Wheat Burn

Beware the Bite

2009-10-07T11:02:00.002-06:00

It is fortunate that Lucifer did not perish back in January because a film crew from the show Untamed and Uncut would not have been able to do a piece on him.

The Preying Dead

2009-01-13T00:34:00.006-07:00

Lucifer died praying in my room tonight. My father tried texting me this news between the commercial breaks of 24, but either the universe was too upset by his demise, or the mind-control devices granted us by the almighty Steve Jobs were being punished for some kind of digital disobedience.

In the end the snake wasn't dead and the voice of logic and experience told me he was just sleeping. But I like to think he was actually praying to the unknown god of rat-strangulation, or even preying on the dreams of slumbering Ophidiophobes. Either way, it was a sad moment that I missed. But the tears my mother shed and worry my family experienced for how I would feel are now dusted over by a blanket of relief and amusement that will live far longer than Lucifer ever will.

The Skilled Slopesman: an Allegory of Pain

2009-01-05T22:04:00.005-07:00

My well of words has been diverted these past few years into an unmeasurable well of trivial affairs and wasted time. Every day that my thoughts go unrecorded, the dusty black notebooks I carry extract a gram of personality from my soul. Hopefully this year I can fill that void.

I was recently inspired to take up skiing again this season. We went to Snowbird yesterday, and the skis I rented were about 10 cm too short. If I was a skilled slopesman this would have been fine since I could have carved sharp curves down the mountainside. But since I am not skilled it ended up being the biggest beating my legs have ever taken. It was an enjoyable sort of pain, however, and I look forward to their healing so I can abuse them again.

Sometime in the next month or so I will be migrating the entirety of this blog to another location, so be on the lookout.

Journal Entry: July 21, 2007

2008-01-21T01:21:00.000-07:00

Her name was Anja and the sound of her soft voice, smooth with silk and honey, still lingers in my mind seven hours later. A sweet Polish accent and auburn hair held back in a clip with butterflies uniquely frame her smile. She hates the heat and American food. I treasure those brief moments we stood together. I'll never see her again.

Paean of Sorrow

2007-12-02T16:49:00.000-07:00

A shadow walks through the narthex of my dreams
Trailing an oily pallor in its wake.
These cloven clouds of fancy writhe somnolence from the sky;
I look into the face of darkness to see my eyes gazing back.
Oh that monstrous visage! Draining light and warmth from the world;
It smiles.
The shadows scatter, fading into a vision of the city at night.
Constellations of light reflect off the clouds in a serene haze
as I float among the quiet buildings
filled with lovers, laughers and loners.
The clear light of this solemn place pulls at the seams of my heart.
It spills into the sky in a torrent, draining me
as the night wraith’s cloak is cast away by the furied light of dawn;
Rising over the hills like an ocean tide into the waiting pool of my heart.

Becoming the Rain

2007-10-08T01:22:00.000-06:00

The rain watched me tonight as the Autumn sun disappeared behind a veil of desert clouds. Tiny voices swarmed my mind with hope and laughter as they fell from the sky, joyous in their falling. Countless droplets sought to drown my consciousness in an ocean of rainwater music, but every moment were silenced by the unyielding Earth. A collective symphony broadcast like a million dying whispers, chipping at the corners of my soul with the tragic beauty of its passage.

Arboreal Confusion

2007-07-17T20:56:00.000-06:00

Today I witnessed a man standing in the rain watering a power line.

Corporate Battlefield

2007-07-02T20:35:00.001-06:00

Today I arrived at work expecting to witness an Epic battle. I was sorely disappointed, however, because upper management apparently put the kabosh on the conflicting issue before it even made it to the ring. This makes my life much easier, but it still would have been fun to witness the polite and smiling faces of sniveling corporate drama.

Tangled Beauty

2007-07-01T03:38:00.000-06:00

I sit here in the moonlight erasing unformed thoughts from a white screen. Maybe tomorrow I will be able to adequately transform my tangled mind into something beautiful.

Urim of Shadows

2006-11-18T21:49:00.000-07:00

I drove around town tonight wearing sunglasses. Dangerous activities are not my usual Saturday night fare. Tonight, however, was different, but not for any reason I can point at or insert into a list. The night air just had a feel to it like it knew my fortune and was watching.

Sometimes I feel like a blind player in a cosmic round robin chess match. Only I don’t know who the players are and cannot see my pieces. Tonight when I put on the brass aviator sunglasses that appeared mysteriously in my glove box, it felt like I found a secret weapon in this game. The world I saw through those lenses wasn’t the same world I’d ever known. This place had a living darkness that hid anything mortal from my sight. It whispered in my ear sweet nothings of power and glory. Images of the safety without light flowed into my eyes like smoke from a black fire, revealing memories from a time veiled from my mind. I knew these weren’t Leland Gaunt’s glasses of wish fulfillment, or a shadow edition of the Urim and Thummim, but that’s exactly what they felt like for a few moments on the empty streets of Sugarhouse.

Noli Turbare Circulos Meos

2006-11-05T02:44:00.000-07:00

Archimedes must have felt much like I do tonight as he uttered the above phrase just before being killed by a Roma soldier. On nights like this my head feels like something inside is ready to explode. There is restlessness in my soul that knows no cure, like a thirst no liquid can quench. At first when I experienced this sensation I would drive out to Saltair and walk along the dry lakebed of the Great Salt Lake. The serenity of that place can scarcely be matched, especially on a night like tonight when the moon is full and the salty surface of the mud shines as if by its own light. If the hour is late enough no traffic can be heard from the freeway, leaving complete silence. I would scream at the stars or lie on my back, immersed in the heavens and in the wonder that such a place could exist. The duration of my visits to the lake would vary, but inevitably I would leave with an inner calm, back in touch with my inner monologue which sometimes left or was silenced by inaction. Over time I realized that the calm state those trips brought was just as accessible from a walk down the street as from a trip to the desert. It was the nocturnal beauty the kept me going back, and only at night was that feeling of mystery present. During the day it was a barren place full of garbage and dreams. The odor made one gag and the salt sting the eyes; a historical curiosity to be visited on trips between Salt Lake and Wendover. Oh but at night! I would park outside the gates and walk through the parking lot. Each footstep on the gravel beaconed to the presence I always felt watching, as if that building were guarding the sand, mud, and salt that lay beyond. The feeling was never malign, only cautionary, reminding me of the forces to fear in this world. I’ve stood on that beach and watched black clouds unroll from the horizon and in minutes transform the clear starry sky into a torrent of wrath. As frightening as it was, the fell voice in the storm was worse.

My visits to the lakebed are less frequent now, replaced by long sleep or nighttime mountain paths. These nights like tonight feel as though I exist in a place between sleep and wakefulness. That by turning sideways I can slip into a tracing-paper overlay of reality, an opaque layer of existence dependant on the pattern of lives beneath it. In this place one can observe and mimic, but never interact. Questions of good versus evil, right versus wrong do not exist, only the state of one’s soul whether happy or sad. In states like this we are most vulnerable, and only by surrounding ourselves with people we love and cherished memories can we emerge from such tempests unscathed. Some people learn this lesson quickly. Others must learn the hard way.

Samhain Alphabet

2006-11-01T01:26:00.000-07:00

Here is the whole alphabet made from pretzals. Always a hit party activity.

Sun Tunnels Video

2006-10-30T16:21:00.000-07:00

Here's the video my brother Dave made of our trip last year to the Sun Tunnels. Less than two months until our next one. Who's in?

Oregon Coast

2006-08-14T00:30:00.000-06:00

After several days of driving, we're here in Cannon Beach for a week of relaxation in the sun. Thoughts and musings may soon follow.

Where In Sam Hill?

2006-08-13T14:26:00.000-06:00

Here on the dry Colombia River border between Oregon and Washington is a fascinating scale replica of Stonehenge. It was built by Sam Hill, a wealthy Portland socialite back in the day. Ever heard the phrase "where in sam hill?" This is where it originated. He moved so far away that the phrase stuck.

Celebrity Death Match: Starbucks vs Wal-Mart

2006-08-10T15:12:00.000-06:00

Some things invoke an irrational fury in me. Like these self-absorbed yuppies lounging in Starbucks as if they own it. The only reason I’m here is the gift card I received from my mother, who in turn received it from a work function. Why is Starbucks so popular? Their egotistical naming conventions are scorned by nearly everybody not connected to a corporate fiefdom. There is something to be said about the atmosphere here, however. This place exudes an aura of comfortable gloom. It makes sense then that Starbucks began in Seattle. Sitting in here makes me feel like rain coats the sky, yet outside the temperature is in the high 90’s.

Yesterday I discovered a way to make going into Wal-Mart tolerable. I had some time to kill before picking up my handicapped friend, James, to give him a ride home from his second full time job. This time presented me with a good opportunity to look at desks, tvs, and other miscellaneous things I will need for the new apartment my cousin and I will be moving into at the beginning of September. While traipsing amid isles of Chinese manufactured capitalist slavery I listened to the new Muse album on my ipod nano (which I won in a raffle). Suddenly the hordes of squatty overweight people no longer bothered me. It was like walking through a comedic montage in a really bad teen summer movie. One thing I’d never noticed, however, was that everybody there seemed happy, or at least content. Here in Starbucks people hate their lives.

The difference between the crowds in Wal-Mart and in coffee-land is vast. The oiled sheen of affluence coats everyone in a crisp, custom-cut layer of manicured mannerisms like an outstretched middle finger to the Wal-Mart generation. I received some interesting looks upon walking in the door to Starbucks, with my tattered jeans, flip flops, and black skull t-shirt. “You don’t belong here,” one office monkey thought. “You are not important enough to be in this place.” He extracts a long clear booger from his nose and eats it, “This is my tree and you can’t have any of these bananas. Go pollute the fig pens reserved for your kind.” People broadcast their thoughts so loudly sometimes it’s a wonder nobody hears.

One of my favorite history professors, John Reed, once said that Wal-Mart is saving us from a class uprising in America. It is allowing those who inhabit the bottom rung of the socio-economic ladder to buy stuff, and as long as they have their curling irons, picture frames, and plastic thingy’s, they’ll stay happy. When I was living in rural Missouri, entertainment on any given night of the week for the locals was Wally World. The quaint old buildings in the downtown district were usually decaying husks from another life; forgotten except by squatters and termites. All the while, on the outskirts of town stretches a concrete and asphalt metropolis inhabited by screeching children and sweaty faces whose eyes and enthusiasm for commercial squalor roots them further into the mire of poverty and clutter. Why then are they so happy? And why in writing this am I not including myself among this group of people, since I am clearly one of them?

Apocalypse Now

2006-08-07T16:26:00.000-06:00

Why do angry storm clouds make me so excited?

Stare into the Sun

2006-07-19T01:23:00.000-06:00

My room is dark, fed by the oily night air seeping in through the window two feet away. My forehead is beginning to itch from a headlamp illuminating these keys, and my vision is washed out from the screen's bright light. I’ve been sitting here on my bed for hours working on my employer’s site map and listening to nostalgic tunes from periods of my life now fading into strange and distant dreams. The passage of time tends to weed out the troubles of our past. This leaves behind a path of filtered memories that can choke our lives.

Havasupai Summer

2006-07-04T01:42:00.000-06:00

Here are some of my pictures from a recent trip to Havasupai.

Calm Before the Storm

2006-04-14T19:18:00.000-06:00

Babel

2006-02-01T01:57:00.000-07:00

"...let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven"
Genesis 11:4

Snipe Hunt

2006-01-07T16:43:00.000-07:00

The desert hillside where we sell ourselves to the gods of lead and powder.

Sun Tunnels

2005-12-28T16:13:00.000-07:00

We drove into the fog and desert blindly, like small children running into a forest. Dave’s Buick consumed the miles in smooth, long strides while Pink Floyd massaged our ears from the Sirius Satellite network. I’d driven out to the west desert many times, but never cocooned in a thick shroud of fog. In Mr. Huntington’s Jr. High English class, we’d listened to Stephen King’s audio drama “The Mist”. Creatures came out of the fog and gobbled people up. I recall the images it left in my mind more than the story itself. The west desert is a fascinating place. It has a magnetism about it that pulls in those with wandering souls. Today the sun was absent behind the clouds and only a dozen yards could be seen in any direction. It was like driving into another world. After three years of failed attempts, we were finally going to see the Sun Tunnels. We pulled off I-80 just before Wendover and stopped at Sinclair to gas up and buy toilet paper. The attendant had never heard of Lucin or the Sun Tunnels, and knew that there was nothing up that road. We didn’t know for sure either, but were determined to find out. The wide, black asphalt gave way to cracked pavement, then a groomed dirt road. Once we were away from the station and the last vestiges of civilization, I felt the great coil in my spirit begin to unwind. To our left outstretched a ridge of violent and jagged rocks leading up to a tall peak. Old fences and abandoned farmhouses dotted the landscape, lending a historic and surreal quality to the scene. Every shade of yellow and brown poked up through the light blanket of snow and we could not help but stop to capture the beauty on film next to the Hastings Cutoff sign. According to the California Pioneer Trail sign, we weren’t very far from the Donner Reed pass. A part of me wanted to get out and search the mountainside for caves, treasure and multidimensional portals; a future summertime jaunt perhaps. The fog retreated to just before the horizon, and a murder of crows took flight one after another as we approached them from their successive fence posts. As five of them circled around in chaos, one crow remained at his station, watchful. Forty miles later we began to wonder about the correctness of our route and stopped at a farmhouse littered with gutted pickups, motor homes and bathtubs. Steve Galloway, a burly man sporting a thick, graying beard, told us we were only 6 or 7 miles shy of our destination. When I told him we were looking for the Sun Tunnels he gave me a fascinated look that said ‘why would anyone want to go there?’ As we thanked him and drove away, we knew that if we got stuck, he’d be the one to rescue us. It was his amused but cautious tone when he said,“Don’t get stuck” that said it. Turning around in his driveway, his wife and daughter stared at us like tourists warily eyeing two caged lions. His daughter had bolted out of the house upon first hearing my voice, with a short cropped mop of mangled blonde hair and wild eyes, and ran full bore at and then beside me. We left the mud and snow of Steve's compound and drank in the cool air in anticipation for what lay ahead. Our first wrong turn was onto a road lined with sharp rocks and a sign that said, “Unauthorized vehicles will experience severe tire damage.” It looked like a sign one might find in a western gift shop in Jackson Hole or West Yellowstone. It had a redneck yet serious feel to it, so we turned back and closed the first “Stay Out” gate on our way. The second wrong turn was an access road for a natural gas pipeline, but while turning around saw a big truck headed down a road a few miles down and know we were close. We’d spotted the Sun Tunnels while stopped at the Stay Out sign with binoculars. That didn’t make finding the right road any easier, however, so once the correct path was unveiled before our eyes, we approached the tunnels with great glee. Parked outside the perimeter of these behemoth tubes were several cars and numerous people milling around. A group of elementary school teachers from Logan were holding hands, dancing around their fire, and talking about bras. My own suspicion was that they were really a coven. A fellow UofU student named Dalton joined us in our marveling at the enigmatic structures. Everyone we met was disappointed that we didn’t have any beer. The sun tunnels are arranged in a cross with each arm aimed at the sunrise and sunset on the winter and Summer solstices. Each tunnel stands about 12 feet tall and 30 feet long. Cut into each one are head-sized holes arranged in constellation patterns whose corresponding stars can be seen from inside the tunnel on a clear night. Inside are mysterious swirling patterns that remind me of occult sigils. Pictures and words do the experience of looking through the tunnels no justice. It is a visceral, time-freezing moment that burns enlightenment into the brain like a Hiroshima shadow. The tubes, one appearing inside the other, seem to open a conduit into the heart of everything that is mysterious and beautiful about nature. It’s what the builders of Stonehenge sought. It’s what standing atop the Grand Canyon feels like: expansive, personal, and mysterious. And now as the fire dies away, with the logs so burned to ash that they appear covered in tin foil, my brother shakes the earth with the deep, primal thrum of his didgeridoo from within the tunnels. The quiet of the desert in winter eases my senses.
Dave and I wondered if sleeping inside the tunnels would incite strange dreams. My own recollections of those dreams are hazy visions of floating cities amid the cloud choked sky, and fighting crime. We were both warm and wrapped in our sleeping bags like burritos. Dave slept little but was comfortable while I sawed logs the whole night. By 5:30am we cleaned up our bags and blankets and were eager to watch the sunrise. We’d burned all our wood the night before, so we stood in the cold next to the video camera on time lapse and listened to a choir of wolves or coyotes very close to us. My heart was gripped with fear for a brief moment while images of tooth and claw mangled flesh flashed by. Just moments before dawn, a large pickup truck pulled in and a tall gentleman named Eldon got out. We turned down the satellite radio and the three of us stood and watched the sun peek over the mountains. As sunlight touched the clouds, the temperature also plummeted and we shivered for the first time since our arrival. Eldon regaled us with tales of his adventures as a nudist, the local burning man group; sharing with us the camaraderie that forms in a mysterious place like the Sun Tunnels. He left us and Dave cooked a dozen eggs and sausages while I carbonized some bacon. We cleaned up and bade the Sun Tunnels and their mysteries farewell, determined to return every solstice from then on. As the morning desert passed us by, we listened to an NPR program on mythology that seemed fitting for the mood of the day and place. Passing the ghost town, Lucin, which sits next to the railroad tracks, we were even more excited to return in the summertime to sleep while trains roared by, shaking the ground. Nancy Holt’s Sun Tunnels are an obscure and hidden jewel in the Western Utah desert. Along with the Spiral Jetty and Tree of Life, the tunnels stand as a monument not only to human ingenuity, but to the power of art in capturing the essence of imagination, mystery, and the important things in life.

Thanks to Dave McEntire for many of the above photos.

Winter Solstice

2005-12-21T09:58:00.000-07:00

Tonight marks the longest night of the year, and what better way to celebrate the occasion than by camping out in the west desert and watching the sun go down inside the Sun Tunnels. I'll be sure to post many photos and any extraordinary experiences I have once I get back from work tomorrow night.

Mare Insularum

2005-12-15T22:18:00.000-07:00

The Salve of Silence

2005-12-15T01:23:00.000-07:00

I drove home in silence tonight surrounded by a soft white landscape and accompanied by the static hum of the defroster. A swath of salt and ice smeared the windshield, clouding my vision like a frozen man blinded by cataracts. It was one of those rare nights where the ever-raging storm in my brain was calm and a blanket of peace floated upon the landscape.

Rarely do I drive in silence. Usually there is music to suit any mood, but tonight was different. I was experiencing a lucid moment and knew that any music or talk from the radio would dampen the transcendent clarity. Driving like this is something everyone should try occasionally. It is too easy to hide from our thoughts behind a barrage of information and sound. The undisturbed, rhythmic vibrations of the road force us to process the good and ill of our lives while letting those miles disappear beneath our feet.

But now as the haze of sleep washes over my consciousness, distilling what my resolve may have been, I cannot help but be grateful for that thirty minute drive home in the beautiful winter silence.

Slave Masters

2005-12-14T01:55:00.000-07:00

Waiting Room Musings

2005-12-07T13:08:00.000-07:00

I'm stuck in the waiting room of Big O Tires with a dead pen and nobody around with a replacement. Not even the employees have one i can use. Boohoo... I'm going to apply for a staff writer slot at the Daily Utah Chronicle and also begin pounding out my book since the last plot details came to me in a flash last night while reading "Goetia: the Lesser Key of Solomon the King" I'm very excited.

The Void of Sleep

2005-12-04T02:25:00.000-07:00

I just left a noisy land of smoke and spirits yet my vision swims with clarity that will die if i retreat home to the void of sleep. A trip to the lake would be foolish on such an icy night, nonetheless, that is where I am drawn. Where the elixer of my wonderous life can be extracted into savage and beautiful tonics.

Decemberween

2005-12-02T00:32:00.000-07:00

December was seventeen hours old before I realized November was gone. This occured at the bookstore while cashiering, like a trained monkey chained to a music box, and a woman haraunged me for not knowing the date. I should have told her that time is an amorphous antique that should go away. I don't care about the date or time of day. My personal happiness and sense of well-being do not hinge on any knowledge of chronological correctness. Calendars, clocks and schedules are necessary evils created by our "civilized" environment and I use them because the alternative would be a life of homelessness and destitution (although homeless destitution on a tropical island wouldn't be half bad).

Let me give you an example of how little attention I pay to the passage of time. A few weeks I was delivering the Skid Row and Quiet Riot tickets to Graywhale and saw my friend Pete who mentioned his upcoming birthday. He asked how old I was and I honestly could not remember. Either twenty-six or twenty-seven, but I had to pull out my drivers license, look at my birthday and do the math to realize that I am in fact twenty-seven years old. Sure that's how long I have been on this planet, but 27 is just a number. It's not who I am. It doesn't constitute my identity. If I didn't have an Ansel Adams calendar on the wall by my desk I would never know the date. I just don't care. The only way I even know the day of the week is by my class schedule.

Maybe someone can help me out with this. Is my dislike for mankinds need to record the passage of time (if it even exists) irrational? According to Einstein, time slows for matter as it approaches the speed of light. Would that translate to someone living above the arctic circle aging faster than someone near the equator? If that question doesn't make sense then stick two pins in a globe, spin it around a lot, then think about it for a while.

Subjecting ourselves to the timelines of other people is not necessary for fulfillment. Being in control of our time does not make us in control of our lives.

Catatonic Turkey Shock

2005-11-24T16:50:00.000-07:00

I am now an hour removed from the catatonic turkey shock of dinner. This sensation should be familiar to all who indulge in the sacrificial gobbler; that invisible hand reaching up from the stomach, heart and chest, up the neck and into the brain where the bloated Thanksgiving fist shuts down your consciousness. Some people lay on the floor and moan while others fall asleep. Currently experiencing these phisiological reactions to food, abstaining from food for a while would make sense, yet still I sit here and munch on chololate covered orange sticks. My mom tells me she's never met anyone so skinny who eats so much, but she also says that people engage in self-defeating behaviour because it initially provides them with comfort and joy. But unhappiness begins once the joy of discovery gives way to frenzied ingestion of sensory desires.

In the currently muddied waters of my brain, the only thoughts I can extract between fits of sleep are questions about how genuine are we about giving thanks? Or is Thanksgiving just the inaugral celebration of the holiday season? The human race is constantly engaged in a vicious cycle of discovery and excess, and I wonder if this season is just a month long celebration of this process. I must say, however, that the ineffable holiday essence which infuses the air with generosity and kindness to all is something that our world desperately needs all year round. My perspective may be somewhat tainted by working as a retail monkey, but the die-hard romantic in me won't let the cheery fervor of December-scented giving die.

Sensory Assault and the Nature of Creativity

2005-11-22T12:24:00.000-07:00

The wooden ceiling and graffitti-laden brick walls of the Pie surround me as I sit in a state of total relapse from my resolve to eat healthy and abstain from carbonation. When I walked in here and looked on the menu their "Mountain of Meat" Pizza sounded delicious so without thinking I also ordered a coke. My stomach is distended from grease, dough, processed swine, and now death by carnivouous over-zealousness is not far off. The complex mixture of meat flavors, cooked flour, sauce, and soda have brutalized my taste buds with the typical unrefined flair of American cuisine. Not that a cacophonous fusion of tastes is bad, because I love spicy food, but what is the difference between a confused pilling of victuals and the elegant bite of a well-crafted meal? That is a question I am not skilled enough to answer, but the core principle behind it is something I would like to pick apart.

Anyone can cook a meal, take a photograph, draw a picture, or sculpt something, but what seperates the ordinary from the exceptional? It is a persons ability ot discern what is truly being crafted and which sensory ingredients are best suited for excellence. Carl von Clausewitx has some good words to say about this,

"Any complex activity, if it is to be carried on with any degree of virtuosity, calls for appropriate gifts of intellect and temperment. If they are outstanding and reveal themselves in exceptional achievements, their possessor is called a "genius"."

Everybody has genius brewing inside them to one degree or another. Clausewitx calls this genius, others call it talent or just being good at something. Whenever I see someone who is very skilled at what they do, I am amazed. This stems from my own struggles to tune out the innumerable distractions offered by our consumer-oriented society while concurrently trying to create maningful and exceptional artistic work. On that subject Clausewits says,

"If the mind is to emerge unscathed from this relentless struggle... two qualities are indespensible: first an intellect that, even in the darkest hour, retains some glimmerings of the inner light which leads to truth: and second, the courage to follow this faint light wherever it may lead."

For myself, this inner light refers to the seeds of creative inspiration that drive anyone to make sense out of the craziness in their brain. If you are lucky to have genius in an artistic, or culinary, area, this process can produce amazong results. Ask anyone who has seen Michelangelo's statue of David in person, or any Ansel Adams photograph, and they will say that is the work of a true genius. The question that lingers in my mind, however, is if genius is innate or if it can be grown through hard work?

Writing at The Pie

2005-11-21T15:26:00.000-07:00

As you can see, every inch of the walls here at the Pie are covered in writing from decades of pizza-goers. The tables are empty except for myself while Pink Floyd accompanies me as I write the blog entry that will be posted tonight.

Addendum

2005-11-18T13:31:00.000-07:00

A number of people have expressed concern over my last entry. I assure you all that I am doing fabulously well. In spite of recent traumatic occurances here at the house, the story I am writing is centered around the best date I've ever been on, which was to Suicide Rock. My goal in writing this story is to illustrate that life is wonderful in spite of how difficult it can be. I apologize for causing concern over my own well being. I'm doing better than I ever have. Thank you all for caring.

The Muse of Suicide

2005-11-17T22:22:00.000-07:00

Posting from my phone in Subway working on the story about Suicide Rock. I'm undecided if it will go here or not since i plan on publishing it. Suicide is a topic very near to my heart since a friend tried to kill himself a few days ago. This story was just going to be a long blog entry but now it'll be more than that since suicide is such a serious and tragic thing.

Tinkerbell

2005-10-30T21:42:00.000-07:00

I sit here crouched in front of my parents computer with the aural textures of Sigur Ros washing over me but can't seem to hold to any of the strains of thought floating in my mind; so hazed from strange sleep and the gnawing specter of bronchitis.

I wonder what happened to Peter Pan's drum after it stopped rolling down the hill. Did the girl became Tinkerbell once they crossed the foaming sea? Who made her green dress? Cut.

Strobe lights flashing behind us. Glittered eyelash laughter. Dead helium balloons dangle from our hands. The leaves are cold beneath my socks. A forbidden tomb made them holy. With potion in hand I fumble through an ivory tune that haunts my dreams. Sinking in the ocean. Cut.

Thanks to Silus Grok for the lead to the amazing video linked above.

Noisy Streets and Nothing Sleeps

2005-10-25T01:17:00.000-06:00

I did a strange thing this evening. At 8:30 I went to bed completely exhausted, but now i'm wide awake. While sleeping, I dreamt that I was a dark elf killing wild boars for gold. My roommates didn't realize I was in bed and had been playing World of Warcraft. You can see my view of the street as I lie here in bed. Tomorrow I'll write about an adventure Amanda and I had at suicide rock on Sunday.

1-900-Blasphemy

2005-10-14T21:46:00.000-06:00

Among the daintily painted I take my seat, sipping a sinful white chocolate latte. Already I feel the fires of Perdition lapping at my feet while the glimmering wrath of God is etched upon my soul. It can be washed away, so they say, but why bother with such repentitious rote rites when perfection looks you in the mirror... Vanity and wickedness ensnare us all, so they say. But how far down the path of iniquity can vanity drive before one must take the wheel and thrive?

All is relative, so Einstein says. He is wrong, by the way. I never have as much Energy as my Mass times the Cpeed of light 2quared. I'm not capable of that much on a good day; even with a bellyful of caffeine and a dissolved Ritalin ADDing focus to my mind. All is relative. Especially for those who ascribe to the story of Adam and Eve, those grand progenitors of the human race. They are the great mom and pop of humanity, which unfortunately makes everybody my relative.

Some would say that moral relativism is a tool of Satan. They may be right, but even so, who's to say the man with a pitchfork hasn't a right to pitch his work? He's probably not so bad a guy. Was he not one of the great ones in heaven, a shining example to us all before the big fight started? People are afraid of demons, evil, and the Prince of Darkness; horns, fire, black leather wings and cloven hooves. It's good humanity is afraid of such ridiculous things because if they knew the truth of what's out there and how evil really works, they'd all be shitting themselves.

Midnight Electocution

2005-10-09T01:47:00.000-06:00

I was electrocuted tonight for the first time in my life.

Earlier this evening while driving home from Barnes & Noble my front tire started to knock and wobble so I pulled the battered Honda into our driveway and broke out the tools. My assumption was that something had gone awry with the break job my roommate and I did on the wheel earlier this week. It was a frustrating ordeal at the time because we had to cut off one of the bolts before the tire could be removed. You can imagine my delight upon removing the tire this time to find everything in perfect working order. The gods of entropy had only loosened one of the lug nuts and tire wobbleage ensued.

You may be wondering how electricity comes into play. Since it was around midnight at the time, it was necessary to use an alternate light source. I strung an extention cord from the garage to run a light, and while checking the break pads to make sure they were on securely, reached for the light to move it behind the tire. Instead of grasping the insulated handle on top, however, I grabbed the bare metal cage protecting the light bulb. An unseen force immediately ripped through my clenched hand, into my arm and chest and down through my legs and feet. Aghast and shaken, moments passed before I was able to pull my hand away.

Electricity is essential to so many facets of our lives but if taken for granted it can end them as well. I'm just glad that things are ok since Monday I'll be starting my new job investigating cell tower sites all over the valley. It will require a living and healthy body and vehicle. Good thing that's still the case.

Killing Joke Weekend

2005-09-30T18:44:00.000-06:00

I'm headed down to Capitol Reef for the weekend. Currently my person is nested in the back of Dave's minivan. I have also declared this official Killing Joke Weekend. I'm going to listen to all their albums including the one recorded in the Courtauld Institute with Jaz talking about strange occult manifestations coming from the middle east. A fitting counterweight to conference weekend.

I Was Dead Today

2005-09-30T01:10:00.000-06:00

So you're sitting in your mom's kitchen eating dinner when you hear on the news that one of your good friends just died in a tragic rollover accident and his funeral was earlier that day. You go to bed heartbroken that you hadn't kept in better touch and now he's dead. Before sleep has fully caputred your consciousness your phone rings and it's your dead friend. Or he's not actually dead and the person who died is someone with almost the exact same name.

That was me making that phone call tonight. I was at work and my friend Ashley who I haven't talked to in a while calls. After getting off work I called her back to say hello and catch up. It was apparent that I had woken her up and she'd been crying. She'd heard on the news that I died in the accident this week involving the Utah State students. Without internet access and no answer on my phone she'd been left with nothing to do but go to bed.

It was actually Ryan McEntire who died in the car accident. You can read about him here.

This makes me wonder about the value of friendships. How many people do I never talk to who are in my phonebook? What if I really had died? I've been meaning to call Ashley for weeks and catch up but have been too preoccupied in my own life to take the time to reach out. If the Reaper had stretched forth his hand to me and I was gone, she would never have known that I wish her the best of times with the boy she's dating. She'd never know how much her friendship means to me and how important her happpiness is after all she's been through. If we care about the people we know why is it so hard to keep in touch with them when schedules pull us apart? This motivates me to be a better friend to people I have neglected. I could stay up and conjure up more words but I need sleep.

Sugar Crashers

2005-09-29T20:42:00.000-06:00

I eagerly await this sugar infusion from lunch and the blissful crash it will bring to my slumber tonight. A real entry will be coming soon. Not such cheap blurbs as this.

A Beautiful and Angry Sky

2005-09-21T15:29:00.000-06:00

I love the rain.

Guardian Moon

2005-09-19T00:35:00.000-06:00

The moon, bloated by the dreams of mankind, watches over me as the shroud of sleep is drawn.

Live from the Wild2: Burning Coals

2005-09-19T00:29:00.000-06:00

The wood has collapsed and I leave my djinns to play as the Sandman's Realm beckons.

Live From the Wild

2005-09-19T00:11:00.000-06:00

A smouldering tree carcass.

These pictures are sent as i sit here in the spruces campground on an unplanned camping trip by myself. It's strange that here in the wild there is still cell service. It is peaceful in this place where road noise clouds not my dreams like at home. I would write more but my phone battery is low and I need it for an alarm in the morning for sunrise photos of silver lake.

Fruit of the Tree

2005-09-18T14:34:00.000-06:00

Lucifer, one of the house boa constrictors, consuming the mortal husk of a helpless mouse.

Rictus of Hate

2005-09-11T17:15:00.000-06:00

Part of me wonders if we are experiencing the opening salvo in the Apocalypse of Saint John. War and bloodshed surround us on all sides, whole cities dissapear beneath the ocean, and people hate each other more than ever. Are the seven angels really pouring their vials of wrath upon the earth, or are we just blinded by our collective ignorance and driven to horrific acts by our own rictus of hate? I don't know. It's sad that bad things happen in the world, but I think it's important to make our own spheres of influence happier places to be. Every bit of good we do can make life easier for those afflicted by what some would call divine retribution. Whether it's donating time and money to victims of terrorist or hurricane attacks, or giving someone down on their luck a ride or some cash, how can we sleep at night if we are not doing something to help those less fortunate than us. I know I can't.

The History of Everything

2005-09-11T16:09:00.000-06:00

For those of you who are in the Salt Lake Valley, beginning on October 11th and every 2nd Tuesday of the month thereafter (except in December) I will be running a book group called "The History of Everything" at the Barnes & Noble on 5249 South State St. in Murray. We will be reading books and discussing topics pertinent to History, Science, and Philosophy. It will be a forum for those who are tired of the endless banter about the latest best-sellers and hunger for intellectual food. I am excited to delve into the treasures on bookshelves today that receive little attention. At our first meeting we will discuss the books we will be reading, and taking suggestions if you have them, and have available our first pick Skeletons on the Sahara. Please come and join me and don't forget to bring your brain. Thanks for allowing me this bit of shameless self-promotion.

Keeper of my Ka

2005-09-06T15:24:00.000-06:00

This is one from my wall.

Guardians

2005-09-05T20:45:00.000-06:00

This is my test of the mobile blog feature where I can post pics from my phone straight here. And the peasants rejoiced.

Poetry, Insomnia, and Disturbed Entities

2005-09-04T16:03:00.000-06:00

A few days ago I pulled a box of old papers from my closet and found a poem I wrote almost two years ago after being inspired by reading Hypnos, by H.P. Lovecraft. While writing I was listening to the song "Lord Hypnos" by In Flames. My mental state at the time was in turmoil and sleep graced my insomniac consciousness only on rare occasions. I entered a hyperfocused state and my pen wrote of its own accord, seeming to act as a medium for some disturbed, somnolent entity.

Hypnos

Oh thou Lord of Sleep
Where have you taken my dreams?
Those dreams that bring rest
and spread peace into my frayed soul.

Now they are gone.
With naught but phantoms left
to ravish my sleep.

Hammer and chisel gather dust
as they rot into forgotten memories
and time fades into crumbled bits
of marble, slinking away, abandoning me
to the golden clutches of night.

Unaging and majestic,
we were beyond gods and men.
Glittering stars forever reaping
the white harvest of
mankinds torpid dreams.

But something pulls me from this state of bliss
and the power which seemed within my grasp
dissolves into vapors of nothing
as I am cast into the darkness below.

Inspiration changes us in interesting ways and in unexpected places. Although my feet have trod many dark paths in life, I have never voyaged without hope, purpose, or excitement. My consciousness may be comprised of a hybrid melding of influences both light and dark, but I am the content and blissful person I am today because I have been able to synthesize my stimuli into themes and experiences meaningful to me. I would continue writing but I must depart to pick up friends so we can visit a comedy club.

The Currency of Ink

2005-08-31T08:10:00.000-06:00

I just wanted to post a quick thought before heading off to class. The other day while I was walking to my lecture on warfare in pre-modern Korea, I realized that I was without a pen. This incited a few crazed moments of panic. I was terrified by the knowledge I might miss by not being able to write. This seems like a silly thing to worry about, but what kind of world would this be if no one knew how to write. Maybe we’d still be whacking each other with clubs and chasing mastodons. What value can be placed on the tool that plays such an integral role in everything we do? It’s a question almost too obvious to even ask. Luckily I didn’t need to take notes since the lecture was on pre-historic pottery, a lecture I’ve heard at least three million times.

Frozen In Time

2005-07-31T13:40:00.000-06:00

I am currently reading The Rule of Four by Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason. Many people hail it as a Davinci Code -esque thriller except well written and not insulting to the intellect. Personally, I haven’t read Dan Brown’s book and may one day do so, but having read his previous work Angels and Demons, I wasn’t particularly impressed with the quality of his writing or the development of his characters. He writes about interesting subject matter for sure, but the work as a whole left a disappointing aftertaste. Caldwell and Thomason’s book, however, seems to be everything Brown’s is not, at least according to critics. But my reason for writing about all of this is that I came across an interesting passage on page 85 that has been the source of much thought over these past few days. The main character is describing a series of events that shaped his father’s identity.

So ended the formative period of my father’s life, the single year that set in motion all the clockwork of his future identity. Thinking back on it, I wonder if it isn’t the same for all of us. Adulthood is a glacier encroaching quietly on youth. When it arrives, the stamp of childhood suddenly freezes, capturing us for good in the image of our last act, the pose we struck when the ice of age set in.

While I find this proposal poetically appealing, I can’t help but wonder about it since I have yet to experience such a moment in my life. Maybe a moment like this yet awaits me, but maybe our identies are grown like a garden, with our childhood recollections tinted by the glasses of age. Is this a kind of observation more easily determined by those around us, or when such a period transpires does it become immediately apparent? I don’t know and will be thinking back on my life to think about possiblities. I’ll share some of them if they strike me as being particularly poignant.

Allergic to Life

2005-07-05T02:24:00.000-06:00

It would give me great pleasure to post some of the digital photos I took this weekend, but unfortunately my room is not air conditioned and it's too hot for my monitor to work. So I find myself downstairs on the public computer like I have for the past while typing away. If my eyes weren't on fire, and my nose a fount of everything but blessings, and my left ear still plugged up from the elevation change today, I might have the energy to gather all the cords to hook up the camera down here, but I don't.
Would you like some cheese with your Whine?
There is a line between genuine gripes and innane whining. When someone is confronted by issues very close to home, they have every reason to complain. But in my view, if your eyes hurt, or you ran out of Claritin, then boo hoo for you. Deal with it. I know this is an insensitive view because there are people out there who live with tremendous physical difficulties. But these kinds of considerations aside, why do people find it necessary to complain about everything? Is is so hard to be satisfied with the set of cards life dealt you. If you don't like your pair of two's, then do some work, trade in some cards and maybe you'll end up with three of a kind. Sure life's a risk, but how rewarding would it be if you never worked for anything.
This morning when we were pulling out of our campsite in Yellowstone, we passed a guy setting up a direct tv sattelite dish in front of his monstrous rv. This wasn't one of those pickup truck addons, this thing was a bus converted into a moving house. For crying out loud if you love watching sex in the city or late night QVC so much you may as well stay home. I'd like to think, and naievly so, that people go to a national park or to the wilderness to get away from the choking stench of pollution, french fry iv drips, and the apathy of consumer society. But almost every time I've gone camping in a place that has actual campgrounds there has been a handful of these cesspools on wheels, these motorhomes; running generators all night- the inhabitants never stepping foot outside except to check the propane tank.
I am also completely aware that this harsh judgement is unfair because who am I to say that someone who may genuinely enjoy the outdoors but can't physically endure the realities of camping isn't entitled to enjoying the gifts nature has to offer. Sure, Edward Abbey is probably turning over in his grave at the current state of environmental affairs, but the outdoors is there for everyone, not just those who value its sanctity.
So I will end this rant/whine session with the usual rhetorical questions and blithely sage advice. Why can't people be satisfied with their situation? If it's rotten then change it. If you can't change it then find someone who can. You wouldn't ride a bike if it didn't have any tires, and if you do, you're stupid and will ruin the resources you already have. It's so easy to be allergic to life and find faults everywhere. Sure, there are problems all over, but until we have confronted the problems within our own selves, nothing else matters.

Yellowstone

2005-07-01T12:17:00.000-06:00

Well all, I'm off to Yellowstone for the weekend. I'll be sure to return with many fabulous photos to enjoy.

Dream Slayers

2005-06-30T01:38:00.000-06:00

I don't have a story to tell tonight or anything planned to write. There is so much that has happened during this past month that any effort to catch up as I've hoped would be an exercise in futility. Instead I will just free write and let the words flow directly from my brain onto the page. I am not going to edit this in any way, just let what comes come. Last Sunday I saw a man on stilts at the Utah Arts Festival. He had a happy clown face painted but was dressed in all black and had a mob of gothic looking kids following him beating a drum. Remembering back to that moment it now feels like he could have been "Giant Joker: Harbinger of the Apocalypse". Everyone at the festival was drunk. I was hit on at the food stands by a gay man holding two beers. He was very awestruck that I had a camera around my neck and wanted to know what I was taking pictures of. My answer was lame no doubt since I don't remember what it was, but neither did he. Undoubtedly he thought I was gay as well since I was wearing a festive blue shirt with flowers and butterflys on it. Noticing the white t-shirt I was wearing he asked me if I was wearing garments and if I was a returned missionary. After affirming his presumption he started to cry and apologized for embarassing me. I sauntered off utterly un-embarrased and paused in a crowd of people to turn around and snap a photo of him standing by the trash crying. Later on when I was watching the Salt Lake Alternative Jazz Orchestra he noticed me standing amid a group of females and walked off upset and ran into a tree. I don't know why I am writing about this. Maybe because being only one of two straight guys in a house where everyone else is gay, i can't help but notice these things anymore. Fuck it, why can't I just write about flowers or something.

I had a long conversation today about why I don't have a girlfriend. It was really nice to have that kind of conversation and actually feel like it mattered what I said. Too often nowadays I have to justify myself and why I'm not wildly successful with a family and kids at my age. The central problem for me is that women my own age are put off by my lack of success and anyone not in my age group thinks I'm too old. While I know it is unfair to judge oneself by societal standards, both have elements of truth. But the central point that people miss about myself, and everyone for that matter, is that who you are is more than just the sum of your lifes accomplishments. How can society bestow a badge of successfulness on someone when there is so much corruption and filth around us constantly. Who sets the standards for happiness? Vogue, Forbes, CNN, Entertainment Weekly! Come all, let us worship before the golden altar of commerce. Throw us your purses. Give us your energy and in return we will bestow upon you a shining crown of immortality. Come, drink from our fountain of youth. Devote your lives to our cause and we will be your provider when your bones turn to dust and skin dissolves like vapor. Fear not old age, for we are here. Buy into our great system of happiness and prosperity. Let us fill your souls with the ecstacy of success. We are the givers of life. Prophetic messengers for an era of blood, excess and putrescence. Give us your dreams...and despair!
Pause for breath
Yesterday afternoon while I was walking down the sidewalk to the Pi for lunch I passed a yard with sprinklers running and two birds splashing in a puddle. They were playing with such happiness that it was impossible to not be caught up in their fervor. This past month has been a very happy and exciting one. Why this is, I'm not sure. Nothing terribly different has occured. I still listen to the same music. Go to the same job, albeit working many more hours. Talk to pretty much the same people. If going from my past trends I should be in a funk right now. I've not written more than once this entire month. Every formal date I've been on for the past year has been like being force-fed fecal matter. Maybe I am finally learning from my past miseries. I am to a stage where it no longer matters to me what others think about who I am. My sense of happiness doesn't hinge upon the approval of other people. The only thing that matters to me in my life right now is being happy myself and doing what I can to make the lives of those I care about happy as well. I love being me.

It makes me sad when I see the lives of my friends sucked dry by the forces of this world. My friend Holly wrote the other day, "never ever allow the devils of corporate america to ruin your dreams." How often do we let ourselves be physically and mentally drained by the routine of our lives. We drive the same route to and from work every day. Do the same things. Talk to the same people and at the end of the day it's all we can do to just eat dinner and make it to the next day. If we're lucky enough to have any spare time it's usually wasted by frivolous things and years pass and we wonder why our dreams are just as far away now as they were five years ago. As Will Smith says in the movie "Hitch" which I watched on Saturday night, "Begin each day as if it were on purpose." Break up the routine. Take the bus to work. Give a hitchhiker a ride. Talk to someone you don't know. Have dreams and work on them. What are we without these things? Just cogs in the great machine being worn down to stubs until our usefulness to society has ceased and we're thrown on the junkpile waiting for our raw materials to be recycled.

That's about enough naval gazing for now. Sounds like I have a lot of bitterness built up inside. I should work on that. I'm really excited this weekend to go to Yellowstone National Park for the very first time. It'll be nice to escape the noise and chaos of the city. Unplug for a little while. I may miss the fireworks on the fourth, depending on how long it takes us to get back that day, but if I do miss it, I did see the most tremendous fireworks display of my life last saturday night at the Trailorsville Days finale. It went on for about twenty minutes and was spectacular. Who knew that Neil Diamond could be so cool. I'd better end this because I need to keep better hours. I hope reading this hasn't been a painful experience. I usually reserve these rants for my actual journal that can be tucked neatly away to be forgotten and read only when I feel like a heavy dose of embarassment, but somehow it seemed fitting to do it here for all to read.

Catching Up

2005-06-09T12:52:00.000-06:00

I have allowed the chaotic tides of everyday life carry me away from my one true love; writing in this blog. There is much to catch up with and I could not hope to do it all now. In fact, I will do none of it now since it's my day off and there are errands ad infinitum to run, but know that I have great stories coming up of meeting famous musicians, miracles, tragedies, and pictures of a boa constrictor eating a mouse. Soon.

Darth Avian

2005-05-28T02:35:00.000-06:00

On Tuesday morning I awoke to the sound of a bird outside my window chirping Darth Vader's theme song. Absurd as it sounds, the critter must have been as excited as I was to see Episode III again. But birds don't care about Sith Lords. They don't care about the coolest scene in the film, where Anakin/Darth leads the Fourth Reich army of stormtroopers into the Jedi Temple. Birds don't get excited about light saber duels on a planet out of Dante's Inferno. Birds are just birds. They eat and sing and shit and lay eggs. But this particular one, which at first I thought was a whole nest of them because of the wide variety of sonds it made, was chirping the infamous dah dah dah dum da dahh dum da dahh. I listened for 10 minutes to make sure I wasn't imposing my own excitement on what I was hearing. Time slipped away and I was forced to drive to class so I wouldn't be late. My mind can rest easily now that I know Darth Avian protects my window from pesky Jedi sparrows.

Saltair Video

2005-05-23T02:08:00.000-06:00

I was going through my ftp folder the other day and was surprised to find a video I made a few years ago. The images come from one of my wanderings out on the lakebed of the Great Salt Lake. I have since lost all of them since the disk they were stored on grew old and dumped its data. The actual video file is 17 megs so at the time I made a shockwave file that is smaller but unfortunately cuts out about half way through. It's amatuerish and campy but the shots are great and it's how I taught myself how to use Flash.

small partial clip
large right-click and save as

The Sociopath Next Door

2005-05-23T00:27:00.000-06:00

My fellow blogger just posted some thoughts that fit exactly into what I was going to write next. Here's what she said.

what do you do when you realize you're psychotic... (the rest was cleverly disguised) but you refuse to go to a psychologist because your mother is one and the "soothing" voice and questions just trigger the frustration and psychosis...
i wouldn't want to put anyone through living with me. what if i'm crazy at my children or husband... who the hell knows what i'll do... i don't want to be that mother or wife... I DON'T WANT TO BE THAT PERSON... not even now... what do i do???
its funny... it's like i'm on the outside... i know exactly whats going on, and what should be happening... but i can't do anything about it. its actually kind of scary... i'm crazy. insane. and completely serious.

Here is my reply

Ha ha... i know exactly how you feel. The real killer, though, is knowing that you should probably go see a therapist while at the same time also realizing that they wouldn't tell you anything you don't already know, or that you'd end up spending the time helping them deal with how twisted you are. Right now I'm reading the new book "The Sociopath Next Door" by Martha Stout. As she works herself into hysterics over how dangerous sociopaths are, I can't help but laugh because in some ways her descriptions of sociopathic attitudes fit my own exactly. Here's a good quote from the introduction.

"The argument can easily be made that "sociopathy" and "antisocial personality disorder" and "psychopathy" are misnomers, reflecting an unstable mix of ideas, and that the absence of conscience does not really make sense as a psychiatric category in the first place. In this regard, it is crucial to note that all of the other psychiatric diagnoses (including narcissism) involve some amount of personal distress or misery for the individuals who suffer from them. Sociopathy stands alone as a "disease" that causes no dis-ease for the person who has it, no subjective discomfort. Sociopaths are often quite satisfied with themselves and with their lives, and perhaps for this very reason there is no effective "treatment." Typically, sociopaths enter therapy only when they have been court-referred, or when there is some secondary gain to be had from being a patient. Wanting to get better is seldom the true issue. All of this begs the question of whether the absence of conscience is a psychiatric disorder or a legal designation- or something else altogether." (pg 12-13)

I don't know if her talk of sociopaths applies to your or my situations, but her book is insightful for those of us whose world exists outside the comfort-zone of our peers.

Arabic Class

2005-05-19T11:05:00.000-06:00

I am sitting in the language lab waiting for the Arabic professor to find the url for some website we are supposed to visit today. The tapes we must listen to are only available here in the language lab and everyone is throwing fits about not being able to have their own. Unless, of course, you work for Barnes and Noble and get them for *nothing*. Let me explain. Last night I came across the very set of tapes that have been out of print for years and are no longer available. Apparantly it wasn't supposed to be on the shelf. It's proper place was in the trash. Why? Ask corporate America that question. They tell us what to do and we do it. I love Big Brother.

By the way, I did much better on my Vietnam paper than I thought I would. I got a big fat whopping A. The prof. is done now so ta ta.

Crosswalk Elves

2005-05-17T13:34:00.000-06:00

I saw something this afternoon that makes me reconsider the truth of something my father told me as a young lad. The chirping you hear at crosswalks in downtown Salt Lake, he claimed, come from birds enslaved inside the yellow boxes on the lightposts. This was a lie, but at the time it was believeable because grown ups know best. Especially my dad, who once told my sister that he was a unicorn. Today's experience is like when the character in the movie Big Fish discovers all his fathers stories are true.

The chirping crosswalk-box on the corner of University and 100 South started working again today. At the very moment I noticed this, I also saw a dead bird on the ground directly below the lightpost. Cooincidences this strange do not happen, so the only conclusion I can make is that last night the crosswalk elves replaced the broken bird with a fresh one. If this chirping does come from real birds, then ergo my father is also a unicorn.

Christo and Jeanne-Claude's Gates Project

2005-05-14T02:29:00.000-06:00

Here are some photos from my trip in February to see the gates in NYC

Book of Cursings

2005-05-14T02:03:00.000-06:00

It seems like the times I am most inclined to write are when I should be doing something else. I must be at work in five hours but yet I type. My less than stellar paper on Vietnam was almost a week late because I couldn’t do anything else until the story of Daniel the hitchhiker was finished, and when it was done I was too drained to do any thinking for days. Luckily the professor was chill.

I must share two experiences, one tragic and the other horrible. The first was about two weeks ago when I was waiting in the doctor’s office. Every month when I go there it is an ordeal because I end up waiting two hours just to see him for five minutes. No real complaints about it though, because that’s what must be done when you constantly ingest a controlled substance like methylphenidate. Anyway, I overheard two nurses talking, one male and the other female. The male nurse, who I’ll call Emelio, was relating the story of his divorce to his coworker. According to Emelio, his wife became pregnant while having an affair that she didn’t know her husband was aware of. For nine months he was tormented by the question of his child’s legitimacy. Even though I didn’t hear the end of the story I assumed it was a tragic one since he was crying.
I wonder if the two of them assumed I wasn’t listening since I appeared to be engrossed in my book, The Soul of Nowhere. The female nurse even asked me about it earlier, thinking it was some sort of New Age blather. She lost interest when I told her it was written by the naturalist Craig Childs, and had nothing to do with souls.

The other experience was a week ago at Barnes and Noble when an ancient man bought the book 1,000 Places to See Before You Die. I was dying to make a snide remark about the likelihood of him seeing any of the locations in the two weeks he probably had left to live. But of course I was a polite employee and wished him a wonderful day. Maybe he will live on for decades, but he could barely stand up or even walk. It's a good thing I don’t suffer from touretts. Instead I write these quotes in my Book of Cursings, a page in my notebook directly after the one for Inspiring Quotes.

Fields of the Dead

2005-05-11T04:35:00.000-06:00

This entry was written tonight while sitting in the Mt. Calvary Catholic Cemetary.

I made a choice tonight that has separated me from the mundane world and brought me to an intimate place where tears and pain linger above a candle burning in the rain. No regrets fill my mind for turning down an offer to spend the evening with friends. Instead I chose to walk around the historic district of Salt Lake drinking the cool night air. My walk brought me to the Mt. Calvary Catholic Cemetery where I now sit. Before me is the grave of John William Gallion III 1980-2004. What attracted me here was a small candle burning in the dark. It sits inside a white paper bag the size of a lunchsack with holes on each side. The top is closed which has allowed the candle to burn for hours even though rain falls on all sides. Behind the tombstone is a bench beneath a giant tree that screens out some of the rain, but still water patters from above and I hunch over this small notebook in an effort to keep the pages dry.

I sit on my jacket next to the candle on the ground and have no idea what time it is. Even with the flickering light of the candle it is difficult to see the words I write. A sign on the way in stated that no candles or open flames are allowed, but I am glad for the light.

I had no specific destination in mind when I walked out on the evenings chatter, only an aversion for both human company and self-imposed exile in my room. Occasionally I am afflicted with bouts of wanderlust, and tonight is just such a night.

Some people find my graveyard wanderings bizarre, but in the middle of the city it is a serene place to disconnect from the routines of life. A bone protruding from a freshly turned patch of soil startled me at first, but it was a plastic bag. I came upon a great white angel writing in the book of life, but no names yet graced this tombstone and I moved on. I was drenched and began looking for a sheltered place to record my thoughts. Drawn by this candle, I wonder how John William Gallion III left this earth. Only two years younger than I, was he an army officer who died in Iraq, or the victim of a car accident? Two bouquets of flowers grace his tombstone, one white and one red. The lamb’s red blood will wash him white as these flowers. The page is smearing now, so I will end.

Midnight NIN Party

2005-05-02T22:59:00.000-06:00

I have done enough naval-gazing during the past few weeks to last a lifetime. Stare for too long and all you see is lint. As a corrective measure I will soon depart for the midnight Nine Inch Nails release party at Modified Music down the street. My choice of music concerns my parents who always tell me that someday I will be the nice father of young children. This may be true, but how can I escape the vortex of post-adolescent male anxt if I don't want to?

Alien Invasions and Phantom Hijackings- End

2005-05-02T17:20:00.000-06:00

I have decided to postpone the writing of my paper on Vietnam in order to finally complete my story. It wasn’t my intention to turn this into a serial story ala “The Green Mile”, but finals week has forced me to do just this. I just started reading the new philosophical treatise called “On Bullshit” by Harry G. Frankfurt. So when Daniel says to me he’d rather go to Park City, my unease was palpable and a passage from this book now comes to mind. “Whenever a person deliberately misrepresents anything, he must inevitably be misrepresenting his own state of mind.” Being the trusting person that I am, and always inclined to believe in the inherent goodness of the people around me, I wasn’t sure what to make of this guy. His mental disconnectedness was apparent, but as he tried to explain to me why he’d rather go to Park City, that his indecision stemmed from trying to find the best place to make it through Wyoming then back east, he also had a crazed look of desperation in his eyes that churned my stomach. I tried to weigh the options in my mind. Main street Park City and back would be well over an hour, and although I had enough gas to make the trip, barely, it would effectively kill my study time for the night since it would be well after 10 when I returned and time for the nightly ritual of worship before the golden altar of Halo2. But my first final wasn’t for a week yet, this assumption was erroneous since I found out the next day it was that Friday, so why not do this guy a favor and take him wherever he needs to go. Without saying a word I exit on Bangerter and get back on the 201 heading the other way. Until I broke the silence a few minutes later, I saw three different scenarios with this guy. First, that he was the stereotypical homeless man wracked by inner demons, mentally and emotionally eviscerated by alcoholism and destined to fall prey to schizophrenia and dementia. If that were the case, I'd probably better not do anything to piss him off. Second, which I call the Hollywood scenario, is that he really is trying to make it back east and plans on using my car without me in it, in which case I should be ready. Or third, he’s totally legit and just on the road trying to find a new life but is currently down on his luck.

To ease the growing silence I ask him where he’s from. “Minnesota,” he offers flatly. Clearly he hates small talk as much as I do because that’s all he says. Trying to find some way of identifying, I start talking about everything I know about Minnesota, I have an Aunt who lives in Walker, I think. Her husband is a park ranger and they’d moved there from Alaska. “So where is Walker?” he asks. Not being sure where it is, I say it’s somewhere in the north. Still trying to draw him in, I inquire about his family. “Oh, they’re still there.”

He looks out his side window and asks, “Where are we?” I tell him that we are on I-80 going east which will take us directly to Park City. He reaches for his papers again and leans forward to use the light of the glove box. Wearied by this exchange I turn on the radio to fill the cavernous space between us. During the day I listen to NPR but this late at night jazz is playing. This seems like a neutral enough choice and I let the road and darkness soak up my thoughts, resigned to my task yet conscious of the knife tucked under my thigh. Still gazing out the window, he says, I started a family here, but…” he trails off and I don’t press him for more details.

Now we are passing by suicide rock and over the giant culvert that feeds under the freeway and into a pool below. I smile and think of the many fun times when we would go to this culvert and block one end and let the water build up, meanwhile sitting inside on a black sled we call “the rocket.” Someone would let down the boards holding back the river and a gush of water would push us through the 200 yards of the concrete pipe into the cool pond below.

“What’s this?’ he says in disgust at the atonal wailing emanating from the speakers. I’m not usually a huge fan of jazz, being desensitized by the rhythmic electronic aggression of industrial techno, or the wailing guitars and throaty screams of European Metal, but today the soft, wandering female vocals backed by a jazz trio was soothing and surprisingly fitting.

“It’s jazz, but you can change it if you want,” I say. “What kind of music do you like?”

“60’s or 70’s. The good stuff.” He nods his head and smiles with a tense satisfaction. I press the search button on the radio and ask him what he thinks of Salt Lake. As the dial cycles through the radio band over and over, my antennae being broken, he says it’s interesting here, but too Mormony.

I chuckle and say, “Yea, it’s kind of like living in a bubble.” He agrees but then says its not as bad or different from Boulder, Colorado. “I guess that’s true of almost any small or isolated place," I say. "They evolve a strange kind of cultural incest that’s completely normal if you are from there.” The radio is still searching so I press stop and he laughs as Santana’s distinctive thrumming greets our ears. “I’ve never been to Boulder, only Colorado Springs. I went there for spring break a few years ago. My friend’s dad was a dentist there and had a really nice house. Good times.” I reminisce out loud and continue on about how Colorado Springs was smaller than Salt Lake, but even closer to the mountains and very beautiful. We’re deep in the canyon now and the radio cuts out. “What’s your favorite place? I ask.

He thinks for a moment then says slowly, “Wyoming, Evanston, the Rockies,” he pauses,” they’re so beautiful. Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Maine, New York,” After reciting this laundry list of favorite places, he adds, “Colorado didn’t like me very much, though.” He closes his eyes and half-turns his head away from me.

Silence again sinks in and I hesitate. Finally I ask, “Why not?”

He chuckles an uneasy laugh, opens his eyes and transforms into a totally different person. He sits forward in his seat and the far-away, glazed look in his eyes disappears. “When I was in Boulder they wrongfully accused me of stealing a van, you know, one of those moving kinds, and I spend four days in lockdown.” I remark on how rotten that must have been. I’d heard these stories countless times in Missouri talking to people on the street who’d served time. They were always wrongfully accused, innocent, victimized by a corrupt judicial system. “It was only four days, though” he adds, trying to ease the shock.

“So you were held there unjustly!” I say, feeding into his story.

“Dang right I was! And let me tell you what I told the Judge and D.A.” he says, starting to shout. “You have no reason to hold me here.” Gesturing wildly with his hands he continues even louder,” What evidence do you have? NONE!” Angrily screaming at me now at the top of his lungs,” WHY THE FUCK AM I HERE? I DIDN’T STEAL ANYTHING! YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO HOLD ME HERE!” I choose not to wipe the flecks of saliva from my face, knuckles going white from clutching the knife. “Anywhere else in this FREE COUNTRY I would never be in here. I broke no laws. You got no evidence at ALL. LET ME GO!” It seemed like he was reliving this experience and thought I was the D.A.. Only this time there were no armed guards and the judge was some punk college kid. Never in my life had I seen the cold gaze of murder in someone’s eyes; portrayed by actors in movies yes, but never the violently charged and malevolent blast of hatred aimed at me, about to die. Somehow I’d disconnected this man from reality and his murderous screams and violent gesticulations had my heart pounding wildly. If it was going to be him or me, I surely wasn’t’ going to be the one thrown in a ditch, gutted and dying. I flipped the knife around for better ease of stabbing, and as he screamed and shouted I wondered how I could dispose of this person without getting blood all over the car. As if on its own accord, my mouth said, “Did they let you go?”

“Yea they did,” he sat back, “they had to.” The tension dissolved into an unforced and genuine laugh. “They let me go and I had to spend four days in jail.” Once again he seemed to transform into someone completely different. One moment he was a furious madman with death in his eyes, and the next all anger and tension were gone, and what remained was a laughing gentleman who seemed no different than anyones dad. We laughed the rest of the way up the canyon about societal injustices, happiness and the true meaning of life. He no longer was the absent-minded, quiet, or killer, hitchhiker, but a genuinely nice guy riding in my car. I pulled off the Kimball Junction exit and he asked if we could stop by a gas station. There’s a Chevron on the so I stopped beneath the lights next to the gas pumps.

“I’m going to run in,” he said, “but promise you won’t leave.”

“I won’t,” I tell him, “I give you my word,” and reach to shake his hand.

He takes it and makes me promise two more times then says, “You’d be surprise how nice people like yourself just drive away.” He shakes his head. “People are rotten.”

“Tell you what,” I say, “I’ll come in with you.” We get out and I lock the car. Inside I start for the back but he looks lost. “Do you want anything?” I ask.

“Grapefruit,” he says loudly. We meet at the back but they don’t have the Dole Grapefruit he wants. “Just get whatever you want,” I say and gesture to the nearest cooler which I nervously notice is full of alcohol.

To my relief, he walks over a few yards to the energy drink cooler and says, pointing at a four-pack of Red Bull. “You wouldn’t?”

“Get whatever,” I say. He starts to open the package but then notices a shelf of RockStars. ”Is this OK?” he asks.

“Aah, sure, don’t worry about it.” We start towards the front of the store. He notices the RockStar emblem, one backwards R and one forwards R, and turns to me and says, “My name is Ruiz.” Alarm bells, panic, gut tightening, “Your name has an R, mine has an R,” I realize he has just told me his last name, “and together we are the RR team.”

“Rockstars!” I say and we laugh and give each other a high five. He stops and turns toward me. We are standing about six feet in front of the cashier now, who is listening intently.

“As you know, I’m hitchhiking and trying to make it to Evanston.” He says, seeming to level with me and open up with complete honesty. “You have no idea how helpful this has been, but would be willing to take me to Evanston?”

I hesitate then say, “Park City is as far as I can take you. If I didn’t have a final tomorrow, I would.” This is a lie, but he doesn’t know that. “But yea, Park City’s as far as I can take you.”

“What if I gave you some gas money?” I turn him down. “What about twenty dollars?” Again I refuse then add, “I’m not even going to accept any gas money from you tonight.”

“Okay, no problem.” He smiles. “It never hurts to ask.” I pay for our drinks and the cashier, a toothless, scraggly guy much scarier looking than Daniel, gives us directions to the Heber truck stop just off the next freeway exit. As we get in the car I decide to put in the new album by Anathema, a mellow blend of British pop and progressive metal. Daniel really likes it and starts moving to the beat. We pull on the freeway and chat like old high-school buddies. I tell him I admire his goal of helping to improve peoples lives with his newsletter. He inquires about my school plans and as I pull into the truck stop and put the car in park I find myself telling him of my plans to live in a beach town, own a small bookstore and art gallery and write books for a living. This excites him and he pulls out a little notebook, saying he wants to send a free copy of his newsletter to all those who helped him on his journey. As I write down my real name, address and phone number, he tells me that “This is my new beginning. I’m starting afresh, a new life. Thank you so much for your help. I knew that when you told me you wouldn’t accept any gas money that you have a heart of gold and I knew not to ask any more. Thank you!”

I finish writing and tell him I’m happy to help a fellow traveler along life’s path. He looks at what I wrote and seeing this blog address, asks, “What’s this?” I tell him that I will write about this experience and he can read it if he wants. We laugh for a minute about the sheer yuppiness of a blog and another car pulls up to the pump next to us. He grabs his things and says, “Thanks so much for this,” holding up his crinkled RockStar can.

“Hey,” I tell him reaching for my wallet, “This isn’t anything at all, but maybe you can get a burger or something.” I hand him my only cash, a one dollar bill. This feels strangely inadequate and I feel almost embarrassed. I realize that that I would have given him any cash I’d had; one or a hundred dollars, it wouldn’t matter. In this short period of time a bond had developed between us and I sincerely hoped he would contact me in the future.

“Thanks again,” he graciously thanks me,” I’m gonna see if this guy’ll give me a ride,” pointing to the adjacent car.

“Good Luck,” I say. He leaves, running too the other vehicle clutching his plastic sack. I drive away and look back to see the other car doing the same and Daniel Ruiz standing in the rain waving exuberantly at me as I drive off. I honk my horn, wave, and am gone.

Driving back with the canyon wrapped around me, and the swish wipe wipe of the rain outside, I start to cry. What kind of person had I become. I’d been ready to kill this man who only wanted a ride. For someone to be nice and help him along the path of rebirth. The miles disappeared under my feet and I wept myself dry. Even now as I write these words sitting beneath a giant Marilyn Monroe poster at the Pi pizzeria, tears blur the ink and I can’t help but contemplate the things I’ll never know.

Alien Invasions and Phantom Hijackings Part 2

2005-04-29T06:21:00.000-06:00

The night has grown long and soon the hour will come when sol invictus slides over the jagged mountains and warm glowing rays touch the heavens. Turned away by our dripping sky, brief moments may pass when these sparkling beams percolate through the weeping nimbus gates, but it is here wrapped within the silence and shadow of my room that I am at peace and feel ready to complete the tale I began several days hence.

I have allowed this time to pass for two reasons. First is the looming specter of my Roman History final in the morning. Second, and more importantly, is the profundity of what transpired this past Monday night. It is true that much of what I have experienced these past weeks has been extraordinary, but I now see that they were only ghostly foreshadows of what was to come.

I have also received numerous inquiries about the nature of this story. It is not the sensational progeny of my overactive brain, and is not fictional in any way. My life would be much simpler if this were the case, but since life is never simple, I must relate this tale as it transpired and leave the lessons to you.

As I mentioned before, while digging for my keys I was approached by a gentleman needing a ride. I crawled in the driver seat, unlocked the doors and he got in. His scarecrow-like figure melted into the maroon fabric almost as if it were a mighty throne and he a King seated for the very first time. He sat limp and expressionless with his head against the back of the seat. This wandering miscreant who sat in my car had the ferocious black beard and leathery, weathered skin of a man who has spent more time out doors than in. Although at first glance this appearance led me to assume that he was another homeless transient, upon closer inspection while backing up my battered Honda, he may not actually have been in such a state of destitution. His clothes were not ratty and discolored with the oil and dirt of ceaseless wear, and his scent was more akin to a group of campers than someone with a long overstayed welcome inside their own skin.

As I pulled the car onto 400 west and asked which truck stop he would like me to leave him at, he turned his head towards me and said while vacantly staring into the distance, “California Avenue.” I told him no problem and drifted along toward the freeway entrance. “Daniel is my name,” he stoically said with outstretched hand. Shaking it, I told him that it was nice to meet him and my name was Bryan. He nodded his head and leaned it back against the seat. This exchange distracted me from turning right onto 4th south, so instead silence descended upon us while I waited for a clear moment to shoot the gap between cars onto the 5th south onramp. Once this was done and the light g-forces of gravity and acceleration pushed us down, I inquired about the kind of publishing and writing he was involved with. “I published a business directory for the Lake Powell area and am headed back east to start up a self-improvement and wellness newsletter,” he said, with the same inflection that might be used while reciting your grocery list to a plant. It was the same kind of plan I’d heard many times while talking up Jesus in the ghettos of St. Louis or from chatty cardboard sign-holders in downtown Salt Lake; I used to be famous and have power, but now I is just waitin’ for the right time to come along, you know. I even believed these stories the first few times I heard them, but after hearing the same exact shtick every time someone down on their luck crossed my path, I stopped listening.

As the moments ticked back and forth and the peering headlights of fellow traffickers passed by I found myself completely devoid of anything to say. I would much rather observe the people around me than interact with them. Even if I know someone well, I dislike conversation just to fill up space, and even more so if it’s with some strange person. That’s the main reason I don’t care about not being trained at the Museum by another volunteer. Forced intimacy with anyone at all makes me uncomfortable. It’s basically the same conversation you have with anybody you first meet. What are you studying? Where do you work? What do you want to do? Just press button number 12 and the same nonsense garbage comes out every time. I used to tell people before 9/11 happened that I was majoring in Terrorism just to shut them up. But this was worse than that. Daniel was like a dead fish sitting in my car waiting to be thrown in front of a truck. So when it became clear after a few minutes that he was not going to talk, I pressed button 12 and started yapping about how self-improvement is a good area to go into, how I work in a bookstore and people go ape-shit for those books, I’m studying history at the university, everyone wants to live happier lives, on and on and on, shtick, shtick, shtick. But I digress and am letting my emotions interfere with the narrative.

So there I was doing the best I could to alleviate the tension of an uneasy situation when just as the California Ave. Truck stop was in sight he leans forward and says, “You know, I’d rather go to the Lakeside stop.” It took a second for me to realize that he meant the middle of nowhere Tooele Lakeside stop. I’d be willing to bet that even most locals don’t know where Lakeside is. I wouldn’t have known were I not fascinated with the West desert and stopped there every time I go on an excursion to sugar up. I verify that this is the stop he is talking about and he says, “Yea, the one just off the freeway by the lake.” Little warning bells started ringing inside my head. Lakeside is at least a half-hour drive from Salt Lake even in the best of conditions, but with a storm rolling in and an increasingly disturbing person in my car I wasn’t sure that would be a good idea.

“No problem,” I heard myself say and switched to West Desert Autopilot Mode. Sure, Lakeside was a long ways away, but at least I could stop by Saltair on the way back and wander around the lakebed for a while, which incidentally, is one of my favorite things to do in the middle of the night. Feeling an odd sense of resolution and unease, I again started happily yapping about my existential trips to the desert while reaching into my door pocket for the blued steel diving knife I keep for just such occasions. As I’m talking I flick open the snap with my thumb, slowly ease the knife from its sheath and slip the obsidian colored blade under my thigh. By now he’s using the light in my glove box to look at some papers that appear to be printed off the internet. My dome lights don’t work and he thought it was strange when I suggested using the glove box for illumination. I can see the Bangerter exit off the 201 now and he sits up and turns to me and says, “You know, if I had my druthers, I’druther go to Park City.” Giant alarm gongs start pounding in my skull and I ask him where in Park City he needs to go? Possibly sensing my alarm, he says, “You see, the only reason I would want to go to Lakepoint is so I could get up to Park City.”

This is a very rotten place to pause, but I must sleep before my final.

Interlude

2005-04-26T12:33:00.000-06:00

I'm in my American history class and am having difficulty focusing on our current discussion of reasons why there are 15 times more land mines in Mozambique than people. Usually I would eat up any discussion of the Cold War, nuclear deterrance and global apocalypse, but today my attention is still focused on last night. (By the way, if anyone has any creative suggestions on how the end of WWII and the Cold War affected American society between 1942 and 1960, feel free to pitch in before next Thursday)

Alien Invasions and Phantom Hijackings Part 1

2005-04-26T00:40:00.000-06:00

This is the tale of how I found myself holding a knife while confronted by a strange man inside my car. It’s not as dramatic as you might think, but well outside the realm of everyday experience. Even as I type these words I know that I should be writing a comparative analyses of the Vietnam war using the writings of Mao Tse Tung and Carl Von Clausewitz as reference points; but such things are reserved for the all night caffeine laden, keyboard hammer-fests that college students are familiar with. Events such as the one I just experienced must be recorded or lost forever to the shrouds of memory.

Monday night is “Family Friendly Monday” at the Museum of Natural History and again I found myself flying solo, but unlike last week when I was accompanied by 150 eager elementary school children, today I had naught but the dust of ages to keep me company. This is what I wrote as I sat in the Paleontology Hall.

Alien Life Forms

For the past week or so I have been thinking about a remark made in Craig Child’s interview on Radio West. They were talking about his traveling companion, an ex-cop, and how similar life on the street and life in the desert are. On the street, he notes, something happens and you are forced to immediately process that event and determine what it means and how you should react. It’s the same in the desert, he continues, you see a rock, lizard, or storm and you have no choice but to determine the significance of that event and where you should place it inside your brain.

Sitting here in the dinosaur gallery with only the immortalized skeletons of ancient monsters for company, I am stricken by the intimacy of this environment. The silence of this gallery is only enhanced by the background hum of the air conditioner, and it seems strange to think of my skeleton displayed in some Alien museum 60 million years in the future. Who’s to say that humans will still be around? Will Earth have become a celestial paradise in 60 million years as predicted by Mormon theology? Or will aliens from a far off planet discover the Voyager space probe and invade Earth after deciphering the recording of a humpback whale song challenging other males for dominance- incidentally when the probe was sent, scientists thought the song was their mating call.

At this point my words were lifted away by the sacrosanct silence and all I could do was sketch the bones around me.

First was an ill-proportioned portrayal of a raptor skull (top) then a near true size drawing of a T-Rex braincase (bottom). As you can see I didn’t get very far in texturing and shading the bone before something inside me snapped and I had to get out of there. The volunteer office was locked up so I left my key and vest at the front desk and began walking home. On the way there I realized that I had some free passes to an advanced screening of the new action flick “XXX- State of the Union”. I made it to the Gateway Megaplex just in time for previews and was thoroughly entertained by the films mind-numbing action. A near clone of its predecessor, the movie offered everything the producers’ target audience could want: government conspiracies, fast cars, prison breaks, aircraft carrier tank battles, explosions galore, and absolutely no reason to use a single brain cell. When it ended, already being in study-avoidance mode, I considered finishing the night off by watching The Interpreter, but decided against it and headed back to my car. It is here that my story really begins.

While walking across 4^th west and up 2^nd south to my parking stall, I was amusing myself by imagining a story where the Utah Paperbox Company, which is right there, is really a front for a secret Mormon/Government installation bent at world domination. I reached the car and was digging in my pocket for the keys when a bearded, scrawny gentleman wearing khaki cargo pants and a tucked in long-sleeved flannel shirt walked up to me and said, “Excuse me sir, I’m an author and publisher just passing though town and was wondering if I were to give you some gas money, and if you were feeling like a Good Samaritan, if you’d be willing to drop me off at the truck stop?”

“Sure, hop in,” My mouth said before any societal conditioning could say otherwise. We got in the car and I entered a world most people only read about or see in movies.

I apologize, but the day's trauma has sucked my juices dry and I'm too tired to continue. I will finish on the morrow.

Lunchtime Musings

2005-04-23T19:05:00.000-06:00

It's lunchtime here at the bookstore and I sit beneath the giant awning overhead while angel tears pepper the sky with their reigns of sadness. All afternoon I have felt like a bloated turkey. Usually I'm not much of an eater, taking time to eat only when my body says it's going to collapse. But today I've eaten way toom much fast food: Arbys for lunch, Taco Hell for dinner, and about 64 oz of Mtn Dew thrown in for good measure. If I don't start cutting back on my soda and crap food I might start to gain weight. I'm not sure how likely that is, though, since I've been 6 feet tall and weighed 165 pounds since the eighth grade- over 14 years ago. Thank the gene gods for giving me high metabolism

Spiral Jetty Field Trip

2005-04-22T17:13:00.000-06:00

This post comes from my notebook and is a confusing stream-of-conciousness since it was written in spurts while on the bus.

Todays final field trip for Geography 3000 is to the spiral Jetty. I was hoping to sit a safe distance away from the frat monkeys today, but due to the lack of foresight on my part the only seat left on the bus was at the very back. This was incredibly lucky, though, because I got the very best one; right in the middle of Sigma Nu squalor. Okay, it's not that bad. I actually like it, crammed on the aisle directly in front of the bathroom door, one of those really small tour bus ones that you can hear and smell everything that goes on inside, and next to a hefty fellow wearing a High School Football t-shirt who takes up his whole seat and half of mine. The icing on the cake, though, is my broken seat that shifts back and forth whenever the bus moves.

We just left the Golden Spike National historic monument and am on our way to the Jetty. Once we got on the freeway in Salt Lake our valiant instructor showed us a video on the histoy of the golden spike and the trans-continental railroad. Everyone complained about having to watch the documentary, but once we arrived at the visitor center they were spewing forth facts from it like they'd known them all along.

The original trans-continental Railbed as seen from the bus looking up.

The same Rail Bed further on covered with grass and vegetation.

A now unused restoration of the rail at the visitors center

While walking across the parking lot back out to the bus I was taken aback to see a character from the documentary standing in front of the bus. He was slightly plump with a pioneer-like goatee and wore a black vest, pants, shoes, and a white long sleeved shirt. Only after gaping at him for a few moments did I realize he was our bus driver.

Now we're watching Robert Smithson's video on the Spiral Jetty.

It has the inhabitants of the bus freaked out. Images of dinosaur fossils, bulldozers and helicoptors suffuse with red light accompanied by a droning narrative and rythmic grinding and tapping sounds have incited everyone to great heights of panic. Cries of "turn it off" "this is really freaking me out" "my head hurts" "I'm scared" and "why are we watching this" make me laugh at the hystarical furor. The intensity of the film subsides and now I hear things like,"This guy had way too much time on his hands," and "It's like the twilight zone"

The Sigma Chi's are awake now and talk of sports, the draft, and alcahol bombard me from all sides- except for behind me where unexpectedly, the bathroom has turned out to by my finest companion.

It has become very difficult to write due to the extreme bumpiness of the road. My linebacker friend and I laugh at the prospect of our bus breaking down and a whining horde of cataclysmically sterile students stranded for hours away from any kind of civilization, sport or intoxication.

There is now talk of capturing one of the many calfs surrounding the bus and hiding it in the bathroom until we get back to Salt Lake. They think they'll be heroes. In front of me a student comments,"why would anyone come out here- to commit suicide or bury a body."

We arrive at a parking lot of sorts that is strewn with wreckage from Amoco's drilling operation.

Our tour bus alongside home sweet home.

Joe, one of the students actually there to learn, leaning against some kind of amphibious vehicle.

Another view of this fascinating beast.

My ride.

The atmosphere of the site is very striking and barren. The abandoned Rozel Oil field streches out before us

and a helpful sign points us in the direction of the jetty.

The half-mile trail to the jetty seems very short. As we get closer to the monumental piece of land art I marvel at how incredibly strange and wonderful this thing is out in the middle of absolute nowhere- alone in the desert, content with the elements and companion to the moon and clouds.

I am amazed at the stark contrast between the black basalt rocks and the layer of white salt that encrusts them.

We are back on the bus now, swaying along the dirt road back the way we came. This is a land scarcely touched by the oily fists of humanity. For miles and miles in every direction an open range of green streches out until it crashes upon the mountainsides and ancient beaches of Lake Bonneville. The vista of green spring growth stands as a testament to the persistance of life in the desert. These patches of green grass and shrubs soak up their few weeks of existence before the carnage-hungry summer sun beats them into dust. The earth has been protecting this place. Except for at the Golden Spike visitor center, there is no visible trace of the railroad unless you know what to look for, and even the oil wells Amoco drilled in the 70's are gone, torn down by the rising water of the living lake. Even if the level hadn't gone up, the oil they extracted was too high in sulfur to be of any immediate value or to be refined cheaply and they would have abandoned the project anyway. The only signs that Native Americans don't still roam these plains is this lonely dirt road and a herd of grazing cattle. Human antics seem silly in this place. Compared to a shoreline 24,000 years old halfway up a mountainside, a frat boy running out into the lake from the Spiral Jetty in his boxers for $50 seems inconsequential.

The now infamous swimmer. Note the redish color of the water. This is one of the reasons Robert Smithson chose the site for his Jetty.

Maybe what distinguishes us from our environment is our ability to attach meaning to what we do. More than anything else that has affected to me lately was a comment the swimmer made upon walking back to his crew, sitting amid the yin and yang of the Jetty's center, "50 bucks dude, that's like, sixty beers." Even when the classmate who offered the bet, a kid in the mortgage business always yapping on his phone about checks, titles, and contracts ad nauseum, stipulated that he would only pay up if the swimmer didn't use the money to buy beer, it was clear that this was exactly what he intended to do.

An Uncomfortable Situation

2005-04-22T03:03:00.000-06:00

First off, good news. I don't have to pay for the library books. I guess flirting with the deskgirl paid off. Before recounting today's uncomfortable tale, I must warn you that it takes place in a public bathroom.

It's inventory time at the Murray Barnes & Noble and I have been passing the time until the RGIS crew arrives by shelving a cart full of Self Improvement and Sex books. I find it amusing to see how many different ways authors can convince people that their lives really are miserable and only by reading their book can this drudgery be relieved. So it was during this period of shelving things like Feeling Good, and the Pop-up Kama Sutra that I felt yesterday’s burritos hit my bowels like a home run. I ran to the bathroom and barely made it into the handicapped stall in time. Upon completing my business I reached for the toilet paper only to find the roll empty. I gasped as a string of unpleasant scenarios raced through my mind, each more horrific than the last. My panic was soon interrupted by noise in the stall next to me. Its occupant was pulling great lengths of toilet paper off his roll. He handed a long wad under the stall and said, “I checked that one before I sat down. Let me know if you need more.” All I could offer was a meager thanks.

I sometimes make fun of friends who have returned from missions in California or Mexico with gastro-intestinal problems, but after tonight I am much more sympathetic to their cause. Maybe next time I go to the supermarket I’ll splurge and buy the expensive burritos.

Kitchen Fairy

2005-04-20T18:53:00.000-06:00

About a half-hour ago my stomach told me it was time to eat dinner. I went downstairs excited to put down a couple of burritos while finishing up the first Dark Tower novel. It can be relaxing to sit in the kitchen on one of our tall stools next to the big kitchen window, looking out onto 1st south and watch the cars fly past the Finch Lane Art Gallery. You can imagine my dismay upon stepping into the kitchen to find it being cleaned by a strange man. I have walked in amid a cleaning by my roommates and even a few times by a hispanic woman, but the last thing I expected was to walk in on a strange person carefully wiping down the landlord's fish painting. Normally I wouldn't have cared at all since there are strange people in the house all the time (with 9 other roommates, 2 kitchens and 2 living rooms you have to keep a casual disposition). But today it was distrubingly surreal, so I just nuked my burritos without saying a word and started pouring a glass of milk. The long silence must have been uncomfortable for him because he finally spoke up, telling me his name, asking me mine, and explaining to me what the hell he was doing there. Cordially I answered his questions like a civilized person, but when the burritos were done I balanced a bottle of Cholula hot sauce on my plate, grabbed my glass of milk and headed back upstairs to my room with the Stephen King noel tucked neatly under my armpit. I know I should feel bad for being kind of rude to the guy, but I don't at all. He was invading my space.

I am now late for class but can't leave because I told the guy sitting next to me here in the library that I'd keep an eye on his bag. I'll continue untill he comes.

So I get back up to my room and am sitting at my desk listening to some music and chomping away when a giant black widow pops out from behind my computer monitor and crawls down the screen, scaring me to death. I usually like to pride myself for being unscareable. Horror movies make me laugh, being mugged or clobbered in a dark alley doesn't concern me in the slightest, but for some reason fat, black, spindly-legged spiders make my skin crawl. Not wanting to wake up in the middle of the night with this thing dangling above my face, which has happened before, I scooped the red hour-glass lady up in the wad of toilet paper I was using for a napkin and shook her out my open window. She'll have to find a dark corner away from my desk to lay her eggs.

I came here to the library to turn in about 15 books that I used for my Roman history paper and also two others that were water damaged from kicking around the trunk of my car for nearly a year. The supervisor wasn't there so I have to come in tomorrow afternoon to see if I have to pay for them or not.

My friendly neighbor has returned so before I choke on the cigarette fumes lingering on his breath and clothes, I'll head off to class.

Stormclouds

2005-04-20T17:51:00.000-06:00

The cloudy sky and rain outside are so incredibly moody that I couldn't help but take some pictures from my bedroom window.

Looking up 100 South at Greek Row with fleeing stormclouds.

Looking North East.

Looking South down University Ave with the gargoyle dangling from my windchime.

On Genius, Torture and the Wrath of God

2005-04-18T21:10:00.000-06:00

I’m not quite sure what just happened, but maybe by writing about it I will be able to figure something out. It feels like a screw that holds the back of my soul in place has been jarred loose and I don’t have the right tools to fix it.

This morning was my first day as a volunteer for the Utah Museum of Natural History. I arrived to discover that instead of tagging along with another volunteer to learn the ropes I would be absorbing the total energy and questions of one hundred and fifty elementary school children in the dinosaur gallery all by myself. What really struck me was a moment during the last group of kids that I can only describe as an Ender moment. I call it this because I recently finished reading Ender’s Game again and this kid who came up to me was just like him. In the hall there is a locked cart with a variety of dinosaur fossils that the kids can pick up and look at. All morning I’d been playing a guessing game with them: which bones are teeth and which are claws? Most of the time they would guess wrong, but if they were enthusiastic I would pretend to reward them by showing them fossilized turtle shit (this always excited them much more than any of the other fossils). So this Ender kid, who couldn’t have been older than eleven or twelve, comes up to the cart and after a quick glance at my proud display starts not only to rattle off the scientific names for all these fossils, but talking about their eating habits and natural habitats. He then took the raptor claw and started running around clawing at the air screeching “I’m a raptor, I’m a raptor”. I smiled, being reminded of myself at that age; but this precocious display of enthusiasm turned bleak when his teacher gave me a look of exasperated despair and said, “That kid knows everything,” she paused and with a deep shrugging sigh, said “He’s smarter than me.” From this twenty-something schoolteacher I sensed a weariness that I would only expect from the archetypical embittered old guy playing a one sided game of chess in a park. She gathered her brood like a sad hen on plucking day and sauntered out of the hall, leaving silence in her wake and me to drown in the turbid water.

I packed up and went outside where an army of angry clouds had invaded the sky. Playing in the sprinkling rain just by the doors was the happiest three legged golden retriever I’d ever seen. He was hop-skipping along the dirt, tongue wagging and paws digging while his mottled companion sniffed at the bushes. In the four minutes it took me to walk home I marveled and tried to comprehend how this dog, who in spite of such obvious hardship, was so incredibly excited about life.

Two hours later I was at the zoo for a birthday party and witnessed several disturbing things. As a six year old I had been traumatized by a monkey who had shown his displeasure at my raccoon shirt by pelting me with a clump of feces. I now look forward to standing in front of the monkeys and wondering if the primates before me are progeny of that ancient nemesis. But today there was a lady standing in front of the glass tapping at a monkey on the other side. This poor animal was going berserk. His jaws were wide open, teeth bared, head quivering, and small fists pounding at this diabolic tormentor. In spite of how thick the glass was I could even hear the creature wailing. The saddest part about this wasn’t the crazed monkey or the obvious pleasure this lady was receiving, but the way her two small children were desperately clutching at her legs. I repressed the urge to smack this lady upside the head and walked to the primate house. Inside the first cage as we walked in was one of the two Meerkat terrariums. They were delightful creatures, scampering up and down their various perches happy as could be. On the ground, however, was a bloody slab of meat whose dark juices were streaming out and mixing with a puddle of urine. Looking up at us from the middle of this swirling mixture was a Meerkat who appeared to be praying. He was probably sleeping, but with his head bowed and hands pressed together in a scriptural position it was hard to think that he was doing anything else.

Fast forward again to a few moments ago when I finished listening to an interview with Craig Childs, whom I consider an heir to the throne of Edward Abbey. In order to understand why what happened next caused me to momentarily slip my moorings I should note that the program was streaming in from the nether regions of cyberspace into itunes. Childs is one of those mysterious figures who wanders around the desert for weeks and months on end and writes books about what he learns. Feeling a kinship with the barren landscape of the desert myself, the interview was very soothing after a day of extreme cognitive dissonance. As the file ended and the next song in the playlist began, my heart was blasted with an aural barrage of howling, distorted guitars. The volume of this assault made my ears ring and vision go black. It was so shaking in fact, that the infernal waves emanating from my speakers were like the Wrath of God striking down an idolater and his golden calf.

I would say that such conjectures are nonsense, but even as I write these words and the forlorn, industrial textures of the new Wumpscut album wash over me, I can’t help but juxtapose the lyrics to this song with whatever meaning lies behind everything that’s happened today.

Perdition

Here in the desert
We’re running out of force
Help us getting out
Oh Lord Anything we’ll do

Afraid of all the things to come
We loose ourselves
Praying for the one
That helps us out and we adore
To go on like we did before

Reaching out
Lord we are reaching out
Out for you

Time Declares War on Humanity

2005-04-17T13:28:00.000-06:00

I looked at the clock today and it read 1:89. Rationally it should have read 1:09, but a minute later it said 1:90. Is the world coming apart around me? That great linchpin of our lives is asserting itself and not allowing mankind to take advantage of its precise nature.

From this poing forward, Time has declared war on humanity. "Beware all who would seek to use me for their own gain. Your lives will be naught but ruin and shambles when I am through!"

A Field Trip to the West Desert Salt Pumps

2005-04-15T16:15:00.000-06:00

My mind floats in a far-distant dreamland as our dust choked bus sways along the dirt road back from the west desert salt pumps. I am now only a half-night sleep removed from an all-night battle with a paper on Roman Britain. Having vanquished third-world barbarians under the yoke of a superior culture, reality now melds into a bizarre conglomeration of marching troops, ancient beaches in the desert, and frat monkeys laughing about the beers they’ll drink tonight and how hot each others moms would be in Playboy.

People start to cough and choke at the dust flowing in from the air conditioner. The bus driver stops to free the unfortunate airborne creatures, but apparently this was a bad move because the horde of whining, mock rigor-mortis ridden students immediately cry that they’d rather breathe dust and get home sooner than sit amid a vast expanse of shallow turquoise lake water, glistening plains of white salt, and snow capped mountains retreating into the horizon.

It is quiet now and outside the bus random groups of cows graze on the rare April greenery. The wet spring we’ve been having has the locals in a panic- fearing a repeat of the late 80’s when the Great Salt Lake rose to historic levels and City Creek ran down Main Street in torrents. I have fond early childhood memories of watching volunteers sandbagging on the news and imagining how fun it would be to have a naval war on Main Street between my GI-Joe and Voltron figurines. I wasn’t concerned then with flooding or housing developments onto the lake flood plain; just heroic battles and observing the ants that colonized our brick patio carry off the remains of our barbeque.

Not much has changed in the subsequent decades. I am still interested in heroic battles and in watching backyard creatures gorge themselves on human leftovers. Only now I have emerged from my childhood naïveté to realize that dreams become highways, not all smiles are real, and the things that still bring joy and meaning are the same ones that did when I was young. Maybe this wouldn’t be true had my upbringing not been full of laughter, popsicles, camping trips, snow forts, and just about anything a white middle class kid from the suburbs could ask for. Overall, I’ve been lucky. My parents are still married, my siblings are my best friends, and we all still get together on Sunday nights for dinner and companionship

Sure, life hasn’t been easy. I’m pushing twenty eight and am still working on a bachelor’s degree. I’ve chalked up six years worth of failed relationships since my mission, and my economic prospects as a history major are about the same as pimpled high-school kid. Of course these kinds of problems are ones people in Darfur would die for.

They already are.


Standing with my back to the pumps looking at the road.


The frontside and inlet


Backside


The Outlet


A full view of the outlet

Official Salt Pumps Website