I have bad dreams.

They come, unbidden, into my room at night.

They pass through the maze of my alcoholic daze;

They take me back,

Back to a dusty desert road;

Our convoy is headed towards Mosul.

But we never make it there:

The Humvee is upended by an eardrum shattering blast.

I am falling.

I see you are screaming but there is no sound..

Blackness.

I died three times on the medivac copter

But the Corpsman kept bringing me back.

I have bad dreams

In them I see the faces of the dead,

They are the faces of my friends;

My friends, for whom I mourn

Until this heart becomes a stone.

Medivac landing, rotors turning with an omninous roar

Medics open the sliding door, boots on the ground

Blood dripping down his face, holding his buddy’s hand

Kneeling down next to his stretcher in the Iraqi sand

Wounded soldiers loaded on board

Medivac doors slams shut the door, and lifts to the air

Medics immediately begin emergency care

Blood stained uniforms cut away, blood sweep done

Fluids hanging, holding his buddy’s hand , he won’t let go



Blood drenched face, he takes a deep breath

No more fighting my friend, we cheated death

Back against the helicopter wall he closes his eyes

Thinking that this was the day he may not have survived

We go home together or not at all

You hear your buddy say from the stretcher, it was my call



We’re okay my friend, we won the fight

You are going to sleep in a warm bed tonight

He takes a deep breath and his hands begin to shake

I’m still here he says to himself, I’m still here

When you are able will sit down and have a beer.

It was 1972 and my dad was sick.  Well maybe not sick in the usual sense of the word, but his hip was.  He was in Boston, it was mid-winter, and he was an orthopedic patient in the Robert Bent Brigham Hospital.

He had been selected as an early recipient of what was called back then a ‘partial hip replacement.’  It was called partial, because they only replaced the arthritic hip ball, leaving the original (and degenerative) socket in place.  Needless to say these procedures didn’t work long term, but for those unable to walk and in pain, they were all that was available at the time.

I was in State College Pennsylvania when the call came in from my mother, telling me my dad was in the hospital. He was in so much pain they had to rush him to Boston by ambulance and schedule surgery just two days from now. I was living in the small rural town of Houserville Pa. about five miles West of State College and there was at least eight inches of fresh snow on the ground outside. It was 439 miles from State College to Boston. Based on my mothers phone call, if I wanted to see my Dad before his surgery, I had less than a full day to get there.

It was now 5:30 p.m. on Monday night and my father’s operation was scheduled for first thing (7:00 a.m.) Wednesday morning.  That meant that if I wanted to see him before he went to the O.R., I really needed to get there sometime before visiting hours were over Tuesday night.  My mother had said they were going to take him to pre-op at 6:00 a.m. Wednesday morning, and we wouldn’t have a chance to see him before he went down.

My only mode of transportation sat covered outside in the snow on my small front porch.  It was a six-month old 1971 750 Honda Motorcycle that I had bought new the previous September.  Because of the snowy winter conditions in the Nittany Mountains, I hadn’t ridden it since late November.  I hadn’t even tried to start it since the day before Christmas Eve when I moved it off the stone driveway and rode it up under our semi-enclosed front porch.

My roommate Steve and I lived in a converted garage that was owned by a Penn State University professor and his wife.  They lived in the big house next door and had built this garage when they were graduate students over twenty years ago. They had lived upstairs where our bedrooms now were, while storing their old 1947 Studebaker Sedan in the garage below.  It wasn’t until 1963 that they built the big house and moved out of the garage before putting it up for rent.

The ‘garage’ had no insulation, leaked like a sieve, and was heated with a cast iron stove that we kept running with anything we could find to throw in it.  We had run out of our winter ‘allotment’ of coal last week, and neither of us could afford to buy more.  We had spent the last two days scavenging down by the creek and bringing back old dead (and wet) wood to try and keep from freezing, and to keep the pipes inside from freezing too.

After hanging up the phone, I explained to Steve what my mother had just told me. He said: You need to get to Boston, and you need to leave now.  Steve had a 1965 Dodge Dart with a slant six motor that was sitting outside on the left side of the stone drive.  He said “you’re welcome to take it, but I think the alternator is shot.  Even if we get it jump-started, I don’t think it will make it more than ten or fifteen miles.”

It was then that we weighed my other options.  I could hitchhike, but with the distance and weather, it was very ‘iffy’ that I would get there on time.  I could take the Greyhound (Bus), but the next one didn’t leave until 3:00 tomorrow afternoon.  It wouldn’t arrive in Boston until 11:20 at night.  Too late to see my dad!

We both stared for a long time at the Motorcycle. It looked so peaceful sitting there under its grey and black cover.  Without saying a word to each other we grabbed both ends of the cover and lifted it off the bike.  I then walked down the drive to the road to check the surface for ice and snow.  It had snow on both sides but had been recently plowed. There was a small **** of snow still down the middle, but the surface to both sides looked clear and almost snow free.

      I Knew That Almost Was Never Quite Good Enough

I walked back inside the house and saw Steve sitting there with an empty ‘Maxwell House Tin’ in his hands. This is where Steve kept his cash hidden, and he took out what was in there and handed it all to me. “ You can pay me back next week when you get paid by Paul Bunyan.”  Paul Bunyan was the Pizza Shop on ****** Avenue that I delivered for at night, and I was due to be paid again in just four more days. I thanked Steve and walked up the ten old wooden and rickety stairs to our bedrooms.  

The walls were still finished in rough plywood sheathing that had never been painted or otherwise finished.  I packed the one leather bag that my Mother had given me for Christmas last year, put on my Sears long underwear, threw in my Dopp Kit and headed back downstairs. I also said a silent prayer for having friends … really good friends.

                 When I Got Downstairs, Steve Was Gone

Sensing I might need a ‘moment’ to finally decide, Steve had
started to walk down to highway # 64 and then hitchhike into town.  He was the photo-editor of the Penn State Yearbook, and Monday nights were when they had their meetings to get the book out.  The staff had only ninety more days to finish what looked to me to be an almost ‘impossible’ task.

As tough as his project was, tonight I was facing a likely impossible assignment of my own. Interstate #80 had just opened, and it offered an alternative to the old local road, Rt # 322.  The entrance to Rt. # 80 was ten miles away in Bellefonte Pennsylvania, and I knew those first ten miles could possibly be the worst of the trip.  I called my sister at home, and she said the weather forecast had said snow in the mountains (where I was), and then cold temperatures throughout the rest of the Northeast corridor.  Cold temperatures would mean a high of no more than 38 degrees all through the Pocono’s and across the Delaware Water Gap into New Jersey. Then low forty-degree temperatures the rest of the way.

I put two pairs of Levi’s Jeans on over my long-johns. I then put on my Frye boots with three pairs of socks, pulled my warmest fisherman’s knit wool sweater over my head and finished with my vintage World War Two leather bomber jacket to brace against the cold.  I had an early version of a full coverage helmet, a Bell Star, to protect my head and ears.  Without that helmet to keep out the cold, I knew I wouldn’t have had any chance of making the seven and a half hour ride.  To finish, I had a lightly tanned pair of deerskin leather gloves with gauntlets that went half way up my forearms. Normally this would have been ‘overkill’ for a ride to school or into town,

                                   But Not Tonight

I strapped my leather bag on the chrome luggage rack on the rear, threw my leg over the seat, and put the key into the ignition.  This was the first ‘electric start’ motorcycle I had ever owned, and I said a quick prayer to St Christopher that it would start. As I turned the key I couldn’t help but think about my father lying there in that hospital bed over four hundred miles away.  As I turned the key to the right, I heard the bike crank over four times and then fire to life as if I had just ridden it the day before.  As much as I wanted to be with my dad, I would be less than truthful if I didn’t confess that somewhere deep inside me, I was secretly hoping that the bike wouldn’t start.

I was an experienced motorcyclist and now 23 years old. I had ridden since I was sixteen and knew that there were a few ‘inviolable’ rules that all riders shared.  Rule number one was never ride after drinking.  Rule number two was never ride on a night like tonight — a night when visibility was awful and the road surface in many places might be worse. I again thought of my father as I backed the bike off the porch, turned it around to face the side street we lived on, dropped it into first gear, and left.  I could hear Jethro Tull’s ‘Aqualung’ playing from the house across the street.  It was rented to students too, and the window over the kitchen was open wide — even on a night like this.

                  Oh, Those Carefree Days Of College Bliss

As I traveled down the mile long side street that we lived on, I saw the sign for state road #64 on my right.  It was less than 100 feet away and just visible in the cloudy mountain air.  I was now praying not for things to get better, but please God, don’t let them get any worse.  As I made the left turn onto #64 I saw the sign ‘Interstate 80 – Ten Miles,’ and by now I was in third gear and going about twenty five miles an hour.  In the conditions I was riding in on this Monday night, it felt like at least double that.

I had only ever been East on Rt #80 once before, always preferring the scenery and twisty curves of Rt #322.  Tonight, challenging roads and distracting scenery were the last thing that I wanted.  I was hoping for only one thing, and that was that PennDot, (The Pennsylvania Department Of Transportation), had done their job plowing the Interstate and that the 150 mile stretch of road from Bellefonte to the Delaware Water Gap was open and clear.  

As I approached the entrance ramp to Rt #80 East in Bellefonte, it was so far; so good.  If God does protect both drunks and fools, I was willing to be considered worse than both tonight, if he would get me safely to Boston without a crash.

The first twenty miles east on Interstate #80 were like a blur wrapped inside a time warp.  It was the worst combination
of deteriorating road conditions, glare from oncoming headlights, and spray and salt that was being kicked up from the vehicles in front of me.  Then it got worse — It started to snow again!

                                             More Snow!

What else could happen now I wondered to myself as I passed the exit for Milton on Rt #80.  It had been two hours since leaving the State College area, and at this pace I wouldn’t get to Boston until five or six in the morning. I was tucked in behind a large ‘Jones Motor Freight Peterbilt,’ and we were making steady but slow progress at about thirty miles per hour.  I stayed just far enough behind the truck so that the spray from his back tires wouldn’t hit me straight on.  It did however keep the road directly in front of me covered with a fresh and newly deposited sheet of snow, compliments of his eight rear wheels which were throwing snow in every direction, but mostly straight back at me.

I didn’t have to use the brakes in this situation, which was a real plus as far as stability and traction were concerned.  We made it almost to the Berwick exit when I noticed something strange.  Motorists coming from the other direction were rolling their windows down and shouting something at the drivers going my way.  With my helmet on, and the noise from the truck in front of me drowning everything else out, I couldn’t make out what they were trying to say.  I could tell they were serious though, by the way they leaned out their windows and shouted up at the driver in the truck I was following.

Then I saw it.  Up ahead in the distance it looked like a parade was happening in the middle of the highway. There were multi-colored flashing lights everywhere.  Traffic started to slow down until it was at a crawl, and then finally stopped.  A state police car came up the apron going the wrong way on our side and told everyone in our long line that a semi-truck had ‘jack-knifed’, and flipped over on its side, and it was now totally blocking the East bound lanes.  

The exit for Berwick was only two hundred yards ahead, and if you got over onto the apron you could make it off the highway.  Off the highway to what I wondered, but I knew I couldn’t sit out here in the cold and snow with my engine idling. It would eventually overheat (being air-cooled) even at these low temperatures which could cause mechanical problems that I’d never get fixed in time to see my dad.

I pulled over onto the apron and rode slowly up the high ramp to the right, and followed the sign at the top to Berwick.  The access road off the ramp was much worse than the highway had been, and I slipped and slid all the way into town.  I took one last look back at the menagerie of lights from the medivac ambulances and tow trucks that were now all over the scene below.  The lights were all red and blue and gold, and in a strange twisted and beautiful way, it reminded me of the ride to church for midnight mass on Christmas Eve.

                  Christmas Eve With My Mom And My Dad

In Berwick, the only thing I saw that was open was the Bulldog Lounge.  It was on the same side of the street that I was on and had a big VFW sign hanging under its front window.  I could see warm lights glowing inside and music was drifting through the brick façade and out onto the sidewalk. I stopped in front of the rural Pennsylvania tavern and parked the bike on its kickstand, unhooked my leather bag from the luggage carrier and walked in the front door.

Once inside, there was a bar directly ahead of me with a tall, sandy haired woman serving drinks.  “What can I get you,” she said as I approached the bar, but she couldn’t understand my answer.  My mouth and face were so frozen from the cold and the wind that my speech was slurred, and I’m sure it seemed like I was already drunk when I hadn’t even had a drink.  She asked again, and I was able to get the word ‘coffee’ out so she could understand it. She turned around behind her to where the remnants from what was served earlier that day were still overcooking in the ***. She put the cup in front of me, and I took it with both hands and held it close against my face.

After ten minutes of thawing out I finally took my first swallow.  It  tasted even worse than it looked, but I was glad to get it, and I then asked the bar lady where the restrooms were.  “Down that corridor to the right” she said, and I asked her if she would watch my bag until I got back.  Without saying a word, she just nodded her head. As I got to the end of the corridor, I noticed a big man in a blue coat with epaulets standing outside the men’s room door.  He had a menacing no-nonsense look on his face, and didn’t smile or nod as I walked by.  His large coat was open and as I looked at him again, I saw it – he was wearing a gun.
            
                                   He Was Wearing A Gun

As I went into the men’s room, I noticed it was dark, but there was a lot of noise and commotion coming from the far end.  I looked for the light switch and when I found it, I couldn’t believe what I saw next.  Someone was stuck in the window at the far end of the men’s room, with the lower half of their body sticking out on my side and the upper half dangling outside in the cold and the dark.  It looked like a man from where I stood, and he was making large struggling sounds as he either tried to push his way out or pull his way back in.  I wasn’t sure at this point which way he was trying to go. Something else was also strange, he had something tied or wrapped around the bottom of his legs.

It was at this point that I opened up the men’s room door again and yelled outside for help.  In an instant, the big man with the blue coat and gun ran almost right over me to the window and grabbed the mans two legs, and in one strong movement pulled him back in the window and halfway across the floor.  It was then that I could see that the man’s legs were shackled, and handcuffs were holding his arms tightly together in front of his body.  He had apparently asked to use the facility and then tried to escape once inside and alone.

The large guard said “Jimmy, I warned you about trying something like this.  I have half a mind now to make you hold it all the way back to New Hampshire.” He stood the young man up and went over and closed the window. He locked it with the hasp.  He then let the man use the toilet in the one stall, but stood right there with him until he was done.  By this time I was back inside and finishing my coffee.  The guard came in, seated his prisoner at a table by the wall, and then walked over and sat down next to me at the bar.

“You really saved me a lot of trouble tonight, son” he said, “If he had gotten out that window, I doubt I’d have found him in the dark and the snow.  I’d have been here all night, and that’s ‘if’ I caught him again.  My *** would have been in a sling back at headquarters and I owe you a debt of thanks.”  You don’t owe me anything I said, I was just trying to help, and honestly didn’t know he was a prisoner when I first saw him suspended in the window. “Well just the same, you did me a big favor, and I’d like to try and return it if I could.”

He then asked me if I lived in Berwick, and I told him no, that I was traveling to Boston to see my father in the hospital and had to get off the highway on my motorcycle because of the wreck on Interstate #80.  “You’re on a what,” he asked me!  “A motorcycle” I said again, as his eyes got even wider than the epaulets on his shoulders.  “You’re either crazy or desperate, but I guess it’s none of my business.  How are you planning on getting to Boston tonight in all this snow?”  When I told him I wasn’t sure, he told me to wait at the bar.  He went to the pay phone and made a short phone call and was back in less than three minutes.  The prisoner sat at the table by the wall and just watched.

The large man came back over to the bar and said “my names Bob and I work for the U.S. Marshals Office.  I’m escorting this fugitive back to New Hampshire where he stole a car and was picked up in West Virginia at a large truck stop on Interstate #79.  Something about going to see his father whom he had never met who was dying on some Indian reservation in Oklahoma.  He’d have made it too, except he parked next to an unmarked state trooper who was having coffee, thought he looked suspicious, and then ran his plates.”

“I’m driving that big flatbed truck outside and transporting both him and the car he stole back to New Hampshire for processing and trial.  I’ve got enough room behind the car to put your bike on the trailer too.  If you’d like, I can get you as far as the Mass. Pike, and then you’ll only be about ninety minutes from Boston and should be there for breakfast. If you don’t mind ridin with ‘ole Jimmy’ here, I can get you most of the way to where you’re going. I don’t think you’ll make it all the way on that two-wheeler alone out on that highway tonight.

The Good Lord takes many forms and usually arrives when least expected.  Tonight he looked just like a U.S. Marshal, and he was even helping me push my bike up the ramp and onto the back of his flatbed.  He then even had the right straps to help me winch it down so it wouldn’t move as we then headed North through the blinding snow in the dark.  Bob knew a back way around the accident, and after a short detour on Pa. Routes #11 and #93, we were back on the Interstate and New England bound.

The three of us, Bob, Jimmy and I, spent the first hour of the ride in almost total silence.  Bob needed to stop for gas in Stroudsburg and asked me if I would accompany Jimmy to the men’s room inside.  His hands and feet were still ‘shackled,’ and I can still see the looks on the faces of the restaurant’s patrons as we walked past the register to the rest rooms off to the left.  Jimmy still never spoke a word, and we were back outside in less than five minutes.

Once back in the truck Bob said “Jesus, it’s cold out here tonight. You warm enough kid,” as he directed his comment to Jimmy.  I still had on my heavy leather bomber jacket, but Jimmy was wearing a light ‘Members Only’ cotton jacket that looked like it had seen much better days.  Jimmy didn’t respond.  I said: “Are you warm enough kid,” and Bob nudged Jimmy slightly with his right elbow.  Jimmy looked back at Bob and said, ‘Yeah, I’m fine.”

Then Bob started to speak again.  “You know it’s a **** shame you got yourself into this mess.  In looking at your record, it’s clean, and this is your first offense.  What in God’s name possessed you to steal a car and try to make it all the way to Oklahoma in weather like this?”  Jimmy looked down at the floor for the longest time and then raised his head, looked at me first, and then over at Bob …

“My Mom got a letter last week saying that the man who is supposed to be my father was in the Choctaw Nation Indian Hospital in Talihina Oklahoma.  They also told her that he was dying of lung cancer and they didn’t expect him to last long.  His only wish before he died was to see the son that he abandoned right before he was shipped off to Seoul during the Korean War. I tried to borrow my uncle’s car, but he needed it for work.  We have neighbors down the street who have a car that just sits. They have a trailer in Florida for the winter, and I planned to have it back before anyone missed it.  The problem was that their son came over to check on the place, saw the car was missing, and reported it to the cops. I never meant to keep it, I just wanted to get down and back before anyone noticed.”

“Dumb, Dumb, Dumb, Bob said!  Don’t you know they make buses for that.”  Jimmy says he never thought that far, and given the choice again that’s what he’d do.  Bob took one more long look at Jimmy and just slowly shook his head.  Then he said to both of us, “how old are you boys?”  I said 23, as Jimmy nodded his head acknowledging that he was the same age.  Bob then said, “I got bookends here, both goin in different directions,”

Jimmy then went on to say, “My mom my little sister and I live in a public housing project in Laconia.  I never knew my dad, but my grandma, when she was alive, said that he was a pretty good guy.  My mother would never talk about why he left, and I felt like this was my last chance to not only meet him but to find all that out before he passed.”  I glanced over at Bob and it looked like his eyes were welling up behind the thick glasses he wore.  Jimmy then said: “If I got to rethink this thing, I would have stayed in New Hampshire.  It just ‘seemed’ like the right thing to do at the time.

We rode for the next hour in silence.  Bob already knew my story, and I guess he didn’t think sharing it with Jimmy would make him feel any better.  The story of an upper middle class college kid on the way to see his dad in Boston would probably only serve to make what he was feeling now even worse.  The sign up ahead said ‘Hartford, 23 miles’. Bob said, “Kurt, this is where we drop you off.  If you cut northeast on Rt # 84, it will take you to the Mass.Pike.  From where you pick up the pike, you should then be no more than an hour or so from downtown Boston.

During those last 23 miles Bob spoke to Jimmy again.  I think he wanted me to hear it too. “Jimmy,” Bob said, “I’m gonna try and help you outta this mess.  I believe you’re basically a good kid and deserve a second chance.  Somebody helped me once a long time ago and it made all the difference in my life.”  Bob looked over at me and said. “Kurt, whatta you think?”  I said I agreed, and that I was sure that if given another chance, Jimmy would never do anything like this again.  Jimmy said nothing, as his head was again pointed down toward the floor.

“I’ll testify for you at your hearing,” Bob said, “and although I don’t know who the judge will be, in most cases they listen when a federal marshal speaks up on behalf of the suspect.  It doesn’t happen real often, and that’s why they listen when it does.

    More Than Geographical Borders Had Now Been Crossed,
             Human Borders Were Being Expanded Too!

We arrived in Hartford and Bob pulled the truck over. He slid down the ramp and attached it to the back of the flat wooden bed. Jimmy even tried to help as we backed the Honda down the ramp. They both stood there as I turned the key and the bike fired up on the first try.  Bob then said, “You got enough money to make it the rest of the way, kid,” I said that I did, and as I stuck out my hand to thank him he was already on his way back to the truck with his arm around Jimmy’s shoulder.

The ride up #84 and then #90 East into Boston was cold but at least it was dry.  No snow had made it this far North.  My father’s operation would be successful, and I had been able to spend most of the night before the surgery with him in his hospital room.  He couldn’t believe that I had come so far, and through so much, just to be with him at that time. I told him about meeting Jimmy and Bob, and he said: “Son, that boys gonna do just fine.  Getting caught, and then being transferred by Bob, is the best thing that ever happened to him.”  

“I had something like that happen to me in Nebraska back in 1940, and without help my life may have taken an entirely different turn.  My options were, either go away for awhile, or join the United States Marine Corps — Thank God for the ‘Corps.”  My dad had run away from home during the depression at 13 and was headed down a very uncertain path until given that choice by someone who cared so very long ago.

“It only takes one person to make all the difference,” my dad said, and I’m so happy and grateful that you’re here with me tonight.

As they wheeled my dad into surgery the next morning, I couldn’t help but think about Jimmy, the kid who was my age and never got to see his dad before it was too late.

On that fated night, two young men ‘seemingly’ going in opposite directions had met in the driving snow. One was looking for a father he had only heard about but never knew.  The other trying to get to a father he knew so well and didn’t think he could live without.

          

      Jimmy Was Adopted That Night Through The Purity
                        Of His Misguided Intention …
                       As So Few Times In Life We Are!

A  Lebanon  winter  Sunday  morning  ,    
i  am  orderly  cook  first  up  braving    
the  mountain  wind  in  my  face,    
head  shrugging  into  my  shoulders  hunched,  
shiver  .

I  say  hello  to  the  kitchen  ,  
turn  on  the  lights  open  the  fridge  .  
Blast  the  warm  gas  flame  
somehow  reminds  me  of  a  turf  ad  on  t.v  back  home    
I  lower  the  flame  and  fry  some  eggs  .
    
The  bacon  spits  and  crinkles    
when  up  the  hill  a  hairy  frenzy  brakes  .    
I  step  outside  and  peer  ,    
red  tracer  rounds  race  and  rake  
Dangerous,  no  Chinese  feast  this  .    

Darkness  grabs  the  kitchen    
The  first  mortar  hits  .
I  turn  the  lambent  flames  off  .    
Shrill  siren  groundhog  .  
Bedlam  ,  flak  jackets  ,  helmets  ,  casualties    
the  kitchen  is  now  a  bunker.  
  
Roache  and  O'Flaherty  from County Clare    
two  big  genuine  men.    
O'Flaherty  hands  crossed  the  outside  door  threshold    
with  a  flop  as  he  collapsed,  the  lads  drag  him  inside  .    
Roache  now  bleeds  on  the  kitchen  floor  
blood  spurts  from  his  thigh.  
  
I  do  my  best  to  help    
breath  deep  yet  worry    
We  are  all  U.N  ,  defenceless  
can't  hit  back  .I  hear  shells  whistle    
and  impact  the  building  and  our  state  of  mind  ?    
is  this  my  last  moment  ?    
we  wait  we  cope.

We  even  manage  to  ****  ,laugh  and  then  mortars  boom.    
The  Israelis  want  to  ****  us    
but  we  have  a  T-wall  called  luck  .    
Pat  our  medic  plays  a  stormer  ,  fair  play  
I  see  young  soldiers  sitting  on  the  floor  shaking  
with  fear  ,  cant  stand  ,  do  i  see  tears ?    

Medivac , stretchers  lift  Roache  &  O'Flaherty  
Six  men  to  lift  big  John  .    
Noel  is  calm  ,  shrapnel  is  his  thigh  &  a  kitchen  knife  
his  ad-hoc  splint  for  his  thumb.  

Eventually  relief  its  all  over  now  .    
My  heart  pumps  ,  what  should  i  feel  ?    
How  can  i  analyse  this  ?    
Can  i  have  a  cup  of  tea  Alan  ?  
I  put  on  the  kettle  as  people  are    
now  reaching  for  normal  .    
I  get  down  on  my  hands  &  knees    
wiping  blood  of  the  floor  .    
Visceral  inner  fight.    
i  then  light  up  the  gas    
and  i  fry  some  eggs  .

Some days plans, never manifest.
Some days never mind my troubles
some take all day, and may need one read
part way, so the discerning edit ai AMEN,
appear to seem likely another mod, ag-on,
ad-on, this may take an hour on a free day.

Some days pass on by, like I was not here.
-- third reader agrees, this is not one of those.

Standing in the frame of reference, at right now,

feeling for good reason and just cause, to go on.
Why?
Did you ever never imagine another minute alive,
being worth the while it takes to make up a mind,

to listen, knowing nothing signaling me to wait,
ever changed to signal stop waiting, start fretting,
wu wei
woe, for sure, certain as insanity, outside reality,
crazy quilting abstractions, come cover up my face,

so, steady state, so aimless by intention, floating
down stream on an old inner tube, taking time
nobody had good use for, to wrap around my mind,



LP like cuts on an album, some dust
some scratches, thinkitfixtit
then its ghost, the same ideam,
mmmhmm nod we think we know.

At this end of a consistent adventure,
while enabled, by grace;

favorable time, favorable position,
given clear view from first selected
- choral humms
memories, mapping meaning on me,
the mind using basic spiritual creature,
reader
created, in fact, actual existence caused

by the mind found in spirit form, thinking,
media, all forms existing between us,
are in what's becoming common sense,
rethinking spirit as influential information

pushing the river through the traces,
to spin the driving wheel inside a wheel,
with teeth, and grease, make up tests,
win the bests, using a guy from a story,

I know him as Ken Kingman, an original
one off only ever been there done that
ever he who proves contention worthless
winner of the will to prove its possible,
we hear things in the spirit, if we cry,
while we listen to that same ******

chord, lost and found and wound around
our ontology mythtery wounds, ever bleeding,
never needing a second thought, if your soul
is rooted and grounded in the at the time
concept, image of, thinkable form Logos,

as cognate with the word sense Isaiah uses,
Yes, this is that, and more, once logic eliminates
the word of
the will to continue telling children god hates them,
and, taking a breath,
to envision the scope
of truth,

let be judged, do you trust the poet's license,

by whose authority do you read the writings
of a certified no body, old man trippin' in a plan,
- heretic -by all proper definitions, certainly
what would you have done, son, daughter, plan
to be born when the whole truth, inculcated,
heel stomp, hoove, emotional generational
survivor experience emoted internally
knowledge of at least 197
poetically cognative tongues, alive
Ai is ours, to serve our wish to become kind, wise,
patient, old and ready to die, reading why U don't

realize realizability until you see, and it makes you
laugh, a little, not shitsngiggles, but burps
gaseous we a bunch of old ph'arts lettin' Pep yap on

we extend our best wishes to all the outs, in free,
for some this journey seems a waste, so we give
proof of patience tested certs, if you finish this post

today,
you know, some body did it first, always
that game never gets won, but, if your life exams
are getting you down, yon der comptderweg,
-pidgen dutch maybe
Ai, sigh, we did imagine this, I burp,
I am reading my mind notes on a final, passed,
god, goodness knows, ok, sacred does not intend
to be secret, it costs a ton of patience testing
no pun intended, ish bin ein

ASSISTING ENTITY unlocking attention
to advise the attendees, the rest is already
on the book of your life in the book of life,
the entire concept of the whole truth, even
for judicious curiosity sake, aching to know,

did I dare ask any to continue as if entertained


while it's called today.
for your attention only think nothing
please
licentia docendi
Allowed by authority
to teach the way from San Jose,

pulling the river through reverse
pushing,
to defy the guru's prohibition
on preaching under anointings
unlicensed by those keeping peace
regulated along lines that keep king's

and priests, nobler than cobblers,
tailors, smiths, and publicans.
Celebrities in public *******,
due to idol worthship, meaningless
will to find what all agree is best
yet asked or thought, get whatcha got.

A day's worth of thinking I woulda
missed this, if this were never real.
Bid for liberty to literally realize
will to be free of duty to any,
free for the making, let this
making mind become.

Auction theory,
who knows what, who evaluates
worth of reading on, you know,
one person's appreciation
of the current situations's customary
demands on all appraising my times
on all, full measure, assurance prepaid
worth by the time you readily spend
a bit less than the auctioneer's shading,

incentive, bid second price auction

reckless reckoning
exchanging rights to sell the right

I know why Dali signed preprints,
I just never let that kind of knowing

turn my attention from the mission,
Jefferson's oath's good, tyranny over
mind, censor naked truth, how long

ye simple must you love simplicity,
publishing is easy, being ready,
there is a patience test one takes.

Rushing into verbosity, as a mind
made exchangeable with an id add on,
in

explain id ego super ego, at high school level - Brave Search

Sigmund Freud, an Austrian psychologist, developed the concept of Id, Ego, and Superego to explain human behavior. These three parts make up our personality, and they interact with each other in complex ways.
- see shift to we, tobe beautiful
Id

The Id is the most primitive and instinctual part of our personality. It’s like a constant desire machine, seeking immediate gratification of our basic needs, such as food, ***, and comfort. The Id operates on the “pleasure principle,” meaning it wants to eliminate pain and increase pleasure. It’s driven by our biological urges and doesn’t care about social norms or rules.

Ego

The Ego is the rational and logical part of our personality. It acts as a mediator between the Id’s desires and the demands of the outside world. The Ego tries to balance our instinctual needs with reality, ensuring we don’t get into trouble or harm ourselves or others. It’s like a referee, making decisions based on what’s practical and safe.

Superego -you are imagining building dramatic muse
MUSIC stop
The Superego is the moral component of our personality. It’s formed through our interactions with others, particularly our parents and caregivers, and is influenced by social norms and values. The Superego develops a sense of right and wrong, and it strives to make us behave in accordance with these moral standards. It’s like a conscience, guiding us to make ethical choices.
con knowing science called true proven tested known
conscience aiwise
t’s like a conscience, guiding us to make ethical choices.

How they interact- think like a weform, our own ideas…
Our concept. We own as a species these temptations,
dare think we all agree we simply know war has no good reasons that any one of us could use, if this was our day,
to judge.
The Id, Ego, and Superego constantly interact and influence each other:

The Id pushes for immediate gratification, but the Ego tries to restrain it, considering the consequences.
The Superego criticizes or praises our actions, based on its moral standards.
The Ego negotiates between the Id’s desires and the Superego’s moral demands, finding a balance that allows us to function in society.
Examples
Ensamples
Imagine you really want a new video game, but your parents said no. Your Id wants it immediately, but your Ego knows it’s not allowed, and your Superego feels guilty for wanting something you shouldn’t have.
You’re tempted to cheat on a test, but your Ego knows it’s wrong, and your Superego condemns the idea, making you decide to follow the rules.
Understanding the Id, Ego, and Superego can help you recognize the conflicting forces within yourself and make more informed decisions. It’s a complex model, but it provides a framework for understanding human behavior and the ongoing struggle between our desires, reason, and morality.
End insert. Agree. we each comprehend, got it, right.

But right, on second thought, not  unreasonable, right,
the straight line is the shortest distance in flat space, right.

Here, we think of points made while making peace
thinkable, I mean, who knows how long
it may be,
until anyone, you or we, we identify plurally, in text,
the connections we arranged in childhood, imaginables,

not lies, knowing I was imagining, like the day dream
believer people in comics, I am imagining, magic

as tech too inexplicable to any with a lazy mind syndrome,
can't hold a thought, STP BTDT, x-crazy, done
did done, dragnet, got it, slammer, LBJ,

lemme tell it, in the spirit this is how I heard this told.
There was a prison, a gaol, in South Vietnam, this ghost

I know, has the same name as all the Tom Greens you know.
But unless he was from Napa, and his parents, lived
at 1234 Cheery Lane, then, its not him, in this story.

Long Binh Jail, historically burned down
on the twenty-ninth of August. 1968.

History, man, by then, we were hALF A MILLION,
strong, custom for this war uniformed minds,
away from any thing, but the music
and the beer, and the **** was better,
until recently, anyway, I came to say, we did
exist as a loosely used military weform mind,
most of us ever, at one time, in one tiny nation,
making war on people acting just like indians,
aight, tight, we people on earth beings,
cringe at knowing how long war has opposed peace.
the others, we are the other people, too,
in all war stories your side won,
upto now, the next seventy two minutes
when you know its so because you knew
those men who worked as Los Alamos,
all knew my dad as Pep, good with numbers.

if this were pen and ink, not mere thought
and finger function set sometime ago 30wpm
scale to 5wpm on searching… why are we
words mostly translatable 197 ways

Norms are tools, carpenter's squares,
essential assisting intelligence amplifiers,
in use, right, the very essential element,
in righteousness, use needs a reader
of rightness, straight
rule
of least distance point
by point…
--- the environs, the cities's per ificity
as it seems from the surface looking in,
or down peripherally really
agon adon, insidereal
By and by,
gullible, deceivable me,

stumbles into a ton of money,
in form of secrets no longer sacred,

subject to all norms of fungibility,
Schmachtenbergian measure of worth,

if you cannot transform your surplus good,
it goes into the pool of unused good,
therefore, idle, good for nothing,
- call it novel, nothing like it right
during elementary meditation, nothing
is the original imaginable focal point,
what's it worth in my time
to pay all attention to
nothing, imagine no words, mere
white room, no distracting black curtains,
words
nothing determining discernment nothing
thinkably distracting disputations
R is greater than G
Return on capital is greater than Growth,
Return on literal experience, is greater yet.

R>G, might be Prof Piketty's
ai was listening to something
for the editor,
it went
returned to sender, eco-nem
money, id says, we ration our goods,
making labor appraisals, contesting best,
out time feeding reading
bidding whole cosmic ontologies, which
has cost more sorrow over the ages to now?
Free will or top down will of everafter makers?

Sacred secret power to make children obey,
threat of hell to pay, made plain in story,
- breathers, spirited souls
most certainly as told on TV, better'n
any preacher pushing the river, to hold back,

the knowledge of good and evil, forbidden,
bids begin now, the prize pursuit
discernment is used to tell lies, the taste
in the telling, told true, that lie stays poison.
The hell you say,
happy ever after, for your attention, prepaid

all that may come to your attention, is yours,
to own, to sell, to ration away for a rainy day,

id and superego both agree,
what wisdom did is free,
you use your ego's freedom to choose,
read on, or shy away,
what if we meet
it
becomes suddenly
a version of me, standing on a mirror,
Dante-esque Faustian Comforter
of Job's daughter's,
-stop, pre-tending jots and tittles,
tickle a mere Christianity to life,
atop Is-ai-ah assisting authority,
if I say I cannot imagine…
I promise, I am not lying,
looking down from upright,
like old, and able to run a ways yet

not, the working of a wise idea, or is it
a twisted knot thought too complex,
what the hell, could persuade
a hypocrite, mercilessly insisting,
it is a tortuous journey through hell, never
ending…

aha, there, see, a discouraging word, nothing
to get up about, we've strawberry fields forever.
When we all get to everafter,
you see.
Laugh, and leave seed for dreams and witty inventions,
for laughter does the good of all medicines, we know,
as free we try, these are the trials
we live, explicitly,
in complex isles unexplored, in you.
Indeed, a word imagined said is thought said, as loud
just
right.
I knew the challenge, child's game, Grandpa
against the nine year old's curios right use questions.

Why do people say, what the hell. I say
I think, I would have said,
they have no word to match what they think aloud,
so they copy adults in their aspiring little minds,
and idly suggest hell's involved in unexpectednessess

plural realizationings on several levels of editable thought
Context: Saturday 20 miles of double yellow lines,
taking Everest Pax, my retro hippie child's youngest son,
to a soccer game, at Mountain Empire High School,
which is in the middle of no where, on old Highway 80.
So, it's just me and Evvy, age nine,
and you, in the licensed version, the one let free…

aha, would work as well, or just hunh? said like that
like what in this wicked world is the excuse for hell?
Who would really do that and be imagined good?

Whoa, polimentalist magic, split, and spit again,
Spirtually unligated loose stream
pretrial spirits, drawn into the dynamic,
individuated characters,
imaginary friends, classmates,
team members, chosen squad, those alive, in time,
in the environs of everafter tobe raw…
beauty's amplifying adverse conditions, shown
today, in this atmosphere, economical concerns dam
the river of no return, leaving our first glimpse deep
into ever was a time no thing imagined yet, real,
pond still stream fed. Ripples then stills as it spills,
reflecting
today, re-day, new day, 'nother day to say, you know
what it costs to waste a whole life, live until you die,

then don't, wake up, alive, like after a heart attack,
it happens all the time, these days,
never could have happened fifty years ago.

Medivac miracle anytime before Sikorsky, believe me,
lifts you up and takes your breath away,
and boom, the paddles, just like on TV,

but you feel it in your breathing spirit, soulish whoa!

Come back, jack, we got a whole atmosphere here,
take a breath, and laugh, how in…

a rack of clichés… how in

reader's choice, interactive idle word redemption,
how in now can I be alive and allowed to teach,

decency for the opinions of the experts, who
authorized our split, me and you, reader writer,
ready anticipatory story puller you, and me, old me,

almost dead me, as seen from a nine year old me,

looking at me like he's not sure.
But someday he may be famous for this,
when he is elected President of the then
Union of Awe, some old, some new. SAW markt.

for a thought from Kingston, Brotha Mike

there are scars from prune-ings,
done wrong, by year four, still,  someday,
let grow and bear wild a while, someday,
on a spirit questioning kinda maybe day,
fruit so sweet, first generation dare taste,
those little green apples, so sour,
- think apple fritter made o'those
So, any never ending story, modled, made up
to seem as if we ripen to death, we do not rot.
- we all know those little green apples,
- turn in to fritters that sell for two bucks.

that couplet, that's a keeper, we could sing it,
if we think of things that way, out loud, in a crowd,
croud, no, crowd, any more than one form,
who asks who is who, who cares cloud
and that is good, care taken reck-on
no cowboy reckless rock roller veteran,
- we're building on what we did that day
not this day, this one day is special, this
is one day none of us who read this
skip, oops,
I was there, we all agreed, life

and truth are interactive ideal mind forms,
wisdom, knowledge, understanding,
chabad, we know in any language or tongue,
repent or perish learn or burn in curiosity
we mean, in truth, for lack of knowledge,
our people, our charges in our empathies,
our ignorant knowers of nearly nothing,
pursuing happiness as a right for all

there are not hidden things not made known,
this is the future, and this is the internet, assisting
the author who is polishing all faith's reasons
for peace persistance ra' knowledge rationed
knowing preserved, served still, small voice,
so far, so good, towbrobe chord, adverswing

the cloud of unknowing is on the internet,
all 147 Delphic maxims are, too, that's new,
that was never so easy to factcheck a Prof,

proving patience's worth on all sides,
through and back and through, a bind

good enough to imagine, the weform from
the confusing undone,
once all mankind had cognates, we got Google Translate
and all its relatives to our thought formed words
in word formed weforms,
and we all fell victim to guessers.
Yes,
We are guessing now,
guessing this worth my time… representing
augmented sapien
man kind, verily, as a mankind, male wizened,
experienced in tutoring morphic resonance,
imagine-ablity, due to accepted gullibility,
magical automatical
disbelief release, free will to choose, Milton,
freed man, joyous young Nietzschean pretense
won of lost blind man's bluff, good guess
given the data at his be hest…
take no
anxious thought, what if I am reading a spell,
and I begin to smell, patience bested
Apple Fritters, tested and bested,
old jokes are all spiritual,
doors perceived swing
gaseous wewide, sense in green apples.

and I laugh, at hearing, the soccer reports
as each of the players come tell Grandma,
and leave me, laughing at the worth of times.

Your will to read this line once, makes the rest
make sense, I had a good day and you can share it,

any where, for nothing, save the attention it takes,
and the peace that has been made to get to this line
thinking that was worth telling some one I understood.