I’ve written that the worst feeling in the world is knowing you are the villain. Or at least the one who has hurt someone, regardless of one’s intentions. In one’s head, you don’t think or plan in a straight line. The water starts out warm and then begins to boil. It’s easy to get into that mindset wherein you begin to believe that there is no resolution; hopelessness is often the result. Emotion, doubt, and undesired consequences merge into a mass of something that seems infinite.
“On a long enough timeline, everyone is going to be an asshole.” – X
I’ve learned again and again that my intentions are meaningless when compared to the consequences, much in the way that love is diluted when you observe behavior versus intentions. If love is indeed a verb, then it follows that consequences are the fruit of intentions.
I tapered off Lexapro by going through three reduced cycles and finally just tossing the remainder. This website might sanction me again for discussing it. (Which I still shake my head about, though it was a year ago.) It was a huge help for months; now, it lies on me to practice what I supposedly learned. For run-of-the-mill idiots like me, such medications don’t add value after an indeterminate time. My doctor’s office helped my decision along by being profit-oriented rather than patient-focused. I’m used to it. And maybe, in this case, it is for the best. Everything seems inevitable after the fact precisely because it happened that way. But as adults, we know that isn’t true, even if we cling to the comfortable idea of inevitability.
Real villains and narcissists don’t worry about whether they are villains or narcissists. But just because I’m not bona fide does not mean that I am not quite often an asshole.
I yield to the truth when I’m able to recognize it.
Discomfort. Doubt.
Ignoring it doesn’t erase it.
I yield.
PS I’m okay! I just like to write and share what’s in my head. Attempting to control how it’s interpreted is a fool’s errand.
“I’m so hungry I could eat a horse and chase the rider.” -Old Saying
“A hungry stomach cannot hear.” -Jean de La Fontaine
“Breaking bread together” is an old phrase, but its simplicity is the message.
If you are hungry, any food will suffice. “Hunger is the best sauce,” someone smarter than me quipped. Hungry people don’t moan about what and where to eat; if they do, it’s kept short and grouchily pronounced.
If you’re happy, bread with wine or dipped in oil is enough to fill you. And if you’re not, no amount of food will create a smile.
If you are lonely, companionship will overfill your plate. People are the food of our souls.
I love great food. Who doesn’t?
But I love simple food, made without stress and shared.
And if I meet with someone or a group to eat, the presence of others is supposed to be the essential element.
X’s Rule On Group Dining: You will dislike eating with at least one person in any group of more than four people.
I’m not opposed to opulent multi-course meals.
Who would be?
But if they require effort not joyfully given, they take away someone’s time and life to prepare.
It’s one of the principal problems with holiday meals or get-togethers.
Traditions inevitably beget obligation.
Often, what was once freely done becomes taxing and vexation.
Complexity and expectations detract from someone’s enjoyment.
It should always be about the presence of faces on one’s couch or around the table, no matter how luxurious it might be. Everyone’s house is lived in, messy, and full of life’s surprises that no one has the time or interest in rectifying. Unless you are eating off the mantle, leave the dust for later.
Break bread.
Eat.
And be merry inasmuch as your circumstances permit.
Because, well, you know.
Tomorrow ye may die.
Whether you’ve eaten like a gourmand or like a ravenous teenager with his hand in the bottom of a bag, it will not be what you remember as the wrinkles accumulate across your face.
Humble food is the joy. And if someone wishes to make a feast joyfully, even better.
“After a good dinner one can forgive anybody, even one’s own relatives.”
– Oscar Wilde
“Almost all happy people I know decide where and what to eat easily, graciously, and without complaint. And if they find themselves in the home of another with friends, family, or loved ones, they make do. Unless they are visiting cannibals, vegans, or Presbyterians.” – X
“It is the faces, not the places, that matter.” – X
Love, X
PS “Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.” -Mark Twain
I took a walk when the sun became hidden behind the dense summer clouds. My wobbly legs protested but the pavement called. Exertion has replaced chemistry in my quest for peace.
After a few minutes, I felt the bite of an incautious step. A little piece of glass upended and pierced the inside of my foot. It reminded me of being young when shoes were a nuisance and terrain was mine for the taking. I was walking barefoot, a modern savage for removing my shoes and walking the streets. Fifty-five-year-old men aren’t supposed to walk barefoot. It’s dangerous and an invitation to pain.
I walked several dozen steps and turned to look behind me. Little red swashes colored the sidewalk, my blood blotting the concrete with an irregular pattern.
Because there was no remedy, I walked until I left no such further trace.
I traversed the same arc after it rained. My little swashes were erased.
Life is like that if we are lucky.
A sharp, momentary pain, even if it lasts an undetermined time. All is momentary in the swath of one’s life.
The rain will come, or time will fade the bite of what harmed us.
We can take measures and cover our bare feet with shoes, yet pain will return, often from a surprising source.
Or, we can walk barefoot again, knowing that proverbial glass can lie anywhere, unseen. We can enjoy the rough textures, the literal touch of our world on our feet.
We can guard against anything, but we lose a dose of carefree disregard for the things that might happen.
There is no ‘might’ in this place we call home.
Everything is eventual, a muse once uttered. Good and bad, storm and calm, hunger and satiation. Ecclesiastes, distilled to its essence, reminds me of that frequently.
Rain will come, disguised as seconds, hours and minutes; it will surely wash us all away.
It boils down to whether you will walk barefoot despite the risk.
My feet uncovered, I decide to do it again.
If glass finds my feet again, I will once again watch in fascination as I leave traces of my stupidity behind me. But at least there are traces.
Cautious and incautious alike often lead to the same path.
I don’t want to find the glass, but I know it will find me, no matter its literal form or how confidently or carefully I walk.
Whether I keep walking is the measure of whether I’ve been stupid or wise.
My bare toes touch the bottom of the landing at the stairs. And so, I walk.
“Are you willing to sprint when you don’t know the distance?”
My manager had me watch a short sports clip. The rest of the clip was good but that pithy last quote resonated. I liked it even though it was sports oriented.
Sprinting is running but not all running is sprinting. It is a commitment to go as fast as you can physically, as much as it is to focus your mind or go blank mentally and let your body do what it needs to.
There’s a lesson in there somewhere. It makes me think in multiple directions.
Just sharing it in case it causes someone else the same introspection.
I will write a happy, fun moment in time. Lord knows we all need one. Some moments are especially sweet precisely because of the bittersweet swirling around us.
I pulled into the convenience store near the interstate. Two boys were wheeling around on bicycles, happy and carefree as young boys often are, when they have freedom and mobility. You don’t see boys like that galavanting like you once did, especially on bikes.
I went in to get a soda and watched as the boys excitedly decided what to buy with their precious dollars. When I went to pay they were behind me.
I received my change and turned and handed one of the boys a $5 bill. “Don’t take money from strangers!” I said. All of us laughed, even the clerk. The boys’ faces lit up as they realized they could buy additional unexpected bounty.
It cost me $5 to make us all smile.
I waited outside in my car to watch as the boys exited.
If you climb a tree way before the sun rises, sometimes a magical moment happens. The dormant fireflies that believed their night of intermittent luminescence was finished… they will take flight as the jostling and vibration startles them into motion – especially if you shake your cell phone to cause it to flash. For anyone who has never thought of this or carefully ascended a tree in the dark, it’s one of those childhood moments that never fails to delight. And if it does ever fail to cause my lips to curl upward in a smile, I will climb to the very top with abandon and launch myself to the bottom.
The images from yesterday, the ones that reached back billions of years, they were beautiful. But there are things hidden in plain sight all around you. Sometimes you just have to look or be willing to do something different to see them. Close your eyes for a moment and then open them. There will be something fascinating around you. If you want there to be.
PS It’s pointless to caution me to be careful. Such advice is practical, but at my age I’ve learned that even the most cautious and careful people don’t have to look far to be besieged with calamity. The universe is not a fair place.
Educational Portion Of Post: the unseen portion of an iceberg is called a bummock, while the visible portion is called a hummock. This is true, as preposterous as the words are.
“The tip of the iceberg” denotes that much is unseen, unmeasured, and unobservable.
I came up with a tangent phrase, one which denotes the same arc, except that it refers to some people: the tip of the dickberg. (“Dickberg” is now in my dictionary. 🙂 )
Whether it’s true or not, I think it’s clever.
“Geez, Steve is really a jerk,” Susan said.
“What he just did is the tip of the dickberg,” Susan.
On a meta-level, I would use it to express the fact that if there’s a little smoke, there’s probably a basement filled with fire.
As a middle-aged white guy in the South, I would like to remind everyone that I am not what you see. Most of us aren’t. Most people aren’t even really the idea of them that we hold in our heads. If we have a fundamentally different worldview from someone else, we tend to vilify their beliefs or motives. We have to be on guard about that. It infects everything. There are a lot of evil people in the world, but most of us want the same things. No one likes other people interfering in their lives, yet so many do exactly that. People are surprised to discover how calcified their belief system becomes as they age.
I’m no Chicken Little. Despite the appearance of continuity, we’ve faced a lot of major upheavals as a society. I used my Handmaid’s Tale picture from years ago because it is a go-to symbol of a possible outcome if we don’t get our crap together. I made mine out of humor. It’s easy to see that we need a buttload more humor lately. It’s easy to succumb to cynicism and frustration.
Everyone’s social media is going to be flooded with opinions about social issues. Women who’ve had abortions, especially those who did so for their own reasons and often without others knowing, are going to learn a lot about their peers and loved ones. Some of those women did so for medical reasons or in cases of rape. Most of them didn’t choose abortion lightly. As I grew older and shared my personal life, I can’t tell you how many women told me stories that would shock you.
Most of the vocal celebrants of the supreme court decision are past the age when abortion is a viable concern for them individually. Old wounds will open and new ones will arise as people spew words. Unlike many of my contemporaries, I’m not worried about the next generation finding new ways to fix some of this. Old ideas don’t serve as well as many would like to think.
I have my own abortion story, one that tempers my interpretation of others’ opinions. Many of your friends and family members have them, too; most you’ll never know. Human sexuality is a constant drive, one that leads to consequences and turmoil. If we are going to limit other people’s ability to mitigate the consequences, we have to step up and provide a better social structure to support one another. It’s not about condemnation or judgment.
Women outnumber men.
I’m liberal, speak Spanish, and am in favor of just about every social program that helps people. Even if it reduces the defense budget, even if outliers take advantage – and even if the systems we put into place aren’t perfect. I’d start with universal health care, which, despite its flaws, would cost each of us less than our current system. Knowing that everyone around me could get at least basic health services anytime they are needed is something that seems stupidly right to me. For whatever reason, people disagree with me. My principal argument is that the rest of the modern world agrees with me. And universal health care is cheaper than our current system.
I anticipate a firestorm across the board.
Entropy is at play on a societal level. We are never going to be at a fixed point on any social issue. No matter which side of a particular issue you’re on, no issue is safe from review, even if you’ve achieved a momentary victory. If you galvanize a particular group, the system can be destabilized to such a degree that it no longer serves anyone. These issues are far from settled. They might even permanently rupture the system of government.
Politics is a dirty, specialized, and selfish game. If you play it correctly, you can achieve almost any objective, especially if money is involved.
So, I am a middle-aged white guy.
But I’m not responsible for the prevailing conservatism of my age group or those who look like me. We look alike but definitely don’t think alike. Despite that, we share a lot of the same ambitions, wants, needs, and desires. We have to learn to stay out of each other’s way as much as we can as we pursue our version of the dream. Conservatism in its purest form is sound; the evangelical version of it makes me cringe and shake my head.
So many of our problems result from those who “know” what is best for everyone else. Certainty breeds callousness. I try to think of all the things I once knew and believed, only to discover I was wrong. Which surely means that I’m mistaken about things now.
Railing about politics on social media is a fool’s errand unless you tell it as a personal story, one which reflects your life and who you are. You are not going to change anyone’s mind – nor should that be your goal.
Whichever side you’re on, remember that we are all human beings and got to our beliefs by inconsistent trial-and-error. Adding anger won’t change anything, even if it is justified. Like all of you, I admit that sometimes the burn of anger is a welcome relief, even as it short-circuits my humanity. It almost always makes me lesser.
I know that people are legitimately scared because the abortion ban will allow states to foolishly prevent abortions even in cases where it’s medically recommended, necessary, or a result of involuntary conception. That’s fiendishly diabolical and evil in my opinion. It ignores science and human decency.
No matter what changed, anything can be changed again.
Literally anything. With the right lever and effort.
Look for your lever and try to avoid adding to the woodpile of words. Find a way to convert your anger into action. Anger or fear is an immensely powerful motivator.
I know that being a middle-aged white guy contains a certain privilege of thought. I see that. But I can worry along with the rest of you, the ones who see a weird arc of conservative social ideology creeping into places that have little to do with fiscal policy or public health. Most of us think we have a singular plan and path for everyone else to live by. Imposing it only leads to no one having autonomy or happiness.
Neither picture has anything to do with the post. 🙂
Someone surprised me with a SPAM brooch this morning. I quipped that my new official title is now Spambassador.
The other picture is of the moon at 3 a.m., peeping through the silhouette of a dead tree amidst living trees. . . .
I absolutely LOVE that people with smartphones don’t use their fantastic piece of technology to prevent late-night intrusions with beeps, alarms, and notifications.
Seriously! I get tickled. It’s like someone complaining that their ceiling light keeps them awake. Uh? Turn the light off!
You can sort it so that only specific people can call, text, etc. You can silence and blind all notifications with almost no effort on your phone. That includes vibrations, flashing screens, and phone rings.
You can even use do-not-disturb in such a way that only certain people will ring through or text regardless of the time of day.
Your phone is almost always near you. It only takes a few seconds to set it so that you’re its master as opposed to the converse.
If you don’t know how, a friend, family member, or phone store employee can demonstrate it. Or, you can use the fancy Google.
By using the DND features on your phone, you can still be contacted in case of a true emergency, which is the go-to reply when most people reply, “Oh, I have to be able to be reached if something happens.” It doesn’t even sound reasonable to offer that reply, not with the options available on iPhones and Android. People can still reach you if necessary – it just requires you to learn a little bit about how your phone works instead of using the goofy reply mentioned above.
Everyone works and sleeps on their own schedule. There is no longer a “normal” window. 9 p.m. is late for some. And others are up at 2 a.m. Lord knows that no matter how diligent you are, your apps are going to bink, boink, and sound at all hours no matter how careful you are with notifications.
You shouldn’t growl at someone for texting or causing a notification at 12:44 a.m. You should growl at yourself for not taking a few minutes and learning how to use that incredible piece of technology that’s inseparable from your hand.
If you use do-not-disturb features and your close family member still texts you at 11:30 p.m. to ask you if you use dust-free toilet paper, that’s a boundary issue you need to discuss. Also, that kind of person shouldn’t be involved in an emergency notification. In fact, they usually CAUSE them.
Because I don’t sleep with my phone near me, it’s not an issue for me. I tend to leave my phone on DND very often. For those who’ve had sleep therapy, you already know that keeping screens away from you while you’re getting healthy sleep is mandatory. We did it that way for thousands of years and the world still kept spinning. I am completely pro-technology. Phones aren’t the ruination of the modern world as so many people claim. Rather, WE are the problem. And if you’re one of those knuckleheads who keeps their phone buzzing, flashing, and ringing while you’re trying to sleep, I suggest you try another way. A simple, easy-to-learn, way. It’s built right into modern phones.
No, there’s no taser feature on them yet, because someone will hack yours and administer a shock when you’re talking to your mother-in-law about the niceties of mulch.
It’s common for people to grouch about phones. No one forces you to use them inappropriately, as in social gatherings. Likewise, you can easily learn to use the features baked into all modern phones, the ones that allow you not to be interrupted when you’re in a social gathering – or trying to sleep.
As for me, I assume that everyone uses the technology on their phones. So, if I message, text, post, or hit like at 3:37 a.m., I’m not going to be the least bit concerned if you say something like, “Your beep woke me up.” You can fix that. The first option is to pretend I’m dead to you. The second more reasonable option is to take a few minutes so that my interactions don’t bother you when you don’t want them to.
Not directly related to the above: everyone basically hates it when someone is using their phone as an entertainment device while they are supposed to be enjoying one another’s company. Focus on your activity and the people you’re with. You’re sending the unintentional (or perhaps intentional) message that their presence is less interesting than your phone. Put it face down, turn it off, or do whatever you must do if you’re with people. And, of course, turn the ringer off.
I craved a diet soda. More accurately, I wanted the pound of small crushed ice that would accompany it. Entering the inconvenience store, I noted that the bananas did not look like they’d been there for six weeks, so I grabbed one. The clerk, one I’ve spoken to before, is one I think of as “Mr. Mumbles” in my head. He sounds like my dad talking after drinking a bottle of Old Charter.
“It’s crackhead central here,” he said, pointing to the multiple people crowded around the ‘entertainment’ row of casino-like machines nestled in a line in the front. These machines cause a lot of consternation for people. Some stores have run into trouble legally because of the way they are actually used versus how they supposedly work. In Monroe years ago, a small store where my mom lived made a fortune using them illegally as casino substitutes. It’s easy to do. I’m not saying this particular store operates that way. I’ll leave my observations aside. People are going to gamble and stores will find a way to provide an outlet. Vice invariably equals profit.
“I wondered why it was so busy in the parking lot,” I replied. (When I drove up, there was an inordinate number of vehicles even for 1:30 a.m. A couple of them looked like the ‘after’ picture from an insurance claim.)
“They got their government money. So, they are going to spend it. They’re high and they’re happy.” He didn’t say it out of spite, although he did go on to add a few comments. His opinions were based on his experiences, so it’s a fine line calling him out.
I didn’t know how to appropriately reply because it wasn’t in me to judge them. Or him, for saying what obviously was true. “I’m glad to have a job,” I told him. He mumbled something I couldn’t possibly understand. I nodded. I left him there, as he kept a careful eye on the various people inside the store.
As for drugs, a river of drugs runs through Fayetteville. Most places are like that, even if you don’t see the river flowing. There are people you know who use them, people who would surprise you. I can literally go next door if I were inclined and buy a pharmacy of them. If people behave, I don’t care what they do. They are going to do it anyway.
For the people who swim in that river, I don’t despise them. I’m glad I don’t.
If they are indeed high, I do hope they are happy.
I’ll take my half-dose of Lexapro and drink my cup of coffee now, as well as eat the banana I bought. Even though a couple of hours have elapsed since I saw the clerk, I know he is still eyeing the patrons of his store, waiting for the inevitable brouhaha that always erupts. My laundry is about done drying. It’s interesting going down to the laundry dungeon so early. I put it in to wash and took a walk, owning the quiet streets, my ears filled with joyous music to propel my steps.
P.S. Parenthetically Speaking 