Thank You Mr. Taylor

Virginia Woolf: Long sentences, long words, flowing and wandering topic

Everyday I tread on these poor soles, wore thin and stained by a life in the dirt.  White hi-top Chuck Taylors are more than simply a shoe, they're my shoe.  They're the only shoe I have worn since I was sixteen because they serve as a canvas for both my wandering mind and restless hands when they hold a sharpie, but also a canvas of the world they tread picking up the grime and wear of the world in which I ramble.  Even after they have become decrepit and decaying they still hang from my ceiling not only proud veterans of countless days and nights under foot, but also a record of my life.

What is this, a shoe signed by every member Bomb the Music Industry! out of sympathy for me puking outside of their show.  Next to that a shoe with a hole worn in the bottom which allowed a rusty nail to penetrate through my foot and forced me into a doctors office.  Or this shoe which has the art work of the LSD addled mind of a cute little blonde.

It has been said that you can not know someone until you walk a mile in their shoes, well if this is true then can I know my past self by walking through memory lane around these Converse corpses.  These shoes which lose all whiteness are left as dirty dingy sacrifices to a lifestyle which I have chosen.  These poor and pure soles decay so my own may go on, for it is the very act of walking which allows me to escape the segments of this world which bother me so.

Survivor's Guilt

This is really long, pretty damn emotional, and perhaps more information than you would like to hear. You have been forewarned.

“And well, I've been thinking things, thinking things that I just hope aren't true. Like maybe you don't choose punk rock, because punk rock chooses you."

            -from "Picking Sides" by Wingnut Dishwashers Union

Idolatry is alive and well among the punks. Growing up punk my walls were decorated with posters and pictures of Sid Vicious, Kurt Cobain, Dee Dee Ramone, and countless other dead rock stars. I used to watch SLC Punk, and imagine myself running around Utah and causing chaos, because there wasn't much else to do in my “suburban prison.” The problem is that when you look up to heroin addicts and suicidal psychopaths, who also happen to play guitar, you get a warped view of your place in the world. Drugs and death are glory, and all your energy goes towards them and causing anarchy. You stand in opposition to safety and all forms of responsibility, especially responsibility for your own life, or at least that's what happened to me.

"Semi-Colon" by Barbara Mallonee

"Semi-Colon" is a well written plea for the semi-colon.  Perhaps most compelling of the essay is the author's impeccable flow and syntax using semi-colons, and interestingly related quotes with semi-colons.  She believes that the semi-colon has sadly fallen out of use, and believes that if it were to be better utilized perhaps her students would be better writers.

"The Human Road" by Susanne Antonetta

Ever want to learn about whales?  Well have I got an essay for you.  Susanne Antonetta can answer all of your whale related questions while she explores her relationship with her young son Jin in "The Human Road."  All and all I liked this essay, but it wasn't anything spectacular for me.  It is at times cute like the description of Jin running along the the shore watching for whales, and at times interesting and informative, especially about whales, but for me lacked the hook to drag my full interest in.

"The Human Road" by Susanne Antonetta pg 213.

Punx in the Mist

The punk or Rockus Anarchorum is a species native to England and the United States.  It's natural environment is outside of that one seedy bar with the tiny stage, or a poorly maintained house in packs of five or more.  It's predators include the police (Dickus Baconum), politicians (Incompetentus Laira), the bourgeoisie (Power-Hungry-Homophobius  Greediorum), and Ronald Reagan (Satan, just fucking Satan).

The punk has a unique social structure centering around an odd ceremony refereed to as the "show."  During "shows" a "band" will play many one to three minute songs which are often simplistic and repetitive.  In response to the music the punks dance by "moshing," a unique form of dance preformed by throwing one another into each other.  Originally thought by biologists to be a form of competition or perhaps conflict, it is now commonly accepted that this is by large a friendly affair, as evidenced by the picking up of the fallen brothers.  Moshing however is not the only form of dance in these communities some others include:

1) "The Hop" where a punk will jump up and down to the rhythm of the music.
2) "Skanking" particular to the "ska" sub-species of punk, this dance consists of kicking ones legs in rhythm with the music, whilst moving, often latched in arms of fellow "ska-punks"
3) "Crowd Surfing," where one punk will jump from the stage into his fellows, and be carried by them.
4) "The Rhythmic Head Nod," employed mainly by the eldest of the species, it is a nodding along to the music often while in the back of the crowd drinking a "Papst Tall Boy," a beverage, and judging by taste a sign of flagellation, which is drank in enormous quantities at "shows."

The punk's famous mating call "AN-AR-CHY!" (anərkē), combined with its strange dancing at "shows," has given them a reputation as violent.  This is a falsehood, as the nature of the punk is that of friendly but wary, unlike it's close relative the skinhead (Nazius Redneckorum).  Punks are social creates who often mingle with others, but do not trust outsiders.  Because of this, punks will often appear hostile as to dissuade others from coming towards their pack.  In the end, however, if the outsider presents him or herself as a friend, and can gain a punk's trust, they will be adopted into the pack.