Chide, Chode, Chidden

In-Between

2010-01-04T11:59:00.009-07:00

"Seamless. Until you slow it down. Then there are spaces in between. Like the frames that make up a film. That's where they live."

That's what he had said. The man. Had it been a dream? It had seemed real. He had appeared. From the alley. The man's eyes, desperate, crazed; his skin taut and sallow in the dim light. Smell of piss. Cigarettes. Just another hobo? Some addle-brained dope fiend? Escaped mental patient?

"Interstitial beings! That's why we can't see them. Something in the way our minds process light. They live in the in-between spaces!"

Then the flash. Blind. Bastard did something to my eyes! A camera gone off? It hadn't been a camera. Was something there? What was that? A shadow. The man was gone. I rubbed my eyes. Pupils readjusted themselves. Everything seemed fine. Strange. Strange man. I kept walking.

* * *

Home. Bed. Sleep. I dreamt.

The man was there again, in the alley. "They live in-between! Look between!" he shouted. His eyes. Full of terror. "Interstitial beings!"

* * *

Awake. Still night. 3:43 A.M. Sheets a twisted mess. Clothes sweated through. Shuffle to bathroom. Light on. Pupils readjust. A face in the mirror. My face. Tired. Look like shit. A dream? A flicker in the mirror. Behind me. I turn. Nothing. Strange man, strange dreams. That's all. I turn back. Water running. Cold. I cup my hands. I splash my face. Squinting, I find the towel.

Someone's there! Adrenaline. Body goes cold. Numb. Something flutters at the edge of my vision. Turn slow. Turn natural. Weapon? No.

II.

Bad shit. Blood everywhere. Blood and bits. No two bits the same size. Bad shit.

"Detective?"

Detective Adler moved his gaze to the officer. "Huh."

"What do you figure?"

Adler looked away from the officer, drew his fingers through his hair. "Huh." No two bits the same.

Cosmic [Fragment]

2009-12-29T13:42:00.002-07:00

I woke up the other day feeling very finite. This was an entirely unpleasant experience, for, generally, I feel more cosmic, more infinite in my conception. During this troubling time I seemed to end right inside my skull, in the region of the forehead. Against this seeming barrier I probed, hoping that, perhaps, I might transpierce it, thus re-uniting my finite self with the vastness of which I generally feel myself a part. This cosmic, or oceanic feeling, and my feeling of separation from it, recalled to my mind Rumi's reed:

"Ever since I was parted from the reed-bed, my lament hath caused man and woman to moan...Every one who is left far from his source wishes back the time when he was united with it."¹

Gradually, fortunately, my feeling of separation abated, and my lack was restored.

Note(s):
1) Mathnawi of Jalalu'ddin Rumi, translated by Reynold A. Nicholson

The Gift of the Magi: Part 2

2009-12-24T11:59:00.007-07:00

Jim Dillingham Young looked away while his wife, Della, put the chops on. My hair grows so fast, Jim! she had said. Again and again she had said it. Damn it, thought Jim, she's right.

Jim looked at the fob chain--her gift to him--now useless. My father's watch; my grandfather's watch! And for what? Her hair would grow back; she could use the tortoise shell combs with jeweled rims in a few months. But the fob? The watch had been an heirloom, for Chrissakes!

Della smiled blissfully at Jim from the stove; Jim returned the smile. Inside him something dark was stirring.

Holiday Tip: Candy Canes

2009-12-22T08:00:00.013-07:00

Today I address myself to those of my readers who intend to consume candy canes this holiday season.¹ Now, it is self-evident that proper removal of this sugary staff's plastic wrapper is essential to one's overall enjoyment of it as an æsthetic experience. However, as this confection is a seasonal treat, generally enjoyed but one time a year, it is no great surprise that during the long interval that passes between opportunities of its consumption, that one forgets how properly to denude it of its cellophanous jacket. Indeed, this blog's author is not immune to such lapses, and his first candy cane of the season was an entirely disastrous affair.

Now, to begin unwrapping, it is first necessary (and prudent) to locate the seam of the wrapper which runs along the the length of the candy cane's shaft. Once this has been located, one should then tease out this seam (with most wrappers this should be possible) until a flap of plastic running the length of the stave reveals itself. Without too much effort, one should now be able to pull apart the opposing sides of the wrapper down the length of the candy cane. In this step one should be cautious, however, for it is of utmost importance that one remove the wrapper beyond the apex of the crook; otherwise, it is possible that one might encounter that occurrence which is the principal cause of the impediments to, and the frustrations of, a candy cane's enjoyment, namely, when the wrapper becomes bunched up at the place where the candy cane begins to curve, and necessitates a superfluity of effort to achieve the last bit of candy, betimes requiring one to dismantle unnecessarily the elegant, curving architecture of the hook. This step having been completed one may, of course, choose to remove the wrapper entirely and begin to enjoy his treat; however, I find it elegant to leave the wrapper on the end of the crook as a grip, which prevents the hand from becoming too sticky, and remove it only when I am about to finish.

Well, I hope this has been a useful reminder, and I wish all a merry Christmas, and a happy New Year, and good luck with your candy canes!

Note(s):
1) If it is anyone's practice to consume the candy cane from hook to shaft, rather than from shaft to hook (as is supremely proper), for him I have no words of advice, for I shall not condescend to address such a heathenish custom.

Suffer Little Children...?

2009-12-23T08:00:00.003-07:00

Let me preface the body of my post with the warning that the material contained herein is likely to offend, and I have done little to mitigate such a reaction. Pray for me that I in future shall exercise more tact and wisdom.

I was pondering the other day why anyone would consider having a child. Is it out of some need to preserve some small portion of oneself from the grave? A hard won and uncertain immortality? Does one whelp to produce a tangible fruit of one's love for another? Does one breed because he is obligated by a religious or societal duty? Because of some other more or less obscure, real or imagined impetus? Or, as seems more likely to me, based anecdotally on casual evidences, are children principally the accidental product of a peremptory desire to rub one's genitals on the genitals of another?

My reasons for asking this are threefold: first, because I cannot fathom any eminently practical reason to procreate; second, because I cannot imagine subjecting an innocent human life to the abject horror of existence; and third, because the rewards of parenthood seem to me rather slim, insubstantial when compared against the resources that are necessarily expended on raising a child.^{1, 2}

To expand on this latter point: very few children become Mozarts or Einsteins, thereby justifying their worth.³ And, save for young children of speaking age, who produce delightful expressions concerning diverse topics, for which I would pay $5 a piece, children have, so far as I can see, no remunerative value. They are (and I speak from my own experience as a child) petty, cruel, contrary, belligerent, sticky, and, in general, pestilent (these in addition to some marginal charms, which seem incapable of weighting the scale in the child's favor). When I consider how little I have contributed against the debt I owe my parents, and, indeed, intend to contribute, I am appalled at the amount (an amount which seems to continuously compound itself).⁴ I posit as final evidence Jesus: this alleged Christ, famous for his supposed indulgence of children, never thought it necessary to have any of his own.⁵

In the end, however, I suppose that this phenomenon shall remain thoroughly incomprehensible to me unless called upon myself--God forfend--to take up that burdensome name of 'father'.

Note(s):
1) The furtherance of the human race hardly constitutes in my mind an eminently practical reason to procreate.
2)When considering life as an object of horror, I am considering things like rape, war, depression, loneliness, old age, &c. Though having myself only experienced a small percentage of life's horrors, my experiences with those few have been sufficient to cause me serious pause when considering whether or not I would be willing to subject another living being to them. I am not certain that the pleasures that can be had in life are worth such a gamble.
3) I realize, of course, the logical end of this kind of thinking leaves mankind with no one to do those contemptible manual and practical chores. In this case, I suggest automatons for these tasks.
4) There is some consolation in the fact that, ultimately, I did not choose to exist.
5) This, of course, represents the traditional view.

Sól Invicta

2009-12-21T08:00:00.003-07:00

A Poem on the Occasion of the Winter Solstice.

Beautiful Sól! Candle of the World, thou
Ebb’st and diest away, but I pray thee,
Bide, abandon not thy worshipful sons,
Thy worshipful daughters, to black darkness,
To the never-ceasing, chaotic night.

Behind thee do rave the red, foam-flecked jaws
Of Fenrir’s grim whelp; flag not in thy pace
Lest he catch thee, rend thee, devour thee whole,
For then, surely, is our last day on earth.
O Elf-Disc, hear my heartening prayer!

Live! Thou of the red-gold hair, Heaven’s bride,
for while thou liv’st, the gods are not yet slain,
Peace dwelleth yet in the kingdoms of man,
Son loveth yet father, daughter mother.
O Sky-Fire, hear my heartening prayer!

How Strange! [Fragments]

2009-12-08T16:49:00.005-07:00

How strange I feel today as I gaze into the world from these skull-perched eyes. Am I the same as that being which observes the sky’s stark winter-blue? The brown grass? The horizon interrupted by the works of man and the deformations of nature? Am I the same creature that feels its body’s weight as it plods across the open field? The same that feels the boreal winds pass across its exposed flesh?

I am not certain. For the creature by which I experience the world seems today so alien to the consciousness that dwells within it. Can they possibly belong to each other? Can flesh and mind be one?

* * *

A hand moves to write these things, yet I cannot tell whether it is by the direct suggestion of my will that it does so, or whether first some intermediary power must relay my intentions to this house of bones. Alas! I can see that something is wrong: the perfections of the mind’s forms become distorted as they enter the corporeal plane. In beauty and strength of feeling are all diminished. The pattern which the hand attempts to reproduce riddlingly lacks somehow both in concision and expansiveness. I feel as if I were attempting to understand the world through the reflections in some unstill pool.

* * *

The mirror lies! I stand before it unrecognizingly, seeing reflected a mere thing of blood and flesh, sinew and bone. But I realize that I falsely accuse: the mirror can but mechanically reflect the outward manifestation of physical matter, and cannot hope to penetrate inward to those unseen operations of the intellect. The body has never seemed to me so distant from the mind.

* * *

We are told that consciousness is the product of the grotesque clockwork of biological machinery; nevertheless, I can’t help but feel that beyond this concatenation of parts roar vast and animating engines, willed by some unseen dynamo.

Εὕρηκα! [Fragments]

2009-12-15T16:41:00.019-07:00

I stand alone in the space of my mind. Above and all around, toward all horizons, arcs a vast firmament. Beyond the firmament shines an eternal sun. Its light penetrates but dimly, for seething across the face of this firmament are seemingly endless convolutions of grey-black clouds. As I watch the tumult of clouds, a cleft flashes opens among them, and a beatific shaft of light penetrates down through the mass, and briefly illumines the ash-grey world below. Sweet realization! I have understood! But it is gone again. Choked off. Veiled.

* * *

Parts and pieces. Parts and pieces. Disparate. Unwhole. How can I correlate them? Meaningless. Yet, before me, tenuous threads of golden light begin to bud forth, tendril-like, from the confused congeries of diverse facts. They lengthen. Eyeless, they reach, feel, search, grope. Shall they, blind as they are, find one another? In their blindness they nearly touch. Something is changed. Somehow they sense the other is there! They move more surely now, but not without some hesitation; a delicate, probing dance ensues. They hold back a tense moment, then leap forward, and ravishingly combine, and across my mind a web of coruscating lines blazes in the darkness.

* * *

I can sense behind a frictionless wall of unending breadth and height a great vastness. I try to touch the wall, my fingers slip away. There is no purchase. There can be no purchase. Have I reached the bournes of my understanding? Or can there be a gate in this seamless wall? And if a gate, a way to open and pass through it? And beyond this gate a further boundary?

* * *

Linear. I feel trapped in the self-imposed logic of the conscious mind. The illogical dream-state. Is the mystic right? To be drunk in love of the infinite. I desire the obliteration of myself into the universal consciousness. Meaningless sophistries? Perhaps. Emptiness gapes. With what to fill this void?

Notes for 11:59 P.M.

2009-12-17T11:59:00.001-07:00

I have thought for some time now, that human evolution seems, from my admittedly limited perspective, stagnated, and that, perhaps, our intellectual if not our corporeal descendants might be mechanical in nature rather than biological.

Notes for 6:27 P.M.

2009-12-14T18:27:00.006-07:00

Leftovers rob a man not only of his dignity, but steal away also a piece of his soul.* **

*Note: The author considers cold pizza an exception to this otherwise utterly eternal and immutable rule.
** Note: The author would also consider certain leftovers so long as the conform to the law of Moses, explicitly expressed in Leviticus 19:6-7: 'It shall be eaten the same day ye offer it, and on the morrow: and if ought remain until the third day, it shall be burnt in the fire.And if it be eaten at all on the third day, it is abominable; it shall not be accepted.' †
† Note for the note: The author realizes there may be contextual concerns with the cited biblical passage; however, the author does not find it necessary to address himself thereto.

Notes for 12:10 A.M.

2009-12-13T00:10:00.004-07:00

I just watched Saturday Night Live, which I normally don't do, because I have found, on the whole, that the generally quality of comedy there displayed is rather poor. Nevertheless, every now and then, because I respect cultural mainstays, I don't mind watching a few clips. I realize, that given various limitations, it must be difficult to... Be warned! If your belief in the comedic spirit of mankind is at all flagging, please, at all costs, avoid this program. As I watched, it was if a dark horror crept into the room, swallowing up all hope I had in mankind's ability to create buffoonery from topical events. Neither chuckle, laugh, nor groan escaped from me (a somber fact given that the average Disney Channel program all but guarantees that some ill-formed pun or impossible situation elicits from me at the very least a groan), and no smile broke my stony features. I despair! I truly despair! How is it that God has allowed mankind to so long suffer from this abomination?

Note for those who think 'classic age' SNL was good: You are wrong.

Christmas Album: The Yearly Resurrection of the Artist

2009-12-12T15:34:00.011-07:00

I'm glad that Bob Dylan has finally decided to seize at an immortality that would otherwise be denied him. Most of his throwaway songs would otherwise have been forgotten in less than a generation and his fame would have diminished into nothingness.

Why, might one ask, would have been forgotten and not shall? What I am attempting to say is, that superannuated artists (as Dylan shall doubtless be all too soon), whom no one would otherwise listen to, manage each year a small renovation in their fortunes. How do they achieve this? The Christmas Album. Indeed, all an artist must do to ensure the survival of his music beyond his death and utter obsolescence is to condescend to lay down, is his declining years, a few holiday tracks.

Consider Handel. He composed a bunch of stuff, but what gets all the airtime? His Messiah. Has anyone avoided hearing portions of it every holiday season since 1742? Only a very few, if any at all. Consider as well the now-defunct hip-hop group Run-DMC. When's the last time they were heard on the radio? Probably sometime this month, but the song? It's the classic Christmas in Hollis. Other examples exist in such profusion that it would be folly to note them all here. To convince himself of the truth of my words, one needs merely make a cursory examination of his local department store's holiday music display.

So again, I congratulate Bob Dylan on the momentous decision to become an immortal: Merry Bob Dylan Christmas!

Tyrant Lizard King

2009-12-10T23:59:00.007-07:00

A black line of distant mountains uphove itself from the plain, forcing blue heaven from its embrace of loamy earth. From this distance, one could just make out a thin, grey thread of smoke, which, emanating from one of the peaks, spiraled lazily into the atmosphere. It whispered of the raging tempers which, unseen, yet seethed, and which, in some recent aeon, had torn from the body of the earth this serrate spine of stone.

On this day, if an observer had looked into the sky toward these distant mountains, he might eventually have discerned a dark mote moving toward him in the sky. Had this observer continued to watch this fleck, he would have seen it draw closer, resolving, bit by bit, into a form not dissimilar to a bird’s. Now, had the observer watched as this apparently ornithoid object moved closer still, he would be forced to concede the fact that none but the remotest similarities bound some common crow or pigeon to this great-pinioned behemoth.

The pterosaur clapped together her massive wings, and let out a screeching cry of blended exultation and hunger. From her heavenly perch she watched all that passed below, eyes constantly roving, seeking out some likely meal. As she passed between sun and earth, her body and great, membranous wings cast a dark shadow below. Within the limbic brain of those creatures that her shadow touched was unleashed a cascade of horrors; those that fear had paralyzed might have managed to look up and to see the cause of their horror in all her ruthless splendor: a nimbus of light around a black, roughly triangular form, save for the light-permeable wings, across which the sun illumined, as if upon some grim vellum, the blood-red capillaries which branched across her wind-taut, inter-dactylic flesh. Had she understood the fear she caused, she would have felt in it a cruel delight. Yet, had she been capable of so complex an emotion, she might also have briefly pitied those impoverished creatures of the earth, who could not spread wide their wings and unchain themselves from the tyranny of gravity. As the stalking she-pterosaur continued to arc her way through the air above the wetland plain, the orbit of her gaze briefly registered the existence of one of that species of lizard-kings, the tyrannosaur.

The lizard-king tried to catch sight of those diminutive limbs which the cruel weight of millions of years of natural selection had awkwardly appended to his torso. The lizard-king could sense them, operate them crudely, yet they were ever invisible to him. The young tyrannosaur, at last despairing, cast back his head, and raised his snout to the heavens. He filled is lungs, and let forth a long and mournful wail:

Notes for 1:34 A.M.

2009-12-11T01:34:00.002-07:00

I'm fairly certain that I prefer erudite matters to be discussed in a vulgar manner, and vulgar matters in an erudite manner.

Bad Fantasy

2009-12-09T20:45:00.007-07:00

CHAPTER 1

WHEREIN SOME BORING EXPOSITION IS MADE, A PROPHECY IS REVEALED, AND AN ORPHANED COUNTRY LAD LEARNS OF HIS GRAND DESTINY.

Michael was awake, but he kept his eyes closed, enjoying a few stolen moments before he had to rouse himself from his warm, enswaddling blankets, and begin the day’s labors in the sharp chill of autumn. He thought of the cows he had to milk first thing: Betsy, Nan, Lady, Twigs and of course dear, playful, little Topsy. Topsy, now she was a beauty! Great gentle eyes, shiny brown coat, long eyelashes, well-made udder. Last year, she had even won Best in Show at the village fair. Then she had worn about her neck a garland of flowers that Michael had carefully braided for her. Such happy times! These joyful reveries, however, could not last for ever. Michael heard Zurd stirring in the main room of the well-built, thatched-roof hut, a room which served as kitchen, dining room, hallway, and living room.

Casting off his blankets, Michael revealed his half-naked form, rippling with well formed musculature, such as one might acquire in a life devoted to physical labor. He drew on his clothing, splashed his face with water from the bowl which rested on a table next to his bed, and exited his room.

Zurd sat at a rough-hewn table adjacent to the fireplace, slurping down a breakfast of cold porridge. As Zurd lowered the bowl of porridge from his lips, Michael examined the face illuminated by the low-burning fire. Porridge dribbled down the chin of a man as shriveled and wrinkled by age as an apple from last year’s harvest, forgotten at the bottom of a barrel. Yet, despite his apparent age, there was a playful gleam in his eye that betrayed the fact that though age had deprived him of any beauty he might have once possessed, it had not managed to deprive him of mental acuity.

“Michael?” Zurd asked, wiping his porridge-y chin with the sleeve of his tunic.

“Yes, Zurd?”

“I’ve got something to tell you,” spoke Zurd with great seriousness.

Michael’s heart began to beat nervously. What could it be? Did I forget to take out the trash again? Since Zurd had taken him in after his parents had been ruthlessly murdered and raped (and vice versa), Zurd had never beaten him for a mistake, though a stern look and some well-chosen words often felt to Michael like a lash. Thinking on these things, Michael again saw the horrible night of his parents’ death. The Orgs burst through the door. His mother screamed. His father took up a piece of firewood to use as a club, but to no avail. Michael hid under a bed as he watched as the Orgs raped and murdered, then murdered and raped his parents. Then it was all over. The Orgs left. Zurd came in and carried young Michael from the scene of carnage.

It was on that day that Michael had vowed to kill every one of that race of broad-nosed, large-lipped, gold-greedy, re-gifting, green-skinned, slant-eyed, fashion-conscious, lisping, raping, murdering Orgs.

Zurd continued, interrupting Michael’s dark thoughts: “I am no mere dairy-farmer, Michael.”

“Oh?”

“In the world outside this small farming community, I am known as a sorcerer of great ability and power. It is no mere chance that I came here and adopted you after I waited for the Orgs to finish raping and murdering your parents. You are at the nexus of a prophecy whose threads have been in the weaving since time immemorial.”

Michael’s face contorted itself into a mask of puzzlement. This was a lot to take in. Zurd was no dairy-farmer, but a powerful sorcerer? Prophecies and stuff? Thread? Michael decided it were better not to think about such things. He would leave such matters to his betters. “Well, I think I’d better go milk the cows.”

Zurd stared at Michael, somewhat nonplussed. “You’re part of the prophecy. You don’t have to milk cows anymore. I mean...”

“Well, I think I’d better, though. Cows’ll get peevish otherwise.” Michael turned to leave.

“No!” shouted Zurd angrily. “Get your things. We’re leaving.”

* * *

Michael, knapsack cast across his shoulders, looked back wistfully at small farm that had so long been his home. Why me? he asked himself. Why me?

Notes for 10:18 P.M.

2009-12-09T22:18:00.002-07:00

Someday I hope there will again exist a generation of children that has never seen, nor will ever see, a Hanna-Barbera cartoon.

'To Sluice the Deuce': A New Scatological Euphemism

2009-08-11T18:06:00.005-06:00

It is my wish to introduce into the vernacular of the English tongue the scatological euphemism 'to sluice the deuce', meaning, of course, 'to defecate'. Google has returned no matching entry, so I feel fairly certain the term is not in popular use.

The benefits of this new term are several, the principal among them being that 'sluice' and 'deuce' rhyme.

Additional related terms include the euphonious 'deuce-sluicer', which can refer either to the orifice the sluices the deuces, or a person who reminds one of a deuce-sluicer (analogous, of course, to the term 'asshole').

If this term pleases, please consider adding it to your repertoire of scatological euphemisms. Thank you for your time and attention.

Notes for 11:53 P.M.

2009-12-08T23:53:00.002-07:00

The search for God, I believe, is a search worthy to be undertaken by the best among us. But when some prophet props up an unlikely idol and says, This is God, and I see the masses bend their knee before the petty monstrosity, it is then that I despair.

Hollow!

2009-12-07T15:59:00.003-07:00

Hiatus!

2009-05-26T22:44:00.003-06:00

Save for the coordinated content posts, the author of Chide, Chode, Chidden is, until further notice, on hiatus.

Monday Broodings

2009-05-25T22:30:00.001-06:00

The blade pierces. The rope draws tight about my neck. Black.

'Daisy-Dukes'

2009-05-24T11:18:00.004-06:00

So, the other day, I was out in my family's garage, helping to build a loft. The heat in the garage was terrible, and so I was determined to provide myself with some relief, by creating from some old jeans a pair of 'Daisy-Dukes'. I informed my mother of my intention, to which she said, "I thought Daisy-Dukes were intended only for women." To which I answered, "No, Daisy-Dukes are for anyone who finds himself in a state of extreme discomfort due to the inclemency of the weather." Dubious, my mother told me she'd rather I didn't carry out my plan.

So, in the end, I didn't make a pair, but only because I didn't have a worn enough pair of jeans. When I do, however...well, I'll post a picture.

Star-Babies

2009-05-22T11:27:00.004-06:00

"Star-Babies!"

For a star-baby close-up, click here.

Shoe

2009-05-23T15:55:00.003-06:00

Today I saw in the street an abandoned shoe. It was a croc, or a croc knock-off.

Spy In My Soup

2009-05-21T22:16:00.007-06:00

Imagine, if you will, a man who was born the size of a thumbnail, and in full adulthood was only the size of the average man's finger.

Now, wouldn't this man make one of the greatest spies known to man? He would. He could fit anywhere, bypass the most stringent security, and escape the most diabolical of traps.

One problem. He just fell into a bowl of scaldingly hot tomato soup. He's dead.

______________
This post is an installment in a continuing series of content coordinated by theme or motif with posts from Enoch Allred of Chiltingham, John Allred of clol Town, Jon Fairbanks of Funkadelic Freestylings of Another Sort, Eli Z. McCormick and Miriam Allred of Modern Revelation!, John D. Moore of Whatnot Studios, Davey Morrison, Joseph Schlegel of Sour Mayonnaise, and Sven Patrick Svensson of Sadness? Euphoria?. This week's theme: 'Espionage'.