May All Your Balls Drop At Midnight...

...and may 2007 bring you peace.

GERALD R FORD 1913 - 2006

Although the presidential events of Gerald Ford's long public life occurred when I was ten years old, he was a key element in the formation of the politics that I carry to this day. He is the second president I remember, Nixon being first, and although I was very young the signs that I would mature into a political junky were evident in the 70s.

Undeniably, I was a precocious and pretentious child. At the tender age of ten I was outraged when President Ford, thirty-one days into the Oval Office, unconditionally pardoned Richard Milhouse "I am not a crook" Nixon. I did not know and don't remember being taught that Richard Nixon's acceptance of a Presidential Pardon was an implicit admission and acceptance of GUILT of the wrong doing of which he was alleged to have been a part. It makes sense now that I know that there was not a Presidential Declaration of Innocence given Pres. Nixon but a plea bargain , if you will, guilt without the trial that would have undoubtably torn the country's fragile morale to shreds.

Equally precocious was my apreciation of his decision to grant clemency to the "draft dodgers" of the war in Vietnam. Selective Service was eight years away for me, but the fear of conscription had me pre-planning my life in Canada already.

I credit President Gerald R Ford for preventing me from becoming 100% cynical about our government at a time when Watergate, Nixon and Vietnam had combined to make that my lot. At 94% cynicism I gladly offer honorable elected officials my heart felt 6% of trust while I will always offer my country and its defenders 100% of my Patriotism.

Thank you, Mr. President.

If Wishes Was Fishes We'd Die From The Stink

Another year winds towards its end and once again talkshow host Montel Williams favorite Wednesday afternoon Psychic, famed Sylvia Browne, has trotted out her predictions for 2007. I remember Sylvia from a 1972 episode of THAT'S INCREDIBLE (Kathy Lee Crosby, Fran Tarkenton...I am SO old) when she outed a ghost that haunted a TOYS 'R US.

I was reared ("reared" is for animals, "raised" is for corn or soy beans) brought up, if you will, to expect the miraculous. From Church to comic books, miracles and super-powers filled my childhood. As a result I have spent 42 years pining, yearning, wishing (and hoping, and praying) for the mystical supernatural inexplicable to occur or be illustrated in my lifetime. Of course by definition mystical supernatural inexplicable events once proven would lose their mystical supernatural inexplicable designation. But UFOs, cryptozoology, ESP, ghosts, astral travel...I have been SO ready for a little magic in my life.

Then. The "psychics" or "ghost whisperers" hit popular television and I, always seeking that special gift in humanity, watched with great interest. Afterall, if any one of us can see the unseen then perhaps we all can. Unfortunately I watched too closely, learned the routines and realized that the one truth that survived is "everything old is new again."

Following the American Civil War, our New Birth of Freedom was accompanied by a New Birth of Spiritualism. There were so many who had died remote from their loved ones rational 19th Century citizens sought out spiritualists to gain closure. In fact, throughout history times of uncertainty have been fat times for "seers" of all shapes and sizes. Some famous Americans, desperate for contact from their loved ones who had passed, sought the assistance of mediums. Abraham Lincoln and his wife Mary Todd Lincoln after the untimely death of sons, Houdini following the death of his beloved mother - opened their wallets and hired the best spiritualist/medium/psychics of the time. Both President Lincoln and the 20th Century's greatest Magician came to the same conclusion - bunk.

Psychic readings as performed by the vast majority of "real" psychics follow simple scripts with or without props (Crystal balls, Tarot, dousing rods, the human hand, lumps on the head, tea leaves, the moon and stars, chicken innards even bowel movements.) But the goal is simple - wish fullfilment of the person paying for the service.

"Did Uncle Sid die in AGONY?"
"No he passed peacefully in the night."

"Do you see Romance in my future?"
"Yes, not this year but next. A tall man with dark hair."

"Will the next year bring peace to the Middle East?"
"No, duh."

Even simpler is the "audience reading." Asking 100 people if anyone's lost a relative with an "S" in their first or last name is a great job if you can get it.

I wish they were special but most are just clever.

When I was Seven Years Old...True Story from Christmas 1971

Twas the night before Christmas,
and Timothy thought,
"I'll stay up and spy Santa
without being caught!
If he uses the chimney for delivering his wares
I can see him quite clearly from the top of the stairs!"
The hours crept by and our Timothy dozed
Until something unusual tickled his nose.
His eyes slowly slitted and opened up slow
And he saw a man's outline in the fireplace glow.
It was smoke from a pipe that had wakened our Tim
But he knew at a glance who was right before him!
It was Santa, yes, Santa bending down by the tree.
Leaving toys and full stockings for the Hogan children three.
Our young Timothy freaked!!
And he ran to his bed.
He pulled all of the covers up over his head.
Fast asleep in case Santa had spied him as well.
It was smoke from his pipe, I remember the smell.
For I was the boy who had stayed up to see
And I'll never forget who appeared before me.
For I heard him exclaim as I dove out of sight,
"Merry Christmas to all and to all a goodnight!"

I Never Know What To Make Of These?

You may notice that my BLOG contains advertisments. They are provided by Google and apparently are based on the text that I provide on my BLOG. I sometimes flinch when I read them. This one is no exception:

HIV cure
Take part in trials of new therapy which has cured two girls of HIV
www.qeptrials.com

"Cured" two girls of HIV? Wow. I guess I needn't feel like I need to publish things I can substantiate. Just because something is in print, even on the WWW, it ain'tnecessarily so.

An Uncle Again!

Great News! My little Sister, RACHEL, her Husband, MARK and my Nephew, DONOVAN are adding to their family. We are adopting a little girl. As the OFFICIAL UNCLE I am un-officially part of the WE who are adopting.

We love all our stinky little boys (LARS, ERIK, DONOVAN) but now we get a little girl to spoil.

I personally promise that she will be thoroughly spoiled.

Oh Crap...Winter!

This is Winter out of my east windows. So beautiful to look at...so nasty to slog through.

He Sees You When You're Sleeping...

He knows when you're awake!
He knows if you've been bad or good!
So be good for goodness sake!

Santa scares me.

I Am Many More Things Than Gay But The Plague Outted Me

I got a DUI in Houston in the 1980s and was ordered to do 50 hours of community service. I was sexually active, very active. HIV had been named for about four years, it had killed gay men for about eight. When you got it, you started wasting away, maybe you got dementia - two years and you were another Memorial Service program.

The infected babies of those years lived a year at most. At the time, nothing prevented the HIV from traveling from the Mother to the infant during passage through the birth canal. Those babies lived eight or nine healthy months inside their prostitute or IV drug using mothers and were infected with HIV as they passed through the blood of their own births. Almost no time and they were orphans.

I used my DUI Community Service time for a charity that existed at that time. People went to Hospital Maternity Wards to hold "AIDS babies" give them bottles, feed or change them, sing to them, walk them outside the hospital ANYTHING normal. Even Nurses in the Hospital System were scared to hold them. Everyone was really that scared. But they were little shriveled purpley newborns with a disease thay did not deserve and they smiled and recognized the kind faces that came to there nursery. And I held them and prayed for them and kissed there little noses as I sang to them. They smiled back, held my finger, learned my face. And they died a lot..

At this time in adult AIDS therapy, grown men wore antibiotic pumps on their arms or chests all day, diapers for emergencies. It was all anyone knew to do and it did nothing. In the ACTOR'S EQUITY newsletter some months 30+
young men under thirty died. I am one of the few survivors of the PLAGUE SCHOOL Class of the 1980s that lived to see the 90s.

Early on, because all the PLAGUE seemed to kill were unwanteds - IV drug addicts and GAY men -we learned that one of our unique qualities, our invisibility was a terrible liability. We organized worldwide. Maybe you remember a very powerful political alliance called "ACT UP!" WE'RE HERE! WE'RE QUEER! GET USED TO IT! We were socially disobedient, loud and we were right out there in public and everything. I've chanted that rhyme in parades in city streets nationwide.

Thank you my loving God that Gay men, for whatever reason, SPARKLE just a little. I don't mean to leave out our Lesbian sisters, but early on we needed every tap-dancing, showtune crooning, hairdressing, head to toe Drag Queen on the planet to SPARKLE bright RED! Their mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers and grandmothers and grandfathers and teachers banded together and REFUSED to let us die. They sewed us a quilt that covered the capitol lawn. We may take for granted the multicolored ribbons for breast cancer or lost children or heart illness BUT the VERY FIRST and ONLY ribbon was the RED RIBBON worn during the 1985 TONY AWARDS ceremony to honor a class of young talented men mostly who were dying.

The worst part was that we were largely an invisible minority. We had to become visible and loud or we would all die in respectful silence. I had never been all that "OUT." Afterall, whom one sleeps with is usually the business of whores and gossips. This disease that killed us BECAUSE of whom we loved forced us to do away with SILENCE and INVISIBILITYand DEMAND that every "favorite uncle" "school marm" "Rock Hudson" "choir director" "playwright" "actor" and even quiet private K.D.Lang step up and question "how'd you like to try get along without us?"

I am blessed, so blessed in this life because I have a quick wit, a sense of humor and make friends easily - always have, always will. During my High School and college days, I was often the "only gay person" people knew - AND they liked me. When a deadly disease made Gay men scary It became very important to me that everyone that liked me knew I was Gay. Even more so when I became a "poster child" for the disease itself in 1995. Millions of dying African children aren't as charming, funny and smart as I am at a party. When I explain my disease, the treatment, I'm not scary. HIV/AIDS is.

As things stand AIDS research wise, 15-19 vaccine trials are moving along at about the same pace. The lead trial has run into it's first set of obstacles in human trials. Since the remaining vaccines work along similar methods we are looking a another decade of lost work. The millions in Africa, India, Russia, China that will benefit from the regime of Anti-retroviral drugs being made available now will live relatively full lives. For third world countries 50-60 years. At a dozen years into my own struggle, maybe I get 60 years too.

So that's why I talk about my sexuality, my terminal illness. Things whispered are feared.

LOOK! UP ON MY THIGH! IT's A BIRD! ITs A PLANE! IT', uh it's you! nasty get down!

When I was a chilld , I wished that I had a super-power DEATH-RAY that I could shoot from my eyes. Thirty years later, and it's clear I got a BORE-YOU-TO-DEATH-RAY that I shoot from my mouth - be careful wishing.
Above is Terrell Owens 2007-08 Cowboys uniform....too much? Next my attempt at the HUMAN TORCH : too many peple think there's a problem when you "Flame-ON!" (never mind the deluge of "go-Girl" that follows) and douse you before you can explain that being on fire is your super-power so most of the time it's like being the Human Guy with Wet Hair and inflammable shorts.

Then there's the classisc, all-american, never married, frequently in the company of same-sex minors, Lycra-wearing, said you'd call again but that's all you "super' guys can manage...sure, kid, I'll call ya!...feeble

The Harder I Think, The Decider I Get

C.I.A./NSA Link OSAMA BIN LADEN to KING OF THE MOON

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a high level Administration Staffer confirmed," All our worst fears are now realized. Apparently toying with FELIX and POINDEXTER is no longer sufficiently EVIL for MASTER CYLINDER and he has joined OSAMA BIN LADEN in declaring war against the Infidel."

What could this UNHOLY ALLIANCE mean? An endless supply of 1930's automobile parts to begin with...


...also...why does MASTER CYLINDER have nipples? Does that worry anyone but me?

GOVERNMENT WARNING:FELIX LINKED TO TACHYCARDIA

Felix the cat
The wonderful, wonderful cat
Whenever he gets in a fix
He reaches into his bag of tricks

Felix the cat
The wonderful, wonderful cat
You'll laugh so much your sides will ache
Your heart will go pit-a-pat
Watching Felix the wonderful cat

satire

The following satirical piece is written "as if" I am a close-minded buffoon who believes that unless English is made our official language (shouldn't we be able to speak it above a 4th Grade level first?) we will somehow be compromised as a nation. HOGWASH!

Begin satire now:

Now I betchur wondrin' (he goes colloquial for the slope shouldered, mouth breathing set) what has my RED, WHITE AND TRUE BLUE drawers twisted so tight I'm chewin' on the waist band? Well, I'll tell ya'll!

Why is it when I go to my neighborhood fast-food establishment to refill the tummy at midday, I AM FORCED TO ORDER IN A FOREIGN LANGUAGE...SPANISH YET? The language of our 21st Century Conquistadors who earn $3/hr & come pouring over our unguarded borders armed with a desire to eat and feed their children.

Whether I have my sights on TACO BELL, TACO JOHN's (must be where Taco Ho's eat) TACO BUENO or my favorite ALL-YOU-CAN-EAT BUFFET PANCHO'S, Each and Every food item has to be ordered in its MEXICAN name.

Burrrritto Enchilada Salsa Tortilllia Chimmy Chamanga Quesadillio...the list goes on and on.

Are these MEXICAN owned restaurants?...Hell no, nobody that works there earns enough to own the joint!

Just who are these establishments catering to? Illegal Alien Mexican Immigrant Criminals? Cain't be! They don't earn enough to eat there!

I am left with one OUTRAGEOUS UNFOUNDED ASSUMPTION that DEFIES LOGIC and therefore must be the TRUTH!

We white- , uh I mean red-blooded GOD BLESS AMERICANS are slowly becoming BI-LINGUAL which is just one titch removed from BI-PARTISAN or *gulp* BI-SEXUAL!!!

It's time to purify your menu AMERICA! DROP THAT CHALUPA before you start saluting the MEXICAN Flag (which is oddly tortilla-shaped.)

COME ON, GET MAD, GET STUPID, USE LOT'S OF EXCLAMATION POINTS AND ASTERISKS (!!!!!********)

IF YOU THINK I'M A RAMBLING XENOPHOBIC (look it up, someone you know has a dictionary) HILLBILLY AND YOU AGREE WITH MY HEIGHTENED SENSE OF PARANOIA (dictionary) PASS THIS MESSAGE ON!

IF YOU DON'T AGREE WITH MY IDIOTIC STANCE AGAINST THE SLOW MALEVOLENT CREEP OF ETHNIC FOODS AND THEIR EFFECT ON YOUR PATRIOTISM THAN... YOU ARE JUST PART OF THE COMBINATION PLATTER.

READ IT! EAT IT! DELETE IT! BUT MOST OF ALL, FORWARD IT WITHOUT UNDERSTANDING IT! GOD BLESS LOU DOBBS!

fear

i have a tiny fear so small it itches in my head.
i think it only sometimes when i'm safely in my bed.
what if the thing that keeps me living may someday leave me for dead?
it must be clearly marked, a switch, a tiny switch so small the itch.
or knobs that need to be adjusted just to breathe. what if mine's busted?
the doctor says YOU'RE JUST DEPRESSED and ARE YOU SUICIDAL?
i answer no i've never been could that be coincidal?
a fail-safe switch for when i'm dark so i can live tomorrow.
i have a tiny switch so small it itches in my head.
a safety-switch that makes me smile at night when i'm in bed.

I am Auditioning to Replace ex-Planet Pluto with Me!

Imagine, my giant blue head orbiting the sun in an enormous eliptical orbit that takes more than a human lifetime to complete. Who knows, at some time of the year I might apear as a faint blue speck in the firmament.

Planet Timothy! A place so cold it burns, so hot you freeze! And the atmosphere is so open and accepting that it is INSTANTLY DEADLY to Rednecks, Bigots, Hypocrits, the Self-Righteous, televangelists, Pat Robertson, Jerry Fallwel, Rush Limbaugh, skinheads, Osama Bin Laden, O.J. Simpson, Scott Peterson, Dr. Philand the Willing Stupid.

It's World AIDS Day and I'll Cry If I Want To

"Oh the Junkie is a Person in Your Neighborhood...

...In Your Neighborhood, In Your Neighborhood. They're the People that you Meet, When You're Walkin' Down the Street. They're the People That You Meet Each Day."
And so it came to pass that Timothy, having narrowly avoided a complicated encounter with the Junkie-Girl at the bus stop last week, runs into her in his apartment building where she is temporarily living. Junkie-Girl happy. Timothy not so much. She asks if she can visit him, he says NO! and explains that things at home for him are chaotic (lie.) but he is glad to see her (lie.)
So on the following day, as he paid his December rent, he explained to the managers of the property what he knew about Junkie-Girl, his fear that she is actively using and his certainty that if she isn't "clean" she's lying and planning to steal if necessary. Nothing personal, Junkie-Girl, but Timothy's been a lying, stealing addict before and well, it really does take one to know one.
Timothy tries to have Junkie-Girl removed from where he lives to establish safe Boundaries, right? They taught him that, he's sure. Still he feels like a coward.

At Least I Only Have One Cat...So Far

Ladies and Gentlemen, allow me to re-introduce the love of my life, and my only child, Miss Stinkerella Louise Fifi Hogan. She answers to "Stinky," though she has no aroma to speak of, it's far more a description of her personality. "Stinkerella" pays homage to Cinderella since my friend David and I rescued her from a shelter (where I'm sure they had her sweeping out chimneys). She shares my maternal grandmother's middle name "Louise" out of love for my grandmother and the surprising number of personality traits they share. "Fifi" was entirely psychically inspired - I feel she danced at the FOLLIES BERGERE in a past, taller and less hairy incarnation (although I suppose there ARE a lot of small hairy French women?). As her adoptive father, she shares my last name.

Here I could launch into a laundry list of "the wonderful things she does..." but as a single 42 year old gay man I am working really hard on the delusion that I MIGHT still be a man under here somehow.

No laughing.

Temporary Interruption

Due to an accidental overdose of L-tryptophan over the Thanksgiving Holiday, our Blogger will return on Monday, November 27 with his usual mix of pathos, satire, empathy and naked rage. In his current state, he silently weeps over the sound of a muffled "gobble-gobble" in the back of his throat.

Thank You for Your Continued Patience.

Thanks.

After All The Words...Real Life

This is just a story that happens to be true and recent so I'm just going to tell what happened but you will have to indulge me some commentary.

I stood in the November night at the bus depot waiting for the 17 for my final leg home. I was talking to a friend on my cell phone when a skull named Anna pulled nose to nose with me. Maybe 75lbs. at 5'6", she had the paper white face of a heroin addict doing some speed to scare up money for the next heroin fix. Her face was marked with raised sores, staph infection probably spread evenly throughout the street meth and heroin crowd.

I ended my call. Her bruised eyes lit! "Timothy, do you have some money you could spot me?"

For the first second I knew the absolute moral imperitive provided to me. No questions, no doubt. A type of purity of certainty that I had never felt before. I knew I should brush off the money, tell her I had a spare room and plenty of food, dvds, meetings we could go to - invite her in to help her heal. And hope she didn't steal too much from me.

The next second arrived and I reached into my wallet and gave her enough money to stay warm, fed, and high through Thanksgiving without giving blow jobs behind buildings for money. She started to thank me and tell me all of the things she could do with the money - new clothes that she hadn't been sleeping in on the street, a phone card to get ahold of her friend to find a place to crash. I stopped her with my fingers to her lips and kissed the back of my own hand. "I can't save you, Anna." I whispered into the space between us. We knew she'd get her fix and at that moment I couldn't pretend I was rescuing her. I was just prolonging her damnation.

This was no "too close to call" moral dilemma. This was a burning bush backed up by the Heavenly Host and The Mormon Tabernacle Choir pointing at a sign that read "YOU COULD TRY TO SAVE HER" and I chose the Path Of Least Commitment

This Joke Isn't Funny Anymore

A Rabbi, an Imam and an Evangelical Minister stand in the middle of an old house filled wih hungry women and children. Around them, troops from various countries are shooting at each other and taking turns gang raping the women. While Chaos rages, the three "men of God" continue to argue about which of their Faiths is the one true Faith, each of them sincere "true-believers"bent on the conversion of the other two. They smell smoke - the whole house threatens to become a conflagration.

Whose side is God/Jehovah/Allah on? I bet you think our Creator wants the victims, starving and raped women and children, saved from their torment. Shouldn't we, people of Faith, want the same? While we stand around debating whose God is God our house is in Chaos and catching fire.

Maybe if we spent more time putting our house, the Earth, into Peaceful order, we'd find we have more in common with those we meet in the clearing smoke.

I Would Never Mock A Cancer Survivor...

...unless she was Suzanne Somers. She appeared on LARRY KING LIVE last week and both she and Larry said "vaginal dryness" like some demented old porn queen's dying mantra. To the tune of CAROLINA IN THE MORNIN'

Oh nuthin' could be moister than the oyster that we call Suzanne's Vagina.
Estrogen from yams and yaks to fight the menopausal cracks that line her.

When the Morning's Bloating twines around her form
TORSO-TRAC and THIGHMASTER, timeships to co-ed dorms.

Strollin' with my girlie when the dew is pearly early in her "females"
Bad Endocrinologists! Crissy ain't no Technologist - no emails!

If I had Bionic Tits and Muppet-Blonde hair,
I'd Lipo-suck it in cause who cares?

Oh nuthin' could be finer than the dank in her vagina in the mornin'!

Love Without Agenda

Thanks to my friend, Jason and his wife Rachel for letting me use this picture of their adorable son Lukas. When I look at Lukas in the leaves I see the pretty ideal of happiness and joy with a bit of giggle around the corners of the mouth. Continuing my redux of Religious Paradigms, I'd love to think that this is what I can look like when seen by my Creator or by my fellow people of Faith - smiling, ready, willing, calm, unafraid.

In case you haven't figured it out yet, I'm not trying to change anyone's existing Religious Faith. In fact, I suggest that any of the Cornerstones or Behaviors that I have suggested can be performed by anyone of any Faith without being in conflict wih their core beliefs.

Civility, Decency, Tolerance, Respect, Compassion, Willingness - though lacking in current Fundamentalist micro-sects of Islam, Christianity, Judaism - allowing them to Hate - are not part of the greater and more moderate Faiths from which they spring.

Extremist, Fundamentalist, Purist versions of all religions find their genesis in FEAR and the INSECURITY that grows into an ARROGANCE that THEY and ONLY THEY know the way to Paradise. A shaking clenched fist can hold no love.

DOGMA is no product of FAITH. DOGMA is the product of DOUBT. True FAITH is alive, plastic and FEARS no CHANGE.

Our relationship to our Creator has no place for Fear or Isolation. It is our duty to reach out accross lines of Faith, our simple Cornerstone Beliefs giving us "cover" and loveingly help to heal our shared Insecurities. Challenge yourself to allow your Faith beyond the box. God didn't shape your box, you did out of tradition, insecurity and Fear.

Tailoring God's Clothes Out Of The Fabric Of Space-Time

If there was a joke in the title of today's entry, the punchline would go:"..make sure you have a lot of thread..."
Well I'm one day into my New World Religious Paradigm (that REALLY needs a name) and already my Mother is concerned that I not "stray from the teachings of Jesus." To the contrary, not only need I NOT stray from the Christianity I've known all of my life BUT I've designed the basic "Cornerstones" or bullet points of this New Paradigm to be accessible to all regardless of the Faith they bring to the exercise. I have no desire to supplant Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Bhuddism, Hindu, Shinto or Druidism. I just want to offer an idea for shared ideals of all people of Faith that should be one-size-fits-all that can facilitate compassionate dialog between the groups, many of whom clash daily, because they trust the sincerity of the Faiths that bring them to the table. An Ecumenical United Nations, dedicated to an end to poverty, oppression and conflict because of the power of all our Faiths combined.

Read yesterday's entry. Contribute. Be shocked. Or just "get it."

We need more Cornerstones, we STILL need a name* and it's about time we win a few believers.


*Name the Religion and become it's first SAINT, word.

It's Time For A New World Religious Paradigm

At least I think so...
Lately, I have found myself confronted by aspects of Legacy World religions that seem archaic, out of place. Prohecies written by the oppressed and enslaved that could only hope for an end to their tortured existence. They prophesied what they most desired.
But in our times, though many still suffer, billions of us live lives that are pleasant, creative, filled with family of all sorts, compassion that extends to include the whole natural world. We need new paradigms in our beliefs that pull away from milenia of praying for release from this life and instead leave us yearning to improve this life for everyone. It's not about doing time on Earth waiting for the prize of Heavan. It's about the capacity for Heaven, a real Kingdom of God on this Earth.

Here are a few of the cornerstones of my New World Religion. Feel free to COMMENT, email, REPLY, complain or even think about what you may read. I'll value your input.

1. We are the most sentient fruit of our Creator that we know but the Universe is vast and our eyesight finite.
2. Our Creator's perfection is displayed in our Diversity. Six Billion independent thoughts every second.
3. What appears to be Fate or Destiny is a simple limitation of our Perception as we try to find Meaning outside ourselves.
4. Though we are never without our Creator's love, we live in an impersonal Universe in which Events will occur to us at random.
5. Any Lesson learned from Events that occur in our lives begins in Grace or how we respond to the occurrences.
6. We owe others (regardless of their beliefs) Respect, Love, Tolerance

Well, that seems like a good start. A little New Age-y to tell the truth. I swear I smell patchouli oil. Does that mean my new religion will include hippie nuns and monks? Cool, good wines, breads and weed.

Anywho, helpout a budding late day prophet buy adding your suggestions to either our "Cornerstones," or how I should start raising money, my outfit for spreading the word...forget that! My New Religion needs a NAME!

NAME MY RELIGION!*

* The winner is our first Saint!

"Connect The Dots! La La La La!"

I love Peewee Herman. Since the DAWN OF MAN (ooh, how pompous!) humanity has sought to understand his world better by seeking the patterns that appear to surround us. The length of days and seasons, repetitive patterns had to be predicted for our hunter gatherer forebears to evolve an agricultural society which gave them enough freetime to form civilization. Pretty important stuff and by and large reliable. Just by observing the slow progression of the sun moon and stars in the sky, primitives who lacked the wheel created observatories and mathematics so that each season's planting and harvest could be maximized. So it stands to reason that the human knack for identifying patterns is hard wired into us all.

Unfortunately, it doesn't always work so neatly. Take the constellations - also the creation of early astronomers - they are basically "connect the dots" in the night sky. Patterns we impose making pictures from the available peices. But the picture, the order in which the dots are connected is arbitrary and totally individual. Where you may see a bear, a goddess or a hunter, I can connect the dots to make a gorilla, a flight attendant and an aardvark. We make something from the dots when in the end they were just dots.

Our love of patterns, how they comfort and assure us, really gets us into trouble when we apply it to life events. We think that if only we can assemble the events correctly, connect them like so many dots, we can find some overall meaning - the picture of our lives that will make some sense. I labored under that assumption for most of my life. If only I could figure out how all of the events could be connected I would understand the theme or lesson that my life contained and would be all the wiser for it.

Now I'm pretty sure they're just dots, the events that have occurred - the shit that has happened. The meaning of my life is not the result of external events but something I have to make from who I am and what I'm made of. The MEANING OF LIFE (pompous again!) won't ever be given to me. I have to make it for myself.

I'm Just A Science Geek at Heart...Thanks Hubble

These are the so-called PILLARS OF CREATION courtesy of the Hubble Space Telescope in 1995. The image is a computer enhanced photograph of clouds of hydrogen and dust, thousands of light-years across, that act as the incubators of stars. Sometimes when I tire of war and politics, I lose myself in the beautiful Universe.

...and the HALLOWEEN-ER is...

In honor of Halloween, I should stop with the Angela Lansbury portrait and move on...if you stare at her long enough her head will spin...SCARY! but I promised you a written version of the Dream you all voted for...and the WINNER is...

4. I'm starring in a multi-million dollar Broadway Musical that I have staged at my old High School Auditorium that combines SHOWBOAT, Blue Man Group, Angela Lansbury and...oh yeah, I can fly.

First, the disclaimer: This Dream is a work of my Subconscious and as such is a work of Fiction. That means NOT REAL, okay? Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, is purely coincidental, Mother.

"Hey! Get in here you guys! I can only do this for a minute or two!" I call out as I hover four feet off the floor," Come on, I think I'm getting the hang of it!"

As my mother and sister rush into my sister's bedroom in a house we lived in for Grades 4-10 for me, my mother scolds,"Timothy! I thought it was something important!" We are all miraculously younger, thinner and I'm levitating.

"Well, I am flying," I defend."I thought you'd want to see."

"It IS against the Law of Physics, Cow! (my nickname) Maybe you should stop." My sister is no help.

As my mother walks off,"It's not like we haven't dealt with THAT your whole life. What are you going to be when you grow up?"

Dissolve to a future/past time. Wind whistles in my ears as I swoop and sweep through the sky to a fictional amalgam of several schools I attended, a couple of familiar churches and theatres from around the world. My mind's stand-in as an IMPORTANT BUILDING looms into view. I float down the hallway searching for my High School Drama teacher, who has apparently turned teaching High School Drama into a lucrative endeavor as a Regional Theatre performed and staged by teenagers.**

**Now here we know it's ONLY a Dream because I've directed a handful of High School musicals and really, well, I'd rather chew glass.**

As I begin to sell my teacher on my musical CONCEPT combining Blue Man Group, SHOWBOAT, the talents of Angela Lansbury and me in flight, my Dream is interrupted by waking...I was thirsty from all of the flying and talking and talking and talking (see it IS my Dream) and I needed a glass of water, or was it to tinkle? Whatever, seems like a good place to say...

...to be continued (which you should only say when you're poised on the edge of a cliff-hanger that is INTERESTING but YOU VOTED FOR DREAM #4, that's on YOU!) and...as we leave we are left (now THAT was deep "as we leave we are left" - great song lyric.) You know my subconscious is actually even messier than this story. All competing sub-plots and no real referee - cue the whistle! - anyway, we are left with these questions:

WILL Angela Lansbury be available for uh... BLUEBOAT! ?

WILL anyone pay to see me fly? And WHAT'S UP with my family's ATTITUDE toward my ALTITUDE?

Was I THIRSTY or did I need to TINKLE? (Not important unless I'm sleeping with YOU.)

BOO! I scared me!

The Runner Up

Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound sat slouched in the towel I'd wrapped it in making soft sucking sounds to itself - rhythmic, almost musical. It continued, the only sound in the room, until my curiosity overcame me,
"Tell me, " I ventured, "do tell me, Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound, how I can ring me up some Jesus to rain down on my head? My spark is stuck in the flesh-web in my brain. I need me some Jesus to rain down on my head."

Silence broken by the sucking sound the wound made - rhythmic almost musical. The next voice was not my own.
"You are SO human!" my kitty cat uncurled in the space beneath my chin and giggled, "Oh SO human and SO all alone! Calling out for the one thing that's never left you. Pity Man, so sure of himself and yet suspended over the gulf of Eternity - his Forever teeters first one way then another."

As usual my kitty cat made more sense than a kitty cat should but her wise words were instantly lost on my slippery soul so again I ventured, "Tell me please, Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound, tell me HOW I can ring me some Jesus to rain down on my poor head?"

It made a smack, its red-ringed mouth slippery as I bled, then silent a second it seemed to think.

"Listen to itself it must!" Its voice a moist, hoarse whisper, "The jug of wine calls out it thirsts! The dinner dies of hunger!"
The "h" in "hunger" bubbled blood, so absently I wiped it clean. My kitten laughed her meowing laugh to fill the awkward moment.

"From Paradise it banished its silly Self! (said banish-shed, Shakespearean)." Smack smack - it giggled? - then it fell mute, its riddle slowly forming like the scab that dried on my forearm. It had drizzled blood since early morning.

For an instant I might have understood, epiphany triumphant. Then Fear, my favorite feeling, Father of all the Others, overcame my clarity. It was too easy, a trick - might I be the source of my own Eternity?

In my horror I cried,"Too simple! It must be Complex, a snarl of rules, a list of Steps!" I shook my arm in anger and the Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound seemed to cough, the blood flow increasing,"I have been taught to believe in a Chosen few, no Infidels allowed! The Diverse made Homogeneous Forever and Ever, Amen."

"Man's Rules, not God's!" It raised its voice. I blinked back tears.

"If true," I whispered,"then all I've learned of Grace and God must be replaced. All my Doing wasted. My frantic quest to be redeemed. My spark alone enough for Heaven's gate - not earned but given - a Loving Fate."

"Mm Hm, " it hummed, my Kitten purred. The Universe buzzed around me.

The Fool, in tears I spoke again,"Please tell me, Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound, tell me HOW I can ring me some Jesus to rain down on my poor head?" My Lesson lost, I begged a task, assignment, cost, some work to do to earn it.

My Kitten ceased her purring, spun a circle curling up with her ass dismissively in my face. Among the three of us I was the least enlightened.

Suck-suck, suck-suck - rhythmic almost musical. Creepy Little Left-hand Stigmata Wound sat slouched in the towel I'd wrapped it in making soft sucking sounds to itself. The only sound in the room...

"I'm NOT DEAD yet!"

Why does Fidel Castro need to have his name embroidered on his track suit? Is it stored in a closet full of matching track suits that belong to other people? Does it get laundered with other people's suits? And why embroidered as F. CASTRO? Is there another suit with R. CASTRO on it? If so wouldn't you just have FIDEL on one and RAUL on the other? And who's in charge of trimming his nails while he recuperates? Have they been fired? Purged?

Tomorrow! The Dream you've selected from my HEAD OF HORRORS gets immortalized (virtually) in the epistle!

HALLOWEEN DOUBLE STUFFED SCARY OPINION POLL!

Lately, my incredibly vivid dreamlife has become even more bizarre, even aggressive. My dreams are like films or perhaps more like soap operas or television miniseries - once interrupted by waking, they restart when I fall back to sleep. Even more strange, they generally haven't waited for me to rejoin them. Their plots, if you will, have moved on and I must catch up on the storyline that I have missed. I suppose it goes without saying that I remember my forays into my own twisted subconscious, but there! I've said it anyway. Even more disturbing (uhuh) than how I dream is what I've been dreaming. A few examples:

1. I have a newborn baby girl, work for the BUSH administration and I'm accompanying my entire family to a news conference at the White House.

2. I have a stigmata wound on my left hand that speaks words of wisdom to my cat, Stinky, and me while we nap.

3. I have an idea for a sitcom pilot that I'm trying to sell to Sarah Jessica Parker while we stroll the Mall of America and as we try to exit the Mall, we get caught in my subconscious.

4. I'm starring in a multi-million dollar Broadway Musical that I have staged at my old High School Auditorium that combines SHOWBOAT, Blue Man Group, Angela Lansbury and...oh yeah, I can fly.

Now, just in time for Halloween. Let me know which of the four dreams you think is the scariest and I'll try to write it into a short story. Either COMMENT on my BLOG or email me at trhogan@mn.rr.com by Monday, October 30, 2006! Oooh! What fun a contest! And only Timothy Hogan would be arrogant enough to think the stuff of his DREAMS worthy of sharing...or SCARING!

The Curse of VERSE (for better...worse) II

"There are Days and there are Days!"
the Rat said, passing in the Maze.
I stop and catch my beath, unphased,
The Herd runs past me, kicking haze
of Dust and Garbage - runaways!
A bag of chips (yes, Frito Lays!)
then Irene Ryan, Helen Hayes
and Ralph the Mouth (from HAPPY DAYS)
and conflict between Straights and Gays
Half a blowjob, lousy lays
(You call it Corn, We call it Maize)
Balcony seats at Shakespeare plays
The HULK was made by GAMMA RAYS!
I start to run again half-crazed
At AMBIGUITY - amazed!
"Yes, there are Days and there are Days!"

It's the Irony, Peaches, the Irony...

Yesterday, during my weekly session with my Therapist, I was having a relatively energetic emotional monologue. In a pause (I occasionally come up for air...occasionally) my dear doctor suggested that I try to relax from the agitated state I was in by picturing "the most beautiful thing you've ever seen." I immediately traveled in memory to the Vatican, St. Peter's standing at the foot (feet?) of Michaelangelo's Pieta. The cold smoothe marble that seems to blush from within. Mary's serenity, divine, sanguine. The drape of the Christ in her arms as she offered Him for us all. The click of feet in the Basilica, whispered echoes...heel toe, heel toe.
In my newly attained moment of peace, a still small voice giggled in my ear, "you picked a dead guy made of marble! Beautiful, yes, but it's the Irony, Peaches, the Irony. Therapy, panic, calm beauty in Death, Mothers and Sons...whatever she's charging you for the hour - a bargain!"
So my peace comes with hiccups of hysterical self mockery. It's MY peace, Peaches, all Timothy.

You Can't Judge A Book By It's Cover

That's a load of crap. Sorry to run a theme into the ground here between Rep. Mark Foley and John Mark Karr pictured here, but I have no problem judging either of those twisted little golden books by their covers. This photo of John Mark Karr says,"if I haven't molested a little girl yet, gimme ten minutes." And if his sweaty little beady eyes didn't make you want to put area schools on lockdown, then I'm sure the dead-fish of a handshake that followed would have. Thank God this pervert was a heterosexual pervert, my people have been maligned enough with Mark Foley - I hear he's a real "page turner."
My point, rare as it is I have one, is that while it may be noble to give every person an opportunity to prove him or herself based on their actions rather than appearance (neither of these guys is a three-eyed, fanged ghoul) sometimes you must go with your gut. The bigger my gut gets, the harder it is for me to drown out its voice - CREEEEEP!

300,000,000 Americans...and I can't get a date.

Gay Republicans, well I swan..

This picture says", please leave me alone with your 11-16 year old boy so that I can try to get my hands on him." Who needs to read the IMs? And while we're asking important questions, what are Gay Republicans for really. Is it self-loathing carried way over the top? Does it give their poor heart-broken Mothers any solace to know that their little fag-pie dears spend their lives in torment once they realize they were bestowed the Floatin' Loafers when Dorothy was handing out party favors.
And of course for this scandal we had to have a GAY creep. Even though it's far more likely that a Male Pedophile with choose a female victim, we get the few memorable ones, the spree killers, thank you Mr Cunanan and your odd Milwaukee Cannibal. Taste like chicken, Jeffrey? Oops! your dead.
I Still can't come up with a use for Gay Republicans...Lawyers to the Mysterious Gay Mafia or La Mafia Miss Ting. I hope I don't awake with a bedful of horse head...again.

There's A Moon In The Sky

It's Called the MOON!
And everybody is there, 'cluding
Saturn,
Jupiter,
Mars,
The Van Allen Belt!

Oh My Dear Lord God I'm FAT!

Not news if you've seen me in the past three months. Which may explain my isolated exile to my apartment. I do shop (how else have I grown my gigantic gut. )
Now I know attractive big men, who have sexy guts. They also have big arms, necks and chest and they are proportional head to foot.
My gut looks like someone snuck up behind me and strapped a 40lb sack of potting soil around my middle. I still have narrow hips and long legs but my massive gut and newly developed love handles & back fat make me look like a potato with pipe-cleaner limbs. Let us not foget the two 42 Double D's that rest atop my gut and bounce when I run. Fear the MOOBS!


Can I lose 40 lbs. in 2 months? Far too fast? Guess I'll need drugs...

Quite A Handful

Every night, before I lie down to rest, I have to swallow this delicious assortment of Chemical Jellybeans. The Doctor must really love me since he (okay, they) give me so many little gifts. They treat a variety of ills, syndromes, complexes and conditions. Some of them treat side-effects that are caused by some of the other ones. Now that's insane. Sadly, none of them make me taller, wealthier, thinner or more tan. In fact, I have to pay for the privelege of taking them. That's insane too.

I'll tell you a secret about chronic illness that no one ever warns you about. Treatable incurable diseases have an element of MONOTONY to them that can catch you by surprise. I will say 'goodnight' to this beautiful handful of pills for the rest of my life. I say 'good day' to their equally colorful counterparts each morning...for the rest of my life. Of course I'm happy that I will live a long full life with medical support but I sometimes see a line of pills that stretches until it disappears from view.

Pills. Infinity. I win.

DUH.

Precious Little "FUN" in Fundamentalists

APOCALYPTIC POLYGAMISTS - try saying that three time fast. Ten thousand followers, twenty-odd wives, the power of life, death and exile to those who call him "Prophet." It's definitely not his looks. At least with David Koresh there was a certain Jim Morrison hippie rocker handsome you could follow into the flames of eternity. But this guy looks like a giant "Barney Fife" (sorry Don Knotts, funny you are - pretty you aren't.)

You know, if you glued a bad beard on the "Prophet" and threw him in a dress, he'd look a little like everybody's favorite Fundamental Islamist Terrorist - Osama (Who's Yo Mama?) Bin Laden. Bad skin and all.

Maybe they had to become crazy evil deluded devil men because acne made them lonely? Hmmm. The World may never know.

7.) MY SOUL-EYE CAN'T CLOSE

It can't, you know, without my dying. It opened far too early. I was only eleven years old when my "sight" was enhanced by the unexpected opening of the eye behind my browline. It made things, natural things beautiful. I could see trees stretching skyward and the rapidly beating heart of the sparrow in its ribs. Skies bluer or greyer or clearer or cloudier - I remember the first Texas thunderstorm I saw with my newly uncovered eye. Oh, so tall the clouds, so bright the lightning and how tiny I was in the thunder-clap. Everything looked as it had the day before but nothing was the same. I could see my dog's love for me like a bright shadow that smeared the space behind him as he jumped at my feet. I knew the colors of joy.

People fared far less well. My "truer" sight of them revealed the many darker shadows they dragged behind them. Fear and Fear's ugly children - Rage, Anger, Hatred, Stupidity, Envy, Suffering, Hurt, Betrayal, Shame - the yellow and green of old bruising.

I found myself shying away from encounters with people I didn't know. Fewer surprises that way. I also spent as little time with figures of authority as I could manage. Preacher man, teacher, politician, doctor, lawyer - the more practiced their treatment of their fellow man, the darker and more deeply layered the "Fear garment" they wrapped themselves in.

I would have blinded my soul eye if I'd known how, Over my adult life I've tried - alcohol, drugs, sex - all just attempts at gouging out the eye that lets me see too clearly.

The dirtiest trick my soul eye played was to reveal the tenuous nature of the Faith that surrounded me. Where I expected Faith solid as mountains I saw Fear. Where Fear was not - in its place stood Delusion.

With my own Fear in place, I scan each face I see.

6.) SLOW ASLEEP

Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep,
I Used To Run - I'm Old, I Creep.
If I Should Die Before I Wake,
Recheck My Pulse, I Like To Fake.

Now I Lay Me Down To Rest,
Cry Havoc! As I Beat My Chest.
If I Should Die Asleep, Afire
Then Blame It On A Faulty Wire.

Now I Lay Me Down To Dream,
Paralysis Prevents A Scream.
If I Should Die - Okay, Who's Kiddin'
DEATH, for me, Has Been Forbidden.

5.) My Dreams Are Viscious

Below us is a pool where, in sleep, all Answers are revealed. Then waking the Questions change. In this pool, this Sea of Sleep we can excercise the dreams of the day with no fears, no reprisal.

Past that most cathartic interlude, Wonderland of Dreams is the place where the miracle ideas begin to take shape. It is our willingness to snatch at the fading threads of dreams as we awaken. Our aggressive scanning of our own minds so that no idea conceived is lost.

We have dreamed the perfect world. It's our waking hatreds that prevent it.