My Life Lesson...

Learning

Spurning

Burning

Yearning.

Wipe Your Muddy Boots, You Look Like a Pilgrim...

 

 

We don't HAVE to do a thing. 

Not a bloody thing. 

Obligation is something we picked up somewhere out there in the wild, like shit on our boots. 

I'll bet that in most cases- like me- obligation is based upon the expectations of others. 

Not our own. 

If I'm wrong- scrape me off your boots like all the other crap. 

But if I'm right...lets do something about it. 

Today. 

Right now.

We don't want to track this shit all over the bloody house.

LET YOURSELF GO...

 

 

People are NEVER going to do what you want them to do...

be what you want them to be...

Nor should you expect them to. 

So unless you pay them, sign a contract or somehow otherwise hold them to ransom...

then let them go.

They owe you NOTHING.

NO ONE owes you a goddamn thing.

You owe yourself the gift of liberation.   

Every time you feel yourself yearning for some unfulfilled promised...

Groaning under the weight of expectation..

Feel a twinge of pain at their failure to fulfil some vague emotional contract...

Let it go. 

Let them go. 

LET YOUSELF GO. 

It's truly liberating.

Real freedom.

Try it. 

You won't be sorry.   

TRUE CONFESSIONS OF A BOOK HOARDER

My friend Tim has prompted me to make a confession. 

It is high time I came 'out of the closet'...and confessed to the world...

I am a collector of books...

but very SELDOM a reader! 

I AM an avid ARCHIVER, who has read only a FRACTION of his collection! 

In a way- I am a fraud. 

I admit it.

I just LOVE buying books, and putting them on shelves! 

I love collecting them, leafing through them, reading snippets of them...but so very rarely do I read them right through! 

I feel a twinge of guilt when I hear of others voraciously devouring the written word...

Those who work the golden seam of knowledge, creativity, ideas...

The eternal dialogue. 

I write plenty of my own words...but seldom absorb others. 

I confess, there is a part of me that worries that the writing of others might somehow dilute my own work- take something away from my own voice. 

That I might start to sound like someone else. 

It has taken me a LIFETIME to find my own inner voice...

to listen to it...

LET ALONE to record it with any kind of accuracy!!

I have a latent fear (i guess from childhood conditioning) of being a copy-cat- so I resist the influence of others, that my own style might remain pure. 

I have a feeling that the words I have read to date have furnished me with the sufficient tools for carrying out the art or writing satisfactorily, & the only task remaining is to hone my own voice, and retain it's integrity, it's purity.

If it might indeed boast such a thing.

But my sense of 'integrity' feels somehow challenged when I look at my vast army of untried, untested pulp & ink soldiers. 

Why do I do it?

It has to be more than some sense of artistic sanitation. 

It HAS to be. 

Even the greatest writers dip into the words of others at regular intervals. 

Why don't I??

Because I think also, at my core- I am strictly a book aesthete. 

I cannot bear the thought of an abandoned book.

I never could.

Nothing breaks my heart more than a book in a bin.

I don't care what it is...what subject, matter...I have to rescue it.

I cannot bear to be in a shop, and see a bargain...a book that is beautiful, in it's first run, in good condition, obviously of substance, fairly cheap, one that I will likely never read...

and allow it to just sit there!! 

A recent purchase of a beautiful mint condition edition of the life of George Gershwin...

I have only a passing interest and acquaintance with the man and his work...

& yet for a dollar I simply HAD to give it a home!!

My home is an orphanage for abandoned books! 

A repository of ideas! 

I cannot handle a volume without thinking...

"My GOD!!  The work that went into this!  The man hours devoted to fashioning such a wonderful piece of art!  THIS IS A SLICE OF SOMEONES EXISTENCE!"

And I have to take it home with me.

I am a HOARDER of the printed page!

My first job was a Librarian- perhaps I am still one!

Like the character in the Brautigan book The Abortion: An Historical Romance 1966



a man whose home was a 7/11 repository for the collective unconscious- a place for occasional scribes to submit their work for storage...

In the name of posterity...

A safe deposit box of true wealth. 

A bank of beauty. 

I delight in it...and yet somehow, carry a certain degree of shame! 

Like I am somehow a kind of fraud! 

Freud suggested that abused children 'collect' things and surround themselves in an attempt to hold onto...something...

we line our shelves with them, as a kind of protective wall against the oppressive, cruel outside world.  We live in a cave fashioned of our own sense of beauty...

insulated by friendly non toxic material- the one place we can function. 

We line our living space with materials that will remain; that will not desert, or let us down. 

And books will never do that. 

People let me down constantly, so I have given up relying on them; but books NEVER do. 

Whether it is an illness, an addiction, or just plain glorious madness...

I simply LOVE books.

My name is John; & I'm a biblioholic...

Time to get the BIG STICK out and spank a few bottoms again...

RIGHT!! 

Pay attention. 

I'm telling you this YET AGAIN for your own good, because I'm a mate.

Ease up on yourself, for heaven's sake!!!

I understand poor body image- I have been there myself. 

But ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!!

The way some of you ride yourself about yourself...

It beggars belief. 

It defies comprehension.

Would you let someone else talk to you that way?

I'm willing to bet NO!!!!!!!!!!!!

So why do it to yourself?

What are you...SCHIZO???

If you are- my apologies- and carrying on, Sybil.

But the rest of you????  JESUS WEPT SALTY TEARS IN HEAVEN! 

I have NO IDEA what most of you are talking about!

It's like you are talking gibbersih you found on another planet!!

Listen to me;

you are BEAUTIFUL JUST AS YOU ARE. 

Every single one of my friends is quite wonderful in every way- & yet I reckon 75% of you have some gripe or other about your weight, your butt, your boobs or your face...

It's madness.  Sheer bloody madness.

I see it all the time.

And it's UNNECESSARY. 

There is NOTHING wrong with any of you- you look just as you are supposed to, and life is unfolding for you exactly as it is supposed to. 

Trust me on this.

You're not a horse- so stop riding yourself like one. 

It does nothing for me...& I would be very surprised if it was doing anything positive for you OR for anyone else.  So JUST STOP IT. 

You look fantastic- JUST AS YOU ARE. 

So cheer up, lighten off, and go do something constructive for someone else. 

And GET OFF YOURSELF, as we say downunda.

If you cannot hear this...then it is not your body that needs attention.

It's your ATTENTION.

Go forth and prosper...

Heart.   

An Asbestos Flack Jacket for those Going to Hell...

If the fundamentalist image of God is one who is all seeing and all knowing and can do & create or destroy anything, 'he' can stop ALL the misery in the world.

It is THAT simple.

That 'he' would have some higher knowing or understanding beyond our ken, & is somehow 'testing' us, is nothing more than Vivisection.

Torture.  

That 'he' does not intervene in such terrible suffering would be like a mortal parent allowing a criminal to come into their home and stab their children to death. 

This is abhorrent to even the feeble minded, and all but the deranged.

I want no part of such a cowardly human being, nor such a deranged God. 

If I am sent to Hell for not beliving in such an omnipotent scumbag- then I look forward to rubbing shoulders with other like-minded souls who believe suffering is wrong. 

I will gladly burn for all eternity to uphold the dictum that allowing others to suffer is CRIMINAL.

Althought I may at times fall short...MY religion is always KINDNESS.

'It is not that simple, John' I am told by Theologians.

Well...my God is simple, and can be understood by even the most moronic and brain damaged amongst our flock; for my God is LOVE. 

And the devil is quite simply...

LIES.

MY DAILY BREAD

Every day is a learning experience, if you are able to open up and receive.

Sometimes these lessons come from the most unexpected of places; but typically, they come from people who you just KNOW have wonderful things to offer.

 

This is for my mate Dave- part thanks, part apology. 

 

I'm not sure how long I have been mates with Dave- I haven't looked it up- but it feels like a long time. 

 

I feel like he has been there forever.

 

People speak of 'old souls'.  Maybe he is one.

 

Maybe I am one.

 

Who cares; the point is...

 

I am always happy to see him. 

It reminds me of Eric Oldthwaite's Father’s attempt to explain to Eric how some people are just a pleasure to see in ‘Ripping Yarns’.

‘Oh, there goes such and such…isn’t it grand to see him!’

A very child-like, innocent country style emotion.

The child in me thinks Dave is pretty cool.

When I was a kid, there was a guy in my class who was just simply ‘cool’.

His name was John Betros, and he was so hip. I admired him and his musical tastes immensely.

He introduced me to grass for the first time.

He came back from the city with the first punk haircut in our little country town.

Dave is like him, in a way.

(the coolness, not the dope thing; I don't know if he smokes dope, shoots heroin or juggles cats. but i do know he loves good music and is a terrific man)

Yesterday, when I saw him, I lit up like a Roman Candle and began to spout my adoration...

But before long, I realised...it was too much.

The adult in me realised...

That the child must have made him feel a bit uncomfortable.

If you are in any way empathetic...you get a sense from people.

He is a humble fellow, and I know NOW myself when people shower me with compliments...

I feel uncomfortable too.

In my case...I feel unworthy.

So today I am thanking him for his company, and for being a friend to me.

And I am also apologising to him for yesterday, when I took it a little too far.

The best lesson of all. 

Empathy.  Understanding.

Humbling.  

 

I give thanks for the gift of enlightenment. 

But, as if that wasn't enough...the gift just kept on giving.

I also remembered WHY I was so effusive with Dave.

 

This takes me back to my childhood.

When I see Dave and people like him- the child in me lights up.

It’s like children with mental disabilities; I have seen them hug one another.

Society has come to regard such open displays of affection as either a mental disorder, or the province of canines.

When I was so glad to see Dave...& the embarrassment I must have caused him...

I was reminded that this is the child reacting.

Plain and simple.

It was funny how I said what I said, and then felt a twinge of…

Remorse?

I wasn’t certain why I felt this, until another party had a shot at me when he said I was ‘buttering him up’. I suspect he was just making sport, and I don’t think any less of him for it- he’s not a destructive soul. But it did remind me how expressions of genuine affection can make certain parties very uncomfortable indeed.

Even angry.

When I was a kid, so starved was I for love and affection at home, I would try to reach out to other kids. Much as I did Dave.

I remembered how, the class bullies would tease me for it, and call me a ‘suck-hole’.

Then they would drag me into the toilet and dip my head into the bowl.

I was a piss-weak child; that’s all there is to it.

I found it hard to defend myself against this kind of behaviour.

I was indeed a lover, not a fighter.

As I grew older, I toughened up, and learned to fight. I came to love violence.

I killed loving feelings- drove them from my heart.

I was conditioned to it by my environment.

But now, I see myself reverting back to my natural state.

A loving state.

And imposing MY will on my surroundings.

Expressing myself in the way that is best for me.

My point?

I had forgotten this about my childhood. It was yesterday’s exchange that reminded me.

Bringing up painful memories? Yes and no; because although it was painful- it DID remind me why I feel a pang of remorse when I am kind to people.

And if you can track back the reasons for these strangely dichotomous feelings- and dismiss them for the absurdities they are- then you can take a clear run at embracing your natural inclinations without a trace of shame.

This exchange was a gift.

Every day I learn something about my triggers…

& can work toward removing them…

Is a day well spent.

It’s a gift.

For someone such as me who had my childhood taken from me, I guess I am reclaiming certain things from my childhood as being ok.

 

I think somehow, on some level I have given myself permission to react as a child.

The child that was beaten down with the violence of home life.

On the other hand...as I am learning...just because I am coming to certain realisations...

This does not mean I can simply behave as I see fit at the exclusion of the feelings of others.

This would be the definition of selfishness- no matter HOW healing it is.

The gift of understanding comes from grasping the complexity of the situation.

 

And finding some simplicity in it.

 

My lesson, is to be grateful to people, try to keep the child respectful of others.

But if the child pipes up with excitement to see you any of you…

I hope you will understand, and take into account.