Reflections on 4 AM with four "radical" white men and a bottle of tequila.

Flowing in lightly on the white winds, whispers of privilege elicit hot responses shot from the hipsters, blowing hard out of XY windbags. In our heady defense of our own efforts to "modulate the dominant academic discourse," we throw around big words and fill rooms with the loud sound of our white-male apologeticism. In that quintessentially Canadian manner, sorry is a word often invoked; yet the other words on either side indicate, with complex subtlety, that we are sorry not for being domineering but for the fact that no one understands that we understand that we have something to apologise for.

We formulate apologies of hierarchy and try to talk over each other the whole time. We apologise with such dominance and verbosity as to preclude even the acceptance of our apology; no one else can get a word in edgewise. Thus, our educated, white males' polemical monologue on injustice blows on, ruffling feathers, rattling the drums of privileged resistance, and never permitting the other's existence or experience to enter the equation.


We dominate all that we touch. How do we cease when it seems we cannot stop dominating even our friends and our families? Nous--les hommes blancs--who seek education so that we might better the world, how can we apply what we learn? How do we fight domination without dominating? How do we proliferate a worldview that values all people without establishing hierarchies not just of quantity of knowledge, but also of kind. To assert a radical, white, straight, educated, colonial male analysis and to project the resulting worldview onto all issues is to appropriate and colonise the discourse of resistance. So if we are truly committed to change, what are we learning for?

A Message to My Younger Self

Relax! Eat those double chocolate muffins more slowly; sit and watch the birds; always make time to write. Good or bad, this too shall pass, so take a moment to savour it--to reflect upon it--before it does.

 

After all, the Dark-eyed Juncos outside the window will not tell you anything about life if you never stop to ask. Let your eyes wander and your mind roam and let no one tell you how you should live. You were not put here to worry whether you are living a good life, but to live it; so feel it out and think not too hard about it.

 

It's all very well and good to know where you wish to go: if you focus you will get there one day; but do not chase your dreams so fast as to overlook the present. You can be only where you are now; if you spend your whole life trying to make it "there" then you will never fully be here.

 

Life should be a short walk, not a long drive; so go where your feet take you, not where the road dictates.

Sunday at my new place

Overlooking the lake, I sit sheltered under the veranda roof. Chirping birds fill my ears at the same time as does Supertramp, and I watch the reflection of the trees bouncing up to me off the rippling water. The tranquil, vacant wharf floats soaked with rain and I can hear a woodpecker chipping into a nearby tree. Looking up, I can see it gripping upside down the branches of a slender little deciduous, its white-striped black head shimmying up a slim limb.

A new roommate at this new place of mine shares the name of the ex-girlfriend with whom I used to live, and even from outside I can hear her remark incredulously that it is almost October. Reflecting on her disbelief, I note that I too can hardly believe it: it is so warm out and, though it rains no longer, all things outside rest wet, the moisture held so well by the mosses, lichen, liverworts, grasses.

Some small form of waterfowl floats across the surface of the lake, which mirrors the argentine-cloud sky. I cannot yet tell what species of waterfowl; its shape resembles that of a loon, but it is clearly too small.

Woods surround the lake, including numerous old growth Douglas-firs. The sun begins to shine and I feel sure that I should stay put: I have reading to do; I am back in school and constantly working. Yet, how often does one live in the woods on a lake? This is my first time living in such a locale and I feel inclined to relinquish a great many of the pursuits that now detract from the time I have to wander, to swim, to enjoy, and to explore.

What am I doing here typing on my computer? Do I hope to convince myself with the elegance of my phrasing that words could somehow ever be as beautiful as life uninterpreted?

Humdrum basement

I am once again lodged for but a fortnight in the basement of my parents' house in Toronto. It puts me back a few years, making me feel as I always did here over holiday breaks from university. It makes me think of my old blog (www.myspace.com/thesocialfabric) and of all my old fears. The old fears come back when I'm lodged in this basement, staying up until 4 am and sleeping past noon, and it makes me want to revive the blogging.

Besides, I wrote a pretty killer letter to the head honchos at work the other day to let them know they're being fools; it got me pretty psyched on my under-utilised skills. So here goes nothing.

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The keyboard on my brother's silver MacBook Pro flutters quietly like the padding paws of a nimble-footed pussy cat running over hardwood flooring. There's a big, black flat-screen monitor behind the Mac and two speakers on either side. The larger speakers are foot-tall black boxes with reverb cones staring out at me like massive, yellow eyes; each sits atop three milk crates. The desk and the piano are cluttered with cups, cans, and bottles. McDonald's and Coca-Cola creep into my peripheral vision. Screw drivers, a pocket knife, a bag full of plectrums, a cigarette lighter, dad's old digital camera. Electronic equipment-- mostly musical-- abounds all around the room. Behind me, the closets' sliding doors left open expose dad's old TV, relegated to the basement for the sake of the elder son. Well-aged gaming systems are set up and sit in wait of another session of Super Mario World or Ken Griffey Jr. Major League Baseball. Four guitars, a bass, and there's ukulele hanging on the wall beside father's framed photos of Saudi Arabia and the family trip to Petra. The cluttered stuff is nothing new, but is stuff of such a different sort from when I dwelt here.

Outside it is not cold, and I feign ignorance when asking myself why not. I swear that Christmas was always white when I was a child; but in the past half-dozen years, I cannot recall a single holiday season that boasted snow the whole time. Every year seems warmer and greyer; this year, on Christmas Day it poured like it does in the rainforest. I think the climate has already changed. How much more is in store?

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Once again, it is past 03:00 and my eyes are heavy. My mind wanders off into the mist and dimness of a fatigued brain, wanders off into the west where the rest of my life waits in limbo for the holiday season to cease. BC has been treating me well, and I wonder how well her spinach grows now and if there's snow. If there's Christmas rain in Ontario, is there Christmas snow on the raincoast?

My Nova girl might tell me but I can't yell loudly enough, and it's even past midnight there. I wouldn't wish to wake her, what with her early morning ice-cracking and lake paddling and bike straddling to do before settling down to winter greenhouse farming. So I'll just ramble on in wonderment as to whether the weather is fair, foul, or freezing over there.

Perhaps sleeping cold in a trailer, tucked tight under covers on a starry night. Perhaps warm in a farm house huddled up close to a raging fire, knitting I know not what for I know not whom. Perhaps crashed in a warm bed in a warm room in the Royal Commodore. Who's to say? Not me, nor you.

What I can say for certain, though, is that there is much too much distance here in this vast colonial nation. A single country as large as the whole of Europe! What utterly nuttered royal British nitwit decided that such a country was a reasonable proposition? Oh Canada! You are a continent unto yourself, and Shell, Exxon, and BP shall be your constituent nations. May they colonise you yet further, tear away your boreal forests, dig out your greasy black bowels, and burn it all! What a blazing bright future we might make with so vast a fire! Oh joy. Yes. We'll burn it all in a big bonfire. Stephen Harper will smile approvingly at us when we roast marshmallows over his tar-sand fires and drink Molson Export in our own country. Meanwhile his fat cat friends will proudly reap profits on earth-rape oil exported to China in exchange for more Wal-Mart garbage.

A nation too large! Seven hours to span it with metal wings, five days with the help of 150 petroleum powered horses, and lord knows how long otherwise. A nation too large for a future! I write madly and without meaning in a basement in the dark heart of this sordid, bloated country, and it is 4 AM again!

Adieu,
B

Thought-Bubble Mind

This is a real oldie from Wednesday, February 20th, 2008. I'm posting it in response to Gleb's Thought Bubble.
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Saccharine kiss, a sugar twist
To complement my
Coffee-black and coffee-bitter
Thought-bubble mind
Hoping to pop like a zit
Fully half the time
About ready to quit
Just when life's all like
"Here we grow again,
'Cause once you pop
You just can't stop
Until the fat lady sings
At your sparsely attended funeral."

After the Bullfight

Spitting blood, the bull tumbles head and hooves into the rustling dust before the gloating matador who, dressed in a gold-tassled pink leotard, turns his back on the beast and holds high a black hat to the crowd.

Soliciting appreciative cheers for so artfully performed an execution.

Behind the matador, a few men crowd around the crippled, dying bull. One man stabs a short blade into the back of the animal's neck and, with a rough, sawing motion, hacks through the spinal cord.

In come two horses to bear the bull away; as it's dragged off toward the red wooden doors, its spilt blood streaks into the dust.

Men shovel fresh sand
To mask the red stains
And ready the place
For another joyous death.

Six times in a row. Two bulls for each of three matadors.

This is sport. The winner so blantant that it need not be announced.

Choosing Truths

Old cheese on a wet napkin
Mouse-eaten partly such that
Now it's holy;
Gold-coloured wax wraps
The surface, shining bright,
Illuminating darkness so
Hard-won by one old fromageur
Who wanted for his masterwork to
Never go to mould.

Mouse-eaten old cheese on a wet napkin
Growing holier by the day
Thanks to gnawing teeth
Housed in mouths that
Whisper no prayers;

Don't tell the priest:
He´ll get angry and say
"Only faith and devotion make one Holy."

Don´t try to persuade him:
He won´t trust your facts.
If priests believed in proof
They wouldn't need faith
To help choose their truths.