The Morning Fire!

                                                               THE MORNING FIRE!

 On those mornings when it is chilly or damp in the house, I often start a morning fire in our wood stove. If the day should warm, the fire unfed goes out. On cold winter days with the right wood, the fire will last all through the night. Today after near sixties yesterday I woke to an outside temperature of thirty-five degrees. Now, as I sit and watch the fire through the stoves glass door I am reminded of past fires. Not just my own, rather the fires that for centuries, warmed peoples hearths and brought that cozy home feeling, that only a wood fire can bring. I picture people with out stretched hands letting the heat from the fire soak into their bodies, in many instances there would be the smell of food, making the association of the fire, even more alluring. Through out most of my adult life, I heated my house with wood, on several occasions I have lived in houses with fireplaces. There is something about the fireplace that kindles in me feelings of home and family, sparking (intentional pun)  an overall sense of deeply soothing, well being. I suppose the memories from my childhood play a big part in all this imagery. The fireplace especially around Christmas time was central too many traditions, like the hanging of stockings. Now for me, it is the wood stove that anchors me to the stream of life. In front of the hearth, is exactly where countless numbers of our species have found contentment and warmth while sitting comfortably watching the flickering flames do their timeless dance. 

I remember a time when I was having lunch at an old New England Inn, a day of Autumn splendor, leaves were ablaze with color, change and chill filled the air, people were already thinking of the upcoming ski season. Walking into the the Inns sitting room, there was a fire softly burning, the fireplace had a flush hearth my favorite, there was no screen holding back the warm glow, comfortable chairs were strategically placed for receiving the fires radiant warmth. I noticed a serving basket of freshly picked apples no doubt recently gathered from a nearby orchard. This scene so completely took me in, I desperately wanted to capture it, this wonderful moment with loved ones. Not wanting it to slip away, kindled that melancholy feeling arising from knowing, "you can never capture these moments". I do realize of course, that this is partly why, they are so precious. This truth has never alleviated the sweet melancholy that I am able to conjure up almost at will, by simply recalling wonderful days like this. In truth I do not want to let go of this melancholy, it has that alluring bitter, sweet flavor.   

As of late I have come to realize that it is the lens through which I am looking that is in control of the brush marks my mind is painting. The totality of everything that has ever appeared before me, made impressions that cause me to look and react to things, in my own particular and unique way. There was absolutely no conscious choice made by me, as to how my mind would interpret what came into its field of awareness. Today the lens is smudged by a feeling that the mind is having a hard time trying to decipher. I have cancer and I may die from it. It is now clear to me that my reaction to this possible ending  has been ingrained in me over the years. My unsolicited conditioning is in charge with various emotions and feelings, arising and falling in my consciousness, fear, acceptance, regret, how fortunate I am for being loved, and a total rebellion of anger for being placed into a situation that I do not have the capacity to deal with nor to understand, this is not only about death it is also about living. Then there is this, no reaction at all. Something natural is going to happen therefore I should simply let it be, let the natural process play out. With what knowledge can I challenge the natural world? I have none. In not accepting what is natural we separate ourself from what is, "natural" in fact this is how we seem to live our lives. It also appears that if we cannot remove the influence of our reactions both conditioned and seemingly innate then we can never actually be free. I have cleaned the glass door on the wood stove which allows for optimal viewing of the fire. Ending the deterrent to seeing life and death clearly begins with awareness. In order to see life and death clearly we must keep the lens through which we are looking clear. The simple fact of not knowing if we can clear the lens and how to do it is the beginning of understanding. I have proceeded as far as my intellect will take me. Therefore any further understanding can only be reached through being aware, that may be like death a natural thing to do! 

DT, AKA Bill Rogan 

The Lord came to Visit!

The actual Lord paid Me a Visit!

Last night as I lay sleeping, I was suddenly awoken by a voice. In deep baritone, my name, “Dung, Dung wake up”!  At first only one eye opened, I was still in a half slumbering state, then again only a bit louder “Dung”. I knew, immediately that there was someone there in the darkness and I became sore afraid. The voice commanded ever so gently “be not afraid my son” “Who are you and what do you want”? I blurted out. “I am the Lord God the Creator.”  "Wow, and you are here in my room tonight, for what purpose”? God said. “read your blog, I have – made things clear, written well you have. I especially like the essay called “The Bible, as fake news” “I thought, that was one of my best.” “Yes it is” God said, " for millennia now I wondered how to reverse that assholes work” My eyes bulged at the Lords reference to the human anatomy. “Don’t be shocked my son I am a pretty regular guy and [father dammit],AKA (also known/stated, as god dammit) Satan is an asshole and a pain in the ass to God”    “Okay” I said “what do you want of me?”

“You have given heaven a chance to reclaim humanity, till now we were stumped, (similar to when we created Earth and humanity and went silent, (for 190,000 years or so) 'frankly everyone in heaven kept saying now what"  anyway I was wondering,  as to how to debunk that bullshit, word of god, Bible crap, where I run around killing people and helpless animals on a flat world. And taking sides, condoning  the  burning of so called witches, and stoning perfectly nice women. Well you get the picture don’t you Dung?, that book has me portrayed as a raving, fear mongering lunatic and a moron to boot, it’s got to stop.”  “Well I agree” I told the Lord,” but I am old and tired and no one will listen”. Secretly I was thinking "why don't you do something" forgetting who I was dealing with" God said its been hands off (he read my mind) from the get go, if humans are going to make it they will do it on their own. All that freakin praying used to drive us nuts until we discovered how not to listen." "I didn't;t ask"

"Look Dung, 
”you pointed out the real author’s of the bible, just keep doing what your doing it’s all anyone can do” I just came here to let you know that I am aware of how difficult this is, exposing the lies but you do it in spite of the fear and loss of friends and family,  and heaven says thanks. “


” Thank you for saying that. And, I mean Lord, do I tell people you came to me?” "It’s your blog my son” “How can I be sure this really happened?” ” I will give you 3 signs tomorrow, look for them, then you will know I was here” And I was surprised how quickly I nodded off.

So this morning I was having my doubts about the visitation, when this happened. Wait now that I think of it, how come Maria didn't wake up? Any way there is a red squirrel living in our wood shed, I see him every morning, but he has never ever looked at me. Well, this morning he not only looked me right in the eye, he winked and smiled – "Wow that’s one I said".  I went about my morning and the remaining 2 pending signs retreated to the background of my mind. Then while pouring pancake batter into the pan, the second sign instantly blew me away, there in the center of the pan was the likeness of the Lord in the sizzling pancake batter, ‘that’s two” I even yelled it out. Then the normalcy of the day unfolded and I’d completely forgotten about the third sign. It was around 3 PM and I was getting ready for my afternoon walk, as I was getting dressed I noticed that my incontinence had abated and that I would not need my Depends, “thank you Lord” I said, knowing full well that this was the third sign and a miracle to boot, from the Lord. And so it has come to pass that I, Dung Teller having been entreated by my Lord from this day on and to my last dying breath, will do to the best of my ability, answer the call of heaven and do as the Lord has requested me and debunk the bull shit (gods words not mine) of the Devils words better known as the Bible. Can I get an Amen?

Amen this is DT in the Heartland. 

See "Bible as Fake News" See also "Why its Folly to Believe"

THE CHRISTIAN GODS BIBLICAL MURDER SPREE! Rewritten for corrections in spelling etc. on 3/23/21

 The other day I watched someone go through the bible and count the number of murders committed by god. In this so called Christian tome, the final count was nearly twenty five million people. Admittedly the number is an estimate because town populations and army numbers had to be estimated. One can consider the largest number of murders arose from the biblical story of (the great flood) where god killed everyone on Earth except Noah and his family. Earth could have had twenty million inhabitants at the time. Everyone of those people were guilty of sin according to god, but what of the babies, the innocent children and worst of all, the thousands of babies in the womb. Let us not forget all of the animals, surely they should not suffer for human transgressions, god killed them all. All these murders convey a very disturbing and sinister tale about a so called loving but "just" god. This isn't the worst aspect of this diabolical tale, what is even more disturbing is that people actually think all this happened and worship the fiendish and despicable monster that committed these heinous acts. Still worse the believer lacks the common sense to recognize nonsense in choosing to ignore the following. There is no record of this flood, of course if everyone drowned (in distant lands) there would be no one to record the event. However records do show that other civilizations thrived at the time and did not record any deluge from heaven. Also consider that in just 3 generations after the flood the bible states that there were large cities populated by thousands of people. These large numbers of inhabitants are a mathematical and demographical impossibility.  There are also large populations in Asia that have no record of a flood and their history is unbroken. 

Of course if I thought for one moment that any of this was true I would certainly be looking over my shoulder, this Christian god is a raving lunatic. Not to worry though, because none of it is true. If it was true, spending an eternity in hell would be a small price to pay to avoid spending one minute with this sickening monster, let alone forever in its presence. The world we see around us is in turmoil and always lurking in the back of our minds is the notion that at any moment the humans will annihilate themselves. This potential culmination of the human species is in no way linked to Christian Eschatology. Rather a violent or environmental end to the human species is a perfectly understandable outcome when you realize the nonsense that billions of people have accepted as truth and thus live their lives accordingly. The people that understand that these gods and their religions are a danger to our survival have stood by long enough. It is time to bring about change and it will not be easy. One of the first things that should be done is to make believers understand that they have no right to pass on their belief to their children or anyone else. If you brainwash a child from an early age you have taken away the child's right to decide what they want to believe provided they want to believe at all. Then there is this, it is a sin to harm a child and, by brainwashing the child you've taken away their right to be judged. God is supposedly going to judge everyone and if you don't let a child decide for themselves then god cannot judge them on their own merits. The fact that religious people continue on with this atrocity demonstrates their complete inability to think clearly. They will hear this and continue with the abuse of their children and their actual defiance of the god they purport to love and obey. 

Science  through the recordings of tree rings and ice cores that go back thousands and hundreds of thousands  of years respectively show no signs of a global deluge. The story of Noah is fictitious, leading to the conclusion that the entire bible is mythical.

DT

Note: If people find this critique of the Christian Bible offensive and not the murder of 25 million people then we are lost. A species with such twisted ideas of what love means and is also capable of self annihilation, is in fact, not a viable species.  

Folly To Believe. & Jesus, Santa & The Postman!

As a little child he noticed that there was a metal flap covering a hole in the front door of their house. On most days there would be letters on the floor below this slot. He wondered about this and became quite curious, so he asked “Mom, where do those letters come from that I see by the door on most mornings?” ” Oh you mean the mail, they come from the Post Man” He never once saw this Post Man, but he believed his mother. Around Christmas a similar occurrence took place though certainly not a frequent event. However this mysterious visitor was purposely introduced to him. He did not have to inquire, it was Santa Claus and he brought presents to all good girls and boys. He never saw this Santa Claus but he believed his mother.

His curiosity increased with time over these mystery visitors, until one day he saw a soldier on the front porch, a man in uniform, like he’d seen in some movies. The man was carrying a brown sack and holding envelopes like the ones that appeared on their floor by the door. Suddenly he realized that it wasn’t a soldier, it was the Post Man. He no longer believed in the Post Man, because now he knew. Unfortunately the figure of Santa Claus did not share the same fate. He simply matured and realized the impossibility of Santa, strange though he yearned for the day’s of innocent belief and all the wonderful fantasy associated with this fairy tale.  He learned that when you “know” there is no reason to believe, but an even greater lesson was that when you don’t know, then you cannot know that what you chose to believe, is true. The reason for your choice is "not knowing" What is true is based on factual evidence and belief only applies to fairy tales, wishful thinking, or desire, all of which arise from the state of not knowing.

                                                         Why it is Folly to believe!

If we understood life, then we would have no questions, there would be no confusion. We would know, therefor, belief would serve no purpose. We have no need to believe that there is a sun and it shines, we know it. We only believe, when we don’t know. Therefor, we can see quite clearly that if we don’t know, then how can we possibly know, that what we choose to believe is true. Another way to look at this is that, we have chosen (what we believe in), in a state that lacks understanding and clarity, in other words confusion.  Therefor we are really saying, that you believe because you are confused, then you say that you are no longer confused because what you’ve chosen out of confusion, has ended your confusion, this is confusion in perpetuity. In short we’ve made a decision to believe and what to believe, from a state of not knowing, nothing has changed. You’ve gone from a state of knowing you don’t know, to a state of just thinking that, now you know. This is a perpetual state of confusion. Understanding negates the need to believe, you may not as of yet understand life, but now you can understand why, to believe is folly.

Can you see the point? If you knew what life was, how it came about and its purpose you would not have to “believe”. Of course you don’t know any of this so you believe what someone else has told you or written down in a book. Also you have not researched your belief, you have not researched what others believe and you have not considered that you are unaware of all there is to believe in. If you took a logical approach eventually you would have to admit that you cannot possibly make an informed decision. (One), there is no way to know that what you choose to believe is true.(TWO) Understand there is no need to believe when you now something is true. (THREE), You can’t know what you believe is true because the reason you believe is because you don’t know. Believing is an act of self contradiction, you are simultaneously stating that you know and don’t know. And as further proof of your confusion, you will ignore what is logical and continue on with what is illogical, further verifying your confusion.  Further adding to the abstraction of belief is this fact, you are not even believing in an actual deity, what your believing in is your own concepts of the deity, this is really a form self worship.

Let's see the incoherence involved in belief. I believe because I do not know. Then I forget that I don't know and say what I chose to believe in - is true. How can you say what you believe is true when the reason you believe is because you don't know? This is why as a global species we've reduced our existence to sex, greed (stuff) and violence and in the process destroyed our environment. We've instead of knowing, invented what we know. Yes we are morons with some meager talents thrown in. Sorry to be so blunt however we are running out of time. We are a dreary little species fighting among ourselves over what basically amounts to shallow, myopic gratifications. Billions dead from wars, starvation and pollution demonstrating to the Universe that we are not a viable species. Even if there isn't a hidden truth that we should awaken too, it is still no reason to do what we've done, what we are doing. Wake up at least to the fact that we are not awake and we do not know.

Bill Rogan AKA DT  

PS: Ask yourself if we should be reproducing, bring more people into this unstable environment, in the long run making it more unstable.

                                                  

My Thought's Keep Going Back.

                                                                                                                                     

5/25/2019

Forty nine years ago today I returned from my tour of duty in South Vietnam. Here is a story I have written about that deployment.

                                                 My Thought’s Keep Going Back.

As of late my mind keeps going back to random memories, and the only recognizable commonality is the time of year. Perhaps this is happening because I am now old and recently lost a loved one, my brother who I miss dearly. It was March of 1969 the weather was hot and humid, normal for the jungles of South Vietnam. I am in the back of an Army deuce and a half, the bed is open with side rails and I am standing holding on to the top rail as the truck heaves and bounces going down the rough jungle path. It is more a path than a road and the tree branches are brushing up against my body. I am in this truck with other soldiers that have been in country for some time so this is not new to them however it is to me and George. We are replacements, newly assigned to an artillery battery about three clicks from the Cambodian border, where just beyond, lies the Ho-Chi Minh trail. ( a North Vietnamese supply route to the south) At some point, it dawns on me we could be ambushed at any time, I chamber a round and set the fire selector to full auto. No one even looked around at me when the noise of the bolt sliding forward sounded, they were already locked and loaded.

We arrived at the Battery around two PM and George and I having been together for about two weeks now, waiting for our assignment had become good friends. Unfortunately we were not assigned to the same gun. We remained friends throughout our tour of duty (now called deployment) and traveled home together and visited each other, his New Jersey home was fairly close to my Pennsylvania home. There was an occasion when I stopped in his hometown of Newton and gave his house a call, his mother informed me that George was killed in a car accident. I can still feel the shock and sadness at the news. George was a good person, and I will never forget him.

These memories are now so vivid that George is here, alive, and we are throwing a football back and forth, the day is waning but it is still hot. I am watching the football soaring toward me fairly high in the air when I hear a low whistling sound that I immediately recognize as incoming artillery fire. As the first round explodes George runs toward his gun while I run toward mine. These guns are 105 mm howitzers that are self propelled, many people would mistake them for tanks but they are bigger, the crews can actually stand up inside them and fire the artillery piece. George and I being new are positioned outside our guns and our job is to feed rounds into the firing crew as they “hopefully” return fire. I have donned my helmet and flack jacket and my heart is pounding as the rounds are getting closer and closer to my position. In order to accomplish this, the enemy had to have someone that could see us, calling in the fire on our position (a forward observer) because the soldiers shooting at us could not see where their rounds were landing in relationship to our position. Our gun sergeant looking through a scope caught sight of the enemies muzzle smoke and got a fix on their position. Then the orders started coming for me to set the rounds, charges and fuses and start feeding the artillery shells into the crew to begin returning fire. It seemed like a long time however; only minutes had passed. We are now in a full blown artillery battle, the rounds are exploding fairly close, there is a small army pick-up truck parked about 30 feet from where I am standing and a round goes through the canvas roof and explodes inside the cab shredding the truck like paper. I hear the first sergeant yelling my name “Rogan take cover” I enthusiastically oblige. I enter into a sand bagged bunker where a few soldiers are already seeking cover. I remember thinking “ a ground attack is coming”, there is an opening in the bunker that we may have to fire out of and I tell one of the other soldiers to clear the ledge. In retrospect I cannot imagine that I was thinking that clearly. Thus began my indoctrination into the Vietnam War, a War whose controversy continues to this day. It has always been my feeling that some people in South Vietnam did not want to be under Communist rule and that was why we were there. Today that War is viewed mostly with negative memories however for soldier’s in combat there is only one issue, survival. All US artillery personnel  survived on that March day in 1969, however that night we sent two tanks out to clear the enemy from the area, only one tank came back the other was destroyed and took casualties.

War is organized killing and we’ve become very good at it. Today I think of all war as the inevitable outcome of people, that lack the ability to get along, because the intelligence that would allow them to do so is absent. It is March of 2019 today there are soldier's globally deployed and if they are lucky they will survive and perhaps have memories like the one I am sharing. It is said that as we age we gather wisdom yet old men do not refrain from war because they are wise, old men are simply not up to the rigors and stress of combat. Wisemen do not have wars. Today instead of being wise with age I find myself more and more confused. I do not understand how we can say we love our children and send them to War. Wise people that love their children would find a way to keep their children safe. Is it possible that wisdom is tiered and we are now at a level that allows us to be wise enough to see, that we are not wise?

Bill Rogan

Acworth, NH

Charlie Battery 3rd Battalion 6th Artillery 52nd Artillery Group, Pleiku South Vietnam. 69/70

My thought’s and heart are with all that served, those that were wounded and those that died serving. Today I’ve come to the realization that we were misled and used by politicians for purposes that were not in tune with our service. Today many of the Vietnam veterans are suffering the ill affects of the war and the chemical's used in the field, chemical's that we were assured were not harmful to humans. This is just one of many lies that a government lacking compassion has perpetuated on its loyal soldiers. Today the United Sates of America in many ways is not what soldiers would be proud to defend.