David Kelsen

Category: Daily Journal

  • What’d You Say?

    January 28th, 2010

    (48 year-old son, Dave,  is driving his 71 year-old mother, Donna to the store. )

    Dave:

    Yeah, I had that 65′ Buick, used keep stalling on me.  Figured out rust chips from the gas tank kept plugging up the fuel filter.

    I’d travel with 2 pencils, a screwdriver and a spare fuel filter.  Whenever it’d stall, I’d pull over, pop the hood, unscrew the clamps on the fuel filter, stick the pencils into the lines on either side of the filter so gas didn’t leak, put in the spare fuel filter and I was back on the road in four minutes.

    Donna:

    We used to have an Olds convertible when you guys were little..

    Dave:

    I remember that car.

    Donna:

    Brakes were shot – driving you guys around on the ice with no brakes, shish!

    Dave:

    And you were probably drunk.

    Donna:

    I always had a few belts before getting into that car. Are you kidding?

  • Why Her?

    Fairness is an utterly useless concept and unjustifiable expense.

    ~~

    She’ll look into your eyes and see you

    Not where you came from, but where you’re coming from

    Not what you do, but what you are

    She’ll find you even when you don’t know where you are

    She’ll find you, then she’ll bring you out

    The best you, not the one you think you’re supposed to be

    After you’re finished fighting with yourself, she’ll chuckle a little and you both will share a moment.

    You won’t forget.

    She may not always win

    But she will never be defeated.

    ~~

    She had one love.

    One.

    ONe lOVe in her life

    oNE true love

    one only one

    one ever

    one forever

    And it wasn’t meant to be.

    The two only ever had each other in reality

    In the reality that exists beyond the feebleness of perception

    There was ever only each other to turn to in truly life changing situations,

    There was ever only each other they could/would rely on

    There was ever only one number to dial

    each others

    then he died.

    We all saw it coming, We all knew, didn’t matter, still sucked.

    She did everything a spouse would do, not an ex-spouse, which she was

    Didn’t matter

    ex on paper, life-partner in reality

    Not the reality you’re familiar with,

    The reality that exists beyond the feebleness of perception.

    But why her?

  • Same UnSame

    Days change, years change, but people remain the same.

    Brutal killings, shocking cruelty, same today as yesterday

    If vicious didn’t exist in action, nor would it in vocabulary

    But the Wild doesn’t kill viciously,

    That perception belongs exclusively to humans

    The Wild doesn’t have perceptions

    `

    Weak strong, smart dumb, popular lonely

    loved, not-loved

    `

    The World Isn’t Changing

    People Aren’t Changing

    `

    The evolution of human perception is redundant and laughable.

    Y wood U believe there is original thought, (chuckle)

    `

    Your thoughts are remakes, ancestral genetic collaborations cellularly revealed anew

    Environmentally re-engineered? Sure

    but

    The environment only affects the outer coating.

    Core intact

    `

    A teardrop composed of time evaporates in the sun

    No stain, no residue

    Footprints fade in the wind

    Voices vanish as their sound dissolve into the clouds

    Bodies decompose

    Planets spin

    Light emits

    Soil inseminates

    Next

  • My Thumb Still Hurts

    Every Day is a Bad Day

    Some days suck less than others

    Metaphorically, if YOU get on a train going the wrong direction, YOU can make the decision to get off at the next stop, thus controlling your destiny.

    BUT,

    What do you do when an integral part of your plan takes another train?

  • Talking Like Walking in a Minefield

    What I want to say
    is different
    From that which I’d like you to know.

    So why bring it up?

    Okay, I’ll bite, what the hell are you talking about.

    Well, talking with you is like stepping through a mine field. An explosion is imminent, but I never know which word will set it off.

    Frustration and resentment are the two emotions we have most in common lately.

    I used to get lost in the gaze of your dilating pupils,
    adrift, physicality defied, encapsulated – obsessed

    Touch me, I’m butter on an Iowa summer picnic table.

    I’m a feather in your palm, awaiting the warmth of breath sweetened by the journey through your sumptuous lips,

    You were/are always ever only

    foward and ago

    That’s not what I wanted to say,
    It’s what I need you to know.

    ever only always was is

    one. you.

    used to. tomorrow.

    can we?

    dried paint chips desperate for rehydration

    lost thoughts of a pale mind

    greys, all grays

    (sigh)

  • One by One

    Her dreams festered and died as she idly sat by.

    Selling precious pieces of life to survive,

    Hope bobbed futilely, drowning in a sea of insecurity and confusion.

    Neglected fulfillment of empty promises,

    Anguish,  isolation…

    Her heart thrown into a cobweb clustered corner of a forsaken garage next to rusted screen doors and termite dregs.

    Her voice more readily cold. Hiding welled tears and carpet stains.  Fear and apprehension. More than waiting, a void exists, a dark empty hole plunging to the depths of a putrid soul.  Each emotion swallowed scratches and claws as it crawls down.

    Alone at daybreak.  Opening her eyes, she scans across the cluttered, claustrophobic paneled room.

    The shabby, unkempt trailer she shares with a friend is located in Treasure Island.  Surrounded by prefab plastic and aluminum boxes, mostly inhabited by seniors in their twilight years waiting to die.

    She’s haunted by the remnants of their life together.  She awakes expecting to see his sleeping face, close to hers, the dreams seem so real.

    Aloneness tips the day into another struggle.  Her heart is as empty as the pillow next to hers that he used to share.

    The wedding gown hanging desolate in closet dark is a disastrous  symbol of the love taken away. She’s still paying for the dissolved romance.

    An evil thief stole her love, her heart and discarded it among the ruins of lost souls.

  • 4:22 AM

    Superbowl Sunday, 1988

    Phone rings,

    I hear the phone but refuse to acknowledge until…

    The line crackled and buzzed but her voice sounded through.  My heart pounds dangerously upon hearing the message on the deprecated mini-cassette answering machine owning her voice.

    “Dave, this is your long lost love Lisa, Please call me…”

    Eight years had passed since last we’d spoke.  I swore her off.  I vowed to never, NEVER, tangle with her again.

    How did she get my number?  Why’d she call? Is she in trouble?  Why at this hour? My mind tumbles into a heap of scrap like the aftermath of a sloppy high-speed car accident.

    I call back, busy…busy again,  wide awake now even after multiple superbowl brews, I contemplate giving up..but try calling one more time.

    Busy signals and bad connections still existed in 1988, but this time she answers…

    She had jarred my mom from deep sleep @ 4am to get my number.

    We Spoke

    She talked about her drug-related life this past year, in and out of rehabs and hospitals, she talked about her estranged husband and their 2  year old daughter.  She talked about her fiance, a navy grunt stationed in the Persian gulf, she alluded to a tryst with Steven Tyler of Aerosmith and accused her psycho-analyst of getting her hooked on Xanax.  She talked about her mom and her friends in rehab and how “everybody love’s me down here”.

    She talked, I listened.

    She said she was an Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) and a model, but was on welfare at the moment.

    “This is a great song!”, she said, referring to some metal song on her stereo.  She placed the phone receiver next to the speaker and sang along, word for word, as the source volume of the music distorted the phone line. She didn’t pick up the phone again until the song ended.

    She told me she love me.  I told her I’d call her later that day.  Another good song came on, she turned up the stereo again and continued singing…I slowly, cautiously placed the phone receiver back on the hook, wondering what just happened.

  • Smoking – What A Drag

    Patches, Pills, Gum, Really?

    Smoking - What A Drag

    Tobacco Tryst

    I used to love to smoke.  My first hit off an actual cigarette was at the age of 9.  Prior to that we’d pretend with bubble gum cigarettes  that came in cute little packs, designed for kids.  How quaint.Bubble-Gum Cigarettes

    Seventh grade was when a bunch of us started smoking for real.  We formed an exclusive club called “The Group” and hung out after school and on weekends at the park adjacent to Gisler Intermediate school in Huntington Beach.  We were absolutely up to no good. We’d bribe older siblings to score a 12-pack of Bud, or loiter in front of 7-11 to pester potential future lawbreakers.  But cigarettes were easy in the 70’s.  There were cigarette machines that didn’t care how old you were, the guy behind the counter at the liquor store hardly ever asked, and if he did you’d say they were for your mom.

    Back then everybody was smoking, all your friends houses had ashtrays on the coffee tables in their shag carpeted living rooms. Some had ornate glass jars brimming with fresh Marlboro’s.  Parents couldn’t smell it on your breath because they were smoking too, and once you hit 15,16 or 17, even they didn’t mind that much, I mean at least you weren’t drinking (you were of course, but you were better at hiding that).

    What’s The Problem?

    We’ve all seen the pictures of black lungs and the decrepit old transient with a breathing hole cut into the base of his throat, and hear constantly about cancer.  But what if you don’t get cancer and you can still climb a flight of stairs without spitting tar?

    I don’t care about pictures and studies or all the propaganda devoted to eliminating the $109.2 billion dollar tobacco industry.  Did the cigarette companies target children? Yes, they did. Did they lie to congress?  Yes, they did that too.

    Tobacco Executives Lie to Congress

    Both reasons are enough to dislike the tobacco industry intensely, but those guys were just doing their jobs (in a sinister, destructive sort of way).   Besides, that has little bearing NOW when you’re trying to quit and jonesing for cigarette.  No, the most diabolical aspect of this entire issue is the command nicotine has over your brain.  You knew it was wrong when you started, you did it anyway, and now that tiny cylindrical paper satchel filled with dried poisonous leaves has complete control of your life.  You plan portions of your day around when you can sneak out to suck on one and when you’re not smoking, you’re thinking about smoking.

    And that is THE reason to quit.

    The Bad News

    Everyone is different, what works for me may not work for you.  In my experience, pills, patches, programs, gum, nicotine replacement therapy, hypnosis, acupuncture, yaddah-yaddah-yaddah… None of it works.

    Sorry.

    Nicotine is an addictive drug, but smoking is a lifestyle.  The only real way to quit is to make up your mind and do it.  You will not suffer physically, like with heroin or alcohol.  Although you may gain a few pounds.  That habit of shoving something filthy between your lips several times a day becomes an obnoxious yearning.

    Your mind is the only true cure on this one and you probably won’t be successful the first few times you try.  I am personally acquainted with those who have, but it took me around 5 years to become smoke-free, so don’t beat yourself up too bad and don’t quit wanting to quit.

    My motivation was simply being so pissed off that I allowed this stupid little cancer device to dictate so much of my life.  I have no idea how many packs I bought, smoked one or two, got disgusted with myself then tossed the pack out the car window driving 70 miles an hour down the freeway.  Yes, it was littering, but I never ventured back to go find them either.  It was a process, a mental process.  It’s the best tool you have.

    The Good News

    YOU CAN DO IT!

  • Big Brother? Big Deal

    The Chilling Invasion of Privacy Personified by Big Brother in George Orwell’s 1984 Frightened and Enraged Us. Why?

    Big Brother, Big Deal

    Surveillance Cameras

    Clearly, having telephone or internet communications intercepted and reviewed without your knowledge or consent assails personal liberty.  But what about the millions of surveillance cameras?   An article in The Independent|UK projected that the average Briton is caught on camera 300 times a day, most times without their knowledge.

    In 2002 ABC’s Sunday Morning reported that New Yorker Bill Brown conducted walking tours of surveillance cameras around Times Square every Sunday.  He had counted as many as 200 in Times Square, and as many as 5,000 he mapped in New York City as a whole.Big Brother, Big Deal

    Caltrans in California provides a large selection of cameras to assist in our daily commutes, along with it’s counterpart New York City DOT in New York.  Many cities around the world have similar setups.  You can also check out webcams around the world at sites like EarthCam and 123cam.  Additionally, there are a multitude of surveillance cams at department stores, convenience stores, gas stations, parking lots, commercial office buildings, restaurants, etc. And that doesn’t even count satellites.  Expect numerous opportunities per day that your ugly mug is appearing on someone’s monitor, so smile.

    The objective of the surveillance camera is supposedly to make us safer, to inhibit crime.  A 2008 ACLU Report concluded that video surveillance has “little to no positive impact on crime”.  But the introduction of the report states that while American cities and towns are investing millions in surveillance camera systems, “few are closely examining the costs and benefits over time.”

    They may have no impact on crime rates, however they have surely helped in apprehending perpetrators.  How many times on the news have you seen disturbing video footage of a crime in action?  Criminals have been identified through the use of these cameras.  Did it stop the crime or financial loss? No.  But in many cases, it did help remove one more punk from the streets.

    [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZjXxIQ41-Y[/youtube]

    The ACLU report also states that calculating the effect of surveillance cameras on crime and the crime rate is very complicated with an exceptional number of variables.

    Break it down

    As is my habit, among many others that are less productive, is a practice of breaking down a situation to it’s lowest common denominator.  Historically, when did crimes rates begin to spike?  Parsing that data accurately could literally take months, so for my example I’ll use the homicide trend in the U.S. between 1900 and 2004:

    Homicide Trends 1900-2004

    • In 1900 there were 1.2 homicides per 100,000 population.
    • In 2004 there were 5.9 homicides per 100,000 population.

    Wars, the Great Depression and high unemployment account for major spikes in the chart above.  But from a purely theoretical point of view, I believe it’s caused by the continued fragmentation and splintering of the family unit.

    The early human race was a smattering of tribes which evolved into small villages and towns.  The makeup of these communities were essentially a group of families banded together for a common cause, survival.  In those days, what would you imagine the crime rate would be?  Everybody literally knew everybody.  You didn’t have graffiti because people in town would recognize your handwriting.  You couldn’t sneak around at night because somebody would hear you.  If you were acting suspicious somebody would call you on it and you couldn’t steal anything because everybody knew what you had.

    In the last hundred years especially, families have grown further apart.  There was no anonymous in your town in the beginning, but as the anonymous population grew, so went the crime rate.  Certainly there is a myriad of other factors, but is there one more important or effectual than that?

    People in large cities have a problem with small towns because they feel like there’s no real privacy.  Is that it, or have we just become too accustomed to hiding stuff?

    What’s the Big Deal?

    I’m not afraid of big brother, I don’t care if there’s 300 cameras on every street corner, I just want my kids to feel safe when they walk home from school.  In fact, I think local cable stations should broadcast the feeds from as many different locations as possible.  You want to check if you’re teenage daughter actually went to the movies with her girlfriends? Turn it on channel 1036 when the show is supposed to be getting out.

    Our police force can’t be everywhere, they don’t have the resources to monitor every street corner, but what if each neighborhood watch group could assign their members time slots to keep an eye on things by turning on their local neighborhood watch channel?  Wouldn’t you be able to recognize a suspicious vehicle or persons creeping up your street?

    If you’re out in public you’re going to be seen by anyone on the street, any window you stroll by and any car that passes you.  So what’s the difference between that and adding a couple of cameras?  And what are you doing, or planning to do, that concerns you so much about it?

    Bring on the cameras and let’s all watch each other on TV.  It’ll be just like the old days.

    peace

  • In Hate We Trust

    The Recent Spate of Outbursts Shift Spotlight Onto America’s Dirty Little Secret.

    In Hate We Trust

    Iowa 1968

    One Day, as a second grader at Lowell Elementary School in Waterloo, Iowa, a ruckus was brewing as the class was dismissed for recess.  Shouts relayed through the swath of snott-nosed, chest-high playground denizens with phrenitic excitement.

    “They’re Coming!, They’re Coming!”

    Half the playground stampeded to the front of school to witness it’s newest enrollees.  I made my way over after the initial rush, curious about the hubbub, and saw a black mom and her two black children enter the school office.  Was that it? Didn’t seem like a big deal to me, but like the newest members of our south-end of town population, I was in the minority.

    African-Americans lived in Waterloo, but were segregated to the north-end of town. There hadn’t been a black family at Lowell, and the reaction to their presence was nothing short of educational.  That was my introduction to racism and prejudice.

    Small clicks of kids made horrible scary statements I hadn’t heard before.  Our newest Lowell brethren were left alone at playtime, except for me.  I’d already been the object of ridicule, being literally the first kid to wear bell-bottoms at school (not my choice) and hanging out with my friend Kim who was taunted and teased daily.  Kim wasn’t a popular boy’s name in 1968 Iowa.  I hadn’t yet given in to peer pressure, hell, I didn’t even know what that was.  Besides, we moved around alot in the early days so I wasn’t beholden to any long-term friendships yet.

    I played with my new found friends because I liked them.  Kids are cruel, but the playing field is pretty even in the second grade.  If you’re encouraged to think for yourself, you’re miles ahead of the pack.

    My parents were Jazz musicians.  Mom sang with Benny Goodman on a tour that included Ella Fitzgerald, Lionel Hampton and Hank Jones, along with many equally talented white musicians.  Frequent rehearsals at the house brought people of all sizes, colors and temperament into my consciousness, but differentiation was never based on race, it was solely on the content of their personality.

    Being white growing up in the sixties with no attitudinal predisposition towards race proved to be enlightening and infuriating.  Because of my parents, I had the good fortune to decide for myself about this issue in particular, because my parents treated everyone like people.  Crazy, right?  Presumptive predication based on race, religion or politics was absent from my formative years allowing me the freedom to decide for myself.

    As a white person growing up in America in the 60’s and 70’s you were exposed to n-word jokes, period.  Sometimes in hushed tones when people of color were in earshot, other times loud and clear as if it were a challenge, but always derogatory with the malodorous stench of underlying hate.

    Presidential Election 2008

    I may not be an expert in human psychology, but after decades in the hospitality industry, managing behavior on a larger scale, I’ve come to learn how to read a face and translate one’s vocabulary and inflection.  Couple that with my experience as a fundamentally unbiased anonymous observer in the American white culture, I know how to recognize racism, and the bad news is that this country is rife with hate-filled ignorance and intolerance.  It’s getting better, but it’s still present.

    For years, the issue had been relatively buried, unless you regularly visited the Southern Poverty Law Center website, where they track hate groups. But the 2008 Presidential Election changed all that.  I think racists were caught with their pants down, because they never in a million years would believe a black man could be elected president of the United States of America.  To illustrate, check this stat from Compete.com on Stormfront.org:

    Stormfront.org traffic surge

    Stormfront is a white supremacist website.  Members of Stormfront would correct me here and describe themselves as white nationalists, but c’mon.  Semantics aside, all you need do is browse through the site.  As you can see, the traffic spiked in November, 08′ when Barack Obama won the White House and has slowly increased, reaching near November (2008) levels this August (2009).  My guess is September will surpass last November (I’ll try to remember to update). Similar traffic spikes were recorded on kkk.com, kkk.bz, kkklan.com, etcetera, etcetera.

    Clearly the November 2008 election hit a nerve.

    Unfortunate Update-

    As predicted, web traffic increased substantially in September for stormfront.org in the month of September:

    Stormfront Web Traffic - September

    Bubbling to the Surface in 2009

    In high school I dated a girl who originally hailed from Mississippi.  She told me she was afraid of black people. “What are you afraid of?”, I’d ask.  “That they’ll take over”, she answered.  “Take over what?”, I inquired.  “Take over the country”.

    To the feeble minded, that’s what this is about.  Reading through the mangled, incomplete and frighteningly evil thought processes displayed by some of the posters on stormfront, it becomes very apparent that a streak of disbelief, hate and paranoia has grappled the short and curlies of these confederate sympathizers.

    As of this writing, President Barack Obama has been in office for a little over 8 months.  His appointees are multi-cultural.  Mr. Obama won the popular vote of the citizens of this great country, in addition to an overwhelming advantage in the electoral college.  Republicans and former Bush appointees serve on his cabinet.  President Obama has repeatedly sought bi-partisan support and central to his victorious campaign was the idea that we as a nation could achieve our mutually beneficial objective through cooperation and intelligent discussion.

    Unfortunately for us, there are biggots who have enough money to sabotage the progress we’re making.

    One need only google Rush Limbaugh racist quotes, and 462k results appear.  Mr. Limbaugh has made  millions of dollars defiling his fellow man.  But Rushbo is an entertainer, a clown, the motive behind anything he says is advertiser dollars.

    A more complicated case is Rep. Joe Wilson. Joe has apologized to the  President, and has been politically backpedaling since his disrespectful outburst on Sept. 9th, 2009.  But he’s a politician.  He’ll say whatever.  Joe is a member of the “Sons of Confederate Veterans”.  Joe was one of only 7 state representatives in the state of South Carolina to defend the confederate flag.

    The confederate flag is the defining symbol of the confederacy.  The core belief of the confederacy, the motivation behind secession of the states involved and the civil war was the right to keep indentured servants.  To own human beings as a commodity.  To treat human beings as a possession, like a cell phone.   How much effort do you expend when you lose your cell phone? As much as your child? As much as a close friend?

    Defending the confederate flag is like flipping off Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King and human decency. There’s simply no place for it in intelligent society.

    The white supremacists, separatists, nationalists or whatever want segregation.  Good luck. Segregation from what?  We all inhabit the same shrinking planet.  We all depend on the same resources and all have the same needs.  Go ahead and create your own putrid colony, but you’ll eventually have needs that supersede your resources.  Then what?

    I don’t understand it.  When I break it down to it’s lowest common denominator, where’s the benefit in that position?

    What would be the logical progression of secession or racial segregation?  Which state in the union is completely self-sufficient?  How long after splitting our gloriously diversified and interdependent nation into multiple individual nations  would war erupt?  How many wars would there be, and who gets the tanks?

    It’s a ridiculous proposition.

    And let’s face facts, if you found yourself in a life threatening situation, and at that precise moment if there were only one person in the world who could save your life, would it matter what color they were?

    peace.