This Time

Martin Rothblatt had his cock turned inside out.

Since then she’s been Martine.

I met Martin, not yet Martine, in 1989.

In 2006, it was declared that Martine’s baby, once divided by FCC Solomonites, might be made whole, even as Martin’s old cock became Martine’s new hole.

In 1989, Martin discussed with me an opportunity to become CEO of his new company.

I didn’t want to move to Washington, so that was that.

Martin was, as Martine is, much more than a mere genius. He/she gets things done.

Through time, the FCC stopped worrying about folks saying “fuck” long enough to make Martin/Martine also change his/her application for a brand new system of direct satellite radio transmission. They wanted to “assure competition.” That’s how the XM and Sirius systems were born. Now a merger has been agreed upon. This will provide band width and other assorted blessings to elevate the complete technology to Martine’s original design . That’s why Martine was interviewed by Howard Stern for almost two hours before millions of satellite listeners after news of the rebirth broke.

Naturally, Howard spent significant time discussing Martine’s personal as well as professional alteration – engineering enlightenment into endorsement.

Martine Rothblatt
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

“Martine Aliana Rothblatt Ph.D, MBA, J.D. (born 1954) is a transgendered American lawyer, author, and entrepreneur. Rothblatt graduated from UCLA with a combined law and MBA degree in 1981, then began work in Washington DC, first in the field of communication satellite law, and eventually in life sciences projects like the Human Genome Project.”

“Rothblatt is responsible for launching several communications satellite companies, including the first nationwide vehicle location system (Geostar, 1983), the first private international spacecom project (PanAmSat, 1984), the first global satellite radio network (WorldSpace, 1990), and the first non-geostationary satellite-to-car broadcasting system (Sirius Satellite Radio, 1990). As an attorney-entrepreneur she was also responsible for leading the efforts to obtain worldwide approval, via new international treaties, of satellite orbit/spectrum allocations for space-based navigation services (1987) and for direct-to-person satellite radio transmissions (1992).”

Martin/Martine didn’t just have his cock turned inside out.

It’s even wilder.

Some say he stuck his head up his ass for good..

But things turn up in the strangest places.

A little light in deepest darkness.

It was 2004.

Martine/Martin founded “Terasem”. The name doesn’t matter. He could have called it “Ramalak.” If you search “Terasem”, you’ll run into a lot of big words. Here’s the bottom line:

To be at all is to be always, to be anywhere is to be everywhere, and to be anything is to be everything.

Terasem 1.1.6 “Time is transcended so that the collective future may help its past.”

OK for openers.

Terasem 2.1.6– “Souls will be reanimated via computational emulation because it is doable, respectful and completes Terasem.”

Better.

Terasem 4.1.1– “Securing partnership with the Multiverse is the ultimate purpose of life.”

Better yet.

Not yet the best.

This Place?

This Place is the surface skin of an infinite bubble with no beginning or end, back or front, up or down, sides, center or edges, sublime in spaceless suspension.

We momentarily exist in temporal linear form as transgenerationally resonant, self replicating machines, divided only by discernment.

I’ve spent this most immediate earth life vibrant with the ceaseless emotional oscillations of an unrepentant Irishman.

Living in a perfect world imperfectly perceived.

As do we all.

Children of the Light.

“In Him was life; and the life was the Light of the world.”

John 1.4

“While I am in the world, I am the Light of the world.”

John 9.5

“Whilst you have the light, believe in the light, that you may be the children of light. These things Jesus spoke; and he went away, and hid himself from them.”

John 12:36

We are all but a single eternal thought.

“And if you feel that you can’t go on –

In The Light you will find the road.”

Led Zeppelin (1975)

Smart, strong monkeys fuck pretty smart monkeys.

That’s how we get to This Place.

This Time.

250 Miles Per Breath

“As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end.”.

Order of Morning Prayer–Ancient Roman Catholic Liturgy

Free Will?

Can you stop time? Fall up? Not sleep? Never eat? Lick your elbows?

It’s been an endless fight ever since Old Faithful was young and wandered.

Some say God is Eternal and destiny Luck of the Draw.

Now entering the ring comes Steven Hawking, wearing no trunks, but occupying the Newton Chair of Mathematics at Cambridge University in Oxford. Make that the Newton Wheelchair. Since his mid-twenties, Mr. Hawking has been a victim of Lou Gehrig’s disease (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis). He is our modern day Einstein. His intellectual capacity and power is unmatched in This Place. He is generally regarded as the smartest man on the planet.

Hawking speaks through a computerized voice synthesizer.

And says –

“The whole history of science has been the gradual realization that events do not happen in an arbitrary manner, but that they reflect a certain underlying order, which may or may not be divinely inspired. Is man determined? Yes! But since we do not know what is determined, he may as well not be.”

Hmmmmmm.

Hawking concludes inconclusively.

Fuck!

This Place.

We balance in perfectly planetary alignment. Above is the Sun, while beyond orbit frigid sister planets. Below churns the molten core of an Earth upon which we rest in cool comfort, between Fire and Ice.

We’re moving two hundred and fifty miles per second (one quick breath) in our annual journey around the Sun, and that doesn’t factor an expansion of the Universe which may even exceed the speed of light.

“Hang On, Sloopy” — The McCoys (1965)

“Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return.” Genesis 3:19

We are pure stardust.

We cooled four billion years ago when Earth was formed.

We’ll be free again in another four billion years when the Sun runs out of hydrogen and becomes a giant red star.

This Place is in between.

We monkeys haven’t been in charge of This Place very long. It took hundreds of generations thousands of years to guess our planet has more sides than one. You’d think the Moon might provide the clever with a clue.

In one of his more wildly optimistic moments, noted Astronomer/Scientist/Pot Smoker Carl Sagan once calculated chances of the human race avoiding self-extermination through a full nuclear exchange at less than one percent.

It’s become so fashionable to ignore the obvious.

Intelligent Designer

Evolution vs. Intelligent Design?

If God wanted to intelligently design creation, who says He couldn’t evolve it over billions of years sped up to six thousand seconds. He’s God! And why does God have to be a “He” and a “Designer?” Or a “Decider?” See “Murphy’s Mirror.”

See the monkey in the mirror?

Peak-a-boo, you see who?

Humans and our closest cousins, chattering chimps, enjoy an absolutely perfect, identical match in 96 percent of our genes. The rest are close. There were many false starts on our road to This Place.

The evidence looks like this:

About 64,000 B.C. around four thousand of the first “modern humans” departed Africa. These were the ancestors of all alive today, having been computer-traced through a FoxP2TNRCIO,SPCH1 variation on Chromosome 7.

By 35,000 B.C., Microcephephalin (MCPH1) significantly increased brain size, which was further enhanced by the emergence of ASPMMCPH5 only fifty-eight hundred years ago, more or less.

This last burst saw the dawning of what we call “civilization”, with written language, developed agriculture and the foundation of cities.

In Western Culture, the Biblical age of the earth using Holy Scripture as a guide is estimated at 6,000 years.

5,800 “more or less” vs. 6,000 “estimated”?

Honest-to-God!

And that’s that.

I love chimps and am proud to be related.

When I was at WWCK-FM in Flint and it was the highest-rated Rock Station in America, Michael Moore handled our Sunday Morning Religious Programming. During this period, I thought it would be a fine promotional dea to find a suitable chimpanzee, name him “Elvis”, dress Elvis up in an “FM105” costume and trot him around at various station events, such as bar nights, store openings and county fairs. I then found out that a chimpanzee has large canine teeth, bites viciously , and easily exhibits the strength of eight powerful men when angered. I shortly (pun intended) settled for a human midget discovered late one night as he was standing on a pool table at the T-Bird Lounge, helium hollering, “I want some pussy”. He was a better idea, but only temporarily. Two six packs of beer and a wad of wild weed on the way to every gig can lay a little lad low.

The Greek philosopher, Diogenes the Cynic (412-323 BC), spent most of his life sleeping in a barrel outside the city-state of Corinth .When awake, he wandered about carrying a lantern, searching for an honest man. Diogenes believed that men and women lived a life dictated by rules and taboos and therefore no one was really truthful. He tried not to pretend. He was witty, rude, and had little respect for authority. Sound familiar?

Howard Stern is the Diogenes of his generation.

Those who find Howard dirty should meet Diogenes.

As a Cynic, Diogenes exercised all bodily functions in full public view – as would a dog.

I made a list.

Impressive.

Howards says on Venus they call God, “Ramalak.”

He’s never said what Venusians might call a dog.

Kalamar?

I could get away with that at LeMoyne College in Syracuse, a Jesuit institution..

Jesuits encourage wide parameters of intellectual exploration. That’s why I consider Jesus Christ to be my Personal Savior. If it wasn’t for Him, Whomever He might have been, I can’t imagine what the Jesuits would call themselves. Ramalaks?

The search for Truth can be found in all lands and in many diverse philosophies, none greater or wiser. Each theology offers its own dynamics and is a reflection of the spiritual nature of its core culture. All religion is true. All single religions are false.

Exclusivity is delusional, but easily understandable.

Imagine God at the center of a Divine Ferris Wheel.

We take our turns on top, deity-high, seeing the world – but no others.

Faith is trust in the potentially untrustworthy – an essential survival mechanism. We need to believe the next untried branch will hold. So are Faith’s sisters, Hope and Love, as Hope thinks wishfully and Love remembers what goes around – comes around.

“But now abideth faith, hope and love. They are eternal. The greatest of these is love because it glorifies both faith and hope and is the one quality that is divine.”

1 Corinthians 13.13 (57 A.D.)

“God is love.”

1 John 4:8 ( 88 A.D.)

“Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself “

Matthew 19.19: (65 A.D.)

“All You Need is Love”

The Beatles (June 1967 A.D.)

“We Love You”

The Rolling Stones (June 1967 A.D.)

“Love Stinks”

J. Geils Band (March 1980 A.D.)

We are locked in Time and Space.

“As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end.”.

J. Edgar Turtle

Confucious say, “Lady who fly plane with head down have crack up!”

P. Cavanaugh
First Grade
Madison Elementary
Syracuse, New York (1947)

I learned such improper prose from an older cousin, John Evans, who would, at all times displaying a true sense of torturous terror, hit us, trip us and nail us in the ass with Daisy Rifle BB pellets.

Thirty years later, in 1977, my mother, wife and four daughters spent one Saturday morning cleaning my apartment near WTAC as I slept on a couch. I didn’t actually live there most of the time, but was quite convincing in establishing a critical need for quiet – a separate space for creative efforts away from the distraction of family frenzy. It was also lovely having a party zone for entertaining countless friends and strangers at closing time, Propriety and common sense suggest no need for further elaboration. The fact is, however, that I actually did write a few things over the six months “Peter’s Play Pen” rocked and rollicked.

Thirty years later, in 2007, I uncovered five handwritten, single-spaced legal pads filled with fanciful froth, stashed away in an old cardboard box, forgotten like a buried beagle.

Here is the distillation of six months’ frolic:

“The embracement of Rock ‘n Roll music centers everything.”

“Although one can be locked into a situation or system which prohibits spiritual or philosophical extension beyond defined perimeters, enclosures exist more to keep the unendorsed out as they do to preserve the approved. A wilfull decision to accept erroneously formulated notions as personal judgment is self-imposed confinement. You are your own jailer. The key to free is a single thought away. “

“You are whomever, whatever, wherever and whenever you wish to be.”

That’s 1,756 words reduced to 87.

Editing!

This I believe.

But in This Place, people believe anything. Anything at all.

Blame it on the attraction of distraction.

Hard answers aren’t easily found and it’s tempting to settle for not quite enough. Joni Mitchell’s right. There’s darkness everywhere a little light shines.

“Equations of Mathematics are the Thoughts of God.”

Srinivasa Ramanujan–Indian Mathematician and Mystic–1917

Ramanujan was born in 1887 and died in 1920 at the age of 32. He is one of India’s legendary intellectual heroes, a true genius who ascribed his brilliance to a personal relationship with a Hindu Goddess.

`After seeing in dreams the drops of blood that heralded the presence of the god
Narasimha, the male consort of the goddess Namagiri, scrolls containing the most complicated mathematics used to unfold before his eyes”.

An ABC News Survey reports that 91% of Americans say they believe in God. That’s the right thing to do. It seems safe to conjecture that a similar percentage would condemn strangling orphans, eating hair or drinking Draino, while affirming Motherhood, Brotherhood and, for Social Progressives, Robin Hood. These things, if of lesser importance, enjoy similar propriety. Yet in This Place, that of supreme relevance is least and last understood. Around the world, tens of millions have died for that of which they actually know nothing, “belief” placing a definable, perilous limitation on knowledge. Such universal martyrs have been on all sides, in all places, at all times – bitterly ubiquitous.

Like Donald Duck. Who wears no pants. Except when swimming.

Go figure.

Did you know we’ll all be naked in Heaven? That’s how Michelangelo saw things.With genitals! Full frontal nudes! Angels at all angles!

“My soul can find no staircase to heaven unless it be through earth’s loveliness”

Buonarroti Michelangelo- (1504) –(Italian sculptor, painter, architect & poet)

Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel masterpiece in the Vatican heart of Roman Catholicism was a swirling, twirling batch of bare, fig leaves added in later times to spare the blushes of Catholic clergy.

Buonarroti Michelangelo is generally considered the creator of the Renaissance.

The word Renaissance (French for ‘rebirth’) was first used to define an era that
followed the Middle Ages and preceded the Reformation, roughly the 14th through the 16th century. Its primary feature was the revival of intellectual exploration through the advancement of science. Renaissance is sometimes referenced to describe other important moments of historical and cultural significance.

“I just had this weird cool thought. I don’t think any of us realize just how momentus the whole time was and not just in the context of . “Oh, wow! That was “The ‘60’s!” I honestly believe that historians and anthropologists will look at our time the way we look at The Rennasisance and that these moments only occur every few hundred years.”

Michael Moore – 2002 – Michigan writer, author, producer, director & WWCK talk show host.

In the 40th Anniversary Edition of Rolling Stone Magazine, Michael elaborated:

“I wouldn’t have been able to do what I’ve done if I hadn’t grown-up in an area that had such a vibrant and rebellious political and cultural scene. The music was so integrated into your experience as a teenager. Everyone knows about Woodstock, but we had our own mini-Woodstock every Wednesday, every summer, just outside Flint. It was called Wild Wednesday. It was in a field with a big pond, and it was the first place that people saw so many of these groups, like MC5, Iggy, Seger. We’d literally be there every Wednesday from Noon to Midnight. Thousands would show up. And out of that grew the protests.You’d have a group of high school students planning a walkout. Maybe it was just over how lousy the food was at the lunch counter at school. It wasn’t like, “Here’s the political thing.” It was all woven together in the same sort of rebellious, rock & roll attitude. When you said rock & roll, it wasn’t just the music. You meant it as a way of life, as a coat of armor against everything that was coming at you. It was a force to be reckoned with. In my mind, there would be no “Roger & Me”, no “Fahrenheit 9/11″ if I had not been one of thousands participating in that moment. And the millions who go to Fahrenheit carry that with them as well. They were there at Wild Wednesday too.”

You can see a drawing of Mike on my website, wildwednesday.com, under “Contact”. He’s at the very bottom, holding up all the rest. Michael’s like that turtle of ancient Onondaga Indian lore carrying all of the earth on his back – “This Place” on a shell. Underneath, I’ve written:

“Moore is a Well-Behaved Young Man Who Plays Nicely With Fellow Concert-Goers” –J. Edgar Hoover (1970) .

That’s something I made up, just as the Onondagas did that Turtle. Even at 16, Michael Moore would never waste any time with J. Edgar Hoover.

Hoover was homosexual, cross-dressing head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation just about forever (1924 to 1972) and, speaking of head, lived on the closet closest of terms with Assistant Director, Clyde Tolson, both of them constantly on guard against gays in the Bureau. When Hoover died, Tolson inherited everything and moved into Hoover’s house. J. Edgar hated Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King and John Lennon.

Upon learning of Hoover’s passage back in ‘72, Richard Nixon offered this tender epitaph:

“Jesus Christ, that old cocksucker!”

Imagine that?

The 37th President of the United States of America saying “ Jesus Christ” and “cocksucker” in the same sentence?

“Cocksucker?”

Like the one Jesus married?

Easy now.

For it has been announced by James Cameron that Jesus of Nazareth might have married Mary of Magdala, that they were buried together along with the Virgin Mary and perhaps even the Virgin Mary’s grandson, Judah.

Coffins were carted forth.

James Cameron!

The most successful film director in human history!

Jesus Christ, Avatar?

Talk about the you know what hitting the you know where!

Magdala is a town on the western shore of Lake Galilee.

Mary Magdalene is noted as having been given to sexual impropriety in several ancient texts, including some that didn’t make final cut into the New Testament. Mary
Magdalene’s own Gospel was also erased from the last mix. Since “God’s” final editors were exclusively male, this should come as no surprise, forgive such verb in
the context herein used..

“God” left almost everything important up to men for thousands of years. With four daughters and four granddaughters, I think this sucks. Worse than sucking cocks.

Trouble Finder

In earliest days, radio was my window to the world.

Recalling living pictures more than sound, “Let’s Pretend” from CBS was unmatched.

Cream of Wheat was the first and only sponsor of “Let’s Pretend”.

It was the early ’40’s.

“Cream of Wheat is so good to eat, Yes, we have it every day. We sing this song, it will make us strong, And it makes us shout – hooray”!

“Let’s Pretend” was make believe – a Saturday morning children’s program offering whimsical tales of fantasy and fairy tales. It was the life work of Nila Mack, a Kansas woman who had been an actress on Broadway. She felt the best way to tell a children’s story was with kids. Mack developed a company of versitile juveniles who could play a variety of changing roles week after week. She trained and directed two generations of child actors. She was known as “the fairy god-mother of radio.”

“Heel-looo, Pretenders! Helllloooo, Uncle Bill!”

LET’S PRETEND!

“Neptune!”

“Poseidon!”

“Oceanus!”

“Prometheus!”

“Atlas!”

“Jesus!”

Jesus Please Us!

Jesus is all over This Place.

He’s here, He’s there – He’s everywhere.

Had He lived in present times, churches around the world would have steeples topped with electric chairs. Or gallows. Or gurneys.

Here’s a brilliant word — “anthropomorphic”–the attribution of human characteristics
to a god, animal or inanimate thing.

You’ve heard of “Murphy’s Law?”

“If anything can go wrong – it will.”

Here’s “Murphy’s Mirror.”

“So God created man in His own image….” Genesis 1:27

I find no salvation worshipping an Invisible Sky Monkey.

“The Well Below the Valley” by Planxty (1973) is a traditional Celtic tune from the Middle Ages, often mistaken for a Christmas offering – soft and sweetly seasonal. There’s a woman continually being impregnated by her brother, uncle and dad – her humble hut more hamster hutch than home. She buries sad little consequences beneath “The Well Below the Valley.” Then Jesus saves her. Amen. One year I put this selection into heavy holiday rotation at WLQR in Toledo. Phones rang off the wall for “that lovely Irish carol.” Few people pay attention to words anymore.

And I meant no blasphemy. Quite to the contrary. It’s about Redemption. And the Forgiveness of Sins. And Life everlasting. Maybe a wee bit over the top. Irish.

The Shanachie holds a sacred place in Irish culture. The Storyteller weaves enchantment from strands of struggle, strife and strength – the vanquished becoming victorious.

No wonder the Irish greeted Saint Patrick’s message in 433 A.D. with open minds and happy hearts. It is Celtic to the core, imagination yielding to exaggeration in elegant elaboration.

I agree with everything Jesus said, which was a lot in few words.

I disagree with what most say He meant, especially the sending money part..

Eternal Fires of Searing Damnation await Pat Robertson and other predator preachers.

More Irish.

Our current Pope is a crazy old man.

Heil Mary!

The Passion of Christ was miserable enough, but what poor Jesus suffers most is everything everyone wants from Him.

Gimme. Gimme. Gimme.

And being played by an unknown actor whose next movie promised “The Passion of Golf.”

Jesus.

Organized religion is modern mythology.

When someone prays to “God” or preys on Infidels or
praises “Allah”, they might as well tell me, “Oops. I’m nuts.”

Kindly note that I put the word “God” in quotation marks. I believe in God, but not “God.”

I am neither atheist, nor agnostic.

I am aware.

We go back thousands and thousands of years. Forward, too.

There is no need for rebirth.

It would be difficult being Born Again anyway. I was premature by seven weeks, spending my first three months in a hospital incubator -a glass tank. Like a goldfish- I wasn’t born so much as hatched.

Home Again, Home Again, Jiggity Jig.

It was September of ‘41.

Gasoline was ten cents a gallon. Sugar – six cents a pound.. Eggs – twenty cents a dozen. Milk–fourteen cents a quart. Bread – eight cents a loaf. Minimum wage was thirty cents an hour. A brand new Buick was a grand.

We were almost again at World War.

I recall the horror of touch.

We don’t want to be here.

Do we?

We didn’t ask to be tiny, vibrating strands of energy trapped as matter in an eleven dimensional universe with no center or edges.

Did we?

Fuck.

Being an us is a pain-in-the-ass.

But exciting.

A mystery.

This Place.

Witch is What?

I’ve always enjoyed movies of a spiritual nature.

There was “The Song of Bernadette”, “Quo Vadis”, “MIracle at Fatima”,”The Ten Commandments” and “The Robe” – with Richard Burton chasing screaming meemies on a galley ship back home.

There was “The Chalice”, “The Greatest Story Ever Told”, “Ben Hur”, “Going My Way” and “The Exorcist” – featuring pea soup a la mold.

And “It’s a Wonderful Life”, “Angels With Dirty Faces”, “Francis of Assisi” and “The Passion of the Christ.”

My favorite religious film saw magic come alive in 1939 as Dorothy Gale joined forces with the Tin Woodsman, the Scarecrow and a Cowardly Lion seeking “The Wizard of Oz.”

“The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” was written by L. Frank Baum in 1900 and published at his own expense.

Baum’s birthplace, Chittenango, New York, is only ten miles east of Syracuse, where I was born. The teeny town holds an “Oz Festival” every Spring. They even feature actual movie Munchkins – special, but spooky. Not many are left.

And even fewer folks know that “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” was just the first trip to Oz

There was also The Marvelous Land of Oz (1904), Ozma of Oz (1907), Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz (1908), The Road to Oz (1909), The Emerald City of Oz (1910), The Patchwork Girl of Oz (1913),Tik-Tok of Oz (1914), The Scarecrow of Oz (1915) , Rinkitink in Oz (1916) ,The Lost Princess of Oz ( 1917),The Tin Woodman of Oz (1918), The Magic of Oz (1919) and Glinda of Oz (1920). Baum wrote them all. Followers wrote another twenty-six.

That’s a total of forty. There are only twenty-seven books in the entire New Testament.

Somewhere over the rainbow.

Don’t know the basic story? You must be from Oz.

A terrible tornado sweeps Dorothy, and her little dog too, from black and white Kansas to a strange, colorful land, where only a wonderful Wizard can help her home – “The Mighty Wizard of Oz”

“The Great and Powerful Oz”

“Messiah”

“Thor”

“Jupiter”

“Zeus”

Sir Arthur C, Clarke of “2001:A Space Odyssey” fame also wrote “The Nine Billion Names of God.” When these names were printed a certain way by computer, overhead, without any fuss, all the stars went out.”

Fuck!

This Place!

Let’s Pretend!

“Elvis.”

“Allah”

“God”

Were I in charge of all organized religions in every church, temple, synagogue, mosque or Irish bar around the world, I would insist that the beginning of each formal service require all in attendance to rise in unison from their seats, hold hands, and joyously, lovingly whisper:

“Permissum Nos Simulatio!”

“Let’s Pretend!”

Which also means:

“Pay No Attention To That Man Behind The Curtain!”

“What?” “Huh?”

“Lions and Tigers and Bears!” “Oh, My!”

Even so – the Lion talks, the Scarecrow walks, the Tin Man squawks.

Monkeys fly.

Then there’s that witch.

Magic!

It’s all true after all!

All religion is true, save that which claims all truth.

Cancel all curtains.

“Toto, I’ve got a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.”

Amen!

We’re in This Place.

Bye, Polar!

I no longer smoke tobacco. After two and a-half packs a day for forty years, I stopped while living in Youngstown when I almost stopped living in Youngstown. It was a Saturday night. Something felt catchy in the middle of my chest.

I had an Irish anesthesiologist. I thoroughly enjoyed the quadruple bypass, but recovery was a bitch.

Please allow me to introduce my wife.

Eileen and I have been an item for fifty years.

We had moved to Youngstown in early 1998, right after we helped the Toledo Irish-American Club join with the Lucas County Ancient Order of Hibernians to bring in The Wolftones – Ireland’s biggest rebel group. It was wall to wall.

Youngstown is Flint without the glamor, sparkle or je nais se twat.

Niagara without Falls.

World without end.

Youngstown pumps water from Meander Reservoir. Locally it’s often said that’s where old gangsters dumped their dead. While we were there, the water was a peculiar, dusky color and tasted like watermelon. City fathers swore it was algae.

There’s little consolation in consolidation. It was the early days. Gocom
Communications had purchased WKBN-TV, the big CBS Television affiliate, and
wanted to add five radio stations to Youngstown holdings. Their bank made a multi- million dollar loan conditioned on my involvement as Vice President/General Manager. Necessitated by circumstance, I ran WBBG/WRTK/WICT/WWSY/WPAO through the end of the year, faithfully executing dozens more upon the altar of corporate efficiency. Thinning the herd.

But financial fantasies failed for the television group. Bankers bailed. I was ballast – terminated for Christmas. A blessing.

Eileen and I headed back to the scene of many original crimes.

Clarkston is between Flint and Detroit on I-75. Crossing north from Oakland to Genesee County transposes worlds. Per capita, Oakland was one of the wealthiest counties in the country – an enormous whitecap on the wave of fugitive flight from black Detroit. 13.1% of Genesee County residents lived below the poverty line, more than double that of Oakland, where folks earned more than half again as much as their northern neighbors. Of course, things are much, much, much worse now.

Comcast Communications, the most powerful cable company in the world, established its first large system in Genesee County – in the City of Flint. Brian Roberts, Comcast President, Chairman of the Board and Son of the Father (as was Jesus), spent his apprenticeship In Flint chasing goals, digging holes and climbing poles. Brian was born June 28, 1959, the day I finished High School. His dad, Ralph, was Comcast’s Founder.

After I joined the company as Advertising Sales Manager in Flint, I was in Philadelphia for a meeting with Ralph in early 2001. At 81, he spoke for almost an hour. He was terrific. When he asked for questions, I inquired as to what single characteristic he’d identified as being held in common among the most successful people he’d encountered on his climb to the heights. There was no hesitation. “Enthusiasm!”, he proclaimed. “Do you agree?” “Undoubtedly! Absolutely! Positively!”, I trilled. Everyone chuckled.

AAF District Governor Chris Frye and MC Peter "Flipper" C. Cavanaugh--2002 Flint Addy Awards

So I was enthusiastic in driving total Flint Revenues up 42% from 2001 to 2002, adding over a million bucks to the bottom line and watching our office dominate the Midwest. I was even more enthusiastic suing the company for millions of dollars after my compensation was cut in half without prior warning or notice. With mid-management mired in mediocrity, Age has no place at Comcast unless your boy is the boss. Comcast treats seniority as Eskimos once did their elders, leaving them on ice for the polar bears.

Never mind fabricated evidence, persistent perjury and amiable amnesia. The HR lady chewed gum during her entire deposition. Accountants are in charge – prediction taking precedence over production. Dreary drones enjoy unlimited resources. This virtually guarantees turning Comcast into a union organized, government regulated
public utility within a decade. Such will cut your monthly cable bill in half. If that even matters by then.

Lately I’ve been dozing more than three cats combined.

Whirlpool deep, star field steep, endless sleep.

Orgasmically magnetic.

Peacefully poetic.

Casually kinetic.

Manic on ice.

Sixteen hours a day have been slipping away – rage morphing and
masking as somnolence and slumber.

At the very gates of the Emerald City.

Marijuana

Fitzpatrick C. Cavanaugh 1987-2002

So I wrote “Local DJ”.

This is what it says on the back of that book:

“Although the surface thread is autobiographical, “Local DJ” is much more an interwoven narrative on Rock “n” Roll culture from the late 50s through the present times.

Perspective is subjectively recounted by Peter C., who was both involved with and influential upon the music over an extended period. The presentation is structurally arranged as a mosaic of interrelated stories with substantial personal overview or, as more commonly referenced, “attitude.”

From the earliest days of Elvis through Z-Rock in the 90s, Local DJ travels through time and space with instinctive grace. Sacramental with sin. A lifeweb spin.”

About Peter C. Cavanaugh

At the age of sixteen in 1957, Peter C. Cavanaugh enjoyed a fifty-eight percent total audience share on his hometown station, WNDR in Syracuse, New York. Decades later, he’s written a book about his adventures ever since, promoting and producing literally hundreds of early concerts with the likes of Chuck Berry, The Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Bob Seger, Ted Nugent, Alice Cooper, Kiss and so on, as well as running a seven station radio group which included the top-rated Rock ‘n’ Roll stations in America. Peter lives in Oakhurst, California, with his wife, Eileen.

“Of all who had a major influence on me while growing up in the Midwest, none matched the audaciousness, tenacity and gonzo-like behavior of Peter Cavanaugh. He was more than just the rock ‘n roll guru who gave America its first encounters with The Who, Bob Seger and all the great Detroit bands (Ted Nugent, Alice Cooper, MC5, etc.) He was the one who taught me how to go up against the powers-that-be and live to tell all. Thank you, Peter Cavanaugh, for saving a generation of Flint kids from the likes of Pat Boone”

MICHAEL MOORE -“Stupid White Men”, “Bowling For Columbine”, “Fahrenheit 9/11” , “SiCKO”, “Capitalism: A Love Story.”

I am a diagnosed Manic Depressive with the papers to prove it.

Other Depressives include Ann-Margaret, Alexander the Great, Hans Christian Anderson, Drew Barrymore, Beethoven (the Composer), Irving Berlin, Napoleon, Marlon Brando, Tim Burton, Truman Capote, Drew Carey, Jim Carrey, Ray Charles, Chopin (the Composer), Winston Churchill, Eric Clapton, Dick Clark, Kurt Cobain, Francis Ford Coppola, Sheryl Crow, Rodney Dangerfield and Charles Darwin,

Then we have Queen Elizabeth I, William Faulkner, Carrie Fisher, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Larry Flynt, Harrison Ford, Steven Foster, Sigmund Freud, Peter Gabriel, Alexander Hamilton, Handel (the Composer), Steven Hawking, Ernest Hemmingway, Jimi Hendrix, Sir Anthony Hopkins, Howard Hughes, Andrew Jackson, Thomas Jefferson, Joan of Arc, Elton John, Ashley Judd, Robert E. Lee, John Lennon, Abraham Lincoln, Courtney Love, Martin Luther, Herman Melville, Michelangelo, Joni Mitchell, Marilyn Monroe, Alanis Morissette, J.P.Morgan and Benito Mussolini.

Let alone Sir Isaac Newton, Florence Nightingale, Deborah Norville, Sinead O’Connor, Eugene O’Neill, Laurence Olivier, Ozzie Osbourne, Dolly Parton, George Patton, Edgar Allen Poe, Cole Porter, Charlie Pride, Lou Reed, Theodore Roosevelt, Axl Rose, Yves Saint Laurent, Charles Schulz, Paul Simon, Phil Spector, George Stephanopolis, Robert Louis Stevenson and Sting.

Without overlooking Tchaikovsky (the Composer), Alfred Lord Tennyson, Dylan Thomas, Spencer Tracy, Ted Turner, Mark Twain, Mike Tyson, Kurt Vonnegut, Mike Wallace, Robin Williams, Brian Wilson, Boris Yeltsin and St. Francis of Assisi

Sounds like a party to me.

One hell of a party.

The hot new name for Manic Depression is Bipolar Disorder.

It’s a chemical imbalance.

All in your head.

From DNA code.

There’s a huge variation in types with various degrees of challenge. I’m told I have Rapid Cycling Bipolar Disorder. Type Two. Discovering this was quite a relief. I
thought I was just a drunk.

I’ve tried Zoloft, Effexor, Paxil, Welbutrin, Lamical, Topamax, Lithium, Lexapro and Celexa. Right now, plain old Prozac seems to work best

Only because marijuana remains outlaw.

A mystery.

Especially since the American Declaration of Independence (July 4, 1776) was drafted on marijuana paper.

No lie!

There’s one thing certain about Rapid Cycling Bipolar Disorder. You ride the monkey or the monkey rides you.

This Place

Saint Mary’s Cemetery–Oswego County, New York

1992 was the 100th Anniversary of my Great-Grandfather’s death. He had left Ireland during The Famine Years in 1848 and had crossed the North Atlantic to the green fields of America. He was buried under a fine Celtic Cross in a little churchyard just north of Syracuse. His name is engraved in sharp and bold letters.

“PETER CAVANAUGH”

Buried Under Six Feet of Dirt and Ten Feet of Snow – 2/14/07

He Wasn’t Going Anywhere “

“When you realize that consciousness is constantly transforming, there’s no such thing as a person. There’s only the universe behaving as a person.”–Deepak Chopra–”Larry King Live”—-January 5, 2009

“Uncertainties of Life”

A Rock ‘n Roll Mystery

By The Universe

As Peter Cavanaugh

Having found salvation from starvation in the green fields of America–Last Will and Testament of Peter Cavanaugh. Fulton, New York. May 1, 1889

“I, Peter Cavanaugh, aware of the uncertainty of life, do bequeath seventy-five dollars to the Church of the Immaculate Conception, fifty thereof to purchase a statue of Saint Joseph.”

117 Years Later. St. Joseph’s Statue — Church of The Immaculate Conception–Fulton, New York. (2009)

Having miraculously attained his 71st birthday against seemingly impossible odds without atonement– Last Will and Testament of Peter Cavanaugh. Oakhurst, California. September 8, 2012.

“I, Peter Cavanaugh, aware of the uncertainty of life, stopped going to Church as soon as I could.”

This would have been puberty, give or take a few squirts.

Oak Room Bar–Oakhurst, California–“Home of Dangerous Drinking” (2009)

After that I only went socially, meaning when my mother would know if I didn’t

“Conscience” is a combination of the word “con,” or “against,” and “science,” meaning knowledge. Let’s keep that in mind.

This is absolutely my Last Will and Testament, but it doesn’t mean I’m about to drop dead. Perhaps so. Maybe not. I believe to be at all is to be always, to be anywhere is to be everywhere, and to be anything is to be everything. That’s it. Thank you.

We’re all here together.

In This Place.

And we’ve just arrived.

“Well, Ma, maybe it’s like Cassy says. A fellow ain’t got a soul of his own, just little piece of a big soul, the one big soul that belongs to everybody. Then it don’t matter, ’cause I’ll be all around… I’ll be everywhere.

John Steinbeck–“Grapes of Wrath”–1939

Goddamn!

Do I believe in God?

Sure!

How else could I write, “Goddamn?”

A fine gentleman named Pun Plamondon sent me the following:

“Peter – I heard your voice on many trips…I assume it was the radio…Perhaps not. You set the standard.”

Pun Plamondon was the White Panther Party’s Minister of Defense in the late ‘60’s. Someone blew up a CIA office in Ann Arbor, an explosion which eventually blasted Richard Nixon out of the White House. Pun made the FBI’s 10 Most Wanted List. He eventually wrote an excellent book called, “Lost From The Ottawa.”

Pun Plamondon (2009)

“Soon the discussion got around to my alcoholism as we continued to smoke. I explained to Louis my inability to stop drinking. I repeated the advice given me by my friends in the alcoholic’s association, that I must find a higher power, God or some such, and find a spiritual center to my life if I was ever to recover from alcoholism . I explained that I didn’t believe in God or any of the religions with their narrow-minded, intolerant philosophies and exclusionary doctrines.

“A higher power? he said quizzically, rubbing his gigantic chin again. “They must
mean, The Great Mystery. Gitchi Manidoo. Great Mystery. Some say it means “Great Spirit,” but our people always say, “Great Mystery.”

There was no fanfare, no drum roll or clap of thunder. Just a bright light somewhere near my heart, an opening, enlightenment..

“A mystery?”, I stammered. Incredulous and flabbergasted. “A fucking mystery?’ “All this grief about a fucking mystery?”

“It’s always been a mystery,” Louis answered. Since the Anishnabee were first placed here it’s been a mystery.”

Goddamn!

Anishnabee?

How about the Nemedians, Firbolgs, Milesians, Picts, Celts, Glasraighe, Fomorians, Partholonians, Firbolgs, Ui Bairrche, Lagain and Tuatha De Dannan, who established Tara, the ritual inauguration and burial place for the ancient Kings of poor little Ireland?

And our Cavanaugh tribe, the Chennselaig in Leinster?

Yes – all of the Emerald Isle – Itself buried in a sliver of time ten thousand years ago under a mile of ice?

A mystery.

My Uncle Vince had taught me of Ireland.

Dr. Vincent Cavanaugh–Syracuse, New York (1927)

Named after his grandfather, he was the coolest man I ever knew. I was over at his house one day. He was reading aloud from “On the Heavens” (350 BC) by Aristotle:

“It is not once nor twice but times without number that the same ideas make their appearance in the world.”

“See for yourself, Peter.”

He passed the book.

Symbols. Lines. Strange designs. Ancient Greek.

Vincent Cavanaugh Buehner is named after Peter Vincent Cavanaugh. At birth this tiny new Vincent received the ragged old Vincent’s dog tag from World War One. It says, “Vincent Cavanaugh”. He’d lost his “Peter” years before. Little Vincent has ten
cousins.

May I present Katherine, William, Cooper, Joshua, Owen, Elise, Riley, Allison, Maximilian and Asher?

With Vincent, these are my grandchildren – the first Irish-American Peter’s great-great grandchildren.

None of them may read “Local DJ” until they have completed medical studies and finished law school.