I’m an Asshole

It this modern era that we live in the concept of friendship has taken on new meaning. Not only do we have good friends, casual friends, and fair weather friends, but now we have cyber friends. Each has their place.

I have recently been called an asshole by one friend.

The question that needs to be addressed is if I am in fact an "asshole."

I think it’s nearly impossible to label one person universally as an asshole. It all depends on perspective. For instance I feel that our current President is by and large an asshole. There are still people who support him and think that he’s doing a good job. That’s my perspective and my opinion.

So am I an asshole?

Well not to go into details let me paint a brief picture of the conflict.

I received a post on myspace that really got on my nerves. It just struck me the wrong way. Admittedly I was already in a mood when I read it and I let the person who forwarded it to me know my feelings of the person who composed it. To cut to the chase I referred to the author as a "retard."

Does this make me an asshole?

Actually in this case it does make me an asshole.

Referring to any person as a retard in a derogatory manner is an asshole move. A major asshole move. I work with people with cognitive impairments. Just because somebody scores 70 or below on an I.Q. test (the legal qualification to be considered retarded) does not demean them as human beings. They have souls and capabilities and are fully able to lead productive and fulfilling lives on their own terms. Hence by referring to this individual as a retard is an insult to a whole group of people who are already misunderstood and whose abilities are underestimated. That’s fair to call me an asshole.

Am I a universal asshole for doing this?

Once again a matter of opinion. Although this was an asshole move I would like to think that other actions in my life counter balance this. Hence I am guilty of assholism just like every person is from time to time. I owe up to this. I was not drunk, stoned, or hoped up on meth. I take full accountability for my actions.

Now I don’t know this person I insulted. I can’t comment on their intelligence or personality but I won’t take back my opinion that it was a stupid sophomoric post. That’s my opinion. I have a right to my opinion. I should have kept my opinion to myself that is true but it was said and I can’t take it back. If my best friend wrote that post I would have the same opinion, although I probably would have been more tactful about it.

So obviously my friend came to the defense of her friend. I can’t blame her. I’d defend my friend. She questioned my own writing style, grammar, and spelling. Fair enough. I don’t spell well and sometimes I use too many qualifiers. Then again it hasn’t stopped me from getting a bachelor’s degree and two master’s degrees. (Admittedly two of those degrees are in liberal arts.) Generally when I know I’m going to be graded or the work will see publication I have somebody edit it. That’s what editors are for.

Well this friend of mine deleted me as a friend.

This I find to be rather thin skinned. As if I am not allowed to have a difference of opinion. Or I can’t agree to disagree. I’ll go on a limb and call it down right Draconian.

One has to look no farther than my own friend list to see that I don’t have many friends on myspace. That’s because friendship means something to me. I’m old fashioned that way.

Every person there has meaning to me. Many of these people I had lost contact with and reconnected with through myspace. This I am eternally grateful to myspace for because these people truly do enrich my life and I missed them. A couple of them I have never met but have had contact with through emailing and I genuinely like them and would be happy to hang out with them if we ever had the opportunity to meet face to face.

Hence I am a little hurt and offended to be deleted because of a difference of opinion and yes, for acting the part of an asshole. Especially since our friendship was one where I was the one who would invite this person out, show up to show support for a meeting when it was asked, and to call when it was their birthday and to bring a gift. I did this because friendship means something.

So if I am to be deleted. Oh well. I know I have real friends and my real friends will indulge the times when I do act like an asshole. They might call me on it or they might let it slide but I know at the end of the day they will still be my friend.

4:58 PM - 4 Comments - 6 Kudos - Add Comment

A passion for . . . .

I was recently at a bookstore and I happened upon an interesting book called Book Smart.

Book Smart is a book about reading book. A one year primer on what books to read in order to be come well read. As an example the first month focuses on classics such as Beowulf, The Epic of Gilgamesh, and The Divine Comedy. How funny a book about what books to read in order to impress people that you're well read.

A recent AP news story says that less Americans are reading for pleasure than ever before. Perhaps this is in part because of the amount of entertainment choices that are readily available. With the internet, video games, television, movies, dvds, and the ability to watch whatever one wants whenever one wants this should come as no surprise. In all fairness there's a lot of programming that's quite good. I'm not kidding. When faced between choices of what to watch I often find the History Channel, Biography Channel, Discovery, and Animal Planet to be far more interesting than network programming.

Despite this I still derive personal satisfaction from the printed word. I like books, newspapers, and magazines. I'd like to think that there will always be a number of us who are devoted to the printed word. Even with our modern technology and the ability to bring a portable device into the bathroom that one can download books, newspapers, and magazines into there is nothing like the smell of newsprint or the texture of turning paper over on the tips of one's fingers.

I find the ideal of a book that is a primer as to the great literature of our world to be in one sense comical and on the other hand a tad perplexing and pretentious. Not that I have anything against classic literature. As I said I love reading. I like reading antiquated works, but I think one should read out of one's own curiosity. That is the real joy in reading.

There's an interesting passage in Henry Miller's Plexus which beautifully illustrates this love of exploration. He talks about spending hours in the library and how reading one work leads him to explore another subject or another author. That's the beauty of reading. It's like a vast ocean that becomes vaster the farther one treads into the deep.

Besides who cares how well read you are if you take no joy in what you're reading. Lack of passion is as transparent as a window. Only a person of equal shallowness would take interest in a reading list garnered on the suggestion of another for the sole reason of impressing at a cocktail party. One should read and do what one takes enjoyment out of and what one can cultivate a passion for. No one is more interesting to talk to than that person who loves what they do and enjoys talking about it, no matter what the subject.

I spoke to a young man who is getting his degree in biology and he told me about the theory of co-evolution. This was a subject that I would not normally be interested in but because he was so passionate about it I couldn't help but become interested and wanted to hear more.

This seems to be the key.

As a side note my friend Amanda told me about a website called LibraryThing.com, in which you list the books you've read or are reading. An interesting concept and a good way to keep track of what you're reading. I recommend it.

3:25 PM - 2 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment

Smokin’ Joe Says

When a former World Heavyweight boxing champion gives you advice on how to excercise it is advisable that one take note. For instance the great Smokin' Joe Frazier has this nuggest of wisdom when it comes to roadwork/running/jogging:

"People who run or jog for fun or in races wear sneakers specially made for runnning. I tell my fighters to wear what I wore and what the fighters in the old days wore: construction boots, or work boots. Here's why: number one, they're heavier than sneakers. You get your legs used to running in construction boots, they'll never get too heavy in a fight, when all you're wearing is boxing shoes. Number two, they protect your ankles and give great support. If you've got a fight coming up and your're doing your roadwork and you step in a hole or something and twist your ankle, forget it-your fight's off. Unless you're wearing construction boots. Then you don't have to worry about twisting your ankle"

And there you have it.

Screw these kinesiology majors, and pretty boy fitness gurus and their lame infomercials. Who are you going to believe. Smokin' Joe, who won a gold medal at the Olympics, was the undisputed World Heavyweight champion, and who went mono e mone against Muhammaed Ali over the course of 44 rounds, or some jerk off who has a two week personal trainer degree and spends most of his time admiring himself in the mirror?

Remember that classic movie Rocky?

Remember where Rocky's from?

Any coincidence that Smokin' Joe is from Philadelphia as well? (The Mecca of boxing and all things vostile and tough) Is it any coincidence that Rocky spent his time breaking the ribs of slaughtered cattle at a meat packing factory with his fists as part of his training, and wouldn't you know but Smokin' Joe did the same thing?

Rocky beat Appollo Creed for the title and gave Creed his first professional defeat.

Fraizer beat Ali in their first fight: The Fight of the Century, to gain universal recognition as heavyweight champ, and handing the "Butterfly" his first professional defeat.

End of argument.

Now if you'll excuse me it's time to do my roadwork: Fraizer style and get ready to start "throwin dem hurtin bombs"

7:54 AM - 1 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

Poetry Readings
Category: Writing and Poetry

Last night I was in the upper Haight with my sister Naima. After eating and doing the required trip to Amoeba Records, where I snagged a vinyl of Frank Sinatra and a double disc set of Shirley Bassey, for the grand total of $3.24, we headed over to the Club Deluxe, where they had jazz and poetry night.

Now I could go for the obvious and praise the jazz band and try to build myself up by knocking the varied poets but as I believe Yeats said in regards to criticism of amateur theatre: That would be like attacking a stick of butter with a hot knife. Besides who am I to critize. Poetry is very subjective and very personal. It takes a lot of courage to get up in front of a bunch of strangers and say something that comes from the heart. This really was a community gathering spot for people to express themselves and I commend everyone who got up there. I will say that there were a couple of people who's work struck a cord with me and others who didn't but that is what its like with poetry.

I thought I might show up there sometime and try to read a couple of my own. I printed out a couple, read them outloud and realized: "Damn, these suck." My mini van one is kind of funny if you know me but comes across terribly when read a loud. Very bitter, which was not its intention. It was suppose to be tounge and cheek, not angry.

I have another I wrote that was entered into the Peace Poetry Contest. My attempt to win a $1000 scholarship. . . . . I didn't win. It doesn't read well  outloud either but here it is for your enjoyment:

DOGS

When dog meet in polite society
Wherever that may be
Big Dog, little dog, pure bred, mutt
It matters not at all

They Stick their noses in one another's asses
You see that's what dogs do
If you're cool it really doesn't matter
How loud or soft you bark

Big dog, little dog, pure bred, mutt
To a dog your're just a dog

Are people that much different?

Despite how we may look
Black, white, brown, or yellow
We all bleed the same stuff
Spit the same bacteria
Born of woman return to dust

In the interim we share the same earth
Different climates that is true
Yet our wants are not so different
Despite our different tounges

A little love
A little peace (of the soul and of the earth)
A place to watch our children grow
Free of fear and unpleasant stuff

Perhaps we should take a lesson from our friend the dog
And stick our asses in the air
Take a long deep draught
And you will find
At the end we all stink just the same
Human's just a human too


I don't understand why I didn't win. My mom told me the ass reference was on the vulgar side. Can you believe that?

9:21 AM - 4 Comments - 7 Kudos - Add Comment

Loverboy's still Workin For the Weekend
Category: Music

The Kid was hot tonight!!

A warm night at the Sonoma County Fair found myself with a couple of my oldest and trusted friends: Sean and Jason. For months we've been looking foward to this big evening. The return of the greatest Canadian rock n'roll band of all time. Bigger than Aldo Nova, Rush, and Bryan Adams combined. I'm talking about the triumphant Bay Area return of Loverboy!!!

With heads raised high and hopes higher we entered the Sonoma County Fair. Thanks to the generosity of Jason's employer we were comped in both parking and entrance wise. That's $7 saved that could be put foward for merchandise for these monsters of Rock n'Roll. A Workin for the Weekend Tour 2006 T-Shirt. The band was already smokin off of their roof shaking performance up in Medicine Hat.

We entered into the amphitheatre around 7:30 and grabed a three seats on the steel benches. The $5 V.I.P. seating up front was already crowded. Ladies with big hair and neon eye liner were on the verge of brawling for the coveted S.R.O. section at the front of the stage. Perhaps they weren't "One of the Lucky Ones" chosen to party with the band during their Oakland Collesium gig back in 81 and now was their chance to fulfil that lifelong dream.

If the foundation was scraped off the faces of all these ladies Heavenly could be supplied with fresh powder for the entire summer off season.

Although Sean was sporting his Poison T-Shirt and Jason had on a "Wipe of Wimp Rock" cut off Tee we were conspicuously out of place amongst the hardened rock rats, bikers, and curious baby stroller pushing teenage moms. One might think they had walked into a tanning shop with all the leathery skin. The result of too much UVB, hard alcohol, and two packs a day I suspect. I was impressed with a biker who had his double chin tatooed. I was wondering if perhaps his neck was tatooed originally or had he gotten the extra chin tatooed with the goal of losing weight to have his neck tatooed.

The band was hot from the beginning. After a two minute synth intro they tore into the first number. Our lead singer sporting jeans and an open long sleeved shirt with a T-Shirt underneath looks as if like an amoeba he split himself in two but negleted to discard the second half. He's gained a few pounds. No red leather pants or bandanas I'm afraid. Half way through the first number you could tell that he was blown up. It was as if he'd run a half marathon.

The benches at this point weren't doing it for us. We needed to rock with the proverbial cock out, minus the cock being out. We found ourselves standing in the back; hitting air guitar solos, drumming the thin air, and Jason and I, not embarrassed beating the singer to the punch by knowing the lyrics to "Turn Me Loose, Only the Lucky Ones, Hot Girls in Love, The Kid is Hot Tonight," and the coup d'ete: "Workin For the Weekend."

Glancing to my side in true Sonoma County fashion Sean and I spoted two ladies with bad peroxide jobs. One lady of whom had the peroxide roots for one third of her hair and the rest being red. The question was were they young or hags because from that distance we couldn't tell.

Knowing that this could be the one that got away. The question that would forever haunt our memories, Sean did the reconisence and followed the ladies as they made their way out after "Hot Girls in Love." The report was that the red head peroxide girl was about 13 and the other woman was her mother. Wheeeew. I'm glad that question was answered.

The only draw back was after all that money saved there was no merch to buy. How could such legends of Canadian rock go out on the road without a healthy supply of T-Shirts and their latest platnum album? I know. They must have sold out their entire stock up in Medicine Hat.

There was an earthquake around 8:50 that evening. Jason's wife called us to ask if we felt anything after leaving the show at 10pm. A civilized hour to end a concert.

That wasn't an fault line you were feeling. That was just Loverboy rockin Northern Calfornia.

11:55 AM - 4 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Lon Chaney's going to get you if you don't watch out
Category: Movies, TV, Celebrities

I've spent the last several day rehabilitating my knee after injuring it running. I've been popping advil like candy and icing like a mad man. Yesterday in my little abode I deceided to have a mini film fest and watched a double feature of Laugh Clown Laugh and HE Who gets Slapped. Both of which featured the great film actor Lon Chaney Sr.

Mr. Chaney has been a great influence in my life. Nobody can convey suffering as Mr.Chaney can. A natural pantomime, both of his parents were deaf so he was trained at a young age to convey emotion through his hands, face, and body. He was a natural for the silent screen.

He was also a master of make up. Hence the moniker of "The Man of a Thousand Faces." It was said that he could play anything except something beautiful. It was also rumored that he would do terrible injury and destortion to himself to acheive his often grotesque characters. For instance that he devised an instrument that shoved his nose back when he was the Phantom in the original Phantom of the Opera, and that he carried over 60 ibs. on his back when he played Quasimodo in the Hunchback of Notre Dame, and my favorite that he put wires in his eye socets to create the bugged out look of the vampire in London After Midnight. All bullocks. He was a pro and wouldn't injure himself to the point where he wouldn't be able to practice his craft. Of course to an impressionable 17 year old I ate this up and Mr. Chaney was almost like a God in my estimation.

One destortion that was true was that he did tie his legs back so tight when playing a double amputee in The Penalty that he could only film for short stretches at a time and it took over an hour for his legs to get out of spasm. All the more incredible because there's a scene in the film where he pulls himself up a wall using arm strenght alone. The man was strong.

I scowered used book stores for the out of print Man of a Thousand Faces bio about Mr.Chaney my junior and senior year of high school to no avail. I even went so far as to make photo copies of an encylopedia which had a large entrant about Mr.Chaney at the Library of Congress when I visited my uncle in D.C.

Not knowing what to do with my life during a college orientation senior year I looked in a catalogue and saw make up artist. Just like Lon Chaney. What the hell. That's what I'll do. Hence never having done theatre in high school I deceided to become a theatre major when I entered college. The rest is history.

Now Mr.Chaney has a tendency to over act at times. This is an actor who benifits from a director to shape his performance. That's exactly what we have in Laugh Clown Laugh. Not a bad film and the first featured role of Loretta Young who is earth shakingly beautiful but nothing special.

HE Who Gets Slapped on the other hand is amazing. The very first film put out by MGM an what a film it is. Lon Chaney is superb. Subtle, creppy, and tragic as a wronged scientist who's work and wife are stolen by his patron the Baron. The scientist becomes HE a clown who gets slapped constantly to the delight of the public. The film is inovative, visually stunning, and I think the performances hold up over the course of time. It's Lon Chaney at his finest.

Any true student of the craft of acting would benifit from watching the work of Lon Chaney. These days with our method actors they concentrate so much on the emotion that they often times neglect the body which is just as important in performance as the words being spoken.

By the way. Lon Chaney made one sound movie. A remake of his silent film the Unholy Three and just to show people that he could make the transition he played a vantriliquiste. Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff were also inadvertably helped by Lon Chaney as well. Mr. Chaney died at a young age of throat cancer. Ironically in his last few days he was as mute as his parents and had to communicate through sign language.

He was more than likely going to play Dracula and the Frankenstein monster.

8:36 AM - 2 Comments - 1 Kudos - Add Comment

Butt Trumpet, too sensitive for punk
Category: Music

On a school night, no less, I ventured out after 10pm to check out long standing punk denziens Butt Trumpet at Annie's Social Club on Folsom St. Annie's use to be the CW Saloon and then spent a spell as some yuppie hangout before returning to its roots playing obscure and local bands.

The band before the headliners, the No No Spots, were pretty decent. Reminicient of that hard rockin, 80's synth pop that seems to be making a comeback. My best description would be that they're similar to the Sounds. They came down from Vancouver on tour.  The band was mostly ladies with their feathered 80's hair cuts and all. On keys the girl looked like a femmed version of Kevin Bacon from Footloose and the basest looked like a female doppledager of Keith Richards. I was in an audience of about 10 and you could tell they were playing their hearts out but they let their frustration known about the lack of energy from the crowd. The band really rocked and they should take their place among the other great Canadian rock outfits like Aldo Nova and Loverboy.

Butt Trumpets' line up consited of the lead vocalists, Tom Bone, and three young ladies, two bassist and one guitar, and a skinny dude on drums. Classic diddlies such as "Clusterfuck" were played along with some new material I wasn't as familiar with like, "Inflatable." Tom took his shirt off, two of the ladies took their shirts off and the other lady took her pants off, but we're still talking PG-13. The band was pissed at us: the eight people watching the show for a lack of energy. Hence the R rated performance would be saved for a more worthy gaggle of spectators.  Hey I thought: "I'm boppin my head over here, what do you want?"

At the end of their set, one of the bassists, who looks like she should be entering 9th grade, and who had been playing tonsil tag with Tom Bone of stage, did the standard punk, "Fuck you. You're worse than L.A. crowds. You suck . . . yah di ya, di ya ya ya" My friends and I cheered heartily for this outburst. This is punk. You're suppose to do things like this. I didn't realize they were serious.

So I went up to the raven haired guitar player who looked kind of like Tara King from the Avengers afterwards. (not the bassist) She greeted me at the door when I walked in, and well, I felt sympatico, and I said, "You know, you hurt my feelings when you said we were a bad audience."

She got very defensive and stated that we should have been going crazy out there, who cares what our friends say or people think.

I then informed her that I generally rock out to Air Supply, and I wasn't use to such hard rockin music but I did my best. I complimented her on her guitar playing, and said that she scared me. Which I meant as a tounge in cheeck compliment but which she responded with, "That's good. You should be scared, we're punk rock."

She then stormed off to the john or the back or wherever.

When did punk get so sensitive?

This isn't that shoe gazing emo crap were talking about here is it?

I was interested in continuing the discussion, but she made me feel genuinely bad, although I knew the situation was absurd. Besides isn't that "Fuck you" to the audience so 30 years ago. I mean nobody's shocked or offended by that. I thought about telling her that the best way to get under people's skin in a town is always insulting their women, eating habits, sports teams, intelligence or lack of, put on the false charm and talk about how they're the "Best" audience that they've ever played for and they were going to give them the performance that they so richly deserved since they got paid at the end of the night regardless. They could then phone it home.

Isn't the punk rock motif about not caring? Isn't punk rock being a non-conformist? Isn't the expectation that I rock out like one of those shirtless burned out hippies at a drum circle in the same vein as any other mindless crowd activity such as "Put your hands in the air" or "You put your right leg in?"   Wasn't my act of standing there looking pretty and bopping my head a punk rock statement unto itself? Wasn't I going against the established norms? A reverse reaction to what was expected?

Perhaps this idea of what punk rock is to our friends Butt Trumpet is like any other philisophical trapings. They put on the uniform without annalyzing the ideals that spurred the movement. Now the late great Diesel Queens, that band was punk rock. I miss them so. Those guys really didn't care. They lost money every time they played. That's punk.

It's too bad. I even considered letting that guitar player pick me up at the end of the evening, since that's a rock n'roll  thing to do.  I was already to sacrifice my virtue and play groupie, let her have her way with me, but that attitude made her lose out . . . . big time.   Maybe she'll get lucky the next time Butt Trumpet plays SF and perhaps they'll be 16 of us boppin our heads this time.

5:44 AM - 6 Comments - 7 Kudos - Add Comment

Widow Maker
Category: Writing and Poetry

Widow Maker

Howl in the breaking wind
Creaking limb
Sway of weight and earth
The sound of thunder
Splits your ear
Wood like pulp
Rains down in tatters
Wood like sticky blood sap
Quites your senses
Splinters your mind
The arm comes down like a hammer
Now silence . . . . .

Those fuckers are dangerous

8:25 PM - 1 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

Resevoir C
Category: Travel and Places

One recent weekend I found a need to get out of the city.

I just needed to get away. To calm and center myself from the recent trials and turbulances that life has to offer. Hence one Friday evening I packed up the car and set about on the great freeways and highways of California and shot myself up to the middle of no where.

Now that first evening and day I explored the caves and topography of one Lava Beds National Monument. Way up on the north coast of California, near the border of Oregon. There was hardly anyone there and plenty of time to reflect, explore, and drive with one arm. (A luxury one never has in the bustle of living in a high density populated area) I had a plethera of old country tunes in the car to keep me company: Hank Penny, Hank Williams, Johnny Cash, Wanda Jackson, and I was feeling good.

I had read about Resevoir C in a camping book I own. Out in the middle of no where. Nobody I talked to had ever heard about it and this intrigued me. So much so that I decided to check it out.

To get to Resevoir C one must take the underused highway in the norhern part of the state, 299. There's a small road, I believe 73, that juts off, about two miles outside of the hamlet of Alturus. A typical small town, where the young ladies are fresh faced and pretty and the middle aged ladies are big haired, tanned, and leathery, with not much variation in-between.

Going up 73 it didn't take long for the road to go from asphalt to dirt. It remained this way for 16 miles. Red dust flying off the back tires and sticking to the back fender like greese trickling down a greesy spoon's wall.

Resevoir C is rather uninspired. More a lake and estuary in appearance than a resevoir. Our surrounding landscape was littered with small trees, the obvious result of a forest fire having ravaged the area sometime past and this being new growth. When I arrived there was a lone pick up truck by the water's edge. The resevoir is a good place to fish but alas I have no fishing equipment, although it is a past time I respect and one day hope to indulge in.

I set up camp and soon started up my fire and cooked my meal. Hot dogs simmered over and open flame followed by a chaser of roasted marshmellows.

Come night fall strange things started to happen. Well not so strange since I was in the middle of the Modoc National Forest, forest being the key word. The woods came alive, and the lone pick up truck packed up and drove off. I was alone in the woods. No ifs ands or buts. I was there bymyself, possibly the only human pressence for miles around and I was getting nervous.

Frogs croaking is one thing but there were the strange sounds beyond the tree lined clearing on the other side of the resevoir. Sometimes it sounded like cows in heat, sometimes it sounded like a little girl singing, sometimes it sounded like chanting. Who the heck knows what it actually was. There were the sounds of coyotes howling and owls hooting and then there was the wind. The wind ripping through the trees which made the trees literally groan. At one point I thought I heard something growl behind me.

Now I wasn't completely alone. I had my aluminum baseball bat: Freddy with me. Ole Freddy use to be my companion when my dad worked nights and he would say if anything should happen the bats in the closet. The first thing out when night fall came was walking to the primitive toilet. To hell with that. The tree next to my camp was as good a pissing post as that toilet 100 yards off would be.

More frightening I found than then the thought of wild animals was the possibility of human freaks that might come up to Resevoir C. With all that land and isolation should some psycho decide to off me my body could be well dispossed of and never be found. I would be just one more missing persons. I had found a shell to a Winchester 357 Magnum and burnt beer cans around my camp sight so I knew a certain kind of good ole boy had used it in the past. One doesn't have to look too far or use their imagination to find stories of psychopaths and weird cults in the backwoods of our United States.

There was only one thing to do. Put the fire out. Crawl into the car, where I had set up camp, lock the door and take my sleeping pill.

Do you know what happened?

. . . . .

I woke up in the morning.

The sun was shinning.

Everything was OK.

8:18 AM - 3 Comments - 6 Kudos - Add Comment

Bees
Category: Life

Yesterday afternoon I found myself down at the Polo Fields in Golden Gate Park. I had just finished my run and was stretching against the fence that lies in front of the grandstand right before the inside track. I was in the midst of a lunge when by chance I glanced down and spyed a lone honey bee stagering around on the pavement.

I find bees to be facinating. Their level of organization and industriousness. The honey bee is a beautiful animal. Originally from Italy. They are know for their placid nature and, well . . . . honey.

The life span of a worker bee is generally three weeks. When you compare this to the lifespan of the Queen bee, who lives anywhere from two to six years, to the worker the Queen must appear to be immortal. A demi-God.

The honey bee is also well known for defying several principles of what we know of about gravity and mechanics, i.e. the bee should not be able to fly and support its body mass with the wing span it has. It is no surprise then that after several weeks the bees wings become frayed and it can no longer fly.

It's at this point that the worker will usually excuse itself from the hive and wander off by itself to die. If by chance the worker has a particular emotional attachment to its home and a particular love of this thing we call life, some of her sisters will either forcibly remove the offender from the hive or in somecases kill the worker and dump them out. Ouch. The life of a bee is not an easy one.

You work from the moment of inception and when you can't work anymore you take yourself out to die or you are kicked out. Not discimilar to traditional Eskimo society, where when the old can no longer keep up with the group they are left behind to die. I shall never complain about social security again.

I surmised the situation and I considered the possibility of ending the honey bees life. A quick, fast death as oppossed to a long drawn out  slow demise and the real possibility of being eaten alive by opportunistic ants, but who am I to make that call.

Nature has its own logic. The bee has its place as does the ant as does the platapuss. The only anonimaly in the scheme of things seems to be man.

Personally I don't like to kill things. The exception being mosquitos when they're flying around my head (disease carriers) and ants, if they have a large scale invasion of my living space. Otherwise I usually live and let live. Spiders I leave alone. If they are too scary looking I'll put a glass over them and escourt them outside. Flys I open the door for to let out. (The exception is a large scale invasion which only happens if something has died in the wall)

Although the world of bees on the outside appears to be a brutal society one must not anthropomorphsize the situation. What is done is not done out of spite or viciousness but out of instinct.

Man on the other hand works much differently. We are capable of great compassion. Of caring for our old, sick, and strangers but we are also capable of the greatest evils and basest acts that would make a honey bee blush.

Interesting.

8:05 AM - 3 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment