PISH-POSH FROM MY VIRTUAL SPACE 

Idle Musings of the Hypothetical Citizen

Disconnection from the core of political values would have the same effect as disconnection of fathers from sons. There would be tempting freedom, ecstatic, insane kind of dreams, but then, all would be seen as an illusion and soon the disconnection would be a habit hard to break. At that moment a heavy corrosive fluid would pass into the culture and it would only be a matter of time before it, too, sunk into the horizon.

A freedom disconnected from knowing, from the past, from belief in the future would be as likely as an airplane without its engine. It was a disturbing thought because the freedom in America was dependent on a great disconnection's. But, in its younger days it always found something new and vital to reconnect to. Now, at times, it seemed like too many people with too much empty time on their hands, trying to make too much money, too quickly until it was under the hypnotic eye of every mistake known to history.

No, that freedom would collapse like a house of cards. It would collapse internally rather than physically, as in the toppling of buildings or houses. It would be a terrible flame carrying ones illusions down into hell where the good baker waited. If the person survived such an ordeal he or she would become one of many; happy people who had lost their humanity but could hide behind any number of structures. He viewed them as examples of the worst a free democracy could raise up. But, they certainly had the freedom to be who they were.

A kind of squeal went up from them when they realized they had been had. Darkness passed in front of their innocent faces and then realized, now, they were as evil as the darkest criminal in history. Did they grow afterwards? Did they do penitence in the streets that evaded all sense of value by smoking cars and luscious businessmen and women hot for lunch and a quickie when the temperament allowed it?

Women, wanting justice, killed the best in themselves. There was little he could do about it. They found out way too late and wanted everyone dead at that point. This tragedy played endlessly through the little regions like storm patterns on wonderful weather maps. The isobar of dark hearted females moving in to destroy the little town, so pretty and done up now; so filled with the miserable trailer park inhabitants. They learn their lessons. They are foul and maleficent and the spirit in life takes them away into nothingness. Even now, here, when the stars are exciting and deep, and they talk about cloning and adventures into space, and telepathic messaging, and levitation, even then, the spirit takes them into nothingness.

Oh, it will be poured back into you before you know it. And it will weigh you down and drive you from the comfortable house to the sea.

And yet endless building and well-being; endless changes.

Compassion is the finest, most bitter wine he had tasted. It was on the lip of some eternity and he sipped it until he could see clearly. "You are not ready for the future, but you are not ready to be destroyed."

And when a humble man creates value and you laugh at it, ignore and try to destroy it, then you have condemned yourself to a deep freeze, a kind of mental lockjaw that is not pleasant. There are many whose jaws are locked in place by their complacency in front of value, who do not accept it and they play as though nothing can touch them. Then they are touched and can not sleep for many days. This is the essence of the fool who is really a disguised god of sorts or, at least, a wiseman. He creates value by his choice and the people reject him. so, for one summer they are forced to wear the fools hat on hot days when they thought they had beaten the world itself. They come to the humble man and beg forgiveness. Oh, he does a little dance for them and releases them from their horrendous conscience and goes on. Freedom is never about punishment and guilt. It is about the spirit liberated for new forms.

He loved America more now than at any other time in his life. He had wrangled with her because he wanted to know her. He did not accept the illusions he was given or the assumptions piled thick on the top of political rhetoric or movies. He wanted to break the frozen sea within her and release something of a new essence. Dreamer! Ah, but without dreams the people perish. So, the TV images fed them, the skylines fed them, the cars and variety of scenes fed them. When they were hungry they went to the sea or mountains and these fed them. They were very well fed people.

© 2005 David Eide. All rights reserved.