This month marks the 20th anniversary of Kurt Cobain's death, and while countless articles are rehashing the same old themes, I want too float an idea out into the world that has been on my mind for...well, for 20 years.
First, I should say on a personal note that while I can count one or two Seattle musicians from the grunge era as friends, I never actually met Kurt Cobain. I blew off a friend's show once, not knowing until later that it would have been my one chance to hang out backstage with Kurt.
I do feel some personal connection to his loss, through friends who knew him and talked about their own personal memories after he died.
This isn't about my personal feelings, though.
I want to put Kurt Cobain into some sort of historical perspective.
To me, Kurt Cobain was the late 20th Century's musical Vincent Van Gogh.
Both were brilliant, troubled artists. Both probably suffered from some form of diagnosable mental illness.
Both were part of artistic 'movements' that caused them to be in conflict with the 'establishment.'
Both even suffered from severe PHYSICAL problems that contributed to their downward spirals (Van Gogh's ringing ear, Cobain's aching stomach).
Van Gogh came up as a painter among France's 'impressionist' movement in the late 1800's.
More than 100 years later the impressionists (Monet, Manet, Renoir) seem tame, but at the time they were revolutionary. they purposely broke all the establishment rules of painting. You could see their brush strokes. They painted sunlight informally as it really looked during different times of the day. They rejected posed mannerisms for candid movement.
They were the art world's punks.
Among this group, Van Gogh was an extremely volatile, insanely talented presence.
The comparison between the rebellious Impressionist movement and the 80's punk rock movement - which evolved into the 90's grunge era - doesn't seem too far of a stretch to me. It's not a perfect comparison, but it's a reasonable one.
Cobain also had a volatile, but insanely talented presence in his movement.
Both Van Gogh and Cobain expressed their anguish, their volatility, their compassion, and their internal conflicts honestly and daringly.
Both suffered downward spirals that resulted in tragedy.
Both remain losses that are hard to explain.
Everyone who writes about Cobain tries to find adequate words to make sense of his too-short life.
I feel those words are not too difficult to find. They are simply:
Kurt Cobain, one hundred years later, was music's Vincent Van Gogh.
-Peter Wick
April 14, 2014
Monday, April 14, 2014
Friday, March 14, 2014
#23 - CHRIS FARLEY - March, 2014
When Chris Farley's "Down by the river" sketch was named greatest SNL sketch of all time recently, I was reminded of the one time I met Chris Farley.
I should probably say up front that telling this story is not intended to be any kind of definitive statement about who Chris Farley was or what he was like. This is the only time I ever met him. Someone who knew him better than me would have to put this story into perspective.
It was 1993, during a year-and-a-half-long period in which I took any small job on any Hollywood movie set that I could.
Central Casting sent me to work an all-nighter on the Fox Studios lot, to be an Extra rocking out to White Zombie in the club scene for the movie "Airheads."
It was a thankless job; an uncredited Extra. I watched the scene again recently and can't find myself anywhere on camera, not lurking in the dark corners of any shot, nothing.
I was there, though, paired with a gorgeous blond girl. I don't remember her name, so for remainder of this story she will simply be referred to as, "Gorgeous Blond Girl."
"You two are boyfriend and girlfriend," the assistant director told us. "When we say 'action,' you just start rocking out."
Simple enough.
Life on a film set has a lot of down-time, though. So, Gorgeous Blond Girl and I had a full evening to hang out together. We were comfortable enough with each other, but she dropped The Big Warning early in the conversation.
"The Big Warning" is a girl very casually - almost TOO casually - dropping the phrase, "Oh, my boyfriend - "
It doesn't matter what the rest of the sentence is. She just let you know she's off limits. some guys take it as a challenge. I accepted it without a second thought.
The club scene in "Airheads" has Chris Farley as a cop, entering the club, getting knocked around a mosh pit by some tough guys, and then finding the character he's looking for at the bar.
We had to shoot different parts of it over and over all night, trying to get White Zombie's performance right, trying to get Chris Farley's mosh pit moment right, etc.
We were still early in the process, during a quiet moment between shots, when Chris Farley was randomly standing just a few feet from myself and Gorgeous Blond Girl.
"What's your name?" he asked her.
She answered.
He followed up with a few casual remarks and a joke or two. She responded flatly, and soon everyone had to return to their marks for another take.
"That was awkward," she whispered to me as Farley walked away.
"And the evening's still young," I said.
"Oh, god, no," she sighed.
Then someone yelled 'Action.' White Zombie rocked their song again. Gorgeous Blond Girl and I rocked out.
Cut!
"Tell me he's not coming over here," she said to me when things quieted down again.
"He's coming over here," I said.
"God! No," she whispered.
Chris Farley turned on the charm this time. He was a celebrity, and he knew he could get what he wanted - most of the time.
She chatted politely with him, but stayed just cold enough to avoid encouraging him.
We rocked out to White Zombie some more, and then she proposed an idea to me.
"Hey," she said, hesitantly at first, "do you think, um, maybe we could actually pretend to be boyfriend and girlfriend, maybe just enough to get him to stop?"
"Sure," I said, smiling. "I'm game."
The next time things got quiet, and we were told to relax, I sat in a chair. She sat on my lap, dropped an arm over my shoulders, and when Farley started walking toward us she leaned close to my ear and teasingly whispered something to me, making it look like we were sharing a very private moment.
It worked.
Chris Farley was smooth.
He stopped in front of a brand new gorgeous girl, making it look as if he had been eyeing her the whole time.
The new girl seemed more open to his celebrity advances.
Gorgeous Blond Girl was off the hook.
As actors we were a little deeper into character the rest of the evening. We were boyfriend and girlfriend until about four in the morning. Then we went our separate ways, never to see each other again.
A few years later Chris Farley was dead, from a lethal combination of drugs.
He left a legacy of brilliant comedy and mediocre movies.
Perspective?
Hell, I don't know.
Maybe someday I'll get a chance to ask his old buddy, David Spade.
-Peter Wick
March 14, 2014
I should probably say up front that telling this story is not intended to be any kind of definitive statement about who Chris Farley was or what he was like. This is the only time I ever met him. Someone who knew him better than me would have to put this story into perspective.
It was 1993, during a year-and-a-half-long period in which I took any small job on any Hollywood movie set that I could.
Central Casting sent me to work an all-nighter on the Fox Studios lot, to be an Extra rocking out to White Zombie in the club scene for the movie "Airheads."
It was a thankless job; an uncredited Extra. I watched the scene again recently and can't find myself anywhere on camera, not lurking in the dark corners of any shot, nothing.
I was there, though, paired with a gorgeous blond girl. I don't remember her name, so for remainder of this story she will simply be referred to as, "Gorgeous Blond Girl."
"You two are boyfriend and girlfriend," the assistant director told us. "When we say 'action,' you just start rocking out."
Simple enough.
Life on a film set has a lot of down-time, though. So, Gorgeous Blond Girl and I had a full evening to hang out together. We were comfortable enough with each other, but she dropped The Big Warning early in the conversation.
"The Big Warning" is a girl very casually - almost TOO casually - dropping the phrase, "Oh, my boyfriend - "
It doesn't matter what the rest of the sentence is. She just let you know she's off limits. some guys take it as a challenge. I accepted it without a second thought.
The club scene in "Airheads" has Chris Farley as a cop, entering the club, getting knocked around a mosh pit by some tough guys, and then finding the character he's looking for at the bar.
We had to shoot different parts of it over and over all night, trying to get White Zombie's performance right, trying to get Chris Farley's mosh pit moment right, etc.
We were still early in the process, during a quiet moment between shots, when Chris Farley was randomly standing just a few feet from myself and Gorgeous Blond Girl.
"What's your name?" he asked her.
She answered.
He followed up with a few casual remarks and a joke or two. She responded flatly, and soon everyone had to return to their marks for another take.
"That was awkward," she whispered to me as Farley walked away.
"And the evening's still young," I said.
"Oh, god, no," she sighed.
Then someone yelled 'Action.' White Zombie rocked their song again. Gorgeous Blond Girl and I rocked out.
Cut!
"Tell me he's not coming over here," she said to me when things quieted down again.
"He's coming over here," I said.
"God! No," she whispered.
Chris Farley turned on the charm this time. He was a celebrity, and he knew he could get what he wanted - most of the time.
She chatted politely with him, but stayed just cold enough to avoid encouraging him.
We rocked out to White Zombie some more, and then she proposed an idea to me.
"Hey," she said, hesitantly at first, "do you think, um, maybe we could actually pretend to be boyfriend and girlfriend, maybe just enough to get him to stop?"
"Sure," I said, smiling. "I'm game."
The next time things got quiet, and we were told to relax, I sat in a chair. She sat on my lap, dropped an arm over my shoulders, and when Farley started walking toward us she leaned close to my ear and teasingly whispered something to me, making it look like we were sharing a very private moment.
It worked.
Chris Farley was smooth.
He stopped in front of a brand new gorgeous girl, making it look as if he had been eyeing her the whole time.
The new girl seemed more open to his celebrity advances.
Gorgeous Blond Girl was off the hook.
As actors we were a little deeper into character the rest of the evening. We were boyfriend and girlfriend until about four in the morning. Then we went our separate ways, never to see each other again.
A few years later Chris Farley was dead, from a lethal combination of drugs.
He left a legacy of brilliant comedy and mediocre movies.
Perspective?
Hell, I don't know.
Maybe someday I'll get a chance to ask his old buddy, David Spade.
-Peter Wick
March 14, 2014
Friday, February 14, 2014
#22 - Brothers - Feb. 2014
I'm not sure what year it was. I think I was in First or Second grade. My brother David would have been in Junior High School. He had received a Daisy air rifle BB gun as a Christmas present and promptly spent the following week shooting tree trunks, blades of grass, basically declaring war on all inanimate objects in the neighborhood.
He became bored with these lifeless enemies, though, so he decided to move on to the most logical next target; our other brother Dan.
Dan is the middle brother; older than me, younger than David.
Anyone who has either been a part of, observed, or even come across a family with three brothers, knows that this is a very dangerous situation, one that is on the verge of combustion at any given time.
Brothers - especially when there are three of them - have a tendency to hurt each other for fun, injure each other for laughs, insult each other as a way to simply pass the time.
David lay on his stomach on the floor of the bedroom.
He was mostly hidden behind the doorway. He aimed the air rifle carefully at Dan, who was vacuuming the living room, a chore my mother had placed on him.
To me David looked like the perfect sniper hiding in the grass, sizing up his unsuspecting victim.
I was behind David and I was absolutely beside myself. I was jumping up and down with an uncontrollable mix of excitement and fear.
"Sh! Quiet!" David whispered back at me.
"Do it! Do it!" I whispered back.
David lay his cheek down carefully on the butt of the gun. He adjusted his eye onto the site and took a slow breath.
Dan was turned away from us, pushing and pulling the vacuum cleaner on the carpet. He was wearing blue jeans, his butt a worthy and inviting target.
The suspense was killing me.
POP!
David pulled the trigger.
The wail that came from Dan's mouth was a thing of terrifying beauty.
It pierced that wall of vacuum-cleaner noise and must certainly have travelled out into the street, to the neighbor's houses.
He twisted to look down at his own butt, where a clear indentation the size of a tiny BB showed in his blue jeans. The BB itself had fallen harmlessly to the floor.
My mother came rushing into the room, as David and I quickly hid inside the bedroom, sharing hysterical laughter.
Our laughter gave us away. My mom and Dan came into the room and looked at us.
"Did you shoot your brother with the BB gun?"
We tried to hold our laughter, but couldn't. We were cracking up uncontrollably.
Even Dan, who was settling into the knowledge that his jeans had prevented any real injury, was beginning to smile a little.
"Listen," my mom said, "there's no shooting people. You don't shoot your brother in the house. Do you hear me? No shooting your brother in the house."
I guess it was a reasonable new ground rule to lay down.
It was too late, though. The moment had already happened, and a moment like that lasts forever.
-Peter Wick
February 14, 2014
He became bored with these lifeless enemies, though, so he decided to move on to the most logical next target; our other brother Dan.
Dan is the middle brother; older than me, younger than David.
Anyone who has either been a part of, observed, or even come across a family with three brothers, knows that this is a very dangerous situation, one that is on the verge of combustion at any given time.
Brothers - especially when there are three of them - have a tendency to hurt each other for fun, injure each other for laughs, insult each other as a way to simply pass the time.
David lay on his stomach on the floor of the bedroom.
He was mostly hidden behind the doorway. He aimed the air rifle carefully at Dan, who was vacuuming the living room, a chore my mother had placed on him.
To me David looked like the perfect sniper hiding in the grass, sizing up his unsuspecting victim.
I was behind David and I was absolutely beside myself. I was jumping up and down with an uncontrollable mix of excitement and fear.
"Sh! Quiet!" David whispered back at me.
"Do it! Do it!" I whispered back.
David lay his cheek down carefully on the butt of the gun. He adjusted his eye onto the site and took a slow breath.
Dan was turned away from us, pushing and pulling the vacuum cleaner on the carpet. He was wearing blue jeans, his butt a worthy and inviting target.
The suspense was killing me.
POP!
David pulled the trigger.
The wail that came from Dan's mouth was a thing of terrifying beauty.
It pierced that wall of vacuum-cleaner noise and must certainly have travelled out into the street, to the neighbor's houses.
He twisted to look down at his own butt, where a clear indentation the size of a tiny BB showed in his blue jeans. The BB itself had fallen harmlessly to the floor.
My mother came rushing into the room, as David and I quickly hid inside the bedroom, sharing hysterical laughter.
Our laughter gave us away. My mom and Dan came into the room and looked at us.
"Did you shoot your brother with the BB gun?"
We tried to hold our laughter, but couldn't. We were cracking up uncontrollably.
Even Dan, who was settling into the knowledge that his jeans had prevented any real injury, was beginning to smile a little.
"Listen," my mom said, "there's no shooting people. You don't shoot your brother in the house. Do you hear me? No shooting your brother in the house."
I guess it was a reasonable new ground rule to lay down.
It was too late, though. The moment had already happened, and a moment like that lasts forever.
-Peter Wick
February 14, 2014
Tuesday, January 14, 2014
#21 - The Middle of Somewhere - Jan. 2014
I was back home in Seattle over the recent holidays, feeling completely at home and comfortable. I enjoyed the company of friends who I miss, and family who are a part of me.
It didn't feel like a year since my last visit, and I found myself promising a few friends that I would make it back a few times during the coming year.
Seattle is home. L.A. is home. These places I am familiar with.
I found myself thinking, though, about places that I've visited that are definitely not home.
My thoughts traveled back in time to a week of my life that began in Decatur, Illinois and ended in Appleton, Wisconsin.
I was in my 20's and was working a stand-up comedy tour of small-town midwest clubs. I use the word 'clubs' loosely.
The week started on Tuesday, with me driving a rental car south from Chicago into small-town Illinois, for what is still the only time of my life.
Tuesday night's gig was a one-nighter in Decatur. I arrived at the 'club' which was a small local tavern, where the regulars merely tolerated the once-a-week invasion by two stand-up comedians. I was the opening act, and I apologize to whoever followed me; I have no memory of who was loosely referred to as the 'headliner.'
My only memory of Decatur, Illinois is this tavern.
It didn't have a stage.
To perform I had to climb up onto two tables that had been placed next to each other. I did my best to get and keep the audience's attention, but I lost the battle to the Chicago Cubs. The biggest laugh of the whole night came when I gave up, dropped the microphone, and turned to watch the Cubs with them.
The next night was Rockford, Illinois, and then Thursday, Friday, and Saturday were in Appleton, Wisconsin.
I am happy to report that the gigs gradually improved through the week. Appleton was good to me.
The most striking memory of the week for me, though, was the driving; driving through Wisconsin farm country in the Summertime. It was beautiful.
It remains a vision that I can't seem too shake years later.
Sometimes those of us who live in a big city like Los Angeles (or New York or London or Paris or Tokyo or Shanghai) find ourselves feeling a little cocky about being in the middle of something; the eye of the storm; where the action is.
I like to remember another kind of middle; the middle of nowhere - which is really always somewhere.
I have to drive through smalll-town Illinois, and Wisconsin again sometime.
I plan to get out of the car at some small tavern, maybe on a weeknight when a little entertainment might be passing through town.
I plan to sit and have a beer and make a couple of local friends. I plan to celebrate life in the middle of somewhere.
-Peter Wick
January 14, 2014
It didn't feel like a year since my last visit, and I found myself promising a few friends that I would make it back a few times during the coming year.
Seattle is home. L.A. is home. These places I am familiar with.
I found myself thinking, though, about places that I've visited that are definitely not home.
My thoughts traveled back in time to a week of my life that began in Decatur, Illinois and ended in Appleton, Wisconsin.
I was in my 20's and was working a stand-up comedy tour of small-town midwest clubs. I use the word 'clubs' loosely.
The week started on Tuesday, with me driving a rental car south from Chicago into small-town Illinois, for what is still the only time of my life.
Tuesday night's gig was a one-nighter in Decatur. I arrived at the 'club' which was a small local tavern, where the regulars merely tolerated the once-a-week invasion by two stand-up comedians. I was the opening act, and I apologize to whoever followed me; I have no memory of who was loosely referred to as the 'headliner.'
My only memory of Decatur, Illinois is this tavern.
It didn't have a stage.
To perform I had to climb up onto two tables that had been placed next to each other. I did my best to get and keep the audience's attention, but I lost the battle to the Chicago Cubs. The biggest laugh of the whole night came when I gave up, dropped the microphone, and turned to watch the Cubs with them.
The next night was Rockford, Illinois, and then Thursday, Friday, and Saturday were in Appleton, Wisconsin.
I am happy to report that the gigs gradually improved through the week. Appleton was good to me.
The most striking memory of the week for me, though, was the driving; driving through Wisconsin farm country in the Summertime. It was beautiful.
It remains a vision that I can't seem too shake years later.
Sometimes those of us who live in a big city like Los Angeles (or New York or London or Paris or Tokyo or Shanghai) find ourselves feeling a little cocky about being in the middle of something; the eye of the storm; where the action is.
I like to remember another kind of middle; the middle of nowhere - which is really always somewhere.
I have to drive through smalll-town Illinois, and Wisconsin again sometime.
I plan to get out of the car at some small tavern, maybe on a weeknight when a little entertainment might be passing through town.
I plan to sit and have a beer and make a couple of local friends. I plan to celebrate life in the middle of somewhere.
-Peter Wick
January 14, 2014
Friday, November 15, 2013
#20 - The Time Traveler's Guide to the 20th Century
The Time Traveler's Guide to the 20th Century
[Note: This is the opening chapter of a much more comprehensive travel guide. the complete time traveler's guide will be published in approximately 243 years, but it's never too early to sign up on the wait list.]
The 20th century was even more bizarre than you think. It was a preposterous century in which people listened to Mel Torme and The Bee-gees, and blew each other's countries up with alarming regularity.
What's worse is that it didn't have to be this way.
In fact, it wasn't.
The history of the 20th century, everything we have on record, is completely wrong.
Not that the history of the 20th century didn't happen the way it was recorded. It did. It just didn't happen that way when it was actually happening.
Um, let me try to explain this a different way.
Everything we know about the 20th century, all the events that were recorded, are what history was suddenly changed to when a time traveler from the year 2246 landed in Munich, Germany, in 1913 and accidentally altered everything. Her name was Sue Moody, and she committed the one disastrous mistake that all time travelers must avoid; she tripped.
Before she arrived, the 20th century (meaning all 100 years of the 20th century, those before she arrived as well as those after her arrival, if that's not too confusing)unfolded as a quiet but productive time during which war was non-existent. This was no grand scheme. No one worked particularly hard to abolish war. Everyone just suddenly realized, on October 17, 1913 (the day after Sue Moody later arrived) that it was pointless to go around killing people, and that getting drunk was a much better way to spend your time, or making up stories about wrestling wild animals.
The non-existence of war was not the most important difference though, between the real 20th century and the one that it was changed to. In the real 20th century Richard Nixon never became President. In fact he never went into politics. He spent his life working at a church camp in California, where he was in charge of cleaning the shuffle board sticks.
Then sometime in late Spring in the year 2246, Sue Moody turned over the ignition of her solar powered 17-3 Tesla Time-Travel Roadster and set the date for October 16, 1913. she landed in a dark alley in the heart of the city of Munich, walked out to a main street, and tripped over a small child's foot. She fell into a crowd of people, setting off a domino effect which knocked everyone over for a quarter mile. This included Kaiser Wilhelm and his entourage, who had been touring the neighborhood, Vladimir Lenin, who was in town for the holidays (just which holidays we aren't exactly sure), and a 24 year-old gentleman who had just begun growing a funny mustache, and whose friends called him, "Dolphie." He would soon come to prefer the more formal "Adolph," or "Mr. H."
[End note: This is all the author has written at this time. Please check back in a little over 200 years - at which time his writer's block should have worked itself out.]
-Peter Wick
-November 15, 2013
[Note: This is the opening chapter of a much more comprehensive travel guide. the complete time traveler's guide will be published in approximately 243 years, but it's never too early to sign up on the wait list.]
The 20th century was even more bizarre than you think. It was a preposterous century in which people listened to Mel Torme and The Bee-gees, and blew each other's countries up with alarming regularity.
What's worse is that it didn't have to be this way.
In fact, it wasn't.
The history of the 20th century, everything we have on record, is completely wrong.
Not that the history of the 20th century didn't happen the way it was recorded. It did. It just didn't happen that way when it was actually happening.
Um, let me try to explain this a different way.
Everything we know about the 20th century, all the events that were recorded, are what history was suddenly changed to when a time traveler from the year 2246 landed in Munich, Germany, in 1913 and accidentally altered everything. Her name was Sue Moody, and she committed the one disastrous mistake that all time travelers must avoid; she tripped.
Before she arrived, the 20th century (meaning all 100 years of the 20th century, those before she arrived as well as those after her arrival, if that's not too confusing)unfolded as a quiet but productive time during which war was non-existent. This was no grand scheme. No one worked particularly hard to abolish war. Everyone just suddenly realized, on October 17, 1913 (the day after Sue Moody later arrived) that it was pointless to go around killing people, and that getting drunk was a much better way to spend your time, or making up stories about wrestling wild animals.
The non-existence of war was not the most important difference though, between the real 20th century and the one that it was changed to. In the real 20th century Richard Nixon never became President. In fact he never went into politics. He spent his life working at a church camp in California, where he was in charge of cleaning the shuffle board sticks.
Then sometime in late Spring in the year 2246, Sue Moody turned over the ignition of her solar powered 17-3 Tesla Time-Travel Roadster and set the date for October 16, 1913. she landed in a dark alley in the heart of the city of Munich, walked out to a main street, and tripped over a small child's foot. She fell into a crowd of people, setting off a domino effect which knocked everyone over for a quarter mile. This included Kaiser Wilhelm and his entourage, who had been touring the neighborhood, Vladimir Lenin, who was in town for the holidays (just which holidays we aren't exactly sure), and a 24 year-old gentleman who had just begun growing a funny mustache, and whose friends called him, "Dolphie." He would soon come to prefer the more formal "Adolph," or "Mr. H."
[End note: This is all the author has written at this time. Please check back in a little over 200 years - at which time his writer's block should have worked itself out.]
-Peter Wick
-November 15, 2013
Monday, October 14, 2013
#19. The Peacefulness of The Un-Governed - October, 2013
I have no desire to write a political editorial.
As I write this, though, our government is shut down, and has been for a couple weeks.
While everyone else is clamoring to score points with one argument or another, blaming Republicans, blaming Democrats, I prefer to sit quietly, watch the sunset, and feel the unusual calm of being un-governed.
I have often described my political views by quoting the line from the Groucho Marx song; "Whatever it is, I'm against it."
I think it's a reasonable position to take. It may be the only reasonable position to take on the politics of 2013.
This in no way makes me a Libertarian. I am as firmly against Libertarians as I am against all politicians.
The government shut means that food inspectors are furloughed. Scientists are not getting paid. National Parks are closed. Secret surveillance of our private phone calls has been interrupted.
This is a funny feeling, this state of being un-governed. It's something everyone should experience for a few weeks of their life.
I was reading, this past weekend, about several car-makers' intense desire to manufacture and sell self-driving cars within the next decade.
These cars will deal with traffic, stop for pedestrians, and take you wherever you want to go, all while you sit back and play games on your iPhone.
The stickiest problem these car makers have to solve is; who is responsible when the self-driving car malfunctions, runs up on the sidewalk, causes carnage when it fails to stop at a red light?
The government is getting in on the act. Government regulators will have to determine the safety standards before these machines can take to the road.
The standards will be extremely high. Government safety inspectors are funny people. They don't care what your politics are. they just take safety very seriously.
I think about this whenever I board an airplane. I trust the safety inspectors to have checked my plane thoroughly.
I don't much like government. I don't think the political process should be taken at all seriously, and politicians should always be viewed with suspicion, like mobsters, or salesmen, or CEO's.
So, I am enjoying being un-governed.
Whatever it is, I'm against it.
But I am also against the government being shut down for too much longer.
Being un-governed truly is a peaceful feeling.
It's like that peaceful feeling you have in the airplane, right at that moment you have accepted what's about to happen, seconds before the airplane crashes into the side of the mountain.
-Peter Wick
October 14, 2013
As I write this, though, our government is shut down, and has been for a couple weeks.
While everyone else is clamoring to score points with one argument or another, blaming Republicans, blaming Democrats, I prefer to sit quietly, watch the sunset, and feel the unusual calm of being un-governed.
I have often described my political views by quoting the line from the Groucho Marx song; "Whatever it is, I'm against it."
I think it's a reasonable position to take. It may be the only reasonable position to take on the politics of 2013.
This in no way makes me a Libertarian. I am as firmly against Libertarians as I am against all politicians.
The government shut means that food inspectors are furloughed. Scientists are not getting paid. National Parks are closed. Secret surveillance of our private phone calls has been interrupted.
This is a funny feeling, this state of being un-governed. It's something everyone should experience for a few weeks of their life.
I was reading, this past weekend, about several car-makers' intense desire to manufacture and sell self-driving cars within the next decade.
These cars will deal with traffic, stop for pedestrians, and take you wherever you want to go, all while you sit back and play games on your iPhone.
The stickiest problem these car makers have to solve is; who is responsible when the self-driving car malfunctions, runs up on the sidewalk, causes carnage when it fails to stop at a red light?
The government is getting in on the act. Government regulators will have to determine the safety standards before these machines can take to the road.
The standards will be extremely high. Government safety inspectors are funny people. They don't care what your politics are. they just take safety very seriously.
I think about this whenever I board an airplane. I trust the safety inspectors to have checked my plane thoroughly.
I don't much like government. I don't think the political process should be taken at all seriously, and politicians should always be viewed with suspicion, like mobsters, or salesmen, or CEO's.
So, I am enjoying being un-governed.
Whatever it is, I'm against it.
But I am also against the government being shut down for too much longer.
Being un-governed truly is a peaceful feeling.
It's like that peaceful feeling you have in the airplane, right at that moment you have accepted what's about to happen, seconds before the airplane crashes into the side of the mountain.
-Peter Wick
October 14, 2013
Saturday, September 14, 2013
18. Sep. 2013 - Dog And Pony Show
Note: Key West - the novel; Key West episode One; "One-way Ticket," and Key West episode Two; "Cooking The Books" are all available from Wheelman Press. Coming soon will be Episode Three; "Papy On Trial." The following is a sneak peek
DOG AND PONY SHOW
"All rise," the bailiff said mechanically. "The Honorable Ian McCarthur presiding."
"Fine, fine. Sit down, everyone. Jesus!" McCarthur plopped heavily into his own chair and looked out at the room. "Well, Christ Almighty," he said. "The whole damn state of Florida here?"
A stony silence greeted McCarthur from the packed room.
McCarthur looked from one side of the room to the other. Every seat was filled.
The small overhead balcony was also packed. Court room B4 had seldom known so many people.
McCarthur looked at the prosecutor's table. Three men, impeccably dressed in expensive tweed suits, sat smugly, awaiting McCarthur's instructions.
McCarthur turned to his left, to the defendant's table, looked first at Belmont, then moved on to Davis. Finally McCarthur looked directly at Papy.
"Representative Papy," McCarthur said, "You're entertainment. We should move this trial to the Gators football stadium and sell tickets."
Papy lifted his head as if to respond, but McCarthur put a hand up."
"For chris'sake don't talk now. It wouldn't be appropriate. Bailiff, let's get this dog and pony show under way."
The bailiff rose with a piece of paper in his hands.
Papy, sitting stiffly between Davis and Belmont, stared blankly at the floor in front of the defendant's table. His ears tuned out the bailiff as the charges against him were read aloud. All Papy heard was the sound of dozens of pens scratching across notepad paper behind him.
This sound grew in his consciousness. every pen scraping across paper, noting these charges, to be printed in newspapers the following morning, scraping, scraping, louder and louder, until he turned around suddenly, and his eyes met those of Pat Murphy three rows back.
An elbow struck Papy in the ribs. Papy looked down with a start. Davis was whispering.
"Pap! Pap!"
"Hm?"
"How do you plead?"
"Oh, uh, why, not guilty!" Papy said loudly.
Davis was looking at him with a note of concern.
"Let the record show that the defendant pleads not guilty," McCarthur barked. "Thank God for that. Otherwise we wouldn't have any fun."
DOG AND PONY SHOW
"All rise," the bailiff said mechanically. "The Honorable Ian McCarthur presiding."
"Fine, fine. Sit down, everyone. Jesus!" McCarthur plopped heavily into his own chair and looked out at the room. "Well, Christ Almighty," he said. "The whole damn state of Florida here?"
A stony silence greeted McCarthur from the packed room.
McCarthur looked from one side of the room to the other. Every seat was filled.
The small overhead balcony was also packed. Court room B4 had seldom known so many people.
McCarthur looked at the prosecutor's table. Three men, impeccably dressed in expensive tweed suits, sat smugly, awaiting McCarthur's instructions.
McCarthur turned to his left, to the defendant's table, looked first at Belmont, then moved on to Davis. Finally McCarthur looked directly at Papy.
"Representative Papy," McCarthur said, "You're entertainment. We should move this trial to the Gators football stadium and sell tickets."
Papy lifted his head as if to respond, but McCarthur put a hand up."
"For chris'sake don't talk now. It wouldn't be appropriate. Bailiff, let's get this dog and pony show under way."
The bailiff rose with a piece of paper in his hands.
Papy, sitting stiffly between Davis and Belmont, stared blankly at the floor in front of the defendant's table. His ears tuned out the bailiff as the charges against him were read aloud. All Papy heard was the sound of dozens of pens scratching across notepad paper behind him.
This sound grew in his consciousness. every pen scraping across paper, noting these charges, to be printed in newspapers the following morning, scraping, scraping, louder and louder, until he turned around suddenly, and his eyes met those of Pat Murphy three rows back.
An elbow struck Papy in the ribs. Papy looked down with a start. Davis was whispering.
"Pap! Pap!"
"Hm?"
"How do you plead?"
"Oh, uh, why, not guilty!" Papy said loudly.
Davis was looking at him with a note of concern.
"Let the record show that the defendant pleads not guilty," McCarthur barked. "Thank God for that. Otherwise we wouldn't have any fun."
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