I uhh, did stuff last night then realized it was nearly midnight so I made up a cold dinner, hummus, olives, cheese, cucumber slices, etc. and ate and drank wine and watched YouTube.
I woke up enough to hear my alarm clock go through its spiel then actually got up at around 10:30.
How am I going to "process" as is modern parlance, the fact that, apparently, no one in my family will speak to me at all? They are that Americanized. To be completely Americanized means to not give a flying fuck about anyone but yourself, and to not think ahead further than a week. Iks who drive cars.
My father's father cared enough for him to send him to Dartmouth, and my mother's mother cared enough to pay to get my eyes fixed and to raise my mother and my mother's sister with enough to eat and everything. But their generation were perfect, American, psychopaths.
My father was great, in a way, don't get me wrong. He bought all those great records of 60s music, all the Simon & Garfunkel, Kingston Trio, 3 Dog Night, etc. Everything Herb Alpert ever put out. But here's the flaw: He bought and played that music because HE liked it. Whether anyone else did was immaterial. He really wasn't capable of caring if even his own children had enough to eat, clothes to wear, etc. If you were around him and there was food in the house, well, great. And if not, he'd sneak out and make sure he never missed a meal, and his kids, his own kids, well, better be good at stealing or begging or foraging.
Because this is the Christian ideal. Every individual on their own, just themself, isolated, with their Bible.
To be Jewish is to be the opposite of this in every respect. To be Jewish is to feed your animals before your self, then to care for your group. You need 10 people together to properly pray - no going off into the woods and inventing a new, even more ripshit, version of the Christian idolatry. To be Jewish is to care about others and to help out, in any deed big or small, where you can.
It's practically standing on one's head. For instance, good Americans don't care a hoot in hell about anyone who's old, and if they've died, they are forgotten. "History Is Bunk" said Ford, and it might as well be the nation's motto. In Judaism, 1000 years is a short time.
I'd held in the back of my mind that if I just reached out, I could get back in communication with my family, at least my older sister with whom I'd been so close. Being a hated "haole" in Hawaii was a very lonely experience, and having her to talk to was a lifesaver. But looking back, she may have only cultivated the friendship for reasons of physical safety - when she had a little store at the top end of Kapahulu Avenue, she kept a shotgun under the counter. Maybe I was only befriended - even at arm's length - because maybe the mokes will attack me first and in killing me, be distracted from killing her. After all, she went to Punahou! I could be sacrificed.
Out of the 5 of us, no kids. Because the American Deathculture, only caring about the immediate, does not care about, or care for, kids. In America I will be forever poor, but in Israel, if I can make it to there, I will do what I can for Jewish kids. Imagine being too poor to care for any progeny! It's beyond Dickensian. Yet this is reality in America for many, many of us. Deathculture leads to death.
This week's Torah portion is full of fire and brimstone but it is only speaking the truth which is plainly evident in the streets. Turn away from Hashem, and your land will turn barren and you will die out as a people. Plain and simple fact.
My belief in God is pretty science-fiction-y. For instance, I heard on the radio that the dream of the 7 fat cows and the 7 lean cows (Chabad discussion here: https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/2689/jewish/The-Seven-Fat-Cows.htm ) was a new thing, as the people of the time were fatalists, and if you had a famine, welp, that's just how it goes. The big new thing was, here was this Jewish guy saying, Plan ahead. That was an entirely new way to think.
So I think if there is a God, then God is trying to get us to understand new ways of thinking. And I think a lot of it is like trying to get people who don't even know Ohm's Law to understand electromagnetism. This is why the actions of God are going to seem strange and even nonsensical. Imagine trying to tell someone how to design a microwave device when they have no idea of the Maxwell/Heaviside equations.
I realized I'd better get going and left at about a quarter to 3. At 3, I was at Bernal Park so I played Taps there. Then I went to Japantown and spent $10 on my card for a small bento and went over to the Japanese-American museum thinking I ought to be able to finagle my way in, having been in the 442nd and all. But they were not open and I had a fun little talk with a lady who was volunteering there or something.
Then I ate my bento on the steps of the old hospital. And once all tanked up on fish and rice, I played Taps by "The Spike", the memorial sculpture there in Japantown.
Then I played Taps in front of the downtown post office, so the bums in St. James Park could know it's Memorial Day.
Then, hugely regretting that I'd not grabbed my hat on my way out. I played for about 45 minutes at Whole Foods. I made $33, I counted it. That was all I could stand being fried in the sun, then I went upstairs with a can of Foster's I bought downstairs. I figured I'd "zone out" for an hour or so then hit the Old Spag.
I rode over to the Old Spag. and the area's still all fucked up. The vast corporate machine is doing its best to kill foot traffic in the area, and I had to pee. I found a twisty little passage that led me to the bathroom in 5 Points, and then into 5 Points. I went in and had a Guinness. My hemhorroid's acting up and I was just not in the mood to play any more. Plus, I don't know how this happened but after the Guinness I had $8 on hand so I don't know if I mis-counted my take, or gave someone effectively a large tip, or the wind blew some money away, or what.
But I got to go out and do stuff and played a bit, so it's all good. And I'd photo'd and listed 10 things before leaving so I'm holing up my end.
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