The Internet is changing so fast, I hope from time to time we all take a moment to remember what it was like at its peak -- and by "peak", I mean
the 2000 version of the Official Chubby Checker Website.
Before "Alexander Graham Bell"... no telephone.
Before "Thomas Edison" ... no Electric light.
Before Dr. George Washington Carver ... no Oil from seed or cloning of plants.
Before "Henry Ford" no V8 engine
Before "Walt Disney" ... no animated cartoons
Before "Chubby Checker" ... no "Dancing Apart to the Beat"
What is "Dancing Apart to the Beat"? Dancing Apart to the beat is the dance we do when we dance apart to anybody's music with a beat and before "Chubby Checker" It could not be found!
19 comments:
Leaving this comment perhaps more to illustrate just how much Thingol-John is on my mind.
When I read Chubby Checker, I thought "Oh yeah, Santa Claus!". He was said to be a "chubby and plump" elf. And he is a checker - making lists and 'checking them twice', in order to determine who is naughty and nice (or who prefers the right books?)
Santa Clause has been compared specifically to Thingol-John going all the way back to Xanadu, if not before, when we had Gene Kelly rollerskating around yelling "Ho! Ho! Ho!".
This thought caught further hold with the specific reference of "Dancing apart to the Beat", and this notion of striking a tune that differs from the prevailing music brought me to Thingol. In Daymon's additional writings, Thingol's efforts against Melkor were specifically described in terms of setting a different music to Melkor's 'beat' or hammering. Here is an example passage:
"And yet, came he [Thingol], renewed in Spirit, sudden to lighten hearts, near Eru-Home, and without Eru-place, seeing there, in challenge, Melkor’s wide filling [falling?] deceptions, that he of the Darkness’s Mastery, was now set to Rule; Not only the night, but also by Eru, being given rule of Day, the night every day-time, to bound, and constrain; There following as Melkor to far out shores descended, was a trailing True-Friend of Eru Light, and where so landing, softly, in Melkor’s devices, thundering came his heart-song, joyful, to all there that Evil-Dark now Abiding; “that sounds…familiar…” and recall was judged anew Ea, Out There, and Minds to past, turned, to Days before Melkor’s Dominion; and though fanciful (mostly), in that was-ing, was Thingol to lay about their dark pits, Estel in Now, from where is not-now.
Always Thingol-Suleman unmade Melkor’s hammering, and set it to tunes, jaunty, and spritely stepping..."
That last description quite literally describes a music set apart from the beat (Melkor's hammering) and which causes dancing (spritely stepping). And before Thingol (Chubby Checker), this dancing and music could not be found, or at least remembered.
The connection to Thingol-John is further supported by Chubby Checker's real name: Ernest Evans. Evans is a form of, what else, the name John (Evan/ Ivan).
It is also interesting to see his first name as Ernest or Ernie. You specifically referenced Thingol in the context of the Keebler Elves, and their head elf is named Ernie.
Last night, I thought through the Keebler Elves as a negative symbol - Beings appearing white but filled with 'fudge' or lies (probably the biggest lie of all is the Keebler lie that what is in those cookies is fudge...). I can still see it that way, but the names themselves are fascinating, and could be viewed in a positive manner. One story element, however, is the theft of names and identities, so just because a Keebler elf is holding up a name tag, we still might want to verify through other means, I guess.
But Ernie is a strong tie to Thingol-John; both from the independent Chubby Checker link, but also your tie of Thingol-John to the Keebler Elves and the mention of Ernie as one of those elves.
I also thought the Chubby Checker logo itself was very interesting, with the Warp and Woof/ Checker background. That Warp and Woof design has been used to illustrate Spacetime in my story, and the ability (and necessity) to manipulate that fabric.
In my own words and dreams, Thingol's rightful realm has been referred to as the area beyond our world, or I guess this physical universe, comprising of the "Waters" of space. That area is comprised of Spacetime, and so the juxtaposition of Chubby Checker over that symbol seemed relevant.
It never ceases to amaze me how literally every little thing I post, however random, gets subsumed into The Story. Every idle word . . .
https://narrowdesert.blogspot.com/2023/12/every-idle-word.html
The Official Chubby Checker Website is a bit confusing, but I think dancing apart *to* the beat differs from dancing apart *from* it. I think the idea is that in the Twist, two people dance to the beat apart from one another (i.e. not touching one's dance partner).
Ernie, Fast Eddie, and Buckets.
Thingol, the Swift Messenger, and Thomas “Bucket of Cream” Marsh.
I wonder which name corresponds to which Flour Boy?
I should mention that what made me think of Chubby Checker and his old website was that Billy Joel song sung by the Background Brethren. (This is Joel's version; I can't remember whether the Brethren's adaptation included Chubby.)
Buddy Holly, Ben Hur, space monkey, mafia
Hula hoops, Castro, Edsel is a no-go
U2, Syngman Rhee, Payola and Kennedy
Chubby Checker, Psycho, Belgians in the Congo
Lots of potential for a cicada-read there. I spontaneously read Buddy Holly as lowercase "buddy holly" -- a budding holly plant. Space monkeys are a familiar theme. "Hula hoop" sounds like something out of Joseph Smith's GAEL (cf. Ho-e-oop).
By connecting them both to John-Thingol, Bill has implicitly linked Ernie the Keebler Elf with Terry the Giant Irishman. Although Bill disagrees, I tend to assume that Terry and Gross Gaur are the same Being. My Keebler post went into some detail on the fact that my siblings and I used to call Keebler Elves "Flour Boys." In the comments on my original Gross Gaur post, Debbie focused on my pronunciation note (where I noted that "Gaur" rhymes with "flower") and dubbed Gross Gaur "the Flour Grocer," adding some notes about the esoteric meaning of flour. It was such a random tangent to go off on that it seems significant.
Can't make saints of Keebler Elves? Hold my beer, G.
Nice work on mapping Thingol, the Swift Messenger, and Marsh. That works out really well. In my story, the Messenger is associated with Joseph's name(s), and one of those names is Ausir. Ausir means "Wealthy, Fortune", etc. And wouldn't you know it Eddie means the exact same thing - Wealth. (Edward, the long form of Eddie, then means "Wealthy Protector").
That checks out really well in terms of supporting your Fast Eddie mapping.
We are also missing a the fourth, though, right? When I read your mention of Flour Boy, I saw it as a play on words for Flower Boy. We've been writing about one Flower Boy in particular - Pharazon. He would be an interesting candidate for a/the Flower Boy since he was said to literally drink from the Flower or Lily on Eressea. At least worth thinking a bit on.
Yeah, maybe the Keebler Elves can be used as a positive symbol here... despite their fake fudge centers.
In addition, your mention and reference of the Twist would make sense.
In a recent post, I left a comment about the Caduceus, and how the two snakes Twist around each other and make Snake Eyes (looking at each other), from your Background Brethren dream. I had equated this to "throwing the dice" from your other reference, in which to "throw" means to Twist.
The Snakes of the Caduceus, in my mind, are representative of the Two Stones and their respective users (Ithil and Rose Stones). The information on each Stone will be shared with the other, and this sharing will happen at a great distance. Once shared, the information, or Music, will be the same on each Stone in their respective places.
This scenario matches very well with your bringing up the Twist, in terms of two people dancing to the same music, but physically separated or apart from each other.
My understanding is also that this all happens under the direction of Thingol, so associating Chubby Checkers with that event (if he does, in fact, symbolize Thingol-John) also makes sense.
Apparently the Keebler Elves are well-known characters in TV commercials. I can count on one hand the number of hours I’ve spent watching American commercial television, so I didn’t know that.
The roster of characters keeps changing and expanding (including, of course, the recent addition of some diversity-hire elves), but it seems that the original four named cookies were Elmer, Fast Eddie, Buckets, and Elwood. Buckets appears to be Fudge Boy, but I haven’t been able to identify the other three.
Buckets mapping to Fudge Boy makes sense, as that was the one that was left over for Thomas Marsh in my own absurd mapping of the Four Horsemen-Keebler Elves to your childhood names. Here is where I landed for now:
Cheekholder = Ernie = John-Thingol
Flour Boy = Elwood = Pharazon (Flower Boy)
Fudge Boy = Buckets = Thomas Marsh/ Peter
Star Boy = Fast Eddie = Swift Messenger/ Faramir
Cheek and Check are similar words, plus both Cheekholder/ Checkholder and Ernie are considered the highest ranking or lead elves in your childhood ranking and the EL Fudge commercials, respectively. In my story, Thingol plays that role in current events, and thus is the "Check Holder".
Jumping out of order and going to Fast Eddie, the Swift Messenger in my words from 2019 and 2020 multiple times was referred to as "Starerios", which can be translated to a few things referencing a "Star". He is also associated with other names with the Elvish word for Star (El) in them, like Kal-El. Seems like a good fit for Star Boy.
Back up to Flour Boy. As mentioned, this is probably Pharazon since he stole everyone's Flowers and this explains him holding the big bag of Flower/ Flour. No one else has any Flower because he took it all.
There is a really interesting commercial I came across supporting this connection, in which Elwood, of course, builds an extremely tall Tower (not to get to Heaven, though, but to drop an elephant off of it to squeeze peanut butter filling onto the cookie... because I guess that seemed easier than just squeezing the tubes?)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MuUoWfHBu-w&t=30s
Plus, Elwood can refer to an Elf Tree, and we know that Pharazon decided to cut down Nimloth, which was the Tree that the Elves gave to the Numenoreans.
And lastly to Buckets = Fudge Boy = Marsh. Have to get a bit creative on this one. Marsh is known for a Bucket due to what has been likely debunked as a false story. Fudge, per Etymonline, can specifically refer to a false story, so that is why Buckets is holding the Fudge. Yeah, I know, pretty bad, but I was stretching for this one. Also, heavy cream is one of the 3-4 main ingredients of Fudge, and since Marsh supposedly kept all of those milk strippings, he could make a lot of fudge.
And you mix the cream with cocoa (and sugar) to make the fudge, and this had me thinking about Coco, or Conan O'Brien. We had that scene/ dispute that Leo brought up involving Jay Leno and Jimmy Kimmel, where Kimmel was ragging on Leno for stealing Coco's job. O'Brien is a form of the name Brian, which means "Exalted One" and "Hill/ Mountain", and God promised Marsh that he would be Exalted on the "mountains"... so, yeah - Conan O'Brien/ Coco, and thus (clearly) Fudge Boy.
In that commercialI linked, Elwood calls his tower the "Stuffing Tower".
Stuffing is notably a thing associated with Thanksgiving and Roast Turkeys. However, it is also, surprising (according to Etymonline), a word that was also used for to refer to pie filling. It specifically mentions meat pies, but just the notion of a pie filling was interesting given our links to pies, pumpkins, and Pharazon nabbing those pies.
So, a Stuffing Tower, or a Tower built in order to go up to Heaven and get some pie filling, seemed interesting.
I meant Ernie, not Elmer.
So Pharazon is still a separate character from Marsh but is now part of a team with the good guys? How do you see his role now? Is Peter still identified with Marsh?
Do you remember anything of how you decided the Flour Boys' rankings?
WG, I think the ranking emerged more-or-less spontaneously, driven by a child's natural eagle eye for "unfairness" in any form. If everyone got the same number of cookies but not exactly the same cookies, that was obviously "unfair" and led to the question of which cookies were better.
I believe Flour Boys were originally the most coveted type. Then one time one of my brothers was gloating over having gotten two Flour Boys when my other brother didn't have any, and the other brother said, "Who cares? Cheek Holders are better than Flour Boys!" Thus it became a settled fact that Cheek Holder was the best and Flour Boy the second best. This eventually evolved into an official scoring system, where Cheek Holder was worth 4 points, Flour Boy 3, Fudge Boy 2, and Star Boy 1. (I think. As mentioned before, I'm a little uncertain as to whether I've remembered the two lowest ranks correctly.)
I have a few different versions I am thinking through, and so I don't know, obviously. But, yeah, in this version Pharazon and Marsh are two separate Beings, with both being on the good guys.
Pharazon's immediate role would still primarily involve repairing what was broken/ stolen on Eressea, which involves the flowers (and thus the sack of flour, I guess).
But honestly, I have quite a few variations of that. Someone can be on the good guys team, and not be a good guy, for example. Your mention of a 'hitman' brought to mind yet again the example of Cypher from the Matrix.
Cypher was on the team, but ultimately sold them all out, and acted as hitman and a spook for Agent Smith. Cypher was promised that he would forget everything in return for doing this.
That point is important because it did link with your dream of getting your head shaved and the lotus. The lotus is specifically associated with sleeping, dreams, and forgetfulness (I don't think you were 100% sure it was a lotus, though, so again, this is just one of many variations). You had the woman shaving your head and speaking in the Isaiah way of scarlet sins becoming become white. One way - the best way (and probably the way intended... I am just being as transparent as possible with my thinking and the variations I can imagine) - is that those sins are repented of, forgiven, and forgotten. Another way, though, is that they are just forgotten, and someone is promised a clean start sans the repentance, which is what Cypher was after.
And honestly, in terms of "good guys", I don't think any mortal person, including us or those we know, can really claim to be that currently. Of the Four Keebler Elves, if that symbolism holds, I think only John can be considered Good at this point.
Anyway, here is the Matrix scene with Cypher making the deal:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Wgn0KlSHl4
By “good guys” I mean the team aligned with God in the spiritual war, not a team made up of outstandingly virtuous individuals.
Cipher is another word for zero/ling.
Yeah, I am using the same definition as you are.
Cipher is also a word used to describe secret code/ coded messages.
I brought up James Strang again in a comment on your "Laurelin the tin tree" post. One of the really interesting things about Strang is that he created his own cipher and wrote frequently in his private journal using that cipher. His code remained uncracked until the 1960's, I believe.
Interestingly, when looking up James Strang and Cipher to learn more about his journals, I landed on a New York Times article in which their wording identifies James Strang himself as a Cipher, in addition to someone who used them ("Strang himself, however, remains a cipher...").
The article is behind a paywall, and I can't access it. Here is the link, though. Not saying it means a whole lot - lots of people are called Ciphers, I guess, and I am sure the writer used the phrase on purpose partly based on Strang's own use of ciphers, but it seemed at least a little interesting given the context and timing.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/books/review/king-of-confidence-miles-harvey-james-jesse-strang.html
I don't know, Bill, to me it sounds like you're being overly strict with that definition. If the four are currently mortal and have some idea of their role in things, they'd be trying to do what Good they can. If they don't have an idea, well -- however clouded our conscious minds are, we all have an inner compass for Good and bad, and in these times heading in the right general direction when possible is still better than continually going backwards. Absolutely no-one is perfect, after all.
Come to think of it, I'm not sure if you've ever explicitly shared your thoughts on John's current state of mortality.
Bill's article link, un-paywalled: https://archive.is/kbfOy
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