Ray Foy's Blog, page 7

Living on The Street

…these houses contained the leaders of a vast band of terrorists, who on a designated day were to launch an orgy of slaughter for the extermination of America and of all the fine old traditions…


This quote sounds like it came from a Donald Trump speech, except the language is more elevated. Or maybe it came from George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, or even Paul Wolfowitz. Its talk of “terrorists” certainly sounds like something out of neocon ideology, like a passage from a Project for the New American Century white paper. At least in tone. The prose is still too eloquent for any of the above.

Actually, it’s a quote from a short story called, “The Street,” by H. P. Lovecraft and it was written in 1919.

Though Mr. Lovecraft is known as the “father” of the modern horror genre, this (one of his earlier works) is light on the macabre and mysterious, other than, perhaps, in its descriptions of the evil intent of the dark, alien, immigrants he describes. The prefacing note to the story, in the compilation volume I have, describes it as a “xenophobic allegory about the overrunning of America by seditious immigrants…”

That’s an apt description for this story that so accurately reflects current attitudes towards immigrants, refugees, and other “swarthy” people.

Now, I have begun reading Mr. Lovecraft’s stories, from his earliest to his latter works, with the intent of seeing how his paranormal and trans-dimensional themes developed. And I was surely seeing that development and enjoying his tales, when I came to “The Street.” I was blown away (appalled, actually) by the story’s modern-sounding theme of racial intolerance.

In a nutshell, “The Street” tells an anthropomorphic story about a particular roadway in North America. The pathway started out as a forest trail followed by the English colonials (and Mr. Lovecraft describes them as the classic “pilgrims”) in fetching water for their settlement. You would think it would have begun as an Indian trail, but if so, Mr. Lovecraft does not finds that fact worth mentioning. Indeed, he is dismissive of Native Americans, dispensing with them in a few words:

There was war, and thereafter no more Indians troubled The Street.

He does not question whether The Street ever troubled the Indians.

Mr. Lovecraft follows The Street’s environs in developing into a blessed place of well-built houses with rose-gardens, and in being lined with mighty oaks and elms—symbols of prosperity and stability. Its surrounding settlement grows into a city that attracts learning and culture (Western). Then the Revolutionary War happens which brings hard times and takes away most of the young me. But The Street remains a good place to live as long as the most of its inhabitants are of English descent (no mention of slaves). As long as this is the case, even nature is happy:

And the trees still sheltered singing birds, and at evening the moon and stars looked down upon dewy blossoms in the walled rose-gardens.

But when strangers from eastern Europe arrive who don’t “know The Street,” things just go to hell:

And those who came were never as those who went away; for their accents were coarse and strident, and their mien and faces unpleasing. Their thoughts, too, fought with the wise, just spirit of The Street…

Mr. Lovecraft goes on to describe the degradation of The Street (and its surrounding city) by the immigrants. They ruin the houses built to last for generations. They are physically ugly, and just totally screw things up:

New kinds of faces appeared in The Street; swarthy, sinister faces with furtive eyes and odd features, whose owners spoke unfamiliar words, and placed signs in  known and unknown characters upon most of the musty houses…A sordid, undefinable stench settled over the place, and the ancient spirit slept.

Another section sounds very much like what’s happening today in Syria and the Middle East in general, where war pushes people out of their homes to become refugees fleeing to the West:

War and revolution were raging across the seas; a dynasty had collapsed, and its degenerative subjects were flocking with dubious intent to the Western Land.

And then Mr. Lovecraft offers that opinion, that I’ve heard so much, that the immigrants are just evil crazies, plotting destruction:

…for there was in the eyes of all a weird, unhealthy glitter as of greed, ambition, vindictiveness, or misguided zeal. Unrest and treason were abroad…crumbling houses teemed with alien makers of discord and echoed with the plans and speeches of those who yearned for the appointed day of blood, flame, and crime.

It’s easy to see these attitudes today being set against Middle Eastern immigrants and refugees. Mr. Lovecraft’s criticism and judgment was against eastern European immigrants, and especially communists who he saw as plotting against America and, I suppose, Western values:

In these writings the people were urged to tear down the laws and virtues that our fathers had exalted; to stamp out the soul of the old America…that at their word of command many millions of brainless, besotted beasts would stretch forth their noisome talons from the slums of a thousand cities, burning, slaying, and destroying till the land of our fathers should be no more.

And the Boston police, who went on strike in 1919, Mr. Lovecraft saw as communist sympathizers who had abandoned America. He seems to be referring to them in this passage:

Many times came bands of blue-coated police to search the shaky houses, though at last they ceased to come; for they too had grown tired of law and order, and had abandoned all the city to its fate.

Now I’m not mentioning all this to ding Mr. Lovecraft, though I certainly ding the opinions and the attitude he expresses in “The Street.” But this story is not typical of Mr. Lovecraft’s works, and I believe there is some indication of his attitude mellowing in his later years. The attitude expressed in “The Street,” however, is pretty common today and is prompted by much biased “news coverage” (actually, propaganda) and by the words of our elite “leaders.” It is this facet of the story that struck me so.

For example, a recent political rally for Donald Trump in North Carolina, turned ugly when a Muslim woman (and a few others) quietly protested some parts of Trump’s speech simply by standing. Mr. Trump was averring some evil intent on the part of Syrian refugees, which prompted the woman’s protest. The crowd around her took up some derisive chants and hurled “Islamophobic epithets” at her. Then Security escorted her from the building.

In referring to the protesters in this episode, Mr. Trump was quoted as saying, "It's their hatred, it's not our hatred." That reflects the tone in “The Street” (as well as being hypocritical, since the Muslim woman said nothing and it was the crowd that did all the vocal hate-hurling).

Since this episode, I believe Mr. Trump has let lose with some more tirades against Muslims, immigrants, and brown people in general. This is, I think, his “wild side” talking-without-thinking and revving up the extreme conservative element among his supporters.

Mr. Lovecraft mentioned the flood of refugees coming to America from the ravaging of Europe by the First World War. Today, they are “flooding” in because Western powers (the US and NATO) are bombing their homes to oblivion (in Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, etc) in the absence of any provocation.

In an opinion piece on the Global Research website, Robert Bridge indicates this destruction and displacement of people is intentional. He avers it is meant to facilitate the Western oligarch’s desires for world conquest:

While on the surface it may seem that the refugee crisis has taken Western leaders by surprise, in fact it is all part of their plan for global domination, which was outlined in a paper by the now-defunct group of US neoconservatives known as The Project for a New American Century (PNAC).

Mr. Bridge’s article is generally correct, in my opinion, in its depiction of the drive by Western oligarchs for world domination, but it is still tainted with a racist attitude that says some races of people are just bad and crazy (yes, there are “bad and crazy” people out there, but they tend not to be defined by race when you look at the bigger picture).

It is this racist attitude, that the oligarchs use against us. It keeps us divided in the face of their tyranny, and contributes to keeping them in power.

H. P. Lovecraft, who wrote his stories in the early 20th century, was not unique in being a talented author who reflected the darker opinions of his time. Mark Twain was the same way, to an extent. Mr. Twain came around, though, and penned a classic criticism of racial intolerance in Huckleberry Finn.

I was simply struck by the tone of “The Street” and how it sounded so contemporary in its intolerance. It makes me think the idea of “American Exceptionalism” has been around for a while, along with that of white, west European supremacy (fostered by institutionalized slavery). It seems, as a society, we have not progressed so much. Or maybe we’ve just fallen so far.

* * *

You can find the Trump rally story here.

You can find Mr. Bridge’s article here .

Exhilaration in Great Spaces

I recently read W. Somerset Maugham’s classic novel, The Razor’s Edge . I watched the 1984 movie version of it, starring Bill Murray, a couple of times and thought it was compelling, but incomplete somehow. After my second viewing, I realized that I never got just what kind of enlightenment the protagonist (Larry Darrell) found in his searching. He just came back, wiser, to his rich friends. I found that the novel clears that up.

Basically, Larry was struck by the fragility of life in his experiences as a flyer in WWI. This led him to begin a literary search for life’s meaning after the war. He conducted much of that search in Paris and it consisted of reading the works of major philosophers (Spinoza, Nietzsche, etc) and more literary writers. He eventually even got into the works of some mystics (like Ruysbroek). So he basically gave himself a liberal arts education in literature with some mysticism thrown in. He eventually reached India and seemed to find the illumination he was seeking in Hinduism.

The movie did not go into the specifics of Larry’s search, but in his book, Mr. Maugham gives us Larry’s thoughts on religion, God, and spirituality. At one point, a Catholic priest describes him as “a deeply religious man who doesn’t believe in God.”

There’s a lot in The Razor’s Edge that I found inspiring and just so “right on” in its observations on life and people. I mention some of that in my review. There are a couple of ideas, though, that I want to comment on here.

One is simply the idea of “the seeker.” That is, a person who is just cannot accept the conventional wisdom and has to search out for himself/herself the true meaning of life (if there is any). I like that Larry’s search was (at first, anyway) a literary one. He availed himself of what others had written over the centuries about their own quest for truth. His single-mindedly determined search is illustrated in the description of his hotel room in Paris:

There was a single bed in the room, with a night table beside it, a heavy wardrobe with a large mirror, an upholstered but straightbacked armchair, and a table between the windows on which were a typewriter, papers, and a number of books. The chimney piece was piled with paper-bound volumes.

Sounds like he had all the necessities, and I’m sure the piles of books provided an ambiance that was agreeable to him. That is, his room, though humble in appearance, nevertheless held an atmosphere charged with wisdom and the potential for living in a wider world.

There are a couple of other passages that also speak to this idea of the world’s wonder, and the potential for more inspired and fulfilling living. Both contain the idea of “place,” amplified in the one case by nature.

The first describes inspiration from a natural landscape:

It was a dull landscape, but the sunshine and the glowing tints of the waning year gave it that day an intimate loveliness. There was an exhilaration in the great space that was spread before you…just then it was strangely exciting, for the vastness of the view invited the soul to adventure.

I felt such inspiration many times in my youth, though I never fulfilled it (at least, not adequately).

Then there is the passage where Mr. Maugham describes one of his favorite places—the port city of Tolon in France:

…Tolon gives you the effect of a terminal on which all the ways of the wide world converge; and as you sit in a cafe, your eyes a little dazzled by the brightness of sea and sky, your fancy takes golden journeys to the uttermost parts of the earth.

It was apparently a place you could sit in a cafe overlooking the harbor, and plan the great journeys your soul longs for.

It seems to me, though, that such inspirations are gone from the world, because we have lost the God-given natural world that is their source. Because we can no longer exult in a brilliant, cloudless, blue sky, because so many run to and fro with increased knowledge but decreased morality, it seems we can no longer dream of wonder and adventure beyond the horizon.

Such are my ponderings as we enter a new year.

* * *
This is why we can no longer exult in a brilliant, cloudless, blue sky.

You can find my Ray-view of The Razor’s Edge by W. Somerset Maugham here .

Star Wars

I saw the first Star Wars film in 1977 (Episode 4: A New Hope). It blew me away. It was something new and exciting in movies. It broke fresh ground in movie-making and defined (or maybe, “refined”) a sub-genre of science fiction (space opera) that continues to this day, with its influence seen in every current blockbuster.

But besides all that, Star Wars is just special.

The first movie was an unabashed space opera (related to science fiction in the same way that “horse opera” westerns were related to historical dramas about the 19th century American West). It utilized cutting edge film-making technology, heavily supported by computer tech, to create special effects that put the viewer in the space jockey’s seat. And those effects were utterly amazing for the time. The spaceships were basically plastic, partially animated, models that “flew” by moving a computer-controlled camera around them, with the resulting images digitally applied to a larger composite film image (of other spacecraft models, for instance, against a star-field). The results were more realistic than anything seen in movies before.

But besides the special effects, Star Wars was a space-action film made by a baby-boomer, and it was embraced by other baby-boomers who had finally come of age and had money to spend at the movies. There were foreshadows of this in the success of the Star Trek TV series and the 2001 A Space Odyssey movie a decade before (and even, Planet of the Apes for that matter). But those still represented the previous generation of storytellers. Star Trek, while it dramatized some good SF stories (especially in the first season), was still very “cowboyish” in format (lots of fistfights and protagonists that didn’t learn and grow), and 2001 was very hardcore science fiction (sacrificing drama-excitement for scientific accuracy) as well as being hardcore movie-making (sacrificing drama-excitement for art). Star Wars went beyond all that.

Actually, I was first engrossed by Star Wars from reading the novelization of it by George Lucas. I think the movie was not projected to be successful by the Hollywood moguls of the time and Mr. Lucas was trying to generate some anticipation with a pre-release novel version. I think it worked. I know it did for me. I was captured by the cover art depicting the obviously ominous and evil, Darth Vader, and the obviously heroic Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia, with robots, and battling spaceships in the background. Then the back-cover copy clinched the deal:

Luke Skywalker was a twenty-year-old who lived and worked on his uncle’s farm on the remote planet of Tatooine…and he was bored beyond belief..Armed only with courage and with the light saber that had been his father’s, Luke was catapulted into the middle of the most savage space war ever…and he was headed straight for a desperate encounter on the enemy battle station known as the Death Star!

And it had 16 pages of photos from the movie with explanatory text! So I bought the book and devoured it. Now George Lucas is not a writer, but he did a good job in translating his vision into a novel. At least it was good enough for me to be thoroughly hooked. This story was what I thought a space adventure should be—lots of action against a wondrous and romantic backdrop of outer space (”a galaxy far, far away”).

When I finally saw the movie, it exceeded my expectations and, apparently, those of other baby-boomers who grew up on Fireball XL5, Star Trek, Planet of the Apes, and all the old SF movies from the 1950s (e.g., The Day the Earth Stood Still). Finally, we had a movie that contained all the elements that we desired in our space adventures, without all the hang-ups of the previous generation or the need to be scientifically accurate (better to be dramatically accurate)!

So there I was, a 20 year-old who had found a movie story about a 20 year-old coming of age in a setting of high adventure, cosmic intrigue, and clear-cut good-vs-evil. Star Wars was the foil of a space fantasy against the extreme ordinariness of my life. It was the inspiration to my own coming-of-age that stayed with me for many years. It was my distraction, much as many video games are the inspirational distractions for the Millennial generation (who also embraced Star Wars; but The Force Awakens may be—and I think is intended to be—their A New Hope).

Of course, there comes a time when you must let go of your distractions, lest they lose you in delusion, but Force forbid that you lose your inspirations.

My inspiration continued with the other two movies of the original trilogy (episodes 4-6). I read the novelizations before seeing the movies and I also bought the soundtracks to enjoy the magnificent scores by John Williams.

Years later, I followed the “prequel” trilogies (episodes 1-3). While they were technically well done (since digital tech had advanced so much), they lacked the originals’ spirit. They were also flawed storytelling, even though they were the creations of George Lucas. In my opinion, this is primarily because Mr. Lucas is a film-maker and not a storyteller. In the prequel trilogy, he simply cinematized his back-stories, and it wasn’t enough. I never read the novelizations for those movies.

Recently, I saw the latest movie of the Star Wars franchise: Star Wars: The Force Awakens. It’s been 38 years since the release of A New Hope. This new movie is “Episode 7” and it features the original main characters in a continuation of the storyline of the original trilogy. Drama-wise and film-wise, I rate the movie as “very good” (4.5 stars) It’s much better than the prequel movies, though not as good, overall, as the original trilogy.

The special effects of The Force Awakens are, of course, better than any of the previous movies, simply because of the advanced state of the FX arts. It was visually breath-taking and it truly brought to life the spaceships, space battles, droids, and the various worlds. The new characters introduced were, I thought, good creations to carry on the story line and were well-played by the actors (especially Daisy Ridley and John Boyega). Overall, the movie was a tribute and homage to the venerable and special original trilogy, and in that, it did well. But before I go into that, let me say a few words about the movie from a general point-of-view.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens is a high-energy, space-opera thriller, just as was the original movie. Cutting edge special effects bring an engrossing reality to the fantastic things depicted. Spaceships, droids, and aliens look very real and believable. As in the other movies, the storyline is second to the action and effects, but it’s still there and it holds your interest (as opposed to the prequels).

That story revolves around the search for the missing Luke Skywalker. Luke was rebuilding the organization of the Jedi Knights but was thwarted in his work by the turning of Kylo Ren, one of his apprentices, to the dark side. Ren was also the son of Han and Leia so his loss was a double blow that apparently sent Luke into a self-imposed exile. Anyway, the good guys want him back to continue his rebuild of the Jedi, and the bad guys want him permanently stopped so that he can’t do that. The key to his whereabouts is a map contained in a droid that everybody’s fighting to get a hold of. Yes, there is a definite resonance in plot there with the first-made movie (A New Hope).

In fact, there are many echoes of A New Hope in this movie. That’s deliberate and it constitutes that “tribute” and “homage” I was talking about. Even so, the main plot of this movie is about the creation of a planet-destroying space station (moon-sized itself) that the First Order (evil descendant of the Empire) wants to use to rule the galaxy. The Resistance (working with the newly re-founded Republic) is seeking to destroy the planet-killer with an attack of X-wing fighters on a vulnerable spot on the thing. It’s visually well-done and exciting, but it’s the umpteenth time this plot thread has been done, with variations, in the collection of Star Wars movies. This needs to be the last time.

All the similarities of plot, however, allow for a plethora of reminiscent scenes of A New Hope. Some of them are touching, especially when they include characters from the original trilogy. And seeing those original characters/actors is very touching for old star warriors like me.

I was very glad to see that Harrison Ford and Peter Mayhew were heavily featured as Han Solo and Chewbacca. In fact, this was very much Han Solo’s movie and is a fitting tribute to the lovable, rascal smuggler and his sidekick. And I think Chewbacca acted as more of a character than he did in any of the other movies (that is, he didn’t just stand around and growl). And of course, Princess Leia was prominent as a Resistance general. She’s a long way from the fiery space-babe she was in the original trilogy, but she anchors the movie’s nostalgia in being a revered leader, rather than an object to be rescued.

Much time has passed since the first movie, and it shows in the faces of the main characters. They’ve aged, about as gracefully as anyone can, but are still vital and living life. Like Han Solo who, after having a son with Leia, went back to smuggling—the thing he knows best. And Leia goes back to leading—the thing she knows best. That’s life affirming right there, to the boomer fan-base.

The droids, CP30 and R2D2, are in the movie, though they are not featured as prominently as in the previous movies. Story-wise, I think that was called for. There’s not much they could have contributed to this movie’s plot. Conceivably, R2D2 could have substituted for BB8, but I think it was better he didn’t. In the next movie, maybe these two could be brought out more, but in this one, they would have just gotten in the way of the new blood.

Which brings me back to the old blood. What of Luke Skywalker? His role in this movie was the big question going into it. I won’t do a spoiler, but I will say that he does, indeed, make an appearance. His whereabouts is the driving plot point and even the heavy featuring of Han Solo begs the question as to what has become of him. I kept waiting for him to pop up and do something heroic—maybe save somebody. But he just didn’t, until, well…

OK, I’ll only say that Luke does appear as the older, wizened Jedi, assuming the role of his mentor, Obi-Wan Kenobi. When we see him, he is in the Jedi cloak, bearded, and obviously aged, though we can still see the young, enthusiastic learner who was the Jedi’s new hope. He is approached by the young Rey (Daisy Ridley), holding out his old light saber to him, and we see a new master-apprentice relationship budding.

The next episode should be Luke’s, as this one was Han’s.

All things considered, Star Wars was something new in 1977. Even more, it was something needed. It was needed by the baby-boomers to be the embodiment of their fondest and most hopeful imaginings of how life should be. It was, and is, their anthem of good-fighting-evil and preferring death to surrendering to the dark side.

While the boomers missed the horrors of the Great Depression and the World Wars, they saw the extreme ugliness and futility of war in Viet Nam. Then they saw their leaders grow more and more corrupt, lying to them and selling them out for financial gain. While they struggled to survive on incomes that stagnated, they watched corporations kill and pillage for profit, all the while telling them that “you can have it all.” As the world died before their eyes, they were told it wasn’t happening. Having their reality soured for them, they hung onto their dreams, and expressed them in movies.

Star Wars tells the boomers, and everyone, that a new hope can come. It says the evil that arises from the darkness of fear and easy profits, and that builds vast machines of destruction, will ultimately fall before love, loyalty, and the deep reverence for life that comes from life and binds all of it together. Only believing there is truth in this, keeps us going.

I’m the same age as Mark Hamil, so I pretty much aged as did Luke Skywalker in the movies. I was the coming-of-age youth, looking for an exciting destiny, as he was. And I’m the old life-burdened veteran that peered from beneath a Jedi hood in The Force Awakens. I only wonder if I have learned as much from my years. I surely haven’t experienced as much, but then, life’s lessons reach us through many routes.

Popular fiction contains our common inspirations. It persists because we need it. It is us telling ourselves that everything will be all right. With courage to stand up against evil, we’ll get through the darkness and reach a brighter day. It’s the way of life’s force to bring the good to triumph. It’s happened before. In a galaxy far, far away.

Ray-views: My Book of My Book Reviews

I’ve written a lot of book reviews in the last few years, mostly as a writing exercise and because I like to read. I’ve generally gotten good comments and “likes” for the reviews, so I decided to compile a lot of them into a single volume, arranged into categories. It was pretty easy to create the categories, since my reading tends to be of specific subjects (my themes). The same goes for my journal entries so for each category, I selected journal entries (blog posts) that were related in one way or another. And on top of all that, I wrote new essays and included them for each category subject. The result was Ray-views Volume 1: Book Reviews by Category (available via Arbordin Park Press).

If you follow and like my work, I think you’ll find Ray-views a good read. The essays will give you a distillation of my thinking on the category subjects and provide a springboard for your own investigations, or simply reading pleasure.

To help you determine if Ray-views is worth adding to your library, I’ve posted a couple of excerpts. One is the essay for the “Inspiration” category. You can find it here. I’ve also posted the book’s Foreword. I thought that would best explain what I hope to accomplish with the book and also provide an overview of the categories. You can find the Foreword posted here.

Through reading we find inspiration and knowledge. We commune with those authors we relate to and we meet the challenge of contradiction from those authors we don’t. I hope Ray-views will point you to literary works that do both. It is available in print and electronic formats (I’ve priced both as inexpensively as I can). You can purchase either format here.

With my two Arbordin Park Press “flagship” books launched, I will turn my attention back to novel-writing. It is my hope to have my first Dentville novel, Power of the Ancients, out sometime in 2016. Of course, that is one of many projects on my plate. Please hang with me.

Inspiration

Here's come Inspiration,
walking through the door,
Bringing back a thousand dreams
I thought I'd lost for shore...

(Paul Williams, Inspiration)




WHENI look back on all the stuff I've written over the past few years--Journal entries, book reviews, short stories, novellas--I see it's pretty easy to spot my themes. Because that's the case, I was able to sort all my book reviews into categories and compile them into a book that I call, Ray-views: Volume 1 (soon to be published via Arbordin Park Press; Should be available by Dec 22). The categories I came up with are:

Beyond the UsualThe Human ProblemOn ProphecyThe Dystopian PotentialInspirationStorytelling
Of these, the most popular pieces are those I put in the Inspiration category. Those received the most "likes" and comments, and almost always generated more web traffic to my blog. I can understand why. Inspiration is hard to come by in these dark times. I know I wrestle with depression when just reading the news (the real news; not the mainstream media) and I'm sure I'm not alone in that. Somehow though, inspiration still finds me, and when it does, I like to share it.

In Ray-views, I include essays of my thoughts on the subject matter of each category, and how the books Ray-viewed in them relate. As a teaser for the book, I've published the essay I wrote for its Inspiration category on the Arbordin Park Press website. You can find it here.

Inspiration is what Ray-views is about. I've included over 40 of my book reviews plus related entries from my online journal and some suggestions for other books to read for each category. All the books I've reviewed have inspired me in one way or another, even where the subject was dark. Many of those inspirations led me to write the stories in The Wider World, and in Ray-views, I share those inspirations with you.

I hope to have Ray-views out by mid December (in time for Christmas!). Watch my website and the Arbordin website for news of its release. I hope you'll buy it and let it be your springboard for your own research into the category subjects, and so find your own inspirations.

After the Flood (Updated)

The flow of moisture from hurricane Joaquin was manipulated between a clockwise spinning high pressure zone to the north of Joaquin and a counterclockwise spinning low pressure zone to the west of Joaquin.  (Geoengineering Watch website)

It is the following Tuesday after the great South Carolina deluge. In Columbia, we're seeing sunshine for the first time in about five days. Helicopters are pretty much a constant overhead as news stations, government agencies, and Lord-knows-who-else survey the scene from the air.

I live in northeast Columbia with my family and the destruction is not so obvious here. I suppose we must be on relatively high ground and so we weren't flooded out as much as the rest of the city. From Saturday night through midday Monday, we had a pretty steady rain. It wasn't storming, or even a particularly hard rain, just constant--especially Sunday (Oct 4). In fact, it's been several years since I've seen rain that constant, falling in big, heavy drops. It wasn't really scary while it was happening; more depressing.

Outside of the news reports, I would not have noted this rain as being anything out of the ordinary (we went to grocery in the midst of it, which isn't far from home) except for when I got up early Monday morning to feed the dog. The water running through the "ditch" that is our abbreviated back yard was up and rushing, though it did not reach the house or even cover the back porch. The french drain was able to handle the excess and channel it out to the street.

We suffered no flood damage and never even lost electricity (as of this writing), so we were pretty fortunate. Judging from the news, a number of streets and portions of the Interstates (I-20 and I-77) around us were closed. Dams and canals were breeched causing a lot of flooding in the southeast part of the city and keeping schools and businesses closed into the first of the work-week. Evacuations were forced in some areas. It seems we are on a high island of relative stability in the midst of a lot of calamity.

Out-of-state family and friends have been texting and calling to verify our well-being, so let me say that, at this point, we're OK. Our unknowns right now are: how long will my wife's workplace be closed, and, will we experience a loss of supplies (the grocery store was being cleared of bread and water) before this is "over."

The news media is calling this a "1000 year flooding event." From a statistical standpoint that's probably true, but the implication is of a natural event and I think there's little doubt of the human input. Some commentators will even concede that this event, like the California drought, is a byproduct of "climate change" or even "global warming." I think that's true, but there is more to the story.

All this was presaged by the passage of Hurricane Joaquin, which was at first "predicted" to make landfall on the US east coast and move over the Carolinas. Instead, it battered the Bahamas and then moved out over the Atlantic where it continues to weaken. It is apparently supposed to have contributed someway to bringing the huge load of moisture over the Carolinas that fell in the intense rains of the last few days. I say "apparently" because it looks to me like the two weather systems are pretty far separated.

So was there a causal connection between the hurricane and the rain? Probably of some sort, but I don't trust the Weather Channel to tell us the straight poop. I think the rain dumped on South Carolina was basically "stolen" from California. If you have trouble believing that weather is manipulated, I suggest you spend some time researching here .

Long ago, a Sumerian city-king (Gilgamesh, aka: Noah) survived a contrived flood and saw his thankfulness and hope for the future expressed as a rainbow. After our flood, I stood on my back porch in cooler air and looked up into slightly less pale blue skies and watched the SAG trails spreading into cirrus clouds.

UPDATE

The anomalous nature of the South Carolina deluge is very apparent to me. I don't see how anyone can spend any time watching the sky and not see that some huge program involving massive spraying from high-flying airplanes is going on. The sky is not as blue and the clouds are not as full as they were when I was young. The evidence is strong that the ruling powers have been perpetrating a program of geoengineering in a big way since about 1998. It is not a benign program, it seems mostly to be a militarization of the science of weather/climate control (according to the military's own documents). So why should they cause such grief for South Carolina (and California)? Why build more nuclear power plants when the meltdown of one (Fukishima) threatens all life on earth? Why explode some 2000 nuclear bombs and poison the land/atmosphere? Why use depleted uranium in munitions that sicken our own military? Why confront Russia and China with a nuclear war that can't be won? Don't expect sense from any of this. Geoengineering Watch has an insightful take on the South Caroline deluge here .

After the Flood

It is the following Tuesday after the great South Carolina deluge. In Columbia, we're seeing sunshine for the first time in about five days. Helicopters are pretty much a constant overhead as news stations, government agencies, and Lord-knows-who-else survey the scene from the air.

I live in northeast Columbia with my family and the destruction is not so obvious here. I suppose we must be on relatively high ground and so we weren't flooded out as much as the rest of the city. From Saturday night through midday Monday, we had a pretty steady rain. It wasn't storming, or even a particularly hard rain, just constant--especially Sunday (Oct 4). In fact, it's been several years since I've seen rain that constant, falling in big, heavy drops. It wasn't really scary while it was happening; more depressing.

Outside of the news reports, I would not have noted this rain as being anything out of the ordinary (we went to grocery in the midst of it, which isn't far from home) except for when I got up early Monday morning to feed the dog. The water running through the "ditch" that is our abbreviated back yard was up and rushing, though it did not reach the house or even cover the back porch. The french drain was able to handle the excess and channel it out to the street.

We suffered no flood damage and never even lost electricity (as of this writing), so we were pretty fortunate. Judging from the news, a number of streets and portions of the Interstates (I-20 and I-77) around us were closed. Dams and canals were breeched causing a lot of flooding in the southeast part of the city and keeping schools and businesses closed into the first of the work-week. Evacuations were forced in some areas. It seems we are on a high island of relative stability in the midst of a lot of calamity.

Out-of-state family and friends have been texting and calling to verify our well-being, so let me say that, at this point, we're OK. Our unknowns right now are: how long will my wife's workplace be closed, and, will we experience a loss of supplies (the grocery store was being cleared of bread and water) before this is "over."

The news media is calling this a "1000 year flooding event." From a statistical standpoint that's probably true, but the implication is of a natural event and I think there's little doubt of the human input. Some commentators will even concede that this event, like the California drought, is a byproduct of "climate change" or even "global warming." I think that's true, but there is more to the story.

All this was presaged by the passage of Hurricane Joaquin, which was at first "predicted" to make landfall on the US east coast and move over the Carolinas. Instead, it battered the Bahamas and then moved out over the Atlantic where it continues to weaken. It is apparently supposed to have contributed someway to bringing the huge load of moisture over the Carolinas that fell in the intense rains of the last few days. I say "apparently" because it looks to me like the two weather systems are pretty far separated.

So was there a causal connection between the hurricane and the rain? Probably of some sort, but I don't trust the Weather Channel to tell us the straight poop. I think the rain dumped on South Carolina was basically "stolen" from California. If you have trouble believing that weather is manipulated, I suggest you spend some time researching here .

Long ago, a Sumerian city-king (Gilgamesh, aka: Noah) survived a contrived flood and saw his thankfulness and hope for the future expressed as a rainbow. After our flood, I stood on my back porch in cooler air and looked up into slightly less pale blue skies and watched the SAG trails spreading into cirrus clouds.

Laszlo vs Salander

Casablanca is one of my favorite movies of all time. It's set in a time and place that speaks uniquely to the American mythos: just prior to WWII in the fight against facisim in an exotic, international place with a band of international characters led by a disillusioned, lovelorned, American tough-guy who doesn't "buy and sell people." But I have to admit, as much as I admire the Humphrey Bogart character, Rick Blaine, I tend to identify more with the nerdy writer, Victor Laszlo.

Of course, in the movie, Laszlo is a hero of the Czechoslovakian resistence (well before the term, "nerd," was known). Why nerdy? Well, Laszlo was portrayed in the movie, not as a soldier but as a writer; acutally, the editor of an underground newspaper in Prague after the Nazi occupation. He wrote truth about the Nazis and that made them hate him and want to throw him in prison, or worse (things aren't so different these days). Now this is admirable in real life and very dangerous if really practiced. Journalists get dead now, just as then, for saying unpopular things to mass audiences. Still, I have this heroic image of Victor Laszlo punching away at his portable typewriter in a dingy basement, while Nazi soldiers patrol the streets above, as he turns out page-after-page of copy that acuses Hitler of murdering innocents, and of having a goofy moustache! (No, Victor didn't get that scar in battle; he was hit in the head when his stuck typewriter carriage unfroze suddenly).

Yeah, Rick's the strong, cool, dude with the heart of gold that Ms Ilsa really loves, but the plot hinges on Victor Laszlo! Getting him away from the Nazis is what puts Ilsa in Casablanca and back to Rick in the first place. And in the end, the cause Laszlo is working for trumps everything else! This is the first revenge of the nerd!

What prompted that rant was my recent review of The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest . Like Stieg Larsson's other "Lisbeth Salander books," Hornet's Nest is a computer/writer nerd's delight. You have a quirky antihero with killer computer skills and kick-butt martial arts skills, but on top of it all, she's a super kick-butt researcher and her sidekick is a major author and publisher of a Swedish magazine! Salander can go anywhere online and find stuff, clone hard drives, and even pull down evidence against serial killers and corrupt government officials. And then her journalist sidekick can publish it all into a world-wide best seller. You just don't get any more nerdy kick-butt than that!

So here we have a direct line in drama from Victor Laszlo to Lisbeth Salander (there's an alliteration between his last name and her first name; surely not coincidence). He is a straight-laced hero of the Czech resistence with a typewriter. She is an antisocial, antihero of cyberpunks with a keyboard. There does, however, seems to be some difference in scale there. Is Laszlo's cause loftier? The characters around him certainly considered it lofty, and they make great sacrifice for his safety so he can continue his work (in private Victor muses: "People are risking their lives so I can indulge my compulsion to write on my typewriter and make pages and pages...." Salander doesn't have to keep such things to herself. She's an antihero so she doesn't care. She hacks and gets around on the Internet because she can. If she tends to solve crimes, it's because she happens to hate bad-guy-low-lifes, especially women-abusers, and she has the tools to do it. Whatever ideological drive she has is much more below surface than Laszlo's. Maybe she's more honest.

I grew up watching two-fisted heroes on TV and the movies. I've loved the khaki-clad jungle explorer fighting crocodiles and hostile natives to find some unknown. But in the end, I'm too reticent for all that. I'm more of a Laszlo-Salander combo, plunking away trying to write something that's worth something and make a difference from the seat of my leather-bound office chair. I'm alternately driven between motivations like Laszlo, who fights for the right out of ideology, and like Salander, who fights out of reaction against injury to herself or others. In either case, my weapon of choice is the keyboard or pencil striking blows in passionate prose.

Maybe you feel that way too. If so, you're my fellow warrior in the fight against the lies of those who would rule through deception, or any who would destroy the Good for the sake of meglomanic agrandizement of Self at the expense of everyone else. Brandish your pencil and plink your keyboard for the sake of the common good, and stick your neck out for somebody. Even Rick came around.

River of Dreams

It has been a busy last couple of weeks for me. I was finally able to complete pulling together my collection of short stories into a volume I call, The Wider World , and publish it through my own little imprint, Arbordin Park Press , and distribute it in print and Kindle editions through Amazon.com. All this involved learning the CreateSpace tools, setting up the Arbordin site and writing its first blog post , and then dealing with some devilish and stupid errors in the manuscript at the last minute. But, at last, the book is out there and its supporting business entity is operational and ready to facilitate the publication of the other projects I want to do.

As it happened, I was able to get all that done and then take a little trip with my wife to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary.

So we headed northwest towards the Blue Ridge Mountains where, after an overnight in Charlotte, NC, we spent a few days in the little mountain town of Blowing rock, NC. It was the first time I had been to any mountains since a trip to the Rockies when I was 17. Well, we were surrounded by mountains when we visited Puerto Vallarta, Mexico three years ago, but we didn't explore them.

Blowing Rock (named for its main attraction--a 3000 foot cliff that channels wind up its face) is a "quaint" little town that is probably as village-like as you see these days. It has a walkable Main Street full of shops and restaurants, including an English pub. We strolled the streets, shopped, and enjoyed the cooler air of the town's 4000 foot elevation.

On our first day there, we visited the nearby wild west theme park called, Tweetsie Railroad. Part of that visit was a ride on a 1943 vintage steam-powered train. It burned coal, blew its steam whistle and chugged along just like you see in the movies. Of course, it stopped for requisite show of cowboy and Indian doings with shoot-outs, fist-fights, a horse, and a fort. For me, though, I just let myself get lost in the rhythm of the train, the smell of burning coal, and a trail of embers in the air that prompted the wearing of sunglasses for protection.

The train steamed over a high tressle and around the steep hillsides through woods and over creeks. At times, I got views of the engine making the curve ahead of us (we were in the last car) in the classic scene of a train rounding the bend.

I also got a look at an old source of steam and the smoke from burning a major fossil fuel, like they did it a hundred years ago to kick off the Industrial Age. That was a first step in the warming of the atmosphere into the current hot-house. To me, all the wild west trappings were mostly from the movies and TV depictions of the US frontier in the nineteenth century. I think what you find in such theme parks is really more nostalgia for the 1950s and 1960s than the old west. The reality was different.

The next day, we went tubing down the New River. Rafting and kayaking are big in this area and there are plenty of stretches of white water to get your pulse up, but I didn't feel we were ready for that, so we just took a leisurely drift down a lazy stretch of water. Still, it was enough of a change of pace for us to challenge our comfort and deal with life from a more elemental perspective.

We each had a tube (with a bottom) to float in and they were tied together. We mostly just drifted as we had no means to fight the current if we wanted to, but we learned to use our arms to paddle together and stay in the middle of the river and avoid rocks and getting stuck on the bank.

Life is a River of Dreams as Billy Joel tells us. And a lot of it is dreaming, as we try to keep our courage up, and our hope alive as we travel on. I mean, it was great to drift down the river with my Love; it was a break from the demands of modern life. We arrived at our starting point, fiercely sunburned, but still feeling all the better for our trip.

We enjoyed the trip and being in the mountains. I hope to go back and maybe do some backpacking and horseback riding. Such activities add fuel to the fire of our inspiration and ultimately infuse my writing. We need to find our fun, and our inspirations, when and where we can.

The Wider World is Here!

SEEKERS look for the transcendent truth they suspect lies beyond the common experience of physical existence.

So begins the Foreword to my just released collection of speculative fiction, The Wider World . Discovering that greater reality is what happens to the characters in the collection's nine stories. What they all find is good, bad, and in-between.

I've written a lot about my book in the last few days and I hope you've read most of that and become interested. If not, let me refer you to the book's publisher's page where you'll find an overview. Then there's further write-ups on the Print Edition and eBook Edition (Kindle) pages (there are links to these pages on the publisher's page).

With the launch of The Wider World, I've also revised my Author's webpage (I guess you've noticed, since you're reading this) and launched the publisher's website-- Arbordin Park Press . The inspiration for APP came from one of the stories in The Wider World entitled, The Spark: A Christmas Story. The APP blog will tell you some more about that.

In the Arbordin Park Press site's blog, I'll make posts of a literary nature--book reviews, publishing news, commentaries on writing and publishing, etc. I'll post all my other blog subjects on my Author's site. Currently, APP has only The Wider World on its catalogue page, though I hope to add more soon. While APP is the imprint publisher for The Wider World, payment and fulfillment are handled by Amazon.com for both the print and Kindle editions.

So while I intend to add much more to APP's catalogue, for now, let me further entice you to check out The Wider World by repeating a quote from the book's Foreword:

Seeking the wider world is the ultimate quest and is at the heart of all existential searches. It is also at the heart of the stories that comprise this collection. Though the writing of each was motivated by the exploration of some facet of plot or character, or the desire to express some theme, they all examine someone's journey to the wider world, or their sudden discovery of it.

And here's the Table of Contents (for the print edition):


FOREWORD...............................................................1
My Christmas Carol....................................................5
Author’s Note: My Christmas Carol..........................13
Supernal.....................................................................15
Author’s Note: Supernal............................................21
The Spark...................................................................23
Author’s Note: The Spark: A Christmas Story..........76
Madam President.......................................................79
Author’s Note: Madam President..............................92
Davis and the Goth....................................................95
Author’s Note: Davis and the Goth.........................106
Fire Dance................................................................109
Author’s Note: Fire Dance.......................................124
Life Cost...................................................................127
Author’s Note: Life Cost..........................................137
Apocalypse Diary.....................................................139
Author’s Note: Apocalypse Diary.............................161
Professor Ladner’s Journal......................................163
Author’s Note: Professor Ladner’s Journal............208

And here's an excerpt from the Kindle edition's page, "From the Author" section:

The Wider World is a collection of short stories I've written over the last several years plus a couple of new ones of novella length. They are all of the speculative fiction genre in that they all have some "what if" element, or a spiritual aspect with paranormal overtones. One is an outright ghost story ("Supernal"). Two are outright Christmas stories ("My Christmas Carol" and "The Spark"). One is a confrontation with the darkest evil ("Madam President"). One was inspired by my early life engulfed in a fundamentalist religion while also being bully-bait ("Davis and the Goth"). One expresses my fear of civilization's coming collapse and how it will expose the frailty of our life supports ("Apocalypse Diary"). And in the last one, I examine the costs of making a sudden turn in the way you live. This one ("Professor Ladner's Journal") is a "pilgrimage" story and probably my most hopeful one.

And finally:

Reader comments for stories that make up The Wider World collection:

Davis and the Goth
"Well written short story about being a bully and lessons learned. Has a touch of a sci-fi twist."
"Very realistic story of bullies and an intended "victim" with a really surprising ending!! Well written."

Fire Dance
"This was an enjoyable story set in a world I would like to hear more about."

"This short story had a look of a novel...it was very good."

"Another good short story by this author."

Madam President
"This is a provocative story given today's political atmosphere and corruption...this one will remain in my mind for a long time."

The Spark
"It was marvelous, both in feeling the pain, joy, and hope that this story discussed. The characters were real and...I will definitely read this author again."

"A great read. This novelette was truly inspiring."

"The Spark is an updated blend of the stories of Santa and the Nativity. Well done with believable characters and that touch of magic surrounding Santa that we all experienced as a child. I was hooked from page one."

My Christmas Carol
 "I thoroughly enjoyed this book and will probably make reading this a yearly Christmas tradition. Great for young and old alike. Highly recommended."


So now I hope I've hooked you on checking out The Wider World and following the blog on my site and on the Arbordin Park Press site. I've added NEWS sections to the home page of both sites, so check that frequently for a quick update on what's happening in both worlds. The blogs will be updated most every week (I'm only human).

For those who have been following me for a while now, I thank you. For the newcomers, welcome and thanks for dropping by. I hope you'll all walk with me on this literary pilgrimage. As my protag in Professor Ladner's Journal discovers, once you've found the wider world, there's no going back.

* * *
The WiderWorld Availability:

Arbordin Park Press eStore:   NOW

Kindle store: NOW

Amazon.com:  08/21/2015 (estimate)

P.S.

If you read The Wider World and like it, and feel my literary efforts are worthwhile, then please consider writing a few words of review on the book's Amazon.com page (where you made the purchase). Thank you in advance, so very much.


Links:

The Wider World on the Arbordin Park Press site (with links to purchase)

The Arbordin Park Press blog

My Author's website (contains this blog: Ray's Journal)