Mostly Blue
mostly blue
an earthly hue
evoking beauty
were that it always
giving me its due
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Mostly Blue
Category Archives: Personal
“Will” You Or Won’t You
This isn’t legal advice. It’s not illegal either. Obviously, I’m not an attorney. If I were, I’d bill you for simply reading this. Or, more likely, I’d sue you for sharing conspiracy theories.
I know you’re immortal and will live forever.
Planning ahead regarding your death isn’t going to cause a Final Destination scenario. Or it might. Either way, as an adult, it is up to you to do the minimum to help the people you love once you’re gone. You never know when a giant log might fall off a truck and take your head off.
That’s no way to roll!
Every year at this time, I think about my thirty-one-year-old wife dying unexpectedly. Or the expert pilot getting thrown out of his parachute and falling to the ground at my feet. Neither really thought, “This is it.” No one does. They know it could happen. They turn an unseen corner and darkness falls.
If you don’t have a will, you’re leaving the people behind with extra baggage they don’t need. If people don’t have access to your financial accounts or your phone when you pass, I promise you that you’re causing needless agony on top of the grief they’ll suffer when you pass. It’s also a great way to encourage family members to behave like contestants on “Survivor.” And trust me, none of them will be as good-looking as those phony participants.
A handwritten will is acceptable. One that’s witnessed is better. The best is one witnessed and notarized. Probate courts love those. It’s one of the best gifts you can give your friends and family. (Not quite as good as living trusts and automatic survivorship or ownership – but much better than no plan.) Once you have one, I recommend telling your family you have one and what the contents are. It will be invaluable after your death if there are no surprised family members or someone claiming you said otherwise.
If you’ve not completed a will because it costs a lot or is a hassle, you’re wrong. It’s neither. You can do one from home in thirty minutes to an hour. After that, get it witnessed at a minimum and notarized if at all possible. The best part? It doesn’t require a lawyer. Doing it this way isn’t for everyone. But if you don’t have one, it is very likely that it will work perfectly for you.
Now that I’ve said all that, I can’t think of why everyone doesn’t have a will in Arkansas. Or share their passcodes.
Rocket Lawyer is my favorite do-it-yourself service. There are others. You can sign up for a trial and try it out. It is NOT expensive or complicated. You can edit it, download it, and easily use it. If you need help, have someone you trust to come to assist you. That will also help if a family member questions the contents. I won’t bore you with horrific family stories that ended in huge fights, court battles, or worse. We’ve all heard or been involved in them. I’ve known several people who died without wills and then had other family members destroy each other over alleged wishes and property. The simple truth is that you cannot know whether your wishes will be honored. Money and emotions cause uncountable family rifts.
If you have a lot of assets or are rich (define however you wish), it’s very likely you already have a will. For the rest of us, don’t worry about lawyers screaming that you should always use a lawyer to prepare one. If you have the money for a lawyer, please use one, but know that most of them use common template-generating software to fill in the information you’ll provide. Lawyers take time and money. It’s better to get one and then worry about “doing it perfectly.” Get a basic will now that covers most of the bases. THEN, follow up with the next step, even though we both know you’ll probably sit on the couch eating from a bag of chips instead.
Trusts and automatic transfer of your property are much more desirable than relying on a will, which might trigger probate. If you use a lawyer or estate planner, he or she will, of course, fill in the blanks for you. It’s best to have your property and assets automatically transferred to the person or people of your choice without the need for additional steps.
I live in the real world and know that many people don’t think ahead. They falsely believe that they will have time later – or that those whom they leave behind will capably take care of it. That’s foolish. All of us must face the idea that today might be our last day to grace this world. A few minutes of your time will save countless hours of agony. If someone you trust doesn’t have access to your phone, your computer, and your accounts, you are causing them avoidable agony.
Now that you know that it doesn’t have to be hard or expensive to get a will (or take the time to visit a lawyer), what’s stopping you? Most lawyers know better than to bite you, even ones who live in Madison County. I hope you live another thirty years. And if you don’t, that you take a little bit of your life to make your passing easier on your loved ones once you’re gone. If you’ve got time to watch an hour of SportsCenter or The Bachelorette, you have time to make a will or talk to a lawyer, estate planner, or psychic.
RocketLawyer
LegalZoom
Do Your Own Will
Trust & Will
U.S. Legal Wills
Nolo’s Quicken WillMaker
Your preferred lawyer or estate planner
Random Guy On The Internet
PS: 90% of the things that you think are valuable are valuable – but only to you. Your death cuts the cord of connection. Reduce, give away, donate, and triage your stuff so that what remains is the essence of what you treasure. Simplicity is its own reward y’all. If the things you have are valuable in the real world, sell them and use the money to live the life you want or to help those who need a hand. It could be anyone’s last day on Earth. Buried treasures help no one.
Love, X
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The Curtain
I’ve written personal stories about my dad Bobby Dean. He was violent and loved alcohol. He went through at least a few years smoking marijuana, too. As did mom, who would be mortified to see me write this. For people with multiple DWIs and violence issues, it’s still odd to me that they were worried about something like that. As I’ve aged, a lot of the hardness I had toward dad dissipated, in part because of the human overlap I share with him. Including base emotions. He was responsible for a lot of carnage. Paradoxically, he infected me with a sense of humor that I like about myself. There were times he genuinely helped people. The same is true for mom. It’s a struggle to separate the dichotomy of that realization.
Especially because of my multiple and ongoing surprises with both DNA and genealogy, my belief that it’s stupid to fight the disclosure that history drags with it. It doesn’t change history; it merely mirrors it. Talking openly about someone or what they did or didn’t do doesn’t change history. Revelation should not be shunned because of the possible ramifications of needing to adjust your viewpoint or opinion. Truth is truth. You can turn away from it, but it remains, whether to illuminate or to tarnish.
No matter what personal mistakes a person makes, they might otherwise have monumental or mundane accomplishments. Dumb people sometimes say intelligent things. Someone might surprise us with their dedication toward a social or religious cause. Smart people? They are the worst about careening into the abyss in their personal lives.
Behind it is a human being. They have vices, anger, sexual issues, or be terrible spouses and parents. When we get to know someone, we go beyond the easy socialization and familiarity we have with people. There’s a lot hidden behind most people’s curtains.
Martin Luther King, Jr. changed the world in so many ways. Yet, as history peels back like an onion, we discover that he had numerous affairs. He was with another woman the night before, and the day he was assassinated. He smoked and didn’t like the image it portrayed, so he kept it a secret. Times were different back then, and though the FBI violently tried to tarnish his reputation and mitigate King’s accomplishment, news outlets didn’t take the bait. Because he was also a minister, it adds a level of incredulity to most people’s heads when they dive into everything hidden behind his public persona.
JFK followed the same trajectory. He was a political visionary but also had a torrid personal life.
Gandhi? He had some wildly racist views. History indicates that he had some strange views on sexuality and was undoubtedly bisexual. You can find reputable sources and look them up yourself. When you read these words, please remember that I’m a liberal. If people are consenting and wish to live their lives the way they choose, I am without criticism. Gandhi didn’t always express his life with consenting people.
Mother Theresa? It’s almost sacrilege for most people to hear reminders that she had so much baggage that I don’t even know where to start.
I wrote earlier in the week about Dr. Seuss, a writer who gave the world a love of words and fundamental poetry. He was not his public persona.
We all write our biographies each day with the choices we make, the words we say, even the things that we believe to be hidden.
I don’t have a premise, theory, or moral to this post either.
Just thoughts piled on the floor like laundry.
X
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Of A Morning Encounter
Earlier this week, at a very early hour, I had a human moment, one which I will write about cautiously, against my nature.
Just a couple of nights earlier, I listened as a neighbor sat outside. His mind was at high elevation, so to speak. He had his phone in front of him, singing loudly and with an absent melody. His voice carried, even against the strident insistence of insects. I couldn’t help but laugh at the content of the song he sang. I wasn’t laughing at him per se; but his delivery and vocal content were so amusing that I couldn’t help but laugh involuntarily. So much so that even days later, I find myself singing a certain segment of what he sang.
On the morning in question, I stood on the balcony. The neighbor sat below. Something about his demeanor signaled that something was amiss. His mind was clear – and that surprised me. “I just need to talk to someone.” So, even though I needed to leave for work, I did. And he told me a story about dear friends, ones who’d moved away. Betrayal had struck them like it does so many. As we talked, his mood lifted, and I gave him a practical distraction about the absurdities of human behavior and its consequences.
It’s the terrain I know too well. I suspect most of us find familiarity in the map of mixed emotions.
I went inside, petted the cat, and headed out again. As I sat in my car, way before sunrise, I looked at him again, still sitting in silence in front of his apartment.
I ignored my inner voice and exited the car, walked over to him, and hugged him. He sobbed for a bit and then thanked me.
Presence.
It’s overlooked and sometimes feared.
But who among us doesn’t want it and need it like the oxygen we breathe?
Each of us will have a turn in our own flooded boat. Perhaps it will be invisible to those around us.
The rain falls on all of us.
I don’t have a moral to the story or a tidy bow to crown it.
Just shared words.
Sometimes, that is more than enough.
Love, X
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Morning Sounds
This morning, as I quietly stood on the landing, I heard someone below fail to realize I was standing above, listening to the sounds of the insects and watching the infrequent traffic. My cat Güino stood next to me, sniffing the air.
A series of staccato flatulent blasts interrupted the nature sounds.
They weren’t mine, in case you’re pondering.
One, two, three, four; the toots almost echoed against the cheap vinyl siding and the wooden platform above the anonymous performer.
I couldn’t help it.
I laughed.
Below, a single word was uttered: “Oops!”
If you can’t even fart outside at 3:30, nothing is sacred.
X
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Rainy Lemon Moment
What a delight it is to watch two small children scampering in this heavy rain. They are squealing with happiness. But I’m also confused because they’re wearing raincoats!
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The Fuse Conundrum
My sister posted an affirmational meme, and it reminded me of something I wrote a few years ago in response to people’s addictive or destructive behavior. Including my own.
“Fill your life with people who reflect who you are and who you want to be, not with those who are a reflection of who you once were and no longer wish to be.
If you’re a fuse, don’t stand near dynamite, as the results are inevitable. You start to believe it’s your purpose and inalterable. Abnormality begins to normalize patterns that aren’t ones you’d otherwise choose.
And if you are a fuse, choose to stand elsewhere. Proximity to undesirable people and behaviors infects you incrementally.
You end up with a life you didn’t choose and don’t want, and you wrongly assume, “Well, I am a fuse, after all.” That’s garbage thinking.
Every change commences with a choice.
Stay away from the fire and those who need or want you to be a fuse.
Choose.”
X
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Underwear On The Door, Part Two
This post isn’t for you. You know who are, favorite DNA person. 🙂
Most of us live in our private nests.
Pretty much everyone feels like they need to clean more, reduce more, and spend more time in the bureaucracy of keeping their nest aligned with an arbitrary level of cleanliness. That’s okay, too. Each minute spent to do so should not be at the expense of your moments, your friends, your family – but more so, at the cost of your mental well-being. Time spent concerned about how your nest looks is time not spent being creative or enjoying even simple pleasures. You become too focused on the “ought to and obligation” of keeping your nest perfect.
Stacks of mail in the kitchen, dust everywhere it can be. Clothes to be washed, clothes to be put away, clothes that don’t fit inside the closet, dressers, and on the floor. Books to be read, magazines you will never read. You don’t have a crazy drawer, you have an entire crazy room, garage, or storage space filled with miscellaneous everything. Most of us do. Just because you don’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not there! People keep their nests largely unhidden, so we wrongly assume they don’t have the same problem as we do.
You can’t triage the physical space. Look around. For the most part, whatever condition your house is in right now, it’s probably the default. That might bother you to accept. It shouldn’t. You can fight an agonizing fight to spend a lot of time and energy temporarily fixing your space, or you can yield and do the best you can and let it go at that. Homes and nests are meant to be lived in, and you will always have to make choices to keep it pristine or lived in. You can’t have both without wasting a lot of your now moments.
The same is true about your job, your diet, your vices, and your mind.
Each person’s best is variable, fluid, and often contradictory. And that is okay.
If you have precious things, keep those that are tied to defining moments and memories in your life. The rest? Sell what you can to have the things that add value to your life.
Donate, discard, disown.
We hoard and clutter partly because it makes us feel like our place is a home, a nest, and our place to be. But we also do it because we don’t see the arc of time getting shorter and shorter.
For a later day, I might need it, it’s valuable; these are all valid reasons to keep things. But it is not things that matter. Not if you don’t use them regularly, not if they don’t light you up, or if they fail to make your life fuller and more satisfying.
“Treasures that aren’t treasured, admired, or used aren’t treasures at all. They are anchors, ones that keep up from enjoying the here and now and the people in our orbit.” – X
Out of sound, out of mind, trinkets, and treasures stored for no witness or participant.
Things are to be used or admired. Everything else? It not only clutters your nest, it clutters your mind.
Simplicity is the toughest goal. It requires herculean effort to overcome the urge to keep, to store, to accumulate.
As someone smart once told me, “Ain’t nothing you got that can’t be taken except for your peace of mind. This world honors nothing with permanence.”
Love, X
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Wait In The Truck / Southern Justice
There are a lot of bad men out in the world, whether they physically dominate or mentally degrade their wives and children. The smart ones are fiendishly clever in concealment; their masks in public are often adorned with a suit and tie, a quick smile, or an engaging personality. Growing up, I had to endure abuse. A lot of people knew it was happening. Few ever attempted to intervene. I understand the complicated issues at play for their failure. That kind of abuse, however, leaves most people with a shaky faith in their parents, their god, and of their ability to leave such trauma behind.
With that in mind, even though I am a liberal, I have always been drawn to the concept of southern justice. When someone does the right thing, even when the right thing is also terrible. It’s not revenge. It’s taking the light back from someone who isn’t worthy of its possession.
I’m not advocating violence.
I’m advocating action.
Sometimes action yields a terrible consequence yet remains the lesser evil.
Someone I know whose life suffered due to the presence of a human monster sent me this song.
It resonated exactly as expected.
Love, X
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Caprice
Preface: I wrote what follows this morning…almost as a coda, on the way to the apartment after work, a black Camaro zoomed impatiently into its left lane approaching me from the opposite direction. The driver was going too fast and over-corrected, sending him into my lane and luckily swerving wildly into the far lane next to me. I had no time to react, not even to stomp my brakes, which would have certainly resulted in a multiple-car pileup. As I passed without time to feel my heart accelerate, squeals, honks, and braking behind me filled the air. The driver of the Camaro managed to gain control without being hit. He stopped in the right lane facing oncoming traffic. The capricious and erratic symmetry of just living reared its head and whispered to me.
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All of these are true
none inscribed to change your hue
An undiagnosed cough ended on the kitchen floor
her love and life abruptly no more
Expert pilot fell to the ground
his loving sister to conjure the sound
A cluster of cells aligned with malignant intent
those around her yearning more time had been spent
The unbearable yet unbeatable beckon of alcohol
those who loved him clutching and watching his fall
A 92-year-old beloved woman took her last breath
a life well lived, met with welcomed death
An aneurysm unseen and unfelt and then all rendered past tense
no warning no reason no sense
Careless driver through the sign leaving one with an unfaithful spine
her arc of life flattened to a baseline
You worry about how you sound or look
how you sing, how you dance, how you might be mistook
any given moment, the universe can close your book
You have this moment to scribble your notes
to construct and imagine needless moats
Kind heart, clear eyes, and curious mind
make sure that you leave something meaningful behind
We are all preterit
This can both energize and immobilize, this insight into truth
beauty and love are in the eye of the beholder
May you live your life just a little bit bolder
no guarantee of life or that you’ll become older
Seize the day, come what may
otherwise, it will seize you
even if you do everything to perfection
these words are no mere early morning reflection
affection, expression, introspection
of these words, there is no question
X
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P.S. Parenthetically Speaking 