Craven's Fifth

There would be less of everything, he thought, yet only as if affecting him personally, such that he no longer wanted what he believed he wanted from others: their time, their cooperation, their contributions.

Yet didn't he give and sacrifice his time, cooperation, and contribution for the benefit of those who always predicated themselves upon the exploitation of "people being good" or the charity and generosity of kindness?

The transcontinental train, the transcendence of time with speed, would also deliver him from the terrors of the universal mind, the 'pops" and "hits" from others like Doug Ninow, a trainer and human resources specialist, at The Hartford in Tampa, Florida or the steely, unemotive gaze of a Charles Manson, possibly during his 1970's decade heyday, or some cult leader fanatic, a Jim Jones, a Lord of Illusions. Such people even had their own sympathizers that you could meet within every state of the country like even within New Jersey. Quite frankly, no one cared about the differences between hippie and beatnik. Perry Como, Burl Ives, Bing Crosby, Andy Williams, Paul McCartney, or Paul Simon. or Allen Ginsburg.

He travels upon this train with a companion, perhaps male, as the train conducts its normal route and he begins thinking,

"How many major cities have subway trains, subway tunnels, labyrinthine mazes of which New York City has over approximately thousands of miles?"

"Does anyone ride outside between the train cars to deliberately experience their speed?"

The train detours from its destination possibly switiching tracks or rails and like an Amtrak derailing from a CSX mismanaged and ill-maintained rail and track line. Yet while passing through a dark tunnel, he considers those flashes of light, brief and unmomentous, as they remind him of those lost within a blind realm of self-discovery and deception.  There are those who seem to wail,

"People are not "good"!!"

"You can allude to degenerate white men from the 1960's decade in America yet you cannot quote the greatest civil rights leader of all-time, The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.!!"

"If not for him, the evil hatred of others who hate you because you are black would certainly destroy you!!"

"We just don't like that you are free, that you think and live as a free man!!"

"You must suffer and obsess, hate and absolve the guilts for the world's pain and hatred!!"

"Why can't you understand that you are despised because of physical appearance and skin color?!!"

"Why can't you understand that you must honor and tribute King if you have decided to free your mind, think free and act or conduct yourself freely amidst a world of evil hatred?!!"

"You must give yourself a mental problem, neurosis, psychosis, clinical depression, and bi-polar disorder by constantly reminding yourself that you are black, are perceived as black and hated by others!!"

"Must we beat, fight, and kill you until or onto submission?!!"

"Accept that you are lesser and perceived without human dignity by the majority of others!!"

"We will never forget our KIng!!"

"Because he didn't have to be murdered!!"

"So rise above and be a slave, no more!!"

There are those that seem like phantoms, mere ghosts to haunt,

"And apologize to Joan Sweeney, once Chief of the Exempt Organizations/ Employer Plans Division of the Brooklyn District office of the Internal Revenue Service in Brooklyn, New York, because you threw a sign at her!!"

"So what if the IRS is still "A Law Onto Itself", that woman is racist and has been awaiting your demise for years!!"

"Like her contemporaries and cronies, they are not men but cowards who await your degeneration into futility, insanity, hopelessness, despair, and old age!!"

Now he is floating and levitating, rising above some other elevation to arrive upon some other railroad track and rails within the transcendental train while it traverses hazardly and perilously in front of another travelling train which is speeding within another direction, some possible evidence that there are other intelligent sensibilities like his own within the universe although perhaps isolated upon their own transcontinental, transcendental trains and trolley cars, although others persist,

"You must be human to have sensibilities!!"

"You have not sufficiently demonstrated that you are human!!"

"Even the President of the United States alludes to your physical appearance compared to Caucasian!!"

Alyssa Coen, originally of Teletech, in Brandon, Florida once said that she really loved rollercoasters, as he ascends a vertical loop before descending again and rolling, still within the train now travelling at a higher and faster rate of speed. He can observe Nicole Sims of FIS or Fidelity National Information Services formerly Certegy, Inc. formerly Equifax, Inc. in St. Petersburg, Florida posibly as if one passing glare of light still within the tunnel,  Donnie, the Latino male, once from Summer Bay Vacation Resorts in Pinellas Park, Florida, and New York Senator Hillary R. Clinton, also a Democratic Presidential candidate, as if hitting the glass,
yet also a call center associate from the company once located at 1705 North Falkenburg Road, as if sitting within his lap.

The companion, perhaps male, seems to be commenting about the train,

"This is a mass transit experiment and excursion gone awry!"

The train ceases and with it, the world is less fair and less just. There are fewer opportunities to frequent anywhere without combustion of fuels or arrive at destinations partitioned by water, sea, or the limitations and restrictions of society or people. The infra and outerstructures crumble while he perceives his banishment from former U.S. Attorney General/former New York City mayor/ current Republican candidate for President, Rudolph Guiliani, and former New York State Attorney General/current Governor of New York, Eliot Spitzer, former New York City Fire or Police Commisioner, Bernard Kozik, and Victoria Gotti, Mafia Princess and celebrity, as they remark or comment,

"New York City never liked you, never wanted you living within it, and still doesn't!!"

"Don't show your face within that city, ever again!!"

"And Rudy and Bernie are front men for the mob!!"

But then a train conductor announces and requests,

"Anyone who prefers to ride or to continue riding this train again must pay another fare!!"

What is the key to good conflict resolution? Is is mediation, conciliation, consolation, concession, confrontation, or forfeiture? Someone demands some right and priviledge or entitlement and those demanded are immediately empowered as if they have some priviledge, advantage, or benefit to grant others that didn't already belong to those requesting it. The condescension and patronage of being harassed, challenged to react or resist like from his team manager and another call center associate from the company once located at 1705 North Falkenburg Road in Tampa, Florida  reminds him that evil seeks to destroy absolutely.

He knows people who can sleep through fire sirens, smoke detector alarms, alarm clocks, cacaphonous phone rings, loud radio music, and blaring television surround sound systems. Some people can actually sleep through anything, ignore anything and usually such people can ignore him, too. Just like the want of sleep, all else seems irrelevant, superfluous, and redundant of one single notion in mind. You don't matter.  With this in mind, who determines what matters to others? If social conventions regulate and monitor our psychological needs for love and acceptance, (if these be psychological and not mere social conventionist thinking to justify more social conventions), why do they become elitist or elusive, high-priced commodities too invaluable to bestow others? How have we become sadists/masochists for the deprivation and denial of others and possibly even ourselves?

He asks himself if people still prefer to be buried or even cremated upon the transformation or passage into enlightenment. Or if fond memories of the deceased are cherished or conversely desecrated because of the resentment for their respect and dignity, although others shout untenably at him,

"Will you please show some remorse and sorrow for the death of your mother?!!"

"Do you finally know what death really is?!!"

"Can you write about it such that you evoke the same pain and emotion among others for the deceased individual that actual respective loved ones might wrenchingly feel amidst themselves?!"



1. Emily Corder
2. Sandy Welch
3. Michelle Way