pianogonzology: death

Showing posts with label death. Show all posts

Friday, September 7, 2018

The Place . . .

. . . we have reached

The recent funeral services (and accompanying media coverage) for U.S. Senator John McCain, were respectful, appreciative and seemingly non-partisan. 'Seemingly' is the operative word here. Many sources are available that question McCain's actual patriotism, bravery and present contradictions in the details of his life(the devastating fire and explosions that killed 134 sailors on the aircraft carrier USS Forrestal during the Vietnam War). I have always felt that death brings out the most generous forgiveness in we humans; take for example the demise of both Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan.

We can only imagine the 'heartfelt' tributes that will accompany the passing of Henry Kissinger. This can be interpreted as either good or bad. We are each, individually entitled to select those that we admire and choose to remember in longingly reverent fashion. I do however wish that the media would cover the past lives of public figures as actual news stories (i.e., presentations of factual information about accomplishments as well as failures) and not as fawning tributes to the deceased which disregard the latters' humanity, both good and bad.

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(To Access all Ray Jozwiak - Gonzo Piano music you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
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Tuesday, May 29, 2018

Merciless . . .

Merciless death strikes conclusively
True, many view it as the beginning
Of a new, 'eternal life' of some sort
But no matter how you slice it
Death makes life miserable
For those that survive
At least in the short term

Merciless
©2018 Raymond M. Jozwiak

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Saturday, March 31, 2018

My Head . . .

. . . or more specifically, the contents therein, provide me with a wealth of entertainment. Musing on the past, present, life, death, the world, the country . . . it's endless. Today, for some reason, the past took front and center, and monopolized the activities of the grey matter for a portion of the early morning hours. The past and my place in it and the person I was in that place back then would pretty much sum it up. I was timid, unsure. So many personalities come to mind; personalities that I envied for your sheer joy, their fearlessness, their humor and their confidence. Then I wonder, where are they now? What are they like now? Are they still joyful, fearless, funny and confident?

GOOGLE? . . .

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Monday, April 17, 2017

High Ground . . .

. . . ???

Former U.S. President George W. Bush on morality . . .

(http://www.npr.org/2017/04/13/523615019/president-george-w-bush-foreign-aid-in-u-s-national-security-and-moral-interest)
"When you have an entire generation of people being wiped out and the free world turns its back, it provides a convenient opportunity for people to spread extremism," he said. He added, "I believe in this case that it's in our national security interests as well as in our moral interest to continue funding this program."

Results of U.S. President George W. Bush's policy in Iraq . . . .

(from https://antiwar.com/casualties/)
American Deaths Total In Combat
Since war began (3/19/03): 4,497 3,529
Since "Mission Accomplished" (5/1/03) (the list) 4,351 3,425
Since Handover (6/29/04): 3,631 2,900
Since Obama Inauguration (1/20/09): 260 128
Since Operation New Dawn: 66 39
American Wounded Official Estimated
Total Wounded: 32,021 Over 100,000

Others
Iraqi Deaths Due to U.S. Invasion 1,455,590
Other Coalition Troops - Iraq 321
US Military Deaths - Afghanistan 2,382
Other Military Deaths - Afghanistan 1,127
Contractor Employee Deaths - Iraq 1,487
Journalists - Iraq 348
Academics Killed - Iraq 448
Sources: DoD, MNF, and iCasualties.org

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Get your copy of OHO's Where Words Do Not Reach now!
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Tuesday, March 28, 2017

Lest We . . .

. . . forget . . .

. . . there was another pope, in our lifetime, with the same potential as Pope Francis. Tragic story though. . .

(from http://www.nairaland.com/3339/murder-name-god-slaying-pope)

Pope John Paul I died only 33 days into his Pontificate (August 26, 1978 - September 28, 1978). It was one of the shortest reigns in the annals of the papacy. The official cause of death was myocardial infarction (a heart attack). But there was a great deal of confusion in the details of his sudden death, and many were crying - murder!

The "Smiling Pope," as he was affectionately called was born Albino Luciani on October 17, 1912 near Belluno, Italy. He was ordained in 1935, made Bishop in 1958 and became patriarch of Venice in 1969. He received his cardinal's hat in 1973. He was a staunch believer in ecumenism and the reduction of Church wealth. He was warm, humble and had no aspirations for the papacy. After Pope Paul VI died, Luciani was elected on the second day of the Conclave in 1978. He refused to wear the papal tiara or to be carried in the gestatorial chair. He was praised as a liberal reformer who read Mark Twain. He was on a mission to reverse the Church's position on contraception, cleaning up the Vatican bank and dismissing many Masonic cardinals.

What do you think?
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My latest solo offering, No Frills, is now available at - No Frills

(To Access all Ray Jozwiak - Gonzo Piano music you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
your browser: http://www.cdbaby.com/Artist/RayJozwiak)

Get your copy of OHO's Where Words Do Not Reach now!
The Ocean City Ditty Video is now on YouTube
Also, be sure to visit: www.rayjozwiak.com and www.ohomusic.com

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Friday, March 10, 2017

Bad . . .

. . . news . . .

Protesters killed in South Korea

Lawmakers struggle to write a healthcare law to replace the Affordable Care Act

FBI investigates 'Odd' link between Russian bank and Trump organization

Military's nude photo scandal widens

Ethics office rebukes WH over Conway's Ivanka Trump plug

2 deaths linked to Listeria in cheese

What do you think?
Tell me at
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http://www.ohomusic.com

My latest solo offering, No Frills, is now available at - No Frills

(To Access all Ray Jozwiak - Gonzo Piano music you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
your browser: http://www.cdbaby.com/Artist/RayJozwiak)

Get your copy of OHO's Where Words Do Not Reach now!
The Ocean City Ditty Video is now on YouTube
Also, be sure to visit: www.rayjozwiak.com and www.ohomusic.com

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Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Fixing . . .

. . . up our performance of Blue Fix . . .

To the one with the key can this thing be known
She’s in tune and in time and she sings with tone
Back to the truth of her core
Back where she waits evermore to shine

Night of vast silence held in suspense
Hints at the content the sense and tense
There in the beam of her moon
Inspiring just the right loon for tunes

Gravitate to the place where no one but you
Believes that it’s holy
Spin around and around until you fall down
Because you’re so dizzy
Spitting into the face of the fate you’d escape
By loving ascension
Older than death closer than breath
Before there were symbols and sounds

How to unstick from the fix you’re in?
With your ear to the sky call the voice of the wind
Gathering kernels and seeds
Forming silk furrows where they’ll be sown
Recalling in keenness of mind
A word that is older than thought and time

Discovering fire again
In a thunderbolt sent through a pen
Pure word

Blue Fix
OHO, rehearsal recording August 2015

What do you think?
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OHO's "Ocean City Ditty," the CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD) OHO is Jay Graboski, David Reeve & Ray Jozwiak. Please Visit http://www.ohomusic.com

My latest solo offering, Just More Music by Ray Jozwiak, featuring original, instrumental piano music is now available at - Just More Music by Ray Jozwiak

(To Access all Ray Jozwiak - Gonzo Piano music you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
your browser: http://http://www.cdbaby.com/Artist/RayJozwiak)

Also, be sure to visit:
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Friday, August 7, 2015

Notably . . .

. . . wise

(from http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/08/19/7-lessons-from-socrates-on-wisdom-wealth-and-the-g.aspx. . . totally out of the original context but genuinely appreciated)
"Those who are already wise no longer love wisdom – whether they are gods or men. Similarly, those whose own ignorance has made them bad, rotten, evil, do not strive for wisdom either. For no evil or ignorant person ever strives for wisdom. What remains are those who suffer from ignorance, but still retain some sense and understanding. They are conscious of knowing what they don't know."

"Well I am certainly wiser than this man. It is only too likely that neither of us has any knowledge to boast of; but he thinks that he knows something which he does not know, whereas I am quite conscious of my ignorance. At any rate it seems that I am wiser than he is to this small extent, that I do not think that I know what I do not know."

"Oh my friend, why do you, who are a citizen of the great and mighty and wise city of Athens, care so much about laying up the greatest amount of money and honor and reputation, and so little about wisdom and truth and the greatest improvement of the soul, which you never regard or heed at all? Are you not ashamed of this?"

"For I go about doing nothing else than urging you, young and old, not to care for your persons or your property more than for the perfection of your souls, or even so much; and I tell you that virtue does not come from money, but from virtue comes money and all other good things to man, both the individual and to the state."

"Fellow citizens, why do you turn and scrape every stone to gather wealth, and, yet, take so little care of your own children, to whom one day you must relinquish all."

"In truth, the fear of death is nothing but thinking you're wise when you are not, for you think you know what you don't. For no one knows whether death happens to be the greatest of all goods for humanity, but people fear it because they're completely convinced it is the greatest of evils. And isn't this ignorance, after all, the most shameful kind: thinking you know what you don't."

"At the time, I made it clear once again, not by talk but by action, that I didn't care at all about death – if I'm not being too blunt to say it – but it mattered everything that I do nothing unjust or impious, which matters very much to me. For though it had plenty of power, that government didn't frighten me into doing anything that's wrong."

Developing Wisdom
©2015 Raymond M. Jozwiak

What do you think?
Tell me at
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http://www.ohomusic.com

OHO's "Ocean City Ditty," the CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD) OHO is Jay Graboski, David Reeve & Ray Jozwiak. Please Visit http://www.ohomusic.com

My latest solo offering, Just More Music by Ray Jozwiak, featuring original, instrumental piano music is now available at - Just More Music by Ray Jozwiak

Saturday, June 13, 2015

Removed . . .

. . . from view . . .

(from Joseph and his Brothers by Thomas Mann- translation by John E. Woods)
". . . A few years more and there would be almost nothing left of the stuff of the Joseph whom Jacob had held in a farewell embrace, as Rebekah had once held him - as little as if his flesh had dissolved into death. Except that, since it was not death that changed him, but life, his form as Joseph remained more or less intact, but less faithfully and perfectly than sheltering death would have kept it in the mind's eye and as it actually, though deceptively, had done in Jacob's mind. But it should still give us pause that, in regard to the content and form of life, the difference between whether it is death or life that removes a person from view is not nearly so important as people would probably like to think. . . "

What do you think?
Tell me at
http://www.rayjozwiak.com/guestbook.html or at
http://www.ohomusic.com

OHO's "Ocean City Ditty," the CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD) OHO is Jay Graboski, David Reeve & Ray Jozwiak. Please Visit http://www.ohomusic.com

My latest solo offering, Just More Music by Ray Jozwiak, featuring original, instrumental piano music is now available at - Just More Music by Ray Jozwiak

Sunday, April 26, 2015

If Not Now . . .

. . . WHEN?

We will most likely hear of this type of situation in many more American cities before any meaningful change occurs. But it will. It has to. The time has come. The time is now.

(http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/25/us/baltimore-freddie-gray-protest/)
". . . Protesters angry over the death of Freddie Gray got into physical altercations with police Saturday night in downtown Baltimore near the city's famed baseball stadium.

Some of the hundreds who confronted lines of police officers got into shoving matches with helmeted cops while other demonstrators threw objects. At least five police cars were damaged by people who smashed windows and jumped on them.

Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake said she was profoundly disappointed by the violence, adding that 95% of the protesters were respectful but a "small group of agitators intervened."

Twelve people were arrested, Police Commissioner Anthony Batts said. . ."

Monday, March 16, 2015

So Doc . . .

. . . How should I interpret a dream I had, in which my son owned a small, reptile (Cayman, Alligator, Crocodile?) which was not eating and had seemed to develop a particularity pugnacious disposition. Naturally I was attempting to assist when the creature escaped its enclosure. I was able to physically subdue it with little injury. Shortly my son returned to the scene with a live bird in his possession in hopes that poultry would whet the monster’s appetite. I thought it a better idea to place the prey into the habitat followed by the resident himself which we proceeded to undertake. When I placed the lizard into the tank with the bird, the latter quickly and instinctively snapped at the aggressor and to my astonishment bit off the alligators head entirely. I was mortified. Not due to any particular affinity for the reptile but because my idea directly contributed, if not actually caused, the death of my son’s new pet.

My son, incidentally, comforted me and took the entire episode magnanimously which, although this was a dream, is quite in keeping with his actual personality.

So am I to glean from this nocturnal video:
a. never place the bird in the cage before the lizard?
b. be forgiving always?
c. cut back on cheeseburgers with onions and mushrooms and sweet-potato fries before going to sleep?

What do you think?

Tell me at
http://www.rayjozwiak.com/guestbook.html or at
http://www.ohomusic.com

OHO's "Ocean City Ditty," the CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD) OHO is Jay Graboski, David Reeve & Ray Jozwiak. Please Visit http://www.ohomusic.com

My latest solo offering, Just More Music by Ray Jozwiak, featuring original, instrumental piano music will be released April 7, 2014 Just More Music by Ray Jozwiak

Monday, August 11, 2014

Life . . .

. . . and death . . .

Walter Ray Briggs
LEXINGTON — Walter Ray Briggs, 73, of Lake Shore Avenue died Saturday, August 9, 2014

Cora Hilton
HIGH POINT — Mrs. Cora Elizabeth Cecil Hilton, 95

Bobbie Waller Blalock
DURHAM — Bobbie Waller Blalock, 64, passed away Friday, August 8, 2014 at Duke Regional Hospital

Aldridge, John
Aug. 9, 2014 John Aldridge, June 16, 1926 – August 9, 2014, age 88 passed away Saturday

Maedine Foletti Turner
August 3, 2014 passed away at her home in Oakland, Calif. on Sunday, Aug. 3, 2014. She was 93 years old

Robin Williams
August 11, 2014, Marin County, dies at 63 of an apparent suicide, the Marin County Sheriff's Office says

What do you think?
Tell me at
http://www.rayjozwiak.com/guestbook.html

OHO's "Ocean City Ditty," the CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD)

My latest solo release, '2014' of original, instrumental piano music, can be downloaded digitally at:

(or you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
your browser: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/rayjozwiak4)

Also, be sure to visit:
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Tuesday, May 20, 2014

The Lab . . .

". . . Grind away, moisten and mash up thy paste,
Pound at thy powder, -- I am not in haste!
Better sit thus, and observe thy strange things,
Than go where men wait me and dance at the King's.

That in the mortar -- you call it a gum?
Ah, the brave tree whence such gold oozings come!
And yonder soft phial, the exquisite blue,
Sure to taste sweetly, -- is that poison too?

Had I but all of them, thee and thy treasures,
What a wild crowd of invisible pleasures!
To carry pure death in an earring,at a ball a casket,
A signet, a fan-mount, a filigree-basket! . . ."
(from The Laboratory by Robert Browning)

Out Of Thin Air
(from the laboratory at Graboski West)

What do you think?
Tell me at
http://www.rayjozwiak.com/guestbook.html

OHO's "Ocean City Ditty," the CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD)

My latest solo release, '2014', can be downloaded digitally at:

(or you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
your browser: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/rayjozwiak4)

Also, be sure to visit:
http://www.rayjozwiak.com