “feltching.” When Gena and I were involved I had no idea what this was, because to me sex had always been the expression of love. It was only later with Melanie I learned “love” is an unnecessary burden. Only then such things come to mind. In a “puppy love” relationship feelings of jealousy and insecurity far outweigh the interesting prospect of sexual diversity. If the internet were to become an example of teenage sexuality it would seem any tenant of love was absent. I suppose that defeats the purpose of a pornographic site, viewing a couple who really are in love and expressing such through the act of sexual intercourse. In traditional video-based pornography you used to be able to find a gamut of sexual experiences. I have always felt the best videos were where there was chemistry between the man and the woman. These exhibited passion or animal desire, and that makes for good sex. It has only been recently that on a DVD I purchased in Nassau I discovered a pornographic movie with this element. The few videos I have bought in the last decade have been lacking in this emotion. It is better to watch this than a young man with a web-cam sexually exploiting underage teens for money. At least with a commercially produced video there is a mechanism in place other than just juvenile, adolescent, sexual angst. There is also a maturity and respect for the business aspect of pornography. Much like the personal computer has diluted the process of making music, it has also diluted the art of making love. Watching the women alone or with each other is pleasing, but viewing a self-absorbed web master video-taping himself fucking women while he coos mindless childish phrases is sickening. “Baby is doing good.” “Very nice.” I would almost rather hear something manly and aggressive. If you are performing for the public it is in your best interest to keep your personal intimate moments stealth. A paid prostitute would not show feelings toward her john. Teenage girls having sex with a videographer also should not. They are being exploited, and this can only result in the same kinds of sexual dysfunction that occur in abusive familial relationships. Likewise the perverse acts of mature adults operating outside the theatre of traditional “puppy love” should be reserved until later years. A young couple destined to marry couldn’t be thinking about passing semen from mouth to mouth. I happily partook of Gena’s offerings, and over time they developed into a full bred sexual relationship. Along with her musical talent Gena had an acute awareness of her own sexuality. She knew about her clitoris. When she was becoming sexually aroused she would inadvertently touch her clitoris like a black man fondling his junk. It was queer, but not in a homosexual aspect. It was strange to see a grown woman touching herself like a tough man would. Maybe that is what made her sexually attractive. She had a confidence with her sexuality, and her intent on exploring it. This later I found out came from her first marriage that never was consummated. Gena was hell bent on having those experiences she had missed early as a bride. She was not the first woman musician I have met that missed that boat so to speak. I have another one living next door. Our relationship came to a close after I had eye surgery. I became a “gimp” of sorts, and that was no longer attractive to her. I also made the fatal mistake of telling her I loved her on New Year’s Eve after a gig. All along I had been that one that kept my hand outstretched with no prospect of destroying a marriage. We had kept it objective, and I am the one that yielded the shotgun. In a moment of weakness I passed the torch to her, and she did the right thing. Our last time of making love was unsatisfactorily after our New Year’s Eve gig. We had traveled out of town, and the group had provided hotel rooms for us. Unfortunately the gig turned into a rock concert, and Gena did not get to sing much. She became despondent and tired and was ready to drive home. It was New Year’s Eve, and we had a room alone. What transpired was the prequel to Melanie’s dead fish lesson, except in this scenario the dead fish was not turned on but mostly asleep. I had to roll her on her stomach and physically spread her legs to get my penis in her vagina. I am not sure if she knew what had happened or not. Later she only remarked that it was wet down there. This was not a great send off to a fulfilling year long romance, and as a result I had a small amount of recurrent depression. Goodbyes are important, and everyone should try to remember good experiences, especially those involving love and intimacy. They could be the last ones you ever have. Gena was the last best kisser I have ever had, because we could “suck face” for minutes at a time both standing and lying down. Melanie was a better lover, but music was the guiding force in this particular romance.

Sonic Youth

Nobody has really stopped to think about the impact the MP3 has had on the music business. While college students may have embraced the compressed file format with open arms allowing them to up and download free audio files, the effect it has had on the modern music industry is robust. What possible negative consequence could the MP3 imposed on the recording industry? Less than a decade ago recording studios were responsible for quality sound. Everyone knew without a great sound no one was going to want to listen to your music much less buy it. Music after all is sound. There are aesthetics that use cacophonous sound in achieving a desired result. The Avant-Garde in the genre of jazz music pushed the envelope of sound to this extreme. To this day many people don’t get it. They don’t understand why Ornette Coleman, Eric Dolphy, and Cecil Taylor remain viable artists and trendsetters in the field of jazz music. The Avant-Garde abstracts traditional processes in music without abandoning their structure. It also uses the sheer power of sound as a device itself. While the organization of the music may seem obscured to some listeners, if you allow your senses to be effected this is no longer a requirement. Many jazz artists have said you don’t have to understand complex harmony to be able to enjoy their music. You just need to be open to being effected by the music emotionally. If you don’t allow yourself to be moved by the music, than it loses it purpose. This element is what is absent from today’s pop music. Either by choice or consequences this element has been removed from the music like an empty shelf in a stocked cupboard. Why would anyone want to remove the key element that defines art? Is it that we don’t think pop music should contain tenants of art? Is it because the industry doesn’t want the responsibility of having to deal with music at the artistic level? Is it that the music industry has devolved to a level rendering them incapable of being artistic? Artistic music doesn’t necessarily have to be non-commercial. Andy Warhol defined pop art in modern America. He showed art can be appealing and thoughtful without being overbearing and high brow. Many consider the music of J.S. Bach such, because it uses the subject of the worshipping of God as its main theme. Bach was a church organist, and during his era church was a major component of society. Some feel his music is not approachable, because the loftiness of God is intimidating. Certainly to music theorists species counterpoint has always carried this stigma. It is a regimen of intense proportions and rules. Pop simply may be the diluting of such content to reach the common person. In doing so if the idea of feeling or effecting the listener in some way has been lost, what viability does the music retain? Does it not must become a shallow device for making money? I don’t think most musicians have ever succumbed to such a low level where they were not concerned about presenting ideas through music. The venue of music has always been that, a platform upon which you can express ideas. The notion that music somehow has been reduced to a level of something else is unacceptable. Who did this? There can be no logical explanation of this phenomenon, much like there is no logical explanation for the acts of Extreme Islam. It is undefined. It only can be a product of ignorance, selfishness, and self promotion. A recent personal music experience can serve as an example of this shallow behavior. Upon embarking a particular vessel for work, the environment eerily was reminiscent of the movie “Night of the Living Dead.” Instead of encountering live, breathing, feeling human beings, I encountered an army of clones, of seeming brain-washed droids demanding your reciprocation of their army-like behavioral mannerisms. Little thoughtful reflection, thinking, or feeling was to be found with interest in finding new experiences. Instead there was callus, rude, and aggressive behavior instigated by the rote indoctrination of principles of which to be mindlessly followed. The clincher was this army was defensive, mounting an offense to defeat any aberration from their norm. There was a threshold of existence that difficultly would be broken, subconsciously representing a blind allegiance to a sectarian-like interest found in Extreme Islam. Survival reliant upon religious-like fanaticism has spread to many cultures, effecting the way people live and behave. If the world continues to fail in providing proper models of civilized behavior, surely we will succumb to the evil forces of Jihad. Increasingly the mis-education and therefore controlling of our youth is serving a nihilist philosophy, being propagated by people unknowing of their own flaws. What mass tool could be spreading this ideology? One only has to look at the TV screen to find an answer. The “reality” TV program is extreme in that it negates contemplative thought and wisdom for the immediate effect of shock. After years of influence upon the American public, children are beginning to beleive this behavior is appropriate for everyday life. This would explain the primitive mindless pursuit of immediate gratification, because we are not investing in anything to promote their welfare in the future. Unlike the “baby boomer” generation which was transfixed with accumulating money, “generation jihad” is only concerned with today because ultimately and extremely there may be no tomorrow. With over fifty percent of Americans believing the second coming of Jesus Christ will occur in their lifetime, there must be sufficient instability in the political world to merit this extreme behavior. We have all ready lost the “War of Terror,” because the roots of our country have been violated. Until a more educated generation dispenses with the childish pursuits of video gaming, cell phoning, and “behaving badly” on television, there will be few viable examples of civil life left to lead society. Are apartheid, civil war, sectarian violence, and mass genocide destined to come to America? The creation of a Department of Homeland Security was one small step in the direction of a police state. If we do not continue to be the country we once were, America is destined to become every other third world country. It’s too bad the guillotine never made it to North America, because the thought of the French Revolution should frighten the wealthy-elite into realizing someone must be responsible for the common man. We are created equal. Music throughout history has provided reason, wisdom, history, and foreshadowing. With this aesthetic and a sonic platform upon which to perform, music can provide solstice from unwanted movements such as Islamic Extremism. The advent of the MP3 effectively rendered impotent the art of music, because its compression scheme dispenses with the very medium necessary to effect its listeners. It’s funny how broadband has robbed music of its power. The bandwidth of music has been reduced with the MP3, in favor of a broadband of communications ability. How can it be that the FCC “broadbanded” the electro-magnetic spectrum to include microwave frequencies for communication, but the bandwidth of music became reduced? The traditional effective means of broadcast of full spectrum music is being abandoned for novelty! What purpose can reducing the sonic impact of music to a communicator-sized MP3 player serve? Why has there been a marked trend toward reducing the size of electronic components when size really does matter? Like the recording industry have manufacturers become too cheap to continue producing quality audio components? How can a deck-of-cards-sized music player come close to replicating the experience of live music, when formerly it took a symphony orchestra, a rock band, and a host of high fidelity audio components? Not to far in the distant past music connousieurs took pride in assembling stereo systems that rivaled NASA control panels. For such a system to provide audio enjoyment, the environment in which you listened must be quiet. That means your home must be resistant to infrasonic pollution. American homeowners must not have the money to purchase the complex systems of noise abatement necessary to shield their living environments from infrasonic noise. One particular manufacturer on the web offers a complex array of sheet steel, cinder blocks, and acoustical treatment. With this in mind it is easier to “retreat” to a contained environment such as an iPod and earbuds. In the early years of television monophonic sound was used exclusively to convey dialog and music. Many people to this day prefer and enjoy monophonic sound, because it is resistant to the phase-shifting caused by low frequency modulation. It seems for a variety of reasons quality music and their counterpart systems of conveyance have been out-sourced for a seemingly more effective means of listening to music. Just as pop music has taken over the existing airwaves, an instinct of survival has necessitated the development of alternative methods of music listening pleasure. In the process many of the core components of the power of music have been lost. Simply put without bandwidth, the ability to recreate these diverse frequencies, and a quiet environment in which to listen, the traditional method of enjoying music has been lost. Our bodies can no longer be “moved” by waves of quality sound, but rather our brains are indoctrinated by sound without a purpose. The consequent result is a populace of music listeners that are denied sensory reactions to the subject matter. We have been taught to “un-feel.” Feeling music is no longer cool, because the onslaught of ensuing feelings modulated by pollution are too complex to fathom. Hollywood celebrities have used the acronym “F-I-N-E” to sum up their now current emotional states. “Freaked out, insecure, neurotic, and emotional.” If these are the choices our current environment have provided us, then it is plausible our youthful generation began searching for and finding their own choices. To allow an underprivileged and needy generation to “school” America in their emotional choices is ludicrous. It defeats the whole purpose of education, the experiencing of the gamut of emotions through music, from which they can draw their own conclusions. In this way the MP3 has become a stumbling block for the musical education of America. As a result everyone in the food chain is suffering, including the record labels, consumers, and artists. The MP3 and the internet are effective tools for exchanging and marketing music, but in the process the very purpose of music is being lost.

The Rolling Stones, Stone Hinge, Kidney Beans, and Rice

Dear Santa,

This year for Christmas I would like for you to bring me FOUR THOUSAND DOLLARS worth of debt for having gone to the Emergency Room for passing a kidney stone. I would like a CT scan, a shot of Dialated, an IV drip, and a clean room for two hours.
As a matter of fact a room at the local Motel 6, a hooker, and a shot of heroin would have only cost $300.00. On second thought bring me that instead.

Love,

Sicko

Today's Top Ten Kudos List

Steve Jobs and Apple Computers for introducing a humanistic and fun product into the saturated but highly diluted cellular phone market.

Greenpeace for carrying the torch for honest environmental political activism.

The television show Maximum Exposure for wisely shifting their focus, presenting a telling expose of political protesting in other countries.

TLC’s effort in taking American Chopper to Europe to meet thousands of adoring fans.

Kurt Cobain for bringing the “Seattle Sound” into the forefront of American popular music.

Conan O’Brien for resurrecting his character the” Pimpbot 5000” on Late Night with Conan O’Brien.

Craig Ferguson for resigning from CBS, joining the BBC and redirecting his show to a crack house in Liverpool.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for donating 2 billion dollars to the National Parks Service in the Department of the Interior for the building of public skateparks all over America.

Phillips for inventing High Definition Direct Internet.

The North Carolina Symphony for a perfect 4th of July Celebration Concert in Fayetteville, North Carolina. (Cheers to composer Terry Mizesko)

Bob and Milo

I have had four cats in my lifetime. Molly was the first, and she was a gift from my then girlfriend Geraldine. Molly was a kitten when I got her, so she liked to sleep in my lap. I liked that, a “lap kitty.” Rodney was my second cat, and he took the place of Molly. Molly got hit by a car and died of cardio-thrombosis. The muscle around her heart hardened after she was hit. One of her claws was also torn out in the process. They set her claw, patched her up a best possible, and I watched her die over the next week or so. She couldn’t breathe, because her heart wasn’t pumping enough blood. That was painful to watch, her in distress sitting on my chair. A blood clot formed and moved through her arteries to her back leg. When I saw it go limp from under her, I knew the time was near. We had her euthanized at our neighborhood veterinarian. He was a nice, good-looking man with a curly black afro. He wore a biker’s jacket, and I think he drove a motorcycle. I cried a lot over Molly’s death. There was another cat living in his office among many they had saved. Rodney used to greet us from the lobby desk when we sent to see Molly. He was black and white and looked like a skunk. He too had been hit by a car as a kitten and his pelvis had been broken. He was slew-footed, so he walked or rather waddled around the room. He was a happy cat, but upon trying to get him home when we agreed to adopt him, out of fright he clawed the be-Jesus out of me. Rodney lived a long time, the latter part of his years as my parents cat, since I left Fayetteville to attend Ohio State. He lived over fifteen years in my parents home and died my parent’s upstairs bedroom of kidney failure. He was weak and couldn’t eat, but he wasn’t in pain. I suggested we let him die naturally, because the process with Molly and two of my dad’s other dogs was difficult. Baron had a tumorous bladder, and Maxine had heart worms. Both had to be put down, and Baron somehow became my responsibility. I took him to an emergency clinic while my parents attended a church dinner. I felt it fitting that my dad take care of Rodney’s death. He buried him out in the backyard. Bob was my third cat, and I acquired her from a set of twin kittens abandoned in a field beside a Suburban Lodge in Columbus, Ohio. I came home one night late after playing a gig. It was raining. As I tried to get into the lodge, I heard this quiet meowing. She was wet and miserable and looked like a drowned rat. The next day I bought food and fed what turned out to be almost identical twins everyday for a month and a half until I found a place to live. I named the twins Milo and Bob. Bob was the girl, and she was the less feral of the two. Milo was a madman and wouldn’t let you touch him. Bob on the other hand I enticed to crawl in my lap. I knew she would be the one I would take. I tried painstakingly for several months to ‘catch’ the two of them. I built traps out of cardboard boxes, string, and duct tape. The blustery March wind all but filibustered that process as my box trap was blown all over the parking lot. I drove up there everyday and fed the two kittens, even while I lived in another part of town. Finally I got smart enough and made a solid trap out of chicken wire. Upon entering it Milo freaked out and began hurtling himself against the sides of the cage. I had to let him go. It was sad, because I wanted to save both of them. I gently placed Bob in the car and covered the trap with a blanket. I drove extremely slowly on the interstate back to my townhouse, so she wouldn’t be upset. She meowed most of the way, but it wasn’t an alarming sound. I think instinctively she knew she was being saved. I carried the trap gingerly into the basement, put a plate of food and a bowl of water on the ground in front of her, turned off the light and left. After several days of boredom she reared her head at the door at the top of the steps. I let her in her own time find her way around and come to trust me. I didn’t force myself on her. She was still feral you see, and had been living in a field since her birth. That field was beautiful. It had a stream at the bottom of a gully and many pretty flowers. I don’t think the kittens were unhappy or lonely, because there was always activity in the parking lots adjacent to the field. Bob was also black and white. She only lived to be two years old, but I knew that would happen. Any kitten you rescue from the wild will never really become your lifelong pet. She was a chapter, a beautiful satisfying story of trust and love, that I saved from the wilderness. We had a bond, and Bob loved me. She often would sleep on my chest purring so loudly my neighbors could hear it. The only harsh moment we had, was when another cat, her first stranger, peeked into the picture window of my townhouse. She let out such an awful howl, I had to throw a shoe at her. She became afraid, but I think she knew I would never hurt her. I moved in with Melanie, and the house we had rented smelled like pets. I knew this would be hard for Bob, but this was my choice. I had a chance at a woman, so Bob would have to become second fiddle. I think she could have dealt with Melanie, but the smell of the other pets and move was too much for her. She disappeared for a few days, and we found her in the basement sitting on the couch with a piece of insulation stuck to her nose. She was almost comatose with fright. I did not realize she had a fever of almost 104. It was a holiday, and my veterinarian was closed. Help could not wait, so I had to take her to a strange place, another veterinarian at Mill Pond. I went in with a a live cat and came out with a dead one. It was one of the hardest things I have ever had to feel, but I made the decision not to delay her euthanasia. She was in dire pain and never would recover. I did not want to watch her die, so I asked them to do it. That I think was a mistake, but there was no other choice. I was in a foreign place, Bob was dying, and I had to do something. I think it would have been okay had they simply just injected her in the neck without preparation. Instead they chose to shave her arm, which was a lengthy process and signaled to her there was something to come. I was not sure if she needed comfort or not, or if touching her would cause more pain. I did finally hold her, but it was a shallow effort. She died in a heap in my arms. I put her in the carrier I had brought her in alive, and drove her back to our home. Melanie was not home, so in emotional distress I buried her in the back yard in a plastic bag. After I came to my senses I decided I wanted Melanie to be able to say goodbye to her, so I dug her up. I took her out of the plastic bag, put her in a nice box with a towel lining, and found all of her play toy mice scattered widely in the house. I put them along with the remaining cans of her food in the box and waited for Melanie to come home. I made a nice cross out of broken branches in the yard and dug her a new grave nearer to the back door next to Mable’s grapevine. When Melanie arrived I explained to her that I had planned a respectful wake, let her look at Bob one last time, and placed her in the ground. Amongst a thousand tears I covered her up with dirt from the yard. That yard would be the yard in which Pedro would come to play.

Texas Instruments

In the immortal quest for new hip cell phone design it might make since to take a look at a Best Products or Sam Soloman catalog from the l980's. What does that new phone really look like? A Texas Instruments TI-33 calculator from the late l970's! That was a pretty amazing device in its day. You couldn't get through the SAT without it. Can you say that about a cell phone?

Melanie

Whilst living in an Upper Arlington Townhouse in David Letterman’s home state of Ohio, I was contacted by a woman via the internet. It seems she was moved by a series of letters I had written to the editor. She was an editor herself and an intellectual. After a sequence of correspondence she appeared at my front doorstep in a long, cowgirl-like skirt, boots, with flowing blond hair. She looked a lot like Annie Oakley. Before I knew what was happening she entered my home and hugged me around the neck. It was a good hug, not a modern hug of control and disconnection. There was full body contact, and I could feel the contours of her thighs upon mine. I asked her out on a “date” as one should. I worried about the date quite a bit and dressed up in brown wide-wale corduroy pants, a pink Oxford-cloth shirt, and pulled my long hair back with an Indian-styled piece of leather and stick. I had long hair back then, and because it was so thick I cut it short in the back and pulled my long bangs back Samurai styled. She drove us to dinner in her dark gray Toyota Camry. I’m not sure why she volunteered to drive, but it was nice being driven around. I owned a Toyota Tercel unibody four-door wagon. It was not the pinnacle of luxury, but it was rock solid and carried my musical gear. We may have listened to the droning of New Age Monk music, and I don’t mean Thelonious. It was rather soothing music, and it was nice to be dressed up and on a date with an attractive older woman. Melanie it turns out was the only real woman I have ever been involved with. She had an Oedipus complex as well as schizophrenia, but that made her interesting. The only reason we broke up was because I didn’t make enough money. I chose to leave the house we both inhabited, because the neighbors got funky and I no longer could work in my studio on the second floor. We both had our problems, and that was one reason we were drawn to each other. Her father, a psychologist, had died of alcoholism having spilt his liver on the living room rug. Her mother died when she was fifteen of Leukemia. Melanie had pain and soul, and I liked her. She loved me, but would not let herself be in love with me because I was still a Mama’s boy taking money from my parents for rent. We had a reasonable life together for over two years. With all its ups and downs and with her inclination to verbally harass me upon acute tiredness, I still loved her. I’m not sure why I left. One reason is because I had an interview for a college level teaching job in North Carolina. She had been pushing me to do more with my life, so I thought moving back to North Carolina and getting this job would look good to her. Because she used to always talk about “going back to school,” I figured if I got the job she could move there and go back to school for free. Isn’t that a noble thought? Her take on it was “You want me to move there so you can @#$% me?” As I expressed in one of my earlier posts, this kind of erroneous projection of intent and feeling is death to a relationship. I guess that sealed out fate right there. I kept in touch with her for a while over the phone and with E-Mail. Because I could be a complainer, and because E-Mail is such an intimate type of communication, she decided no longer to answer my E-Mails. I have never tried to call her, because what would we say? It has been my experience women have difficulty with long distance relationships. When I was in college my first love of seven years strayed. She completely was dismayed when I announced I would be attending the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She had not been accepted there. My thought was, “This was college and your future, so you have to do what you have to do. The rest will fall in place. We can see each other on weekends.’’ That did not fare so well with her or my own mother. Prancing back in the house on weekends all up on your high horse as not what my mother had in mind. This was a shock to me. My parents have always been demonstrative in keeping the children in their place, and that continues to this day. While we were able to keep in touch on the phone and with letters, little did I know that continual sex in high school was destined to be replaced by her somehow. For some reason I did not think about it. Strange, I guess. After a few months without her lover, she strayed and put me through hell on earth. Instead of having the decency to break up with me, she allowed her infidelity to continue treating me badly in the meantime. I had a bonafide cold fish on my hands, but I made her make love to me anyway. It is after all your responsibility in a relationship. When you are married, it does not matter that you grow apart from your spouse. When you take those vows that your beloved will be the only person you have sex with for the rest of your life, then you must give it to them whether you want to or not. That’s the deal. She would not explain to me what was going and would not break up with me. It is ironic her philandering gave her a smelly yeast infection. It was only after forcing a visit upon her at her college, that I was able to discover the problem. I found a postcard in her top desk drawer from another man that said, “I love you.” I gave her a tongue lashing, and we proceeded to make up. Later she transferred to my college as a Junior, and as she still tells me, it was the best thing she ever did. UNC was a reputable school, better then the homosexual-laden debauchery that was taking place in Greenville. It was only a few years ago that I figured out those experiences at ECU changed her, and that was the reason we could not be married. These “diverse” sexual experiences including lesbianism changed her into a different person, and I was not involved. We grew apart, and as adults we both knew. We had a teary but peaceful divorce. With that experience in mind it was easier to let Melanie go. She was working for an older man that wanted to marry and have sex with her. While she adamantly resisted his attempts, I can’t be positive he didn’t resume full frontal contact the second I left. I have not kept up with her out of respect, but I still think about her. It is often easier to cut something off clean during a break up. Emotionally it is easier that way, but when a lover is the most recent chapter of your life I think people tend to hold the torch for a while. I did, but as a sane adult realized there was no point in nurturing those memories. You must move on. In this situation our relationship was tied to musical creativity. Living with Melanie allowed me to have a music studio on the second floor of our house. Her love and affection and willingness to have sex with me gave me the fulfillment I needed to be extremely musically productive. While living with her in that house on Billingsworth Avenue, I produced eleven CD’s. In two years of dedicated artistic and intellectual achievement, I cranked out saleable musical product. I will always have her to thank for that possibility. This cowgirl, this waif, this Dolly knew the deal with sex. She was liberal, more liberal than I was, and she forced me to learn things. I had never had a woman suggest I masturbate in front of her. I had never met anyone with self-esteem high enough to take the responsibility to admit they liked certain things. I used to think allowing the other person to be “who they were” was what love was. That is a noble effort and worthy of praise. Taking gratification from another person wanting you? Holy shit man! That is an antiquated concept. Are Scarlett and Rhett in the house? Now I fully believe recognizing someone’s desire for you and channeling that in a positive way is key. Instead of scorning love like we are all conditioned to do out of contempt, we recognize and are turned on by someone’s interest in you. Wow, that is truly romantic. That turned me on, her knowing I liked her and being turned on by that. “Old School.” We had Old School love, and I learned a lot from it. That was the virtue of being with an older woman. Melanie was not shy about stimulating herself, and I respected that. I had never met a woman that was willing to even admit they knew what masturbation was. Most women deny it exists to a man, much less being privy to trying it. Melanie performed better fellatio than anyone I had ever been with, because she enjoyed it. She knew the difference between a man and a woman and was not afraid to use that as a turn on. She would verbally ask me things like, “If you put the chair up in the attic I will give you a blowjob.” She also, in one of the biggest turn ons of my life, said to me, “You can @#$% me, but I am not going to do anything. I am too tired to engage, but I am turned on and you can have me.” This gave new meaning to the term dead fish, and that stereotype was gone from my mind forever. Of course partially through the session, she found her energy! Melanie was not one for small talk or foreplay. While our love-making was deep and long lasting, it did not have to be precursored by adolescent high jinx. Her routine was to shower to clean her body, brush her teeth, lotion her skin and lie down naked in the bed. That was it. Upon having her period she would place a towel on the bed beneath us. It never was a hindrance but instead was an aphrodisiac. More to come.