The older man was standing outside the inconvenience store. He animatedly gestured to another man I see frequently. I’ll call the first man Steve and the man I recognized Paul.
I didn’t catch the first part of the conversation. As I exited the store, Steve said, “I just don’t understand how they’re blaming the folks below the border for the drug crisis.”
“Well they’re not controlling the border. Anyone can come in here.” Paul stated the obvious.
Steve nodded. “Okay, okay, okay, okay,” he said in a staccato rapid-fire reply. “Assume every one of these people comes in with a kilo of fentanyl, heroin, or meth.”
Paul looked at Steve like he was crazy. “I don’t think that’s true.”
Steve nodded. “Yeah but for the purpose of my argument let’s just say everyone comes in with a kilo.”
“Okay dude,” Paul replied.
“It’s like popcorn flavored with urine.” Steve smiled, knowing that Paul was going to either think he was crazy or ask a follow-up question.
“No one wants popcorn with pee on it!”
Steve smiled. “Exactly.”
“Exactly what,” Paul asked.
“Imagine that I’ve made the ugliest car in the world and manufacture 2 million of them. They’re going to rust because nobody wants to buy them.”
Paul was still confused. I listened in fascination because I could tell that Steve had told this anecdote before. Probably many times.
“The problem ain’t who is getting in the country. The problem is the people who actively want and use the drugs that you say are coming over the border. I’ve not seen anyone be forced to buy an ugly car or to use hard drugs. They go looking for it.”
Paul realized that Steve had a point.
Steve kept talking. “The problem is never the supply. It’s that people want it. Heck, way over 10,000 people a year die from alcohol accidents driving. And 20 times that die from drinking alcohol every year.”
“What does that have to do with popcorn and urine?” Paul asked the question like he really needed to know the answer.
“Nothing. It’s just a way to phrase the question in such a weird way that it makes you reset your brain a little bit to listen.”
Paul laughed.
Steve added, “And while we look to where the people are pointing the finger at the border, we are kind of forgetting that the drugs that are really hurting people are made by the drug companies. The ones making alcohol and cigarettes are right up there with them.”
“It didn’t used to stop you,” Paul told him.
“Exactly. Drugs are everywhere. We can go next door and get them from several different people. They wouldn’t be selling them if people weren’t lining up to buy them.”
It’s not that Steve said anything particularly novel. It was the urine-flavored popcorn that stuck in my head. I sometimes engage in this type of nonsensical reference when I’m talking to people. In case you didn’t notice. Now I have a ridiculous name for the habit.
“I knew what the canned jackass responses from the usual suspects would be.” This quote embodies 90% of the problem with social media commentary.
Be creative.
Be authentic.
Be truthful.
Most importantly, be funny.
Angry negativity compounded with excessive capitals is the communication equivalent of pooping in your own hat and then complaining that something smells.
I’m a big believer in expressing myself directly. If I share a meme, I made it. Disinformation converts my brain to cottage cheese. Ad hominem attacks or personal derision, especially on social media, is not my cup of tea. It convinces no one and just bounces around in the echo chambers of the people who follow such content. I’m not sharing my thoughts because I expect anyone’s opinion to change. I’m sharing them because it exposes the things I believe and the frustration I see all around me.
It’s interesting that when most of us grew up, family members would warn us not to hang out with people who misbehaved. They would admonish us that it invited danger. And that people would judge us based on the people around us. Personally, this isn’t true in my case. My parents and some of the people they associated with tended to be the actual bad example I’ve struggled to unlearn my entire life.
Being in a group of people in no way automatically defines you. If you are in a crowd of people and all of them have a top hat on except you, people will assume you forgot your hat, not that you’re the odd man out.
This is one of the things that people struggle with regarding their family and friends. You might be kind. You might be open to diversity. Your views on sexual identity might be universal.
If you are under an orange flag, the tendency to fairly or unfairly attribute affiliation with those holding the orange flag increases.
It’s why people who might normally otherwise vote Republican usually react with silence when they watch Mr. Orange. He is the embodiment of what’s wrong with living a good life and suitability for the office of president. He did not serve as a beacon of reason and inclusiveness. Objective observers can only conclude that he oafishly and cleverly co-opted a specific brand of religion while simultaneously hijacking a political party to gain office. Politics and religion don’t mix well precisely because such systems invariably become autocratic and blur the line that is required for large groups of competing ideas and interests to coexist. Religion is personal and should not be favored or codified into our law. If you think otherwise, I’ll wager your opinion will shift if you find yourself in a particular religious group that loses favor to another.
Politics is never a question of intelligence. There are extraordinary intellects along the entire spectrum of politics. The same is true for those who succumb to the allure of tribalism with their respective ideologies, parties, and candidates. It is supremely difficult to argue someone out of a position they did not argue themselves into. One of the basic truths is that overwhelmingly people choose an idea and then avidly search for evidence to support it. Once entrenched, it is miraculous that someone will fundamentally shift their ideologies.
Fair or not, some watch their family and friends avidly support someone who has proven that he is not a man of character in his personal life. Sometimes, we draw erroneous conclusions. You might be a fan of disruption or economic issues. There could be myriad reasons for you to support such a candidate. But we can’t shy away from the fact that people around you are recoiling. They recoil because voting for such a candidate is a package deal. In his case, you can’t separate the consequences of your choice, regardless of the main reason he will be getting your vote. By endorsing him for a particular reason, you’re also dragging the rest of his damaging type of politics into power.
The problem comes because Mr Orange marginalizes and demeans groups. They just want to live their lives without interference. When we see support for a person demeaning us, our interests, or the people we are close to, some of us cannot find the right words to explain to his supporters that they are inadvertently or purposefully endorsing some of his ideas. Mr. Orange is a failed businessman who doesn’t attempt to conceal his contempt and prejudice. Bullies empower other bullies.
Good people don’t want to attack those around them. But so many wince in silence because they are personally insulted by your endorsement of such a candidate. Good people also eventually stand up. Part of the reason is that people they love or respect are being harmed or marginalized. The other realization is that if we remain silent long enough, it could easily be us in the bullseye in the future.
Things that people explain away as “just politics” aren’t politics at all. Politics is running the government efficiently with core principles. We all get an equal voice regarding the collective rules we are supposed to live by. Prejudice and discrimination of any kind are among the things which have no place in politics. Furthering the interests of a particular group in such a manner that they receive special privilege through law counters one of our most basic principles.
It’s not my job to ridicule Mr. Orange. His record of fraud, coercion of women, and obvious attempts to avoid accountability for his actions speak louder than any condemnation I could utter. Even absent all the other behaviors in his business and personal life, he actively encouraged literal insurrection after the last election.
And of course, we wouldn’t be dealing with him if our antiquated system of presidential selection wasn’t based on an anachronism resulting from the power struggle of those who wanted to preserve slavery. A popular vote such as that which governs every other candidacy historically would have resulted in several different presidents in the last few decades. The Constitution is a living document, one which is supposed to embody our collective goals and ideas. Abusing one of the branches of government in such a way as to skew the balance of the separate branches will lead to ruin because people will lose even more faith in the fair process of elections and decision-making.
It is a shame that we do not have several political parties. Or even none. That the best idea and plan will overcome, but all of us know that this is a daydream. People across the spectrum, unfortunately, strive to exert power when they should instead focus on governance for the collective mismatch of people and groups that we are.
In so many ways, we are still that same nation of divided priorities. And we always will be. One thing we could count on was that even though we were not happy about the person occupying the presidency, we at least maintained the illusion that they were qualified for the office. That any party would put forward a convicted felon for a race in which said candidate could not even legally vote, we have a serious problem. I’m conflicted because I have believed for years that a felony record should not take away your essential right to vote. Fomenting rebellion or insurrection to destabilize a government or overturn an election is one of the unforgivable acts of a citizen.
The premise of this post was supposed to be a reminder that the candidate you enthusiastically endorse also comes with the perceived reputation and behavior to whom it is attached. Your alliance with particularly pernicious candidates comes with a raised eyebrow and a profound feeling of disappointment. Each time your candidate disparages women, minorities, and people of different religious groups, people are watching, expecting you to acknowledge that some people are a danger to democracy.
I don’t say these things because I question your intelligence.
I say them because some supporters say they don’t understand why they are arguing with their loved ones over politics. These are not political arguments. They are attacks not only on people but also on our entire process.
When you encourage authoritarianism, you place yourself in the future invisible line of being the target and losing freedoms that you take for granted. Each country that has succumbed to it couldn’t fathom that it could happen to them. The riots of January 6th should have been an obvious wake-up call that a certain faction of our citizenry was willing to upend the entire political process.
Joe Biden stepped aside because it was the best thing to do to further his political ideology. Who among us could imagine Mr. Orange swallowing his ego to further his political party’s goals? A party is not one person and a single party is not a government. We require competing and conflicting interests to maintain balance.
As damaged and erratic as the process sometimes is, you need to stop and realize that the entire system was constructed with checks and balances to prevent the subversion of the goal of collective politics.
Mr. Orange co-opted religion, a party, and populism.
We’d be wise to be done with him so that the Republican party of old might regain its stability and reason.
If you’re waiting on life to be simpler or less distracted to do something, you’ll turn gray waiting for your fingers to stop tapping. Doubly true Is the folly of waiting for someone else to appropriate time. Time is the currency we use to pay for our decisions.
Someone smart told me that they couldn’t stand the phrase, “Stop and smell the roses.” Take the time to grow them. Or go outside where they grow and meet them on their own terms. We’re all too busy making money in order to buy the flowers, something that’s available in abundance all around us.
You can go to Disneyland and bring back the memories. You’re still going to have to find a way to enjoy washing the dishes that stack up on the counter, in the sink, or in the unloaded dishwasher.
I made it clear that jumping out of an airplane wasn’t to test my fear. I never felt a moment of apprehension because it’s an entirely safe act. Yet these things spray gray across things that should be as colorful as a prism’s rainbow. You don’t get a taste of the diverging universe that’s out there for you without thinking about the million mundane ways that you focus on ridiculous nonsense.
I say these things as a hypocrite in the truest sense of the word. I also say them as a tourist, visiting places but staying at the airport.
There are some intangible pleasures in life that go beyond explanation. For some, it’s watching their children become independent and creative people. Others sit by a campfire and watch the tendrils of smoke ascend to the night sky. A cup of pungent coffee, one that triggers the strength to help you avoid using a skillet on your coworkers.
Whatever your fjrudje might be, find a way to give it priority. Finite time and a limited reservoir of energy compel you to put in the time and effort for the things that matter to you. It’s hard enough living in a modern world and pushing away the distractions.
Fjrudje is a word I created, one based on an imaginary European language. It is supposed to be almost unpronounceable. Much like the alchemy and complexity of the feelings and thoughts you deal with during a normal day. I often refer to the lemon moments, the moments between the Kodak moments that most of us associate with a good life. 98% of your life fills the margins between the bookmarks that are worthy of qualifying as great memories.
I’m 57. One of the things I’m grateful for is that I am almost oblivious to self-image issues. Most of the people my age spend way too much time preoccupied with how they think they look. Some will say that my gender affords me a different perspective. I wish I could infect people with my attitude. You can fight the tide of aging as best you can. But if you are lucky, age will gift you with more years. In exchange, you’ll pay the price by seeing a different person in the mirror. Be who you are if you can. Since there is no such thing as a universal standard of beauty, regardless of how you get there, it still won’t satisfy everyone. Almost all fashion and appearance trends are geared toward the external, which is a strange way to focus and spend time and energy. Most say they do certain things to make themselves feel better about how they look. There’s nothing wrong with this approach unless you also disingenuously fail to acknowledge that the way you get there is by feeling like people think you look good. It’s the same problem with social media; the likes and approval feed our need for validation and interaction. There’s an element of control and curation about how we present ourselves. All of which is bizarre to me. People see us and hear us in real time each day, without filters. We are who we are in full display. Rather, we’re supposed to be. Beauty is where you find it. As is entertainment, joy, laughter, and grief.
The same circumstances and appearances cause some to blossom and others to flail. This is proof enough that the entire game is a personal perspective. You can ride the wave or swallow seawater.
Though I’ve given away many of my sentimental things, I still have one of my friend’s first paintings. She rendered the woman on the beautiful hill and the sun as black.
Below the art is a framed caption I wrote: “Black Hole Sun: The same sun, yet filtered by negligent eyes renders darkly all that shines.”
We are not designed to be immortal or perfectly rendered. We are supposed to strive to do and be our best. We’d be a hell of a lot better off by focusing on our minds and brains, which avoid physical scrutiny and bring satisfaction in ways that function independently of our faltering bodies. What purpose does it serve to be an Adonis or Helena if entropy demands that it cannot be maintained? Everything falters with time.
It’s not depressing. It’s liberating because it requires you to get up, make coffee, and put on your boots. You nod at the wrinkles and instead focus on what makes you satisfied. You can’t get there if you’re fixated on what must fail.
The universe definitely has a perverted sense of humor. Perhaps It is providence that it wants to repeat a lesson or theme until it sinks in. Possibly it is coincidence.
The other morning, I wrote a post sharing myself and my thoughts. As happens, someone reacted very badly to it – and rightfully so from their perspective. But their reaction was based on a misunderstanding, one that punctuates what I was trying to say. I wish I could have given them a hug. It wouldn’t have solved anything, but silent human acknowledgment is often more than we need. She accused me of being self-righteous. It stung and triggered a defensive reaction. Which of course means that she’s right. We only react when something challenges us. I earned myself self-righteousness. It does not serve me well and of course I understand that it makes me unlikeable to some people.
I had so many alcoholics in my periphery that their stories overlapped. It’s because at the heart of it, it is the same story repeated in an endless loop, like trying to ride a unicycle while drinking hot tea.
All of us are out here in the world staying busy, earning a living, and avoiding facing the idea that in so many ways we are small children camouflaged as adults.
By coincidence, someone on my periphery was secretly struggling with the consequences of someone else’s choice to dive into the bottle. Her story overlaps with mine. Although she didn’t say it in that way, I could feel the ambivalent resentment and love reverberate. It’s a feeling I know all too well. It’s why I wrote the Bystander’s Prayer that sometimes comes back around to me on the internet.
There are people around you right now who need hugs and attention. But what they’re getting is the temporary allure of things that distract them. The distraction comes with a price, one paid incrementally and almost always ending the same way.
The things we choose to numb us end up isolating us. If not in person, definitely in our own heads.
Sunlight cures almost all of this. Setting aside secrecy. Embarrassment. Shame. Not changing is a choice. We’re supposed to be honest and open, starting with ourselves. The fact that we can’t be adroitly explains why we cannot be that way with other people.
No argument, appeal, or logic can pierce the veil of insistent ignorance. Learning can only occur if the person accepts new information as a new opportunity. Too many people consider their knowledge and opinions to be finished forever. Coupled with the inability to understand that they might be wrong, this tendency toward close-mindedness becomes toxic to both the person and the society around them. It also leads you to wrongly conclude that either Rush or Nicki Minaj sounds great at any volume.
“…but scientific ideas have been proven wrong…”
They are supposed to be. The premise of knowledge is expansion. New information isn’t met with denial. It’s embraced so that the base of understanding can be revised. Being wrong is built into the scientific method. We went from an Earth-centric bubble to one in which we are a minuscule component of a vast universe.
Among examples of this is that it wasn’t until the late 1980s that it was declared unethical to perform surgeries on babies without anesthesia. Another great example is that people thought Led Zeppelin made great music. The man who insisted that ulcers weren’t caused by stress was told he was an idiot – until he proved it by infecting himself. Germs didn’t exist for centuries.
We should strive to live our individual lives with the same mantra: new information leads to new ideas.
“Regarding human affairs, the expectation that you can heal someone’s inability to be open to new information is among the most foolish.” If you think that bombarding someone with information will change their mind, you’re forgetting that you’re talking to a closed door.
“I know what I know and no amount of proof otherwise will sway me.” This quote is from something I wrote four years ago and it perfectly sums up so much of the problem. We expend considerable money and effort to educate people. It’s useless unless all of us are willing to listen, absorb, and change our fundamental understanding of anything and everything.
Study after study has proven that we tend to believe something and then find ways to substantiate it, excluding other possibilities. It’s the problem with politics, religion, and interpersonal relationships.
Knowing you’re ignorant is the essence of humility. Just because I don’t know something doesn’t mean it’s unknowable. If you blind yourself to the likelihood of error, you’re going to be betting on dead horses.
Ignorance is easy to exploit. A questioning mind, though still ignorant, can’t be locked into permanence.
At 2:02 a.m., I watched a meteorite burn out across the sky to the north. I was sitting by the pool in the dark in a strange place watching the American flag wave across the street. Yesterday’s clouds were gone, leaving an open canopy view of the overhead nigjt sky. The cicadas were keeping me cacophonous company, their shrill ancient sounds providing a background syncopation to my thoughts. I made a wish upon a star. It went right to the heart of my reoccurring theme of abandoning secrecy and living a life of accountability and openness.
We can’t understand ourselves or other people if we continue to insist that we can control and curate the dissonance in our lives resulting from believing that secrecy is beneficial.
Some of my posts are interconnected without seeming to be. A few years ago, I went to one of the local ERs. My family member, who I will call Susan, had an accident. In the course of her treatment, it was discovered she had fallen at home and likely suffered an event triggered by a brain injury. Because I have a background both in medical and secrecy, I was glad to have shown up. Had I not, she would have been administered a medication that likely would have killed her quickly. Another family member had decided to keep Susan’s history of excessive drinking secret. I understand the tendency to not discuss it. Being me, I didn’t hesitate to pull medical staff aside and indicate that alcoholism was an undisclosed factor. The doctor, despite having experience with all manner of such non-disclosure, reacted with surprise and took measures to quickly change how Susan would be treated.
Much later that day, I visited the hospital and discovered that some of the information had not been passed on to the nursing staff. The nursing staff once again immediately changed the medications for the course of treatment for Susan.
I’m not telling the story so that I will somehow look better. People who know me well know the opposite is true. I’m not saying any of this to point the finger at anyone. Most of us do the best we can and hope that we are rationally making the best choices. Family honor, misguided loyalty, and the inability to tell ourselves or the people around us tough truth combine to rob us of a better life.
Part of my truth is that a portion of my identity is tied to the resentment I experience when I deal with people who want to live in secrecy. The stubbornness and resentment has caused me sometimes to stick my foot in icy water and challenge people. My early life is full of such stories. One of those stories resulted in me discovering a sister. Others pushed me into huge fights when I foolishly tilted at windmills and asked people to choose differently. Conversely, the same obstinacy cemented my own feet, resulting in my idiocy morphing words of concern for my choices into accusations. We tend to recognize it later as love or concern. But in the moment? Our defensiveness whispers to us that we are being unfairly attacked.
My life history is littered with people who ruin their lives with alcoholism, addiction, or anger. Every person in my family who drank too much finished their lives still suffering from the little voice in their head that insisted that they continue drinking. It’s one of the reasons I’m proud of my sister. It took her a long time to look back on the arc of her life and tell herself that enough was enough. Each of us usually only takes action when it’s the only other choice. We sometimes talk and nod toward one another, once again agreeing that it has nothing to do with intelligence. We make choices, or adopt maladaptive ways to feel better. And then our strategies turn traitor and entrap us.
All of the preceding words also disclose my volatile resentment regarding secrecy. People can’t develop long-term drinking issues without secrecy. They can’t blow up their marriages without secrecy being perverted into privacy. We can’t become helplessly overweight unless we don’t talk about the elephant in the room or the ostrich in the closet. Depression blossoms because the difference in what people experience inside their private worlds in their heads becomes disproportionately silent. Isolation in thought or action inevitably brings toxicity. Even to otherwise normal behavior that becomes an unhealthy obsession.
If we had to experience the accountability of people around us knowing us in our private moments, it would be difficult to continue the charade of secrecy. Instead of choosing authenticity, we spiral into a cocoon of self-fulfilling prophecy. Image truly becomes the identity we cling to. The people around us flail and overthink because they bear witness to the consequences of our choices. Further out into our personal periphery, the people in our orbit are unaware. Most of the time I think we have this backwards.
A little bit ago, I navigated the dark and put my feet into the pool. After a few minutes, another dimmer meteorite scorched its way into non-existense as it penetrated the atmosphere above me. I didn’t make another wish, even though initially I wished that I wouldn’t overthink. I’m sitting in the late night or early morning of the last day of July. I’ve outlived people who were better than me. Definitely smarter.
For a brief second, the lesson of detachment and gratitude reminded me that it’s to be experienced. And the only way to experience anything meaningfully is to unflinchingly know yourself and live in the reality that you’ve been given rather than the one you attempt to craft.
Secrecy can kiss my ass. It’s no irony that I’m sitting in the dark writing this.
P.S. Parenthetically Speaking 