Music Mind

I just finished playing guitar for a cool two-hundred and ten minutes... without stopping. My mind is happier now.

The past few mornings (5, exactly), have been punctuated by the neighbors' doberman going completely apeshit between 6:34 and 6:36am. The consistency is frightening.


Today was good. I was doing things with stuff and working hard at it. I talked to some people and agreed with most of what they said. I had a flipshit conversation with an engineer at... I can't remember what it's called. They're in India. The company developed a server monitoring program and this guy was going to email me later in the day with more information about something. This character used the word "yanti" as his phonetic expression when attempting to communicate the letter "y" in his email address. He had already sidestepped two of my questions about the program so after trying to make both heads and tails out of what the hell he was saying, I simply asked him to spell his phonetic translation so I could understand the single letter he was attempting to convey. This provided me with an irreplaceable opportunity to remove the phone from my ear and laugh heartily. "Hey man, you got any yanti?"

Ah, the yanti.

I was listening to the radio for much of the day. I took notes.

"Someday we might learn to tell the truth.
We might even find the fountains of our youth."

That's from a Brandi Carlile song, "Closer to You." It hit a vein and I wanted to write it down. I was daydreaming at the time and considering the piecemeal structures we create over our own heads from the examples set by our parents. And I decided that most people end up just wanting to go back to the same mental state they were in during their childhood. In many cases, this most likely includes the habits instilled in them by their parents and their parents before them. And this led me to believe that knowing what is good is easy. It does not require speech to communicate what is or is not good. What requires communication is the reasoning for either acting or not acting on that goodness. The only reasons many people ever consider are those which were supplied to them initially. We humans treat emotions like instincts, strangely enough. We never consider changing them because they usually come and go at about the same time in the same situations. I consider a boy learning things from his father to be tantamount to a young animal learning how to hunt. Many years later, after the father is gone, the child will still have an unfounded desire to do certain things much like the animal who simply must hunt. We do it because we want to feel close to eachother. Animals do it because they have to survive. Anyway, that quote resonated with me because telling the truth to ourselves will allow us to reclaim the youthful creativity we once had, the youthful creativity that once allowed us to look past the darkness of mundane responsibility and into the corners of creative motivation, comfort and personal inspiration. I believe this is why the lyrics were written in this order, either knowingly or not.

Maybe that's what he meant when he said, "Yanti."

The next note is:

"snare drum in 'in your eyes' by peter gabriel is outstanding... and cymbals"

Enough said. I'd link it but the youtube video has poor audio quality. I'm a sucker for tight heads on thin snares.

Next is the keyboard slam in Ryan Adams's "New York, New York" at 2:31. Most people would just look right past it because it's "part of the song." You're damn right it's part of the song. Except this part picks the song up by its suspenders and throws it's ass back towards the speakers. There's something really great about a musician who's normally in the background and gets the chance to just geek out for a minute in the spotlight. It takes incredible composure as a musician to walk the line like that... to be comfortable enough to play in the background all day but willing to stand up and rip it when the time arrives.

Next is Amy Cook's song "Hotel Lights." I had heard this once before. The initial vocal melody reminded me of an old British or Celtic melody. The rest of the song is just really, really peaceful and I am unable to do any single thing while it's playing. Anything. The audio mix is exquisite. The strings are liquid. The video was shot in Austin. It's a great song and it's good to hear an artist who makes the microphone work for them, not the other way around.

Last in my notes from the day is the following:

"there's nothing like some coldplay"


Done and done.

>> "Hotel Lights" by Amy Cook

Space-time continuum

Space and time go together. In this space and time tonight, I was looking at porn. And its beauty compelled me to post.

So I was sitting in my chair at the office today doing god knows what when I was transported to elation... or "exultant gladness," as dictionary.com puts it.

I experienced a similar emotion years ago under different circumstances. Specifically, the emotion comes from transcending time and space... allowing the mind to drool vividly into another time while the body breathes normally. Well... I've done it dreaming and meditating, but only twice that I can remember during either conversation or body... intensive... things...

I opened pandora.com for the first time in a while and was listening to my Ulrich Schnauss station. This song started playing. And I was content to let it... I think it was helping me with my livecycle edits. So... I was editing pdfs and... pretty much fighting them with my bare hands.

Now, the song sort of gets... twinkly... at the three minute mark. It gets floaty. And... I was jamming. Livecycle did something I liked and I got all excited and clicked on something that wasn't meant to be clicked. Windows made its error noise like any good operating system should. But the Windows 7 noises are sorta spacey. They're kinda floaty in their own right, the default sound scheme, anyway.

In an instant, the song's tide gifted a glimpse of the spacial error sound and I was immediately staring at myself from at least a hundred years ago. I said to myself, "Jesus in a hamster wheel! I'm in the future!"

Now, in the past, revelations like this one have been inspired by various substances ranging from Russian combustibles to the stickiest of the ickies. But I had neither today: just PDFs and Windows errors.

I'm sure you all think I'm just batshit at the moment, so let me explain. As a disclaimer, I acknowledge that said "explanation" does not guarantee my personal absence from the mental state of bat...shittery. But I'll continue, since you've asked so kindly.

Here I was, listening to a musical recording emanating from a place few people have ever seen. Can you hold the digital information as it runs through the speaker wire to your speakers? No. You might actually get electrocuted if you try. So I was sitting there staring at glossy finish glass monitors with displays of infinite depth and commanding them with my hands without ever even touching the screens. An unknowing bystander would have seen me engaged and, based on my body movement, probably would have noticed I was sending some kind of relevant information into these shiny, bright things. Even if they had no idea what kind of voodoo was in use, they'd be able to see I was going to considerable mental lengths to achieve some personal result inside the magic window pane. In addition to the computer... sensory stuff, I was listening on overdrive. It's the only setting I have. I'm either listening to crunchy high frequencies that might or might not exist in the original recording or am listening to the barrel tone of the snare drum.

I don't know if you know this, but the human ear can hear a lot. At least the two next to my brain can. Everybody talks about our ability to hear as opposed to other animals. We can hear everything dogs can hear. Dogs are idiots. But convincing our minds that the sounds are relevant takes a little work. At any rate, my brain was lost in the full spectrum of sound. My fingers were electric as they sent commands into the shiny, flashing machines. And I was just enveloped for a moment. Frozen. Mesfin was wrapped up in a .NET blanket next to me while I was lost in the beauty of the present technology. I was absolutely unconvinced that we are not living in the world we all hoped to be in one day. What else do we need? I know a jetpack would be nice, but physical laws suggest flight in numbers is safest.

The average American is able to type five or six letters and click on what they see. It will allow them to see and hear what they want to see and hear. It's brilliant. And all I can do is sit here and consider the disenchantment that must be responsible for the lack of awe and wonder I see in other people. Or are we perhaps just so humanly jaded that we shun the entity altogether because it only appeals to two senses. Look, people. If you click on something, you can see and hear it. That's two senses. Now... access the third by chewing on your keyboard. Access your fourth my tapping your toes on the floor. And access the fifth my smelling whatever in the hell you want to smell. Then, you won't be all that different from two other notorious individuals who pioneered the practice. Anyway, that's my steaming pile of an explanation. It's all I can muster.

Right now, I've used an old dress shirt to tie my headphones to my head. They kinda suck and sound was escaping between the headphones and my head. So I did this. My pigmentation has thankfully remained intact.

The other night, I continued watching Philip Seymour Hoffman movies with Love Liza. It was about a man whose wife recently committed suicide by asphyxiation in her running car in a closed garage. Philip copes by sniffing gasoline. My interpretation is Philip's character wanted on some level to be with his wife in her last moments. And in an attempt to relate to her state, he referenced the only other form of automotive inebriation I can imagine. It also starred Jack Kehler from The Big Lebowski and Stephen Tobolowsky. Any respectable movie viewer will recognize him as the tons-o-fun insurance salesman from Groundhog Day.

Anyway, I saw the summary of the movie and on some level just really wanted to watch Philip Seymour Hoffman sniff gasoline for an hour and a half. And... he sure did it. He sniffed the hell out of some gasoline, model jet fuel... you name it. It was uncomfortably humorous.

Kathy Bates stars as his late wife's mother. The story basically revolves around his inability to operate in reality any longer and his refusal to address the suicide note his wife left. It was filmed very well and I recommend it. It had a pretty good soundtrack, too. He's just a great damn actor.

I'm kind of tired now. It was a decently long day. All the softphones are working now. The temperature gauge in the server room seems to be pretty stable between 70° and 77°. I've still got some Livecycle updates to do and... I have salespeople calling me back to back. I'm researching options for both remote backup and enterprise monitoring software. Many of these salespeople are really, really happy to hear from me. And when they ask if they can, "...follow up in the next few days," they really mean 9am the next morning. It is what it is. I also figured out how to check voicemail on the new phones. Our telephony support group, who in my opinion is just disinterested in telephony, informed me they don't even support the telephone. Thankfully, there is the internet.

>> "For Good" by Ulrich Schnauss on Goodbye

Friday Face

Well I had this fancy bit in mind to start this post but when I went to my blog a minute ago, I clicked on the Trombone Shorty link from last week. And now here I am, jamming to it on repeat, all bouncin around like an idiot in my chair with a bottle of Guinness and a stupid ass smile on my face. Yes, my hand is in the air whilst jamming. Yes, I do this alone on Friday nights and I'm really okay with it. Such is life.

This song is out of control. This kid nailed it. I had things to say and ideas to spout but they just cleared out of the street and made way for this massive music.


Mmmm it's the weekend. And I've got nothing to do. Guinness abounds and pizza is in the oven. I put in 12 hours today and now I know how to add printers by IP in XP, configure SIP voicemails, lock down USB ports and restrict drive access to any number of drives. Yeah.

I have nothing planned for the weekend. So that's incredibly great.

I created an FTP server and am working on a script to upload -- break


Sometimes, you look down and realize that the words you were just typing are in no way comparable to the steaming pizza resting in your lap. And you realize God has just smiled upon you.

Baby jesus. I shit you not... if you can imagine Trombone Shorty playing with the volume at 11... and a pizza in my lap... you will understand my happiness. Granted, there is some Guinness involved. But everyone is a little Irish on Fridays.

Last night, I watched "Owning Mahowny" with Philip Seymour Hoffman. He plays a financial advisor/account manager who perpetually steals from his clients to satisfy his gambling addiction. The emotion is conveyed in a cold, direct manner which made me plainly uncomfortable. But Hoff submits his standard measure of theatrical genius and allows the audience into the mind of a truly innocent, compulsive mentality.

Gamblers are always grasping reality one hand or one roll at a time while trying to convince themselves that a deck of cards or a pair of dice are divine entities capable of dictating their future. Sad is the man who does not believe his future well-being is in his own hands. Currently, my well-being lies in the thyme kindly included on this pizza. But I digress. Philip nailed it. And Minnie Driver was pretty good, too. She could have survived with a different haircut. Hi Mom. I know you're reading this. "Skype" does not contain a "c" and I don't have a girlfriend out here yet. It turns out I'm only attracted to women who have Gmail accounts.


Alright. I'm still hung up on the Hurricane Season. It's unreasonable.


Moving along, I've been reading the news. How about some New things? There's a stupid asshole in Florida and an equally stupid congregation in Topeka, KS who want to inflame a large portion of the human population because they're too fucking ignorant to... I'm surprised these people can even speak the English language with such an outstanding mental incapacity. My Orthodox Christian, Ethiopian coworker just heard about this Koran-burning business today and he wanted to know what I thought about it. We share a respect for cultural identity, Mesfin and I. And I told him, outright, this is a national embarrassment. I told him this country has made great strides to promote equality and cultural awareness. And if this spiritual inebriate was actually as offended as he would like us all to believe, he wouldn't have waited nine years to take [such stupid fucking] action. No one who chooses to publicly incinerate in bulk the holy text of more than a billion living human beings has any possible capacity to lead a congregation of any kind. Given the size of the Islamic following, this moron should be incarcerated just out of globalized DECENCY if nationalistic integrity exists at all. I told Mesfin I'd be surprised if this guy himself stays in good health through the coming days/weeks. And even if this guy is just being a social thorn and exercising his Constitutional rights to be a loud fucking American, he's just as stupid. Someone needs to shove a four-foot, bronze statue of an obese Buddha up this guy's ass so he can understand the pain he's birthing. Unbelievable. Keep it up and I'm headed to Europe, folks.

In other news, some drunken Swiss man was sitting in his castle pushing buttons at 2am European time last night. I thought it was an SNB intervention until I looked at it on the minute charts.

Google Instant came out. And I like it. But I like my search field at the bottom of the page, too. I hope they reinstate the footer search field. It just made sense. They still have not redeemed themselves for the gross mutilation of images.google.com.

Oh... I read a really great article by Stephen Hawking in the Wall Street Journal of all publications. One of these days, people will start to listen. This was also a comforting read.


Man... I'm all about the links tonight. More importantly, I just said I'm "all about" something. The sincerity is oozing. I'm done.

>> more of this

Humanoids

Tell me how big your beats are. Do they walk themselves down the street? Do they make people look out the window and come outside? Yeah Shorty. Shorty Trombone. Now you know.

I just got back from Machete. I went alone to the first showing around the corner today. It was pretty good. I have to admit, I had been looking forward to it since I saw the preview at Grindhouse. I personally think Desperado should have been written around Trejo's character (just a general badass) years ago, but good things take time. Accompanying Danny in Machete are Cheech Marin, Michelle Rodriguez, Don Johnson, Robert DeNiro, Jess Alba and Lindsay Lohan. It was pretty great. I don't have much to say about it, really. The obvious is that Jessica Alba still can't act. But I think Robby Rodriguez just told her not to try in this one. Little Lohan is pretty gross in both her nun costume and in her birthday suit. I just can't... yeah. Not good.

DeNiro didn't really sell the Texas politician role in my opinion. I just... couldn't smell the whiskey on his breath, you know? Don Johnson played a great shooter-for-hire/contract militiaman. Michelle Rodriguez kicked ass, chewed bubble gum and then kicked the bubble gum's ass. She's just great. And Cheech? Yeah. Cheech was just the right mix of priest and pothead. And how could I forget Steven Seagal? The everlasting antagonist, Steve played the Mexican ringleader who... well.. I won't spoil the movie. Let's just say the man knows how to tap out nicely from a fight.

Watching the movie felt like being back in Austin. I recognized the parking lots, the intersections, etc. The Frost Bank building is all over the film. Michelle Rodriguez is the head of an underground Mexican network comfortably named "The Network." Her hideout/HQ is in the old, spray-painted carriage house on E. 4th Street where the horse-drawn carriage company mounts and dismounts the carriages each night. Just before the grand finale, Trejo and his army blow down a widened E. 5th street all fanned out in a swath of hydrolic, shiny hoopties and ape-hangers. It was pretty cool.

Anyway, the movie was certainly eye candy. The nudity and body count were established very plainly in the first 60 seconds of the film. He's called "Machete" for a reason. It was pretty cool. I don't know if the advertisement for the trilogy just before the credits was genuine, but I hope it was... for Danny's sake. I want him to stay up front and show these kids what movies are all about.

This weekend is... allegedly three days long. I think I'm going to go into the city again tomorrow and ride around... exhaust myself. I don't know. I'm kinda stagnant at this point. I need to take some time and finish some songs. I might... miiiiight find an open mic night at one of the colleges around here at some point and see if anyone cares to relate to me in this place.

I haven't been able to look at the forex charts at all in the last two weeks since I started my new job. I've been working 12-14 hour days consistently and am... things are starting to fall into place. I'm getting a feel for how the place runs and just what exactly is expected of me. Right now I'm gonna brainstorm on the charts and see if I can't start automating my system.

Little can you tell, but I just got sidetracked and listened to an hour's worth of Florence and the Machine remixes. This is why my god invented the weekend: so I could hear Florence and the Machine remixes. There's one reason why these remixes work. And I've said it before. It's because the producers on this album (3 producers) did a masterful job of layering her voice. Every vocal part, be it a lead part or harmony, is either doubled or tripled. The voice carries this album like Atlas carried the world. It was written as a deliberate wave of emotion in the wake of the singer's father's death. Live performances do not, unfortunately, maintain the same power of the recordings from 2009. Such is the magic created in a studio over time.

I'm gonna listen to my favorite radio station for the rest of the day today and get ready for my trek into the city tomorrow. I'm gonna take my computer and geek out somewhere. My phone charger is at the office and the phone is dead. So I will have no music on the bike tomorrow. This is regrettable. But I will manage. Who knows. I might even be forced to engage in conversation with other humanoids, perhaps of the female variety. I hear they like being called "humanoids of the female variety."

>> "A Last Dance with Leon" by Doctor Flake on Minder Surprise

Sink in

My feet haven't really hit the floor since I drove out of Austin a few weeks ago. I told my sister it still really feels like I'm in transition and I'm doing what I can to expedite the... whatever it is.

Things are good, though. This whole area is rich with activity, active people and active places.

I took my bike on the DC Metro down to the center of the political world a couple days ago. It was a Saturday so I didn't have to deal with too much traffic. A police officer forcefully banished me from a particular road in front of the White House. But it was otherwise easy riding.

I actually got off the metro at 930a and was out riding until about 430. I saw every monument I could find and then some. I paused somewhere North of the White House and went to Subway. I went to the park to eat and... that was alright. It was basically a big ass ravine... like... you slip, you die. I did not slip. I ate a footlong construction with chicken teriyaki and the sweetest onion sauce in all the land.

It feels weird saying it, but I was more comfortable riding in the streets in downtown DC than I am here in the burbs. I don't know. Maybe it makes sense. Maybe it's because it was a Saturday. Maybe it's just because there's more pavement. Whatever the reason, the pavement was kind to me there.

I was out for about 8 hours and... I think the only person I talked to was the person who made my sandwich for lunch. Ah I bought a homeless guy a Sprite, too. When he asked me if I would buy him something from the grocery store, I said, "Yeah man. What do you need?" He replied, "Ah man, I want some french toast!" Last I checked, precooked and prepackaged french toast was pretty hard to come by at the grocery store. I actually check for these things from time to time. Anyway, we settled on a Sprite and... yeah. I talked to that guy.

I had one way conversations with the quotes inscribed on the walls of the Lincoln and Jefferson memorials. I'm certain the Jefferson memorial is the most beautiful. And looking to the South, I could only stand still. The memorial itself is structurally open with many large columns surrounding the effigy and supporting the dome overhead. After reading the mountainous quotes overhead, I wandered out the back of the sanctuary and let the wind from behind take my eyes far out in front of me and show me what the hills might have looked like centuries ago. Highways and signs dissolved and there were only slow hills. It forced me to consider with strength the pieces of land which undoubtedly sowed the peaces of mind from which our national fiber was borne. What a time that must have been. Pre-industrial revolution... horses and thunder were still the loudest distractions imaginable on any given day. At the risk of committing to a full-on rambling escapade, I'd just like to state that the founding fathers' individual enlightenment, as unnatural as it was in their time, seems thunderous indeed to the natural environment in which they were living. It's comforting to know these things gave way to such great discoveries. And it reassures my quiet lifestyle. Focusing so hard at my new job, I needed to state this tonight.

I was completely worn out and was not... really... able to stand when I made it back to the metro station that evening. I hadn't ridden in about a month. But as it happened, the city was doing maintenance on the rail system that afternoon and evening. So I was able to reflect on the day a bit sooner than I had expected. It took twenty minutes to get into town and two hours to get back. But there was a sweet girl who wanted to smile at a dirty fucking guy on a bike at the King Street platform. And that made me less exhausted for a short while. Then the metro came and our visual romance ended.

I've started my new job and it feels like I'm in space. Before I get into my new job, and while I'm thinking about space, I need to record something which beached my mental ship this afternoon. It's inspirational in nature. And it's sensory. It's comfortable to me.

At Valentine's Day, I used to say the green candy hearts tasted like grass. They actually taste like something closer to feet. But back when I was stupid enough to ingest these green candy hearts, they reminded me of the smell of grass. I know, I know. Yes... I ate grass when I was a kid, too. But I'm talking about the scent... I'm talking about cross-sensory relation. This is like when love feels like you're skydiving or when certain candy makes you feel like you're wearing your Halloween costume from nineteen eighty-something. I had one of those moments of irregular sensory relation earlier today... a mild synesthetic event.

This pairing really, truly exposes my admiration of a particular musical entity. I recently stumbled upon a simply amazing video (in my opinion, of course). I won't describe it just in case anyone cares to watch it. It's important you watch it full screen with sound on the first time through... and don't skip forward. Just wait. Click the link and don't even read the description. Cause the surprise is half the fun. You might need to turn your volume DOWN a touch, but having sound is quite rewarding after... i don't know... the first third of the video.

I was listening to my songs earlier with my headphones, and "I Remember" by Yeasayer started. It reminded me of the sensation I got the first time I saw the video from above. I'll leave it at that. It's not really something I can convey in any more detail.

Alright. Enough mental meanderings. I'm headlong into my new job and as I told my friend earlier tonight, it feels like I'm straddling a freight train every second of every hour on the clock. I actually brought a small portion of the train home with me tonight and am currently listening to my (half-assed) French submersion and Fredo Viola while I wait for one of the servers to finish stomping several thousand customers' bills into tri-fold pdfs. It's madness. I feel like a crazy-ass Santa Claus with several multi-core reindeer at the end of the reins. Granted, my gifts suck. But I'm fat and happy, generally speaking.

I'm living very, very close to my office... about 4 miles. I've been putting in 10-14 hour days consistently since I started last Monday. But it feels like... it fucking feels like marathon recording sessions... the last thing I can think of I did consistently for such long amounts of time with so much interest, intent and happiness. Hours go by like someone greased the clock's gears a little too well. I've had one minor flub so far across 13 servers. But... that call center didn't need those call recordings anyway, right? :) Right.

I'm tired now. And I was tired this morning. I'm getting up in 6 something hours and maybe this thing will be finished. I don't know. I'll sleep when I can. I'm the first one at the office and the last to leave. Nothing especially new, but it's fucking awesome. And that's all I can say about it tonight.

>> "The Sad Song" by Fredo Viola on The Sad Song EP

Recollections

I don't remember if I wrote most of the following on the flight out to Hawaii or while I was on the ground, but I trust Google to save my documents more than paper. So here it is.


Before I left on the trip, the night before, I had dinner with my grandparents at their place in Bethesda. My grandmother made the standard quality, lavish fare, chicken marsala and the works. And I had yet another "bonus" chance, as she likes to call it, to listen and watch them enjoy their remaining time together.

Grandpa went out to the course that morning and did his best to work his way through 18 holes. With record highs, the temperature surpassed his age (which doesn't happen very often). He did say that toward the end of the trip, he was having trouble swinging the club at all.

During dinner, we talked about the details of my trip. I know and, at the time of this writing, KNOW very little. But he had spent a good amount of time [in Hawaii].

His father had an expansive career as a naval officer and was, at one point, an active member of Harry Truman's War Cabinet during the second world war. My great-grandmother, his mother, was actually living on the islands when the Japanese attacked in 1941. My grandmother was wise enough to interview her on tape to get a first-hand account of the siege. Her tone on the recording was expectedly somber, but she herself also realized the historic value of her experience. Two of my grandfather's brothers, who I never met, were in the house doing whatever children do. They were drawn outside by a buzzing which they expected to be American planes in formation... training, perhaps. That day, they saw the first wave of fighters and kamikazes on their way to Pearl Harbor on the other side of the island.

My grandfather was in Annapolis at the Naval Academy at the time, I believe. His father and the rest of the crew on the USS Battleship Texas had been dispatched to the central Pacific only two days earlier on December 5. Otherwise, they would have been carrying out their normal duties according to schedule right there in the harbor. I can't imagine the news, the alarm, when my grandfather heard of the attack. His mother and brothers were all physically fine, but the infamous damage took its toll. During dinner (I've been on planes all day and am having a hard time accepting the fact that I was just eating w/ them last night), my grandfather had to stop and think hard as to whether or not his two younger brothers went to the harbor that day to help pull bodies out of the water. He concluded they did not. But his mother, as a ranking officer's wife, ended up consoling numerous wives whose families were destroyed that morning. he said she acted in this role for several weeks.

Pardon the discontinuity, but I just had a tremendous turkey sandwich. Zero of my three planes were on time today. And I didn't have any time to either get something to eat or drink in between. So... I just bit the culinary bullet and bought the $10 sandwich. It was outstanding.

So... previously, I suppose I was talking about something other than a turkey sandwich. At this point, I find that notion rather unlikely. Let me investigate by reading what I've already written and count the number of references to turkey sandwiches.

Well that was disappointing. Forgive me for making light of such a serious topic. But according to the accounts I've heard, there were no turkey sandwiches at Pearl Harbor from Dec. 5-7, 1941. I will ask my grandfather the next time I see him for confirmation.

Pearl Harbor aside, my grandfather had other stories. He said the snorkeling is divine and I have to make time to do it. I told him I most certainly would. But the story to which I relate the most at present is his first trip out to Hawaii. The story is brief, but it made me think/reflect for a moment. And the bridge between something happening and me making you goons read about it is whether or not it makes me reflect.

Jack was at the Naval Academy and he received word from his father that he (Jack) would be spending the summer out there. Some kind of transport took him out to either LA or Coronodo where he waited for "orders" or, more likely, an escort of some kind. Anyway, he mentioned that there were any number of ships he could have ended up using. But he was directed to a "boat" in the most formal sense. As opposed to a battleship or something of a similar class (cruised at or above 20mph), he was taken to what he referred to as, "...a real POS... only went around 8 miles an hour the whole way." He went on to explain that it took a little over two weeks for him to get from the California coast to the big island of Hawaii.

And this put everything into perspective this afternoon. As it happens, "this afternoon has lasted about 10 hours so far. And as we chase the sun into tomorrow at 38,000 feet, I don't suspect it will change in the immediate future. But I digress. Perspective. Mine has been adjusted.

I was all bent out of whack because I might have had to sleep in LAX and go to Hawaii about 12 hours later. And I had to stop and think about the true measure of convenience we all have at our disposal.

Be grateful both for your survival and for the wisdom you have gained through the pain and sorrow of the past.

[a small tune struck me the next day or two after settling into the breeze on the island...]

Oh you came, you talked
you laughed, you walked

ah ye celebrate

you've got a whole lot of life to go
give your best to those you know
float the river... enjoy the show
and celebrate

[I'll finish it up at some point. I put some bliss in my pocket out there and I only hope I haven't put those pants through the wash yet.]



[and I'm pretty sure the remainder is from the flight back]

Artificial love must include selfish intentions classified and erected as anything not directed towards the audience. This only takes place in active conversation. There is time for selfish thought. This time, this thought, is reserved for personal reflection. Must there be--

There must be time for personal reflection.

I'm on the plane ride home now. And the trip was akin to discovering a new world. Some people never get to live the thrill. Others live it and, I suppose, they never share the knowledge they found.

The green was greener and the rain was more watery. The wind never sat and the sun was content to move its own speed. The waves ran their own course all day and every day.

Time spend with family was time well spent, even along the adversities. Friends were met and, presumably, family was made.

The reason for the initial bit here in this entry was the death beach we visited during the first week. The Minihuni (sp?) were an ancient people and maintained royal roles from birth. One of these obligations was bestowed upon the "royal companions"" of sorts. The royal entity was never to be alone.

In fact, the first individual borne after the royal individual, be it hours or days after the birth, was effectively obligated to remain by the royal individual's side indefinitely. Regardless the circumstance, the royal one was never to be alone. No matter what happened, that person would always have counsel, direct empathy, to assist in the decision-making process. This relationship would last to the death. And the finality would manifest at Polihale, the death or dying beach.

The name was given to the beach because the pocketed cliffside was used to bury/hide the bones/remains of the royal entity. As the sole purpose of the lifelong companion was companionship, his/her services were no longer needed at the conclusion of the royal one's life.

The companion would be lowered by rope over the towering cliffs while clutching a bucket or some recepticle with his friend's remains.

The Hawaiians consider the physical remains eternally relevant to the soul's well-being after death. A person's power was retained in their bones after death and it was therefore of the utmost importance to conceal the specific location of the remains of each leader.

After the companion would locate a sufficient place for his/her friend's remains, the individual would tug the rope to signal success and the others at the top of the cliff would cut the rope and allow the companion to fall to his/her death on the rocks below. This was how their ancient culture ensured their leaders' powers were kept safe. The cliffs are referred to as "the jumping-off point for spirits." And the view is astounding.

The couple sitting next to me is returning from the same island. We are now on the second plane en route to Dallas and they're going to Baltimore as well. I just had to break from my recollections to save on paper their strength. In their silence, they remind me likes do exist. They intend to move to the island within the next year. That doesn't relate to my path. But it's comforting knowing, being shown, that likes exist.

Descent into Dallas.


>>No music tonight. WallE is on HBO.

Mainland

Well I'm back on the mainland and am back in the urban sprawl. What a difference 5,000 miles makes.


The Hawaiian island of Kauai was a complete blast from the past, a separate world altogether. The most striking elements were, of course, elemental. The prehistoric peaks and the perpetual breeze just eclipsed time completely. And it was unusual to see moving vehicles and actual modernization. But it's generally apparent that foreign influence has been held to a minimum over the course of the last few decades. The Hawaiians have worked hard to keep it that way on the remote island. Such is not the case on the others.


I wrote a little on the trip in a journal of sorts and I think I'll transfer it onto here tomorrow night. I didn't write nearly as much as I thought I would because I was in the water the whole time. Well... in the water and drinking mai tais.

We went to a luau, talked with locals, ancients and fellow tourists alike. We snorkeled, surfed, bodysurfed and I was beaten and broken by the ocean almost daily. I turned into one big ball of sand and salt... and comfortably so.

I'm heading into the office tomorrow for the second time to meet the telephony consultants and to watch them install the fiberoptic system. It was deemed "relevant to my interests" by the powers that be. They know me well.

>> "Is This Love" by Bob Marley