March 17: Music and Art and Things, Exhausted, Good Dream

Ford Prefect is discussing the tedious life of a Vogon with the young Vogon guard about to throw him into outer space . . .

"Er . . ." said the guard, "er . . . er . . . I dunno.  I think I just sort of . . . do it really.  My aunt said that spaceship guard was a good career for a young Vogon--you know, the uniform, the low-slung stun ray holster, the mindless tedium . . ."

"There you are, Arthur," said Ford with the air of someone reaching the conclusion of his argument, "you think you've got problems."

Arthur rather thought he had.  Apart from the unpleasant business with his home planet the Vogon guard had half-throttled him already and he didn't like the sound of being thrown into space very much.

"Try and understand his problem," insisted Ford.  "Here he is, poor lad, his entire life's work is stamping around, throwing people of spaceships . . ."

"And shouting," added the guard.

"And shouting, sure," said Ford, patting the blubbery arm clamped round his neck in friendly condescension, "and he doesn't even know why he's doing it!"

Arthur agreed this was very sad.  He did this with a small feeble gesture, because he was too asphyxiated to speak.

Deep rumblings of bemusement came from the guard.

"Well.  Now you put it like that I suppose . . ."

"Good lad!" encouraged Ford.

"But all right," went on the rumblings, "so what's the alternative?"

"Well," said Ford, brightly but slowly, "stop doing it, of course!  Tell them," he went on, "you're not going to do it any more."  He felt he ought to add something to that, but for the moment the guard seemed to have his mind occupied pondering that much.

"Eerrrrrmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm . . . " said the guard, "erm, well, that doesn't sound that great to me."

Ford suddenly felt the moment slipping away.

"Now wait a minute," he said, "that's just the start you see, there's more to it than that, you see . . ."

But at that moment the guard renewed his grip and continued his original purpose of lugging his prisoners to the airlock.  He was obviously quite touched.

"No, I think if it's all the same to you," he said, "I'd better get you both shoved into this airlock and then go and get on with some other bits of shouting I've got to do."

I wasn't all the same to Ford Prefect at all.

"Come on now . . . but look!" he said, less slowly, less brightly.

"Huhhhhggggggnnnnnnn . . ." said Arthur without any clear inflection.

"But hang on," pursued Ford, "there's music and art and things to tell you about yet!  Arrggghhh!"

You know, I sort of get the Vogon.  Even if you're miserable in a life situation, especially one that you've been in a long time, it's still difficult to make a change.  The thinking sort of goes like this:  you choose familiar pain versus the unknown (which might be painful or might be wonderful).  The unknown is scary.

Perhaps I'm investing too much humanity in the Vogon guard, but, given my current situation at work, I can't help it.  I've been living with the unknown for over a month now.  Not a very fun place to set up camp.  It sort of feels like I'm about to be tossed into outer space, like Arthur and Ford, and I'm trying to talk my way out of it.  But, I know you're tired of hearing me talk about this subject.  I apologize.

It has been an exhausting Saint Patrick's Day weekend.  Yesterday, especially.  Between practicing and playing the pipe organ for Mass and doing the last-minute preparations for the benefit poetry reading I organized last night, I am pretty whipped.  When I got home from church this afternoon, I actually took a nap.  A long one.  Now, I'm moving forward with grading and school work.

I guess I'm just trying to get myself mentally ready for the next five days.  Tomorrow will be the hardest and longest.  Work at 6 a.m. and then teaching until 9:30 p.m.  Long, long hours.  I know that I'll be nearly brain dead tomorrow night.  It's a matter of just keeping my nose to the proverbial grindstone for the next day.

That is my known.  I can handle that.  I've done it before.  This coming week, I have a couple job prospects that I'm following up on.  One prospect is a total blank page for me.  I just have a vague notion of what the job would entail.  The other prospect is a position that I've held before, with people that I know and really like.  I'm hoping that, within a week or so, I will have news as to what I'm going to be doing with my life for the next several years.  (Just typing that last statement also makes me anxious.  It almost sounds like some kind of prison sentence.)

Of course, all of this upheaval could turn out better than expected.  Maybe I'll get a big bump in salary.  Have better benefits.  Be able to save up some money for rainy days (translation:  car problems, heating bills, broken TVs, etc.).  Retire before I'm 80.  That's what I'm going with this evening.  It's a good dream.

And then, as Ford points out, there's music and art and things.

Saint Marty is ready for all of that.

March 2: A Puff of Logic, Upheaval, Hope

And now, a little bit about the Babel fish, the translating creature currently residing in Arthur Dent's ear canal . . .

"The Babel fish," said The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy quietly, "is small, yellow and leechlike, and probably the oddest thing in the Universe.  It feeds on brainwave energy received not from its own carrier but from those around it.  It absorbs all unconscious mental frequencies from this brainwave energy to nourish itself with.  It then excretes into the mind of its carrier a telepathic matrix formed by combining the conscious thought frequencies with nerve signals picked up from the speech centers of the brain which has supplied them.  The practical upshot of all this is that if you stick a Babel fish in your ear you can instantly understand anything said to you in any form of language.  The speech patterns you actually hear decode the brainwave matrix which has been fed into your mind by your Babel fish.

"Now it is such a bizarrely improbable coincidence that anything so mind-boggingly useful could have evolved purely by chance that some thinkers have chosen to see it as a final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God.

"The argument goes something like this:  'I refuse to prove that I exist,' says God, 'for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing.'

"'But,' says Man, 'the Babel fish is a dead give-away, isn't it?  It could not have evolved by chance.  It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't.  QED.'

"'Oh, dear,' says God, 'I hadn't thought of that,' and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.

"'Oh, that was easy,' says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets himself killed on the next pedestrian crossing.

"Most leading theologians claim that this argument is a load of dingo's kidneys, but that didn't stop Oolon Colluphid making a small fortune when he used it as the central theme of his best-selling book, Well That about Wraps It Up for God.

""Meanwhile, the poor Babel fish, by effectively removing all barriers to communication between different races and cultures, has caused more and bloodier wars than anything else in the history of creation."

There you go.  The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and the Babel fish prove that God does not exist.  The circular logic is pretty interesting and funny.  People have been trying to prove the existence of God since He created the universe.  The Grand Canyon is proof of the existence of God.  Or it's the result of the Colorado River carving a stream bed into a ditch into a cavern into a canyon over a mile deep in places through thousands of years of erosion.  You can extend the logic.  Who/what created the Colorado River?  Melt from glaciers?  Okay, then who/what created the glaciers?  An Ice Age?  Alright, then who/what caused the Ice Age?  The collision into Earth of a huge asteroid that created a cloud of dust and dirt that lowered the planet's temperature for another thousands and thousands of years and caused a mass extinction.  Okay, then, who/what created the asteroid?  Well, that was the result of collision of two astral bodies in the universe that fragmented and sent pieces of rock to go soaring through the Universe on a collision course with Earth.  So, who/what caused the collision of the astral bodies?  That could have been of an offshoot of the Big Bang, which set into motion the creation of the sun and moon and stars and planets.  You know the next question--who/what caused the Big Bang?  Well, that was caused by the collapsing of matter, a reaction on the atomic level.  Who/what created the atoms?  You see this logic.  Eventually, there will be a "who/what" question that can't be answered.  That's plain logic.

Now, there will be some disciples and readers of this blog who will pick apart my reasoning here.  That's fine.  I'm a questioner, too.  I believe in science.  I don't accept things on face value.  I struggle with my faith all the time.  That's human and understandable.  It's the struggle that deepens belief and understanding.  It does for me, anyway.  It helps me make sense of my life.

I don't know why my life had to change so much these last few weeks.  Don't know the meaning of all this upheaval.  I know the causes:  the healthcare system in the United States.  More specifically, for-profit healthcare.  Whenever big business gets involved in anything, the middle and lower classes will be negatively impacted.  Dem's da facts.  That's the reason the surgery center where I worked closed.  However, there are more existential questions for me to contemplate.

Why is there such struggle in my life at the moment?  One of my friends keeps telling me that she believes something better is coming my way.  I want to believe this.  That goes right along with the idea that everything happens for a purpose.  God has a plan.  As a devout Christian, I'm supposed to believe this.  And I do, in the front of my mind.  In the back of mind, I'm still in a state of panic.

The people I know who seem most spiritual, most connected to God or a higher power, are very happy, centered people.  It's because they have faith.  Believe that God is looking out for them all the time.  Yes, bad things happen in their lives.  Death.  Illness.  Job loss.  The big difference, however, is that they have hope..

That's it.  Hope.  It makes darkness less dark.  Good times more joyful.  Without hope, there isn't a whole lot to look forward to.  I hope that my daughter and son will have happy, fulfilling lives with people who love them.  I hope that Donald Trump will be removed from office.  I hope that I will have bacon for breakfast tomorrow.  Big and small hopes.

That's why I think faith is important.  For my atheist friends, I hope you have faith in humankind to make the world a better place.  For my religious friends, I hope you have faith that God's got your backs, won't abandon you.

Saint Marty will always err on the side of hope.

February 10: Hi, Upheaval, "To My Father's Ashes"

And President Zaphod Beeblebrox has arrived for the adulation of his adoring constituents . . .

Water boiled up beneath the bubble, it seethed and spouted.  The bubble surged into the air, bobbing and rolling on the water spout.  Up, up it climbed, throwing stilts of light at the cliff.  Up it surged on the jet, the water falling from beneath it, crashing back into the sea hundreds of feet below.

A thoroughly ridiculous form of transport but a thoroughly beautiful one.

At the top of the cliff the globe wavered for a moment, tipped onto a railed ramp, rolled down it to a small concave platform and riddled to a halt.

To tremendous applause Zaphod Beeblebrox stepped out of the bubble, his orange sash blazing in the light.

The President of the Galaxy had arrived.

He waited for the applause to die down, then raised his hand in greeting.

"Hi," he said.

Zaphod has something up his sleeve, if you haven't already figured that out.  Actually, he has three arms, so three sleeves.  He isn't going to follow the script that has been prepared for him.  Stay tuned tomorrow to see how Zaphod intends to surprise everyone.

I'm not much for going off-script.  I like to know what's going to happen all the time.  Read the last page of a mystery first.  Read movie reviews with spoilers.  I knew that Han Solo died in the last Star Wars movie before I even stepped foot in the theater.  No surprises for Saint Marty.

This past weekend, I have been dealing with all the upheaval that happened last week in my life.  (Like I said, surprises are NEVER a good thing!)  On top of that, Friday was the first anniversary of my father's death.  That sort of sneaked up on me, as well.  Therefore, all the accompanying emotions for that milestone were thrown into the mix.  Needless to say, it has not been an easy few days.

Now, I have to head into a new work week, a little exhausted emotionally.  For the next couple months, my life is going to be in a state of flux.  Not really knowing what's going to be happening from day to day.  I can't do anything to avoid it.  Emotions are going to be running fairly close to the surface for me.

Last night, I watched Springsteen on Broadway on Netflix.  It was an incredibly moving experience for me.  At one point, Bruce started talking about an encounter he had with his father, a kind of coming-to-terms moment in their relationship.  Then Bruce sang a song.  I found myself sitting on my couch sobbing.  It was almost as if I could feel my father in the room with me.

So much of my life seems to be ending.  Depending on the results of the voting for Poet Laureate of the Upper Peninsula, that part of my life may be closing, as well.  Please don't quote me that old chestnut, "When God closes a door, He opens a window."  At this point, if I decide to go through that window, I'll probably fall 13 stories to my death.  At least that's what it feels like.  No, I need a little more time, a little more distance.

Saint Marty has a poem to honor his father this evening.

To My Father’s Ashes

by:  Martin Achatz

Staring at your dust

in this black vase,

I wonder what of you

I possess.  The cinder

that was your hands. watered

tomato plants every summer

until they swelled into orange

fists of starfish.  Grains of your

crooked spine that kept

you from the missiles and grenades

of Pork Chop Hill and Pusan.

Or the pollen of your lips, tongue

that sipped Seven and Seven

all night until you didn’t remember

stoking the furnace with so much

wood that it roared, turned brick

red, almost reduced the house to char.

It could be the soot that was your testes,

scrotum, vesicles, the place

where the Y of me first swam

in white brine the night

you reached out, atlased

my mother’s body with yours.

Perhaps the ember of calf, shoulder.

Powder of ulna, incisor, humerus.

Or maybe it’s a part of you

I don’t know.  The finger

that traced the arc of a neighbor

girl’s breast under a haystack moon.

Your grey eyes, the ones the cried

for two days when your daughter

was born with an extra chromosome

swimming in the pools of her nuclei.

An eardrum that heard Louis Armstrong

coax “La Vie En Rose” from his trumpet

one August night at the Paradise

on Woodward when the Detroit River

was a black tendon of water.

Or a mole on your chest that your bride

kissed over and over on your wedding

night until it blossomed to the color

of lupin.

October 26: Upheaval, Uncertainty, Upset Stomach

I found out last night that the health care organization I work for decided to restructure 21 middle managers out of jobs yesterday.  The translation of that statement is that 21 people showed up for work yesterday morning, went to one of their normal weekly meetings, and were given pink slips.  Sorry.  Don't let the door hit in the ass on the way out.  Obviously, that kind of upheaval is going to create a lot of uncertainty, unhappiness, and upset stomachs.

This is not unusual news in a country where the health care system is so broken that normal people have to decide between life-saving medication/treatment and food for their children.  However, when it hits this close to home, I just have to sit back and shake my head, wondering why God doesn't push a cosmic erase button and start the whole universe over.

I truly don't believe this problem is a Republican or Democrat thing.  It's not a rich or poor thing.  It's a people thing.  We live in a world where people don't care about each other.  Instead of working as brothers and sisters on this little ball of mud we call Earth, we just worry about ourselves.  Community has become a dirty word, right up there with charity and tolerance.

This morning, twenty-one people are unemployed who were employed yesterday.  People with families and mortgages and kids in college.  People who had their futures planned out, maybe even had vacations planned.  Instead of thinking about these individuals, everybody where I work is scrambling around, trying to protect their jobs.   It's not about "we."  It's about "me."

This world is a messed up place.  Quoting Kent M. Keith, Mother Teresa once said, "People are illogical, unreasonable, and self-centered.  Love them anyway."

Saint Marty's going to try to find love today.

You tell 'em, Mother.