The Diamond Island

Whatever has been going on since I started down this creative procedure it has been going about its business hidden from conscious view. I haven’t been immediately aware of much more than “something” is happening, and so I’ve waited for the next step to appear and indicate whether I might join in with a conscious intent of any kind.

“Still waters run deep,” said my friend Kimaroo recently. Oh yeah, that’s right! I forget these things, whether its concerning people or matters of psychic complexity.

Then, an eruption. Or rather, an image of molten liquid in motion as if it were magma spilling out of the earth. And yet, transition into a process more amenable to human interaction: A foundry.

I live in the area of the country that is known as “the foundry” after all. Funny that something I take as a negative about the place I live should suddenly take on a very vital and important force of life!

I watch the opening sequence of the 1976 adventure yarn At The Earth’s Core and then it strikes me that this is exactly what is happening. Strange primordial powers deftly transformed by a sleight of hand into a process familiar to human endeavor. Though still fantastical given that a fantasy craft is being built out of this process, incredibly.

When I started I was composing a crystal matrices to bring together the elements and intentions I would need. Next I revealed the components and blueprints I would use (I’ve found others since then). I’ve been working on transpersonal narratives necessary to my journey. Molds that will serve to form the parts I will use to build the finished craft. And now, we are at the foundry.

I search for and find a diagram that shows me how it all works on a mundane but necessary external level. The elements are brought together into various furnaces and other mechanisms that turn the elements into the compounds that will make up the parts. Moving from lowest to highest, from the Blues up.

The central image of the molten liquids is where it all comes together—the crucible and cauldron of utmost hazard and intense energy directed towards the formation of psychic parts. Sparks fly, liquid fire falls to the ground in sizzling droplets. I am witness to a process inside myself of great childhood power.

The parts, cooled and cleaned then go to a place of manufacture. Industry is a word that has to do with women’s work. It may be directed towards mostly destructive, accumulative ends—yet the hands that strike the anvil and thread the wire are borrowing the true form of crafting: Introspection. Creating substance out of thought and from that substance, goods.

I dreamt of a UFO being sighted in a way that was also recognition of a form to be. Input from the dream state, cooperation from the unconscious.

I come across a video of The Bamboo Saucer, a film that in a way is about earthlings struggling to understand a UFO and direct its use towards peaceful means. This is, in a sense, a training manual and familiarity exercise to show me that I have been studying up for this since I was young.

K and I watch GalaxyQuest, and it dawns on me this is also a relevant experience of understanding. Of knowing that what you imagine is real, while also recognizing that it is absurd and that life is filled with terrible changes into new forms of consciousness from which life emerges, better than before.

I’m coming to an understanding of the tremendous forces at work within me, of me choosing to become part of this process and behold a beautiful, mysterious Karavos revealed to me.

Her name is coming to me.

Yet always there are still those lost souls who need to experience the call through others. They have wandered too far seeking the dew from faraway flowers in shadowed glens.

Yogi Bear is a generally decent being. Smarter than the average bear, he hunts the elusive picnic basket while dodging the romantic inclinations of Cindy Bear. The Ranger does his best to keep Yogi (a yogi? A teacher?) within the confines of general bear existence without havoc ensuing to either the tourists (voyeurs?) or the picnic baskets (containers of food—life—bliss?).

Kind of a standard cartoon tension you find from Hanna Barbara outfits. Well sometimes things get turned upside down and all havoc breaks loose. That’s kind of what happens in the old early-eighties movie Yogi’s First Christmas.

After those killer bees woke me up to the vuvuzella phenomenon and dialed me in before I missed the train completely, I started getting the shakes one day. You know, patrolling the perimeters of the neutral zone for invaders from butt-town who don’t like to get down.

Hey! That’s right, wasn’t there this movie with Yogi Bear in it I actually liked? Sensor sweep is ON, Babykins. Oh yeah there it is coordinates ready to beam aboard for ducats transfer. Hey, cheap considering the civilization one is poring over.

So in a nutshell, what is that dang show about?

It’s winter at the Jellystone Ski Lodge. Yogi Bear and his compatriot Boo-Boo are fast asleep in hibernation land, so the Ranger is looking for some well-deserved (he thinks) rest. When the bears are down and out for the winter, he gets his summer vacation so to speak.

Special guest stars include various characters from other cartoons. Augie Doggie and Doggie Daddy, Snagglepuss, and Huckleberry Hound. Besides offering a number of views on events in the movie, they also double as generic extras in every scene requiring “people”.

Their presence is to ensure that this is a memorable and fun holiday at the lodge. Who wouldn’t want to hang out with such a festive and interesting bunch? Who wouldn’t sympathize with them and their friendly outlook?

Only, the manager of the ski lodge says there’s trouble! The owner of the ski lodge, a Mrs. Throckmorton, is coming to inspect the premises and make a decision as to whether or not to close the lodge permanently. See, there have been all these strange happenings driving visitors away…

Chances are, unless the staff puts on a grand show of all grand shows the lodge is finished! Because while the Ranger is good at dealing with Yogi Bear, he is generally poor at just about everything else. The manager is really just a satellite extension of the Ranger, representing “the suits” behind administration.

But wait, there’s more!

There’s a mean old hermit who hates Christmas and all them “do-gooder city folk” ruining his solitude with their crummy good cheer. Well, this time, he’s decided he’s had enough and is going to go Nuclear Grinch on all their big behinds.

Although, he doesn’t have any elaborate plan other than ruin or destroy stuff. Which is actually kind of funny even though if he’d pulled any of it off people would have gotten hurt or killed.

Extra bonus!

Mrs. Throckmorton’s nephew is a spoiled rotten little brat who hates everyone and especially hates Christmas. He decides to make everyone pay by makin’ mischief. Oh! Who could it be pulling these pranks on us nice cartoon characters?

The little brat eventually hooks up with the hermit and they join forces to make this the worst Christmas ever. After a song where they sing about their mutual hate of Christmas and the horrible things they will do, of course.

Good times.

Looks like the lodge is toast. Not only that, but the good guys are going to work their little rumps off trying to make a good impression, and when they fail will probably think it was all their fault for not trying hard enough!

Unfortunately for the bad guys, Yogi Bear hears Christmas singing and wakes up. He decides to find out what the noise—noise—noise is all about and leaves his cave. Boo-Boo has to keep an eye on him of course, and follows Yogi through the secret cave tunnel that leads RIGHT TO THE DAMN LODGE!

Okay, we are in weirdo land here folks. The Ranger finds all his powers useless during the winter. Yogi declares his intention to see what this Christmas thing is all about, and there’s not a thing Ranger can do but gnash his teeth while the manager panics. A bear on the loose is clearly much worse for the lodge’s prospects than all the vandalism and near-fatal accidents going on.

The guest stars are, of course, delighted to see their friend in a holiday special and support him fully. Yogi then proceeds to use his magic powers of effortless compassion and easy going slack to foil every damn plot by the bad guys by sheer dumb luck.

Every. Dang. Time.

Mrs. Throckmorton is immediately impressed by Yogi Bear and makes sure he is promoted each time he does something amazing. I mean, with a ski lodge with Yogi Bear protecting it from all danger and making everyone smile, who wouldn’t be impressed?

Somewhere off screen the owner must be seeing dollar signs, but from what I can tell she is just really excited that there is this awesome bear who fixes everything and is super polite and friendly while he does it.

Oh yeah and Cindy Bear gets wind of Yogi being up and decides to pursue him despite the need for her beauty sleep! Mistletoe and a music number showing Cindy at her most alluring, hoo boy.

Will Yogi manage to stay awake long enough to see Santa Claus? How will our two villains make out on Christmas Day? Will the lodge be saved instead of sold down the river for an oil refinery or strip mall? I’m pretty sure you can guess the answer to these important questions.

Watching this old show, I’m struck by how wholesome the story is. Ever since dark realism infected the popular entertainment feed trough, it’s been difficult to find any shows that dare to tell a story where things work out like gangbusters and pull it off. It all comes down to stance and technique, folks.

Yogi Bear rides the luck plane on nothing but good-hearted excitement and optimistic curiosity. This is the true spirit of adventure folks; watch a master at work. We’re all in need of this kind of energy awakening in ourselves to see and do things that have never been done.

All the other characters are driven by immediate, real world needs–responsibility of one form or another and the fear of rules not being maintained or of not doing one’s duty. The villains operate from a more selfish and dissociated form of behavior; sabotage of a system in which they feel cut off from.

Along comes Yogi Bear with his evergreen heart chakra glowing with warmth in the heart of winter. He hears the noise—noise—noise and is affected. Do we hear and are we affected?

The vuvuzellas are calling, even in the darkest night of Xmas Not.

The other day I went about my patrol business as usual. It’s a strange charge and a difficult burden being the park ranger for the Mysterious Island beyond the reaches of many imaginations. Boiling coffee in a hat can be a drag. Pulling improvised cosmic torpedoes out of your bag of tricks is a common state of affairs.

Then those ding dang killer bees started making noise in the main hallway of the honeycomb hideout. What is that crazy noise?

They’re all set with sweet sweet honey for the winter, plenty of mega-zhord stings stored up for a beastly Spring of ultimate bushwhack, and wing music beats from the sampladelic depot near party central to keep them warm. They may make surprise jackup-in-the-box snow strikes in time for Xmas Not, just you wait Henry Higgins!

That’s what that noise is. Those glorious, outrageous, thrilling vuvuzellas that made the world wince and tremble during World Cup time. The videos were enough to make me tremble with longing, such awesome noise—noise—noise!

A lot of Grinches were pretty put out by those things, laughably complaining that they should be banned because they were “too low”. This from a sport that invented the term “football hooligans.”

Methinks it was a little bit of the ol’ jealousy of being outdone to infinity, mixed in with a general dislike of brown people.

I used to have a red vuvuzella when I was a kid and lived in New Hampshire. Ivy league students would blow them furiously during an annual bonfire in the central park of the university I lived beside.

I thought it was outstanding, so I badgered my folks into getting me one. Wasn’t hard, as they liked the noise too. Though the scale could hardly compare to those videos on YouTube—that sound was epic, man.

Broke my vuvuzella and forgot about it, until the killer bees reminded me.  “Hey, like dig, right? Remember that thang you used to have and blow every now and then? Check it out, it came back and you shluffed the notice.”

Argh! They’re right. As much as I am listening and straining with all my might to understand, still the boundless life rushes past me in countless ways.

This time, I gather to myself a number of mp3s of the noise—noise—noise, droning incessantly like a world of bees insisting that the people awaken. Awaken to judgment and resurrection to the sound of trumpets blaring in a chorus of people answering angels with a swarming sound of “yes!”

This gets me back in the frame of mind of beekeeping. Not just the physical manifestation, but also the psychic one. Of hearing the sound and recognizing my own innate calling to myself of the call.

Xmas Not is coming, and the Grinch came sliding down in a sleigh blaring a trumpet having awakened his heart.

At long last, after deciphering arcane instructions on the website and fiddling with settings on ancient programs I have managed an Amazon Kindle version of Diamond of Darkness. Woo and hoo, go me!

You don’t need to shell out 100+ bucks for a Kindle. There are free apps so you can just get the goods and start reading.  Believe it!

Now time to get started on the Lulu physical version. Back to the laboratory to study forgotten mixtures and play with strange settings on the abacus we call a computer. Stay tuned, folks.

I helped the bees.

The killer bees who came to rock me been wintering over and building strength.  As the spring rains of radioactive doom spill out over the land, they been buzzing slowly into hot activity, like a magma swarm of super-charged sparks under intense pressure.

All they needed was a shelter from the mindlessness of humans caught in their repeating basic mantra of bad brains programming. The killer bees grow stronger in my mind; can’t help but feel a little like a king bee, if only in a small way.

I helped more bees.

Since I decided on becoming a beekeeper, I figured I ought to start at Level 0 somewhere.  K ordered this hang-able bunch of cut bamboo wrapped and stapled together, and I put it outside for mason bees to find a home.

Those bees are rover bees, wanderers and nomads without a hive. Heh, pretty cool. They’re all over the place, but you never notice them because they come in so many shapes and sizes not always resembling the humble honey bee.

K had her doubts, but I stubbornly insisted on getting started. Next thing I know, bees! Gathering their pollen for their little larvae and mud to seal up the little nursery capsules.

She was so excited by my success that she gathered up some bamboo and created a makeshift home bunch herself.  Next, she took a block of wood and drilled holes in it.  All these things were hung in a place so as to avoid the rain and get regular sunshine (warmth and dryness being key).

Okay, so it’s like six or seven sealed nurseries now. Very small results, but still so exciting!

Started looking up YouTube videos of beekeepers, and K tuned me into the top bar method of raising hives. This looks awesome. In particular, the video of the dude installing a queen without gear and only a pipe for smoke while his kids watch strikes me as incredibly brass.

It’s a preview to get me excited about one day being capable enough to help the bees. Yes, the honey is a benefit—I am thinking of myself at least a little. The satisfaction of exploration and experience, however, is what draws me. I must know more about bees!

And I will. Muah-ha-haaa!

Last year I learned terrible news. If I had learned of Molly’s passing earlier, it might have destroyed me.  Instead, I took responsibility and danced. For a whole year I have held a candle and sung a song of hope and peace.

Now I square the circle and complete the grieving.  The time has come to let go and forget, so that the universe may continue to spin a spiral of love.

Keeping and releasing. This is how we find an experience of being alive.

I think now of how we go through our lives and miss so much, waste so many chances to make a connection, and this is okay.  The universe is generous and this is harsh on us.  We who are limited by our smallness.

It’s funny, but there’s a part of me the universe revealed that belongs to myself and only I. This secret can never be replaced or duplicated to my knowledge. That mystery knows Molly now and will remember if the other parts of me forget.

Caring transforms our darkness into the light of sorrow and suffering so that we might know ourselves and the human depths and heights of our unknown nature.

I imagine ecstasy, seeing my friend and almost lover in the ways she might have been and may yet be beyond the realm of our Mesozoic understanding. She is released from the obligation to carry the torch of life through the darkness of precipitous living.

I rejoice, knowing I have made meaningful some small part of her brief course in the span of time and space. That is, after all, what our calling often is as human beings.

She is free to travel, and I am released to continue on my small and winding night of the body for as long as is needed by my barely glimpsed destiny.

I love you Molly Kleinman.

Okay, so a long while ago I swore I would level up on the knitting power. It’s pretty sad news that a category on this blog has been limping along at only one entry for such a long time. Can you guess my undeveloped side here?

No longer! Unpacked (again), re-learning my skill (again). I will get back in touch with this and make myself the very scarf that Kimaroo mentioned I need in this day and age of psychic blizzards.  Everybody needs an advanced tool of civilized multi-purpose function in this era of Road Mutants In Training.

But hey, sometimes the trove comes up extras on the bonus round. Lo and behold at the store, an array of potions such that K and I thought were relegated to an age of history sadly written. Just goes to show that anything can reappear when the world turns with a subtle flavor.

Behold, potions of healing goodness! K loves this beer, swears by it and has sorely missed it. We plan to stock up before those Roguesy weirdoes turn off the emergency damage repair spigot accidentally again.  For now though, it is exceedingly cool to run into an old friend of tasty character and refreshing vitality. Times are tough!

Of course, scrolls of revelation are included in the package as well. For my roleplaying game group I do maps and tokens as part of my full Game-mastering package of goodies.  Here’s a picture of one such map that I created, of the village where the characters begin their adventure.

Yes, full on detail and color of the highest order.  These things help my players imagine the scale and scope of the area they find themselves in. I was telling Kimaroo about this very thing, when I realized I ought to show her what the Hek I was talking about.

Yes, magic items are everywhere. Because we need them.

For the last few months, I’ve found myself at a high degree of stress factors with diminished creative activity. You could say all sorts of components and clusters of energy have been blazing hot and ashen. Then, the downslide into long periods of rest and dulled, zombie-like shuffling about to no particular aim. Whatever’s going on in the deep unconscious, I’m pretty much surfing it as best I can.

No doubt, this last year I’ve been processing and working out an avalanche of dislodged material from my brain connections. I’ve truly felt like this was not for the faint of heart or tender of spirit, yet I’ve managed to keep the trans-warp drive going on jury-rigged plot devices.  Work, relationships, artistry; all on the hopper alert main panel with flashing jewel studded lights.

The past returning along the elliptic, the future looming across the event horizon, and the present busting a move on the loudspeakers and display panels as fast as I can render a thought.  Still, I’ve found fun where I could and helped people along in whatever manner I could find the wisdom and strength to do so. Really, there are long periods where all you can do is hope, and wonder, and dream your way through these blizzards of the soul.

Back in the college days of yore I encountered a mighty strange phenomenon.  In the student center there was a dining area for all the students on the generic meal plan (which at the time was called SAGA, or as it was nicknamed in fun, Soviet Attempt to Gag America; ironic since it was a liberal arts college).

Basically, you’d be sitting there eating your meal (usually dinner) and someone would say, “Rat-hump.” Someone else would say a little louder, “RAT-HUMP.” Then the real contest would begin: There would be a rush to see who could say “RATT-HUUMP!” the loudest without being embarrassed.

These things happen.

Just the other day on the FaceCrook channel my colleagues in college were doing the still-alive-but-past-life analysis in order to revisit this strange irrational gift from the beyond.  Alas, like all mysteries we could not find a suitable answer.

Where did it come from? Who brought it into being? The seed of this break in so-called well-behaved discourse must have come from somewhere reasonable and rational, right?  Right?!

I talked to the “cool” people of that time period, and they refused to say.  Maybe they know too much! In any case I got nothing on that angle.

I spoke with the folks from the period before where it might have manifested. They knew nothing.

The rational minds of the crew came up with some interesting (NSFW) origins of the word, but not quite the practice:

• This blog provides general analysis.
• Google Books references placing clues in 1922.
• Democratic Underground digs up the popular culture graveyard.

My initial rant went as thus in the discussion:

***

Rat-hump is used in an escalating declarative sense to achieve a conscious recognition.

• Step 1: “There is a rat-hump, hello!”
• Step 2: “No, there’s a rat-hump, HELLO!”
• Step 3: +1 until consciousness raising achieved.

At which point someone recognizes that yes, there is a rat-hump and someone’s face is red. In other words ritual re-enactment of “shock the monkey”, in which we all participate in the recognition of “crap thru a goose” life.

So the definition is rat-hump as a state of mind in which one realizes one is rat-humped, or someone you know is rat-humped.  QED: we are alive and life is rat-hump, Gloria Et Domine or Kyrie depending on where you stand on the rat-hump wheel at that particular moment

***

Spontaneous affirmation of life through a subversive exclamation of experience? Such things are among us now, refusing to allow our mere reason or tyrannical infant-services to repress them.

THERE IS NO SANCTUARY.

Nowadays Anime and Mecha (giant robots piloted by humans) are no big deal.  While I was still in high school though, many a moon ago, any appearance on television was a huge event. Of course, the concept of television was not the endangered species it is today either.

You had to get up early to catch this kind of stuff, like many shows that were barely allowed to show in the backwaters far from prime time slots.  But Robotech blew my mind with its character complexity and ongoing story.  Like Speed Racer, Marine Boy, and Starblazers before it I would be exposed to new ways of thinking and civilization would move forward in microscopic ways.

The premise is this: An alien vessel crash-lands on earth, filled with advanced technology and a brand new fuel source—protoculture.  The event causes the earth to unite under a world government and rebuild the alien ship into the flagship of a military organization called the Robotech Defense Force (or RDF for short).  It is believed that the aliens will come looking for the ship and earth wants to be ready to repel them.

Turns out that’s a correct assumption.  On the day of the maiden voyage of the flagship (known as the SDF-1 or “space defense fortress”), the aliens (giant humanoids called the Zentraedi) appear with the intention of capturing the flagship and returning to their home planet.

In the first series, known as “Macross” (named after the island the SDF-1 crashed and was rebuilt upon), we follow the adventures of both the humans and the Zentraedi involved in the struggle over possession of the SDF-1.  During the initial attack to recapture the ship, the humans discover not all of the modified-for-human-technology works at they believe.  Despite their superior forces, the Zentraedi find the behavior of the humans confusing and are constrained by orders not to destroy the SDF-1.

The Macross series really begins in earnest when the humans use the SDF-1 to execute a “space fold”, but botch the process.  They end up transporting themselves and most of Macross Island to outer space, at the far end of the solar system.  They are forced to rescue the 50,000 or so inhabitants of the island along with as much supplies and material as they can, then try to return to earth.  The Zentraedi attempt to stop them as the SDF-1 makes its way back home.

All a decent enough back-story for what happens, and in many cases that would drive the action of most television shows. What struck me as most powerful though was the idea that you could have a vast array of different iconic characters that included the “bad guys”.

Who it turns out aren’t as bad as first thought. The Zentraedi are controlled by the Robotech Masters who have stolen the fuel source of protoculture from another alien race—the Invid.  Protoculture, the source of immense power that fuels all the giant robot machines in battle, is a life form that belongs to the Invid.

The second series would examine the Robotech Masters and the third the Invid—and their effect on humanity.  In the second series the main protagonist is a woman.  That was another cool thing; how different kinds of women could have important parts in the drama.

The Zentraedi find the human culture awesome and exciting and many eventually elect to “micronize” themselves to human size and assimilate into humanity. The show evolves from a struggle for survival to a question of integration among different cultures.  This is handling the big stuff folks.

It isn’t perfect. There’s bias creep in the stories, not all of which holds up today.  But back then it was like advanced technology.  Cool characters dying? Questions of gender identity? Complexity in villains?

It was hard, getting up to watch this show.  Remembering to program my folks’ Beta VCR to record it wasn’t easy either.  Sometimes there’s only so much willpower available to a teenager, even when the stakes are something you really care about. This wasn’t the first or last show I had to fight to watch.

But sometimes that’s what young people have to do, fight for the things that matter for them.  Their very education is at stake. I would argue the future of civilization itself is at stake.  For where else will you learn the important lessons of culture if not through the hard-to-reach treasures of artistic pronouncement?

I still have my die cast metal SDF-1, bought on discount from Kaybee toys for ten bucks. My symbol of the adaptability of human transformation and the ability of new forms of thought to disrupt even the most ingrained forms of coercion and repression.

Nothing belongs to us; it is all borrowed on the backs of someone else.  Yet in a sense we are stealing from each other because we need to separate ourselves from truth, believe we are special above all others.  This is the dilemma of our civilization, the ability to recognize our limits and accept our indebtedness to others’ lives, yet still celebrate the individual who dares to speak with an honest need.

The stories are there now—alive—as we speak. What secret wonders are being revealed to youthful and eager eyes beyond our imagining?