I am a soldier. 

Before sunrise I wake up and report in. 

I am a soldier. 

I've never fired a gun, know nothing of explosives, and am useless with a knife, nevertheless,

I am a soldier.

I've never really been in a fight, yet each day I commence in battle, I do this because,

I am a soldier.

My weapon is a smile, ear to ear I smile down my enemies blasting them with positive energy so overwhelming that they shout for medics and extend their credit cards, for,

I am a soldier.

Armed with half Winsor pastel knots and pinstriped-three-button black gray uniforms I extend my right hand and shake a deadly "Hello" taking territories from my enemies in a steadfast blitzkrieg towards martial law.  I do this because,

I am a soldier.

For I only benefit from the benefit of the corps, oh the corps! oh the corps! oh the corps!  I am just one piece of one machine who needs to ferociously dominate the dominated market share.  For my individual efforts, I will benefit when my generals do, the core of us do, because that's what soldiers do.  Why?

I am a soldier. 

And I'm winning the war. 

I am the war

8 times today I asked myself "why?"  8 times I thought to myself that maybe there's no point to this at all.  8 times I felt a dark wind over my ninety eight point six degree heart.  8 times I seemed to skip a breath, hastening my mortal biological vessel.  I looked to the sky, 8 times, and let rage fill my eyes and silently screamed to my soul that I live in a senseless dungeon called  Philadelphia.

What's so damn special about the number 8?  It seems rather inconsequential.  After all, baseball teams have nine players, soccer has eleven.  The heavenly celestial numbers in the bible are seven and twelve.  Even bad things seem to happen in threes.  So why 8, why is the number 8 so important to me?  8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 8!!!!

Did you know that Philadelphia is on pace to average three murders a day?  That's one thousand and ninety five murders—mostly from hand guns.  And no, I won't turn this into, "if there were no guns there'd be no murders."  We could open the flood gates of discourse with public policy on the slab.  We could drown in the back and forth river about constitutionality, individual rights, the greater good, etc etc etc etc.  It gets us no where.  One thousand and ninety five people could die this year.  And who wants to talk policy?

8 people were killed this past weekend, Labor Day weekend.  Three days, 8 deaths.  Pointless, senseless, no valor, no glory, no life immortalized by song or poem, just angry uneducated kids armed to the teeth with no regard for tomorrow—with no regard for today.  No regard for the pieces that comprise the puzzle of existence.

Three days ago the puzzle seemed to be coming together.  I thought I was seeing each piece with clarity—with wisdom.  I have eight more reasons to doubt the beating hearts of each puzzle piece in this game.  What's so special about the number 8: maybe nothing.  After all, 8 is only  .7% of 1,095.        

Someone just told me yesterday that all life is constructed from a series of moments.  Each moment defines a part of the long tale called you and me.  Today I was reminded of how very true this is.  One single moment could embrace, elevate, estimate, or evaporate you.  Each breath, each second, each minute is one part of a larger puzzle, a game that involves each cell that makes up the fragile biological vessels called life.  The game runs the full gambit of the human spectrum.  For moments we join the game and dance around passionate fires that burn from our desires.  And like all flames, the game can burn us to cinders-- even on random week days.   

What I mean to say is: a friend of mine died.  Or what I really mean to say is: a friend that wasn't mine; a friend in waiting; a bundle of kinesthetic friendship.  I am in a state where each thought doubts the next, and words like justice and logic seem stripped of value.  Today, justice lies naked and logic smiles with harsh material properties that seem to say I told you so.  As I curse inanimate values, I curse the negativity that ruined the few moments I could have spent with my fallen comrade.  Most of you don't know him.  He asked me to make beautiful music with him.  He dared me to create, and I scorned him. 

Why?

However, in the face of this shame I remind myself of the night we made amends.  It reminded me that no matter how strange the game of life is, or how its cold rules blow like winter winds, there always is a spring.  And I'll never forget how amazing it is to live, love, breath, feel, and experience each moment of ourselves—and how easy it is to forget how powerful our actions are.  In the spirit of my lost friend George, I say to each and every one of you that I love you.  All of you have shaped and changed me and challenged me.  You have all been such an amazing part of me.  In fact you are me.

One of my most favorite quotes is "where is the justice when no one is at fault and a human life is tragically wasted, how fragile is the flame that burns with in us all, to light each passing day." (bad religion)  Because of all of you, and because of George, the next passing day looks fucking bright.       

Have you seen the latest news?  The dynamic human spirit has plugged in, turned on, and writes fifteen meaningless surveys a day.  Listen up everyone because I have a major point of contention here.  I don't want to know if you loved the last person you kissed, or if you prefer pajamas over sleeping naked.  Honestly now, what's the deal????  Is there a sense of satisfaction one receives when they post silly intimate details of themselves that have no immediate application or ramification?  When I first got hooked into the whole myspace communication revolution I thought surveys were a slightly amusing way to get quick attention to ones self.  However, now that I have been on myspace for some time now, I find surveys more painful then trying to commit suicide with a hammer!  I sign on and I see twenty different bulletins about people's clothes, there love lives, there favorite foods, where they went to high school, who there top friends are, why they have Brian Adams "I'd Die For You" playing on there page, and on and on and on and on.  Surveys are an endless epitaph to a culture that grows ever more out of touch with reality.

Perhaps I am the only one who sees it, but there is a monotonous repetition of pointless details in this myspace culture that our generation is helping to create.  Why should I tune in and care that civil war and genocide is raging Africa?  I should be spending my free time telling the world if I prefer boxers to briefs, or if I would rather eat a meal with Leonardo Dicaprio or Albert Einstein.  I'm sorry for ranting here.  But, if one is going to spend time posting there life to the world, then one needs to be able to face a rational critique.    

And if there is anyone who feels like I am being harsh, if there is anyone who thinks I am being mean, or if they think I'm calling them out, guess what: I AM!!!!!!!!!             

            The first time I discovered the portal it came to me in a flash.  At once I knew it had to be opened, and I knew I would need Michael's and Matthew's help.  We were in that fateful kitchen.  Matthew had just robbed a bank.  He walked into the bank and withdrew all the money while holding everyone's mind in a blank stasis. 

            "You could end it for all of us!" Michael shouted, "Our powers do not serve your small material needs."

            "Why shouldn't I take what I need from them?" Matthew retorted, "We are the powerful, our skills and understanding dwarf those beneath us, and there petty rules do not apply."

            "But still," I chimed in, "those who are beneath us have rules because they need them.  And while we live among them we need to follow them.  Additionally, taking claim over another's mind for personal ends seems so…." I faded as I couldn't find the word to symbolize my thoughts.

            "Seems so what?" Matthew sardonically retorted, "Wrong?  What's wrong is that each day we scurry about trying to fit in with those disgusting insects.  We work menial jobs acting as if we are part of their hive.  Each second spent in their captivity is a second wasted.  We need material ends to satisfy those societal needs placed upon us."

            "So this is about morality is it then," Michael said, "So to prove the point that those who do not have the power are less then us, you steal from them?  There is no truth to what you speak.  Our power is nothing if we do not use it to serve those who are beneath us.  We did not choose to have the power.  However, we do choose the facet, form and extent to which we use our power.  That choice is sacred, and must be of a higher moral standard."        

            "And what should that standard be exactly," I asked, "Do you suggest that we develop a code or even a law about how we should exercise our powers?"

            "Perhaps," Michael replied, "All religious codes and social laws, stem from conversations such as these.  I think ambiguity, or should I say, moral ambiguity, clearly hurts us.  But since we can act without fearing any consequence at all, are actions need to be held to the highest of moral standards."

            "Indeed," I agreed, "All of my life I have struggle with wondering where, when, and how should I use my powers, more so then wondering why I even have them."

            Mathew locked eyes with Michael and then my self, "You both have hit the nail on the head.  Now with force we should drive the nail in further.  Are actions are free of any consequence.  I could kill someone, steal their intellectual sovereignty, take everything from them, exploit there deepest anxieties and exploit their fears for profit, yet I don't.  Today I realized that to serve the insects best I need to be freed from the confines of their societal ends.  Ends such as, be a good worker, play by the rules, build a home, etc. do not have any application to us.  However, to fulfill basic needs such as shelter and food, we can either play their lengthy games acquiring what we need after time and energy, or just take what we want.  I move for taking what we need, and then we can put all of our efforts into understanding our power, how best to use it, and how best it can benefit all."

            On and on they went back and forth like this.  I would give my feedback and opinions when necessary.  When the three of us made our small society, we agreed to never keep any secrets from each other.  Michael thought that secrets would destroy are mutual psychic benefits.  Honesty, he said, was the corner stone of our development.  However, I kept one deep secret from them both.  I was the more powerful of the three.  Perhaps on some deep level they both knew that I was capable of so much more.  However, I never flaunted it, I never exposed their weaknesses, and I always played the quite third member.  It was my deeper psychic abilities that lead me to the portal.  As they deconstructed each others views about our moral responsibilities, I saw the portal open in my mind.  I did not have the strength to open the portal alone-- I would need their assistance.  Once I brought the portal to their attention they were able to see it too-- opened in all its majesty.  We worked day and night to gain the psychic fortitude to tare the fabric of this world apart, and open the gate into another.

            With the portal now open I knew what I was meant to do. 

            "Sorry for what," Michael said "What do you have to do?" 

            The three of us had gotten as far as we could go.  There sluggish psychic abilities served me fully, and now I was ready to take the step alone.  I looked at my hand and the pistol it held.  How funny, I thought.  I didn't even know I was holding it.  I lifted the gun; it was soft and weightless in my hand.  I squeezed.  The hammer of the gun slammed down on the barrel and the bullet fired with a mighty bang that I almost didn't even hear.  The bullet shattered Michael's face as blood sprayed the room from the stump that was his head.  I turned to Mathew and yet again squeezed off another round.  This one struck Mathew in the chest and he gasped for breath.  I fired another then another then another into Mathew's chest until we was more a bloody pile of smoking flesh then a man.  The deed was done.  They could not follow me; they could not spend their lives trying to open more portals.  And now that I know how to open them, I will not need their assistance any more.

            With a great smile I lunged myself into the portal, the future, my future, and I did it alone.       

The three of us sat in the kitchen of my high rise apartment.  We locked eyes, knowing the boundaries we were going to cross.  "It's time," one of us said. 

This moment would define our journey, its passage through the realm of human existence.  It reminded me of my childhood, when I first discovered the power.  I was just a small developing creature, yearning to open my development to new and dynamic thrills.  Each moment carried magic and excitement.  Indeed, I thought I was magical.  Each night I dreamed of the day to come, and each morning the day followed as in my dreams.  I could touch the future, yet I could not control my abilities. 

There was the day I went with a friend into the woods behind my parent's quaint suburban home.  There was a rustic path with glistening green leaves, deep brown bark and life in each crevice and corner.  We walked the path frequently in our summer shorts and cartoon covered tee-shirts.  On this particular visit, my friend...what was his name again?...thought it would be fun if he brought his uncle's cigarette lighter.  It was small and red.  He held the little torch under leaves hoping it would ignite a giant fireball.  I felt removed from the situation, like I was watching him from a great distance.  We were children, yet I knew deep in my bones that this was very wrong.  I felt my consciousness grow beyond the material confines of the prison called the human body.  I could touch each green leaf, each twig on each tree; each individual bird as they flew in flocks.  My mind blanketed the forest and this "friend" of mine, bored at burning leaves, found a toad.  He laughed as the toad fruitless tried to escape.  I could feel the searing flesh of the toad as my "friend" held the tiny lighter to amphibians brown wart covered skin.  My companion's eyes ignited with sadistic ecstasy at the sight of torture.  I had nothing but contempt for him.  I reached out with an exhausting amount of force and some hidden tremendous power.  My childhood companion felt the power.  With a great "snap" the bone in his wrist broke under the weight of my mind.  He screamed, dropped the lighter, and ran home in tears. 

What had I done?  What power did I possess?  My heart ached.  I sulked my way back home mulling over the events of the day.  What a sick place for a child to be.  Could there have been a greater torment then knowing my thoughts evoked power, my dreams spoke of the future?  How should I utilize this power?  I snapped a young boy's wrist with just a thought.  What other great and terrible things was I capable of?  I was isolated in the why, where and what next.

"Are you ready," he said snapping me back to the present, his faced rapped in shadow.  "You seem distant," I glanced straight up into the light that hung a pair of feet below the ceiling. 

"No, I was only reliving the memory of…" I drifted as I looked at the two of them.  I could barely make out their silhouettes, as my pupils adjusted.  "I am ready."

"Then let's permeate the nature of this world."  What new territory I would cross was yet unknown.  Like the child I was, who unknowingly broke someone's bone, I was about to embark on yet another transcendental adventure.  With a loud silence, the three of us opened the portal.

How did it come to this?  The society of three.  I first meet Michael when I was at college, and it was he who introduced me to Matthew.  I was in a contemporary ethics class.  In the class the professor spoke of Kantian views of morality.  He spoke of the universe, the moral universe as its own sustaining entity to which every action should be held to.  I remember trying so very hard to avoid stealing this man's thoughts.  Such petty dialogues surrounding right wrong, up down, black and white, meant little to a creature such as me.  I spent my life gripping with the extent of the power I had.  I could open my mind and get every answer to every question the professor would ever teach.  His knowledge could be mine and it would cost either of us nothing.  I may seem very moral to some. For I let this man keep his thoughts.  Indeed I resisted each and every temptation.  However, resisting temptation doesn't make me moral.  Stories about the real right and the true wrong seemed subdued beneath the conflicts of my abilities.  

The class was held in a dank concrete room in the basement of a college building.  The room was laced with florescent light.  The kind of light that was so artificial it seemed more like night then day.  I sensed that for once I was not alone.  Near by there was one who knew me; a powerful creature such as myself.  His name was Michael.  His skin was pale.  His hair red and he had a red beard.  I turned to see him standing in the corner of the little concrete covered class room.  His body was not there; just an image conjured in my mind's eye.  "I know you," he silently spoke.  "I know that you and I are the same by design, with powers great and tremendous."  I new where to find him, at a bar a few blocks away.  After class I would go there.  It wasn't long before Michael introduced me to Matthew.  Together we could grip our true selves, our purpose and place.  Yet it was I and I alone who discovered the portal.

The kitchen in my apartment faded to a dark bliss like glow.  Michael, Matthew and I concentrated hard as our minds met in the middle.  Slowly the darkness grew around us.  With each second we fought to keep ourselves from being removed.  Gusts of psychic blasts swirled up.  The skin around my faced pulled tight around the boney frame of my face, and my hair stood on end.  Our minds took forced steps back again and again.  We fought to stay focused to force the portal to open.  At first there was a soft shimmering blue glow, like a beam of light cutting through a calm pool.  Then slowly this slit of light grew in diameter.  The objects of the kitchen, the table, the ceiling, the walls, the oven, the little fixtures that remind people of their day to day selves, faded as inch by inch the portal opened before us.  Brilliant colors of blue, orange and green shimmered around us.  Even our bodies seemed like cut out shadows.  I rose and took in the majesty of the portal.

"I'm sorry for what is to come next," I said.

What a start to the day.  Today has been one of those days that started so good that I must smile at life.  It began with a brisk walk with my sister to the bagel store, and a sweet cup of hazelnut coffee.  Then we sat at Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia and ate breakfast.  Rittenhouse Square was full with dogs, quite meditations of spring refreshment, glistening trees looming over us with ancient roots, and peaceful thoughts of bizarre images.  I thought of old science fiction comics I read when I was fifteen years younger.  Stories of such wild insignificance and unusually images washed my mind as I ate my blueberry bagel.  After breakfast my sister told me of a blossoming garden about a mile away.  The path to the garden was along the river.  It seemed like the perfect way to continue my day, so we walked with other foot travelers.  When we got to the garden, it was sadly closed and under reconstruction.  Somehow, not seeing the garden was better then seeing it.

I took a minute to sit and talk of epistemology—the philosophical study of knowledge.  I wondered if walking a path is the same as knowing the path.  The debate unveiled.  Walking the path was experiencing the path.  So does experiencing the path give knowledge of the path?  Or simply put, does experience of a thing grant knowledge of a thing????  I wrapped my mind in philosophical discussion, concocting examples of metaphysical and epistemic issues, while starting my walk home.  I reached no solution.  But some how not reaching a solution was better then reaching one.

What can I say?  Now I'm off to work and I couldn't be in a better mood.  I just wanted to share this peaceful morning with everyone.  It's rare for me not to feel satiric, angry, or alienated while I write.  Usually I write in dark moods of wild selfish expression.  Today, it was simply peaceful morning greatness.  Anyhow, take care everyone.     

The self has always been a philosophical point of interest to me.  I've written on it before, and I go back to it frequently.  I am tantalized by exploring the self as it pertains to personhood, identity, our biological selves, etc etc.  It's a subject that I've always pondered to appease my intellectual curiosity. 

For example, we tend to think of our "selves" in a linear time line.  We see pictures of our "selves" as children and say, "that's me".  Our mind connects stored eclectic impulses and connects the past to the present.  For example I can watch a movie, listen to a story, or see a picture, and biologically, I connect my present experiences with the past.  When all the connections are made a narrative is formed which I call my "self".  We define our "selves" as a sustaining entity.  The entity (de facto, the self) is granted temporal continuity by our habitual mind.  We can call it the continual self.

I always have found the continual self to be a troubling view.  Do we really sustain in time as one identity, or are we stuck in a state of constant reformation?  Has the "me" always been the same "me"?  I wonder these questions lately because I've found myself challenged in new ways.  I've found myself plunged into emotive states that I never new I had.  I've been feeling my way through my life and it has taken me to new places, new risks, new rewards, and new defeats.  I wonder now if I am the same "self" as I was before.  I do not wonder as a point of intellectual wonderment.  But rater have I changed in a pragmatic manner?  Am I new?  Have I been reborn? 

Can I write a story called Derek, and do I continual write this story?  Do I have the power to rewrite this story as I see fit?  It's funny, but as I grow emotively, I feel like I have less control.  I feel that I can not separate the "me" now and the "me" then.  If I could, would I be free or would I be a slave to my own narrative?  It reminds me of one of my favorite lines in one of my favorite songs:

"How fragile is the flame that burns within us all to light each passing day."

The line is about self-destruction, social isolation, and the struggle to find one's way in an empty world.  The "flame" to me is the self, and its dim light keeps me guessing…where do I go from here?         

Well, another holiday is rapidly approaching.  I am not speaking of presidents day (which is today in case you were unaware), Lincoln's birthday (I mean who really care's about the guys you invented the LS and the Navigator— that's car rental humor), or Ash Wednesday (believe it or not, some people still celebrate this one).  All of which are adequate and noble traditions.  I am speaking of Valentine's Day.  We all know where the tradition comes from.  It's the day that the gentle god Cupid shoots painless arrows into the hearts of men and women making them fall deeply in love.  It's a day that comes from a Christian saint who helped procure marriages when tyrannical kings outlawed marriage.  It's the day of heart shaped boxes stuffed with chocolates.  In short, you'll never know what you're gonna get, but its all about hearts and human connection.  Yes, the long tradition of mythological love and mystical power surrounds this great day. 

Or does it?

Now, you all know that I'm a very trusting guy when it comes to what the public accepts as true.  I also know, that you all know, that I love holidays and find them all to be very worth while.  However, I did look into this whole Valentine's Day thing a little.  Has anyone heard of the name Lupercalia?  It's the name of the ancient Roman holiday celebrated on Feb. 14^th.  The word Lupercalia is derived from the Latin word wolf, and is connected to the legendary wolf who breast fed Romulus and Remus (founders of the Roman civilization, born of Mars, raised by wolves, enslaved and rapped a tribe of women to breed Romans, all the typical stuff).  On Lupercalia, Roman noble men would run through the streets naked slapping any women caught in their path.  One would think most women would avoid such a thing— but not in ancient Rome.  Women would line up to get smacked buy an aristocrat. 

So, Valentine's Day, Valentine's Day, Valentine's Day….how do you frustrate me?   

When you guys are buying you're sweethearts their trinkets, chocolates, stuffed bears, meals in five star restaurants, and other commodities of love, don't forget Lupercalia.  I will not tell you how or why Lupercalia culturally transcended into Valentine's Day, for the tale is too terrible, too tragic, too troublesome to tell.  Just know that Feb. 14^th used to involve naked rich men slapping the shit out of women in public-- the tradition that turned into our hallmark holiday.

To all the ladies out there waiting to see if I will ask them to be my Valentine, I offer you this.  I will gladly run around naked and slap you, then and only then, will you be my Valentine.

Hope everyone has a real nice Valentine's Day.          

What? What's that quote, you know from the movie; Life is like a kick in the gut with a steel tipped toe boot.  Did I just say tipped toe?  What is life huh?  So one day my eyes blur into focus my brain starts to develop, I grow hair, learn words, learn how to spell, grow more hair in stranger places, keep growing hair here and therem in my ears, in my noise, on my chest, then I meet people, love some, hate some, lose some, win some, I drive, I smoke, I quit smoking, I play music, its a never ending eventual epitaph of stuff that some how is confined to me, Derek.  I don't know about this life thing any more.  It isn't really me.  I've been thinking and I've come up with a white washed under developed pseudo philosophy that isn't substantiated by anything other then me-- but its something.  So here it goes.  There is no external, only the internal.  I mean this in a metaphysical and epistemic sense.  I'm not saying that nothing exists externally, what I'm saying is that what does exist externally is dictated by the murky depths of our internal self.  Look, I could go on and on here and the more I write the better it sounds, so stop reading and think about it for a second.

Wow, so I'm sitting here thinking about what I just wrote and I completely convinced myself that I'm wrong.  So many things exist and happen without one's internal self dictating it.  Like meteorites, lighting bolts, and tsunamis.  There's a school of thought developed by Schopenhauer that says the physical world is a manifestation of will.  It's wrong.  Why would I will harmful or hurtful things upon myself or anyone else? 

I've been renting cars and some guy called me a fucked up cracker asshole because I wouldn't rent him a car. In a freeze packed, ready to go, hot to cold, cold to hot, eat on the go, hey how you doing you know how it is, hyper insulated, over stimulated kind of world, the only peace I get is when things go really badly.  People want to do well, and if I rent them a car and they are happy with it then I know I did well.  There's this little devilish part of me that gains bureaucratic satisfaction about turning a customer away.  However I would have much rather have all my customers qualify without conflict because I am not a fucked up cracker asshole that wants to ruin a strangers day.  For someone who claims to be so proud, I really can take a lot of shit.

This blog sucks, I'm sorry you're reading.

Happy birthday Maureen