Sources of Inspiration

It has been some time since I have been able to post a good article, and for good reason.  Now that I have a break for a short bit, I will catch you all up on what's been happening.

To begin, as you may have read in my year-end post last year, I have switched majors at Franciscan University of Steubenville to the Catechetics program.  I probably will finish up in the same amount of time, as it is the same number of credits, but I have a lot of work with these courses that has been keeping me pretty busy the past couple of months.  It more than likely will continue to be like that probably for the next year, so I will be somewhat limited in writing.

I wanted to now talk about some more specific things that have been on my mind lately.  For one, I have recently really taken to a classic work of music, that being Shostakovich's Seventh Symphony (or the Leningrad).  Dmitri Shostakovich composed that great work in 1941, at around the time the great city of St. Petersburg was being beseiged by Nazi offensive forces.  Shostakovich wrote the piece as a patriotic work, and although he was not a great fan of Josef Stalin's, he did love his "Mother Russia" and wanted to awaken a sense of patriotism in his people. It is a very majestic and beautiful symphonic work, and it invokes in my own soul a great desire to stand against forces today that threaten the way of life I hold dear.  This one now can be counted along with Sibelius' Finlandia, Aaron Copland's Appalachian Spring (which makes me homesick for my native West Virginia whenever I hear it), and of course Igor Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps as well as Petrouchka and The Firebird.  I don't know how many of you folks reading this can relate, but I have an endless soundtrack of great music like this in my mind that resonates almost constantly, but it is good to hear it this way too.  I am listening to the Seventh Symphony now on a disc as I write this, and something about that great music makes my spirit soar - good music should do just that too.

When I used to sketch years ago, I often listened to certain music that inspired my creations too - listening to a certain piece of music sort of paints a picture in one's mind about what the picture should be, and it often turns out better with that inspiration.  Sketching is something I just don't have the time to do like I used to years ago, but I probably should keep in practice.  Music like this also helps me with my writing, as my flow goes better and I can write more lucidly.  On occasion, that piece of music might be something like Shostakovich's Seventh Symphony, or it could be something as simple as a Chuck Wagon Gang gospel song - I have been inspired by both of those in different ways.  And, that leads me to another part of my discussion.

My distant ancestor, St. Vladimir, Grand Prince of Novgorod

How many of you reading this can attest, when you listen to a certain recording of music, that it strikes at something at the core of your being?  I have had that happen to me many times, and it is almost directly related to my above creative interests in writing and sketching in that it unfolds something that is inherently part of my overall makeup.  Many of you by now know my genealogy, and that I have aristocratic blood via one of my distant ancestors, Sir Thomas West (the Third Lord De la Warr).  One of the figures that pops up in my family tree is Prince Vladimir of Novgorod, or St. Vladimir of the Rus.   In  AD 988, St. Vladimir was baptized a Christian, and Russia has a deep Orthodox Christian identity thanks to my ancestor Vlad's conversion.  When I listen to Russian symphonic music (contrary to the popular terminology, Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Prokofiev, and other modern Russian composers are not "classical" - they are 20th century composers of their own genre) it resonates with something deep in my soul that connects me to Kievan Rus and my roots there.  I am a proud American of Russian heritage because of that, and I am blessed to have that Slavonic DNA interwoven in my genetic blueprint.  I am equally proud of everything else I am too though - I am a Pennsylvania Dutch, a Muskogee Creek Indian, a descendant of French Huguenots, a Jew, and a scion of nobility, all simultaneously.  WIth the blood of Charlemagne, William the Conqueror, Constantine, and so many other royal personages in my veins, my DNA is a history book of Western civilization.  God has blessed me in that regard, and it gives me a clearer sense of the identity I have been gifted by God with.   And, recently, that identity has given me some reflection on something serious.

We in the US are under a cultural onslaught of things that essentially seek to destroy and undermine Western civilization, and something must be done about that.  Especially with the demonic scourge that is radical Islam, which is slaughtering innocent Coptic, Assyrian, and other Christians as well as Jews and other minorities in the Middle East, in particular with the rise of ISIS in the past year or so, it has become imperative that we who are traditionalist, monarchist-leaning Christians need to step up to the plate, and quite honestly, the only way that Islamic extremism can be successfully combatted is by doing so on its own terms - show no mercy.  That is why I believe that maybe it is time we call a Crusade against wicked forces like ISIS, and begin to put Islam in its place.  There are many ways this can be done, and different people may feel called to different aspects of the same work, but it must be done.  If not, we risk a serious threat from radical Islam.  We cannot rely on people like Obama for this either - Obama is a traitor to the country he was supposedly elected to lead (as Rudy Giuliani correctly and astutely pointed out a couple of weeks back), and he is as much a part of the problem as ISIS.  It has to start at the grassroots and work its way up until we neutralize the threat of ISIS and the demonic Islamist agenda it has.  My own ancestors, such as Charles Martel, fought to keep Islam from corrupting and destroying Western civilization, and now I am starting to feel that it is up to me, through whose own veins the noble blood of Charles Martel flows, to do my part to defeat ISIS and those like them.  I don't necessarily feel the need to take up physical arms against ISIS or anything, but perhaps I can inspire and encourage those who have been persecuted by these evil dogs as well as those who are making a courageous stand against them.  I believe that a new breed of Crusader could take the Shostakavich Seventh Symphony, and appropriate it to our cause - we, like the many valiant Russians who fought off the brutal Nazi aggressors back during World War II, can be inspired by the great music that built Western civilization like this piece did.  We need to start by being creative in punishing Islamic terrorists instead of rewarding them, and I have an idea I would like to propose.  In the US - particularly in the Southeast - there is an explosive population of feral wild hogs - they are mean, they cause billions in damage to farmland and other real estate, and they carry disease.  However they are also good meat - if you have ever had the privelege of eating a wild boar porkchop, it tastes like a T-bone steak, seriously!  I believe the feral hog problem and dealing with dangerous Islamic terrorists can be dealt with in one major action.  First, the feral hogs need to be rounded up and controlled in such a way that they can remain alive.  Now, the terrorist part of it.  Islam strongly forbids any association with pigs - no eating pork, no raising them on farms, etc.  If a devout Muslim even touches a pig, they believe their soul is imperiled.  So, I got an idea.  When we catch these Islamic terrorists, why not throw them into an enclosure with a bunch of these feral hogs, and let the hogs dispense the justice?   I will tell you one thing - if we did that, Islamic terrorists would think twice about attacking any American, that is for sure!  I think solutions like this take care of more than one problem, and again it is the only language a radical Islamist will understand.  I would probably get into some hot water for even proposing  something like this, but you know something, who cares anymore??  I hear so much crap that offends my sensitivities these days, and no one seems to take that into consideration, and therefore why should I have to be held to that standard??  If this offends you, suck it up and keep your hatemails to yourself, because I have the freedom to speak my convictions too.

Well, I have essentially said my piece for tonight, so I will end there.  I hope to write again in the near future, so take care, and keep your chins up.