RECALIBRATE

They are calling for a general strike. 

I'm going on strike. I'm leaving. 

"Dropping out" was how the Sixties put it. 

I'm still in Mexico now, returning to the States on Thursday. I don't like the country I'm coming back to. I'll be leaving again two weeks later, after my taxes are filed and various legal technicalities taken care of. 

I'm leaving the country. I'm doing the thing many said they would do if DT were elected. I'm doing it, but to an imperfect extent.  

I'll still be sneaking back across the wall on a regular basis, if they let me in.

I met and stayed with two different people in two different places here in Mexico -- in Merida and in Cholula -- who expatriated from the United States to Mexico many years ago. 

They have good lives here. I felt at home with them. They didn't want me to leave. I didn't want to leave.

Here is where I am staying in Mexico City.

This will be the way I live now. 

Temporary housing and recharging my laptop in airports. 

Privileged refugee status. 

Perpetual motion. 

My wife died less than a year ago. This trauma has been amplified exponentially with the political turn of events. 

My life is trying to recalibrate in the midst of the national trauma. I have no answers.

I walk down the street and wallow in the faces of humanity, the 22 million people of Mexico City.

Children laugh and play. Some are barefoot.

I give beggars money. I don't care. 

MEXICO CITY AGAIN

The expatriation tour continues.

Fleeing is a form of resistance. 

It is the historical choice of my pacifist ancestors, who preferred to relocate rather than take up arms.

The desire to fight back is strong. But resisting the impulse can be more powerful in the long run.

Few believe that. I happen to.

Or, as they say in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, "Run away, run away."

Fear is not a factor in this path. It is the opposite.

Direct actions of justice and sacrifice and selflessness are required daily.

The more those actions are visible and announced, the less effective they may be.

Appearances, thus, are deceptive.

I am not on vacation.

MY ROLE

I have been in Merida for the past week and a half.

Today the dentist completed my three-unit bridge work and I am entirely pleased with the result and the cost. It came to about $2500 less here than it would have been in the States. Of course, that more than covered the entire trip.

The dentist says about half his business is from American tourists. 

I also got new eyeglasses.

In a month, I will be going to Guatemala and Honduras to work as part of a medical service team. Perhaps then I will have something more to write about other than myself and the joys of temporary expatriation. 

I have learned, though, that being at a distance is helpful in handling all sorts of crises. One is necessarily helpless at such a distance. One's responsibility is alleviated. 

This is why I came. I missed the inauguration and, although I am aware of what is happening, I am absent from eye contact with a humiliated population in the midst of a terrible suppression.

I have always been the alien. I function best as the outsider. Here, in Mexico, my role is fulfilled.

STILL WAITING FOR MUSE TO APPEAR

A FAILURE ?

They are rioting in the streets of Washington, Chicago, and elsewhere.

They are breaking windows and overturning garbage cans.

While that happens, my own efforts to circumvent the polarization of the United States appear to have failed.  It isn't that I have nothing to say; I have no will to say it.

I have found no surprise formula.  What I am doing looks an awfully lot like simply ignoring the situation, distraction.

I believe my engagement with my surroundings is active. 

I'm doing what I can, where I am.

Perhaps that will be enough.

SUCH AN ODD DAY, JANUARY 20, 2017

I have been trying for days to find something to write for this blog. 

Maybe I've said all I have to say in this life.

I'm spending many more days in Merida than I had planned. Tonight I got a haircut. I bought new glasses. I went to the dentist and got long overdue dental work done, a bridge and two extractions. Tomorrow I'll be going to one of three days of excursions to visit area ruins and cenotes. I've been eating really well. It's hot here. I'm comfortable. No one should be in the least interested in this. I have written and deleted pages and pages. 

Haikus are easy

But sometimes they don't make sense

Refrigerator

THE DENTIST IN MERIDA

I had better eat now with Susan. Tomorrow I'm getting extractions done and prepping for a bridge and an implant. I've put this off for years. Now is the time, but it means I'm staying here for an extra ten days.

Museo MACAY

THE WALL

Outside my place in Merida

GIVING UP AND FADING FAST

My pale skin is fading fast. 

The sun is browning up my face

to match the smiling population.

I thought that I would dine alone

until welcomed by a group of ten. We laughed

and then we danced in crowded rooms,

"PUTO" etched above the bar.

If news were better off to shun

the words and actions of the mad,

then why not us as well?

Frida's garden

Counter-revolutionary t-shirt?

Friday the 13th

A perfect day to give up.

There is no more struggle.

RATIONALIZATIONS FOR GIVING UP

a comment from Beth Cioffoletti:

Any actions of resistance and in the future are likely to involve the media, and that confounds things considerably for me. Things become "staged," made for the cameras, and that confuses the authenticity of the action. I'm remembering the weekend before we started the shock & awe bombing of Baghdad -- the largest worldwide protest in the history of humanity -- what did that mean? What did that say? Obviously it had no EFFECT on the powers bent on that particular war. Will that worldwide protest in the major cities of the world be mentioned in history books? Or is the resistance somewhere deeper in the story of humanity to make the news or the history books?

And thanks to Gordon Oyer for these:

Thomas Merton to beat poet/publisher Lawrence Ferlinghetti, 8/61:

"Someday I want to talk to you about effective protest as distinct from a simple display of sensitivity and goodwill. I think we have to examine the question of genuine and deep spiritual non-cooperation, non-participation, and resistance. … [Just] standing up and saying with sincerity, candor, and youthful abandon "I am against it" has the following bad effects: a) it perpetuates an illusion of free thought and free discussion, which is actually very useful to those who have long since stifled all genuine freedom in this regard, b) it flatters the [establishment] by giving them something they can contrast themselves with, to their own complacent advantage."

Thomas Merton to Nicaraguan poet Napoleon Chow, 5/63:

"It also seems to me that the protest of the beatniks, while having a certain sincerity, is largely a delusion. … Yet this much can be said for them: their very formlessness may perhaps be something that is in their favor. It may perhaps enable them to reject most of the false solutions and deride the "square" propositions of the decadent liberalism around them. It may perhaps prepare them to go in the right directions. I think the beats have contributed much to the peace movement in the US, in their own way, and they are quite committed to the only serious revolutionary movement we have: that of rights for the Negro."

Note to He Who Must Not Be Named -- You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. John 8:44

Note to some of those I love -- How can you not be deeply ashamed? Or at the very least, embarrassed?

Note to the smart people -- Please stop saying "neoliberal."

My heart breaks because I know Lee's would be broken. 

How many people have stopped reading the news? Are clams really happy?

Sometimes leaving, like nonviolence, is the best thing to do.

Busy doing nothing. Old Zen phrase

PACKING DAY (FOR THOSE I HAVE DISAGREED WITH IN THE PAST EIGHT YEARS)

Barack Obama represented me for eight years. Apart from the military actions he inherited and was tasked to perform, his words and his behaviors made me proud. I accepted him.

Those of you who opposed and worked to thwart Obama, you now have another person stepping in to represent you. 

He will not represent me, but his words and actions will be what I think of when I think of you. 

What he says will be your words; his actions will be yours as well. What he says and does will reflect all the things you claimed to want and need. 

He is the choice of your party and he is the image of your beliefs, ideas, policies, and religion.

There is nothing more to argue. The last eight years have seen truth itself dissolve into a mud puddle in the park. All lies were welcomed; people insisted on believing what they wanted to believe, despite hard evidence to the contrary. 

We could be told it was a deluge on a sunny day.

The arguing is over. The proof-texting has reached the dead end that was always inevitable. 

There should be something amusing about this. Perhaps I will find a place in the world to laugh.

I am going away again. Months at a time, I will find myself on the road, wandering, seeking sacrifices to be made, knowing well the cost and willing to face the challenge.

I am packing today. Packing, then repacking. My life will be bundled up. I hope there is room for the dignity of the last decade. I think there's still some around. For me, at least.

We are not amused

Nothing amuses me.
Even La La Land did not amuse me.
Anything spoken by Cornell West or Jeff Sessions does not in the least amuse me.

I am leaving.
I do not expect to be amused.
I expect to be somewhere else.

Preparations

I leave Friday for Mexico.
Yesterday I drove Antonio to Indianapolis to get fingerprinted. It was the last possible day he could have it done. We had to go to the library to have another paper forwarded to us. 

I argued yesterday with people on Facebook, progressives who continue to complain about liberals.
"You were duped by really smart Russian operatives to waste all of your time spreading viral hatred for Hillary Clinton and it worked."
I dreamed last night about Lee, who was trying to help me write a paper on the history of Dada for my graduate studies class. It was due and I hadn't started. I couldn't find my books.
This morning Honey and I walked our usual two miles through the park before dawn.
Plans are for playing poker on Thursday, the night before I leave.
There is no order to these notes. It is not poetry. 
I cannot reveal the people I see in secret by candlelight, so how can I ever tell the truth?

Giving Up as Strategy

A SMALL COLLECTION OF VERBS IN THE PAST TENSE

Fell in love.

Got a tattoo.

Bought a hat.

Attended a play.

Saw sunset over ocean.

Wrote a sonnet.

Ate guinea pig.

Drank quinoa beer.

Taught English.

Observed religious festival.

Lost myself.

Explored ruins.

Watched glacier crack.

Heard an avalanche.

Walked a dozen miles a day.

Slept with the indigenous.

Chewed coca leaves.

Trekked Inca Trail.

Kissed people.

Wore sunscreen.

Got sunburned.

Visited church.

Listened to Uber drivers. 

Asked for directions.

Rode a horse.

Packed lightly.

Went to restaurant run by nuns.

Meditated 13 hours.

Priced ayahuasca.

Gave massages.

Donated old books I never read.

Cut my hair.

Cried.

Took pictures.

Fried an egg.

Danced naked, once.

Forgot.

Virus-free. www.avast.com

HOW THE WORLD ENDED

When did the world end?

When our blood was poisoned in the 80s?

When Jackie wiped blood from her pink hat and face?

When Mennonites decided to bear arms?

It wasn't when the Manhattan Project launched.

Nothing so dramatic.

Or when the Pill went to market.

Or any single war back through the annals of time.

Maybe it was when an unknown Guatemalan coffee farmer

Who never could learn Spanish

Decided to sleep in one morning

And just gave up.

Or maybe when smoke rings 

Blown from a barber's cigar in Seattle

Caused a bystander to choke

That thereafter all was lost.

The end of the world was determined the day that it began

And for me I hardly realized

How and when the world had ended

Because we kept going on

Even as the parade of death passed down my street

Walking toward the park

The sniper on the roof 

Picking us off

And I took it for granted.

This is the way things are.

They end. They already ended.

We are just fiddling around right now.

July 12, 2017