its_ephemeral

Inspiring.

2008-04-14T22:54:45Z

We The Tribe.

2008-04-11T02:33:01Z

You are quaking, sitting in your irretrievably mangled car. The powder issuing from your recently-deployed airbag burns your nostrils and makes you uneasy. You are not trapped inside your vehicle, but you feel as if moving is impossible - anxiety overwhelms you.

Lights, horns, sirens. Officials scurry in an organized but undiscernable fashion. Gloved hands hold your head in place with a firm and reassuring grip. Strangers surround you and descend upon you, to care for you.

My voice is laconic as I coach you. It sounds deep and deliberate. I take time to articulate my words, and I try to soften them. You think that I am slow, mentally, as some people tend to, due to the attributes of my voice. It is odd, but it eases you. The smell of the latex gloves that encompass your shivering head is a smell you will remember for months hence. You acknowledge words spoken to you but hardly comprehend them. Many times you try to survey the damage done to your body, but are unable to due the the firm placement of the hands on the sides of your head and neck. Words are spoken in your direction with great emphasis when you try to wriggle free of the grasp. Again you become at ease. This is the ebb and flow of true drama unfolding.

You recall the petty arguments and altercations of recent memory. Arguing sports, belittling your spouse over a sink filled with dishes. You have resented your cat for shedding on your bed. You have called in sick to work because you did not feel like stirring from your slumber. He said, she said, they have always said. Drama from everyday life which agitates an otherwise unremarkable gelatinous life now seems trivial. In your car, certain that you are bleeding entirely too much, and in the care of strangers, you realize this is truly 'drama.'

Moments have passed. How long has it been? You come to and see fluorescent lights; two strangers are hovering around you; an intermittent beep checks in to your right; your head is completely immobilized by a cervical collar; and finally, you gather, your body is exposed. Are you naked? You are unable to tell.

Anxiety turns you inside-out. You forcefully hoist your left arm to survey it and gasp in horror as you see a fragmented bone which has erupted through your skin. You gather that it has been hastily bandaged and the bleeding has possibly stopped.

Inside your body, the sympathetic nervous response has taken over. Adrenaline (epinephrine, norepinephrine) surges through you, making your heart race, your eyes dilate, and your injuries seem frivolous. Your body is perfection and it is taking you away from the pain of your injuries on its own. A true marvel.

You acquire lucidity. You comprehend my voice over time. You shake your head yes and no.

"I am going to be doing a number of things to you," the paramedic, my partner, says. "Dustin will start an IV in your arm, and you may or may not feel a pinch as he does. I will give you pain management drugs through that IV..." and in a stream of audible mentation, he interjects his own sentence. "--Did you lose consciousness?"

It becomes too laborious to follow what the stranger says. You are not compliant with his questions. Phantom receptors fire rapidly to inform you of vague emergency; that you are bleeding out. Your limbs are becoming cool and you wonder what you look like on the outside. If you were a fly on the wall of this ambulance, would you be watching yourself die?

My stylet pierces your skin; you flinch. The catheter advances into your vein. An invigorating sensation consumes you as fluid courses through your veins. In moments you become euphoric.

And as I'm caring for you, I just wish you could understand what has occurred. We are strangers; did you know that? We have never met. A warmth within me radiates toward you, and you are nurtured. This is how I've longed for the world to be...

We were all tribes once, so long ago. Natives to every plot of land. We were communal and our needs were visceral. We erected shelters for one another, hunted and gathered plants and game for everyone, and cooked. Tremendous crowds of tribespeople encircled the fire as we roasted our spoils of the day. Everyone was family. There was no such thing as a stranger. It was not weird then, to care for someone who was not a family or friend. It was expected.

There were no rifts. No economical barriers to separate a ghetto from a castle, a bus stop from a golf course. Racism, centricism, ageism, religion, and government did not exist. All barriers were permeated by humanity...

...a concept now inconcievable and irretrievable as we transport you to the hospital. We were once a tribe, my patient, and this was not a duty which required compensation.

I am privy to complexities and nuances and ugly vantage points of human life. Life is often unforgiving or worse, stripped away. Many times in my past and many times in my future I will long to have you as my friend, patient. I would wonder what it is like to share coffee, have a drink, or take a walk through a park with you. What would you tell me?

It did not happen, and it will not happen. We're the tribe of muffled desires. These desires, if uncorked, would reach in every direction voraciously, seeking human companionship. Unwarranted, genuine, dizzying and warm! I would not have to respond to you in your time of need, stranger meeting stranger, to validate our entangling of lives!

But today, and for every forseeable day hence, this is an absurd longing. I will keep it to myself, until I explode again.

Poor Dead Horse.

2008-02-29T23:06:37Z

It's odd; we establish new acquaintances with handshakes and henceforth find it necessary to determine what traits about this acquaintance we dislike. The handshake - in all its altruism - is therefore quite misleading; just another ineffectual gesture that somehow found a home in our social programming.

My mind is in need of re-framing. You may read this and decide (if you have not already) that your mind also needs re-framing. I want to shirk that initial synapse that instructs me to find bad traits in strangers. I want to displace that synapse and in its place plant the seed of a more amiable synapse that compels me to seek the good traits in strangers. Even if the bad trait seeking synapse is not compulsory or repetitive, it is still my default mode of evaluation. I want to recognize and exalt the confidence in men who have worked hard to define their mannerisms, and worship the assertive stride of a mid-twenties woman as she pays me no mind and has me convinced that hers is a state of constant aloofness.

So can we? With effort, I would say yes. My mind tires from rigorous examination and re-examination of its own processes. It fatigues from looking in the mirror too much. When my mind is tired, I can see the justification in stereotypes and generalizations - sometimes even profiling. It is a terribly bad state of mind to be in but I admit that I do. For some people it is more than a status the mind tires itself into: it is a constant state of being. Worse yet, some people are in this state irretrievably. Convinced in the sureness of their ways, and in vast enough numbers, it makes the potential mind re-framers feel like their efforts are insignificant, and the mission too daunting. I believe the people chronically in a state of judgment and profiling remain there because they are unaware that their mode of thinking is harmful to their social proxy, and to themselves. And because this mode of thinking spreads exponentially, you have circles of persons teeming with scathe and judgment, ethnocentricism and and racism.

I am not sure that tentative mind re-framers will ever be the majority. When the problem was born - whenever that was - it should have been addressed promptly. I can guess that the it was borne of a pursuit of money or power (or both).

I ingrain this incessantly into those who take the time to read my writing: be thoughtful, and be careful with your evaluation(s) of people around you and events that take place. Gather data, perspectives; calibrate and re-calibrate your mindset toward these issues. Do not assert until you are sure. Seek and bask in the multitudinous unique and incredible traits of your friends, your family, and the strangers all around. Extricate strangers from the wreckage of normal, pre-programmed conversation and engage them. Bring out the best in them and find their interests. Entangle yourselves in those interests and become lost in the lull of correspondence and genuine vibe. Feel intoxicated by it so that you seek to do it again.

As a final thought; remember to take notice of the little things and discard the details. When you feel overwhelmed with responsibility and tasks, remember the heart of the matter and what you truly care for. We're overstimulated. Sometimes we can't imagine a commute to work without coffee in hand, wireless headset, GPS directing us, and the radio blaring. Turn the radio off, put the coffee down and the headset aside, and pay no mind to the GPS. Look outside. Look at everyone all around you in the streets and in traffic. Survey the scenery. Appreciate.

My (Tentative and Fallible) Philosophy.

2008-02-24T15:21:05Z

It is not that I am antisocial, nor am I incredibly introverted. It is just that I require a billboard right now. And if you go so far as to construct this billboard for me, I would like it to state "Please leave me be; I am manufacturing words in a clever manner at the moment." Were I not engaged in this endeavor, it is likely that I would embrace - Eric is interrupting me again; bless him. (Although, I am not religious.) As I was saying, I would likely enjoy a good interaction with co-workers were I not making muddy my hands with the toils of wordsmithery.

Surely, the statement "Please leave me be; I am manufacturing words in a clever manner at the moment." is a very slanted and inappropriate statement to make. I, the humble smithy, cannot very well determine whether or not this rhetoric is clever. Then, who holds the intellectual platform and disseminates judgment of such works? Is it the Grand Duchess of Proseville? Maybe it is the entity known as the Creative Writing Police. An imposing abbreviation indeed; the CWP!

My thought process is too linear, too linear! To my surprise, it may not be a human at all! It could be the invaders from a galaxy uncomfortably proximal to our own. The Blue-Skinned Crustopods! Beings with a crustacean-like structure, but the carapace has the texture of skin! Well maintained and soft to the touch: supple skin! And blue! This is an uncomfortable vision to behold. I digress. . .

Eric interrupts me again. Hardly a worry to me, oh talkative co-worker, for momentum is on my side. The rail car has long since started skating downhill. But without a proper rail to guide it (in this case, my mind, which is not right right* now), where may this vessel recklessly voyage?

And if the judicial entity of both grammar and storytelling is neither of this race or of this planet, it could still be a creature which existed not within this era! The portrayal of dread to so many thinkwriters so many eras ago: the Criticosaurus Rex. No neanderthal was safe, as I vaguely recall. Scribing on cave walls their most intimate and wild thoughts, they etched tentatively for fear of being found. Even then, prestigious cavewriters did not react well to criticism. This is especially true when you consider the tendency of the Criticosaurus Rex not only to critique their musings with unrelenting abrasion, but also to rip to shreds all hapless cavewriters that he or she found.

In this time, we should be so lucky! To carry home our bruised ego after a critique of our work which did not end so favorably. We still have our wit, the wholeness of our physical selves, and most importantly, the notion that if we are persistent and dumb and verbose enough, we may one day garner a following.

And everyone, my endearing reader, wants a following. So don't let the harsh words get you down. Instead, fly off the walls as you write. Abandon intellectual posturing in your work in lieu of incomprehensible chicken scratch which expounds of the virtues of eating on the greasy skin of fried otter for seven days straight. With your effort and recognition of the futility of being smart, we can achieve a horde of groupies unfathomable by doctors, scientists, speechwriters, and philosophers. After all, philosophy is just failed excrement of the human mind that did not quite become a law.

That's my philosophy.

* In my twenty-fourth year of living, I am finally comfortable with using two of the same words in succession. I must thank the noble George Orwell for this. Right right on!

The Mediocre Baseball Analogy.

2008-01-15T02:54:23Z

Rummaging. Rummaging rummaging rummaging rummaging rummaging rummaging rummaging. Rummaging is similar to snooping around in someone's personal belongings, except it sounds so much less malicious when you call it 'rummaging' and not 'snooping.' I was rummaging through my old journal entries on Tensaiji, untrust, and this account. Over time I got away from personal accounts for the most part and I resorted to being informative and offering perspective. That is good sometimes, but there is a certain human, vulnerable characteristic about personal blogging that I like. I've withheld personal accounts for various reasons - but mostly because I felt imparting personal information would be a burden or the truth just scared the living shit out of me.

Herein, because it feels good for the moment, I'll make a personal blog.

I will be glad when certain things are over. EMT school; my final court hearing for the divorce; my mother leaving Greg. I like EMT school and learning, but not being able to have time to run or work a second job is an inconvenience. I look forward to working for a private ambulance service and determining whether my erection for EMS is merely a fairweather reaction to the information in EMT class or if I really do enjoy EMS - although for certain philosophical and personal reasons I believe I truly have a passion for it. My final court hearing is tomorrow at 9:30 AM. It will be nice to finalize the divorce, and I am grateful that it is something Lesley and I both want at this point. My mom has asked that I don't answer the phone if my stepdad (Greg) calls me. She has also asked that if he comes to the station while I am on duty and asks me where she is living, that I reply by stating that she is living with Chris and I temporarily. This is a lie. I hate being a pivot for any of this. I try not to think about the fact that I love Greg, past differences aside.

In the next week I begin ambulance clinicals. At minimum I need 24 hours of ride time, 4-5 successful IVs, and a few other interventions documented. Like a girly-man, I worry about my ineptitude in the back of an ambulance. This worry is born out of unfamiliarity with the layout of the back of the ambulance, as well as doing procedures in the real world; not poking a synthetic human arm with an IV needle, because synthetic arms don't flinch and plastic veins don't roll.

The past two months have been dedicated to extensive inner restructuring. When I was younger and I imagined myself at age 24, I never really suspected that I would not be able to identify myself. 24 sounds mature and resolute and concrete. For me, it is not so. I love the foundation of myself and I've lucked out in terms of raw materials but I stay in my head too often to get out of my own goddamn way. One revelation I have had (and this really applies to dealing with women), is that it is not WHAT I say, but HOW I say it and how my body language conveys it. This comes full circle when I apply this logic to the actions of others. Instead of analyzing the content of words, it seems more accurate to identify what emotion people convey their statements with. This has been a true work in progress for me, an overly cerebral individual.

Being right is a disease that plagued me for a while. Rarely is it truly important to be right. When there is a disagreement between two people, most of the time there is a common goal that both would like to achieve. I can apply this best to a relationship. When lovers argue intensely, feelings are hurt, staticky thoughts are conveyed and die in the air, and if it is bad enough, there is a period of silence, and hopefully later, there is reconciliation. Through it all, the two want nothing more than to be content with one another, but because both people find it imperative to be right, they continue arguing. It is unfortunate when two lovers argue over right and wrong and it proves to be their demise, but I suppose Darwinism can apply to relationships as well.

And now for my humble analogy: In the great, big game of baseball that is life, we're all switch hitters. From the right side we bat with apathy and it yields a consistent batting average, and this in turn leads to very little risk or scrutiny. From the left side we bat with passion and produce awe-inspiring home runs and triples. Swinging in passion and with all that we have, we sometimes miss. This does draw scrutiny. Us, being our greatest critics, feel condemned and defeated for a certain amount of time, and regress to batting on the apathetic side of the plate again.

The reason I dislike political campaigns now is because of the impassioned high hopes and 100% energy carried into the campaign. They're batting from the left side. In the end, there will only be one candidate elected, and the rest who constructed elaborate dreams and visions strike out, regardless of how much batting practice they put in. Seeing man defeated is one of the greater portrayals of despair that I have seen.

Admittedly, I'm on the right side of the plate for now. I embrace the time when I can stick my neck out again, go for the big swing, and aim for the bleachers. It'll happen eventually.

We all dig in and take our stance, eventually.

Moar Good Stuff.

2008-01-13T19:04:57Z

To any LJers who may be financially destitute:

http://consumerist.com/344124/get-100-gallons-of-heating-oil-for-free

It's an article on receiving free heating oil for this cold season. There is a link to an application that you fill out, and if you meet the economic criteria (or lack thereof) then benevolent hippy dwarves deliver drums of oil to your doorstep via pocket airplanes. As an aside, these airplanes have a remarkable payload, to the sum of 112,500 pounds. Fascinatin'.

I watched an episode of Bullshit by Penn & Teller and it was about boobies. At one point it touches on America's movement to support breast cancer awareness and how corporations have rode that dense-in-moral-fiber cash cow all the way to the bank. Yeah, that pink ribbon equates to staggering sales numbers, but there are approximately ZERO charities in the US of A which forward its coffers to *researching and curing* breast cancer. All efforts currently are pointed toward awareness; which can be as simple as people acknowledging that women are dying of breast cancer in this age. Puts a whole new spin on those 'Save the Ta-Tas' stickers, huh? Just another farce that makes the general public feel good to contribute toward, which yields no real results. Me likey.

There sure is a lot of fluff in this entry. The only reason I made this second entry was to inform you (my 4.. no 3 devoted readers) that I'll be taking more pictures to accompany entries now. I feel like a lot of my life has went by visually uncharted. What with this new fancy digital camera which I received for Christmas. I'm terrible. I'll be doing something about that.

Among the things you can anticipate seeing pictures of are:

- Me!
- Oddities which I behold on the job
- People-meetin'; friend makin'
- Elite dance moves
- Bacon

It's gonna be a what to do.

7 Reasons the 21st Century is Making You Miserable

2008-01-13T14:59:17Z

Hey guys and girls. I like this article.

http://www.cracked.com/article_15231_7-reasons-21st-century-making-you-miserable.html

My friend from the somewhat far west, Kyle, posted it in a bulletin. I feel like it's worthy of extra exposure, so I made a blog about it! A lot of the information is illuminating, if only in the sense that it evokes thoughts which have been dormant all along. A lot of us suffer from an inability to commit wholeheartedly to a physical interaction - I am guilty of this as well.

Remaining within proximity of one of its statements, I think our 'online selves' are an idealized projection, and as mentioned in the article, subject to far less scrutiny that your real person. We are indeed held accountable for far less. In real life, I get dragged off by my roommate Chris to run errands and accomplish small victories all the time (and I assure you, we always win). On the internet, at most I have to impart information or provide solace in an IM or e-mail. This requires far less commitment.

I have to stop myself at times. I become dependent on the comfortable, cozy lifestyle that the internet and text messaging provides. I communicate on my terms, I engage when I want. If I don't want to talk, I ignore your IM. As far as you know, I'm not there. In reality? I'm probably reading a forum or playing a video game. That's something I can't get away with in a real life confrontation.

If I spend long enough living my life through the internet and messaging, I DO notice myself feeling a bit empty; lacking purpose.

And somewhat unrelated: when I feel my day becoming bad, or my mood worsening, there are certain things I can do to improve things. I'll bullet them out really quick. Most of them are obvious, but underlining the obvious is sometimes necessary to validate its implementation. Hopefully it can help!:

- Smile! Seriously. I know I'm not the only person who is easily tricked. Roll out of bed and start grinning like a doped-up preteen with an extra chromosome. It works WONDERS and you can literally fool yourself into a pleasant mood. Smile big. Make your face hurt. Yeah, that's it.

- Do work. Accomplish something that needs to be done. Mow the lawn, pay some bills, call your grandma back. It's little things such as these which build up a debt of stress slowly and surely. Instead of letting that feeling of stress dismantle you, take the offensive and knock out the stressors. The feeling of accomplishment is an immediate reward and provides good momentum for the rest of the day. Ever notice how you accomplish one thing and the rest of your tasks become easier? I oftentimes build up certain tasks to be tougher than they really are. Once I am engaged in the activity, it's not so bad. =)

- Exercise! Run/jog/walk a couple of miles. After a few miles I feel a bit euphoric (you know, after the misery of burning muscles and aching lungs subsides), and that carries into how I feel for the rest of the day. I don't feel so bad for rewarding myself with a drink or an entire pizza (is that pushing it?); I actually feel justified in doing so. Not only that, but since I started running regularly two years ago I've been sleeping soundly ever since. I fall into a deeper sleep and my body recovers more. That's why I'm a raging, annoying, up and at 'em morning person. The kind that you hate.

- Regulate! If someone has pissed you off, let them know. Don't engage in an argument of right versus wrong. Simply saying "Look X, you ticked me off when you pissed on my cat last night. I want you to know that it made me mad." works great. After you get mad at this person, you can genuinely forgive them. It's a crazy world we live in. Most of the time when we forgive someone, we do so out of formality and it is ineffectual. We don't reap the rewards of actually forgiving someone. When we become flagrantly angry before someone and then forgive them, the sentiment is genuine and the problem is actually solved. I'll be the first to say I suck at this, but I am working on it. Not genuinely stating anger or forgiving only leads to resentment, he-said she-said drama, and flaking out on that person as a means of passive griefing.

This stuff works for me when I have the fortitude to carry it out. Unfortunately I still hide behind my PC some, I drink more than necessary, and I let certain things which piss me off roll off my back (except it doesn't roll off, it absorbs). It would be cool if this information benefited you, but I'm a simpleton so it probably won't.

Deleted!

2008-01-04T01:26:59Z

I typed up a long entry chronicling the unfortunate happenings of 2008. Yes, 2008; all 3 days of it. Instead I'll just bullet it.

- I was a victim of identity theft, again. It was determined to be Lesley's card on the transactions. Not sure if it was the genuine card or a duplicate.
- Too many forays with meaningless women.
- My mom is leaving my stepdad. She has been cheating on him for a little while now and will be telling him within a few days that she wants a divorce.

My previous draft for this entry was centered around describing the aforementioned bullets. Instead I'll redirect that energy into a different subject.

Drama. Ok, as much as everyone resents drama on the surface, it is a necessary spice that we use to give life a little more zing. Just by saying the word "drama" I have hopefully garnered the interest of those involved. While drama is a trait of life unto itself, the amount of drama (and thusly, how long it is perpetuated) can be controlled in an adult fashion.

I do not wish to be a liasion or pivot to the drama of others. First, it is an unnecessary addition of stress to an already stockpiled amount. Second, there's a chance I won't deliver the message or advice in its intended packaging, because everyone has a different interpretation of words. I'm not a conduit. Nip it in the bud, hash things out. Get mad at each other so that you may apologize to each other. Do what ya gotta, 'na mean?

Or don't.

But I'm not a conduit.

And I will do my part to stop being so paranoid about how you guys perceive me. It surely is not a charming habit to assume.

Merry part for now, LJiggas.

Succinct and Success Sound Similar.

2007-12-23T19:09:26Z

X-posted from MySpace:

www.hackyourself.org is a neat little trinket I happened upon thanks to my friend Chris, yesterday. It's a short passage of self-improvement tips.

Enjoy and happy holidays.

Black Holes.

2007-12-05T04:18:52Z

After watching this a second time, I am truly intrigued.

http://www.thinktechnologies.com/portfolio/demos/Blackhole.html

Credit goes to Krista for bringing it to my attention.

You're So Sensitive . . .

2007-11-20T23:25:15Z

I am, I am a machine.

You're so sensitive,
I am, I am a machine.

Pardon the influx of blogging. Pardon also for the fact that I could have consolidated these two blogs, since they are two similar veins running parallel.

I sometimes worry about becoming a robot. In order to do this job for any duration and maintain a healthy mindset, one must perceive the calls you run as 'business as usual.' In order to carry out this business, we must train. We train to make procedures into habit. These habits cast a mold that is not the person carrying out the habits, but a projection of that person. This can apply to other jobs (namely service related) which are not Fire/EMS.

When severe calls occur and they do not affect me, I wonder if it is the correct response to have. I have control over how I react to any given circumstance. It is my choice to remain impartial in the face of human despair. I write my report in terms of how many inches of intrusion the tractor trailer created in the passenger side of your daughter's SUV; not the emotional toll it takes on your family when you find out she was transported to a trauma center via helicopter ambulance. When I am conducting a primary search in a burning building, I am looking to complete my objective - perform a search pattern and rescue anyone inside - not become distraught at the thought of someone actually being trapped. It is understandable, then, that I feel like a robot when I behold tragic visions and I emote next to nothing.

Conversely, I perform my job with passion. I believe I provide great patient care. When I walk into your home, I am trying to become your friend within just a few moments, so that you will trust me enough to care for you. Very often, the calls we run seem unwarranted (the vernacular is 'bullshit calls'), but even still I find a way to rationalize the perspective of the patient in my mind. It is necessary to me to rationalize these perspectives, because it is otherwise misinterpreted as a malicious 911 call - we insinuate that this person is abusing the system. In reality, it is not my job to make that assessment. If they are abusing 911, it is not for me to know or care. I respond to calls. People who take it upon themselves to assess whether or not each call is worth their time eventually become burnouts. Burnouts no longer care about their job or the patients they respond to. They are mercenaries now, only here to collect their paycheck.

A burnout will place blame on the job itself. They do not want to acknowledge that they are subjected to the reality they have created for themselves. It's one great big mindfuck. Perception is reality. You hate this job because you wanted to. You are the poor inundated tragic hero that we should feel sorry for. You are another selfless martyr that got beat down by the system.

That's a load of whale shit.

Emotionally intelligent people realize that there are circumstances associated with every call they run. No one is out to get you. This is not some great conspiracy to make you not sleep at night. Sleepless nights do happen - a lot. It's part of the job that we do.

I have been told that once I am a 'veteran' of the fire service, I will stop caring so much about the calls that I run and the people that I meet. This is a cop-out burnouts use to justify their disposition. It is incredibly contagious. It only serves to turn my stomach.

In short; I have the stiff upper lip necessary to perform this job and not be worn down by what I must see. I still reserve a fraction of my heart for the people I meet on these calls. I got into this job because I was an adrenaline junkie; I'm sticking around now because I have a deep-seated passion for people.

The only issue I must contend with is reserving enough of my heart to delegate to people outside of the job, when I take the uniform off. It's hard sometimes.

Of Few Things Can I Impart.

2007-11-20T22:58:24Z

Of few things can I impart, but this is one of them: never stop being weird. If you're around my age, give or take some years, then you are already starting to realize this; even if you do not mull over it consciously.

As kids, and throughout our childhood, we are instructed to abide by certain formalities and moral codes. As a by-product, individualism and being 'weird' is de-emphasized. Now, 15 to 20 years later, the weird people with eccentric qualities and distinctions are the individuals we seek to engage. It requires courage and persistence to stay true to yourself and maintain your unique qualities in the light of scrutiny. However, life is simply not long enough to take this time for granted.

Be weird. Paint the walls green. Snap with your ring fingers. Do the damn thing.

Night Divides the Day.

2007-11-06T02:16:29Z

Many people have interpretations about the song "Break on Through (To the Other Side)" by the Doors. I think that it is about depression and the moment, at the crescendo of your depression, when you realize you're about to coast down the hillside into a state of happiness again.

I was sitting in my chair at work and I was contemplating making an entry about my interpretation of the song, when I was interrupted by Eric, my co-worker and presiding officer. Rewind to this morning. I arrived at Station 51 only to be told I was reassigned to Station 52 for 24 hours. I packed my things and reported to Station 52. It has been a quiet day here until this point.

I was interrupted by Eric, who asked if I could assist a lady with a flat tire outside the station. Eric did not feel as though he could be bothered to help the lady, as he had to study for a test tomorrow. Initially, I was perturbed because I too had a test tomorrow. Obviously I delegated myself to the task of updating my journal instead of the more practical assignment of studying, so I had no excuses for being upset at this task. I went outside and met the person I was about to help.

She was an older black lady. Delicate and slight; it quickly became commonplace that I implored her to speak up. She had a lazy eye and she seemed shaken up by the fact that her tire was flat and it was dark outside. Very quickly I surmised that it was petty of me to feel inconvenienced by helping someone who was quite clearly having a worse day than me.

As luck would have it, my portable air compressor was in my truck. I picked it up the day before from my house and declared it necessary to keep it in tow in case of roadside calamity. Or to help a perfect stranger.

I drove my truck up alongside her vehicle and inspected her flat tire. It was indeed flat, with what appeared to be a section of chainlink fractured and jutting out of the tread of the tire. I used pliers to remove it, which left a sizeable hole.

"You may want to start looking in the phonebook for local tire stores and tow services. I may not be able to fill this tire. The hole is very big." I advised her.

Hesitantly, she complied, and walked back inside the station to look through the phone book. Meanwhile, I tried filling the tire. As expected, the hole was too big and the tire would not hold pressure. I searched my truck for other tools. Ah! I found my tire plug kit, which had two plugs remaining. Of all the things my stepdad ever tried to teach me in making me into a man, I actually listened to him when he told me how to locate and repair small leaks in a tire.

When the lady returned, she was very glum. "There are no tire shops open right now. I don't really have the money for a tow truck." She quaked. I felt very uncomfortable knowing that I'd be in the presence of a crying stranger.

To defuse the situation, I rammed a spike into the already exposed hole in the tread of the tire, augmenting it. I explained that I was making the hole bigger, in an attempt to plug it with a small cord of material which had the same consistency as rubber cement. She didn't really understand the logic behind it, but I told her I may be able to get her back on the road.

As I'm doing this, I recall the last time I tried to plug a tire - it wasn't even necessary to attempt it.

After enough struggle and display of ineptitude, I managed to plug the tire. I sprayed the damaged area with Windex to check my work - no bubbles formed. I plugged her tire. (No innuendo)

I explained to her that I had fixed her tire and she could drive on it again. I told her to have it checked as soon as possible, because it was only a temporary fix.

Throughout the time it took to repair the leak, I thought about how little things in life can feel so catastrophic at times. Before she spoke to me, I knew that this problem was the crux of a very bad day or week, or month.

"I've had such a bad day. When I found out I had a hole in my tire, I wanted to cry..."

"I figured. Flat tires always seem to come at the worst time. I'm sorry I could not work any faster. I'm glad it is fixed though." I feigned some degree of humbleness.

"God bless you. I cannot explain to you how thankful I am." She began to cry, but at least this time it was for her good fortune and relief.

For the next five minutes she tried to give me ten dollars and I played extreme defense on her - I wasn't having any of it.

And while there is nothing truly remarkable about the entire exchange, I felt something very exposed and very human about the situation. I had this person pouring their heart out - crying no less - as I was doing something which I considered minor. These moments come so unexpectedly and they are what we live for.

We go to bars. We go to concerts. We travel the world. We kiss strangers. We listen to music. We go to movies. We do all of this in a veiled attempt to live more and feel alive. We thrive on chance encounters with the energy and spirituality of one another. (this portion of my entry was interrupted by a call)

I think Jim Morrison wanted us to push through the barrier; push hard. Break on through to the other side.

Ego Masks.

2007-11-04T14:09:50Z

The text below is a post from a message board I visit. It was submitted by a Ukrainian member whose English is not the best; but it is still readable. The point he homes in on is really cool to me. It's very taboo. For every moment of every day it seems like we walk around with masks on. Let this sink in:

"Hi everyone, I have something to say now, because yesterday was a huge break-through point for me.

I've suddenly realized it after I watched my two best friend - a couple, boy and girl, relating to each other.
They relationship is close to be perfect, and what I mean by that I want to tell in this specific post.

After this realization I had a talk this my girlfriend, almost after we had a big "fight" about hurting each other every now and then.

So I sat with her and asked her "I wonder what would our relationships looks like if we were open absolutely the most vulnerable sides of ourself one to another, what if would feels like for our love?"

Ok, I will start from start.

I will be refer to "we" in my post 'coz I think we're all guilty for this in almost avery aspect of our lives, at one point or another.

We are all wear those masks, in our every-day life. It's almost like Halloween, ascept we're not using "dreadful scary" ones, but the "cool" ones, and even most preciesly, "The Strong" ones...

And I have to say, that the funny thing is, if you take this mask and look at qualities that it communicates, you would really realized that in reality there's absolutely no people so strong in our whole world.

We're all weak and far far from perfect. The strongest persons that I feel gratitude for knowing them are the ones who really not hiding their weaknesses... Their just comfortable enough to show this world their real faces. And I think about it and realized that those masks are the only thing that kills love.

And I know what you're thinking right now, that you've heard it all before...
But I doubt that you thought about the other side, the complete opposite to those masks.

And it's vulnerability, and what I mean by that is total absence of self-defense.
I would like to go really abstract from here...

If you read and what Eckhart Tolle is teaching about, my abstracts will be more understandable for you, and I pretty much sure that most of you would dig it.

When you in a relationship, 90% of you time that you spend together is ego-driven, if only your not blissful or something. And if you here, I'm pretty much sure that you're not in this sense. No offence, I talk only to your ego right now ...

So let's say that most of the time you communicate with one another through your egos, and sometimes, maybe in the rare moments of deep intimacy, you're absolutely present and not in your head.

But when it's ego-driven, I grasp that the TRUE you, in any given moment, can easily welcome it and CHOOSE the mask for you ego, 'coz you ego is nothing but collection of all your masks.
And I never said anything about "social" masks anywere in this post, because those mask are social AND personal at the same time. And they all your illusions anyways.

So what I want to say here is ask you what it would be like if in any given interaction, in any given moment you would decide to choose your most vulnerable, most "undefendable" ego. Because you CAN control this, you really can do that easily.

It is yourself with absolutely no self-defence.

What would you love feels like?

What would your interactions be like?

For me, it feels like totally life-transforming, and I'm glad I could share it with all of you, guys."

The Intoxication of the "They" Mentality.

2007-10-26T00:45:16Z

The Intoxication of the "They" Mentality
Author: Dustin Pumm

I will type this quickly and without spellcheck, because after cramming 8 hours of class, 27 hours of work, and 2 hours of traffic into a nonstop 37 hour block of time, I am tired and ready for bed. This will be crossposted to Myspace.

People, when met with adversity in trying to be progressive, typically react to this adversity in one of two ways.

"They":
The "They" mentality runs amok in the fire department, and surely in workplaces everywhere. I define it as the notion that we are victims of circumstance; we are subjected to certain scenarios by the powers that be, and we are helpless to reverse the effects.

Looking closer, it often seems that we use "They" as a nondescript and tyrannical entity - a hinderance to us when we seek out to accomplish goals - and we use "They said this", "They ordered that we cannot do that" as a cop-out. We sell ourselves short. Subconciously, we realize that we could accomplish these goals despite what "They" say if we really wanted to, but the path of least resistance is to comply.

I do not want this to be misconstrued as endorsing insubordination, so I will use an example from my fulltime fire department.

Recently, the administration purchased RIT bags for us, which require experience and/or training to implement correctly on the fireground. Not just any lay person could be assigned to this duty. Immediately, the majority of us - including myself - objected to its use because we were not trained on it. We said this while acknowledging that we could train ourselves using drills easily found online, in books, or in fire magazines. But because it was not placed directly before us, we objected, and succumbed to the powers that be.

After long enough, my crew decided we were tired of this RIT bag collecting dust and being unused, and we researched RIT evolutions and webbing tactics for two hours before we got on with the dirty work of RIT training. After the training, we all felt much more knowledgable about the RIT bag and we felt comfortable having it on the truck. Had we adopted this mentality from the start, we could have been competant with the RIT bag much sooner. What we employed was the "We" mentality, and it felt good!

As an overview, we objected to using new technology because the lessons were not spoonfed to us by those responsible for doing so. In reality, we don't have it bad and if the most that "They" ask of us is to show some intiative and train on the new equipment ourselves, then we should do so. They did purchase the equipment for us, after all. And whether or not it is laziness on the part of "They" for not scheduling training to be done on the new equipment is a non-issue; we still could have taken responsibility into our own hands, and from now on, I hope "We" do.

Humanity has moved forward and thrived because brave men and women were not displacing the blame on "They", but rather placing great importance on the capabilities of "We". We assumed responsibility for ourselves and our actions and trudged forward, training be damned. I feel like this can be applied quite liberally to many settings.

We need to enforce better habits in ourselves - don't sell ourselves short and think that we cannot do something simply because the road hasn't been paved for us. This is my movement to DE-EMPHASIZE the "They" mentality. Do what takes effort and assume responsibility. Sometimes doing what's right isn't the easy thing to do but we must strive to do it anyway. We are much less subject to tyranny than we believe we are.

And before I dismount from this soapbox I'm perched atop, I'd like to press another hot button in my conscience.

Idle griping.

At nearly every firehouse on the planet you will hear the guys idly griping about what is wrong with our present state; whether it's union dues, lack of funding, lack of equipment, scarcity of raises, or whatever. What gets me, is most of the time, the people griping aren't even upset! The vibe is cancerous. We gripe just to gripe without realizing what we're doing. But that impressionable jake is soaking all of this up and in a year or so he'll be griping in a very similar fashion. Do you see where this is headed?

Don't get me wrong. When the crew is mad about an injustice in the department, there is no better motivation than hate and discontent. What I am referring to, is the habit of complaining without substance - complaining just to make small talk, for lack of anything better to say. Even if you get hit with several 'unwarranted' requests for help via 911, remember that the person dialing 911 is the reason why we are here. That may seem like a bitter pill to swallow, but just because we don't view the request as an emergency, does not mean the caller doesn't think it is.

Take a step back. In the grand scheme of things, there are few jobs better or more fulfilling than the fire department and EMS. I don't feel like I need to kick and scream in order for that to be realized. And once you do realize it, please kick the habit of griping about trivial things - it erodes morality in the house and it sounds a lot like clatter to me. Oh, and if you hear me idly griping, smack me and remind me why I'm here. No one's perfect and it's easy to regress back into those old habits.

Cliff notes: Don't sell yourself short. Take initiative and accomplish goals that the lazy mind deems intangible. And the next time you have the impulse to complain about something that in reality is a very small detail, reconsider before speaking your mind. The crew will be much better off without the contagious bellyaching.

A Great Read.

2007-08-05T01:49:00Z

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19001200/site/newsweek/page/8/

Here is the article in full.

"Beyond Bush
What the world needs is an open, confident America.

By Fareed Zakaria
Newsweek

In the fall of 1982, I arrived in the United States as an 18-year-old student from India. The country was in rough shape. That December unemployment hit 10.8 percent, higher than at any point since World War II. Interest rates hovered around 15 percent. Abroad, the United States was still reeling from Vietnam and Watergate. The Soviet Union was on a roll, expanding its influence from Afghanistan to Angola to Central America. That June, Israel invaded Lebanon, making a tense situation in the Middle East even more volatile.

Yet America was a strikingly open and expansive country. Reagan embodied it. Despite record-low approval ratings, he exuded optimism from the center of the storm. In the face of Moscow's rising power he confidently spoke of a mortal crisis in the Soviet system and predicted that it would end up on "the ash heap of history." Across the political aisle stood Thomas (Tip) O'Neill, the hearty Irish-American Speaker of the House, who personified the enormous generosity and tolerance of old-school liberalism. To a young foreign student the country seemed welcoming and full of promise.

Today, by almost all objective measures, the United States sits on top of the world. But the atmosphere in Washington could not be more different from 1982. We have become a nation consumed by fear, worried about terrorists and rogue nations, Muslims and Mexicans, foreign companies and free trade, immigrants and international organizations. The strongest nation in the history of the world, we see ourselves besieged and overwhelmed. While the Bush administration has contributed mightily to this state of affairs, at this point it has reversed itself on many of its most egregious policies-from global warming to North Korea to Iraq.

In any event, it is time to stop bashing George W. Bush. We must begin to think about life after Bush-a cheering prospect for his foes, a dismaying one for his fans (however few there may be at the moment). In 19 months he will be a private citizen, giving speeches to insurance executives. America, however, will have to move on and restore its place in the world. To do this we must first tackle the consequences of our foreign policy of fear. Having spooked ourselves into believing that we have no option but to act fast, alone, unilaterally and pre-emptively, we have managed in six years to destroy decades of international good will, alienate allies, embolden enemies and yet solve few of the major international problems we face.

In a global survey released last week, most countries polled believed that China would act more responsibly in the world than the United States. How does a Leninist dictatorship come across more sympathetically than the oldest constitutional democracy in the world? Some of this is, of course, the burden of being the biggest. But the United States has been the richest and most powerful nation in the world for almost a century, and for much of this period it was respected, admired and occasionally even loved. The problem today is not that America is too strong but that it is seen as too arrogant, uncaring and insensitive. Countries around the world believe that the United States, obsessed with its own notions of terrorism, has stopped listening to the rest of the world.

More troubling than any of Bush's rhetoric is that of the Republicans who wish to succeed him. "They hate you!" says Rudy Giuliani in his new role as fearmonger in chief, relentlessly reminding audiences of all the nasty people out there. "They don't want you to be in this college!" he recently warned an audience at Oglethorpe University in Atlanta. "Or you, or you, or you," he said, reportedly jabbing his finger at students. In the first Republican debate he warned, "We are facing an enemy that is planning all over this world, and it turns out planning inside our country, to come here and kill us." On the campaign trail, Giuliani plays a man exasperated by the inability of Americans to see the danger staring them in the face. "This is reality, ma'am," he told a startled woman at Oglethorpe. "You've got to clear your head."

The notion that the United States today is in grave danger of sitting back and going on the defensive is bizarre. In the last five and a half years, with bipartisan support, Washington has invaded two countries and sent troops around the world from Somalia to the Philippines to fight Islamic militants. It has ramped up defense spending by $187 billion-more than the combined military budgets of China, Russia, India and Britain. It has created a Department of Homeland Security that now spends more than $40 billion a year. It has set up secret prisons in Europe and a legal black hole in Guantanamo, to hold, interrogate and-by some definitions-torture prisoners. How would Giuliani really go on the offensive? Invade a couple of more countries?

The presidential campaign could have provided the opportunity for a national discussion of the new world we live in. So far, on the Republican side, it has turned into an exercise in chest-thumping. Whipping up hysteria requires magnifying the foe. The enemy is vast, global and relentless. Giuliani casually lumps together Iran and Al Qaeda. Mitt Romney goes further, banding together all the supposed bad guys. "This is about Shia and Sunni. This is about Hizbullah and Hamas and Al Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood," he recently declared.

But Iran is a Shiite power and actually helped the United States topple the Qaeda-backed Taliban regime in Afghanistan. Qaeda-affiliated radical Sunnis are currently slaughtering Shiites in Iraq, and Iranian-backed Shiite militias are responding by executing and displacing Iraq's Sunnis. We are repeating one of the central errors of the early cold war—putting together all our potential adversaries rather than dividing them. Mao and Stalin were both nasty. But they were nasties who disliked one another, a fact that could be exploited to the great benefit of the free world. To miss this is not strength. It's stupidity.

Such overreactions are precisely what Osama bin Laden has been hoping for. In a videotaped message in 2004, bin Laden explained his strategy with astonishing frankness. He termed it "provoke and bait": "All we have to do is send two mujahedin ... [and] raise a piece of cloth on which is written 'Al Qaeda' in order to make the generals race there, to cause America to suffer human, economic and political losses." His point has been well understood by ragtag terror groups across the world. With no apparent communication, collaboration or further guidance from bin Laden, small outfits from Southeast Asia to North Africa to Europe now announce that they are part of Al Qaeda, and so inflate their own importance, bring global attention to their cause and-of course-get America to come racing out to fight them.

The competition to be the tough guy is producing new policy ideas, all right-ones that range from bad to insane. Romney, who bills himself as the smart, worldly manager, recently explained that while "some people have said we ought to close Guantanamo, my view is we ought to double [the size of] Guantanamo." In fact, Romney should recognize that Guantánamo does not face space constraints. The reason that President Bush wants to close it down-and it is he who has expressed that desire-is that it is an unworkable legal mess with enormous strategic, political and moral costs. In a real war you hold prisoners of war until the end of hostilities. When does that happen in the war on terror? Does Romney propose that the United States keep an ever-growing population of suspects in jail indefinitely without trials as part of a new American system of justice?

In 2005 Romney said, "How about people who are in settings—mosques, for instance—that may be teaching doctrines of hate and terror? Are we monitoring that? Are we wiretapping?" This proposal is mild compared with what Rep. Tom Tancredo suggested the same year. When asked about a possible nuclear strike by Islamic radicals on the United States, he suggested that the U.S. military threaten to "take out" Mecca.

Giuliani praises the Bush administration's aggressive approach for preventing another terrorist attack on U.S. soil after September 11. Certainly the administration deserves credit for dismantling Al Qaeda's infrastructure in Afghanistan and in other countries where it once had branches or supporters. But since 9/11 there has been a series of terrorist attacks in countries like Britain, Spain, Morocco, Turkey, Indonesia and Saudi Arabia—most of which are also very tough on terrorism. The common thread in these attacks is that they were launched by local groups. It's easier to spot and stop foreign agents, far more difficult to detect a group of locals.

The crucial advantage that the United States has in this regard is that we do not have a radicalized domestic population. American Muslims are generally middle class, moderate and well assimilated. They believe in America and the American Dream. The first comprehensive poll of U.S. Muslims, conducted last month by the Pew Research Center, found that more than 70 percent believed that if you worked hard in America, you would get ahead. That compares with 64 percent for the general U.S. population. Their responses to almost all questions were in the mainstream and strikingly different from Muslim populations elsewhere. Some 13 percent of U.S. Muslims believe that suicide bombings can be justified. Too high, for sure, but it compares with 35 percent for French Muslims, 57 percent for Jordanians and 69 percent for Nigerians.

This distinct American advantage-which testifies to our ability to assimilate new immigrants-is increasingly in jeopardy. If leaders begin insinuating that the entire Muslim population be viewed with suspicion, that will change the community's relationship to the United States. Wiretapping America's mosques and threatening to bomb Mecca are certainly a big step down this ugly road.

Though Democrats sound more sensible on many of these issues, the party remains consumed by the fear that it will not come across as tough. Its presidential candidates vie with one another to prove that they are going to be just as macho and militant as the fiercest Republican. In the South Carolina presidential debate, when candidates were asked how they would respond to another terror strike, they promptly vowed to attack, retaliate and blast the hell out of, well, somebody. Barack Obama, the only one to answer differently, quickly realized his political vulnerability and dutifully threatened retaliation as well. After the debate, his opponents leaked furiously that his original response proved he didn't have the fortitude to be president.

In fact, Obama's initial response was the right one. He said that the first thing he would do was make sure that the emergency response was effective, then ensure we had the best intelligence possible to figure out who had caused the attack, and then move with allies to dismantle the network responsible.

We will never be able to prevent a small group of misfits from planning some terrible act of terror. No matter how far-seeing and competent our intelligence and law-enforcement officials, people will always be able to slip through the cracks in a large, open and diverse country. The real test of American leadership is not whether we can make 100 percent sure we prevent the attack, but rather how we respond to it. Stephen Flynn, a homeland-security expert at the Council on Foreign Relations, argues that our goal should be resilience—how quickly can we bounce back from a disruption? In the materials sciences, he points out, resilience is the ability of a material to recover its original shape after a deformation. If one day bombs do go off, we must ensure that they cause as little disruption-economic, social, political-as possible. This would deprive the terrorist of his main objective. If we are not terrorized, then in a crucial sense we have defeated terrorism.

The atmosphere of fear and panic we are currently engendering is likely to produce the opposite effect. Were there to be another attack, politicians would fulfill their pledges to strike back, against someone. A retaliatory strike would be appropriate and important—if you could hit the right targets. But what if the culprits were based in Hamburg or Madrid or Trenton? It is far more likely that a future attack will come from countries that are unknowingly and involuntarily sheltering terrorists. Are we going to bomb Britain and Spain because they housed terror cells?

The other likely effect of another terror attack would be an increase in the restrictions on movement, privacy and civil liberties that have already imposed huge economic, political and moral costs on America. The process of screening passengers at airports, which costs nearly $5 billion a year, gets more cumbersome every year as new potential "risks" are discovered. The visa system, which has already become restrictive and forbidding, will get more so every time one thug is let in.

Unfortunately, our fears extend well beyond terrorism. CNN's Lou Dobbs has become the spokesman of a paranoid and angry segment of the country, railing against the sinister forces that are overwhelming us. For the right, illegal immigrants have become an obsession. The party of free enterprise has dedicated itself to a huge buildup of the state's police powers to stop people from working.

For the Democrats, the new bogeymen are the poorest workers in the world—in China and India. The Democrats are understandably worried about the wages of employees in the United States, but these fears are now focused on free trade, which is fast losing support within the party. Bill Clinton's historical realignment of his party—toward the future, markets, trade and efficiency—is being squandered in the quest for momentary popularity. Whether on terrorism, trade, immigration or internationalism of any kind, the political dynamic in the United States these days is to hunker down.

To recover its place in the world, America first needs to recover its confidence. For those who look at the future and see challenges, competition and threats, keep in mind that this new world has been forming over the last 20 years, and the United States has forged ahead amid all the turmoil. In 1980, the U.S. share of global GDP was 20 percent. Today it is 29 percent. We lead the world in technology and research. Our firms have found enormous success in new markets overseas. We continue to generate new products, new brands, new companies and new industries.

We are not really in competition with Chinese and Indian workers making $5 a day. We want Americans to make things that they can't, move up the value chain and work on increasingly sophisticated products and services. We have an educational system that can help make this happen. Of the 20 best universities in the world, 18 are American. And the quality of American higher education extends far and deep, from community colleges to technical institutes.

Perhaps the most hopeful sign for the United States is that alone among industrial nations, we will not have a shortage of productive citizens in the decades ahead. Unlike Germany, Japan and even China, we should have more than enough workers to grow the economy and sustain the elderly population. This is largely thanks to immigration. If America has a core competitive advantage, it is this: every year we take in more immigrants than the rest of the world put together.

In many senses, the world is moving in the right direction. In continent after continent, countries are adopting more sensible policies. That is why we see the extraordinary phenomenon of truly global growth. America, Europe, Japan, China, India, Brazil, Russia, Turkey are all growing robustly. Even in Africa, the mood is different these days. Fifteen countries on the continent—with about a third of its population—are growing at more than 4 percent a year and are better governed than ever before. True, the United States faces a complicated and dangerous geopolitical environment. But it is not nearly as dangerous as when the Soviet Union had thousands of missiles aimed at American, European and Asian cities and the world lived with the prospect of nuclear war. It is not nearly as dangerous as the first half of the 20th century, when Germany plunged the globe into two great wars.

In order to begin reorienting America's strategy abroad, any new U.S. administration must begin with Iraq. Until the United States is able to move beyond Iraq, it will not have the time, energy, political capital or resources to attempt anything else of any great significance. The first thing to admit is that our mission in Iraq has substantially failed. Whether it was doomed from the outset or turned into a fiasco because of the administration's arrogance and incompetence is a matter that historians can determine. The president's central argument in favor of the invasion of Iraq-once weapons of mass destruction were not found-was that it would be a model for the Arab world. In fact, the country has fallen apart. Two million people have fled; more than 2 million are internally displaced. Shiite extremists are in power in much of the country, imposing a thuggish and draconian version of theocratic rule. Normal life for normal people-schools, universities, hospitals, factories and offices-is a shambles. If anything, Iraq has become a model in exactly the opposite sense from what Bush had hoped. It has become a living advertisement of the dangers of illiberal democracy.

Things could improve in Iraq over time. But that will take years, perhaps decades. It would be far better for us to reduce our exposure to the current civil war, draw down our forces, let Iraq's internal political forces play themselves out and restrict our troops to certain limited but core missions. We need to continue the battle against Qaeda-style extremists, maintain a presence to reassure and secure the Kurdish region, and continue to train and keep watch over the Iraqi Army. All this can be done with a substantially smaller force—about 50,000 troops, which is also a more sustainable level for the long haul.

The administration has-surprise-tried to play up fears of the consequences of a drawdown in Iraq (which is always described as a Vietnam-style withdrawal down to zero). It predicts that this will lead to chaos, violence and a victory for terrorists. When we listen to these forecasts, it is worth remembering that every administration prediction about Iraq has been wrong. Al Qaeda is a small presence in Iraq, and ordinary Sunnis are abandoning support for it. "If we leave Iraq, they will follow us home," says the president. Can they not do so now? Iraq's borders have never been more porous. Does he think that Iraqi militants and foreign terrorists are so distracted by our actions in Iraq that they have forgotten that there are many more Americans in America?

As for the broader Sunni-Shiite civil war, even if we improve the security situation temporarily, once we leave the struggle for power will resume. At some point, the Shiites and the Sunnis will make a deal. Until then, we can at best keep a lid on the violence but not solve its causes. To stay indefinitely is simply to keep a finger in the dike, fearful of the outcome. Better to consolidate what gains we have, limit our losses, let time work for us and move on.

There is a world beyond Iraq. The primary challenge we face in the Middle East is the rise of Iran. No country has caused greater panic among American elites—of both parties. There are many influential voices arguing for military attacks on Tehran. But let's keep in mind that this is a poorly run, internally divided oil tyranny that is increasingly antagonizing the rest of the world. It is insecure enough to have arrested Iranian-American civilians and warned its own scholars never to talk to foreigners at conferences abroad. These are not the signs of a healthy system. Iran is a serious and complex problem, but it is not Hitler's Germany. Its total GDP is less than one third of America's defense budget. A nuclear-armed North Korea has not been able to change the dynamics of global politics. A nuclear, armed Iran-and we are still far from that point-will not bring about the end of the world as long as we keep it tightly contained.

After years of empty threats and foolish rhetoric, the Bush administration is moving toward a more sensible containment strategy on Iran, though one that faces continued resistance from hard-liners like Dick Cheney. The United States should ensure that the reality of a resurgent Iran brings together the Arab world. The focus should stay on Iran's actions-and not U.S. threats.

I have no magic formula to stop Iran from going nuclear, nor to change Iran's regime. But the strategy we have adopted against so many troublesome countries over the last few decades-sanction, isolate, ignore, chastise-has simply not worked. Cuba is perhaps the best example of this paradox. Having put in place a policy to force regime change in that country, we confront the reality that Fidel Castro will die in office the longest-serving head of government in the world. On the other hand, countries where we have had the confidence to engage-from China to Vietnam to Libya-have shifted course substantially over time. Capitalism and commerce and contact have proved far more reliable agents of change than lectures about evil. The next president should have the courage to start talking to rogue regimes, not as a sign of approval but as a way of influencing them and shaping their environment.

There are many specific issues that the United States needs to get far more engaged in, from the Israeli-Palestinian problem to global warming to Darfur to poverty alleviation. Most important of all is the shift of global power toward new countries in Asia, and what that means for international order and cooperation. But to succeed at any of this, we will need greater global legitimacy and participation. We are living in new times. As countries grow economically and mature politically, they are demanding a greater voice in global affairs and a seat at the high table. The United States should make sure that it is listening to these voices, new and old, and recognize that to function effectively in this new world, it can lead only through partnerships, collaborations and co-operation. The Bush-Rumsfeld model of leadership-through declarations, threats and denunciations-is dead.

Above all, the United States has to find a way to send a powerful and consistent signal to the world that we understand the struggles that it is involved in-for security, peace and a better standard of living. As Barack Obama said in a speech in Chicago, "It's time to...send a message to all those men and women beyond our shores who long for lives of dignity and security that says, 'You matter to us. Your future is our future'."

Some of foreign policy is what we do, but some of it is also who we are. America as a place has often been the great antidote to U.S. foreign policy. When American actions across the world have seemed harsh, misguided or unfair, America itself has always been open, welcoming and tolerant. I remember visiting the United States as a kid in the 1970s, at a time when, as a country, India was officially anti-American. The reality of the America that I experienced was a powerful refutation of the propaganda and caricatures of its enemies. But today, through inattention, fear and bureaucratic cowardice, the caricature threatens to become reality.

At the end of the day, openness is America's greatest strength. Many people on both sides of the political aisle have ideas that they believe will keep America strong in this new world—fences, tariffs, subsidies, investments. But America has succeeded not because of the ingenuity of its government programs. It has thrived because it has kept itself open to the world-to goods and services, ideas and inventions, people and cultures. This openness has allowed us to respond fast and flexibly in new economic times, to manage change and diversity with remarkable ease, and to push forward the boundaries of freedom and autonomy.

It is easy to look at America's place in the world right now and believe that we are in a downward spiral of decline. But this is a snapshot of a tough moment. If the country can keep its cool, admit to its mistakes, cherish and strengthen its successes, it will not only recover but return with renewed strength. There could not have been a worse time for America than the end of the Vietnam War, with helicopters lifting people off the roof of the Saigon embassy, the fallout of Watergate and, in the Soviet Union, a global adversary that took advantage of its weakness. And yet, just 15 years later, the United States was resurgent, the U.S.S.R. was in its death throes and the world was moving in a direction that was distinctly American in flavor. The United States has new challenges, new adversaries and new problems. But unlike so much of the world, it also has solutions—if only it has the courage and wisdom to implement them."

The point made about maintaining national posturing after a terrorist attack seems so completely logical and abundantly practical to me, that I am amazed I hadn't heard it prior to tonight. Of course, to sit idly by and wait to be attacked would be a bad idea, but the article also states that most terrorist movements are local, not nationwide, making them nearly impossible to anticipate.

As I see it, and this article so clearly points it out, we've become a nation always in a guarded position, keeping insiders and outsiders at arm's length because we live in fear. Everyone is untrustworthy!

Toiling in Taboo Topics.

2007-07-24T00:39:37Z

Aside from the epic alliteration of this entry's title, this passage will have little to do with grammar or anything that may pique the interest of the average LJ reader, but it needs to be remarked upon nonetheless. It will, at least, raise awareness in citizens under their local fire department's jurisdictions about bureaucracy and the safety-oriented mantra which is sweeping across the fire service community. Indeed, we are deviating further and further from the basics which got us here, and we may soon begin tarnishing the romanticized vision that the citizens behold us with.

Let me establish this foremost: no one likes to hear about a firefighter dying. This applies tenfold for the firefighters in the service and a hundredfold for the people who were family to these fallen. Line of duty deaths (LODDs) have a resounding impact and disheartening effect among firefighters nation and worldwide. We've lost a lot this year too; the numbers will be higher than last year, at this rate. The response that has been implemented is one which emphasizes firefighter safety, which is fine. However, we're starting to stray from some fundamental principles which made the fire service great.

When we, the fire department, arrive on scene at a house fire, we begin assessing our course of action by prioritzation; life before exposures before extinguishment. The first question we ask a bystander is "Is anyone inside?" Regardless of their answer, we should be sending a team in to search the burning building for victims. We protect loss of life foremost. Only after we have completed a primary search of the structure can we begin fighting fire. If the building on fire is already fully involved and likely to be a loss, but it is close to burning the neighboring building/car/property, we protect the intact property until we have enough resources on scene to extinguish the main fire.

The newfound thought process of protecting our firefighters can often times cloud our ability to do this on-scene prioritization. It seems to me that the bureaucracy of fire chiefs, commissioners, mayors, and so on has truly beleaguered our service. Where we may have sent an aggressive attack team to the interior of a house fire ten years ago, we are not doing it so much these days. We are also building houses with more lightweight and freely burning materials. Roof systems are lightweight truss construction and collapse after only 8-12 minutes of fire exposure. We are fighting less fire these days due to people making less mistakes and because of sprinkler systems. All of this, along with the mantra of safety, has greatly affected our knowledge and aggressiveness on the company level. Unfit firefighters further inundate our service.

The best way to offset these odds which we have stacked against us is to train as much as possible, stay in shape, and learn from mistakes; whether they are yours or someone else's. A line of duty death is an awful thing but we almost always learn something from it. I am concerned that we are going to become so concerned with the risks we take that we may forget about why we're here in the first place. If we are not searching burning buildings for victims then we are nothing more than glorified sprinklers with red lights that make a lot of cool noises.

And contrary to what you may be thinking, I do value my own life and the lives of those I work with. There are ways to attack a fire aggressively and still maintain a sense of safety, but (at the risk of sounding repetitive and longwinded) it requires training. Even if we train for ten years and only ever rescue one victim, it is still worth it. If we make an aggressive interior attack on a house fire and at the end of the day we've saved 75% of the structure, then the physical strain involved was worth it. Actions like that are what validate us. And if we fall victim to a building collapse while searching for a mother's two year old child, then we gave our lives doing what we acknowledged could happen in the first place, and we've done so for a justifiable reason.

The technology we have developed and the safety systems in place are nice tools for the job, but they are not something we should overly rely on. If we do not have a Thermal Imaging Camera, we should still be able to do a fast and effective search. It boils down to assuming responsibility for yourself and hitting the books, hitting the weights, and doing the company-level training.

I don't have all of the answers when it comes to the fire service. I'm still very new (I've only been doing this for a little more than three years), but if you have any questions then feel free to comment!

Some Idle Thoughts.

2007-05-22T02:13:39Z

I think it is important to take to heart and commit to memory every amount of incidental knowledge you pick up along the way. It is equally important to question the things placed before you (but not to the extent that you would convey yourself as a cynical, skeptical isotope) so that you can draw your own conclusions and make firm the mold that is your being.

And speaking of implementing knowledge: Thank you Josh Hamrick for making me a more frequent and precise flosser; and thank you Roberta Westcott for informing me that brushing the roof of my mouth will help my breath after meals.

Lichen is the fungus that saved George Washington's battalion from starvation during the Revolutionary War.

Here is my knowledge to you: (Insert diatribe concering soda, fast food, and lack of exercise here)!

Tomorrow is the first shift I work since ten days ago; however, even then I had to leave work early due to a conjunctival abrasion (scratch to the eye). I'm ready to learn and work out and goof off and drink coffee with my elderly coworkers.

And one final thank you to Lesley AraPlummgo for teaching me why it is that we say "bless you" to a person after they sneeze.

Good night!

Hitting Your Stride.

2007-05-21T17:54:27Z

Whether you realize it or not, your occupation is a projection of yourself. Or perhaps, you are a projection of your occupation. And if you pay attention to the nuances and subtleties of your toil, you realize that you have your good days and your bad days. I think this applies to you whether you are a shopping cart gatherer, an animal psychologist, a political lobbyist, or a call center representative. And then again, maybe I am remiss in assuming that everyone has hot streaks and cold streaks regardless of occupation - maybe I have watched way too much baseball and ESPN Sportscenter. After reading this, maybe you will begin to recognize hot streaks and cold streaks in your occupation. Maybe you will feel like a professional athlete who must endure the highs and the lows of your job.

For me, highs and lows can be minor and imperceptible to the naked eye, or they can be clearly abundant and emphatic. Regardless of how the third person would perceive these occurrences, I give attention to all of them.

An accurate patient report that is quick and concise makes me feel good. It is a small victory, and it doesn't even begin to scratch the surface on a patient's condition, but it is the initial push that gets the sleigh moving. If I notice dull, left-sided chest pain that radiates to the left arm of a patient, then I have identified the onset of a heart attack. The patient is not likely to go into cardiac arrest before my eyes, but there is reason to transport this patient as fast as possible to the hospital. If the patient has the symptoms listed, and is pale, cool, and diaphoretic (sweating), then I can rightly assume that I will be doing CPR and using the AED fairly soon. Noticing these signs and being prepared for what may or may not happen on scene is a moderate victory. The AED, bag-valve mask, and backboard should probably be in arm's reach.

If my patient has a tight, burning pain in the back of his neck, and remnants of a headache which have been around for a few days, then I could easily write this off as an unwarranted 911 call - this guy has a headache and he called us? - and just do a primary assessment and wait on the ambulance to arrive. Or, I could see that these are symptoms of meningitis (imflammation of the meninges - the lining of the brain), and I could put on a facemask while giving patient care, as meningitis is airborne. Not noticing this could result in a lifelong malignancy; I'd call it a huge victory.

These events, strung together, act as a series of wins - a sweep - and leave me riding high. It's fun to look at my job from this perspective. It invigorates me and makes me want to try harder to perpetuate these wins and go for the single season record for wins. Alas, you can't win 'em all. Sometimes you're just vapid and cloudy-headed and you cannot for the life of you get in the game and focus on the task at hand. Sometimes I am in the middle of training and all I can think about is this new dance move I just conjured up. When I'm driving the truck, I'm missing shortcuts to calls, I'm drawn into the lull of the siren, and I'm not navigating through the city as expeditiously as I am required to.

I arrive on scene to a cardiac call and the patient is quite obviously having chest pains. By the time the paramedic arrives on scene, I have not applied high flow 02 to the patient (one of the best and most remedial treatments one can give) and the moment those scornful eyes fall on me, I know what I have (not) done.

Or we are dispatched to a house fire and I'm on the nozzle. I advance the line in and I make entry to the room where I believe the fire is, only to find out the seat of the fire is on the floor below me. By the time I've backed the cumbersome firehose out of the room and the floow above the fire and I try to advance it to the room below me, the fire is already too big to fight inside the house. The on-scene commander tells us to back out and go into defenseive firefighting mode. Now we will lose most of the house and even though the home-owner will not know that the house was completely lost due to my lack of attentiveness, I will know, and that in itself is a killer. To further twist that knife of irony which is so deeply embedded in my gut, the home-owner will send us a thank you card and some other gift in appreciation for the work we did when we were trying to save his house. That is what you'd call a streak-ender. It's going to leave a mark, produce some wrinkles, and make you older. Things become less fun when you are burdened by something that huge.

Events like those mentioned in succession will induce a losing streak. The only way to get back on the horse is to compile some smaller victories and re-establish your confidence enough to have faith in your ability to diagnose a patient or extinguish a fire precisely. And to be frank, the job is not always so action-packed - as a matter of fact it rarely is - and not being drawn into the lull of unwarranted 911 calls and minor medical calls is hard to do. Maintaining a state of readiness for the big calls is hard to do when you're so accustomed to fire alarms, stubbed toes, and trees in the roadway.

I guess you just have to hope that when the bells ring, your head will be in the right place.

In ur church, eloping with ur Plummz.

2007-05-14T23:23:31Z

Obligatory introductory sentence where I state that I have not updated as much as I should. Follow-up sentence where I apologize to my imaginary reader-base and vow to update more often.

Formalities aside, I can't really say that the wedding is the reason why I have not updated lately. I guess my primary reason for not posting lately is because my life just wasn't intriguing enough to post about. Very recently, however, something interesting did occur; I married Lesley Arango.

The wedding and planning for it and the financial inundation were stressors, certainly, but the experiences I had on my wedding day more than atoned for any hardships that planning for the wedding created. I learned a lot about people and I rediscovered a lot of fundamental principles about human spirit and good intentions.

So many people came through in a big way, some came through as I knew they would, and some completely amazed me with their unyielding selflessness (Nathan). I (re)learned that people are worth going the extra mile for. I learned that you can break through anyone's jaded facade if you just show them you are willing to make the effort for them.

I'm going to keep this entry short and sweet. To my family, Lesley's family (that is now my family), the wedding party, and our friends; thank you for coming through for us. Whether we broadcasted the sentiment clearly enough or not prior to the wedding, we did need the help. The experience was made surreal by everyone involved.

Old Saint Subterfuge.

2007-01-18T15:34:01Z

I just finished reading an interview conducted by Terry McNally with renowned author and verbose atheist Richard Dawkins. It was vindicating to read this interview. For me, a lot great deal of Richard Dawkins's replies are quoteworthy, meaningful, and savory. Without further delay, here is the link:

http://www.alternet.org/story/46566/

Because I am at work with no assignment, and because I have little reason to believe anyone would read that interview in its entirety, I will quote some key rebuttals and give my take on them. At best, I hope to make you understand why I am the way I am, and at the very worst, I hope to make you understand that atheists are no less capable of making informed, moral decisions than your average God-fearing citizen.

Terry McNally, the man conducting the interview, will be in bold. Richard Dawkins, the author, will be italicized.

TM: You compare the experience of atheists to that of gays in the fairly recent past. Do you think that's an apt comparison?

RD: I think the parallel is a valid one. Until recently nobody dared admit that they were gay. Now, they're rather proud to do so. Nowadays it's impossible to get elected to public office if you're an atheist, and I think that's got to change. The Gay Rights Movement raised consciousness. It initiated the idea of Gay Pride. I think we've got to have Atheist Pride, Atheist Consciousness. I think it's pretty clear that a fair number of members of Congress must be lying because not a single one of them admits to being an atheist. The probability that in a sample of over 500 well-educated members of American society, not a single one of them is an atheist, statistically, that is highly unlikely. So, some of them, at least, have got to be lying, and I think it's a tragedy that they have to.

I feel that the plight of atheists in the southeastern United States as far more muffled simply due to the general mentality and noncompliance of the devout in this region. Industrially and scientifically speaking, we have been a stubborn region; slow to undertake new laws, slow to implement the latest developments, and so on. This is because most of us are of the opinion "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." I cannot oblige. It is an innate yearning that I must seek the truth and live within that truth. I cannot fathom living a lie for the sake of acceptance in others. How pronounced this mantra of mine becomes, however, is yet to be seen. I feel that I will gradually feel more comfortable in my social skin, and explaining to people that I am atheist will become easier.

I can also see how the speculation of our Congress being at least somewhat atheist is true. After all, to be in Congress requires quite a lot of academic exposure; during that time, you will at some point question your own beliefs simply due to your incessant exposure to science. The religious ideal that our leaders and all of their followers are Christians is not plausible.

TM: You give the Americans too much credit. In the last couple of years, perhaps since 9/11, when people criticize the Bush Administration, they are accused of Bush-hating. I think they're attempting to clothe this President and this Administration in the same kind of protective halo that religion has had.

RD: Now that you mention it, I have noticed that very thing. There has been a tendency to say, if you criticize the President, Bush, you are criticizing America, which is ludicrous because he was elected by a --

TM: --a minority.

RD: -- if indeed he was elected at all. I take your point completely. Thank you.

"He's the president and what he says is right and if he says we should invade Iraq because God told him to then it is the right thing to do." It amazes me how we can have the courage to rush headlong into warfare but we don't have the intellectual courage to pursue the truth - it is so much easier to mindlessly adhere to a standard, because it is within the safe zone, socially. It is well within the parameters of acceptance - why ever deviate? It is sickening.

TM: People finally say, "What's it to you? Why not be an atheist if that's what works for you, and leave the rest of us to be as religious as we wish?" This, I believe, is offered as a challenge to your open-mindedness or your respect for others. You're being called "an atheist fundamentalist."

RD: "Fundamentalist" usually means, "goes by the book." And so, a religious fundamentalist goes back to the fundamentals of The Bible or The Koran and says, "nothing can change." Of course, that's not the case with any scientist, and certainly not with me. So, I'm not a fundamentalist in that sense.

Why not live and let live? Why not just say, "Oh, well, if people want to believe that, that's fine." Of course, nobody's stopping people believing whatever they like. The problem is that there's not that much tolerance coming the other way. Things like the opposition to stem-cell research, to abortion, to contraception -- these are all religiously inspired prohibitions on what would otherwise be freedom of action, whether of scientists or individual human beings.

There are religious people who are not content to say, "Oh, well, my religion doesn't allow me to use contraceptives, but I'm quite happy for anybody else to." Instead, we have religiously-inspired prohibitions on aid programs abroad, including in areas where HIV AIDS is rife, prohibiting aid going in any form that might be used to help contraception. That is religion over-stepping the bounds and interfering in other people's freedom. So, religion does not observe this "live and let live" philosophy.

Basically he states that our society has a severe rational occlusion toward any notion which is counterintuitive to religious scripture/belief. This is why benevolent causes such as AIDs relief, stem cell research, and something as simple as contraceptive usage cannot exist without dispute. The whole "You're atheist; why do you care?" argument falls on its face when religion breaches human rights by not allowing the dissemination of information and awareness regarding AIDs and so forth. It is sickening that religious lobbyists actually lobby to have volunteers and supplies normally sent to Africa, diverted or somehow misplaced.

TM: Could you briefly respond, as you do in the book, to some of the arguments for this supernatural, directive, personal God. The argument from beauty...?

RD: People say things like, "If you don't believe in God, how do you account for Beethoven? How do you account for a lovely sunset? How do you account for Michelangelo?" It's such a dopey thing to say. Beethoven wrote beautiful music. Michelangelo painted wonderful paintings and did wonderful sculptures. Whether or not there is a God doesn't add to the argument one bit. So that's not an argument, although an amazingly large number of people seem to think it is.

Hey, we've been wrong before. Imagine the uproar that was caused when we figured out the world was not flat. So since it is unclear to the average joe as to why the atmosphere appears blue, we chalk it up to divine design, simply stating that god made it this way. There is in fact a scientific explanation for what average joe pawns off as creation by god, but it is so much simpler to regard it in such a fashion. This is how information, education, and potential is destroyed. Talented bob went to school for 8 years to be a scientist - a physicist to be exact - to debunk the mystery of the blue atmosphere. When he did, it was accepted by those who could understand and indulge in that information. But misinformation spreads more rapidly, and average joe can tell all of his friends the easy to digest resolve that 'god made the atmosphere blue' much more rapidly than talented bob can print out his explanation for Popular Science to distribute. It makes me ponder how much more information is lost in the air, no pun intended.

TM: The argument from scripture...?

RD: There are lots of scriptures all around the world and they contradict each other. There's really no reason to suppose that just because something's written down, it's true. You have to ask who wrote it and when and why.

If you ask somebody, "Why do you believe that your Scripture is the Word of God?" the answer that comes back is, "Oh, because it says so." And you say, "Well, where does it say so?" And they say, "In my Scripture." So, the Holy Scripture, whichever it is, The Koran, or The Bible, or The Book of Mormon, says within itself that it is the Word of God. This is a circular argument and not to be taken seriously.

Circular argument indeed. Also, I find it equally amusing that religion is generally contained to region. So if you're from the Middle East and you are Muslim, your be-all end-all view of life and the afterlife would vary greatly from that of a Catholic from western Europe, or a Christian from North America. The one distinction all of these people have in common? They all think they're right. Another thing they have in common is that they have all waged war against one another at some point or another, resulting in numerous deaths. Yet we find it perfectly okay to admonish contraceptives and stem cell research - only to let them grow older so they can fight in a war!

TM: My president claims God talks to him.

RD: Yes. Your president is told by God to invade Iraq. It's a pity, by the way, that God didn't tell him there were no weapons of mass destruction.

Hahahaha. I'll end my chronicling of this interview on that note. A very wholesome and informative read, if you ever get the chance.

Another point of intrigue is the subterfuge implemented (knowingly or otherwise) when a parent teaches a child about Santa Claus. The phrase "Santa Claus is watching you!" is both popular and endearing when raising your child, but the harm done by it seems quite evident to me. Whether realized or not, it embeds the mindset that we are watched by someone from a hidden looking-glass, and we should feel compelled to do good things not because it feels right and would help ourself or others, but because Santa Spy may see us and our toy tally would take a hit as a result. So as we grow older, Santa Claus transmogrifies into God, and we're held to that same ideal; do what is right because God sees all. At the end of your life time you'll get eternity to spend with lost loved ones and pets. But what really gets me is that the incentive for doing good things remains the same as when you are a child! Do good, not because it is just or rational, but because God requires you to do so.

The general American population trusts a Muslim or a homosexual before they will trust an atheist, yet the average god-fearing citizen needs enforcement of scripture to continue to do what is right, whereas all I require is to recognize that someone is in distress, and assist them. Who is so crooked now!?

In closing, yeah it sounds really appealing to die and have a lush and affluent afterlife, but it takes intellectual maturity and courage to seek the truth and not live in a fantasy. You can plainly see my stance on life. I observe that animals die, rot, and return to the earth and I will follow suit in the same fashion. What ever led us to think that we, as humans, possessed an innate quality or held a membership card that entitled us to die with more dignity than a squirrel or a dog? At what point did we decide it made sense that we are lifted to the heavens when we die? I can tell you when: it was when we decided that we could not bear the thought of death being final.

Misc.

2007-01-10T13:36:40Z

Rejoice! We're the most ignorant western country!

http://www.shoutfile.com/v/gSfSsCpR/Why_People_Believe_Americans_ Are_Stupid

That video is the very epitome of disheartening. I feel like a salmon swimming upstream when I seek edification anymore.

I want Bush's proposal for more troops to be dead on arrival, however I don't foresee this happening. Also, from truthout.org: "January 8, 2007 | The Bush administration has gone to great lengths to prevent any access to information documenting a relationship with convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff. Repeated denials from the White House about close ties to Abramoff are again placed in doubt by yet another photograph emerging: this photo of Abramoff and President Bush taken at a campaign fundraiser in December 2003." More shady happenings at the White House. Ho hum.

I finished What is the What by Dave Eggers. It was a long read because I felt it difficult to relate many of the instances to my own, but it did not fail in its goal of making me more aware of what has happened in southern Sudan and neighboring countries (Somalia, Ethiopia, Kenya, and to some extent, Egypt). The Sudanese civil war began because the Muslim inhabitants of Sudan wanted the cattle grazing land of the Dinka (Sudan natives). It seems so trivial, that so much blood could be let simply for the sake of fattening cows. The final paragraph of the book made the whole book worthwhile.

On to bigger and better things! I'm reading Robert's Rules of Writing by Robert Masello. Lesley got me this for my birthday. It's been a helpful, wonderful read thus far. Will it spark any writing activity? That remains to be seen. Here's to hoping.

Let no one tell you that owning a home is easy. Problems and setbacks rain on me intermittently with a frequency that really gives me a clear understanding of "If it's not one thing, it's another". The most recent problem would be some water leaks in our dining room. If it rains, water leaks through two corners of the room where plyboard is rotting. Why is it rotting? Because it sits directly on top of the roof and its shingles. The dining room was not existing, but rather an addition to the house. It was once a screened-in patio that was eventually converted into a dining room. The water rolls down the roof, and into the siding of the house, rotting the plyboard. This grants easy access to our home. Yay.

Well, thanks to Josha, our resident dancer, handyman, and heart throb, we've fixed 50% of the problem. I fully expect that once the annoyance is mitigated, a new one will arise. Bring it on? Yeah, that sounds hopeful.

Crossover from Myspace.

2006-11-28T17:36:00Z

An Excerpt on War from Howard Zinn.

Why War Fails

by Howard Zinn

"I suggest there is something important to be learned from the recent experience of the United States and Israel in the Middle East: that massive military attacks are not only morally reprehensible but useless in achieving the stated aims of those who carry them out.

In the three years of the Iraq War, which began with shock-and-awe bombardment and goes on with day-to-day violence and chaos, the United States has failed utterly in its claimed objective of bringing democracy and stability to Iraq. American soldiers and civilians, fearful of going into the neighborhoods of Baghdad, are huddled inside the Green Zone, where the largest embassy in the world is being built, covering 104 acres and closed off from the world outside its walls.

I remember John Hersey's novel The War Lover, in which a macho American pilot, who loves to drop bombs on people, and also to boast about his sexual conquests, turns out to be impotent. George Bush, strutting in his flight jacket on an aircraft carrier, and announcing victory in Iraq, has turned out to be an embodiment of the Hersey character, his words equally boastful, his military machine equally impotent.

The Israeli invasion and bombing of Lebanon has not brought security to Israel. Indeed, it has increased the number of its enemies, whether in Hezbollah or Hamas, or among Arabs who belong to neither of those groups.

That failure of massive force goes so deep into history that Israeli leaders must have been extraordinarily obtuse, or blindly fanatic, to miss it. The memory is not lost to Professor Ze'ev Maoz at Tel Aviv University, writing recently in the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz about a previous Israeli invasion of Lebanon: "Approximately 14,000 civilians were killed between June and September of 1982, according to a conservative estimate." The result, aside from the physical and human devastation, was the rise of Hezbollah, whose rockets provoked another desperate exercise of massive force.

The history of wars fought since the end of World War II reveals the futility of large-scale violence. The United States and the Soviet Union, despite their enormous firepower, were unable to defeat resistance movements in small, weak nations. Even though the United States dropped more bombs in the Vietnam War than in all of World War II, it was still forced to withdraw. The Soviet Union, trying for a decade to conquer Afghanistan, in a war that caused a million deaths, became bogged down and also finally withdrew.

Even the supposed triumphs of great military powers turn out to be elusive. After attacking and invading Afghanistan, President Bush boasted that the Taliban were defeated. But five years later, Afghanistan is rife with violence, and the Taliban are active in much of the country. Last May, there were riots in Kabul, after a runaway American military truck killed five Afghans. When U.S. soldiers fired into the crowd, four more people were killed.

After the brief, apparently victorious war against Iraq in 1991, George Bush Sr. declared (in a moment of rare eloquence): "The specter of Vietnam has been buried forever in the desert sands of the Arabian peninsula." Those sands are bloody once more.

The same George Bush presided over the military attack on Panama in 1989, which killed thousands and destroyed entire neighborhoods, justified by the "war on drugs." Another victory, but in a few years, the drug trade in Panama was thriving as before.

The nations of Eastern Europe, despite Soviet occupation, developed resistance movements that eventually compelled the Soviet military to leave. The United States, which had its way in Latin America for a hundred years, has been unable, despite a long history of military interventions, to control events in Cuba, or Venezuela, or Brazil, or Bolivia.

Overwhelming Israeli military power, while occupying the West Bank and Gaza, has not been able to stop the resistance movement of Palestinians. Israel has not made itself more secure by its continued use of massive force. The United States, despite two successive wars, in Iraq and Afghanistan, is not more secure.

More important than the futility of armed force, and ultimately more important, is the fact that war in our time always results in the indiscriminate killing of large numbers of people. To put it more bluntly, war is terrorism. That is why a "war on terrorism" is a contradiction in terms.

The repeated excuse for war, and its toll on civilians-and this has been uttered by Pentagon spokespersons as well as by Israeli officials-is that terrorists hide among civilians. Therefore the killing of innocent people (in Iraq, in Lebanon) is "accidental" whereas the deaths caused by terrorists (9/11, Hezbollah rockets) are deliberate.

This is a false distinction. If a bomb is deliberately dropped on a house or a vehicle on the ground that a "suspected terrorist" is inside (note the frequent use of the word "suspected" as evidence of the uncertainty surrounding targets), it is argued that the resulting deaths of women and children is not intended, therefore "accidental." The deaths of innocent people in bombing may not be intentional. Neither are they accidental. The proper description is "inevitable."

So if an action will inevitably kill innocent people, it is as immoral as a "deliberate" attack on civilians. And when you consider that the number of people dying inevitably in "accidental" events has been far greater than all the deaths of innocent people deliberately caused by terrorists, one must reconsider the morality of war, any war in our time.

It is a supreme irony that the "war on terrorism" has brought a higher death toll among innocent civilians than the hijackings of 9/11, which killed up to 3,000 people. The United States reacted to 9/11 by invading and bombing Afghanistan. In that operation, at least 3,000 civilians were killed, and hundreds of thousands were forced to flee their homes and villages, terrorized by what was supposed to be a war on terror. Bush's Iraq War, which he keeps linking to the "war on terror," has killed between 40,000 and 140,000 civilians.

More than a million civilians in Vietnam were killed by U.S. bombs, presumably by "accident." Add up all the terrorist attacks throughout the world in the twentieth century and they do not equal that awful toll.

If reacting to terrorist attacks by war is inevitably immoral, then we must look for ways other than war to end terrorism.

And if military retaliation for terrorism is not only immoral but futile, then political leaders, however cold-blooded their calculations, must reconsider their policies. When such practical considerations are joined to a rising popular revulsion against war, perhaps the long era of mass murder may be brought to an end."

Howard Zinn is the co-author, with Anthony Arnove, of "Voices of a People's History of the United States.

Kenny Loggins? Pfft.

2006-10-31T19:09:27Z

Kenny Loggins, self-proclaimed spelunker into the 'danger zone', would not dare work a 24 hour shift at Walton County Station #7. I had a severe inclination to refer to one who spelunks as a 'spelunkerer', which in hindsight would have been grounds for disengagement should Lesley choose to carry out the punishment.

After a topsy-turvy commute to Walton County with one Chris McDaniel, being rerouted to several different county stations before being told our final destination was station 7, Chris and I parted ways; Chris destined to drive a fire safety bus around the county and I forsaken to the abysmal confines of station 7. I arrived an hour late because the district captains decided to have a conflict about which station I should report to.

When I did finally begin my day, I was greeted by a strange encounter. I approached engine 7 to check it off and do inventory, I heard a resounding clang emanating from the side of the station. I commenced investigating and immediately found a very old and shaggy man with a slingshot, firing rocks at the side of my station.

"Where did you come from?"

"It is not your business to know - leave me be."

"I can't perform proper checkoff of my fire apparatus with you damaging my home!"

"I will be out of your life when you take it upon yourself to leave me be."

"This accomplishes nothing."

"You're too young to understand."

I walked inside to get the logbook and when I returned the old man was gone. He was not hunting wildlife, he was not warding off miscreant invaders, and he was not picketing for any noteworthy cause; he was harming my station. He with slingshot expertise and madman rhetoric and myself with nothing more than a blood pressure cuff and a clipboard. A volatile encounter mitigated by my necessary procurement of the station logbook!

Later in the day, after the topsy-turvy commute, after the old man with a slingshot, and after I damaged my wrist trying to start the leaf blower, but not before the incident of no habla espanol, I was caught with my pants down. In truth I was merely tucking my shirt in neatly so I would be presentable if I needed to do any public relations. I had just finished composing a Myspace message to Lesley when I decided to tidy myself up and suddenly a man entered the station without knocking. I was standing before my laptop with my shirt untucked, pants unzipped, and belt undone - I did not appear to be tucking my shirt in but the man will not read this and I'm already looking for a new part time job - and it was an awkward exchange.

"What are you doing?"

"You did not knock. This is what occurs when you opt not to knock."

"Were you pleasing yourself on duty?"

"....."

"I want a burn permit because I need to burn hay. Where am I? Is this a fire station?"

"You need to call Georgia Forestry - here is the number. Let me finish what I was doing."

"Everyone will know about this."

"I will save your life if you dial 911. Let me have my hedonistic devices."

"Goodbye heathen."

After the pants incident and before I concluded this entry there was the incident with the turbulent exchange with a hispanic citizen(?) in distress. I was only trying to watch a training video when I heard a rapping at the door. I answered the door and there was a hispanic male with a plastic pumpkin trick or treat pail and a child with him who had a scraped elbow. The man implies that I should cleanse and wrap his child's wound. I do not know how he got the wound. Children should be in school, not trick or treating on rural roads in plain clothes with bleeding wounds. I infer that the kid needs treatment because even though I am not proficient in spanish like I was in my high school days of yore, I still manage to perceive human emotion and urgency quite well.

"The wound is wrapped. I do not know how to tell you this in any other language. This is me explaining what I've done with my dumb gestures. These gestures could mean anything."

"This is me replying to you in spanish. This is not adequate treatment; I require more. My son is ill. You will treat him. His elbow is not the extent of his injuries."

"Have a nice day and good luck on attending school with some regularity one day and have fun trick or treating."

"My son will become increasingly ill because no one can understand our plight. You do not understand despair. You have never sacrificed. You have not become acquainted with humility and you do not work as hard as I do for as little as I do. There is so much inadequacy in this life."

"Goodbye!"

I don't have any candy to give the children who stop by and the district captain is not keen on the prospect of handing out smoke detectors and nitroglycerin tablets. This is the part where I ended the entry.

For Miles.

2006-10-28T16:20:21Z

I just ran 4 miles.