Schism

Back in the 90's, one of my favorite bands was Tool. I especially loved the rawness, the exposed emotion and aggression. The fearless expression of reality of our world and how things are apart from idealism, optimism, or even delusional westernism.

Where I'm going with this is that I'm sitting here, pissing away life browsing the internet and listening to a "Pandora" station and this song, "Schism" comes on:

I know the pieces fit cuz I watched them fall away
Mildewed and smoldering, fundamental differing,
Pure intention juxtaposed will set two lovers souls in motion
Disintegrating as it goes testing our communication
The light that fueled our fire then has burned a hole between us so
We cannot see to reach an end crippling our communication.

I know the pieces fit cuz I watched them tumble down
No fault, none to blame it doesnt mean I dont desire to
Point the finger, blame the other, watch the temple topple over.
To bring the pieces back together, rediscover communication.

The poetry that comes from the squaring off between,
And the circling is worth it.
Finding beauty in the dissonance.

There was a time that the pieces fit, but I watched them fall away.
Mildewed and smoldering, strangled by our coveting
Ive done the the math enough to know the dangers of a second guessing
Doomed to crumble unless we grow, and strengthen our communication

Cold silence has a tendency to atrophy any sense of compassion

Between supposed lovers
Between supposed lovers.

And I know the pieces fit.

And I remember that Tool offered up some pretty good stuff. What is "good"? I guess each one of us gets to decide. Obviously, I have decided favorably for Tool, and if you don't, that is your prerogative.

Don't take that to mean I'm indifferent to your opinion, on the contrary, I find something special there.

"Finding beauty in the dissonance."

There you have it.

That is all.

Beauty.

More Learnin' For Ya

I just saw this over at Jen's blog, and thought I'd spread it around a bit more:


The Crisis of Credit Visualized from Jonathan Jarvis on Vimeo.

There is a minimal amount of time investment required to watch this short video. The one thing that this illustrates is how regular people could have innocently (that doesn't mean they are excused of ignorance) been responsible for the crisis. Basically, the financial world made loans available to people who couldn't afford them. The people who were taking the loans never seriously asked themselves if they could afford the payments. The banks, in their greed, were not going to tell them.

When we bought our first two houses, we had to have top notch credit, 5% down, another 5% for closing costs, and the total monthly payment could not exceed 35% of our gross monthly income. In these last couple of years, I don't think they were requiring those things.

I certainly understand how people would still sign on the dotted line. Home ownership is part of the American dream. I wish for others to own their own home as I have been blessed to own 3 now. I also wish for them to start out with 'starter' homes. Yeah, it will be a little cramped. There may be children sharing bedrooms, no home theater, den, mudroom, formal and informal dining areas, etc, etc, etc. BUT, that is how we need to live, one step at a time! So many who bought their first homes, were buying houses larger than the ones they grew up in! What I mean by that is, young folks were buying more home to start with than their parents had when their family was growing. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that each family and its successive generations should not pursue upward mobility. I'm saying we should simply pursue a sustainable rate of upward mobility.