Zero Dark Thirty

It is not my intention to elevate pop culture on this blog, but here I will make perhaps my first (and doubtably my last) exception. 

Oh what a tangled, wicked web we have woven in the Middle East! (And now North Africa.) I wonder if there will ever be a time when we are not involved so intrinsically in this region.

Of all the elements presented about this film (the complexity of the man-hunt, the valor of the Navy Seals, etc.), the one 'elephant in the room' not talked about is all the nasty shades of grey we have cloaked this involvement in. We are no longer the good guys, or the bad guys, but both. And the same can be said for the natives of the Middle East. So much pain and suffering we have all caused.. and for what?

How did we get drawn into this? I'm sure there is more to it than the passages of history. And how will we ever free ourselves from this knot? Will we ever?

It's an ugly, inglorious period in America's saga. And we've had so many already!

This is a powerful film because of the questions it asks, and answers. As Americans we should be uncomfortable with both.

Dean Martin

Another pleasant serendipitous find: a photo of "Dino" in a very casual home setting with his sons, making men out of them. I always admired Dean Martin, especially when I was a kid. He seemed the ideal father, classy, warm, handsome and someone for whom drinking made him cooler not scarier. This is the sort of scene fathers had with their sons. "Make a muscle, boy!" You just wanted to be a man.

This, That

I could have told you but you wouldn't have listened. I would have barely listened myself, honestly, and it was my own goddamned voice! Who listens? I doubt anyone. And if they do, it's not to any advantage. Out of weakness or stupidity they do it. Then they have to listen to more, which is the price one pays.

So instead I just sat there, sort-of-listening. And you just rambled on and on about that craziness in your head. I thought of things that you should have been told, but I knew if I'd said them you would have been upset. So I just shut up and drank my beer and let you go. And on you went, like the unravelling of a rubber band. I could have walked away and you would have gone right on talking.

The main thing I could have told you would have been to listen to this crap coming out of your mouth. Just listen to it. My god! Any person over the age of 30 would have known something was wrong. This, that, and all of that, and you were caught up in it like some kind of soap opera. But you were too obsessed to listen to it. You would have just struck back.

So I sat there looking at my hands beneath the table, hoping the beer would make it all smooth soon enough. So that your words wouldn't be so strong. A few more slurps and the velvet sheet would draw over everything and I could hunker down in a fine drunken blur. But you got louder.