Hollow Victory

The ToeKnee Show




I had a great friend once. One of many.

Or so it seems.


Let's call him "Stan".


This is all true.

Listen.

We'd met at a meditation university, both of us on staff.

Both of us shared many friends around the music, the meditation, the exploration of realms of consciousness.

We all used to stay up late at night and discuss warrior ways, the honor of warrior, the path towards enlightenment.. Our various views on life, modern society, how most folks got lost in the "illusions".

we'd talked about our woman troubles, successes, the search for life in balance,

the role spiritual path could take as we grew towards our envisioned "enlightenment", levitation all day long, traveling to other planets and still being here... walking through walls...

While sharing our stories of home towns and upbringing, we'd talk about teachers of our grade school era... How we were raised, our quest to see everyone have a more balanced upbringing... Sometimes saluting our childhood innocence,, which was the case for me, raised among the Midwest wild country, I had what seemed to be a more serene upbringing... Sometimes I felt it was miles away from the modern style of childhood.

Eventually, Stan told us about his childhood.

When Stan was a kid,
... His mother used to tie him to the coffee table.
according to Stan... And he used to laugh while he explained the craziness of it.


That was her easy way to keep him where she wanted.
Instant Baby sitting.

If he raised hell, she'd lock him in the closet....
...Go out and see a movie.

"That's motherhood for you", said Stan...

I heard this a few times before it finally sunk in...

Between such stories,
We used to discuss the vedas,
politics... Buddha, the Rishis, prayer, ....Meditation...
life, science, creating a better world.

Hovering around those ideas and ideals,
every passionate discussion relied on shared perception, I started to notice...

with discomfort,
of who the "real"... "Enemies are".

Stan took a lot of pleasure in tearing away the veils of illusion.
sometimes with force, in conversation.

among our small group, we didn't always agree... But it was usually light hearted, with laughs.

sometimes sneaking off to the train tracks and smoking a tiny speck of a joint,
just to compare it with our surreal serene meditation enhanced minds.

we would laugh at it's inadequate delivery...

Those long Midwest, quiet days and walks along the tracks,
We'd always come back to our shared vision of a better world, what it would look like.

and when we were in agreement, I noticed, with silent "unease/dis-ease", I noticed how much we both needed to believe in the "enemy",
as much as our friendship.

The reason I specifically speak about this one friendship in this way, is because eventually there came a day to acknowledge this, ...our division.



Striving to devote ourselves to a better world, we had met on that path,
a path of building from inside out...

Expereincing the "God within" and expecting it was all going to be automatically easy after that.

The shared meditation practice, with about 10,000 people, always guaranteed agreement on many things....
Easy and simple... yet not quite as simple...

Because I could feel the flaws in myself...

The work still ahead, no matter what.

...And I knew, agreement about the "silly humans out there" who did not share our agreements/path was the same as finding external enemies, and I had found enough internal flaws myself, that I sensed, I "knew" it wouldn't satisfy forever.

Stan and I could agree to disagree about the science of perceptions,
Yet.. his upbringing and mine were radically different. It seemed to be a deeper desparity than that...
I'd known my father. I had a great and devoted mother.
My family was conservative, but compassionate.

I'd seen my family sacrifice for strangers, friends, and family.

I saw devotion to our Catholic faith.
I had bought it hook line and sinker , until I had walked out of being an Altar Boy.
all it took was sensing something was amiss while helping the priest get ready for Mass... the eerie silence lasted too long...And I was out of there. Even though Sister Christopher got angry with me... I walked anyway.

I must have already had a sense of my own inner voice...

I knew that someday I had to find a more personal path, rather than listen to anyone's interpretation of God, I wanted to know the God within.


I'd been raised in a large family.
We got along for the most part.
I'd never been chained in the dark.... Ever.

I had no clue what it felt like to have been raised like Stan.

...to be raised by a single mother, tied to a coffee table, not knowing his father...


Somehow I knew we would find our differences in that gap of perception and expereince...

Even though we seemed to mostly find agreement in all our philosophic discussions...

and, among our shared group of friends,
we all had many laughs about those various divisions...
That didn't seem to matter at all!

We liked the same kind of women.

We stayed out of each other's territory.

We seemed to respect and support each other in the quest to find a mate.


But always, all of us filtered it all back down to being "buddies"...

a loyalty equation.

... at the ver heart of our friendship.

then... The distinct difference in our divergent views was accented
by challenges I found in my life that would never mirror challenges in his.
I'd hit my own special Cross/"crossroads'..Choices... Ones that only I could make.

In a sense, I knew I had to figure it all out on my own.

But I couldn't.


I wanted that validation... That support, that loyalty while I decided.

Yet... It was not meant to be.

I could only rely on what I had known of the peace and adventure in my childhood,
the way I had been raised... The simplicity, the humility... The regularness of it.

Which I hadn't understood was also rare in the person I tried building a future with.


...Trying to remake it for my own new family, where equally divergent childhood experience could find no compromise.

Consulting with all my friends, all of them, and finding no solutions,
I often discussed the dilemma, unsolvable ... over and over again, with Stan,

until one day it was over-heated...

We'd both reached out , and both found that different harsh separate view.

I got upset with Stan,
It was a serious time in my life,
and the "buddy buddy" wasn't going to work.
...He was a great friend...
...But I sensed our disagreement represented a wider gap, and maybe a worldwide gap,
one symbolic of all our lives...

with no solutions... Or compromises possible.

and I couldn't digest it...

At point of friendship, he told me I had to just save myself,
from a situation/lost marriage that had gone more than bad.

His method was harsh, and it was a reflection of the world he knew...

He insisted I agree him, and let it all go... Never look back.
He wouldn't budge.

and my upbringing caused me to stand for family beyond my own self, beyond the pain of everything....
so...I disagreed. I was going to make it work, or go down with the ship.
I showed him the door, instead.

I showed him the door , for good.

Haven't seen him since.

"ce le vie.... To that friendship"...

recently I noticed, it was also "ce le vie to those styles of friendship".

Many folks perceive they are making forward motion,
but all they are really doing is sticking with "friends" who never disagree wwith them...
"through thick or thin"

As a ntaion, notice the ones who say, "my political party, right or wrong... or my country right or wrong".

How can we, any of us... get anywhere, if we claim we have no where to go, no way to grow, nothing needed from anyone more than what we say is "how it is...how it should be... love it or leave it"?



...These days,
I know I was too hard on Stan.

I've seen a few miles on my machine, by now.

and I know why he took pleasure in that escape clause he demanded I use...

why he urged me to stop the sacrifice mentality,

and why he inssited that I chain my dreams to a cage somewhere... then with no thought, or remorse,, Walk away.


He was speaking from where he had been.

I wonder if he has ever been able to sort out that maze of his childhood.


I sure hope so.

but , whether he did or not,
or how it all turned out...

proves nothing about his side or my side.

that either was righter or wronger...


Still...Without our shared friendship growing ... What are the chances?

For him... Me... Or anyone? FOR YOU?

And if love/friendship/shared goals never includes passionate disagreement,
then aren't all of us lost... ???
I mean , really?

no matter which views we favor?
nothing to share????


Maybe other friends, replaced me, for Stan....

If I met Stan again, these days,
which I surely and definitely will,
now that I bring him from my past memory into present day vision,
...I won't be surprised to see the weight gain,
the new unrecognizable person,

or the near-Saint ... If he found other routes to find redemption, enlightenment...

I am sure he would see similar strain in my world... and the weight I have carried since.

As we all seem to have to do... whether we like it or not.

I can tell you this, he'd probably point out that where I now am, is far different from the trajectories I had set to accomplish.

I might be amazed by what he'd reflect of the space between us,
as much as what I'd reflect back for his path.

Maybe service to the world saved each of our asses... Who knows.

because that was the only part to which we truly ever shared or agreed.

Separate versions of how to accomplish the same goals,

I now understand this is actually the reality of this world.

we all find a way to get to the same place,,, eventually,

or we never meet anywhere.

EVER.



This is all beside the point;


Stan was ex-military...

Back when wee were still friends,
He told me a story once about a recruit, and an incident
he witnessed as a Drill sergeant, ...In Bootcamp.

One of the other drill sergeants was riding a certain new recruit , really hard. really hard.
probably, as usual, "for his own good".

one day, when they were practicing /teaching grenade toss,
things went rough, and ridicule ensued...
again... For the good of the company, the mission, the shared vision...
an impasse occurred which soon turned into .... A deal breaker.

When they got to throwing the live grenades,

The recruit looked at the drill sergeant,
and did his last maneuver, ... and it probably felt like a great idea at the time,
How to "win"... against authority, and that new recruit
... just dropped the grenade between them.

Neither moved,

Kabloooooeeeeyyy!

...All anyone ever found, after the blast,
... Were two sets of boots...

and splatter.


Stan would laugh when he told me that story.
His eyes would sparkle.
... andf I admit it... so would I.

Back when we "knew who the enemy was",
and shared a view about a person who won.... and what the "problems of authority were"
and when I was an idiot agreer.

Just so happens that time froze...

even in the shared laugh.

a big gap.

winners and losers.

yet, never another step forward ever again for the dead guys....



Stan was there,

He saw the whole thing.

but he was also there, in his own past, still chained to the coffee table,
while he told me about it with glee...an extra amount of glee, for what the recruit had balls to do....

and I guess I got spanked too hard ONCE or twice as a kid......

so , a part of me could see that vision too.... just enough to get the joke of it...

How to win, and also how to say,
F**k the world...F**k life... F**k love...
all in the same motion.


Admit it... You got some of the same disease.
Yes you do.

If not from growing up, then from a boss, a teacher, a lawyer... a former spouse...

Knowing how to teach anybody a thing or two always emerges from the experience.

...it's a wound, a curse, not an answer worth living.. is it???

Or how would you be here, on this planet, in this world, watchingit all go by just like it is a tv show you invested energy in, agreeing with what we all share????


But , even more,


When Stan told that story, Stan got the joke of the victory which went nowhere,
in a way I took note, ...was far deeper than I could conceive then...


the lesson that taught nothing,


except "immovable" as a premise.


I took note.

I said nothing. I laughed about it too.

A decision... disquised as forward motion.

disquised as a lesson taught and learned.

Would you be surprised that from Stan's childhood, it was easy for him, later in life, to become a prison guard?

and by now, he may have gone back to that.

The caged youth watching over other caged youth...



I showed Stan the door.

But I found my own ghosts, anyeay.
I haven't heard about him ... Seen him... Or thought about him much,
...until today.


It all makes sense doesn't it?



Yet, I see beauty in all of it...Today...

Because, like it or not, I still have a fondness for our friendship whcih went beyond what we agreed or disagreed about.

or the losses he had then... or I have now.

where I had formally, formerly judged and despised it all,
I now see the world you and I create with each second that goes by.

Yeah... You....

Yeah... Me.


Isn't it this the mathematical equation of perfect balance, the
reality of our present days???


Can you see it?

Just so happens, some people blame it all, what's wrong with this world, on folks like me,

other folks, like I used to be,

blame it on others... LIKE YOU.


I see it is , has always been US.

Us that create what we all wake up inside of each and every day.

We create it together.



and I offer no solution.

not here.

except, that if there is one... It's inside you,

as well as inside me.

or it's never gonna change.

EVER.

you can't kill the differences.

we all share the journey.

or we go nowhere believing we got somewhere.

end up Hollow.

with dead folks and statues representing nothing....


and just building more cages for those we call enemy.


.........

People ...watch as we see folks face each other down.
People ...cheer the contestant on,
until the last empty suitcase is opened.

Kids sent off to war to find enemies that all look like people.

Winning at all costs.

Gunning down the opposition.


The whole world seems to be at the mercy of such formulas.

NOT created by others,

but voted forward with each of our moment to moment thought, we endure.


A person expressed to me, the other day, how the "evil ones" need to be treated.

ostracized...


and I was instant in my reply.

"I used to believe in evil people", I said.

and "Now when I see an "evil"person, one I used to hate or judge or want to destroy,
...I just see an injured person".

So says I.

Yet today, for unknown reasons, in this case the cover story is my family name and reputation,

I hold my ground... Rather than move forward and find something
that springs back, peaceful luscious and ...Better.


At this rate, I won't be finding a cabin studio dream art life for years, years, years,years, years, years, to come.

Instead, I get to rub somebody's nose in their own stupidity, which scarred me permanently 15 years ago.



If you have a chance to develop any skills for rising above your anger,
don't even think they have any validity,
unless you can demonstrate them when you lost what was truly precious.


Otherwise, you will be as fake as I am today.

Then again,
I am a believer that truth expressed is ALWAYS a step towards peace,
just as valid as a

...Walk around the block,

or sleeping on a decision...

and then, at least, maybe the consequences of actions won't be such a surprise.


I must say I have clarity, after expressing my truth.

But it seems like such a hollow practice, and definitely not as good as caressing her skin, or feeling her touch on mine.

.

oh well.


this is where I get to go out and wail to the trees.

a necessary step, also.. as necessary as any.

And after all, especially after all those portraits of the ones who lost family, friends, and children in disagreements/wars long forgotten.

Every culture, ever generation seems to pay a price in blood.

and every other generation takes the lessons for granted, leaving the reasons and the methods behind,

to learn through suffering again?

loss?

I simply discovered that winners and losers are what this world craves.


and maybe all that ever got made here, after all...

maybe it's all going to continue to find balance for us all.
... maybe... someday...


TODAY we get to see how our leaders posture and threaten each other, day in , day out...

and the commentators measure the winners against the losers, by the quotas, and the poles.

seemingly no one with an original idea left..

... We expect any kids to see much more than a contest from here on out?

we all vote for what the future is.

Just know that you create your share for all who bear witness, by how you use your energy and breath.
NOW.


you know it's true.
..............

We live on a planet among children who were whipped into shape.

and every so often somebody drops a grenade, just to watch the fear in each other's eyes.

Make it into a scene for a movie, and bring the whole world to the same cliff's edge.

Sell tickets.

bank the hidden profit,

break for a commercial...

then power up folks driven in to fix it,

while you sit behind the screen and laugh.



It's all gonna be fine.

don't worry.


don't be fooled.


Victory that slices a space between you and me.

Whether it's showing each other the door,

or passing along a rumor and an extra laugh at another's expense,

It's victory,

yeah... It's victory... It wins awards.

but see what we are creating.

grabbing for the better pussy... Over and over and over.

never deepening the sense of truth or peace, or life, or breath?

we can have it if we want it.

and don't forget the visions of enemies we teach, endure, entertain, build...

Just by the way we walk through this as if it's all ok, as long as we get ours!

...Don't forget your enemies...They might even deserve what you give them.


but , who can live with a hollow heart?


Victory Hollow...

these words, and this idea...is starting to make sense to me now.

I never knew what it meant.


Seeing angry leaders who will never find a way to find another way.


And never seeing the power women emerge, becasue they had no mothers, after all...
...if they never exist again... then who can include us, after all?

Let's hope the real future can come rising from among us... bringing us all back to the nurturing we crave, desire, can believe in...

maybe even from inside us...



it's a desperate planet... Desperate, and soon disappearing with all our agreement and compliance, otherwise....


I can't seem to preach about peace today.


I guess the enemy ... HAS won.

for now.

let's test it and see if it's a box office hit...

forget about what it means...

how many dollars can we make...

you know ... For most... And maybe even us...

it's all that matters.

these sentences smack of idiot simplicity and judgment.

I don't pretend this article is leading anywhere.

But what reflects in your own heart...

well... That just might be what we need... Really.

so... Take my hand when you see me in my next gutter.

and I will be satisfied with some chicken soup.

no statuettes, or gold plated plaques.

Just realize...

My vows of poverty left me in the dust and at the mercy of the greedy and the real rapers.

and their label on me as a loser, was correct, because I found out I couldn't stomach sacrifice forever.

Who could?

who ever did?

I need to win something too someday!

so... I guess I am headed to the graveyard of the warriors who died winning hollow victories.. Too.

Just like you.


We can all find a way to bury our chosen enemies.

We can all find a way to decide who to show the door forever.

We can each define which closet we locked ourselves in , and why.


But I swear to God... as best I can believe in Her/Him ... I'd settle for something far simpler now.. This very second.

I sure wish I had a fresh REAL breast to nurse, NOW, and Superman or WONDERwoman would show up soon , and sort out our disaster.


Otherwise, I think we may be watching the whole thing sink for good pretty soon.


And you never know...

It might actually be a great destiny we should never have tried to hold back.

And once we see it sinking, shouldn't we all get out the guns and make noise and cheer?

we all participated, it was our laugh, our joke on ourselves.

and we each get to believe we wanted it, truly,

and secretly know we won.



Jesus... I gotta turn on the Craig Ferguson show.

something to laugh about and another beer.

as good as Nirvana.

Hollow Victory!

hip... Hip... Hooray...... KaBlooeeey!!!!


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