Letters to Daniel

 Letters to Daniel

Number One

Daniel

So good to hear from you! I hope all is well with you and yours. We've been dying from the ridiculous heat lately, but we seem to be getting a break the last couple of days with some good much-needed rain cooling things down a little bit.

Well, whoa..."different kinds of information"...there's a topic that deserves contemplation and I have thought about it for awhile since receiving your letter, in hopes that I might contribute to the discussion without coming off as a fool. Which may well prove to be the case anyway. There is a distinct possibility that I might unknowingly veer off, without even realizing it, into territory that has little if anything to do with the topic at hand. You are intellectually so far above me that I almost fear insulting your intelligence, and I don't mean for that to come off as false humility. It's just the truth. So with that in mind, I'll try to express my thoughts in words and hopefully will not wind up looking like a fool in the end.

Are there other kinds of communication other than the direct type? Are you talking about whether there actually are other methods of communication or whether anything can actually be communicated through symbol, metaphor et. al. ? Or perhaps the two propositions are linked so closely that differences are too insignificant to take into account? I don't know, so my thoughts will likely vacillate between the two "poles".

I don't know that actual objects can be communicated by indirect communication. There's no need for a symbol to communicate the reality of, say, a fork. It's just there. You eat with it, you poke people with it, you use it to pry the lid off of stingy cans of paint.

But what about recognized concepts such as colors and shapes and things of that sort? Take for example your example of the box of crayons. Yes, that one is green. That other one is red. Just about the most direct and simple means of communication you could think of. But it wasn't always that way. There was a time, who knows when, millions of years ago for all I know, when there was no categorization of "colors", obviously no names for them. But one day a man decided that they needed names, they should be differentiated because there were so many. So, from somewhere, who knows where, God or the turtle in the stream he was sitting by, he uttered the word "green" (it's primitive equivalent of course...maybe he didn't even think of it as a word), and decided that was what he would call the leaves on a tree. That would be the symbol for the hues of frog and grass and lizard as opposed to the hues of the cardinal, the strawberry and blood, which he designated as "red", on and on and so on until all the colors he was aware of had names (a lot like the metaphor of Adam naming the all of the animals). We take for granted (and why shouldn't we?) that the names for the colors are themselves symbols for each individual color, given to them at some point in the long distant past.

Assuming that human beings apparently had no need to categorize colors before the initial naming, one has to wonder not so much WHEN this singularity occured, but WHY. And WHERE did the word itself come from? He could have called yellow "Crunk" or green "Kind" Take into account that I'm not talking about "literal" names, which obviously evolved throughout the years. I'm on about the very first uttering of classification, the reason (if any?) that a certain color was given a certain name. Maybe it's a stretch, but I truly believe that those particular words were given via indirect communication. They had to have been since there was no one there to describe them by direct communication (seeing as how there was nothing at the time to communicate). I think those words/utterances/classifying terms are the product of inspiration, and I believe that all inspiration is of God, that it's a reminder that He hasn't gone anywhere and still loves us enough to give us a glimpse of His glory.

I'm a big believer in inspiration. There's no way in hell anyone is going to convince me that Barber's "Adagio for Strings" is the product of Samuel Barber's talent, intellect, compositional ability. The Adagio moves me so deep in my soul that I can only conclude that it's the work of a higher power with the ability to stir up and evoke emotions that the original composer may well never have experienced. Music that makes a grown man cry is not the result of even the most gifted composer. Or perhaps I mean to say there is a quality to the music that is conveyed despite any shortcomings or strengths of the composer. Folks say "I like it because it speaks to me", and I think that's a lot closer to the literal truth than a lot of people even realize.

I guess I do think that there are indirect means of communication. I don't know how anyone can listen to really hardcore death metal without getting angry. If you listen to it for a while you notice that it actually nurtures that anger until it becomes almost a rage. So it would appear that this kind of music indirectly communicates the emotion of anger. That's an abstract concept, I know, so maybe it's not a valid example for the conversation at hand. But I have to wonder, what is it about that music that affects people in such a negative way? Is it the growling, gutteral singing? The "Satan Piss On My Grave" lyrics? The disorienting speed of the thrashing guitars? A combination of the lot? From where does it's power to aggrevate come? Why doesn't Perry Como illicit the same reaction? Some might chastise me for suggesting this, but I maintain that it is still inspiration, and moreover I believe it comes from the same place as Beethoven's 9th, "My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys" and "Macho Man". I say it's from God, and I say it because I don't believe God is a one dimensional self help guru for the "righteous" to cling to at the expense of every other aspect of His creation. If joy is from God, then anger must also be from God. Obviously it's a beneficial thing to nurture joy. But whose to say it isn't just as beneficial for some people of perhaps a different disposition to nurture righteous anger. Sometimes I think people may not even realize how "righteous" their anger may be...I mean, if I've been abused as a child there is gonna be some serious anger lodged within me, and if rocking out to some ridiculous metal band gives a temporary catharsis, then why not, as long as I can keep it in check...most people can, I think, but I could well be wrong about all of this). The important thing is that inspiration communicates a plethora of emotions, it fuels countless dreams, it kick starts will and accelerates ambition. And it's an indirect form of communication.

Am I still on the same page? I'm pretty sure I'm babbling on about nothing that has anything to do with what you were wanting to discuss. I see I've been on more about "communication" than "information".

When you say that christians literally make up "the corporeal body of God" do you mean that in the esoteric sense in which all things make up the "body" of the All? That word "body" throws me. I can't help but see it as symbolic, especially in light of Paul's admonition that each part has it's own role in the grand scheme, that a person should not be resentful or angry because he isn't equipped to perform the functions (ministry?) that someone else is blessed with. We're the body of Christ insomuch as we are to carry out the ministry of Jesus as he would if he were still on earth. We are his arms and legs to go and do, we are to display the compassion and feed the poor, help the needy as he would have done were he still physically among us. I'm sure you know that, I feel like a doofus writing it as if I were telling someone something they weren't already aware of. But as I think of it, I'm not even sure that "the body of Christ" is a metaphor or symbol at all. I mean, when you take into account those verses I just mention, it seems much more like an example, or better, just another way of looking at something that should have been obvious to the people who were gung ho to do anything and everything they could to perform the duties required to spread the gospel. No doubt that entailed a lot of different things, so telling them that they were like the body of Christ on earth, with the examples, was just a way to explain their respective roles and to let them know that one aspect of "ministry" was no less or no more important than perhaps a less "glamorous" one, if you will.

Then, over the years, it gets put under the microscope and people come to their own conclusions as to what it means NOW. Like, maybe you want to explain away the issue of various church denominations. You could take that "body of Christ" concept and apply it to that in such a manner that it seems acceptable that we have so many different kinds of variations on the same belief system. Personally I think that is okay, because it does make sense to me. I'm a big believer in continual revelation based upon my best understandings of the bible combined with informed reason making allowances for the progress of civilization. I mean, what kind of person in their right mind would say it was not morally correct to let a woman pastor a church or even get up and speak at all? Yeah, I know there are still some left, poor souls. Paul said it, right? It's in the bible, so that's that. But what's NOT mentioned in the bible is that the reason Paul made that proclomation was because women (most women?) were not well educated, they were basically one step up from being slaves in regards to their position within society, it would have been a scandal, much more trouble than it was worth at the time. Of course times have changed, long long time ago when it comes to women gaining their rightful place in society. Women, I'm sure, are much smarter than men anymore. I'm convinced that Paul would have rolled with the changes had he seen the direction things were going. Doesn't make the bible "wrong". Maybe that is there to encourage common sense and reason? Ha! To seperate the blind herd who would take all things literally (which runs counter to normal human behavior, IMO) from the people who will question and make an attempt to find out WHY it says what it does and if it still applies BASED UPON THE WHOLE OF THE BIBLE'S MESSAGE. Maybe that's the key. MESSAGE. Not to take away from the "medium", but I can't accept something that doesn't make sense as a whole. Meaning to say that I believe the bible presents the most "logical" (?) answer to the problem of "good" and "evil" and other essential philosophical questions.

But I don't want this response to come off as a weak apologetic...just couldn't help throwing that in to kind of offer perspective of where I'm coming from. Is hell a literal "place"? I remember about 20 or so years ago reading in a newspaper that the pope had declared that hell wasn't a "destination" so much as a "situation". It was the state of being completely cut off from God. Which all boiled down to the complete cessation of existence. Jesus parable of Lazuras and the rich man might need to be re-examined, but as a parable it is open to all manner of interpretation. It's a condition that people would do well to avoid, I think it's a condition that most people would not want to "experience", but it's perfectly fine if someone doesn't want to believe in the alternative and aren't open to the possibility of eternal life with a God they don't believe in. They don't have any reason to be "afraid" of "hell"/"the grave" etc. It's a release from all personal identity, and isn't that what the Buddhists shoot for? I personally wouldn't have any problem with merging back into nothingness. But I'm hard-wired to believe in God. Despite all the bullshit I see in certain corners of Christendom, I always gravitate back to Jesus Christ for the reason I stated earlier. The atonement, as difficult/impossible it is to truly comprehend, is the crux of the answer I've accepted to the question of good, evil, sin, salvation as I see it. I want to know about things I never knew in this life, and I think that's part of heaven. I want to experience things I never experienced in this life, and I think that's another part of heaven. And even if heaven, as some people say, is nothing more than worshiping at the feet of the Lord, I believe that just as I'm hard-wired to believe in good, knowing with certainty will completely "re-wire" my spiritual senses to the point where that will not only be enough to satisfy, it will be much more than enough. But who knows? The same bible that tells me who I am, why I am the way I am and how I got here also talks about heaven as if it is a beautiful reward, a return to innocence...

Now that I've strayed so far off topic I'd like to tell you about something I don't think I've ever told anyone before. Maybe Dustin, and who knows but that I might have told you as well but I don't remember. Anyway, I think the gist of it will help offer some insight into what I believe....

It was in the summer 2006. I'd begun to have delusions of grandeur...for one thing I thought I had cracked some kind of code that associated Freud's id, ego & superego with the Trinity and their various functions in the make up of psychology. I ramble on about it all the way to OCCIC, if you get my drift. (haha). So I'm spending a few days there, in what is basically a holding area to facilitate the transfer into Griffin (you remember good ol' Griffin?). I believed I was being called by God because of all the revelations I'd been receiving in my manic state. There were 3 or 4 administrators I had to sign documents for. From one office to the other I asked them, "Are you a Christian?" All of them said yes, they were. Then, get this, I asked them what denomination they belonged to! One said he was Catholic and I was, like, "that's great! I hold the Catholic faith in very high regard!" Then likewise to the next guy, who said he was a Methodist. Once again, I was like "Wow! That's great! I went to a Methodist church for a long time". So you can see that I was a bit too obsessed with religion at the time...a manic state is not the best time to turn into a Jesus Freak. I know this is crazy (after all, I was about 24 hours away from spending 3 weeks in a mental hospital), but at one point I believed I was channeling biblical figures, from Paul to Daniel to the Big Guy himself. I became ecstatic at one point because I believed I had determined the exact date of the end of the world by ciphering the number of the beast (no worries, it was millions of years from now).

So this silliness went on for a couple of days and then I had a psychotic episode. Something I've learned about these things is that you develop a sort of amnesia around certain actions and words. You can remember the poles, the stuff that happened when it started, and the stuff that happened as it descends but what goes in at the peak gets completely forgotten, someone will tell you what you did and you think they're lying or making it up because not only don't you believe them, it's stuff you know you would never do. In this case I was told that I became extremely angry, I think because I felt a curfew was not fair, and I went to the nurses station completely naked and let all my aggressions fly. I'd love to see the security camera footage of that! Anyway, next thing you know I'm being forcibly escorted to the isolation room. There were a lot of people hoisting me away, including one of OKC's finest with firearm in full view, so I was probably pretty rowdy.

That's when I got scared. And when I say "scared", I mean "shit in your pants" scared (though I did not do that). I don't scare easily as a rule, but I was terrified. As they pushed me through the door into a room that had a weird glow in the lights, and with the claustrophobic aspect of it, I "realized" why I was so frightened. I believed, with every bit as much certainty as I can see the words I'm typing right now, that a nuclear bomb had been fired by some enemy country and that it was going to land right on top of the building. If you can imagine that. I was going to die. Within moments. I knew it just like I knew it when I had my roll-over car wreck in 95. You know how scared I was? Just a couple of days ago I picked up a book about 9/11 and looked at the pictures. I came to one that showed people on the upper floors standing at the windows, some even on the ledges, knowing it was fall or fire. A wave of empathy and fear hit me like a splash of water. It's so odd for me to use the word "empathy" as I could never, in my wildest nightmares, be able to describe what it must have felt like for them. But it shook me, because seriously, I do know what it's like to think you are going to die. No, I don't mean "think"...I mean "KNOW". The doctors had to come in and shoot me up with a sedative or no doubt I would have kicked it from an adrenalin overdrive before Enola Gay had a chance to reach us. I cried and screamed "I repent! I repent!" until I conked out from the haldol or whatever it was.

I slept for a couple of days straight. After I woke up and had a chance to collect my thoughts I began to think about "where I was" during those 2 days I slept. I wasn't dead so it couldn't have been heaven or hell, right? But I thought, if this was all there was when I died, which would be a dictionary definition of the atheist point of view, then I would be fine with that. But as days and weeks and months passed by I realized I wanted more, that there had to be more. Or maybe not "more", but SOMETHING. Maybe it was down to a choice between "something" and "nothing" on the most grand scale, perhaps that's the difference between heaven and hell, I don't know?

I guess that means that we are at odds with the "literal" and "symbolic" descriptions of hell. Why would the Bible use such graphic language to describe "nothing"? I am tempted to think that it's because the majority of people in the world, today but especially in those days, have no real concept of what "nothing" is, at least in that particular philosophical manner. And people are so attached with their personal identity that the prospect of losing it completely is terrifying, even if it's only on a subconscious level. Even as terrifying as an eternity spent in hell fire. I may be right, I may be wrong on this. But if you think about it, whether I'm right or wrong doesn't mean a damn thing, you know? If it helps me, personally, process mysteries then it has value. A merciful God may or may not send someone to a literal hell. I can't comprehend the kind of mercy that would make that okay. But I do absolutely believe that God is a just judge and that whatever "punishment" He might mete out would be absolutely and irrefutably fair. To me, the kind of non-existence I went through would be the best way I can reconcile the consignment of sinners to hell. It's merciful. In many ways it is extreme. It would not be the preferred choice of the vast majority of mankind. And it satisfies the demands of any reasonable person seeking righteous revenge (bin Laden is NO MORE. That should be enough). Certainly not meaning to put atheists and such in the same category as Osama bin Laden. But you get what you want or you get what you deserve, not in the dogma of Christians who say "If you have Jesus in your heart then you are going to heaven, vice versa, and that's that", but in the eyes of God.

I think a lot of Christians need to expand their understanding of what a "parable" is. Jesus spoke in parables. It doesn't say "Jesus spoke SOME parables". I could be wrong, but doesn't the bible say Jesus TAUGHT in parables? That would mean that all of his teachings, from the Sermon on the Mount to the ones he taught to the 3000 he fed, can be interpreted as if by parables, or in symbolism, hyperbole, etc. Why? What's the point? Why not, you ask, just come right out and say it? I sure can't answer that. In the gospel of Luke, Jesus tells the apostles, "The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of God has been given to you, but to others I speak in parables, so that, "'though seeing, they may not see; though hearing, they may not understand.'" (Luke 8:10 NIV). Can't say I have a grasp of what He meant by that. But there's probably an answer within it and it's context within the rest of Scripture.

Well, this has gone on probably a lot longer than you expected, and I'm sure the original topic has only been touched upon, sacrificed to my rambling. I was probably writing more to myself than to you. Thanks for giving me the chance to pick my brain. Look forward to hearing more from you.

JAC

Addendum July 19, 2026...Jesus saves! Heaven is real! It will be better than I envisioned it in the state I was in when I wrote this letter to my old friend Daniel Baldwin Newman.

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Number Two

I'm sorry it has taken so long to reply, and even this perhaps not a proper response, but I'll try to touch on some of your points.

I would have to disagree with you about religion being one and the same as it's adherents. From here on in this message I will equate "religion" with "Christianity" because, though I do have some knowledge of other belief systems' worldviews, obviously I am coming from a Christian perspective. I don't speak for the "community" of Catholics or the "community" of Baptists or so forth and so on. I can only speak from "Christianity" as I have known and believed it...and who knows but that I may be the only one to see it in such a manner, but I do believe it's based on biblical principles with an acknowledgement that my spirituality is a "work in progress" and that revelation did not end with the last stroke of the bible's authors pen.

With that said, I have no problem distancing myself from a huge portion, perhaps the majority, of "Christians" in this country. I stand by every minority that has ever been attacked by fundamentalists. I won't even excuse the "non-fundamentalists", because so many have their own less obvious yet just as insidious forms of intolerance. You mention the whole "love the sinner, hate the sin". And it almost always gets tossed out when in reference to homosexuality. The phrase is a judgment, that's obvious. But the problem is that it seems to be mainly used by straight Christians as some perverted way to cloak deep rooted homophobia while coming off as "accepting" to others, even in the church, who may not see things that way. It's a judgment, but it's fucked up because when all is said and done only Jesus can live up to the standard of loving the sinner and hating the sin. I mean, you can hold it up as a standard, as a goal to shoot for, but you're not gonna love all sinners and so you might as well not pretend you can truly "love" any. You can fool yourself into thinking you hate sin, but if you were able to somehow count every sin you commit during the course of even a single day you would have to revise the "hate the sin" bit, because you surely don't totally hate something that you willingly or unconsciously do all the time. So if "love the sinner hate the sin" is really a judgment, and I believe it is used in that manner most of the time, then it applies every bit as much to the one using it against another. Using it adds one more sin to your bill.

I don't go to church. I believe I am part of the church. Maybe a pinkie toe in the body of Christ, but important, nay, essential nonetheless. And I am not sure that there is a need for hiearchial systems in individual congregations. I don't know, maybe there is...I mean, I'm looking at it from one point of view, you look at it from another point of view that, at least on this point I think we agree upon, but as for the vast majority of people in the country, I think they might NEED such leadership...I mean, they're the ones who are in control of it, regardless, so no doubt the leadership is just a figurehead, but so many people need/want to be told they're in line, they're doing fine, what they need to do, because they are truly clueless as to what that may be. The bible is a deep, deep book, and I doubt there are 1 of 10 in every congregation in every denomination who has read it through or studied it thoroughly or maybe even ever get it out except on Sundays so they can wear it like a badge to a service in which a preacher will give them a tiny, infinitesimal glimpse of what's between the covers...all of which they will forget when they smell the pleasing aromas of pizza offered at the Ken's Pizza Sunday afternoon all-you-can-eat buffet.

But the point is, most people who look for guidance or advice in all things spiritual don't look to the bible or even to God in prayer, they go to their pastor, minister, priest, what have you. Not to ostracize all "men of the cloth", but they all know who pays their bills, who keeps them well fed and clothed. It's not hard to imagine a minister who is more than willing to validate points of view that may be founded on misreadings of key points in Scripture. Does that make sense? I mean, I don't know if something like that happens often, but the proliferation of "love the sinner hate the sin" would suggest that someone in power is not willing to "lay down the law" in a manner of speaking.

And so, homophobic tendencies are allowed to fester even though the fact of the matter is that NO ONE is judged in a lesser or greater degree for their sexual preference. Jesus put the mojo on straight heterosexuals in the sermon on the mount: “You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not commit adultery.’ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart."

The point being that NO ONE, based on ANYTHING, is free from sin. A few verses later He says, "Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect." And I think a lot of people get this statement wrong. Maybe *I'M* the one who is wrong, but I see zealous Christians who think "Be perfect" is a target goal that, alas there's no way to achieve it, yet is still demanded by their peers in the church. And I guess that is a lofty ambition, but it's futile. All throughout this sermon Jesus is dispelling outdated mindsets and traditions. And He wraps it all up with what may perhaps be a key to the mysteries of salvation..."You're not perfect. There's no way in hell you will EVER be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. Haven't you heard what I said only 5 minutes ago? It's too late for perfection. You never had a chance..."

All of which sounds kind of nihilistic. But it's the message of the bible, I'm not telling you anything you don't know, eh? I really don't want to come off as proselytizing, so my apologies if I have.

But, moving on...I do acknowledge that far too many wars have been waged in the name of religion. I only suggest that they are waged IN THE NAME of religion and are not condoned by THE ESSENCE of religion. I could be wrong, but Al Queda could wage a war they would call a jihad, even though the majority of Muslims may very well condemn them for their actions, so is it the "religion" that they fight for, or their own messed up interpretations of the religion? Yet they still call it jihad. I just get pissed off when I hear atheists, whenever they mention war at all, toss off every "religious" war ever waged and point the finger at God for letting it happen. They bash religion and worship science all the while ignoring the fact that the single greatest destructive force ever used in the pursuit of justice is the atomic bomb, a masterwork of the scientist's craft. We live in constant fear, and have done, for over 50 years of the devestating power unleashed by Truman and Einstein, with no religious ties whatsoever. (edit: I realize that Truman was not the president when the bomb was dropped, I was just making an elusion to the Jim Carrey film The Truman Show). What I'm trying to say here is that no matter how much atheists (and hopefully people in general) may be appalled at "religious wars", the fact of the matter is that the possibility of a war backed by science is even more distressing. I hate to talk in terms of "better" or "worse" about these things, but I only try to make a point.

Well, I must go...maybe I'll get a chance soon to take up where I left off. I would like to say, though, in response to the last paragraph of your message...I could never align myself with any group of people whose ignorance, intolerance and hatred are mixed in equal degrees and hurled at people and ideas they don't understand. It's sad, to me, that so many of the intolerant people use their Christianity, their perverted understanding of Christainity, as some kind of warped justification for their actions. And so, I am actually leary of even calling myself a "Christian". Priests molesting young boys, televangelists fleecing the flock, politicians waving bibles on their soapboxes, the radical element protesting funerals, and they all call themselves "Christians". It is certainly not for me to say whether they are or not. The true essence of Christianity, as I see it, is GRACE, so who knows how God is using these things for the future good of mankind? I only know that He IS. It's impossible for me to know even how my own actions will affect the fabric of space and time in the long run, but I do honestly believe that, in some manner big or small, they WILL. Likewise all of the bad shit in the world will one day be turned to good, even if there's no way we could or would want to see it in the here and now. And we won't know. It may be a million years from now. It may be forgotten by everyone who witnessed it, and yet in some manner it will have become manifest in an essentially beneficial way.

I personally think the "war" against the LGBT community is reprehensible. It's based on judgment and not Grace, and that's how I know it's wrong. It's not a matter of anyone "forgiving" anyone. There's nothing to "forgive". It's about acceptance and unconditional love. On both sides. I say that, even knowing that the LGBT community *have* for the most part, offered those conditions while Conservative right wing religious fanatics have not..

You know I'm not a homophobe. I haven't been since 1989 when I had you on "speakerphone"...HAHAHA! Do you remember that? All it took to break down my uninformed opinions of homosexuality was to hear a close friend tell me he was gay. I wasn't concerned with those things before you told me, and that's probably why it was such a shock when you did. But I didn't care because it made no difference, it just didn't factor into the reasons I held you in such high esteem. And I did respect your path. As I do now. Mainly just wanted to say that I hope you can exempt me from any of the generalizations that many people use in defining "Christians"...

Jimbo Rawk and ROOL

1976 Toyota Corolla Commercial -

Record Review:Rolling Stones Sticky Fingers

 I put on the headphones and let the Stones take me back for 45 blissful moments. I have to say it…if you don’t agree with me that Sticky Fingers is far and away the band’s finest album then you and I, friend, have reached an irreconcilable impasse. It’s so full of intricate guitar passages that work together in such a manner that the combined result sounds fresh and sometimes even different from the last time you heard it. And I’ve heard this record at least a few hundred times from start to finish, it really shouldn’t give me goosebumps every time I hear Mick Taylor’s solos in “Sway” and “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking”, it really shouldn’t make me bristle with anticipation and want to pump my fist during the climactic end of “Moonlight Mile”, and yet it just did and I’m sure it always will. I mean, Sticky Fingers is not only why I used to like the Stones more than the Beatles when I was a kid, it’s the reason I wanted to play in a rock and roll band one day. If you haven’t listened to it in awhile do yourself a favor, give it a spin and remember what Keith Richards sounded like at his best, challenged by the addition of a new face in the band whose stylish fretwork elevated the group’s sound to an even higher level than what they achieved on Beggars Banquet. Listen and hear Mick Jagger deliver songs of lust, loneliness, ennui, feistiness and drug-addled death with the conviction, at least for the most part, of experience. Listen close to Charlie Watts’ impeccable drumming and maybe you’ll see part of the reason I was not so impressed with Hackney Diamonds. Lester Bangs was right when he hailed it as one of the greatest albums of all time.

Mike Hardwick Rest in Peace

 

Blog out of commision

Don't blog much these days. 

Great Escapes

 ***GREAT ESCAPES***

PROLOGUE

They thought I would forget.

They thought I would just lie down, satisfied with clean sheets, and forget all they told me. No matter that it was the truth, but they knew I would never catch on. They had serums in syringes especially formulated to make a man forget. Comfortable, clean rooms I was supposed to be happy to sleep in, even if only for a few months before being tossed out and left to the unenlightened. Unenlightened myself, as they would have it. That's what the needles were supposed to do, anyway. Yes, friends, they thought I would be just fine because you can't miss what you don't think you ever had. The truth is malleable, right? They merely implanted it in my head to see how I would respond. In those illumined months the truth was charted with meticulous care, as filtered through my own personal experiences, opinions, dreams, ambitions, hopes, desires...and nightmares. If only they had surgically removed it after that first bad dream I would probably not bear such a grudge as I do. I wouldn't give a rat's ass about the truth. When it was given or how it was taken away. But they waited.

It is a single nightmare that drives me towards the lost truth. The truth I lost. Truth I never would have had and likely would never know again. Not in it's totality. Maybe not at all. It is a long nightmare...6 months in the space of a single night's slumber. I've heard it said, and likely it's true, that the dream state lasts only a few seconds. Not even half a moment and yet the suspension of corporeal time allows the experience of moments, hours, days, weeks, months, years, who knows but we could experience entire lifetimes between one second and the next. 

So 6 months, really, is nothing. Right? Nothing at all. Zilch. Nada. That's what it all comes down to. Just expendable dream time. No matter that the world turned hateful towards me, it was only for a second or two. Imprisoned in an air conditioned, nuclear-powered incubator, convinced that I'd done something deserving a life sentence. 

They knew better. 

Only 6 months. 

Only 13 seconds. 

Ah, to know the things I was told, settling even for those 13 seconds alone. Wondrous, glorious prophecies, eons easily condensed into 6 months. It should have been enough. More than most people will ever see, feel, taste, touch, smell, understand, comprehend, know with the absolute certainty even reality does not offer. Seconds & months, I should have realized that this knowledge could not be hosted for the duration of a lifetime. There's only room in this universe for one God.

So they tell me it was a dream, and like all dreams it can (and will) be forgotten. I know this is true, at least the part about how they are forgotten. Only makes sense...it's easy to recall a special moment in the past, triggered, perhaps, by a song or a smell or the way a woman walks. But who can recall a single second? Not enough time for the embers of emotion to be fanned into deja vu. Add up all the seconds spent dreaming and you still won't have enough time to catch and codify the collective memories. Maybe a handful will make a lasting impression. Yet even they feel tenuous, as if they could slip through the cracks into forgetfulness at any time. No matter...you'll reach out and grab them, and you'll hold on to them like a character in an old black and white serial. The anti-hero who grasps his enemy's hand, with inconceivable strength, to keep him from falling off a high cliff and spiraling down to a rocky death below. Spin and twist to your will, they remain. The atoms of time are little more than stragglers still convinced, despite the apathy of others, that they are capable of something lasting. 

Maybe it actually was a dream. 

One of theirs. 

The only difference being that they had the luxury of waking.  

CHAPTER ONE

"Great Escapes Dream Implant Manufacturing Company". 

The sign is rather nondescript considering the implications of all it represents. The building, relatively small and unremarkable. Nothing at all like what you'd expect from a firm specializing in the manufacture and sale of dreams. But it isn't even a consideration for the proprietors. There is logic in low overhead. It doesn't take a lot of room to store a million tiny micro chips, even if the information coded in them contains millenia & galaxies. For all we knew there are more lives represented in a single bowl of chipped quartz than have ever actually been lived out in the real world. The "real" world...ha! Now that's a concept that's fast becoming antiquated. 

There aren't a lot of people who work in the manufacturing wing. The technology has become so advanced, practically perfected, that there's really no reason to keep engineers or technicians on the staff. Just a handful of coders to tweak what already exists in the archives. A few minor details. Nevertheless, details that will make a world of difference in the customer's experience. The tone of a lover's voice. The level of hatred towards an enemy. Just a touch of melancholy when a lucid moment  suggests it's not real. Slight variations of the implanted dream's perceived reality as specified by the customer cannot be tolerated. These things are important because the customer could actually retain the "dream" long enough to recall possible defects after waking. There's nothing worse than signing up for a trip to the Bahamas and winding up in some backwoods town in Arkansas. Oh, well, perhaps there is something worse. Not a few cases, kept "hush hush" by the corporation, have resulted in the necessity of ice pick lobotomies for customers who have not paid for, and did not want, the special "Halloween" temp-paradigm (which, I assure you, is every bit as terrifying as you'd expect from an implant based on the holiday). 

So what though, eh? You're gonna wake up anyway, right? That's all fine and good and seems like the logical point-of-view, but you forget that you're in an implanted dream. Until, maybe, the last few dream moments. It's only natural that such a situation would be cause for disgruntlement. With a full money-back guarantee the coders had to be very careful not to let such intrusions occur. 

Then again, very few people had ever succeeded in getting the best of the Great Escapes money-back guarantee. Litigation was usually thwarted by the tried-and-true "Dream-Within-a-Dream" defense.

The plant was located on the east side of mile marker 200 on Interstate 49, where, for the most part, it existed unseen to passing motorists. It was situated in this desolate region for a reasonable reason. You see, dream implanting had become such an inseparable part of everyone's lifestyles...much as the Internet was in the early 21st century...that it's materials, technological secrets, and everything about it, right down to the junior coders, were as closely guarded as even the massive storehouses of nuclear weapons that littered the land like a sea of push pins stuck in a map. It's brain trusts, time warping machines, indigenous templates and even the massive holograph integrator, all were as safely defensible as was humanly possible. Fortified by a shield dome capable of withstanding any and all atomic explosions, the Great Escapes Dream Implant Manufacturing Company was the safest fortress on the planet. No one knew this, of course, other than the chief CEO, a few senior officers from each branch of the military and the President of the United States. 

So, how did I get here?

There were a few among the Great Escapes ranks who thought it would be unethical to ride out a nuclear attack knowing they would come out on the other side unscathed. Very few citizens had even heard of a shield dome and fewer still had the ways and means to purchase and maintain one. "How can we live with ourselves," said these dissenters, "knowing that 99.99999% of mankind will be annihilated while we sit here talking about the meaning of life, heaven and hell, the nature of reality?" These qualms were quickly discarded when the truth set in...human beings, the entire race, were either dreaming or thinking they must be dreaming. There is comfort in believing you are asleep even if you're wide awake.

**************

I'm going to die. 

I can almost hear the warning sirens in the distance. The lights are flashing on and off. A strobe effect that would knock an epileptic to his knees. I know the camera is pointed towards me. I'm pretty sure that the postmortem assemblers have enough footage of my body so that I don't have to worry about abnormalities. Pretty sure. My mind races to confirm. I mentally scan my entire body, checking off each inch until I'm certain they've got it all in the memory banks. Inch by inch. Limb by limb. 10 fingers & 10 toes. Eyes and mouth and turned up nose. Satisfied for the most part, still something nags at me. Something very small, yet important enough that it distracts me from the seconds that are left before the bomb lands, point blank, on top of the cell...In the frenzy it hits me...

I turn around, bend over, pull down my pants and stretch wide my ass cheeks, hoping that the camera will squeeze off a shot before it's too late. I stand there, bent, for too long, not long enough, until the man with the stick and gun opens the door and says, "Pull your pants up".

I do just as he says, choosing to believe that his authoritative tone was not a command but a confirmation that now, thank the Holy god in heaven, I am complete. The assemblers have everything they need to put me back together before I wake up. 

I close my eyes.

I say a most sincere prayer of repentance, then the required mantra: 

"Now I lay me down to sleep

I pray the Lord my soul to keep

If my soul the Lord should take

I pray He finds me when I wake."

After the first "Amen" I take a peek to see where I am, hoping to see you by my side. 

Four grey walls. 

In my fear I wonder...are you still there, waiting for me to arise? Will you be there when I open my eyes? Will you be in the other room waiting for me to rouse myself, grumpy as usual in the morning? Will I wake up to an empty house as you've gone out to get us some coffee and donuts? Or will your absence be permanent? Through death? Disregard? Disagreement? Will I feel the soft brush of your breath on my shoulder or the vacuum left behind by spent rage? 

Were you ever there at all? 

I chant the supplemental mantra:

"Now the Lord my soul doth keep

In Him I find the dreamless sleep

Within His love I wish not wake

Though offered back, I will not take.

Amen."

**************************

This was the first defective dream implant I received from Great Escapes.

An autobiograhy of James Arthur Casey (Part 8)

 An autobiograhy of James Arthur Casey (Part 8)

originally written on September 18, 1995

Slightly revised on August 27, 2021

(This is the final page of the handwritten original manuscript)

She's been gone a long, long time and I can't even imagine if things would have been better or worse had she stayed. Different, probably. I know I'll regret the time not spent with her when she passes away (god forbid that happen soon). I've had dreams of her dying and me getting upset for not being closer to her. The guilty feelings and the dreams still don't push me to make amends, though. I don't understand because the love between the mother and her child is supposed to be something transcendent, special, the most important love one should cultivate while still living. I think I'm ready for that level but I don't even know if she's capable of that. To be honest I have let things get so bad that I don't even really know if she's still alive. (this sentence is from the revision, written in August 2021)

I lived with her in Oklahoma City on two different occasions. Both were disastrous. Her old man and I were of a different species and I'm sorry too say but I hated that man, not just for what he represented (whatever that means). 

It was a rare occasion when I saw her after the last eviction from his house. I remember that one well. I had spent the whole day walking around the streets of Southwest Oklahoma City, ostensibly looking for a job. No one was hiring though during this time, nothing like it is now where you can find employment everywhere you look around. Furthermore I was still reeling from my experience with the Navy. I haven't written about that particular Naval Experience in this autobiography because the memories are still too intense. (a lengthy piece about that span of time can be found on one of my blogs, though you may have to do some hunting to find it, I don't see myself posting it on Facebook soon. - JAC) I would sometimes stop at libraries and stay there until I felt comfortable going home. One day I guess my mom's second husband must have followed me to one of the library branches close to "our" house and he walked right in dressed in work clothes covered with paint and laid it on the line. He wanted me out of the house and he didn't care the means I had or didn't have to make it happen. I wound up asking my brother if he would keep my stuff while I tried to make it happen, and he let me stay at his house for a few days. I have this weird memory of watching Trinity Broadcasting Network (the wacko 24 hour a day religious channel that thrived on money donated to ministries who in turn would buy airtime to appear daily on their own shows or as guests in the flagship Praise the Lord program...not to be convinced with Jim Bakker's similar Praise The Lord program on HIS satellite channel (he was from the cable TV generation while his doppelganger Paul Crouch tapped into satellite networks to do basically the same thing). Anyway this particular evening when I was once again homeless, living on a few days of charity, there was a program that featured some dude who did actual exorcisms. It looked real to a person who had seen The Exorcist in a drive-in theater as a teenager having snuck  past any age restrictions and no previous knowledge of the Catholic Church. That movie had been the equivalent to The Passion of the Christ in terms of how much "buzz" was generated by people who had already seen it. 

So I'm watching this wacky tv preacher (they're all wacky) and he's knocking people down by touching them with a bible...he's casting out Satan in the name of the Lord Jesus. He's doing the same thing that Bob Larson is currently doing only he's not trying to look like a priest like Larson does with his silly collar. I don't think this was Larson doing it back on that day when I saw this unknown preacher casting out demons "in the name of the Lord Jesus". I knew it was pure crap constructed and probably rehearsed but I think I may have been vulnerable because of my new homeless stature and knowing I couldn't just up and expect my brother and his wife to let me move right in... I was primed to be a bit worried and scared of the future, my subconscious probably screaming "Let Me Out!"

I moved on. There was no way I was going to go back to her husband's charity and it would have been a fool move because his charity had run dry for me laying in the bedroom doing nothing but reading and listening to music "all day" (Jim Ed Brown's "Pop a Top", the Psychedelic Furs "Heartbreak Beat", Public Image Ltd.'s Album and of course R.E.M.s new masterpiece Fables of the Reconstruction. Such a work of genius right down to the album cover and the back side which completely changed the name of the record to Reconstruction of the Fables. I played that album at least as often as I'd played Never Mind the Bollocks Here's the Sex Pistols in my younger, more rebellious years. The R.E.M. album had become a symbol of me making it through what little career I had in the Navy and of how I was embarking upon a journey of life without my ex-wife Barbara. This getting over her became the next thorn in my side. The pain lasted a long, long time but I eventually did get over it, with the help of nature and the love of another woman who was willing to take me with all my damage and love me through it. A woman who knew how hard it hit me to have gone through a divorce, a woman who even after I told her I had bipolar disorder was willing to "pick up her cross" to do the hard work of getting me back to a place in my world that is more like the real world, I had started to slip away and even now, with all the stress of 2020-2021, can still make me smile and think of holding on, if I ever had in my life thougnt that I was serious about taking my own life, I would, by the grace of God, not do it because I know how it would it would affect her. Of course I'm not going to join Swingin' Ian with the World's Famous Auto Asphyxiation Club in his honor, I have something and someone to live for and this person thinks I post weird shit on the Internet and this person refuses to budge on her stand that marijuana, even medical marijuana, is detrimental to my mindset (although we both agree that it may well work for other people)...I'm not going anywhere without her. She doesn't even like most of the music I like (she actively dislikes the Christian music that I find a lot of comfort in but hey, so what? In the long run I understand it's JUST music). 

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

[I've drifted from the original manuscript, but there is very little left of it so I'll try not to drift far away so I can "put this to bed", as they say in newspaper journalism)

The way I understand it my mom's second husband learned that he had a brain tumor or some untreatable malaise and when he found out he only had like a couple more months to live he went berserk and walked to a neighbor's house (I think it was a neighbor, it could have been someone else and for all I know he had his own gun) and procured a gun...he'd told my mother if he had to die then so should she and their young daughter. 

She may have been a dummy for getting involved with this loser (IMO) but this wizened her up quite a bit and immediately. She grabbed her daughter, hurried to the car and got the hell out of Dodge and moved back in with her sister, my aunt Wanda where I assume she hid out until news arrived of her second husband's demise. The doctors were apparently correct because it was only a month or two before he passed away...on the other hand I have that on second hand nature, he may have killed himself. One thing seemed for sure: the old fucker left this world alone, contrary to his psychotic notion of taking his whole family with him. My mother dodged a bullet, I suppose it could be said. Her daughther, who I have always had an aversion to calling a "stepsister" because of my disdain for her father, has grown to be married and now works in a bank where she's been for several years. I've been hesitant to get in touch with her because I have so much guilt for not paying attention to OUR mother, she's been there to take care of her all of these years and I have gone off to do my own thing... but I hope she knows that I still love my mother despite what I percieve her as being, the mother who walked away. I wish I could see her for more but it's a two way street and my mother, if she's still alive, has done zilch to get back in touch with me and my family. The onus has been on me all this time and maybe she's made my brother feel the same way...

That's basically how it feels but I have it on good authority that she is still with us. I went to the Library book sale the other day and bought at least 20 of the Harlequin Romance novels she reads, I'd love to be the one to give them to her because you gotta know I forgave her a long time ago for any and everything that I've written about here. I've, as they say in the south, "put it in the hands of Jesus". 

Where it belongs. 

-30-

An autobiograhy of James Arthur Casey (Part 7)

 An autobiograhy of James Arthur Casey (Part 7)

originally written on September 18, 1995

Slightly revised on August 25, 2021

She walked away from home, from her family, when I was 17 years old. It took me by surprise. Sure, things had been bad with lots of arguing but that had been going on for so long maybe I'd become immune to it. I can't say how well Charles took it but I do know that we both fared MUCH better than my old man. He was devastated. I t was like the only thing in the world that mattered to him was gone. In my time I've fallen on many black days but that one was probably the absolute worst, most likely a contributing factor to dark days to come. 

It was bad enough I had to watch my father cry like a baby. I didn't feel sorry for him at the time. I'd become used to it and it made me angry. He was convinced that my mother would only listen to me - if I'd only speak to her I could convince her she should come home (a lot like dragging me into an argument, don't you think?) What he couldn't/didn't want to see was that it was a useless hope thata they could ever live together again. Their love had died years ago, maybe it wasn't all my fault or my brother's fault after all... Who knows but that their love had been dead ever since the time we were babies? Does that happen? Of course it does. I never heard either one of them say "I love you" to one another. Hell, I don't think I heard my dad say them to ME more than 10 times in his life but what are they but words, right? Three stupid little words that don't seem to add up to much unless you put them in the proper order. By the time he'd come around to saying them to me it was difficult to hear them. They just didn't seem natural coming from his lips (or my mom for that matter because she wasn't one to say them much either, if at all). 

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

To this day I know so little about my parents... one of the reasons I've been writing this bio is so that my daughter Aubrey Lynn and my son Bryan James might know me better than I knew my own dad. 

My father insists that my mother was unfaithful to him. This is very possible because she certainly wasn't satisfied by him. She denies this and I have to believe her but what then? Why would my dad make up a story about catching another man in the closet? That's exactly what he told me, that he'd found this "other man" in their bedroom. When I last saw my mother (it's been years ago) I confronted her with this accusation and she laughed like I was telling a joke on the Carol Burnett show. WTF, right? 

So she denies the accusation...is she being honest or does she not want me to know the Truth? I can understand that, I suppose, but it's hard not knowing my pa wasn't delusional, now that he's been gone for so long and I can't talk about these things. God knows I would have talked to him about it whenever he'd let me, but then again I'm sure he wouldn't want me to dredge it up so often as I might. I'm ashamed to say that we got into a few arguments not too long before he died and I'm even more concerned because they seemed like old times, like we were doing what we were supposed to be doing. Only these arguments were different because I'd already proven that I could be a decent father to my own son having been given the opportunity, the blessing, the responsibility, having it thrust upon me. Knowing what love feels like once again, Love, capital L. 

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()

(I've veered from the original manuscript somewhat, now I will return to 1995, so some dates may be off)

Does it even matter? It's been over a year since I last saw my mother. I know where she lives and it's not far from my where I live now - so why don't I go visit? I'm not mad at her. Her second husband, who never liked me and the feeling was mutual, the man she left my circle for is dead now so I can't use him for an excuse for not at least checking on her. 

I suppose some part of me is still pissed off at her for walking away. For putting me in the position I wound up in. Surely she had no idea that my dad would carry on like he did. Surely she didn't expect me to carry such an enormous burden... She says I could have come and stayed with her had I wanted, at least that's how I remember some kind of choice being offered back in 1977. I don't think of it as a choice these days but I guess it was and I also have to consider that I made that choice to stay with my father and that there was no turning back for any of us. 

I was too naive to realize that she'd already put the divorce in motion. I remember thinking she was starting a new life and had nothing, not even a place of her own, which was only half true, I just wasn't privy to the "where" of this domicile, at least not at first. She gave me the address and let me drive to OKC to visit her anytime I wanted, she gave me stuff just like my dad gave me stuff to go fetch her for him. She gave me a cool new suit that made me look like a new romantic with my long hair finally straightening out. I was looking pretty damn good in those days but I couldn't see it because I wasn't looking at through the right "lens". My mother saw it. My first girlfriend/wife Barbara McLaughlin saw it. We drag the pictures out nowadays and my beloved wife Stacie sees it. What's most important though is that *I* see it now. When I was free, when I was given the freedom to make myself whatever I wanted to be I was happy in the midst of all the chaos that was going on around me. I pretended I was in a band when I was a kid and I never stopped pretending and look what I got. A talent for drumming, singing, playing soprano, alto, baritone saxophones, keyboards (though I never learned to play with music), and now a new suit my mom bought for me at one of the malls in Oklahoma City... I remember getting a Clash button from Friends Records when they were only located in Norman, OK and wearing it on the lapel of my suit jacket, skinny tie and all. [Those "tacky" badges were really cool, you could show your respect for your favorite band by wearing them in your coat, shirt, wherever a sharp pin wouldn't jab you...the import copy of Joy Division's double album Still had one of these pins included and it was my pride and joy in 1980, the design on the pin was the cover art for the band's first proper LP Unknown Pleasures... I went on to be the biggest Joy Division fan in Oklahoma.]

As for my mother...she never asked for custody and therefore she didn't have to fight for it. That's the black and white of it. That's the stuff I didn't understand at 15 years of age. I knew what divorce was... I had seen Dustin Hoffman and Meryl Streep in "Kramer vs. Kramer" at the Ritz theater in Shawnee (or it may have been the Penthouse theater a couple of blocks away) so I had at least some kind of experience with the concept of the ravages of divorce, even if it was only a movie... it was a great movie and I recommend it to anyone whose children (and grown up children) might have a hard time understanding the pain of the "big D".

(I only have one more page of the original manuscript for this autobioraphy so I'll probably dig deeper into my hand written archives for future facebook and blogger posts. Just so you know, they aren't all in this biography form but there is much there to laugh and cry at. If you've been keeping up with these posts I can only say thank you. It makes me feel better knowing that I'm not the only one who understands or who might wish to understand. And I'm not. 

Peace OUT!

Head...Oklahoma's first truly original alternative band

HEAD, left to right
Gregg Dobbs - guitars, backing vocals
Jimmy Casey - Vocals, bass guitar, acoustic guitar
Charles Casey - Drums, vocals, cowbell

Head was an alternative rock band which consisted of Singer-bassist Jimmy Casey, Guitarist/E-Bow master Gregg Dobbs and drummer Charles Casey, who also sang backing vocals with the group. Though there was much confusion as to their band name, Jimmy told Genius, "It was lifted from an old Man Ray piece entitled 'Head Found Underneath a Bed'. There was something I found singularly absurd about the title and I wanted to infuse the sound of the band with it." Apparently they were successful, as many took it to mean everything from an actual head to a myriad other possibilities.

"We were serious about it," Casey continued. "Dead serious."

Indeed they were, for within a matter of less than a year they found themselves playing in dive bars, at weddings and even opening for national acts The Call, and soon to be local 90s legends, The Nixons ("Sister"). Lesser known local Oklahoma band The Wake also shared the stage with Head on at least one occasion.

Gregg Dobbs

Gregg Dobbs' mesmerizing mix of rhythm and lead guitars, often sounding like space wars waging in the distant night, also bore the distinct distractions of Peter Buck and Angus Young influences.

Charles Casey played the drums like John Bonham ina jazz club, with finesse and power. Though his role was almost always confined to the traps he was also quite a versatile background singer. Known to friends simply as "Chuck" he was a personable comrade and fans loved him.