Stoned Thought #3

Maybe it's just me, but I'm thinking that writers are people who are so nervous about interactions in the world that they run practice scenarios and dialogues in their heads on a regular basis. Some of those end up as (or in) stories.

DDR: In the Spirit of Crazy Horse by Peter Matthiessen

Big book...xli + 646 = 687 pages. And tiny  letters...probably 1 1/2 pages' worth of words on every page. Dare I eat this 🍑?

I don't know. But I'm going to take a bite.

Day 1 (DDRD 3,257) October 4, 2026

Read to page 2.

"Let's not walk on the moon, then fail to understand what this creation is all about. This is life, this is beautiful, everything is the way it should be." (xxxviii)

Day 2 (DDRD 3,258) October 5, 2026

Only read to page 17. Not for lack of interest,  though.

I was pretty thrilled to find out that Peter Matthiessen had written a book about Leonard Peltier. I'd seen the documentary Incident at Oglala (1992) and read Prison Writings: My Life Is My Sun Dance (with a Great Books class to boot), so I was a bit familiar with Peltier's "case," but I was ready for more.

Day 3 (DDRD 3,259) October 6, 2026

Read to page 47.

Going through the "background" material has been very painful. It's just stunning and psinful to think how the Indians were treated. It makes me want to do something...but I have no idea what.

"I hate all the white people. You are thieves and liars. You have taken away our land and made us outcasts." (Sitting Bull, quoted by Dee Brown in Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee page 607.)

Which makes me think...maybe Trump is the quintessential American president: a thief, a liar, a rapist, a fool. Is that who we are?

I fear that it is so.

Toward the end of today's reading, Leonard Peltier came into the story. The pages before his entry were just horrifying. The Indians were treated so terribly, so mercilessly.  It's shameful. 

Day 4 (DDRD 3,260) October 7, 2026

Read to page 77.

Check out this video: "I Hate the White Man" by Roy Harper https://share.google/ben753zwBpjLFYUmj

Day 5 (DDRD 3,261) October 8, 2026

Read to page 107. Leonard Peltier has stepped out of the picture, but the heinous treatment of the Indians continues: people are beaten to death, children are raped, and the land is plundered. So shameful. It also becomes apparent how important AIM was for the American Indians. Their presence altered outcomes in many important cases.

2 Years of the Rosary

Today is Anniversary Day: no missed days in two years. Although there were a few getting up out of bed just as I was falling asleeps, some those gummies are kicking in and I'm really going to have to CONCENtrates, and such likes. 

But I've enjoyed the daily twenty minute meditations. I'm going to do my best to keep at it every day.

For one thing, it gives me a chance to think about my family, my friends, people I know who have suffered from tragedies, people I don't like...as I pair each of the 53 Hail Mary beads with a person in one of the four aforementioned categories. It is an interesting bifurcation, focusing on both the rosary and a person I know simultaneously. 

H. P. Lovecraft

I wanted to see if this poignant line

"writing alone will allow me to endure the final mockeries of living"

was really written by H. P. Lovecraft...or if Romuald Giulivo (writer) + Mercedes Gilliom (translator) had written it in the letter attributed to Lovecraft (writing to Robert E. Howard) in The Last Days of H. P. Lovecraft.

So I " " -ed it and guess what? No results found. I did get this unsolicited AI advice, though:

Thanks fot lurking out for me, AI.

Peter Matthiessen

I've been circling around Peter Matthiessen for several months now. I remember my mom reading one of his books —The Snow Leopard—and I picked up a copy of that and put it on the To Be Read pile. And then more recently the movie At Play in the Fields of the Lord, which is based on a Matthiessen novel, kept coming into my head, so I ordered a copy of that. Before it arrived, however,  I decided that I needed to read the book before rewatching the movie, so I ordered a copy of the novel.  I started reading it right away, just a few pages, and somehow (don't remember how)  found out that Matthiessen had written a book on Leonard Peltier. That one, which is called In the Spirit of Crazy Horse, was available at the library, and it is in my hot little hands right now. I think it's going to be my next DDR after the AFL book.

I also saw a very nice copy of The Peter Matthiesen Reader at Better World Books for a pittance, so....

P.S. Speaking of Better World Books, my other favorite online bookstore, they do some lovely things with a portion of their profits. For instance, this showed up after I placed my order today:

So...you know what to do!