slappyjenkins

I was going to do a line by line critique again of some lyrics you had posted on here. But I could see that once again I would be making comments or asking questions so I'll just ask the questions right here about "Brilliant Tragedy".

I recently made the mistake of posting in the religious threads here. WHEWWWW...I don't know if everyone here is simply anti-religion or don't have the tools/maturity to cope with this subject, but beware getting into one of those discussions, it INSTANTLY turns ugly.

And here I am trying to get you into one of those discussions sort of....I like everything you said in Brilliant Tragedy. It is a very logical and common sense observation of the reality we live in...it is most likely true that we were put here to live and to die and that's about it...so the most important thing becomes how we view our life, if we are able to still find the love and courage to go ahead and live it while we're alive. I enjoyed it!

The question is, and the answer is probably overly self-evident, do you believe in any 'creator' or anything spiritual or above us? I promise I'm not calling you out. I am honestly curious. I believe art in all its forms(painting, drawing, writing, acting, speaking, singing, composing) is one of the most intimate things you can share about yourself...the only thing as intimate in my opinion is your true feeling on yourself and your place in the universe and your thoughts on God. I'll go ahead and say it, I believe in God, but I despise organized religion. The reason I believe in God is I feel a design in everything around me. And no I don't mean my house and car and my clothes. I feel a design to the universe. Not neccessarily a PURPOSE, but surely a design. And trust me I don't do the converting thing...I'm cool with whatever you have to say...it's not my duty to sway you one way or the other.

And also your feelings about eating meat(I saw from a few of the lyrics/poetry here)...I'm a meat eater, please don't hit me! *ducks* And again I promise promise I'm not calling you out on that, but I've noticed things about the natural world I'd like to get your opinion on. I have had a love affair with animals all my life....stop laughing, not that kind of love affair....I've had pets of course and I've even helped hurt animals get better and released them back into the wild. We had a duck fly over our backyard, well two ducks together, and a HAWK swooped in and tagged them both midflight, craziest, coolest but saddest thing I'd ever seen. The one duck got away but the other landed in our back yard. And the hawk was standing over the duck with his wings full spread and I think he was about to peck or claw him to death but I shooed him away. I didn't think a hawk would be scary but I was actually afraid...I was like this hawk is going to kill me AND the duck and feast on both of us. Well his/her poor wing was broken and we put a splint on it and it healed up just fine. The duck was getting used to us when we took the splint off so it was sad to see him go. He flew away maybe 3 days later after the splint was off so we must have done something right.(Yes, we named him Mr.Quackers) We always hoped that he found his mate. By the way...I loved that duck, I really did, but oh my god was he mean and he S#!T all over the yard. We got him a yard pool and he pooped in that too. I loved how he would dip his head under the water like was at the lake and then look at us like, man this pool is only 2 foot deep you cheap #@@#%@^.

Anyway that lovely little story leads me to this discussion that I would love to have with you. With how you feel about eating meat....how do you view animals eating/hunting/harming other animals in nature? Because we've all seen the nature channel and how tigers and lions use hunting patterns and tactics to bring down big game. And I've personally seen any number of cats I've had go outside and chase down chipmunks, squirells, birds, and lizards. All of my dogs at one point have bagged small animals, from birds to possums and I'd find them chewing their guts out or chewing on bones. And don't you love getting that 'present' from your dog or cat...that little bird or lizard that they caught and wanted to show off to you...OMG...I had a cat who was a superb mouser and he layed a dead mouse on my chest while I was sleeping!!! I felt this little drop on my chest and woke up and he was there and I started petting him and felt it there on my chest....I said 'Aw Chester I'm so proud of you.' But I was thinking, what the hell cat, dropping dead stuff on me while I'm sleeping.

I guess I was wondering if you ever ponder those things and how do they affect your writing on that subject?

I do admit that is the main reason I feel little to no remorse in eating meat. I've grown up around animals and every single pet I've had would naturally hunt other animals to eat them. (We even had a minature pot-bellied pig that would root for chipmunks. That pig would eat anything from bugs to rodents. Never saw him eat a bird though I think he would if given the chance.)

I guess I didn't line by line critique Brilliant Tragedy because I'm trying to figure out how to critique in a more constructive manner. I don't want to do another...'oh well this line is good, but I don't like this line, and I love this part' because I'm sure you are not getting much out of that.