We Now Return ...

My thoughts: I couldn't get Simon Horne's accent or his dry and dessicated tone just right; the 'Swamp Ape' seems a little tall and his tenrils not kinetic enough; but Henry Harris Byrd is just right.

Diary 2010: July Starts To Crank Up

7/1/2021: First day of July. Up at 5:30 AM. Prayers and Bible. Cartoons. Made an order to HEB. Called in some stuff for the pharmacy there. Saw Kelsey and Ryan about 3 PM; gave Kelsey $50 as a welcoming present to buy themselves supper. Made chili, corn, noodles. E-mailed John with a gentle hint about my appointment with Dan on the 6^th.

 

7/2/2021: Up about 5:30 AM after a restless night. Prayers and Bible. The cartoons today were all related to the Fourth of July in some way, including the old Porky learns the Pledge of Allegiance. Must stay till the groceries get delivered then get to HEB for my glucometer stuff. Somehow. Bus? As it turned out, my shopper was way late with the groceries, and it was very hot by then. (I was not well pleased with sitting on the bench, which was still wet after two days). I called Kelsey and she came and got me and we went to the pharmacy. I bought us some Whataburger afterward (a grilled chicken salad for me and a mushroom burger for her) and I sampled a peaches and cream milkshake.  Didn’t have to make supper as everyone was going to Freedom Fiesta food trucks in the park, including S&A&Co, J&A&Co., and Kelsey. But I made myself turkey soup with celery and onions. They came back about 9:30 PM and went swimming and John and I visited and yakked about our various aches and pains and philosophy and life. John gave me some tips about people he listened to on YouTube. Everybody left about 11:45 PM. I played DQ8 a while and then to bed.

 

7/3/2021: Grampa Alfred’s memorial service today (I’m not going but thought I should mention it). Up at 6 AM and started watching cartoons. Washed dishes, showered, dressed. Prayers, Bible. Not much doing as the family went to the parade and fireworks in the evening.

 

7/4/2021: The actual Independence Day. I think, but am not sure, the Shanafelts went to the Shanafelt get-together. Despite my fears of predicted thunderstorms and initial reluctance, I went to church and made it home without any mishaps; in fact, it scarcely dripped all day. In the evening I watched “1776” and the new Rick and Morty, which seems to address the dilemma of saving the environment vs. serving the needs of humanity. To bed without seeing or hearing from any of the family. Some desultory fireworks in the evening, but the city display was yesterday. Despite sticking to my diet, my numbers were in the 200s.

 

7/5/2021: Up at 6 AM. Cartoons (today’s batch were Warner’s made in the Eighties, so not good). So, prayers and Bible. No laundry today as it is a holiday and S&A are doing all their Sunday stuff today. Had eggs for breakfast; BS still in the 200’s. Washed dishes, made bed, and finally went through that pile of mail in the pencil drawer. Found a check for about $30! Straightened up the rest of the drawer. It’s now 11 AM, and I’ve arranged for Andy to take me to FamMedCen tomorrow (he’s doing a little mowing). The three cardinal eggs in the nest on the potted plant on the kitchen porch have hatched. It rained off and on afterwards through the day. Didn’t have to make supper but went in at 6:30 PM to boil eggs and make egg salad. Ordered stuff from HEB Pharmacy. Listened to Shippey on Tolkien and Beowulf. Got an e-mail from Kris Jerome saying he wasn’t going to publish me anymore because of his own limitations, and he wants to send me the files.

 

7/6/2021: Well. I got up at 6 AM and was halfways dressed at 7 AM when I thought to check my appointment card and found I wasn’t due till the 9^th! That pulled the rug out from under me especially as I didn’t sleep well last night in anticipation. Slumped down and just slept till almost 1 PM, when I went out and did a load of clothes and made cucumber salad. Rainy on and off. Rest of the day as usual, except I started reading Tolkien’s Beowulf again.

 

7/7/2021: Up at 6 AM, got ready, and caught the bus at 7 AM. Went to HEB, did a little shopping (folders, Underwood Deviled Liverwurst, paper towels, a stiff spatula), then at 8 AM got my pharmacy stuff, including insulin. Caught bus and back home a little after 9 AM. At 10 AM went out and waited for grocery delivery which I then brought in. Turned the AC on only at 1 PM, as it had been a very moderate morning. Went in at 3:30 PM and started supper (the displaced sausage and cabbage usually had on Tuesday). Wrote a respectful and grateful e-mail back to Kris Jerome. Now it’s 7:20 and I’m making one of my big burger patties for supper.

Notes

"Nothing puzzles me more than time and space; and yet nothing troubles me less, as I never think about them." - Charles Lamb. Wish I could be as care-free as old Charlie, but I'm always unclear about what happened when and I do think about it. Many things that happened five years ago seem to have happened 'just now,' at most three years ago; most things are 'just a while ago.'

HELEN: Is that the time?

MIKE: No, time is an abstract concept. This is a wristwatch. 

- The Young Ones.

Ubi sunt and Carpe diem and all that rot, kiddies.

Well, That Was a Thing

As an experiment, I ran the last blogpost through ChatGPT, chose a meter and rhyme scheme, and asked the AI to turn it into a poem. Here is the result.

Being Self-Ish

Within myself there dwell seven different men,
Who take the reins by turns and call me "I."
The sages gave such riders names divine;
I only know they seldom pass me by.

The first is Boredom, heavy-limbed and still.
He bids me linger where no labor lies,
To waste the golden hours in vacant thought,
And watch dead embers with unseeing eyes.

He asks no feast of triumph or delight,
No noble quest to stir the heart or hand;
To drift, to yawn, to idle through the day—
That is the kingdom where he loves to stand.

The Earthy follows, sturdier by far.
He keeps one foot upon the solid sod.
He dreams of suppers, budgets, roofs, and tools,
Content with things beneath the vault of God.

He prizes clean-swept floors and mended gates,
Good barbecue—or hot dogs, if they must—
The body's needs, the household's daily cares,
The honest claims of appetite and dust.

Above him stands the Family in me,
Who longs to shelter all within his reach;
He cannot heal the world's enormous wounds,
Yet serves with needle, skillet, word, and speech.

He seeks no glory in his little works,
But only that his loved ones safely thrive;
A peaceful home is victory enough,
Where thankful hearts and humble joys survive.

Then Nerdy comes with lifted brow and grin,
Defender of each truth he counts as dear.
He tilts at error like a knight of old,
Though knowing well his blind spots still are near.

His pride is checked by many a foolish slip,
Yet still he'll plant his banner where he's sure;
He loves an argument for truth itself,
A hopeless cause can make him more secure.

Behind thick walls another captive waits,
The Bawdy, laughing, restless, horned one.
I thought the stones had made a prison strong—
Perhaps instead they built a bastion.

For now and then he sallies from the gate
To raid the quiet provinces within;
He plants strange gardens where I least expect,
And mocks the watchmen with a knowing grin.

Then rises Piety with folded hands,
Who fears to wound the grace he longs to keep;
He hastens toward the altar and the cross,
Yet trusts God's mercy deeper than the deep.

He knows beloved sins are still but sins,
However warmly they may plead their cause;
He prays for all he loves with steadfast hope,
And rests beneath his Father's wiser laws.

Last comes the Maker, whom I love the best,
Who gathers every other self as one;
He takes their wheat and chaff into his mill,
Then laughs to see what unexpected's done.

He asks no fame, nor riches, nor applause,
But loses self within the work's delight.
When he steps down, I marvel at the thing
That somehow came from darkness into light.

It still needs polishing; the Nerd agrees.
The flaws remain for later hands to mend.
Yet every honest work that comes to birth
Feels like a gift no labor could pretend.

Perhaps when all the clamor has grown still,
And every lesser ruler yields his claim,

The Maker bears me nearest to the One

Whose image first imagined whence I came.

I think it came out pretty good. It sounds like me, like something I would write. In fact I did produce the content; the program patted it into form.What status do such twi-formed, amphibious works have? Can I really claim it as mine?

Being Self-Ish

"Whuddya Gonna Do?"

Reverting to the subject of my self (which I’m sure everyone finds endlessly fascinating) I’ve identified seven major aspects or avatars. They seem quite distinct to me, though there is some overlap and interaction between them. The ancient Greeks might say they were the gods riding me; the Medievalist the vices and virtues contending for my soul. Modern psychology (or what passed for it thirty years ago) might say they weren’t yet individuated parts of my psyche; ordinary people that they’re just moods I go through. Whatever they are, let me introduce them to you. I present them fancifully clothed as what I like to call the ‘Internal Me,’ since they are concepts, and to show a Me in real life is just too sad.

I’d like to start with a very basic character, the Bored Me. He doesn’t want to move, just vegetate and ruminate. Sloth might be my besetting sin. It is a mood that, as C. S. Lewis said, “You [a devil] no longer need a good book, which he really likes, to keep him from his prayers or his work or his sleep … You can make him waste his time … You can make him do nothing at all for long periods. You can keep him up late at night, not roistering, but staring at a dead fire in a cold room.”

Next on the rung, only slightly better, is what I call the Earthy Me. He’s physical more than metaphysical. If he can’t get barbecue he’ll settle for hot dogs and enjoy them. He dreams about great meals he’s had and plots about the possibilities of great meals to come. He’s not simply food-centered, though; he’s concerned with keeping the house clean, staying on budget, and to a certain extent, health. Mechanical, worldly things are his province.

Up quite a few rungs is Family Me. He’s concerned with the welfare of the family, and to a certain degree the world. He wants everyone to prosper, to be safe, to get through life smoothly and happily. He does not have much power to do this, especially now-a-days, but what he can do he will do, be it cooking a meal or sewing up a tear in a shirt. He is mainly altruistic, but not without a certain element of “Happy Family, Happy Life.”

Then there’s Nerdy Me, the smarty-pants. He would be in danger of the sin of Pride if his own inadequacies and blind spots weren’t a constant check on his assertions. But he can be quite stubborn about what he’s sure is true and is always ready to champion his affections and enthusiasms. Not from any personal stake in the matter but as a Quixotic, almost romantic attachment to what he sees as true.

There’s a Me I’ll call euphemistically the Bawdy Me. Whenever he sticks his horns out, he tends to shock even people who know me well. I like to think I keep him quarantined behind a stone wall, but lately I’m wondering if it’s not so much a prison as a stronghold from which he sallies forth periodically to take prizes and bedevil the other Me’s. He’s growing a strange garden behind that wall.

Of course, the Bawdy Me is of concern to the Pious Me. In some ways the Pious Me is a great worrier: worried about getting to church, going to confession, receiving the Eucharist worthily. On the other hand, he has great peace of mind as long as he tries to improve and not get complacent. He believes that God has the power to save and prays constantly for the family. He does not believe his favorite sins are okay just because he likes them.

Last, we have perhaps the one I like best, the Creative Me. When the Creative Me is in charge, the self seems to go beyond time, indeed forgets itself in the act of making. He seems to participate in all my selves, or at least their better parts, if only to use them as grist for his mill. When he’s at his best he’s not thinking about wealth or fame but only feeling sheer delight in the act. When he steps down out of the driver’s seat, I (the Me that is basically the seat) am usually left to marvel at an artifact that didn’t exist before. Oh, it may need work (that’s for Nerdy Me) but it seems a minor miracle. Perhaps when I’m Creative Me I come closest to my Creator, to Eternity. 

The Esteemed Directors of the Department of Extranatural Affairs

Samuel Ballantine Frobisher 1733 – 1838 (aged 105; started 1788)

Joshua Phineas Williams 1786 – 1888 (aged 101)

Benjamin Franklin Creed 1860 - 1952 (aged 92)

Tyrone Lovett 1909 – 1999 (aged 90)

Henry Harris Byrd 1969 – Present Day (57 in 2026)

Frobisher appears in multiple tales at various times of his life; Williams is shown from the event of The Tzaddick Who Could Walk Through Walls; Creed from The Past is a Different Country; Lovett from Lovett's Last Case; and Byrd from There is a Season. Stories posted here on NOT. You can assume that after Frobisher established the Department, each Director assumed office soon after the death of his predecessor.

Getting Closer

Illustrated Edition

Samuel and Samantha meet their Aunt Jocasta (from the story of the same name on this blog).

The 'Swamp Ape,' from Daisy Bellamy's story And Then There Was the Time (ditto).

And from Ortha and the land of Forlan, the Harvest Pilgim, a fantastic figure of fun who appears at the Autumn Festival, a sort of in-world combo of Santa Claus and Trick-or-Treats.