Money Pit

The money pit continues to consume my savings and my patience. UckingFay OuseHay.

Not What I Planned...But...

I've been walking quite a bit during the last couple of weeks. A couple of miles or more most mornings and the occasional midday walk have been good for me. I awoke this morning with the intent that I'd go for a long walk, but sloth and the desire for coffee, coupled with bad knees and the knowledge that I'll spend a good bit of the day mowing the yard and doing other yard-work conspired against my good intentions.

So, instead I am spending my time futzing around on the internet and otherwise being unproductive. Speaking of coffee, I had been enjoying my new Keurig coffee maker immensely since buying it a couple of weeks ago, but then something went awry. I loved the fact that I could drop in a K-cup and have a fresh, hot cup of coffee in just a minute. But then after only a week, it stopped working correctly. It insisted it needed to be "primed" in order to produce a cup. I followed the troubleshooting directions, then called Keurig. The customer service tech walked me through the process of getting it operable again, but I was concerned that it was giving me grief so early in the process. The next morning, it happened again. Again I called Keurig. Instead of the usual insistence that I go through a lengthy process of troubleshooting again, the tech apologized for my inconvenience and said a new machine would be shipped to me in short order. The old machine obviously is defective, she said, so I need not return it; just discard it. But she asked me to mail in the K-cup holder from the old machine as evidence that the machine had been taken out of service. I hate that I have to delay my coffee gratification, but love the actual customer service Keurig delivered! This will provide fodder for my languishing customer service blog.

My wife returned home earlier this week from visiting her sister, whose husband died unexpectedly about five weeks ago. We'll be making another trip to Boston soon, though, to accompany my sister-in-law when she takes her husband's ashes to Illinois for burial in his family's plot. His 94-year-old mother lives there and wants him buried with his other siblings and his father. We will accompany her on the trip, which probably will be via Amtrak from Boston to Chicago and then on to Aurora. I'm not sure yet how we'll get to Boston; we may drive, as my intent to go on long road-trips during my year-long sabbatical has, thus far, been derailed by one thing and another. I had hoped to drive from Boston to Aurora, but my SIL would rather take Amtrak, so that's what we'll do unless she changes her mind. It's a 26-hour trip to Chicago from Boston via Amtrak. I look forward to the train trip; I enjoy travel by train.

For the past couple of days, I've had a guy working on replacing the soffits all around my house. The existing soffits had been painted several years ago by incompetent painters who had done virtually no surface preparation, resulting in bad blistering of the paint. The cheap masonite material, coupled with the difficulty of removing the old paint, argued for replacement instead of repainting, so that's what we're having done. It's an expensive proposition, but one that's been desperately needed for some time. After that job's done, he'll fix the rotting bases of the columns on the front of the house and will replace the front door and the door leading from the house into the garage. There are a few other odds and ends he'll do; these are things that are not apt to be highly visible "fixes," but they are badly needed and obscenely expensive. I sometimes wish we could sell this house and build a new one from the ground up. At least that would give me several years' freedom from expensive repairs.

But expensive repairs on the house are only part of the equation. If the weather cooperates and the contractor shows on Monday and Tuesday next week, we'll have our driveway and front walkway jackhammered and removed, then replaced with fresh new concrete. The sidewalk is tilted badly and cannot be righted. The driveway is cracked in pieces and heaves and swells with every season. New concrete, I hope, will improve both the appearance and the utility of both of them.

Enough of this. It will be time, soon, to begin the yardwork.

Spring

I can feel summer coming on. If it were within my power, I would put the brakes on that nasty progression, as summer in Dallas can be overwhelmingly miserable. During the worst of the worst days, the air itself is scorched and brittle. On such days, every breath one takes fills the lungs with tiny, sharp shards of burnt molecules of air. It's enough to make dogs growl and cats scratch and humans lash out with sharp razors, the latter in vain attempts to cut through the oppressive envelope of super-heated air to reach the cool comfort just beyond.

But that's not the case today. Though I feel summer coming on, as evidenced by yesterday's high of 82 degrees, this morning is absolutely glorious.

I started the day by getting out of bed a good 40 minutes later than I had planned, thanks to getting to bed later than I should have done. It was still dark, though, and by 6:25 AM I had weighed myself, put on my walking clothes, positioned my iPhone and ear buds just right, and headed out for a walk. Inasmuch as I've only recently returned to what I hope will continue to be a regimen of daily walks, I did not walk as far nor as long as I once would have done on a Saturday morning. It has only been this week that I've finally persuaded myself to muster a bit of discipline and go for morning walks, and some afternoon walks, as well.

Today, the Runkeeper app on my iPhone tells me I walked 3.68 miles in 57 minutes 39 seconds. I started off much slower than normal because I was wearing a new pair of shorts to which I had clipped my iPhone and had to get used to the way they felt. I kept getting the sensation that the iPhone was weighting them down and that they were slipping down. That apparently was not the case, but it felt like it. So, I started slowly. But it felt good. I was ready to call it quits by the time I got back home, though; I look forward to building up my stamina and addressing concerns about chafing, both of which will permit me to take longer walks. Before slot overtook me last fall, I was walking 5+ miles per day on weekends, topping out at just under 10 miles on a few occasions.

Before I summarize my week in walks, I want to record what this morning is like as I sit at my breakfast table looking out the window. Since I returned from Boston, leaving my wife to stay for awhile with her sister, I have made it a habit of opening the casement windows in the kitchen, breakfast nook, and living room. Not only does this allow in an abundance of fresh, cool air, it fills the rooms with light that no ceiling fixtures can ever replicate. It is absolutely delightful to sit here, after I return from my walks, and sit facing the windows. The early morning temperature when I start my walks is in the low to mid 60s. As daylight comes, the temperature rises fairly quickly, reaching 70 or above by 10:00 am. With a light breeze, 70 degrees feels wonderful.

When I return from my walks, I turn on the ceiling fans in the house to help the air circulate, hoping to replicate inside what I experienced during my walk outside. I then make my breakfast (one egg, two slices of turkey bacon, a glass of tomato juice, half a clementine, and at least one cup of coffee from my new Keurig brewer, which I adore) and then I sit and gaze out the window.

Many of the trees in the neighborhood have begun to leaf, some extensively, and the lawns have begun to get green. With a blue sky punctuated by puffs of white and grey clouds as a backdrop, the trees and lawns and houses look welcoming and happy. I know...but "happy" is the best word I can use to describe how they look.

The occasional walker or jogger comes by, but rarely do they acknowledge me when they pass. I suspect they may feel a bit embarrassed to look in the window and see someone looking back. I wish they would stop to chat, or at least wave and say hello. But, then, I think of myself as I'm off on my purposive walks: I don't want to stop and chat with anyone, I want to get some exercise. Maybe a walk a little later in the day might have better social results.

I do feel summer coming on, but for now I am entranced with this wonderful, but brief, spring.

Remembering

My wife has been helping her sister cope with the immediate challenges of widowhood for almost three weeks. I returned home after just a week and have been playing bachelor for nearly two weeks. In many respects, this time to myself is welcome. I'm learning a bit about myself as an individual versus one component of a couple.

It is good and important to recapture, if only on occasion, one's individual characteristics. I find myself with more time to reflect on things that rarely receive a moment of my thought. What I don't find, though, is the discipline to capture my thoughts by recording them in words. Even now as I type this, my ability to put my thoughts into suitable words seems to have escaped me.

I miss my wife and want her to come home. On the other hand, I may need more time yet to remember who I once was...if that person is someone worth remembering.

Muscle Memory

Yesterday, while my wife and sister-in-law and I were having lunch at a seafood restaurant just up the road from my sister-in-law's house, I began having muscle pains in my mid-to-upper back. By the time we'd finished lunch, the pain...which felt like pulled muscles I'd experienced before...had spread around to my side and to the left side of my chest, just to the left of the base of my sternum. I was worried that it might be more than just muscle spasms, but didn't want to get unduly alarmed (or unduly alarm them). I was conscious, too, that my worry might have been influenced by the fact that my brother-in-law had died, just six days earlier, from what is assumed to have been a heart attack or other such cardiac "event."

So, I just took aspirin and hoped the pain would disappear. My wife and sister-in-law expressed worry, but I assured them it was just a pulled muscle. I hoped deeply it was a pulled muscle. When we got home, I decided to take a nap so my muscles could rest and recover. More than three hours later, I awoke just a short while before my wife and SIL were ready to prepare dinner. They made a very nice "chicken hash" dinner. We watched an episode of House Hunters. The pain had not improved much, so a almost immediately after dinner I decided to try to sleep some more. That was about 8:30 pm. I woke up about an hour ago, at around 5:00 am. The pain is better, but still very much with me. I took a shower, shaved, went downstairs to make a cup of coffee, and here I sit, wishing the muscles would cooperate. In less than five hours, the services for my brother-in-law will begin. I don't want my muscle pain to divert attention from the remembrance. I won't allow it.

Private Grief

The past several days have made me reconsider all the posts I make on Facebook. This week, the grief my sister-in-law is dealing with should be private grief. Facebook is too public, too open, too much like papparazzi poking cameras in one's face. I'll have to think about that when I return home Sunday night. While my wife continues to help her sister deal with her grief, I'll be home alone for a week; perhaps I'll be private for a week. Perhaps not.

A Death in the Family

My brother-in-law, John, died today. It was utterly unexpected; a complete shock. At this point, I don't know the cause, at least not with certainty. The conjecture is that it was a heart attack.

After lunch today, my wife and I went out for a drive. We had no objective in mind other than to stop by the bank ATM to get some cash and go shopping for a few groceries. As we wandered about on the rain-slick streets, we approached an environmental educational center that we've been watching as it has been developing over the past many months. It's really just a demonstration garden, coupled with examples of solar collectors, composting bins, rain cachment system, and other odds and ends designed to serve as educational resources, mostly for school children, I assume. Being curious and somewhat "in" to the stuff, I stopped. My wife stayed in the car while I got out and walked around, exploring the demonstration site. When I got back to the car, my wife was finishing a conversation with her sister, who had just called to tell her what happened.

More calls took place later in the day. My wife and I will leave tomorrow for Boston to try to help her sister deal with the trauma and shock of what has just happened. I'm glad we can do it. But it's a hard, cold reason for making the trip.

Such things serve as brutal reminders that no one among us knows how much time we have left and when our lives might abruptly end. That realization can give rise to bitterness or despair, I suppose, but I choose to try, at least, to use it to try to reshape my cynicism into joy and appreciation. I will most certainly try. We are all we have. WE. You and me. All of us. We should serve as one anothers' treasurers.

A Heartfelt Tribute to Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day post redux. Just read the post from last year. I'm a romantic, really. But that's not what Valentine's Day is all about, is it?

UPDATE: But wait! Now it's über-cool to become a Valentine's Day afficionado! Now, the über-über cool people are writing snarky, sarcastic bits about how those of us who snipe at Valentine's Day are just tragically unhip, uncool, and deeply behind the latest trends. If we were REALLY cool, we'd adopt Valentine's Day as a great opportunity for sex and chocolate and we'd just shut up about how it's an opportunity for certain commercial ventures to make out like bandits. After all, they reason, is it any secret that Valentine's Day is a consumerist's bacchanalian fuck-fest? Let them snark. I haven't changed my mind. I opt not to allow myself to become a tool of Hallmark, spreading the gospel about how perfectly GOOD it is to spend needlessly on crap that ostensibly quantifies my love. Thanks, Hallmark, but I'll pass on the currently über cool Hallmark moment.

A Few Chapters

I woke up this morning a few minutes before 4:00 a.m. Most of the time when I awaken so early, I look at the clock and roll over and go back to sleep. Not today. Today I got up, unloaded the dishes from the dishwasher, made a pot of coffee, and went online, looking for something to catch my attention. An acquaintance who had just gotten home from a night of partying noticed that I was online. We chatted briefly on Facebook, then I looked at the "to-read" books on my desk and picked up When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times, by Pema Chödrön.

The book has been sitting on my desk since October, along with others that have been there even longer, waiting for that elusive time when I would be in the right mood to read them. Today, the mood was right for When Things Fall Apart. I'm not quite sure what I was expecting, but I was not expecting what I got upon reading the first few chapters. I suppose I was expecting to read an instruction book on how to cope with difficult times in one's life. And perhaps that's what was intended. Instead, though, I began reading a book that seemed to me to have been written to enable the reader to have a conversation with himself about the real world. Not the world as it has always been understood to be. The real world.

I suppose I expected the book to be more "spiritual" in its approach, which always has been a bit of an issue with me. On the one hand, I think "spiritual" often is code for "you must believe what I believe with respect to religion," but on the other hand I think "spiritual" is simply a way to classify how one integrates one's personal sense of morality with the way in which he interacts with other people. Come to think of it, maybe the latter meaning may get at my experience in reading the first few chapters. But there's more than that. I just can't quite put my finger on it yet. I suppose the concept of circularity that seems to me to underpin Buddhism became clearer to me. Previously, I had interpreted that concept of circularity as requiring a belief in reincarnation (if one were to accept some fundamental Buddhist principles). But what I understand now is that circularity or rebirth in the Buddhist sense may simply describe the constancy of change.

As I write this, I realize I am not able to express in words what I believe I am beginning to understand intellectually. That is a bit disturbing, because words are my currency, my pathway to knowledge and understanding. But that notwithstanding, I find I feel more about what I am beginning to realize than I can articulate. For inexplicable reasons, though, I am comfortable with that, despite my discomfort. That, is circularity. But it makes sense in a ways it did not before I began reading the book. I'm only four or five chapters in, but I feel that I've learned much more than could be held in just a few chapters.

News

I learned tonight that a cousin, who is considerably older than I am, has breast cancer. Some time ago she decided that, if she were ever diagnosed with breast cancer, she would not accept treatment. She has since lost her ability to recognize her friends and family, due to Alzheimer's. I gather she is unaware of what is happening.

The prognosis is that she may have six months to live. As the end nears, she will be put in a hospice.

Such abrupt information of such import.

Sand

I suppose it's possible that we're all living lives of mass hysteria. Nothing is real. It's all imagined. The daily drudgery, the surprise birthday parties, the unexpected attraction to happily married women who return the favor. It's all fantasy, hiding the reality buried deep under the dry, gritty sand.

I listen tonight to "Take This Waltz" and I wonder why it seems so so and so true? "Take this waltz, take this waltz, it's yours now, it's all that there is."

"With its very own breath of brandy and death, dragging its tail in the sea."

"My mouth on the dew of your thighs."

"I yield to the flood of your beauty, my cheap violin and my cross."

The thing, the unexpected yet utterly unsurprising thing is that it's all fantasy. It's all artificial. It's all built from plastic made especially to assuage the bewilderment of the ones among us who question the legitimacy of the corporate elite.

Mary

I once had a very close friendship with Mary. We shared a lot of the same ideas, attitudes, beliefs, questions, hopes, and dreams. She was one of my closest friends for a very long time. I would go so far to say as she was my very best friend.

But people grow in different ways. We took different paths, followed different dreams, made decisions that were contrary to maintaining what was a close friendship. Her views on religion were very different from mine, though I have since mellowed a bit and can better understand now what she tried to tell me about what she believed. Our assessments of the human condition were at once quite similar and very different. I was, and remain, deeply skeptical about the fundamental goodness of people. On the one hand, I believe people will be good and kind and helpful if left entirely to their own devices in development, that doesn't happen. She believed humans have an inate core of goodness about them. I want to believe that. Some days I do. Most days I don't...or, at least, that point is deeply in question.

But we both had high hopes for the future. We could imagine good things happening. We both were advocates for equality and justice. We were the liberal poster children.

Something went awry. I think she absorbed some of my skepticism and distrust and I absorbed some of her trust and faith. Those things happened without the opportunity for us to have conversations about what was happening in our mental evolution. A friendship that had seemed as solid as granite just disappeared. I miss that. I miss her. I miss whoever I was back then.

Reflections

Where did all the plans for long, aimless road trips go? What happened to becoming a couch-surfer? When did the concept of behaving like a gypsy for a year just vaporize?

Maybe it set in when it became apparent that we still have obligations...check the post office boxes for mail and forward it to clients...pay bills...watch our expenses...look out after the house and yard. They are excuses, pure and simple. And I may be buying into them now. I don't want to. But maybe I am. Now, it's looking like a year of spending time at home, playing word games and wishing I had the money to do repair work on the house.

Has it been me all along that I've been dissatisfied with? And here I thought it was the work, the clients, the constant obligations, the lack of freedoms. Maybe that's it. The lack of freedoms. What is it, exactly, that prevents me from doing what I want to do?

Someone so young

I read something this morning that made me think. It was a post written by a 26-year-old woman whose blog I've been reading quite a bit recently. This young woman is full of energy and positive thoughts and seems just bursting with life. It's energizing just to read her words, so fresh and unburdened by experience and so undeterred by too many years of reality. But it's not just her youthful exuberance that I find appealing. It's her youthful wisdom. It's the fact that, when she experiences something new and gains new knowledge, she shares it in a way that brings that same new knowledge back to me. Her words resurrect in me the knowledge and thewisdom that lay buried under years and years of years and years. I found these words from her blog this morning particularly meaningful:

We cling to things because we’re terrified of empty space. We surround ourselves with possessions because we feel like we need them to help us express who we are. We hold on to people because we’re afraid of being alone. We carry around our sadness because we would rather feel something than nothing. We try to fill our emptiness with whatever we can.

How can someone so young know so much?

More Movies

After spending a Friday afternoon lazily watching two movies, one right after the other, at the theater during "matinee" discount time ($1 per movie), I decided that's exactly the kind of relaxation I needed. When I left the theater, I had the sensation that the stress I brought with me when I entered the building had been left in the seats.

It's hard to say why I feel any stress these days: I am not working much, I have very few demands on my time, and there are very few expectations placed on me. Yet I've felt stress anyway. I don't know where it's from. But if I can get rid of it simply by going to see a couple of movies, then I shall start seeing more movies.

Hygienic Art--New London, CT

Recently, a blogger friend who lives in New London, CT posted a series of photos taken at the Hygienic Art event in New London. I'd heard of it through her blog a couple of years earlier but hadn't explored it much. But this year, she posted a comment about a video that described the event. I finally found the video to which I think she was referring. It's shown below. Seeing the video made me even more interested in actually experiencing New London for myself.

Frost

When I walked outside this morning, I noticed the roofs of the houses all around mine had heavy layers of frost on them. But not mine. That surprised me, since I just had a vast quantity of insulation installed in my attic. I assumed the insulation would prevent the heat from inside the house from entering the attic...and I assumed the warmth of my attic was responsible for the lack of frost on the roof.

In fact, when the insulation guy came to give me an estimate a few weeks ago, he pointed out the same thing to me. My neighbors' roofs were all coated with frost, but mine wasn't. He explained that was because the warmth of my attic either melted the frost or didn't allow it to form. Once the insulation is installed, he said, my roof would look just as frosty as my neighbors' roofs. He was wrong.

I am sure my attic needed a LOT more insulation. I am not sure, though, why my roof does not have frost on it. Is my assumption about the warm attic right? If so, where is the warmth coming from?

You probably don't know. You probably don't care. That's alright. I'm asking anyway.

What's behind it?

I wonder why, tonight, my emotions are overflowing? I've been trying to think of what might have caused this flood of memories or wishes or whatever it is that's overwhelming me. But I can't think of a trigger. Maybe it's just time. The steady beat of time continues without pause. In fact, it's faster and faster with each passing hour. Maybe that's it.

I listen to Tacoma Trailer, an instrumental piece from Leonard Cohen, and I cannot control myself. I just weep. I am no longer embarrassed by it. I'm just surprised. And I wonder. What's behind it?

Oceans

I have a great many friends. Unfortunately, most of them do not know about our friendship, since I tend to keep it under wraps, even from my friends. This rather secretive side of me, coupled with the fact that I've never met most of them, makes it impossible to say we have an intimate friendship (not that kind of intimate, damn it, be serious here) friendship in the traditional sense, but I think it's intimate. I think it's intimate, though, because I feel like I understand at least a part of what's inside their heads. At least a little.

Let me explain. I believe poetry and its cousin, music, reveal a great deal about what a person believes, feels, sees, understands, and cares about. Music, especially, opens the door to a person's soul (not in the religious sense...bear with me). It's not just the lyrics. It's the emotion carried in the tune and the way it's delivered. A person's humanity can be revealed in the degree of attachment he or she feels to music. Of course I can't measure the degree of attachment. But I can sense it. And when I'm right and I feel a deep emotional attachment between a person and music that creates that same deep emotional attachment in me, I feel attached to that person. Whatever communication we've had, whether via telephone, email, or simply comments on a blog or social media site, I feel that level of attachment.

Ideally, I'd break through the barriers of space and meet these people. Sometimes I do. But mostly I don't. Yet I have friends in them. Maybe our friendships are very, very close. Maybe they don't feel that way at all. But isn't that true of more traditional friendships, too?

I listened today to some music by a woman named Brandi Carlile. I encountered her by chance as I stumbled across an "activity" on Facebook of a friend I've never met. When I listened to the music, it evoked music of others I like and it made me realize I have a connection with the friend who inadvertently shared it with me.

What does all this mean? I suppose it means that the dimensions of friendship are changing. It's no longer necessary to have a physical presence with a friend to BE a friend. But, come to think of it, if we read the letters of poets and writers, many of their friends were distant. Maybe social media and the internet are becoming today's version of oceans and distance.

Ice cream man

Goddamn the ice cream man.

He lured me into thinking vanilla was a natural thing. He led me to believe pineapple and peppermint would always be there to brighten an otherwise dull day.

Goddamn the ice cream man.

There was no okra-ice in his truck, no garbanzo swirl, no chemo-crunch. His truck was a lie told to unwitting co-conspirators.

Goddamn the ice cream man.

If only he'd laid it out plain, if only he'd been honest, if only he'd served up what he didn't have, I might not have been blind-sided. Come to think of it, though, I don't really remember the ice cream man that well. But I imagine what it must have been like, with all those cold sweet flavors. If I don't really remember him, why do I think I know what it was like? Why do I think it's different now?

Goddamn the ice cream man.

Right...uh huh.

What would you do if you fell in love in late middle age?

I didn't think so.

Thinking about someone on the coast

Damn. Just damn. If only I could head south tonight, I could be there in the morning. But I can't. Damn.

Adjustment

Muffled sounds pierce the thick, warm fog, but they are mere noises, nothing meaningful. The time between becoming conscious of the noises and the point at which they seems to have some rational content might be seconds, but it could just as easily be hours or even days. Finally, or perhaps not finally but just suddenly, an irritatingly repetitive noise becomes louder and louder and then, like the fog was lifted, becomes a question. "Mr. Kneeblood?" Louder: "Mr. Kneeblood?" LOuder: "Mr. Kneeblood?" LOUder: "Mr. Kneeblood?" LOUDer: "Mr. Kneeblood?" LOUDER: "MR. KNEEBLOOD?! Can you hear me?"

This questioning robotic voice won't stop until I respond, which I try to do, or think I try to do. I can hear myself responding, but then maybe it's just my brain telling my body to respond. Maybe my body isn't properly interpreting the instruction. I try again. I try again. Nothing. The robotic annoyance continues. "Mr. Kneeblood?!" Then, finally, the blanket of unconciousness that silences my response is torn away. I hear myself respond. "Jesus Christ, yes, I can hear you! Stop it! "

The woman seems pleased. "Good! You're doing fine! It will be just a while longer!"

Longer? For what? I know only that I'm not fully aware of where I am, or even whether I'm awake or am dreaming this. The fog has lifted, but only the heaviest layer. I still feel as though I'm breathing through a mountain of cotton. I feel like my body is wrapped in thick, cold blankets. I don't know exactly where I am. I'm not even conscious of whether I am aware of who I am. But the blankets are being removed, somehow, and I have the odd sensation that I'm getting warmer with the removal of each successive layer. I am becoming more aware, more conscious, more an actor in this environment instead of simply the subject of actions around me.

It seems like I have been wading through this odd purgatory of molasses-speed awareness and slow-motion movement for hours, but it may be only seconds. I see time seems as a physical "thing" that bends and molds around my body, then becomes a fragile mirror that shatters when touched by a feather. Eventually, its tangible presence fades away to reveal only shadows and a sense of loss and vulnerability.

Then I open my eyes. Finally, I open my eyes and that simple act brings the sounds into sharper focus. I hear the hum of the machinery, the beeps of gauges, the repetitive "swoosh" of pumps handling things I can no longer handle on my own.

Hospital. Surgery. Hours? Days? Weeks? Who was calling out his name? Kneeblood. Who the hell is Kneeblood? And then it hits me. It will take some adjustment for all of this to sink in.

Edges

I don't know exactly where my edges are. Maybe they're just over the end of my patience. Maybe they're more distant and less visible. But I know they are there. What I don't know is what I'll do when I go over them. What happens when the edges are behind me, or above me? What happens when I've run past the edges and can't get back? I don't want to learn when it's too late. But I may not want to learn too early.

To Hell and Beyond

I think I know what it is. It's fear there's just nothing there.

After digging deep, looking under every thought, studying each action, there's just nothing to be found. At least nothing substantive, nothing coherent. Just a mass of jagged emotions and attitudes, most of them only partially-formed, badly underdeveloped, irrelevant and pointless.

Fortunately or unfortunately, their irrelevance is hidden from all but the most relentless explorers. As if someone could explore another's motives. You just cannot know what drives a person to be who he is. Not even yourself. Or maybe it's just me. Maybe others have a clear understanding of themselves. Maybe others really are as deep as I am shallow. Not shallow in the traditional sense, though that may describe me, too, but shallow in the sense that this shell I live in doesn't have much depth. It's the stuff beneath that goes all the way to the bowels of hell and beyond.

A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese

A friend I made through Facebook has recommended a film I want to see, but I have to be in the proper mood and have adequate free time to watch it. To ensure I won't forget where to find it, I'm "memorializing" it here: A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese.

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xdmrny_a-personal-journey-with-martin-scor_shortfilms

Daily Spirituality

I have a new friend on Facebook, someone I've never met. He teaches a college English composition course (courses) at a college on the west coast of Florida. He is either "from" my hometown or spent a considerable amount of time there. He considers it his hometown.

My new friend and I have had some short conversations via online posts and messages. He seems like a very nice guy, a very down-to-earth guy who delves deeply into issues that interest him or that he finds illuminating. Based on some of the conversations we've had, and on comments I've seen him make on others' pages, I gather he grew up Catholic and has retained his belief in a supreme being, but has lost...or is losing...his connection to the church. His beliefs are changing, or have changed, enough to cause him to question (perhaps 'reject' is the more appropriate term) the traditional church dogma. But he retains a sense of spirituality that is, or may be, religious. I'm not sure. Just recently, he posted some comments about Scientology; while not endorsing the 'religion,' his comments demonstrated an extraordinary sense of open-mindedness about something I always have considered greed-driven espousals of magic. There's something about his willingness to give 'believers' the benefit of the doubt that I find refreshing and genuinely good, despite the fact that I cannot bring myself to be as generous as he appears to be.

All of this is a prelude, I suppose, to what's really on my mind right now. And that is, what IS spirituality? Is it the sense of wonder that I have at the world around me? Is it the utter amazement I feel when looking deep into a pool of clear water? Is it the sense of amazement that I feel when I look at all of what humankind has accomplished in harnessing the resources of the earth? What the hell is it?

I guess it's something different for everyone. For me, it may be something different for every day of the week.

Love of...Country?

This morning I read an exceptionally thought-provoking piece that bears sharing here. It gets at my personal beliefs about "love of country" and how dangerous that can be.

I will admit to wanting to document it here for my own selfish purpose of wanting to be able to find it more easily in the future. Regardless of my motives, though, anyone who stumbles across my post and then moves on to "High Treason" on via Negativa will be fortunate. He writes about a poem by José Emilio Pacheco, a highly-regarded Mexican poet.

So This Is Christmas?

It's Christmas Day, 2011. It's not yet 7:00 am, but I've been up and awake for close to three hours now. I didn't get up early to prepare gifts or stuff stockings—we haven't exchanged gifts in quite some time and we decided this year we wouldn't even do our "traditional" stocking stuffers. So I don't know why I got up early. Maybe I just needed a bit of early morning reflection time.

After my wife and I decided gift exchange was rather pointless for us—if we need something and can afford it, we buy it— we shifted to doing stocking stuffers. We would fill one another's Christmas stockings with little treats: a can of smoked oysters, special jams or teas, a tin of sardines, a whimsical toy. It was fun and we enjoyed it, but I guess it just played out. This year, we didn't put up a tree or any ornaments or decorations.

So today is Christmas Day, but it doesn't look like Christmas Day. We'll have a special breakfast this morning and a special evening meal, which will add a bit of seasonal celebration.

Maybe next year we'll return to the old traditions. Or maybe we'll make some new ones.

The Embarrassment of Low-Dose Sentimentality

I sometimes think people are embarrassed by their emotions, by what some would call their "sentimentality." I would argue that's true for some of us who tend to view the "Christmas mush" as a profit-driven, media-induced effort to persuade us that we should listen to our "consciences" and spend accordingly...our "consciences" tell us we must buy to express our love. Because we are skeptical of the motives behind the "Christmas mush," we are loath to buy into—and certainly loath to express—the emotions that the media present to us as evidence of the Christmas spirit.

But I think if the skeptics among us were to be completely honest with ourselves, we would not work so hard to present ourselves as unwilling to buy into the Christmas spirit.

Despite my lack of belief in the biblical basis for Christmas, I have no particular reason to find anything offensive about Christmas. While I think Christmas has been co-opted by capitalists to a very great extent, I find the themes surrounding the Christmas holidays (and many other religious holidays, for that matter) to be good and valuable and attractive. Goodwill toward men. Peace on earth. Sharing. Helping those less fortunate. Love of family and friends. Being charitable in thought and deed. Those are good things. (Noticeably lacking, unfortunately, is goodwill toward the Earth, but that's another post.)

But back to my opening comment: if you're skeptical about the motives of those around you, you tend not to want to reveal your own...especially the ones that are REAL inside you but that appear, at least to you, PHONY in others. Part of it is that you're questioning your own skepticism, I think, and part of it is your concern about your image among those who share what you may think is your intellectual superiority. You don't want to look like a patsy for the proletariat, as it were.

I will readily admit that I remain highly suspicious of the motives behind a lot of the "spirit of the season." Earlier and earlier Christmas sales, earlier and earlier Christmas tree availability (another issue for another post), bigger and bigger splashes by the media about their toy drives and help for the homeless and so forth. But I have to acknowledge that the results of toy drives and efforts to help the homeless are, or can be, wonderful. The fact that the motives behind them may not be "pure" in the way I'd like them to be does not change the results. While the results may not always be as good as I'd hope, they're probably better than the outcome of inaction.

Granted, some believe, as I once did, people are not naturally caring, empathic beings. But whether people come by those attributes naturally or not, I believe many people and perhaps most people do possess them. They want the world to be a better place. They want to help their fellow humans. They don't want to allow themselves to be the beasts we all can become. And I think most people, even those who present the face and the attitude of a hard-ass, believe the same thing.

In my admittedly schizophrenic assessments of people, I think the hard-asses are just willing to allow themselves to exhibit sentimentality in extremely low does, if at all, and that's an embarrassment in and of itself. I've been embarrassed across the board in that regard.

As of this moment, though, I am allowing myself to revel in the spirit of the season. I just wish I'd revel in it year-round. I wish we all would revel in it year-round.