Food for Thought

Never read words can't fall on any ears. The deafness is silencing. If eyes fall on these words, accept humble apologies. A necessary repast comes from their formation.

There are those who feed on foods that would poison others. Be careful to look at what's in the trough before you eat. If your ability to digest isn't adequate, you may get sick.

Dashlit

Dusk traveling down dirt roads to nowhere dimly intuits otherworldly truths. Memories get tied to those roads and places. Grainy recollections trigger squinting-eye versions of the past and what could've been the future.

Curves lead to thoughts long-gone. Trying to get lost exercises the futility of believing in fantastic possibilities. Roads go somewhere, though, and will lead there after the Sun sets and rises.

Maybe everything means more than the sum of its parts. Trees in shadow mean something other than their corporeal form. Menacing and shape-shifting clouds mean more than a storm. A horsefly hitching a ride means more than an insect traveling dozens of miles per hour.

On the old gravel roads of the mind, wheels turn. An age passes. A buzzard watches.

Suicidal Photoaxis Arthropod

If the door is open for 2 seconds, a tiny fly will somehow find its way to whatever screen I'm using. Flies chasing the light get in the way. Wave 'em off and they seem to multiply.

What do they like about light? If I've ever thought to do any reading on the subject, time and memory have failed to recover the reason a fly has such an affinity for light. I'll do a quick search...

Well, it turns out photoaxis, which is the tendency of some insects to be attracted to light, is a topic that isn't universally agreed upon by science. Some postulate that bugs use the stars and Moon to navigate; others think it's to help bugs find flowers. Still, others believe bugs are suicidal.

Humanos en Musica

I've always appreciated music created by one person. As a kid, I remember building one-man-band contraptions with whatever Radio Shack and household components I could get my hands on. There was intense satisfaction in putting something together that worked.

Apparently, lots of other kids were doing the same thing. Now, as adults, those same kids have worked at it so much that they've reduced the effort to basically pushing buttons. It's utterly amazing.

However, I also recall there being something a little depressing about it, even when I'd get something that sounded cool. After a few minutes, the mechanical and impersonal nature of electrons repeating a pattern begins to feel lonesome. There's no human nuance.

That's why I've always liked playing with others more than making music by myself. Even if you just play the same thing for 12 minutes, there's an audible change in the way others inflect, percuss or intonate. You can't get that with loops and samples.

Aural Induction Feedback

Actions can affect the world a lot more than anticipated. The preference may be to change only the items in the crosshairs. Like wake from a boat, though, unintended consequences amplify until they break on unexpected shores.

It's impossible, in the eventuality, not to say or do something that butterfly-effects on another thing you'd never expect. Just existing feels like it may be enough. Even lacquered brass will tarnish if exposed to the elements for long enough.

Shy Friday

Who's that sneaking up on us? I think it's Friday. Hey, Friday... You look pretty good.

Don't be such a stranger.

Ozymandias the Cave Man

There are about three dozen symbols found in caves around the world, dating back tens of thousands of years. Layers of minerals deposited at a known rate indicate these symbols were used for tens of thousands of years. Human beings thousands of miles and thousands of years apart decorated cave walls with these same non-verbal communications.

We may never know what they meant, if they meant anything at all. It may have been meant to say, "Look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair." Instead, it now simply says, "I was here, but now I'm gone."

Maybe they just meant, "I'm human and I'm here." That's pretty much all we can gather from them, at this point, anyway.

The electrons ordered in such a way to record the words you now read will not be permanent. In tens of thousands of years, the storage of this data will be aeons gone. In an undiscovered niche of a deep cave, though, some of those ancient symbols will likely still be recorded.