i've decided...

i am going to become a professional writer. i am going to do what my father should have done many years ago. why? i think for the following reasons:

i have things to say and can say them with a certain degree of proficiency
i come up with ideas that are worth exploring
i like language and expression
i enjoy writing

what are my obstacles:

my lack of self discipline
laziness
procrastination
limited language skills
i don't read very much
need to support my family financially
time and energy

how do i get around my obstacles:

work a little every day
read a few pages every day
use dictionaries
make a deadline
work when i have time

currently i have ideas for 3 novels, 4 feature films, 2 shorts, and half a dozen short stories including a children's book. for goodness sake, i have to write otherwise i'll never be able to read how they end!

anyhow - i thought i'd say it publicly. what better way to kick things off and be on my way.

-cyrusout

american shame

i've watched the country known for democracy and freedom shame itself. it is neither democratic nor free - it is tied by it's nose through the media chain held by the current administration. and where the administration leads, the mindless minions latching like a baby onto the breast of easy slogans and simplistic fears follow.

i am ashamed to be an american today. for the first time i thought about giving away my citizenship. i thought about the embarrasment i will face living abroad as a u.s. citizen.

how can americans be so ignorant, so easily confused by denial, repetitive name calling, and mudslinging to forget the issues, the world circumstances, the deep divisions precipitated by one of the most narrowminded, most war mongering, most self-serving administrations in recent history? how can we want a continuation of war unless we are a nation of redneck simpletons who believe bush's bonanza sherrif "not on my watch" campaign lines? how can we forget the lies and trickery of this administration, shenanigans which have been so transparently obvious and yet somehow rendered unimportant by some well planned sloganeering?

there is no end to the questions which the election results bring up and no answers to satisfy them.

just because bush was able to screw up america and the rest of the world doesn't mean he is the right person to clean up the bloody mess. he has demonstrated no aptitude for creating a moderate milieu to allow for discussion and coalition building. instead he has polarised the world with "if-you're-not-for-us-you're-against-us" threats and struck fear into the heart of other nations with his unilateral military action. no longer is america a leader, but rather the most dangerous nation in the world: paranoid, powerful, myopic, and aggressive, blantantly leveraging those who do not agree with it and fighting those who will not be coerced. can this kind of america put aside war to create stability and soften divisions that are the breeding ground for conflict? hardly likely.

i can only pray in a way that i don't normally pray that somehow the polarisation of opinions and viewpoints reverses and people wake up from this continuing nightmare with the desire in their hearts to look for constructive ways to build accord and rebuild the destruction wreaked by the belligerent actions of an administration that can be easily termed "mentally ill".

to hope that the next four years will be any better than the previous four seems like folly, but hope is all i have left for now. i will watch from my distant vantage point and do the best i can to see beyond the cloud of my current fears. things would be so much simpler if i just believed everything i saw on tv.

-cyrusout

all i can do is wait

with the early results of the election coming in favoring bush, i can't help but feel a sense of dread. reading the news doesn't help. i want it to be over, but over in a sane way rather than the insane option which looks to persist. i guess in the end if calamity is to happen then it is unavoidable.

on that note, here's an article from the onion which might serve as an interesting counterpoint...

mantra

i will live to see the day we return from the landfill clutching a gum wrapper and piece of string
i will live to see the day the serpent rises from my bed and devours me in two bites before watching 'jeopardy' reruns.
i will live to see the day you bring flowers and a blue plastic vase to the pta meeting
i will live to see the day my face withers and sags in the summer heat
i will live to see the day you look at me and think of derelict whitewashed fences
i will live to see the day my children point to me and say "it was his fault"
i will live to see the day i open my mouth and india ink drips from my tongue on to your embroidered doilies
i will live to see the day my past is summed up in a single snapshot
i will live to see the day the stars fall to earth and all property values rise
i will live to see the day i forget my name and stand at the signpost at the bottom of the world and see nothing but the pacific ocean breaking over the volcanic stone and spraying on to my technicolor windbreaker
i will live to see the day i open a box with my name on it and see it empty

all this is nothing more
all this is nothing less
all this is nothing more
all this is nothing less
20/10/04