For *Real* Matrix Lovers, Totally Moshimo

I once had a short e-lationship with a British man in the right demographic- he was cute and witty and he seemed bright. But it turned out he acted childishly controlling, he wasn’t really interested in understanding me in any capacity whatsoever and he was NO fun to play with in Second Life At All.

He’d disagree with me over stupid shit that I was right about all the time, for no reason. Our most memorable confrontation was when I tried to share how much I appreciated the cleverness of the “There is no Spoon” metaphor in the movie The Matrix. When he responded with some sort of contempt, I tried to explain it was because the metaphor was meant to imply an eastern mystical concept that our material world is one of illusion, and that the spoon represents the world of illusion. In fact, this metaphor is rather obvious, spoken by the Asian boy monk in the film. But my brilliant e-boyfriend begged to differ. He maintained that the statement “There is no spoon” was *only* meant literally, and only means that there is no spoon in the Matrix (the simulated reality created by sentient machines). He then went on to chide me for finding metaphors where there aren’t any meant to be found. Yes, he did.

This guy also didn’t enjoy revisiting spats once they were over so I knew he wouldn’t appreciate my forcing the issue, but I needed more than a couple minutes to find the evidence. Not much more though, as there are ample explanations to be found straight from the mouths of The Wachowski’s all over the damn place, not just speculation by other fans. So later that evening I emailed him a handful of these quotes and he received them the next day. Some might think it sad, but it gives me real joy to remember his fury at receiving those emails.

So in his honor I present the following video of someone’s Mom’s unique interpretation of The Matrix along with her son’s hilarious visuals and can’t help but wonder if she is also related to my long ago e-lationship.

Miss You Paradise by Emma Hewitt

Life isn’t supposed to be perfect, and beauty can be measured in the striving, and blah, blah, blah…

“What if people focused all the energy and effort they used for wars and hurting each other and destroying things on helping each other and creating beautiful things instead?” – Nathan Burkett, 2003

Enemies of the People

In spite of the 1982 Academy Award winning film The Killing Fields, there has never seemed to be any sort of understanding by anyone in the west of how the mass gravesites of the same name became filled with an estimate of up to 2 million souls by Cambodia’s Khumer Rouge regime between 1975-1979. In the first few minutes of this amazing documentary, I was surprised to hear the narrator explain how he was compelled to research the causes because nobody in the east really understood it either! Thet Sambath is a Cambodian journalist a couple years younger than me, orphaned by the regime, and has set forth in this film to interview Nuon Chea, former chief ideologist of the Khmer Rouge, now in his 80’s. Commonly known as “Brother Number Two” and second in command only to Pol Pot, these interviews took place in the few years before his imprisonment for crimes against humanity in 2007. Over a period of time, he patiently gains No. 2’s confidence until he finally confesses to being complicit with the killing, and the reasons why. What I gleaned from his confession and from Thet’s commentary, was that No. 2 and Pol Pot were simply nationalist zealots who were trying to make Cambodia ‘more communist than China’. And making no apologies for the arrogance of taking on an ‘experiment with society’, No. 2 clearly stated his philosophy! He said he loves the nation and the individual both, but if forced to choose, he would choose the nation. Nevermind that neither one of them had any experience in governing a nation, and literally had no idea what they were doing. And finally, I perceive pathological paranoia within the regime, caused in the beginning by secret Vietnamese loyalists and eventually extending to the 2 million innocents in those fields as the paranoia grew unchecked to monstrous proportions.

Thet also interviews two men, poor farmers themselves, who were forced to participate in the killing. As he states, those who took part in the Killing would barely speak of it at home, much less ever speak of it to foreign journalists, but for him it was no problem to bond with these haunted old men, since he was a country person too. I guess there was much healing accomplished with this film (for Cambodians) and it is an extraordinary document. Did the world ever see any Nazi tears for their crimes? Did they ever shed any?

Oblivious to the beauty of his family in the background, Brother Suon is haunted with guilt and tormented by post traumatic stress.”My life is nothing now” he says.

Brother Khoun seeks solace in Buddhism.
Fascinatingly, neither of these men, nobody living in higher command, nor Brother No. 2 seem to honestly know who actually gave the kill orders.

..Everybody Knows What You’ve Been Through

In contention for my favorite cover ever, of all time, is Concrete Blonde’s rendition of the legendary Leonard Cohen’s Everybody Knows, for taking the vocals at the chorus up an octave, and then once more at the end. From the soundtrack to Pump Up the Volume.

The Measure Of a Cat’s Life

Goodbye to my beautiful kitty Diesel who took such good care of me and everyone he met, who passed away 2 days ago from some sudden onset of a blood condition.

Surely there have been and will be cats missed as much, but never has there been or shall be another that will be missed more.

Who In My Beating Heart Endures

Who’d have ever thought John Mellencamp had so much Yeats in him??

Human Wheels

Reverie

…They Don’t Mean It

The Fat Girl by Lyle Lovett.

Haunted by the Love which Died in June

Many, many thanks to my oldest and dearest friend Phoenix Dreamfyre, AKA PrimePrineFan over on his youtube channel, for creating this charming video of Your Silence I Will Always Admire by Michael McDermott, a major anthem on the soundtrack of our misspent youths. The video is just packed full of meaningful images and quotes from all the wonderful ideas we used to share, along with some timely references to current events. Your Silence I Will Always Admire remains an example of some of the strongest songwriting I’ve ever heard, every syllable and beat positioned for maximum impact, featuring my beloved jangly power chords, a rousing organ/harmonica blend, and always-inspiring female gospel backing vocals. I never get tired of those..

Phoenix learned while making this video that McDermott had recently read Hesse’s Siddartha and that was on his mind while composing it. While not exactly shocking, that seems to partly explain how McDermott expressed so many sophisticated, complex ideas with such disarming eloquence. For so many words, none are wasted!

Oh Canada

Tori Amos’s signature piano style is unforgettable in this vintage cover of a Joni Mitchelle song.