"A Tale of Redemption, Restraint and the Good that Lives in the Heart of a Few."

Dog Poet Transmitting.......

I'm going to start this off with an anecdote. It was a real teaching moment for me and left me feeling pretty good about myself. When I left the Big Island of Hawaii a few years ago, I wasn't in the right headspace, I guess that's what it was, to sell my car. I had met this fellow, Charlie Abel at the weekend market up in my neighborhood, about 10-12 miles out of Hilo. I used to go there every weekend for papayas and vegetables. Charlie sold motor oil and also did some amount of mechanical work and I had hired him to do something minor to my car. It worked out that I left the car with him and he was going to sell it for me. I left him my email and off I went.

Time passed and I never heard from him. I figured, 'well... I guess something or other happened' and I put it out of my thoughts. It's been around 4 years now since that happened and last night I was communicating with my friend Issac Shapiro who lives in Australia. We were friends on Maui when I lived there. We parted company at some point and (I see this story is getting a tad over involved... ah... so what?) Zac (short for Issac- grin) went and married the heir to the Otis Elevator fortune. I attended the wedding; talk about a big time extravaganza... heh heh.

As relationships go in this day and age, the marriage only lasted a few years and during that time and following that time, Zac had had something to do Papaji who was... how do I put this? He was a tad eccentric. The story I heard and I can't verify this tale but the source was fairly unimpeachable... the story I heard was that he knew he was about to pass on, so he initiated a half a dozen or so (could be more) of his student as gurus. That is not the interesting part. The interesting part is that after he did this, he told this source that he did it as a joke to see what would happen. Like I said, he was a tad eccentric. As it so happens, in my view, some of those students/followers proved to be full on opportunists and all about the money and the profile. I know this is not true about Zac and that is the only reason I tell this story because... otherwise, it would have gone into this vault I have; a vault of events and goings on from the past, that are best left in the vault. I suspect we've all got a vault or... we should have. Zac actually helps people.

Zac has matriculated into a spiritual teacher and he travels to Europe and other places where he has followers. I met up with him in Munich about ten years ago.

So... not likely to make a long story short at this point. Anyway, I'm engaged in this back and forth with Zac about my music, since he had really appreciated the song I sent him over the weekend and it was decided I would send him a selection from the albums, which led to a discussion about movies since the flash drive was 16 gigs and the music only came to 540 megs of mp3's (which is still about a hundred songs) and we were going back and forth on that, as to whether he had seen this movie, or that series AND OUT OF NOWHERE, the left hand side of the page changes and it is a list of messages from as far back as 2016 that I NEVER GOT! Several of them were comments that would have been important at the time and one of them was from Charlie Abel, circa 2016, telling me that he hadn't been able to sell the car for the price it was worth, which would have been between $600-$800 and he'd let it go to a young student for $250.00 and he needed an address so that he could send me the money. Wow!

I spent some time last night responding to various messages and one of the responses was to Charlie, to let him know I finally got his message and in case he still had that money and was inclined to send it. None of this is the primary issue that has caused me to tell this story in the first place. One of the key features is this; I'd given Charlie my email and that was how I expected to hear from him. It turned out that he found me on Facebook and messaged me there and this message went into some internet bardo and sat there.

Time passed while I was in Corning, California and then I traveled to the East Coast to stay with my friend in Ocean City, New Jersey. The weather coming off the ocean in the winter is pretty fierce and in the summer it is a madhouse, with families going up and down the sidewalk, some of them have massive carts filled with umbrellas, coolers, boogie and surf boards, beach chairs, tables, tents and you name it, they probably put it on these huge carts, or in these super large wagons. I was stunned at the amount of items people felt were necessary for their beach experience. Try to imagine what I am talking about, volume wise and then, double it, triple it.

All day long they would go by the house and in the evening they'd head back the way they came. It was impressive, this march of material excess. There was a lot of living that had to be shoehorned into the week or two they had apportioned for that year's beach visit. Ocean City is not cheap. The houses rent for around $2500.00 a week and it goes up from there. There are some houses there that rent for $5000- S10,000. a week and more. Certain realtors and landlords are making a fortune over that time span from May 30 to Labor Day. The rent for a small 8' to 10' by 16' to 20' space, to have a shop on the boardwalk, will run you around $80,000.

Ocean City is an unusual place. It is one of the premier family resorts on the East Coast. No alcohol is sold or served on the island (it is a island), except for (drum roll) The American Legion. So... right where one enters the bridge to OC, there is a humongous liquor store, with at least half a dozen cashier lanes and... in season... it can get a tad (understatement alert!) crowded. I used to crack up, watching people's shopping carts go by. Some of them contained hundreds of dollars worth of booze.

Rarely, I would take a walk on the boardwalk. I'm guessing you've all been in a beach town at some point in your lives, so you know the tawdry and tasteless array of crap for sale. You can get one scoop ice cream in a cone for $5.00. Everything is very overpriced!

The back and forth clatter on the sidewalk, in front of the house, wore on me over the course of that single season I spent there. I did see some very funny things, like a never ending procession of hundreds, thousands of Cellphone addicts, thumbhumping their units. One time I saw 3 teenage girls go by on bicycles at around 30 miles an hour, thumbing away on their cellphones, with no hands on the handlebars. I watched them shoot through an intersection without looking; truly an impressive display of stupidity.

We'd walk the dog in the evening and perambulate past the largest collection of Audi's and Volvo's, with a goodly amount of Honda Odysseys and the occasional Bentley Maybach or classic T-Bird. Poor people don't come to Ocean City. The middle class doesn't come to Ocean City, though there are probably a few. The houses are ramshackle affairs, with the cheapest of fixtures and amenities. Every few years they tear them down and build another.

I told my friend, “I can't take this place long term. Let's go west.” That suggestion met with approval and so I set out , guided by the indwelling (that is a story in itself) and shortly thereafter, we were in The West... balmy year round temperature, for these less than youthful bones. Safe and serene it is and half the year, nearly everyone up and down the street and around the corner, goes home to Canada (they have to spend half the year there to maintain their heath care.) so... there's no one here.

Earlier in this posting which, at a certain point, took off like a runaway horse, I was talking about a car left with a fellow on The Big Island, in Hawaii. There's a little more backstory required here in order to provide a complete picture. I'd been away from America for 15 years. A lot can happen in that time. A reader that I knew from the blogs, offered me a place to stay while I got myself oriented. I'm one of those people that moves very quickly when I think I have to, so... in a little over a week, I had a place to stay, a car and that was that. I knew a number of people there from my writings on the internet. I stayed on the Big Island for a year.

There was one group of people that I saw every month during a film club get together. Then there was a fellow named Robert, who had worked in Hollywood as a scene builder for the movies. He used to come by at least once a week, most of the time it was more. I'd provide a movie and some small amenities and we would talk about God. At one point he brought over this martial artist named David (from Las Vegas) with an, allegedly, natural, snow white eyebrow, who came and went for a month or two. We all got on well. So... I never expected David to come up to me from the side one afternoon and... without warning, hit me so hard that he fractured my jaw. The attending doctor who repaired it said it was the worst break he had ever seen.

The attack had been arranged for some time. The police refused to investigate and got ever more pissed at me for inquiring. I was unable to move in any direction. I later found out it had been set up by Israelis who wanted me taken out. The doctor said I was lucky not to have died. Of all the people I knew there, one fellow, Kelly, helped me out as I went through the process of leaving. Since I left I have not heard from a single person there and that is quite a number of people and that has NEVER happened to me before. It was as if I had never even been there.

I've never seen a place like the Big Island of Hawaii. Perhaps it is the high cost of living there and so many people are on a hand to mouth existence. Meanwhile the percentage of alcoholics, drug addicts, people on social services, is unlike anything I've ever seen anywhere. No one trusts anyone else. People are constantly being ripped off. Their homes are broken into. Then there is a very large New Age, Trust Fund, airhead contingent that behaves like they have completely lost their minds, which I suspect is true. One needs only to read the Craig's List personals to see what kind of romance climate is present. I saw what it would be like if America went Communist Socialist because that is the atmosphere there. It is the most depressing environment I have ever been in.

For all the pretentious, over the top, cartoon spirituality I saw there, that island was a hotbed of the most intense materialism and epidemic selfishness and narcissistic self involvement I have ever seen. It is as if, they being unable to see themselves as they are, are able to behave in ways that even a mental defective would know better than. It's truly a land of the haves and have nots and the width of the separation is remarkable and... not in a good way. If you're ever in the area and enjoy unintended humor and irony, locate some of the island billboards and local new age publications and you'll be in for a treat. You really have to experience it. My telling you about it won't convey the unreality of it.

There is a palpable anger in the air and a racial divide that is striking. I went to a few events where this was in your face and intimidating. Nearly every man I met was on their own. I was told the women were impossible to be around and I did see evidence of that, though personally, I had no interest in that kind of company. It was so crazy there that when I arrived in California it seemed sane in an almost surreal way by comparison.

In conclusion; Charlie had asked for an address in the initial, time warp, query. I sent it to him. This morning I received a reply from him, telling me he had already sent the money off. Wow! Here's the thing. The whole time that time kept passing, I never thought badly of him, or cursed him out in my head. I did think of it being emblematic of that location, a zone of lost souls, some kind of material purgatory where nothing works out. Then I come to find that he had tried to contact me, soon after ...and had done the right thing and was a good guy (God bless you Charlie for being a diamond in the rough!!!) and... so was I; for not projecting negative intent on his part, regardless of the island leaving me with that impression about nearly everyone I had met. This has proved to be a powerful lesson for me. NEVER...never make assumptions about people until you know what's going on. As for what I've said about the island, those are not presumptions but the result of a full year of contact, wherein nothing changed and my worst impressions were confirmed. The only exception being Charlie and a couple that I knew from the film club.


Here's Charlie's page. If Tom Waits shaved his head, this is who he would look like. I know this has been a strange posting. I don't know why it turned out like this or went where it did. Sometimes things just happen all on their own. This certainly did.


End Transmission.......


This evening's song is;

♫ God's not Dead ♫

As you travel across the internet, you'll encounter a great many unusual sites and people. Some of them will seem like locations and residents from another planet and maybe they are. I don't yet know how to take Pocketnet, with its vastly diverse subject matter and members, from superficial twits, to deep and often profound and multi-talented individuals. In any case, despite the Top Post Mafia that controls the place and the often suspect and agenda driven characters that come and go, I keep going back there. Maybe I came down with something? (grin). In any case, here's Pocketnet, join if you like.

My friends, devoted readers, thank you for commenting and voting for me. It is making a huge difference and when I write my Pocketnet Expose in the next day or so, you'll maybe get an idea what I am up to. Keep at it if you are so moved. I am incredibly grateful for your help!