Not that anything will change, but...

check out this report from the ADC on Israel's war crimes from last year's war on Lebanon. http://www.adc.org/PDF/Lebrep.pdf



It's been a year, people are already expecting the sequel.

five ramblings of a textured stone

As the wind swiftly crashed the tent around me leaving my flesh exposed to piercing droplets of acidic rain, I woke stumbling a lethargic grog trying to catch up to the half-spent night. I always lament the incomplete dream halted by necessitated waking hours not longing for longer sleep, but an urge to see a vision through that hints a path of my future battles is turned away.

I walk. As though not accustomed to limbs carrying this burdening weight, I stagger my pace into tree limbs for stability. Losing control is not as devastating as I had once feared.

The fear comes in exciting doses of shifting concerns rushing in increasing intervals till time mashes all to one overwhelming isolation. The laboring rain is gone. Even the trees are gone.

I’m left to roam a parched earth weary of my steps. I can not float. Perhaps the vision is meant to abandon. As a child I witnessed my impending doom. This was a vision I could grasp. As an adult the vision alarms into an aim broader with me surviving for moments longer to serve. I remain idle.

As the wind reshapes my forgotten face into guiltless smirks that keep suspicious strangers from attacking, I seek coyly a silent cave trying to pray a solution, waiting for sleep to recapture a wondering mind urging a vision complete.

Sans Islam?

So Yusuf Islam continues on his comeback to pop culture with a new album "An Other Cup" (first in 28yrs, released last year) and by performing during Live Earth Concert at Hamburg. Leading up to the concert Fox News ran a special attacking Islam, portraying the man as a terrorist, a US hater and claimed that he is on a "watch" list and "no fly" list. He is not on any list. Why is the man with numerous peace awards being attacked so much? and are these attacks influential enough to have his stage name shortened to just Yusuf? He has been misquoted and bullied into making comments he does not support. Regardless of what the West makes him out to be, his music is classic. Just listen to Peace Train. PBS aired a documentary that clears the air and calls any allegations against him comical. Good program, but I can't find it anywhere. (if you know of it let me know).

Well, I'm certain there is a lot that could be made about him, his music, his life and statements, I don't think hes' a "great" man but a good man and deserving of some peace like the rest of us, but forget all that and listen to his music, it's less stressful.

4th of July in Dearborn...do you still miss it?

sure this looks like a professional display of some 4th of July fireworks in a large park somewhere

but this is in my neighborhood! The entire neighborhood was lit up by kids firing their extensive stash. The streets filled with empty shells and the air was smokey for hours. I can still hear them going off at 1:38 in the morning. I also saw the Dearborn police patrolling with no action taken, perhaps they were happy with the display of patriotism.

Get off of my Cloud!

“If left to their own means, the Lebanese would destroy Lebanon,” said Hilal Khashan, professor of political sciences at the American University of Beirut. But “There is an international decision that Lebanon be maintained.”

I wonder who's paying this guy.

If Lebanon would be left to the Lebanese, it would be heaven on Earth.
The problem with Arab nations is not the people, it is with all the people who want to run each nation, or destroy it, or create a "civil war" or instill a dictator.

If each Arab nation would be left for the people, the people would be happy and more importantly, Alive.

Lebanon's leading Chirstian, Sunni and Shiite clergy all said pretty much the same thing, all of Lebanon's sects want, can and will live together in peace and harmony, if not for all this outside agitation by powers looking out for their personal gain, where Lebanon is a proving ground, a test facility, a target, a battle ground to settle old scores, a lamb sacrificed for a glutinous gorge by perverted tastes. of course most of this could not happen without a couple of crackheads who are in government selling their constituancy and power for a chance to party with condi.

I've heard every theory and every excuse and every blame, but hell...just leave Lebanon the hell alone, they'll fend for themselves and they'll thrive in peace.

Anyone who thinks otherwise is being paid to think so.

Ignorance is Bliss?

Today, I realized I've been living a lie.
Living in denial.
Living in fear.
Today I realized that what's important to me,
is in conflict with what's important to me.
What's important is a lie.
Everything around me has been built to perpetuate a lie.
And I believed it most, because I believed I knew what the lie was and what the truth was.
And that's the lie.

But it's about to change

convergence

A week ago I heard my phone ring. I chose to fall asleep rather than answer. In my sleep I did answer, it was my friend telling me to take him to the hospital. He was having a heart attack. I ignored him. The next day, I decide to call him. His brother had taken him to the hospital in the middle of the night. It wasn't a heart attack but he felt he had one. I didn't tell him about my dream.

A couple of days ago I woke up from a dream violently due to its last action. I dreamt chronologically, a rare occurrence. Playing out like an opening sequence of a surreal film, it was quite and erie. I was driving. At an intersection by my house I heard a loud revving of an engine, I was stopped in the left lane. A motorcycle swerved around the corner hit my driver side and crashed, the rider landed in the intersection in the path of oncoming traffic. His head was crushed by an oncoming car.
After I woke up, I thought nothing of it. I got dressed and headed for work. I stopped at an intersection by my house. As I was stopping in the left lane, I heard a voice say "Right" so I took the right lane. Then I heard the loud revving of an engine, the motorcycle swerved a bit less then in my dream and didn't have my car there to hit, he missed the oncoming traffic and rode off.

This morning as I was gardening, I gave my son a simple task of bagging some yard waste, I thought I was making a mistake leaving him alone in the back yard alone while I was in the front. Then a vision popped into my head of him running to me screaming with his head bleeding. I ignored it and went back to work. ten minutes later, I heard a scream. My son came running with his hand on his ear crying. His little brother hit him with the rake. Luckily it was a minor flesh wound.

After a long day of gardening I decided to sit in the back yard quietly with my coffee and smokes. I was shocked by an instance of violence and what appeared to be a bullet coming straight for me, there was no bullet...
as of this writing, I'm still alive.

well my friend is back home, surviving a small scare and a couple of days in the hospital. Thanks to those who prayed for him.

I can't believe it has been a year.
I never thought that I'd be able to live a year without my brother or be able to function or get back into the routine.
I never thought I'd be able to let life take over again. I always thought life or time or I would just stop when the person I loved most in life died, but it didn't , the world didn't stop. It kept going and even faster, unrecognizably.
I can't believe it's been a year.
I often catch myself in a normal everyday situation and wonder how it is possible to be normal, how is it possible for me to do alone the things we used to do together, how is it possible to laugh with his children without him, how is it possible for me to live after the realization of the fear that haunted me since his birth.
How is it possible that it has been a year.
My son says he feels like his uncle is not dead, but more like on a long vacation and he expects him to come through the door any minute, all he can remember is his smile. I remember more, more of the pain and know more about death than I care to.
My friend lost his son as he came to mourn my brother, my brother-in-law lost his father before my brother, then his mother shortly after. I lost a friend in the war and then a couple of relatives, then more friends. A family friend lost in the hospital where my brother's blood had not yet dried, then another. My grandfather lived longer than most, then he too joined them, I lost another loved one.
I can't believe its been a year, I can't believe this year.

Now my best friend is in the hospital. All I can hope is that the trend is over.