Foundational Names & their Obligations within Ecology: Homestones

Written by Ecology: Homestones


Editor's Note: The following was found in a discarded laboratory notebook, discovered somewhere deep in the forest. Its dates of origin are unknown. We are publishing it for educational purposes only.


OTHER NAMES (ANY)

You understand your name as the thing you call yourself, but have you actually tried calling yourself? A true call, aloud (as in a summoning) until finally YOU appear? You will, later this week. 

When you tell two (2) people about your experience, they will exchange a curt, knowing glance. You will misinterpret it as judgment, but in reality they love you. 

“She’s figured it out!”

“Yes, we love her!”

“Both of us!”

After you leave, they will shake hands. 

“This is a profound victory.”

“Yes. Both for us, and the company.”

For the purpose of this demonstration, we’ll imagine these two “knowing people” as Mountains.

Figure 1. Knowing People as Mountains

If a quartet of boulders rest atop each Mountain, fenced off from the demanding slope, what is the fastest way to obliterate them? 

Option A: The Stairs

Each boulder is beckoned by name until they process down a hidden stairway (for only a hidden stairway evokes the thrill of nighttime discovery necessary for true obliteration).

Option B: The Slope

The surrounding fence is removed, either upward by the hand of an unseen puppeteer, or downward like a retracting switchblade in the hands of a cartoon hooligan. The boulders find their own way down the edge of the Mountain. Leaves and twigs crackle apart beneath the boulders’ divine path. The obliteration is rapid, inevitable and very cool and also fun because of the fast rocks and their great behaviors.

When the fence is removed, we know the boulders will fall. This is not considered precognition for some reason.

When we call the boulders by name, we do not know whether they will approach or remain. If you hazard a guess either way, no one will care, because you are insane. 

_________________________________________________________

MOTHERNAMES (ROBERTS)

In 1778 a competitive gnome (known as Cheapskate) initiated a Campaign of Torment upon eight (8) very sleepy carrot farmers, all of whom were coincidentally named Robert. Like the “knowing people” (or the Mountains we use to represent them in diagrams when we talk to our friends) the Roberts were & are destined for obliteration. The following information is incomplete, partially because I haven’t opened my mail in a long time so I’m wildly behind on the updates I receive from the FPPC and partially because I Do Not Want to Tell You.

R1: Witness, assailant. Stabbed a god four (4) times. Isolated in a floatation tank.

R2: Driver.

R3: Reduced (like a balsamic glaze) to stumps after failing to feed a bloodthirsty slab of limestone. Communicates through dreams (at least according to people who dream and therefore aren't to be trusted).

R4: N/A

R5: Immortal and starved through food temperature manipulation. Related—Cheapskate’s four (4) peppercorn eyes can control the shape and temperature of salt. When R5 leaves food sitting out, instead of going cold, it gets progressively hotter and hotter. This is a rare instance of  something called magical inconvenience.

R6: N/A

R7: Integrated into a vast fungal network after discovering the concept of “ideas.” (Slowly, because I am slow and move slowly, I am reconstructing his body into a new spherical enclosure. This new sphere will condense his previously visible forms of tubes, tendrils, and flaps into one (1) easy to understand guy. My goal here and everywhere else is unrivaled clarity.)

R8: N/A

Figure 2. Campaign of Torment 

_________________________________________________________

CHEAPSKATE (GNOME)

Certain people with certain books may speak with reverence for the sphere of Malkuth and Sandalphon the Archangel for the connection / similarity those things have with our beloved earth elementals, but those people have nothing to offer and I find it exhausting. You may have noticed this in your life as well. Whether it is at the office during an arm wrestling competition or at your nephew’s Christening, people cannot stop professing their love for and insatiable interest in gaining the essential knowledge about gems and minerals that is only available to us through the guidance of the earth elementals, which many people understand to be gnomes.

Cheapskate is a gnome in the way that your Playstation 2 is your DVD player. It is, but maybe it shouldn’t be?

Figure 3. Cheapskate wearing his Hourglass Hat

A more accurate description might be, “Cheapskate acts in a manner similar to the popular understanding of gnomes.” That is to say, he is small and of the soil.

While Sandalphon famously adores something called music, Cheapskate doesn’t. So, that’s different. Also, Sandalphon’s “Angel Numbers” are 0 and 9, and like, Cheapskate is doing this thing with 1 through 8, right?  So that’s another thing. 

Honestly, I haven’t finished the book I was sent about this. I was supposed to read it, and then communicate it clearly to you on behalf of FPPC, but I gave up. I tried pretty hard, though.
_________________________________________________________

LAIMOCH’S GIFT (NAME)

0:00
/0:21

In July of 2023 I saw a skinny man floating in a tub without disrupting the water as if he were a digital image. He told me he could show me the places that are normally out of reach because he knows the way. I could see lines of potential growing from his body and splitting apart. I followed him, floating along a path around unseen obstacles until we reached a vibrant purple town silhouetted against a harsh red horizon.

He told me there was no life there, and that it was this way because of him. As he spoke, I saw a person on a bicycle in the distance. I lost my grip on the setting and the world dissipated around me. Later on, I found myself outside of a train station and I understood his name to be Laimoch. 

I am of the belief that this was a real communication from a real entity, though I dislike that word for its “spooky” connotations. I personally find Laimoch (and his NAME) to be comforting. I offer this name to you like foreign currency. You probably don’t want it, and you will likely forget it is in your wallet, but if you ever find yourself in a new situation where it is useful, you will be indebted to me in a way that you cannot begin to comprehend. 

-E:HS, on behalf of THE FPPC


Ecology: HomeStones is a cartoon-industrial audio project based out of Philadelphia. Their new EP from Addendum Records is available here, and an upcoming self-titled full length will be released on Sleeping Giant Glossolalia in December 2023, available for preorder here.