Thoughts As You Go

by: Victor Claude Pirtle

The day's ride promised to be strenuous. There was a 30 mph wind blowing, with gusts as high as 40. That bicycle, Claude loved to ride. Riding afforded him the time alone he demanded from life. It was a time he could let his mind wander, gliding quietly along on two wheels. He would often reminisce some old memory drawn from 62 years of them. He tried not to think of the future; not only was it futile, but plans quite often didn't turn out as prepared. Nor did he live in the past. He did recall events from the past that floated cross his mind as the crankshaft of his bicycle went round and round powered by nothing more than two legs human. What did the events all mean other than places passed on his particular road of life? Muse of the last question filled his days and nights, not without consternation and bliss.

It's funny how one thing will make you think of something else, and that will make you think of even something different, like rows of dominoes falling on one another stimulating potential energy to kinetic movement. Claude looked at thoughts very much like a row of falling dominoes. Often a wry smile would form on the corners of his mouth when he thought of dominoes falling as a pile of thoughts and sometimes as chaotic. Claude had a well-honed sense of the absurd, and from that place was the source of the wriest of smiles that would often grace his countenance. It made him look as if he had a private joke occurring in his mind that perhaps wasn't all that funny. When asked what it was that garnered such a smile, he would just shake his head and say nothing.

Claude somehow wished that he could share the absurdities that circulated in his brain, and wondered who would possibly care to listen. He had a feeling that he was not alone with these kinds of thoughts, but he seldom saw similar smiles on the faces of others. From time to time he would see just such a smile on the visage of a complete stranger, but he usually let it alone and watched it go by, lest he impose on a private reverie of another. Privacy was a highly sought after gem for Claude that life did not often dole out with great frequency, so Claude afforded the courtesy of the privacy he wished for himself to others.

In solitude exists a state of grace found nowhere else.

On part of this ride Claude had to ride through city streets of a funky little college town in eastern Iowa. Most motorists were aware of the many others using the road that rode on two wheels, and there was a pleasant symbiosis between the two users of the roadways. There were many bike paths, and he had his favourite. One thing, and perhaps the only thing Iowa was good for, was riding a bicycle, Claude thought. Iowa is relatively flat. It is therefore good for long rides that don't require grinding up hills in lower gears. Other than that, Iowa wasn't good for much, according to Claude, unless you enjoyed watching corn grow, and freezing your balls off in the winter time. This particular bike path is paved, and takes riders under a busy motorist bridge that crosses a river, down one side of the bridge and out the other to avoid becoming another to avoid becoming just a greasy spot from being hit by a car. In this underpass that was just next to the Iowa River that had deposited sand on the path while the river was high in the spring. Sand, Claude thought, and he was off on a history tour of memory, and one very specific memory. Part of his mind well attended the road ahead, while another went visiting a scene when he was only three-years-old.

At three Claude lived with his parents and older sister in university married student housing where his father was attending classes, and earning his doctorate in microbiology. There was a sandbox for the children to play in. It was in the midst of clustered quancet huts that served as housing for students with children at this university. Even when three Claude liked time to himself alone, but as you may imagine other children had their own agendas, even at a young age. There was one particular young man, who consistently tested the bounds of his very small reality at this time of his life, and on this particular lovely fall day, he should have minded his own business. He was about to learn that some bounds of reality should never be crossed.

We don't know this young man's name, and it really doesn't matter, for he plays a small, but a salient part in Claude's life. Claude wouldn't even remember the child's name if asked today.
Claude does remember what this nameless child did to him as 1950 was coming to a close. This little guy who thought he ruled the sandbox because he was Claude's senior by two years, and at least twice Claude's size thought it would be a lark to fill Claude's eyes with sand from the box, and that is exactly what he did. Needless to say, Claude was quite astonished by the feeling of gritty sand covering one of the most delicate and most important tissues of his body, and tears formed profusely trying to wash out the sand -- to no avail. Claude went back to his quancet residence hut for his mother's help crying his three-year-old eyes out.

His mother heard him coming and rushed to the rescue, and about 45 minutes later all was well, but his eyes were very sensitive for a good two weeks after the sand in the eyes incident. Claude composed himself, wiped away his tears, and trundled back to the sandbox where his newly won adversary was still ruling the roost in the box of sand. Now back in 1950, before there was such a thing as consumer advocates, especially where children's toys were concerned, many toys were still made of metal. Claude saw a toy hoe laying in the sandbox, and without hesitation picked it up and opened the skin covering the skull of Mr. High and Mighty himself. While blood in profusion flowed onto his face, and his ego shrunk to the size of his immature penis, Claude trundled on back home with a feeling that revenge was served well, adequate to the occasion.

Claude was, of course, not charged with assault, being only three, and when the respective parents met to talk about the travesties of the day, both children were admonished, but a silent and unspoken sense of pride filled Claude's father's mind as he surveyed his son's face at that meeting. It was resolved that the two would not play in the sandbox at the same time in the future lest a homicide take place. Moral of the story: Don't fuck with a Scorpio, no matter their age.

The thought of homicide made Claude think of a time eighteen years later when he was 21, and -- 'serving his country' -- in the Vietnam War. Now tales that are good to hear, and tales that take at least some telling, should not all at once ravage the listener with their unfolding. Claude's mind, or that part of it that recalled the events, the people, the smells, the sights, and sounds of that time in his life overwhelmed him, so he was doubly careful to watch the road as he peddled the bicycle into the wind. He really never liked to go to the places that these thoughts evoked in him, but somehow he could not avoid the trip backwards.

He had entered the 'service' as a volunteer of all such nomenclatures when he was still only 17.
A delicate age for a lad, and the recruiters assured him that the military would not take him until he was 18. I mean, what the hell did he know about war, death, depravity, and real evil? He learned about all of these things in his three years in the US Navy. Vietnam was authorized insanity, and nothing less, and probably a great deal more. It was self perpetuating evil at its darkest; it was all about as much homicide as possible, in the least amount of time. Everyone involved was either a murderer, or an accomplice to murder. Of course, in war, it is called 'defending your country' by killing your 'enemy; it is not called murder. We were all culpable culprits. Anyone who says otherwise is selling something that just ain't real.

These kinds of thoughts only brought down Claude's enjoyment of his ride, so he cleared his mind, and waited for thoughts to come. These thoughts continued to lurk just below the surface, and some days he was more successful in repressing thoughts of Vietnam than others. He did knew that they would be with him for the rest of his natural life, so he could pick and choose when to surface them to have a real close look, or he may have been deluding himself.
These thoughts came whenever they chose to. Sheeeeeeeeeeeit~!

Memories may lie hidden for years, and all in the moment when they surface, it is like what they bring to present tense just happened. It's weird, it's freaky, sends shivers up the spine. There was a hot summer night; Claude wanted to talk to his girlfriend, who really wasn't his girlfriend any more. He was 15 or 16, and had plenty of energy -- and then some -- Claude walked to her house in the darkness late at night. He took all the old shortcuts she and he used to use. There Claude was below her window. He tried to get her attention for so long that his presence was known to the entire household, and he had to run. Claude was pursued by a big brother, but he melted into the shadows of a large oak tree, and stayed there until danger of being discovered was over. He walked back to where he was staying disappointed, but excited about the evening's frolic. He never tried it again.; she really wasn't worth the trouble.

Wind had picked up, and heading into it was a struggle. Shifting down to lower gears, making it easier to peddle -- bucking the wind. The thoughts sped by so fast it was hard to capture one to look at closely. Exertions of peddling, and concentration thereof were, at the moment, paramount in importance. Life goes by so fast, and moments such as these are some of the best. You are in competition with none, but self, and that competition may even be dropped. The wind was enough to compete with, and when it blows in Iowa where there is really nothing to break it or slow it down, working it takes concentration to say the least.

Concentration, Claude thought as wind subsided for a space of time, and sheltered by trees planted as a wind break round a farmhouse, pedaling became easier. The rest was welcome, and he had time to think. Concentration was the way of all the days after he had had his first thought at all. One that belonged entirely to him, and none other. It happened one evening in Oakland, California while he was still in 'service'. He knew that he had to extricate himself from the military machinery of the United States, but didn't know just how to go about it. Floundering in a sea of doubt, he closed his eyes and waited for something enlightening to come. Now, I don't know what you readers think about spirits and such, but Claude had/has his very own guardian spirit that has been with him all his life. He doesn't bring it up often at all, and I am sure he will forgive me for bringing it up here. I must, you see, to make the point I began with this paragraph.

Concentration with easy breathing while Claude lay on the bed in his Oakland apartment as the sun was just dipping passed the western shore became more than concentration. All in an instant his spirit came and went, but hung around as it always had. It said, "You just had to know, didn't you?!" It seemed appropriate; Claude had been asking questions all his life without the courtesy of answers from any source. Now connections were being made, and new lights were coming on -- doors that were once closed began to open. This event brought with it new enlightenment, and new confusion, unlike the old confusion, but confusion nonetheless.

This confusion led him to look for answers to new questions. Questions about the meaning of it all. Yes, Claude had reached the plateau where this particular query is always asked. Now he asked it. Appended to that question are all the rest following in its wake. Some are true, some are false. Which is which is one of the questions, perhaps the easiest and most difficult to answer.

Because this was somewhat of a spiritual matter, Claude contacted some clergy. Silly thing to do; what do they know of spiritual matters? He did however find someone to speak with. The librarian at the Oakland, California Theosophical Society. His name was Brian Bell; a slight man with a twinkle in his eye. He and Claude had made an appointment to meet over the telephone for the following day. Claude showed up early, Brian didn't, but he was on time for the appointment.

Claude stepped up to the door, and knocked. Brian's wife, Edith opened it. She showed Claude into the library, and Brian soon joined him there. There were the usual conversational niceties exchanged when two people meet for the first time, but Claude wanted to get down to business, as Brian knew quite well. At that moment, Edith came in with mint tea, and gingersnaps. Claude, not being used to such lavish presentments and courtesy, being only just 21, and not that worldly, was pleasantly surprised. He accepted the tea as gracefully as he knew how, Edith left the room, shut the door, and Brian asked, "So, tell me why you are here?"
Claude reiterated their telephone conversation, the content of which was enough for Brian to want to see him. But Brian asked again, "Yes, but why are you here?" To which Claude rejoined, "I want answers to my questions, if you can help me with them." "That is splendid!" Brian answered.

As they began to speak, Claude noticed that each word he was about to say Brian was mouthing silently with his lips before Claude got the words out of his own mouth. At first, Claude thought he was seeing things, but as the conversation proceeded he was assured that he was not mistaken. At one point Claude said, "Brian, if you know what I am going to say, why are we having this conversation?" "Because I want you to hear what you are saying, Claude."
"I have heard what I am saying, but I still don't quite know what happened when this spirit came and talked to me, and said, "You just had to know, didn't you?!" "Is this that something that happens every day to people?" Claude asked. Brian smiled a knowing smile, and just said, "Oh no, it isn't." "You are a very fortunate young man."

Claude wondered what was so fortunate about being so confused, so Brian helped him sort it out over mint tea and gingersnaps.

First of all, Theosophy is not a religion, but embraces them all religions as being quite similar, but different, or differently the same. It is more a discipline that investigates all manner of phenomena on our little planet than anything else. Theosophy's credo is "There is no religion higher than truth." Not bad for starters~! Brian had made a lifetime of investigation into the 'truth' as it were, and when he met Claude his investigation was still ongoing. Brian did have some insights that he offered Claude: A soul's evolution may be said to be broken down into increments, even though there is an unbroken flow of the same evolution.

Claude, as Brian explained, had reached a stage in his evolution that allowed him to look past and beyond the restrictions he was theretofore subject to. It is of little wonder that he was somewhat confused. Brian explained that each of is on his/her personal path, and at certain times helpers from the spirit world arrive to be of help. This one factor, in essence, is what had happened to Claude. Brian and Claude sat for an hour or more speaking of the many things they had seen in the world, and many things they would like to see. The mint tea had cooled, and the gingersnaps were delicious, but the meeting, at least for this time had come to an end. Brian and Claude saw one another many times thereafter, and became fast friends. They remained in communication for over 20 years, until Brian's death in the late 1990s, and much enlightening information passed between them in all that time.

Riding fifteen miles on a bicycle into a 30 mph wind will wear you out, and it is always good to make the turn and have the wind at your back. It was still a beautiful day; the sky was crystal blue, with one or two flying clouds, but mostly clear. It was good to think of Brian while riding, which made Claude think of the San Francisco Bay area, and all the women he had known in his life. Now, don't get the wrong idea, Claude loved women as the most beautiful creatures on the planet. There were many he had known; one night stands, long relationships, several marriages, some just for conversation, good friendships, casual acquaintanceships, and of the lovers, they all seemed to be temporary lovers, even the long relationships and marriages turned out to be temporary. And like a fool he kept on trying.

Claude didn't think much of men. You have to remember, Claude was 62, and anyone who has lived around men that long has generated an opinion of his own sex of the genus and species Homo sapien. His opinions were, of course, judgments -- but it was his only method of making his opinions work for him. Claude didn't like the way men treated women. It is just that simple. And to protect themselves as best they could, women reciprocated ill feelings back to the men who had been abusive. True, women could and can be just as abusive, but in Claude's estimation, it came from a realm of self-preservation.

Claude was not enthralled with the way men treated other men, or indeed themselves. He considered them an embarrassment to the human race as a whole. I told you he had an opinion, but Claude had never been accused of being wishy-washy. He meant what he said with each statement. There were times that he stepped on his dick, true; there is no doubt about it, and he often found his foot in his mouth, but he never backed off or down in a verbal argument or debate. When he was wrong he admitted it, and proceeded to the next, and there always was one.

Let's not see Claude as flawless, because he was far from it, but he did love women, and treated women with the respect that they deserved. Not to say that he trusted women, but that is another tale for perhaps another moment. Let's stick to one thing at a time, and try not to digress to infinity! We may get back to that pesky trust issue, but not just yet.

There was that young Lakota Sioux girl in Vermillion, South Dakota who was Claude's first date. She was taller than he, but that made no difference to Claude. He was proud to go to a movie with her. He was only 12 at the time; you have to start somewhere~!

There was a summer infatuation with a young lady from Plainfield, Illinois. Her name was Karen something, and she was very pretty. She and her family packed up and went back to Illinois after spending most days with her that summer of 1958, and Claude felt that first sense of lost love at a very young age. "Lost love," Claude thought, is never something one gets used to, and his life has fulfilled that particular manifesto to the last letter of it.

One nice thing about having the wind at your back while riding a bicycle is that you can ride with no hands. You just sit up straight, lean back a little bit, fold your hands behind you, and trust your balance. Claude had about 20 miles yet to go with a couple of stops along the way, that took him out of his way. He didn't care. Riding is a carefree exercise, and he never rode to race, just to ride.

There was a young woman named Helen in high school who caught his eye, and a little more than that. She was cute; she was crazy, like most young ladies her age, she didn't know when to stop with the crazy part, but that only made her cuter to a certain extent. Of course, cute has a point of diminishing returns, and in this case that is exactly what happened. Helen went to school on the other side of town, but that made no difference. The girls in his own school wondered why he had to go looking all the way out there, when there was enough talent closer to home. Claude was undeterred by criticism, and still is. He knew what he wanted, and what he liked, and in his own singular way he usually got it, but not always.

The not always part was named Julie. She was glamorous for her age, and the flirt's flirt. Claude was smitten by her for all the years in high school, but never got anywhere in the Julie case and category. Just as well. She wasn't really his type. To be absolutely specific, he didn't know from what his type was in those formative years, but the experiments were fun, frustrating, and enough to make his palms sweat blood.

Oh, there were many, and there could have been more, but Claude was not what may be called a social animal (or even today) in high school. He figured he had his whole life to find out about the ladies, and he certainly did, one catastrophe at a time. As it turned out, he met a young lady by the name of Connie, whom he later married. "What a mistake!" -- he thinks now. She was a natural redhead, and Claude came up with a saying. "Red hair, bad luck!”
Connie couldn't keep her legs together around other men, and like most men, they took advantage of her promiscuity. The marriage lasted only three years, but Connie and Claude had one hell of a ride! But not quite like Bonnie and Clyde. Connie and Claude are still with the living.

One thing about really great bicycle rides is that they are soon over, so Claude turned back into the wind which was beginning to subside to extend the ride a little longer. It couldn't have been blowing any harder than 25 mph at that point. There was plenty of daylight left, but that mattered little. Riding at night, or in the dark had its own excitement. For one thing, if you rode wearing dark clothing, you were nearly invisible at night, albeit somewhat dangerous in automobile traffic, but what the hell -- you only live once one day at a time. Then you reincarnate, and keep coming back until you get it right.

Which reminded Claude of the ultimate question: "Why am I here?" His friend Brian had a good deal to rejoin to this question. "Evolution of a soul's journey through matter is one reason we are here, Claude. Not to mention the enlightenment and the awareness gained by the trip." Brian would say. "Yes, but why are we here?" Claude would retort. "You do have questions, and that is a good thing; and your innate curiosity is also good, but it can bog you down." Brian would say more than once. "Yes, but water fills each depression as it flows along, and curiosity is much like water that flows." Claude would contend.

Brian often shook his head at Claude's impetuosity, and Brian's smile would light the room with a glow from within him; that was often answer enough for Claude's queries. The two had many conversations of this sort, and Claude learned a great deal from Brian through the years, and just before Brian died he told Claude that the sign of a good teacher is that his students surpass him. "You have surpassed me, Claude!" he said one day. "Your curiosity that I once thought at times so restrictive to you has relentlessly kept you asking why, and you have discovered much that I could never have told you in words." "It has always been my pleasure to know you, young man!" Now Brian was nearly forty years Claude's senior, but the two owned a bond of love that is rare between humans. It was non-judgmental and inspiring; it was just right, and never was restrictive; indeed it was stimulating to the last of Brian's breaths on this plain of woe mixed with joy, and joy mixed with woe. One hell of a dichotomy, that.

Brian's wife, Edith, passed some years before Brian, and Brian often confided in Claude how much he loved and missed her. Claude once told Brian, "You will be with her soon enough." and that very year Brian died. Now it was Claude's turn to miss a friend, but he always felt that Brian was still around, keeping an eye on him in the most uncanny way~!

Once again Claude turned his cycle around to have the wind at his back. He let go the handlebars, and glided along with little effort. "What better way to spend the day!" Claude thought, but he knew of a better. His mind drifted back to the women he had known.

There was Cheryl in Denver, and Maria de la luz Asturias in Albuquerque, Corrine in Tennessee, Dianne in Boston, Adele in Nashville, Claudia the dancer, Deborah from Corales, New Mexico, several others in Boston he could no longer recall the names of, and a multitude of one nighters that passed between his sheets, or he theirs, on his way to where he found himself today riding a too familiar road wind at his back or no wind, he missed them all, and was waiting for the one he loved most of all of them. Actually, he didn't have to wait; he already knew who she was, and in the sense of good taste and allowing her some privacy we shall refer to her as Marie, which was/is not her true name at all.. We shall get back to her in a minute, but first: Cheryl in Denver.

Cheryl and Claude met in Denver in about 1970 or so. Claude was living and teaching in a yoga ashram at the time, and Cheryl happened into one of his classes. She was beautiful enough to tempt a celibate saint. She certainly tempted Claude to the point of giving up everything he had to have her, and he did. The glitch was, she was married. Ain't that a pisser?! The two of them did have quite a fling of it nonetheless.

Now the ashram owned a restaurant in Denver on University Boulevard called Hanuman's Conscious Cookery that Claude managed and cooked in for some months. The food was clean, and the ingredients were of the highest quality available. There was seating for eighty, and there was usually a line of people outside waiting to get in for lunch or dinner. Hanuman's served no breakfast. On a time most of the other people who lived in the ashram went off to New Mexico in an old school bus owned by a fellow whose moniker was Ramananda (a given yogi name. Names of this sort were quite commonly given during that period of time, or may even yet be), and the responsibility of the daily running of the restaurant fell to Claude and a skeleton crew, of which Cheryl was one.

Eighteen hours a day is what it took to operate this restaurant. It was clean when the doors opened for lunch, and the kitchen was prepped for the day, or at least for the lunch rush, and there always was one. The food was that good, and incidentally, it was close to the University of Colorado in Denver, and many of the clientele were students and faculty from the school. The crew that didn't go on the trip spent their days for two weeks in the absence of the rest of the staff. Even when you are young eighteen hours a day for two weeks will begin to tell on energy level, and attitude. The whole skeleton crew made it through the rigors of those 14 days with as few frazzled nerve explosions as possible. It was the end of the day that required all the discipline one could muster. The entire restaurant had to be swept, mopped, the kitchen had to be spotless for next day's business, so getting back to the ashram by midnight or later was commonplace.

After all, it was an ashram -- weren't the people there (even though most were in their early 20s or younger) supposed to conduct themselves with the decorum of yogis and yoginis. That was the theory, but these were American children, not died in the wool, raised from birth people of yogic families. Judgment was always a big part of each one's agenda. The two weeks were over, and the other residents of the ashram finally returned. Those who had stayed behind were relieved, and wanted some time off. Claude and Cheryl had decided to take a week in Aspen, and that is exactly what they did.

Aspen for them was wonderful while it lasted, but as we all know, or should know, those things which are good to have are only good as long as they are being had, and they always come to one end or another. This was one of the 'another' category. The people who had gone to New Mexico chastised Cheryl and Claude ruthlessly for having an affair. Claude thought, "O! excuse me!" Dissention arose in the ashram's population, and judgments flew as the proverbial shit flies from the blades of the fan after it has struck them. Well, hypocrisy was never Claude's favourite lie on the menu of lies, and he left the ashram and made arrangements to meet Cheryl in Albany, California about a month later. Claude left Denver with his integrity intact. Guess what? she showed up with her husband and her dog, and asked Claude to take care of her dog while she and hubby went off to a place Claude can no longer recalls the location of. Being a kind soul, Claude agreed to keep the mutt, not really caring for dogs in the least. But he knew he would at least get to see her again when she returned for the four-legged defecator. She came, picked up her dog, and it was the last time he ever saw her. What another pisser!!

The women were all lovely and special in their own ways, and the love he felt for each of them was still alive. That he may have never wanted to see them again had nothing to do with the feelings he still had for each of them. Claude just couldn't turn the love off once it began to flow. Perhaps there is an analogy between love and matter. Matter cannot be destroyed, according to physics, only transmuted into some new form, but love has many faces as well. Living in the void where love is requited and unrequited, the land of dreams wished for and often not fulfilled with reality in time and space is a head shaker to say the least . . . or most in the life of uncertainty, and temporary lovers permitted to be a moment's delight.

Series of concatenations -- never resting, always proceeding, ongoing, filtering as they went, sifting out the clods of impurity, the questions of absurdity, the conquests unresolved, and silence that was always wanted foremost of all the rest. Ah, wonderful silence! A commodity that one may perhaps not have enough of in life that lingers midst noise of others' wishes with wheels that turn, hammers that strike, saws that whir, dams that spit energy from turbines shrill, horns that honk, guns that go - BOOM, jet engine clamour that insult ears' sensibilities,
rape of innocence that makes no noise at all, and perhaps the loudest cacophony of all~!!~

Sun was going down for the day, but it was just flying through space with the rest of the stars. It wasn't really going down; the Earth was spinning round it. Sunrise and sunset were ill-named in the human condition. Claude considered this misconception by humans a major anomaly in human thought. Even on the morning and evening 'news' on the TV the person on the screen says, "Sunset will at x hours." They just perpetuate the illusion that the Earth is still the center of the galaxy -- universe?? But as he looked up he saw jet streams in the sky; evanescent streaks on a background of a blue colour caused by water molecules -- known to most just as the sky. The troposphere, that most see, and call by their witness the 'sky' is just that. It goes on forever as far as we may know. Claude wondered who was in the various aircrafts going hither and yon that left gossamer streaks on the blue sky. Why were they going, and to where?

Wind began to change direction. If you are a cycler, you know that when you go one way into the wind, you expect on the return trip you will be aided by the wind at your back. In life all things are adjustable; and even the wind of a day for a perfect ride on two wheels may give you pause for another wry smile. The Cheshire cat has no monopoly on that physiognomy's subtle grin. That grin comes from the heart of hearts that has been there once or more times before.
'Tis not a surprise, which is where the wry smile comes from always, in nearly every situation--previous experience

Claude was headed in a southerly direction on the return trip to his point of departure at ride's origin, and the wind was flowing from the north at the beginning, but changed to a westerly breeze which crossed his path. "Oh well," he thought -- just the way it is. "When you think you know what will happen next, what you think turns into a whole new scene, and you shouldn't be surprised.

Claude did wonder where all the people were going in those jets that flew overhead, and why. He often wished he were in their company going somewhere, too. "One may only ride up and down the same road any number of times without the road becoming too well known, and no longer adventurous, or able to offer things of new observation at bicycle speed," Claude mused. Thoughts of going on another adventure often entered Claude's daily thoughts, which reminded him of . . . the idea that he could ride until he ran out of road, or the road he was traversing got tired of holding him up, and his two ludicrous wheels. On occasions when this thought entered into his consciousness he was either prepared or unprepared for its arrival; nonetheless it was always welcome, and never turned adrift in the wind of "I don't want to think about that just now, thank you --" Claude always pondered the imponderable to its least and last quotient, or the ones that he considered relevant, and these were many.

Consider, for instance -- the pressure it takes over millennia for a lump of carbon to become a diamond, or the moment it takes for cowardice to become courage, the longing of flesh to be borne by souls drifting round planets here and there in the known and unknown universe, and plunging into the newborn as it takes its first breath, how ocean waves turn sand into smaller fragments on beaches near every strand of land where the moon says high tide and low tide is the order of the day, grace of the graceless come to a point where only grace will do, the loser wins it all in Vegas, the unrequited fulfilled, the cure for cancer found as a prize in a box of Crackerjacks, the thought that there would be no more wars, ever --. It is quite common for a clerk in a store, or a bank that when you transaction was complete would ask, "Will there be anything else for you today?" Claude would say, "World peace and fifty-cents worth of hundred dollar bills." Absurd, right? not really, that's what he wanted, and it was probably the most improbable thing that might occur.

Wind now crossed bike's path -- no more handless riding -- not wanting to eat pavement, skin elbows, or a cracked skull from a sudden gust of wind blowing over the bike. Claude held on gently to the bars that steered the bicycle. Once again loving the ride with no one to inflict their presence on the moments of solitude so precious for Claude's life, and a requirement for his continued sanity. Claude loved humanity; it was people that he could not stand. Even his own company at times was upsetting, especially at night during dream sleep.

What wonders and horrors visited his unconscious -- out of body existence during sleep~! Claude had wondered about the cold sweat soaked pillow, shivers of nightmare's realm, and come to unreasonable places -- innocuous that would be to his waking reality's reason -- unconscionable. He no longer wondered of these theories, having conducted his own experiments in the hostile environs of dreams. Life, waking or sleeping, was a mystery, being solved one breath at a time for Claude, and riding into or with the wind made no difference whatsoever. The true challenge of remembering to breathe, and listening to it was the discipline of life that was the only challenge worth a damn at all in the entire imbroglio of living for Claude.

In the past were the untrue terrors that lasted only in brief whiles that confused like the illusions of a magician's sleight of hand trifles that awed crowds, while the magician inwardly howled with laughter at the amazement of people gathered to watch what they called 'magic'. To the illusionist it was just a matter of quick dreaming -- awake. Nothing magical about it at all, because they all, to a woman or man knew that breathing was the most important device, owner resolved activity, object of focus, quick claim to consciousness that any living being could boast of knowing, without boasting at all. So if they knew this, why didn't they practice it with each breath, not just the ones when they happened to remember their ultimate importance?

Riding with the wind at your back is kind of like being in love -- when love starts. And just like the wind, love is changeable; it shifts, gusts, is still, pounds down with fury, blows dust into your eyes, and then shifts again to be at your back. It would seem that the wind is nearly more preferable to love, or being in love. That is, of course, a ludicrous proposal, but it sounds good in theory. But theory only goes so far with it until it is torn apart, and the upshot of it all is that without love in one's life what real good is it to have one -- life, that is? Claude rode along with the wind at his back, and came up with these teasers of the grey matter, eliciting one half a wry smile.

Now back to that pesky trust issue that was mentioned before. It is with some constraint that I must say trust was not Claude's strong suit, and he did try, but I believe he gave up trusting people a couple of decades ago. He trusted himself implicitly, but that is as far as it went. The only other person he had ever trusted like that was his departed father, whom he dearly missed.

Trust is an abstract noun like love, hate, mercy, goodness, and many more that have no definable quantities. Unlike concrete nouns such as: wood, rain, smoke, George across the street, or ghost. All concrete nouns can be observed by the senses. Abstract nouns cannot be observed by the senses, only that which they produce may be observed. Back to trust.

Trust is getting on a jet airplane without meeting or knowing the pilot, or the mechanics who think their work will keep the craft airborne from point A to point B with no disasters occurring. For instance, Claude boarded a Lockheed L-1011 in Denver, a rather large bird that was to take him to Seattle to settle a little business fracas. All went well, and as the aircraft neared its destination on a picture perfect clear day in the northwest of North America which was uncanny for that part of the country, over the intercom system came on the captain's voice. "Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. We will be in Seattle soon, but we have had a tailwind all the way from Denver, and we are twenty minutes early. We have been given permission to do a fly-by of Mount Rainier, so sit back, relax, and enjoy the view."

If you know anything about that part of the country, you know that Mount Rainier usually has its head buried in clouds. This day was perfectly clear, and as the plane got closer to the mountain the view was astonishing. The captain circled it twice just because he could. The cabin attendants were as amazed as the passengers. The cabin attendants who had made this same trip over and over, had never seen this site, so everyone was at a window to see it. Claude has photographs of the event. Claude landed in Seattle alive. That is trust requited, with a kicker of a beautiful, once in a lifetime view from the air of the tallest mountain in Washington state: 14,416 feet about sea level.

The last is an example of trusting someone that you don't know, or have never met. What about the people who you are close to, and even sleep with at night. Yeah, I am talking about women in the latter, and others in the former. And for this we will concentrate on the people that Claude knew, as he tested the factor of trust that must be earned, once given is often trod upon.

In Claude's most recent past, there was the woman that he lived with in Tennessee. He liked her, and probably even loved her in his own way, but he never thought that what came to pass was even possible. It is often the case that when a man and a woman live together they grow closer together or further apart. This was one of the further apart scenarios, but the end of it was ugly, and the trust that was once freely given to this woman by Claude was trampled into the mire, so that trust would perhaps never be given by him again in his life to anyone -- be it a man or a woman. She kicked him out, and stole $50,000 from him. Out on the street destitute, and wondering, "What the fuck was that!?!" He still shakes his head over that one,
and the only person -her- that can answer that question will not talk to him. You are probably thinking what her side of the story is, aren't you? Whatever the case may be, Claude didn't deserve this from her. She whose back he watched, and did for her around her house. Among other things, Claude was a master carpenter, and he put the fix on many things around that old house. He cooked, cleaned, did laundry, etc., etc., ad infinitum. Trust totally and irrevocably destroyed, probably for the rest of his life he would never trust another. That pesky thing called trust; it lives way out there in the abstract zone.

Talk about way out there in the abstract zone, let's have Claude look at government. Wow! government, what can one say? Claude had plenty to say if you should get him on a roll. As he rolled along he thought about government, with its machinations, ruses, prevarications, and the artifice of its players. You've got millionaires, and billionaires running for offices to rule/govern a population that doesn't know from million dollar lives. Please understand that Claude had his go round with the government during Vietnam and ever since, and according to his perspective, the government had only gotten worse verging on a fascist state. Now there is an arm of the government called the IRS that Claude loathed above most others. He had even thought of a catchy campaign slogan to attract employees to work for the IRS: The Marines are looking for a few good men, The IRS is looking for a few heartless whores. This governmental branch collects taxes from the populace to pay the debt incurred by the government from borrowing money the Federal Reserve Bank that has absolutely nothing to do the government at all. It is a privately owned bank that loans money at interest to the federal government, and the taxes collected try to pay the interest that accrues from the loans from the Fed. The interest will never be paid because the government keeps borrowing and keeps going into debt while the little people, not the millionaires become poorer and poorer as the government goes down the tubes, but on the way becomes more and more repressive to its own population. "Americans don't have a bill of rights." Claude thought, "They have a bill of privileges that are being taken away one by one. There are two kinds of people in America: The truly needy and the truly greedy." When this upstart little country came into being, one of the reasons people left Europe was to get away from banking institutions like the Federal Reserve. Guess what folks -- our ancestors brought it with them.

There has always been a sub-culture in America of the very wealthy, and one of the ways that they got that way was/is to steal from the poor: Their labour, their sons and daughters for military 'service', illegal taxation, outrageous interest on loans from banks/bankers, repossession of homes when the poor could no longer pay, manipulated unemployment, inflation, and a myriad of other travesties visited on the poor. This kind of repression is one of the reasons that revolutions begin, but Americans are too well entertained to even think about overthrowing the government and installing one that is honest and equitable. Claude saw the blindness of his fellow countrymen quite well.

Entertainments: Sports, TV, and communication devices are enough to begin with. According to Claude, "There is a psychosis in America when it comes to sports, especially a 'game' that is dying to be banned, called football. The 'game' perpetuates the idea that violence is OK -- more than wrong!! There is a trickle-down effect from watching, or associating one's self with that egregious 'game'. Domestic violence may be one effect -- it has to come from somewhere . . ." You may think that is a stretch, but Claude doesn't. If you do think it a stretch, you probably watch football. There are other 'sports', but football was the most offensive to Claude's sensibilities.

TV is another entertainment that the world could do without. Granted, there are some worthwhile broadcasts on the tube, but they are in the minority of things that television has to offer the viewing public. But where the entertainment factor is concerned, TV does nothing but dull the intellect, and lower the IQ of watchers by giving them more violent images to fill their psyches. Commercials to titillate their avarice, and 'I need that thing', whatever that thing is, from a new car, the latest kitchen appliance , or a fragrance or a lipstick to wear, that was bound to get you laid that very day. Bullshit!! Claude hadn't watched TV for over 25 years, and hadn't missed it once. He read books instead, and wrote what he called poetry, and some of it was even good poetry. "People were offered entertainments galore, so they would forget that they were getting up the ass from the government they put and kept in place from ignorance and complacency," Claude contended. "Apathy is a wasting disease," Claude thought. "It is a cancer of the mind!" He further mused. Then we come to 'communication devices'.

On his daily rides Claude, as has been mentioned, had to cycle through city streets in a sparrow fart town in Iowa where there was a 'thriving' university community. The majority of young students walked around with ear microphones in their ears from their I-pods playing goodness knows what while texting gibberish on their cell-phones. These people became so withdrawn from their external environment that they forgot to look both ways when they stepped off curbs into traffic, and became victims of their own stupidity as cars mowed them down while in their reveries of listening to their I-pods, and 'communicating' on their hand held 'communication' devices. As a courtesy when cycling, Claude would warn those pedestrians ahead of him that he was about pass them, but most of them never heard him because of the ear microphones in their ears. So these morons who were being entertained became even a danger to cyclists who were not riding in traffic. Entertainments, sheeeeeit!!

"The most horrible entertainment of all," thought Claude, "is war." "It is the ultimate diversion, and the participants use real bullets and bleed real blood. Insanity, insanity on a global scale," Claude further considered. People do not cause war, governments do. Of course governments are populated by people, and who are they? the millionaires, and billionaires whose pencil dicks are so small that they have grown giant egos instead to rule the masses with. "Life," Claude thought, "was hardly worth living." in a society such as the one he daily witnessed. "No one was paying attention any more," thought Claude. "The whole damn world is out of its mind!" These, of course, were only muses Claude had while riding on that wonderful windy day. We may, as readers, accept his suggestions or reject them on their face, but as for your commentator, I don't think he was too far from incorrect in his assumptions. He was called negative, a downer, and other such wonderful adjectives by those who loved the entertainments brought to them by the very government they supported with their tax dollars.
Old patterns of government repression was honed to a science to keep the populace down, and enforced by corrupt and eager young fascist police on the local level, and a standing army in the grander scheme of things. The whole picture was too ridiculous to even be close to humorous; it was downright pitiful. The 'entertainments' were too bitter a jest to be borne~!

"Life is stranger than shit," Claude thought as he turned back into the wind for just one more little dance with it. He had been playing it all day, and it had been playing him. His legs felt like iron ingots still in the furnace waiting to be tempered. Cranking out the feet, the yards, the miles was his only thought now, but what are all these but distances? And distance is what he thought of next.

" There is never nothing going on round this wheel called life!" Claude thought. "It is a distance, too." This particular thought had always come trundling into his consciousness. Not that he really minded it, but it was at times more of a nuisance than a welcome friend. Of course he knew that something was always going on, so why the constant reminder? The wind tried to hold him back, but perseverance kept his legs working the peddles for one more stroke that described a circle round the crankshaft. If wind were a resistance, then Claude had met ones more formidable, so the wind didn't seem more than a blowing caress on his cheek. What can be said for his life, is that he never quailed in the face of adversity, or change, though change was slow and slogging, it nevertheless was constant. Claude appreciated that about it; the change, in its many forms, but that didn't mean that he wanted to go on living with it. One thing that I have not mentioned about our lovely protagonist is that he was very depressed.

Depression is a mental illness that so many turn away from, and don't want to hear about. They are all too busy being entertained, while depression visits them, too. He was also an atheist who loved Nature, but didn't think any g-o-d had anything to do with its beginning or its evolutionary processes. "God," he thought, "was a matter of convenience, born of fear for lack of any other excuse to explain all the shit that goes down on this planet." "Didn't people realize that they are all alone, and no g-o-d is going to rescue them at the last minute to avoid being murdered, raped, stolen from, child molested, never winning the lottery, broken into, or devastated in so many other forms that evolution has set up for our personal enlightenment?" One must admit that he had a singular, or perhaps not so singular view of it all!! Claude was an anomaly, an anachronism, a fluke, a loose cannon, a dropped stitch, a bad penny that always shows up, a crack in the hole of time -- where the light gets in, an alien, an artist, a believer in truth, a clown, a wizard, a white witch, a healer, but he just couldn't heal himself because he was already healed, and wished to heal the rest, but knew he could not. Perhaps this was a cause for his depressive state -- perhaps not.

The wind was dissipating in its speed and force, so Claude moved into a higher gear to keep up the cardiovascular intensity from his pumping legs. The day was growing older, and he thought about turning round again, but he figured, why bother? this feels much too good to stop. Besides, once the ride is over the city streets will have to be negotiated once more, and all the entertained zombies will have to be dodged. The sky was still crystal blue, and meadow larks were still singing their brilliant song, there was no one else on the road, but for an occasional car, and the wind was good company. A groundhog skittered across the road just ahead with a store of fat for the winter months that were yet to come soon.

There would not be too many more days like this one, so why go back, and give up the opportunity to keep the two wheels spinning? Claude was thirty miles now from his point of origin, and this ride would end in the dark. He stopped, got off the bike to take a leak in the ditch next to the road, had a drink from his water bottle. His stomach growled at him from being empty, and he had an energy bar that was tucked into the pouch that hung from his handlebars. "It will have to do," he thought. "If I were a bovine, I could eat some grass, but I ain't." "Tighten your belt, and hang in; you have done it many times before, so you are practiced." Claude figured he should always speak to the wisest one present, so he had many conversations with himself.

As he was stopped a wonderful throbbing of blood flowing and glowing in his legs reminded him of his mortality, and there's an end on it. A murder of crows flew out of a corn field where they had been eating fall corn, and they must have had enough to last a bit. Caw, caw, caw they expressed their satiety, and if their beaks were more mobile, they may have shown a smile for sharp eyes to witness; the caws would have to suffice.

Claude surveyed the bucolic scene in front him, and how it looked so peaceful, but then he recalled how the corn in the field go to be so tall. Chemistry poured on the ground for the corn roots to feed on all summer long. In the winter snow would fall, and melt in the spring. The chemicals would flow from the fields and enter streams that would feed lakes, or flow into larger estuaries, and finally larger ones like the Mississippi or the Missouri, and eventually flow into the Gulf of Mexico. Shortsighted agriculture is what Claude called it, when organics would do just as well. A lot more work was involved, but at least it was cleaner. He then thought of unborn children that would inherit what their predecessors would leave them to deal with -- filthy soil. Iowa had/has the deepest top soil in the world, and its colour is black. Black gold is what Claude called it, but with 'modern' agricultural methods, and the lack of care for the soil, he wondered how long this kind of abuse could be sustained before the soil just said, "NO! I will not, can not grow anything else without a century's rest." Claude also wondered if it is in the humans' best interest to destroy that which feeds them. All he could surmise as an answer was no, it isn't, but the empirical evidence he witnessed could do nothing but support that conclusion. "Silly humans!" Claude thought. "Why must they always shit in their own mess-kits?" "Is it an innate part of human nature to destroy instead of sustain?"

Fragmentation of simple concepts such as: good sense, kindness, love thy neighbour, 'charity begins at home', don't go to bed angry, count to ten before you say something that you may/will regret later, measure twice -- cut once, think before you proceed, look both ways before crossing any street, have become platitudes debauched by wanton willingness to abuse even them, without thinking of consequences. Dichotomies everywhere one may look. One of Claude's favourites were the words affect and effect. If affect is an influence, and effect is a consequence of the influence this is basic to existence, the opposite of which is non-existence.
One thing just brings about another, it goes on and on, perhaps to a place where dichotomies end, and there is only one thing left without an opposite. "But we are all stuck here in matter, time, and space," Claude would consider.

World of matter is nothing but opposites: cold/hot, love/hate, wet/dry, going away/coming back, right/wrong, truth/lies. This last one Claude had a wonderful time with. He defined truth as the absence of lies, so truth may be that place that stands alone, by itself, the one left standing that needs no opposite. Claude figured that he could get along with nothing but truth, but he wondered if it were possible to know what truth was without its opposite. He was certainly willing to attempt the experiment. He had had it up to his eyeballs with lies, deceits, equivocations, fabrications, canards, rumours, calumnies, scandals, falsifications, taradiddles, evasions, falsehoods, and he wished that he had never heard of one of these. Claude was not at all surprised that there were so many synonyms for the word lie and the postulate of a lie. Yes, he would be happy to live with nothing but the truth; it was far easier to remember, even if he had to live without the point of reference of lies; they are so boring, and they did nothing but hurt. Claude wistfully wished he had never heard or told a lie, but alas, he had done both. As for the latter, not any more.

Truth may stand alone, without any help. Liars will never know this, because they are too busy making up new lies to cover the old ones they told, and just can't pay attention. Claude thought that was just a damn shame~!

"Humans have so much potential," Claude would think, "and they just piss it away for portraits of dead presidents, new cars, baubles, stuff, stuff, and more stuff. Stuff that will rust, rot, and break, be stolen, lost, and replaced." Watching this type of seething never to end scampering for the latest and greatest, newest of new, going to stores full of things that are not really needed, but merely offered -- the human animal embarrasses themselves carrying armloads of stuff to their cars, and loading them in, that are parked in parking lots next to cars of others carrying armloads of stuff doing the same damn thing. They start up their internal combustion motors that burn dead dinosaurs, polluting the air as they drive to their little boxes and unload all the new stuff, none of which will bring true joy or enlightenment. "For those who are ambulatory," Claude thought, "they should at least hop on their bikes and ride, or at the very least take a good long walk." "Instead they sit in front of their TVs and grow fatter, and wonder why they feel so terrible all the time."

This caused Claude to think of something that he had considered many a time on many a day. That which Americans are willing to settle for -- mediocrity --. "Excellence," thought Claude, "was something that was rarely seen, so how can it be demanded?" Another of Claude's gifts was his ability to perform massage therapy. He had had a forty-year career practicing massage
to the tune of excellence. "Excellence in all things, especially excellence, and right now," Claude considered normal. He demanded this of himself constantly and on purpose, stretching for new plateaus of excellence in his practice. His client/patients certainly appreciated it, but there was a flaw in the mix, and one that caused one of the wriest smiles on Claude's face ever -- he was the only person on Earth who would never receive a massage from himself. There was something inherently wrong with this picture that he could never reconcile in his mind. He did look for at least a good massage, but he was always disappointed, and got up from more than one massage table in the middle of the massage, suggesting to the practitioner that they keep their day job, when he knew full well that what they called practicing massage was their day job. Sure he pissed people off, but he didn't care. Claude was looking for excellence, and what he found was medium mediocrity. "Why do people settle for so little, when they could have it all?" Claude wondered. And he wasn't talking about having a yacht to water-ski behind! He was thinking of the non-tangibles like love, peace, honour, integrity, justice,
kindness, knowledge, laughter, happiness, courage, beauty, pleasure, redemption, intelligence, tolerance, sensitivity, imagination, and clarity, to name but a few. Not one of these can be purchased or even rented cheap with money. The day was coming to an end and Earth kept spinning out of the way from the light of the Sun. Claude pointed the bike for home, feeling the endorphin rush from a long ride. At least for this day, he was satisfied.

Ride nearly over, pedaling nearly finished, but thoughts just kept on coming like old hits in a hit parade that just don't know when to shut up!~!