Fin du Mondaine

Pandemic woke up an old boomer, who finds satisfaction in each obscure yet informative explanation and obtuse political pontification. Points made, promptly nods off again. Nobody listens. Had Woodstock Nation not totally tuned out against fascist exclusivity and relentless thievery, world might be a better place with fewer deaths and less disgrace. Alas, efforts that go into resistance strengthen malfeasance in almost every case. Demonstrations have lost clout no doubt due to interpersonal distance; knocks against press, lack of substance, and mistrust on all sides combine to give con men credence and leaders license. Health paranoia has also incited history’s fifth (or sixth depending upon who’s counting) bike boom, as urban commuters avoid busses, subways, and trains for a safer option.

Insufferable trolls, measurable insanity, and mob mentality are why consensus fails and democracy derails. But that’s the point, no? Baiting through namecalling, claims of best yet and boundless confidence, continually shifting positions, doxing on scant evidence, and insincere appeals to explain and prove are what insiders intentionally do, so confusion can raise fears and power can be consolidated. Provocateurs act as if Academy Award, medical license, Nobel or Pulitzer Prize, PhD, and stellar resume are no more remarkable than common sense, and everyone is intellectually equal. Nonsense. But when experts offer advice and you refuse based on hunches, pray only you die or suffer, not infect anyone else or unnecessarily run up costs to society. Such are the bugs mankind primarily needs to avoid. It’s not what you say but what you do that matters; one does say “indeed” to affirm a fact.

Interpreting motives behind online chatter isn’t as difficult as convincing partisans they are being brainwashed, duped and manipulated. It’s not just campaign rhetoric but covert coercion. Stories of fabulous lives in spotlights often disguise persuasion to waste your life desperately chasing impossible dreams so agents and producers can select among most talented and profit enormously from their unpaid sacrifices. In addition to 32 bit data encryption flying over wavelengths and wifi, secrets hide in plain sight through, among other things: bitcoin transactions, backmasking tracks in songs, crossword puzzles, cryptocurrency, cryptography, foreign translations, idioms, image metadata, location tracking, malware, metaphors, passwords, patterns of behavior, selection bias, semiotics, smartphone GPS pings, steganography of data within data, subliminal suggestion, supposedly private forms, sudokus, survey responses, symbology, television programming, textual anagrams, trojans, unforeseen consequences, violence desensitization, viruses, and zebra codes.

Ancient humans after millennia began to appreciate and exploit season cycles and signs in nature. These days facial recognition and profiler software promise to anticipate what you’ll buy or do and discriminate meanings from apophenic readings, fanciful imaginings, and schizophrenic leanings. Statistics don’t directly reveal causality. More things happen wherever people spend most of their time. Few things occur in deserted deserts, lots in densely packed cities. But neither will you remain disease free by ignoring factuality. As in all things, balance is key. You may conduct internal investigations without becoming dysfunctional or being certified crazy.

Conspiracy theorists speculate that COVID-19 was a weapon to weed out undesirables; it targets homeless, old, stupid, vulnerable and weak who are dole recipients and non-producers. It also cowers survivors. ”Important in managing a herd is to destroy all forms of critical thinking, in particular anything that challenges the supremacy of private property.” Eli Zaretsky, Culling the Herd, May, 2020. However, it may not be a “a grand conspiracy among sentient capitalist overlords - lately the much-maligned 1%. Rather... the result of a discursive system of actors/agents from all socioeconomic strata making (false) choices based on a shared body of internalized messaging that ultimately and accidentally result in The Way Things Are... Monocled robber barons are simply the ones best positioned to capitalize on the fallout,” as Robert Ware commented. Debacle of budget cuts and priorities, “Tells you something about the nature of the sociopathic buffoons who are running the government, and the country’s suffering from it,” opined Noam Chomsky concerning America being contagion’s epicenter.

All you have to do is be attentive, react sensibly, and think things through, what most people prefer to avoid. Bicycling in latest advertising still flags salubrious and smart; be assured next pharma ad will show them, no matter how ludicrous their storyline. When a vehicle was being driven badly, took notice though suddenly nauseated: Black Chevy pickup with a MAGA plate. Must accumulate ghastly amounts at any cost signifies crass greed, self interest, sheer stupidity, and wanton prejudice, what any law abiding American would never condone.

Disgusting how far America has slipped from decency, leadership, morality and statesmanship, but such betrayals aren’t new. Nixon promoted bumper sticker patriotism with Love it or Leave It platitudes. Inadvertently, improvement can be a double-edged sword; a better nation makes you a target for invasion. Advancements only the rich can afford create widespread resentment. Helping entire world to grow at same rate is one solution, though dictators and theocrats disagree, since it undermines their oppression and powerlust. Corruption and greed hurt everyone, including self. Such a paragraph probably sounds insufferably righteous, but consider conditions that motivated writing it.

Reached the rock bottom of boob tube addiction by watching daytime broadcasts. Left a dirty feeling, as if sifting through ash trays for roaches to roll one more spliff. Saw rerun of season 4, episode 54, bike lane blockage (February, 2019) where Mablean not-a-judge-just-play-one-on-TV Ephriam handed down a decision that was a blatant miscarriage of justice based on federal and state laws she’s supposed to uphold. Perhaps plaintiff didn’t prepare his case well, but any vehicle operator who injures a bicyclist or pedestrian is always 100% at fault. The presence of bike lanes doesn’t confine bicyclists to them, especially when an armored vehicle parks in one; they can still use all of street, for example, shifting into passing lane for a left turn. Motorists have to anticipate swerving, let bicyclists be, pass with a wide margin, or slow until they can. Mablean punted decision to city, who can never be approached or sued, thus provided victory for her preferred defendant. Pilate likewise washed his hands to do what was politically correct with no forethought of a future full of warfare justified by phony spiritual fervor. If not gospel, something else would have

to suffice, such as race, since ambitious asshats full of avarice just aren’t nice.

Practically as bad, Adult Swim collects drug addled anarchy posing as puerile, possibly psychotic anime. Spaceman (Dan Britt, producer, 2018) says, “If you play like a child, you will never grow old.” Earthman figures, “There are two possible interpretations to this, but I think what he meant was if I taught him to do a wheelie, I would live forever.” Earthman did choose correctly, but eternal life doesn’t turn out to be the boon he expected.

Supposedly went from ridiculous to sublime by viewing documentary Secrets of the Universe (Stephen Low, dir., 2019), really brief biographies of 20th Century physicists from Albert Einstein to Stephen Hawking. Cambridge University in 1970’s England reeked of cycling reminders for a quadriplegic to ponder when he wasn’t exploring space-time with his unfettered mind.

Is entire world coming to an end, or only society’s mundane smugness that everything will turn out fine as long as you’re fit and rich, no matter how many meanwhile perish? Six-part television miniseries Good Omens (Douglas Mackinnon, 2019) pitted evil against good in a merry manner based on novel of same name by Neil Gaiman and Terry Prachett. When Anathema Device (Adria Arjona) moves from beachside Malibu to a small village in Oxfordshire, England, she arrives by bicycle, then begins pedaling countryside searching for young Adam, The Antichrist (Sam Taylor Buck), who she wants to kill to save world from Armageddon. Corrupt nuns, crucifixion disrespect, cyclist heroine, feminist savior, fey angel (Michael Sheen), God as a woman (Frances McDormand), hipster demon (David Tennant, aka Doctor Who), widespread satanism, and witchcraft normalcy: Little wonder humorless Christian patriarchs hated it and lobbied hard to get it cancelled. Adam and his foursome ride their bikes to encounter apocalypse after Anathema nearly gets pulled up into a tornado, as if another wicked witch. Demon Crowley’s classic Bentley has a cassette player, but all recordings quickly revert to Queen’s Greatest Hits, heard repeatedly throughout, reminiscent of Freddie Mercury’s bare ass fat bottomed Bicycle Race in Wembley Stadium. Celt’s Boudica and Lady Godiva figuratively rock on in something finally worth watching. Alpha Aquarians will inherit everything, maybe accomplish millennials’ aqua aura policies of peace, because ancient farts from previous century just couldn’t see past greed to leave a worthwhile legacy.

Adam Raised Cain

Worst Bike Month Ever: Established by League of American Bicyclists 64 years ago, you'd think they'd promote this cycling tribute all the more given it's a chance for individuals to get crucial exercise and fresh air without risking gym visits during an epidemic. Instead they've postponed until September. Can't even offer to lead group rides because of liabilities of infecting people, though health policy surgeon Marty Makary explains that more people contract diseases indoors than outdoors, and urges fitness activities alfresco as long as you maintain distanced by 6 feet and remain masked on every street. Can't blame Labann, since recommend nothing; participation is your own choice.

Today would have been Bike-to-Work Day. Instead, dodged coronavirus, drove to market, swabbed all groceries, washed everything twice including self, then watched films, a full time occupation without gainful employment. Most fit general categories: Action/adventure sagas, biography/history pics, chick/date flicks, crime/detective dramas, horror/slasher films, romance/tearjerker melodramas, science fiction speculations, war/western nostalgia, and whatnot not so easily pigeonholed. For decades SyFy prepared viewers for viral contagion and zombie apocalypse as vicarious thrills. Not so amusing when life actually resembles worst of these nightmares. And what will new normal be after this huge time out? Businesses won’t recover? Desperate bash and grab begins? Entitlements and investments get eliminated? Reactions, sanctions, warfare?

Scanned through scores of Lifetime made-for-television movies. In their dumbed down world of petty jealousies and teen cruelties, characters barely ever go outdoors, bumble behind the fourth wall and within some privileged hall, so none displays bicycling culture at all, rather multiple ways to misbehave and mock moral protocol. Now understand how the unenlightened don’t pedal integral to living, though those portrayed seem more miserable than bicyclists in general, gladiators in a draconian arena. All films can't be equal or great, but low budgets don't necessarily mean bad acting or uninteresting ideas. In fact, you find more fascination, inspiration, plot twists, reality, and warmth while conversing with nobodies than in grandiose tales of make believe ideals. Fiction stinks of idioms, metaphors, morality, what could be, if only... Truth reveals itself in what people actually do, not what they say. Science collects such instances and creates strategies for sailing through inconsistencies, such as quarantining most vulnerable by numbers of infected among age, gender, and race, or whether inoculated with common influenza, then tracing disease back to ground zero to find cures, though advancements take lifetimes. Mankind merely exists within nature and will never dominate it no matter what Bible preaches or pundits espouse.

There’s no honor among thieves on Perfect Friday (Peter Hall, dir., 1970), when stuffy manager Stanley Baker plots to rob own bank along with a Lady (Ursula Andress) and Lord (David Warner). He sits apathetically as another London taxi forces a bicyclist into curb onto butt, and through an argument in which driver ridicules innocent victim as a “bleeder”. Can't trust bankers, but government relief will nevertheless wind up in their hands.

Black high school basketball star Rob Brown, after Finding Forester (Gus van Sant, dir., 2000), befriends and gets mentored by aging, agoraphobic, Pulitzer Prize writer William Forester (Sean Connery). Famous but reclusive, when establishment makes accusations of plagiarism, Forester goes to bat for Brown. In something of a reversal, not kid but O.G. is the bicyclist, as was Connery’s character James Bond back in the ’60’s, perhaps on same bike.

In remake of Carpenter’s The Fog (Rupert Wainwright, dir., 2005), Maggie Grace breezes back onto Antonio Island off Oregon’s coast, but soon becomes bogged down in a supernatural threat. She finds a journal that explains why townsfolk are being murdered, which leads back to crimes committed by founding fathers, whose likenesses were cast in bronze a century later, as shown. Turns out she herself belongs among these spirits as the reincarnated wife of vengeful sea captain, whose crew contracted leprosy and spread through entire colony while trading with China. Crimes of ancestors can haunt the living, though you can’t legitimately share glory or shame of those with same name.

Nobody paid much attention when Carriers (Alex & David Pastor, dirs., 2009) debuted. Brothers (Chris Pine and Lou Taylor Pucci) cross desert Southwest with girlfriends (Emily VanCamp and Piper Perabo) doing whatever they must to avoid inhaling virulent contagion. Delineates a crass descent to depths of indifference for anyone else, and Darwinian predation for dwindling resources in a dire struggle to survive. Could also restate Republican worldview, who'd have everyone injudiciously return to what they do to feed their greed and speed profits they need to retain power while minions bleed and cower. Kept latest email from Trump, who pathetically attempted to shame donors into coughing up $37 minimum for his reelection presumption. Deserted destination at least has a bicycle, something useful with fuel scarcity.

Charles Fihiol, a schizophrenic from rural Louisiana, considers Joan D’Arc, depicted in a New Orleans monument, as his Invisible Girlfriend (Ashley Sabin & David Redmon, documentarians, 2009). She has no complexion in the darkness of his mind. One winter he bikes 500 miles just to see her and a sexy barmaid named DeeDee he once knew and liked. As did Dorothy in OZ, he encounters a straw man, strong winds, tin man with a crutch, wizard, and witch.

Mona (Bailee Madison) questions her former math teacher, next door neighbor J. K. Simmons (narrator, Netflix’s documentary Coronavirus Explained), why he wears wax numerals as neck pendants, though she knows they represent his varying mood levels as An Invisible Sign (Marilyn Agrelo, dir., 2010). Decades later, as a reluctant teacher herself, Mona (Jessica Alba) learns to accept responsibility and be an adult who helps children with similar issues. Nether life or love is an equation; both defy qualification and quantification. Windows with teddy bears notwithstanding, what traumas will coronavirus pandemic visit on child psyches?

A family takes their 1929 summer vacation in UK’s Lake District, where mailmen still deliver telegrams by bicycle to Swallows & Amazons (Philippa Lowthorpe, dir., 2016), what children call themselves as rival crews of thus named sailboats. Skullduggery is afoot, and they bravely save the day among irresponsible adults who seem unaware of personal protective gear, such as life preservers for children camping and sailing unsupervised on one of England’s deepest lakes.

With global doom assured before dawn, artists Shanyn Leigh and Willem DeFoe do what they always did: Make love and more art, meditate, order Chinese takeout, and watch as events unfold in 4:44: Last Day on Earth (Abel Ferrara, dir., 2012). What else can you do? A bicycle sits idle as they perch in their loft overlooking New York City while humanity fritters away remaining hours. How did we arrive at this inexorable conclusion?

Horizontal mambo gets stale for urban couple Sylvia and Mark (America Ferrera and Ryan Willams) in X/Y (Ryan Piers Williams, dir., 2014). They seek advice and solace from friends, including bisexual bicyclist, expressionist artist, fashion model, and serious surfer Jake (Jon Paul Philips, shown), who gives Mark more than he expected.

Viveik Kalra plays a Pakistani youth who was Blinded by the Light (Guinder Chadha, dir., 2019) in late 1980’s small town England, who burns for a better life without fear of fascists and father, so finds magic in The Boss’s gift for lyric among songs that speak to him of victories less pyrrhic. As a consequence, he loses his shell, makes a friend (Aaron Phagura), and meets a love interest (Nell Williams), who break out together, dance through town, and ride their bikes to Springsteen cadences.

“You know it's never over, it's relentless as the rain. Adam Raised a Cain. You're born into this life paying for the sins of somebody else's past... Daddy worked his whole life for nothing but the pain. Now he walks these empty rooms looking for something to blame.” Bruce Springsteen from Darkness on the Edge of Town, 1978

Le Pétomane

Went forth early on roads presumed empty and safe, but found several crowded and dicey, full of pedestrians convening without masks, now required by law locally. So, later looked for bits of bicycling culture never before noticed, and found plenty with little difficulty, stuff to occupy mind and time instead of rumors of contagion casualties surpassing those of Viet Nam War. No point crying crocodile tears over decline of journalism, which you killed by enabling conservatives, Nixon, Reagan, The Bushes, and Trump, who did everything possible to destroy and discredit labor unions and the press, sole opposition to their power mad constituency: religious establishment and rich oligarchs. Fake news or fascist resurgence? Do you get to pick? They only succeeded in exiling journalists to blogs, dark web, social media. Doesn't matter how much dirt you bury truth under, it sprouts. But you'll never get back $50 trillion they stole from US treasury, or witness speedy recovery from latest pandemic's enormous hit on economy.

Since contagion is aided by air pollution. Brussels, London and Paris now encourage cycling as a way to fight COVID-19, while Italy and Spain still prohibit outdoor activities. French esteem liberated individuals, from peloton champions to previous century fartomaniacs who put tush upon a bike saddle to push into town and perform. And you thought no more rhymes with Bike&Chain were possible as titles. Might as well read and ride virtually, though in a mad rush to be marketable or topical many writers will betray truth and say anything that comes to mind, however unremarkable, when one should be rethinking what bad leadership did to land you in this pickle, such as cut funding to disease watchdogs. Their zero sum game nears its conclusion. Among amusements, visceral and vulgar repeatedly beat virtuous and zealous. Time to clear the air of poisons. Can’t confine bodies to armchairs and indoors forever, since they break bonds and bust out of prisons.

Crazy, Stupid, Love (Glen Ficarra & John Requa, dirs., 2011) stars Steve Carell (bicycling nerd in The 40 Year Old Virgin) and Julianne Moore as his soon to be ex-wife. Despite differences in ages, babysitter Analeigh Tipton badly wants him, while son Jonah Bobo wants and woos her with flowers he delivers by bike. Carell’s coach for dating scene reentry Ryan Gosling falls for Emma Stone, later revealed as Carell’s adult daughter. Complicated intertwined plot lines didn’t interfere with award nominations/wins and box office success.

In northern Serbia, young adult pharmacy intern Hana Selimović catches up with childhood boyfriend and deadbeat globetrotter Mladen Sovilj in Neposlušni (The Disobedient, Mina Djukic, dir., 2014). Sparks fly amidst contagion that has people fleeing village and wearing masks. Despite risks, couple embark spontaneously on a bicycling trek across sun baked countryside, she draws a bucolic scene including a bike on his bare back, then they return to crash a wedding. She wonders if they can build a life together given their shared disrespect for authority and convention.

Communist statesman and Nobel Laureate Pablo Neruda wrote a famous poem about bicycles, as already noted in appendix to B&C. So, flashes of them naturally belong in post-WWII Chile in biopic Neruda (Pablo Larrain, dir., 2016). So many people today pit conservatives against liberals you wonder what thorough brainwashing took place that lies could ever displace what history does already trace. Deprived of civil freedoms, communists on several fronts overthrew fascists, who forever mistreat and oppress in favor of ruthless totalitarianism and tightfisted domination, whatever dictators call their regimes. Must extol poets past and present who fearlessly face persecution to serve mankind and strengthen civilization.

Rose Clear/McNulty (Rooney Mara - young, Vanessa Redgrave - elderly) is much too attractive for 1940’s small minded Irish townsfolk of Secret Scripture (Jim Sheridan, dir., 2017), who conspire to commit her to a mental institution for life and deprive her of her newborn boy. Rose hides her diary in margins of a bible, but says, “There’s a sickness in people that stops them seeing the truth. Anything you see with love is the truth. The rest is smog.” While hamlets traversed by bicycles had little atmospheric disturbance, villagers dearly needed to be seeded with christian tolerance and logical sense.

Feel honored to point out this extensive list of Hindi and Tamil bicycling songs. Shows how different cultures can be. For a Malayalam film, Nonsense (M.C. Jithin, dir., 2018) has BMX obsessed Rinosh George aiming for bike stunt stardom, while those around him dismiss his dream as what title says. This thriller breaks ground as India’s first film about BMX sports.

Isn’t It Romantic (Todd Strauss-Schulson, dir., 2019) stars audacious Aussie actress Rebel Wilson as a no nonsense assistant architect who dismisses love depicted in chick flicks. When a subway mugger tries to snatch her handbag, she fights him off only to knock herself out by running into a post. When she wakes up in a hospital, suddenly everything resembles those romantic comedies she so despised, replete with girlie loaner bikes with baskets conveniently stationed around New York City, a place suddenly astir with savvy cyclists.

Youtube members post indices of bicycling songs, some of which are only related by the fact they show artists riding their bikes, though all such lists only ever just scratch the surface of the 3,000 that exist out there, nearly 2,000 listed here.

Robin Thicke, When I Get You Alone, A Beautiful World, Interscope Records, 2002 - has recording artist posing as a New York City bicycle messenger dodging traffic with impressive moves.

Anna Ternheim, To Be Gone (Swedish in English), single, self, 2004 - "Let me leave the body, leave the mind, every promise, every place behind. I just happen to feel so alone, for today for all days to come. I just wanna be wanna be gone, leave the city, leave the cold. Young people far too old. Let me cross a very fine line for today, for a lifetime." Epidemics breed despair, but why not liven days you're given, not moan over betrayals?

Nada Surf, Whose Authority, Lucky, Barsuk, 2008 - “The picture is gone. Put a contract out on things that go on and on. How do you stay where you most want to be? Where'd you get the patience? Did it come easily? On whose authority? I have none over me.”

One of The Bazillions, Super Sonic Rocket Bike, single, self, 2010 - “Countdown from 10 to 1, as we blast off towards the sun, we’ll be having some fun on my super sonic rocket bike. You won't believe how far we'll go on a super sonic rocket bike, all the planets we will know.”

Puding Pani Elvisovej - Ďobkanie (Slovak techno), π (album), self (PPE), 2010... group parks motor vehicles, rents bikes, and spins out to serene countryside, but shown in reverse, so what are they trying to say?

Alec Benjamin, My old Bicycle, single, self, 2016 - “My old bicycle was a Ferrari. It rusted in the yard and now I’m sorry. I crashed my car, so when I pull up to parties I tell the girls my bike is a Ferrari. And are you grown up enough to outgrow the things you love and leave an old friend in the dust? Yeah, I remember this one time when I picked up the phone line and I heard you on the other side, and you said, 'Come on, let’s ride.'”

Budapestain

Further pursuing obscure film viewing amidst this despotic and horrific pandemic, can’t help but notice how truth takes a beating. Literary and litter seem to have same root, bits or memes strewn carelessly, stuff to which you can never lend your faith. Photographs were admissible in court until Photoshop began to falsify. Film or video evidence was beyond doubt until viewers learned about special effects. Few things are as completely genuine as a kiss on your lips or slap across your ass. Spinning along on a steed of steel will always be credibly real. Meaningful, small, unexpected references give 21st Century cinema inspirational appeal.

Beginning with The Year of The Bike, 2009, and proceeding by date of release, in television program Law & Order Criminal Intent, “Legion”, Season 2, Episode 18, major case detectives Eames & Goren (Kathryn Erbe & Vincent D’Onofrio) expose a cult where adolescents must steal bicycles or wind up dead under an authoritarian ring leader.

Documentary called A Murder of Couriers (Neil Brill, Tom MacLeod, dirs., 2012) chronicles culture and lives of Vancouver bicycle messengers. Not to be confused with 1998 crime thriller called A Murder of Crows, title comes from a 15th Century term of venery, developed by witty hunters, to which ornithologists object, who call any group of birds a “flock”. Deadsoul Tribe’s like named album coincidently features a track, The Messenger. Coincidence echoes pestilence while surrounded by sickness born from premeditated malice and sociopathic avarice.

White God (Kornél Mondruczó, dir., 2014) has preteen protagonist Zsófia Psotta discovering how music soothes the savage beast. When her mongrel pet is tossed aside because of an excessive tax on dogs that aren’t pure breeds, she defies family and looks relentlessly for her beloved Hagen, during which her own bicycle is stolen. Meanwhile, Hagen leads a canine revolt against blood sport organizers and petty animal controllers who’ve mistreated him. A hundred dogs escape pound and race through streets of Budapest terrorizing residents.

Zsófia borrows a bike to outrun them so she can go home, but gets knocked down, then plays Liszt on her trumpet to quell their wilding. This allegory about Nazi and Soviet occupation of Hungary won an award.

While We’re Young (Noah Baumbach, dir., 2015) explains why middle aged hipsters Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts befriend bicycling twentysomethings Adam Driver and Amanda Seyfried on their quest for authentic lifestyles. “Ride on the street, man!” screams Driver.

Stiller’s stride into cool cyclist gets tripped up when his bike less its front wheel is stolen. Driver disappoints cyclist Stiller, naturally, in a vignette of how privileged millennials mash up culture instead of invent their own. A generation ago horizons were devoid of textural complexity offered over today’s internet, much of it as phony as Wikipedia entries spawned by propagandists and publicists that researchers and xennials take as gospel. Nonfiction is now in question, truth on trial, for every documentarian. Intimacy and spontaneity can only survive when you feel alive.

The Sweet Life (Rob Spera, dir., 2016) tells how bicycling ice cream vendor Chris Messina meets likewise despondent Abigail Spencer. They make a suicide pact to cross America and throw themselves off the Golden Gate Bridge. After several awkward adventures including boosting cars and robbing convenience stores, he steals a bike to rush and save her.

Life can be sweet if you have someone with whom to share your journey.

Last time guardian Alison (Dianna Agron) sees her teenage brother Darryl (Shawn Ashmore), he’s taking off with his BMX bike and friends to hang and party. She spends rest of Hollow in the Land (Scooter Corkle, dir., 2017) looking for him, as does town’s vindictive police chief (Michael Rogers) who holds them both responsible for their dad’s traffic accident, which killed his son who was riding on a bicycle.

Brazilian drama Arábia (João Dumans, dir., 2017) opens with teen protagonist riding his bicycle alongside a valley vista, only to discover diary of an itinerant worker whose life was even harder than his.

Mail Order Monster (Paulina Lagudi Ulrich dir., 2018) spins an awkward yarn of a gifted and resourceful teen (Madison Horcher) with family and friend issues, shown bicycling away from high school bullies and intended harm. She orders an overprotective robot from a comic book ad. Mayhem ensues, but scenario ends well for Sam and her stepmom.

Amidst factory lofts Evalena Marie awaits entry into the secluded world of pharmacologist Joey Klein in Painless (Jordan Horowitz, dir., 2018). Klein portrays a person with rare congenital disorder CIP, insensitive to pain, thus often repeatedly suffers inadvertent injuries. When you are unlike others, you choose between letting your desire to conform destroy you, or maximizing whatever skills you have to play hand you’re dealt. Other directions sit on your doorstep, if you make a choice and take a chance.

Hope may not be rational, but not one life is futile. For the first time in its 50 year history Earth Day 2020 sees planet recovering from mankind’s influence. Woodstock Nation, who instigated this annual commemoration, responded to threats of pollution and waste, none of which have been abated to date or addressed in haste. Reports from everywhere describe a resurgence in bicycling as a way to be green, maintain personal distance, move about cleanly and effectively, and stay healthy. Who knew?

But for Messiaen

Heading out into prevailing breeze in order to return with ease, a bicyclist might contemplate disease. When traffic is heavy, too much roadkill in gutter is what one sees, but lately notice few new. Squirrels, safe only when up in trees, must view motoring as a pandemic, what bicyclists begrudge as expediently politic. Apex predators, bears, coyotes, mountain lions and wolves have rebounded to relative degrees. Despite nearly empty pavement, you still must pick distances and routes using your psychogeographical expertise.

Despite wrong terminology tossed carelessly around, today’s contagion is not plague (a now rare but specific disease spread by flea bites from rats), unforeseen, or unprecedented. COVID-19 is a mutant form of same influenza that causes SARS, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, which presents real danger, as lung inflammation can suffocate victims. So far globally, less than 0.01% of people have contracted. Prognoses aren't encouraging, though epidemiologists predict improving outcomes overall. Cleaning diligently and distancing self from coughs and sneezes seem effective. Statistics indicate case counting has begun to catch up and coronavirus has shortened its reach. Labann along with many writers warned of dangers from bacteria, fungi, and viruses; has been a common literary theme for decades.

A century ago, related and so called Spanish Flu killed up to forty million people, about 2% of planet’s then two billion population. During the 15th Century, The Black Death, traveling between North Atlantic and Pacific Rim along the Silk Road, wiped out half of Europeans. Spanish conquest of The Americas and subsequent Columbian exchange represented history’s worst instance of biological warfare; diseases for which natives had no immunities killed 90% of indigenous survivors who weren’t otherwise slaughtered. Then as today, commerce and trade filled coffers and coffins. Until 20th Century, nobody knew how to stay healthy, how to stop diseases from spreading through quarantine and sanitation, what even caused illness. They blamed demons, mistrals, possessions or vampires. Mechanisms understood, nowadays you look for who’s responsible and try to make some sense of what’s happening.

If you carefully assess COVID-19 cases, non-Asians were hardest hit, particularly Italian and Spanish among American, Middle Eastern and Scandinavian afflicted. Global outcomes, excluding those still sick, are about four recovered versus one who died. If you can believe numbers out of Beijing (no reason to after so many misinformation campaigns), Chinese recovery rate is radically superior, 50:1, though Hubei province had been in total lockdown. This could also be due to better immunity after having to deal daily with contagions and crowds. More Indians than not also seem likewise immune. Indonesians and Japanese appear similarly spared. Reporters say they traced COVID-19 to wet markets in Wuhan, and would have you believe it began with pangolins eating bats, thereby transmitted to humans who consider these scaly anteaters a delicacy. Some say Chinese devour just about anything that squirms in a land with limited resources and widespread hunger. Inadvertent leaks from research facilities into unsuspecting populations have occurred everywhere, but was this what happened here? Beijing already stated their goal to dominate microbial sciences, but to what end? They'd be ashamed to admit stupidly infecting entire planet. Lack of transparency instigates suspicions.

Given numbers reported, what makes the most sense is a premeditated biological attack specifically against the West. After bribing a Harvard virologist for vials of deadly viruses, and a WHO Director with aid to Ethiopia to silence warnings, China’s Biolake laboratories in Wuhan secretly acted. Suspect they used genetic engineering to target races other than own. Why use weapons of mass destruction if you want to seize minerals and treasures from rivals? Genetic bioweapons were developed decades ago, and have been successfully deployed on several occasions. This pandemic is what WWIII will look like, less damage, more deaths, not the nuclear holocaust you expected.

“Taken together with the fact that influenza virus is readily accessible and may be causing more deaths than previously suspected, the possibility for genetic engineering and aerosol transmission suggests an enormous potential for bioterrorism.” Mohammad Madjid, Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, 2003

What sort of leaders resort to genocide? Well, communist totalitarians and conscienceless sociopaths. Emboldened by corrupt and inane European and US officials, China figured now’s the best time to get away with it including plausible denial due of domestic deaths. Ready for next release, their only problem is timing, though 5 and 10 year plans have been diligently pursued. Trump’s response was all about himself, how pandemic and press made him look bad. How moronic does worrying about legacy sound while citizens are dying for want of decisive policies? Maybe what capitalists really needed was a time out to reevaluate how they treat others, and who they elect.

A persistent belief repeated in Bike&Chain was Nature’s growing resentment of mankind’s stewardship. “You’re fired!” could she be saying? If anything, Nature has been proven to retaliate against betrayers and transgressors with wrath of God vengeance. Climate catastrophes now appear linked to carbon crimes and resource depletion. Modern humans get more diseases than any other creature, followed by their domestic livestock and pets. Creatures in tune with nature consume scavenged flesh that would make a dog gag, drink water that pigs would find poisonous, fit nicely into climate and ecology as long as people don’t destroy habitats or outright exterminate species, and would get by fine without mankind. War is no cure for overpopulation. Aggression ultimately consumes aggressors and victims alike. What’s enviable about America is that Americans work. Otherwise, it’s just concrete jungles, crumbling roads, empty grasslands, garbage dumps, rocky mountains, and strip malls. Its treasures include know how, product turnover, and work ethic, whole lot of which has long been in irrevocable decline following similarly inept policies in Europe. Why do Chinese think manufacturers increasingly rely on their workforce? Certainly not because it is better, rather carefree and cheaper, until now. You can keep pollution, sickness, and stink, what all of industrial world already knows too well.

Had a Hannity breakfast of hardboiled egg on anguish muffin while hearing him excoriate The New York Times for their reportage of pandemic related layoffs after corporations pledged to be kinder to stakeholders. “Capitalism isn’t nice... companies must profit despite price,” says a greedy investor never employed in any value adding industry. Layoffs have hidden but huge costs in company reputation, customer loyalty, employee morale, and replacement training. Might as well chuck current innovation and viable future out with the bathwater, since parasites dump nonperforming stocks every quarter. Jump starting jobs just to take a free ride on worker backs will exacerbate contagion and massacre millions. No worries. Allegedly, “free” Miracle Spring Water will fix any disorder. Conservative mania, intense sociopathy, led to cult devotion, Great Depression, media scams, rise of Hitler, and warfare ever since, all under Republican administrations. Who wants this kind of world?

Society abides snap decisions without full awareness of consequences. Vast numbers are woefully ignorant. Complaints of forfeiting of basic rights, such as freedom to roam about by car during quarantines and race to reopen businesses, outnumber concerns over attempted genocide. During world wars they imposed curfews and rationed food, and how is this not equally dire? Life could certainly be livable without exporting and importing durable good and food stuffs. Local farm-to-table initiatives already supplement groceries from industrial corn, rice and wheat fields. But East Coast urban sprawl claimed a lot of failing farms for housing tracts due to developer greed and state overtaxation. Fields left fallow for recovery over several years represent irresistible temptations for opportunists. First thing construction crews do is fell forests so heavy equipment can dig foundations. Without trees branches upon which to roost, bird migrations are disrupted. Barriers kill beneficial animals and insects. Ecosphere collapse can be avoided with zoning codes and enforcement, but money grubbers push back with bribes and campaign contributions toward an ever bleaker future. Eliminating restrictions does nothing to expedite recovery; in fact, regulations create jobs and safeguard return to previous standard of living.

Profiteers recoil from whatever they can’t comprehend. Kept at arm’s length is no longer far enough. What you seek to escape relentlessly hunts you down. Artists embrace what’s unknown, predicted viral apocalypse in hundreds of films, but they were deemed irrelevant when everything seemed tolerable with technology prevalent. Dread, horror, and slasher films harden viewers to what they’ll have to taste, sequelae of ignorance and waste. Einstein said science is no savior, may even be tool of choice for enemies. With billions under house arrest, and too many dead and dying, spirituality becomes a beacon of hope in chaos. Recalls such cacophonic and desperate musical expressions as Quartet for the End of Time, composed and first performed by Olivier Messiaen while interred in a WWII concentration camp in 1941, where he felt he belonged after society’s excesses sent him there. But for the grace of God, so go you, too. Evil may provoke a good response, but isn’t required for selfless creativity and social justice. Given selfish appeals and thickheaded responses so far, don’t see how this will end well.

“The abyss is Time with its sadness, its weariness. The birds are the opposite to Time; they are our desire for light, for stars, for rainbows, and for jubilant songs.” - Olivier Messiaen, POW, 1941

"Do we seek to transform whatever forms of violence we experience into something creative and relational, or do we spit them out and perpetuate the cycle?" Stephen Osborne, virtuoso performer, for The Guardian, 2016.