Ghosts in October

Perhaps ghosts aren't the only mysterious entity people will believe in. Considering the ease of which a man’s reality can be formed simply by changing his perceptions, I have no doubt that many people believe in ghosts, or demons, or aliens or the Mayan Calendar’s ending of the world. I myself have never seen any of these things. Their existence has entered my perceptions, through the eyes and ears of my senses, but I have never actually connected my brand of reality in contact with something like this. Then again, because they cannot be disproved, I would only limit myself by ever ruling these types of things out entirely.

There are, however, other entities that a majority of people believe in without having ever come in contact with them. They see them, they hear them, sometimes they even touch them for a brief moment, but these entities are no more real than a ghost or a Martian. I’m talking, of course, about the politician.

History has taught us, with few if any exceptions, that the politician is a unique kind of anomaly. Upon introduction, and re-introduction, and subsequent re-introductions, the politician is an actor’s actor. Supported by teams of dream-writers, the thing can weave a story of hope, faith and promise that plugs in perfectly to the needy collective psyche of the populace, much like an opiate fits so perfectly in the pain receptors. The money pours in, the believers wave their cloths and sing their songs, and soon the savior-beast has gained the standing so graciously granted by the faithful. And then it disappears. Like the apparition haunting the dusty stacks of some library, once the shouting is over of “I saw it” and “I heard it” the thing just disappears. But the haunting still continues.

It is impossible to have a representative government, which is what we Americans claim to have, without having access to the person representing us. You can send in your letters and faxes and emails to the missing vapor trails of a politician until your fingers bleed, but in reality you may as well address those to your local library’s ghost or Santa Clause. The entity that made all those promises and wishes almost come true evaporated from your home locale and reappeared in new form in a land far, far away called Washington D.C. Once there, the thing transmographied into the only thing it ever was: a shady rattler of chains in backroom dealings with other shades of the same caliber. Occasionally it will make an appearance, on the television or radio, temporarily morphing back into the teller of yarns about a future that could still be promising if there were just a little more belief, and it will make a feature presentation when it comes time to re-introduce itself and scare the children into voting again. But ultimately, its entire dimension that it will and must return to is one of draining the believers physically and spiritually of all they are worth.

Halloween truly is a time when the apparitions from other worlds and dimensions make their appearance. And come November they disappear again, off to their haunted house on the hill. As long as the people believe in these ghosts, these ghosts will rule the lives of the people. As for me, I will stick to the real. I will put my trust in a man that I can access face-to-face, that has a stake in my community, my family, and my liberty. Ghosts don’t have any stake in any of this. Ghosts are really only concerned about other ghosts and the phantom world they create using the energy of the people they haunt.