An Ideal For Living

In 2007 Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino brought the grindhouse/exploitation genre back into the theaters with Grindhouse. It was a kitschy homage to the exploitation films of the 60’s and 70’s with plenty of nods and winks to audience. Planet Terror and Death Proof both had their strengths and weaknesses, but the breakout feature of the film was ultimately the fake trailers used to give the double-feature an authentic grindhouse feel.

It wasn’t surprising then that in 2010 the first of the trailers was made into a feature and released. Robert Rodriguez brought Machete to the big screen and while it took some risks that paid off and worked hard to give us current political commentary on the hypocrisy and racism at the heart of a lot of US anti-immigration activism and legislation (Arizona’s outrageous and increasingly absurd laws and attitudes in particular), the film came off as too slick and too self-aware to really be effective. The film really wanted you to see how clever it was and the slick cinematography stood in sharp contrast to the genre it was supposed to be emulating.

Ultimately, Machete was fun but it was not really the grindhouse experience that exploitation fans were anticipating.

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“As a dedicated and aggressive Constutionalist, Jones consistently defends the Bill of Rights, property rights, and our nation’s borders. In the spirit of Thomas Jefferson and George Washington, Jones passionately argues against foreign entanglements and wars for the sake of corporate and banking interests. Jones avoids the bogus political labels of “left and right” and instead focuses on what really matters — what’s right and wrong. As a tenacious journalist, Jones has broken hundreds of national stories over the span of his career.”

This is from the bio of Alex Jones on the Infowars website, part of an small media empire with Jones at its centre. It paints a certain portrait of Jones, as does his radio show, internet broadcasts and documentary films, namely that of Jones as this crusader for truth and as a great unmasker of government charlatanry. Yet for all his years on the air and on the internet allegedly exposing the high crimes of states and corporations he’s never had the kind of attention Julian Assange and Wikileaks have garnered both from the press and from state powers themselves.

One might wonder why Alex Jones has been shut out of the big time.

No US senators ever openly called for his extrajudicial murder.

No committee was ever formed to determine if Jones and his extensive media properties broke laws that were more or less totally designed to suppress dissent like the Espionage Act.

Yet the things Jones has exposed about the US government and the big corporations looming over our lives are far more shocking than anything Wikileaks has ever published. Go check out Jones sites like infowars.com and prisonplanet.com and you will see the lurid details of the government conspiracy to destroy the World Trade Center and Pentagon and pin it on terrorists in order to justify an assault on personal liberty and for the bankers to profit. We are left to wonder if the bankers in question might be jewish, but we know the conclusion Jones wants us to draw don’t we?

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There has been a recent stir in the media over Rob Ford not returning calls from the press on the issue of the fee stores are mandated by law to levy for consumers to use plastic bags in the City of Toronto.

It is well known that Ford prides himself on answering every call and getting personally involved with every constituent who comes to his office. Hell, I’d be proud of this too, it is one of the things I genuinely admire about the man.

Ford demands better customer service from the City now that he is mayor. Wants the entire City to run like his constituency office-every call is answered and given personal attention not just the run around. This was one of the main planks of his platform.

Now, people attempt to contact Ford about an issue. The call isn’t answered, there is no official response, personal or otherwise.

Some in the press and in the public are stopping and pointing out the glaring issue here.

Ford supporters are suggesting what would amount to a media conspiracy to make Ford appear to be a hypocrite by suggesting media outlets only made one call, or they made a bunch of calls at once when they knew Ford wasn’t available just so they could have a “gotcha” moment.

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Nightswimming
Draft C
David Pace-Bonello
December 12 2010

The “No Trespassing” sign was just another warning they had ignored that night. Older versions of themselves were sometimes struck by how cavalier they were; either ignorant of the risks they took almost daily entertaining themselves in the way of small town misfits everywhere or just as flippant about it as they were with anything else Big and Serious in the world before them. It was a kind of grim fatalism that wore sexy on the young and the lost; sad and frightening on the adult.

It was well known this strip of lakeside cottages were long since sold to some developer or another and trapped in the limbo of failed real estate projects, tattered notices of applications for zoning changes stapled to plywood placards which served as a marker for the overgrown narrow private drive that lead them to the secret beach.

How long before the fences went up or even worse that it was discovered by the bush party crowd? It was only a matter of time, certainly, but this is why they were careful and went in only under the cover of darkness, down the pitch black gravel path, past the long abandoned sailboat with its flaking blue pinstripes fading after each winter spent entombed in snow and each summer turned belly up to the sun like a dying tortoise. After the boat it was a quick walk down a path marked by cracked patio stones until you felt your feet sink into the cloying sand, usually still warm from the daylight.

The beach that night was scattered with clothing discarded in the rush to the water. A rush both eager and hesitant as each faced the cold water and the exposure of their naked bodies to the night and to each other, some not for the first time naturally, but still not without the awkwardness of the abandon. It was an almost sequential trail; backpacks and purses to shirts to shoes to pants to underclothes to socks and then the choice to dive for the cover of the water and face the cool depths or anxiously shuffle around fully exposed while waiting for the courage to take the plunge. Shrieks and splashing would follow.

He watched it play out. Watched them silhouetted by the moon against the horizon and took a long drag of his cigarette. Beside him, planted in the sand was the cheap bottle of merlot stolen from his mothers wine rack. It was already half-drunk as they called for him to join them, to stop being a pussy and get in the water. He heard her out there too, asking him to come out and assuring him the water was great. The water was always great.

They would soon give up and resume their fun in the water. He knew it and waved them off like it was no big deal, like he didn’t need to swim right now and he just wanted to drink and relax on the beach.

Predictably they swam out further until he could no longer make out their shapes in the moonlight and just heard their laughter and faux-whispers, loud enough to be heard across the whole lake no doubt. He lay back, closed his eyes and puffed lazily.

He heard their laughter. The giggling of the girls, the shrieks at being grabbed by unknown hands underwater, the playfighting. He heard her laugh, so familiar to him yet sounding very different to him that night as she swam and played with the others. She sounded like some kind of pure joy out there, free and wild. His heart swelled and he felt himself drifting into reverie, the same joy in her voice as they lay in bed and shared a cigarette long ago. Maybe too long ago.

A sudden scream and he was bolt upright, ready to dash into the water, quickly followed by more laughter.

- You asshole…

He relaxed again, leaning back on his elbows and took in the night and the pleasure of his friends. Unable to deny to himself that he wanted to join them any longer he gripped the gritty wine bottle, took a gulp for bravery, stood up and began an uncertain walk to the shoreline discarding his shirt as he went.

Kicking off his shoes and pulling his socks off and tossing them with abandon due to his sudden surge of bravery he slipped a foot in the chilly water. Then another.

The splashing out there intensified though he still could not see them. Very soon he thought he would be joining in. He heard her talking with the other girls, marveling at what a perfect night it was. How could it be perfect to her, he thought, without him out there with her?

2 bold steps into the water. The cold stung and he closed his eyes. Felt the mushy sand and tiny stones between his feet and felt the first waves of fear grip him. His mind conjured unknown horrors from the depths, a rotting hand brushing along the bottoms of his feet grasping for him, hungry prehistoric species of something nipping at him, tendrils coiling around his calf and pulling him under.

Paralyzed for a moment he summoned his courage and willed himself to move forward.

He failed and as the bitterness of his weakness struck him, so did her words out in the water:

- I don’t know…he’s sulking on the beach or something. It’s typical, just leave him.

Deflated he went back to his bottle, took a drink, plopped down in the sand again and lit another cigarette.

He heard her laughing again and then a male laugh. One of their friends. There was more splashing, more laughter back and forth between them. He wondered what they were doing and if they were just playing in the water or if hands were wandering below. An accidental touch here, a sly grin and a blush. A bitten lip and a rush of blood riding a wave of confused emotions and the impulsive sexuality of their youth.

He sat up again abruptly and distinctly felt the wine go to his head as he tried to dismiss the images even as he heard the two of them laughing and talking, their words masked by the white noise of the water and the vast open space between them.

Surely nothing was happening out there. They were all loyal friends, were they not? He then recalled a night nearly a year before, drunk in a closet with a friends girl. The ice in his stomach grew colder.

He had to go out there. Had to put himself between her and whatever was leading her away from him, whatever was making her content to let him sit on the beach, whomever she was laughing with. It ought to be him.

Another walk to the shore.

Another foot in the water.

Up to the knees this time before the paralyzing fear took hold and he could go no further and he stood helpless, a pilgrim between two worlds.

He couldn’t hear them anymore so he stood completely still, closed his eyes and held his breath. Imagining them floating out there in the dark void, free and without fear he listened carefully.

Was that whispers? Or was it the wind through the plastic tarps which covered the unfinished boathouse? What secrets were being shared out there beyond his reach? What oaths were being made in word or flesh?

Stop it. Stop thinking like this. He admonished himself. He clenched his fists until his nails bit into his palms and still he found no more courage and no more ability to drive away the panic he was now in.

Just relax. Nothing is happening. They are just floating around out there. These are your friends, your lover.

A sigh. That familiar sharp intake of breath and barely stifled groan. He knew exactly where to touch her to make her do that and now so did someone else. Or did they? Was he hearing things? Was an overactive mind turning the ambient sounds of their covert beach into a paranoid fantasy? Were they talking about him? Were they talking at all or was it all unspoken now, the secret silent language of hands wandering under black water, of naked bodies brushing in the slick darkness.

He had no idea how long he was still for, straining his ears and contorting his head to attempt to better hear what was happening out there, his hand in the water to try to catch how their bodies illicit moves disturbed the lake.

Finally a series of splashes, some more laughing and a “race you back to the beach”.

He moved quickly now as if being in the water implicated him, made him an intruder. Back up the beach, shirt and shoes back on and more wine.

Her kiss seemed hesitant when she came for him and though she held his hand on the walk back past the derelict sailboat and along the gravel path he felt like she was still out there somewhere and he was on the beach, looking for her. Marooned.

Many years later as he reflected upon his life and where he was in it he would come to see this story as a metaphor.

He was found naked in the spillway of a dam at age 40, bloated from a full weekend in the water. He may have been in there longer but the discovery of his clothes in a neatly folded pile, wallet and an empty bottle of merlot by the riverside prompted a search.

The police wrote it up as a suicide. There were those of us who knew better.

So I found my battered copy of Racewarrior today and decided I would share it here. It was given to Julian in a kids birthday party loot bag and we actually ended up tracking down several copies at a Party Packagers store.

Here is what I immediately don’t understand about this comic:

Everything.

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I finally got around to watching Avatar last night with my family and although I’ve read and seen a lot about it over the past year, actually watching and experiencing the thing in all its glory was completely worth it. Even if only to help me decide exactly how I feel about it as it is a film with plenty of controversy surrounding it. The high minded film intelligentsia look down on it as populist popcorn dreck for the huddled masses while the huddled masses turned out in droves to watch blue space elves fight space marines in what could easily be called Dances With Wolves 2: Wolves in Spaaace!

You might think by that last line that I’ve surrendered my opinion already and that I’ve sided with the film elite against Avatar, but I like to think my opinion is a little more nuanced than all that.

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The internet is a world of wonders and information. The greatest repository of human knowledge yet assembled and possibly the greatest mirror into the very culture that created it.

This is why on the internet I can learn how nuclear fission works or I can discover the world of biology. I can email astronauts in space or learn how people all over the world are creating homemade solar panel networks to power their neighborhoods. I can read firsthand stories of brave people who challenge tyranny in places like Iran.

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Not sure why I feel such a strong need to justify having this blog in the first place but I think exchanges like the one I’m having with Mike in the Mary Sue announcement post illustrate to me at least another really good reason to pursue this.

The question of whether or not it was going to be a funny story forced me to really consider what the story was about at the heart of it. It isn’t that I hadn’t been thinking about the themes of the story and what it would ultimately be about, it is that I’ve never had to really articulate it anywhere besides my own mind. Having to actually write it out and try to explain to someone else what this story was supposed to be aiming for was a great exercise for me and forced me to cut through a lot of the tangential notions of what the story is and just focus on communicating the core of it.

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I’d like to introduce my readers to the first of 3 major projects I plan to work my way through over the next however long it happens to take. I’m very excited about this one in particular because I think it is going to be fun to write (an unusual perception of the writing process for me) and for readers I think it will be a lot of fun to read.

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Easy Like Sunday Morning

It’s a nice Sunday morning and I’m ready to work.