Tita Dita,

You're welcome. I was thinking the same thing. I really enjoy talking to you
because you have the ability to touch "My Dusty Buttons". I recently had
written a poem about the superficial and the shallow that our society
promotes (how and why Paris Hilton is a celebrity I will never know) and how
it has institutionalized itself in our everyday conversations with people or
even friends and family. Day to day conversation with people usually tend to
gravitate towards the uninspired and mundane.

In this poem I had made a parallel to learning how to type, "Qwerty". Along
with how the majority of the people I have come across in my life fit this
mold. The mold of being on the surface not requiring any mental reach or
challenge at all. It will lead one to "rheumatoid arthritis of the brain and
soul".

But there are however the people in your life who know how to make you reach
for the Tilde', the exclamation sign, and the question mark. Which require
you to use both hands. You are one of those people for me.

I had a conversation with someone and I had told them that I was losing
faith in humanity and that my spirit was a deflated balloon. Also that they
had somehow managed to inflate it back again in order to give me back my
faith in humanity. You again are one of these people.

So I'd like to share with you this poem:


"My Dusty Buttons"

Water-cooler talk
Machinated responses
The ones that require minimal brain neuron activity
Somehow we've managed to drain the human out of humanity
Discrediting ourselves as if we don't have an emotional receptor to decipher
what is genuine or not
The people whom I have known for years
but continually say the same damn thing:
My favorite CD is now scratched and continuously plays the same fragment
over and over and over is now rendered useless
qwerty
No expansion of the hand
Not taking the effort to experience and discover the other keys on the
keyboard
Restriction:
Out of fear?
Creatures of habit?
Comfortably?
=stagnation
Now the other keys on my keyboard are collecting dust
Over the course of time the qwerty keys have been rubbed out while the
others remain legible
I can always find qwerty because it is everywhere and is now part of our
instinct
The ligaments within my hand start to loose flexibility
Developing early stages of rheumatoid arthritis
My ergonomic keyboard gel pad is no longer effective
Then my pinky gets the urge to move to the letter "A"
The structural framework within my hand is frozen like a dilapidated engine
and somehow manages
Then my middle finger makes a move for "F"
then "T"
then "E"
"R"
The reflexes and muscle memory then start to take over my left hand
"I"
"T"
"I"
"S"
"A"
"L"
"L"
"S"
"A"
"I"
"D"
"&"
"D"
"O"
"N"
"E"
I realize that there are certain people/things in the world who know how to
push my buttons to expand once again.
It and they have managed to unfreeze the locked gears within my being
Wyatt's Torch is still burning.

(Wyatt's Torch- is an Ayn Rand reference in Atlas Shrugged which represents
the human will to survive regardless how dismal the situation is)

Thanks for being you,

Chris

________________________________________________________________________

HI Chris, 
How touching is this?!?  I am so glad I am able to make an impact in your
life because I truly want to.  I feel that you are as much of a son to me as
Bradie.  Honest!  Thank you for sharing this poem.  I didn't even know you
liked to write them.  Good to know you have the ability to reach inside of
you to express yourself this way, regardless of what you are feeling.  I
meant it when I said let's get together more often.  And I'm sorry I was not
available last Friday but we could have spent some time last Sunday if you
came around.  How about we schedule a set time to meet, like every couple of
Sundays or something like that.  This way I have on my calendar, which
happens to fill up faster than I want to nowadays.  Let me know.  See you
this Sunday. 



All my best,

My Tito Edward is an African American with his family centered in rural
Pennsylvania. I have never hesitated to call him Tito (Uncle) because
he embodies all of the qualities I wish my blood relatives have:
patient, wise, loving, intelligent, cultured, traveled, caring just to
name a few.

He came to visit us over this past weekend and said, "Christian, I've
been wondering what you've been up to recently and I wanted to tell you
that I had a dream about you. You were in the 'Peace Corps'...".

I looked at him and smiled. Then I told him, "The 'Peace Corps' has
always been a secret dream of mine. I've always wanted to teach and
help people but why should I help people who are in an advantaged
position? Who I need to help are people who are looking/needing it.
Another plus would be to show the rest of the world that all
'Americans' are not arrogant and insensitive to the world's needs".

It all took place in the self-contained community known as Uptown Whittier. Here one can see the full spectrum of society. From the "Millionaires" living in the hills to the "Homeless" who stash their 40 oz. beer bottles in the bushes. It is a microcosm of society.

This marked an era of my life when I spent nearly 12 hours a day in this city working for money and my labor of love.   

My favorite Russian Female Jew Author/Philosopher's birthday is coming up on Feb. 2nd, Ayn Rand.
In honor of her work someone had made a myspace page dedicated to her. This person also had posted a bulletin asking people to submit their favorite Rand quotes. Atlas Shrugged is by far my favorite book ever written and although it is highly celebrated within it's own circles I believe that it hasn't gotten the credit it deserves, it is truly genius. What I find most impressive about her work is that she has mastered the English language which is her second language. I think so highly of this book that..."If I were president I would make it required reading for high school students".

It is a story of the thinker(s) versus the rest of the world, producers versus the destroyers, and what exactly happens to the world when these "Prime Movers" decide to strike. Also these prime movers aren't accepted in their society. They are seen as selfish egotists who are socially inept, when it is hardly the case. These people just want to work and produce which is a strong indicator that they are good at what they do. Rather than their contemporaries who have to personally campaign and use the media to further their public image, which is a sign of ineptitude. If one's work is good it's good, and should not have to rely on lobbying for reviews and the graces of popular opinion.

So here's my quote: (Atlas Shrugged)

Through all the centuries of the worship of the mindless, whatever stagnation humanity chose to endure, whatever brutality to practice - it was only by the grace of men who perceived that wheat must have water in order to grow, that stones laid in a curve will form an arch, that two and two make four, that love is not served by torture and life is not fed by destruction- only by the grace of those men did the rest of them learn to experience moments when they caught the spark of being human, and only the sum of such moments permitted them to exist.

The other week someone had asked me if I drink coffee or tea and if I did how often do I drink it.

The answer to that question, "everyday".

Then they had followed up that answer with what's your favorite drink?

Reply: "plain brewed coffee" and "plain green tea".

To be specific the answer was Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee and Whole Jasmine Flower Tea.

It wasn't necessarily the answer that they were looking for so naturally I had to explain why:(The answer they were expecting was some type of exotic ice blended, chocolate dressed, whipped cream topped, infused with fruit type drink.)

I then began to explain the differing levels of appreciation and respect I had for these drinks. Nostalgia was the first on this list. I grew up on the stuff, not necessarily drinking it or them, but just the smell. When I was a young child I remember my dad brewing and drinking coffee and tea while he'd draw (Architect), listening to music. In recollection it reminded me of happy times when I was a child.

Secondly, throughout the course of learning I realized that it also represented the arts. I specifically recall Edgar Allen Poe and how he used to write in English Coffee Houses. I know some of you may know that in England they are known to drink tea. The reason why they drink tea is due to a thing called "Lack of Genetic Diversity". During colonial times India and what was known as Ceylon (modern day Sri Lanka) were territories controlled by the East Indian Trading Company (a business front for the British Monarchy). They did not have the scientific knowledge to realize that they needed different types of coffee in case of crop disease (same exact reason for the Irish Potato Famine). So consequently they now drink tea.

Also it represents times with loved ones. To be able to catch up and engage in conversation whether it be profound and serious or strictly humorous.

Lastly, it represents time with the most important person in your life, you. In our modern day and age we don't really devote much time for introspection. Just think of how many great ideas were thought of while having coffee or tea in solitude.

I then began to think of it from a personal philosophical standpoint.

In our "Shock and Awe" society we are conditioned to look for bigger, faster, stronger, and the new and improved, we tend to overlook what is most important: the core. We are so consumed with packaging, the frills, the excitement and buzz that particular items give us. In the culinary world, French Cuisine isn't necessarily revered in high esteem because of the method of cooking, but the freshness and superiority of the ingredients.

That is why I answered Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee and Whole Jasmine Flower Tea. It is the superiority of ingredients and the lack of frills that these drinks have. They can't hide behind additional ingredients because of its simplistic recipe.

In many ways our choice of answer or drink tends to reflect our society. We tend to side with the "overly ornate" rather than simple. Let's use society's standard of beauty for example; we tend to respect and gravitate towards females who wear too much make-up, perfume, and the more skin they show the more beautiful they are. We tend to forget the core, the superiority of the main ingredient itself.

Now let's use music as an example, how many top-40 and major label acts do you honestly believe can actually sing or play their instrument? Keep in mind that we are at the saturation point of the vocoder (the organ sounding voice effect that we are hearing so often now). Or how many bands or musicians are hiding behind: sound effects, mass marketing, visual effects, and are considered great by default because they have no contemporaries, competitive balance.

To me "plain brewed coffee" and "whole Jasmine Flower Tea" represent a cappella and acoustic renditions of brewed drinks because there is nothing to hide behind. It is what it is, the truth, which happens to be my personal standard of beauty.

In spirit of Dia de los Muertos and All Souls Day, I obviously began to think of my family and what they had meant to me along with the thought of "without them I would not be".

Shortly after, I then started to think about how there is a common thread that we all share, historically. If we are to retrace our own personal familial history we will find that we are all bi-products of some type of "Catastrophic Event". Whether it be a War, Colonialism, Natural Disaster, Economic, Political and Religious persecution.

Take me: If it weren't for a couple of notorious guys named Chancellor Adolph Hitler and and Emperor Hirohito. My Grandparents (Mother's side: Constancia Fonacier and Bagong Araw Santos) would never have met. I am a bi-product of WWII. If you want to take it even further back.

King Charles the V, if he hadn't had funded Ferdinand Magellan in the "Good Graces" of Spain and their obsession which birthed the term "The sun never sets on Spain" hadn't occurred, then my other set of Grandparents (Father's side: Jose Bernabe Mendoza and Lourdes Eugenio) would have never met.

You can trace it back to the origin of mankind if you want to. In more recent times. I can accredit my birth to another notorious character in history named- Ferdinand Marcos. At his peak of corruption, he had 5% of the population controlling 95% of the Philippine economy, by using the "Cold War" (yet another can of worms) as his leverage. Which resulted in the economic push that had eventually led to my parents meeting in Guam.

This is me and whether you acknowledge it or not, it is you, it is just told in a different manner with different specifics.

In even more modern times I have a Cousin who is half-Honduran. If it wasn't for the U.S. and their monitoring of the "Sandinista: Daniel Ortega" her father (a U.S. Military Intelligence Officer) and mother would have never met.

I have omitted other major things such as "Middle Passage", "Holocaust", "Soviet Revolution", "Irish Potato Famine" just to name a few.

This however does not include personal family tragedy: business failure, family death, divorce, single parenthood, prison, drug addiction etc. So we all have a dark cloud that binds us all together like the double helix of DNA which stitches us together to make the "Patchwork Quilt" that is society. The precisioned incisions between two adjacent puzzle pieces eventually gives us the comprehensive picture of mankind.

But in honor of our dark past we all manage to survive and live. It is a celebration of the human will to survive. But unfortunately we are losing the drive to think and create "Ground Breaking Ideas and Creations" that will make us transcend to the next generational age. A celebration of "Human Ingenuity".

This is the intended interpretation of my photograph:

(located in the Dia de los Santos en el dia de los Muertos album)

"Life Shall Spring from Broken Wings"