I have watched Fate unfold her pattern; Try endured/ What she endured; her captor now, by Helen’s decree,/ Ends thus.
I have done with tears. I will endure my death./ O gates of the dark world, I greet you as I come! Let me receive, I pray a single mortal stroke,/ Sink without spasm, feel the warm blood’s gentle ebb,/ Embrace death for my comfort, and so I close my eyes.
Friends, there is no hope, none – once the hour has come./ This is the day. Retreats wins little./ I go. Now in the land of the defeated I/ Will mourn my end and Agamemnon’s./ I have lived. I am not like a bird scared at an empty bush,/ Trembling for nothing. Wait: when you shall see my death, woman for woman; when in place/ Atoned with death woman for woman,
Then witness for me – these and all my prophecies/ Were in utter truth. This I request before I die. Alas for human destiny! Man’s happiest hours/ Are pictures drawn in shadow. Then ill fortune comes,/ And with two strokes the wet sponge wipes the drawing out.
Cassandra’s lines (1297-1328) from Aeschylus’ Agamemnon.
A few notes from the margins, semi-blog-worthy, and so put together in this morass:
Liars, Cheaters and Ignoramuses: The Republicans are doomed to go down in history for childish stupidity. While they may not be a species of themselves, they remain a bitter reflection of our world, a breed of astounding ignorance who no longer deserve the laughs.
Silly Old Upper Canada College: The main building at Toronto’s richest and oldest all-boys school, Upper Canada College, is as imposing as ever – wide stone staircase, red brick wings, iconic tower – the halls as long and echoing and the students as privileged.But something has changed. There were females in the building, actual women, not students, but teachers and administrators. And they were in charge. A much better place than yesteryear, without a doubt.
Helvetius Porn: The doctrine of Claude Helvetius is fundamental and clear: as human’s faculties may be reduced to physical sensation, we are motivated solely by the avoidance of pain and the pursuit of pleasure.
Yes, it’s all about feeling good, finding the sunniest possible spot, drink in hand, and staying in that as long as possible. In other words, there is no freedom of choice between good and evil and no such thing as absolute right.
“What I am is very deep. I came here for love.” “I came here expecting to meet the girl who had her heart broken, not the girl who wanted to get her field plowed. I wonder if you’re that shallow.”
“My blood is boiling a little right now.” “I am super offended by you. I’ve appreciated your deep side.”
“I don’t belong here.” “I’m being punished for being an intellectual. You have to have original thoughts. I feel like I’m destined to be the bachelor. Oh man, I’m needing to have some sex.”
“He called me shallow.” Kaitlyn took Nick on her next date.“The way he pulls me in, the way he kisses me, the way we are…Nick just makes me feel like a woman, a desired woman.”
They went into the bedroom, away from the cameras, and Kaitlyn moaned deeply many times and then, after a commercial break, stood in the morning light. “I don’t necessarily feel guilty about the act. It’s more just guilt from caring about other relationships that I have. And I’ve never done this before. I’ve never dated so many guys and had to feel this guilt.”
Beyond the expected demands of not being a criminal, politician or married, The Bachelorrequires contestants to sign a document which includes the following:
Rule #6: Applicants must never have had a restraining order entered against them… involving moral turpitude or violence, as defined by the Producer in its sole discretion.Rule #8. Each applicant…agrees that the Producer may disclose any information…about the applicant’s private life (including) confidences and secrets with family and friends.
Rule #9: Each applicant agrees to be recorded 24 hours a day, 7 days a week…by means of open and hidden cameras, whether or not he or she is aware and that such recordings may be disseminated on all media now known or hereafter devised, throughout the Universe in perpetuity. Rule #10. Applicants agree that revelations of personal Information and recordings may be embarrassing, unfavorable, humiliating, and/or derogatory and/or may portray him or her in a false light.
In other words, the producers of The Bachelor are free to cast judgement, steal secrets, and lie about anyone on their show for as long as they wish…which begs the question: Is only an ‘x’ required on the signature line?
Unreal, Lifetime Network‘s new fictional reality show based on The Bachelor, has it all wrong. Their aim is to offer a behind-the-scenes scoop on how reality shows really work, heaping blame on soulless producers and production assistants who feast on guileless participants. And I’m not buying any of it.
Not only is Unreal‘s narrative dull, actually triter than the real thing, but it is founded on the inane premise that there is a star chamber in Reality TV.While the show purports to be yet another phase in the modern world’s self-deconstruction, it is merely a naive sidetrack.
The point of The Bachelor isn’t making a deal with the devil but rather sharing in everyone’s common stupidity. The contestants actually do want to find love and are willing to expose themselves, and all their frailties, in blind faith to “the process” espoused on the show. That’s the beauty of this train wreck…and our pathetic desire to watch.
Jane’s Addiction is back on tour, playing their critically acclaimed Nothing’s Shocking from start to finish. As Perry Farrell asked the crowd last night at the Brooklyn Bowl, “Is it shocking that Nothing’s Shocking is having its 25th anniversary?” Meant to be rhetorical, it wasn’t. Because it is, shocking that is. Dave Navarro remains as tattooed and rocking’ out as ever while Farrell maintains his crackhead je ne sais crois. But even with the bra-and-pantied girls swinging above the stage, the music isn’t as raw, nor as overwhelming, but has deteriorated into more of a burlesque. All of which was made worse by the Williamsburghians, in their hats and beards, chanting “Let’s Go Rangers” at the bar.
One of the greatest challenges in writing is getting the sex right, which was an especially difficult matter in my bad side, because it’s a key aspect of the novel.
“But now let us go to bed.” He pulled off my blouse and kissed down my back and stayed at my hips and held himself just away, me standing, legs spread, naked and had me play with his penis. I opened my mouth, my jaw down, pliant, and ran my nails across his stomach and neck, watching the pink trail up his cheek until he had my thumb and forefinger in his mouth, sucking like a baby, getting frantic. He pressed against me hard, knocking us onto the bed, desperate, burrowing into my breasts, his tongue sloppily out, like a honey bear, unable to slow his thrusting, faster, kissing and licking my ear and then quiet, trying to pull back, to look at me and then just grabbing as hard as he could. He had his hand on my face and neck, almost choking me, and then pushed all the way in. I grabbed the edge of the bed, pulling the sheet up in clumps. I kept him in that ecstasy, on the brink, tight, and he was trying to lift us all the way to the ceiling and then crazed, holding my leg up like a post.
He snorted coke and wanted me to pose again and held himself exact above me. “Who has been taking my bed from the place in which I left it? He must have found it a hard task, no matter how skilled a workman he was, unless some god came and helped him to shift it.” His penis bounced wildly, and went into me, doing knee bends, carrying us into the bathroom. My shoulder and head were pressed flat on the ceramic tiles, white against my face, a coiling of green vines and branches against my breasts. “I was victorious over the Cicons. I vanquished the Cyclops, Telepylos and Circe. I have been to Hades. I have heard the Sirens.” He grabbed my waist, the cool of his ring against my bellybutton, and pinched my nipple, whimpered and was done. He filled the Jacuzzi with salts and massaged my back and shoulders and went down into my legs.“I have seen terrible Charybdis and Scylla. I was promised immortality by Calypso. I have come back to you.”
This blog,my bad side, receives an average of 70-100 visits per day. The aim of these posts is to intrigue visitors with brief and, hopefully, insightful reflections on writing and life – and throw in the odd image. All of that said, I am aware of what many virtual visitors are really looking for, and I even occasionally deliver on that. My post on Jade Elizabeth, of Bachelor/Playboyfame, underlines the parameters of this virtual world. From January 29 through February 17, the blog maintained its normal humble traffic, and then suddenly tripled in one day and triple again the next, to only dwindle down again a week later. Whether any of this surge of visitors stopped to read my “insights” is dubious at best.
Espousing virtue when it comes to desire is a tenuous thing. This is not just because sex is often considered dirty by those proclaiming a purity of heart but more so that the self-same go incognito in pursuit of their own lust.The internet provides the opportunity to delve into erotic fantasies, case and point being this blog, which had a surge of thousands of hits over the past few days from searches for “Jade Elizabeth Bachelor Playboy”. This virtual world of sex amounts to a reported $14 billion annually, which means that porn, as shadowy as so many claim it to be, is a reality for the silent majority. And so what of it? Can it not be left at that? Must there be shame attached to sexual desire? Why must there be some self-damning awareness for craving nakednesss?
Surely no one can claim anything wrong with the impulse, nothing out of the natural order. It would seem to be one of the great things about being alive.However the lectures on decency and propriety always follow, inspiring schizophrenia in the listener, who must fight a natural impulse. Indeed, trying to be good and pure isn’t just difficult; it’s impossible.
The most common route – and most damaging – is to find shame in the desire and target the object of lust for this urge.This violent demonization of sexual imagery, turning women into disposable objects, is founded upon a system where men seek to control women through mysogenic messaging.It’s a lame-brain rouse that has dragged on for thousands of years (Yes, literally thousands.).
The issue is skewed, everything muddled between the left and right brain, just because of the premise that there might be something wrong with desire.
A sensible route would be to simply exit these sanctums gated by moral doctrine, therefore rejecting the shame that judgement wields.
And then the object of desire is no longer the issue, and instead it is only a matter of understanding and accepting the passion in oneself…and then clicking a button to see what’s there
I feed my guilty pleasure for The Bachelor not because I want to see anyone find “true love” nor participate in a drinking game based on the amount of times a character says, “This is amazing!”, but rather to witness the humorous and pathetic decline of American civilization. Last night’s episode (Week 8 of Season 19) was no exception. Viewers witnessed Jade Elizabeth reveal pictures from her Playboy shoot to Bachelor Chris Soules on her computer. Confused between arousal and indignation, Chris bumbled through a proclamation that he would stand behind Jade if he were to choose her as his intended…and then went on to dump her the next day. The Bachelor offers that unique hybrid of American television which attempts to straddle the impossible: trashy titillation and a wholesome Christian story. Girls get drunk, do various stunts in bikinis, act with spite and scorn toward one another and then reflect thoughtfully on their Christian values and what it is to love. As amusing as all of this might be, I do find myself getting irritated at the hypocrisy when it is so foully-craft as the broadcast last nightForgetting the fact that Chris, while promoted as true and pure, has at the very least indulged in porn-surfing and attended a strip club or two, no matter what he, his family, town or state might think of making money (or just expressing oneself) through nude modelling, it is inane to judge anyone on these standards. As it states in the Constitution of the United States, a document fervently cited by Republicans, Democrats, libertarians and capitalists alike, it is everyone’s right to exercise “the blessings of liberty to ourselves.”
An issue to consider instead might be the presence of guns in the household of potential mates. Indeed, what if it turned out that one of the contestants had a relative who had a treasure trove of assault weaponry in the home? Would the music turn ominous? Would the bachelorette scowl and flee? Or would she be forced to don her bikini and let her rip? As for Jade, I hope that the producers of The Bachelor have the wherewithal to select her for next season’s Bachelorette so that we can watch all the eager boys shrug off her so-called past “for all the right reasons.”
Friends, there is no hope, none – once the hour has come./ This is the day. Retreats wins little./ I go. Now in the land of the defeated I/ Will mourn my end and Agamemnon’s./ I have lived. 
I am not like a bird scared at an empty bush,/ Trembling for nothing. Wait: when you shall see my death, woman for woman; when in place/ Atoned with death woman for woman,
Alas for human destiny! Man’s happiest hours/ Are pictures drawn in shadow. Then ill fortune comes,/ And with two strokes the wet sponge wipes the drawing out.
