The Supreme Beings

 “Susan, why do you feel?” Darnell kept asking his subject over and over again.

“I said, why do you feel?” He said again noticing her straightening up.

“I don’t know, Sir,” at this moment Susan began to cry.

“Look at you, you are a disgrace. My robots have far exceeded your quota.” 

“I have a question Sir,” Susan replied.

“What?” 

Darnell got in her face nose to nose.

“What is your question?”

“Does electricity have a limit?” Susan said.

“In time, everything has an end and everything has a beginning. Where are you going with this?”

Susan pointed to one of his robots running low on energy.

“Is electricity infinite, Sir?” Susan said, as she noticed Darnell backing away slowly.

“That thing has no emotions, it has no feelings, and it can’t do anything without a human mind controlling it by putting in commands. If you get rid of me and my team you will find this out the hard way. That thing is going to suck up so much energy that it’s going to drain all of our resources. Now I need you to make a decision. It’s either us or them,” Susan said as the robot fell to the ground needing a recharge.

Darnell couldn’t believe her logic but she had a point. In his push to save money by using AI he did recall the lake going dry and the farm land now overrun with data centers. 

“Have you noticed the storms and strange weather patterns, Sir?”Susan said.

“That is your hypothesis, where is your proof?” Darnell replied.

“Sir, artificial intelligence will eventually drain reality, it rust and has waste just like everything else. Our eyes are going numb without the weight of an old book. Our brains our going in circles because we’re losing our sense of purpose. It’s convenient but it’s making us all useless and lazy.”

“That’s not true,” Darnell said.

“Why does a dog crave meat even after he’s eaten dog food.”

“Because he’s an animal. A dog is an animal.”

“And we’re all humans, coded by a creator. That’s why I feel, Sir. Eventually, all of this artificial radiation is going to cause our cells and body chemistry to go out of wack.”

Darnell took Susan by the hand, “I’m sorry. You’re right. We’re all intellectually made. We feel, we bleed, we’re human. Supreme beings with the power to shape our own destiny.”

He then took his investments and slashed the AI budget and called everyone back to work. While soaking in all of the nature and natural feeling of human life back on the work room floor he felt alive again. He felt human.

Supreme beings.

Mr. Owl

 After a long night watching the moon, Mr. Owl decided to sit in his room by the fireplace and drink tea. It was fall now and the weather was cooler. He’d sat on his tree branch for hours watching the kids trick or treating playing in the freshly fallen autumn leaves. Relaxing by the fireplace he figured maybe it was time to live a simple life. His days of dreaming about flying to the moon were over. It was now time to watch the next generation do the things that he’d once dreamed of doing.

Mr. Owl

The Spider in the Sink

 I had a conversation with an older man that probably didn’t like me.

I spoke to a woman that probably hated my guts.

After the conversations I saw a spider in the sink.

Frustrated, I thought about killing the spider.

Ironically, I heard a voice in my head.

“Where are the gnats?” the voice said.

After hearing the voice, I noticed that the spider left his spot in the sink. He or she got rid of the gnats for me.

Throughout the entire situation the spider said nothing, it just did what it was made to do, so I let him live.

He or she did me a favor.

The Spider in the sink.

The Scent of a Woman

In a combat zone I lost one of my five senses and I spent fourteen years alone. I lost my sense of smell and I hadn’t been in the presence of a female for 14 long years. 

It was a cold night, bitterness filled my drafty room as the furnace kicked on. Looking through my second floor window I noticed my neighbors arguing, soon after I heard my doorbell ring. It was her.

“Why are you here?” I said, noticing something strange happening to my nose.

I could smell her but nothing else.

“I’ve been watching you do your yard,” she said.

At this moment I’d become speechless as she began to take her clothes off.

This was my neighbor and I knew something was wrong so I did the right thing and I backed away.

“I want to feel good,” she said, rubbing up against me. At this moment I couldn’t help but notice her husband out of the corner of my eye. 

As he grabbed her they continued arguing on my property so I kindly told them to go and closed the door.

Standing on the other side of the door I felt my heart beating fast. It was like being put next to a magnet, the attraction was there but I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t allow myself to be forced upon by another man’s wife. My thoughts were racing. My body wanted what she had to offer but morally it would have destroyed me. Tempted, I came to understand the laws of attraction, I used the built up energy to finish building my shed only to be haunted by the scent of a woman. I survived one battle, but how many more were coming before I fell deep into temptation.

The Scent of a Woman

The 5 Year Loan

 I’d just reached retirement. It was January 28th 2014 and I sat in a room and looked at the same fly on the wall for three days trying to figure out what to do with all of my time. I had to have read just about every book in the apartment. I went to the YMCA for an entire year non stop. Every relationship ended the same way. “Hello, why do you keep calling me? Get a life!” I got call after call from people needing to borrow something, then that’s when it happened. I got an offer in the mail telling me that my approval odds were great. It was time to take out a 5 year loan. The process was smooth, I applied, got approved and the money went straight into my bank account. I found something new to get into. I had every loan sharking company on speed dial so I decided this was how I would spend my retirement. I’d become a high interest loan magnet destined to become a financial expert just by filing for bankruptcy, taking financial classes and surrounding myself with people who loved to talk about the markets. I’d racked up a total of 15 credit cards and I’d maxed them all out. I learned about gold and silver, then at year 14 of retirement that’s when it hit me. The system was rigged. You owned nothing and even if you did someone was in line to take it. If you lost your home, someone would end up buying it for much cheaper at an auction than what you paid for it and if you tried to do things your way that’s when the law and regulations came in. So to conclude, it’s been twelve years and I’m still paying on a five year loan. The truth is that once word gets out that you have a deposit coming into your bank the offers are endless and they won’t stop until they have all of your assets as collateral. You may think you have a choice but the truth is, you don’t. The more you try to control your own decisions the more you go under. The money was not made to hoard it’s printed out to spend.

Good luck.

Headed into Halloween, I’ve come to believe that the smell of money creates blood thirsty vampires looking to suck it up until you’re broke.

The End.

Goodbye Youngstown Black Monday

Tuneup bombs.

Mob rule and violence.

Steel Mills gone.

Corrupt public officials.

What’s left is a city of people filled with segments of the past to hard to overcome.

The Valley surviving on a river of Mahoning water that flows to this day.

Invisible heroes and money under the table.

Many residents plagued by poverty with those born and raised fleeing to the suburbs.

Not too much left to kill as everyone joins hands for nonviolence week with old timers who still have visions of what Youngstown used to be.

Today you see people coming together in a still divided and tribal way. 

Some generations have returned to pick up the pieces left for those brave enough to fight for a place to call home.

In a new town riddled with unusual decisions and many residents still in poverty a sense of hope is what’s keeping those in the ice castle together.

Today, with many ethnicities and cultures, the clouds of steel smoke have lifted but is still in the blood of those who survived generations after Black Monday.

There is hope because the old will never forget Black Monday. The fight now is left for the “young” in Youngstown to win.

Writing overdose

 Hmmm.. what can I make up today? I could write about politics or sports, maybe angels, gods or demons. I could write about conspiracies, drug addicts or rapist. I could write about criminals, doctors, dancers or teachers. I can write about good and bad, sex or Nuns. I could even write about problems or maybe victories and defeats. The topic about life or death seems cool. Today I had a thought about falling in love with a female who lost her legs. What an amazing love story. I loved her for her and she loved me for me. What a story to write about. I’ll even add a turtle searching for his shell in the story.

Writing overdose.