il Compendium

A Victim of Christian Distrimination

2012-02-12T14:44:00.004-06:00

To day I went to an interview. The company is some kind of wedding/party service that needs attendants for the portable photo booths they rent out on weekends. I didn't sound like a great job, but I figure if I can handle a room full of college students without getting into trouble, I could probably deal with digital photo booth, and it would only be part-time.

When I entered the office, I was told to complete a form that consisted of several pages of basic logic and mathematics questions. Things like "what relation is your niece's brother to you." I briefly considered writing in that my niece does not have a brother.

One of the final questions intrigued me. It read "How many of each type of animal did Moses put onto the ark?" The question was an easy one (I am an atheist but I greatly enjoy reading the bible so I could see that it was a trick. It was Noah who sailed the seven seas after the great flood, not Moses) But seemed to have little purpose other than to test my personal knowledge of Bronze Age literature. The test didn't ask anything about work experience or availability, but I figured those questions would come during the interview proper.
The interviewer's questions were as follows:

"why didn't you dress up for this interview?" (This took me aback a little. I was wearing a dress shirt and brand new jeans that fit properly, but I replied that I felt a middle course was best because I didn't know how formal the company atmosphere was).

"Describe yourself." (I described myself as a responsible adult who teaches English part time, loves dogs, and works hard).

"Have you ever been let go from a job because of performance issues?" (Now we're getting somewhere I thought. And no I never have been fired for performance and, if the interviewer had asked, I could have told him that I tend to stay at any job for at least five years, even part-time jobs)

"How do you see the world, is it black and white or are there gray areas?" (Now my spider-sense began tingling. Three of my passions in life are politics, language, and religious studies. To me, this question seemed designed to give me an opportunity, without actually demanding it, to express my abiding love for Him and His son. Something like "Well, sir, my faith in Christ compels me to view the world in black and white terms because the Bible is clear on this etc." I enjoy listening to crackpot radio preachers when I can't sleep at night so I could probably rhapsodize for at least an hour on the absolute authority of the Bible before my conscience compelled me to come clean.)

Instead I told him the truth, that, when I was young, I was more "black and white" than I am now and as I became older, I began to feel that it was wiser instead to acknowledge the limits of what I know and work very hard to learn as much as I can.

He ended the interview, thanked me, and I left.

So here's my question: Was I discriminated against or has it become normal to ask biblical and philosophical questions instead of specific questions about work history and current abilities?
If a private business wants only Christians, that's their choice and their right. But this was a new experience for me and I'm not sure whether I'm reading too much into it.

Has anybody else had this experience?

From God, to Rush, to Carl

2012-02-08T15:05:00.000-06:00

In the early nineties, when I considered myself a conservative, the movement had a different vibe. For example, Rush Limbaugh was actually funny. Back then, Rush presented his listeners with an upbeat and positive persona that belied the fact he was apparently blowing out his eardrums on prescription meds at this stage in his life. His lampoons of liberals and democrats, if not informative, were at least delivered with good timing and panache. Rush would eat steaks and smoke cigars on the air. His musical parodies were on par with the Daily Show or Colbert Report from our present time. My personal favorite spoof was a song called “sensitive 90’s guy”. Musical comedy is not easy, and El Rushbo deserves credit for this if nothing else.
As with any hero, my friends and I tended to invest far more significance to the pronouncements that emanated from the golden EIB microphone than Rush’s limited scope and intelligence warranted. The biggest dittohead in my peer group, let’s call him Carl, was also the most conservative among us as well as being the biggest loudmouth I have ever met (those of you with right-wing friends will no doubt be familiar with this trifecta. If you are a conservative, and you don’t know a person like Carl, then you are probably that person).

Carl referred to himself as a born-again Christian. I say referred because, for Carl, Christianity seemed to exist mostly for the purpose of making Carl feel superior to others. In order to pick up on this, one had only to listen to Carl act out his trademark fantasy in which a pious Muslim or Hindu, or even a Catholic, would die and ascend to heaven to meet with God only to be told, in a southern drawl, that “That’s real nice buddy, but there’s just one problem, y’see, I ain’t Allah”( or Vishnu or the virgin Mary) before being dismissed to their eternal damnation.

After high school, Carl went to an evangelical college where, if my memory serves me, he majored in Napoleonic history. Once, while we were driving around listening to Rush on his car radio, I asked him what he hoped to do with a BA in this subject. Carl replied “Once I get my degree I WILL be given a PODIUM,” (you could hear the capitals). “Then I’m going to point out how the liberals are trying to turn this country into a communist regime through Greenpeace and the Democratic party.”
It all sounds ridiculous now, a couple of pretentious assholes trying to make themselves feel important. But we were young men. Neither of us had girlfriends, and the idea of defeating communism still resonated a little with my generation. At any rate, saving the country sounded a whole lot better than masturbating to a tits-and-ass movie on Cinemax, which was closer to reality.

Carl eventually got a divinity degree and worked for some time as a holy man of some variety. I once came across a youtube video of him teaching his flock that they could rest assured Christianity was true because so many of the early Christian fathers held on to their belief even when they were tortured and crucified. If it was a hoax, Carl’s argument ran, they would have admitted it in order to get out of jail. I almost looked him up then to point out that, if a willingness to die for one’s beliefs substantiates that belief, then he had probably backed the wrong horse since the attackers of September 11^th were no doubt the most devout believers on that day. In Carl's video, there was a crucifix in the background, so I assume he has not converted to radical Islam, though if he did, I have reason to believe that he would find himself right at home in their midst.

A couple of years ago, I heard through the grapevine that, while he was ministering to the faithful, his wife left him and his parishioners fired him for being single. I’m not sure if he is still a minister or even a believer and I don’t much care. A few weeks ago, I saw a clip of Rush on CNN. He was still ensconced behind the mic., but the panache was gone. He was giving commentary on the newest Herman Cain Accuser, Sharon Bialek, and his argument consisted of calling her “buy-a-lick” and making disgusting slurp noises into the golden microphone. I have long since moved on from Rush and his cronies, but I couldn’t suppress a twinge of sadness for the guy. Maybe he just hadn’t got his fix that day.

Community College Confidential Part I

2012-01-25T07:31:00.004-06:00

As I write this essay, I am looking at my high-school graduation tassle, which I have draped across the corner of my laptop. I found it the other day when I was looking for an old usb wireless antenna. I wasn’t surprised to see it. The faded red and white strands with their telltale “90” in gold colored plastic turn up from every now and then to remind me of how much time has gone by and how little distance I have travelled in the years since “90”.It’s funny that I should find it today though, as I have this very day decided to strike colors on my campaign to become a full-time college English instructor.

I have begun instead to look for more “conventional” work. Though, when I embarked on this campaign, it was particularly because the idea of teaching college English seemed like a fairly conventional one. What I mean is, I should think that any mother would be, if not proud, at least satisfied, to hear that her son had grown up to be an English professor and, honestly, if you went back in time to 1990 and told my friends and family that I would eventually become a college professor, I’m sure that the consensus would be something like “yeah I could see that”. And yet, said career has not been forthcoming.

In order to be truly fair here, I have to cop to the fact that this is partly my own fault. I am a born contrarian. More than once I have, like Christopher Hitchens, found myself vehemently defending positions in which I truly have no interest, just because everyone else believes differently. Coupled with that is the fact that I bristle any time somebody tells me what to do. I have ended friendships over such phrases as “Drive me to the store,” or “Don’t do that” (Not officially ended, mind you, just left to die on the vine like the big passive-aggressive wuss that I am.

But I never shoot first. I’m not an asshole, I merely turn into one when some other asshole gets uppity. And, even then, I’m usually pretty cool on the outside. For example, when I was teaching at a certain community college west of Dekalb Illinois, I once taught a section of English 104. My class was immediately followed by another section of the same English 104, taught by a different instructor. This fellow was a full-time professor at the college and was somewhat revered in the hallways because he had published a work of “Christian fiction”. He had a nasty habit of standing in my doorway as I finished my lecture and storming into the classroom immediately upon the end of class, obstructing my own students’ exit. This was annoying and completely uncalled for, but, in the nature of his personal savior, I forgave him (actually at first I thought he was a noobie because he seemed incompetent and nervous). I never commented upon his actions one way or the other, despite the fact that my students were annoyed by the way he would begin fiddling with the projection screen while I was still fielding after-class questions.

One time, near the middle of the semester, I decided to engage my fellow instructor in some chit chat and get to know him better. So, as he was fiddling with the projector, I queried him with “So what’s on your agenda for today’s class?” He replied by informing me, in front of my students, that “I’d rather be setting up than talking to you.” This Christian needs his face pushed in, I thought to myself. But all I said was “well, ok. As you like it.” Later, some of my students offered to beat the shit out of him for me, but I declined this and I don’t really think their heart was in it. Still, I probably should have beat the shit out of him myself. But I was trying to get along.

I murdered a family

2012-01-18T20:50:00.001-06:00

I had been stalking them and I knew where they lived, just behind the water heater in a dark corner of the laundry room. I wasn't gonna murder them at first, I swear. Actually, I thought I had bought traps that didn't kill them. I had bought this same brand of trap once before and it hadn't killed any mice. The squeaky little rodents merely got held in the clutches of the trap, which allowed me to fling them out into the field. I liked this arrangement. I had always felt bad about breaking their necks (or even worse, those horrid sticky traps - what sick freak thought those up?). This way, they were at least out of the house, and my hands were clean.

Evidently that first trap was defective. I set the new one with some almond cheddar spread from Figis (mice just can't resist it and neither can I), and placed it, like room service, in front of the little hole where the heater pipes go into the wall. I had only to turn the lights off and wait a few minutes to hear the tell-tale snap of the little trap. Heh heh, gotcha little devil. I thought to myself, it's back to the field for you.

For a second, after I flicked on the light, I could see his little legs wiggling and I assumed all was on track. But, as I picked up the trap and walked with it through the back door, I couldn't deny that he was...well not so much...anymore. Sonofabitch, I thought, these traps are deadly! If I wanted to purchase a humane trap, I would have to drive all the way back to the hardware store. I looked out across the field. The sun was going down.

The next mouse to die must have gone almost instantly because the trap caught him square on the head, before he ever even got to have a taste of Figis almond cheddar which, if it tastes as good to a mouse as it does to me, might almost make the game worth the candle. Well, there he was, my first willful murder. I washed my hands of the first mouse because I didn't know about the trap, but this one...

I had to face him, so I picked up the trap and I looked closely at this rodent...at this mammal (who for all I know was female). I do not know the exact percentage but I do know that, in terms of genetics, there is very little difference between myself and the mouse who's life I had just taken with full knowledge of my actions.

His or her eyes were small and black. His head was not particularly attractive but one cannot look at another mammal and avoid noticing certain similarities to humans. The ears of the mouse, for example, were cute and I would guess, his hearing superior to my own, but I don't actually know. As I dumped his dead body into the garbage, I thought, I can't keep doing this. I've got to call a halt to these hostilities and go get some kind of humane trap, if they even make such a thing. But, after the first mouse, I had drunk a couple of vodka tonics to soothe my nerves, and in my heightened state I felt a certain sense of fate taking over. And my mother (it’s her house), wouldn’t sanction a ceasefire. She whooped with excitement bordering on the maniacal every time she heard the signature snap coming from the laundry room. “We got another one!” she would yell in a sing-song voice and command me to remove the offending animal. As the ancient Greeks so often demonstrated, character is tragedy; tragedy is character.

After the third mouse, the cognitive dissonance began to set in. Mice are indeed disgusting. They smell bad and they don’t ask before coming in and trashing your house. They spread disease and, even though I feel dread harming another living thing, I’ll be damned if I’m going to let a mouse give me some kind of god-damned plague bacillus.

By the time I managed to find a humane mouse trap on the internet the next day, the killing was over. We had “trapped” a total of five mice. My great fear is essentially that of karma. I worry about what will happen if a race of superiors shows up and judges us by how we treat those lower than us…those mammals who coveted nothing more than a warm place to eat and multiply. Who among us could fault them for wanting these things? But if a superior alien race were to arrive on our planet and examine its primary occupant, they might find that we clutter up the place and that our feces stinks like shit.

Free online guitar lesson

2012-01-17T12:54:00.000-06:00

I am working on a set of online guitar tutorials, of which this is the first. This lesson will help you stretch your right hand and develop independence of finger motion.

Free Video Game

2012-01-06T12:56:00.000-06:00

Hi everybody. This is just a quick note to tell you that I have finished my first ever video game, Krazy Planes. It is pretty much a copy of 1945 with a few changes.

You can download Krazy Planes from the BOX widget on the right side of the blog.

Use the arrow keys to move your plane.
Use the space bar to shoot at the enemy planes.

Please drop me a comment to let me know what you think of the game.

Amazon Mechanical Turk: Get Your Turk On

2012-01-05T09:59:00.000-06:00

I am not so naive as to believe that the Internet could ever provide me with a "get rich quick" scheme. However, in these dark times (I'm too old to get a fast-food job and too dumb qualify for a good job...and my field of expertise, English Composition, is overpopulated by attractive young women) I often find myself surfing the net for "keep your head above water quick" schemes (KHW's). One of the more interesting KHWs I have clicked across so far is the Amazon Mechanical Turk

The Mechanical Turk is a web service where you can get paid very small amounts of money to perform simple tasks that cannot be performed by computers (Amazon calls these Human Intelligence Tasks or simply HIT's). For example, one common "job" requires you to look at a hundred digital photos and click on the ones that appear to have inappropriate content (note: you must be over 18 for that particular HIT). This job was kind of fun. I looked at a bunch of pictures and clicked the nasty ones. It took a minute or two and I earned $.04.

HIT's range from simply going to a website, for which one usually earns a penny, to writing a 500 page article on a specific topic, which could net $2.00 or possibly a little more. For one job, I was paid seventeen cents to describe something unique about my home town (both the Unibomber and the creator of Little Orphan Annie have lived here). One HIT that I quite liked had the worker (or Turker) look at a digital photo of a business card and type the card's information into a preset form (name, position, company, etc.). This task only paid $.02 per card, but there were hundreds of cards that needed to be done. So, a Turker with high stamina and good eyesight could do this task all day long at two cents a pop.

I haven't tried a full day of "Power Turking" yet. But I did work straight through for a little over an hour yesterday and I made $2.05. This is not exactly the type of wage I had in mind when I went to graduate school. Like I said, it's not a get rich quick scheme, but it does seem to work as advertised. And, clocking in at 2 bucks an hour, a Turker who is persistent or desperate enough could at least supplement his or her income.

Guidelines for Turning 40

2011-12-29T10:06:00.002-06:00

If you should have the good fortune to live until you are forty years old, then you no doubt have a lot of junk that you collected in that time. It's not all junk. Some of it is useful, other pieces are precious to you, but most of it is just crap taking up space. This handy guide will help you make more room for the good things in life by getting rid of useless junk such as:

The importance of being special
Whether you acquired this as a child or picked it up in graduate school, you don't need it any more. By the time you turn forty, your hearing and eyesight have diminished beyond the point where you are likely to be special at anything. Your mind, solid though it may be, is probably not going to get any sharper. Let's face it, if you have been mingling with society for the last forty years, and nobody has given you a Nobel Prize yet, you are probably not going to be a genius.
This isn’t necessarily all bad. For one thing, you no longer have to waste time trying to convince people that you are a genius. You'd be surprised at how much free time this opens up in your day. Ultimately you will find acknowledging the fact that you are never going to be the best piano player/guitar player/etc., will help you to appreciate the sound of your own music a great deal more.

The need to be right
Forty is a good point in your life to reflect upon the fact that you have been wrong about a great many more things than you have ever been right about. Not counting the time you toyed with the idea of joining [insert ridiculous wacked out cult name here] or that year when you voted libertarian, there are the myriad things about which you are wrong every day (“This way is faster”, “I’m sure it won’t rain today”, or “I guess I could give you a ride.”) We go through life like pinballs bouncing off our failures and bad decisions, which propel us ever deeper into the game. You’re going to be wrong either way, so you might as well live with it. Besides, only geniuses are right about everything, and you aren't one of those any more. Remember?

I have noticed that some of you persist in believing yourselves generally right about things in spite of the above evidence. Let me direct you to the words of Robert Wilson, who wrote “If you think you know what you’re talking about, you’re probably full of shit.” Mr. Wilson is expressing, in his own way, the idea that knowledge is hard to come by and certain knowledge of anything is a rare occurrence indeed. People who refuse to admit this are generally still fixated on the need to be special.

The need to look good
Being a bachelor, I could be a little off on this one. I suppose married couples need to remain at least moderately attractive to one another if they want to keep the spark alive. Yet, studies have shown that happy couples get fat. The fact of the matter is that nobody looks good at forty. If you claim that somebody over forty looks good, you are really saying that they don’t look like they are forty yet. If they did look like they were forty, you wouldn’t say anything at all. You would just bow your head and try not to look at the walking ruin as it shuffled by.

So if you are forty, or you look like you are, relax. Nobody expects you to look good. Nobody expects you to act cool. You are no longer burdened with the responsibility of being special. You want to obsess over your dogs in public? Go ahead, you’re forty. You want to walk around the block every morning in a bathrobe? You’re forty, who cares? Do you like cake? Have some cake. Have two helpings. Have all the goddamned cake you want.

Note to my readers

2007-09-29T15:17:00.001-05:00

Buy my music on itunes, dammit.

Poetic Proof that Fouts Should Increase His Meds.

2007-09-22T18:26:00.000-05:00

Friends and Lovers.
M. Fouts

The bird is gone and you are not
the sky, and you are not the words,
and I am not writing them down.

   this morning she
   perched on my roof,
   reminding me of the wish
   I couldn’t make.

or allow myself to think about,
or the words I don’t have
to describe it. When she

     perched on my roof,
   she reminded me of you.
     I couldn’t make
     the words to describe you

or the way she looked at me just
before she spread her soft feathers
and wheeled into a too big sky.

     She reminded me of you
     because I don’t have
     the words to describe you
     without the bird.

And now my roof and the sky are
empty like I am empty, like
this page is empty, and

     because I don’t have
     you, or the sky, or the words,
     without the bird,
     I will not write them down.

   2007

Fouts is on itunes

2007-08-10T12:42:00.000-05:00

Hi everybody. I am very happy to tell you all that you can now purchase my newest album on itunes. I hope you will all go and buy it so I can get some money. I gotta say this album totally rocks. It's got some of my solo stuff along with a couple of live cuts from my band "high cotton". You know you want it so go to itunes and buy it. Click the link below to go straight to my album.

Sunday Sing-Along: Fouts in Space

2007-08-05T18:21:00.000-05:00

When I was a little kid I always wanted to be an astronaut. What red blooded American boy didn't? I dreamed of strapping myself in to the pilot's chair of the space shuttle and flying that bad-boy out into the deep blackness of space to...who knows where. I'm sure women would want me if I had a sweet uniform to wear and, since this is my fantasy, I'm sure they would all want to join the "way more than a mile-high" club.

I suppose that the yearning for space exploration is not very popular these days, what with all the problems we have on Earth. Nowadays, kids probably grow up dreaming of being either a marine or a suicide bomber. Well, I'm gonna follow my heart on this one and stick with my astronaut fantasy. In fact, I think it would go a little something like this.

Wednesday Night Sing Along -

2007-06-13T21:24:00.000-05:00

I have to admit something here: Summer is a complete waste of time for me. All winter I think to myself "wow, I can't wait until it's summer. Then I'm gonna do all kinds of cool shit!" Oh yeah, I'm gonna write a novel or maybe a screenplay, or wait, no. I'm gonna write like fifty freakin hit songs or something.

Then every summer, I do the same thing: I sit in front of the computer or the Playstation like the fat worthless shit-bag that I really am. I'm not busy enough, so I don't do anything, unless you count taking ten or fifteen hours to rank up on Killzone as doing something.

So here is a little video that i found. I think it accurately represents how much work I get done over the summer break.

Sunday Night Sing-Along

2007-06-03T18:20:00.000-05:00

So you're all wondering what happened to Fouts this week. Sorry I haven't posted in like seven days. The reason is this: I started playing Second Life on the internet last weekend and since then I have been sitting in front of my macbook like a cocaine-addicted rhesus monkey.

I can't get enough of Second Life and I have no idea why. Everything that I can do in Second Life, I can do in real life. Granted, I'm a flop with women, but there are plenty of places around my house for dancing and shopping etc. For some reason, it's highly addictive for me to sit on my fat ass and just pretend to do these things.

Well anyway, I will start posting more often this week. Y'all sing along now.

Why is it so !@#$ Cold Outside

2007-05-25T19:51:00.000-05:00

I thought global warming was supposed to turn us all into fried bacon. So why am I freezing my ass off in Illinois on May 25th? I call bullcrap on this weather. I should be outside right now, enjoying the heat and smoking a fine cigar. Instead I'm sitting in my little room and bitching about how goddamn cold it is.

MF

An Impromptu Poem

2007-05-24T20:11:00.000-05:00

Asshat

There once was a man from Cass
Who's head was a hat for his ass.
When he went to the bar,
the girls near and far
said "thanks, but no thanks, I'll pass."

MF

Sunday Sing Along. Special Edition

2007-05-20T10:03:00.000-05:00

So I've been sitting around the house feeling all depressed and sorry for myself. I won't burden you with the intimate details of my problems (receding hairline, no money, my abject inability to attract women etc.)

I got tired of playing "Always Something There to Remind Me" on my itunes. So, I figured I would record my own version. Here it is. Enjoy. You all know the words, so sing along!

One more reason why Michigan should be kicked out of the United States

2007-05-18T06:40:00.000-05:00

This pretty much speaks for itself

I Don't Want To Hear Your Goddamn Music, Asshat.

2007-05-17T19:39:00.000-05:00

Here is something that pisses me off: I'm trying to support the blogging community by clicking on the 'next blog' button and reading whatever comes up. Suddenly I come across a blog that starts blaring shitty music out of my speakers.... My Freakin Speakers!

Now I know that you want to share your favorite band with the world. This is understandable. But I have a big problem with websites that automatically play music when you load them, and my problem is this:

I am not a loser. I work hard for a living, and that means that, unlike you, I have a nice stereo. So when I sit down with a box of wine and my laptop to surf the blogs, I'm already listening to music, asshole!! I don't fucking want to hear yours.

Listen to me, people: Nothing says "I'm a complete fucktard" like setting your webpage to auto-play your shit music. So don't do it.

Announcing the new Official Muse of il Compendium

2007-05-15T23:17:00.000-05:00

Every blog needs to have a muse, a beautiful woman who inspires one's thoughts. So...DAT DA DA DA. Meet the official muse of il Compendium:

You guessed it. It's Erin Esurance, the talented, and beautiful, animated spokeswoman for Esurance. I don't even know what esurance is. I think it's like car insurance or something. All I know is that whenever this pink-haired personification of pure beauty comes on the television, I feel...uh...shall we say inspired? I think we shall.

Now I'm not some kind of slouch. I mean, I've "known" a few women in my day and sure, each one was special. But Miss Esurance is so much more than just a woman. She is an inspiration. My beautiful Erin is the platonic ideal toward which all women strive.

She is undoubtedly possessed of all the greatest physical virtues: a charming and mischievous smile, a graceful- almost feline- figure, and sultry catlike eyes that can see into a man's soul. On top of all this, she has a job.

What more could a man ask for?

IC Mailbag and Sunday Sing Along

2007-05-13T20:51:00.000-05:00

Hello everyone. Looks like it's time to dip into the mail bag once again and see what people have to say. Here is an interesting letter I recieved earlier this week.

Dear Il Compendium. You seem to know a lot about love, so I hope you can answer my question. I have been trying to get a girlfriend for a long time now. I am thoughtful and romantic but I have been turned down by the last ten women I have tried to go out with. Why do you think that could be?

Well...Maybe you're an asshole. Be sure to sing along now.

Poem

2007-05-11T18:22:00.000-05:00

You will be happy to know

that I am not fantasizing about you tonight.
You are not wearing the black shirt
that shows off your neck.
You are not wearing the blue dress
that makes me crazy

and I think I can be forgiven
if I picture you,
just once more, in your grey coat
and your black boots.

Exam Week

2007-05-09T18:48:00.000-05:00

Y'know. Love is a little bit like a final exam. You spend a lot of time preparing for it. You do your homework: you flirt with pretty women. You study them day after day. You..um "practice" (though I don't think a lengthy description of that is warranted). Anyway at this point you are quite ready for the final test. So you think.

But suddenly love finds you in the form of a delightful young lady and you are no more prepared for it than you are for the rhetoric final you have to take this Thursday. Well, you'll just have to wing it and hope you don't forget how to undo those little hooks, or Edmund Burke's rhetorical pentad. Best of luck!

LC

Fouts's New Passion

2007-05-06T20:25:00.000-05:00

so it's late Sunday evening and I'm sitting out on the back patio and surfing the internet on the wireless connection..Sweet. But really I am indulging in my newest passion: Pinot Grigio.

I realize that pinot grigio is not exactily hard core as passions go. It's not Coltrane or Cubism. Ah, what the hell. It's been a cold winter and now I'm sitting outside with some good music and some good wine and a good cigar. Why shouldn't I be happy? Why shouldn't I say "God is in his heaven and all's right with the world."?

Poetry Corner and Sunday Sing-Along

2007-05-06T18:36:00.000-05:00

Mr. Blue

After the divorce the old man and I
cross the lake. We spell each other
at the wheel and listen
to the luff of sails, the slap of water on
the hull, the radio playing call
me Mr. blue. Somehow, then,
or now, I can see so clearly:
This is all we have.
The past is in the swirling wake
behind us. So I hold the wheel lightly
(the boat knows, better than I do)
and watch my old man smoke his pipe
and look for land.

MF

Be sure to sing along