Letter 2
I think I explained in the last letter to you my lack of interest in politics and religion. One only has to read a little to understand why: "Origen (Theologian) opined that all women are daughters of Satan and that the pious should abstain from sexual intercourse. Origen castrated himself giving rise to the first Christian sect of castrates." "St Augustine (Theologian) one of the great teachers of the church said that sex should be mechanical, without pleasure, in order to bring forth Christian children." "Thomas Aquinas represents the culmination of scholastic philosophy..." He claimed that from man's experience of the world a god must therefore exist. Ballam's Ass is probably the most intelligent! No 'Creation' no 'Chaos'. Existence/Universe is Eternal. "Infinity" is Eternity. "Time" is emotion. The foundation of Existence is contrast-change-emotion. It is the principle of the universe. "Wilhelm Reich, attacked by the press for clailnmg that repressive attitudes to sex are the cause of physical and mental disease. He was arrested by police in America and his books destroyed. He died in jail in 1957" Christian fundament-ALISM! Anyone who still believes the bible, or any "Holy Book", is naïve. People who believe that there is an individual somewhere playing God are more than naïve. They are primitive. Finding myself in the company of such primitives sends shivers up my spine. Still, a hidden agenda? Society attempting to keep sex exciting? After all, sex isn't all it's cracked up to be being as we are basically tubes. No, the whole history of church and state belies such speculation. Consider how the authorities, world wide, sought to enforce their opinions on the populace. Their victims, chosen in order to set an example, were burnt at the stake; crucified; boiled in oil; skinned alive; hung - drawn and quartered, etc. etc. Contemplating the perpetrators of such unbelievably vicious crimes is enough to put one off wanting to have sex with human beings for ever. It's not surprising that some people love animals more. Anyway, enough about such a subject. Turning to a more depressing subject: Ego ergo ex animo. Is that grammatically correct? It looks posh. About myself: I don't have the courage to explore the Amazon Jungle on my own or to be a mercenary soldier, I doubt I'd have the courage to travel to the planet Mars. But it's not lack of courage alone. Other factors are involved. For example, there are too many insects in the jungle. Too many bullets in a war, and too many miles to Mars. So it seems I'm stuck with a flat cap for the rest of my life. I was never interested in travelling to other countries, at least bodily. Television documentaries are best. The TV camera can get where the average tourist cannot. And if it's on Video with rewind, pause, stop (to make a cup of tea), etc, Voila! All from the comfort of your own armchair. If the pleasant perfumes of a country are desired to accompany the glorious colours, sights and sounds from the screen then buy a few aromatherapy oils appropriate to that part of the world. All that for a few quid! Not for me luggage lugging, paperwork, walking, waiting, inoculating. I'm not even a trencher-man. To me toast always smells better than it tastes. A KFC or a kebab stills my hunger. The trouble is some rich people just don't know what to do with themselves. Apparently a few of them are now acquiring a taste for the human placenta. I've read how the rich gluttons of the past would stuff one bird inside another, beginning with a wren and ending with a swan. A peacock would often be roasted whole, its feathers meticulously replaced and the bird used as a cynosure upon the table. An eyesore to me. Not forgetting the whimsical: Nightingales tongues dipped in honey and dusted with poppy seed. What's wrong with Scotch broth or Irish stew? Lovely dumplings. I've tasted caviar: "A flavour too fine for the "vulgar taste." It's all hype. I've tasted the best from Russia. I don't like fish eggs anyway. The same goes for champagne. The best is not much better than "Babycham." Hype! The rich have nothing better to do. I drink very little. The occasional Grouse whisky when I get home from work. I once drank seven pints of ale. Almost a bucketful. An unpleasant experience. I could feel it sloshing around inside me as I walked down the road. I could even hear it. No more large quantities of liquid in one evening for me. Not even Adam's Ale. Bacardi & Coke is OK (Cola not cocaine). I never get offered any of that hard stuff unfortunately. Forget the propaganda. "Statistically more people die from eating peanuts than from taking Ecstasy tablets." Brandy is liable to give one a headache. I'm sure a cocktail lounge would have a pleasing ambience for one with a highball or a Manhattan in hand. Liqueurs are too thick and cloying. The finest claret? Acquired taste? Why bother? I got drunk once. I was 15 years old. At first I was glowmg, illuminated! Then I began to stagger, in disguise so to speak, to the next honky-tonk - anticipating a jar or two of Scrumpy. A meal in itself. After that I would have groped my way to any Shebeen to taste some moonshine. Sharing the sawdust and the barn bottled hooch along with the other sots and tosspots. By then I would have been well shellacked! Embalming fluid might have been the death of me. A Mickey Finn cockeyed from grog could have had this lush. No more will "The breath of the road worry me more than the length." I might easily have progressed to Manganese! And a cordial deoch-an-doruis to you! Perhaps you're wondering why Nature fails to eradicate such depressing creatures. Well, everything falls eventually. From the mightiest of empires to old houses, Suicide? No, because "Hope springs eternal in the human breast." Moreover, "It takes all sorts." So what would I do with a fortune? When I started to lose my hair at 24 years old I considered doing something about it but I had no money. My aversion to baldness was prompted by a television camera zooming over the heads of a theatre audience towards the stage. I thought as I watched how like birds' nests the bald heads appeared - each nest with one big white egg in it. The few Asian and African baldies dotted about the auditorium resembled dark chocolate Easter eggs. I don't think I'd bother with a transplant now, even if I won the lottery. I still have hair. It's just a bit thin on top. Therefore, what would a labourer without children do with a fortune? Regarding clocks. I love pendulum clocks. I don't own one. Rather expensive. You go ahead and buy a grandfather clock if you want to. Don't defer your emotions, other people's opinions are chameleonic anyway! If I bought a longcase clock it would have to be one with a suitable periodicity - as in music the interval is most important. I sometimes fantasise about having such a clock while sitting in front of a log fire in mid-winter deep in the countryside listening to its heartbeat. With the wind and rain through a nearby forest as a Pan orchestrated accompaniment. Even more than Beethoven's Sixth. I'm an Elementalist. Am I a loner? It's the only time I can really relax. Most people are tense. Ask someone to drop their shoulders -99% of them can. Tension! In spite of the fact that we possess amazing self-control. Consider how we direct our own nightmares: When one feels that one has had enough simply raise a hand in your dream to end the nightmare. As arresting as a policeman stopping traffic. All achieved without losing the continuity of sleep. One can decide before going to bed, if one fancies a bit of excitement, to have a nightmare. It will be a 'Command Performance.' All that ability from one cell as small as a pinhead. At least that's how we started. Growing of course into trillions and reproducing themselves exactly, almost every week. All from a windbag! (Pun intended.) Skin, bone, blood, organs, etc., emerging from a little gasbag. Fantastic or what? One should not get too pompous: "The number of chromosomes in each cell is distinctive, the human being has 46, the potato 48 ... after about seven weeks the gills and tail regress (The human embryo is an aquatic organism)." Also, it is possible to 'will' the white cells into a specific area of one's own body: I've done it. For instance, if one has a tiny cyst in the lobe of an ear it is possible to flood that area with white cells to such an extent that the ear lobe becomes tumescent. But when the skin is broken only white cells and plasma can be expressed. No cyst. The experiment may be repeated as often as one desires. (Being mindful of manufacturing capacity and tissue regeneration.) Why the limitation? He who can do all things has nothing. Which leads me into philosophy again. I remember an evangelical soul on television recently pontificating about the sins of the flesh. I imagine her 'upper storey' had been meticulously vacuumed. I doubt there was a speck of grey matter left. Stiff as a scaffold board! The trouble is these fanatics only read the Bible. Bible = 'book'. Gospel = 'good story'. All, so-called, "holy books" should be sub-titled "Pinocchio". I read a different newspaper every day in order to prevent myself from becoming another's artefact. The evangelical harangue is usually about sex. Is it because (forget the Bible) that the preacher subconsciously thinks sex is dirty? They should examine a sunbeam and see what's floating around in the air they breathe. Not to mention the bits of dead bodies they eat on a regular basis. 90% of the dust in a living-room comes from dead skin from one's own body and from visitors plus the debris of flies, bugs and beetles, etc. Some people believe that they are clean after a bath. I always shower the bathwater from my body while standing waiting for the bath to empty. But it doesn't matter how much one bathes and showers, mites will still inhabit the body. I recall seeing a young healthy person put under a microscope after they had a bath and a shower. The mites could be seen scurrying out from every fold and wrinkle.on the body to nibble at the edge of dead skin cells that fell continuously, like cornflakes, from that healthy individual. Mites are everywhere, in carpets, curtains, beds, bodies, et al! There are even eyelash mites. Viruses, bacteria, fungi - inside and out. Enough to turn you off sex? Love will turn you on again! A good heart being the most attractive feature of a human being. Nevertheless, I bitterly resent the overpowering influence of sex. Sex to me is positively circean. (I'd pig out on it right now!) But I do feel sorry for some victims, especially those victimised by the media. For the real big sin in our society according to the right-wing tabloid press, and often the broadsheets, is sex. They will ridicule any deviant behaviour among consenting sexually active adults. They are the people who murder our children. Not forgetting their partners in crime: Church and State. "17 -year-old XXXXX XXXXXXXX, clambered over concrete defences to reach the railway track. A railway timetable was found in his pocket. The train driver said: The boy ran down the side of the track and deliberately leapt in front of the train as it emerged from the tunne1.' The 17-year-old suffered massive injuries and had to be identified by his dental records. A friend said that XXXXX was worried by his homosexual orientation as he had been teased about it by other students. Just before his death he wrote "Anyway, got to go, miss my train." His fellow students might be excused for teasing him about his homosexuality themselves having been influenced by the climate of opinion generated by the Gorgon. And yet, " ... in America, XXXXXXXXX XXXXX stands accused of eating 10-year-old Zachary Ramsey. It is said the accused has been using children as a â la carte delicacies for perhaps 25 years. His diaries refer to 'The little boy stew' and 'Little boy pot pies' which he served to neighbours. Very few newspapers cover the trial." "There is a girl, one of many, living in Sierra Leone whose left arm was chopped off.- Rebel soldiers stretched her arm out, held it steady and hacked it off. She is 14 months old." The media was also responsible for inciting violence towards gays with an easily remembered logo: 'Queer-bashing.'. It had to be simple for the morons it sought to influence. It's no big deal knocking someone down. An ox can do the same. Brute strength rules only if the victim fails to engage their own brain. Socrates said: "Think for yourse1f." Women didn't get the right to vote until recently. Law of the jungle - brute strengfu rules if you fail to use your brain. But don't be too devious. Only criminals are that. I remember reading as a child how the crucified man from Nazareth was given a sop of vinegar by the Romans to quench his thirst 'How cruel' I thought But that was written in a religious tract. When I turned to other documents I discovered that the sop was not of vinegar but anaesthetic. Traditionally given by the Jews to those crucified. A practice permitted by the Romans. Anyway, it's all hearsay. Inadmissible evidence. Moreover, 'Messiah' does not mean God. It simply means to anoint. All the kings of the House of David were so called. Do religious zealots enjoy fooling themselves? If I write again to you I'm of a mind to omit all double letters from words and mute 'Es'. I find them irritating. No wonder school children become bored when learning to spell successfully. I say that which is easy to say and write accordingly. But I doubt that I shall write anymore letters. I sent a poem of mine, a sequel to Tennyson's 'Lady of Shalot', as an entry to the Daily Telegraph's International Poetry Competition 2000. They acknowledged receipt last year and that's the last I heard. They didn't even have the decency to return the poem though I included a large S.A.E. P.S. My earlier jottings I burnt. Living in one small room at the time I had no storage space, so I took them around the back and made a bonfire: A couple of comcdy scripts and short stories, some verse, a few ideas for board games and inventions - even one or two oil paintings! No epics. They are boring. And long words are for showing off. Move swiftly to the point say I. Illuminate. Let your heart follow your head as surely as the moon follows the sun across the sky . Best wishes J Whitehead I almost forgot - you indicated your intention to design a greetings card for your fiancé. Well, I've just thought of one. You are welcome to use it.
I don't suppose you will see this sketch anywhere
else -
I will explain the symbols: P.P.S. Last week I was asked to explain 'Consciousness'. My answer: Contrast - Change - Emotion back to homepage |
