Missoula Transitions

Here's a few shot I've taken the last week or so around Missoula. Fall is such an active time. Weather constantly changes, shadows dramatically lengthen, trees change clothing colors than shed their clothes (you'd think they want to keep some clothes for the cold) and animals move towards winter habitats, whether a dirt bedroom or our next door neighbors in the hills. All prepare for the long, stagnant, cold that lies ahead. Get out the synthetics and the ice scraper. Switch from sandwiches to soup....

I personally don't care for fall. I can appreciate it but I don't care for it. The body needs to adjust to the light and cooling temperatures. I have an urge to eat and sleep constantly. Fall is a tease, a flirt, of the white giddiness soon to layer the land. Freshies. "Put out, already!" every bone screams. "Quite givin' me that pillow talk."

Transition times, like fall, are always hard. You never know what to expect and you're always saying goodbye to something. Some people don't like winter. It's long, dark and cold. But at least you know what to expect and it stays the same - long, cold and dark. I guess this is why I snowboard and tele. I have to do something to pass the time; otherwise, I would drink too much coffee and beer, smoke to many cigarettes, and sleep with all the wrong women. But the routine is set. Get up in the dark, put on the poly then the clothes, make some coffee and oatmeal, read the paper, take the dog for a quick, cold bike ride, and watch the sky get lighter as I head to where ever I'm going for the day...

Violence in Missoula, Violence in My Life

Two more men were beaten up on the streets of Missoula last weekend. That same night a friend had her purse stolen, after a rock was thrown through her car window. My friend Marcus is saddened by his friend lying in the hospital. My friend with the smashed window and stolen purse (who is handling it better than I would) must reassemble the life's contents that a purse contains. Both acts were violent and disruptive, but only one sent people to the hospital. This is the crime I will address.

I have so many reactions to violence and they are confusing each other. I want to deal out some justice Wild West style. I am nervous when walking the streets of the city I love and respect. I am pissed that I am scared my property or health might be stolen. I want to lash out. Go huntin' and kick some inbred ignorant asses. I know violence doesn't solve anything. It just generates more violence. I know TV commercials, speeches and essays, like this one, only preach to the choir because people who commit violent acts will only learn when they are incarcerated. But, even then, rehabilitation and education hardly ever work. It's frustrating, scary, emasculating and enraging. Hence the confusion.

So, what to do about violence? Marcus wants to educate and hold a benefit art sale. I applaud this. I'm going to help with this. We both despise violence. I appreciate his advanced evolutionary approach. I am trying to stay on his level because he and I share a similar background. But, I will continue to stay in shape. I will continue to imagine how I will mutilate a person if they ever threaten me or my friends and family with violence. More confusion.

Mutilate. Yes, that's what I said. This is where Marcus and I differ. It's a very strong word. It comes from fear and hate and powerlessness and red, blinding, self-hating RAGE. I will never hurt someone, physically or emotionally, on purpose, but I will defend myself with a force I may not be able to control. I will want to teach them a lesson. This scares the hell out of me. I am a big, self-hating, red head, itchin' to teach someone a lesson because as a child I lacked the power to defend myself...

I grew up in a suffocating, black and green world of violence and powerlessness. I drink, smoke cigarettes and I think about suicide everyday because I've refused to turn that powerlessness, hate and violence out into the world. So I turn it inside where it has created this big giant black hole. It's not just the void. It's a massive black hole and it eats at me everyday, threatening to consume a life that never felt like mine in the first place. This is the other extreme of violence. I don't want to live in a world of violence, internal or external, anymore. I am scared and confused by all of this.

I'm probably not much different from those thugs who beat up those two men. I just deal with it differently. But, like I said: confusion. Why do they turn their hate out and I turn mine in? Why does Marcus want to take the peaceful route and I want to go redneck huntin', even though I know it won't solve anything? Why do those assholes have to corrupt peace lovin', liberal minded, over-educated and under-paid Missoula with that shit? I want peace, but I also want to feel their cheekbones collapse under my knuckles.

It's very confusing. I don't want to live in a world of violence and hate anymore.

Smell Winter (Haiku)

by
DeTrav

Lightly abandoned
Landscape smells rich emptyness -
Ridge runs to flake fog

Sack of Mashed Potatoes

By
De Trav

Breath and blood roar
At the same level and beat.
Toes feel the rotten(!) rock
Fingertips burn small ledges.
Veins in throbbing forearms
Pulse and expand
As agonizing fatigue seeps.

Pumped.

I look up.
Two moves to heaven
Blocked by polished marble
And flaming arches.

I look down.
My last piece of mind taunting
From 15 feet under
As rope slaps blank wall
And wind curls around chalk bag.

On the back of lids
I see the sandy, slopey hold.
I see the slow delicate move.
Here comes Elvis.

Heaven it is.

Sliding breath echoes and shivers in helmet.
Blood river sings from shadowy canyon.
Matching hands reach up
And palm sandy rock.
Gear quietly clinks.
Tip of shoe finds balance on a grain.
Sparks through toes and fingers…
I slowly stand up and…

OH NO

Body tilts sideways
Old holds flash past
I hear my sack of mashed potatoes
HIT

White speckles on darkening gray
Silently, then
Every nerve SCREAMS bright red.

Our Great Country

...Driving across our great country.
No border checks, and the freedom
to think about...

...whatever I want.

Essay on Katrina

Wow. I just went to the "Operation Eden" blog. Amazing pics on this blog. Very personal. I'm sitting here listening to NPR talk about the fiscal impact Katrina will have on our national economy. Now they're talking about oil refineries in the gulf. It takes oil and money to run this country that's understandable but... it just doesn't feel right. The contrast of this man's personal struggle to comprehend this major trauma and these talking heads blabbing about money and oil. It seems to me government and media have forgotten why there is a country in the first place. People make a country. Without people, money wouldn't exist and the oil would continue to hide in the caverns of earth.

So where does a person draw the line between the people and it's oil and money? It's hard to separate the people from money and oil. After all, we have to work to pay the bills and drive our cars. And if you don't work, drive a car and pay your bills you're looked down upon as a bum, mooch, crazy - a half person. I'm not exempt. I smell the bum on the street and pity the half person he has become. But I also wonder how he lost that other half. What could happen to a person to tear them in half? A hurricane? War? Bad genes? A corrupt and cold society? A bad attitude? Addiction? Divorce?...

How many of us now unconsciously look at these hurricane victims as half people because they don't have a home or a job? What kind of flawed society teaches us to view people, our fellow humans, in this way? This is why all this talk of money and oil bothers me a little. Because we're working so hard to make these people whole again by giving them money and oil. But we're not made of money and oil. We're made of water, emotions, bones, thoughts, blood, creativity, memories, values....

You've got to wonder if there isn't a sickness in a society created by humans that tries to fix people with parts that don't fit. How did such a wonderful, exotic and complicated thing (society, culture) created by wonderful, inventive and extraordinary creatures become so sick and perverted that it tries to fix people with the wrong parts? It's like tying to fix a car with tree branches.