Licking The Elbow

Did you know that it is impossible to lick your elbows?

(I am sitting here, affectionately chuckling as I imagine you trying to see if it is true.  I tried it too.)

Mouthwash

Did you know that ancient Romans used human urine as mouthwash.  They also used it to wash clothes.  Hmmm…gives a new feel to the the admonishment, “You need Scope!”

Anonymous

People are more likely to believe something if it comes from an anonymous source.

Anonymous

Reality

Reality…accept no substitute.

Marriage

Marriage will make us either bitter or better.  Although happiness, of the kind we imagine in romances, can be one of its important by-products, Marriage was designed to mature us through the constant working out of differences and life changes.  The promise that a white dress and a tuxedo bring to the altar is not happiness; it is maturity: growth into eldership.  The happiness that a life-long relationship brings is found in the hard won depth and intimacy that is current in a seasoned relationship; one in which we move beyond our own needs and demands.

Life is a dream…marriage is the alarm clock.  It challenges us to grow up; to embrace a kind of loving that doesn’t have anything to do with good feelings and emotions.  The kind of love that we learn to express in a life-long relationship has little to do with sentimentality – although it has its place; it has little to do with romance – although it is pleasurable when we experience it; it has little to do with being completed – although it may feel oceanic when it happens.  The alarm rings when the differences start; that is when the ‘real’ relationship starts.

When we are having differences – even passionate ones – we know that the relationship is working and that we will reap the prime benefit of marriage: intimacy: being open, vulnerable and responsive to another human being who wishes the same thing.  When these things occur – even when we are suffering within the relationship – we know that we are maturing.

A marriage breaks down and makes us bitter when we are not able to move beyond our own needs and demands for that which makes us happy.

In any event, here are some uncensored thoughts on the subject.  Leave your comments.  I am interested in a conversation with you all. 

The Abyssal Zone

Today I came across a news article about the absence of sharks from the abyssal regions of the worlds’ oceans.  As I read the report I found myself experiencing it as if it were a found poem. 

I began to read the words “shark, abyssal zone and lack of food” as metaphors and symbols that were evocative of Dante’s Inferno.  These words he saw inscribed in dark characters over the gateway to the infernal realm:

THROUGH ME THE WAY INTO THE WOEFUL CITY,

THROUGH ME THE WAY TO THE ETERNAL PAIN,

THROUGH ME THE WAY AMONG THE LOST PEOPLE.

JUSTICE MOVED MY MAKER ON HIGH,

DIVINE POWER MADE ME AND SUPREME WISDOM

            AND PRIMAL LOVE;

BEFORE ME NOTHING WAS CREATED BUT ETERNAL

            THINGS AND I ENDURE ETERNALLY.

ABANDON EVERY HOPE, YE THAT ENTER.

As a dream symbol, the abyssal zone seems like a place so foresaken that nothing which ventures there ever returns: swallowed, shredded, uncreated – the profane comfort of
Black Holes: “Abandon every hope, ye that enter.”   

I found the last paragraph particularly ominous – a foreshadowing of apocalypse.  As you read the broadcast allow yourself to drift into a realm of myth and spirit.  Read it as if you were reading a dream: What does it evoke in you?

ABERDEEN, Scotland, Feb. 22 (UPI) – An international team of scientists says the absence of sharks from abyssal regions of the world’s oceans may mean some species are in danger of extinction.

The findings mean the world’s oceans are about 70 percent shark-free, researchers said.

The oceans’ abyssal zone remains in perpetual darkness at depths below 6,560 feet, with immense pressures of nearly five tons per square inch at its deepest.

It had been hoped that, as man explored deeper into the abyss, new shark species would be discovered. Scientists do not know why sharks are absent from the deep, but suggest one possible reason might be a lack of food…

Quilpish?

In Galsworthy’s epic novel, “The Forsyte Saga”, the author uses the word ‘Quilpish’ three times in the beginning of the book.  It describes George Forsyte, one of the author's characters, but left me stumped as to what this strange new expression was illuminating. 

I reasoned, because of the suffix (“-ish”), that it meant “Quilp-like.”  And since the word was capitalized I imagined that it named a person.  If this were true, what kind of person was Quilp?  What was it about Forsyte's character that was so distinct, so unusual that it could only be described by a reference to another personage?  This word promised that if I understood Quilp I would understand Forsyte.

I accepted the challenge and looked in every available dictionary – including the Oxford – without success.  On the Internet I found only one promising hit: a reference to a heavy metal, punk band.  Hmmm…a group of Quilpish musicians whose video clip captured the essence of everything heavy, metal and punk.  This gave me the feel of ‘Quilpish’ but did not cinch it for me.  I wanted specific words lined up like a choir of ducks that quacked the definition clearly.  So I looked for the character himself – Quilp.

I found him on a site called The Victorian Web where his description clearly reflects what those musicians wanted us to know about them.  Daniel Quilp inhabits a twisted landscape in Charles Dickens’ “The Old Curiosity Shop”.  He is Little Nell’s ‘cruel, lecherous persecutor’ – ‘a monster of self-destruction.’  Quilp skulks from the shadows of a quote, deformed, perverse – his outward appearance the ambassador of a warped soul.

The child was closely followed by an elderly man of remarkably hard features and forbidding aspect, and so low in statute as to be quite a dwarf, though his head and face were large enough for the body of a giant. His black eyes were restless, sly, and cunning; his mouth and chin, bristly with the stubble of a course hard beard; and his complexion was one of that kind which never looks clean or wholesome.  But what added most to the grotesque expression of his face, was a ghastly smile, which, appearing to be the mere result of habit and to have no connexion with any mirthful or complacent feeling, constantly revealed the few discoloured fangs that were yet scattered in his mouth, and gave him the aspect of a panting dog.

Now I understand what Galsworthy wanted me to know about George Forsyte when "…even in his compassion George's Quilpish humour broke forth."