Minutes of a Strange Sort of Synod

Posted on October 22, 2023 by Guillermo Calvo Mahé

The sacred body of Yeshua (minus two) was called to order by the sacred foreskin as the senior member to have been separated from the sacred body, with the exception of the sacred umbilical cord (who had excused itself due to pressing personal business elsewhere) and, a quorum being present, the sacred foreskin of Yeshua declared the meeting duly convened. The sacred heart, being the subject of the meeting, had neither been invited nor informed of its convocation, anyway, being too busy with all of its personal endevors and appearances at festivals, etc., which was the reason for the meeting as it was a sort of revolt directed at the heart’s vainglory with respect to sacred days, the “carnivals” dedicated to the sacred heart being repugnant to the rest of the sacred body.

The sacred liver initiated the business part of the meeting by making a motion, seconded by the sacred spleen, to officially censure the sacred heart for pomposity. The motion was carried unanimously but with abstentions for some unknown reason by the sacred stomach and the sacred intestines.

The sacred prostrate, joined by the society of sacred twins comprised of the sacred lungs and the sacred kidneys, then asked the sacred brain to make a speech, to which the sacred larynx objected, feeling that role was best reserved for the sacred vocal cords. The sacred foreskin called for a vote but everyone decided to abstain and the vote was postponed on a motion by the sacred testicles, one having made the motion and the other having seconded it.

The sacred foreskin as the presiding organ (sort of) then noted that the business of the revolt had been concluded, and asked that a motion be offered to send a note of reprimand to the sacred heart and, upon motion duly made by the sacred penis, seconded by the sacred left tonsil (the more revolutionary of the two), and, being unanimously carried this time joined into by the sacred stomach and the sacred intestines which appeared to have urgent business elsewhere, the meeting of the sacred body minus two was duly adjourned.
_______

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

Circuitous Introspection

Posted on October 12, 2023 by Guillermo Calvo Mahé

He wrote in the third person when he wanted to make it less obvious about whom he wrote. Of course, that sometimes made it more, rather than less, obvious.

Anyway, ….

He was a closet introvert who spent a great deal of time on reflective introspection trying to understand himself and to fathom the realities involving good and evil, all too often, apparently, sides of the same coin as interpreted by those impacted, either by their own actions, or by the consequences they experienced as a result of the actions of others. He very much wanted to be good, as long as it was not too inconvenient, and he hated hypocrisy, at least in others.

He believed that truth was an absolute but an obfuscated absolute, too often artificially complicated and muddled by those for whom truth was inconvenient, and that, sadly, included him. He speculated on the nature of mendacity and came to various conclusions. First, on the one hand, it was a natural human impulse when an imbalance of power existed, resulting in insecurity, or even when such an imbalance was only an inaccurate perception; but on the other, it was a sadistic expression of hubris on the part of those who wanted to be perceived as in the right, knowing that was not the case. The latter tended to need quite a bit of cake in order to eat it, but without exhausting the supply available to them. He wondered concerning the long term consequences of mendacity and came to conclude that it prevented solution to real problems, although perhaps masking the problems for a time during which they tended to metastasize, creating a more and more complex web woven of materials apparently based on singularity theory and thus, all but inescapable. The conclusion? Well, formulation of any real conclusion would require a lot more than merely two hands.

He also reflected on the consequences of boredom which he came to believe led to overeating and depression (among other things), and to ill thought out actions whose consequences were rarely positive. Boredom seemed avoidable but cognitive labyrinths inexplicably blocked positive solutions, creating self-perpetuating negative feedback loops which required a great deal of discipline to avoid.

“Discipline” doing something that needed doing when was not disposed to do it.

As seems obvious from the foregoing, his introspection tended to wander from subject to subject, sometimes involving rational links, sometimes objective, but all too often seemingly without rhyme or reason, or at least apparently without rhyme or reason. Further reflection sometimes turned up profound insights, or at least what appeared to be profound insights.

He liked writing, perceiving that it provided a means of communication between the diverse aspects of his personality and nature, both concurrently and temporally, and disclosed the unreliability of memory, evidently something heavily impacted by what he referred to as legis murphiatum. Writing seemed an essential means to maximize the potential of his introversion while minimizing the existential threat of boredom.

And, of course, he wrote in the third person when he wanted to make it less obvious about whom he wrote although sometimes that made it more, rather than less, obvious, about whom he wrote.
_______

The Woke and Globalization in the Context of Hoped-for Relationships: A Soliloquy of Sorts

Posted on September 24, 2023 by Guillermo Calvo Mahé

He considered himself an empirical philosopher. He’d taken a number of college level philosophy courses but almost always dropped out before final exams having found his instructors unbearably opinionated and unfair in their grading schemes. He was not always wrong about that. The times were, in fact, sort of “a’changing”, although perhaps not in the manner Bob Dylan had expected. On the other hand, perhaps he was wrong about that. But anyway, he considered himself a philosopher. After all, innovative philosophers frequently went unrecognized. And innovative philosophies were not built upon the structures and beliefs expressed in prior philosophies. There was a great deal to be said for “thinking outside the box”. And he enjoyed pondering abstract notions and arguing about them with others, especially with others who were less informed than he was, especially when their rhetorical abilities were less developed than his.

On this particular day (it was morning, very early morning, although it seemed like very late at night and sleep had eluded him), he was considering something he’d found written on a discarded, or perhaps lost, notebook. Handwritten. What a novelty. Who wrote anymore he’d thought when he first opened it, when computers and the Internet so easily facilitated cutting and pasting! And when with multiple-stage-translation-programs, intralingual rather than interlingual, it wasn’t that hard to disguise the origins of materials borrowed from uncited sources.

The “notes” in the notebook dealt with a comparison of the similarities between the sociopolitical and economic concepts of globalization and localization, and the social beliefs of followers of “identity politics” who referred to themselves as the “woke. At least that’s how it was titled.

The author claimed to recall when “globalization” made sense, but then, according to the author, in a Marxian sort of dialectic, up had popped “localization”. Which to the author made sense as well, although the concepts were diametrically opposed. The first had seemed to the author a sort of Alexandrian concept in the sense that Alexander of Macedon was among the first to publicly insist that all men were equal, while the second, seemed a profoundly libertarian sociological interpretation which insisted on the collective right to be communally special, communally different, with an innate right to preserve independent cultures. “The difference between the homogenous and the heterogeneous” the author had written.

“The ‘woke’ would homogenize us all (if they could) into a society perhaps ruled by a version of Kurt Vonnegut’s ‘handicapper general’: all races comingled into one and, if possible all genders as well.”

Interesting perspective he thought. He’d read that book by Vonnegut. “Harrison” something or other. It was in a class that dealt with comparative dystopian literature. He remembered that, for some reason, he’d confused it with a book about strange firemen whose job it was to burn books, and that he’d dropped that class when the class had found his mistake amusing. Way too amusing. The other students obviously couldn’t grasp dystopian subtleties, and anyway, none of the girls in the class paid any attention to him.

The author had continued (in handwriting that seemed too perfect to be a man’s), writing that: “of course, until real equality was attained” (according to the “woke” with which the author was in contact, evidently the notebook involved some sort of research project was involved), “all races, genders, nationalities, religions (at least their secular versions), sexual proclivities, etc., had to be represented in everything public, and to the extent possible, everything private as well. No one’s feelings could be hurt under threat of dire legal sanctions and civil penalties.”

“A delight to trial lawyers everywhere” the author had noted, underlining the phrase for some reason. The notes continued, now in sort of a narrative fashion, as though meant to be read somewhere, perhaps to a class:

The “woke” envision a “globalized” version of social interaction at every level. Pretty much today’s version of the world as portrayed by Hollywood. Unfortunately, a clash among “woke” constituencies erupted when the “Trans” (males who insisted they be treated as females, sort of like full time cross dressers as they used to be called, although the difference between trans and gay men seems sort of subtle, at least to me) insisted on competing on an equal basis in female sporting events, and feminists realized that the despised patriarchy, albeit in drag, was once again depriving women of competitive rights to equality in everything.

“Ironic” the author had noted. Apparently wondering how that scenario would play out, a sort of “unstoppable force facing an immovable barrier”. At least that was the metaphor the author had used.

Then the author had added a “note”:

Note: what happens if a Trans person also identifies as a lesbian? Seems as though that would be a man who identifies and dresses like a woman but still prefers intimate relations with women. Interesting.

The author had then continued, slightly changing focus:

Traditionalists, at least of the antithetically anti-woke variety on the dialectic scale, those who insist that biological diversity is a reality and that there are only two genders and are thus, according to the “woke”, automatically racist misogynists, anti-Semites, fascist warmongers and patrons of genocide if they refuse to accept alternative views on gender (even if they clung to pacifism, internationally and domestically), have sort of sprung up in a reaction against the “woke”, albeit in a sort of anarchic fashion, apparently tending to be libertarian.

He put down the notebook, wondering what kind of person the author was, sort of hoping it was a woman, a pretty one, preferably slender.

He thought of getting up and rummaging around his refrigerator for a beer, he was pretty sure there was at least one left. He kept different kinds of beer in his refrigerator, mainly for effect. Cheap beer for when he was alone and dark beer for when he had company he wanted to impress. Lowenbrau dark, he loved how old and European the brewery was, apparently it was still brewed in Mucich. The cheap beer he drank straight from the can but the dark beer he liked to serve in frozen beer mugs he kept in the freezer section. He had a similar formula for wines and tequila, although he didn’t drink those straight from the bottle. He had fancy wine and shot glasses for special guests, sometimes professors but usually coeds, and plain old glasses when he drank alone, … which was not all that often. He had to hoard his money wisely.

It was late (and very early concurrently, as we noted earlier) so he just put the notebook down, and shuffled off to his bed, still unmade but the sheets were relatively clean. He always changed them when he hoped one of his female guests would consider spending the night. That was not all that often but he’d gotten sort of lucky a few nights before.

The next morning he went off to a class he was auditing, well, auditing without the professor’s or the university’s knowledge, the class where he’d found the notebook, It was a big class in an auditorium style room and, even though roll was called on occasion, no one noticed that his name was not included. It wasn’t as if he was fascinated by the subject, but it was a good place to meet sort of interesting people, some of whom were attractive women who under normal circumstances would not pay much attention to him.

After the class he walked to a sort of down and out, twenty-four hour, seven days a week diner whose prices (if not necessarily the food), appealed to him and had the soup and sandwich special, a BLT and French Onion soup, then headed towards Central Park. He liked to walk along Central Park West and imagine that he had an apartment in one of the buildings that adjoined “the” Park. He liked to go by the Dakotas where John Lennon had once lived and where he’d died.

He wondered what Yoko Ono was really like. His friend Bill hated her and called her Yucky-Oh-No, blaming her for the Beatle’s separation. But he didn`t care, he was a Stone’s man himself.

He sort of drifted into the heart of Park and watched a softball game being played next to an impromptu touch football game. The players kept getting mixed up and the softball guys became annoyed when the touch football guys drifted onto the space the softball players had claimed as their own, after all, it was set up for softball. But the Park was everyone’s. Some middle-aged women were playing soccer on the opposite side. After a while though it started to drizzle so he headed back to his garden apartment.

“Garden apartment” he mumbled, “right, it’s more like a subterranean cave”. But it was what he could afford, and after all, he was playing the role of an undergraduate student. Cement block and wood plank bookshelves and all, decorated with multicolored candle residue set in old bottles of Chianti. It was a studio apartment but the bathroom wasn’t bad, and it wasn’t really all that tiny. “Less to cleanup” he thought to himself.

When he walked in his door he spotted the notebook on the floor by his bed, picked it up and placed it on the table that doubled as a desk and dining space. “Got to clean this up a bit” he thought, hoping someone interesting would drop by. Oddly enough, that happened sometimes. So he made his bed, without changing the sheets, and even washed the dirty dishes in the sink that served both the kitchen and the bathroom. It was never a good idea to leave dirty dishes there if someone ever showed up and needed to use the John. He wondered what “John” had to do with bathroom functions, but for some reason it did. He decided he’d Google the question after he was through cleaning up and decided what to do with his evening.

In the meantime, the drizzle morphed into a driving rain which sort of decided his evening plans for him. A pleasant evening at home, or it might have been if his aparta-studio had been a bit larger and had had a fireplace, one with real logs and a warm fire burning. And if he had some brandy, but for the moment, his tequila would do. So he got his salt shaker out, cut up a lime and half-filled a water glass with the amber liquid he liked best. Dinner and drink combined he thought, as he opened a bag of nachos, humming Margaritaville to himself and imagining he was in Key West

After his sort of dinner he picked up the notebook again, speculating on who the owner might be, imagining that it belonged to one of the more attractive women in the class he was sort of auditing. There were a few, and he wondered if he could use it as an excuse to meet one or more of them in a gallant sort of way, certainly a reasonable ice breaker. But he wanted to read it first, not because he was all that interested in its contents, but he wanted to be able to pretend that he had been just in case the owner seemed worthwhile. He could develop and rehearse a few lines first, just in case.

So he opened the notebook and continued reading:

There is a confusing sort of middle ground”, the author had written. “The ‘woke” insist on the right to personalization in matters of style, of dress, tattoos, interpersonal intimate groupings, but certainly not in matters of political opinions where only those whose opinions are ‘correct’ ought to be ‘allowed’ to share and express them. To the “woke”, effective censorship is the hallmark of a free society. On the other hand, ‘traditionalists’, at least younger traditionalists, don’t seem to give much of a damn what they wear, as long as it’s fairly clean. At least that’s been my experience with those I know and classify that way.

“I wonder if that means anything” the author had written, “If it provides any psychological or sociological insights?” There was a telephone number circled in red with a date about a week ahead. “Hmmm” he wondered, “should I call and try and find out to whom the notebook belongs?” Or perhaps, he thought, he could pin a note in the classroom where he’d found it with his own name and phone number asking the owner to contact him, but then he decided that might put his surreptitious attendance at risk. “Drats!” he mumbled to himself, putting off deciding what to do, … if anything. The notebook had some sketches, not bad, and some geometric drawings whose meaning was utterly unclear.

Then he sort of decided it was time to sleep, or rather, he just fell asleep with his night lamp still on and dreamt of riots and chaos and rats and roaches. In his dreams that evening, after the episode with the non-human vermin, somewhere outside of time and space, the shade of Maximilien François Marie Isidore de Robespierre smiled, chuckled, … perhaps even laughed uproariously, albeit maniacally, … he just couldn’t seem to stop.

He woke late with a foul taste somewhat inexplicably in his mouth and a throbbing ache behind his eyes, as if he’d spent the night drinking, which he most assuredly had not. So, first things first, he went to the multipurpose sink and brushed his teeth, then took a few aspirin, or ibuprofen, or, well, something to exorcise whatever was playing in his head and making it pound. Then he took a hot shower and changed into not quite clean, definitely grubby clothing, … stay at home clothing, no shoes or socks necessary.

He’d pretty much finished the notebook and was wondering what to do with, or about it, which led him to reflect on its context in an introspective manner. He liked introspection. He was an empirical philosopher after all.

We wondered where on the personality spectrum dealt with in the notes he fell, or whether he had a place there at all. Too much of his personality was reflective, depending on who he was with and what he hoped to accomplish with respect to them. Did he hope to impress them with his erudition or merely induce them to like him, or to at least consider him tolerable? Or did he want to make them feel insecure and inferior? Or was he merely hoping for a one night stand free of subsequent mental, emotional or medical entanglements?

To “wake” or not to “wake” he thought to himself, “that is the question. Whether it is better in the ….” But he couldn’t recall the rest of the quote he wanted to play with. His head was still not quite right. Of course, he realized that his attitude towards being or not being among the “woke” would in all likelihood depend on whether the author of the notebook was male or female (he voted for female), and if female, whether she was attractive or not, and if attractive, whether or not there were any possibilities for any kind of relationship with her, whether ephemeral or meaningful. An awful lot of variables and all centered, assuming the best, on what her position was with respect to the “woke”.

And that was not quite clear to him, although it seemed she (assuming it was a she) found them superficial. Then again, the author seemed to find both groups superficial.

Well, at least for the nonce, perhaps his habitual boredom would not be at the fore.

He wondered if it might not be wise to actually register for the class he was purportedly auditing.

_______

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

Ironies in being a Sports Fan

Posted on September 21, 2023 by Guillermo Calvo Mahé

Being a “fan” is a form of self-deprecation. Rather than taking pride in our own accomplishments, we tag along vicariously on the hoped for accomplishments of others. Being a “sports” fan seems an exercise in sadomasochism as well. We suffer through defeats in which we really play little or no part while gloating over the defeats of others’ aspirations when our teams triumph, all the while of course, our attention and energies are distracted and siphoned away from pressing existential issues, like our families, our jobs, war and peace; like minimization of poverty and inequality; like efficient and just penal and educational systems. The list seems endless but we can avoid worrying about the related problems, or working towards their solutions, by concentrating on sports. Or the rich and famous in show business, etc.

Being a fan is addictive as surely as the most powerful intoxicants perhaps because, like them, it’s a way to avoid our realities. And perhaps, given the reality that we have little or no real ability to impact the world in which we live, like the opiate of the masses referenced by Karl Marx, it’s a necessary vice.

One to which I’m clearly as addicted as anyone. Goooo Yankees! Goooo Jets!! Goooo Citadel Bulldogs!!! …. Not a great year.
_______

Sméagol the-all-colored-and-none

Posted on August 15, 2023 by Guillermo Calvo Mahé

The lava was dazzlingly bright and malodorous, viscous and horribly searing. He could feel the ring formerly called by some Isildur’s Bane, the One Ring, the one still on Frodo’s finger but both now both ensconced in his belly, both stirring and rumbling, as if fighting or perhaps mating. Somehow the One Ring and Frodo’s finger formed a strange amalgam protecting him from the elements in which he found himself immersed, albeit changing him. He was actually breathing the molten blend of minerals in the core of Mt. Doom, becoming one with them and gaining insights. Everything that had once been vague, confusing and occluded was becoming crystal clear. Well, actually, had become crystal clear. His metamorphosis, if not complete, was well on the road to completion. For some reason he thought of two thespians, one a crooner and the other a comic, and strangely, at the same time, visa versa. They’d someday be famous for something called “road movies”, at least for a while, but their time would be followed by one where the past was something to be quickly discarded and replaced with nary a trace. Strange sort of prescient instant but not one involving the Middle Earth he’d always thought of as home.

His Gollum aspects had been purified and distilled somehow, and become integrated with the Sméagol from whom they’d once escaped, the Sméagol who had once been and would be again, albeit in a drastically changed form, all occurring concurrently. Everything, he realized, was both concurrent and complimentary, especially those things that most seemed at odds. Oxymoronism was the rule rather than an exception as the power of the One Ring and the one finger were integrated into his being. As had been the case with that damned Gandalf the Grey, when he’d been had been transformed into Gandalf the White, his essence seared and melded in the comparatively minor fires in the depths of Khazad-Dûm, so Sméagol was being transformed, was transformed in the infinitely more powerful and hellishly hot timeless fires of Mount Doom. Yes, Sméagol too had emerged transformed, transformed into the all-powerful being he’d aspired to, but not quite. The metamorphosis apparently involved a complex blend of good and evil, and the Gollum he’d been ironically found himself transformed into Sméagol the White, Sméagol of the many colors, Sméagol the-all-colored-and-none. But what had he been before? Gollum the Black perhaps, or Sméagol the sort of dingy grey.

Anyway, “it”, whatever “it was”, was not what he’d imagined. His final triumph over the burglar had not turned out as he’d hoped. He was encumbered rather than liberated, chained to responsibilities in every direction. He was chained in chains more biting and bitter than those in Barad-dûr, although as ethereal as they were ephemeral. He was as imprisoned as he’d ever been, although now in a prison of his own devise where “duty”, rather than feckless free will and whimsical follies and grandeur, seemed to be what divinity entailed.

He was not quite omniscient, although he now knew almost everything that had ever happened and had a fair inkling of what was to come, and if he was omnipotent, his use of power was severely constrained through limits that may or may not have been self-imposed. And omnipresence was very overblown as it stretched him so thinly over time and space as to make him virtually non-existent. As to omnibenevolence, well that was only possible if he froze everything and failed to permit any action at all, and apparently, his possibly self-imposed limits rendered that as improbable as it was impractical. The closest that could be attained in that regard was a sort of perpetual balance between the light and the dark, between absolute silence and the eternally unwinding song of the orbs. Damned stifling he thought.

Sméagol was disappointed. And he had a bit of indigestion as his body tried to assimilate both Frodo’s finger and the One Ring, and despite the hellish heat in the nethermost pits of Mount Doom, he felt bitterly cold. And the massive constant input of information made him dizzy. And he was lonely and alone, now the only being of his kind. Worse, the former occupant of his current post had evaporated as Sméagol’s metamorphosis took hold, changing into a joyful mist from whence was shouted: “free at last, free at last, thank Me all-mighty I’m free at last”, … or some such thing.

Sméagol remembered Bilbo and Frodo and Hobbits and fishies and his cavern and his lake and his little boat, and he remembered the stages through which he’d passed to become what he now was, some phases when he’d been relatively happy, albeit mainly as a baby, then increasingly less so as he’d grown into a young lad of a species now extinct (having been assimilated into various other species, Hobbits among them). He remembered how tasty orcs and goblins could be, especially when seasoned with a bit of garlic, which was hellishly hard to come by given the absence of Italians in the Middle Earth of his time. But now all times were his to play with, albeit passively, but what fun was there in passivity he thought to himself, there being no one around with whom to chat, or with whom to share riddles.

He speculated on how Italians might fit into “his” Middle Earth. Perhaps medieval Italians. But had they already invented the cuisine for which future Italians would become famous and with which he, free of temporal constraints, was already somehow familiar? And what about the famous “Mafia”, which was apparently not an acronym for the Mothers and Fathers Italian Association? He wondered why Italy had come to mind, rather than say, South Africa, or England, now that he had the omniverse in which to play, although, he recalled, only in a passive sense. Then he wondered why South Africa and England felt more relevant. And Iceland, something about its sagas seemed important.

Perhaps, thought Sméagol the White (or whatever, the colors issue had become confusing), this was all a dream, perhaps everything was a dream and only dreams existed, and perhaps he was the only dreamer. Perhaps he’d always been the only dreamer in a dream from which there could be no escape, notwithstanding omniscience and omnipotence and all the other omnis, all of them being somehow passive in the end, each one cancelling out the others.

Then gratefully, if not blissfully, everything became dark, if not quite silent. That damned infernal music of the orbs was incessant as was the somewhat painful rumbling in his stomach, but Sméagol the White, Sméagol of the many colors, Sméagol the-all-colored-and-none slept; hopefully dreamlessly and forever if not quite peacefully.

Sigh!!!!!

In a corner somewhere else in time and space, a place but not a place, someone chuckled, and a string of multicolored rings made from some sort of smoke played at tag.
_______

© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2023; all rights reserved. Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution. Adapted from concepts developed by JRR Tolkien in his diverse copyrighted Middle Earth projects furthered by his son Christopher in other Middle earth related projects. Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

A Tale of Canaan and Ur and Uruk, of Three Trees in Three Gardens and of Eggs and Omelets as Well, all as Overheard by an Angry South Wind: A sort of bridge over troubled waters

Posted on July 30, 2023 by Guillermo Calvo Mahé

Gilgamesh was not really fond of the little Canaanite wanabe storm deity, one of El’s seventy sons, one not all that important. The kid was Baal’s shadow, always following him around, mimicking his gestures behind his back, envious and enthralled concurrently, ambivalent, apparently without much of a future (although past, present and future as well as time in general were considered irrelevancies to deities, even very minor and insignificant deities). Anyway, in the little deity’s opinion, all of his siblings shared the ichor derived from El’s semen so, in a sense, they were all sort of avatars, a form of equality; at least that’s what the little deity kept telling himself, at least then.

Gilgamesh was a Kengirian from the city of Uruk who loved to wander, even though as Uruk’s king he had serious responsibilities. He had a decent, well trained staff though and they knew better than to disappoint him.

His wanderings not infrequently took him to the lands of the Canaanites, no big deal really, but also, given that he was at least a demigod, on occasion they also took him to the divine court of El, the elder and ruler of the El-ohim. The El-ohim were the Canaanite’s complex pantheon, in some ways, an incubator for other pantheons although certainly not for the much older pantheon of the Anunnaki to which Gilgamesh was sort of pledged.

Gilgamesh interacted with the members of the El-ohim, perhaps a bit too proudly, but with the exception of El and his spouse Athirat, they tended to defer to him. Sort of. Sort of fearfully. But with their dignity at least superficially sort of preserved. They’d heard stories. And it was, of course, at the court of El that he’d encountered the minor deity some referred to as “the pest” (as in pest-ilence). If he had a name, it was too much trouble to worry about remembering. Gigamesh just thought of him, when he thought of him (which was very infrequently), as “he-that-was-whatever-he-was”.

Gilgamesh was not a full, one hundred percent deity, that was true, although he was a son of Ninsun, a goddess, and of Lugalbanda, who although born a mortal was eventually deified. Lugalbanda had been a great king, albeit of a small city by today’s standards, but the largest and most powerful then existing (boasting of between 40,000 and 80,000 inhabitants, depending on how its boundaries were interpreted). Even so, Gilgamesh was and had always been (and would always be) unique. Like his father, he tended to be the best at everything he tried. Something the little Canaanite divinity, taken with him, unsuccessfully sought to emulate, … at the time.

The very minor divinity (at least then), had a very vivid imagination. While his principal role in the pantheon of the El-ohim merely involved smelting and metallurgy, not such a small thing as future events would indicate, it seemed just a craft to him, and he sometimes fantasized about eliminating his father and then his sixty-nine brothers, especially Baal, and perhaps even his mother and sisters, although perhaps the latter could serve in a divine harem. When he was in a more generous mood, his fantasy was a bit less bloodthirsty, perhaps he might just someday dethrone them all and rule over, but not merely as a primus inter pares. While time did not really exist for divinities, at least not as it did for mortals, he felt that someday, his time would come. “Just wait and see”.

Given his insignificance among the El-ohim, the little Canaanite deity tended to wander alone in lonely desserts in the mortal realms rather than sitting around, ignored at court. He loved basking in the heat, learning to wield lightning and thunder, and even assuming the form of fire as a burning shrub from time to time, frightening the inhabitants. He loved playing in the giant sandstorms that appeared out of nowhere but which did him no harm. Indeed, he considered himself a sort of storm god rather than merely a patron of metalworkers. Deism had its privileges, even for insignificant, minor deities. And of course, he experimented with melting rocks and extracting the metals they hoarded, especially the shiny yellow one that seemed to capture the essence of the sun and which was so easy to mold into interesting shapes.

Sometimes when visiting the El-ohim, Gilgamesh, unobserved, would watch the pompous little deity at play and laugh to himself, recalling his own infancy at court. And his own apparently bloated aspirations at the time as he fantasized about what kind of king he might be when his time came. Sometimes Gilgamesh even speculated on what might become of the young and obviously insecure deity. Insecure with good reason. But divine insecurity tended to breed unpredictability and ruthlessness, both of which interested Gilgamesh (he was prone to neither but fascinated by both). And sometimes, albeit not that often, Gilgamesh too fantasized, longing for the challenge of an equal, imagining that a real challenge might be fun.

Interestingly, after a time, a pretty long time for those forced to deal with that messy concept, the little deity (no longer quite so little, in fact, he’d be best referred to as a “young” deity), decided to find out more about Gilgamesh, a sort of reversal of roles, but stealthily, by following Gilgamesh to his own domain, Uruk.

And he did.

He was fascinated, not only by the cosmopolitan nature of the city and its people, but by all of the area that surrounded it, and he wished that rather than having been born among the El-ohim, he’d been born into the Anunnaki. Charmed by the area, a sort of league of cities, the young Canaanite deity took to wandering there instead of in the Canaanite dessert and eventually, after a millennium or so, he started spending more and more time in a Kengirian city not all that far from Uruk, one called Ur. And he sort of started hanging around there, but sort of incognito, especially careful to avoid being noticed by the local deities who might take it into their heads, as a sort of diplomatic courtesy, to suggest to El that he might want to have a sort of census of his progeny. And then El might take it into his head to have proud Baal come and collect him, which would be even more humiliating than usual. And so, while wondering around the land known to its inhabitants as Kengir (but by others as Sumer), and from time to time slipping into the abode of their local pantheon (after all, fair was fair, and if Gilgamesh, not even a full deity, could visit his pantheon, why shouldn’t he visit theirs), the young Canaanite deity learned a good deal more about his childhood hero, who, it seems, was everybody’s hero. Indeed, much later, he would be acknowledged by many as the first superhero of the human race, although, as we know, he was not fully human.

He learned many interesting things, but a few stood out.

It turned out that Gilgamesh had had two true friends, … well sort of. Maybe only one. And that one for only a time. The first and foremost had been Enkidu, called by most “the hairy man”, unkempt and uncouth, but very strong and very loyal. He’d passed on to the underworld, and Gilgamesh had tried to save him, battling and defeating both monsters and divinities along the way, but to no avail.

The other had been Inanna, a beautiful and all too amorous goddess with a terrible temper. She may have been a member of the Anunnaki that the young deity admired, the pantheon in which Gilgamesh played a much more direct role, but the issue seemed confusing, at least to him. Inanna had once unsuccessfully sought to seduce Gilgamesh, then, a while later, had begged a favor only he could perform and which he’d granted. Superficially it seemed a minor favor, one involving a beautiful but vexing tree which Inanna had found drifting in the great river Euphrates, one of the many that flowed into the nearby sea (really, just a gulf). It was not just any tree though, no indeed. For one thing, it was immensely thick, thicker than several houses combined, thicker even than it was tall. And its trunk seemed made of silver, which, as a metallurgist of sorts, was of interest to the young Canaanite deity; and its leaves seemed made of gold, his favorite metal. And rather than just one variety of fruit, it produced two, but only during alternating seasons, each large and juicy. One was yellow and the other red. Under the proper astral and atmospheric conditions and subject to appropriate invocations and incantations, the fruit could grant the person that consumed it either knowledge (the yellow fruit) or immortality (the red), or if, with patience, both were eventually consumed, then omniscience and immortality.

It was a tree with its own very special name, one it had given itself (it was capable of communing, at least with deities). It called itself Huluppu. After salvaging it, Inanna had replanted it in her own garden and had nursed it and cared for it as her own. For very personal reasons but not exactly altruistic reasons. She had definite plans for the tree but needed for it to attain a specific level of maturity before they could be implemented. Plans that required sacrifices, specifically, one sacrifice not at all to the tree’s liking. But then, what the hell could a tree do when a deity, or even a human had designs on it? Still, according to legend, it could not be forced to assume other shapes as long as it was inhabited. And rules were rules.

Fortunately for the tree (at least for a while), while it was both unique and special (the two things are not exactly synonymous), there were a few beings who had, over time, nested in its branches and in its roots and eventually, for brief period, even in its trunk. On the down side, unfortunately their cacophony robbed Inanna of the sleep which, while not something which, as a goddess, she required, was something she enjoyed, especially when accompanied. Like the tree, the three who called it home were special. The first, an incarnation of the South Wind, had originally uprooted the tree from where divine Enki, Inanna’s grandfather and the avatar of Wisdom, had planted it as a seedling in Dilmun, the Anunnaki’s garden by the shores of the great river. He’d planted it and endowed it with a “backup” copy of all his vast wisdom and knowledge deeming it prudent, as he planned a sojourn to the underworld to visit his granddaughter Ereshkigal. One never knew what awaited one there or how easy it would be to return with everything one had had when one arrived. He recalled all the fuss when Inanna had made that seven layered trip.

As told above, Inanna had found the tree floating near the juncture where the great river flowed into a nearby sea (actually, just a gulf) and with divine prescience, recognizing that it might someday prove essential for certain rites and rituals necessary for her to come fully into her attributes, she’d rescued it, re-planting it in her own garden. Unfortunately for Inanna, she’d done so somewhat carelessly, somehow not noticing that the South Wind had incarnated in avian form as the divine Anzu bird, and had nested along with its young in the tree’s branches. And the Anzu bird had not been alone. In the tree’s roots, long before it had been uprooted, resided a very special serpent, perhaps the very first serpent, one who could not be charmed and who called itself Nin-gish-zida. Somehow, when replanting the tree, Inanna had not noticed it either. But then again, the tree was huge!

Nin-gish-zida was not a slithering tube, as future serpents were to become, but rather, had the body of a well formed man but with chameleonic skin that blended with its surroundings making it virtually invisible. And it was endowed with both great wisdom and knowledge, both inadvertently obtained from Enki’s backup due to the serpent’s long association with the tree. In a sense, it was knowledge gained by physical proximity and osmosis, something lazy but creative students in the far future would unsuccessfully intend to duplicate by placing books they’d failed to read under their pillows prior to final exams.

The third and most recent denizen, she’d moved in after Inanna had transplanted it, was a beautiful virgin, at least then. One known to Inanna. After all, she was Inanna’s personal handmaiden. But, seeking a secret refuge of her own, one away from prying eyes (who knew why), Lilitu (that was her name) had had made a place of her own in the tree’s trunk, a trunk (as we’ve noted) so vast that the entrance to Lilitu’s hideaway was safely hidden from even a divinity’s inquisitive eyes.

Of course, after Huluppu had been safely replanted in Inanna’s garden, the noise from the three interlopers made their presence obvious to Inanna, but for some reason, perhaps the Anzu bird’s divinity, or Nin-gish-zida’s camouflage, or Lilitu’s stealth, Inanna was unable to dislodge them, nor did it seem essential, at least for a time. But, after many, many years (as reckoned by mortals), Inanna, determined that the time had come to harvest the tree and use its flesh for her existential, coming of age rites. She’d finally attained the level of maturity at which she needed to undertake special rituals involving vessels made from Huluppu’s flesh (a bed and a throne to be specific), but according to the rules of the rituals involved (who knows why), she could not dismember Huluppu unless it had first been vacated.

Unable to dislodge the tree’s tenants on her own, not yet having attained her full powers, she’d begged the assistance of her twin brother and sometimes paramour, Utu, the sun god, (as she was goddess of the moon, among other things) in ridding the tree of its “vermin (her word, not mine), something she felt would be relatively simple for him given the fact that as he circled the mortal realms, shining light on everything, everything was visible to him and the unwelcome guests would be unable to hide from him. But for reasons he did not disclose but which we can surmise, he’d declined.

So, surmising: as we’ve already suggested, Inanna needed the throne and bed made from the wood of the Huluppu tree in order to complete the ritual required before she could fully attain her divinity, making her Utu’s equal, and perhaps that was threatening to Utu. On the other hand, perhaps not. The three siblings in that particular branch of Enki’s progeny did not always get along. Ereshkigal, was the eldest and with her husband Nergal, ruled Kur (sometimes called Irkalla), the underworld and abode of those who’d passed beyond the veil. She was usually the most difficult, being envious of Inanna’s beauty and fearful of her ability to seduce most males, and jealous of Utu’s ability to dwell in the sky, at least during the day, while she was forced to dwell beneath the ground. On the other hand, Utu felt that while not the eldest of the three, as a male (he was a chauvinist among very feminist sisters) he should have primacy over Inanna as, in his opinion, the sun should always outshine the moon. So perhaps it was not surprising that Inanna had been unable to seduce Utu into assisting her, although seducing him was usually not all that difficult (incest among divinities was not universally proscribed).

Sibling rivalries often prove very problematic, even after the siblings have purportedly matured.

The young Canaanite deity had become privy to the foregoing and followed developments with interest, especially when Inanna, despite her prior history with Gilgamesh (as we’ve written, she’d been unsuccessful in attempts to seduce him), had turned to him for help after Utu had declined her request. Gilgamesh had been taken by Inanna’s beauty, but had refused to be seduced by her because his pride was greater than his lust. And he was all too aware of Inanna’s fickle nature and reputation of disdain for former lovers (including her husband Dumuzid, the timid shepherd divinity and perhaps, patron deity of cuckolds). To be eventually cast off by Inanna, as always occurred, would impact his reputation for invincibility in a very negative manner and his reputation meant a lot to him. In fact, he may have been the first person to have had his own biographer, one who was working on a series of clay tablets describing Gilgamesh’s epic exploits. There were no photographers then but Gilgamesh, somewhat vain about his appearance, also had a court sculptor who specialized in bass reliefs meant to assure Gilgamesh’s immortality, whether or not he managed to avoid eventual exile to Ereshkigal’s realm.

Anyway, notwithstanding the foregoing (as lawyers, even then, were wont to say) Gilgamesh was aware that a woman scorned was a dangerous thing and helping her in the matter of the Huluppu tree seemed just the thing to ameliorate her antagonism. Thus, eventually, perhaps with the help of his friend, Enkidu, or perhaps alone, Gilgamesh did as Inanna had requested and not only evicted the Huluppu tree’s sort of tenants but also personally crafted both her throne and her bed (which, as we noted, he declined to share), thereby assuaging her enmity, although, in doing so, he secured the everlasting antipathy of the Anzu bird, of Nin-gish-zida, and of Lilitu as well.

Oh well he’d thought, inventing a saying that would become famous in many different languages, “you can’t make omelets without breaking eggs”. The young Canaanite deity, who was busy taking all of the foregoing into account, especially liked that saying, and all too quickly appropriated it as his own. Somewhere, another divinity watched and snickered, he’s known by many names, one being Murphy, and he’s a legislator of sorts, even today. His two most famous legislative achievements are the Law of Unintended Consequences, and a more negative variant thereof which bears his name and provides that “whatever can go wrong, will. “Snicker, snicker, snicker” (and not the delicious future candy bar variant).

The prying young Canaanite deity, well, not quite as young by that time, more a sort of an elder adolescent, being aware of all the foregoing, had already made excellent albeit somewhat duplicitous use of that knowledge, all the while chuckling about the eggs and omelet metaphor. As we’ve discussed, he’d been very taken by the Anunnaki, and especially, by their garden, Dilmun, and saw an opportunity to start working on realizing his long held and now much more complex fantasies. For some reason, thinking of omelets and eggs breaking led him to think about starting his very own pantheon, and he had some clever ideas now on just how to begin, although it meant “borrowing”, not only ideas, but a few other things as well.

“Borrowing” appealed to him. He couldn’t help it; kleptomania was part of his nature, something of which his many siblings had constantly accused him. So he started his new project by stealing (in his mind, “salvaging”) two of the shadows cast by the Huluppu tree (the morning shadow and the afternoon shadow) just before it had been felled by Gilgamesh, and from those shadows, the young Canaanite deity crafted special trees of his own, but, unbeknown to him, shades of Nin-gish-zida inhabited them both, moving from one to the other in the darkest dark of night.

The formerly little Canaanite divinity also eventually sort of “borrowed” Lilitu. Some would claim he’d stolen her from Inanna (not all that hard as her eviction had caused hard feelings), and had eventually placed all of the foregoing in his own garden, modeled on the plans for Dilmun that he’d somehow “acquired”. But he’d been very careful to first carefully wipe Lilitu’s memory clean so that she’d not repent of her escape and confess. Inanna, her former mistress, was, after all, not only the patron goddess of carnal love (perhaps lust would be more accurate), but of war as well.

The no longer little (as we’ve made abundantly clear) Canaanite divinity had special plans for Lilitu, being a voyeur at that stage of his emotional and sexual development. Perhaps he’d devolved into voyeurism, as sometimes happens with males after a divorce or two, because his own prior direct experiences with female deities had not turned out well. He’d had more than a few unsuccessful relationships with, among others, Anat-Yahu, Aholah and Aholibah, Asherah, Anatha of the Lions and Ashima of the Doves (ones he’d married and then divorced, but, had used his best efforts to wipe away any records of the divine judicial proceedings involved). For some reason, he preferred to be thought of as sexually abstentious rather than as a cuckold. An aversion he perhaps shared with Gilgamesh.

It’s said that for a time, he’d gifted Lilitu to a fellow whose name was Adam who the once little deity claimed to have created from dust. Perhaps dust from one of the dessert storms he’d so loved. But the Anzu bird, once again in the form of the South Wind, had managed to escape his clutches, having been terrified when he kept snickering about omelets (the Anzu bird having an obvious aversion to broken eggs). Being able to shift forms between bird and wind, by the same means it had managed to escape the avaricious clutches of Inanna and Gilgamesh too. As would Lilitu, eventually. Unfortunately, Nin-gish-zida’s fate was not as positive.

But that’s another tale. A rather tall tale at that.

Anyway, the young Canaanite deity, now no longer all that young, in fact, sporting long hair and a luxuriantly full beard which he’d copied from Gilgamesh, decided to leave his garden and, like Gilgamesh, go exploring. Attaining his fantasies still required a good deal of work and even more luck, so he decided to return to Kengir, of course, avoiding at all costs, for the time being, until he could build up his strength, returning to the court of the El-ohim. He’d, in fact, renounced his allegiance to the El-ohim and no longer even considered himself a Canaanite. He was out on his own, an explorer, an innovator, a revolutionary, one with the wind (albeit not the South Wind), although he was not yet quite ready to make that public. He’d need to build up his following before his coming out party. He still needed a bit of patience, but time (which usually did not impact deities) was on his side.

So, smiling at the term, tempus fugit, he took his time and sort of loitered in Uruk and its environs for several centuries, perhaps even a millennium, learning everything he could about the Anunnaki and the Kengirites, their histories and rites and rituals. Carried away with his “research, the now former Canaanite divinity, still a divinity of sorts, just not a Canaanite divinity, at least in his mind (which was all that mattered to him), lost touch with his original objective, Gilgamesh, until, eventually, it became clear to him that his hero (or perhaps now, former hero), had permanently departed for parts unknown. Most people suspected that he’d become a denizen of Kur, although whether as a subject or ruler was unclear. Or that perhaps he’d retired to Dilmun joining the Anunnaki side of his family there, but again, whether as a subject or ruler was unclear. The fact though was that Gilgamesh was no longer in Kengir, other kings having replaced him in Uruk. Consequently, the now middle-aged Canaanite deity spent less and less time in the environs of Uruk and more and more in nearby Ur and, while stealthily wandering in Ur, sort of stumbled onto a pair of angry, petulant and very dissatisfied siblings.

He liked them at once, they reminded him of, … well, … of himself, .. way back when. One was a petulant young man whose name was Abram, and the other a very attractive young girl whose name was Sarai (or something like that). Anyway, they were very unhappy because their parents were very opposed to their aspirations for intimacy (given that they were brother and sister). And in fact, the priests of the religion of which they were a part were demanding that they, or at least Abram, be sacrificed as a form of atonement for their amorous aspirations. That was not something Abram was really interested in, at least not in a positive manner, nor, to be honest, was Sarai.

Up to that time, despite his success with his garden and Adam and Lilitu, perhaps because of the unwelcome intervention of that busybody, Nin-gish-zidam the wandering former Canaanite divinity had not really acquired many worshippers of his own, and worshippers were, as all deities knew, the key to increasing their power. He had Adam, and a replacement for the escaped Lilitu, a pleasant girl he’d convinced Adam that he’d made especially for him from one of Adam’s ribs (Adam tended to be somewhat gullible), and then, after he’d thrown Adam and Eve out of his garden (one he’d named Eden) in a temper tantrum over dietary transgressions (the now mature former Canaanite deity was strict on dietary rules and rituals, although even he didn’t fully understand why). they’d had children, all but one of whom had acknowledged him as a deity. But the one who got away had caused quite a bit of trouble (perhaps taking after the formerly Canaanite deity), as had his descendants. So he needed a new strategy with updated tactics, and he had what he felt was a brilliant idea.

He just needed a few new adherents to start the ball rolling (so to speak), and if he managed to talk Abram and Sarai into escaping from Kengir, hopefully collecting additional followers along the trip, hell, he might finally be able to attain the aspirations that had seemed so improbable way back when he’d been a kid (in case you’ve forgotten, supplanting his parents and siblings, perhaps even all the other deities in all the other pantheons as well). There’s probably a related psychological syndrome associated with the foregoing, with a fancy name, or there will be when Freud, Jung and company show up. Or perhaps Joseph Campbell, or Robert Graves.

Anyway …

Adding a touch of silver to his beard, hair and mustachios, in order to disguise himself and make himself appear more mature and more powerful, he appeared to Abram in his divine aspect (rather than in the disguised from in which he’d met first met him and Sarai), and, feeding on his dissatisfaction and fear (who really wants to be sacrificed), promised him that if he and Sarai would worship him, and only him, he’d give them and any of their family members they selected (and who’d agree with a few minor rules and conditions which the now former Canaanite deity might suggest) a land of their own. A place where they could fornicate or do whatever they wanted to their hearts content, although, as indicated above, they’d have to adhere to his commandments and rituals. He did warn Abram that it might take them a while to get to the land he’d promised them (and which he didn’t actually control, he was, interestingly enough, thinking of Canaan) and that they might encounter some problems along the way. But he also promised that he’d be with them always (and that part was true; you may remember that he had a penchant for voyeurism).

Well, neither Abram nor Sarai had ever, to their knowledge, met a deity before and thus, after Abram shared with Sarai his discussion with the former Canaanite deity, she was very impressed at the interest taken in Abram, making him even more special in her eyes, and she also felt that it was obvious that if a deity was willing to help them, then their parents’ prohibition against incest and the priests’ demand that Abram be sacrificed were just old-fashioned and incompatible with the changing mores of the time, and that neither their parents nor their priests understood anything concerning the exigencies of true love (especially when coupled with irresistible lust), and that this new deity was much more hip than the deities their parents and their priests worshipped so, after talking it over (as usual, Abram did most of the talking and Sarai the listening, plus all the real work), they both agreed to follow the former Canaanite deity and, in the dead of night, with the former Canaanite deity’s help, drugged their parents and escaped with most of their parent’s goods and flocks (not stealing they assured themselves, just an advance on their inheritances, as the former Canaanite deity had explained to them). And as the former Canaanite deity had hoped, they’d been joined by a number of their siblings, including Haran, Nahor and Abram and Sari’s nephew Lot. A great start to the former Canaanite deity’s plot.

And away they went, the formerly young Canaanite god snickering (sort of like Murphy), thinking, “man this is going to be fun”. And it wasn’t really stealing he thought, not for the first time. He didn’t steal! He just sometimes borrowed things other deities were not really using, and Abram and Sarai certainly fit that pattern, as had the shadows of the Huluppu tree (he’d actually saved them from becoming shadows of mere furniture) and Lilitu (who, as he saw it, Inanna had discarded). He just loved omelets! And he had already become very fond of gardening as well.

Of Nin-gish-zida he had nothing to say. That had proved awkward, but it involved a sort of collateral damage situation, or perhaps an “adoption”, certainly not a kidnapping. Anyone can make a mistake he thought. Admitting that he could err was, however, another matter.

Good thing that Gilgamesh had not been immortal though, he thought to himself. That might have proven awkward, at best. And that damned Lilitu, where the hell had she disappeared to?

Now to erase all those other pesky deities! And to remake Canaan in his image.

“Pest” was he?

They didn’t know the half of it.
_______

Serendipity:

Posted on June 16, 2023 by Guillermo Calvo Mahé

The Saga of a Gal Sort of Named Sue, and … well, … Company

This is a story about consonance, not assonance, but certainly contains more than a trace of dissonance. It’s a sort of fractured and sad love story. The characters are, well characters, and no effort has been made, with respect to the nature of their names, to protect the innocent, so we are neither admitting nor denying that they involve real people or real situations, at least deliberately. But nature being what it is, …who knows?

Well, … maybe the Shadow, … but who else?

Anyway ….

Sue was a lucky girl. At least for a while. Good things fell in her pretty lap without her ever having to do anything to earn them, anything at all. Some said “serendipitous” was her middle name. It wasn’t. “Serendipity” was her first name but, for some reason, she preferred to use Sue, which was, in point of fact, her middle name. Interesting.

Everything about Sue was pretty too. Not beautiful, not cute, just pretty. But so much prettiness tended to dazzle, and it wasn’t as threatening as beautiful, although perhaps not as perky as cute. Being perfectly pretty helped, well, let’s call her “Sue” (since she prefers that name), it helped Sue with everything: with her grades, with her roles in all kinds of organizations, with her teachers (none of whom ever even considered hitting on her), with her family and relatives, with whatever job she decided she wanted, although, to be fair, she never sought anything beyond her capabilities, and she gave every job she ever had her all. That was Sue.

At least until she inadvertently met “Melancholy Mike” during her senior year in college. Sometimes destiny sucks. Or is that fate. Or perhaps, karma.

Mike wasn’t really melancholy at all, he just had terrible luck at everything he tried despite seemingly having all the physical and mental assets for which any male could hope. Although he was fast and had great hand and eye coordination, he somehow always had “bad luck” accidents, and, truth be told, he was easily distracted, which is probably why it seemed so hard for him to keep his “eye on the ball”, in every sense. So, … rather than being a first string varsity sports star, he tended to be a junior varsity backup, but not with awesome promise, without awesome potential . Same was true with academics, and work, and, as we’ll see, with personal relationships.

Initially, everyone Melancholy Mike met wanted to be his friend and, if it involved a female, and well, some males too, a bit more than just a friend. To say that Melancholy Mike was not empathic was a massive understatement, so he didn’t pick up on how others felt about him and, all too soon, those who’d initially been drawn to him became, at best, cross with him. Too many stupid little things just seemed to go wrong around him. He tended to trip quite a lot, and to spill things, and to blurt things out he’d have been better off keeping to himself. And all too soon, those who’d initially found him fascinating but had then become being cross saw their feelings devolve towards disdain, and quickly thereafter, to avoidance, and then to generation of nasty, untruthful rumors (which is how he acquired the moniker “melancholy”). That was especially true among those who’d originally found him irresistible but, with respect to whom, he’d “failed to catch the pass”, if you get the drift. They’d be embarrassed at first, feeling foolish, then his lack of any reaction towards their obviously miffed feelings, made them feel belittled and ignored, even though he was just being oblivious and, had he caught on, might frequently have reacted in a very positive manner. Thus, over time, by his senior year in college, Melancholy Mike had become singularly unpopular.

While Melancholy Mike was “usually” oblivious, that was not the case when he met Sue. They bumped into each other, literally, in a park by a pretty flowing river, where flowers of diverse species bloomed and shade trees abounded. Sue had gone there to study and Melancholy Mike, well, frankly, he’d not been paying attention where he was going and had gotten lost. They’d really bumped into each other, as I indicated, literally, but figuratively and physically as well. Melancholy Mike had tripped over Sue and hit his nose on a large rock and was bleeding profusely. Sue, who was always nice, sought to stem the bleeding and, of course, succeeded in doing so. But in the midst of that endeavor, she glanced into his eyes, and became lost there, and when Melancholy Mike, who was in a bit of a daze, looked at her face, he figured perhaps he’d been hurt worse than he’d thought, worse than usual, and ….

Well, as somewhat polar opposites, the attraction had been as intense as it was immediate, but then, all too soon, perhaps a few weeks later, it seemed as if a thick glob of sticky and sickly sweet molasses had engulfed them, sort of like amber sometimes engulfs insects. The figurative ambient mess kept making them keep figuratively colliding, first to one side and then to the other, but still clinging. Yuck, what an awful metaphor, or was that a simile, but anyway, it was unfortunately all too accurate.

Having never learned to cope with failure, Sue refused to admit its possibility, She stuck by Melancholy Mike, literally, figuratively, physically and every which way, and he rubbed off on her (given that her attention was focused on him). It had to be, to avoid constant disasters, and people started to avoid her as well but, she was so entranced with Melancholy Mike that she didn’t notice, at least not until it was too late to do anything about it, and thus, she was not only stuck to Melancholy Mike, but also stuck with him.

During a tumultuous courtship, as Sue too became ostracized from her old friends and acquaintances, and even her family, their relationship became stronger instead of weaker. A phenomenon common when parents disapprove of a child’s choice in romantic partner. Thus they married on a spontaneous whim, without her family’s approval (his was ecstatic) and started on a life somewhat lacking in the bliss they’d expected. As might be expected, after turmoil overwhelmed ecstasy, they first separated, to sort of sort things out, give each other a bit of space, and then, at Sue’s insistence and to her family’s profound joy, they got divorced, but then, inexplicably, got back together, got engaged, which they hadn’t done before they were initially married (purportedly the second marriage would involve a long engagement), but then, impulsively, they eloped again (they had no one to invite to their weddings anyway, neither the first, nor the second, nor the ….; but that’s another story). Well, maybe it’s really part of the same story but the repetitive nature of the telling becomes tedious, soooo ….

After their second wedding, hoping it would help them bond, they quickly had two kids, the first, a cute daughter with an amazing voice whom they named “Melony” (but her nickname, among her friends, friends she never dared bring home, was “Melody”); and then, eighteen months later, a son whom they named Anthony but called Tony. Tony was, from the very first, even as an infant, pretty much a loner, a kid who preferred comic books, Anime and video games to interaction with other humans. Tony also refrained from bringing friends home (but that was because he hadn’t any). In a futile quest to build unity, the family tried acquiring pets, but they tended to run away all too soon, or to die, although Melony suspected that they may have committed suicide.

Their house was not awful, in fact, if you liked oddities, you might have found it fascinating, in a sort of poor couple’s Adams’ Family, well, not mansion, but a hell of a nice triple wide mobile home, with an aboveground pool outside, and next to it, a third-hand Jacuzzi that worked intermittently, on and off (but off involved squirting tepid water full of rust). And their home was set on a quarter acre, but next to a junk yard. Melancholy Mike liked the spot because he loved the junk, and Sue hated the spot because she hated the junk, but she loved Melancholy Mike, at least then, sooo. Well, perhaps geography explained why they had such a hard time staying together, even for the kids’ sake, although the kids would have been happier, had they stayed apart, especially the times when Melony could live with Sue, and Tony with Melancholy Mike.

As soon as Melony turned eighteen, she left home and joined a travelling troupe of purported actors, and at one of their gigs, in Rye, New York, an inebriated talent scout spotted her singing, and, sobering up quickly, he introduced himself and eventually, talked her into leaving the group. He fell in love with her and financed music lessons and introduced her to the right people, and got her a contract with a decent recording label, and she climbed the stairway to success, but dropped Joe off on the first rung (Joe, well Joseph H. Riddle II, it should just have been Junior, was the talent scout’s name).

Joe became so despondent when he was so suddenly and completely dumped that he sought out Melony’s parents, and, after interacting with them briefly, for about a week, he realized why Melony was as she was, and decided he was better off without her, and returned to his own family from whom he’d been estranged while he explored his artistic roots. And his family, a very wealthy and prominent family, took their prodigal son back, but he had to accompany them to religious services at least three times a week. They were thrice born fundamentalists, who are much more stringent in their puritanical traditions than the merely born-again (whom they disdained even more than they disdained the heathen and the heretic). But anyway, once again, that’s another story. Suffice it to say that their family strictures explain why Joe had left in the first place, to pursue a career indirectly involving the arts. Until, of course, he crashed into the Melony hurricane.

So, to wrap things up. Melony became hugely successful as a heavy metal singer with Goth overtones set in a hodgepodge of sort of country music styles. Sue finally divorced Melancholy Mike, permanently, and became a nun in a European religious order where, to the extent possible under the circumstances, she regained a good bit of her serendipitous nature (a lot of good that did in a convent though). Melancholy Mike kept screwing things up but Tony’s jobs at the local Burger King, where he became a deputy assistant manager and counter boy, but with a night gig as a stock man (boy was too insulting for forty year old man) in a videogame warehouse, his dream job, kept them in stale burgers and hot dogs and pork and beans and cheap beer, which was fine with them.

And, they all lived, if not happily, well … at least ever after.
_______

© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2023; all rights reserved. Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution. Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

What’s in a Name, … Anyway?

Posted on June 14, 2023 by Guillermo Calvo Mahé

Sucleforth Winslow hated his name. Where the hell did his parents come up with the name Sucleforth anyway? He’d googled it and had come up with absolutely nothing, which, apparently, had been his parents’ goal. His nickname, of course … sucked!!!! And it had gotten him into quite a few physical altercations. If that’s what his parents had hoped for, that he’d grow up tough, why hadn’t they at least named him “Sue”? But he guessed that, in today’s “trans is awesome” world, that wouldn’t have worked. Apparently his parents had foreseen the writing on the wall and acted accordingly.

He’d tried reversing his name, Winslow Sucleforth forth was not great, but it was quite a bit better. And he’d run with it for a while, several times, but then his parents would introduce themselves as Albert and Agnes Winslow and questions would arise and answers would be given and things would be worse than ever.

Sucleforth refused to ever do any drugs as he firmly believed, and his parents did not deign to deny, that drugs of some sort, or perhaps many sorts, had quite a bit to do with their decision to gift him with a name so utterly unique. And worse, they expected him to pass it on to his descendants, so that, eventually, there might be a Sucleforth VIII, who put away wives willy nilly, assuming, that with his name, he’d ever be able to acquire any.

His parents were first generation “woke”. That meant that they engaged in number of somewhat uncomfortable practices, at least to Sucleforth, but obviously, not to them. They’d both agreed, prior to starting their lives together (they refused to marry, making Sucleforth a bastard), that his father would be a cuckold, but not just any cuckold, as variety was imperative in everything. So his mother engaged in serial coupling and group coupling with a huge variety of partners, in both gender, orientation, and race, always in front of her submissive husband, who was required to clean any resulting messes. Notwithstanding her very active sexual life, his mother did not procreate, except in his case, abortion being very, very important to her. So, she always tried her best to become pregnant, their being no other way to constantly demonstrate her dedication to abortion as a guiding life principle.

His father, on the other hand, having been born a Caucasian male of the protestant variant pejoratively referred to as a Wasp, had to be perpetually punished for sins perpetrated on other races, genders, sexual orientations, religions, nationalities, species, plants, etc., and thus could not engage in any activities that provided fulfillment or satisfaction, not even masochism, which made his wife’s duties a bit complex with respect to assuring that his punishment, on behalf of his race and his religion, etc., was adequate. But she’d proved up to the task, regardless of the effort required.

The Winslows were well off, having sued their parents for permanent and perpetual support, but has arranged things so that Sucleforth was financially completely dependant on them, without any possibility of ever getting access to their wealth, not even on their demise, their fortune having been pledged in trust to a gazillion unusual causes, many political (to assure the election of woke candidates), but also designed to assure the ever increasing variety of woke entertainment, woke education, woke anything. They really were very, very woke. And Sucleforth pitiful periodic stipend would only continue if he procreated with someone from a different race, a different nationality, a different religion, well, someone totally different, and provided a new “Sucleforth”. Unfortunately, based on his experience with his parents’ “lifestyle”, the idea of a relationship terrified him.

He really did not need much of a stipend as his parents insisted that he live at home, in his room, which was supplied with every videogame console and every videogame possible that being planned as his access to education. Athletics were absolutely forbidden but he was expected to attend woke rallies and protests and riots regularly, that was a given, no exceptions tolerated. And he was also expected to become a connoisseur of drugs at a very early age, the only area where he’d successfully rebelled. But then again, notwithstanding the irony, his parents expected that he’d turn out rebellious. As had they. But not in a way that in any manner threatened their lifestyle.

Sooo, Sucleforth, for some reason, blamed his odd life on his name, for some reason believing that, if he could just somehow discard it, everything would be a bit more, well, bland and normal. He knew he had a legal right to change his name, but unfortunately, all the lawyers and judges and social workers and bureaucrats he’s ever been able to contact shared his parents’ perspectives, so he was stuck, at least so far.

But he wasn’t getting any younger, and the world, at least the world to which he was allowed access, was not as comforting as a young boy of thirty-seven might hope it would be.

If only he’d had a name like “Schicklgruber”!!!
_______

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

What Was a Schmuck Anyway?

Posted on June 14, 2023 by Guillermo Calvo Mahé

“Peter the Pretty Good”, as a sobriquet, had not really altogether worked out well. It didn’t help that his Jewish subjects, an important minority, referred to him as a “nebbish”, whatever that was. But he couldn’t really get angry with them. He found Jewish women irascibly irresistible. It was well known that they were the most talented in the amatory arts, the most flexible, in every sense. And recognizing that, Jewish men were unusually understanding. And “pretty good” was not the worst possible suffix. It could have been “Peter the Petty”, or “Peter the Petulant”, or any other in a long series of adjectives that for some reason, needed to start with a “P”. That was a family tradition. Of course, “Peter the Pithy” might have had a bit of flair.

His cousin, “Peter the Great” had it made, made in the shade it was said, whatever that meant. And he ruled a whole empire, not merely a county.

But Peter’s county was as prosperous as it was peaceful (not very in either case), and he fancied that someday, if it became prosperous enough, perhaps he could be promoted by the Patriarch to Grand Count, instead of merely Count Peter. That was pretty much the height of Peter’s aspirations, except of course, with respect to Jewish women. Unfortunately, those with whom he sought intimacy insisted that he be circumcised first, and he found that distasteful, and they claimed that his member was distasteful to them, so long as it remained uncut. What a quandary.

His cousin evidently did not share that problem, but then, he did not share Peter’s affinity for sabras, as the Jewish women in his county referred to themselves. His cousin was too caught up with conquests and with modernizing and civilizing his court. His whole damned country actually, which unfortunately for Peter, included his county.

Peter was more of an orientalist than his cousin, who was apparently besotted with all things European for some reason, and with navies. Peter’s family had actually gotten on quite well with the Golden horde, although by Peter’s time, the Horde was more akin to a brass horde, or perhaps even a brass plated horde. But his cousin had pretty much replaced the Horde as suzerain.

Still, his cousin was stuck with Shiksahs to play with. Although he could actually play with them rather than merely long for them, as Peter was forced to do with the sabras, the sabras who loved to flirt with and tease him, but who then would always bring up the issue of the Moil. Yuck!! What a profession!!!

And what was a “schmuck” anyway?
_______

Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com, a commentator on Radio Guasca FM, and an occasional contributor to the regional magazine, el Observador. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

An Interview with Yaʿaqov ben Yosef, the Nazarene; the Son of Mary and …

Posted on June 7, 2023 by Guillermo Calvo Mahé

[Interview through impenetrable rails in purportedly pearly gates, somewhere outside of time and space]

Interviewer (me):

Sooo, is it “άκωβος” now, or “Iacobus”? I’m not sure what they speak in there. For some reason a lot of people over the years assumed it was Greek and then, Latin, but perhaps its Aramaic, or Hebrew, or perhaps Enochian. Enochian makes the most sense, but no one understands it where I’m from. You know, there are a lot of strange, maybe even weird rumors about you down below, and definitely weird rumors in the deepest of basements. Thanks for granting me this exclusive interview to clear things up. It is exclusive, … right? I mean, you haven’t really done this before have you. Given all the stuff written over the years back home, it’s a bit confusing where they got their material.

Here’s a list of questions, I assume you’ll be able to read them.

יעקב, James, or Jacob, or Santiago, or ….:

Okay, well, not exactly in any order, I have no recollection of ever having granted interviews before, actually, I’d never heard of the concept until you showed up, but I did know quite a few people back in Yerushalayim, and even more people apparently claim to have known me. Maybe they did, I didn’t really keep records. You can call me יעקב (Yaʿaqov), but if you can’t pronounce that, then James will do, although I’m sort of partial to “Santiago” although, for the life of me, I can’t fathom how the Spanish got “Santiago” out of Yaʿaqov, or for that matter, where “James” came from. Is “Yaʿaqov” really that confusing for you English speakers? It must have had something to do with an ancestor of one of those clowns who worked at the entry desk at Ellis Island.

Don’t look so surprised, we get a lot of news up here, well, at least sometimes. When the airwaves aren’t clogged up with incessant prayers.

Still, … I can’t really read the list of questions you gave me, I never learned to read in English, we didn’t have it back then, my family only spoke Aramaic most of the time, and we read Hebrew, and understood Greek, and even some Latin. But I only really read Hebrew. And anyway, I’m not Joe Biden you know. I don’t need to have someone prepare cheat sheets for my interviews.

So, if you don’t mind, I’ll just rattle off what we up here refer to as a stream of consciousness, sort of anticipating what I think you probably want to know. You know, to share with those down there. Actually, according to my brother, we were expecting a bunch of you up here a while ago. Maybe you can enlighten as to why the hold up.

Anyway …

During my lifetime I was sometimes referred to as “James (יעקב, Yaʿaqov) the Just”, to which I invariably replied, “just James please”. Well, in your language. In mine, at the time, it was “Yaʿaqov”. But after I’d journeyed beyond the veil, “James the Just” seems to have stuck, … As well as exaggerated rumors concerning my hygiene, or lack thereof, (for the purported sake of piety). Neither really made sense. I had to submerge myself in water not infrequently, in conjunction with ritual cleansing required by my Hebrew religious rituals, although it’s true that I rarely cut my hair. Most of us Jews didn’t, at the time, and never my facial fair, which after a certain length stopped growing of its own volition. Damned Hegesippus didn’t know anything about the real me, he just made stuff up. Yeah; I know it was him! Damned rumor mongering gentile! And please, don’t think I’m using inappropriate verbiage. “Damned” is exactly the correct adjective when I use it, … especially up here.

It’s not true that I never drank either. My brother Yeshua, as you know, insisted that we drink in his remembrance, but even as a child, who in Palestine would ever permit their children to drink our water without being treated with wine to avoid disease? I was a confirmed bachelor though, that part is accurate; Miriam of nearby Magdala was the only woman I was ever drawn to, but she only had eyes, or anything else, for my brother, the prophet, or rabbi, or whatever. That was for the best anyway.

Bishop? Me? We had no priests even, let alone bishops. We were communists for Heaven’s sake. Yeshua had made it perfectly clear how he felt about that, although that creep, Saul, seems to have befuddled Simon on that and other points while the two of them were carousing in the Imperial capital. That damned Saul (and as you know, I mean it literally) perverted everything he touched. Money, money, money, but it worked. Simon should have stayed home.

As for my skydiving off of the Temple roof, well, I can’t really recall doing that but I understand that I was stoned around that time, so, who’s to say. I understand that being “stoned” has several different connotations nowadays though.

Oh!!! And yes, Miriam was our mother!!!

Anyway, that’s about it for this interview. Hope I clarified a few misconceptions, and obviously, I do have a sense of humor.

Interviewer (me):

Wow! You pegged the questions, although the answers are a bit unexpected.

You know, lots of us expected your brother to return an awfully long time ago, and to take us up with him. Any idea where he is now? A lot of people would like to know. The delay really caused a lot of confusion, and then, a lot of us sort of lost faith. But the “Adventists” are great at rationalization, even if not great at math, but even they’re starting to look a bit put off.

יעקב, James, or Jacob, or Santiago, or ….:

Hmmm, well, errr, … time doesn’t really run here, at all, so maybe Yeshua just sort of got carried away, the angels tend to put him to sleep with all those constant hymns and harping, and Dad’s preaching is pretty drawn out. His Dad I mean. Mine was Yosef.

But I’ll be sure to tell him you stopped by and asked after him. If I see him that is. This place has no dimensions or space, so things can get confusing.

Interviewer (me):

Ahhhh! Hmmm, well, I guess that’s it then. But, well, could I ask a huge favor? Would you please give your brother my regards, and his Dad too, and my mom, please let her now I really miss her, and my grandparents, and ….

_______

© Guillermo Calvo Mahé; Manizales, 2023; all rights reserved. Please feel free to share with appropriate attribution. Guillermo (“Bill”) Calvo Mahé (a sometime poet) is a writer, political commentator and academic currently residing in the Republic of Colombia (although he has primarily lived in the United States of America of which he is also a citizen). Until 2017 he chaired the political science, government and international relations programs at the Universidad Autónoma de Manizales. He is currently the publisher of the Inannite Review, available at Substack.com. He has academic degrees in political science (the Citadel), law (St. John’s University), international legal studies (New York University) and translation and linguistic studies (the University of Florida’s Center for Latin American Studies). However, he is also fascinated by mythology, religion, physics, astronomy and mathematics, especially with matters related to quanta and cosmogony. He can be contacted at guillermo.calvo.mahe@gmail.com and much of his writing is available through his blog at https://guillermocalvo.com/.

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Guillermo Calvo Mahé

Author, Academic, Political Analyst, Political Commentator, Poet, Linguist

Category Archives: Satire

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Ironies in being a Sports Fan

Sméagol the-all-colored-and-none

A Tale of Canaan and Ur and Uruk, of Three Trees in Three Gardens and of Eggs and Omelets as Well, all as Overheard by an Angry South Wind: A sort of bridge over troubled waters

Serendipity:

What’s in a Name, … Anyway?

What Was a Schmuck Anyway?

An Interview with Yaʿaqov ben Yosef, the Nazarene; the Son of Mary and …

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