Sitting here drinking cold coffee....  Since I'm still fighting this cold, I don't like it hot so well — and anyway, our fairly new coffee pot only keeps it hot for two hours.  Lucky (the Doberman) got me up at 4:20 a.m. to go potty.  While I was downstairs (I take the dogs out through our basement door), since I knew Geri's alarm would go off at 4:30, I went ahead and made the coffee and then climbed back into bed.  I usually don't climb back into bed, partly because I can't sleep when someone else is up around me (ever since prison), partly because I feel guilty sleeping when she's going to work to pay the bills, and partly because I'm used to getting up early (also since prison, where the bright white lights came on at 6 or 5:30, depending on what year) — plus, the morning's my most productive time.  I say the "bright white" lights (which might sound redundant), because in prison the lights never went totally off — in the dormitories dark blue lights shined all night, and white light streamed through from the bathroom area and sometimes the day room or the lamp on the officer's desk.  Actually, I'm not sure whether to call it a bathroom or a restroom because both are misnomers.  You couldn't take a bath there or rest there — though you could bathe there (just not in a tub, and not after "lights out" — which is another misnomer because, like I said, the lights never went totally out).  Oh — there were also the personal TVs that many of my fellow inmates had (I never did).  If you had a TV on the nightstand by your bed, you could leave it on all night, as long as you had headphones attached — even during the day, playing your TV without headphones was against the rules, though I always found the pictures on TV more distracting than the sound of it (but at least I could turn away from the pictures if I didn't want distracted) — though some officers would come by and turn off your TV if they saw you were sleeping.  You could watch your TV all night, as long as you got up and made it to work the next day.  Every inmate in prison had a "job" - most were paid $18 a month for that job (some jobs required 5 hours of work a week, some 50 or more, though that was supposedly against the rules) — unless they had a "medical restriction," essentially a certification from the prison doctor that excused them from work.  An inmate with a medical restriction made $3 a month for not working.  So the usual working inmate received a net $15 dollars a month from the State of Ohio for his labor.  But I digress....

I went back to bed this morning, but then almost immediately had to pee.  So while I was up again I figured the coffee must be done — went down to get Geri a cup (she was putting on makeup or doing her hair or something) and went back to bed again (it was probably 5 a.m.).  A few hours later, another of the dogs woke me up.  Geri was at work, the pot had turned off and the coffee was cold.  I hate wasting good coffee — but I also dislike microwaved coffee (since prison, too — but not just because of that).  So I'm drinking it cold.  But first I had to drink another Alka Seltzer Cold Plus, because I felt shittier than I did last night when a combination of good poetry/music, friends and Alka Seltzer Cold Plus helped me get through our 2nd annual St. Patrick's Day poetry event at Bela Dubby.  And I forgot to mention root beer.  Normally I resist taking pills/tablets/medicine of any sort (besides Prilosec, because I have horrible heartburn, reflux, chest pain if I don't), but I was determined not to miss Lix and Kix (and our featured performers Sammy Greenspan, Zach Ashley, and Trenchcoat Manifesto) and didn't want to be coughing, sneezing, blowing my nose and/or having constant snot running down my lips and chin if I didn't blow all night.  I still felt like doodoo (as I do now), but the ASCP makes it bearable and allows me to get something done.

Now for the big news — my mom's been in the hospital since Sunday.  I hadn't called to check on her or visited in a week or so because Geri's sister, daughter and our four little grandchildren were staying with us from Friday through Sunday.  And then I started getting sick Sunday on our way home from dropping them off in Columbus.  I don't go to Mom's when I'm getting sick because the last thing she needs to pick up while nursing her fractured back is a cough.  And she's been dealing with that for a while since she's been reluctant to have back surgery if she can at all heal without it.  Well, the pain became so great Sunday, she had my step-dad take her to the emergency room.  The hospital then admitted her and apparently convinced her to finally have the surgery.  Anyway, my brother tried to call me Sunday to let me know, but I hadn't taken my phone to Columbus.   He says he left a message, but I never got it, maybe because my voice mailbox was full.  Anyway, so Mom's been in the hospital since Sunday and I didn't find out till yesterday (Wednesday) around noon when my step-dad called me.  And I live pretty darned close to just around the corner from her house!

When I found out, I called her at the hospital.  She was understanding, as mom always is — more concerned with me, since I sounded like shit on the phone, than with herself, though she's the one having back surgery and the excruciating pain that's led up to it.  Of course I felt like a dick because I would've known where she was if I hadn't been too consumed in my own work/activities and sickness to give her a call.  I had checked in on her Facebook page a few times — but though I noticed she hadn't been on it in a week or so, that didn't alarm me, because that's common with her.  Anyway, she's scheduled to have the back surgery today (Thursday) at noon.  I wanted badly to be there for and with her, both yesterday and today — thought if I slathered my arms and hands with disinfectant and kept my mouth covered with a mask I might not infect her — but she insisted I STAY PUT and just visit her when I'm over this and she's home.  She even tried to talk me out of going to Lix and Kix last night.  But she knows I love her and am there "in spirit" (whatever that means — but it's true).

Okay, this sick morning rambling has worn me out — and anyway, I need to blow my nose and get more cold coffee.  I'm tempted to go back and remove all references to prison from this blog.  Talking about it (and thinking about it) wearies me — and I feel I bring it up far more often than someone who's been out nearly six years ought.  But part of the problem with writing a book about my experience is I can't fully begin to put it behind me as long as the book's not finished.  Then again, who am I kidding?  I'll never be able to put it totally behind me, any more than the Lincoln memorial can put behind the statue of Abe in it that makes up a big part of what it is.  An imperfect analogy, I know — but cut me some slack.  Only a man with a fever would compare prison to the Great Emancipator.  And would sick morning rambling be sick morning rambling if edited — even if the editor was a sick morning rambler?  So here it is...

In the words of one of the Beatles on "Revolution #9":  Take this, brother [or sister].  May it serve you well.

        

Wednesday 17 March 2010 at 7 p.m. — The 2nd annual Lix and Kix St. Patrick's Day extravaganza will feature Trenchcoat Manifesto (poetry and music by Tom Adams and Richard Hearn), Michigan performance poet Zach Ashley, and Cleveland Heights' very own Sammy Greenspan (author of Step Back from the Closing Doors, from Pudding House Publications) at Bela Dubby, 13321 Madison Ave. in Lakewood, Ohio.  An open mic will follow.


poster by Dianne Borsenik

        

Though still exploring this through a bad head cold that struck me full force last night, I'm very intrigued by what I've read so far today about Kazimierz Dąbrowski's Theory of Positive Disintegration.  Read more about it here: http://positivedisintegration.com.

You might also find the Wikipedia page about it interesting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_Positive_Disintegration

Thanks to Sammy Greenspan for turning me on to Dąbrowski and his theory in response to my last blog entry.

        

Much to think about here....  I was recently told by a poet I respect highly (and a couple others I respect, but less highly) that I think too much.  I wanna be open to what they're saying and have given what they said much thought (perhaps proving their point - ha!) — and I know I may be wrong, but I can't help but be inclined to believe that anyone who thinks I think too much has observed and/or thought about it too little before drawing that conclusion.  Maybe I'll believe something different after I observe and think some more.  But I don't think so.

        

Beck and Caw

        

Not as intimate as the last, but nonetheless... I recorded this (on March 6th) before I posted the other.

        

Post Scripped 

        

Recorded at home in Elyria on 20 February 2010:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rHYMVCJQVQ



   

        

Drove by the old house

        

Here's a larger than usual eye coo written late last year, but sometime before 12/3:



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Dig the new William Merricle poem I posted in the Online Library today: Gather.  Four more coming soon!

I found Paul McCartney's Chaos and Creation in the Backyard around 2005.  I've always gotten Paul's albums as soon as they came out — but this was the first time in many years that I was not only not somewhat disappointed, but actually had my high expectations exceeded.  A fantastic album on many levels — I daresay one of my favorite five post prison records.  Here's one song that shows why:




But that's not the song I started out wanting to share.  Here's one I just discovered this morning — apparently it was a bonus track from Chaos and Creation, though it wasn't on the version I borrowed from the Westlake Porter Public Library and ripped to my computer in 2005.  Anyway, though it's not as "perfect" a song as "Riding to Vanity Fair," I rather like it and find it fitting in the wake of the Identity Crisis video I posted on this blog yesterday.





Since 2005, Paul's created some of his best solo works ever (one of them under a pseudonym, The Fireman).  I highly recommend all of these:


     

        

Here's me reading a newly revised version of my 2008 poem "Identity Crisis" at Dunkin Donuts on 11 February 2010 in Brunswick, Ohio - hosted by the Brunswick Art Works.  Since the video by Dianne Borsenik is too long for You Tube, I've uploaded it here exclusively.

        

Tag Tea Him

blink blank stink stank crank me yankee hanky panky
painting spanky semi gloss greener than alfalfa
in mickey house buckwheat o my darla-ing
darjeeling varsitea little rascal u
our gang bang

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Featured poet Jack McGuane (with Claire McMahon) - photo by JC

Featured poet J.E. Stanley - photo by JC

Featured poet Roger Craik - photo by JC

My impromptu pre-show poem using Bela Dubby's magnets - photo by JC

To see the rest of my photos from that night, please visit my Facebook album.  For even more photos, check out my co-host Dianne Borsenik's album.  Videos from the evening will be appearing ASAP on You Tube and the Crisis Chronicles Online Library.

For details on our next Lix and Kix Poetry Extravaganza — on St. Patrick's Day (17 March 2010) featuring Sammy Greenspan, Zach Ashley and Trenchcoat Manifesto, with an open mic to follow — please visit our Facebook event page, Dianne's Lix and Kix MySpace page, or my Crisis Chronicles home page.

        

I'm thrilled that S.A. Griffin has accepted one of my poems for inclusion in his Poetry Bomb project, touring the nation this spring.  Read about the Bomb here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/8966236.  Here's hoping he stops by northern Ohio with it....