There was some war protest song written and sung by some great singer in the sixties. It had words within it, to the effect "hip deep in the big muddy." I liked those protest songs of the Vietnam Era. We don't have such songs any longer. Clear Channel, the Fox of radio, has assured us of that. We must always be reminded that the war on 'The Oceanic Front' is going well. That we have had our asses handed to us in Iraq, Afghanistan is besides the point. What good would have protests done, anyway? Saved four thousand young men and women who died for nothing? Well, ask Dick Cheney. He said it was a necessary sacrifice. He lost nothing. He lost no children. Neither he, his wife, nor any of his craven spawn have lost one damn thing. Quite the opposite. He, and his family, have tremendous power, have enriched themselves twenty times over since the start of Iraq, and will continue to hold positions in our new American Aristocracy. That is, until children come to visit them with matches. To those Gold Star families out there, my heart goes out to you. I left 211 boys behind in Vietnam. I remember every one of them. All good Marines. I still think, all the time, about Corporal Fusner (18), Buck Sgt. Stevens (19) and Sugar Daddy, my Scout Sgt. At this time of the year it is hard not to. I am living and they are dead. I know they would celebrate my living but I cannot celebrate their passing. A glass of that Val de Flores, lifted to my lips for one sip on Christmas Eve will be the only clue that they are well remembered. Their names are clustered together on one block of that black wall I visited in Washington D.C. My name should be up there, but I got a 'get out of jail free' wound that night, and ended up discovering that I possessed a 'survivor's body.' Great. Maybe I am only here, in my own tattered form, simply to remember them.
I read a review in the New York Times that was bleak and dark. About one of my favorite movies called "It's a Wonderful Life." I cite it often in these blogs, especially at this time of year. The review was harsh, because so much of the movie was 'real,' in my opinion. And the reviewer gave away much of his own battered perspective on life by his writing. It is a problem for us real writers. We live a lot of what we write and vice versa. Anyway, this guy wrote about how the raucous and wildly crass times, as illustrated by the shots of Bedford Falls portrayed as the result of 'George' never having been born, were much more cheerful, alive and filled with success. Those shots, rather than the boring and staid placidity of the 'real' Bedford Falls Jimmy Stewart was still alive in. About that, all I can say is that if you love what Las Vegas has become, then you agree and deserve such perspective on life. If you think that the Dells, in Wisconsin, are just great in all their neon and crappy water slide idiocy, then you deserve the poor taste you somehow got from your parents. The reviewer also screws up the 'mysterious disappearance' of the eight thousand bucks which the evil Potter found and squeezes George over. The reviewer goes to a prosecutor to determine that this eight thousand would be treated as theft, and George thrown in jail. It would not. Not unless it could be proven that it was theft. George's idiot uncle, responsible for the loss, might have to answer some serious questions, with respect to the loss, but it would not be likely that he would be held for theft. Certainly not George, who only entrusted the money to his uncle. The movie is dark in parts, especially the interpersonal relationship's of George and his family and his relationship with his brother. But good God, have you looked around at relationships in this country lately? What is our divorce rate? What is the holiday get-together like for most people? I can't say the following about most all of film that has passed before me during my life. But, I would love to have written that screenplay, or the novel behind it (there was no novel). I love real people. People with too much weight, varicose veins and bad hair. I love people who lose control on occasion but reel themselves back in. I love people who do things they need to apologize for and then apologize. I love people who tell me that I am full of shit, and then argue appropriately that I really am. I love people who say no to what I want to do, so that I am forced to convince them. I love people who drink too much of my wine and get drunk, and then drive when they should not, and then suffer a bad hangover and call to apologize for things they cannot remember. Am I this way because of Fusner, Stevens, Sugar Daddy and the rest? Is what I feel, as my true humanity, nothing more than post traumatic stress disorder from the DSM IV manual?
I don't know. Joe Campbell said that you must work and toil to finally, and only possibly, enjoy bliss at the very center of your being. I have that. I know it. Even if I am McMurphy (One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest) inside some facility, unaware of where I really am, I have this bliss. I just know it. Merry Christmas.
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