House of the Singing Waters

I've always felt not quite a part of humanity. I don't know if it was how I was raised, or if I was raised at all and instead brought myself up because my parents were too busy dealing with one emo crisis or another, or if it's just the way things are with my brain.

At 65, I still don't. Most of you amaze me in your creativity and also in your stupidity. Feel free to stop reading if that offends you. I don't really care anymore. Let me clarify that, just a bit. I do care, deeply, about every single one of you, regardless of how stupid you are, how lovely you may be, how wonderful you perform or the everyday miracles you create.

It's your choices I don't care about. Those are your choices. Mine are mine, and I've grown tired of forcing myself to care about your choices. Because that was exactly what I was doing, because I thought I was supposed to. I would become upset when I felt unjustly not heard, and even then, I thought it was my fault.

Nope. It's just because, for the most part, people are so concerned with themselves that they can't hear anyone but themselves. What I have found out is that I can pour my heart out, try to tell my tale only to be interrupted by "You've told me that before," or "I've already heard this story", which may be true or may not be. Or, even more likely, I get to hear your story, which I may or may not have heard multiple times and I still listen because it's still you and you, by golly, are interesting to me.

It doesn't matter... it was a choice for you to listen to me, regardless. If your father or your son or your daughter or even someone you like told you a story for the umpteenth time, you'd probably listen, repeating the words they are saying to you in your own head, but you'd listen. Because it's the polite thing to do. We all know that. However, oddly, it didn't apply to me. It was your choice.

So... I've never truly understood the downside of being human. Apparently I demonstrate it enough. Last serious relationship lasted 12 years, I say 13 and she says 12 because I count when we started, she doesn't.
The first 10 years, were fights, arguments, screaming matches. Somewhere I started to list all the things she said were my issues and when I got to number 40, I stopped. Why go on? Why beat myself up? Apparently I was not who I advertised (no, seriously... I am) and instead was this 'Non human' (yep... that was a description of me) who cared nothing for hygiene, nothing for anyone's feelings but my own, always won every argument (how is it I ended up in an apartment, and how did we get a dog and a cat, when I specifically said no?), on and on an on... if you've had an argument with your significant other, multiply the stupidity times 10 and that was us.

And so, a reset. What's a reset? It's when you take something back to an original state. Unless you've never played a Video Game, then you've heard of this. How bout a do over? That might work, except this time we are not going to do it over. No arguments. I'm tired. I'm old enough to tell you to go fuck yourself. Ouch... yeah. I don't like language like that. But it makes a point, doesn't it?

Back in March, I was informed that back in January, I was told that she realized that this would never work. And so, self-fulfilling prophecy that it is, she was right. There are other details, but let's just say that my eternal negativity of the spotless mind was harshing her buzz and she couldn't find her path with my aura in her way.

So, given the chance to stay in the house and have her move out, or me move out and she take care of all the business of the house, I chose to move out. There were multiple reasons for this. As I knew she had no idea what it took to run the house, let her have it. I still manage the bills and I still will help out where I can, and I refuse to be a bastard about it. She is a good person and I'm just hurting and confused by stupidity of choices.
She also had aforementioned cat and dog. Hard to find an apartment on what she made that would take dog and cat easily, I think. I could be wrong. Don't really care. Cat and Dog were going to traumatized by the moves anyway. Well.. maybe cat. Dog is, was, and always will be her friend. She has her own business. It would have been harder for her to make the commute than it was for me to work from home anywhere in the universe. She mentioned moving in with her father, which would be 40 minute drive to her office. Not acceptable to me.
I could not afford the house. She can, barely... maybe even more easily than barely. She makes about 3x more than I do, if she works at it. And now she has to. She asked me to not pay anything toward the house, so I won't.

There's more, I'm sure. I'm tired of thinking about it. Let's just summarize by saying I made this choice to move out. Disagree? Don't care. It was my choice to make.

Let's see.. so far, after being told that my existence was no longer wanted in that house, I've rebuilt a fence... twice, and supervised a hot water heater installment. I have had a birthday, which came and went and had dinner with her to celebrate it. I've spent 2 weeks in this apartment, gotten to know my across the breezeway neighbor and I'm thinking I'll like it here, if they don't raise the rent too much over the next decade. I've walked on the hottest day of the year to the local store and back and it's not too bad. It's rough, like the people who live here, but it's okay. I've seen worse.

When I turn 75, I'm changing my name and identity and becoming someone else... target age? About 28. Why? My choice, again. I could be 45. I could be any age. Doesn't matter to you.

Like I said, I've never truly felt a part of humanity. All those words before this one is just intro and bitterness over a raw deal. I wish her the best. I do. She deserves it and the path I've seen before her is fantastic. She is needed.

Me, I'm sure I have a use. I figure I'm a Swiss army knife sort of person. Needed when needed but not any other time. Thought about when necessity requires but put out of sight otherwise. By the way, this would be called 'playing the victim card' in my other life. I don't see it that way. I see it as my version of the truth. Victims carry a sort of bitterness about their situation. I carry bitterness toward betrayal, but not situations. People, not places or things. People are stupid. Situations are just that... things to be dealt with. Swiss army knife, see?

And that's okay.

I'm really getting to my point. Really... this is all just crap I need to get out my way, once hopefully, so that I can proceed to the real story.

I'm going to pause right here. I'm a bit tired.

It is time to move forward. Sixth grade was traumatic for Glenn. It was, as much as possible for a child who may have been, as they say, a little bit on the spectrum, a sucky place. Rarely understanding exactly what the heck was going on, Glenn struggled to find meaning and depth in any sort of thing that the children and adults did at his school. He was lucky he had no friends, as his friends wouldn't have been friends, for sure and true. They would have been folks who found pleasure in humiliation, acquaintances who felt that his true purpose was to support them when they needed it, but to certainly be the butt of their personal jokes.

At least, that is how it felt to him, many times as he traveled his personal roads in life. Bitter much, dear Glenn?

Seventh grade, also known as Junior high, brought about many changes. Hormones for one. He was becoming a raging hormone beast, believing in one moment that he was in love and in the next that he was totally unlovable. In short, he was becoming a teenager. Yes, he was only 12. There is no law that says that you have to be thirteen to be a Teenager. Just as becoming an adult can happen through all sorts of means simply because life and experience pushes you that direction. It's a thing, you know? It happens and it's kind of a drag.

Seventh grade and Glenn found that he wasn't so odd that everybody was out to get him. Granted, back in Sixth grade, he had been a new kid on the block. When he started Seventh grade, so did everybody else, and everybody else was an alien too, so it just made more sense that he was not just the odd man out, but so was everybody else. Including the girls.

Girls! There's a concept. Glenn had a few friends who had been girls back in Indiana, and, although they weren't built like farm implements (yet), they might very well have been headed that way. He could remember exactly two, with remembering a lot fuzzy a whole bunch. Brenda Ritter and Betsy Barteau.

Oh, how he fell head over heals for Betsy Barteau. She made his little heart just pound in his chest and his head would spin around and about and not one single time did he know what this meant. There were moments when he wanted nothing more than to spend every single waking moment in her company and quite possibly some non waking moments as well. As he got older by four or five decades, he might have remembered her in dreams, as some of the characters he dreamt about were people he could not quite identify. They looked familiar, but then, in some ways he didn't quite understand, they looked totally unfamiliar.

Brenda Ritter was an across the street neighbor who would have tea parties with her dolls and dollhouses and invite Glenn and his brothers over. There was even one time when Glenn went. Brenda, like Glenn, was not from a well to do family. She was, indeed, from that rarity of the 50's; a mixed family. It was decades later when Glenn would wonder about her, wonder what had happened to her, and hoped her life had become like one of her tea parties. Perfect and innocent and way from pain and hurt.

Oddly, it was Brenda who Glenn would think of the most of all his childhood people. She was such a minor player, but somehow carried so much weight. It seems that almost begs the question of 'is there really such a thing as a minor character?'.

There were other 'minor' players, many and many. Two hands full of many, names somewhat faded with time, faces obscured by the clouds of memory, but still there, like a Greek chorus full of spear carriers.

Back then, though, he was a boy, with a boy's heart and a boy's head, often dreaming of kite flying and climbing the next hill and romance was... well, it was something else all together that he didn't understand as a boy. And yet. And yet... there was something in him that wasn't exactly a boy. Something that remembered things.

Sometimes when he was meditating in the bare bones dining room, facing away from the 100 year old dining table and focused on the one plank in the floor that could be pulled up so you could see into the basement, he would drift away, away, away.

He didn't know it was called meditating. Now, if the television show Kung Fu had been on, then by all means, he might have picked it up from that source. But no, that show didn't appear until 1972, and at this point it was only 1965. It may have come from his readings, as the books that he brought home frequently from the municipal library might have contained mentions of meditation, but his studies were more along the lines of Science and science fiction. It is unlikely that in any of the books he had read by Doyle or Heinlein or Bradbury or Einstein or any number of authors who had written about physics or science or mystery that the concept of mediation had ever come up.

There are, as there always are, possible exceptions. One could have been Sherlock Holmes, by the eminent Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, when he talked bout how to develop powers of concentration beyond those of mere mortals. There may have been some dabbling into the metaphysical realms with such authors as H.P. Lovecraft or Edgar Allen Poe.

Fifty decades later, two of Poe's stories would continue to be carried in Glenn's heart and his head. One, a tale of horror and death entitled "Hop-Frog; Or, the Eight Chained Ourang-Outangs", was about the red death, humiliation and eventual justice, in the form of revenge. Another was "The Cask of Amontillado", again a tale of justice in the form of revenge. There may be a pattern here.

Understand, young Glenn was indeed, young. Slights were big things to him. He often suffered beating from his older brother. He often was the victim of his youngest brother's accusations, and therefore recipient of beatings for youthful crimes he had not committed. There were a multitude of things done to him to twist his mind to thinking of dark thoughts, of revenge, of unsavory concepts.

It was a blessing when Glenn, in some form or another, came to find the concept of meditation, or perhaps the concept of mediation came looking for him. Regardless, they found each other, and it was not meditation as if you were just sitting there with your eyes closed. No, not this. This was the meditation of someone who was taking a deep dark dive into his own being, his own worth, screaming at the top of his non-existent lungs "Who am I? What am I?" into the eternal darkness that is inside each of us, deep, deep down.

Indeed, that is what his meditation was like. He would climb inside himself and just keep climbing. Deeper, deeper, down and down, through his head, down his spine, to the center of himself and deeper still. Once the center is found, where is the center of the center? And the center of that, ad infinitum?

Every time he went in, he went deeper. It was as if he was reliving his sick dream all over again, with out the nausea, without the mocking laughter. There was only darkness and silence, and then a deeper darkness and a deeper silence. As if he was peeling away the layers of black paint to find even more layers of even darker black, he continued in, and down, and in, not knowing what he was searching for, or even why he was searching, only that he was and it was something that he had to do.

It is possible that he was hiding from his life during those times of mediation. It was also possible that he was doing something just for the hell of it. Regardless of the reason, he did it, and not just once. There were many times he would find himself woken up by Mother, who was gently shaking him awake. As one who had carried catatonia all her life, perhaps she recognized, or though she recognized the symptoms and was felt her son had contracted the illness from her.

Farther from the truth, young Glenn was an explorer, a spelunker into the darkness of the human soul; his own. The final time, as a child, that he did a deep dive of this nature, he went to where he felt that he had met the very center of his soul. A complete and total darkness from which the only respite was just one tiny pinprick of light existed.

Such fancy and fantastic language, no?

But you see, this is the essence of magic. Sounds have frequencies. Frequencies are vibrations. Vibrations are the motors that moves the Universe and it is the Universe in which all things happen... except those that happen elsewhere.

But in this universe, the universe of Glenn, vibration is key, vibration is master... understand and harness vibration and, my friend, you will hold the key to Everything, with a capital E, in the palm of your hand. There are some caveats, which we shall get to in the bye and bye.

So, so, so and so. Back to Seventh grade we go. Hormonal and alone, carrying crushes like a handful of daisies and wishes. And crushes there were!

Janet, the crush de la saison, was his first long lasting crush. He worshiped her look, her style, the way she moved, the way she spoke. Pretty much everything about her. She on the other hand, had little to no recognition that he existed.

She might speak to him, but it was the passing sort of 'Christian' thing to do. She was very much a Christian. One of those folks who truly tried to do their very best, not because of a fear of a God, but because it was the decent thing to do.

She was slender, with long blonde hair and bangs so straight you could measure the earth's meridian with them. Narrow face and sharp visage, one could tell that she was intelligent right off the bat, even if she wasn't.

Glenn didn't know it, but it was Janet who would become his very first vibrational partner. This is not as dirty as it might sound. Follow please:

In all the universe, there is harmony and discord. That's pretty much it. Ying and Yang. Black and white, shades of gray or grey. I get those two confused. Regardless, there are really only two states of anything. There could be more, since there are greater than 27 dimensions, but you didn't hear it here.

Harmony and discord. Even in our own voices there are those two. Even in the smallest quanta there is harmony and discord. States of energy. States of vibration. Same, same, see? Vibration is energy. Energy is vibration.

It's completely possible that there may be more than just this, but this is just the hypothesis that currently works in Glenn's mind, so let's run with it.

Harmony is the state when things all move together, as one or close to one. Sometimes it just when things mesh and make for a calmness, be it music or trees or a crowded elevator. Or two people.

Discord is when things don't mesh, when things don't move together and instead crash around as if it was the bumper car ride at spring break. Do they still have those things, bumper car rides, or have mothers caused them to be outlawed due to the dangerous nature of the ride, and the possibility for whiplash?

Discord works with the grinding of diamonds, some forms of music like jazz or rap or punk. It works with war as in the Seeds of Discord. It works in politics. Basically, discord can be incredibly uncomfortable Be it war, or the grinding of diamonds or rap music. Or two people.

If you have ever walked into a room and felt an immediate attraction to someone, and not in a sexual or sensual way, but in a way that says 'I must meet that person', or even more subtle, so that you gravitate toward each other as if you were two celestial bodies pulled along toward each other's gravitational well until you find that spot of gravitational equilibrium or Isostasy. It is here where two people look at each other and think 'It is as if we have known each other for ever', and indeed, that might very well be the case.

Discord, on the other hand, exactly as one would expect, mirrors this. You walk into a room and you immediately want to leave. You see someone and you know, in that millisecond, that the possibility of friendship here is nil, non existent, nada. It is uncomfortable and you can feel the push of their gravity well shoving you far away.

Interestingly, this may also be the case where you have known each other for ever, and that is why you can't stand each other.

This is not a bad thing. This is not a good thing. This is just a thing.

Glenn found that he had started to attract and be attracted to the people who would nourish him, and in turn, he would nourish.

By nourish, it means feed the soul, the curiosity, the intellect. He found individuals, and on occasion, groups of people with whom he could discuss most of the things rambling around in his head.

"What is the nature of life?" "What is the nature of love?" "What is God?" "Why is God?" "Why are people, in general, so stupid?" "Why do I continue to question, when it would be much easier to just surrender to the numbness of whatever passes for a mind these days?"

These are some of the questions that young Glenn had. Of course, he also had questions like "What is a rainbow?". He was fairly typical of anyone of his age and generation. He had read a quote from Albert Einstein, one of the physicists that would stay with him all his life. That quote said, to paraphrase just a tad, "Never stop questioning."

And he didn't. Ever. All through his young life, starting in the 7th grade, where he realized he was alone in his thoughts even though he had begun to develop friendships and build relationships, he was always searching and researching. Later in life, he would say "There is no bad information. There is only information."

In truth, he was a nerd. A geek. That weird kid who would spend his lunchtimes alone, reading books. Reading was his constant companion and he did it wherever he went. He found that he was quite comfortable walking and reading as his peripheral vision was such that he never ran into anything. He would be found sitting in a park, reading. He would be found in his room, reading. he would be found... anywhere... reading.

And music. He had music in his head, he had music in his house, he had music on the radio. Music helped him think, helped him stay calm and not be so damn angry all the time.

When he turned 12, his family moved into a two story house. It was in a relatively undeveloped part of Broken Arrow, which was growing fast. It was a nice house, and his mother demanded that they buy the lot next door, so there would be some room to grow, and there would be no neighbors on that corner. This was done and that lot remained empty until after the divorce, when Father and his new wife, Hydra, decided to sell the land to a developer. A small single story house was built there and a new family bought it up quickly.

Life moves on, apparently.

There was, a few blocks away from the house, a small park, a creek, and a wooded area. It was a wild area, owned by the city, and during the year any number of children could be found there, playing, running trails, wading in the creek or swinging across it on long, thick grapevines, which grew in abundance. Tarzan yells could be heard echoing out of the wood, and no adult was ever seen there to put the world to adult order. It was paradise.

There was also a field, yellow with tall grasses and had small trails that the animals would use in their search for food or shelter. It was here that Glenn's life found peace, a place to meditate and relax, away from the noise of anyone else. It was here that Glenn's life changed for the mystical.

-*-

It was the summer of 1968 when Father explained that the family was moving. It was a quiet announcement, on par with what they were having for dinner or that Mother was going into the hospital for a while. While it was true that Mother had been in the hospital a couple of times, it was only true now that they were moving.

The word moving means so many things. One the one hand, it might mean that they were growing, evolving, turning from what they were to something else that was a step upward in their emotional and spiritual journey. This was not likely.

On another hand, it might mean that they were physically moving, as the earth rotates, and revolves around the sun and if one truly knew the speed and angular momentum of that movement, it would lead to an astounded gasp. Or perhaps not. Google is an amazing thing, is it not? Or is Google a *they*? Does Google identify as a gender, since, in the Us of A, it is recognized as a person? Gender Neutral then. Maybe? Regardless, it is not likely that this was the sort of movement that Father meant, although he might, given his predilection for literalness.

On a third hand, if you were so disposed, moving could easily be a simple movement, and as Father had looked increasingly upset in the last few weeks and Mother was looking increasingly blurry-eyed drunk in the last few years, moving meant that they would be moving out of town. As Father explained it, they would be moving to a place called Oklahoma, which was somewhere in the middle of the country, about 12 hours away by automobile following a mythical road known as route 66.

Glenn pulled down an encyclopedia from the shelves in his father's office and looked up the land of Oklahoma and specifically the village of Broken Arrow.

Glenn was used to small towns. He lived in one all of his 11 years. He knew the ins and the outs of his small town. All the best places to hide from bullies and the best place to steal candy when nobody was looking and the best place to go splashing in the summer. His mother used to talk about jumping from the top of the Four Arch into the creek below.

The Four Arch was called the Four Arch because the top of this structure was an arched road where freight trains ran from here to there and from there back to here and then far away to another there. These were the very same freight trains, or one of which, that his older brother Gary hopped on to have his adventure. Quite often, the freight trains would make deliveries and pickups at the RRDonnelly paper company, which was just down the road from where Glenn's little house stood. It was the house that his father had gotten from Grandmother Dorothy, the Paternal Grandmother, a rather stern looking woman whom, it was rumored, could type 200 words a minute. She was a professional secretary of some sort.

To Glenn, this was just a bunch of words. The most important thing about Grandmother Dorothy is that she made cookies of the most incredible smell, had toys that he and his brothers were not allowed to touch be cause they were 'too old to be played with' and a crank telephone that hung on the wall. The cookies were sublime and he had never had another like them in all of his long life, although he did come close when he found a thing called a 'Ranger Cookie' that was sold in a grocery store named Skaggs Albertsons.

The other, sort of important things about Grandmother Dorothy is that, at the time his father was born, she was married to a man who was also named Glenn. This was where Glenn the younger had gained his first, and quite possibly, his last name. Grandfather Glenn was not alive when younger Glenn was born. Grandfather Glenn had been killed in an automotive / train collision, decades in the past. It was this same collision that gave his Uncle James his pronounced limp and the eternal sense of guilt as James was the driver of the Model T that stalled on the tracks. Before he passed away, Grandfather Glenn was a postman during the week, and on Sundays, he would deliver traveling tent ministries. Regardless, he was a man who delivered news, good or other wise, ha ha.

Glenn's house, the one from Grandmother Dorothy, was a white house with a grey front porch that Father was very proud of, having rebuilt is and painted it using an industrial paint that was used, he said, in the painting of battleships. Who knows? It might very well have been true. It was located in the poor part of town, three blocks down from an all men's Liberal Arts college, one of the last in the nation.

Imagine, if you would, that three blocks in one direction was one of the remaining bastions of all male higher learning, and was the very same college that had given Glenn's father had his three degrees, an institution whose motto remains 'Scientiae et Virtuti', and interestingly enough, it was here, in 1956, that Father had met Mother in the kitchen of the Student Union where they served a delightful drink call a 'Suicide Spritz' made from every sort of flavored syrup on hand and a dash of seltzer water, and, as these things tend to do, produced a baby Glenn in 1957. Because his father was the type of man that his father was, Father married Mother two months before the birth. It is unknown if any discussion of, er, alternative methods of, um, delivery occurred.

Mother's family was 35 miles away, and in 1956, that was quite far. Father's family was very staunch religious folk, and lived much closer. One might think that discussions of some nature happened in heated tones and with tears and with guilt. One might be right. Tape recorders were very expensive in 1956 and there are no written records of what transpired, and Dick Van Dyke was no longer available to point a finger at. So, regardless, a Baby Glenn was going to be born, and it was the decent thing that a decent young man could do, during this time of human evolution.

Technically, Glenn was a bastard, having been conceived out of wedlock. This idea that he was responsible for his father making the choice to marry a woman he did not love would, for many years, give him some considerable guilty thoughts. One day however, he came to the conclusion that the Universe does not play with dice, and even if it did, the dice were loaded. It was going to be, one way or another. This Universe needed this Glenn.

If you walked three blocks in the opposite direction from the all male Liberal Arts college, you would find the RRDonnelly company, which due to the types of chemicals used in the process of making paper and the types of governmental restrictions imposed on such facilities at that particular point in time, created such a stink that, even today, decades and decades past, Glenn would recognize a paper mill blindfolded and with no ears, using only his olfactory sense.

The RRDonnelly company also had a hill. Such a hill that, came wintertime and snowcovered time and childhood time, made for excellent and incredible sledding. Fond memories of whooshing down a steep decline at breakneck speed, feet splayed out in front to steer the low slung bladed beast, mittened hands that held the reigns of a sleek missile which full bat out of helled flew on waxed blades down a hill that might have been the Matterhorn in his young mind, with his young voice whooping and hollering and the guards at the RRDonnelly poison your water paper mill just chuckled in amusement and may have, for all we know, wished that they were young again.

Oddly, there was a row of trees at the bottom of the hill. It was this row of trees that the brothers, Glenn, Samuel and Jamie, used to stop their descent before they ended up in a ravine at the bottom of the hill. By stop, it is meant that they purposely crashed head long into them, laughing and brushing snow away and getting up and racing to the top of the hill to cheat death again, and again, and again. Such were the young back then. Such may be the young of today. Young Gods, all of them, hard to kill and harder to tame. It is no wonder that their mother would, on occasion, lock the door behind them as they went out.

This was the place that they were moving from and this place, this Broken Arrow, Oklahoma was the place they were moving to. A house, three blocks in the middle of Higher Learning and Paper production. A house, where fairies and little folk lived in the Honeysuckle and trees gave out spring elixir of life and the oak tree in the back didn't speak to the Maple tree in the front because of a hundred year long feud that only Glenn knew about and the monsters stayed in the corner behind the clothes rack where they should stay and the sound of trains in the night would forever remind Glenn of his hometown and bring comfort on those nights when being an adult was the hardest thing to get through and the heaviest burden to carry.

Time passed far to fast, as time tends to do because it cares not who you are or what your troubles may be. Summer came and went, school started up, the fabulous 6th grade for Glenn. It was the last year before Junior High School, because Junior High Schools were still a thing. He was saddened because he knew he would not be joining his friends at this new adventure. However, he was excited that he would be finding new friends, as his parents had promised. They had promised this. He would find new friends and his old friends, David and Gorden and George and Brad would all still be there when he came back to visit.

And all that would be excellent and it would be fine and a grand time, if it had only been true.

In matter of fact, it was not, or at least, not immediately. It would be three years before young Glenn developed a friendship in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, population eleven thousand.

Four days after a presentless Christmas, which was presentless because moving is an expensive thing, children. We know it's hard on you, and it's hard on us as well, but next year, next year will be different, will be better. We promise. Four days after Christmas, with U-haul in tow behind a 1968 mercury station, the family waved good bye to the house that had seen years of growth, years of laughter, years of pain, years and years of family and headed west to their new home. They waved good bye to the house that would, in the next ten years, become the western half of a double tennis court for one of the last of the all male Fine Arts Colleges in the nation. They waved goodbye to the Four Arch where Mother allegedly could jumped thirty feet down to a 5 inch stream and suffered no injuries. Goodbye to the park where Samuel, hanging from the bottom of a bridge that was over a rain swollen creek cried for help and when that help was offered and given, stood up, brushed himself off and said, "I didn't need you anyway."

For good and ill, the family waved goodbye to that part of their lives, and like a million gazillion other people on their small planet, they moved forward to the next part of their lives, even if they didn't know it.

Trip was not terribly eventful. Driving from Crawfordsville and through Terre Haute, the family merged onto highway 70 and into Illinois, driving through boring farmland after boring farmland, which is all that there is in Illinois unless you travel north to Chicago where things can get interesting for good or ill. The family drove on and on, eventually stopping at the Powhatan Restaurant in Pocahontas, to have a lunch. Snacks had been baloney sandwiches and Kool-aid from a picnic basket Mother had prepared, so stopping somewhere different to get out of the car and 'stretch their legs' as Father called it was a treat indeed.

Glenn was entranced. It was somewhere different. He had never been here before that he could remember. The feeling of the place was exciting and unaccustomed. He loved traveling, even if it gave him a bit of car sickness if he ate the wrong grape flavored hard candies. Mother had come prepared for that, too. She had packed a bottle of flat Seven-up, just in case.

Dinner was eaten, back on the road they went, said road passing under them in a wiz. It was winter so they were all bundled up in their coats, trying to be as comfortable as they could be, playing license plate bingo and how many colors and how long can you be quiet games until all the games were used up and quick as you knew it, a big place called St. Louis was just across the river.

Not just any river, mind you, but the Mississippi river. Old Man river. Grandfather of Rivers. Really, nobody cared. They were tired of the road.

On they family of six drove. On and on. Outside of St. Louis, in tiny town called Sullivan, they stopped for their last meal of the day. Call it supper or dinner, it's all regional and doesn't matter anyway. It was the last meal of the day. They ate at a marvelous place called 'Howard Johnson' and Glenn had spaghetti, because he loved spaghetti. He and his brothers and his parents sat by a big plate glass window with the moon shining in and Glenn watch people swimming in a hotel swimming pool and felt all was right with the world for a moment. A brief, shining moment at the Howard Johnson and the moon and spaghetti.

It was just a few miles away, once last meal had been eaten and the station wagon refueled and back on the roaded that Glenn's car sickness arose and, although he loved spaghetti, that evening, spaghetti did not love him and the rest of the trip was made most uncomfortable. It was indeed fortunate that Samuel was completely covered by a quilt when the explosion occurred.

There was only four hours to go before the destination. On the Bright Side, they got to watch part of 'Yellow Submarine' at the Sullivan Drive Inn Theater while Father hosed out the car. And it was winter, remember. Car Heaters, cranked as high as they could go, can only do so much. Glenn was not the popular kid on the road that night, let me tell you.

It was night traveling that Glenn loved the most. All the lights in the distance, all the life and living that happened at night amazed him. The stars in the sky, the stars on the ground that had quite obviously fallen from the sky, regardless of the other part of his brain telling him that they were the lights of houses, entranced the boy. For the rest of his very long life, even if he was in an aircraft, night travel was the favorite travel. Once, while flying over the ocean, he caught the glimpse of a Cruise ship, all alight. It was heaven, after a fashion.

Travel, travel, small town, mountains, mountains... after car sickness everything else pales and the destination becomes the goal. Four hours and a bit of retching later, Father called out, saying, "We're here, boys. Broken Arrow, Oklahoma!"

Rubbing sleep sand out of their eyes, the boys looked around. There were no Teepees. There were no campfires. No war parties. It was nothing like on Death Valley Days. Grandfather Joe had been wrong. Maybe he had just been kidding when he said, "Watch out for them injuns! Don't let them scalp you! Ha ha ha"

On the last day of 1968, the temperature in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma was two degrees above zero. There was eight inches of snow on the ground.

The Mercury Station wagon pulled into the parking lot of a shabby hotel looking apartment building. Glenn had never seen an apartment building before. He had never been in an apartment. It was an adventure, for sure. At 11:30 pm, New Years Eve 1968, the family opened the door to a one bedroom apartment that was loaned to them from Father's new place of work, and piled in as best they could, tired and road weary. They had arrived. That was the good news.

Mother had started to drink.

That is the story of from there to here, dear reader. And this is just the beginning, really.

Well now, that was quite the introduction, hey? Let us on, then.

This 'remembering' that our friend, the man... Er, let's call him something else. Give him a name. I mean, after all, everything has one, even if it's just 'that thing'. It's an identifier. It's a locator. It's what your mom used in full length when you knew you were in trouble, even if you didn't do anything, really, at all.

Let us call him Glenn. With double Ns. Double Ns just add to the mystery, don't you think? Really, we could call him by my name, but that would just be silly and clumsy and I would never know who I was talking about anyway. So we'll call him Glenn. It's a good name. Not as good as yours, perhaps, but then, if it were, we'd be talking about someone entirely different.

So, to begin again. On this particular Sunday, at 6:42 am precisely, or at least as precise as atomic decay can be, and bless it's little heart as it surely does try doesn't it? At 6:42 precisely, Glenn remembered EveryTHING. Great flashes of awareness and awesomeness flared to life as the answers to... well... everything flooded his great brainy brain. He felt that who he was and what he was became stretched so thin that he, the he-ness of himself, disappeared into the all that was existence. For that moment, that flaring and painful and somehow joyous and ecstatic years long moment, he was everywhere. He was everything. He was Nothing. Nothing was beyond his knowledge as there were no past, no future, no life, no knowledge. It was all part and parcel of the incredible, unloving and unlovable persistently present now.

Now, there may be some 'debate' about the use of the word 'unlovable'. Again, don't care. I'm a sheet of paper here. HOWEVER, if you choose to love objects that have no true existence, then who is anyone to judge, unless of course, they are a judge, and then it's pretty obvious. Loving a rock? Okay... but don't expect it to love you back. Love the taste of pizza? Purely a chemical reaction to another chemical reaction. Love the air around you? You better! If it wasn't around you, you'd be dead, right?

But to love a universal state of is-ness seems that it would be incredibly hard since it requires a leap of faith and a jump to the left. To love the Now is to love forever and away and never to stop because there really really, and truly true is nothing else in the universe but the Now.

As a human being, it's very hard to love the now, especially when that splatter of bacon grease flies up and gets your cheek. It's insanely hard with the now contains the very moment when you see a loved one breathe their last breath. It is beyond reason to expect one to love the now when a baby, not barely old enough to ... or anyone, actually, because everyone is somebody's baby... when a baby is murdered, killed, snuffed out, removed from your particular now forever and ever again, amen.

If one human being has ever, ever, ever, reached that point of loving the persistently eternal now, then I put forth that the one who is doing the loving is no longer exactly a human being. They have reached a point of something moreness that can only be attainable by leaving that 'human' thing behind, at least part way. It requires a sacrifice of ego. A sacrifice of self. The release of the Id from all the Idcentric obligations.

In short, you either start out being not 'exactly" human or somehow it finds you in a moment of weakness or a moment of strength when your mind is distracted by incredible amazement or by mountainous sorrow or unbearable pain, and you become transformed beyond what is 'exactly' human into the something moreness of realizing how small and yet how large you are. How small and how large we all are. And in that bubble of realization we, you, usn's, expand to be beyond the all, beyond the veil, beyond the beyond and see all of it for what it is and in that moment... in that incredible moment,

We laugh.

And not just one of those knowing chuckles that are reserved for the sly of eye, either. Not one of those 'I know something you don't' snort of derision. Not even one of those snickers of 'If only you knew what I knew'. No indeed. No sirree. No ma'am and miss and buddy and pal.

This laugh rolls from the toes and grows to the knows and out through the throws of a solid great gallumping belly of a laugh that you feel will never stop and in the end it is so incredibly overwhelming that to think of it in the future, and you will....I promise you that you will, you will cry from the joy of the memories and you will cry for the sadness of the loss, and you will laugh again, but not as loudly and not as sadly and not as joyously. You will realize the simple and complex real truth that we are all part of this madness, this absolute balmy bonkers of an IS, this nutty conceptual Now of a Universe and no matter how far we run to deny it and deny it we will, we cannot, in the end, once the truth of it all washes over us like the worlds biggest cat tongue, rubbing us raw by scraping away that incredible stench of proud human ego ignorance.

In short, we are the liars, and we are the lie. Conversely, we are also the StoryTellers and we are the Story. In fact, you can take any combination of we are the ... and we are the ... and it would still fit. See how easy it is to make a myth? Or a hit? Same/same, dear reader. Same/same.

It's been a while. It's Christmas, and since I have chosen this as my journal home, I will christen it with my Christmas tale. Here ya'll go!

It is that time of year! That time when we think of those near and far, near and nearly near to our hearts. And so, I present to you, my annual Christmas offering

There were six inches of snow crunching under heavy boots, leaving foot craters trailing behind and showing the path of the weary traveler. Grey woolen greatcoat with the collar pulled up over near frozen ears, black fedora crowning a cloud white mane of hair and showing that better days were somewhere far behind. Round rimless eyeglasses, wet almost beyond transparent, perched above a strong round nose and in front of pale blue eyes topped with pale bushy eyebrows.

Red cheeks burning with the cold, sat proudly above mounds of cotton beard that framed a small, yet generous mouth. Smoke colored gloves covered hands that reached through the blowing wind, with one occasionally reaching up to touch the brim of the fedora, to save it from whisked away into the blow. Greatcoat flapping open to show a bright red vest with golden buttons that protected a white linen shirt. Onward into the windish ice strode the traveler, step by ice crunching step.

Lights up ahead, coalescing into sleety blobs, squaring into windows with frames. Hatless heads and coatless arms could be seen through the windows, and the traveler was gladdened by this. It meant warmth, not just of fire, but also of people. Automobile shaped mounds sat scattered in the mercury light covered parking lake of white, and surrounded the green mound of the Silver Diner. It was an aging and comfortable green and silver island that appeared almost ghost-like as the wind swept the blowing snow 'round and 'bout it.

Mounting the old wooden stairs to the door, the traveler noted that not a speck of ice were on any of the treads. Crystals of fresh snow-melt had been sprinkled liberally to protect any visitor from slip sliding their way to a hospital. At the top of the stairs was a mat, proudly proclaiming 'Welcome!' in bright red letters. Hunter green holly springs and their poisonous red berries were imaged on the mat, surrounding the word, reminding stair steppers that it was the season to be... if not jolly, then at least red and green.

The doorknob was a simple latch on the old spring aluminum door, and it was an easy pull, and it too had been painted bright red. A sign on the window of the door also bid "Welcome", and "Watch yer step!". The front door led to a small entry room that was brightly lit, with windows all around to show the inside with the happy diners and the outside with the frozen air.

There were, in that entry room, three gumball machines, though one was filled with peanuts and another was filled with candy baked beans. The third was filled with gumballs large enough to make any parent think twice about the possibility of choking in a small child. There was also a small corkboard stuck on one of the windows that faced toward the parking lot.

On this corkboard were flyers for "Home repair done cheap!" with little pull-tabs with a phone number. There were business cards from near and far, each proclaiming the travels of someone else to somewhere else. Notices of lost dogs, washers for sale, babysitting offers, a church bake sale that was to be held the preceding August, all hung for the inspection of anyone caring to look. There was a coat rack and above it, a hat shelf, all used, filled to the cotton, woolen, synthetic, natural fiber brim with coats and hats and gloves and scarves of all colors and types.

The traveler stood in the warmth, letting his bones get used to it, feeling the glow start from the inside and move to the out, and letting the heat move from the outside to the in. Leaking through the door that led to the dining room, drifted the sound of Bing Crosby singing that he's dreaming of a white Christmas. Glasses could be heard clinking and the squeaking scrape of flatware on dishes gave indication that food was indeed served here.

The screen door to the diner opened and a large woman stood holding it. Her blond hair was avalanched on top of her head and the entire yellow snowfall was held in place by two pencils, stabbed through a bun at the back. She wore a typical blue waitresses blouse with the rounded white collar and short sleeves. The blouse barely contained her breasts and the white buttons seemed to smile with the strain as they held back the burgeoning flow of flesh. A patch on her pocket said that her name was Nancy and the smile on her face said she was happy to see him.

"Well, stranger!" she said, smiling and laughing while talking in a loud voice. "You gonna stand there all night and freeze your butt off, or you gonna come in and warm up a bit?"

She held the door open wider and beckoned the traveler inside. "We haven't seen a snow like this in the last twenty years or so." The wind outside howled beyond the window. "You stranded?" she asked.

"Yes." The traveler answered simply. "Just past the highway, and just over the hill."

"Hooo Whee!" she cried out. "Son, there ain't no road out that way." She waved her hand in the general direction the traveler came from. "You must have taken a snow trail to end up over there."

The traveler smiled and said nothing.

"Well, get yourself in here; grab a table or a chair if you can find it." She stepped back from the opening. "We have lots of folks here tonight, must be the weather." And she laughed deep and serious and melodic.

"I don't want to be a bother," the traveler said. "I have help on the way."

"Ha!" Nancy said. "They better be driving a tractor or a snowcat if they think they're gonna be making any headway in this stuff. Might as well get in here and wait. Least you can take the weight off your feet."

"Thank you," said the traveler. "I have walked quite a distance. Perhaps a sit would do me well." He pushed past her and through the door. "Thank you, Nancy." He said.

The interior of the diner was well lit. People sat and talked or looked at him as he entered and took off his hat to brush the snow off its rim. It was an old fashioned diner, from out of the highway's past.

Tiny individual jukeboxes sat on each booth. Each table had old-fashioned steel napkin holders and slim plastic red catsup and yellow mustard bottles sitting happily on red and white checkered tablecloths. The chairs were white, rounded back shaker style with red Naugahyde seats.

In the center of the diner, a white faux marble counter ran around the kitchen area. Nested around the counter, on the non-kitchen side, an army of stools stood patiently on their one brushed aluminum legs, waiting for seats to fill their round red Naugahyde covers. In truth, a number had been filled already, and there were a few children spinning around and around while their parents patiently talked or sipped their hot drinks or fed their twirling offspring French fries.

The traveler moved down the length and found an empty two-person booth in the corner of the diner. Nancy followed on his heels, and surprised him when he was finally seated.

"So," she said with pad and pencil in hand, "What'll it be? How bout a cup of coffee to start? Tea? Chocolate?"

"Nothing, really," the traveler said. "I'll just wait here until my help arrives."

"You're sitting pretty far back in the place for them to see you," Nancy observed.

"Oh, they'll know I'm here." The man pulled a small red and white case from his coat pocket. A cell phone. "I'll tell them where I'm sitting."

Nancy stood, with her arms crossed, and looked down at the traveler as he sat quietly, still wearing his coat and gloves. "Are you going to take off your coat at least? Your gloves?"

The traveler shook his head negatively. "No. I won't be here very long."

"Well," Nancy said. "Hope springs eternal, I guess." She turned away. "If you change your mind about something to eat or drink, just whistle." She bustled her way thought the diner, stopping and checking on each customer as to how they were doing, and did they need anything. Like a blue clad tugboat, Nancy coasted down the coast of customers and finally docked at the register near the door.

The wind howled fiercely and the snow piled deeply but safe inside the diner, the laughter and talk and clinking and singing continued as if to spite the weather. The traveler sat in the back at his table, looking out the window, waiting and watching.

Wrapped in his silence, he almost didn't notice the tug at his coat hem. In fact, the first time he didn't notice at all. It wasn't until the chubby little fist grabbed the bottom of his coat and gave the dark wool a mighty tug that the white framed face turned to see what was going on.

There stood a child before him. Perhaps five years old, perhaps six, with curly red hair, chubby cheeks and bright blue eyes. She smiled up at him, and despite the wrinkles on his brow, the traveler found himself smiling back.

"And what," he found himself asking, "may I do for you, Donna?"

In a sweet voice sounding like cherub trumpets, she asked, "Are you Santa Claus?"

"What would you say if I said that I am?" he asked.

"I would ask you to tell me a story, Santa," she replied, sounding very serious in her child's voice.

A woman's voice came from behind and above, saying, "I'm so sorry!" The traveler looked up at a pretty face framed in nicely curled red hair that matched the color of Donna's hair. "I hope she's not bothering you." Donna's mother reached down and said, "Come on, Donna. Leave the nice man alone."

"Oh, she's no bother at all, Andrea," the traveler smiled. "In fact, I was just about to tell her a story." He waved his hand at the seat across from his and asked Andrea, "Would you like to hear it, too?"

Donna's mother stood for a brief moment and then asked, "How did you know my name is Andrea?"

"It's because he's Santa, Momma!" Donna volunteered.

The traveler nodded and said with a knowing wink, "That's exactly right, Andrea. I'm Santa Claus. And if I can have your permission, I'd like to tell you and your daughter a story. A winter story."

"Why...," Andrea thought for a moment, looking out the window. She pulled out the seat and sat across from the traveler. "I don't think the weather is going to be getting any better. Why not?"

The traveler whistled, low and long. Nancy steamed over to the table and asked, "Did you change your mind, hon?"

"Yes, Nancy." The traveler looked at the two and said, "I think three big mugs of hot chocolate would do nicely." The two across the table nodded. "With extra chocolate?" He asked Donna, and the little girl nodded furiously. "And extra marshmallows?" He asked Andrea, who smiled broadly and nodded.

"Okey doke!" Nancy said. "Be back in two shakes of a reindeer's tail!"

The traveler unwrapped his bright white scarf from around his neck and folded it gently. He unbuttoned the top two buttons of his coat, revealing a crimson vest below.

"Are you really...," Andrea started, and then stopped. She blushed furiously at the silliness of her question.

"At this time of the year," the traveler asked, broadly smiling pearlish teeth, "Aren't we all?"

Nancy showed up with three large and steaming mugs of thick brown liquid hidden beneath a large heap of marshmallow mountain. "Here you go, kids!" She winked at Andrea. "Extra marshmallows!" And off she steamed to help another customer.

The traveler took a might sip, smacked his lips appreciatively and said "And now the story."

He settled into his seat a bit more, and giving Andrea a wink and giving Donna his most serious of smiles, he said, "This is the story of how the pine trees got their needles." He cleared his throat and began.

"Many years ago, as most good stories begin, the world was warm and covered with water and land and flowers and grass and animals and trees. People had not even started to walk the land and the four seasons that we now know didn't exist. There was only one, and it was summer all year 'round."

"In this time, long, long ago, the animals and plants could all talk to each other. There was one language and peace covered the land because everyone knew what each other needed and everyone was willing to share, from the smallest bug in the land to the tallest tree."

"One day, the story of a change rumbled through the land. It was a story of the air growing cooler, of the world getting ready for its very first winter's sleep. Of course, it wasn't known as winter at that time. Winter had never come to the world before, and all the animals and plants knew was that it was steadily growing cooler.

"Well, at first, there was hardly any change at all. The sun had moved from its place in the sky and had sunk a bit toward the south. The early morning air carried a bit of a chilly nip, but the day was still warm enough for the animals to play outside. There were obvious changes that had begun, though. The animals grew thicker fur. The grass started to hide their seeds in the earth. The leaves on most of the trees had changed from green to all the colors of the rainbow.

"There were some trees, however, that decided that they would keep their green all year long. It was their pride, you see. They were some of the oldest in the forest and therefore had decided that they should display their superiority by keeping their leaves green and youthful all year long.

"These were the pine trees, and they had beautiful full leaves, as straight as a knife blade and as wide as a big man's hand. They were flat and could hold a full cup of water when it rained, and they carried a shine that would flash the summer sun so that it looked like as if a forest of fish where hanging on their limbs.

"Now, the tales of the pride of the pine trees and their refusal to have their leaves turn all different colors rippled through the forest, and all the animals and all the other plants ignored what they heard. It made no difference to them, as they saw the pine trees for what they really were. To the other plants and animals, the pine trees were just a lot of hot air, thinking they were better than everyone else, simply because they were the oldest, or the tallest.

"There was one, though, that could not ignore the stories of the pine trees and their folly. This was the Great North Wind. Before the sun had started to move to the south to keep warm, when it was Summer all year long, the North Wind would blow from its home, and bring cooling relief to the hot summer days.

"But when the world changed, the North Wind found that he had developed severe power and tremendous strength in his bite. For quite a while as the world was just starting to cool, the North Wind had been blowing around the North Pole, freezing water and making snow and putting whitecaps on mountains and creating glaciers. He was very proud of his strength, and knew he was the most powerful one around.

"When the North Wind had heard the rumor of the pine trees, he puffed up like a big balloon and said 'Keep their green, will they?' he huffed and howled. 'We shall see about that!' and down from the North pole he rumbled, determined to give a taste of this new season to the prideful pine trees.

"When the Great North Wind appeared, he brought blowing snow and freezing rain and the leaves on some of the trees blew away like colored feathers in a storm. It was still quite early in winter, so the North Wind's strength was not fully grown.

"The North wind blew as hard as he could, but since it was not quite December, and indeed was only the last few days of November, its breath was not as strong as he had thought, and could only cause the pine trees to barely shiver. The pine trees were indeed keeping their leaves green, and were holding onto them with a tight grip. All this did was anger the North Wind more.

"Don't you worry!" the North Wind roared out, spitting ice cicles. "I'll be back, and when I do, I will take your pretty green leaves and scatter them all across the land!" Then, with a great earth shaking howl, the North Wind retreated to his North Pole home, to wait and build his strength and plan his attack.

The pine trees, though prideful, were not silly trees and began to worry. "What if it's true?" they worried. "What if the North wind can blow all of our beautiful green leaves away?" they fretted. "We would be naked! We would be laughed at!" It was a thought the pine trees did not want to think about, but it was a thought that the pine trees could not help but think about.

Now, in this land, this Summerland that was turning to a Winterland, there lived a curious little animal called a woji."

"A woji?" asked Donna, from below her chocolate mustache.

"It was called a woji, and there has never been an animal like it since. It was small like a small dog, but it was slender, like a weasel. It had fingers instead of toes and its ears were round and not pointed. It had big, slanted yellow eyes, and a long mouth full of teeth. And it was always hungry.

"The woji was a very smart animal, and could tell that when the North Wind came next, the world would turn very cold and frozen and it would be very hard for the woji to find food. And the food that the woji loved to eat the best was fresh and green pine leaves.

That is why the woji was pleased that the pine trees were going to keep their leaves green and that is why the woji was very frightened by the Great North Wind. If the North Wind succeeded in blowing all the leaves away, then what would the woji eat? How would it live? And besides having no food, the woji did not like the idea of cold. It did not like the idea of cold at all.

And so, in those last few days of November, the woji thought and thought hard. It thought and thought and thought. Then it rested and thought some more. And then one day, one of the last sunny days that also happened to be the last day of November, the woji came up with an idea.

He approached one of the pine trees and told it of his idea. Well, the pine tree just laughed. "Preposterous!" it bellowed. "Ridiculous!" it scoffed. "It would never work!" it mocked.

The woji was not put off. The woji knew that the idea was a good one, as good an idea as an idea can get and that all that was needed was an open and wise ear to listen.

So the woji went to the next pine tree, who also laughed at the idea. "Ridiculous! Preposterous! It would never work."

On and on, from pine tree to pine tree the woji went, always hearing the same thing. "Ridiculous! Preposterous!"

The world was turning cold now. The Great North Wind was getting closer and some of the leaves had started to drop and blow away. Tiny flakes of snow fell and blanketed the land in a thick white sheet that melted as the day warmed. All who lived in and on the land knew that it wouldn't be too terribly soon before the snow would not melt, and the leaves would all blow away. They knew it as surely as they could feel the cool air in the morning and the chill in their bones.

Further and further the woji traveled, telling every pine tree it found the idea it had. The further north and the colder the world became, the less and less the pine trees laughed, but still none would even listen to the idea. Snow had started to pile up around the bases of some of the trees and a few of them had already lost some of their leaves, but still the pine trees held onto their belief that they were, somehow special. Somehow, they would keep their leaves and keep those leaves green.

The woji was beginning to become discouraged, and almost gave up. It decided to give it one last try, but rather than talk to each and every tree in the pine forest, it would go straight to the oldest and wisest pine tree there was. Now, being the oldest and wisest it was also possible that it was also the most proud, so the woji approached most carefully.

"Oh, great pine, oldest and wisest of all the trees," the woji said, "I have an idea of how you can keep your green leaves all the year round. No matter how cold, no matter how fierce and strong the North Wind may blow, your leaves would stay on your branches and stay green."

The pine tree king pondered and muttered and hummed. It too, had heard the threat of the Great North Wind, and though it was as vain and proud as the other trees, it was also aware that pride did not equal wisdom, and sometimes pride must give way to wisdom in order for life to continue. Besides, the pine tree king had already seen some of the other pine trees lose some of their leaves, and did not want to join them.

"Tell me, little woji," said the tree king, "If I agree to this idea you have, what is it that you will get from me? I have heard of you, little woji, and I know that you never do anything for free."

And it was true. The woji was a very crafty animal. There were some animals that would not even speak to it, because they simply did not trust what the woji would do next. The woji was rather famous, you see, for doing jokes at the other animal's expense. That is how the skunk got her stripe, the giraffe got his long neck and the leopard got her spots. All were because of one joke or another that the woji had played.

Even so, this was not a time for jokes, and the woji became very serious. The woji told the pine tree king the idea that had popped into its head. The woji spoke a very long time, from when the shadows were almost straight up and down until they were stretched far out to the side.

After the woji had explained the idea, the pine tree king once again pondered and hummed and muttered. While the pine tree king pondered, a cold wind blew hard and the tree and the woji both shivered in the growing cold. This may have helped the pine tree king make up his mind. We may never know.

"How long will it take you?" asked the tree king, to the shock and amazement of the other pine trees in the forest. The other pine trees protested, admonishing their king and flatly refusing to take part in such a foolish plan. The pine tree king silenced all the other pine trees, saying he would be the first and therefore, if anyone looked foolish, it would be he and he alone.

"Your majesty," said the woji, "it will take me hardly anytime at all. And all I ask is that, when I am done, you shelter me with your branches, and you allow me to eat, just a few mind you, of your green and tender leaves."

"Very well," the pine tree king said, sounding dubious and suspicious. Another, colder blast of wind blew through and the pine tree kings shivered where he stood. "Can you start now?"

"Right away, your majesty!" the woji said, jumping up and clapping his hands. "Right away!"

So, for the next few days the woji worked. It was the hardest work it had ever done, and at night, the woji would collapse, exhausted and fall into a deep sleep, only to wake the next morning and start again.

The work took three days, and each day was growing colder than the one before it. When all of the work was done, the woji stepped back to admire what had been done. The other pine trees laughed at such a sight, but the woji simply smiled and nodded, satisfied with what it was seeing.

"Now!" the woji cried out. "Now, Great North Wind! I dare you to do your worst! Blow and howl and scream and freeze and snow all you want. I will be safe and snug and warm, and there is nothing you can do about it!"

Well, now, this did not make the Great North Wind very happy, as you can imagine. Down from the North Pole he blew, freezing everything in his path. Snow covered the land in great heaping mounds. The lakes and rivers froze over, freezing fish in mid-swim. The animals all moved south, running hard to get away from the cold. Some ran so far that they ended up in far away countries, never to be seen here again.

The North wind blew so hard and so strongly that all of the trees in the forest lost their leaves and they shivered in the cold, naked and frozen. All trees but one, that is. Surrounded by bare bark and naked limbs, the pine tree king stood, green and glorious.

What the woji had offered to the Tree King was really very simple. He would take each and every leaf on each and every branch and roll them into little needles. Then using the woji's own fur, each leaf would be sewn, like a button, to its place on the branch. That would keep them safe and secure no matter how hard the wind blew and no matter how cold it would get.

And so it was, and so it happened. The Great North Wind blew and blew and howled and screamed and froze and snowed, but the greatest screams and the loudest howls were from his own frustration. Hidden deep and snugly secure in the green clothed branches of the pine tree king, the woji slept with a smile on its face, with its belly full of fresh green pine needles.

"And that," the traveler said, "is why pine trees have needles instead of leaves."

Donna was sleeping in her mother's arms, her belly full of warm chocolate and her mind filled with dreams of Christmas. Andrea looked up from her sleeping daughter and said, "That was a wonderful story. Where did you hear it?"

Nancy appeared at the table and said, "Well, folks, look like the storm has broken and the skies are clear again." She looked over at the traveler and said, "The chocolates are on the house. You spin a good tale." She looked out the window, and her eyes grew wide.

In a quiet voice, not quite a whisper, but as close as she could get, Nancy asked, "Is that your ride?" She nodded to a scene outside the window.

The traveler followed her nod and stood. He wrapped the snow-white scarf around his neck, and donned his hat once again. "Yes, Nancy. That is my ride. I thank you for your hospitality, and now I must be leaving. I have a long way to go and a short time to get there."

The traveler moved out from the tiny booth and strode to the door, stopping and turning before he opened it. "By the Grace of God, and however you believe, may you all be at peace in this season, and may you all find the love and joy that you deserve. These are the gifts you can give yourselves, and your loved ones. A very Merry Christmas to all, and to all," he winked, "a good night!" Then he turned and disappeared into the night.

Andrea, mouth gaping, turned to Nancy and asked in a hushed voice, "You don't think he really is... you know?"

Nancy shrugged and smiled. "Who knows?" she said. "I've seen a number of strange folks come through here, so it wouldn't surprise me one little bit."

Outside, a tiny sleigh, pulled by what looked like reindeer waited for the traveler to mount his seat. Once he was seat-belted in, he waved one gloved hand at the patrons looking out the window of the Silver Diner, pulled a whip from the side of the bench seat, and smartly cracked it. With a jerk, the reindeer, sleigh and rider started down the road.

Nancy wiped down the table, and noticed that the traveler had left a tip. A crisp twenty dollar bill, with the words, "Merry Christmas!" written on it. There was also a signature: "S.C."

"Nope," Nancy said, placing the bill in the pocket of her blouse, "I wouldn't be surprised at all."
And a Merry Christmas to you All!

I find that there is one word that confuses me, over and over. It's a human word, doesn't exist in any other language that I'm aware of, though there are bound to be plenty of folks who argue the point. Still... they would have a hard time convincing me that they, themselves, speak any language other than human because it is that very limitation that causes them to act as they do. They are human beings, limited in scope of life, limited in depth of thought, limited in complexity of language. Like the word 'god', which, oddly I can totally understand without needing to know the details, (that is the basis of this particular Abstraction - details don't really exist. All evidence is anecdotal and therefore hearsay) the word love carries with it much the same reaction and revulsion.

Why revulsion? Oh, because there is, I feel, so much misunderstanding of the concept. Love isn't a feeling. Love is a concept. Love is an idea and an ideal. Feelings are chemical in nature. Love isn't. Feelings are a reaction to stimulus. Love is a... rationalization of that reaction. A conceptualization of a dream of an ideal. Love is some thing that we have defined as a saving, when it is really just a definition to fit what we want it to fit.

Why revulsion? Because, because it isn't real. It's a lie we tell ourselves to explain a chemical reaction that hurts so badly we can't help but be lost in it and yet, enjoy the sadness and pain in retrospect.

We place far, far too much demand on such a little word. We use it to fit almost any sort of thing we merely like. We 'Love' that color. We 'Love' that experience. We 'Love' eating or sitting or camping or driving or...

No. We really don't.

Love... I don't think we know what that means, anymore. Love. See... do you really love Ice cream? Would you do anything to ensure Ice Cream's happiness over your own? Would you sacrifice all that you had to keep Ice Cream happy and safe and warm and secure?

I didn't think so. So... you have a limit to love, then. Now it's little 'l' love. Which isn't really love, is it? It's more like... Like. A strong Like. A Like with a capital 'L'. Okay.. I'll let that set for a second while I get into the other part of 'Love' that is a revulsion to me.

'In' Love. I'm in love with... You can't be 'in' love at all. You either love, or you don't. Simple as that. Why do I say that? Here:

To be 'in' love means that your happiness is far more important than whoever or whatever you 'love' Little 'l'. Why do I say this? "Where are you?" "I miss you!" "I'll die without you!" "My life has no meaning without you?" "If you leave me, I'll kill myself!"

See the pattern? If not, stop reading now, because you won't get it.

To be 'in' love is an incredibly selfish act, where you demand...not just ask, but demand all the attention that you can get from whomever or whatever. Seriously. It is, without a doubt, the furthest thing from love that a person can have. I'd rather you were indifferent than 'in' love with me. Love me or leave me... please. Just don't gross me out by being 'in' love with me. I don't play that sort of territorial game. Hell, I don't even know what 'jealousy' is.

I have lost lovers (another odd word) because I admitted that I wasn't 'in' love with them. I really pissed off the first wife with that admission. I liked them a great deal. I even loved them...some of them. But 'in' love? I would not do such a disservice to another human being.

Love I hold in great esteem. Love is, as Max has said, "The greatest thing in the world, next to an MLT." Love I has me in Awe. It is, to me, Awesome, in the true sense of the word.

With Love, all things are possible. Really. You can move the moon if you have the love. Okay... that's a bit poetical, but there it is.

Look... the first time I ever loved someone and knew it was when I held a 6 week old baby in my arms. Up until then, I had no idea what the word meant. And I was wondering about what it meant, because it seemed to elude me. I was that sort of kid.

I was a morose, introspective, sad dumbass, who forgot to have fun as he was growing up. Instead, I crawled into my belly button to answer some of these questions:

Who am I?

Why am I here?

Why is anything?

What is love?

Love was important because, I think, I had a screwed up and skewed up concept of it. Mom and dad were not the best of role models... then again, perhaps they were the perfect role models... they got me to thinking about it, after all. Love was a dilly.

Growing up, I felt strongly towards a number of folks... men and women. As a boy, it was girls and boys. I felt strongly towards my brothers. I suppose I loved them. I suspect I just liked them a lot, because sometimes I wished them dead.

Now... when one of them passes away... dies... I cry and mourn and carry sadness for quite a while. They are my brothers, after all, and I miss them as I would miss my left arm or a big toe. But love them? I dunno. I don't think it's a requirement for life to love your blood family. In fact, I know it's not a requirement. So, you don't have to love your blood family. Loyalty is not love. You can be loyal to the assholes, because nobody can treat my brother like that. See? But that's not love. That's territorial. That's some weird genetic bonding thing. Not love.

I have liked women more then men. I'm sort of... Oh, asexual now, I guess. Pity my poor wife, but I suspect she's used the energy to further her own interests, and good on her. There was a time when my appetites were very, very large.

Everyone who is reading this has known me after those appetites started to fade to the point of non-existence. Do I miss it? Not really. The moment I realized that a 30 minute or 4 hour session of foreplay followed by a 15 second ejaculation which was followed by "I wonder what's on TV" just wasn't frigging worth it. Get me to the TV or the book or whatever and leave that 'growing closer' to the young kids. I'll grow closer my own way, thank you. I will 'grow closer' using Love.

So, what does sex have to do with love? Not a damned thing. Nothing. That's my point of my little admission. That thing that was once the center of my being - my Pan Essence - no longer exists. But.. but... but... NOW I can Love stronger.

Love is a convention. An idea. A definition of a reaction. It isn't real... and yet, there may be nothing more real. People have died for it. People have lived for it. Palaces were built for it and stars were named for it.

Love isn't a fuzzy feeling. It's not the warm cocoa of the soul. Not even the cardigan sweater of the heart. It's something deeper. Something more serious. Something beyond the beyond of the deepest part our endless minds can imagine. It's out there, somewhere, beyond sight.

It's not palpable. You can't touch it, but you can hold it.

It's not visible, but you can see it. It's impossible to hear it, but the sound is unmistakable.

Love, for all we, as humans, try to pin it down, can't be defined in terms other than poetical, musical, fantastical phrases that only hint at the depth and meaning and substance of it.

I know this: At this point, if I say I love you, it means something far deeper, far stronger, far more serious (and I mean serious... like to the death serious) than 'in' love infatuation. Than anything superficially sexual at all.

I have grown enormously tired of all petty feelings and don't really have time for them. That is why I value friends like m'Ladye. She's never known me, and yet, she is a sister, wife, friend, old love, sitter on the porch sort of love that I can relate to. She too is tired.

Or Bill the Tailor. He's a man who sings with such depth that he makes me cry from the depth of it. And yet, I have read of his difficulties with some human conventions. This is a man I am pleased to call brother, and I love him as such. The world is stronger with him in it. He is important.

These are two examples. Only two out of millions... and perhaps billions.

Okay. This is a bit maudlin and getting icky. So I Love. Many people do. I think there are those who don't and I think there are those who can't. These are the scary ones. And you'll know them when you are near them, because there is something missing. Something sad. Something dangerous. I have known one or two of these people.

Those that can't Love are ... well.. I think the world would be best without them. But that's my personal thought, and I'm not a nice guy.

I'm running out of words. So, I guess that's bout all I have to say bout that.

I am an immortal. I know this. It isn't a choice. It came from a curse something like a couple of thousand years ago that rolled up through the gene pool and landed in my lap.

See... when I was younger (yes, I was born in 1957, so this whole immortality thing is untested. One could say it's just a hypothesis at this time. Not even a theory)... any way.. when I was younger, I noticed a number of differences between my brothers and me.

Now, I had 3 brothers. 1 half brother and 2 birth brothers. However, to me, they were just brothers. Here, I feel the distinction needs to be made that my oldest brother was not a birth brother. He had the same mother but a different father. Not really sure who that father was, but mom said it was an escaped criminal, while I tend to believe it was Dick Van Dyke, who my mother knew and whom my mother had an undying hatred for. This hatred she never explained, so.... why not?

Older brother Gary can be kind of discounted. Even though I believe that thousands year old curse came from mom's side of the gene pool, I'd rather not be lumped with Gary. He was intelligent and talented and strong and good looking. Oh... and massively self destructive. He died of stupidity at the age of 50 something or other. I forget and there isn't any obituary in the entire interwebs that mentions his name and dod. Anyway.. I don't count him. Unless I should. But I don't think so. But I've been wrong. But he's dead, so not so much immortal. Unless... So.. to continue.

Brother James, the youngest. 28 months my junior. The baby of the family, who is, routinely the most frail, also passed away. He was a gentle soul, occasionally given to bouts of rage and stupidity. He was overtly religious, believing in superstition and holding it dear to his heart as if some bearded giant in the sky actually cared about his existence. It's possible. It's been said that God has a wicked sense of humor. That would be why James died at 45 from cancer of the everything. Bet whasname had a big ol' laugh over the irony of that one. I don't discount him, but if James had been bitten by the 'mortality curse, it would have been a pretty crappy life. Forever. I know he didn't want to die. He was ready for it, but he didn't want to make that trip. So, hey. Whatchagonna do?

Brother Sam. Ah, Sam was the middle of the three Mom and Dad kids. 13 months after me. 13 months before James. Sam is still going. Strong is debatable. Never the emotionally stable one, he's showing the cracks in the facade of his reality.

Last night, for example, he came to one of the parties the wife and I throw on occasion. He came, with his wife, very late. 9:45ish pm. That's when I'm starting to thing it is time to wrap up. Anyway, he lay, inebriated, on my sofa and whined about how hard it was to be an immortal, because you had to watch everyone else around you die and grow old.

Waa.

See, here's the thing. When we were young - wait - I was going to tell you about differences, right? So hold that thought "When we were young." Let's go.

Gary.. older, different dad, same mom. Tall, good looking, full head of hair, dark brown eyes, massive reader, sang like the Archangel Michael (in fact.. if angels exist..) died because his kidneys shut down after decades (not just years... DECADES) of physical abuse he had heaped on himself. His last words were probably "It wasn't my fault", because he lived in a world where someone was always against him.

James.. Youngest, dark brown hair and eyes, thin, frailish, mentally not quite as fast as the rest of the fam. Not retarded... okay... retarded in the way that retard means. Slowed down. Not a reader of literature. Not athletic, unless you count little league. That kid could hit, though. Man. Anyway. Died of pancreas failure from complications of cancer of everything.

Sam. Samuel. My best friend growing up. Diagnose manic depressive schizophrenic by folks who have a lot of letters after their name. One time Jail bird at 19. Long time Felon (nope... can't vote or get a decent job). Dark hair, dark skin, dark brown eyes, dark soul, dark life, dark, dark, dark. See the pattern? He was dark. Still is. Stole some Nebutol from a Veteran and tried to take the long sleep. Would have made it too, except he was late for work, so I went looking for him. Believes himself to be immortal and thinks that part of the requirement is that to be immortal means you care too much, so you need to not care, not feel at all. Boy, is he wrong.

Me. Cancer baby. 24th of middle of the year. Missed being the Anti Christ by ONE friggin day. Blonde hair. Blue eyes. Massive reader. Survivor. Died twice (car accident and some other time I can't quite remember) and came back each time. Knows that I'm immortal and hopes it isn't true because there's too many people I would miss. Not dark, per-se. Angry, yes. Dark? No. Is a happy drunk, this one is. Remove the inhibitions and he'd buy the world a coke. Funny how one has to be drunk to be happy. Seriously, it's possible this one is the incarnation of Pan, Loki, Kokeopelli, or any other of those fun, life loving, joksterizing Mothers who are out for a good time.

And yes. I am an immortal. I tried to join immortal anonymous, but there wasn't anyone else there. Not even Sam. And speaking of that, here's there deal about that.

I believe that an immortal becomes an immortal in two and only these two ways. Keep in mind, this is my believe and I've been wrong before. Marriage taught me that.

One is through a curse. Now, a curse is just a wish your heart makes, if your heart is really dark and full of nastiness. You thought wishes were strong? When was the last time you had one of those come true? Nope.. hatred is stronger than love in the short term. Long term, love wins hands down, but for pure immediate solid wall destructive power, hatred will tear love a new one, bend it over, pretzel it up and make love pray for the end. Love cannot withstand hatred in the short term. Love can rebuild, don't get me wrong. As miracle Max said, "Sonny, true love is the greatest thing of all." And love, true love, will regenerate, survive hatred and be changed by hatred but will come back. For long distance, love has my money. But for those short sprints? Always bet on black, baby.

Number two is belief. This is a bit trickier, though no less effective. See, a curse exists long after the curser (Ha!) has cursed. It doesn't require sustained believe by the one who originally formulated the curse. It DOES require the sustained belief of the cursed. After long enough, this belief becomes part and parcel of the person, so it becomes self sustaining. It can even be passed on, like vampire or being a baptist. All that is required is belief. Strong belief. Strong as the belief that you have a right to exist. Belief so strong that it becomes a knowing, and it is that knowing that fuels the immortality.

And if another has that strength of belief, that knowing, then hey presto, whatever it is becomes passed on. Immortality or old guys in the sky... it's the same thing.

There's a catch to both methods. IF the curse is recalled by the originator of the curse, then the curse is broken. Belief, see? Knowing the curse is broken breaks the curse. But it is the originator who has to know, not the one cursed. Why? Because the cursed one knows that they are cursed. They can't unknow a curse. You can't unmake a baby. Or a cake, if you'd rather. Cakes are cuter than babies.

Same thing with method number two. For some reason that requires understanding of Quantum Entanglement, if the originally immortal, who knows he is immortal and has bestowed that immortality upon another creature (what, you thought this only applied to humans? Bigot) who also carries that knowledge around - if the original decides to withdraw that knowledge, then the recipient is on their own. The original sustains the recipient and without the original belief, the recipient cannot sustain, because the recipient has bought into the originator's reality and Quantum Entanglement ensues, with dog and cats living together, mass hysteria. My love is your love is my love, blah, blah, blah.

So, since Sam was my closest friend (and yes, my brother) when I figured out I was an immortal, I told him what I figured out and made him immortal too. By the way, it was a stupid thing to do. Unstable people should never, ever become immortal. It's just sad. Friends don't let friends immortal.

I only made that mistake one other time. This was out of love, and that's when I figured out the rule about the Quantum Entanglement of Intentions.

Okay.. that was a lot of words. Let me catch my breath.

I came back here to be with my thoughts. I think it's because the other place has everybody else's thoughts, for good or bad, for brilliant or stupid. Sometimes immensely stupid. I had to get out. I had to. I was in danger of becoming the very thing that I detested... argumentatively moronic. One cannot win an argument on FB. One cannot change anyone's mind because by the time the words hit the interwebs, the mind, she is already made up and it would take an act of congress to get that mind to change. Act of Congress? In this day and age? Hahahahaha. It is to laugh.

*****

So... this is forward in to the story.. let's take a future look at Lockwell and Hart. Needless to say, they met on the train, under auspicious circumstances, one might say. There was an attempted robbery, as these were common enough to even be expected. Lockwell outdrew one desperado and was saved by Hart when, thinking quickly, as only Hart can do, he side kicked a carpet bag into the sneaking shins of the other desperado.

Said move didn't disable the evil doer, but it did delay him long enough for Hart to pull his derringer out and cover Lockwell's back. With a tip of his hat, the lanky cowboy tied both of the bad guys up, gift wrapped for the authorities.

"Say," Lockwell said. "You did that right smartly, for someone who dresses so poorly."

Hart nodded back. He'd heard worse. "For someone who dresses like a dancing dandy, you certainly handled yourself well, as well."

"My daddy always said that clothes make the man, sir." Lockwell brushed something invisible from the bib of his shirt. "If I look like a dandy, it's because I take great care of how I look."

"And my father said that a golden trap was still a trap." Hart stood up and extended his hand. "Milton Hart, sir. At your service."

Lockwell shook hands with a firm grip, saying, "John James Lockwell, at yours. Where you heading Milt?"

Milton pushed his spectacle up on his nose and shrugged. "Westerly, I suspect. Or perhaps back easterly. No particular place, just some where quiet. I seek solitude to think."

Lockwell slapped a meaty hand on Harts shoulder. "An egghead, huh? Well, we could certainly use some of those around here, that's for sure. Not enough brains in the last four towns to spark a decent fire, if you ask me."

Hart sat back down and rearranged his luggage so that they were ordered by height. "No argument there, Mr. Lockwell. The vacuum surrounding that last hamlet was quite evident. It was time to leave that place, and quickly."

Lockwell sat across the aisle from Hart. "You mind if we travel together, Milt? I don't find many folks talkable on this trip, and to be honest, there's just something about you that I find I trust. My daddy always said that if you can find a man you can trust, hold onto him like a prized steer."

Hart smiled thinly. "Very well. I admit that you have a certain... rough joie de vivre ... as it were. John... do you mind if I call you John?"

Lockwell tipped his hat back. "Not at all, sir, not at all. I feel we are going to be companions... compadres... the best of friends, in the long run. You may call me what ever suits."

"Ah. Then, John. Please don't call me Milt. You can call me Milton. Or you can call me Hart. Perhaps, when and if we become, as you say, the best of friends in the long run, you may call me Milt. Please, however, until such a time as I am comfortable with you, call me Hart. Or Milton."

"Hart." Lockwell tasted the name. "Milton... not the same at all. I suspect that once we get you a bit loosened up, you'll find that your real name is supposed to be Milt. But until then, my good compadre, I will call you Hart." This time he tipped his hat forward, over his eyes. "Hart, I'm going to get bit of shut-eye. Wake me when we get to ... whatever the next station is, so we can hand over those thieves. Keep an eye out for more shenanigans. Wake me if you need me." And with that, the long lanky form of John James Lockwell started snoring softly.

"Hmph", hmphed Milton Hart. "Ordering me about as if I were his servant." He stared across the aisle. "Not a servant, then. A partner, perhaps." Lockwell shifted in his sleep. "A compadre. More than just a compadre, a trusted compadre." Hart shifted his luggage again, until the fronts were lined up. He smiled again, a thin line. "Trusted compadre." He shot a glance back at the cowboy. "I've been many, many things. Never a trusted compadre. Might be nice, for a change."

He tilted his Bowler hat back. "Lockwell and Hart. Hart and Lockwell? No, that doesn't quite scan right..." He nodded to himself. "Lockwell and Hart, then." His small smile twisted into a sad frown. "At least until it is only Hart again."

*****

So... we have a clumsy meeting, but a meeting none the less. Who knows how much of it is true? More than likely, Hart didn't speak that much, and perhaps Lockwell didn't say anything at all. Maybe there was only one robber and Lockwell took him out with a shot to the heart? Regardless, this tale needs to be moving forward, and to do that, the two had to meet. So now they have.

Hey there... it's been a while. You know that baby sibling of LJ and Dreamwidth? It's become a bit of a monster. I know, I know... we can only control the things that we, personally, do or think or say. Yeah, yeah.

I got to thinking bout that. The crowd... and I mean that quite literally, over at that other place is like hanging out at a Karaoke bar... worse, it's like hanging out at a bar that hosts Karaoke on only some days. The sound is always too loud or off tempo or just too frigging loud and there are so many folks that just want to talk but can't so they end up shouting and there are just so many that want to sing and they just end up shouting....

So I had to leave. Yes, I picked up my toys and walked away. Not sure for how long, but my blood pressure and general attitude toward humanity could only take so much. Such stupid, stupid people.. and so many of them wanting to stay that way.

Not saying I'm any better.. wait.. yes I am. Dammit! I do not and will not support anyone who knowingly walks into the room saying that they are the greatest, the best and the most... anything and then turn around and Mr. Hyde themselves to show they are actually the worst, most terrible and least... anything. Nor can I support those who support those. Take off the blinders of the Jim Jones like behavior before you walk over the cliff! I mix metaphors like Kool-aid and cyanide. See what I did there?

So, I'm back... for a bit. Let's see how I hold up without the constant and sometimes instant response of a pancake of babble. Not a tower, because towers are tall things, and it's already been done. Facebook is, indeed, a marvelous thing. The concept, however, has been brought low... to the level of a... well.. you know. Pancake, in case you didn't.

Looking forward to writing a bit.

A recent Idea I had was for a starship, heading out, out, out to another home, or a new exploration, or just to go... like meeting the neighbors. It's about the crew, most of whom wander their daily lives, doing their daily things in a manner that indicated that it was more than routine... it was the way things were.

Something happens and a rumor starts to spread through the ship. What if, some postulated, that their lives weren't real? What if, some murmured, that the lives they were living weren't lives at all.. that the lives were really recorded memories, played back, day after long day.

Preposterous! returned the rejoinder. What would be the reason? What would be the purpose? And who?

Ah, nodded conspiracy faceted minds, who indeed? As to what the purpose might be, let's look at that. What is it that is done every day... every single day?

After some head scratching and shoulder shrugging the answer came. Running the ship, of course.

And in truth, that is exactly what they were... the encapsulated memories of folks long dead, making decisions and deciding actions that required human minds and human creativity.

It never was understood how to put creativity into robotic minds, no matter that those mechanical wonders were lightning fast and millions of bytes beyond the capacity of the three and a half pound of flesh that sits between the ears of most humans.

So, with the advent of multi-dimensional crystalline storage, it became possible to record and preserve the personalities, the core personality, if you will, of individuals, and interface those personalities with the fantastical electronic brains in such a way that the two parts became much much more than the parts.

Who would possible create a technology to preserve a person, if you will, in crystal? The funeral homes made a killing. Grandma talking on her tombstone. Yes indeedy. Some undertaker slaving away in his basement in upstate New York, undertook a bit of this, a lot of that, and some serious usage of his background in quantum states created a way to talk to the dead after they were dead. Not surprising, that man became obscure in the way that the man who invented windshield wipers that pause became forgotten.

Snead and Sons, LLC, owned the patent. Biggest funeral home in Syracuse, New York and soon, biggest purveyor of Video Resurrection Technology in the world. Pretty much the only one, as the creation of the crystalline structure was kept such a close secret that it was nearly fifty years before the processes were duplicated and modified and after some lengthy court battles that Snead and Sons, LLC, lost (and they won quite a few, too) there came competitors.

Who were soon bought out, by Snead and Sons, LLC.

But wait! See, Snead and Sons, LLC, for as smart as their lawyers were, were not terribly smart when it came to creativity. They were, after all, caretakers of the deceased and that doesn't require creativity. Well... maybe some creativity when it comes to making Gramps look happy that he has moved on to that great fishing spot in the sky, but no creativity at all when it comes to thinking, "Hmmm.. what if we applied this to a field where long distances and time is required. Where a normal human would go crazy or even, you know, died? What if this bubble memory human being were put in charge of running a star ship, where the processes were pretty much the same, day after day and it was only in extreme circumstances that a leap of cognitive creation would be required. Something that those tin can brains had yet to accomplish, no matter that they wrote some of the worlds greatest sonnets. When faced with two equally challenging... er... challenges, those amazing robots would freeze, metaphorical gears grinding to a halt, unable to turn left or right, forever."

Fortunately, if you look at these things being fortunate, there was such a human brain that made this leap of cranial deduction and asked himself this very sort of question, but probably using fewer words.

Franklyn (yes, with a 'y') Badger III (yes, the III) thought those thoughts right after losing a lawsuit brought against him for patent infringement. Granted, it was a few days right after, and he had to remember what he had imagined stone drunk on some very good whiskey. Luck would have it that one of the napkins, from one of the dozen or so bars he wandered into, had been stuffed in his shirt pocket and contained the three words "Bubble wrapped space"

And that, as it has been said by more and better people than I, was that. Frank Badger created "BWS Memory Storage" and sold the concept to a fledgling private space corporation who wanted to get in on the ground floor of the "Let's see what all these Exo-planets are all about" movement. He had made enough changes in his processes that it was not quite indistinguishable from Snead and Sons, LLC's processes, but the fact that nowhere in the wording of the patent were dead people mentioned gave him just enough leverage that he won his lawsuits when they inevitably came. His memory bubble process was exclusively for Space Research, not preserving G'nanas image so little Timmy could have nightmares of Granny digging herself out of the ground. No sirree.. he made his lot for Science!

So, I'm thinking about doing a story or a book or something based upon this idea. And Sid is still hanging back there somewhere. I'm afraid I'd have to dig him out of cold storage and start from the beginning. Not writing all of it... just re-posting so I can remember where I'm at and what he was doing.

So yeah.. I'm back again, from outer space. Kinda hoping I'll stick around for a bit.

Oh, I don't know. I mean, everybody has those days. Today just seemed like one of them. I mean, I woke Shannon up because I have sleep pain, which means I have pain when I sleep and then I moan or groan and stretch to make those pains ease up. So, I woke her up an hour before she had to go to class.

Then, I decided to have a small Jameson's, like you do, in the afternoon. Somehow or other it kicked my ass and I fell asleep in my chair for an hour. That may not sound so bad, but I think I went to sleep in the middle of Shannon complaining to me about some action or other that I did that up set her.

What did I do that upset her? I used the work probably, as in 'there is probably corn and peaches in those sacks'. Now, I knew that the sacks contained corn and peaches. I bought them today. However, I was under the influence at the time my mouth engaged and I was overcome with the Schrodinger function. In other words, I could not see in side the sacks, so they might have contained corn and peaches, or they might not have. Probably they did, because I tend to not believe in the complete mutability of the universes. But they might not, because, you know, irony.

I picked up the sacks and carried them to the kitchen, more to prove to myself that the universe was still solid than anything else. Then, apologizing profusely, as a husband does, I sat in my chair in my office.

So when she started her rant about the use of the word 'probably', I replied, as any good drunken physicist would, 'Obviously, you don't deal with a mutable universe on a daily level', and feel promptly asleep.

I don't know what Shannon thought. She probably kept talking up to the point where I snored. I don't know why women feel they need to use so many words. I got her point before I carried the sacks into the kitchen. that's why I apologized to her. So she would quit talking about it.

But no.... I had to hear the whole "I come home from a long day and all I hear is 'probably'..."etc, write your own script.

Sleeping was a bliss. So, I think I'll do it again. On the sofa. So she can sleep the night through.