Sherlock Holmes' Great Escape

Page 427 concluded Sherlock Holmes' obligatory service for what he hoped would be some considerable length of time. Once again, he had served Doyle’s words with dignity and honour. "The End" fell on page 427. Two few letter words read silently as the book was closed and shelved. Like the very first ending read, Holmes was transferred from page 427 to the place all characters of fiction retreat between readings.

Each character born on a piece of wood-pulp, carefully crafted in ink and captivating life in the conscience generates a residue of existence. Once any form of existence occurs, the universe grants a home, it has no choice. The characters of fiction, like any would, crafted both home and community. While unread, they lived in apartments and houses. They had lawns, pets, and played softball on sunny days. Today, Holmes, while unread, decided to go for a run. Running offered Holmes a clarity he relished.

He ran until exhausted.As he entered the lobby of his apartment building, Holmes passed through the mirrored entry. Noting his image, he was content. Holmes was an honest six feet tall with wavy brown hair and blue eyes. The owner of a solid build, Holmes was certainly capable physically in addition to his well-documented penchant for problem solving. Had you a different vision of Holmes, well, you have been wrong all this time. You may also be surprised to learn that James Bond has unibrow despite numerous occasions friends have given the gift of tweezers. Coincidentally, Holmes was walking past Bond while making his way to his suite. Bond was dressed in his black tie best as he was about to make his grand entrance into the second chapter of Goldfinger currently being read somewhere in Istanbul. Holmes wondered to himself, how could Bond not notice? Holmes was not about to be the first to mention it either. Holmes saw Gregor Samsa and Hamlet playing chess. Hamlet was having difficulty dealing with Samsa’s latest defensive gambit. Holmes hoped swordplay could be avoided. Hamlet brought his Oedipal issues with him. 500 years of therapy and no improvement. Oedipus thought it was funny. Hamlet didn’t like him very much either.Many of the most senior citizens of this community were spending more and more time at home as Shakespeare and Kafka had surrendered centre stage to Dan Brown. Robert Lang was rarely home. In all, many of the deep and refined characters of fiction were left in backrooms and old buildings in this land of fiction. Perhaps their time had passed as the newer characters were all far more flashy. It seemed that in order for attention to be drawn and credence won, characters need the gist of volume and self-congratulatory pursuits. Characters who followed accustomed formats with assured outcomes had won favour. The deeper characters are too complex and difficult to label for a world determined to avoid uncontrolled discovery. Prozac was prescribed for modern literature. Times are a changing. Time had not been kind to Hesther Prynne. Hesther’s idle time had been spent gambling on Mark Twain’s riverboat. She now owed money to some of fictions most notorious shylocks. The A weighed heavy on her. She could never see that all those unconventional wear the A. Well, maybe not a scarlet A but still, a stigma. Never mind, actually, wearing the scarlet A would suck.

Unlike many of his neighbours, Holmes enjoyed his time at home. Holmes fate as a master crime solver was not his dream. It was his living but never his passion. Holmes dreamed of wide-open spaces. He longed for unconfined landscapes where he could breathe deeper. He dreamed of being a cowboy. The hat, vest, boots and jeans secreted away in the recesses of his closet somehow connected Holmes to the faint hope of his unspoken dreams. How could Holmes speak of his dreams? He belonged at cocktail parties not on the range. He had been categorized. Holmes had been deemed. Once one is deemed, what in deemnation can anyone do?Holmes sat quietly and read the sports page. Shelley’s Shocks had defeated Chaucer’s Knights in a hard fought football game. Frankenstein had rushed for 300 yards. He was sipping his brandy when it ended. Normalcy ended. The devout normalcy that was his life simply ended. It came without long consideration or careful conception. It came like thunder from a clear sky. It came like some lone onion ring that had somehow made its way into your order of fries. Holmes donned his western wear, put on his topcoat. It was time to leave.

The place fictional characters had a lore of its own. Not of characters but of the design of their slice of the universe. The professional demands of the citizenry and hectic nature of everyday life had relegated all lore to hokum. Holmes put his hope in hokum.

Keeping to the outskirts of the community, Holmes avoided attention. The southern boundary of the community lay along a foreboding mountain landscape. A mountain ofyee old words. The words comprising the mountains are obsolete pieces of the lexicon.Forgotten words held in storage. Words that had once built nations. Words are powerful.Words change the world. Words affect every life every day. It should follow as no surprise that words are gargantuan. Obsolete words are monstrous monoliths. For instance, "exegesis" has a height and depth of 37 meters and a length of 254 meters. Even if unfamiliar with metric, you can sense the magnitude. There are so many words. To the citizenry of this community, the mountain range was a graveyard. For the older characters, some of these words were the progenitors of their very being! The mountainscape was seldom spoken of. None ventured into the mountainscape. None save Sherlock Holmes.

Sherlock had heard the hokum. It was rumoured that beyond the dark landscape of forgotten words stands a door. Not a mystical portal but a simple door with a knob. Or, maybe a lever handle, I don't know for sure. The point being there may be a door to the corporeal dimension. Spurred on, Holmes eased into the land of obsolete words. Holmes was quickly overwhelmed. So much effort expended for so little progress. Obsolete words were near unscalable. There was no path. Holmes felt pangs of hopelessness discharge themselves into his stout heart. Complicating matters, Holmes had taken a wrong turn at "rogation" and seemed to be going in circles. He sat spent resting his cowboy hat on his knee as though resting his very hopes and dreams. He was lost.

Through the constant lore of overcome challenges a singular abetting act emerges again and again. Behind every success, somewhere the recipe has the ingredient of a helping hand. But what hand could move so ominous an obstacle? The only facilitation for the removal of forgotten words from this dark landscape would be there current use on the printed page. As an obsolete word is read, it will briefly disappear from this imposing landscape. The universe will quickly realize the anomalous use of the word and it will promptly be returned to its place in the mountain of forgotten words. With a strategically designed paragraph, it would be possible for a short-lived pathway to emerge. Holmes needed the help of the omniscient voice. But what author would dare change literary history for the freedom of a single dream. Could there be an author willing, willing to write a wrong? Without a helping hand, Holmes would continue to nourish hearts and minds while being denied access to his own. Are not hopes and dreams the stuff of souls? Holmes surveiled the impossibility around him as he grasped his fading hope with every part of himself.

Intermission(it's ok to refresh your coffee now, not to much sugar please)

The landscape of forgotten words is a sight to rival the most formidabble any minds eye had adduced. Yes, adduced. You'll see. Anyway, if written and read, their brief displacement from this land would allow Holmes to navigate an escape. Somewhere, out there, could there be an author to help? Might the universeprovide a fribble fabulist of facetiae able to lucubrate and deal quietus to the tenebrous locus of barriers at hand? Perhaps a quixotic soul such as someone you just may know. Repugning doubt, Holmes sorel shoes stepped non-sequaciously into the spirit vitiating landscape. Holmes trenchent bearing was buoyed by an emerging path! Holmes moved with circumspection through doleful corridors. Anon, a luculent path evolved! Within sight a relucent opening presented itself as a welkin. It was a door. With a lever handle! Aahhh! Ok. Anyway, Holmes was free.

He walked through the door and found himself in Peru. The door opened into a small coffee house in a small town. Holmes was immediately confronted with a problem. He did not speak Spanish. he waited a moment expecting a Spanish language background to be written in and fluency to follow. Nothing happened. He was on his own. He would need to learn Spanish. He did manage to order a cup of coffee. It was not what he expected. Sugar helped. He had no money to pay for the coffee.Fortunately his top coat was accepted in trade.

Holmes walked out of the shop and onto a quiet street. He squinted into a sky far more bright and blue than he had been led to believe possible. he had no inkling of where he might find himself in a day or two. How would he survive? It wasterrifying. It was overhwelmingly uncertain. It was perfect. The uncertainty was his own. When you own your own uncertainty, it becomes possibility. He creid. he walked toward some something, somewhere.
This paragraph represents the passing of some time. Let's say, 1 year. The place elapsed time fades into is uncertain at this time. It must go somewhere. Time does pass. You are now older than when you read you at the beginning of this sentence. Time is like that. At any rate, we now rejoin Holmes a year into his new life.

"Binga la cosina." a weathered man on horseback called. It was time for dinner. Commida tiempe. The old rancher was happy with all his hands. Even the British man, Holmes, was working out well. Holmes had even solved the rancher's long standing mystery of the prankster who was sneaking into the livery and greasing his saddle. Holmes would be along for dinner soon enough. Holmes always rode the long trail back. Who knows why.

Holmes absorbed the scenic vista of mesas around him. He breathed deeply. He found differences in each and every sunset. A beauty immune to description. The world found a means of amazement with every passing second. He smiled and marvelled at the popularity of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's series of novels about wildly successful criminals. It would be years before he owned his own small ranch, but he was on his way. He tilted his cowboy hat upward and wondered if there might be rain in those distant clouds. he could see so very far.

Afghanistan should not be coloured by our collective insecurity

Our relationship with America is a curious one. we seem to belittle the United States at every opportunity gleefully pointing out every misjudgment in US history while simultaneously craving US attention! Strangely, anti-American banter is ultra-trendy. Any contrary voice is quickly labeled 'conservative' and rejected. Labels are handy that way. We even have Canadian politicians pandering to trend by marching in the street under the flag of Hezzbollah!
Hezzbollah, a terrorist organization with a mission to destroy. It is essentially an ersatz element of Iranian aggression. Remember the emergence of Hamas? It was shortly after Israel had reached an understanding with the PLO. Following the recent progress between Israel and Hamas, Hezzbollah wades into the fray to ensure destabilization. There are elements in play that do not seek peace but the destruction of Israel and severe punishment for Western democracy. Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khomenei has called for the end of Israel. He has called for Islamic youth to engage in suicide attacks against all western entities. His speeches are nothing less than disturbing. This is the man who slected the candidates for the Iranian presidency. The reasonable and progressive Katami was removed from consideration leaving us with Amadinejad. We all heard his speach in New York. These are the people who support Hezzbollah to the tune of 65 million dollars per year.
Canada seems to be choosing a path of least resistance. The collective seems disinclined to be a nation that takes a stand. We seem more interested in being a nation that points fingers. As we speak, our most incredible citizens are half-way across the world making an actual difference. They are not sitting around a coffee shop with trendy others that "get it", talking about all that is wrong, they are out there, on the line, doing something about it. I have heard on more than one occasion "We shouldn't be imposing our will in Afghanistan." I saw a sign in a shop window that said "Bring our troops home, for a better world." How does abandoning a people and leaving them to the devices of an oppressive regime create a better world? I doubt the author of the sign considered Mullah Muhammad Omar.
For years Afghanistan suffered the whims of Omar and the Taliban. The only entity seeking to impose their will in Afghanistan are the Taliban. Some feel that the Taliban are fighting to resist American domination in the region. In truth, the Taliban are not a force of resistance, they are an offensive force that seeks to dominate and control. The Taliban seek to dominate just as they have since reducing Kabul and much of the country to rubble when assuming control in 1996. The Taliban imposed overwhelming restrictions on Afghan people. An Afghan citizen was detached from any sense of individual possibility by Taliban rule. The only possibility remaining to Afghan citizens was the certainty that any deviation from Taliban edict will lead to grave punishment carried out by masked men with guns.
The Taliban engaged in the ethnic cleansing of the Hazaras people. Public executions were the norm. Mulah Muhammad Omar used to actually spend time dreaming up exotic new methods of execution. This is how he entertained himself. He once devised an elaborate technique that included the construction of a large brick wall built for the single purpose of being pushed over onto a condemned prisoner. Education was strict and limited to males. Women were forced to stay indoors unless accompanied by a related male escort. Homes with women were commanded to paint all windows black so she would never be seen. Women had no rights under the Taliban.
In the late nineties, journalist Jan Goodwin reported first hand the oppressive conditions women were subject to under the Taliban. The Taliban minister of education told Goodwin "It's like having a flower or a rose. You water it and keep it at home for yourself, to look at it and smell it. It (a woman) is not supposed to be taken out of the house to be smelled". Afghan women referred to themselves as 'living dead'. Completely denied any access to basic human experience, suicide rates soared. While American Aid agencies actively lobbied against the restrictions placed upon women in Afghanistan, one UN official interviewed by Goodwin was quoted as saying "the gender issue is too dangerous, I don't plan to risk my career over it." The same reticent UN strategy that failed at Srebenica and in Rwanda. If Peace Keeping includes inaction in the face of genocide, what is it truly about? Peace Keeping has to be about more than wearing blue helmets on PR missions so we can all convince ourselves how great we are.
It is easy for one to say that if the citizens of Afghanistan were unhappy with their circumstances it is up to them to do something about it. It must be understood that these people were forced into subjugation. They were completely disconnected from any sense of their own possibility. The Taliban are ruthless and heavily armed. Consider this analogy, if you were held hostage in a bank robbery by armed gunmen, would you like the help of police or should they ignore the problem with the idea that if you were dissatisfied with being held hostage you will do something about it yourself.
At what point do we decide to take a stand? At what point do we respond? Dione, Layton and Duceppe are exquisite finger pointers but cannot answer these questions. They certainly have been asked. We have to open our minds and consider the entire picture. Who do we want to be? It's important to think about this.

"The penalty good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.
Plato

Utah Saves Sophocles!!!

Utah trekked across the Grecian Desert sands, blazing sun and all
Utah was making good time, he had ample water and a purple parasol
Shortly after his venture began, he came across a ragged, thirsty man
Utah gave aid and direction as the ragged man related a diabolical plan
His name was Thurman Pez, curator of the great Sophocles Exhibits
Charged with the care of Sophocles private tome, keeping them secret
Sophocles asked that his private tome ne'er be revealed to any eyes
Bandits had stolen the lost tome from his tomb in order to sell the prize
Utah headed off leaving Thurman the purple parasol made in Albania
So confident he could save the tome from the tomb he danced the Macarena
Utah knew little of Sophocles other than he had penned Oedipus Rex
He had read it once, a play now famous for giving so many a complex
Utah intended to help, a sojourn later, Utah came across the bandit's tracks
He followed them to a nearby bandit camp where he formed a plan of attack
With one bandit on watch while the others slept, Utah hatched a scheme
Utah approached the camp hidden by night, guided by the moon's gleam
He identified the secret tome from the tomb located next to the bandit's feet
Utah would have to get close to the watchful bandit, he had to be discreet
He approached the camp quietly, once in guitar range he began to sing
An old camp song from the Klondike, a lullaby later, the bandit was snoring
Utah reclaimed Sophocles' tome from bandit camp and melted into the night
Though curious, Utah did not read so much as a word, it just wouldn't be right
Sophicles wish to keep his own tome private and intact must be held dear
Upon return of the tome to the tomb, Sophicles grateful ghost did appear
"Utah, thank you so much for returning these private writings to my memorial
You're my favorite person, next to mom, I would hug you were I only corporeal

Babbling

In my mind my speech is eloquent
Character, poise and grace readily evident
I have the ability to clearly express
My thoughts and ideas without duress
The only problem I run into
My mind and voice never rendezvous

The diaphragm forces up the air
The larynx then takes it from there
Mouth, tongue and teeth oscillate
The finished product should be great!
Should being the variable term
Sadly, reality does not conform

The diaphragm forces with conviction
With anticipation of marvelous diction!
But then my meddling mind reneges
"Don't say it, they'll laugh! It begs.
Then the larynx fails to capitalize
Bout then fear is visible in mine eyes
My mouth then loses all precision
To punish my mind for indecision
I then unveil a nonsensical babble
It really is not me! It's organ rabble.

Mind tongue and teeth can't get along.
It's fodder for a hillbilly country song
But what can I do as components rant
I only wish there were some sort of transplant.