It was one early, February covid day when I broke my usual silence.

I was qued up with a gaggle of fellow gasoline serfs in our local co-op fuel station, collectively drifting in and out of linehood when a member attendant queried the actively waiting.

“Pump number 4?” She asked without prejudice.

I was pump number 4 that day so I immediately responded “present!” to which the attending attendant replied with her eyes “keep your distance weirdo” instantly propelling me into a crazy town only talk can get a person out of.

“A hundred and forty-seven dollars even” continued the smiless member attendant.

Now it was the senior moron’s turn to squeak.

“You know, when I was sixteen I was a gas jockey and I squeezed ten dollars worth of gas into a woman’s Pontiac, and she refused to pay, saying there’s no way 10 bucks worth of gas would fit in her car.”

I pregnant paused for impact, then continued fabling.

“The gas station manager explained how i maybe hadn’t zeroed out the pump before filling her car and he cut her bill in half to only five dollars.”

“I really did pump ten bucks worth of gas into her car,” I clarified, “and that woman would be astonished to see what a fuel fillup costs today…”

Stunned silence from the gasoline serfs as I brought my economic lesson to an awkward culmination.

“A hundred and forty-seven dollars,” the attendant said a bit more loudly as the guy behind me expanded his social distance.

Here fishy fish fish!

Hop into my kettle.

No, you wouldn’t settle

You goddamn nonconformist!

Now you taste the bitter

Of an it won’t stop no-hitter.

Protesting loses power as the

Sentiment of the hour

Is hungry.

I’m so hungry…

Here, fishy fishy fish!

Let’s pretend you have a gun.

You want fun and to find some

You put boring on the run

Come undone.

You’re the one

You say stop or we will shoot

We still loot

With your boot

Firmly stepping on our throat.

You know that we didn’t vote

For you try hard to get our goat

To cross our moat

In a holy boat.

That won’t float.

Mr. President, you can’t swim.

The police officer is your friend not.

The police officer he won’t lie not.

The police are honest people not.

The police don’t cover shit up not.

The police investigate their own not.

The police are to be trusted not.

They’re good guys not.

Too many been caught.

Covering up their rot.

The police have got

To go.

We need a new force for good.

We must start again.

Well we said this and we said that.

Circumstances change Bud, that’s a fact.

You go ahead, there ain’t no back.

You’ll get it right in a minute.

Feels like hell once you’re in it.

But you can get out.

No needa shout.

Or flail about

It’s just a wet sack

Punch through it.

Free! Stuff was free!

They were giving it all away!

There was just no friggin way

One could lose.

Less you choose

Not to partake of

The partay

Because it’s their way

Or the highway

Doing spoonwork

For some fat jerk…

And lovin’ that Brown Nose Shitaay!

Oh you don’t realize who you are!

Who you are!

Who you are!

You are you but not too far.

You could be another star.

You could change and change so far.

You could hate your neighbor.

You could demand favor.

You could be a savior.

Or you could kill

And likely will.

When they say kill

You will sir.

WHO wants you dead.

They put a price on your head.

Just like Cicero said.

They take your hands

Then take your head.

Don’t slit your own throat.

Buddy ain’t no goat.

Andy don’t know it

But slitting ain’t befitting

Any profit you be gitting

Goes right to the next guy

Maybe kiss goodbye

Those things that compel you

To do what you must do

To get yourself at monaay!

In sanity,

Your friend Barry.

You hit the ball then I hit the ball then

Billy Bob Smith winds up his driver

Straight down the fairway and

Stuck in your airway a Yay!

For today

You remember that round in September

When life was so tender

We touched and embraced and revealed

Our humanity but

Dammit he

Thought now that’s no longer

Each has to be stronger than

Useless emotions that portray

The notion that

People stand taller together.

Stay away from the old folks.

What? You want them dead?!

Stay away from the children too.

Stay in the bubble in your head.

Keep your distance. Humans are bad.

No hug yo’ mama. Not your dad.

Everyone’s a stranger. Everyone’s disease.

You hug yourself now. Touch don’t please

The soul like it once did.

Back when we had souls.

Oh you should see the devil’s smile!

Lucifer grins like sin.

Grind your will to a yassuh pulp.

Loser you shall win.

End like you begin.

Come on, come right in!

You are a good mate.

Shall not debate.

Whom gets berate.

When you come late

To a party that starts with cleanup.

There might be only a thousand to one.

We’re taking the triple six back.

A kid dies and you send everyone.

They’re born and you give ’em a slap.

You’ve hunted this forrest too many eons.

It’s time we covered your tracks.

We’re taking the sixes which

Pretty much nixes your chance of

Regaining that lack.

So slewfoot get back on your side!

The little town where you reside.

It’s surrounded by threes now.

The Lucifer Hoosecow.

We hope you enjoy your new life…

God says jump!

You ask how high? How high?

God says jump up to the sky.

You don’t ask why.

This ain’t no try.

You’re the guy.

Fly guy fly!

And when you’re coming down you ask…

Was this the task…

The time just past,

Had it past at last?

Or was this all a dream naw?

Couldn’t be.

Shouldn’t be.

Better be

Real.

Or no needa feel

This tremblin’.

The score don’t matter when

You’re hanging with the crowd.

Sitting on yer ass when there’s a wave

It ain’t allowed.

You yell like the others ’til

Your voice is nearly gone.

Wearin’ copy uniforms and it will never dawn

Upon you

That you

Are not enjoying.

What they’re employing see

So annoyingly

You are not free.

You clap and holler like the others.

The trick or treaters come out at night.

To many trickers it don’t feel right.

Shoppin’ when and where there’s not a cop in

Sight. But what ya gonna do when baby

Cries at night? That ain’t right!

So to night

Like any other.

Every good mother.

Watchin’ to see lights on and

If anyone’s at home.

You better watch out.

Better not pout.

Santa Claus is coming to town.

He foils every Santa alarm.

Shushes every bark.

Drinks a million cups of milk.

This all for his work.

Easter Bunny.

Kinda funny.

Hiding eggs of chicken.

And hanging quite the lickin’.

On chock-late likeness of itself.

It can’t help…

It’s ordered to.

Has to do

What it’s told to.

By the fairy who

Buys fresh teeth from children.

No one else can shit your pants.

No they can’t.

Try, but shan’t.

No one else can make you cry.

Do or die.

Wonder why.

Why the beggars even try.

No one else can make you brave.

Brave to save.

You and loved ones from the grave.

No one else cares more than you.

You must too.

You must care more than they do.

You be true.

First to you.

In sanity,

Your friend Barry.

A friend is not a person, it’s a thing.

That person may well outlive your friendship. The thing that existed even if one of you wished it didn’t, like some illegitimate child.

Relationships grow and falter and die. Relationships steal and give and make you cry. Every person begins their relationships crying, most out loud, some out loud forever.

Relationships burn in the sun, die in the dark and wilt in a few short days without attention.

Attention is their food.

The ugly ones don’t need feeding.

In sanity,

Your friend Barry.

You watched your step.

This way and that.

Get smoked by a carriage.

Step in some crap.

No goddamn helmets

No glasses.

No gloves.

No goddamn crosswalks.

No steel toes.

No huddles.

You watched your own way

And one other back.

Knew them without wits

Had boots shined with crap.

A man with a gun and a bullet proof vest.

Ain’t no effing hero.

Could be mothershootin’ zero.

Nope. He ain’t no hero.

A guy with a hose and an oxygen tank.

Ain’t a goddamn hero.

Without coin he ain’t even here no.

A gang member ain’t no hero.

A woman with a mask and a stethoscope.

That woman is no hero.

She’s working the job she chose and trained to do.

She’s paid damn well and mistakes are on you.

She’s doing exactly what she wants to do.

That woman ain’t no hero.

There’s a guy lost his house, his job, his life.

Whistleblowing loser even lost his wife.

Everything because he wrongly assumed right.

He don’t feel heroic but he is alright.

…

A momma wakes her baby who’s been up all night.

Her baby fights a fever momma’s broke it right.

A world she fights alone and she’ll be alright.

Because she’s a hero each and every night.

She doesn’t give a thought to her heroic plight.

If you ask, she ain’t no hero.

You are stupid. You don’t matter. No one cares about you.

You are ugly. From a bad family. You know you are screwed.

Because you think, you are.

That’s how powerful, you.

In sanity,

Your friend Barry.

Most folks have never seen shit hit a fan.

Shit doesn’t hit all at once. It starts with a dribble of shit, then a squirt, finally a steady flow called shit creek.

Now, you want to be downstream shit creek because upcreek there are no paddles and paddles are necessary to keep away from the shore.

See, the shore is where all the shit disturbers live and they take all the fun out of tubing shit creek.

Go with the flow but on the surface, not floundering in shit like the unpaddled.

Ride shit creek thru shit storms until you arrive at shit swamp, where everything, including you, settles out.

And remember, eyes skyward.

In sanity,

Your friend Barry.

Scary rides aren’t so scary the second time around because life is invested in diminishing returns.

Love fades. Bread moulds. Boredom is.

Life isn’t fun. It can be fun, but for the most part, it just is.

Life is the bowl, you are the soup.

Get it into you and enjoy…

In sanity,

Your friend Barry.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/anhedonia

Don’t get all tied up about work or:

• your church or
• country or
• your god or
• your favorite color or
• your skin color or
• your address or
• your bank account or
• your car or
• your degree or
• your reputation
• your watch collection
• your talents
• your circumstances
• your parents
• your luck

Everything is temporary when you forget about time.

This ain’t your first rodeo and it won’t be your last. Enjoy the stampede!

In sanity,

Your friend Barry.

So when you walk too fast past the neighbor’s house, he attacks you.

If you happen to glance when the neighbor is glancing, he’ll throw shit right in your eyes. You’ll get cataracts if you’re lucky.

And the couple of times the neighbor’s woke you up in the middle of the night by stabbing you deep in each calf?

Ooch that effing hurt and you hollered GODDAMN IT YOU SONOFABITCH but the neighbor left his knife in, fucking thing flopping out the wound as you kangaroo’d about the room at 3 a.m.

That was fun… remember?

Oh, and remember when he wouldn’t let you piss or get a goddamn boner?! You could hear the bastard chuckling as your bladder slowly exploded but that wasn’t the worst. How many times when you wanted to practice procreating, that SONOFABITCH was waiting in the closet to ensure there’d be humiliation and guilt where heaven, you hoped, might be?

Will you be friends with your neighbor?

He wants to be your body.

In sanity,

Your friend Barry.

Why do you look for freedom in the street?

Because that’s where they keep it…

Deese guys we now follow are heading toward the cliff and at the last moment they peel off while de heard dey tink goes over.

It’s a warped record with many coins piled on the stylus and soon you will need that spoonful of sugar to help the medicine go down.

There’s a grocery shortage coming. Bigger than toilet paper, flour and yeast. This shortage is a you’re getting punched in the mouth shortage and grocery “shopping” by birthdate / virus card.

Start your own secret society now and build it quickly. Watch for wolves and maybe get one of those biting alarm systems. Start a dawg for a day biz.

Start keeping secrets.

Stop grassing.

In sanity,

Your friend Barry.

Take a quick peek around your humble abode.

Look at everything. The pictures, frames, glass, walls, paint, furniture, shellac, light fixtures, carpet, stupid little ornaments…

Take a long, hard look at your environment. And then slowly come to the realization that YOU HAVE NO PART IN IT!

You didn’t make SHIT!

Like the humble squirrel, you just brought it here, to this place you call home.

You. Don’t. Make. Your. Life.

You just live it…

But if you want to stop living like y’herd, you gotta stop accepting shit as it is.

You gotta change something.

Change your world, you change yourself.

Change yourself and choose your world.

Make it one that’s better fit for cats and dogs and cows and y’all.

In sanity,

Your friend Barry.

Broccoli? Who the hell likes broccoli?

That’s a coupon waiting to be sold.

Coupons?

That’s a market about to explode.

Is all.

In sanity,

Your friend Barry.

Eyes. Ears. Nose. Mouth. Skin.

And attention.

Morphogenetic energy.

https://www.sheldrake.org/research/morphic-resonance/introduction

You don’t have much so I’ll pay you fast, okay?

What you focus on, you become.

Whatever you give your attention to, owns you.

People are owned by pets, relationships, countries, gangs, sports (once upon a time) games, jobs, religions, brands, cultures, fashions, marketers, lotteries, cities, neighbors, cops, landlords, banks, bingo halls… to name but a few owners.

Drapetomania

You are infected with something right now that you likely didn’t know you were infected with.

What To Do?

1. Decide to arm yourself with you. Wake the fuck up and start paying attention!
2. Look down the road. Shit just changed big time and the FENCES ARE DOWN! Start making 12 month plans.
3. Herd, ya heard?! You are a bovine. You have dog brain. At least that’s what “they” think. START THINKING HU MAN, like only Hu Man’s can… Da Golden rule.
4. Get food and networking. If you can’t make gold, make friends. They’re gonna be worth more.

Stay tuned. Shit’s gonna get nasty and all the things we bought insurance for are going to happen. There goes our premiums!

In sanity,

Your friend Barry.

UN WARNS OF FAMINES OF BIBLICAL PROPORTIONS DUE TO LOCKDOWN CAUSED BY COVID PLANDEMIC

She loved to hear her mother laugh.

Memories causing present laughs.

You’re in the moment, not the past.

You’re shining bright but it won’t last.

Step on your brake or hit the gas.

It all adds up and pretty fast.

Your numbers put you to the test.

There is a number of the best.

Six six six sick!

You leave the rest… you got the thickest.

Pain flops from eye to head.

You want so bad to avoid dead.

Pain flaps from even said!

It licks it’s chops with sharp tongued dread.

Screaming vibes attack haired neck.

Your eyes turn wide and mighty fast.

You better have some plenty Karma.

Or Evil’s gonna kick your ass.

And ass kickings, they leave a mark.

A big ‘ol mark of being beat.

You get what’s left while running backwards.

It’s Evil three three three.