what do they (“they” defined as that shadowy globe controlling organization) know that you don’t?

you are warned…

we head into Easter weekend with our thinking through the course of events that led to His rising, and it’s anniversary Sunday. we understand He sacrificed his mortal body so He could be a great example of our collective, and greater potential. so, there is always that hope.

meanwhile… and, possibly grimly at the other end of the spectrum…

what do they (“they” defined as that shadowy globe controlling organization) know that you don’t [the secret series: in pursuit of They]?

so… the AMC television show, “The Walking Dead“ is great.

not the flesh-eating monsters that eerily represent their prior existence… the show, itself.

better still, is the not less than brilliant and far-flung World War Z –  by Max Brooks. NOTE: go with the Audiobook. trust me on that one. do it!

mind you, the zombie theme remains a consistent favorite for TV and movie fans and in a few months the mother of all flicks in the genre – Brad Pitt’s World War Z - will hit theaters.

Pitt’s version of World War Z is more of an abomination than the ghouls themselves portrayed in his movie. in fact, the trailer makes me think in terms of “dead man walking”. In the film, Pitt portrays a United Nations crisis specialist battling a deadly zombie-creating pandemic in a bid to save humanity.

“The book focused on slow zombies. We chose to be more dynamic in that we wanted to base all of this on science. So it’s ‘What if we had them move like ants? Or a swarm of bees? Or birds or a school of fish that’s being chased?’ One of the first [questions] we asked was how to portray the zombies and how to do it differently because it’s been done so many times and been done pretty damn well. “This unprecedented threat comes along, and it’s going to end everything and everybody unless someone comes up with an answer.  The interesting thing is how different those answers are and the way those choices lead to power shifts and life-and-death consequences.” – Brad Pitt

that seems reasonable, I suppose. however, I wish he had made creative changes, as in license, with another story-line. In my view, Brook’s effort is sublime.

Max Brooks created a narrative story about society and the genuine human condition as it evolved through a historical event later known as “the Crisis”. the “Zombie War” came unthinkably close to eradicating humanity. Brooks, driven by the urgency of preserving the acid-etched first-hand experiences of the survivors from those apocalyptic years, travels across the United States of America and throughout the world, from decimated cities that once teemed with upwards of thirty million souls to the most remote and inhospitable areas of the planet. he recorded the testimony of men, women, and sometimes children who came face-to-face with the living, or at least the undead, hell of that dreadful time. World War Z is the result. never before have we had access to a document that so powerfully conveys the depth of fear and horror, and also the ineradicable spirit of resistance, that gripped human society through the plague years.

however, Pitt makes the movie about the narrator himself. he completely lost the point of pathos that Brooks ingeniously engineered.

that said, where the two classic efforts vitally differ from other zombie faire is in the ultimate message. what is both cool and noteworthy through “The Walking Dead” and World War Z is how they manage to make zombies the back-story.

clever.

so are the efforts of…

the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (“CDC”) Office of Public Health Preparedness and Response Zombie Preparedness 

what do they (“they” defined as that shadowy globe controlling organization) know that you don’t?

in any event, I believe this is about the devolution of man or humankind when faced with the unimaginable. while some people rise up – just not as the reanimated dead [sic] – most others channel the abyss and literally lose their humanity through endless examples of depravity. they exchange their souls for a kind of survival. they lose their  way of life, and become literal dead men walking.

as most of you know, and now even more of you do, I coach youth Lacrosse. These kids are fifteen, fourteen and thirteen. they love zombie stuff. they eat it up. seriously. and, they would think me saying that was funny. hell… my wife would roll her eyes (so would both of my daughters), but the lads think their coach is hilarious. in any event, one of our assistant coaches, Jake, is a star on the reigning state high schiool championship Lacrosse team. we were discussing Dawn of the Dead, one of the zombie-fan-nation favorites al-la George Ramirez, himself. but, he had to make the point that if the zombie apocalypse came about he would forget the mall and head straight for Home Depot. “there is noting you can’t do once you have control of Home Depot“. You have all the tools (they can be weapons) you need. they even have hydroponics”.

absolute genius. there is hope for the latest generation yet. they are full of life, hope and promise.

let’s be grateful this weekend, for what we have, and can have. and, don’t be surprised if you see me strolling purposefully around Home Depot taking careful notes that have nothing to do with finishing basements.

by the way… remember what Hemingway said, “you can always defend Spain”.

peace be to my Brothers and Sisters.

brian patrick cork

Special NOTE: Brooks is also the author of the determinedly straight-faced parody The Zombie Survival Guide (2003).

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1. there be Zombies!
2. those Jewish Basterds!
3. Facebook is dead to Me
4. better Safe than hypocritical
5. Walking In Circles
6. Movies, Life and Stuff
7. arbiter of the Abacus
8. singing to the end with the Queen of spain
9. 2012 and the World goes Round
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have you paused when someone invokes the amorphous “they” in a conversation, or lecture? as in, “you know what they say”.

they are insidious. the word, the interlopers, it’s pervasive nature unto itself…

consider these other musings, of my own…

that smoking Rabbit again

dire Warnings, indeed

the secret series: in pursuit of They

that word is broadly used around almost anything uncertain, sort of like almost any reference to government and Wall Street.

it’s probably worse with government, especially when it’s invoked as, “the government”. such bodies are meant to be form or function, not an end-all reference as if it’s the best or only example.

here is how we can tie it all together to make you feel really uncomfortable:

“they say the government controls Wall Street”.

or,

“they say the government is a helpless pawn of Wall Street”.

so… can you name the dude, bloke, puppet-master that actually runs the government? whom is actually in-charge of Wall Street? how is the ultimate decision made? is it all in the hands or at the feet of a shadowy group of old men, or smoking rabbits? or, is it really about a black pipe-smoking dog?  where do they get their training? are they actually Muslim youth Soccer coaches? don’t they actually have the most influence? what if Atlas really is shrugging?

peace be to my Brothers and Sisters.

brian patrick cork

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3. a little Government action on the side
4. Brian Cork Acknowledging Congressman Dennis Kucinich
5. does the fed work for Goldman?
6. the shadowy Troy Brown says brian cork is a Liar
7. government is not your business mr. obama
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so…

I’m guessing there was another climber above this chap that created that errant chunk of ice.

otherwise, what are the odds of something that size being sent by providence to find the noggin of a lone climber on a mountain in some far-flung land amidst a tiny speck in God’s eye?

is that a mote in God’s eye?

this scenario begs one of my questions that makes people gnash their teeth and shake fists with impotent fury:

was this an accident or an appointment with destiny?

I was taught to use safety lines while climbing. on the other hand, I am a free climber.

the fellow lived to tell he tale, and record it all, no less. obviously it could have needed worse, possibly tragically.

he could have been hit by an asteroid!

and…

Asteroid near miss in early 2013

Read story, here: Asteroid near miss in early 2013

Good news: Most insurance policies cover asteroids

…now I need to go do some research and determine what the difference is between an asteroid and a meteor.

today I’m listening to Like a Stone by Audioslave.

peace be to my Brothers and Sisters.

brian patrick cork

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…this is what my life feels like, right now. however, I don’t think I want that to change.

life is like riding a big glassy-fronted wave. one stupid mistake and it things get nasty, or awesome.

what is the human body made of? water. the physical makeup of all our bodily fluids and ocean is very similar. and, its glorious they find each other.

life is like riding the [a] wave. something is always changing. adapting to these changes is the challenge, just as the surfer must adjust quickly and accurately if a successful ride is to be realized.

Eckharte Tolle wrote that “if the primary focus of of your life is the now, then you will be free from pain and suffering.” thusly, when you’re on a wave, time ceases to exist, and you’re in a such an intense combined state of euphoria, peace, presence and excitement that it’s something you have to return over and over again. once you realize that, to live any other way would seem completely insane. - Srinivas Rao, The Skool of Life

that makes surfing, and life’s potential rather like feeling close to God. just like being in the arms of a woman you truly and genuinely love.

so… you can’t change the way it breaks, but you can change the way you ride it.

…seriously.

“There’s no secret to balance. You just have to feel the waves.” - Frank Herbert, Science Fiction writer (1920-1986)

we encounter waves in every minute of every day. there are light waves which make things visible and sound waves so we can hear. even solid physical matter is a wave that is vibrating at a certain frequency. if we observe the behavior of waves, we can see how energy changes from one state to another, and back again.

just like the ebb-and-flow of life. the analogies and potential for metaphor are boundless.

I love to watch the ocean waves. my Mom was a child of the sea. she was drawn to it. her best childhood memories speak to it. she took me there at any and every opportunity. when I told her I might love surfing as much as running (this was big), she just nodded. she got it. of course, she was born under the sign of Cancer, the sign of the crab, so she liked coastal areas like Merced, California, and sunny beaches. she would spend an entire day contentedly watching the waves, preferably with me atop one.

the act centers me. sometimes waves are big and strong and sometimes they are gentle and calm. a wave can throw us back to the shore or if we are not careful can suck us in. water that were waves have nearly taken me a number of time. here is an example: no body is home – by brian patrick cork

life is whacky. and, God has a wild sense of humor.

whatever wave you are on, one thing you can be sure of is that they will always come, crash and then smooth itself out. if we learn to read the pattern of the waves in our lives through our interaction with them we can understand the energy of a wave, how to use it to our best advantage, how to dwell amidst its awesome power, and how to avoid crashing into, or being overcome, one.

big waves are actually quite rare. just like HUGE, epic events are much too rare in other peoples’ lives. I crave adventure, the wild twist of fate, less the cruel mirth of a capricious God.

for perspective…

eighty percent (80%) of all ocean waves are less than twelve feet high, and forty-five percent (45%) are smaller than four feet. the largest waves, those measuring over thirty-five feet, require anywhere from six to nine hundred miles of unobstructed ocean, or “fetch,” to reach full size. by the time such an anomaly encounters a reef break or shore incline, it has become a powerful rolling mass of wind-born energy moving through the water at speeds of thirty to fifty knots per hour and capable of exerting forces of more than three tons (that’s six thousand pounds of pressure per square foot) as it finally curls up-and-over itself and breaks. in life that may read like a tragedy… or adventure. some might ride that wild wave, whereas others might cower from it. however, in an attempt to elucidate (look it up) just why the experience of riding a wave is so unique, author Daniel Duane writes in Caught Inside: A Surfer’s Year on the California Coast:

“The climber never quite penetrates the mountain, the hiker remains trapped in the visual prison, but the surfer physically penetrates the heart of the ocean’s energy – and this is in no sense sentimentality – stands wet in its substance, pushed by its drive inside the kinetic vortex. Even riding a river, one rides a medium itself moved by gravity, likewise with a sailboard or on skis. Until someone figures out how to ride sound or light, surfing will remain the only way to ride energy.”

then, there is also…

emma jo rock climbing

for those driven to put themselves in the center of the “kinetic vortex” of big waves, the risk is incredible.

perhaps this is why being an adventurer, entrepreneur, provocateur is in my DNA. I’m “salty”.

being caught in the falling lip of a wave can send surfers underwater so deep and so fast that the pressure change breaks their eardrums and the capillaries in their lungs. there is the risk of losing everything in a heart beat. and, that is perfectly acceptable. dismemberment, fractures, or broken bones from contact with the ocean floor or from the seething force of whitewater are so common that Laird Hamilton – Big Wave Rider stopped counting his stitches after a thousand. both of his feet are disfigured from broken arches, but he claims that they may now be “stronger than before.”

how many times in LIFE have people around you said something like, “if it doesn’t kill you, it will make you stronger”.

Derrik Doerner, another pioneer of tow-in surfing, and the man who launched Hamilton into the infamous wave at Teahupoo with a jet ski, was once hit in the face by a surfboard underwater. just before he went unconscious, he felt his cheek. “My hand went in, like, two inches,” he says. “The next thing I knew, I was waking up in a helicopter. I had a broken jaw, broken cheekbone. I needed 123 stitches in all.”

…ride your waves of life.

“I never saw a moor, I never saw the sea; Yet know I how the heather looks, And what a wave must be. I never spoke with God, Nor visited in Heaven; Yet certain am I of the spot, As if a chart were given.” - Emily Dickerson, American Poet (1830-1886)

“Believe in love. Believe in magic. Believe in Santa Claus. Believe in others. Believe in yourself. Believe in your dreams. If you don’t, who will? –  Jon Bon Jovi

‘Tuesdays with Morrie’

okay… read this story to your daughters…

the story is about a little wave, bobbing along in the ocean, having a grand old time. he’s enjoying the wind and the fresh air-until he notices the other waves in front of him, crashing against the shore. “my God, this is terrible,” the wave says. “look what’s going to happen to me!”

then along comes another wave. it sees the first wave, looking grim, and it says to him, “why do you look so sad?”

the first wave says, “you don’t understand! we’re all going to crash! all of us waves are going to be nothing! isn’t it terrible?”

The second wave says, “No, you don’t understand. You’re not a wave, you’re part of the ocean.” - Tuesdays with Morrie, American Educator (1916-1995)

“You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your eternity in each moment. Fools stand on their island opportunities and look toward another land. There is no other land, there is no other life but this.”  - Henry David Thoreau –  American Poet and Philosopher 1817-1862

“live your life darling. all of it. question everything. accept nothing.” – Barbara Anne Cork, Wife to one, Mother to all

the Chinese have a twist on the word, “interesting”. it’s a form of curse. but, it’s worth exploring.

there is a Muslim maxim that goes something like, “the promise is in the punishment, and the punishment is in the promise.”

I hope you all get hit hard by great waves. just don’t hold your breath too long.

peace be to my Brothers and Sisters.

brian patrick cork

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