Pico de Orizaba

Pico de Orizaba
Taken from Huatusco, Veracruz, the closest town to Margarita's family's ranch.

Sunday, February 22, 2015

I am wondering... and I've wondered about this before...

As you know, I find myself juggling ideas and interests, all of my adult life...I'm Gemini...  "Jack of All Trades, Master of None"...  But, that's really besides the point.  The reason I mention the juggling act is because I constantly find myself thinking about a writing subject in my head and then I forget about it, because something "came up"...  Today, I noticed that someone entered my piece on Chinese Weevils twice.  So, I decided to re-read it... and remembered something I had forgotten to write about...

Various scientists/medical specialists claim that the problem with chemotherapy is that while it may destroy one tumor, it makes the rest of the bodies cells unhealthy, putting them in extreme risk of malignant mutations...  I've mentioned my landladies' older brother who is being treated with chemotherapy for Lymphoma, has not been told to obstain from sugar and wheat products and now has malignant tumors in the small intestine.  My aunt died from cancer of the small intestine while being treated with chemotherapy for Lung Cancer...  

How many scientists, cancer researchers and medical specialists know that chemotherapy does not increase the length of life of a cancer patient compared with the patient radiation/chemical free?  


Friday, February 20, 2015

Under investigation for using words...

When they investigate you, do they truly know what you truly wrote?  Investigated because in July 2011 I wrote that in the 1990s a friend had a Mexican boyfriend who took her to the coast of Colima for a visit with his mother, who's boyfriend's brother was a drug runner and was later tied to a coconut palm and...?  If I write the word "drugs", am I worthy of an investigation...  For a moment not long before leaving the U.S. for Mexico and just before having my J-Pouch Surgery and rectum removed... It makes you cringe, doesn't it? RECTUM!  ... I worked with homeless veterans and drug addicts... crack and heroin addicts...  My first semester at Hampshire College in Amherst Massachussetts, Fall 1993, there was an "epidemic" of heroin overdoses on certain campuses in the region (1 died at Bennington College; 2 at Connecticut College--truthfully I don't remember the name of the college and I'm blocking on the name of the city between Hartford and Holyoke)... A rich "boy's" sport at that moment...  When my younger sister was experimenting with acid in the late 80s and cocaine a few years later, I still had never seen the white powder outside of movies like Scarface...  And, I'm sure I've written this before...  So, you could say that it was strange that I was councelling cocaine and heroin addicts at the time of 9/11...  

"Today" in Mexico, I don't make friends because I don't drink... and you must be a compa in order to have male friends here... In Leon a few weeks ago, my neighbor asked me when we would go for a few beers... and I explained that I haven't drunk beer in almost a year... And he asked me if I drink whisky... which I've never drunk... how about tequila... And then he asked Margarita if it were ok with her if I went out with him and his friends bring with you your mineral water...  And, of course, I declined...  

I've never been that partier...  I've never enjoyed those social gatherings...  I was a rain on the parade... always...  Just because I have an alternative mind, doesn't mean that I appreciate that lifestyle... Last year we stumbled across "The Wolf of Wallstreet" and you have no idea how embarrassed and offended I felt... How many years I've been telling Mexicans that "my" United States isn't like that...  And where was I those years that everyone else was doing what I didn't know about? My younger sister's parties... My mother's probable swinging not long after my father's death... What my sister and what my mother experimented with, I have never seen...  And people have always arched their eyebrows and asked, "are you kidding?!!!"  

And fortunately for me, as I sure you've heard me say frequently before... I had enough problems in my youth than to have further re-structured or disenravelled my mind with drugs...  I remember the friend of Peter's sister's friend offering to sell us cocaine at the cinema on the Somerville circle back in 1985... Peter looked at me and I said, absolutely NOT! since the idea scared the shit out of me...  But, what if I had said, "yes"...?  Do you know slippery slopes?  I do... enough to avoid them, even when my mind supposedly wasn't working near well at the age of 15-16...  Even in the late 90s in Manhattan when Michael suggested I go with him to a rave and try Exstasy...  I said, NO THANKS... and Michael isn't a bad person or a pusher... he thought it was part of the spiritual or existential experience... And in as much more experienced as it may seem Michael is, he has also been much more naive than I... Can a naive person be harmful?  Can a less naive person be harmless?  Or these are truly just questions of perspective...

And if I say I'm being investigated, does that make me guilty of something?

Read Solzhenitzen's "Gulag Archipelago" and see how Lenin and Stalin "defined" guilt...  Thank god for not being born in the Soviet Union... At any given time you could be arrested and sent to a concentration (work) camp for between 10 and 25 years or put on the firing line for having written a series of words or for not having written anything at all...  Imagine, if you return home to your wife in bed with another man and you kill (now I could be investigated for using the word "kill") that man, you could be encarcelated for homicide.  However, if that man is "party worker", you will be accused of an act against the Revolution and given capital punishment.  Now, if you only threatened that man with something bad happening, you would be accused of threatening terrorist acts against the "Revolution" or against the "Soviet"...  Do you understand what I'm saying?  Do you think that Solzhenitzen invented what he wrote (risking his life 1,000 times more than you would ever imagine risking yours) or that it was Western Capitalist propaganda?  But, it has been written that this very non fiction piece of writing is what gave Solzhenitsen the Nobel Prize for literature (that he did not accept, since he was living in the Soviet Union and he would have been "punished" harshly for accepting the award, for the same reasons Boris Pasternak refused the award also)...

I wonder why I write things that could unjustly cause me problems...  But, I believe in truth, justice, understanding and honesty much more do I believe in comfort... Granted, if something bad happens to me, it is possible that in that moment of discomfort I may wish for have been a gopher in a hole most of my Mexican life and not shared my innocuous experiences and socio-political-spiritual beliefs...  Granted, I am sure that most of those who have investigated me since 2006, when they crashed my computer in Xalapa for inquiring about John Kenneth Turner after he published Mexico Barbaro, have realized that they've greatly wasted their time with this incredibly boring Gringo or Expat.  I'm sure you've come to that same conclusion about my writings...

That's the conclusion I've come to... Although, occasionally when I notice someone has returned repeatedly to one of my writings, I finally decide to re-read it... And, like something I just re-read after having written it in July 2011, since someone entered that piece at 11pm Central Time last night just over 280 times (makes you wonder, what I wrote about that "friend's" experience in Colima in the 90s, years before I would ever dream of "visiting" Mexico).  And, "someone" from France, Russia, the Ukraine, Turkey and a few Asian countries has found my writings interesting... for a good while now and visits daily for at least over a year...  No, I can't know who they are.  I basically know when it is my mother and possibly my sister's boyfriend... Granted, it could be James or Milo and not the sister's boyfriend.  But, I basically know when it is my mother...  How and why?  Not important...

And I have a general hunch when it is an "organization"... investigating...  Hey guys!  ¡Hola! ¿que tal?  The U.S. department of homeland security... the CIA...  the Mexican Federal Police...  Does it really matter?  For years, I've occasionally wished for a visit from them for having a conversation... so that they can finally leave this behind...  It causes unnecessary head aches...  Granted, depending upon who visits, determines the style of the meeting...  I don't see the Mexican Federal Police as much different from the organized crime that extortion and kidnap...  I wish I were incorrect.  The CIA?  Who do you think created all of this "organization" in Mexico?

And you may ask, "why do you write this believing that they are reading you?"  

I guess because "they" trained me well as a child/student believing in the 1st and the 4th ammendments...  And, yes, I'm not living in the U.S.  But, I'm still a U.S. citizen... I'm not sure if that's truly worth what they have us believe it's worth...

Thursday, February 19, 2015

John Oliver, Prescription Drugs and Pharmaceutical Marketing to Doctors


"Nuts"...and I'm not referring to Cashews...nor am I "speaking" in obscene slang...

Margarita and I were in the middle of a conversation while driving to the Metropolitan Park where we go for gathering a lot of the Sun's Rays (vitamin D) while we exercise for around 1.5 hours... And now I must re-phrase this introductory line leading you towards why I mention the word "Nuts"... Ok.  Here we go again...

"While strolling through the park one day. In the merry merry month of May I was taken by surprise. By a pair of roguish eyes. I was scared but I didn't run away..."  

Maybe you should have...  run a way... if he didn't have legs twice the length of yours... and the key to the bathroom door...  

Ok.  Maybe I should continue over again... 

You think I'm crazy.  Don't you?  But, truthfully you don't know what all of this is about.  Do you?

While driving to the park this afternoon, I found myself in the middle of a conversation with Margarita that led me to remember the wonderful Barbara Streisand/Richard Dreyfus movie, "Nuts".  Truthfully, I don't remember why I saw it decades ago, and just how much I saw... Although I was very impressed...

Before showing the movie with Spanish Subtitles I found on YouTube (we can't buy every movie I think a pertanent part of our constant conversation). I introduced Margarita to some of Barbara Streisand's music, thinking Margarita should have heard her songs, just as she's heard the BeeJees and Billy Joel etc...  I wanted Margarita to know a little about Barbara Streisand as a singer before seeing her act so...  And I remembered that I would NEVER have told my middle-school peers that I like Barbara Streisand's music or face.  Actually, I loved her face and her original nose...  The same went for Barry Manilow...  You've gotta love the "Copacabana", although I had no idea I would find myself living a good part of my life in Mexico only speaking Spanish.  In fact, it is very difficult for me to speak English... It was much easier when I changed from English to Spanish speaking with my Mexican Federal Police friend, whose probably reading this as are you...  Fortunately for him, he can also read what I just posted in Spanish...  Good for me, I can read, write and speak both languages, although it is easier for me to speak Spanish than write it and write English than speak it...  

But back to Claudia (Barbara Streisand) and her "craziness"... I loved the scene when Claudia's mother cries out, "I'm so sorry! I had no idea!"  No she didn't.  She was always too drunk...  But, as you know, just because a family member or the family members didn't know what happened behind closed doors or when they weren't around, does NOT mean that those things did NOT occur...  

At the moment I am having difficulty remembering what led up to the part of the conversation where I remembered the movie and wanted Margarita to see it... Something to do with feminist "theory" and why some feminists believe that female prostitution is the legal right of the woman...  As Claudia explained to the Judge and others in the courtroom, "I knew women who married men they despised just to be able to have the Mercedes, house in the country, fir coats... I know women who crawled through shit just to..."  The conversation was long.  An earlier part of it explaining why it is the adults' (and parents) responsibility to talk with the children about sexuality (not in the form of Claudia's step dad) since they will find out about it possibly in ways or much earlier than what would be desired by the adults.  But that wasn't really the beginning.  Margarita had made a comment that sexual pleasure is most logical during the period when the two people are able to create babies and possibly when they are passed the procreation period, maybe it is understandable that they feel less... 

It was a good conversation that led to our watching the very impacting movie... But, a poor recreation of the actual conversation is a slippery slope...  When do children discover their "sexuality" or what can cause pleasure and how... who taught  "little twin" about her "little dick" (her words at that age) when she was only 6-years-old and that had a horrible impact upon all of us... But, for some, it is "better" to ignore and forget.  I have this horrible problem of not being able to forget as easily as others and the other problem that I can't ignore ANYTHING...  I can walk on by... But, I can't truly close my eyes...  I couldn't forget the tears... nor the screams...  You've gotta love a good Dionne Warwick song...  

Truthfully, I don't know why I was so impressed by "nuts" when I was so "young"... I guess I know now.  Or maybe I always knew...  I remembered other things today talking with Margarita in the Park... They were interesting discoveries.  But, I don't remember them at this moment...  

There are two or more people in a relationship.  For that relationship to work, all of the members must truly respect and consider the needs, feelings, experiences and rights of the others...  If it is a relationship between two people, both people must have their lines of communication open and respect the needs/desires and state of being at each and every moment of the other... All people deserve equal respect and equal consideration.  No one is the property of another...  And if we "mess-up" it is our responsibility to share our awareness and disappointment in ourselves with the other person.  And not because that's what we think the other person wants.  We have the responsibility to work towards harmony with the other person and try and understand the best we can why the other does not feel harmony with us.  

Why?  I don't know.  Maybe I was too strongly impacted by what I saw in movies or read in novels or heard from the Rabbi who visited with us a few times every summer in camp... Maybe I was too sensitive to the messages between the lines meant for teaching "us" how to be better building blocks of a healthy, productive and harmonious society...  Yes, it could all be part of a Utopian Dream or nightmare like Aldoux Huxley's "Brave New World"...  Or was that book written when Huxley had come to "terms" with his dream of constructing "Utopia" and realized that it was organically impossible?  Originating from Great Britain was the Utopia philosophical/cultural movement you find the writers Huxley and Orwell...  But that seemingly gave way to the existential movement of Sartre, Camus, de Beauvoir and Moravia (although he was actually listed below humanism, but there are few differences, although some may say that humanism is intentional and existentialism unintentional)...  Maybe with the second world war, the Utopian bubble was burst... and with the fascist occupation of France and Italy, existentialism was born... 

But, what does this mean for those who were traumatized in supposedly safe environments?  And what about those who live in safe environments intentionally created incredibly safe for others, but not for them, although they've been told that they have the right to what only the others receive?  And what if you live in a world where you were never promised anything and in the name of something good or something bad, you were made to suffer horribly for super-extended periods of time, and without any form of explanation?

For the poor Catholics, "It's God's will" and something good in the future is only possible if it's "God willing"...  

And what if around the age of 6 the girl or the boy began being sexually abused by bigger people (people we "should" trust... possibly people who "should" protect us) and the were confused, because it was a confusing "issue" or experience or situation... and maybe they said no one day and didn't say no another... and what if they liked the attention or confused it with "love" or they like the feeling... at the same time as not liking any of it?  Claudia exclaimed that she NEVER said NO to her stepfather, as if she was to blame for his assault and violation of her...  

What happens when the woman puts on a mini skirt and a low cut blouse and wears a push-up bra to eccentuate her breasts?

Why can most people accept a shirtless man and a woman in her "brazier" etc on the beach, but not on a sunny day in a park?  

What happens or is happening?  If the woman in the bikini top in the park or the mini-skirt in the club is assaulted or raped (or misunderstood by her date who couldn't control his excitement or desire and received an undesired response to his actions)...

Yes, all adults must consider all possible "responses" or "consequences" to their actions... and ask maybe why the would risk being in certain situations...  Although assault is assault, violation is violation and there is only one truly guilty party...  However, what happens to children, what is done to children is a whole different subject and has life long consequences for the innocent (the child is always innocent).  The form the consequences take depends greatly upon many factors, that depend greatly upon the adults responsible for the health of the child... 

They didn't create the film "Nuts" just for entertaining viewers or for creating mental masterbation for the intellectuals... or for displaying Barbara Streisand's acting skills.  

It wasn't hypothetical...

Wednesday, February 18, 2015

PeregrinaciĆ³nes con CuƱao

¿Recuerdas quĆ© me dijiste saliendo del rancho... del nuevo aƱo... que va estar muy bueno?  Imagino renunciaste tus planes poner un centro de servicios psĆ­quicos...  Pero, siendo personas no psĆ­quicas, no podemos saber como estaria el resto del aƱo.  Claro.  No podemos desdefuntar personas queridas defuntas...  Tampoco podemos cambiar que paso antes...  Como no podemos saber como va estar maƱana y sĆ­ sabemos mucho de que fue, la Ćŗnica opciĆ³n que tenemos es entender el pasado, aprender de lo "bueno" y lo "malo" y planear lo mejor que podemos para maƱana.  ¿Sabes que maƱana es perpetua y nunca cambia?  El momento que estĆ”s en maƱana, es hoy resbalando en el mismo tiempo hacia "ayer"... Pero, maƱana siempre es maƱana...  Entonces, como siempre estamos en el presente aprendiendo del pasado y mirando hacia "maƱana" o el futuro, tenemos que procurar hacer bien el presente... Tratalo pensarlo asĆ­:  EstĆ”s mirando hacia el medio metro cubico de tierra donde estĆ”n parados tus pies...  ¿En que condiciĆ³n de estado quieres tener el medio metro cubico de tierra en que estĆ”n parados tus pies?  ¿Quieres que estĆ”s parado encima de una falla tectonica muy activa o un sumidero?  ¿Quieres estar parado en el medio metro cubico de tierra en que va caer un meteorite?  Claro que no puedes saberlo.  Pero, puedes saber si donde paras tiene la tendencia de terremotos fuertes o se inunde seguido o si es entre los dos frentes militares que estan disparando balas o misiles o lanzando grenadas...  Puede ser un medio metro de Tepito o, Culiacan o....  El segundo que mueves tus pies, necesitas que no estĆ”s lanzandote hacia un abismo y todavia no has aprendido volar...  Me dijiste algo de que tanto le queria a Oligario yo... Pero, siento que me entendiste mal.  Cuando muere algo, tenemos el deber acordarnos de como fue su vida... Cuando la person estĆ” viva, tenemos el deber respetarla y considerar sus necesidades... Pero, tambien tenemos la responsibilidad de considerar las necesidades de TODAS las personas relacionadas con nosotros, los moribundos, los difuntos, los machistas y los alcoholicos.  Puedo decirte con confianza, si te ama tanto a ti y a Margarita como le amaste a Oligario, no cree Ć©l, tĆŗ abuelo que estoy faltando respeto de Ć©l...  Acuerdate, a veces hacemos cosas que verdaderamente no queremos o no lo queria nuestro alma... O, mejor escrito: hacemos cosas que parece que hacen daƱo a la gente importante a nosotros, aunque nunca fue nuestro deseo verdaderamente hacerla daƱo.  Tal vez, en el gran plan, uds necesitaban vivir las consecuencias del alcoholismo de Oligario, sus hijos, yerno y nietos...  A veces repetimos actos daƱinos en la esperanza de encontrarla respuesta adecuada...  Solo conocĆ­ dos Oligarios: el borracho horriblimente ofensivo y el no borracho discapacitado mentalmente...  SĆ­ tengo la memoria (y fotos) del dĆ­a que fuimos con Ć©l y tĆŗ papa al Fortin... Fue un muy gran dĆ­a y "mis respetos" a la fuerza fĆ­sica de los dos viejos...  Pero, existe otra historia o un presente perpetua que saben todos relacionados con tĆŗ abuelo... SĆ­ tambien existen cosas que pasaron en privada que muchos no saben... Y tenemos que respetar Ć©stas eventos tambien...  Si cierras los ojos a la verdad, se repite lo malo... como mala hierba. Si brincas, necesitas saber hacia adonde estĆ”s brincando.  Si no te mueves, no pasa nada, mientras no estĆ”s parado encima de una falla tectonica o un sumidero.  Y si no sabes donde estĆ”s parado, mejor debes empezar preguntar y investigar...  Y si no pasa nada, significa que ni bueno...  No digo, ni malo, porque si puede cagarte un pajaro...  Tal vez lo vez como un seƱal de buena suerte... Pero, si nunca te mueves... o no suficientemente frequente o rĆ”pido...  ¿que pasa con la gente moribunda o condenada a una cama, quien no puede moverse para ir al baƱo o para baƱarse quien no tiene que le mueve de posiciĆ³n, lleve al baƱo y hace aseo de la cama y limpieza higienica de su cuerpo? aunque le da agua y comida para mantenerla nutrida adecuadamente?  SE PUDRE POCO A POCO...  Y ¿que pasa si sigue bajando el valor del peso Mexicano para el rancho porque sigue subir la canasta basica y no sube adecuadamente el sueldo mĆ­nimo (o no tan mĆ­nimo) ni el precio estatal o nacional de cafĆ© cereza...?  La gente tiene menos poder equisitivo para pagar sus necesidades, mejor el medio metro cubico de tierra en que estĆ”n parados o guardar algo para "maƱana"... en el caso de un terremoto, inundaciĆ³n, guerra entre pandillas, la visita prolongada de Zetas, un Hurrican, una plaga peor que la Roya o Colera...  Todos necesitarian bastante fe en que "si Dios quiere"...  En Estados Unidos escuche muchas veces el dicho Protestante (Cristiano) "Dios ayude a quien se auto-ayude"... o como ha escuchado en EspaƱol Margarita: "Ayudate que yo te ayudarĆ©"... Es un buen consejo... No esperes que Dios te manda un seƱal que tal vez no entendiste... Salio una noticia durante la feria de Leon: regresando de San Juan de Los Lagos, despues de visitar con "la Virgen", en el autopista Leon-Aguascalientes... estaba viajando una familia grande en una camioneta Ford cargada con reliquias y otros regalitos... se volo la llanta de frente y se volteo la camioneta viajando a alta velocidad... Murio una de las niƱas...  Es que ¿no rezaron suficiente o adecuadamente?   Es pensar... Dijo el noticiero otras cosas para prevenir un tal "disgusto"... Accidente de tal estilo...  O tal vez tenia mĆ”s poder que la Virgen el Diablo...  Parezco irreverente o faltante de respeto... Sin embargo, creo que podemos aprender de la multitud de posibles mensajes...  ¿esperar que te dice Dios que valor tiene tĆŗ vida cuando has muerto y estĆ”s en el dĆ­a de juzgado divino? o tratas lo mejor que puedes trabajar "bien" en la vida mientras que estĆ”s vivo?  ¿Que leyenda dejo al rancho Oligario? ¿que dejarias?  No tengo que dejar nada al rancho.  Pero, lo he dejado bastante.  Y no es egoismo que digo...  No fue mi responsibilidad estar tan en contacto con uds... En la historia de cuƱados o yernos, parece anti-natural.  Claro, no siempre entendemos que deberia haber pasado o que debemos o como debemos estar pasando para que se satisface el trabajo divino que todos tenemos que estar haciendo...  Tal vez un trabajo divino es ser alcoholico o desollar gente o repetir mentiras o engaƱos o que quiere el gobierno que escuchan los niƱos de los profesores o la gente del sacerdote...  igual que tengo que hacer algo con uds, aunque parece demasiado frequentamente que no entienden o no respetan o no quieren que ofrezco...  Tal vez estamos trabajando juntos en un trabajo divino aunque no entendemos verdaderamente, y no podemos saber como terminaria... Pero, tenemos demasiado historia atrĆ”s de nosotros para no entender hacer algo un poco diferente, un poco mejor/proactivo...  Tengo acceso a mucha informaciĆ³n, tengo mucha experiencia... y la capacidad encontrar mĆ”s informaciĆ³n y ideas...  Todavia creo que cuando nacieron uds, nacieron con buenos cerebros y buenos "corazones"...  Pero... Y tienes que entender el "pero" y tratar entender hacia donde va la frase no escrito... porque no es mi responsibilidad explicar todo, todo el tiempo.  El trabajo tambien es de uds...  No fue Dios quien dijo "Dios ayude a los quien se auto-ayudan."  Todas las palabras escritas y escuchadas han sido por voluntad humana...  Los humanos tienen la responsibilidad de resolver sus problemas y limpiar sus desmadres ;-)  Y si, no quieren hacer nada... Es su decisiĆ³n tambien... solo existen ciertas repercusiones que tal vez no van apreciar "maƱana"...  

Existe mucho trabajo... fĆ­sico, mental, psicologico, y espiritual...  No tienes que hacer nada... pero, no hacer nada es hacer algo... aunque existen mĆ”s probabilidades no vas o van (como los nietos y sobrinos de Oligario, Chayo, Gollo, Negro y Fego cuando todos estaban tomando juntos) gustar el resultado de Ć©stos acciĆ³nes que si hiciste algo proactivo...

Tuesday, February 17, 2015

under investigation... Ross the revolutionary...

always a curious boy... wanting to know the world... too much... understanding to seek... constantly...

I like that line.  Very poetic... in my conception of poetics...  But I can't continue with the thread.  Nor will I try.  I know I disappoint you.  Why?  Because maybe it could have been better... the time you dedicate to reading what I wrote...  But, that's just it with "maybe"... there is no certainty... as I know with my blog...  The other day a friend wrote me in Spanish that I seem like a writer.  Now, what's the difference between writers and those who seem like a writer?  "MAYBE"... a lack of certainty.  But, what gave you the idea that there existed so much certainty in life...  We don't know.  We just plug on... someone once wrote "keep on keeping on..."  It may have been in a popular song I heard... I may have used the line too...  you keep on continuing, just as the Earth continues spinning... Do you ask why...  Remember that song, "I stop the world and melt with you"?  And when we thought about the world suddenly stops spinning, we feel nautious... why?

Margarita is reading the last part of Follett's "the 20th Century Trilogy"... that takes place during the civil rights movement, the cold war... etc and so forth...  I finished that book in October...  Towards the end I became disappointed... as if Ken Follett felt extremely pressured to finish it on time...  Too bad.  A few days ago, I was looking for movies on Youtube... if we don't have to pay to go to the movie theater or buy the video (if you can actually find it here... or on YouTube)...  At the moment I don't remember why I stumbled across Spike Lee...  Or was it that he produced or directed a movie... aah... yes... It was because we wanted to watch "Old Boy", as a change of pace... a film unrelated with anything we were reading or studying at the moment... and I was surprised that it was produced and directed by Spike Lee... If I'm correct, I haven't seen a Spike Lee "Joint" since the early-90s...  I'm so out of the loop.  Truthfully, I don't know what I was seeking and how it led me to "Black August"... maybe I was looking up Spike Lee's documentary on Huey Newton... 

At the moment I'm reading at least 3 books at a time: The second book "The Green Pope/El Papa Verde" of "the Banana Republic Trilogy" by Guatamalan Nobel Prize Novelist, Miguel Angel Asturias, "The Gulag Archipelago" by Alexandre Solzhenitzen (also Nobel Prize Novelist) and the last 40 pages of Udo Erasmus' book "Fats that Heal; Fats that Kill"... in the middle of awaiting the response by our car insurance company and considering the acquisition of a new cargo van and "arguing" with one of my 8 brothers-in-law and researching random items about diet and health etc... I figured a change of pace would be good...

The interesting thing is that, while movies are a nice change of pace, they also serve as great back up sources for what we or Margarita is reading...  Since I couldn't find anything interesting by Spike Lee on YouTube, like The Huey Newton Story or "get on the bus"... I settled for "Mississippi Burning".  Today we watched "Black August", connected with Angela Davis' prison reform movement... It serves as a good back-up source of Margarita's reading, since one of Follett's main characters "Verena Marquand" is based partially upon Angela Davis...  In the film, one of the very aggressive/intense Black Family (related to the Black Panthers) members "Lumumba" sells out to the CIA.  Since the film is based upon true events and since Margarita mentioned that the name "Lumumba" appears in Barbara Kingsolver's "A Poisonwood Bible", I decided to look him up on Google... It turns out that there are 3 Lumumbas...  The lider of the Congolese Independence movement and the first democratically elected Prime Minister of the Republic of Congo (who appears in Kingsolver's Novel), Chokwe Lumumba, former Mayor of Jackson Missippi who is mentioned by a different name in Follett's book, who was the lider of the "New Africa Movement" for creating an African American Republic in the region of the gulf states just after Martin Luther King was assassinated.  While seeking historical truth connected with the traitor Lumumba portrayed in "Black August", I stumbled across a "Black August Conmemoration Kick-off and Chokwe Lumumba Birthday celebration party..." page on Facebook and "Chokwe Lumumba [speaking] on Black August Resistance"... and then Lumumba Akinwole-Bandele; NAACP/LDF, who is senior community organizer in LDF's Criminal Justice Practice, also community organizer/educator in central Brooklyn, and founder of the "Black August Hip Hop Project", but too young to have been the Lumumba traitor in the film...  Ironies...

All in all, in the middle of all of this "curiosity may have killed the cat; more likely he was just unlucky..." my computer froze...  I'm all to familiar with the freezing of the computer in the middle of an innocent search...  But someone else has always been searching.  But, truthfully, what do they find?  

Maybe they find my writings less boring that do I.  Yes, you heard me correctly.  I don't return to read my writings... not even curious to see why "someone" returns constantly to read certain writings... I get bored.  Why?  "I spy a... " what?  Part of a 60s or 50s children's game...?  No, it's from a much earlier children's game in England... around the 30s...  Can you finish that line?  I heard it in a recent ZoĆ« song... although the singer was singing in Spanish... and the singer and the group are from Mexico... Granted, he sings wonderfully in British English... sounds a little bit like John Lennon or the singer of Arctic Monkeys...  although from England, they film a lot in the Mojave Desert of California...  the drummer seemingly wishes he were an actor and has a fixation on guns, the "Hells Angels" and motor cycles...  If the Beatles could sing "The Balad of Bungalow Bill..." and "Rocky Rackoon" that takes place in the Black Hills of South Dakota... I guess this turn of the century (21st) Punk/Indy group from Sheffield England could be fixated on Film Noir Lifestyles of Southern California, just as the author of "Curiosity", Scottish Poet and South American Scholar, Alastair Reid could have lived in Argentina, Mexico, Dominican Republic and Chile, writing his poems in English...  

During the fair, I was repeatedly visited by a Federal Police officer who supposedly wanted to practice his English with me since he supposedly spent most of his life (26 years) in the U.S., while destroying sales, since Mexicans don't like to buy from us if they hear me speaking English (or Spanish with my "American" accent)...  One of the first of his questions was, in his words, personal, "Are you legal here?... My brother-in-law is from rural South Carolina (where I also worked for the sheriff's department) and he wants to know how he could live in Mexico." I offered to show him my residency card pulling the wallet out of my back pocket, immediately causing his response that that is not necessary... The following day he asked my permission to take a photo with me for the Federal Police website showing their contact with foreignors in Mexico and asked me why I seemed nervous when I was considering the response.  With the JosĆ©'s destruction of the pick-up, and the fact that our line of customers dwindled in the time that the Federal (Investigator) was speaking with me... and due to my having prepaired myself two double moka-nut cappuccinos a few minutes earlier, since I was very tired and needed to be awake for the heavy work, I may have seemed nervous...

But, his two questions in two days reminded me of the only other time I was accused of being illegal in Mexico and at the same time asked why my hands were trembling:  February 2008, after packing our coffee bar the whole night and not having slept for 36 hours and then while driving 6 hours from Colima through Guadalajara to Tepic Nayarit, on the federal (not toll road) highway approaching Tequila, Jalisco (yes, that Tequila), I passed a Federal Patrol car that had just pulled over someone in a curve, noticed that the speed limit sign said, 40 kms, and slowed my speed to that... And then suddenly, that Federal Patrol car was pulling me over... And then one of the two Federal Police Officers asked me why I was driving so slow... And then they asked me to step out of the truck and told Margarita to stay seated.  And then they asked me to show them what I was carrying... and asked me if I was transporting arms/weapons... And I invited them to inspect my cargo... And they asked me for my visa, which I explained was in Immigration in Mexico City, since every February (I entered Mexico at the end of January) they asked for my visa (FM2 or FM3) for the visa renewal process... Sometimes they didn't give me the response for between 3 and 6 months... The younger official was very antagonistic and said, "so you are illegal here!!!".  And I explained to him that I was NOT illegal, since my papers were with Immigration... and showed him the paper that explained that they had my visa in their offices...  In the end, his superior told him to stop wasting time with me and let me return to the truck and on our way...  But, I will never forget the question and how it reminded me of the only other time I was asked the same thing...  

Look, this is petty stuff... when you read about what happens with other "less fortunate" people and in other countries... Did you know that the only way that the newly formed Soviet Union could defend its "revolution" and later on compete with the U.S. and other industrialized nations was to arrest innocent people (many highly educated) and send them to labor camps?  I didn't know that... But, Nobel Prize writer Boris Pasternak and especially Solzenitzen make that extremely clear...  And one can spend their lifetime reading horrifying examples of much worse communal experiences of people of African Descent in the U.S. and how the Soviet Union treated their ethnic "communists" and what happened in so many South and Central American countries in the 60s through the 80s... And why ignore what has been occuring throughout Africa and what occurred in the Carribean during the first half of the 20th Century and what is happening in many Islamic countries...  And, yes, what happens here in Mexico since 2006...  

And maybe these things are really the least of anyone's troubles... And if someone became interested in why I was watching "Black August" and looking up information that may have something to do with Black-"American" revolutionary or separatist movements... causing the freezing of my computer... it was not the Mexican Federal Police but a department of the U.S. Federal Government that is always concerned that "expatriots" living in foreign countries (especially Mexico) are connected with subversive movements (terrorist), such as Al Quaeda...  

Read my whole blog... and read it twice... and you should find the truth...  and what I realized a long time ago:  I'M NOT THAT INTERESTING...  Interested, yes... I am curious...  I want to understand...  As for revolutions and changing the world...  Nor with incredible violence, nor with incredible logic or education or super intense and massive peaceful movements...  Human nature is generally selfish and autodestructive, greedy and inconsiderate, hedonistic and chauvanistic with a tendency towards ignorance (which is intentional and not innocent) and short sightedness...  You can preach all you want about honesty, sincerety and consideration... But, what you find in the end is that everyone lives as if there is no other life (and no one more important than they; "Look after #1") and worries first and foremost about being comfortable and increasing their material well-being... and who truly gives a flying "fish" (You know what word is hidden behind "fish") about how anyone else lives or suffers or had their rights stolen from them...

The United Nations is home to the International Department of Human Rights and UNICEF and WHO... and finds its headquarters in New York City... But, truthfully, those "funding" the UN truly worry about human rights or if countries designate enough of their budget to protecting and developing their children or if poor communities around the world have adequate food or clean water or medical facilities or or or for true health etc?

And do you believe that killing people and blowing up buildings will help the UN work better?  Or millions of people marching on their capitals throughout the world will actually change things?

Yes, I believe that the activists and the educators and the documentary film makers and those who try and publish their stories or have their voices heard... the conscientious and concerned people are very very important... for something... The world's "lesson"?  But, I don't believe that they are enough, even if they were half of the world's population or 3.5 billion people, they could "correct" the problem... Since, truthfully, I don't believe that they truly know what it is that must be cured or solved... And if they knew, maybe they wouldn't truly care... or they wouldn't know what to do... Violence is simple-minded... Although, when you understand what has happened in the U.S. to offspring of those who were brought from Africa to the Americas, you may understand the violent response...  But, you should also understand that that isn't a solution either... What is the solution?

You can't change human nature... Some people change dramatically. But most people don't... And we find history constantly repeating itself, although we do teach it...  The idea was that remembering the events prevents history from repeating itself... momentarily, in regions, possibly...  But, in the long run... it's all a nice intellectual idealistic illusion... like a catch phrase...

Yes, I believe in sharing for raising consciousness.  Truthfully, I don't know why I do that... since I have so little faith in human nature...

Look at who has responded to what...  "They" read so much of what I write.  But, no one responds... Why not?

And do a perusal of the internet blogs and analyze what creates lots of responses...  

What a bad revolutionary I am! 

Back to the esoteric, another perspective of Adam and Eve; response to the idea of reincarnation or past lives...

Considering that the spirit is sex or gender non specific, and much of what we "understand" about gender is socio-politically constructed for us... aside from certain physiological/biological differences... it really doesn't matter what sex we are... Imagine if we could replicate without conjugation... or if men had female sex organs etc... How would that change our perception of things? I say all of this because the probability is very high that the boy turned man will reject the idea that he was a woman in a past life... Why? because of what it "means" to be a man or a woman for at least 10,000 years... Life is a lesson... very personal for each and every person... The lesson could have its base in horrible suffering... or it could be based upon frustration and boredom caused by the lack of any form of difficulty or challenge... It could be the process of believing you are a man in a woman's body... Considering socio-political constructs and certain perceptions, this could very well be obsurd... In ways "you are what you are"... at this moment... In another life? a different story. It's kind of like the interpretation of dreams: 

Over 7 years ago in Acapulco a Middle-Class Mexican woman in her 50s told me that the soul can inhabit up to 10 bodies at a time... and that she had experience with "removing" spirits or souls (I'm not really certain if there is an actual difference) trying to occupy the body occupied by another spirit, such as your very own spirit... Sounds like exorcism, and maybe it is in forms, but not like exorcizing "the devil."  My first reaction was that she was off her rocker... But, for some reason I never forgot what she said, how she said it... and have returned to the idea repeatedly... thinking about certain dreams. And back to that... 

Was the dream the return to an experience of a past life? But, it really seems very modern and vivid... When we sleep, is it possible that we connect with the lives that our spirits are participating in other bodies at the same time? Or is it that our minds are so creative that they can invent Hollywoodlike films as dreams? Although I do believe that our brains or minds have much more potential than which we connect with in our normal life, I still doubt that we can create/invent such vivid "artificial" moments. Dreams are symbolic or metaphoric... They are psychological (subconscious) manifestations of our concerns or fears... or forms of our subconsciousness trying to manipulate us to change... Dreams occasionally are warnings or messages about what will occur later on or what we must change so that certain things don't occur or stop occuring... like premonitions... 

Some people believe that time is just a human construct and that everything is occurring at the same time... so there are no past lives but concurrent lives... returning to what the Mexican woman said in Acapulco in 2007... That concept of non-lineal time (like "back to the future" in ways, although it still used lineal time) is a bit difficult to understand. Then again, humans, in as complex, sophistocated and scientific or intelligent as we are, have extreme difficulty understand the "abstract" like the metaphysical because we are extremely dependent upon a certain form of organization of understanding. Like relying upon the triad/trinity (Father-Son-Holy Ghost/Father, Mother, Child/Birth, Life, Death/Elderly, Adult, Infancy), devolutionized from the circle (womb, family, community, world). How did they pull triangle from circle? "The triangle is still a circle because it is closed..." 

When woman was worshiped for her ability to create life from her body or propagate plant life from already existent plants, life and god/dess was represented as a circle... Then man became "jealous" and ruthlessly envious and the trinity was constructed... with the grand father of humans at the top of the pyramid... But, virtually without the presence of women... until the culmination with God giving birth to a son through "his" metaphoric penis... Ejaculating Jesus through the vulva of Mary into the "modern world" of Bethlehem... And when Abraham was going to sacrifice his son (Isaac?), why didn't Sarah have a word in the decision? And Moses... who was his mother? Didn't he just appear floating in a stream? And wasn't this similar to another biblical story about saving the son by sending him floating down the river? But, the river could be metaphoral symbolizing embrionic fluid... We're so creative, aren't we? 

Most of my paintings are female centered intensely looking back at you... some are pregnant. I have a crucified pregnant woman in one of them... None of my paintings are intentional... I wonder why they are so female oriented... And have repeatedly wondered about what that means about me... why I worry about "universal" sexism and the repercussions for the world... Sexism is the turning everything on its head or upside down... meaning that from the "beginning of time" or the beginning of the super-sexist era when the idea was invented that the man is the constructor and the protector of all that is truly important to humans, and the woman is just there to support "all the great men"... to care for their (his) children and care after his home and to make sure that his dinner is ready and his clothes ironed or taken and brought back from the cleaners and as a suppliment income to his income and an ear lent for listening to his complaints or his fantasies or his projects etc... 

since that evolution in our socio-political-"spiritual" constructs, we can only fail and deconstruct/ruin what was once true health... The fall from grace or the removal from Eden of Adam and Eve is the starting point. The biting of the apple and the snake didn't occur within the garden. It occurred outside. "God" didn't vanquish them from the garden. They got bored or curious and left... The snake more likely was in the mind of Adam and he offered a poisoned apple to Eve in the attempt towards robbing her of her uniqueness and vitality... A form of Vampire attempting towards robbing the health or vitality of the vital, sane and healthy... And that's the life we live... teaching the sons that their mothers are less important than are they... teaching the daughters that they will always be less than their brothers... teaching the daughters that the are at service to the men... a certain sexual exchange... they must give sons to their men in order to carry on the "family name"... the last name of the man... The woman gets erased... Granted, the man must offer something to the woman... and all modern religions teach against materialism. But, for some reason, they don't teach their people how to remove materialism from the equation... The women and men and children cease being objects of value with an actual exchange rate... 

No, it doesn't really matter if the boy was a woman in a past life... It shouldn't matter. It doesn't really matter that genetically we are half man/half woman and no one has explained the moment when the fetus "decided" to be one and not the other... How did that happen? What is important is that we challenge certain constructs and perceptions in order to try and return to the true truth and not just what we've been conditioned to believe is the truth... And, maybe these are ideas I've developed over the past so many decades. Or maybe this is information given to me by the spirits that supposedly guide me or surround me or this is information stored from so many past lives... Who knows. At the very least, it was nice of Sherilynn Lewis-Mahoney to invite me to your page and also nice to see that someone from Somerville High School is interested in something "para-ordinary". "You" caught me directly after my first coffee of the day before I had actually begun doing something "constructive". Thanks for the inspiration!

Saturday, February 14, 2015

Synovial Cysts, Fibrocystic Breasts and Flaxseeds...

I don't remember if I mentioned my synovial cyst on my left hand near the wrist...  It appeared somewhere in August or September.  By November it had become the size of a marble...  During this time Margarita visited with a doctor about certain "female problems".  I imagine I had mentioned an "argument" between the doctor and I about fat and inflamation.  The doctor diagnosed Margarita with Fibrocystic Breasts and said that Margarita shouldn't eat nuts or seeds and should take Vitamin E supplements;  This is actually where the argument truly began, since the best sources of Vitamin E is in seeds, such as Sunflower, Pumpkin and Sesame...  Plus, Vitamin E supplements give you very little of the actually vitamin E your body needs...  In any case, I was curious about why she (the doctor) would prohibit nuts and seeds for Fibrocystic Breasts and began investigating...

Some of the organizations specializing in Fibrocystic Breasts and Breast Cancer suggested against the consumption of nuts and seeds.  Some recommended increased consumption of nuts and seeds.  However, the organization most virulent against the consumption of nuts and seeds due to the idea of plant estrogen suggested that Flaxseeds, although containing plant estrogen, have been shown to reduce breast cancer tumors...

Since we were already consuming ground flaxseeds (although very sporadically) for increasing HDL cholesterol, it wasn't difficult to take the leap into increasing the "dosage".  The recommended dosage of flaxseeds for increasing HDL cholesterol is 5 tablespoons per day. I mix the flaxseed in lime water; 3-4 tablespoons and the juice of 2 limes in a large glass of water.  You must constantly stir the water, since the flaxseeds constantly settle to the bottom...

It wasn't until we were working in Leon (after JosĆ©'s accident) that I began "taking" the flaxseeds regularly.  Margarita also increased her consumption in the mornings...  Since Margarita and Nicolas were grinding the seeds every morning, there was always ample amounts of ground flaxseeds for me in the afternoon when I was in the apartment cooking...

No only was I taking the recommended serving (5 tablespoons) of flaxseeds, I was serving myself heaping tablespoons; I calculated that I was serving myself 1.5 tablespoons instead of 1, increasing my consumption to 8 tablespoons per day...

Two weeks after I began taking the flaxseeds daily, I noticed that my synovial cyst had decreased significantly.  Today, it is hardly visible.

Margarita also mentioned that she ceased experiencing pain in her breasts, although she was eating a good amount of chocolate and drinking a lot of coffee (working in the coffee bar for 26 days straight); no-no-s for fibrocystic breasts... The lumps still exist.  But, for the first time, they ceased causing discomfort.

Polƭtica "humana", una carta a un amigo nacido el mismo dƭa, mismo aƱo...

El mundo es polĆ­tico; no importa donde estĆ”s... Es porque no soy maestro en una escuela en Nueva York... porque decidĆ­ no estudiar para una maestrĆ­a en los 90s... porque todo es polĆ­tico. No me gusta "el juego" polĆ­tico. No lo hago, no lo juego bien. Soy demasiado sincero... "Sincero" siempre significa "sin-trabajo" o puede significar, "sin-amigos"... No puedo disimular disgustos o preocupaciones/molestias. Entonces, los tipos "polĆ­ticos" fijan en la abertura de mi "ser" y se plantean como bacteria y se hagan llagas... Imagino esta experiencia tuya no es nueva... A veces repetimos ciertas experiencias en el intento de superarlas... Un dĆ­a, tal vez, las masterizamos o cansamos de la misma cosa y decidimos buscar una experiencia mĆ”s productiva para nosotros... alejando de la negatividad... evitando los mismos invasores... depredadores... El lobo o el gato montes es fuerte y feroz de verdad porque tiene que cazar para vivir y es la Ćŗnica cosa sabe hacer verdaderamente bien. TambiĆ©n, para vivir, no tiene que hacer otra cosa. Pero, el humano depredador de humanos, es un ser verdaderamente dĆ©bil quien inventa ilusiones de fuerza o omnipresencia haciendolas otras personas (sus presas) sufrir, inventando (proyectando) debilidad en la otra persona para auto-engaƱarse momentariamente que no es dĆ©bil si mismo... Todos los movimientos racistas, clasistas y nacionalistas tienen sus bases en la necesidad de enpoderarse artificialmente los humanos dĆ©biles robando la fuerza y felicidad de otras... El Vampiro es un ejemplo de Hollywood y de ficciĆ³n Europeo centro-este del siglo 19 del "humano" dĆ©bil quien tiene que chupar la esencia positiva de gente sana para sobrevivir. Y no es suficiente que la robe a la gente sana, tiene que hacerla sufrir como Ć©l o ella mandandolas a vivir en las tinieblas con Ć©l/ella por una eternidad...


Simbolismo es interesante. OjalĆ” pudieramos aprender de el intelectualmente y no personalmente. Pero, como sabes, la vida (puedes llamarlo "el seƱor", la Diosa, Dios, los espĆ­ritus etc) nos pone en una vĆ­a o ruta o lecciĆ³n para aprender algo muy personal para nosotros espĆ­ritus o almas o mentes... En una forma, tienes que abrazar tĆŗ experiencia, tus dificultades, tĆŗ lecciĆ³n como algo muy importante para ti y solo mirar hacia arriba o alrededor de ti mismo, arcar las cejas en cuestiĆ³n y preguntarle "¿adonde me llevas?" Sabes que estĆ”s conforme... estĆ”s con Ɖl o Ella... y no te guiaria mal... Solo tienes que encontrarla fuerza propia tuya que te ayudarĆ” alcanzarla meta solo tĆŗ alma o espĆ­ritu entiende...

Thursday, February 12, 2015

As certain things end, others continue...

The same month that JosĆ© Francisco totalled the business' truck he was driving 5 minutes from concluding the 3 hour drive from Guadalajara to the apartment we rented in Leon, Guanajuato, Angelina's late husband Oligario died and Roberto's and Paz's first grandson, Alin 14-years-old left home with his girlfriend only to return with the girlfriend to live with his parents, who didn't send her back to her own parents...  A month earlier (New Years Day) I was speaking with Alin's parents and grandparents and uncles about finding him and his younger brother Pablo good private schools for taking advantage of their academic potential...  Since we don't have children, and since no one else worries about the quality of education in the ranch, Margarita and I decided we would float the bills...  But, now, we consider the investment an extreme risk, especially since Alin's parents haven't realized that a 14-year-old boy doesn't determine how the household is run... enough to tell the young girlfriend to hop into Daddy's truck so he could take her home to her parents, where she belongs at this age.  Granted, there is a possibility that the were "saving" her from clear and present danger such as sexual abuse etc... But, for some reason, I doubt it...

Alin is bored and restless.  It's understandable.  But, after 12 years experience with 11 brother-and-sister-in-laws and experiencing how they respond to boredome and rare opportunities, I see Alin's behavior as typical, if not just a bit precocious.

Angeline died of neglect after a lifetime of experiencing the alcoholism of Oligario and her 4 sons and their neglect of their own children.  Oligario stopped drinking a few years earlier and rapidly slipped into dementia, certainly caused by the alcoholism.  A month earlier Margarita and I had bought him a very high-tech wheel chair that reclines so that he didn't have to be lifted from the chair and carried to his bed if he were tired...  One of his legs and arms had failed months earlier...  Oligario was approaching 88-years at his death...