Now for something completely… completeNow for something completely… complete
This was featured on APOD today:
The silence of dutyThe silence of duty
“The scenes in a soldier’s life are continually shifting, sometimes for better and sometimes for worse, and we soldiers get to be nearly as indifferent about the matter, and care as little where we go, as a horse cares where his driver may see fit to drive him. And we have just as little voice in the matter as a horse has. One day a soldier may be in his tent comfortable, contented, and happy, and the next day on a march with but few of the world’s comforts and but little cause of contentment except what he finds within himself. A soldier’s time and services are not his own, they belong to the Government which he has sworn to defend, and it is his duty to be ever ready and obey with alacrity whatever the Government calls upon him to do. Sometimes a streak of good luck will turn up to a soldier whether he deserves it or not, and sometimes they won’t turn up though he may deserve it ever so well. It would be easy to mention a great many good boys in the ranks who have been doing duty at the front since the war began, but to whom no soft detail has ever been given, or any particular favors shown.” – Wilbur Fisk, Hard Marching Every Day (eds. E. and R. Rosenblatt)
An uncontrolled experimentAn uncontrolled experiment
“Treat men like brutes and they will become like brutes, but you treat them worse than brutes and there is no telling what they will become.” – Wilbur Fisk, Hard Marching Every Day (eds. E. and R. Rosenblatt)
Physical and moral knowledgePhysical and moral knowledge
“If a man wants to know what it is to have every bone in his body ache with fatigue, every muscle sore and exhausted, and his whole body ready to sink to the ground, let him diet on a common soldier’s fare till he has only the strength that imparts, and then let him shoulder his knapsack, haversack, gun and equipments, and make one of our forced marches, and I will warrant him to be satisfied that the duties of war are stern and severe, whether we march or face the enemy on the field of battle. A fellow feels very much like grumbling at such times as that, and when we march on and on, expecting every minute to halt but still hurrying forward, when every spark of energy seems about to be extinguished, and the last remnant of strength gone, tired, hungry, sick and sore, who blames a soldier if he finds it hard work to suppress thoughts of a quiet home he has left behind him, with its comforts and endearments, and if he sometimes turns his thoughts to himself and wonders if he, as an individual, will ever be compensated for the sacrifice he is making. What if the rebels are whipped, and what if they are not? How does it matter to him? One blunder of General Grant’s may make final victory forever impossible and all our lost toil go for nothing. I tell you some of our hard marches put one’s patriotism severely to the test. It finds out a fellow’s weak points if he has got any, and we don’t claim to be without them.” – Wilbur Fisk, Hard Marching Every Day (eds. E. and R. Rosenblatt)
Spotsylvania, Virginia, May of 1864Spotsylvania, Virginia, May of 1864
“The most singular and obstinate fighting that I have seen during the war, or ever heard or dreamed of in my life, was the fight last Thursday. Hancock had charged and driven the enemy from their breastworks, and from their camps, but the enemy rallied and regained all but the first line of works, and in one place they got a portion of that. The rebels were on one side of the breastwork, and we on the other. We could touch their guns with ours. They would load, jump up and fire into us, and we did the same to them. Almost every shot that was made took effect. Some of our boys would jump clear up on to the breastworks and fire, then down, reload and fire again, until they were themselves picked off. If ancient or modern history contains instances of more determined bravery than was shown there, I can hardly conceive in what way it could have been exhibited. This firing was kept up all day, and till five o’clock next morning, when the enemy retreated. Gen. Russell remarked that it was a regular bull-dog fight; he never saw anything like it before. I visited the place the next morning, and though I have seen horrid scenes since this war commenced, I never saw anything half so bad as that. Our men lay piled one top of another, nearly all shot through the head. There were many among them that I knew well, five from my own company. On the rebel side it was worse than on ours. In some places the men were piled four or five deep, some of whom were still alive. I turned away from that place, glad to escape from such a terrible, sickening sight. I have sometimes hoped, that if I must die while I am a soldier, I should prefer to die on the battle-field, but after looking at such a scene, one cannot help turning away and saying, Any death but that.” – Wilbur Fisk, Hard Marching Every Day (eds. E. and R. Rosenblatt)
Discipline and punishmentDiscipline and punishment
“The band discoursed a dirge-like piece of music, when the prisoners [John Tague and George Blowers] were conducted to their coffins, on which they kneeled, and the guard filed around and took position in front of them, scarcely half a dozen yards distant. A sergeant put a circle around the neck of each, from which was suspended a white object over the breast, as a target for the executioners. The prisoners were not blindfolded, but looked straight into the muzzles of the guns that shot them to death. The guard were divided into two platoons, one firing at one prisoner, and the other platoon firing at the other prisoner, but there was no reserve to be ordered up in case of failure. Blowers had been sick, his head slightly drooped as if oppressed with a terrible sense of the fate he was about to meet. He had requested that he might see his brother in Co. A, but his brother was not there. He had no heart to see the execution, and had been excused from coming. Tague was firm and erect till the last moment, and when the order was given to fire, he fell like a dead weight, his face resting on the ground, and his feet still remaining on the coffin. Blowers fell at the same time. He exclaimed, ‘Oh dear me!’ struggled a moment, and was dead. Immediately our attention was called away by the loud orders of commanding officers, and we marched in columns around the spot where the bodies of the two men were lying just as they fell. God grant that another such punishment may never be needed in the Potomac Army.” — Wilbur Fisk, Hard Marching Every Day (eds. E. and R. Rosenblatt)
Hurry up and waitHurry up and wait
“The duties of a soldier are very unequally divided in regard to time. Some days he may have nothing whatever to do but to pass the time as best he can; and then of a sudden he may be called upon to perform all that his physical powers can possibly accomplish, and often his power of endurance yields to exhaustion, and he is obliged to stop ere his task is completed. These extremes of physical exertion may not accord with the strictest rules of physiology, but they certainly do not conflict with the rules of military life.” – Wilbur Fisk, Hard Marching Every Day (eds. E. and R. Rosenblatt)
The frontiers of languageThe frontiers of language
“See major, see! The domned skillipins skedaddle extinsively—extinsively sir!” – CSA Captain “Old Tarantula” Reilly, Second Manassas, 1862 (quoted in John J. Hennessy’s Return to Bull Run)
The deterministic universeThe deterministic universe
“Everything is the way it is because everything was the way it was. Sometimes I feel ensnared in this, as if no matter what I do, what will come has already been fixed.” — Joanthan Safran Foer, Everything Is Illuminated
Have you heard the one about…?Have you heard the one about…?
“Humorous is the only truthful way to tell a sad story.” – Jonathan Safran Foer, Everything Is Illuminated
GnatsGnats
There is a new story posted in the “Previously Published Stories” sidebar, or menu, or whatsit. It is called “Gnats” and it was first published three months ago in Snow Monkey.
While we’re on the subject, I’ve recently had stories accepted by Fox Chase Review, Noon, and Mayday Magazine. They should all be appearing over the next eight months or so.
This weekend only! One fully realized self for the price of two! Get yours now!This weekend only! One fully realized self for the price of two! Get yours now!
“Our system has relentlessly denied the role of any human practice that cannot be monetized. The capitalist apparatus has worked tirelessly to commercialize everything, to reduce every aspect of human life to currency exchange. In such a context, there is little hope for the survival of the fully realized self.” – Freddie deBoer, “The Resentment Machine”
Not a thingNot a thing
“There is nothing to which the hearts of men and women cannot be driven by love.” – Virgil, Aeneid (trans. Humphries)
Illusions of IdentityIllusions of Identity
“Since we live in the heads of those who remember us, we lose control of our lives and become who they want us to be.” – David Eagleman, “Metamorphosis” (from Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives)
Only the young die goodOnly the young die good
“The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the broken places. But those that will not break it kills. It kills the very good and the very gentle and the very brave impartially. If you are none of these you can be sure it will kill you too but there will be no special hurry.” – Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms
Capital depletionCapital depletion
“We never get anything. We are born with all we have and we never learn. We never get anything new. We all start complete.” – Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms
A manageable approachA manageable approach
“Life isn’t hard to manage when you’ve nothing to lose.” – Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms
Pitchin’ the fantodPitchin’ the fantod
I gotta get rant-a-rific here for a few. I just got off the phone with a major American airline which I won’t embarrass by naming outright, but if you like, you could say its name rhymes with benighted. I was on the phone with them for a fucking hour trying to correct, or verify the correction of, a $75 mistake they made. And when I say I was on the phone for an hour, that means I was on hold for most of that time, listening to an endless loop of Rhapsody in Blue, except for the two times early on when the menu selections I made failed because those parts of this Dinosaur Corp.’s phone system no longer work, and the few minutes toward the end of this when I finally got to speak to a person (who was actually in the United States, which pleases me, atavistic chauvinist that I sometimes am (an effect of growing older, methinks)).
A fucking hour. It’s like I was dealing with an obscure bureau in some third-world country, address 1984 Kafka Avenue in Downtown Chaotica. An hour! A major airline! Now, I’m an old but I’m not ancient. I’m well over a decade away from retirement, should I in fact be able to retire. I well remember a time when in this country–in this country, boys and girls–that simply never would have happened. Americans had more pride than to pretend to run a business where people were kept waiting on the phone for an hour. I like to think we still do, but here I am dancing the Whiskey Tango Foxtrot to a tune I don’t recall having any part in calling, and it’s a whistling past the graveyard for anyone to think it doesn’t matter that major businesses are run that way. Look around. See all the crumbling? Yeah, we sure as shittin’ all do. Anyone care to dance?
And at the end of it all, the poor soul who tried to help me, bless her heart, couldn’t provide any sort of verification that the problem had actually been solved, even though she said she’s pretty sure it was. But that’s not acceptable. It’s not acceptable to run a business like that, or a government like that, or a school like that, where there’s no one on duty, no one who can assist, no one who knows what’s going on, no one to take responsibility, no one who is willing and able to get to the bottom of things, no one to step up and say, We can fix this–we are better than this. It’s time to clear away the rot.
No hidden agendaNo hidden agenda
“Everything is on such a clear financial basis in France. It is the simplest country to live in. No one makes things complicated by becoming your friend for any obscure reason. If you want people to like you you have only to spend a little money.” – Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises
And yes, never is a very long timeAnd yes, never is a very long time
“Never take counsel of your fears.” – Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson
Further, tooFurther, too
“The difference between constructing a short story and constructing a novel is like the difference between building a rowboat and building a yacht: They both have to float, but one is bigger and grander and meant to carry more people farther. Just as the yacht is not simply a bigger rowboat, the novel is not a bigger short story; knowledge of one doesn’t necessarily translate into knowledge of the other.” – John Stazinski, “A Novel Approach”
Pragmatic knowledgePragmatic knowledge
“Enjoying living was learning to get your money’s worth and knowing when you had it.” – Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises
Mount up!Mount up!
“Caffeine puts a man on her horse and a woman in his grave.” – Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises
A call for blessingsA call for blessings
“May the corn-stalks grow as long as my stretches, and may the will of the Holder of the Roads of Life shelter me from dangers as he sheltered his children in the days of the ancients.” – “The Maiden the Sun Made Love to, and Her Boys,” Zuñi Folk Tales, Frank Cushing
Let that be a lessonLet that be a lesson
“Perhaps had men been more grateful and wiser, the Sun-father had smiled and dropped everywhere the treasures we long for, and not hidden them deep in the earth and buried them in the shores of the sea. And perhaps, moreover, all men would have smiled upon one another and never enlarged their voices nor strengthened their arms in anger toward one another.” – “The Maiden the Sun Made Love to, and Her Boys,” Zuñi Folk Tales, Frank Cushing
Form a line on the rightForm a line on the right
“Doing right keeps right; doing wrong makes wrong, which, to make right, one must even pay.” – “The Cock and the Mouse,” Zuñi Folk Tales, Frank Cushing
But we do it anywayBut we do it anyway
“Remember that war is always a far worse muddle than anything you can produce in peace.” – Sir A. P. Wavell (quoted in Robert K. Krick’s Conquering the Valley)
I do not knowI do not know
“Is it not well that even for a little time the light of life shine—though it shine through fear and sadness—than be cut off altogether? For who knows where the trails tend that lead through the darkness of the night of death?” – “Atahsaia, the Cannibal Demon,” Zuñi Folk Tales, Frank Cushing
And at other times besidesAnd at other times besides
“You have to live with yourself to live by yourself.” – Eugene Marten, In the Blind
Getting their priorities straightGetting their priorities straight
“Pretty girls care very little how their husbands look, being pretty enough themselves for both. But they like to have them able to think and guess at a way of getting along occasionally.” – “How the Corn-Pests Were Ensnared,” Zuñi Folk Tales, Frank Cushing