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Tag Archives: Henry Rollins

The World Awaits You, or, Meeting Henry & Seeing His Travel Slideshow

09 Tuesday Jan 2018

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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authentic, Henry Rollins, life, music, oneworld, politics, travel, truth

Prepare to be uncomfortable. Prepare to be challenged. Prepare to leave your Western constructs and ideals behind. Get a passport and go visit Kerala on Friday.  You will give me one hundred reasons why you can’t, and Henry Rollins will give you one hundred twenty reasons why you can and you should. You will be a changed person when you leave your doorstep Henry promises, just as J.R.R. Tolkien promised in his tales, but there’s more at stake here in terra firma of 2018.

I wanted so much to tell you what it was like listening to Mr. Rollins give us the backstory of the photos he’s taken on his Travel Slideshow tour. I wrote a pile of pages and when I took a breath, walked away, and came back all I could see was me fan-girling all over my Dad trying to get him to understand why it was so important that he listen to this rock band, see how smart and wise they are, full of boundless passion and world interest, won’t you love them just like me, Dad?

Henry doesn’t need anyone to fan-girl all over him, and he doesn’t need me to promote or explain him or his books or his tour. Henry has, however, explicitly asked all who will listen to get a passport and travel.  To get uncomfortable, to be challenged, to try to see the world without Western filters. To see the people who aren’t making headlines, the young and old, everyone in between whose clothes are clean though they sift through garbage for food, whose children are happy and playful though they play in graveyards, who sell their fresh foods at the market and have better diets than we do. Discover colors and tastes, notice the flesh, the sinews, the strength, the smiles, the customs that make us different and one.  That Ismail and Awa and Hai on the street ain’t the devil but just a dude, as we all are, having a life, doing their thing, and it’s the politicians that really fuck everything up. And we have the power to make a change, not a “Democracy or else you backwater jerks” kind of change, but the kind that brings access to clean water, food, healthcare, and school without fear.

For those of you who are already doing this, you get it. This is old hat for you.  For those who have a problem with anything that whiffs of globalism or liberalism, I hope you will still give travel a chance.  Anyone who hasn’t seen Mr. Rollins on his speaking tours, I say see him pronto. He’s an entertaining and insightful speaker, and you will not be unmoved one way or the other.

(And now for the fan-girl part, because I hafta, and you can skip this no problem.)  Through my Dad, I was able to get a VIP ticket to meet Henry after the show. About 25-30 other people were there. We lined up and got to meet him and he was no different on the floor as he was onstage. When you see him on TV, that is the real, authentic Henry, as every good punk knows, there is not one fake thing about him.  My turn came and I approached him sheepishly. We shook hands. I thanked him for all that he does (What does he do? Well go look it up, he’s laid hands on more of our servicemen than our current president will probably ever do). I asked could I hug him, he said yes, and we did and some pics were taken.  As I walked away I turned back and pointed and said loudly, “KEEP GOING!”  He looked at me and smiled and hollered, “I WILL!”  So wonderful.  Do I need to meet him and hug his hard body again? No. But I will keep reading his work and seeing him live when he comes around. He inspires me, and I hope to get uncomfortable and be challenged and write about it from another part of the world before I kick the bucket.)

Impatiece, Truth Coffee, Newton’s First Law, & Meeting Henry.

06 Saturday Jan 2018

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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coffee, Henry Rollins, ice, impatience, journal, not staying safe, stasis, travel, truth, winter

Much to do this morning in a hard, cold world that makes all travelers, all the living feel the world is against them, waiting to thaw, hoping to thaw soon, wondering where has everyone gone post-blizzard Grayson? The birds are still flitting past icy roofs and trees, streetlamps, bannisters. They do not land, only flitting, asking, “Where, where, where?”

I watch the ice cube melt in my blue and green coffee mug knowing that this moment defines me. Holding it warms my fingers but too hot on my lips and throat, I will not wait for it to cool in a cold, hard morning. I will force it to cool with ice I wouldn’t invite into my house, but I want to drink it and must have it now now now. 

I think of my son who negotiates his responsibilities, everything is tied to everything else. I can only write in green now. I won’t write with anything else, my thoughts won’t come in black or blue. (This isn’t true, but it was an interesting thought that flitted through my head, “Where where where?”) 

I sprinkle cinnamon in my coffee grounds and it makes the house smell heavenly. I can drink mouthfuls of you but you will soon be gone, and I will stammer in stunned cold deciding if I want another, and pace and taste my mouth to see if it is dry, note the time, scribble in green pen, watch patches of snow melt and drop from roof flashings, when I should be packing getting ready to meet Henry in Raleigh.

(I will only go if the roads are safe, I don’t know if the roads are safe, how will I know)

I will meet Henry Rollins tonight for my ticket says I’m VIP. I will meet his eyes, say nothing useful, he’s heard it all before, perhaps he will be chatty and not run for the door as soon as the gig is done, back to the hotel where he will pace and sip water and read and write and think alone, carrying small memories of us back to his room for he is all he needs.  He’s not afraid of icy roads, I’ll bet, but oh, he carries his own demons, and I wouldn’t swap concerns with him today. 

My coffee is almost too cool to enjoy now. God bless microwaves, heroes of the impatient, we who don’t have all minute to sort out which way we are going, let alone what color underwear to put on after a hot shower in a cold room, gathering speed to go forward. Or just pace and check the parking lot to see if the magic snow plow came in the night, or sit down and read bad news and lose all the goodwill the magic green pen brought me. It will be sunset soon in Raleigh, Henry does not await me, and my blue and green coffee mug pulls at my sleeve, saying, “Really? You gotta do this now?”

A Sensual Morning

13 Thursday Apr 2017

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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birds, evolving, Henry Rollins, ocean, soundrack

Sounds. Sleeping with the windows open brings me sounds, or sometimes thoughts, in one window and out the other.  Ghosts of truck tires, distant. A stiff breeze. Silence. I woke to the spotlight in my face, the moon fierce in the window. Damn, girl, don’t you know I’m tryna sleep here? (Me and her got beef, her being a silent witness and all, and I’m not going to stand for it anymore.)  I turn over to begin again.  Silence. A stiff breeze.  He began singing in the dark, an hour before the paler blue comes. He is loud, energetic as he sings the sun, singlehandedly, up from the water and into the sky. My dear friend, I wish you knew more than two lyrics, broken record dawn patrol. That’s all right. You have a job to do, and I’ll not shoo you away.

Sounds. I hear your feet below me pounding the floor as you walk from room to room which is a miracle because my hearing is blurry at best. Perhaps I feel the vibration through the walls, or I just know what to listen for.  Is it too soon to prepare myself for the slam of your door as you embark on another office day? Too soon to prepare my snarky comment, “Have a nice day!” as I watch your back, wet hair plastered to your head, stomping off to your car? Yes. It is too soon. I don’t know if responding like this to someone else’s energy is good or bad. It informs me of my own emotional tendencies, my inability to forgive “trespasses,” and tells me I should send her off with blessings if nothing else.

North wind this morning. I can see and hear the wavelets clearly, the bay scent is strong and clean. Mourning dove plays his reed. A wind-chime tinks. Refrigerator hums. Pick-up trucks throaty exhaust. Finch father calling his little ones for flight lessons today, a happy racket. Sounds like someone striking a toothbrush on the edge of the sink to cast off excess water, one two three.

By now the maintenance people would be power washing the walkways, using the leaf blower to clear off excess beach debris or the lawn edger to manicure the little bits of grass in the courtyard, but not this morning. I have a day to consider my tasks. To do them or not do them, it’s as simple as that, so sayeth Henry Rollins.  To think about another neighbor who surprises me all the time. You never really know a woman, it seems. Or anyone. I probably won’t write down at the beach today in my journal that smells like olive oil (long story) because it’s a little chilly out there, north wind and all. So many things are calling and it’s a blessing to take each one down at a time.

Disconnected Ramblings

17 Thursday Nov 2016

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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D.H. Lawrence, evolving, Henry Rollins, Internet, life, YAY Libraries!

Upon my marathon drive and midnight return from New York, I discovered I had no internet connection.  I was too tired to care much, but in the morning after troubleshooting on my own and with Verizon tech support, it was clear that my line was fubar’d.  Closest repair date was a week away.  Interesting things happen when your connection to the world is mostly severed. (I still had the library WiFi and some data on my phone, if it were emergent.)  I was unable to stream the news in real time, or the quasi-comedy news shows that put a reality-based spin on things.  Imagine not seeing hateful political rants, memes, and fake news shares on Facebook for a week!  So what does one do when one is unplugged?  Fresh brownies in the pan for me and the neighbors. Longer walks, better writing, more reading, and interestingly…  more intense dreams. By the way, DH Lawrence ain’t all he’s cracked up to be, mostly.

This week I saw the courtyard light catch fire and then burn itself out, triggering fear of another fire.  Learned that a valued neighbor and apartment employee is finally ditching this place. Had a talking to in the parking lot (in the rain) by my downstairs neighbor who does not appreciate that I walk or breathe or fold my laundry a little too loud for her liking at all hours of the night.  I spent a whole day pissed about that, but everything seems to have settled.  Babysitting the neighbor’s cat for a week triggered allergies and asthma (or was it the lack of internet?)  Cat-proofing the apartment was necessary and how interesting that my OCD has not kicked in. She bunched up the carpet runner, found the bath tub drain plug in the living room, knocks over the wood stool next to my desk… and I just leave it all there. Somehow I know that if I put everything back the way it was–immediately– she will take that as a challenge and take it all down twice as fast. Here she is occupying this card table that doubles as my dining room table, her luxurious, plumy black tail twitching on the keyboard.  This week I learned that I don’t appreciate fellow tenants who let their movers damage our building and maintain an “oh well” attitude.  Thanks, man, glad I don’t have to live with you. This week I learned I have been trying to diagnose and cure Henry Rollins of his anger and emotional pain, and that’s just a flat out waste of time.  He’s a big boy who is living his life, the one he chose to build, best he can. Glad that’s out of the way.  😉

My internet has been reconnected, and all I can think about are emails from the lawyer who is waiting on information from me, and a reply to an email that should have begun in person instead of impersonal text. Of all the letters I have written in my head to people that didn’t matter, wasting my time and breath and energy, this is the one that needs the most care.  And it should have been eye to eye.

Stand Up For The Nameless Holy Ones

22 Saturday Oct 2016

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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evolving, faith, Henry Rollins, history, politics, refugee

The fate of the world rests in what my father believed and passed down to me.  In what his father and fathers before passed down to him.  All father’s everywhere in the world are responsible for the mess we are in right now.  But what about our mothers? It is said that the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world. What did she, the universal Mother, pass down to us through the ages?  Is her voice and actions responsible for the mess we are in?

Those are blanket statements, overgeneralized, narrow and fearful in view.  I come here today to chew on the savory stew brewing in the world’s cauldron, yes, even the blood and gristle that come boiling up to the top. Today I am sorting to see what needs to be done.

In the beginning there was the Word, it is said. Every culture has one. All our fingers are printed with ancient soot we told our stories in. We record them because we need to remember, and perhaps more importantly, we want others to. Sometimes the words become holy, and what is holy for you is not so much for me. When I was an infant I was baptized Catholic, an action I could not consent to.  I withdrew my faith as a teenager and my parents discontinued their push to get me Confirmed, to continue my life’s journey through Christianity. Strange that I would study the bible and torah looking for answers when I no longer believed them holy.  What about the rest of the world? Shift your eyes to the greater world, other cultures and faiths. I wonder how many still believe the faith of their fathers in the same way?  How and when does their faith shift, if ever? The poorest among us still share what they have, and I ask is it out of basic human decency, or is it faith?  So many of us do not have the time (or inclination) to sit down and sort through verses and quotations to establish their truth via translation, or study the men who composed them to attain a deeper understanding of what they really meant. “How can I believe anything Paul said when he was once Saul, why should I care, and what bearing does that have on just another workaday in this soul-sucking life,” is what I believe so many people must feel.  Conversely, so many people adhere to their faith without question. They don’t feel the need to do a background check on Paul. They get through their working two jobs with no car, no daycare, no healthcare because they are living their faith. It heals and upholds them, and that is a beautiful thing.

The Constitution of the United States was written by men who owned other human beings. We learned about them all throughout school, memorizing certain facts from textbooks in order to pass tests. Henry Rollins, once a rock star, can quote amendments, Jefferson, and Mandela because he wants to, not because he has to pass a test, and it makes my pea brain want to implode. So many of us do not have the time (or inclination) to sit down and sort through the Constitution, the amendments, to do background checks on the framers, Supreme Court justices, hell, even local official, to get to the bottom of things. To become informed about our country or the world.  I believe most of us just don’t have time or the need for that, so we take the worms our parents fed us, assimilate their biases into our own, grow up into good little birds, leave the nest and start the whole thing all over again. (Yes, we assimilate their good deeds, too.)  Even if we were their clones, we would still make our own mistakes in the process of being our individual selves. Wouldn’t we? We just take it all on faith making our way through life best we can. I can feel the weariness from here, and it makes my soul tired.

There are some who are delving down into faith, into our history.  The best-seller list indicates as much, but what are we doing with what we learn?  Time to break the cycle of “I am the product of my father and mother’s faith, teachings, and what I observed of them.” Time for us to stop being the product of our parents faith, their history, their biases, the product of our schooling, our jobs, or being somebody’s lamb.  Time to give a shit about that guy down the street, our neighbor, those strangers who are a family,  instead of some guy on the squawk box or the pulpit.  A “radical” idea from a pro-choice privileged elite feminist hell-bent on destroying religion and by tearing up the political and moral fabric of our nation?  Or just a small idea from a person who believes that making a better world comes from the bottom up, not the top down. From my hands into yours. Who believes a smile, a hello, a hug, speaking kindly, speaking someone’s name can make a difference.  You are the majority, the weary ones with your hands in the soil, giving the last of your bread to your neighbor. You are the nameless holy ones missing from our table.

This Music Must Destroy, and you will build

01 Saturday Oct 2016

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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change, Equality, Henry Rollins, oneworld, Ruts DC

Ask yourself in what ways you can y0u reach across the table and make a difference.   Stand up and say you see the Man and you don’t want to take it anymore.  Want to make a difference in the street, across the hall? Because you chose not to keep drinking the Kool Aid?   And what part you can play in making the music destroy, and the WORLD a better place. Our leaders can’t make it happen, but you can.   Think about it. I want to feel your fingers entwined with mine. I stand with you if you want peace and equality, through peaceful change.  Meanwhile…

I AM NOT YOUR PROPERTY! I AM NOT YOUR PROPERTY! I AM NOT YOUR PROPERTY!

Find Your Ember Of Rage

 

 

Late To The Party

08 Tuesday Dec 2015

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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Concrete Blonde, Flash fiction, Harry Potter, Henry Rollins, HoW, Jane Yolen, Junot Diaz, muse, NYPL

I don’t know if anyone else remembers it, the first time they received a piece of mail addressed to them that wasn’t a glittery birthday card from Mom Mom wishing you happiness, Xs and Os, along with a starched five dollar bill wrapped in a blank sheet of legal paper. Today I think about a piece of mail addressed to me of all people, my name, how did they get my name, how cool is this, to get a bit of correspondence from the New York Public Library, here in this place where I kind of lived, unsolicited. It arrived like… well…rather like Harry Potter’s acceptance letter from Hogwarts.  It was an invitation to a talk given by well-known authors, and sadly the only name I can recall is Jane Yolen. I was maybe 15 years of age and there was no way, in that time of my life, that I could conceive of asking my parents to take me to the event.   My best friend’s father died and I couldn’t even ask them for a ride to the funeral because I didn’t know how, and I knew without need of an oracle that my Dad would never drive me to the hated city for any reason at all. It was a folly, that bit of letter, and the idea that I-I–had been invited was very cool but that’s as far as it went.  (As an aside, the other letters I recall receiving in those days were heart-shredding solicitations from PETA and the Republican Party, neither of which I subscribe.)

Some years ago I came across a book of essays by Henry Rollins titled “Solipsis.” I flipped through it and found the writing visceral, angry, fascinating, but I wasn’t ready for it: I was too young to understand.  I have rediscovered Mr. Rollins who causes my writing self to be disturbed, unmoored, get a lady boner, and hungry. NOW I get it.  I made a few mouse clicks and discovered he has a spoken word tour going on, and lo and behold, one in traveling distance!  I went to click on the “buy ticket” button only to discover both nights have been sold out.  He won’t be back within 300 miles of me mostly likely for the rest of the year.  Late. Gutted.

So many things have opened up to me because of that magic thing called ‘internet.’ It’s how I discovered a taste for flash fiction, came to fall into the arms of a cadre of writers who help keep my creative mind moving, and more importantly, their friendships.  Thanks to this thing called a Twitter feed I was able to attend a conversation with Junot Diaz.  There are so many events and calls for submissions I find it hard to keep up.  I am drowning in opportunity, and the only thing holding me back is me!   I discovered a talk about Tarot and the Poetics of Imaginary Solutions fairly locally, but I found out a little too late. There was no way I was going to be able to wrest myself from my job in order to attend.  This morning I regret not trying hard enough to swap days with someone so I could attend. It was a little adventure I declined to fight for. What did I miss? What might I have gained? How many adventures have I declined? Oh god, that’s hard to think about.

I have been late to the party so many times, like that night I fell into Social Distortion and never looked back, or the day I was captured by Concrete Blonde; blessings.   These bands have been around a long time, and I’m running around waving my arms going “Hey look this is awesome! Wow!” And everyone else is like, “Yeah babe, we know, where you been?”  Today I am sorry I didn’t fight harder to attend a little bookstore talk, a missed opportunity, adventure.  There’s a little adventure in every day, there has to be.  I’m not some scared 15-year-old without access to a car and handwritten directions to get me to the parking garage so I can get to the NYPL, to be surrounded by a bunch of people that outrank me in every way… right?  Oh god…

Today I will meditate on how to get hungry enough to take it all, fill my plate, devour fearlessly, and fill reams of paper with results.  And write, baby, write!

 

 

Henry & Me, A Work In Progress

07 Monday Dec 2015

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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Henry Rollins, motivate, muse

I guess it was only a matter of time.  My muse who I once painted in a lilac goddess gown, communicative only with her facial expressions (the wrinkled nose, the head shake, the “what the hell??”, and the nod of “now you’ve got it,” has been supplanted.  My new muse is a drill instructor from hell.  That’s right. Mr. Henry Rollins.  I WILL awaken, I WILL think, I WILL learn, I WILL write to answer my life’s call, otherwise I’m just another useless piece of shitbag crying at the breakfast table unable to say why I’m crying when YES I REALLY DO KNOW WHY.

Yes, Henry, I really do know why.  And now you’re taking this trip with me, as I took the trip with you. The one where I got to know you a little bit when you said you couldn’t bear to have a space with free time in it for fear you might become one of us mere mortals that lounge about aimlessly instead of gearing up SURVIVAL, so your long-suffering travel agent booked you on the Transiberian express… because you wanted to experience.  I’m taking this trip with you because you’ve shown me that if we’re not breathing, living, thriving, learning, asking, reaching, thinking, DOING…  we’re just better off throwing ourselves off a cliff.  I used to think the saying “an unexamined life is one not worth living” was harsh as hell and horrible and wrong. But once you start examining, and you recognize your agony of living among “mortals,” the Wal-Mart masses, the complacent, the ones who never thought or even tried to make themselves or this world a better place, then yeah, we reap what we sowed.  And maybe that’s harsh as hell, but is it worse than drinking cups of regret and dying from it every day?

No more.

 

Forgiven

03 Thursday Dec 2015

Posted by Kristine in Uncategorized

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evolving, Henry Rollins, inspiration, long night, thoughts

My debt to society was paid the moment my eyes fluttered open, took a deep breath, stretched, and said “I am forgiven.”  I arise leave the warm bed behind and the sins and stains of a lifetime there. I shower, scrub the hours of hate and jealousy from the body as she is, watch a lifetime run down the drain and the best part? I’m keeping the best parts, right here, with me.

I forgive myself for being imperfect. I will always be imperfect, and I do not forsee myself becoming a beacon of greatness for all to follow. I do forsee that I will keep breathing.  And walking. And reading. Listening. Writing.  And today I forgive myself for not doing all of the above hard enough, long enough, with enough truth, trust, and passion.

The world is not black and white, and I can’t always get what I want: a quiet space to think, to listen, to read, and write. Sometimes I have to surrender my time and space to the needs of the outer world. And there’s no halfway for this anymore.  All in, baby girl, otherwise, I’m missing out on the things I need to fill in the words.

Arise Awake Be Grateful  Go Create

 

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