Almost a year of unemployment has driven me so deep into my psyche that I think I'm slowly losing touch with reality. The things that were anecdotes or exaggeration of my perceived life have begun to seep into real life as actual fact. I'm still curious if this is some type of legitimate defensive reflex my mind has invented to cope with dismal depression. Regardless, it fails to compensate like a clown trying to calm a horrified & weeping child with a colorful balloon. The terror always hides within colorful trappings.
I'll try not to go all Dennis Miller when I write, but you'll have to forgive the pop culture references as they are as much apart of me as the Vindrizi were one with Duncan. I believe its a side-effect of the time I lived. Calling me a Generation X-er is only accurate in the sense that I was born in the late 60's and grew up in the colorful gray scale of the 70's and 80's. The thing most people don't realize is that Gen X-ers were not without purpose because there was no purpose besides breathing, eating and existing without conflict.
Think about it; we had no wars, plagues or natural upheavals to define who we should, would or could be. We never wrapped our faces with dirty cloth as we navigated narrow European streets filled with rank and rotting corpses in 1350. We never desperately powder packed a musket as the thrum of 1,500 Mexican troops advanced on the poorly supplied and manned Mission we tenuously held. We never felt the cold clutch of communism as the bloody Axis committed genocide.
All our threats have been technological and financial enemies that neither have a face nor discernible agenda. However much we wish to rage against injustice, our enemy is invisible and unconquerable. We have formed an uneasy alliance with the Beast and are uncomfortably content with this relationship. We have become the battered spouse who would rather be assured with the abuse they know then the possibility of the undefined torment which awaits them.
But, we must exist as more than an interesting footnote on Wikipedia. I have to believe this. If I don't then I lose complete and total justification for my existence on this spinning globe of 3/4 water.
There's a memory that keeps floating in my head which I hope will relate my Roshomon perspective with the cloying desperation of my life and purpose. My mother used to date a lot. I can't fault her; she was a woman raising 3 kids on her own and was lacking the crucial element of human companionship. Needless to say, more than a few colorful characters showed up at our door to escort my mom to dinner and whatever else the night held. One of those gentlemen callers was a guy named Jim. Jim was an Elvis fanatic and the only man I've met that served in World War 2, Korea and Vietnam. He was an avid amateur photographer and had pics to prove he was a participant in three bloody conflicts and survived them all (obviously). However, it wasn't until we found a box of his personal effects in our garage that this story picks up significance.
Contained within the battered wax coated chicken box, buried under various worthless Elvis trinkets and personal papers, a dark brown three-punch binder lay undisturbed and yellowing with age and neglect. The curling label on the half-inch thick binder with brass fasteners said in jittery Smith-Corona typeset "The Stories of Grampa Grumpus". There was no name of authorship; just the silly title. Inside, a table of contents in the same shaky typewriter font described the half-dozen stories which were denoted by brittle plastic tabs of various colors. What I first believed to be a compilation of paternal remembrances or war reflections changed dramatically. These were semi-truthful anecdotes about a lovable, but crotchety soldier who gained the nickname Grampa Grumpus through his pessimistic responses to crisis situations. These stories were not meant to show what war was really like or to document critical moments which would have been unremembered if not committed to paper. These were stories created by an anonymous writer for the enjoyment of his comrades - nothing more, nothing less. Whether these were initially presented around a low-burning campfire or in a painfully silent bunker, the unknown author felt it was important enough to slave away at a shitty typewriter during his down time to immortalize on this now-decaying parchment. And that created an indelible mark on my consciousness.
Less than a year later, the garage roof would collapse and destroy any paper product the wet Spring shower could touch. The Stories of Grampa Grumpus was one of the casualties. As I was in my early teens and computers were the gimmicks that filled rooms in IBM, I never thought about translating these tales to a more semi-permanent form. Then again, I thought storing them in the garage attic would have kept them safe. That wasn't the first or last time I'd be wrong, but it is regrettable for me to this very day.
So, what does this all mean? I parallel this to my own writing. I have filled journals, 5-subject notebooks and legal pads with half-written stories and ideas that seemed to die 5 pages into its inception since I was 10 years old. I switched to sketch pads and drawing pens for a while, but words have always been a gentle mistress. Now that my 45th birthday is rolling around, I look at the 5 books, 50+ short stories, and who knows how many poems and wonder: "Is this my Grampa Grumpus?"
I have spent a lot of critical thought on this and am glad 42 was not the answer. The definitive answer is NO. I really haven't spent much time committing my recollections and reflections to paper (electronic or otherwise). So, I have opened this blog to share some of my trials and tribulations. This is as selfish as I have been in decades, but since nobody really knows this blogspot exists then I really couldn't give a good gorram who does or doesn't read this. I need to do this for me.
I call my little niche Breaking the VMS. I won't explain it, but if you're ever curious to make a guess then I will be happy to oblige right or wrong. In the words of one of my strangest characters, Kanterous Jahl: "My mind my is a vast and wondrous playground filled with curiosities of a sharp and deadly nature." A little dramatic, but I have been known to go drama queen occasionally. So, deal with it.
Also, I'll try to include some lyrics of deep philosophical context to appease those searching for greater meaning in my simple ramblings of times fading from memory.
It's not
What you thought
When you first began it
You got
What you want
Now you can hardly stand it though,
By now you know
It's not going to stop
It's not going to stop
It's not going to stop
'Til you wise up
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