Elsewhere in Dreams

At the ragged edge of a spasming
ocean, day’s egress to brittle dark’s
entrance seems sublime;
between the clap of sandstone hands
and Atlantic belly
a colossal upward rush of air
gives fire to a myriad stars,
and you among them slung low to the earth,
touching beech and oak and newsprint
till everything flickers flecked red and orange,
reflecting in the deep nothing
of your retinas.

Here’s the deal. I expect you to say what you mean. Exactly. If you don’t say it, I won’t know it. If you’re offended or hurt or happy or jonesing for a beer, I won’t know it unless you say it.

This is public service message.

Also, there’s a difference between a good argument and a convincing one. This may seem like trivial semantics to you, but you’d be wrong. People have been spinning convincing arguments for millennia. People tend to dislike a good one.

More: there’s a difference between respect and honour. You can honour someone but not respect him. Honour is outward. Respect is inward. Honour is in what you say and do. Respect is in what you think.

• BBspot: MPAA to Thwart Pirates by Making All Movies Suck
  Satire. But true.
  (tags: mpaa satire films)

Prelude: My mother just brought me a little St Nicholas chocolate man. I don’t like chocolate much, though milk chocolate isn’t bad. It turns out the little man is hollow. I feel cheated.

Onward: I had a talk with Steve last night, and I think I’ve narrowed down the internet-connected public to three categories, at least in the context of blogging and reading blogs.

The Blind Eyes don’t really care. Blogs exist, maybe they read them every once in a while, but generally blogs aren’t interesting to them. Most of the older generation tend to be like this.

The Voyeurs do care, but don’t care to interact. They’re the hit-and-run drivers of the internet. They read blogs out of curiosity, out of boredom, or out of the all-too-human urge to cast judgment on someone or just to be nosy. Most of the generation who grew up just as the internet was exploding are like this.

The Socialites read, care, and interact. Even if they don’t care that much, they still interact. They primarily use blogs like their parents use phones: as a method of social interaction, and they create blogs primarily for that purpose. This is why blog growth has exploded amongst young people. Blogs are like a townhall meeting: everyone gets to talk, and everyone gets to respond. Most of the younger generation, especially teens, do this.

Postscript: For those of you reading right now, I really do encourage you to share whatever thoughts you have in the comment form. It’s easy to use, it won’t broadcast your email address to the world, and it will provide linkage to whatever site you choose if you do so choose. Be a man and sign your name; use at least some form of legible English; try to make a modicum of sense. Even if you think I’m dead wrong, or if you think I’ve missed a category, above. Or if you’re Geof Morris and rather invested in the blogosphere.

Finally, what class of blog reader are you? Feel free to invent your own category in the comments.

• globeandmail.com: Free Drinks Investment Strategy
  Absolute genius. I MUST do this.
  (tags: gags investement interesting)

Tonight I’m polishing the silverware. I bought it at a yardsale thirty-two years ago, but you won’t find a spot of varnish anywhere. I think it’s 18th century, but I got it at a yardsale thirty-two years ago. A good deal no matter how you slice it.

I don’t use it, of course. Jenny used to say we should, when company came over. But I always thought it looked better in the display. When company came over they’d never notice the actual silverware, or the china. They’d always notice the case, though, and I’d explain how I bought it at a yardsale thirty-two or twenty-nine or ten years ago. Might be 18th century, too. How do I know? Look at the way it shines. They don’t make it like that anymore.

Sleeping in a four-poster bed is a treat, too. You should try it sometime. Not just any four-poster bed, but an ornately carved beauty. The kind you can only find at an auction. Fact is, I found mine at an auction twenty-seven years ago. By then Jenny had left me, but I didn’t mind the extra space. I can lie there and imagine running my hands over the carvings and imagine myself imagining the fellow who spent his time chiseling out the grooves.

These are the things I think about as I polish the silverware before bed. The silverware and the bed. Beautiful works of art in their own way. And I found them at an auction and yardsale. Remarkable.

I wake up seven hours later coughing. Bathed in sweat. I realise my room is too bright and too hot before I understand that the house is on fire. My bed is on fire, even. When I throw the blanket aside, the flames move with it, and then gather back in around the bed like a halo. As I leap to the floor I can see the carvings turning to ash and cracking off: the anguish at the thought keeps me from thinking about the anguish in my feet as they blister wherever they touch floorboard.

The stairs have almost collapsed. Smoke is billowing upwards, escaping somewhere, as I make my way downstairs. I am ginger on the steps, though almost blind with the heat. Arm in front of my eyes. Not doing much good.

I make it to the front door before remembering the china. In a split second it seems that if I can save anything at all it should be that one last reminder; I rush to the kitchen table where they’re neatly arranged inside the case. Miraculously, it’s unscathed. I grab it, gritting my teeth in pain at the frame’s heat, and turn as the table collapses in a cloud of sparks behind me.

They land in my hair, on my clothes, but I don’t mind, until I realise my pajamas are on fire. I race for the door, for fresh air.

Outside, I strip frantically, and drop on the grass, rolling to soothe my skin. I have flakes of polyester all over me. In a moment I feel better.

I walk over to the rapidly cooling case and pick it up. Jumbled, but it’s all there. The silverware.

It’s then I notice the neighbors. I cover up my crotch with the case of silverware as they stare at me, shocked. My mind flashed to a thousand things: insurance, Jenny, sirens in the distance.

I’m standing naked on my front lawn, and it occurs to me finally to be ashamed of this fact. There I am, on the front lawn, as the second floor begins to collapse into the first, naked and ashamed.

But for a moment I’m happy, as the company staring wide-eyed at my collapsing possessions gets one final chance to admire the silverware.

If you want me to listen to you, there are a few things you need. First, I’m going to have to respect you. Second, you’re going to have a compelling reason. Otherwise, you’re just another gasbag flapping your lips.

If this seems arrogant, I assure you it’s not; it’s life. Get used to it.

If I have to see another blog by another set of newly-minted parents doing nothing but posting picture after picture of their baby eating, their baby cooing, their baby smiling, their baby frowning, their baby in clothes, their baby in a diaper, their baby in a bonnet, their baby reading the Belgic Confession, their baby in the forest, their baby in the living room, their baby in the bath, their baby near a stream, their baby in a jumper, their baby with a rattle, their baby with other babies, their baby with other babies and other babies’ parents, their baby with other babies and small animals, their baby waterskiing, their baby lighting Rome on fire, their baby farting, their baby crying, their baby lying down, their baby being held up, their baby being cradled, their baby being entertained by pictures of war-torn Kosovo, their baby having its diaper changed, their baby being outclassed by others’ genetic material, their baby burping, their baby gassily smiling, their baby sleeping, their baby holding on to a finger, their baby wrapped in a “bundle of joy blanket” or any of a seeming million other precious moments that simply must be kept on a the internet for all to see as if the web is a pageant for every infant without a deformed face, I’m going to jump off a cliff. A very high cliff.

My mother had 11 of them, bless her soul. Babies are special, sure. To you personally, sure. And I’m not entirely serious about this post, but certainly one or two of you fresh-out-of-the-box parents can think about something (anything!) interesting other than your poopy progeny?

• Web Sudoku
  Play Sudoku online.
  (tags: games)

You can’t squeeze water
from a rock, can you;
but you can grind it up
and make sand.

A liquid canticle drowns adults
and brings them to life
in the same damp breath
as children.

Your particular précis are grit
between the teeth, or
that scratching in the ball-point
telling you for the love of all things holy
stick to memos!