Renaissance

 There was a time, in a corner of a shingle of Christendom, when more than your fair share of men were "pregnant" with opportunity...bearing  weight, pressing against the repressive confines of a fixed, but expanding wall...pregnant with purpose. 

They were realizing a fundamentally inadequate position in the fallible human structure of a religious entity...so much so that your man was unable to break free without a supernatural birthing that shattered the pagan structure imposed upon him and those with him who did not fit into the structure assigned to him by an aristocracy out of touch with members, active congregants, and those seeking to do God's will.

It was, frankly, a pathetic period of regression, when whole denominations decayed, when vomit-worthy nominalism forced many from those within the movement. This egress from that denominationalism freed the expectant and birthed a more organic house church movement in the flailing West.

But, I am not fixated on that time, venue, nor the aftermath of that era. I am alluding to the same kind of repressed passion in the sense of a Creative in a complicated, anti-creative tech-friendly social environment that makes that Creative feel like a baby stuck within a womb, more than ready to be birthed onto the stage, into relevancy, and freedom.

Some of us have spotted that glimmer of hope, that foreshadowing that we shall come out of obscurity, pregnant with message and purpose, to speak to the hearts and minds of a generation drowning in mediocracy. 

Wherever humanity embraces God-driven creativity, not the warmed leftovers of artificial intelligence, the soul is once again awakened by the written and spoken word, and imagination blooms. Character grows, compassion grows, community grows. When creativity is once again on stage, in action, fervent and connective, we all benefit, we all grow. It borders on a touch of the heavenly because our intellects break free from programmed thought.

Wherever men and women gather to interact with a purveyor of that compassionate Creativity, culture finds a home, and we rise above the downward movement of a society losing touch with the divine and the human.  

I call on all those who desire to break free from this anti-creative, pro-machine world, who have a compassionate creativity to share with the world. There is a growing segment of western society longing for the creative word. It is time to return to a place of performance poetry, prose, and remembrance, to enrich society and bring back culture, a component of today's world that will die without a literary and vocal renaissance.

Mission Oaks

They told him "you can't grow that here" so many times that he purposely planted flowers, trees, and bushes in the ravine behind his house that defied every local landscape artist and every garden center.

Walking along the sidewalk outside the low wrought iron fence around the house lot, Bert planted Banana trees, orchids, and stuff that isn't supposed to grow in Ohio.

One day I was blessed to be able to meet Bert, his wife Susan, and photograph the house and gardens. And while they were inspired by a trip to the Chelsea Flower Show in London in 1990, it sounded like the local attitude toward his plans was what drove Bert to create Mission Oaks Gardens, acquire more land, and establish a Smithsonian Institute recognized American urban garden that has inspired the creation of many community gardens throughout the world.

                            Mission Oaks in May 2021

                            

                            Japanese Red Pine and Bald Cypress,

                            2018

Bert Hendley Jr. was a successful financial planner and a Master Gardener. He and his wife were instrumental in the founding of the Muskingum County Park District. Bert passed away in early 2024, and  the gardens have shifted more toward the conifer and rhododendron plantation, away from some of the more stunning exotic flowers that once lined the garden trails...

But, Mission Oaks, maintained by three wonderful people I met last week, remains Ohio's premier urban gardens. 

                                            in the conifer garden today

                            

 

when the vines creep and none are cut

you are caged by codes and regulations

all in the name of Health and Safety

power-mad manipulators ruling by control

ignorance and theft on a daily rampage

stealing your dignity, stealing your identity.

there is no freedom when a bully reigns

when your officials create illegal vendettas

destroying your every choice, your every right,

suppressing creativity, speech, and history

in decisions made in temples of immorality.

who fell for the science when the science wasn't fact?

who fell for the mantra when the mantra was a lie?

who fell for the checks when they printed worthless cash?

Drunk on Tyranny

while you were sleeping,

it slithered through your grass.

now it lives, with more slithering things

in your yard, in your house, in your garage

while it feeds on fear and tyranny,

the original sin clothed in governing.

but you have not been crafted for peasantry

nor woven in the depths with hostile hands.

 

she hides in plain sight

 

She hides in plain sight,

her brown blending

with earth...suddenly not so horizontal.

it is only because I stop to attend to my own nature,

that she appears at all…

which begs the question…

what else did I miss on my journey?

it is a question few ask until that rugged edge of time-

passing into an unplanned quadrant-

suddenly without a spouse, without a plan, without a head of hair.

somewhere between someone’s somewhere, and someone's nowhere.

on a road regularly driven in the center, to avoid wandering off

to fall precipitously hundreds of feet below

an unexplainable statistic

for this unfortunate soul, nature was kind to her

to cover her with creeping vines, soft leaves, and soft moss

where one can genuflect the vacancy marked by a cross.

For thou art more neath round yonder sun

Thou art more than dust and roses

Thou are the reflection of a Creator

Though thy bones rot beneath the sod.

Live to love

If you woke up this morning, God gave you another day on Earth to do the right thing. You are not promised tomorrow. Today is the day of salvation. 

If you are awake now, ready to go to bed, to sleep, remember, you have been given another night. If He wakes you tomorrow morning, will you give Him thanks for every person you meet? Will you share His love with those people you meet?

We were made to love as the creator loves- selflessly. While the enemy of our souls seeks to sow fear and hatred, reject the way of the worldly, and be the person God desires you to be. Love as Christ loves. 

In the library

 As a child, I would sit on the carpeted floor at the county library reading through juvenile books while my father would wander "the stacks," a cramped area where adults had to search through smaller books in a labyrinth of rows. It amazed me that I could, if given the opportunity, read through two or three books, then find others to take home, all while my father found himself lost in the stacks.

So many years later, I still remember the titles or faces of some of those books, with occasional flashes of memory, or a strange name appearing in my mind at the most unusual of times.

If I did not read all the books of Eilis Dillon, it wasn't because I did not want to. If I did not read every Madeline book, it wasn't because I tired of the little French watercolor, it was because someone had checked out the book I wanted. 

I have fond memories of that library and the beige carpet. It was in that space that I found so many stories that probably helped contribute to my own storytelling skills at such a young age. 

But it was not always that way. I remember the first readers in school. I remember some phonics, some mixture of sight recognition, but no one method of acquiring reading skills. 

This was before I found solace on the beige carpet. I'd sit in the circle as we read aloud. "See Flip run. See Jane run. See Flip and Jane run." It was dull. It was stupid. And I was bored out of my mind. I could not understand why we only read three or four pages at a session. 

Finally, one day, I took my book home with me. That day I read the rest of the entire reader. I went back to school the next day and wondered aloud why we weren't moving on to other books. 

I went through On Cherry Street so fast the teacher was embarrassed. I went to the school library. While there were books in that library, there were few interesting ones, and certainly none with the kind of story that would enthrall a child who had passed all the reading levels "allowed" in his grade.

The education system there was so poor that many of us lost interest in the texts used. 

But in the county library, I was free to roam like a buffalo on the plains. I had a home to roam while my father...or mother...was preoccupied looking for that one book. Meanwhile, I was accumulating enough books to need a bag to carry them all home.

If the books in that library helped give me a desire to be a reader, imagine what you can do by taking your child to the library. Let your child search through the level-appropriate books. Encourage them to take several books for the week.

Your son or daughter may not become an author, but they will gain an appreciation for reading, and thereby, an appreciation for learning. And reading is just the beginning of that journey.

A Reminder

 The works presented on this site are mine, created by me without any touch of artificial intelligence. All individual works, in the form of posts, are copyrighted by International Copyright Law and are the property of Daithi Fleming. No portion may be used as part of a whole of original creation of another, in any disseminated form, but each passage must adhere to standard copyright laws, citing ownership of the passage quoted, and adhering to international law.  

My profile narrative contains one line meant to remind readers of that protection. I am disseminating this information in this form because there are many throughout the world unaware of these international creative protections under the law.

Beef with Onion in a Mustard Cream Sauce

 

Beef with Onions, Garlic, Mustard, and Sour Cream...

For a quick and easy lunch:

1/2 pound beef stew meat

1 medium or large onion

1/4 cup butter

1 tablespoon of a red wine

6 cloves of garlic

2 tablespoons Dijon Mustard

1/4 cup sour cream

black pepper and salt to taste

In a stainless steel sauté pan, add beef stew meat, and chopped or sliced onion, peeled and chopped garlic, butter, and salt and black pepper. Cook on low to medium heat. Add red wine in the process. Test the beef to see when cooked, do not overcook. Remove the beef from the pan to finish the sauce. Add in mustard and sour cream, more butter if desired, and sauté the onions to desired completion. Warm the beef in the pan. Mix with the sauce. Pour the sauce on top of the beef if not mixed before. Enjoy your lunch!

Servings: One. For two, double the amounts.

Moving On from The Humane Part 2

I have yet another upcoming phone interview with a transient company wanting to hire at a rate that will not even pay for the mileage accumulated to do the job. I'll listen, I'll discuss, but it may be as futile as expecting a reboot of the American senate or house of representatives in my lifetime. It's not going to happen. 

It is startling that a company can offer such a job. It means that there are people who work jobs that send them into an economic spiral, and a departure from everything standard. It is an accelerated phenomenon, for a greater percentage of the populous, to a point that it cannot be explained away. It is discussed in private circles, amongst neighbors, in the not-so-blessed economic potholes on the highway to decadent wealth.

I live in a region shadowed by this prevalence. It is called Appalachia. It is a geographic region and cultural region, the latter mainly because of the former and the effects that such topography inflicts on the inhabitants.

Instead of economic expansion, companies shrink or disappear. Emigration exceeds immigration. The sad song, like a dark version of "Jolene," tells you all you need to know. You may try, but someone has already taken your dream. They are in the flatlands, a cultural wasteland where wealth and debt work together to create a stability. While the mountaineer has a faith in the supernatural, the urbanite has a blind faith in a man-made economy based upon premises that don't work in the region, mainly because Appalachians own less resources than those who parasitically take from them. 

And while Appalachia suffers from this tragedy, many other areas, in between the money-debt system centers, share the same fate. The same lack of economic incentive. And it is not just in the countryside. There are hundreds of thousands of ex-urban migrants escaping to campers and mobile homes because their prospects have disappeared in the technological change shaping the entire nation. While the unaffected, including those broadcasting a particular narrative for the country, enjoy the benefits of that increasingly technocentric system, there are many migrating into a survival mode that would terrify the ones who retain wealth now.

But as technocentrism touches nearly all industries, will the ones who acquired such vast wealth be the next victims of the ever-changing paradigm, or will their businesses be excluded from the purge destined to come when more humans within the system are replaced?

Moving on from the humane

 I've spent a significant amount of time interacting with people of all sorts of professions- from truckdrivers to Dollar General cashiers- in the past two weeks. Also, I've been blessed to be part of discussions with thousands who have suffered from a changing economic landscape threatening the economic safety of hundreds of thousands of American citizens. These have been targeted by an increasingly hostile, anti-human agenda, proliferated by a technocentric advancement. 

Companies, in this environment, care less about workers and more about technological advancements that squeeze out human labor, and human-dependence, and bypass them with apps and advanced technologies. Instead of a cashier doing her job at the grocery store, I am forced to do her job. 

At the same time, those who have benefited from technological advances in their profession or those who have isolated themselves from human interaction, now pay insane fees to be able to sit at home and have a driving servant class bring their meals directly to them. Most of these making money from this relationship are currently humans; however, many companies have been using drones or robotic delivery in other areas to extricate the humane from the economic transaction.

Those replaced by an automation, or a new paradigm (making the customer work for the company they are paying for a service), find themselves in a world few predicted. Standard fields of employment disappear...often shocking quick, with no warning. 

Many end up still employed, but so underemployed that they cannot make ends meet. And lately, I have heard from so many of these. I have heard their heartbreaking stories. More than ever before, men and women in their 50's and early 60's, who cannot retire with full social security benefits even though their employers have collapsed or are collapsing under the weight of this technocentric change. 

Instead of paying people back for what they put into the social security system- they, and their employers- the government has taken years away from prospective retirees, shortchanging them, and putting restrictions on them while making money off of the taxpayer's own income.

In response, many have sold their homes, land, and resources and gone off to live a simpler life that the rest of the first world would not recognize as "an American lifestyle." There are whole communities of RVs, campers, and tiny homes scattered across the Rockies, the West, and even scattered here and there between the cities in every state. They live that way because they have lost everything to an out-of-control Pharmacological Elite who can and will surgically remove your savings from you while charging you medically incorrect billing from people coding at 2 AM in a little house down the road. (From one of those I personally met and would never trust to handle my hospital bill).

But that is only one aspect of the story. One slice of what is causing a great country to become more divided and more out of control than ever before.

Part 1

When Cultures Collide

 Pork Dijon With Wild Leeks

When you're an American, it is easy to mix cultural influences. Ask anyone, staring in the refrigerator after returning home from the grocery store....or as most Americans would say, "the grocery stores." The world feels like smaller place when one can dine on Korean food one day, Amish the next, and Phillipine cuisine the next day at lunch. And, with a touch of creativity, whatever you find in the grocery stores can create a new world of flavor.

Even if you reside somewhere else in the first world. And sometimes the second world... maybe even the third world.

Today, after planting some new Peppermint plants in the garden, I returned home to a small butcher-paper-wrapped set of pork butterfly chops (not made of butterflies) waiting on me in the refrigerator. I had a hankerin' for something with country Dijon mustard. In the fridge, I had some Ramps (wild mountain leeks- a delicacy here), some regular leeks, garlic, and peppers (capiscum  for some of you). The result of today's lunch creation is in this recipe.

1 set of Pork Chops

1 Leek

2 Ramps (or more Leek)

2 cloves of Garlic

1 Medium Pepper

Olive Oil

Fresh Parsley

1/4 cup of Dijon Mustard (Country Style)

French Tarragon

Cut your pork into small strips, place into steel sauté pan and add olive oil, garlic, fresh chopped or sprigs of parsley, sliced leek, sliced pepper, Tarragon to taste, and diced Ramps (one may substitute with a stronger tasting ingredient like more garlic) Cook, attended, adding the 1/4 cup Dijon Mustard about five minutes after starting the meal. Continue until pork is thoroughly cooked

and hopefully, your meal looks something like mine.

Digging Deeper

Digging deeper,

the humusy soil yielding

to my strokes and claws,

the prong harder than steel

yet made of wood

slicing, cutting the roots that bind

the tangled past unearthed

revealing bulbs, purple stems,

the green frond that salutes

the wind whipping the meadow,

cherishing the ramp as I dig.

and yet here i go again

sitting beside the exposed trunk

massive tree engulfed by a lake

watered with a garden hose,

producing mud by the pailful

as the plastic boats

spin out of control.

My hands dig deeper

into the soil of my youth.

what beckons me that I should

bruise the knees of my Wranglers

and drag a sack against the ground?

I am as the baby who delights in wonder

the toddler taking precious steps

the newlywed gathering roses

as I gather the bouquet 

of the green, the purple, and the white.

I have been here before

in my secret dreams.

I am playing in the dirt

and I am free.

c 2012, Daithi Fleming

the appearance of the holy fire

This Saturday, on the day before Orthodox Easter, in the Holy Sepulcher Church in Jerusalem, which supposedly has a small entrance to Christ's tomb, Orthodox Christians claim a white fire miraculously appears from inside that opening. An Orthodox patriarch, using an oil lamp in the opening, waits. After a humble prayer, the holy fire appears. 

The holy fire is then passed to candles. Eyewitnesses state that for the first 33 minutes, the holy fire does not burn human skin, nor human hair. 

On the internet, videos circulate showing the fire causing pain 34 minutes after the miracle appears. 

So, what is this and why have so many within the Christian tradition never heard of this? 

Within the chronicles of Orthodox history, there are supposed references dating back to the first century. But while that may be enough for a traditional Eastern Orthodox, what can be said from other sources. Are there any? 

Throughout documented history, the Greek Orthodox authorities have been involved in the tradition. There have been dates where it did not happen, although rare. There were a thousand years ago. Those dates usually corresponded to a religious tension between Christian groups. 

There are plenty of doubters. The patriarch is hiding his hand inside the tomb opening, so could it be manipulated inside the tomb? Could the flame be ignited from planted phosphorous from inside the tomb? And why is it that the Greek Orthodox patriarch is favored? 

Whatever the truth, the "holy fire" that allegedly appears has more believers than you might first assume. Among others, there was at one time a tradition among Lutheran churches to have an "eternal flame" hanging somewhere in the sanctuary. I can attest to this as I witnessed this in my childhood. But, I was a child and found the mystery of the "eternal flame" just that, a mystery for others to discuss. 

  

The Senior Citizen Dictionary

Every once in a while, a new generation creates a compendium of useful words, notably a slang or associated vernacular, which is then classified by their generation. Those within that generation might understand one another better than those who had formative experiences in another time period.

These anomalies of formalized language tend to be most pronounced during youth or during a maturing phase of life. Sadly, the language of a Senior, or Senior Citizen, may be misinterpreted by earlier generations.

One way to solve this, would be to compile a "Senior Citizen Dictionary" that would explain the world as it might be viewed by your man or won 65 and older. I say this as one who would know.

The Senior Citizen Dictionary, which I believe could be as successful as the "mansplainer," would contain dictionary entries solely based on relative senior experiences.

For example, under "Golden" (Noun):

1. The stream running down your leg because you did not make it to the bathroom 2. the color of your urine because of dyes in your medicine.

3. The false idea that your latter years in life will be filled with smiles, happiness, and massive discounts on everything from steaks to new gutters. SEE Golden Buckeye Card fraud.

These definitions would require "as used in a sentence" sentences, like when we were in school.

TEACHER: Can you give an example of that in a sentence?

9 YEAR OLD: Yes, I can.

TEACHER: Give me a sentence with the word used correctly.

9 YEAR OLD: He correctly her mouth.

TEACHER: That is not a sentence.

9 YEAR OLD: It is too.

TEACHER: You are incorrect.

9 YEAR OLD: I know you are, but what am I?

Included in said dictionary would be words like "Epizoodie," which some old codger used to ramble on about to you...and now that you have gray or white hair, you have been dwelling on that word, wondering what in the blazes it means. So, of course, it goes into the Senior Citizen Dictionary.

It would be colored by your great grandmother who used the word incorrectly, spelled it incorrectly, but it was "a thing" to her...and very awful...so it goes in the dictionary...

Epizoodie (Noun, adjective)- Your grandmother's term for a horrible thing, likely a deadly disease. "I swear she got the epizoodie last week and it plumb near killed her."

This grandmother did not know there is a term "epizoodic." Hence, it appears in the Senior Citizens Dictionary as used by the senior citizen.

Slang words from the 1940s might appear because your mother used them. Since she called the stupid guy who dropped a pass from the quarterback a "dumbbunny," that entry would go into the Senior Citizen Dictionary. Forget about it being a word that shouldn't belong in the standard dictionary. The Senior Citizen Dictionary should supersede such a "narrow view."

As you can plainly see, this proposal would very likely be a best-selling reference text, right up there with The Oxford Dictionary of Verse and The Toilet Seat Reference Tool. 

Perhaps, I will go to Wix, Squarespace, or another website builder and craft a slick-looking site to market and sell the new dictionary, offering a free T-shirt with every sale. I am sure we could make big money...mucho dinero...but right now, it is 10:59 PM and I've one minute before my bedtime and all those pills and I have to strain my urine for the doctor and i have to gargle with salt water and i have to check my oxygen level, so i've no time for it. Besides, I have to eat a handful of nuts before bed, 'cause Momma always said if you don't eat nuts before you go to bed, you won't be able to poop in the morning.

 

  

where is your treasure?

 

when the mud is so thick

and the world is so cold

look to the Heaven

to that city of Gold,

your reward awaits you

for all those long nights

you prayed for a miracle

for wrongs to become rights,

for all those long seasons

when hope kept you from fear

and you walked in the grey-light

your angels were there near,

for God has been watching,

indeed, God has been true,

so keep your eyes on Heaven 

until God sees you through.

 

The way forward

 In a tech-centric world, the creative arts are tolerated. They are for those who do not fit the maze-like mentality of the Program Nirvana. Their talents lie outside the future of the global circular hive.

Consider the vast millions freed from box-like thinking, from a box-like world. Forty years ago, we peasants of the pen were still struggling with typewriters and word processors that slowed our creative geniuses crafting word-painted works. 

Technology freed us from those containers, then stifled us by hiding us in the toy closet. Too many grown-ups gravitated toward that which would not be composed of word-pictures. Unless the screen observant followed code, the creative could not come out to play in the sand box, nor in the arcade. The code enforcers tolerated us, even enjoyed our works, but did not value nor compensate us with a superior value set.

Twenty-six years on from the aftermath of the Y2 embarrassment, the tech elite have not learned from their failures, nor their hubris. When word-painters are relegated to the fringes of "contemporary culture," a systematic decline is inevitable.

The AI Revolution, or "Data Center Revolution," is unraveling. The glaring holes in reliability have been exposed. When Wikipedia, Instagram, and You Tube are elevated as "factual data," rather than what they are, your AI entity becomes less reliable than the factual standards solidified in the age of the dictionary, encyclopedia, and statistical-based standard reliability source. Why do we need "data centers" where deviance is glorified as statistical?

Meanwhile, those seeking to enlighten the populace with stories illuminating the truth of human nature and reality, encouraging the creative, stirring the soul, find too many potential audiences mesmerized by the less human, the less kind and gentle, the less compassionate. As authors, driven by creativity, we need to offer them a positive alternative to the Narcissistic, an alternative to soul-less culture. So, let us throw off every obstacle, and create a compassionate alternative, a spirit-driven soul-filled excellence that artificial intelligence can never create. And in the end, the populace will open their eyes and see the world as realists, not those manipulated by a soul-less revolution seeking the degradation of the human spirit.

An Excerpt From My Novel

     

     Not everyone in the parking lots on Baker Street saw the amber-hooded track star, painting her lips with ruby red, sitting inside her drained-yellow pickup truck, dreaming of malls, money, and cologne-drenched men.

     The grocery store supervisor, out on his smoke break, his mind fixated on Billie Jo Wells, the youngest cashier, stood at the edge of the parking lot.

     The postmaster, who parked near the edge of the ball diamond grass beyond the pavement, lay back in his seat after consuming a large slice of cherry cheesecake and a few sausage patties.

     Across the lot, the cable guy slept in his back seat while the company paid for an elaborate breakfast he left largely untouched forty miles downriver.

     Most people on Baker Street saw the long-bearded figure checking his phone, as lunchtime pushed into an hour-long break, but he looked like just another logger standing around wasting time before taking his massive haul up the next mountain highway.

     Across the street, a tractor-trailer sat in the gas station parking lot. The owner, Joe Jackson, sat in his cab eating a snack cake. He remembered a similar town, several miles back, where he'd met a man with goats...and he daydreamed about a life with freedom.

     For a couple hours every week, Joe Jackson was an important man. People counted on him; they waited for him. The rest of his existence, between bathroom breaks, coffee breaks, and a nap in the cab, he dreaded. The hours on the road were never ending.

     There were many times he drifted, driving by rote, sobered by the appearance of a tow truck, a school bus, or a clueless compact car driver going much too slow.

     But the man in the big rig dreamed of goats, fifty acres, a pond, cabin, and barn, off a gravel road in the middle of nowhere.

     And few on Baker Street watched the black-hatted lady, in low heels, pushing a grocery cart with a small sack of dog food. She clutched her alligator purse, ignoring the tears leaking from her eyes. As she climbed into her small white truck, she set the purse down, opened it, and dabbed her eyes with handkerchief.

     She, like the man in the big rig across the street, opened a Zebra Cake, and ate the icing before the rest of the snack. She wiped her hands with the monogramed white handkerchief. Backing out, she floored the pedal and sped out of the parking lot to get momentum to snake up the mountain to her empty house...

     They, the locals and visitors alike, went about their business with waves around the parking lot, but no one revealed their dreams, their hopes, their cares. In Messer's Cafe, in Hamrick's Convenience Store, Grayson's Grocery, and Cogar's Hardware, folks from out of town, like the hiker, met those from deeper in the hollers, hills, and mountains... beyond Laurel Springs and the nine hundred people who called it home.