Irreverent Humor

George Carlin and Mark Twain had a lot in common. Both decried hypocrisy and both vigorously attacked the hypocrisy they saw in organized religion.

One of Carlin’s classic routines was this one, a to-the-point, meant-to-shock revelation about a Biblical deity from his perspective.

Religion has actually convinced people that there’s an invisible man — living in the sky — who watches everything you do, every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does not want you to do. And if you do any of these ten things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever ’til the end of time!
But He loves you.
(Excerpt from George Carlin on Religion)

Twain’s approach was softer but no less effective. His style and biting humor reached a peak with a book written in 1909 and published after his death. The book is Letters from the Earth, and it’s written from the perspective of an angel on Earth who chronicles every human foible under the sun.

Twain also wrote a short story that he called The War Prayer. The piece in its entirety appears below, courtesy of The Resources for Peace, found on the Internet here.

The War Prayer graphically describes the results we pray for when we pray for victory in war. This is a rather long story for inclusion in a blog post, but I hope you have the patience to read it through. The story appears here without editing.

The War Prayer
by Mark Twain

in golden seas of glory! With the volunteers sat their dear ones, proud, happy, and envied by the neighbors and friends who had

It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on, in every breast burned the holy fire of patriotism; the drums were beating, the bands playing, the toy pistols popping, the bunched fire-crackers hissing and spluttering; on every hand and far down the receding and fading spread of roofs and balconies, a fluttering wilderness of flags flashed in the sun; daily the young volunteers marched down the wide avenue gay and fine in their new uniforms, the proud fathers and mothers and sisters and sweethearts cheering them with voices choked with happy emotion as they swung by; nightly the packed mass meetings listened, panting, to patriot oratory which stirred the deepest deeps of their hearts and which they interrupted at briefest intervals with cyclones of applause, the tears running down their cheeks the while; in the churches the pastors preached devotion to flag and country and invoked the God of Battles, beseeching His aid in our good cause in outpouring of fervid eloquence which moved every listener.

It was indeed a glad and gracious time, and the half dozen rash spirits that ventured to disapprove of the war and cast a doubt upon its righteousness straightway got such a stern and angry warning that for their personal safety’s sake they quickly shrank out of sight and offended no more in that way.

Sunday morning came–next day the battalions would leave for the front; the church was filled; the colunteers were there, their young faces alight with martial dreams–visions of the stern advance, the gathering momentum, the rushing charge, the flashing sabers, the flight of the foe, the tumult, the enveloping smoke, the fierce pursuit, the surrender!

Then home from the war, bronzed heroes, welcomed, adored, submerged

no sons and brothers to send forth to the field of honor, there to win for the flag, or, falling, to die the noblest of noble deaths. The service proceeded; a war chapter from the Old Testament was read; the first prayer was said; it was followed by an organ burst that shook the building, and with one impulse the house rose, with glowing eyes and beating hearts, and poured out that tremendous invocation:

“God the all-terrible! Thou who ordainest,

Thunder thy clarion and lightning thy sword.”

Then came the “long” prayer. None could remember the like of it for passionate pleading and moving and beautiful language. The burden of its supplication was that an ever-merciful and begnignant Father of us all would watch over our noble young soldiers, and aid, comfort and encourage them in their patriotic work; bless them; shield them in the day of battle and the hour of peril, bear them in His mighty hand, make them strong and confident, invincible in the bloody onset; help them to crush the foe, grant to them and to their flag and country imperishable honor and glory–

An aged stranger entered and moved with slow and noiseless step up the main aisle, his eyes fixed upon the minister, his long body clothed in a robe that reached to his feet, his head bare, his white hair descending in a frothy cataract to his shoulders, his seamy face unnaturally pale, pale even to ghastliness. With all eyes following him and wondering, he made his silent way; without pausing he ascended to the preacher’s side and stood there waiting. With shut lids the preacher, unconscious of his presence, continued his moving prayer, and at last finished it with the words uttered in fervent appeal, “Bless our arms, grant us the victory, O Lord our God, Father and Protector of our land and flag!”

The stranger touched his arm, motioned him to step aside–which the startled minister did–and took his place. During some moments he surveyed the spellbound audience with solemn eyes, in which burned an uncanny light; then in a deep voice he said:

“I come from the Throne–bearing a message from Almighty God.” The words smote the house with a shock; if the stranger perceived it he gave no attention. “He has heard the prayer of His servant your shepherd, and will grant it if such be your desire after I, His messenger, shall have explained to you its import–that is to say, its full import. For it is like unto many of the prayers of men, in that it asks for more than he who utters it is aware of–except he pause and think. God’s servant and yours has prayed his prayer. Has he paused and taken thought? Is it one prayer? No, it is two–one uttered, the other not. Both have reached the ear of Him who heareth all supplications, the spoken and the unspoken. Ponder this–keep it in mind. If you would beseech a blessing upon yourself, beware! Lest without intent you invoke a curse upon a neighbor at the same time. If you pray for the blessing of rain upon your crop which needs it, by that act you are possibly praying for a curse upon some neighbor’s crop which may not need rain and can be injured by it.

“You have heard your servant’s prayer–the uttered part of it. I am commissioned of God to put into words the other part of it–that part which the pastor–and also in your hearts–fervently prayed silently. And ignorantly and unthinkingly? God grant that it was so! You have heard those words ‘Grant us the victory, O Lord our God.’ That is sufficient. The whole of the uttered prayer is compact into those pregnant words. Elaborations were not necessary. When you have prayed for victory, you have prayed for many unmentioned results which follow victory–must follow it, cannot help but follow it. Upon the listening spirit of God the Father fell also the unspoken part of the prayer. He commandeth me to put it into words. Listen!

“O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle–be Thou near them! With them, in spirit, we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of the patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of their guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their offending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it–

“For our sakes who adore thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet!

“We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him who is the Source of Love, and Who is the Ever-Faithful Refuge and Friends of all who are sore beset and seeking His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.”

(The old man paused). “Ye have prayed it; if you still desire it, speak! The messenger of the Most High awaits.”

* * * * *

It was believed afterward that the man was a lunatic, because there was no sense in what he said.

–Mark Twain

Technorati Tags: George Carlin,Mark Twain,The War Prayer,Letters from the Earth

Shades of Zane Grey

…only better…

Occasionally, I run across nice people on the ‘net. One such is Jeannie Watt. No, I don’t know her personally. She’s a romance novelist who writes about ordinary people in modern-day small town communities in Nevada’s Cowboy Country where she lives.

She’s the best author I’ve stumbled across in recent memory. When I say “stumbled across” I mean it literally. I’d been looking through a book rack in a supermarket when my eye caught the partial cover of a book in the bottom row. I glimpsed a cowboy and a ranch building in the background and quickly grabbed it without reading the back cover or browsing any of the pages.

When we returned home, I discovered that the book was Jeannie’s The Brother Returns, a novel classified in the Romance genre. I almost discarded it but decided to look through it because I had nothing else to do. Imagine my pleasant surprise when the book turned out to be an excellent read about two ordinary, 21st Century people in a small community in Nevada’s Cowboy Country. I was so captivated by Jeannie’s style and talents that I immediately logged onto Amazon’s site and ordered another of her novels, A Difficult Woman. This one was a page-turner of the first rank.

A Difficult Woman chronicles the relationship between Tara Sullivan and Matt Connors, two individuals who labor under the umbrella of unwarranted suspicion and mistrust. Tara’s family members are the virtual outcasts of the community of Big Sky, Nevada, and as usual in small towns, descendents are the beneficiaries of the sins of their mothers and fathers. In Tara’s case, her father served prison time.

Matt, a Reno police officer, is suspected of being a crooked cop because his father had been involved with a ring of crooked cops. The old corruption of blood characteristic of humans applies in Matt’s case as well.

At any rate, call if fate if you wish, the two wind up in Big Sky, Nevada, where Matt helps Tara renovate an old pioneer house bequeathed to her by an aunt.

Naturally, as you would suspect in a romance novel, romance flares. I don’t intend to include any spoilers here. Suffice to say, their path to love is filled with a few surprising twists and turns.

The pleasure in Jeanne’s style is the very ordinariness of its characters, ordinary people in an ordinary small town who go about their business in an ordinary way. There are no lords and ladies, no descendents of royalty, no powerful and experienced men teaching innocent maidens the exquisite joys of sex.

She doesn’t offer passages of glorious ecstasy, no orgasmic explosions or rocket trips to the moon. Jeannie Watt is a skilled author, a master of the art of suggestion. Imagination is always more powerful than detailed graphic descriptions. Diane creates the subtle illusion of the ultimate sexual experience and when the ultimate finally occurs, our imagination convinces is that we could be Tara or Matt.

A Difficult Woman was Jeannie’s first novel, but I swear you wouldn’t suspect it. Her dialogue is superb. In fact, if you didn’t know she is a woman, you’d think the author is a male. No woman could create such realistic male dialogue. That requires a great deal of observational and listening skills.

And she created a great little gathering spot, Big Sky’s only casino which also serves as a restaurant. She touched one of my nerves with its name–the Owl Club. I used to hang out at a spot called the Owl Club on San Pablo Avenue in San Pablo, which was remarkably similar to the one in Big Sky, Nevada.

Although Jeannie’s novels are of the Romance genre and published under the Ballantine imprint, they aren’t purely and solely about non-stop romance. Jeannie weaves love into her stories when it is appropriate, but the underlying currents run deeper, touching on hopes and dreams and the abilities of regular people to meet the challenges of life and cope with hardships.

We’ve all experienced the same kinds of travails. It’s good to read about people like us. And it’s good to be reminded once in awhile that ordinary people can experience extraordinary romance with a degree of intensity equal to that of lords and ladies and worshipful virgins.

Jeannie has other works in the mill which I fully intend to read. This is unusual for me because I do not read romance stories. Until now. Jeannie’s works are the first I have read in more years than I care to mention.

One final thought. As a classic American male, I am not overly romantic (at least not publicly). My reading tastes run to Westerns. Every little boy wants to grow up to be a cowboy, right? Somehow, Jeannie tapped into my interest in the West and my subterranean romantic tendencies.

Technorati Tags: Romance Novels,Jeannie Watt,Nevada

The Past Becomes the Future

This is the center of three piers at Fort Mason in San Francisco. Here is where I was introduced to the pleasures of troopship travel.

Prior to arriving, we had spent four hours on a ferry from Camp Stoneman in Pittsburg. When the ferry reached Mason, the tugs parked it on one side of the pier, and we debarked (a new term learned then) and assembled in the shed where we waited until the ferry had been emptied.

Then we were lined up by number and marched aboard a troopship parked on the other side of the pier. The entire process from Stoneman to our bunks in Compartment C and then a walk up a couple of gangways (’nother new term) for an idle stroll around the main deck took about seven hours.

In mid-afternoon, I felt the ship move almost imperceptibly, and then I noticed the gap of water between the side of the ship and the pier widen. Shortly, the tugs began to slide the ship backwards until it cleared the end of the pier. Then just as slowly, the tugs swung the bow of the ship around until it pointed at the Golden Gate Bridge. Soon, the tugs dropped away and the ship was on its own, heading toward the open sea beyond the orange span.

As the ship moved toward the Bridge, I walked along the deck so that I could look up at it as we slid below. And then I walked aft and leaned on the rail, watching the Bridge grow smaller and smaller until at least it disappeared.

I remember clearly at that moment the tears in my eyes and the terrible thought that I would never again see my family. The brains of 18-year old males are at one and the same time adventurous, amorous, and loaded with trepidation and high emotion.

Call it luck or the hand of God as you choose, but two years later I sailed under the bridge, into the bay, and joked over the rail with the tug sailors who shouted up at us that San Francisco women would take our money. “Stay out of the bars,” they said.

Fortunately, I was on my way to a discharge at Parks in Pleasanton and freedom at last. I had no time for an interlude with the San Francisco ladies. The feeling of euphoria is difficult to resurrect now, but suffice to say, I could have walked on water at the thought of relaxing for a few months before deciding on my future.

Mason is still there, much in its original form. It’s been turned over to the city and serves some interesting purposes such as an arena for fashion shows, which are nice if you are into that sort of thing but which serve no useful purpose unless you consider skeletal women in grotesque clothes disjointedly walking to the end of a runway, whirling around, and returning, a valuable purpose.

When I think about inane activities like this, which aren’t restricted to San Francisco, by the way, I am often confounded by the utter self-absorption that has given rise to a culture and an entire economic industry based on a transitory act of physical indulgence. Foreplay by any other name is still foreplay.

But I have more unsettling thoughts. I wonder if my brief time in uniform contributed in any way to the vital national defense of the United States. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t regret my service.

But the nearest I ever came to combat and either heroism or cowardice was sitting in the passenger seat of a car across the street from a bus station in Oakland watching two United States Marines do their level best to beat the living hell out of a single sailor who more than held his own.

Despite my constant calls then for fairness and equity, I Cheneyed out. I deferred to the sailor. I remained in the safety of the car. I rationalized my failure by convincing myself that the sailor could more than take care of himself, and then suddenly, before I could think further, the fight ended and the combatants faded into the darkness.

Someone had called the police, and the fighters hadn’t yet sunk into a state of absolute, unmerciful degradation. They heard the siren. They were after all United States servicemen. They didn’t want to kill each other. Did they?

Today, I still hide the cowardice of that time and place by blathering about fairness and equity. Two on one is patently unfair, I proudly proclaim, as if I would never be a disinterested bystander when someone is in need. Deep inside, though, I know my own reluctance.

I am your classic, patriotic All American, a man without an American flag lapel pin, a condition I justify neatly with a classic degree of political cowardice by pointing out that I do not wear shirts or coats with lapels, and I have no intention of having an American flag tattooed on my forehead.

Besides–and we all know this, right?–a symbol isn’t a gauge of reality. Or, as someone wrote once upon a time, “The map is not the territory.” For those who say they will not vote for Barack because he doesn’t wear an American flag lapel pin, I say fine and dandy. Don’t vote for him. I would hazard a guess that he prefers only intelligent people in the booths on election day anyway.

I wonder if the 4,000 plus American men and women who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan would be wearing lapel pins if they were alive. My guess is that some would and some would not.

I also wonder if those men and women once believed in fairness and equity. Did they think it unfair for two to pick on one? Did they believe they had an obligation to help those in need?

Would they come to the aid of an abused child or an abused spouse? Or would they, in their sheer elation and euphoria at the joy of life, choose to look another way? To create justifications? To attend fashion shows at Fort Mason where men once sailed off to give their lives so that those very inanities could thrive?

Barack Obama is at this moment like the sailor I witnessed withstanding an almost overwhelming attack by two United States Marines. I have no doubt that he will not fade into the night. He will remain in the arena. He doesn’t need a lapel pin.

Life is a Circus

I read lots and lots of on-line newspapers, and one of my favorites is Hometown Annapolis.

Annapolis is a sort of fifth-level hometown, meaning it would be about Number Five on my list of the best places to live. It’s really an All-American town, very historic, very East Coasty, and very scenic, although in a rather subtle way.

It isn’t too far from Washington, D.C. if you like to browse historical and genealogical records at the National Archives, a real treasure trove for historians and family researchers. I’ve been to Annapolis with side trips to D.C. several times, so I’m somewhat familiar with the landscape.

When I scanned the Annapolis paper this morning, my eye fell on a story in the Children’s section that reminded me of my own hometown, which shall remain unnamed here because I don’t want anyone there to know my whereabouts in case there’s a warrant out with my name on it.

The story that popped out was about the Cole Bros. Circus.

I did a little breath intake when I saw the headline. This was a real coincidence, not because I like circuses. I hate them. And not because I had been dragged to circuses against my wishes and now suffer irreparable psychological damage. No. None of these.

I actually was dragged off to the Cole Bros. Circus as a kid, more than once, in fact, because adults justify hauling defenseless kids around as excuses for satisfying their own fantasies.

That’s not the big deal here, though. A few years later, in high school, I worked for a circus in a manner of speaking, and I am firmly convinced that it was Cole Bros. That’s the only circus name I know and the only one ever to visit my hometown.

Well, to make a short story interminably longer, someone from the circus showed up at school one day recruiting temporary labor to help erect the bleachers. They offered no money, just a free meal and a ticket to the show that night.

Of course, they selected our high school because the only suckers who would work for nothing were high school boys who could not have cared less about attending the circus. We just wanted to get out of school for a day. We figured the work couldn’t be that hard.

Wrong. This was slave labor pure and simple, and about two hours after our labor started, three quarters of us had bailed out. I stuck around, and I swear, single-handedly erected almost the entire set of bleachers.

In the process, I talked to some very nice circus people, laborers mostly but a gang boss or two as well. Some told me practically their life stories, which weren’t quite as romantic as the lives depicted in the movie The Greatest Show on Earth starring the recently demised Charlton Heston.

At the end of the day, I was too tired to think about attending the circus. Circuses are for kids, anyway. But I learned a couple of lessons from my brief stint as a circus laborer.

The circus food served to me, and I presume others, was lousier than anything I’ve run across since, except possibly the green eggs served on a rolling and tossing troop ship.

And I learned that most people have interesting stories they are willing to share, even with a kid like me in a hick town down South.

The arts of observation and listening have served me well over the years.

 

Technorati Tags: Cole Bros. Circus,The Greatest Show on Earth,Charlton Heston,Annapolis Maryland,Washington D.C.,Hometowns

Sex in the Civil War

A few nights ago I watched Sex in the Civil War on the History Channel. I was kind of surprised because I didn’t know people actually engaged in sex in the 1860s. I thought it originated with the Hippies in the 1960s. In my mind, birth was kind of like spontaneous combustion. It just happened. Or, a woman swallowed a watermelon seed.

Now that I think about the matter, I suppose those old folks with their Burnside whiskers and hoop skirts could have figured out a way to overcome these obstacles. The human mind and genitalia are quite innovative.

Back then a person in search of sex had to be persistent. Although traveling brothels and freelancers hung around the edges of Army camps and battlefields, displaying their fully-clothed wares and awaiting eager customers who apparently were driven into a frenzy by the imagined pleasures that lay below seven layers of crinoline, the task of actually reaching El Dorado wasn’t as quick and easy as ducking into a booth in a classy speakeasy for a quickie.

Or as simple as booking a call girl on a business trip to D.C. Even so, Eliot Spitzer wasn’t the first high muck-a-muck to take up with a prostitute. A couple of Union generals used the same consort at various times. In fact, prostitutes were so numerous and Union army soldiers so hungry for feminine companionship that 40 percent of the Union army occupying Nashville contracted VD (venereal disease then, STD now).

A whole euphemistic code language evolved around the sex business. For example, “Please pass the butter,” was code for let’s play around a little. These interesting linguistic twists gave rise to a philosophical concept called hermeneutics, the study of hidden meanings. It all started when a curious supply clerk asked a mess sergeant one day if he needed more butter because the soldiers were always hollering “Pass the butter.”

One thing I noticed about the women of the 1860s. They were coyote ugly, what with their yellow skin and cellulite thighs clearly visible through their polka dot stockings. The sales of Tennessee sipping whiskey skyrocketed around Army camps, as soldiers needed to be drunker than skunks before entering Paradise. That’s the way people talked back then.

Today, modernity has altered the sexual landscape. Neither men nor women wear a lot of clothes. In fact, on a good day on the beach, you’ll be lucky to spot even a teensy weensy yellow polka dot bikini unless it’s been tattooed on. And only fools pay for sex.

And only exceptionally foolish fools pay with a credit card.

 

Technorati Tags: Civil War,History Channel,Prostitution

Internet Addiction Anyone?

Do you suffer from a bunch of these symptoms?

• Neglect of basic drives, Loss of a sense of time, Withdrawal, Anger, Tension, Depression, Desire for more computer equipment, Arguing, Lying, Social Isolation, Fatigue

If so, you may have a psychiatric condition known as compulsive-impulsive spectrum disorder.

So says the American Psychiatric Foundation in a recent article that I fully agree with even though I can hardly spell the condition.

In fact, the symptoms named above fit me to a T. If someone else monopolizes my machine, I can go berserk. Violence is a distinct possibility on an exceptionally emotional day.

I’m probably not alone. Brittney of CBS Eye on Blogs has reported that she has about 700 Bay Area blog feeds pouring into her desk daily, and she expects that number to rise to 1,000 or more shortly.

The Bay Area is widely know for having the largest number of bloggers of any equally populated metropolitan area in the nation, so the figures provided by Brittney are hardly surprising. My guess is that at least 75 percent of the bloggers in her count have C-ISD.

Extrapolating the numbers, I firmly believe  many millions of people nationwide share my pathetic symptoms.

Maybe Dr. Drew will offer us a Bloggers’ Rehab program.

Technorati Tags: American Psychiatric Foundation,Symtoms,CBS5 Eye on Blogs,Jack Cafferty,Compulsive-Impulsive Spectrum Disorder,Celebrity Rehab,Dr. Drew Pinskey

To Err is Humorous

…oh?…

One of my original (I think) thoughts is this:

• No one is perfect. Therefore, everyone is imperfect. The question is, what degree of self-inflicted imperfection is permissible?

Here’s another one that I like:

• Democracy is when we get to vote for the gang we want to rob us.

Both of these came to me out of thin air one day the way thoughts have a habit of popping into empty minds.

I am not in the game of congratulating myself for great thinking, but I happen to like these two because they seem to exemplify almost the totality of modern human behavior in America. In fact, I like them so well, I’ve included both on my Facebook page.

For the moment, however, the matter of Eliot Spitzer brought the first one to mind.

Spitzer is a guy who had an almost unlimited future. In the throes of passion, he flushed it all down the toilet.

The girl-woman Spitzer reportedly was involved with is 21 years old. His wife is 50. Does that have anything to do with his self-inflicted imperfection?

His wife is also beautiful. But some argue that beauty isn’t the primary attraction. Variety is the draw. Was Eliot looking for variety?

Who knows? But I believe one thing is clear. Eliot inflicted this imperfection on himself. He carefully planned his liaisons with logic aforethought.

Some have argued that he suffers from a deep psychological defect. Ex-Mayor Koch of New York, said Spitzer “has a screw loose.”

Heidi Fleiss (remember the Hollywood madam?) had the best take on why powerful men take these risks.

“They just want sex.”

Nothing mysterious here. No clinical mumbo jumbo. Straight to the point. Occam’s Razor in action. “When faced with several explanations, the simplest one will probably be correct.”

My own take is equally simple:

• The only difference between humans and dogs is that humans can explain why they fornicate in the street like dogs.

So, Eliot, let the explaining begin.

Inevitable Afterthoughts

Yes, to err is human. It isn’t a canine practice. Thank goodness we possess the god-given talent to explain our own self-inflicted imperfections.

What next for Eliot? The story will die soon. Only the pain in the hearts of his wife and children will remain. Sad. Very sad.

Technorati Tags: Eliot Spitzer,Ed Koch,Heidi Fleiss,To Err is Human,Prostitution