Lou Perryman/ No Country for Old Men

Lou Perryman was in his home on April 1 of this year, and Seth Tatum somehow got in and violently killed him with an axe. With Albert Camus, I have to question the sanity of a god who lets such random events brutally cease the life of a richly realized man like Lou. Immediately the question was asked, "Did Lou know this person. And the unanimous answer was NO."

Do we have to make an accounting of complicity in our own deaths? And I shall quote Camus here:
"The Evil that is in the world always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding. On the whole, men are more good than bad; that, however, isn't the real point. But they are more or less ignorant, and it is this that we call vice or virtue; the most incorrigible vice being that of an ignorance that fancies it knows everything and therefore claims for itself the right to kill. The soul of the murderer is blind; and there can be no true goodness nor true love without the utmost clearsightedness." From THE PLAGUE, p.131. Vintage Books: March 1991 edition.

At Lou's memorial, a representative of the local Men's Movement allowed that Lou was probably thinking, "Where is this kid's FATHER?" And I also imagined this. Perhaps he wished to reach out to Seth even as the blows were being struck. And if Lou were at a place of surrender to the Unknowable, his death does not seem meaningless.

I must question, "Where did Seth get the axe?" And I can imagine it leaning up against Lou's house, and Lou had described his rigged cat door which probably allowed access through the door by one who was on the move fueled by rage.

Early in March was the first time I met with Lou on a "date." We chose The Flight Path as a place to sit and talk. Something kept prompting me to describe the "good people" of West Texas as "dangerous." This is because they refuse to take account of the dark realities which move through life. Deliberate Ignorance chooses to be unaware of these forces. And it has been my experience, no matter how "good" folks are they are not bullet proof. And no matter how these unaware "good people" assure me that they can help, or be there for you, if they are not cognizant of the pitfalls ignorance causes, I see them as a danger to me.

As a metaphor, I advise you to pick up your axes and get them out of sight. If you live on the edge, or in the inner city, be aware when your door is not secure. It doesn't mean that you don't trust your fellow man. It means that your first love is the safety and integrity of your own body, your own person. (This is the base fact of communion with the divine, a clear, functioning sensorium residing in your corporeal self.)

Whatever hell Seth has lived through, whaever punishing ignorance his been his reality, this must be recognized and not glossed over. We cannot handcuff the results of rank ignorance. Its manifestations do not "go away." There are many effective avenues of psychologcal, social, and spiritual evolution moving in our world today. Who blociked his access to them? Is it "macho" to ask a young man who may have brain abberations, chemical imbalances, and emotional wounds just to "get over it!" No, that is tantamont to murder. And I think Seth was murdering himself when he targeted Lou. He was destroying the recalcitrant, punishing male which he projected on all authority, and he was trying to end his own sense of lack and helplessness. Who failed him?

I think Lou, who had a big heart, may have generally assumed that most peole were on their way to "ordination," ( as Henry Miller put it)...that folks want to pull up out of the small town and get wise and constitutionally strong, to make something of themselves. That's what the parents of our generation expected of us, too. Yes, parents.

I must refer to "No Country for Old Men" now. It looks to me like, as someone of the same generation as Lou, that people of this present "Country" must now more than ever be as sly as foxes as well as gentle as doves. Fact is there are many people whose early development was violently compromised and they are adapting in a newly extreme socially pathological way. There's a new government report out on public schools serving "special" students that are resorting to handcuffs, restraints, and solitary isolation. Kids with PTSD, ADD, ADHD are not easy. And there is no easy solution, but we must be moving toward solutions because these needs left unmet become problems, and they do not just "go away." Check out this story: http://motherjones.com/mojo/2009/12/ed-and-labor-committee-members-introduce-bill-prevent-abuse-students-school#site-content

Back to the "innocent" West Texans. I think what bothers me about these folk is they "believe" that since they are good people, usually church-going and Bible-reading, they don't have to even bother with knowing about the problems such as Seth struggles with. Their idea of themselves, their "position" in life is apparently hermetically sealed against this knowledge. But, as the "No Country" movie amplifies, this is a dangerous position to hold. .."without the utmost clearsightedness."

Any policy, any religion, any good ole' club which condemms any person to the margin will eventually have to deal with the result of ignorance. St. Paul struggled with the self knowledge that to know the good doesn't necessarily result in doing the good. It falls upon us to consider the dark side -- knowing the bad doesn't always result in doing the bad either. But we are called to use our intelligence and imagination to assess what the tasks are before us in order to create a New Country for Young Men.

Buddhism encourages mankind to expand and contain. Lyndon Johnson said "Know your enemy, keep him close." And me? Well without asking people to become completely paranoid, I would suggest that we find the courage to know the evolving dangers, determine and find our safest and most nourishing actions and environment, and include as much knowledge as we can cram into our noggins. Be scrupulously honest with yourself about yourself. And then get started giving thanks that you are alive. Also, since more than just one of us was created to live on this planet, develop a social consciousness.

And, I can't forget the Pogo cartoon from the '60's. Pogo says, "We have met the enemy, and he is us."