Tears of a Monster

How would you feel if someone died because of a lie you told? How would you feel if it were your neighbor's son - or your own? How could you live with such a thing? It would be unbearable and would take a lifetime to repair. God help the person in that position. The hardest forgiveness to achieve will be one's own.

But imagine if your lie sent thousands to die, thousands more to be maimed, tens of thousands emotionally scarred; unleashed years of terror, drove millions from their homes fleeing said terror and ripped further apart an already gaping wound in our world. What do you do if you're that kind of unspeakable monster?

Easy. You just disconnect.

The thought of actually being such a monster is unbearable. So one must devote all of one's life to keeping the lie alive you are something else. You somehow have to believe your evil has made the world a better place. Problems start, though, when others don't buy into your delusions. Oh sure, your fellow monsters will support you and call you good but even that won't be enough as truth becomes clearer.

Now our President Monster is crying because no one loves him. He/it desperately seeks to hoodwink history and declare himself a success - reality be damned. "Academics" are being brought in to offer advice on how best to fart and call it perfume. But is this really in the monster's best interest? Only an enemy tells you you do good when you do wrong. Luckily for the monster, he called on the Sarcastic Samurai!

As the famed samurai entered the Oval office, he drew his sword, made several impressive and threatening moves, then loudly screeched, "Ogenki desu ka!" ("How are you?"). This was followed by a completely motionless stare of contempt.

Standing in the corner wearing a shirt saying, "VEEP CREEP" was a man of vice. "Excellent!" lauded the human creep.

The Oval Office monster was confused and sought understanding from the man of vice. "What did he say? What did he say?"

"I'm not sure, but I think he told us to go fuck ourselves. God, I like that in a man," breathlessly replied the creep.

"I like it too then!"

The Sarcastic Samurai relaxed his stance as he pondered if he were on the world's most bizarre candid camera episode. But comfortable now in a state of delusional acceptance, the monster poured forth its woes:

"You see, it's the people - they just don't understand my vision - it's from God hisself you see - life is just a fantasy! - and I'm living my beautiful dream. But the people have a problem knowing this and loving me like God. I have to be frankly, I thinks people have a complete understanding of what I do."

"No, you moron!" interjected the creep. "You're supposed to say they have no appreciation of what you do!"

"Oh..." apologized the monster wearing its "I is your god" shirt. It nodded towards the veep creep. "What he said."

"Well," posed the samurai in feigned thought, "I suppose you could blow your brains out and call it victory."

The monster was very excited by the idea of victory but was cut off by his creepy partner. "Fuck him! Fuck you bastards with your goddam truth. I'm going to skull-fuck the truth right out of every one of you sons-a-bitches! What do you think of that?"


The samurai shrugged. "I think you should lick my shoe." Then he added with a smirking raised eyebrow: "What do you think of that?"

The creep licked his lips. "I think that's hott!" But as he made his move to the floor, the lightening flash of a sword erupted and a thud was heard with the rolling head of the creep. The samurai shook his head. "You people are too stupid for sarcasm."

"Awesome!" declared the monster president. "Can you do that to Iraqis, too? I promise to say you're doing God's work and spreading freedom!"

"A most tempting offer!" Sarcastic Samurai mused. "If only it weren't for that pesky soul!"

"Yeah..." agreed a crestfallen monster. "I hate mine too." Then, with tears in its eyes: "Have you no advice how to makes things better for me?"

"Indeed I do!" replied the samurai, sheathing his weapon. "Love your neighbor as do yourself. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

It's difficult to describe the movements the monster made on hearing that. It was as if one could physically see its internal struggle to digest the words. Then came the venom: "That's sarcasm isn't it? I'm on to you now! You don't care about me! You don't care about anyone who doesn't benefit you! You're all about you, thinking you know right from wrong when the only thing you care about is selfishness. That's your god! I read about folks like you in my Bible. In the end, you guys are always exposed and hated!"

Sarcastic Samurai applauded. "There you have it! Well done!"

President monster blinked his eyes rapidly in confused excitement. "You mean I'm right??"

"Absolutely! I think there's no doubt as to your legacy now." The samurai motioned to the severed body of the veep. "Now be a good boy and clean this up. I'll be back later to piss on your head."

"OK! Thanks!" As the monster bent over the dead body, he was heard to mumble over and over, "He said I have a legacy! He said I have a legacy!"

The Suicide String - Debby's Delimma

"You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do men light a lamp only to put it under a bushel basket; they put it on a stand where it gives light to all in the house."
As Debby slipped the suicide string around her wrist, it was the fear of what would happen on the inside she dreaded more than any fear of what could happen on the outside. Falling 30 stories to certain death was at least a way out. Trapped in a life she could never leave, she was tethered to this world by her string of god's approval. She was addicted to it and she felt that to die an untimely death would also mean the end of all her adoration. So in leaving and staying she was torn.

Best to let the chance of a breaking string take all the responsibility.

Tears of regret dripped from her cheeks. The same haunting questions voiced themselves once more in loud tyranny. How did she let things go so far off? Who was she? What was she good for? Why couldn't she find an answer?? The aching emptiness pounded her temples and broke her heart. It was much too much to feel! “If God wants me dead then so be it!”

She was the superstar who ran away from life. Growing up, everyone could see the dreams in her and loved her for it. She fiercely believed in those dreams – but slowly gave up on herself. And the more she gave up, the more she need approval. To do What Was Expected became the paramount concern in her life. She rationalized that as her need. If she were ever to face life on her own, she feared to be exposed as not the stalwart defender of dreams for which she was so admired. So she hid in the discipline of her marriage and hopelessly grasped onto its illusion of fulfillment. But the more she let herself be used, the less useful she became…

“Oh, my God! What will people think!” Debby pictured her lifeless body splattered on the ground and the resulting shock of her parents and family viewing such an inappropriate spectacle. She shut off the pipeline to her feelings and grasped her way back onto the roof. Back into her trap.

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Tim the Tormented always knew when someone had just come back from using the suicide string. It was the fresh look of despair that gave them away. “You know the difference between a woman and a girl?” he asked pretending to not notice her presence. “A woman knows the difference between being useful and being used.” He turned to his nemesis. “Oh, hi Debby. Are you a woman?”

Debby never broke her wall of silence. Façade Fred felt the need to interject though. “Wouldn’t you like to know!” Then he winked to Al to join in, who obliged.

“Seems to me, Tim, Debby here already has a man!”

Tim could strangle them both. Yet it was Debby’s silence that hurt him the most. Deflect, deflect, deflect. “You gotta be kidding! Who would want to make a life with her? Little miss Prom Queen has turned her back on everything she is! Tell me something, your Perfectness, you gonna teach your children to grow up and empty trash for a living too?”

The arrow struck home. “It’s easy for you to talk,” Debby railed back. “You don’t do anything. You live in a cave and comment on everyone’s life but your own.”

Having finally got a response, Tim had Debby exactly where he wanted her. Thus he ignored her. “I guess that’s just what we’re gonna do in this country: just keep on raising kids to be as stupid as we are. There’s a noble goal! There’s a secret every sick parent knows: a sick child will love you, a healthy one won’t. It’s good to have a plan!”

As defender of the world, Fred was threatened by talk of its demise. “You wouldn’t know a noble goal if it bit you on the butt! Some people live to serve the greater good. Not that that’s something you can understand.” Tim started to smile as he pictured Façade Fred’s idea of greater good.

Their old friend of Uneasy Silence arrived on the smirking lips of Tim. But all that was shattered by the meek, matter-of-fact voice of Debby.

“We’re out of trash bags. I’ll go get some more.”

The Suicide String - The Ballad of Al

"You are the salt of the earth, but if the salt has lost its flavor, with what will it be salted? It is then good for nothing, but to be cast out and trodden under the feet of men."
With fevered hands he clumsily slipped the looped string around his wrist and tightened it. The wind was harsher and gustier than usual, adding to the sense of chaos and panic. Of course, it’s always somewhat windy when you're on a rooftop thirty floors up. As he reached the edge he hesitated, paused by the thought of the certain pain to come. But the soberness was drowned by waves of inner darkness, pressing him onward. This much he knew: he must have hope.

With pounding heart and sickened stomach, Al the Apoplectic teetered on the edge wall of the high rise building. It was nighttime and he was an unseen man. With nothing to live for – and everything to die for – he jumped. The string – as always – snapped sharply on his arm causing him to wince. But at least that way he knew was alive. Dangling 300 feet in the air exhilarated him and choked him. Al was a man who needed a way out and in this nether world between life and death he found sanctuary. If the string snapped, all problems were solved…

It had all started with the Election Won But Lost. Al had gotten the votes to justify his life but the results had been rigged against him. He never got passed the stinging bitterness. For his future for now, he saw nothing. For Al had been seduced by politics: the idea you can make the world a better place without becoming a better person yourself. With the strings of power ripped from his hands, he was left with only himself. And once there, Al found nothing…

Given enough time hanging, the spark of life resumed, cutting through the darkness. Terror had put him over the edge and terror pulled him back up. With a starry night above him, Al’s heaving chest looked down to where his precious life had literally hung by a thread. With shaking hands he gratefully pulled off the suicide string. But as he moved back from the edge and into safe haven, twinges of regret already started gnawing on him.

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“Damn, it didn’t break!” greeted Tim the Tormented upon Al’s return. “The drama queen has arrived,” he dryly remarked.

“You know,” demurred Al, “your life isn’t so great, either. Maybe you should think about ways of improving yourself instead of always criticizing others.”

The stinging words failed to remove Tim’s smile. He knew Al’s reply before it came. Tim had to manipulate everything – even if it meant his own discomfort. He just hoped the other two – Façade Fred and Debby Do-Gooder didn’t join in. Tim’s tormented soul wasn’t sure it could handle all of that. But his gamble crapped out.

“Yeah, leave him alone,” joined in Fred, happy to return the torment to one who had so many times poked holes in his façade. “I bet ol’ Al over there has a heckuva better life than you.”

“It’s really not a nice thing to do,” weighed in do-gooding Debby. Rarely did she have the courage to raise an inclement word but she felt the wind at her back this time. “You would do much better to find ways to be positive.”

Tim’s burning soul lashed back at both. “Yeah, well, you’d do a lot better to keep your mouth shut like it should be. What kind of moron is positive about bullshit! And Fred-head thinks loser Al has such a great life then how the fuck do you explain him using the suicide string?”

No answers were to be found.

Sitting amidst so much blood, even Tim felt obligated to end on a few words of healing. “We’re all fucking janitors and our lives all fucking suck.” The words were directed at no one and to them all, helping to fill the painful vacuum of silence. Each returned to his rolling trash barrel in funereal solemnity. No one saw a way out. Where was hope?

The Lonely Wind Blows Cold

It’s time to face the reality I’ve made. I often think of the final scene of Shampoo when Warren Beatty is spinning around, looking for someone or something to latch onto…and finds nothing. I put up a brave front to my co-workers at whatever job site I’m on, pretending I have a future, a don’t-worry-about-me-attitude. But like that Beatty character, I’ve destroyed everything.

I have no true human contact. Any support I build up is based upon the fact they don't know me. So that’s no support at all. The perpetual con is killing me. I need rest. Rest from the street, rest from meaningless work, rest from me. I guess I have to do something to earn that rest. I don’t know what that something could be anymore.

You age quickly on the streets. I’m sick, twisted, alone and horny. If no man is an island, how come I can’t get off mine? The lies I’ve been feeding myself just don’t cut it anymore. I wanted to be today’s Tom Sawyer. I wanted to bring a message of love. I was going to show the power of life. But all that’s a joke. I’m a joke and my life’s a joke. I’ve got nothing. I’ve made my bed and now I can die in it.

Letter for Father's Day

Dear son,

There are some people who actually don't believe in being successful! But I ask you, what are scruples without success? Those who don't take aren't achievers and doers but merely sheep who blindly follow orders. A man has to take the world by the horns to reach his destiny! Do not let outside voices sway you from your goals. No one is going to give you anything. You know what you deserve so go out there and get it!

The world is for the strong, weakness is your enemy. The foolish and meek will whisper foul lies in your ears to make you as they are. Is it them who should hold the reigns of power or us? Is it the frail among us you want to make decisions for you or the strong-willed? Be loyal to what makes our way of life great. Who are we to question it? The future is ours to control.

You have to know what you want and never vary from it. Only those who keep their eyes on the prize will get the reward. These are turbulent times. The winds are changing course and who can stand against the wind? Be smart and do what benefits you. Don’t be some idiot who wants to save the world but not himself. Be on the side of the winners. The losers get what they deserve. That is why I have decided to join the Nazi party’s most elite group: the Schutzstaffel or SS. It will be glorious!

Remember, son, do what you want to do to benefit yourself but don't let that define you. It's what you say you do that defines you.

Your father, der kampf 1935

P.S. If you can't join the party, at least be Republican. Live the good life!

The Moral "Theory" of Objectivity

A mesh of live wires lays on the ground after a storm. A curious boy reaches down to pick them up. In the nick of time his father swats away the hand of the child to prevent his electrocution.

So what just happened?

To the father's understanding, he just saved his son's life. From the son's point of view, his hand was hit for no reason by an unjust parent. Each person's point-of-view is shaped by a personal understanding of reality. If there is such a thing as Objective Reality (God), then we must assume one viewpoint is more correct than the other, i.e. is more in tune with the Objective Truth. If there is no Objective Reality then the small child was safe picking up the live wires because to him he saw no harm in it.

If the child remains self-serving and conservative in his outlook, doom is inevitable. Refusing to admit his father's action was correct, a dogmatic crusade ensues to prove himself right. This then becomes his religion, which he calls holy and claims it to be Objective Reality. But this conservative lack of faith in the truth leads to his downfall as he once again tries to pick up a mass of live wires and dies from the shock. In this way, God will cleanse the earth with his "wrath".

Religion is derived from man's insecurity, thusly it serves man, not Objective Truth. But inside each of us lives Objective Reality. Problem is, it does not flatter us and always say we are right like religion does. Some even refer to it as an enemy because it contradicts an individual's religion. The danger is in declaring your religion holy and true instead of keeping a more liberal and open-minded view to what is Reality. You can tell how infected with religion a person is by whether or not he believes in Questioning.

One perfect example of this is the Theory of Evolution. I have studied this with an open mind and found it based upon insecurity, thus making it a religious statement. It is a fairy tale being passed off as science. We are not now nor ever have been fish. For some it is important not to believe in a Creator - which then gives more credence to a religion which refutes the existence of Objective Reality - thus relieving us of any responsibility to it. We think that makes us smart.

But Reality is our friend. It guides to the things that benefit us and away from things that harm us. It's all a matter of faith if you believe Reality is good or bad. When they boy asked why his hand was hit, his father told him it was to save his life. It was then up to the boy to accept the truth or choose a path of darkness.


See if you find these words to ring true:

Then the Lord answered Job out of the storm:
"Who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge?
"Brace yourself like a man; I will question you; and you shall answer me."

"Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation?
"Tell me if you understand.
"Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know!
"Who stretched a measuring line across it?
"On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone - while the morning stars sand together and all the angels shouted for joy?"
So what is the definition of "know"?

The Moral Theory of Relativity

Many people fasten onto science as something hard and fast. The phrase "scientifically proven" acts as sort of a bulletproof vest against any arguments to the contrary. It also implies that anything outside of science must then fall into the realm of philosophy. This reduces life to a more manageable level and sheds moral responsibilities. "Each of us is merely a mass of cells processing data and bodily substance until such time as the body expires." See how much simpler life becomes?

Unfortunately for these people, many scientific “truths” have changed over the years, thus making them lies. But as we all know, real truth never changes, it is absolute.

The true purpose of science, as Einstein reasoned, is to gain a greater understanding of God and the reality that has been created for us. This makes it a moral cause. The greatest leaps in science – the ones most hailed by its proponents – have been moral ones, to change our reasoning from a self-serving egocentric view to realizing there is an objective reality. Morality is an absolute.

The scientific strides we have made forward come from rejecting the point of view of insecurity. Deciding the earth revolves around the sun is the most obvious example. Einstein’s theory of relativity is another, i.e. what is physically true for one person is not necessarily true from another perspective. Meaning you can’t even unequivocally state a ruler is twelve inches long because were I to pass you at the speed of light that ruler would appear to you at a different length. And you would state that as a matter of fact.

So if all things are relative, is there absolute truth? Is this our only reality or does a supreme reality lie elsewhere? Is there a reality outside of this dimension we are also affecting? My answer to these questions is an unequivocal Yes. The sun is a parable for the truth. We cannot look directly into it but we know it’s there. So the truth cannot be seen, but it can be known. What we do know is right from wrong. And the (scientific) truth is that’s all anyone needs to know to be happy.