this is… The Neighborhood
the Story within the Story
Trapped (
You have been trapped in the inescapable net of ruin,
by your own want of sense. – Aeschylus
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from Los Angeles – Bryan Catalan with It’s Alright
In the middle ages, represented from the 5th through the 15th century, jails were not made of cookie-cutter templates, nor were long sentences handed down, since most people did not survive. Taking cues from Caligula, the insane Roman Emperor who terrorized his own subjects until his uneventful assassination, it was not uncommon for a sadistic village ruler to try and convict a poor soul of a crime and then out due the punishment from the last, eventually giving birth to rat torture – the cruelest jail sentence of them all.
The village ruler would summon the guards with a nod of his head. The guards would then order the inmate to lie down on his back, where his limbs were immediately shackled to heavy stakes in the ground. Once secured, the prisoner – at this point – would start begging for dear life. The lead guard would nod back to the village ruler, indicating that the prisoner was secured and of no further threat.
The ruler would then repeat the crimes the prisoner had committed, then order the sentence to be carried out. Lead guard would pick up a metal, removal bottom cage, revealing a ravenous, ill-tempered, giant rat.
Ignoring the pleas of the now insane prisoner, the guards would place the rat’s cage upon the howling man’s stomach, then light a match and set the top of the cage ablaze. Once the prison guards were assured all other exits were blocked, they would retract the bottom from underneath the cage, placing the rat directly upon his victims’ soft and meaty stomach. Rats, no matter how filthy we believe them to be, are a very intelligent species. In seconds, the rat would sense the approaching fire, and note, his only way out. Ignoring the screams of the human underneath him, and in an attempt to save its own life, the rat would bite down and begin tunneling his way out.
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Trapped by indecision. Surrounded in grief. Buried, not by our dreams, but by the thought that we may never reach. Consumed by our addictions, lost in a destructive love, weighed down by historical fears, sated in sowing distrust. Trapped in the headlights, and although there is time to make a move, we stand frozen and stare before crashing into despair. The high-dive is in the distance, which is where we long to be, but our fear of the unknown, blocks all exits to greatness – measured by the person we want to be – so we settle into a cycle and pretend that we are free.
Words of inspiration and stories of how others made it, become abstract and fall upon deaf ears. Every life is different and the burden distribution may in fact be unfair, so we shut down our motivation, and watch our destiny disappear. A true believer in peace, and love and nice and the world’s inhabitants are not heavy, for each is our brother & sister, but we do not exist in never never land, where the magic of the moment always finds beauty victorious in the end.
So do we remain trapped, taking comfort in the familiar, no matter how deeply the emptiness fills us, or like the rat, do we fortify our existence, not by devouring our fellow man through judgemental lenses, taking satisfaction of an unearned victory, but rather by trying to make a positive difference.
Traps do exist, but so do escapes, and while the answers made be hiding, we all know they exist. So if the house of cards we live under is swaying, do not surrender peacefully; and even if the cards all come tumbling down, consider it a ticker tape parade, because determination is noticed, felt and inspiring, and just maybe, your {my} contribution is in contributing toward the success of others.
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HOPE
Hope is being able to
see that there is light
despite all the darkness.
– Desmond Tutu
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from 1984, Steel Pulse
w/ Wild Goose Chase
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Hope is all we need, true or false? Hold on to your answer for a moment, or at least until you finish reading this post. Our answer may remain the same, but we must never be afraid to stop and think, out of fear of change. Hope is a wide open expanse, no walls or borders, just a seemingly endless horizon, living beyond the world of chance. Where wishes are bound by magic, maintaining power and influence in fairytales, where most everything is made up. Unlike believe – tormented by traps for fools – which can make us believe lies are true. And have faith, seemingly innocent enough, but taken in its literal sense, is far too personal, and maintains the most rigid borders of all.
But hope is bulletproof. It cannot be influenced or bought. It cannot be stripped or altered in anyway. We can keep it to ourselves or we can share it with the world. It makes no difference when we invoke its use; dire straits – surrounded by sharks and we hope they do not eat us – or trivial pursuits – hoping the light stays green, so we do not have to stop. Hope springs eternal. Keep hope alive. Hope is all we need. Because without it, the vacuum effect exist and despair becomes the impostor, convincing us that life will never get better.
In 1820, Egypt conquered Sudan and for nearly 200 years, the people who lived in south Sudan would never be left alone. Eyed for its riches after the opening of the Suez Canal, the British and the French would bind them into debt, of which they would never come out. Sudan would change hands in an unending stream of revolts. Revolts against the westerners, revolts against the Egyptians and when the revolts were finally successful, they revolted against each other, in a full-scale civil war. And if the cries of war were not loud enough, thousands would parish from a famine that had overtaken not just Sudan, but a vast region of Africa. But the people of southern Sudan would persevere, for even with life so cruel, the hope of a new day would see the bad ones through.
from Foreign Affairs, photo by Goran Tomasevic
In 1972, a fragile peace agreement was made, allowing the south autonomy, but the religious and tribal differences from the north were to wide a gap to fill. Hope for many was all they had and they held on for dear life, since it did not take long for the power structure to collapse. Ethnic cleansing, financial unevenness and disputed borders, put the peace treaty to its strongest test, of which it had no chance of passing. And in less than 3 decades, the largest country in Africa would become engulfed in its second and most deadly civil war. Landlocked, thereby offering no easy escape, a feud between Muslims and Christians, allowed there to be no sanctity within faiths. For nearly 200 years, they did not dance under their own flag or speak their native tongue or understand how they had become a foreigner on home soil. But somehow, knowledge was past down of who they were, a proud people, and I imagine each generation passed their wisdom on, knowing they would need it if they hoped for a nation to call their own.
from Politico, Renewed Hopes
In 2011, with no real infrastructure or system of controls. With a single revenue stream, the oil underground, and with a battered land still reeling from a mind-boggling 22-year-long civil war, their hope would come to pass. On July 9, of that same year, South Sudan would become the world’s newest country, finally putting control back into the people’s hands.
As of December 2017, fighting has clouded a sustained peace. But this is not fairytale, and war is a shit hole, but home is worth fighting for and hope gives South Sudan a chance, a reason to hold on.
Hope springs eternal. Keep Hope alive. Hope is bulletproof. But is hope all we need?
– an editorial by thepublicblogger
this is… The Neighborhood
Short Film of the Month ‘A Battle for Peace’ by Joost Jansen
I observed my enemy for years
He is human, just like me.
– A Battle for Peace
The Neighborhood has established itself as a collaborative of arts. Many of the posts and all the shows are a mix of visual, recording and written-word artists, contributing pieces of their individual imaginations, then spun into a single performance we call the show.
A Battle for Peace is a showstopper in the collaborative arts. The twisted animation is fast, sleek, terrifying and real, with the voice over narration matching its pace blow for blow, but neither able to land a knockout blow. In just 69 seconds, this award-winning, animated short feature, plunges us deep into the heartless soul of war. But it’s the last seven words… that blows our mind.
A Battle for Peace by Joost Jansen
July 6, 2016: Defining Moment or Future Game of ‘What if’?
“If I had an hour to solve a problem;
I’d spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem
and 5 minutes thinking about solutions.”
– Albert Einstein
Windows are so common and ordinary, we sometimes forget how large of a role they play in the shaping of our past, present and future life. The most common visual definition is that windows are to see through, offering a glimpse of only the present day. But windows are so much more. They are gateways to the past and pathways to our future. So when we close the windows on a beautiful or rainy day, we are placing ourselves within the confines of a box. As artists, there are times when seclusion is our stage, where our finest work is created and the imagination runs rampant. But there are also times, when we should be anywhere but alone in there.
Windows of opportunity come and go. There is no such thing as when one closes, all is lost. However, for whatever the reason, we may close or simply never open the one window, that led to our defining moment.
‘What if?’ is a game of sorts, that historians and debaters love to play.The design is simple and rarely do tempers flare, for mission of said game is found in make believe. What if begins when a person poses a historical question, only the asker changes the actual facts, and then each person delivers their spin, on how history would have been altered. The most famous What if? question, posed so often it is now cliche: What if Adolf Hitler had never been born, would the Holocaust still have happened? Around and around it goes, with intricate stories and details based on a timeline of factual knowledge, spun with theories and speculation, for a moment, one may forget it’s only a game. But it soon fizzles, as reality remains unchanged.
On July 6, 2016 a man was shot and killed in Minnesota. But unlike so many other similar occurrences before it, somehow, most everyone knew this one was different, Not different in a vacuum, but different because of the greater implications. A collective epiphany or perhaps it was the moon, resembling a giant lightbulb or maybe the winds of a social conscious, that had been buried so deep inside, and only the gale force of Orlando, Baton Rouge, St. Paul and Dallas could dig it up, but with good fortune it was still there. Newt Gingrich, known more for his Senate takeover and hostile rhetoric, than words of unity and understanding. And while most Americans already knew, galvanizing in city squares nationwide, it was the public voice of reason, from a man who built his brand on division, that captured a nation’s thoughts as one.
July 6, 2016: What or who will define this moment? The moment when it clicked for America and her children: The problems of race, while very real, are nothing more than psychological smoke and mirrors. Perhaps, the psychology is the last to change. Zachary Hammond an unarmed white teenager, shot dead by police. Our literally non-stop squabbling national government leaders apply archaic wisdom to a nation and time, that it no longer resembles, rather than imagining, how to bring its people together and direct a course for the next 200 years – like the framers did. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor in fiery dissent illegal stops corrode all our civil liberties.” This moment we are in, as the winds are still blowing, carries the power to stir even the most rigid thinkers among us Internal Revolt at NRA over Castile Shooting Will we, the people, no longer take part in a ludicrous system of choosing our leaders, by who can outwit the other in an ugly contest of mud, that never gets better. Or do we take note of this moment: that mud fights from the top, cannot be contained, leaving we the people sullied and stained, and ripe for the psychology to lure us into believing, we like it that way. We can participate in a system of civility, and still allow a contest to assure we elect the best Public Servant, that will serve we the people – not special interest. Look inside our local government, side step the daily if all they report is scandal. Take pride in progress made, respect how hard they work and embrace the motivation, because we know they are always working,. Absorb the compassion, if we trust it is real, allow for reason, as they will not always agree with us, for they represent the people, not the individual. Anticipate a lapse in judgement or a mistake, for our leaders are still human, but demand they do their best. We know, they are genuine and will not suddenly change, because they never have. Circle of Life: Sacramento’s District 2 Candidate Allen Wayne Warren (Flashback 2012. Councilmember Warren is presently in his 2nd productive term). Imagine a government of the people, led by the first woman in history of this great nation, with such strength, she stands strong after decades of trying to bring The First Lady, US Senator and Secretary of State down. Imagine if all her attention can be afforded to the job of governing a nation, I imagine, high stakes fumbles, would not happen.
Will our learning institutions take this moment to imagine, a curriculum that creates thinkers, that solves problems when they arise – retiring kick the can – or as a case study in what does not work. preventing the need of defusing future time bombs, that we all heard ticking. Will The Legacy of Diamond Reynolds’ Video inspire us to instill a think big mentality, affording the ability to maintain calm, even if trapped in moment, so much bigger than we had ever imagined? Will our leaders of prayer and heads of our families pass down through generations, that we the people are of one nation with bloodlines flowing to the world’s people, and it is God’s judgement anyway, if that is the way we pray.
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Life happens and there are moments or even days when isolation from the world is the only way to find ourselves – any longer and we risk slipping into stagnation or worse, depression. But even if we are reinventing ourselves or recovering from a slump we can never ignore once we know, the fact we are living in a moment. If we hold back our contribution, we may hinder the forward progress of society as a whole, turning a pivotal moment into a game called What if.
Kendall F. Person
created by Kendall F. Person produced at thepublicblogger.com and thepublicblogger FB Pagethepublicblogger FB Page, and supported by a host of talented undergroiund artists.
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An Angry World: Shooting Death of Philando Castile Marks a National Epidemic
His energy ran low and he collapsed outside of the community church. Completely out of breath, Brooklyn looked up at the distinguished steeple and screamed at the top of his lungs, “Why don’t you help us! Why don’t you come back and help us!” – excerpt from An Angry World
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Shooting Death of Philando Castile Marks A National Epidemic
Falcon Heights Minnesota
by Kendall F. Person
Everything about this one was wrong, even this sentence. So many shootings of Black men in America by officers of the law who are sworn to protect and serve, occurring so often, that we now have frames of references. So openly violent, that if not for the entirety of the gripping and ultimately tragic video – the voice of the little girl, the darkness which amplified the sound, the epic breakdown of an incredibly strong woman, who held it together and broadcast her plight to the whole wide world – news of another shooting would have been garden variety and not even noticed outside of the famed Twin Cities in the Land of 10,000 Lakes.
And please, not in Minnesota, perhaps the most welcoming state and above the fray of all 50 of the United States of America. Not to a former honor student. Not to a working man. Not in front of a 4 year old little girl. Not for a bad headlight. Not for doing exactly what the officer of the law asked him to do. And not with a precision of hate so absolute, that he continued to point his gun directly at a human being as he lay dying, then dead.
It has long since been beyond the imagination. Ferguson and Baltimore exposed the systematic ‘fire away’ mentality that has been allowed to spread across our nation. It was never a coincidence, no matter how us hold outs tried to believe it was. It is not remorseful or accidental nor was the shooter in actual fear of their lives. He shot him dead after a routine traffic stop and never stood down even after Philando Castile was dead. The officer was at war. And the 4 year old little girl’s lifetime of ghosts be damned.
The culture of hatred spewed from our elected officials has saturated the country. It has poisoned the well. We are one nation, that is tearing itself apart. And we are watching it and we wave our flags and say we love our nation and yet we care so little about it, that we no longer even try to stop it. Who do we think we are? Do we actually believe that God Almighty is pleased? Do we actually think, the rest of the world inhales it as normal and sane for a super power to implode and then sell it days later like “Oh well.” Do we actually believe that we are creating a better land for future generations? They see us. They hear us. And they will become us only worse.
This was wrong and yet this is real. And this national epidemic has to have our full attention. On all levels. In every community.In education, in policy, in training, in family. Together. For united we stand or divided we are doomed to living in angry world of our own creation.
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