matiaslanzi

Please take your shoes off sir!

2010-02-09T12:03:00.001-08:00

Please take your shoes off sir!

One of the hardest things I had to do lately is explain to my children is why do we have to strip of all our belongings at the airport.
Why is daddy being set aside and why is he being padded?
There is a message being imprinted in their young minds from a very early age, an element of indoctrination, making these kind of assaults to our personal liberties something normal. We are forced to teach our young that it is fine to have ones rights as human beings revoked in the name of fighting an imaginary enemy that will strike no matter what, that it is fine to keep the general population in a need to know basis and fear, that is fine for somebody to exercise their power over a person for no real reason other than the exercise of power.

As I think about it was not the actual explanation the hard part but the brain washing that took place, the submission they where witnesses of and mimic as a natural fact of life. That's where the explanation is needed only to hope they grow up to be free and although they will have to submit to these facts of life, their minds will fly high enough not to exist in the same plane of reality as the enforcers of these acts.

You don't mind the world so much until you have kids.

What to do when things end?

2009-05-25T00:55:00.001-07:00

What to do when things end?

A great question to ask, and the reason it is such a great questions is because it has a a great answer. Not complicated, simple and straight forward, an answer that usually comes to mind when we hear the question. We start again.

As with anything in this life, things start and inevitably sooner or later come to an end. This is the very nature of life, it is the nature of existence. This is a nature that us humans have a hart time understanding. We cling to things, we reminisce in the images of the past, trying to re-live things over and over, to feel them again, to repeat what made us feel so good while on the other hand we try hard to erase any pain that comes from the memory of a sad experience. We try to forget, we avoid the memory of that horrible moment, the memory of that none reciprocal teenage love or the person that broke our hearts or of those that are no longer with us.

We live our lives driven by emotions, emotions that influence every single step we take, always procuring happiness and pleasure while avoiding sadness and pain creating a world of duality, of good and bad, of right and wrong of yes and no, of beauty and ugliness of love and hate.

With this very human behavior we tend to neglect the very nature of existence, the very principle we can not and will never be able to control, the mutability of the universe, the relentless process that keeps us alive.

We base our well being in what makes us happy and of course if things don’t happen the way it make us happy, we become miserable. Making use of the duality we created to push us to where we want to be, we now punish ourselves with sorrow. The same process we use to move ahead, to excel is the process that creates suffering and deception.

These are all feelings, human feelings, feelings we can’t avoid having. How would we gauge life if we didn’t have them? These feelings are there for that exact reason, to guide us, to teach us what is the best way to handle things. Never the less we are accustomed to ignore the message in these feelings and we react, usually to the same desire or aversion to the joy or pain, to the want and don’t want. We put thought to the feelings and turn them into stories, stories that justify what we want or don’t want, leaving our feelings and the reason they exist for last hence confusing what feelings are and creating pain for us and the world. Forgetting to be true to what we feel in order to justify our needs with a never ending story.

What would happen is this duality I talk about just wasn’t there? What if we understood that there is no duality, that there is no opposing feelings, just feelings and their real use is to guide us to one single place, the better of humanity. What if we remove the story that justifies our successes and our failures and we simply started again with the knowledge of our previous experience without judging sentencing ourselves? What if forward is the only way by living right now using the wisdom we gathered every moment of our lives? Wouldn’t it be much easier?
I think it would.

So what do I do when things end? I start again.

The End

2008-12-22T00:00:00.000-08:00

It started again, the sinister unleashing of all demons to raise hell and havoc among the inhabitants of this planet. I can hear the apocalyptical screech of a tortured mind trapped in its own misery and self inflicted pain.

It started again, it seems like as if well being and balance are concepts too unbearable to grasp. It is a love-hate relationship with peace but at the end not wanting it at all.

It started again, like riding a bicycle, one never forgets and once in a while you just have to do it.

It started again, a relapse, like an addict in remission for years and years until one day some switch gets flipped and it starts again. 8 long years passed, enough to see the seasons go by, the moods come and go, enough cycles to identify a pattern witch frequency the medication doesn’t seem to tame. I can see the self sabotage mechanism causing the medication to run out, disappear, fade away or change. I’ve seen the mechanism in action many times, the same times the prescription changed per patients request. All directly proportional to how well things are going.

It is impossible to continue like this, it is unbearable to witness the self destruction and chaos one person can cause in a matter of minutes. Like a sand castle created only to be destroyed once its you're done constructing it.

I’ve been patient, I’ve been loving, I’ve been understanding, but it becomes a point where all the patience, love and understanding in the world isn’t enough to withstand the destruction. There is no more love to heal the broken hearts, no more understanding to accept the erratic behavior, no more patience to put up with cruelty and abuse. No more bright dreams to pursue when all you can see is the darkness of a tortured soul.

Nothing else to do but to save one self or what’s left of what one used to be, run away and watch from afar to see it all crumble only to pick up the pieces and start again, this time from the heart.

Construction time!

2008-04-29T15:16:00.000-07:00

This is how it all started; an awful mess and massive destruction took over our peaceful way of living. Debris, construction materials and workers became the imposed landscape for something close to 3 months. This was our second incursion in the construction business. Our first experience was hell, the chosen contractor re-roofed the house with some rainy days in the process making us take involuntary showers in the middle of the night and use those saucepans we never use because they’re too dam big. This one was going to be different, we learned our lesson, on this one we calculated everything, this one was covered, we where completely prepared, we had a budget, we knew the job to be done, we researched the materials, we where ready, not.

The job required some framing. This was not a difficult task for our skilled workers who in a matter of two days had done all the required framing and extension of the room we were working on. I was amazed, these guys really know their stuff, they came with the hammers, they banged away and done. Of course I had to run to Home depot quite a few times to get nails, to get hammers, to get materials that where not accounted for or brought by our skilled employees.

Once the framing was done and with high expectation we followed with the process of installing high density acoustic insulation, same insulation that was not ready for pickup by the time we needed to, so the plan then diverged to several little jobs while the material arrive. Finally the material arrived, or should I say that I picked it up, anyway, the framing was supposed to be filled with this high density thing that will hinder sound propagation. The walls where easily filled with this nasty material that will get on the pores of the skin and itch like a motherf#@#!!@. When it was time to put this material on the framed roof, our skilled professionals devised some kind of holding system integrated to the framing by a strange mixture of duck tape and wire that was supposed to hold this thing in place. In theory, it could work, unfortunately the material was a bit too sneaky for the duck tape to hold it so the entire thing fell down during the night. Now, be prepared for a long story..

It’s time for the drywall, - great, we’ll do the drywall and the taping and then we’ll be done right? - said one of the workers. Well, not exactly – you see, we need to do a sound proofed room, that will require two layers of drywall, one layer of acoustical vinyl one layer of soundboard, a ½ inch resilient channel, followed by 2 layers of drywall fire taped and sealed with acoustical caulking – I said, and that’s where our skilled professionals lost track of whatever the hell we where trying to build.

The first layer of drywall was a flash, the second was too, the problem started when the soundboard came along, some argued that they where not sure on how to handle such delicate material that will itch and itch. I explained that this material is the most common known to humans and it is a simple mixture of processed wood and cardboard, anyway it was useless, they refused to understand that at this point we where dealing with standard stuff and they started praying to the construction Gods.

When I came home that night, the drywall was done but I noticed a little detail, the 24 line cable I put through the framing was too short, why is it so short? Well for some unknown reason to me they decided to pull the cable into the booth - why? – I asked, but they where unable to answer. – fix it! – I said fearing the consequences, and I was right, as they fixed it they cut 3 of the lines in the cable, same cable that I had to replace.

When the time for vinyl came, I encountered frustrated and tired humans by the end of the day; no progress was done at the time because every single piece of vinyl will not stay stapled to the walls and ceiling. – This thing is too heavy! – They agued. I didn’t want to hear their reasons, I didn’t want to know their techniques, I didn’t want to see them any more, so I just said – Please don’t come back for the next two days, don’t worry. – Right away I got on the phone with two great friends who kindly enough where willing and able to staple nine rolls of vinyl to a 400 square feet room. We spent two afternoons stapling away, probably 2 journeys of 5 hour each and we where done. Needless to say that the budget drifted away some time ago when the dreaded goons decided they didn’t know what to do with everything that was not drywall and even with the drywall they had some problems.

Each layer needed to be caulked with the acoustic stuff so every night after my session, I was caulking away until 2 or 3 in the morning in order to finish the layer so the workers could keep forging ahead, if you can call it that way.

I was the happiest person in this planet when I received a call in the middle of a session ordering me to return home because they where done and they wanted me to inspect the work done, but of course they wouldn’t wait for me more than half an hour. I was so happy that I suspended my mix and left.

At this point the room was horrible, It had a middle division that separated a very dark vocal booth from the control room, a 3 by 5 hole for a window and a horrible plaster smell that made my nose itch. The walls were grey, the bare drywall had white plaster lines covering the workers imperfections and mishaps, but we were happy.
The taping and painting was later done by a very skilled young guy with a terrible sense of time and responsibility, but his work was pristine, one and a half weeks later he finished the job that was supposed to take him 3 days to complete.

The window for the recording booth took only 3 weeks to be installed but to tell you the truth that was the least of our worries.

Our original plan consisted of 3 parts, one was re-roofing, next the studio and once the studio was finish and the last drop of paint dried, the final touch would be a limiting fence that will hinder the kids from the school to play in our front yard every single day of the working week. So we went on with the plan.

Ha but this one was going to be different, we learned our lesson, on this one we calculated, this one was covered, we where completely prepared, we had a budget, we knew the job to be done, we researched the materials, we where ready (dejavu).

This one was hard in another way, this one being in the public eye, this one displayed without any shame to the world, this one brought trouble.
This one brought people, asking things, this one brought the spotlight to our peaceful residence, this one brought inspectors. Ahhhhrrghgg yes inspectors, not one but 3 inspectors, one after the other, like falling dominoes. – Someone complained – he said. Someone picked up the phone and call not 1 but 3 inspectors. At this point everything lost its meaning, just witnessing how somebody with a lot of time in their hands and a will to bug the hell out of people has the power to do such a thing makes me sick. In the land of the free, famous words. Free to intrude into other people’s lives, dreams, plans and goals. Free to use dusty laws to enforce madness, nonsense and painful sanctions that compresses the soul, ok enough that’s another story.

Anyway our neighbor complained so they come. Inspector 1 was an unfriendly grumpy old man with bad temper, a temper that I didn’t meet, he asked for permits and an openable garage door. Inspector 2 was a friendly middle age light headed individual. – When someone complaints, we have to come, I’m sick of these people - he said – Let me see your permit -. Shit !, Permit? - I went to the department and I don’t need a permit – I said. I went to the department of building and safety where everybody said something different. Ha, my journeys to the dreaded department became legendary, 9 in the morning, 7 in the morning, afternoon, go get a paper, come back, station 9, station 2, “Now serving number 345 at station 12” on a loud speaker every 5 seconds, never my number, try drink, food, cigarette, ahhh gameboy advanced; nothing made the time flow, it could’ve been because I wasn’t flowing, I was stuck in the twilight zone!

Inspector 3 came here to stay, after telling me that the 1st one was the chief, the second one the supervisor, both filling in because he was on vacation. - Well welcome back dear inspector, how can I help you? - I managed to exclaim with the permits on my hand. After he saw the permits and I agreed to trim the frontyard pilasters to half its height, I proceeded to show him why our garage door wasn’t able to open. - Great work - he said, I was flattered, I was proud of our accomplishment, - but you have to make the garage door open and fit two cars in this garage, don’t worry, you can keep the 4 walls and the electricity if you get a permit for it, just open the door. He made it sound so easy, he made it sound normal, he obviously didn’t know, he obviously didn’t know! And of course he wasn’t even beginning to care.

There is a way to keep the door closed later I found; we just had to “provide covered parking for our two vehicles” as the code mandates. Simple ha, ok no problem.
New project: a plan for the construction of our carport. We started the research by going to the twilight zone to ask how. The process is simple, you go to this sterile public place with big plastic desks and a lot of Asian people, you get a number for what they call “plan check”, not being really the actual plan check but a check for the plan check. You see, they check if you filled out your application correctly, then they check if your project bounds within code, things like that. If you get past this point, you can consider yourself a very lucky human. This is the barrier, here is where the nonsense begins; they will tell stories to confuse your mission, to make your task more difficult, to squeeze your wallet and leave you bleeding on the sidewalk with a million questions with a million doubts without the desire of ever coming back. But you do, you do come back, it becomes personal, it becomes your life.

Ok we’ll put it in the back… we break the new block wall and we put it in the back. We can also open the office, make it the garage, but we have to remove the bathroom… too much. All this great ideas do not conform to code, no matter what we did, there was no way to place a carport any where inside the property. Being our lot a corner lot, on an R1 zone, the code indicates that the narrowest side is the front of the house therefore a fence on the front can not be higher than 42 inches, no matter if our address and front door is not on that side, so basically what this means is that our front is a side yard, our left side is the frontyard, our right side is the backyard and our backyard is our sideyard. Now we have the kids sitting on the pilasters on our front yard, exactly what we where trying to avoid. Anyway, this leaves no room on the frontyard due to a 30% setback requirement, no room on our sides and no room on our backyard with a 15 feet setback requirement. We where 6 inches short every time we tried.
At this point I was exhausted it seemed like dark evil forces surrounded us and wanted us to just give up. On our last attempt to save our space we went to ask for a “variance” to the city planning department. A variance is a special permit to modify the code for your specific case, in this case the submission cost was $980.00 waiting for 3 months for a public hearing where your neighbors, honorary guests, attend to explain why they don’t agree with your thought of home remodeling. Of course, the disclaimer says: Favorable decision is not warranted. A very nice guy in city planning then asked, - Why don’t you ask for a slight modification? – And that is…
That is how we went to see one of the barrier people who informed us about the impossibility of getting the grant, then he mention that I could try speaking to a supervisor but I’ll be wasting my time. So we did, with nothing to lose.

Can you prove to me that you can fit 2 cars there? Show me. – the man said. So we did exactly that.

We showed the approve plans to our friend, inspector 3 and a promise to start building as soon as we could afford it. So he left leaving me a piece of advice, “Always get a permit” he said.

Life slowly started coming back to our normal flow. We resumed the journey to our main objectives and moved on. I know they’re coming back, until then life goes on. We did our part and we’ll never bail.

Bachelor Party

2008-04-28T18:02:00.000-07:00

It all started on a Saturday afternoon for me. Actually, it started one day earlier but I decided to skip the first day, I knew my wife was going to make a big fuzz out of it. I also thought the real fun night was going to be on Saturday, so there was no point on unleashing the demons.

We drove for about four hours on Saturday morning from Los Angeles to Palm Springs. We missed every single turn, sign or cue that would get us closer to our intended destination. Submerged in a frantic conversation, we discussed many things until Palm Springs became the clear indication that we had missed another cue. We stopped at a gas station to get some cigarettes, snacks and booze and back traced our steps to hit the final mark that would take us to Pioneer Town.

We drove through a swervy road, past civilization, amongst extraterrestrial rock formations, Joshua trees, sand and a breathtaking sky, really beautiful stuff if you're just visiting. We saw a yellow jeep at the distance, as we got close to it we identified the driver, it was a good friend of ours so we decided to follow a him, we thought he knew where we where going. At this point we knew how useless we were following directions. The yellow jeep driver turned out to be as bad if not worse than we were. When you pass it once, turn around and pass it again, that is bad.

We arrived to the hotel, old west style all made of wood and decorated with cowboy paraphernalia. There where eighteen zombies walking around the sandy parking lot as if it was one of those “Return of the dead III” horror films. This human figures walked dragging their feet, they where wearing dark glasses and carrying a glass with some kind of intoxicating substance in their hands. “How's it going” I asked, without obtaining much information in return. “We're hungry!” one said. We where supposed to arrive before 2 in order have lunch together, of course due to my lack of attention on the road, we arrived much later than that. They where planning a barbecue for all of us, but for some unknown reason it wasn't happening.

Finally we where able to catch a bite at around 5 in the afternoon, great food. It was important to eat at that time for there wasn't going to be much food available for the rest of the evening. I could see the cases of booze, beer kegs and strange teas ready to be consumed by all of us, so a filled stomach was an absolute must.

We settled in this bizarre place and took care of the mandatory financial situation. We headed for the saloon where the festivities where scheduled to take place. It was located at the end of an old cowboy town used as a movie set for most of the classic westerns I've never seen. The saloon was destroyed. It seemed like they left it untouched after a fierce fight scene in one of those movies shot thirty years ago. There was an old beat up piano with a little window to insert the roll, It was completely useless, the keys where sticky, the sustain pedal was always on and the tuning was excruciating. The bar was a thin piece of wood and all the bottles where there as an omen of the nonsense to come.

It was dark, no moon in sight and the saloon was ready to endure whatever there was to come. We were ready too. The team started drinking a day before and I was cautiously catching up. There where no clocks around and time passed very slowly in this strange town. It was of my best interest to be in full control of my motor skills, or my head for that matter. At least until the festivities had passed.

And so it went, we talked, we laughed, we screamed until the announcement came. A busty blond called our attention to set the rules of engagement and negotiate the different fees for the different shows. There where two of them, good cop and bad cop, sweet and bitter, but ultimately the bad bitter one called the shots at all times.

The show consisted of several parts deemed unmentionable in order to protect the innocents from our significant others. This doesn't mean that anything unmentionable happened but I will not corroborate or deny anything. It was just good fun. At some point in the evening, the show started to fade, the performers demanded more money changing things around and not sticking to the original deal. We spend a good hour in negotiations as soon as we got them more money they split with it, yes they had ripped us off.

So there we were, 20 humans, all male raging drunks and other things with nothing else to do but keep drinking, laughing and screaming. And that was exactly what we did.
Little after the unworthy performers left, a joint was passed around, I managed to catch a couple of puffs avoiding too much of it due to the alcohol level in my blood. I had several beers and a screwdriver and I know I should not mix. But I did.
I was handed a set of bongo drums somebody brought for the occasion and started banging on them mindlessly. I was in a trance, having lots of fun, people where singing, playing other instruments without worries. At that point somebody removed the bongos from my lap, an act that sent me into a downward spiral that will soon deteriorate to become a serous case of the spins. "ahhhg, not again!". I gather my strength and stumbled out of the saloon as everything spun out of control around me, I could hear the loud rumble, my fellow partygoers fading away as I crossed the front door. Far away from my room I managed to find a very comfortable old fashion single sofa/chair at the entrance of the bar, it seemed to be the perfect place for me to chill it out. I couldn't move, the slightest thought would make me awfully sick. I've been here before, I know how it works, just chill completely motionless for half hour and the burden slowly disappears. I forgot something very important, never remain motionless sitting on a comfortable chair surrounded by drunken raging lunatics, it is only a matter of time until somebody wants to save you from own stupidity, only to make you a victim of their own. And so it happened.

I sat there for some time listening to the people, I was the gate keeper, I was the sentinel of the night, witness of it all, eyes closed, ears opened gathering information, far from passing out but yet unable to move or say a single word. Several humans approached me, laughed at me, asked questions, covered me with blankets and finally tried to move me. “Noooo !!!” I mumbled “Please leave me here for 45 minutes, I’ll be fine, I just need to stay still”. Useless words to a raging drunk that in a matter of minutes gather 3 more of us to keep asking me to stand up and go to bed.
I knew I couldn't move, I also knew that they where determined, relentless, drunk, stoned out of their minds and bored of it so they took on the mission of moving me to my room against my will, a mission that became the event of the night.

There was no point on fighting it, all my attempts where futile, I was not going to be able to defuse this one, I had no choice, I gave in.
In the beginning there where three, three of what used to be humans debating the most efficient way to transport me to the wrong room. How to do it, how far it was, wondering what did I take, was it the tea? “I saw him drinking it!” one muttered. That’s when the movement started, they grabbed the chair “ 1, 2, 3 up and gooooo!”, but they dropped it three steps later. “Too heavy, man ” one said. “Who’s that?.... Mati? Hey everybody, Mati crashed, help us!”. I don’t know what was more sad, my terrible state or the unbelievable site of fifteen people attempting to carry one without being able to move me more that 3 feet. I screamed loudly “Leave me alone you fuckers, this is excruciating!” but they where too caught up in their elaborate plans to really pay attention, or maybe, we where just having too much fun. One of them, the yellow jeep driver, big guy, decided to carry me on his shoulder. So up I went for two seconds only to be deposited on the sandy cold floor. “I was comfortable in the chair you dreaded mut!!!!” i said, no one listened. It was then when they decided to put a blanket underneath me and drag me through cowboy town into my room, and that was exactly what they did. I was barely lifted off the floor for small intervals at a time for no one was really able to stand on their own feet without tumbling, much less carry dead weight on a blanket. “You’re doing it wrong!!!” someone said, “You have to nab it like this, other wise you have no grip, don’t you see?”. The spins where amplified, this time everything was moving for real but there was no convincing these people to leave me the fuck alone.
Finally, we arrived at room 7, any room would have done it but I have to give them credit, they got it right. They grabbed my arms and legs and threw me in bed. I managed to catch a glance at the team, a deplorable mental picture I will never forget. “Thank you” i said.
As they were getting out of the room someone said “Wait! he is on his back, he can puke and choke on his own vomit, lets move him!”.
“Noooooooooooo” I scremaed in complete horror.

It was nine in the morning when I woke up that Sunday, too early, so it must have been early when I crashed last night. Who knows. I found my copilot and drove away in search of good breakfast. After that, L.A. was a couple of hours away.