this makes 4 in a year.

All the raccoons seem to die in my backyard. There are now two perished which I will have to bury later today. K came in the bedroom weeping over the deaths. She is a mother and feels for the mother and children of all animals. Her compassion, sometimes hidden, has always made her beautiful.

nature has a way of knocking the wind out of you.

Ukulele's are a blast to play.

County stickers are due to be on vehicles today - I suppose I ought to go get one or two.

I've no interest in the goings on of wall street thought, again, I ought.

Now I need some wood, paint and a few other things that will go unmentioned as they are interesting only to myself and voyeurs.

Beautiful day, although a bit over done on the inside.

Accomplished a lot yesterday and it feels good - warm and toasty like the hives or something. Body now a bit on the worn side and deciding what I am going to do today along the same lines. All thoughts include power tools but what I really ought to do is sit in front of the power tool that brings me that much closer to the goal - namely, the IBM Selectric III - best power tool I have.

The poem I was intending on putting up here today is becoming a broadside from free penny press and may be available for free through this blog - I don't think it has been decided yet on distribution - So, that poem will not be appearing here today or for a long time as I would prefer it be gathered up in the published form. So I will substitute.

only the poor know

only the poor know of love's intensity/ many know only of mergers (marriage)/thus propagating the common ideal.// for love you merge the bodies (sex)/thus propagating life./love, joy, obsession, fixation, release/ and good sleep.

 - Hoc Scripsi

 

a day in the life

was with the same insurance company for about 14 years on the cars and cycle. Last August when I bought a new bike they quoted me three times what the same policy had cost four years before on a then new bike of the same make and model - I didn't go with them on that - when it came time for house and renter property insurance I went with the same company and although I thought it was high I went with it because what the fuck did I know - well just switched away from them and saved on the cars and houses about 1600 a year - haven't switched the Harley insurance because as of right now I am insuring through Harley and who knows motorcycles better then they?WIth the former company I insured through they would up my premiums every six months and I had to call and negoiate the rates back down and usually prevailed in getting them lower than they were the 6 months previous - yea for me but what a waste of time every six months.
Lesson - want to save money? shop around the insurance and give the big names a try - they will surprise you. I did not go with any company that hadn't been in the business for decades - nor did I go with any that advertised any specific or non-binding % off current coverage.

That is enough about the business side of life...

on the more fun side I have been on a lego building kick for a few weeks and am about to complete the Death Star which I received as a gift two Christmases ago. I love Lego and couldn't think of any better way to wind down the extremely busy weeks that have compromised the last two months - well, Lego and going to the range tomorrow with a good friend, Kevin. We are partners in pain - physical pain, not mental - physical which fucks with us mentally continually.

Not the best poet and certainly not nearly as entertaining as Pearl or Micael - but it will have to do.

a poem perhaps?

only sleep eases pain

only sleep eases pain

pain defines.

joy, happiness, collusion

love even distrust,

having dreams, night terrors, delusions.

all are unknown in entirety.

“how perfectly goddamned delightful it is

to be sure.”

every moments considered

length is by pains

varying degree.

 - Hoc Scripsi

Today

I am fairly embarrassed to call myself a blogger lately - as you can tell I've had other things on my mind and keeping up with everything is difficult - So, I've read almost no blogs, written very little in mine and in general am none too fazed by this.

The words on the page look foreign to me and today we recall the death of Willem de Kooning. Becoming a ghost of his own brush stoke today in 1997. 

Listening to Chopin, Opus 34, no. 2 in A minor - Writing a letter to a friend who I owe more than just that letter. I managed to nap between nine pm and eleven pm. awake now or still I can only think about Willem and Chopin, My friend and my pajamas.

Monday, in the gloaming.

My last cup of coffee for the day and it is burnt. The smell coming off the mug is too much for me to have my head around.
such a shame.

I need a cigarette and an off button for my brain.

yes, both are for my brain - because smoking does nothing positive for the lungs and I hate the way it stinks up the joint.

I've been creating and writing lately but have nothing to offer here as of yet. soon, soon.

woke up, got out of bed, dragged a comb across... no I didn't

I finished eating the remainder of a bag of potato chips to cap off my lunch. I nearly hate them as think they are greasy, tasteless abominations. I ate them as I was hungry and not in a mood to be any more decisive.
I am having an odd day and the body and mind are not operating as a unit.
Having intended to nearly end my facebook profile and all things connected to this blog on the weekend - I did it last night, not wanting to put off the difficult task of deleting a little over 1500 connections to people I never knew and have not gotten to know - no matter what the intentions were. For now I am okay to leave it with the people that are left there, people I actually know or have gotten to know through this blog - facebook brought me no readers, sold no books or so few that I was unable to notice. Not worth the extended effort that it took.
I feel the pain of losing another close friend though. A person that I have associated with for 12 years and knew intimately, personally - a bond established before either one of us owned a computer. He is not at deaths door but at the door of something which I have been unable to join him, uninvited I do not intrude.

Life is becoming increasingly isolated, medications have proven no assistance as my mind's mettle cannot be undone by such simple ingredients. The New Yorker's jokes have become stale and it's commentary mundane and repetitive. Altogether my connection to the outside world is through magazines, tired of them all - I am reaching out through the space interrupted, the space between.

Today has many famous birthdays, but we recall that today my brother-in-law would have turned 31. He is remembered nearly daily around here and his magnitude is greatly missed.

I'm behind on everything - even sleep.

Jackson, my son is sick so the wife and I have not been sleeping and might as well be sick. O, to live in a sick house.

I've two major poems to finish and two letters to write - one to my lovely Aunt Kate who does not deserve to have me fall behind on my letters to her and another to a fellow writer who wants to get in on the mid twentieth century communication kick.

the book is out and selling well enough, (they make excellent Christmas presents  - or Hanukkah gifts as well) and I would like to thank the people that have helped to get it further out there - thank you. Send me a photo or picture and I will link to your blog on my page here. It's the least I could do.

napping now before I go to the DMV and register my truck - I have one more day until I am more behind on that then I can afford.


the tulips surrender
in the fall
the tulip surrender

 - hoc scripsi

awoke in my own bed

 I awoke in my own bed this morning still worn out from the previous days driving. I do not regret my life.
By this I mean that I have lived hard and worn out my body. By this I mean that I have loved fully and still love completely my wife and son. By this I mean I may be crazy and have gotten that way from various treatments, concussions, drug and alcohol abuse and there is more, but for today and yesterday I think that I do not regret my life as once I could drive California to Chicago in thirty hours and still be okay after and now two days and 1100 miles with a few wrong turns has shown my endurance and that I do not regret my life.


ENDURANCE

having endured years of pain
solitude
and feeling like a crippled

boy,
I now have this painted
deep red four walls with a

couch room where I can do all of
my writing
without any concern of troubling anyone

even at 3 am.
I take naps on the couch brought from
ikea for around 800 bucks, it

has no real comfort but does
not make my back sore and
I do not have to move while sleeping to

remain.
I have a small desk on wheels
that a typewriter sits along side

a half empty box of 20 lb
fine business paper on which I compose
all my typewritten drafts.

a book shelf mainly occupied by typewriters,
clocks, a skeleton, amithaba and
a picture of 20 cats my

son drew first for his grandmother
then his mother and finally me.
I keep a massive dictionary in case

I need to consider a word or a spelling on
a cart like the one for the typewriter but grey.
My chair isn’t that comfortable but that

is best. Too relaxed and I will not write
too much or too well if I write at all.
and that of writing,

I don’t do too much of that now
as
I have a place in which to perform it.

 - I wrote this