Yup. It's been a month. I'm getting worse and worse at updating this blog, but at least several
of you seem to have found me on MySpace, so that's good. Ol' Dana's still around, just
neglecting her duties, as it were.
How it became a duty to tip out the odds and ends of my mind into this space, I don't know.
Apologies to those who were probably ready to strangle me for not updating the Dojo for a
month. I got sick. Being sick, I got really uninterested in writing articles. Much more
interested in lying abed feeling miserable. Hacking up lungs, that sort o' thing. We're back on
track now, and you should have plenty to look forward to.
So it's Christmas. I'm drinking a wine that tastes somewhat like distilled Christmas from the
Republic of Georgia. You realize I don't even know what the majority religion is there? Let me
consult the Wikipedia oracle...
Ah. Predominantly Christian of some description. So, Christmas is probably in.
Anyway. So I'm drinking a wine that tastes like distilled Christmas from the Republic of
Georgia, which makes sense, and thinking of my friends. As in, should I send them all some
ridiculous E-card to wish them Happy Holidays and all that Shite, or should I just tell them
right here, right now, that they mean the world to me?
I'm plumping for here. So: You guys mean the world to me.
I hope your Christmas or whatever you're
enjoying rocks immensely, because all of you
deserve it. It's been an extraordinary year, and
you made it extra-. Thankees, and love to all of
ye!
There. That seems a bit right.
It's that awful time of the year when the old year's dying and the new one's inhaling to start
screaming, and you start thinking back on the year and getting all mushy and then, just when
you've strangled that and carefully hidden the corpse, you get blasted by
EVERYFUCKINGBODY writing End of Year retrospectives, and it's frankly annoying when
what you're really after is today's news.
And every time you turn on the TV, it's something lame. I spent all night last night while
designing the Christmas Craptacular watching programs about Jesus. Not that there's anything
really wrong with that - after all, it's Christmas - but there's nothing really good. Nobody's
making a really fun Christmas special this year. They're all too shit-scared of lawsuits from
offended religious groups. And that drives me nuts, because whether you believe in Jesus or
not, most people without a PC bug wedged up their arse can agree that things like Santa are fun.
Instead of lawsuits, why not competition? I'd like to see a good Hanukkah program. Give me
the Ramadan version of - fuck, that one movie, really popular - It's a Wonderful Life. So what
if all the images have to be abstract - give me a snappy soundtrack. Do what you like. Give me
something to get me into the holiday spirit - I don't care what holiday.
See, this is the bad thing about Christmas. There's nothing now that I can pop into the DVD
player and enjoy. It's either sap, schlock, or sad. Sanitized to death. Boooorrriiiinnnngggg.
That's why I like Easter. You know what I do at Easter? I watch Jesus Christ Superstar. Oh,
yes.
I'm probably going to get burned by a fanatic for that statement someday.
Christmas was so much better before everybody got so uptight about it.
So anyway. I should be writing tonight, but I'm not in the mood. Should be researching, but
ditto. I think I'll put myself to bed soon with Hogfather, which at least is a Christmas story I
can feel good about. It's got all the trappings and trimmings minus the bullshit.
Tomorrow, for my Christmas music, I'm going to listen to Savatage's Dead Winter Dead. It's
set at Christmastime. It's about the war in Sarajevo. It ends the way I'd like to see all such
things end: with two people of different faiths finding their way across shattered ground and
deciding to set aside their differences and bugger off somewhere for a nice pint.
I'm trivializing that, I know. So here's the real story: there's a Serbian soldier and a Muslim
woman in Sarajevo. They're kept apart by the No Man's Land. But every night, they listen to
this old bugger playing Mozart and suchlike in the bomb-cratered wasteland. They don't realize
they're being drawn toward the same thing, this little bit of human beauty in the midst of
unbelievable brutality.
Well, shit happens. People die. One night, on Christmas Eve, there's an almighty horrible
deluge of bombs, and when it's over, the music has stopped. They both rush out to find out
why and run into each other. They're terrified. But when they both realize what they're there
for, and what has happened, they're able to reach out past the horrors of history and war and
come together.
Basically, they bugger off for a nice pint.
It's a great album, and I encourage you all to buy it. Especially if you're interested at all in that
particular conflict con genocide. It's a nice capsule description of all the factors that went into
making one set of neighbors decide it would be good times to kill the other set, and it points up
how ridiculous this all is.
Good Christmas music, that.
I need to buy some more Savatage albums one of these days.
Damn, running out of things to say. Although it strikes me that there's one thing I meant to
mention in my MySpace blog, and didn't, so I'll mention it here.
In The Fracture Zone, I just came across a bit where the author, who's English, meets up with
an Argentinian officer who's in Sarajevo as part of the UN's peacekeeping force. The first thing
the Argentinian does is apologize for the Falklands War.
Incredible. It's really amazing how we humans hold on to things, and the oddball things we do
about them. I mean, that war had ended at least ten years before, and here's this guy saying,
"Whoops, sorry about that" to an Englishman simply because the Brits and the Argentinians
had, shall we say, had a bit of an armed tiff over who was in charge of these itty bitty but rather
strategic islands. Bizarre.
Almost as strange, and wonderful, as the Japanese gentleman who noted Joseph Campbell's
discomfort at a Japanese monument for the victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and said to
him, "Then, we are enemies, now we are friends, and both are beautiful things." Or words to
that effect.
Amazing, that Joseph Campbell by virtue of being American felt responsible for such horror,
and that the man whose people those horrors were unleashed on could be so sanguine about it.
Too bad the rest of the world can't be like the people in these anecdotes. Too bad we can't just
all put the past elegantly to rest and move on from there.
You know how I know this should work? It's because I know, to the core of my soul, that if the
person who raped me came up to me tonight and said, "I am really, really sorry about hurting
you like that," I could in turn say, "Oh, hey, no worries. We both survived it, water under the
bridge, let's move on, be good folks and say no more of it, shall we?" Why hold on to such
things? Why nurse the grudge? As long as he's not a rapist now, I could give two tugs on a
dead dog's dick what he did when we were both young, and I guess that's where the real
problem is. Isn't it? Because to some of these people, folks who still worship Allah are as good
as unrepentant, persistent rapists and murderers.
Gods damn it.
And there will always be people who see worshipping the "wrong" god as something just as evil
as rape and murder. Probably worse, as they are then usually the ones who use the pretext of
"infidel" as an excuse to rape and murder in their turn.
What cheerful thoughts for Christmas.
Happy thoughts. Chestnuts (have I ever had one? Can't remember. Know for damned sure
I've never roasted them). Christmas trees (ha, pagan symbols in disguise, yes, I LOVE
Christmas trees). Tinsel (not with a cat in the house, don't want her to go all sparkly-arsed,
never mind). Fruitcake (an extra environmental weapon, there, good thing to have around and
very colorful, too, if slightly less edible than dwarf bread). Eggnog (only if I want a severely
coated tongue and an upset tummy). Christmas music (lends a new appreciation to Muzak the
rest of the year). Reindeer (as in Grandma Got Run Over By A). Lights (disguises the fact that
this city has no such thing as snow). Loot (oh, yes, the loot. Mustn't ever forget the loot, and if
I try, the marketers are always there to remind me).
Yes, there is much to appreciate. Especially the fact that Christmas will soon be over, and I can
stop worrying about being attacked by rabid displays of Holiday Cheer very, very soon.
Until Again,
Dana
