MY WESITE IS DOWN!!!! :(

just tried to go to my site through google, they say it does not exist!?

Well, today it's been 20 days since i started this Blog.
My "people-counter" tells me that i had 87 views. 
Yet, not a single comment!
What's up with that???
Cat got ur tongue?
...  :|

WEBSITE SHORT STORY # 3 (not yet posted on the website)

Today, April 26. 2013, i shall have the pleasure of reading this story to an audience @ the Sta. Fe Playhouse Theater, as my contribution to Jules' show: JULESWORKS.....FOLLIES....

What she remembered most, about their initial encounter, during that first spring-time walk with her dog, in the small park downtown by the river was, how incredibly content the two of them were in each others company. Being together, was all they cared about. Nothing else mattered very much.

Theirs, was the kind of love poets describe in romantic sonnets, some of which she had read long ago, overcome by embarrassment for secretly wishing to be the one, they were addressed to while, at the same time, telling herself that only fools and poets believed in the existence of such a perfect love.

Yet, here she was, witness to the fact that, indeed, it did exist and, therefore, how foolish and cynical she had been, to doubt it. This realization brought tears to her eyes, not from sadness but from relief. And, whenever she recalled the memory of that overwhelming moment, those tears were always its companion.

Replaying the past in her mind, she could see them now, as they chased each other from tree to tree, across the lawn, dashing, darting and tumbling down, only to rise once more and disappear into the distance in mock pursuit. They were sleek, black and very beautiful. At some point they raced right across the path in front of her, while calling out with delight and looking at her curiously and cautiously.

The excitement of it all, spread through her like fire and, she called back to them, again and again, until they decided to pass her for a second time, intrigued by this stranger, who wanted in on their game.

She gazed into their dark shiny eyes, laughed out loud and introduced herself. On their next return, when they called out to her, as if inviting her to join the mad chase, she realized that she had been accepted. Just like that.

This filled her with such profound happiness, it made her cry and she began to sing a song for them. They stayed close and, listened to her, until she stopped singing. Then, they called out to her, many times and, she knew that she had found two new friends. That’s how it began.

A Raven Tale......

© Corinne Wesley, Monday, January 14, 2013

ESSAY FROM WEBSITE # 2

Blue lights over Baltimore

She was excited, as highway 1 carried them toward the city limits. Couldn’t wait to get there! Baltimore had been on her mind, ever since she had faithfully watched every episode of Homicide: Life in the Streets. The show had somehow ended up placing a deep love in her heart, for this town she did not know. But, that was going to change today. While she and her husband entered the beginnings of suburbia in their rented RV, a sense of returning overcame her and she breathlessly tried to see everything at once. At the same time, it reminded her that she was a stranger and a foreigner.

This was another America altogether. They lived in New Mexico, a place filled with great empty deserts and mountains, mostly devoid of humans. She loved it there but felt that it lacked the diversity of people she knew existed elsewhere in the country.

Black people were such an important part of what she considered the “American Experience” and, in New Mexico, their presence was sadly missing, as far as she was concerned.

In the past, when she mentioned her desire to see Baltimore, some of her white friends would ask:

“Why Baltimore?”

They did not have much else to say if she enquired as to the nature of their question.

“It’s a black town and there is a lot of crime.”

This comment was usually followed by a gushing:

“But it’s a great city with wonderful museums.”

Then the conversation would move on, as if nothing else were needed to explain the lack of interest.

For her, though, this reaction only made her more intent and she thought that she wanted to see for herself what Baltimore had to offer to someone who cared to look. The man, who was the creator of Homicide, loved his city, this much was clear. To him, despite all the imperfections and conflicts, it seemed a place well worth mentioning. She had come to see what he saw.

They rolled down the street, emerged in traffic and she watched as people crossed the road, stood at street corners, or entered convenience stores, advertising beer, cigarettes and milk. There wasn’t a white person in sight. To her it was like being in another country. As block after block appeared in front of them, each one less inhabitable, she noticed a strange kind of landmark along the sidewalks. Tall lamp posts with a big blue light flashing on top. After taking a closer look, she realized that there were four cameras attached just below the blue light, pointed at the streets and side-walks below and, just underneath, she saw a sign that read: 24/7 YOU BETTER BELIEVE IT! When she told her husband what she had discovered, he reacted instantly to the message in the intended fearful way. It made her sad to see how easy it was to manipulate people. But, she was not scared by such theatrics.

She just continued watching the inner city of Baltimore, while her heart began to ache. This is unacceptable she thought. No one should have to live like that. As they continued through the remnants of former neighborhoods, with boarded up hostile buildings and lost souls on the sidewalks, she wished they could stop so she could leave the safe capsule of their vehicle. She wanted to talk with the people in the street and ask them what had happened here. It made no sense to her and she asked her husband how something like that was possible in America, today?

He could not answer her question. 
Instead, he steered them onward, frightened and hoping for a turn-off that would get them back to the safety of an interstate. By now, there were blue lights on every block. The place looked deserted, except for the occasional group of young black men with hard faces and single mothers wheeling their offspring bravely toward unknown destinations.

 He swore when, ahead of them, a traffic light turned red and forced him to stop the RV. A homeless-looking man started along the line of waiting cars and her husband rolled up the windows hastily, leaving only a tiny crack open. She was looking for change to give the man, who had reached them. Before he could say anything, her husband told him that nothing could be gotten from them.

The man said:

” Come on, why do you have to be like that?”

Her husband responded:

” I am too afraid. I am sorry. I don’t want to be killed.”

Before the man could answer, the green light appeared and they began to move again. She was intensely embarrassed by what had occurred and wished she could get her husband to abandon his fear, so she could get out into the street and find out what everyone there had to say about the impossible state of their city. But she understood that he could not accommodate her and touched him gently, saying:

” I am sorry it makes you feel this way.”

All of a sudden the ghetto ended. There was no warning, no transitory area to pass through, and no way for those who lived on the edge of the ghetto to cross over to the generic perfection of the houses that were now lining Highway 1.

On one side of the street the boarded up dilapidated architecture, with broken steps and front yards covered in weeds, told a silent sad tale of lost lives and livelihoods, while across the road manicured gardens showed off their abundance as if to say,:

” See here this is the American dream and you will never have it.”

It was shocking to both of them. The brutality and finality of the division left them speechless and she thought of their house back in New Mexico and the beauty of their land. She knew that from now on she would always think of Baltimore and how it could be changed from hopelessness to a new and better place, where people could live their lives in dignity instead of poverty and crime, illuminated by those damn blue scary lights. She had some ideas and decided one day soon she would be back. There was much to do. In her mind, she was sure that it was possible because the way things had been allowed to become was truly intolerable. She thought that, perhaps, she had found her American dream.

© Corinne Wesley 2007

Pick a War - Any War (Essay from Website # 1)

Pick A War - Any War

If the Trojan War were a current affair, it would be on the front page of USA Today with headlines such as: When Will It Finally End, or: Greek Fleet’s Continued Presence on Troy’s Shores prompts U. N. Sanctions. There would be outraged commentaries by leading columnists, demanding the return of Helen to Menelaus or else defending a woman’s right to choose. Some of them would be citing irreversible loss of moral values as grounds for further support of the war. Others would assure the world that this conflict has to be won, in order to save the honor of a nation of decent seafaring men. The religious right would have had field days preaching how fire and brimstone were the well-deserved products of such sinful acts as infidelity, betrayal and murder. On public radio, one could listen to desperate reports smuggled out of Troy, a city under siege with no solution in sight. And, all over the world, peace-loving liberals would shake their heads asking how this war had been allowed to go on for ten long years.

Why Homer picks up the story of the Trojan War in its tenth year could be debated. One reason might be that only after ten years of ordinary fighting and laying siege to the city rather unsuccessfully, things were finally approaching the fulfillment of various prophecies connected with the main characters in this bloody myth. Hector, Andromache and her seven brothers, most of the inhabitants of Troy, and many of the heroes, whose sole misfortune of being one of Helena’s suitors had brought them into this senseless war, were all connected by the unbreakable bond of a divinely-spun web with twists and turns worthy of mankind’s first soap opera script.

The basis for the entire conflict appears to be a sense of honor so impossible to live up to that there can be no escape from failing, or from being punished for having done something Agamemnon incites Achilles’ wrath when he finds himself forced to return an abducted maiden, then chooses to replace her with one who is dear to Achilles. This insult spurs bitter words between them, each man certain of his rightful claim though neither girl was with them of her own free will. What makes this kind of conduct acceptable or praiseworthy? How can any self-respecting hero accuse another of committing the same deeds, which he, himself, had carried out in the past? It reminds of divine comedy, and perhaps it is. After all, the gods are always watching, scheming and trying to deceive one another, meddling in the affairs of men, playing favorites and planting the seeds of violence in entire family lines. Fathers against sons, wives against husbands, children against their parents, no one is safe from harm. Both the Iliad and the Oresteia Trilogy are brimming with such carnage that one question comes to mind. Have these people never heard of a happy ending for any tale? What about mankind learning from its mistakes and from all the pain afflicted in the name of honor, which seems to be just another word for pride, thus losing virtue? The imaginary New York Times headline on the front page, over which one had absolutely no influence because of what the old Greeks fondly called inescapable destiny. The mighty Agamemnon’s unfair treatment of Achilles, not to mention Briseis, seems no less dishonorable to the observer, than the sacrifice of his daughter Iphigenia to Artemis, at Aulis. And what of Odysseus, trying to avoid the draft by pretending to be mad, or the goddess Thetis, dressing down her son Achilles as a woman to spare him from the prophecy of certain death. Might this behavior point toward a more human aspect of these super heroes, who would otherwise be too incredible and too perfect? On the other hand, is it not this lack of perfection, which drove men to war then as well as now, seizing lands and possessions, capturing and violating each other’s women? Who is to say when such acts are honorable or despicable?

Agamemnon incites Achilles’ wrath when he finds himself forced to return an abducted maiden, then chooses to replace her with one who is dear to Achilles. This insult spurs bitter words between them, each man certain of his rightful claim though neither girl was with them of her own free will. What makes this kind of conduct acceptable or praiseworthy? How can any self-respecting hero accuse another of committing the same deeds, which he, himself, had carried out in the past? It reminds of divine comedy, and perhaps it is. After all, the gods are always watching, scheming and trying to deceive one another, meddling in the affairs of men, playing favorites and planting the seeds of violence in entire family lines. Fathers against sons, wives against husbands, children against their parents, no one is safe from harm. Both the Iliad and the Oresteia Trilogy are brimming with such carnage that one question comes to mind. Have these people never heard of a happy ending for any tale? What about mankind learning from its mistakes and from all the pain afflicted in the name of honor, which seems to be just another word for pride, thus losing virtue? The imaginary New York Times headline on the Trojan War – "No End in Sight!" – is universal and unanswerable. For thousands of years there have been good reasons to keep on fighting, so to ask, “why,” makes even less sense than demanding to know when it is going to stop. Be it for God, the fatherland, money, or revenge. Someone always needs satisfaction and, unfortunately, the means of getting it are limited, conceived of narrow, but manly, minds.

There seems to be a sense of longing in the words Homer placed so firmly in Achilles’ mouth about the existence of another, more benign possibility for his personal path through life. In the end, he chooses glory and immortality over living happily ever after with his hypothetical family of children, wife and children’s children. What Achilles failed to recognize was that there lay the potential for a different kind of infinite tribute in this rejected choice. He could have been the perfect hero, the one who put an end to these insane quests, by simply choosing life instead of death. He would have had to take the chance that his further accomplishments, based on some other less fatal set of values, would forever remind the world of the man who dared to say no and braved life in spite of his heel.

Homer realized that he had the story of the millennium; it was just a tad bit long, so he decided to let the first nine years be bygone. There was enough of the right stuff in the final chapter of Troy’s siege and the return of the surviving champions to keep the audience well entertained. The Iliad starts at the beginning of the end and, from this point onward, the people of ancient Greece, and those who came after them, were granted the chance to know all that occurred during the fateful conclusion of the Trojan War. Never before had there been a written account of such things and, although the details might be exaggerated and tainted by ancient superstitions and beliefs, it nevertheless provided a valuable insight into the minds of the individuals involved, including the writers themselves.

As for Agamemnon, he met bloody destiny at the hands of his own unfaithful wife, upon returning home from Troy in the company of a mistress taken by force. Instead of focusing on the repercussions of this predictable development, which most readers would be able to imagine by now, another turn in subject is much more tempting. The setting in motion of the so-called domino effect, started by the very first man who decided that all was fair in war and love, cannot be interrupted, it seems. And so life goes on, today as much as yesterday or two thousand years ago. There lives an odd creature in the society of men. He, or she, reports the events unfolding and hopes in vain that by telling the appalling story, enough peaceful souls could be inspired to resist the urge to tumble along when it is their turn to be one of the pieces in this intricate one-track game.

© 2006 Corinne Wesley

this is an essay i wrote for a Humanities course after returning to school in 2004. part of the syllabus were the Greek myths. i wanted to present my argument against war in general and picked the Trojan war as the "background".....

“happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know” Albert E.

this one's about the following issues:

the growing problem of logistics (and the economics thereof),
in regards to general maintenance connected with the decision to stay alive at my age and in my condition.... 

versus 

opting for "early disengagement" and giving it all up amicably, without any complaints whatsoever, thereby creating space for younger people....

any takers of this debate??

“happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know”

poem of today....one i wrote...lol

11:39am

noise:

people play

musical chairs

to the sound

of the wind

they all chant

@ each other

simultaneously

"please be

mindful of

the energy

that you

bring

into

my space"

PS: 

food 4 thought

4 dinner 

4 two 

4 me'n u... 

[in the long run
that ain't happening]

:| ...

copyright - corinne wesley - 2013

WEBSITE POST # 1 by LAKHAN from MUMBAY, INDIA!!.... :)

lakhan(Saturday, April 13 13 01:47 am EDT)

hi dear......its amazing n m v glad tht U made this :)..
my hats off to u....my sis will surely like this coz c is like u only
.
.
.

"ENTHUSIASTIC"

website-comment # 2 by dan about contributions

Daniel Klausmeyer(Wednesday, April 10 13 02:09 pm EDT)

I am confused, like that's something new lol, how do we post our pics or vids or whatever here. I tried to copy and paste a pic in this box and it didn't take - I am on google.

website-comment by andreas from germany!

Andreas Götz(Monday, April 08 13 07:27 pm EDT)

Die Seite ist echt toll geworden!! Die Bilder und das Gedicht sind echt schön geworden!!

website-comment # 1 by Dan

dan(Sunday, April 07 13 11:25 pm EDT)

Corinne I love you and feel your pain and suffering right now - cause I been there and deal with the dark whole of depression....I am just grateful that I didn't take my life in my suicidal thoughts in my late 20's. I lived in such hurt and pain and much of it needlessly because I fought the depression and darkness. At some point I figured out that not fighting it sure helped and as all of us who live with this affliction know that in our darkness we isolate ourselves and cut ourselves off from others and become so consumed with ourselves that we dig ourselves into a deeper darker hole. I know you don't need to hear what you know, but being said to affirm you and what you are doing in your blog site....you are awesome and certainly shall be the creative artist and find healing and give healing to others in a most positive way and giving meaning and purpose which is a struggle for many of us at our stage in life. Be patient and keep you energies focused on this endeavor.......love you dan

nobody's talkin'.....

......    :|    ......

announcing the creation of my website "bipolarcreativepeople.com" and its partner-blog under the same name

hi,
it's done. i'm pooped but i got both projects up'n running!
almost 6 am...gotta try and get some sleep.
later!
c....  :)