Go Cry Mommy

The day was in August, and it was well into the three digits sort of hot.  I mean the sweat poured off my forehead like a faucet watering the dirt collected around my feet, into a pool of personal mud.  I took on the task of digging out a sink hole that was developing in my front yard.  Beneath the crumbling sod was a growing hole about three feet deep and about seven feet wide; it was literally swallowing up my lawn.  So I thought I’d dig up the sod and get a look at how big this growing dent in the grass would get.  Well it was a gaping cavern.  I decided that all I needed to do was pour a bunch of large hunks of granite into the hole to fill it in, then add some smaller river stones, followed by some fresh earth. Then finally sod it over and presto…problem fixed.

 Well, the hole had all these jagged honeycomb pockets I saw needed to be cleared off to make room for the hefty granite rocks I had assembled to fill in the hold.  The little caves consisted of this really hard clay; hard enough to bend the cutting edge of my shovel; concrete like.  In Northern California, growing up, we had similar substructure we called hardpan.  I had to try and dig that stuff out as a boy when we finally convinced my parents a pool would be a great idea for us kids. It was back breaking work and I knew the only way to deal with that kind of hard-packed soil was to use a crowbar and a sledgehammer.  So, I resorted to getting a crow bar and sledge hammer and knocked those chunks off and made a wider hold to receive my rocks.

   I was just about finished when the combined effect of heat exhaustion along with sweat in my eyes blurring my vision set up the incident for me to not realize my right hand index finger was between the crowbar and the descending head of the sludge hammer in time. 

  To this day I am not certain if I actually heard the thump, or that the shock wave of the impact rode along my skeleton to my ears, but one thing was clear; I was stunned into disbelieving inactivity.  I saw blood rushing out from under my fingernail, so I knew I had done a serious number on my finger; then the waves of pain came.  And the pain throbbed in unison with my pulse.  It was then and there I uttered the phrase that has been said to be common on battlefields throughout the ages from around the world by the wounded and dying.

   “mommy”

   I’ve been hurt plenty of times growing up: Falling out of trees, crashing my bike, open field tackles in high school football, you name it.  But this was the most personal I had ever been with pain.  It didn’t just know my name; it had my social security number.  I stumbled to the kitchen and ran my finger under the facet watching my damaged digit in disbelief.  It had so many shades of blue-black that I was uncertain what to do.  The echo of Mommy was reverberating in my skull.  I realized it was the primal response to the shock and awe of the pure unknown.  The good news is that my finger was not that bad, I didn’t go to the doctor (this was before I had a wife who would demand I do that or there would be hell to pay).  I learned something crucial through that experience…That if I don’t leave this world in a fiery explosion without notice, then I’ll most likely utter in with my last breath;

Mommy.

Insufferable Pain

It’s true I have to find a job. 

It’s also true I’ve grown rather fond of my routines.  In particular, as a matter of course, the routine of taking a nap after lunch.

   On this occasion I was suffering.  Suffering as only someone who over does their routine in the gym can suffer.  It was the ball of my foot; and I haven’t as of yet figured out why this aching continues to happening.  What I do know is that limping around the house causes the nurse in my wife to flurry up into the immediate firefighter attentiveness, and take charge.

     So she wraps my offending limb in ice and then scurries into the kitchen asking me as she leaves,

   “From one to ten how bad is the pain?”

   Now we’ve sandbagged pain pills from several past dentist visits for, what I thought, this very sort of an occasion.  You know, situations in which one of us needed pain relief immediately and didn’t want to have to suffer the hours it takes in the ER to get a doctor to agree that well that we’re suffering pain.  So I’m thinking, pain pills, I tell her “six” because I also guard my male ego from appearing too much like a simpering little girl. 

   “You get three”

Three? Man I am going to be flying. 

   “Three pain pills?” I reply

   “No, three aspirin.” 

  Well, crumb, big fat hairy deal, that’s a rescue from pain?  She comes up to me and tells me to open my mouth. Then, while tossing the pills into my open mouth, she blows in my face; the very trick we use to get pain pills down our cat Obediah.  Except in my case, I get stinking Ibuprofen. 

I had to capture this slight before I forgot it.  Now, I have to go back to the couch and keep my foot elevated.

Undoing Your Folly

Morgan Spurlock wrote, and then starred in the 2004 block buster movie,  Super Size Me.  It won all kinds of awards and put the fast food franchise McDonalds back on its heels to recover its customer base.  By the end of his 30 day experiment of eating only McDonald’s food, three times a day, he gained 24 and a half pounds.  As shocking as that may read, what most people don’t know is that it took him over eighteen months to lose that weight to get back to his original weight…. And that was WITH the help of his Nutritionist girlfriend managing his recovery.

   I mention that because I just lived through a similar experience with trying out a fun idea only to have it haunt me for longer than I would ever imagine.

The other day I was informed that the US Defense Finance and Accounting office was planning to decrement my retirement pay by half.  Starting in December no less, you got to love their timing.  Why not December, I mean, what’s going on then?

   I digress into my black mood concerning the government.  Realizing I would have to make up the difference to continue to live my wanton life of luxury and outrageous month long block parties, I would have to come up with a way of bring in more money.  One thing I learned after twelve years of college study, and most of that in business, was that you don’t get rich working for someone else.  Nope, nada, nyet, a paycheck is the consolation prize in the land of risk-makes- fortunes.

   So I was seduced to the dark side.  Yes, I saw on the Internet offers of money for taking surveys; I bit.  I signed up with scores of sites.  The more that came, the more I signed up, I would turn this enterprise into an empire of point earning opinions and dispositions about everything under the sun from Obama Care to Oscar Meyer Bologna.

  The raw truth of it is, as you may already suspect like my wife; it’s a scam.  OK, yes, my wife TOLD ME SO, but then who listens to their wives? Right?  I’ll take the “I told you so” with the same aplomb I weather the reasons we don’t leave wet towels on the floor or put the toilet seats down.  Just stop talking to me like I’m a retarded dolphin and I’ll do whatever you say.

   The surveys fall into two categories. One is where they get the information they want and then dump me.   A window pops up near the very end of the survey, the payday threshold I call it, with: “We’re sorry you’re not of the demographics we are seeking to hear from” What kind of crap is that?  How on EARTH can a national survey have any validity if they only pick a particular segment of society?  No more listening to those commercial voices telling me their product was found the best among 89 percent of those they surveyed…I’m wise to that ploy now.  Secondly, no matter how many times they say FREE….it’s not.  Free if you order should be mandatory; but then by the stated condition of ordering something makes it not free at all.  I think someone had to go to court to get their hand slapped for saying it’s free when it’s really not.  I don’t think that applies to survey takers though.  So I fill out the survey and give them my thoughtful opinions only to find out I have to order two of the three options, (usually credit scores, magazines or trial something or other that I’ll forget about in 90 days and then get slugged in the stomach with a huge bill).  After a dedicated couple of days taking every survey they sent me, and having the same thing happen time and again, I realized it was a shame and total waste of my time.  When I mentioned that to my wife she actually did the moon walk and snoopy dance together…I’ve never seen that before then.

  Now the rest of the story is that happened a week ago and I am STILL unsubscribing to survey emails.  I am STILL getting phone calls from India offering to find me a school that I can enroll into.  And like my friend Morgan Spurlock, I am paying for my impulsiveness…one day after the other… minus the 30 million he raked if from the movie.

Your Waking Life

In the 2001 movie, Waking Life, the topic of dreams drive the story.  What are they; an escape from reality or reality itself? Waking Life follows the dream(s) of a young man and his attempt to find and discern the absolute difference between waking life and the dream world. While trying to figure out, a way to wake up, he runs into many people on his way; some of which offer one sentence asides on life, others delving deeply into existential questions and life's mysteries.  We become the main character as we follow along growing ever concerned that just maybe the trip is endless. It becomes our dream and our questions being asked and answered. Can we control our dreams? What are they telling us about life? About death? About ourselves and where we come from and where are we going? The film does not answer all of these for us.  Instead, it inspires us to ask the questions and find the answers for ourselves.
   As I age, I continue to refer back to that piece of film work. I do it because my waking moments are becoming ever so much more dreamlike while my dreams are beginning to take on more definable plots and continuity. In the movie the main character ultimately gives way to the possibility that the physical life has ended while his mental activity of dreaming continues on.
  How often have any of us been visited by the nightmare of forgetting an important test?  Or an appointment, or being naked in public?  Or how about hastily trying to get to a location where we're supposed to be and being delayed by an invisible slow-motion power pulling us back?  Sooner or later it is realized in a lifetime of busy day-to-to activity.
  I think about that whenever I read in the media where a celebrity left their children at a favorite restaurant, or strapped in the back of the family SUV. In the past I'd chastise the behavior for the irresponsibility of it all. Now, I'm not so quick to judge.  Especially when someone asks me how was my weekend and I can honestly not recall the details.  That is when I can relate to that awkward feeling of loosing track of my life.  Truth be told, I can't recall with much clarity the events of even a few days ago; I've tried.  If ever I am accused of a criminal act that had been performed on a specific day a year ago I will be prone to reply,
   "It could have just as well been me as anyone.  What physical evidence do you got?"
  If they come up with a bunch of my personal stuff, I guess I did it.  I'm more circumspect these days...maybe, I tell myself, if by practicing a little tolerant compassion with people who forget, that just maybe...just may-be, I'll get a glimmer of a similar treatment when my blunders begin to get really huge.

Invasion Proof

I was mowing the yard the other day and as requested by my bride, I closed the garage door to keep the clippings from blowing into the garage.  She has a thing for junk blowing into the garage and onto the newly washed cars, as I have a thing about arguing on topics I can’t win.

  So I close the garage door and do my outside job.  Her domain is the house; mine is the outside.  She freaks when MY bugs come into the house; I dutifully punish them with summary execution. You have to keep order with strict rules or anarchy will preside and it will be late nights keeping the crowds at bay.

BUT on this particular occasion I took a long time to get the work accomplished.  When I finished putting all the tools away I walked up the back stairs to discover the kitchen door was locked.  I knocked on the door, but there was no answer.  She must be upstairs, I reasoned, and if she were vacuuming she didn’t hear me.  That was ok, because I had a spare back door key hidden in my work belt hanging over my work bench.  But I found out when trying it, that key worked for the old lock, the one before we turned our house into a fortress. I replaced that lock last fall, and added a deadbolt to increase the notion of security in our home.

The rest of this story is I had to resort to pounding heavily on the door to be let in.  The downside is that now I am aware how easy it would be for me to get truly locked out of my house.  When the garage door is down, the drawbridge is up.  I might-could break the glass in the garage door, but that would only win me access into the garage.  I have no way of getting into the house itself.  All of the down stair windows have bars over them, another safety device installed not too long ago, so how would I get in?

I can’t…or couldn’t….

  So I’ve decided to handcuff Montse to something in the house and she is forbidden to ever leave without me due to my fear of being locked out.  I told her of my solution right after writing this blurb.  

She smiled and sent me outside to trim the verb. I’m thinking I better get a sleeping bag to store in the garage just in case.

Modern Conveniences

Just the other day, I was listening to the host of a talk radio show going on about those little things he remembered while growing up.  Specifically those pencil boxes he had when he was a boy going to public school.  Obviously he was from my generation because most grammar school kids today would give you a deer-in-the-headlights look if you mention them; but I knew exactly what he was talking about.  Something that was in that box and that has changed very little over the years, was the personal pencil sharpener.  A single razor blade screwed (or glued) to a plastic housing that held the pencil. I remember with distinction they never worked very well. Oh sure they got something that resembled a point on them, but nothing close to those hand cranked babies on the door jam in the classroom; now THAT was a point.

  Something that stood out for me during my return to college was the absence of those pencil sharpeners in the class rooms.  I’d venture to guess less than a quarter of the classrooms had them. And let me tell you when you need a fine point, for like filling out a test scantron, they are sorely missed.  For the sake of readers who may happen upon my site and read this, and are puzzled by what a scantron might be, it’s a fill-in-the-bubble form (that’s old folk talk and most of my generation will nod their comprehension now).  Yes, they’re called scantrons today…so, that’s the embedded lesson that every good story must possess to be referred to as being good.  I’ve checked the meaningful information block; for good or ill.

   Since I am on the topic of pencil sharpeners I must admit my favorite all time sharpener is the desk model JUST LIKE THE DOOR JAM model, but comes with a suction cup apparatus that anchors it to any flat top you desire.  

Yeah, you just place the sharpener on a selected flat, non-porous  surface, then turn this steel arm at the bottom ninety degrees, and it bears down on a rubber grommet which creates a suction that keeps the sharpener locked down firm onto the flat surface.  And it stays too, I can whirl-a-way sharpening all the pencils in the world without it breaking free; and obtain that needle like acuity that only those cuties can produce. 

   On a side note, I happen to have sat down once with the business end of the pencil in my pocket and got one of those tips jammed into my thigh.  It even bled. But most important, I still have, for lack of a better term for it, a tattoo.  Yes, a Number 2 Fourth Grade tat.  I still enjoy the idea of admitting I have a tattoo on those invasive applications I face.  I fill in ‘yes I have a distinguishing mark on my body.’ When asked I tell them it’s a “Tat from 4^th Grade”

Makes me sound somehow…dangerous.

Every Day A Great Adventure

The well renowned Dog Whisperer, Cesar Millan, mentioned in one of his programs that a dog’s dream life would not be like yours or mine.  They would be indifferent to opulent surroundings or fancy cars or communities.  They wish for every day to be an adventure. Yes, every day an adventure.  I’ve mentioned it before, but it bears repeating. 

   My wife broached the topic of death while we were driving to the gym for our morning workout, in particular her own. 

   “I wonder how I will die?” she muttered.  I was just drinking in the flawless autumn sky, so was caught by surprise.  After being reassured her health was good and her mood buoyant, we began to toy with the topic and then conditions of how that would someday play out. Of interest was what if we knew the exact day, but not the time? Oh, and you could know the place, but not the means.  After a short venture into the subject I had to add; the prediction would be certain.    That needed to be added for the sake of an obvious flaw by which in just avoiding the place, the dire prediction of you dying wouldn’t happen.  So we said the end would occur at a particular city park.

We each took different track on the idea.  She was practicing her usual gift of Capricornian stubbornness by believing she could avoid the place and outfox the rest of the prediction, (she so detest limitations).

  “If you were in another town how could you possibly die in Piedmont Park?”

   I, on the other hand, embraced my demise within the context of the rules of the GAME we were playing. So I immediately began constructing a perfect morning; a great breakfast followed by calls to my loved ones, then I’d write notes and place them by the things I wanted certain family members to have when I was gone, then finally take a leisurely walk towards my appointed end.  She was mentally googling flight times of airlines, trains, buses and caravans out of the city.

The topic of how continued to loom, it was at that point the idea of what we would do on our final day was hijacked by the horror of so many ways (painless and PAINFUL) that one could meet their end.  Of note, we agreed that being in an airliner plunging to the earth from 12,000 feet up would be the most terrifying, (according to the math it would take a minute to hit the ground.) even if we both agreed besides the fall, it would be pretty painless at the moment of impact.

   After some time of picturing situations where it would be more accommodating (we agreed in our sleep the best), the topic lost its edge and we refocused on the other mundane things we would do after the workout.  But for a few moments we were in the adventure of our ending….and I can get the idea that if we’re interested….then the process of our interest is our adventure.  It’s not ABOUT anything, it’s how we think and feel on the particular situation that makes for the adventure…

and here we thought dogs were limited.  They’ve shaved a life of excitement down to the necessary… “Oh look, the human is here! Now the fun starts!”

Change of Situation

I received a letter from a distant friend, where in sharing their situation with me, I saw myself; how I had been, not too long ago.

Yet now I sensed the subtle change, from the way I had grown accustomed to judging myself by my current conditions. 

  The words wove of a fellowship, born from past hurts.  The gravity for them brought others with similar complaint to the center; those with current constraints and difficulties in adapting to the unwanted.  I was told they gained comfort in having another listen and encourage them; those familiar with like kind suffering.

   I nodded my head as I read, acknowledging the companionship in the feeling of desperation; the acrid inner aching for anyone to understand. 

Anyone, just so that I'd not feel neglected, abandoned; the oppressive feeling of being alone.

   I've grown to understand more about the conditions with which we shape

our lives; claiming still ~ I know nothing; I became aware of this driving desire to connect with others.  That most commonly we resort to any theme available.

Is it any wonder how in misery we focus and pick on each other’s wounds?  I've been hurt, captive to the notion that constant attention to the pain would somehow suckle the poison out.  Doing such, I'd magically become healed; made whole again.

   Years ago I read that we humans are habit forming creatures, since we did not possess the wealth of instincts our animal brothers had. As habits become addictions, it’s just a matter of form. Change calls to surface observation on those habits, our situations that support them ~our associations and routines that create more. 

Discomfort calls us to adjust, but most oft ~ release. 

   The quest of improvement can be mostly comprised of cleansing, of canceling an effect; I’ve read where in ancient Aramaic that means forgiveness.  It's an uncomfortable experience, for we find it difficult to explain the vista from which a new horizon is viewed.  Sorrow, loss, reluctance and lament vie for attention to influence our choices.  Keep safe; keep dear; keep close; that is not the same as cherished character, the ultimate freedom to allow ‘what is’ and not have it be a measurement of the quality of ‘us’.  

How can we hope to feel better when our efforts are focused and burdened with examining where we've been?  Rather than on where we are; the actual threshold to what we shall become.

Thinking

I was thinking about what I'd comment on this beautiful fall day.  I happened on this little piece tucked away in my DO NOT DESTROY file on my computer, (sorry I can't credit the author.)  But it was amusing and I thought today was a great day for something amusing.  So here goes ~

Hi, my name is Bob, and I am a recovering thinker...

It started out innocently enough: I began thinking at parties
now and then to loosen up. Inevitably though, one thought
led to another and soon I was more than just a social
thinker. I began to think alone, "...to relax..." I told
myself, but I knew it wasn't true. Thinking became more and
more important, and finally I was thinking all the time. I
even thought on the job. I knew thinking and employment
didn't mix, but I couldn't stop.
I began avoiding friends at lunchtime so I could read Thoreau
and Kafka.
I returned to the office dizzied and confused, asking, "What
exactly are we doing here?"
Things weren't great at home either. One evening I turned
off the TV and asked my wife about the meaning of life--she
spent the night at her mother's.
I soon had a reputation as a heavy thinker. One day the boss
called me in and said, "Bob, I like you, and it hurts me to
say this, but your thinking is a real problem. If you don't
stop thinking on the job, I'll have to let you go." This gave
me a lot to think about. I went home early after my
conversation with the boss. "Honey," I confessed,
"I've been thinking..."
"I know you've been thinking," she said, "and I want a
divorce."
"But Honey, surely it's not that serious."
"It is serious," she said, lower lip quivering. "You think
as much as college professors, and college professors don't
make any money, so if you keep on thinking we won't
have any money!"
"That's faulty syllogism," I said impatiently, and she began
to cry.
I'd had enough. "I'm going to the library," I snarled and
stomped out the door. I headed to the library in the mood
for Nietzsche, roared into the parking lot, and ran up to the
big glass doors...they didn't open. The library was closed.
To this day I believe the Higher Power was looking out for me
that night. As I sank to the ground clawing at the unfeeling
glass, whimpering for Zarathustra, a poster caught my eye.
The words "Friend, is heavy thinking ruining your life?"
stood out in large letters. You may recognize the line: it
comes from the standard issue "Thinkers Anonymous" poster.
Today, I am a recovering thinker. I never miss a TA meeting.
At each meeting we watch a non-educational video-- last week
it was "Porky's." Then we share experiences about how we
avoided thinking since the last meeting. I still have
my job and things are a lot better at home. Life just got
easier, somehow, once I stopped thinking. Soon, I'll
be able to vote Republican again.
It's not that some people have willpower and some don't.
It's that some people are ready to change and others are not.

Other's Words

You've adequate experience with conversation to recognize when something someone says takes you on a mental rivulet of exploration unintended, obscured to the daily assigned ordinary.

And its of little consequence what brought me to examine or share this psychotic process now except in that perceived glee that can be felt when we connect with another in the sacred "yeah"

Whenever I speak with others on the topic of 'real' as well as 'fear' the words sound familiar as oft as not echoes surface.  Allowing me to snicker with the honesty in phrases such as we teach what we need to learn, as well as other shiny pebbles.

    And it would seem for me today, as not a quest of understanding the living breathing rituals for a purpose of collecting more knowledge, but a more subtle art of allowance.  Certainly there's adequate past experience to suggest places for alarm, danger, caution, but its the master who can add those colors to their pallet and say,

  "ah, that was when I wasn't aware, lets try this again...with feeling!"

then magical joy, happiness, and mirth develop out of the pigment of our choosing what and how to apply the resources we have at command.

I hear stories....I tell them.

Mythology as with the ancients, an effort to comprehend the mystical mysteries of life.  Then, having failed to find comfort in adequate definition, assign the unexplained to the nature of divinity.   Amusingly, that's allowed, just as preferences are.  Since creating is so natural, to break it down to its fundamental's calls to question what would be the point?  The mental process can be irrelevant except for our notice of who is in charge of questing? Finding improved paths towards 'what do you wish to feel?'  A significant stride from the childish security seeking Why the universe is what it is.

So, the day invites participation, 'come see' without promise or threat, a passive element for our purpose; opportunity.

My fun continues with this tale, where I have fellow sojourner's who are also exploring and sharing their discoveries.  Gathering as we do at the dusk of our adventures speaking in turn at the warming campfires. Relishing the eloquent fashioned and  elaborate embellishments to events that have unfolded. In our shaping, create the extraordinary; living art.

Giving up the Harley

It was time

It had quietly arrived; without fanfare, without so much as a whisper.

The inevitable moment of change was like the visage of a stranger suddenly recognized as an old companion. “I know you”

   Each age has its passages, and this was no different.  I had to get my Harley hauled to the shop because it wouldn’t start.  It wouldn’t start because I neglected it for over two years. I passed it numerous times during my comings and goings; sitting in the garage.  It had become garage art. Collecting towels and umbrellas on its handle bars and seat.  I had agreed to sell it.  Having successfully deflected my wife’s curiosity as to why I never rode it, I lost conviction to the reasons I argued for keeping it.  Part of it was that I found myself always busy with something else, along with the growing knowledge that my wife dreaded me getting hurt.  I surrendered to the fact I couldn’t go for a ride and dismiss her worry, even if I liberated the time to go out on the road.  Lastly, I was growing fearful of local traffic; in that, I realized, it was time to let it go if I were too afraid to ride. 

   I tried to start it up, but ran the battery down in the effort; so then was forced to have it towed to the motorcycle shop.  

There was a time in my not so distant past where I needed to take mental rescue missions out into the frontier in order to quiet my restlessness.  Somewhere living my everyday life, that need had calmed.  I no longer required an escape; the ache just left me.

   I bought the Harley back in 2003 when I desperately needed to feel free.  Having the Sportster fed my sense of adventure.  I could, if I wanted to, ride to the Pacific whenever the notion struck me; it never did, but I was content to know I could if I wanted to.  As the days and then seasons turned me towards different things, I became less aware of the pressing need to identify or protect my freedom with my mechanical trump card ~ The Harley.  I named it Blue Blaze because it was fast as anything I had ever been on.  I enjoyed it most during autumn.  The weather was brisk as the cold bit into my face when I opened the throttle up.  I enjoyed looking back at the leaves stirred up in my wake on country roads. It gave me a sense of affecting my surroundings.

   Well, all of that is finished now.  I walked the bike up onto the tow truck and escorted it to the shop for reconditioning.  I’ll pick it up tomorrow and then post the ‘for sale’ on the Internet.  I have friends who ask me to send them photos; along with what I’m asking for it.  The amount doesn’t matter, not really. The relationship has been broken.  It’s just a piece of equipment that is taking up much needed space in the garage.  I guess if I had a preference, if I could ask for anything, it’d be for a buyer who was a dreamer; a dreamer with a need for wings.

Now that’s poetic

Minion

Autumn has always been my most creative month.

My emotions seem to be more receptive to a harvest dance

For whatever the reason, creativity calls emotions to be raw, and those include

tears.

I wonder why our society is so adverse to tears; or conditional at best.

As for grief, you get a week for intimates and a day, two tops, for ex's. (you know ex significant other who moved on; now a winking acquaintance)

I scared most of my passing companions, they didn't drink artist,  or just maybe I allowed myself the luxury of applying that salve to the blinding flash of the obvious in we no longer got along.

A few I’ve cultivated

So I can feel at ease in speaking my random, dark thoughts.  You know, and trust that in sharing such thinking I don't notice a nervous inching towards a phone to call for professional help.

We watched The Time Traveler's wife the other night. He couldn't control when he'd disappear to another time. It was a sweet love story but I felt it deeply.  Here was a poor soul who would be whisked away from his familiar surroundings and comforts only to be thrust into a foreign place naked and friendless.

kind of like

College.

I looked at over 900 professional job announcements the other night. I considered the bulk of them equivalent to punishment for violating social laws or crimes against nature.

To think that so many put work saddle's on for their entire life and consider it a good fit.

Counting sales, or tricking others into buying...is that the height of aspiration? Scotty, beam me up.

Or could it be.....a lingering thirst to have power over a vast minion? To strive to be in control of something we can't get our hands on?

At the dog park, minion was a miniature pincher. I took great care to not step on its tiny feet as he scampered about; sniffing the ground for scents I had no idea their meaning. 

I didn't want to break anything delicate on such a lovely fall day.

Turmoil

That’s my definition of today. 

Small details contribute to edge my usually optimistic disposition into the realm of gray.  My back hurts from over doing it at the gym. I’m looking for a job and that entails a rain of recruiting firms and work at home franchises who are seeking my investments…but no jobs.  Then an ongoing argument with the Defense Finance System that would take too much time to explain and in doing so, would tap my already ebbing emotional strength.

   I’m bummed.  And being that opens the door to turmoil.  I can’t control the rate or duration of this feeling of uncertainty.  Not that it’s personal, I know it isn’t.  Indifference never holds a grudge. 

  It’s a case of me stepping into the lime-light  of a process that is much like stepping on used gum.  It’s on my sole (duality here) and that’s all there is to say about it; I’m stuck in a net of delay intentionally set or not; I’m there.  Going down the road of deserving will only frustrate my efforts to dig the gum off with a twig I find along the roadside. 

  I feel the shift of my priorities and I’m disgruntled that I didn’t make them on purpose.  Yes, a victim of circumstances; and boy do I have issue with victimhood.  OK, so I’m gathering my command of situation and realizing I choose what mood I’ll meet the repairman with today.  Yes, along with the above irritants we’re having a fan being installed into the living room and one in the master bedroom today, lending yet an additional layer of stress onto a collective unwanted situation.  Is there a moral to this posting?  A thread shining some welcoming positive anecdote?  I can’t find any in my current grumbling. I have to go clean the outside ladder for the guy to hang the fans.

I’m sure there could be something redeeming….I’m just recognizing that challenge has come a’callin ..it’s my turn.

So Busy

To awaken and find a note of affection is like cookie dough...placed into the oven of our hearts it makes delightful treats for our day....

            Having a heart care...in what appears to be a cold and indifferent world is a big thing.  I don't know how many bother to take account of the positive aspects of their lives; in the form of people who are interested in their welfare...I'd suspect most don't even consider it unless a holiday or special event forces some kind of acknowledgment of appreciation.  And not out of arrogant entitlement either.  It’s just that so many seem to be so busy.  That word covers a host of self-inflicted wounding doesn't it?  Perhaps we should consider the word busy as a profanity; at the very least a cause for sorrow and remorse. 

Busy robs us of what is important in our existence.  It's used to shield us from responsibilities of tending our most important relationships.  It’s whipped out as an excuse for being late; or not attending at all, social events or celebration, gatherings, and festive galas; the very fabric of our family. 

   "Sorry I was busy and lost track" yes indeed.  And the use of it is insidious.  Like a cancer, it creeps into all aspects of our lives.  Once only used on rare occasions with our most beloved, liberally due to our feeling secure in their acceptance, then too soon to discover we are using the excuse more often without so much as a thought over why.  Like a ripple on a still pond~ it travels outward....

   "Sorry I got so busy"

   If not tending ones love ~ what else is so darn important? Tending the heart is a reverent thing for me.  Not a task of progressing towards a goal to be achieved, or out of an obligation to be met. Worse still, being present as the opportunity to pat myself on the back a deceptive self congratulations for projecting an image of being dependable and responsible. 

   Mine is the message and gift of appreciation.  In gratitude I tend my garden so that love has room to grow and blossom.  I am eager for its fragrance to waif on the warm summer breeze.  Or, in quite moments, like now; close my eyes and feel near.  Only in learning and knowing the details of our intimates can we experience private revelry.   Not just the details of the beloved face, or the date and place of their birth.  But to the depth of knowing where favored slippers rest.  Or is the water cup on the nightstand filled. What is more sacred than to have experienced the day’s last sigh from their lips? These are not so easily discerned, only revealed through time and attention. All foregone~ for the sake of busy.

            Certainly I can list my delights; some more private than others.  Learned by attending touch, and taste; the very smell of them. How their whisper invokes empathy, the awesome privilege of the feel of their tears.  How a shutter from the fear of being alone can be calmed by a warm embrace.  How they tease; how they pout. It seems to me, these facets would merit focus and attention for anyone who is interested.  As the practice art of desire to know the ways of love.  Such things are spinning in my conscious and subconscious.  So that I claim to be busy no more.  I have no room for it.  I'm decisively engaged in tending my love... my life 

First Things First

Sometimes events unfold in a peculiar way....out shopping at my local grocery store I notice the cost of my favorite labeled wine has gone up once again. I feel obligated to say out loud, and to no one in particular, my objection. In fact I do that even if there isn't anyone in the isle but me.

"When I starting buying this it was only...."

I left the amount and name of the brand obscured for two reasons. One, is I didn't want to reveal what a low-class-wino I've become, and secondly the details are insignificant if they don't propel the story along. I think I heard that in a creative writing class? Anyway, I'm off into the forest again and I need to come back to the sunlit path. Commenting on change. Yes, well as the years pile on I get more and more opportunity to take notice of how things used to be. Yes, I remember the invention of the Slurpee (now called Icee); Panty Hose; Disk Players (of every type, music first then video); and (drum roll please) the fasten your seatbelt campaign. No kidding, we owned cars without seat belts...Seat belts cost extra back when I was a kid.  Oddly they are still beating that seatbelt drum and I’m not convinced they’re making much more headway then back in the 60’s.

  Now it’s true I’m on a tangent because what I should be doing is brushing up my Resume. You see, I am, once again, at the threshold of finding employment. I have recently begun to have those sleep-interrupting thoughts at night about my past.

“Oh yes, I was the very first Financial Management Club vice president at Auburn University in Montgomery, that should be noted.” As exciting as that may strike the casual reader, the dulling truth in the rest of it is; that was back in 1985. Nineteen ANY NUMBER is over TWO decades ago…relevant? I think maybe not.

   So instead of reciting any relevant and recent achievements to laud over I’ve come to the realization that I just stopped keeping track. Perhaps once you start getting a list, you stop keeping score. I remember aching to have something to put on a Resume that made me look like an achiever. Now I can’t possibly squeeze all of my experience onto a page…or two….And frankly….most of that is a blur now and I’d be hard pressed to talk about it in any detail during an interview.

   “So tell me Mister Cuddy, about your entry of possessing a dozen tactical nuclear warheads? We don’t see a lot of that here at Ambercrombe, Finch, McLemore and Davis.”

   “Yes, well, there’s not a lot to really say, nor am I at liberty to tell you due to national security issues don’t you know. But I can tell you that they are warm to the touch.”

That may or may not get me a parking spot, but I’m not convinced that my evasiveness is something that would be welcomed.

   “I see here you say you have a cat that can fly? Tell me about that?”

  “Well I see we’re really getting into the trivial weed details here, so let me just say Obediah is an extraordinary cat who I rescued. I can’t go into the details because I am sworn to secrecy by the department of defense, but let me give you a hint that there are no cats on this planet quite like him” (I plan to look skyward and make circle gestures with my index finger).

I figure if I don’t torpedo the interview with that, then they are probably really desperate to fill a position that has been vacant for so long there is no continuity and I’ll have to start from scratch. So, that’s the place for me. I mean really, when you take a job with a desperate company, they’re nothing but appreciative; who doesn’t want that?

As for the boat loads of money?  Well first things first.