When I am gone, don’t say I died.
Say I changed.
Say: At last, the butterfly has left its cocoon.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Believing In Santa
When I first told my children about Santa Claus, of course I knew there was no actual human being I was talking about. But I told my children he was real and would reward them for being good.I didn’t care how they envisioned Santa, for there are so many variations of his image, all so innocent in spirit, lighthearted and loving. It didn’t matter. I didn’t care how they imagined he spent his time at the North Pole with Mrs. Claus, the elves and reindeer. It didn’t matter.
We all understood that Santa was real in a different way than our friends and neighbors were real. He was real in spirit, and so we could imagine all sorts of things about Santa and even read conflicting ideas about his life and accept them all without difficulty. After all, nobody really knew for sure.
The specific details of Santa’s existence were not important. It was the underlying truth, that there are larger reasons for good behavior, reasons that could last for a year or even longer. Santa was a power for goodness in the world who would bless you for your honest heart and punish those who were cruel and deceptive.
As a grownup, I replaced the idea of Santa with knowledge. I knew that honesty, no matter how unrecognized it may be among friends and family, fills your life with joy, the kind of joy that is free from shame and guilt. I also knew that those who are dishonest and mean, no matter how long their actions may go undetected, are immediately punished for their sins because of who they become. They have lost the heart of an innocent child.
Heaven and hell are here, and those who are evil live in a hell of their own making, the hell of their own existence, no matter how long they avoid punishment from others.
In this dangerous and unpredictable world there are so many good people who are so unjustly punished by life, by disease, natural disaster, political oppression or just everyday happenstance. Earth is a place where all things are possible, both good and bad. It has something to do with free will. But if we struggle against adversity with an honest heart, we will find higher ground.
So my children grew up believing in Santa, even though they did not keep him firmly in mind throughout the year. But they grew up believing that striving to be honest and good was the right way to live. And even though some of the children they knew did not believe in Santa, they did not fight with them. Some believed, some didn’t. It didn’t matter.
Most of the children who believed in Santa needed no proof. They accepted Santa as a matter of faith, buttressed by the occasional Christmas morning miracle of the missing cookies and nearly empty glass of milk. When my children began to seriously question the existence of Santa, I took them to an old stone church and we sat in a beautiful, vine-encrusted alcove and I explained that Santa was more than just one single person.
I told them Santa was the spirit of giving that lives in all of us who find joy in bringing happiness to others. I told them every department store Santa who gave joy to little children was filled with the spirit of Santa. I told them every parent who wrapped up a special gift with a card that said, “Love to you, from Santa!” was inspired by the spirit of Santa. I told them Santa was more magic than they imagined, that instead of being just one person, Santa was the spirit of kindness and love that filled the hearts of millions, especially at Christmas, and that we should keep his spirit alive every day of the year.
I told them that as we grow up, many of us replace the idea of Santa with the idea of God.
I told them the best parts of all religions were filled with this spirit, and that this is what so many people mean by the word God, that God is a force for honesty, kindness and love in the world. I told them it does not matter how we picture God or how we define God. As long as we fill our hearts with love and charity, then we are doing the work of God here on Earth.
I told them words and pictures are what we use to help us understand the spirit of Santa, the spirit of God, but the words and pictures are not what’s important. It is the meaning behind the words and pictures, the inspiration that fills each heart.
We are all imperfect, we all make mistakes and we all have times in our lives when we are so certain about things that we become blind to our errors. To fight each other over ideas about God is like trying to prove whose idea of Santa is the real idea. To fight each other over ideas of God is to be so certain that we have become blind to our own imperfection and capacity for error.
I told them some people forget that these stories are about meanings, not details. They are intended to open our hearts and help direct the course of our lives. It’s the message that's important, and what it says to each of us.
I told them to respect the religions of all cultures, that whatever ideas of God people believe in, if these ideas open their hearts and lead them toward honesty, compassion and love, then they are on the right path – all of them.
The details are not what’s important. We all speak different languages and have different ways of describing and understanding things. It’s the essence from which all explanations come that is important. That’s what faith is for, to keep the connection strong between ourselves and God because words are not enough.
We all have to start somewhere. Some of us start with Santa. The important thing is to realize that spiritual growth is like any other kind of growth – it requires change. The lessons we learn as children are for children. The lessons we learn at the beginning of our spiritual journeys are for beginnings. To grow a larger soul, we must not get stuck. We must not stop. We must keep going.
When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
1 Corinthians 13:11
~ by Russ Allison Loar
~ Photo by Russ Allison Loar: Christopher & Joshua Loar with Santa
© All Rights Reserved
After I Died I Saw My Dog
The first thing I saw after I died was my dog Nova, wagging her tail madly and wriggling like a salamander with delight.
She was my only dog, a border collie and Australian shepherd mix given to my family when I was twelve years old. There were two puppies, Nova and Scotia.
We got Nova.
The dog donors were people of wealth and standing in the community and so my parents felt they could not refuse, accepting the gift with feigned appreciation.
About a year earlier my parents' English bulldog died. He was a snorting bowlegged drooler named Charlie. He did not enjoy going for walks or companionship of any kind. Charlie was an ornamental dog. Eating, scratching, snoring and rubbing his genitals on the back of an old black cat too feeble to escape his advances—that was Charlie’s life.
I essentially grew up a dogless boy until Nova came into my life. She was my dog by default due to a lack of enthusiasm on the part of my late middle-age parents whose hobbies were dining out, ice cream and television. My older sister was too busy with the demands of high school society to spend time with a dog. But I was in dire need of canine companionship. I was an indifferent student on the low end of the popularity totem pole in a snooty private school that was a freeway away from my neighborhood. My only friends were our three family cats, and they could take me or leave me.
Nova and I were boy-dog, dog-boy soulmates. We were constant companions; the Lewis and Clark of our neighborhood. By summer Nova had grown and loved to run. We were creatures of the summer, awakened early by the excitement of eternal youth. We would never grow old and the day would never end. I see us still, taking the long hike to the foothills, running through unsubdivided fields, collapsing under a shady tree, finding secret places. We will be there forever.
Nova was smart. I taught her dozens of tricks. I'd place a cracker on her nose and she would hold perfectly still until I said, “OK!”, then she’d toss the morsel into the air, catch it and eat it. Each trick she learned reinforced the fact that we could communicate directly with each other. We knew how to say all the things that dogs and boys need to say to one another. We were sincere, and our sincerity was a river of love that flowed between us, through us.
The years went by and I moved away from home, no longer a boy. Nova was always overjoyed to see me when I returned for a visit and she never forgot any of her tricks, always so proud to perform them. One day, I returned home to take her on a last car ride, to the veterinarian. She was dying and my parents decided they could no longer take care of her. When I led her into the veterinarian’s office she was nervous and shaking as I had never seen her shake before. She knew, somehow. I never forgave myself for not being with her when the assistant led her away for that fatal injection.
~ ~ ~
"Welcome to heaven,” Nova said, extraordinarily delighted to see me, yet still remembering her manners and restraining the impulse to jump on me. I’d been in the hospital, fifty-seven years old, with a bleeding ulcer, my skin turned too, too white. After days of weakness and decline I awoke in a place between life and death. I heard a dog barking. I saw her. I crossed over.
~ Text and photograph by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
# 213:
There’s no one quite as stupid
as an ignorant man who thinks he’s smart.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
as an ignorant man who thinks he’s smart.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Lost In The Desert
I was in Egypt when I was 15, but it took many years for me to realize where I'd been and what I'd really seen.
~ by Russ Allison Loar (far left, on camel)
© All Rights Reserved
# 137:
Perhaps the innate joyful nature of children has something to do with reincarnation. Perhaps it’s a joy that comes from some unspoken, inner realization that one has survived death and come back again.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Blackmail
To You Whom It May Concern,
I am in possession of certain facts and sensitive material that have no relevance to you in any way.
Unless you deliver $1 million in unmarked coins to my home within 48 hours, I will be forced to release this irrelevant material to the newspapers, which, in all likelihood, will not publish it.
This is your next-to-last warning!
Ima Moron
54321 Blastoff Avenue,
Zoloft, CA 98765-4321
P.S. Do not give my address to the police.
~ by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
# 214:
Sometimes, a nation, like a person,
must make mistakes in order to learn
and move forward.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
must make mistakes in order to learn
and move forward.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Heh, Heh, Heh
L aura was breathing harder now, her head resting against George’s shoulder as they sat in his pickup truck at the drive-in movie. It was a long movie and she had been up since the crack of dawn. She was asleep.
"Looks like you managed to cut off our only escape route,” Princess Leia tongue-lashed the handsomely handsome Han Solo.
“Maybe you’d like it back in your cell, your highness!” Han rhetoricated mockingly.
“Aaugh!” Laura screamed, awakening to the sound of laser fire pontooning from the small metal speaker box hooked on the passenger side window.
“Laura, what’s wrong?”
“Oh George, I just had the most frightening dream of my life. I dreamed you were president and I was First Lady and a band of bearded evildoers blew up New York City!”
“Heh, heh, heh,” George spontaneously chuckled, draining his fourth Budweiser. “Heh, heh, heh. That’ll be the day.”
~ Story & photo morph by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Donald Flintstone Elected President Again
You can agree or disagree with Donald Trump, but he clearly represents a vision of the past, a vision of a homogeneous culture in which the implanted beliefs of white, Christian males supersede all others. It is a vision without a foundation in the actual country in which we live.
O yes, the Earth is flat and no longer revolves around the sun.
O yes, we shall march in lockstep back to the Dark Ages, where the wildest conspiracy fictions and contrived pseudosciences rule our lives. And we shall imprison all traitors who do not comply.
O yes, ideologies shift and change, but that is of no matter. Compliance is what we seek.
O my country. O my people. What have you done?
Ways We Lie
"This is not about sex!"
~ by Russ Allison Loar
~ Illustration: Danmark Lovers ~ 1872
© All Rights Reserved
# 135:
When the seeming hopelessness of reality
darkens your spirit, employ faith
as an instrument of imagination.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
darkens your spirit, employ faith
as an instrument of imagination.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Holding On
What can we hold onto?
When everything changes,
When everything passes,
When the years recreate who we are,
Sometimes lifting us,
Sometimes tearing us apart.
O love,
The clichéd word so easily pronounced,
The greeting card verse
Spoken without feeling,
O love,
If kept alive and breathing . . .
There is so much to love in this world.
Even when you are old and confined
You can love a memory.
Even when memories fall away
You can love an idea.
Even when cognition falters,
When fear invades,
When the dark idea of godless death threatens,
Believe!
Hold onto love,
However untranslatable it may seem.
Love will persist.
You will be saved.
~ by Russ Allison Loar
~ Photo by Sharon Pruitt ~ Pink Sherbet Photography
© All Rights Reserved
In A Perfect World
I n a perfect world
there would be no need for emulsification.
~ by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Youth Has An Expiration Date
It is somewhat amusing to older folks to hear pop song lyrics and see pop song videos in which handsome young men worship at the altar of beautiful young women. Oh those words of eternal passion, pledged by the young. How quickly terms and conditions come into play as familiarity grows, as obligations mount, as the marriage ties that bind, bind.
And what of the aging process, that chronological decay of flesh that robs us all of youth’s bounty? Can you visualize a wrinkled old man and woman in a pop song video, singing:
Almost paradise
We're knockin' on heaven's door
Almost paradise
How could we ask for more?
I swear that I can see forever in your eyes
Paradise*
 |
| Herman, Marjorie & Bess Allison ~ Redondo Beach, California 1917 |
No, me either. Youth passes, passion passes and we move on. Yet I remember spending the night at my grandparents’ house many years ago when they were in their seventies. I woke up early the next morning and peeked into their bedroom to see if they were still sleeping. I just happened to see them waking up. My old, wrinkled grandfather gave my old, wrinkled grandmother a kiss and said “Good morning.”
Almost paradise.
*From the song “Almost Paradise” written by Eric Carmen and Dean Pitchford
~ by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Leaving Home
It's not the holding of his hand,
but the pulling of his arm that makes a boy leave home.
~ Words and photograph by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
# 223:
First, it’s what you say.
Then, it’s what you do.
That’s Love.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Then, it’s what you do.
That’s Love.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Brush Your Teeth!
Brush your teeth
Good and well
Cause if you don’t
You’ll burn in hell.
~ by Russ Allison Loar
~ Photo by Cathy Keifer
© All Rights Reserved
# 128:
You’ve got to keep a vigilant awareness
of your own ignorance to keep learning.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
of your own ignorance to keep learning.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
My Cat
O the quiet life of my cat,
The empty bliss of this is that.
~ Words and photograph by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
# 219:
There are only so many years
between ignorant youngster and senile senior.
Make the most of them while you've got 'em.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
between ignorant youngster and senile senior.
Make the most of them while you've got 'em.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
A Worried Man
He was such a worried man,
so sure something was about to go wrong. Every time the clock struck the hour, he counted the strikes, fearing the clock would make a mistake.
~ Text and photo by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
The Universal Question
You have to make an effort to not do something, much less not do anything. Perhaps more properly “not doing” should be called “pre-doing.” This suggests a possible answer to the universal question: “What is the universal question?” The answer, of course, is the question.
Knock knock.
Who’s there?
Everyone and everything.
Everyone and everything who?
Yes!
Knock knock.
Who’s there?
Everyone and everything.
Everyone and everything who?
Yes!
So before the universe there was nothing. So what came before nothing? Once again we are faced with the contradictions of logic, which suggest the answer: Nothing. Perhaps then “nothing” should be called “pre-something.” Whatever created the universe, aka, something, was, I suppose, not in existence during the time of “pre-something.” So, once again we return to the question: “Where did the universe (something) come from?” Some quantum physicists may tell you that coming and going, that time itself may only exist in certain selective states. This may be true, for I was in Utah once. Nevertheless, if you find yourself in the company of a quantum physicist, whatever you do, don’t ask what time it is!
Now what I want to know is, what came before nothing, aka pre-something. (I cannot discard my sense of linear time, my sense of here and there, of before and after.) If something indeed came before nothing, then did that which created the something before “pre-something” make a conscious decision to eventually extinguish something and start over again? (There is Biblical precedent for this.) So doing extinguishes not-doing in order to not do nothing?
{Blues riff into with harmonica}
I ain’t gonna do
What I’m not gonna do
Cuz I’m already do-ing
It.
~ Writing and Artwork by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
# 208:
When someone gives you advice,
ask yourself what they want from you.
It’s almost always something.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
ask yourself what they want from you.
It’s almost always something.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Enchanted Princess
She is glowing
And her light penetrates me,
Fills me with unexplainable joy.
She dances playfully around my soul
And I am awakened,
Enchanted.
All is love beyond love.
She has placed a diamond in my heart.
I do not understand the blind
Who cannot see her,
Who see only another pretty girl,
An object to possess,
To label and put into some convenient category.
It weighs on her fragile heart
That anyone should expect her to live
An ordinary life,
This enchanted princess,
Surrounded by so much that is ordinary,
This enchanted princess,
So ready for the magic to begin.
~ by Russ Allison Loar
~ Artwork by Cy Brinson
© All Rights Reserved
Filling
When at last the lover leaves intensive care,
All is a fragile balance on the edge of relapse.
One must re-learn the enjoyment of simple things:
The bitter spark from a cup of coffee,
The sweetness of sugar on the tip of the tongue,
The penetrating warmth of the sun
Shimmering through the crisp afternoon breeze,
The pleasure of another hour,
Another day,
Filling, filling, filling
That dark and dangerous place
Where love was.
~ by Russ Allison Loar
~ Artwork by Maxine (aka: Maxxximpact)
© All Rights Reserved
Koan
Those who believe in God, abandon God.
~ by Russ Allison Loar
~ Sistine Chapel fresco by Michelangelo
© All Rights Reserved
# 185:
In this information age, true understanding
requires us to go beyond generalization
and examine what is specific.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
requires us to go beyond generalization
and examine what is specific.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Despair
"Don’t do it!” I implored as the old lizard who had lost most of his tail stared wistfully into the frothy, swirling waters of the Jacuzzi.
~ by Russ Allison Loar
~ Lizard painting by Robert Lennon
© All Rights Reserved
Tuesday
I found a piece of paper in a parking lot.
It had been run over numerous times, torn and trampled, faded by the sun and still damp from a light morning mist.
Because I was not in a hurry; because I was not wearing earbuds and distracted by music; because I was not staring at a cell phone screen; because I was not talking to anyone; because everything has design, color, shape and texture, I picked up the square piece of paper.
It had been some kind of glossy, card-stock advertisement for a nightclub, probably stuck under the windshield wiper of a parked car long ago.
Looking closer, I saw the face of my lost love, a strand of her curly long auburn hair falling across her bare thin shoulder and finely sculpted collar bone.
She was smiling and looking skyward, as if she could see all the way to heaven.
That was Tuesday.
~ by Russ Allison Loar
~ Artwork by a parking lot
© All Rights Reserved
You Are Here
You are here.
I am writing this for you to read. How do you like it so far? Not too interesting, eh? Well, you see, there’s a very important theory behind this rather unorthodox way of beginning a . . . of beginning a . . . of beginning this. You see, blah blah, blah and et cetera ad infinitum. (Imagine a long-winded, deeply serious lecture, punctuated with those very special words that immediately give you the impression the speaker is indeed much more learned, articulate and insightful than you, humble reader, could ever be.)
Anyway, the word I was looking for was mimetic—an all-time favorite with those who would rather discuss reading than read—but I’ve got the wrong book. Please excuse me for another moment because I must take this book back to the attic, for in browsing through its index, I stumbled upon the entry: “Neo-Platonism,” and it’s making me queasy. I’ll be right back.
[More time passes.]
{Back again.}
Sorry I took so long, but I couldn’t find what I was looking for, and because I am a bit obsessive-compulsive, I nearly got sucked into cleaning my carpets because the steam cleaner is also in the attic, near my box of books on literary theory.
I do get distracted by the ephemera of everyday life. In fact, I’ve spent the last few years on preparations alone, laying the groundwork for some really serious and incredibly important writing.
First, I had to buy a computer because the writing machine I purchased shortly after the age of reptiles required cranking by way of foot pedals. Then there was the moving. I had to move to a more literary city where I was less likely to have neighbors who rebuild 55 Chevys in their garages late into the night. And you know what a time-consuming task moving can be. It was. Only last week did I finally finish decorating my den slash office. And then there were those photo albums I’d always meant to organize. And so forth.
You get the idea.
So anyway, I was about to explain that this rather freeform manner in which I am writing is actually based on my experiences in graduate school. I learned that one can invent a plausible literary theory for anything. For example, Hamlet is really a dog afraid to bite his evil master. Bad Hamlet! Bad, bad Hamlet!
It’s not that I believe that traditional storytelling is that passé. I love a good story, especially when it has the word “that” in it a lot. I myself have many ideas for stories, like the one about how Mozart is reincarnated into the 1970s as a slovenly piano player in a suburban steak house. He can play pretty well, but this time around he attracts more flies than attention.
But the minute you (I) start writing a story like that, you’re just (I’m just) chained to this traditional structure of character and plot development and so on and so forth, until you just think (I just think), “Why bother?” Because in the end, it’s just another gimmicky story of the type that one sells to the movies (Make me an offer!). Where’s the fun in that?
Huh?
[Insert interjection here.]
So if one (Don’t worry, I’m not going to do this anymore, after this one last time.) does not engage in storytelling, then what is the point? And there (here) we have arrived at the crux of the issue (Sorry, I could not resist one last parenthetical. But then, you had to know it was coming, didn’t you?).
Were it not some philosopher employed by the Hallmark greeting card company who once wrote, “It’s not the destination; it’s the journey.”? Or is this just an excuse to demonstrate the use of punctuation outside quotation marks, since the question mark in question would alter the original intention of the quoted material if placed within the close-quote marks? (Take that you funky wagnalls.)
Which reminds me of a story:
Once upon a time,
there was a little brown mouse with tiny black eyes who was very, very hungry.
He was searching for something to eat in old Mr. Shimelplatzer’s house when he
happened upon a bottle of Minoxidil. Old Mr. Shimelplatzer was trying to grow
some new hair. The little brown mouse with the tiny black eyes pushed the
plastic bottle off the bathroom counter falling to the floor cap flying
contents oozing puddle.
The little brown mouse with the tiny black eyes scampered over to the towel rack, lowered himself paw-over-paw down the bath towel and tiptoed across the throw rug, leaping over the bathroom scale to inspect the strange-smelling pool of liquid. After the little brown mouse with the tiny black eyes licked it all up, he awakened the next morning to find himself transformed into a super-steroid, red-eyed, 23-foot monster mouse. He subsequently killed a lot of slow-moving senior citizens before being blown up with microwave radiation by the National Guard.
Excuse me for just a moment.
[A brief interlude, passes.]
I had to open the door of my den slash office for Inky, my sway-bellied black cat who spends many long hours in the faded adobe-colored recliner where I once spent many long hours writing something I called poetry. Inky will not stop meowing at my door until I let her in, then she meows at me for a minute or two before settling in on the seat of the well-worn recliner, where I once spent many long hours writing something I called poetry.
Ah yes, sigh, those heady, ennui-filled days of youth. Now,
I sit wearily on this adjustable office chair and type assorted letters into
this computer that appear before me on this screen where they line up to become
words and sentences, where they all gather together to do this funny little
dance called, “Pretending To Matter.”
~ Text and artwork by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
It's Been A Long Struggle
Supreme Court Rules In Favor Of Same-Sex Marriage Nationwide
~ June 26, 2015
~ Click here for the story on the L.A. Times website ~ by Russ Allison Loar ~ 8-5-1996
© All Rights Reserved
Juneteenth ~ Say what?
Happy Juneteenth, however we white people may or may not celebrate it. Of course the Emancipation Proclamation was about two and a half years earlier. Can you imagine being a slave in Texas when one day Union troops come to town saying black folks are free?
“Says who?” asks a suspicious black man.
“Why none other than President Lincoln,” a Union officer responds.
“But I heard someone say Lincoln was shot dead?”
“Well, Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation before he died.”
“When did he do such a thing?” the perplexed black man asked.
“Well, actually, it was about two and a half years ago,” the Union officer sheepishly answered.
“Two years ago? Why in the hell did it take so long to let us know? Here we’ve been free for more than two years and nobody bothered to tell us?”
“Sorry about that,” the Union officer apologized, tipping his hat while signaling to his men the need for a quick exit from what was an increasingly embarrassing situation.
~ Image by ? © All Rights Reserved
The End
There was a blinding surge of light.
I didn’t even have time to pray.
~ Text & artwork by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
# 117:
Being enlightened.
Knowing you’re not enlightened.
Pretty much the same thing.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Knowing you’re not enlightened.
Pretty much the same thing.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
Take These Roads, Please!
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood
And glad that I could travel both
And be two travelers
Because I’m schizophrenic.
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood
And glad that I could travel both
And be two travelers
Because I’m schizophrenic.
~ Russ Allison Loar
Apologies to Robert Frost
© All Rights Reserved
Meeting Slated
The Inland Valley chapter of the Society For Clear Thinking will hold an all-day workshop on “How To Make Life Simple” from 10:20 a.m. to 5:47 p.m. Saturday, March 2, at an undisclosed location.
New members are required to attend an orientation session at 7:48 a.m., in the Thoreau Room of the Simple Gifts Meeting Hall at the Southern California College of Agronomy and Moral Certainty.
After the orientation, exit on Walden Avenue South, past Civil Disobedience Drive, then turn west on Emerson Road and make a U-turn at the third intersection past the green/black student dormitories (If you see the black/green student dormitories you’ve gone too far!), bearing to the right onto Harpers Ferry Way to Parking Lot 81, Section 26 (southeastern quadrant), next to the campus greenhouse.
Walk northeast on Campus Loop toward the Transcendental Arts Building, past the Hell No We Won’t Go food court, turning right at the Gandhi memorial bird bath. Walk straight ahead until you see the second unmarked bus stop and wait for bus No. 331, or 28-A if after 9:15 a.m., or any bus between H-9Q and 12 if after 9:33 a.m.
Exit the bus at Tolstoy Street and walk north on Tolstoy, past the King Cotton Laundromat (on the left) to the Thrifty Chick fried chicken restaurant (on the fourth, north-south corner of the traffic hexagon). Enter Thrifty Chick and say: “Sir Larry has come to collect the poll tax,” if the man at the counter is wearing a hat or an eye patch, or “The goslings weep for their mother” if there is another man without a hat and/or an eye patch, or a woman (mature, no eye patch), behind the counter.
You will be led to the rear of the shop and put into the cargo area of the Thrifty Chick delivery van whose driver will blindfold you and take you to my house where I will then drive you to the meeting. The workshop fee is $20 (stamps).
~ by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
The Fly
H ere,
In this beautiful world,
A fly is trapped in my house.
Trapped.
It's buzzing madly against the window glass,
Certain there must be an opening,
Beckoned by the light of the outside world,
The outside world,
Just a fraction of an inch away,
An impenetrable fraction of an inch.
Here,
In this beautiful world,
Where all things are possible,
This Garden of Eden where life explodes,
Where love and hate contend,
Where joy, real joy is actually possible,
A fly is trapped in my window.
I get a clear plastic cup
Reserved for such rescues
And capture the exhausted creature,
Gently sliding a square of cardboard beneath
To prevent escape.
Here,
In this dangerous world,
Where evil survives and babies die,
A fly was trapped in my house,
And I opened the door
And I let it go.
~ by Russ Allison Loar
~ Artwork by Chris Ezelle aka Boogey Man
© All Rights Reserved
Before I Barely Knew Anything
Before I barely knew anything
I awakened each summer morning
To the cawing of crows
And thought,
How very tall these trees
In which they gather to ruffle their feathers
In the morning breeze,
How tall these trees
And how much these crows must see.
I climbed an orange tree,
So frightened by the height,
So amazed at the sight of neighboring houses
And city streets
And thought about what the crows must see
From the tops of the sycamore trees
And from higher still
As they rise into the sky,
Knowing I would never know
What they know,
Before I barely knew anything.
~ Poem and photograph by Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
# 177:
Academic poets hide behind literary devices,
keeping a safe, intellectual distance
from what is intensely personal.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
keeping a safe, intellectual distance
from what is intensely personal.
~ Russ Allison Loar
© All Rights Reserved
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