Saturday Night Live and Hemingway (but really Hemingway)

Originally this blog post was going to focus on the television show “Saturday Night Live” as seen through my eyes over the past several decades.  I even had a keen observation on the  “Not Ready for Prime Time Players”.  Belushi (John not Jim) was definitely the Id whereas Ackyroyd (Dan not Peter) was the Ego.  Gilda was the heart, Jane the face, Lorraine the inner child, Garrett gave the cast some theatre cred and Billy I think was the soul.  Chevy in some ways I think was the Super Ego, but I may be stretching that just to include the whole Freudian psyche model. 

 Then I read Ernest Hemingway’s “The Green Hills of Africa”

Then something changed.

     I have been trying to write this post for weeks.  I’ve debated back and worth of writing a fictional story embracing the concept or just to go forward as a standard post.  Time and a desire to communicate, even if it is just me yelping from the blogosphere as pushed me toward the latter, but the former hopefully will be on some page in the future. I am still fathoming the passage listed below; an echo that rings back and forth at my core.  A competing call that sounds against the constant uncertainty that plays inside.  A call to truth, my truth and to write that truth and share it no matter the lack of reward or recognition, simply for the sake of the quest (Hemingway uses the word hunt, but I like quest, it is more noble) itself.  Can the madness of Don Quixote still persevere in this modern world, consuming its victims as it has over the centuries and propelling them to fight, to woo, and in then end to succumb to their fate.  It’s a far better adventure than what I am on now and I can’t help to be a bit excited about embracing the madness, but decades of being cautionary is not easily dismissed.  I suppose not every journey begins with a leap.  Bilbo’s began with one step; one step and then another, and another. 

   I have copied the excerpt from the book and listed it below.  Read at your own risk!

“Now it is pleasant to hunt something that you want very much over a long period of time, being outwitted, out-maneuvered, and failing at the end of each day, but having the hunt and knowing every time that you are out that, sooner or later, your luck will change and that you will get the chance that you are seeking.  But it is not pleasant to have a time limit by which you must get your kudu or perhaps never get it, nor even see one.

     It is not the way hunting should be.  It is too much like those boys who used to be sent to Paris with two years in which to make good as writers or painters after which, if they had not made good as writers or painters, after which, if they had not made good, they could go home and into their father’s business.  The way to hunt is for as long as you live against as long as there is such and such an animal; just as the way to paint is as long as there is you and colors, and canvas, and to write as long as you can live and there is pencil and paper or ink or any machine to do it with, or anything you care to write about, and you feel a fool, and you are a fool, to do it any other way. “

I Got Nothing

     I have nothing to say.  That is not entirely true; I seem to always have something to say, but nothing significant on any particular theme for the blog.  This post will be more of a potluck of various subjects and perhaps writing in this stream of consciousness something of some note will occur.

I AM IN A PLAY

     Rehearsals have started for Bare Theatre’s production of “As You Like It” and I am in the show playing the part of Silvius, a lovesick shepherd trying to woo and win the heart of the elusive Phebe.  I am excited about the show for several reasons.  1^st, I love Shakespeare shows and I love working with my friends at Bare Theatre.  I am also excited about the setting of the play in Appalachia, a region in which I feel that I have some expertise in. I don’t know if I consider Shawsville pure Appalachia, more of a small community with Appalachian tendencies. but I definitely had a rural upbringing. Also this will be a somewhat musical show.  The bluegrass band, The Zinc Kings, have been writing music, and the songs I have heard are great.  It is a nice ambiance being outside with the bluegrass playing  (I like a good fiddle song).  That being said, it is HOT.  I mean North Carolina July/August hot.  I knew this of course going in to the show. The key I suppose is how to use the heat to my advantage in order to use it for my character development (perhaps my character should be famous for his icy thermos of lemonade).  It does make me thankful for conditioned air.  I don’t remember a lot of air conditioning when I was a kid (I know we didn’t have it in the trailer), and I don’t know how we survived.  Regardless, I am happy to be in the show and everyone reading this should definitely check it out if they can in late August!

SANTA CLAUS, ANDY GRIFFITH, and ABRAHAM LINCOLN ATTEND A PLAY

     So I attended the 10x10 festival at the Arts Center in Carrboro, NC last Saturday.  A friend of mine, Mora Harris has a play in the festival  (titled “What You Don’t Know” and a very good play at that), All in all it was a great showcase.  The plays were great and the cast fantastic.  Even some of the “weaker” pieces were acted out magnificently and I highly recommend the show.  Also in attendance that night in the audience were a Santa Claus, Abraham Lincoln and Andy Griffith impersonator(s).   In hindsight I suppose I wish I had talked to them more, but I just thought it was too weird (especially having Abraham Lincoln in a theatre, isn’t that in bad taste?)  Abraham Lincoln and Santa Claus (Santa wasn’t dressed in his winter garb, but a green and red t-shirt/pants ensemble) cornered my playwright friend in hopes of having her write a play for them.  I managed to get her clear of them once, but they persisted and cornered her gain and finally she was rescued by one of the cast (great save Mary!) and taken to a safe, but undisclosed location (well the bar across the street).  In the impersonator’s defense, the Andy Griffith guy really looked a lot like Andy Griffith (Matlock Andy).  I just can’t imagine when you would need an Andy Griffith impersonator.  Abraham Lincoln, I suppose in some type of re-enactment, and Santa has the month of December covered, but when do you need an Andy?  I mean perhaps a pickle-judging contest?  All in all I thought it was odd, but then I felt bad thinking that the impersonation of these celebrated figures might be their only way to relate to the outside world.  What If I was mocking them, and failing to see the positive gifts they had to offer.  If it were a movie, that would make me the bad guy.  I thought about that for a while, and then went back to my original observation of thinking they were just weird and that I was not a movie bad guy after all.

THE RULE OF THREE

   The above two sub sections are pretty much all that I have, but I felt that I needed a third sub-header in order to fulfill the “rule of three”.  Life is busy at the moment.   I have a lot of things on my plate of late, trying to make some healthier choices and working on using my time better.  I don’t feel like I am accomplishing any significant changes, but perhaps in writing about it, even a little bit in the blog will push me to try harder.  Ok, that’s it.  Git on now, just git (Silvius’ words, not mine).

  

C.E. Keith II - News and Observer subscriber and Citizen!

     I recently received an e-mail via Groupon concerning a discounted offer for a subscription to the  Raleigh News and Observer at a discounted rate.  Now being in IT for the past fifteen years which involves sitting behind a computer for a good part of the day, almost all  of the  news I read is  on the Web; WRAL, CNN, AP, PBS, etc. I peruse these sites mainly hitting the highlights and occasionally posting an interesting article to Facebook.  That being said, deep down I actually prefer an old-fashioned newspaper.  I like the sound of the turning of the pages, I like being able to fold it up and get comfortable. If you see a man with a newspaper, there is a man who is informed, whereas a man with an iPad is probably just playing Words with Friends or something of the sort. My dad takes the paper and has ever since I have known him which is going on forty three years soon. Growing up, that was part of his morning routine, the paper and a lot of coffee.  Dad takes great care in reading a newspaper. Once he is finished, the paper looks barely touched, whereas when I am finished with one, it is barely recognizable which in my teen years was one of several sources of irritation between father and son.  Back to 2013, I see this  N&O Groupon, I take the bait, and voila, I am a brand spanking new subscriber.  I now take the paper.  Add this with incorporating hot tea back into my diet of late and another proud generation of the Keith clan is continuing the proud tradition of hot caffeinated beverages and keeping abreast of current events.  We do indeed live in exciting times.  That being said, I was reading the paper this past Tuesday morning (July 2, 2013 for you reading this at the C.E. Keith II Museum located in Shawsville, VA in the year 2125) when I happened upon an editorial written by Rep. George Holding concerning the cost associated with President Obama's recent trip to Africa'  "What means this I say?".  Why is the distinguished gentleman from Wake County taking the time to write an op/ed piece that is petty and partisan?  There are so many issues we are facing as a country, heck that we are facing as a state and even as a county, and this is what our congressman decides to take a stand on, that the president's trip costs a lot of money!  I was incensed (ok, more annoyed than incensed, but I have to used inflammatory language to keep the high school kids on a field trip in the future engaged in this), and being so incited, I took up my pen and I wrote a response to the congressman and sent it to the editor!  In truth it was an e-mail to the editorial mailing list and some intern probably sorts through them, but to you future kids at Shawsville Intergalactic High School,  I have now followed in the footsteps of many a great statesmen and submitted my opinion to the city's leading newspaper in order to shine a light in the dark places which do dot the littered landscape of the The People's Forum on the editorial page.  So in taking on such a daunting task, perhaps I should sign such a piece with my full given name, no?  I will admit, it does have a nice ring, but it doesn't quite strike the right tone.  I could just go with my nickname, but I don't want to appear too folksy.  I know, I will used my first and middle initial and then my last name with suffix so that they won't think that it is my dad relapsing on coffee.  Thus C.E. Keith II, a man who take the paper, a voice crying in the wilderness!  Citizen and hot tea drinker!
    Perhaps a tad much, but please bear in mind posterity is reading this and this blog piece is no doubt competing with some holographic X-Station virtual reality game implant in your great great grand kid's eye.  I am not sure if the N&O will print my editorial (if they do not, I am sure the future kids are laughing at this huge error on the N&O's part) so for my blog subscribers I have added it below.  Enjoy and note the clever twist at the end.

     In U.S. Rep. George Holding’s editorial “Obama’s Costly Trip to Africa” in the July 2^nd edition of the News and Observer, Mr. Holding points out that the president’s recent trip to Africa will cost up to $100 million dollars.  Mr. Holding states that although it is important that the president “foster bilateral relations with foreign nations” and that this is a “crucial role” for the president, the costs for this trip to Africa at a time when Americans are “out of work and struggling to make ends meet” are just too much.  Mr. Holding also points out that $100 million could “pay the annual salary of 2,000 teachers in North Carolina or of the 22,000 civilian employees who were furloughed in the state due to defense cuts”.

   I agree with Mr. Holding, that it is crucial for our president, as part of his job, to foster bilateral relations with foreign nations.  This aspect of the chief executive’s position sometimes requires him to travel abroad and yes that can be very expensive, but alas it is one of the president’s many responsibilities that he is expected to discharge.  I also agree that$100 million is a lot of money.  It would be far lest costly if the president could have accomplished the objectives on this trip via Skype, I would love to see that money spent to help people hard hit in these rough economic times such as the 22,000 civilian employs who were furloughed due to defense cuts that occurred because of the sequester that Rep. Holding voted for.  Mr. Holding is quick to point out the costs that are incurred with the president fulfilling his duties, but the real costs are inflicted upon his constituents due to the failure of Mr. Holding and his esteemed colleagues to legislate any real solutions in regards to the many issues facing our country, such as our national debt, our immigration crisis, major issues involving gun-violence, and such.  The Congress was elected to make laws and to govern, that is their job.  So in that it is nice to see that the distinguished gentlemen representing Wake County is privy to the hard times facing people in North Carolina, let us implore him to do the job that he was elected for and to allow the president to do his.

C.E. Keith II

Yeah well it didn't work out so well

     Alright it looks like I didn't keep up with my original commitment concerning the blog venture.  I think the issue was that I was worried about it being good.  If I think about it that attitude seems dissuade me from finishing projects I think.  Mind you I am not going for a whole "single bullet' theory on why I don't finish things.  I'm easily distracted, I am horrible with time management, and I do have my melancholy moods in which I just swim around in the myriad of thoughts and daydreams which come and go like the tide in my head.  I'll let you in on a little secret, the only reason I'm even this blog post now is that I'm going through my bookmarks and updating sites with a new password.  I've established a new password policy for my personal accounts and I am in the process of implementing it.  A fairly mundane Monday night.  I tried watching a movie from my queue, but I just couldn't get into the "Fighting Kentuckian" with John Wayne, though this also had Oliver Hardy in in (minus Stan Laurel) which I thought was intriguing.  The movie also starred Vera Ralston who I understand (from IMDB and from trying to watch this movie) was a horrible actress, but luckily was loved by her husband the head of Republic Pictures.  Alright, well that is all I have to say now.  Who knows, I may post again, and then I may not.  I did enjoy writing this little blurb.  Right now I'm playing with the thought of creating some characters who I might let have a voice in some postings. No promises, but we shall see. Until you read again!

Chuck