The Painters Light, the Sheep, the Brambles and the Rocks.

Portugal is beautiful, the landscape, the people... beautiful. I haven’t been anywhere in Europe (or anywhere else, except in my head that was) this nice. I knew it would be a nice place because you never hear much about it. Places that you hear a lot about usually suck; they’re full of pushing crowds and blind-eyed people hungering for a fix. Portugal is filled with painters light. Maybe it’s the air; it’s so clear, vivid; you can really see things, everything stands out in stark relief.

I came here because my dear friend ‘auracatblue’; what she called herself when she used to post at that entropic cyber-swamp, The Fray, told me about it and described it so wonderfully that I had to see it. She described it beautifully, just as it is. We’re born on the same day of the year. I don’t know if that means anything. It might mean we tend to see things in a similar fashion. I know that we do see things in a similar fashion, inasmuch as I know up to this point. She had considered coming to visit with me here this winter but circumstance came betwixt.

Today I was sitting on the deck at the sunny side of the villa and a herd of sheep came up the hill to my left. I’d not seen any sheep here since I arrived. The lapdogs of my loved ones broke into the frenzied yipping that serves to make small dogs less preferable to me than large ones. I walked out of the driveway and watched them. Forward they came. There’s a nice area of lush green clover like grass growing near to where I live. In the direction from which they had come there was less of it. They grazed for a short while until some portion of the herd began to move off in another direction and then all of the sheep followed after. They went off toward the rocks and dry scrub that could in no way be described as an improvement over where they had just been.

Seeing this put me in mind of present day America; bushligula is the herdsman of the moment, though he himself is without a clue as to whither he may go. He is herded himself like some ambitious traveler convinced he can find water in the desert, even though the desert itself is being milked of its moisture. bush is the public face of national greed. He is the formed gollum of Ayn Rand’s distorted ruminations. Greed is good.

What an irony it is that sheep will leave the lush feeding area to wander into the land of stones and bramble at the behest of a clown without compass or compassion. Will faith in all the wrong things lead the multitudes into the land of milk and honey? The milk and honey futures have already been shorted by the traders who convinced bush that fewer witnesses meant less interference and what better place for the would be witnesses than circumstances of extremity that would capture all of their attention; “Oh yeah, and don’t forget to shear them on their way out. They won’t be needing coats where they are going.”

If you take the trouble you can find more information than you can read on how yet another election was stolen. You have to look though because the usual sources are mute. The usual sources are part of the whole ganglia of control that work the sheep.

There’s only one problem with the whole charade and that is that there are a huge portion of life forms still moving on two legs who are not happy camping in a wilderness of stones. If some large portion of people has abdicated its humanity to become livestock, well, that’s history in facing mirrors; but what about the rest of you? What will you do and where will you go?

A rising demagogue on the neo-fascist Christian front is one Franklin Graham. He and those of the favored cadre are presently doing blackmail duty in Iraq. Well, Frankie-Boy himself isn’t there. Franklin and the rest of the Christian soldiers marching on to war have joined up with all interested parties to shut down, wipe out, burn to ash and otherwise eliminate the Muslim threat. You ain’t seen nothing yet folks.

Now, I can see pretty well what’s on the Event Horizon. I possess what I suppose must be a peculiar lens that doesn’t come stock. I’m suspecting it’s a custom job. I’m not quite sure how I came into possession of it. All I know is that I have it and you can’t get it at Crazy Bill’s Computer Warehouse. By virtue of this lens I knew there were no WMD’s right from the giddy-up. I cam right out and said it from day one and I posted about it every day in a day count up until Day 125 when I got tired of it. Along the way I was mocked and dismissed. I was asked whether I would apologize when they were found. I was asked what I would say when they were found. People offered to bet me certain sums of money. Well, as you can see...

And I’ve noted any number of other things along the way. I saw through the “Alqaeda Bombed the WTC” scam pretty quickly. I’ve seen through pretty much whatever they’ve shaped to put in front of the light in order to cast whatever shadow they have a mind to manipulate for the benefit of controlling your minds and influencing your actions. I know that the large evangelical religious movements have dick to do with Jesus. I know it’s just crowd control. I see it the way I see these words appearing in front of me. It’s clear. It’s crystal. You don’t see it? You do see it? Why’s that?

It may not matter how many tens of thousands die, except to them and only until they are dead. It could be that they all deserve what they get. It’s a bizarre possibility that God really does want to make the world safe for SUV’s and fat people’s rights to eat saturate fats until they explode. It’s possible that the people writing at Slate and MSNBC.com are more entertaining than I am; more truthful than I am. They’re getting paid a lot of money and I’m not getting paid any money so, wouldn’t that make them more truthful than me? Isn’t the amount you are paid and the measure of your wealth also the actual measure of your essential worth and veracity? So I am told... So I have been told.

I’m in the green clover and I can see the sheep down the hill among the stones and bramble. I’ve plenty of water and food and attractive shelter. I was at dinner last night with a very wealthy man who can buy anything he wants several times over and go anywhere he pleases. He’s a really decent sort too, or I wouldn’t have been having dinner with him. Yet I know he doesn’t live any better than I do, nor derive any greater pleasure from his life. I know that the sheep in the valley; the herdsman, the herdsman’s herdsmen- “Mrs. Brown you’ve got a lovely daughter...” I know they enjoy the thing entire far less than I.

So I am in Portugal, this heartbreakingly wonderful land. Earlier I sat in the sun and felt it wash me. With my eyes closed I could sense the citizens of the sun grouped about in their astral garments. They do visit me. And I dream sometimes of my walled garden in Southern France where they and others will visit me on a regular basis as I sit among the foliage and the chosen rocks of my private garden. I know what I want. Knowing what you want then eliminating the peripherals and non-essentials is the key to being there. Knowing where to find what you want is the key to knowing where to look. The sheep know what they want but they do not know where to look. The ones leading the sheep have sold their inheritance for a mess of potage. Am I responsible for shaking the sheep? Am I the defining obstacle to the blundering herdsmen? I have neither the power nor the mandate for such a thing.

It may be that what I have it a common thing, likely to be thrown aside and trampled by the rush into Wal-Mart; were I standing there with thing in hand I would likely be trampled too. I once asked my teacher, the man on the beach, why he wasn’t in the city where many people could profit from his wisdom. He said, “I don’t like being pushed around.” Do you like being pushed around?