and you find it in the wierdest places

the other day someone told me what everyone thought was a lame-ass joke, but i couldn't shake it, it took me half a day to decode the pearl in it which was as profound as any wisdom i ever heard

it involved a hunter and a bear, the hunter was a fool and the bear was a natural, nature (what is).

it reminds me of that idea in the GoT (not game of thrones, gospel of thomas)

His disciples said to him: "On what day will the kingdom come?" "It will not come when it is expected. No one will say: 'See, it is here!' or: 'Look, it is there!' but the Kingdom of the Father is spread over the earth and men do not see it."

right here, right now

as Jesus (jesus jones, not the other one) says

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwpjsToHzAE

always a party in the upper room

There were many lamps in the upper room where we were gathered together.

One of my favorite songs. Blasted it right after the SCOTUS ruling on gay marriage...

I have arrived. I am home.
In the here. In the now.
I am solid. I am free.
In the ultimate I dwell.
--Thich Nhat Hanh

youkrst wrote:right here, right nowas Jesus (jesus jones, not the other one) sayshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwpjsToHzAE

It's a song I've not given much thought to, reflecting on the lyrics, I see that, "I was alive and waited for this" and "watching the world wake-up from history"
have relevance.

Should be taking delivery this week of Pier Head Jump and Nobody Comes Back, These are fictions, Dying In The Sun is a non-fiction about growing old in Florida particularly, I'm curious here, though the material may be dated.

In the interim I've been reading The Carrier book.

wonderful, i'm still trying to find time to get into Cool Hand Luke, time to read text is the hardest thing for me, but i have holidays coming up so that will be the perfect time to dive in.

what a theme, what a mythology, Pearce FTW!!!

Cool Hand Luke on playin' the banjo:

"Just pickin' and pluckin' and playin' it real cool" "Cause you gotta be cool. That's part of the job" "That's all. Remain refrigerated."

Dnn Pearce's "Nobody Comes Back"

From the book jacket:

Winter 1944:
Ardennes Mountains

"Master story teller Donn Pearce, author and
screen writer of Cool hand Luke, brings readers
into the heart of the Battle of the Bulge as the Germans
exploit the Allies vulnerable position.

Told from the point of view of sixteen year old infantryman
Toby Parker, this is the story of a boy's catapult into manhood.
Captured twice by the Germans, he refuses to surrender and
escapes to eventually form his own unit of MIA's. Triggered to fight WWII
biggest land battle, this angry, maverick soldier must struggle to
forge his own brand of ethics while savoring the thrill of risk
and danger.

In this moving novel, Pearce conveys the passion and
urgency of one of WWII's most memorable operation's
and the motives, courage, and emotions of those who fought it.

No Body Comes Back, takes an in-depth look at a lone
soldier forced confront himself in the chaos of battle."

I'd compare the story to Andy Weir's "The Martian". In both stories the main character is in a struggle for life, both have to deal logically with results of the unknown.
In NCB we read about Parker a sixteen year old kid who is in love with a girl that is emotionally distant, he wants to make an impression upon her, he enlists in the Army.
His first day in theater finds him in a foxhole mere hours before a major Nazi offensive, the siege of Bastogne.

In Donn Pearce's mind, I find a writer, who is incapable of sugar coating a sledgehammer.

No Body Comes Back, the title refers, not to a tragic tail of some kid who dies in battle (ultimately Parker is awarded the bronze star) But to orders that there is no safe place in the rear,
that if a man has at least one good eye and at least one good trigger finger, they will remain on the front lines in defense of the besieged Bastogne.

Pearce spares the reader extraneous character development despite there being many cohorts introduced into the story but the nature of tragedy and the history of actual events necessarily means that many bite the dust.

A wiki link to the Battle of the Bulge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Bulge

The only Cool Hand Luke like moment in NCB is after our MIA squad has captured a German held farm house

"Fred-half crazy, wincing and laughing as Jenson worked
on his shoulder with sulfa, bandages and tape.
"You shoulda seen it. I'm tellin' you. General Goldilocks
here? He just walks right up. He knocks on the front door like
he's one of the local neibors and he says, 'Scuse me. Is there
any l'il ole bears at home today?'
Parker smiled. Headly told him he did a good job. But
Parker thought of that look in the snoozing trooper's eyes and
that feeble wave of toilet paper. Shit in heaven was right.

Just one moment from the story that was amusing for my sensibilities.

Earlier in the thread I linked Jimi Hendrix's version of the Star Spangled Banner, What I find
interesting is that it was a measure of pride for Hendrix, He wasn't mocking the U.S.,
He was an ex-soldier himself, Not necessarily a protest, but a participation in America.

A person has an idea, a story, it possesses them like a disease, an author writes the idea out to get it over with, to cure that disease.

Write till you are blue in the face, but if what you are writing is turning blue, well, it just ain't clicking, Keep on writing, as writing can make you nuts.

At some point it will click, the work will stream from you, lean back, visualize, it has a life of its own.

Understanding writing is done by writing. Construct the story, from you it will go from non-existence to existence.

Writing is from what change comes from, What part of the universe do you want to talk about? that's your genesis of thought.

We're human, We are collectors of experience, get hooked, What's your hook as a writer?.

Key is understanding yourself, understanding is inside of yourself, know what you want to be objectively, rational, do it!.

Life is circles. Learn, learning, having an experience, experiencing different points of view makes you a person(human).

What requires the greater effort, to teach or to criticize?

None of the above can be sited as direct quotes, these are just some words a kind man spoke to me.

That man is Donn Pearce, these are some of the things he spoke to me and for those excellent thoughts I will always be grateful, Thanks Mr. Pearce.