I've been trying to figure something out.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, President of Iran, wants to visit the site of the World Trade Center.  America is up in arms.

See, there seems to be this notion that he's there looking for a photo-op to take home and say, "See!  America is weak!"  Frankly, that's absurd.

An Ahmadinejad spokesperson tells WCBS in New York that he wants to "pay tribute to the people who died on 9/11."

Now, the U.S. says Iran is a terrorist country...that they sponsor terrorism.  They may, I don't know.  Like most Americans in the age of Bush Jr, I only have the credible information disseminated by our trustworthy government to rely on.  However, I would think that having the President of Iran at a photo-op at "Ground Zero" would be a bit of a coup for American media.  If he truly wants to pay tribute, it could well be a quiet attempt to start healing the rift between the Persian world and the West (particularly after France's inflamatory remarks a week or two ago.)  Given my understanding of Islamic culture in Iran, I think that may be the case.

On the other hand, if this is indeed a "trap" to promote Iranian terror tactics, the angry US propaganda machine would now have photos and reports of this man's behavior at the site.  For better or worse (and we know what it's like, Iran), he is representing his entire nation.

To the families who lost people at 9/11 yet oppose this man's visit, I implore you to consider that for all the evil in the world, it is our duty as Americans to be bigger than that.  It may well be a part of middle eastern culture to hold on to grudges and desire revenge at every turn, but don't let the death and suffering of your loved ones go in vain.  This could be the beginning of a chance to heal, particular on the heels of a major election.  It could also be crucial way of contributing to the fight against terrorism by our deeds rather than military action.  It's our job as Americans to show the world that the fight is as much about forgiveness and offering a hand of friendship as much as defeating the unreasonable persons of the world by way of combat.  It's the very mission our troops have been boldly undertaking since they were first deployed.  Consider it. 

Hi There.

Yup.

That's me, alright.  Funny thing you know.

Yup.

Cuz you hadn't bothered to check this in some time, of course, and with good reason.  Oh.  There I go.  Wisdom from the mouths of babes.

Yeah.

Yup.

Okay, look.  You wake up one day and suddenly think you've got it figured out.  You've done it.  You've faced the abyss.  You've done battle with the ever present darkness.  You've conquered the demons, slain your foes and vanquished your enemies, and now you are certain, and I mean certain that you've got it all figured out.  You can't write it down fast enough.  You have to tell everyone you know, and quickly, before you forget.  Of course, you say to yourself, you won't forget, because it is THE answer.  THE solution.

Yup.

Once upon a time; later that is, you wake up much as you had those eons ago and realize you have NO IDEA WHAT YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT.  You don't feel any smarter.  You don't feel like you've accomplished anything.  You discover that now you are comparing yourself to completely unrealistic criteria (like everyone else) and you...can't...stop.  No matter how hard you try.

Seriously.  Remember the glory days?  Innocence?  Youth?  Everything was new?  I'm not old.  Well, okay.  I'm older.  But I'm not old. 

In those days there was a barrage of POSSIBILITY.  See, that's because you could only see the future ahead, and the myriad things you would one day do.  The great accomplishments.  The feats of greatness.  The penultimateness of great-ery.  It's like standing on the starting line, knowing that whatever happens, you are gonna run one hell of a race.

Yeah.  Yup.  That's what it's like.  And why shouldn't it be?  There was no rent, no car payments, no utilities to cover.  If food didn't just miraculously appear on the table (or more often the counter or fridge), then it still seemed to come from somewhere.  And besides, going hungry occasionally wasn't all that bad.  There was always Ramen, and Taco Bell, 75 cent TV dinners once you'd ended your fast, and that was all food that could be purchased with the change from the couch.

There was no expectation of being brilliant (quite yet.)  You'd only just begun.  And maybe most importantly was the shear naivite...the gaul, in fact, to lack wisdom, and be okay with that.  After all, the future was a long road ahead.  Infinite possibilities.

Why do we have to go away from that?  Why do we leave behind the discovery of all that's new...the thrill of learning, the first kiss, discovering some cove of local geography on your own, the overtures of pretending to be an adult, right at the edge of adulthood.  Somehow it seems we instead choose to grow up.

And most of the time, it's boring.

Look, I have no problem with the notion that we have to provide for ourselves, but something's gone wrong.  The fun gets sucked out.  We start to fake it.  We start to entertain ourselves with things that aren't really creative because we have no energy for creativity anymore...nor time.  We try.  We do.  The haze of confusion beckons, however.  Suddenly things don't seem so simple, or they seem *too* simple.

The little joys have all grown up and you've left them far behind.  You question...and question...but unlike how it used to be, you're not sure what the question is anymore.  Confidence dips.  Status becomes more important than ever (and I speak as someone who had absolutely no status in my post adolescent years.)  We don't talk about it, but it's there:  a fine print subtext underscoring the rest of reality.

I remember what it was like not to care that I had to work the next day.  Not to care about what time it was.

Ahhh...there it is...timelessness.  The center of Zen.  So long as the clock dictates our lives and the weather is mere interuption, we are lost in the mists...no guide...no clue as to why we're even here...or what the mists even are...

You'd write, or you'd sing, or you'd play, or you'd walk / hike / camp / drive, or you'd just hang out with friends till the sun came up and then get breakfast, and maybe you did have things to do that next day, but it didn't matter.  You were invincible, and frankly, whatever you had to do didn't really matter. 

In the end you knew that you, like everyone else, would one day die.  All your work, your money, your education could be dust in the wind.  That's not to say those things aren't important, but when you step back and decide they are fleeting, then living now is what counts.  Living now is the work, and the education, and the hope, and the creativity, and the change...it is everything that matters, without caring about what happens next...and somehow, once older, what happens next is ALL ANYONE TALKS ABOUT.

I don't calendars.  And I don't like clocks. 

Besides, look at the birds.  What about the lillies in the field. 

What ties you down could free you if only you understood the tether.  Unfortunately I am adrift in the slipstream, aware that my rope holds me fast to ground somewhere far below, out of sight, but unable to imagine what it's like.

I am Sam.  Head in the clouds.  Wings at my back.  An evil empire before me, sprawling out in my fisheyed vision.  I yearn to fight off the oppressors.  I seek my maiden, and my mentor.  But in the end...it's all a trick of the light.  I am my own oppressor.  I've invented the evil empire.  It is Maya.  Illusion of my perception, or even my choice to perceive.  Here, Samsara has fallen apart, and Buddha is a distant being, far from my understanding.

Whither my heart?  At what cost, my soul?  And by heaven, where is my mind?


Oh, and you?  You just go on back to living properly.  Don't mind me.  I am perhaps a touch mad and without grace.  So please do not be offended as I shun you off.  Quietly.  Without ado.

For it's too much of me, and not of you.

Yeah.

Yup.

-Zen

This has a lot (black holes) to do with not a lot at all (planck time), but I was wondering, somewhat out loud, to myself...

In order to make a functioning time machine or to access any kind of wormhole that might connect one portion of spacetime to some other portion of spacetime (courtesy of the curvature of spacetime, etc...), one needs a tremendous amount of energy.

Not impossible, but highly (and I do mean highly) improbable.

So I'm reading through physics articles, and I'm relatively (haha) sure I'm not the first to have considered this by a long shot, but we've got this hypothesis (I think it's a hypothesis) about vacuum energy, which as I understand it is created by the reaction of kazillions of subatomic particles and anti-particles colliding with one another (in the "vacuum) before planck time (the shortest measureable unit of time) has passed, maintaining an equilibrium of energy in the universe (or something like that.)

So lo, ye physics gurus who must inhabit the blogosphere somewhere and can thus set me, a layman, straight on this matter.  Tell me if I'm wrong.

If the collision/reaction of these particles were delayed, say longer than planck time, then they would effectively show up in the "real" (observable) universe, offsetting the total amount of energy in the universe, yes?  I presume this would result in a very large (read: catastrophic) release of energy.  Assuming 1)  all of the above is in fact correct and true, 2)  we had the technology to harness such particles and the energy they release, would we not then have a sufficient source of energy for such a purpose?

Or is this precisely the delerious imaginings of the "perpetual motion" charlatans?

That said, if we can't observe subplanck reactions, how do we know they are there?

For a little while there the universe all kind of made sense.  Now we've got Vacuum Energy, Dark Matter and have proven the existence of Black Holes.  Proponents for the theory of everything...your odds are not looking good.

And thanks, 'lix for all the commenting.  My inability to keep up with the interactive portion of the web is really showing...(meaning I often don't realize where to find things like comments and am in too much of a hurry to spend time looking.)  Just sayin.  Keep on truckin!  er...

Elementary, my dear Watson.  I wouldn't know what to do with it.

Oh, I know.  Everyone has a myspace account.  For those that haven't heard of it, crawl out from under your rock and experience it in all it's glory.  Go ahead.  Clicky, clicky.  But seriously.  There isn't anyone alive in the western world that hasn't heard of it.  And apparently it is the most amazing invention of our age.  Check it out.

It's a networking tool, a way to keep up with old friends, a way to meet new people, a mass business card, a method of delivering music, video, art, poetry, DRAMA, chaos and horrid web design to the masses, a window into someone's SOUL, an inspiration for peace, love, joy, hatred, anger and loathing all wrapped in a warm corn tortilla with more than enough beans and cheese to fire the engines well into the early morning, it slices, it dices, it even does your laundry (and everyone elses.)

Yes.  It's glorious.  It's amazing.  It's fantastic.  So why can't I bring myself to create a "myspace profile?"  What could possibly be wrong with this perfect tool?  This haven, heaven, Nirvana?

I wouldn't know what to do with it.  Perhaps it's being anti-social (I am anti-social, aren't I?)  People would post nice little messages to me ("D0000000d, u r sooooooo cooool" and "PONIES1!!") and I would respond occasionally, dwindling to rarely, until I hardly respond at all.  I would check it religiously for a few weeks until that tapered off to nothing.  I would grow bored, and probably wouldn't be able to think of anything to write. 

It would become like my blogdrive account.  The sequel.  And you know what they say about sequels.  (The Godfather and Empire Strikes Back nonwithstanding.)

I wouldn't know what to do with the damn thing.  I don't have a nice picture of myself.  I don't have any great artwork.  My background would probably be simple, making my entire page actually viewable (a major taboo, it seems, in a world where gaudy is godlike.)  I could post a couple songs, but there's nothing my friends haven't heard, and I'm not so interested in what anyone else has to say about my weak, progrock inspired demo recordings.  I would rarely find reason to post.

The Revolution thus carries no meaning for me.  I get no kick.  Once it was an issue of the cutting edge.  Of meaning.  More than just a soundbite quote of Marshall Mcluhan ("the medium is the message") or Timothy Leary ("turn on, tune in, drop out.)  It's made me a browncoat.  Somewhere on the outskirts of "civilized" society (however revolutionary and rebellious civilized society thinks it is.)

It starts when you're the outcast.  Then you become anti-social.  Then you are pariah.  Suddenly you have a choice.  Become briefly popular and go insane, or spiral further outside of the cliques and coterie.

Now, if someone can give me a damn good reason, and believe me I wouldn't mind having one but it better be mighty fine...to create an account in this legendary establishment of modern hipdom, please let me know. 

Until then, I'll be sleeping among the outcasts, dreaming of Pluto before he fell out of favor.  It is, after all, very cold in space.

-Zen

mtvU.com

Just go there and play it if you haven't already.  If it doesn't get you interested in helping those in Darfur, then hopefully it gets you interested in helping someone, somewhere.  Thanks to soreeyes.org for this one.

-Zen

I'd just like to know where one looks to get the attention of those that created all the wonderful pieces of inspiration that litter my brain.

How did one get the job editting audio for Farscape?  How about doing ADR for Firefly?  Who gets to do Sound Effects for Doctor Who?  When the next science fiction film comes out, who will be tracking the production audio?  When the next Henson feature rolls through, how does one get the gig of writing the soundtrack?

I'd just like to know.  I am an audio engineer.  I'm not brilliant (yet), but I am ambitious, and a bit lost...caught up in those golden handcuffs in an environment I'm not really sure I can grow in.  I've gotten to this point in my life where I spend so much time trying to figure out how to just make enough money to survive that I don't seem to have the time to turn all these ambitions into realities.  Debt doesn't help.  Don't do it, folks.  Don't take any debt you aren't 100% certain you can pay off in a truly reasonable time frame.  The longer it's going to take, the more of your life it's going to suck up.  This includes student loans.  Especially student loans.  You can always offload a car on someone else, but a student loan is yours until it's paid.

Not only that...I mean the audio gigs...but I've often considered myself a wealth of creativity.  Problem is, I'm not really good at knowing what to do with it.  I can write both stories and song.  I can compose, though I probably don't have nearly the amount of formal training most composers have (though believe me, I'm confident that I can compose.)

Most of my problem is lack of experience.  That's a damn shame at my age.  It's hard to get more experience when struggling just to get by.  Especially if my job is...grrrrr....the way it is.

I digress.  I'm venting some steam here.  No specifics.  I just need a change already.  I need to stay mobile and keep moving, because that's what I do, I guess.

Answers, correct or not, are welcome.

-Zen

That means STRESS.  I'm tired of stress.  I hate stress.  I'm sick of stress.

Look.  It's one thing if I'm just not really making enough money to get by, what with student loans and a car payment breathing down my neck (and yes, I do require the car for my job, I'm afraid.)  Yes, many people in the world suffer from this condition (debt, I believe they call it), and some manage better than others (typically those with both higher incomes and better financial management skills.)

I can find ways to deal with that.  There are ways to make more money.

The problem is, as my good friend likes to call them, the GOLDEN HANDCUFFS.  You know, when your job has got you by the balls, and you let it.  What's worse, is the STRESS of the thing.  My boss...he's a great guy.  Make no mistake.  I respect him tremendously, and he's been extremely generous even offering me this gig in the first place.  But he's a bit scattered.  He's in another dimension.  In my view, it's like everything I do is wrong.  Well, not everything, but whatever new thing I'm learning this month at the place.  Truth is, I can get the job done, but the lines of communication are...well...frankly...to be frank, that is...honestly...ARE NOT THERE.

My workflow is sloppy.  Sometimes I leave messes that only I can clean up in a given circumstance...so I'll stay later and try to clean it up...but the actual task at hand...look...if I could just receive the information, top to bottom, on how to do it, I could do it!  Instead, I stumble through it loaded with misinformation and half-information, and have to try to make my way without calling him every two minutes to verify that I'm doing this correctly (because he's always BUSY...which I understand perfectly...but it's not helping me.)

I want to accomplish it, and I want to do it the right way, but if I don't know what the RIGHT WAY is, then how can I accomplish it?  And then, when I get to a certain stage and the task at hand has not been handled at all elegantly (though the actual end product is still arrived at, and I am willing to sacrifice my own time to correct workflow issues and "messes"), then I catch total hell about it.  I don't need to be admonished for failing to follow procedures I was not informed about.  I just need to know the procedures...explained clearly and directly...not with "you know?  I mean...why...I mean...look at this...you can't...you know?"  Because you know what?  I *don't* know.  That's why it's like that.  I would LIKE to know, so please explain it to me clearly, the first time, and don't go after me if I can't explain clearly what I've done if you can't explain clearly what you want me to DO.

I'm sure I could rant further.  I better stop.  The STRESS is killing me.  AND I have to be up in 4 hours to go to said job so that I can be griped at for approaching the whole thing (the first time I've done said job, btw) "incorrectly" (despite the task being nearly completed and the producer seeming pretty pleased with the whole thing.)

I'm done.  Hopefully there is still such a thing as anonymity online.  If not, oh well.  I'm getting tired of trying to explain myself to people who don't really want to understand.

-Zen

Which means two entries, two days in a row, which means nothing at all.

Well, it does mean that I've become vaguely aware of how I communicate (or fail to) lately.  It's really quite bizarre. 

Allow me to explain.

I'm verbose.  I talk...a lot.  I have a tendency to open my mouth and unleash a torrent of unnecessary words.  I babble.  I have been given the gift of gab.

It's probably painfully obvious by now that this gift includes the ability to use so many words to communicate so few thoughts.

That's why I never do this.  I've spilt the milk.

And now my censor is going up.  Despite the potential practicality of this exercise, I am suddenly acutely aware that there may be some small, voyeuristic audience staring in at me.  I cower.  Frightened, I turn.  I run. 

There on the horizon is a glimmer of moonlight, and I know I'm trapped by it.  I must obey it, because I always have, but I fear it.  It charges me with a moment of hope and respite before reminding me who the master truly is.  I fall.  Tumbling.  There's a rocky edifice.  It's not steep, but it is rugged, and roll down it wildly. 

At the bottom, worse things await me.  A garbled sound in the distance.  It becomes more distinct as I sit there, waiting for my doom.  Doom?  Why doom?  Am I crazy?  Yes.  That's it.  Crazy.  Mad as the March Hare.

The hare.  In the moon.

Get up.  Get up, now, I plead with myself.  My muscles aren't working, and the dreaded something is getting closer.  As it approaches I can taste adrenaline kicking in.  It's metallic, like a stainless steel spoon.  My mouth becomes dry.  Fight or flight.  Reflexes begin to take over.

Nearly here now.  Nowhere to run.  Isn't there?  There's always the way I came.  I could go back up the slope toward the top of the hill.  Certainly it wouldn't follow me there.  No, I think.  It's time to face this fear.  Time to challenge it.  Time to stop procrastinating and avoiding the challenges, slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, opportunities.  Besides, fleeing is hard, but fighting is harder.

I see it's shadow.  Finally I have reason to thank the moon.  Luna.  The huntress.  Is it a sign?  Do I now turn from prey to hunter?  Can I?  Fear expands within me to fill my veins.  It pulses, in competition with my blood.  My brain slowly surrendering to the notion that it will accept whichever wins.

I stand.  I finally stand. 

I open my mouth.  Words.  I close my mouth. 

Lips sealed, I contemplate this moment.  It cannot be the moment of my demise.  Awakenings are born of moments like these.  Foundations are poured.  Buried treasures are rediscovered.  Latent abilities rise again.

I open my mouth again, but this time, all I do is breathe.  From my pocket, I withdraw a pen.  On the back of my stronger hand, I write.

Making an effort.  Words. 

The something waits.  All it does is wait.  It wants to know what I will write next.  Fine, I conclude.  It must be a part of me.  I can't imagine who else would really care what I would write next.  I can't imagine who it would be more important to.

Fear subsides, for now.  So long as I have ink.

-Zen

Hiding.

Damn if I'm not bad at it, but I sure do it quite a bit. 

What's amusing about it is that as I age, I become more apathetic about what other people think, and yet I've just had this notion about...hiding.  In fact, the funny thing is, I'm not even hiding very much now.

Am I.

No, not in the old sense.  There's this sensation, though, that reminds me, perhaps all too appropiately, of the biblical allegory about concealing the light of a lamp. 

Inspiration, that old fleeting friend, is hiding.  I'm not talking about, "OMFNG I AM HAVING A MENTAL BLOCK."  More like a subtle spiritual crisis.  Because it seems there's enough to go round, we all get to have as many as we want in a given lifetime.

And I was sure I'd fulfilled my quota.  Surprisingly, I was wrong.

I don't recall who the statement is attributed to, but, "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results" comes to mind.  What do you do when you do get a different result?

I'm still doing it, aren't I.  Obfuscating.  Concealing.  Cowering.  You aren't even entirely certain what I'm talking about, but you have an idea.  And you're not far off.  I should be talking about it now, but somehow it seems better to beat around the bush.  To dodge the bullet.  The lamp is beneath the table.

So I'm not hiding out of fear of life's trappings and confusions.  I'm starting to not care so much about them.  The occasional drink probably contributes to this attitude, for better or for worse.  I'm hiding from myself.  I'm hiding from my "potential", a word so loaded with expectation that it induces waves of anxiety in the commitment-phobic.  I'm hiding because I'm too afraid of inner struggle between having the knowledge that comes from the tree of life...science, truth and comprehension, and not having it.  Not having it implies innocence, naivite, purity and simplicity.  Yet it also means ignorance...and maybe lies.  Was this the dilemna of the gnostics?  One god who espoused truth, but another malevolent god who created a Maya...a world of illusion...to entrap us?  Presuming, of course, there was ever any kind of god at all.

Where is that level ground?  Sure, we all struggle with it to some degree.  No-one wants to be wrong in the end.  Assuming it's the end.  But why does it even matter?  What are we really afraid of?

Me?  I'm afraid of reverting back to a time of darkness...without light.  Without contrast.  It's not that I want all light.  That would be equally troublesome. 

The compromise?  Leave the room dark by covering the lamp.  That way, I know the light is still there.  I simply cannot see it.

Can you?

-Zen

A little nod here to the end of an era in the world's least populated continent.

Wonderful blog.  Should be more like it.  Exploring our world is so much more exciting than living vicariously through fictional worlds.

- Zen