As I drove past the bus station in the early morning, I noted a young man standing with a throng of people waiting to board the long, modern bus. He wore what appeared to be a tophat. I laughed. He’s either optimistic or weird. I wanted to chat with him and see how funny he might be. But he was a stranger standing in a way station parking lot, on the way to one of an infinite series of destinations. The quirky word ‘sonder’ came to mind as it often does.
We all are, though, even though we might not even know where we’re going. Each of us could sharply turn on a whim. That’s the conundrum of our lives. We c-o-u-l-d wake up today and choose something markedly different. We won’t though, mainly because we are obstinate in our continuation of the same. Even if the arc we’re traveling doesn’t suit us, most likely our choice will be along the ellipsis of what we chose yesterday. There’s comfort in that. The obverse of comfort is that new choices could render new ways to be happier.
We could laugh at the stupid things that will happen to us today. Some of us will have car accidents. Some will sit across from the doctor and hear unexpected diagnoses. Others will lose their jobs or start new ones. Loved ones will leave us, people will disappoint us. Yes, others will delight us, and humor will surprise us.
Meanwhile, the young man stands in the bus station parking lot wearing a tophat. I know I love finding meaning in things that are random. It seems like a metaphor to me, though. I can’t shake it. I’ll have another cup of coffee and ponder the sonder of all of us.
A couple of social media friends inadvertently asked me to do something hilarious with the original photo. Instead, I had a moment imagining the morning. This is what I wrote and created:
The “Wake up!” shouted in her dream brought her instantly to consciousness. She stared at the small red aura of the clock in her peripheral vision for a few seconds.
It had been her own voice in her dream. She drove with her companion as he hung his head out the window, smelling the water and watching the scenery pass. She fumbled with her phone long enough to snap a picture of the moment. In her dream, she experienced a series of overlapping moments, each one of her through the course of her life. The last one was a picture she’d happily snapped one hundred and twenty-three days ago. She slowed the car as she came to a stop. The images flowed backward across time, carrying her from adulthood back to her infancy. The reversal repeated, bringing nostalgia and appreciation for the moment – and for all the moments she’d lived.
As the dream faded and its grip loosened, she wondered what it meant and what the day might hold. She smiled secretly as she lay in the shadows of the morning.
It’s hard learning new tricks. I do everything in the most circuitous way. Using rendering engines is something that I love doing but lack the skill. Sometimes, I get the intended mood exactly right.
The one on the left is me imagined as an old man, half-awake, looking back at my life, listening for someone’s approach. The one on the right is me fighting to express the color that floods me.
Not for everyone; nothing is, though.
Visiting Crystal Bridges reminded me to keep asking, “What is art?”
The rain started at 2:59 a.m. I heard it approach in a crescendo as it moved through the trees toward me. An hour later, I sat on the plant bench watching the lightning illuminate the sky in bursts of violet purple-blue. Thunder rolled languorously as occasional cars passed by. I would have loved to sit there until sunrise at 7:09. My shorts were still damp from walking in the rain. It was 67 degrees when I spontaneously decided to take a barefoot walk around the neighborhood cut-through. It was a beautiful little walk as the rain pelted me and refreshed me. I’ll go inside now as the thunder grows in intensity and the lightning strikes become more pronounced. Not because it makes me nervous, but because I must yield to the day. Reluctantly. .
Sometimes, instead of drinking my protein drink I make with recycled coffee, I opt to eat a scoop (or two) raw with a teaspoon as I start my morning. I love the texture and flavor.
This morning I woke up early and sat at my computer. My cat Güino loves to jump up and interfere and sit in my lap, his little nose popping up constantly to block my wrists as I type. In front of me were a cup of bitter coffee and a little black bowl of protein powder.
The first couple of bites of powder caused no problems other than caking my teeth temporarily with a pasty mixture. After each bite, I took a sip of coffee and petted the cat as he popped his head up for attention.
The next bite? It was like the cinnamon-challenge-gone-wrong. Somehow, I breathed in sharply as I took a spoonful of powder. It started to invade my lungs as I breathed in. This produced an involuntary cough response.
The powder spewed out of my mouth in a small cloud. Güino’s head caught the brunt of it, covering him in a fine brown powder. He looked at me in surprise, his little whiskers covered in chocolate protein powder.
And then the barrage of little sneezes started, his head bobbing strongly with each sneeze.
I laughed, ignoring the mess of powder on my lap, keyboard, and desktop.
I took the picture when Güino jumped back on my lap a couple of minutes later. I was still amused.
You can tell by the cat’s expression that he wasn’t amused.
Summer gallops toward us. My metal front door already reached 156 F this afternoon. Last summer, it reached over 180. It catches the sun directly. It’s great for my solar lanterns and lights but makes me wonder when the wall might ignite in a fiery burst. The previous door was wooden until I moved in. The occupant had made the front door unusable too. That amuses me. What level of hooliganism must one exercise to render a door unusable? My childhood provides fodder for the ‘how.’
I bought Subway to eat. I still had a slew of coupons to use. The problem? I didn’t know they expired on my birthday until I ordered. To counterbalance my self-amusement and chagrin, I tipped the two workers in cash, surprising them. Jessica gave me a bottle of thai chili sauce and I drowned half of my sandwich in it, letting it run down across my hands and face as I stood outside in the warmth of the full sun, the sandwich precariously perched on the railing. Güino of course kept me company out there while I ate. He then tricked me and darted past me to the neighbors, where he proceeded to peer into the low window and meow at the cat occupants of the apartment. As I prodded him back toward my apartment with my foot, he had a lot to say to me in protest.
Earlier, hundreds of birds accumulated in the brush and unmaintained trees behind the apartment simplex. Their chirping roar was loud and beautiful. It gave me the idea to put a 15′ feeder pole outside my bedroom window. Lord knows the screen will never be fixed so moving it aside to fill the feeder won’t be a problem. Of course, I will paint it a garish vivid color, one befitting a person dedicated to swathing everything in polychrome.
An uncle of mine died this week. Amusingly, we called him Poor Bob. He was a plain-spoken, opinionated, and humorous man. He needed all those qualities to be married to my Aunt Marylou. It’s okay that I pick on her. She’s heard it all at least two times in her long lifetime. She’s the origin of my quip, “Every family needs an Aunt Marylou to get things done.” She’s been the de facto matriarch of the family since grandma Nellie died.
I’m sitting at my computer, facing the sun as it penetrates the poorly-closed blinds of the window. Shadows play across the bottom. The cat sitting on the extra-wide sill I installed below them provides a little motion as he moves and arcs his back against them. I left the back window open for him when I left early this morning. He’s had a full day of sun and warmth.
I filled the hummingbird feeder because I’m an optimist.
I’m going to make a cup of bitter coffee and stand on the landing as I drink it. Sunset isn’t until 7:35. If I do it right, that hour will seem languid and filled with countless thoughts. Some hours are much longer than others, just as some embraces are more fiery and soulful.
It’s not that this location is beautiful, but sometimes the light shimmers on surfaces and provides the perfect backdrop for contemplating.
I’ll look at pictures later, searching for those who’ve stepped away. It’s the least I can do, to remember. Even to experience a small moment. Most of our lives are these moments.
I went to Crystal Bridges yesterday. It’s always a beautiful place, one I’ve been absent from for quite a while. It was my birthday. Today, I am 20,090 days old, which still seems a better metric to me. 20K+ opportunities for me to do something that resonates.
Despite the multitude of art, it struck me again that while there is much to see, a great deal of the art isn’t art at all to me. Art is in the eye of the beholder. I’ve seen much better in the nooks and crannies around Fayetteville, created in lemon moments by people who will never be appreciated for their creativity.
The painting that had the biggest visual impact for me was Daylight at Russell’s Corners, by George Copeland Ault. As serene as the picture is, I imagined it as a metaphor, with a restless creature at my back, one representing my mistakes and my past. It can stalk all it wishes to.
Despite some of my missteps, I’m still not a fan of secrecy. It leads to all sorts of behavior, much of it counterproductive. I learned the hard way! Which seems to be the way I learn everything. I’m using the word “learn” very loosely here.
When I talked about anxiety and taking Lexapro, this social media platform restricted my account a few months ago. Given the content I see, I’m still perplexed by this.
I can only imagine what this post might trigger. It’s personal and honest. And maybe a little irreverent. I have a sense of humor about it, just as I do with everything else.
About 50-80% of adults have oral herpes (HSV), a virus that we usually know as cold sores. Another 16% have been diagnosed with HSV2, the kind that typically hits below the belt. Many more have it, as they are either asymptomatic or the symptoms aren’t apparent. There is no cure. Over time, most people tend to have fewer symptoms. Women in particular often have it without any visible signs given their anatomy.
I have HSV2. I recently used Everlywell at-home testing to confirm it again. It doesn’t usually have any serious medical complications. There are exceptions for some people.
Most of the people who have it don’t talk about it. That’s a problem for a lot of reasons. The principal consequence is that so many people don’t tell their potential partners. Additionally, most people don’t get tested for STDs, or even have their yearly blood tests for the spectrum of other possible diseases or illnesses. Testing for STDs is essential for sexually active adults. So many people have one without being aware. No one likes to imagine that a partner might be infected; either the potential partner knows or doesn’t. It’s on you to be proactive, no matter how phenomenal someone looks standing next to the fireplace while wearing a come-hither look in the dim light from the Bed, Bath, And Beyond candles on the mantle.
If you are wondering, you can get herpes of any kind even when you’re with someone who has no symptoms. Even if you are careful and use protection. Using contraception as an example, none is 100% effective. As I’ve personally learned, being ugly isn’t a guarantee, either. Someone will look at you with fire in their eyes. It’s one of the most complicated parts of being a human being. We superficially talk about it, of course, but few people are direct about how important this side of private life is. It’s possible to have a fulfilling life without sexual expression, but it’s one I couldn’t imagine. I can listen to only so much NPR.
If you have an STD, it is the least you can do to have an uncomfortable conversation with your partner before engaging in the horizontal mambo. Such discussions will likely be awkward. All important ones are. It’s possible to avoid transmission to a long-term partner. But it is equally valid to remember that nothing you do is 100% safe. Your libido will lead to a satisfying sex life if you’re lucky. Any potential partner worth having will be glad you took the time to allow them to make an informed choice. Giving someone an STD is the best example to prove why “it’s better to give than to receive” is problematic.
Suppose you want to test without the embarrassment of going to the doctor? In that case, you can use a service such as Everlywell to test yourself for all manner of medical conditions affordably, STDs included. It’s better to know the truth than to risk someone else’s health.
I know what you’re thinking. No matter how attractive someone is, they likely have something for you to worry about, not the least of which is bad credit and a penchant for being best friends with their exes. Hopefully, an STD won’t be an additional worry. If you haven’t had comprehensive blood testing and an STD test in a while, you owe it to yourself to do it.
You can get back to Chad or Suzanne afterward. Or Chad and Suzanne if that’s your thing. No judgment here.
Infrequently, I try to use my endless ideas to create something ‘serious.’ I hate that word, as it needlessly demarcates life into impossible categories. I’m both ridiculous and contemplative – as most people are.
For years I’ve thought that Washington Regional Medical System needed both a new logo and a new name, one that reflects simplicity, recognizability, and appropriateness. The hospital system is flung across multiple counties, with dozens of clinics. As it has grown, the “Washington” part increasingly becomes a misnomer, especially as it encroaches on other systems in the area.
The name I invented is pronounced “Regional Plus.” The logo is just the word “Regional” with a symbol that uses the essential foundation of the complicated logo it utilized for years. It’s simple, recognizable, and has a plethora of built-in marketing potential. I’d rather have the word “Regional” be purple, too, but I used a nondescript gray to keep the suits and ties happier. Additionally, my proposed rebrand fits on t-shirts, badges, and marketing materials – something the longer current one does not. It will save a LOT of space on signs, too.
“At Regional +, we’re not just a hospital, we’re a hospital plus.”
It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to extrapolate dozens of such marketing phrases. Naturally, I have several funny ones, too, but I’ll leave them for later.
I shared it with marketing and a few other people and didn’t get a response. Crickets.
The weird thing? Without evidence, I see this logo becoming the new one for the hospital.
Tell me that mine isn’t better and I will shut up.
I patiently explained to the inconvenience store cashier that I wanted a Natural State jackpot multi draw ticket for the next 10 drawing dates. She mocked me, so I explained it again, telling her that it meant the ticket would print with one set of numbers on one line and with a corresponding date range from today and the next nine drawings. She mocked me again and then rang it up wrong. For the first time in several consecutive such encounters, I told her she was going to have to void the ticket. She launched into an angry rant at me and called me an idiot. I told her that I am indeed an idiot but that she should ask her manager how to ring up a multidraw ticket. And then I wished her a good day. I genuinely smiled at her, even as she muttered profanities under her breath.
When I drove up to the inconvenience store, a homeless person was bundled in a white blanket.
When I left, I saw him walk around the back side of the parking lot. Out of curiosity I walked around too. Behind the brick facade containing the dumpster, there was a shopping cart full of someone’s life. Next to it, a closed tent. The homeless person I had followed was not the occupant of the tent.
I shivered with the chilly March breeze.
And even though I was beyond polite to the cashier who mistreated me… Seeing that cart and the tent next to it broke up a stone in my heart.
I don’t have a moral to the story. Just grateful for my life.
Love, X
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I hadn’t seen Max the terrier in a few days. He got excited and jumped up to me to give me hugs and kisses as I petted him…
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That’s the moon next to the stop sign. Sirens racing past, dogs barking, sitting on the patio with my sister as she talks to one of her 300,000 friends. An unexpected life, a moment in time…
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In LR, making sister seem annoyed with me. Enjoying time and also missing home.
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I used my night vision lens to snap this picture at around 6:00 a.m. Scull Creek roars and overflows on both sides of me. The bright moon of course is diffused by the filter but I took a mental snapshot too. I’ll look back in a year and probably feel like 10 years have elapsed. A beautiful moment, full of thoughts and delights for the eye. .
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Zen proverb modernized:
A farmer arrives home late from the day in the fields. He finds his wife of 30 years in bed with another man.
“Is dinner ready?” He asked her.
She emerged from the bedroom, hair a mess and bewildered.
“Aren’t you going to ask why I was in bed with another man?”
“Why? Would it change what happened? And I still need to eat.”
Acceptance.
Not defeat.
Life relentlessly marches forward, even as things out of your control happen.
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I finally got the hint and realized that I’m not attractive. My proctologist stuck his finger in my mouth.
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“Rain can’t wash away enthusiasm.” – X
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“Some people at full tables will wish they were you.” – a quote contained in a video sent to me by my favorite cousin. It’s a good reminder that a lot of people don’t live deliberate lives, or the ones they wish contained them.
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Operation Blue Justice is going exceedingly well at work today!
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Dubious~Optimistic FB Post #637: the percentage of known drug dealers in my apartment building is now down to 14%. I’m confident that no one has ever posted this type of statistic on their personal Facebook before.
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If you hear the klaxon call for help, know that I will be there quicker than Metamucil clears out a senior citizen. I will fight for justice and also tacos.
Love, X
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“If you put both arms out, he will hug and nuzzle your neck and face,” the owner of the large dog told me, as I kneeled on the trail’s edge.
I put both hands out palms up. The dog wagged his tail and put one paw on my hands. As I leaned forward, the dog put its nose against the side of my neck and I rubbed its flanks and neck. I laughed and watched its tail wag ferociously.
When I stood up, the dog barked a single time, a pop against the quiet and the dark around the trail.
“He wants another one,” the owner said.
I kneeled and got another hug from the dog.
“If you put both arms out, you’ll get a hug.”
I wish the entire world would stop long enough to absorb that lesson.
Love, X
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I like to get everyone to use hand sanitizer. Not for hygiene, but because it looks like they are hatching evil plans when they use it.
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Güino and I in an imaginary world, where colors blend and bend to the will of those seeing them. Where the sun both sets and rises simultaneously.
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Another famous painting suffers at my creative mercy. PS That’s my Uncle Buck in the bathtub behind me.
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“Always wear two socks,” I was taught, so I put them both on one foot for the day. “Be happy,” they said, forgetting to tell us that happiness is being grateful for the opportunities in front of us rather than what we think we think we’ve lost or what we want.
-X
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Two women were jogging on the trail, both with dogs on leashes and flashlights blazing. One of the dogs saw me and surprised its owner by barking and yanking the leash free. The dog continued to bark and ran towards me. I kneeled down and waited to see if I was going to get mauled. The owner shouted in fright, probably assuming I was about to get a bite-sized chunk taken out of my ass. Instead, the dog ran at me full speed and jumped up on me with its paws licking my face. I made a new friend. Totes is his name. The owner was very apologetic. I petted and rubbed Totes until he decided it was time to run again.
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If you wear underpants without pants, they are no longer underpants or under pants. There is a lesson here. And that lesson is that decaf isn’t the same as regular.
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Redactyl got cold and started complaining. I put a blanket on him so he seems to be comfortable now.
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Compared to middle managers, velociraptors are pretty tame!
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My coworker Darian is a big guy. I definitely wouldn’t play seesaw with him.
He was complaining about young women being unable to cook.
Without missing a beat, I retorted, “Evidently young men these days definitely know how to eat though.”
I got a lot of laughter but I deserved a round of applause.
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I sat next to the trail. An enormous blackbird came and sat directly above me, commenting vociferously with a loud cacophonous caw. When I stood up, it looked directly down at me and stared. For reasons known only to the CIA, I talked to it in broken Russian. The bird cawed at me again. It did this all three times I spoke to it. I hated to leave the bird and to return to work. It felt like that bird needed to tell me something. Probably not to talk to strange birds.
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My guardian dinosaur, Redactyl, is a lot happier now that I have bedazzled him. He has the watch because of course dinosaurs have no sense of punctuality. Everything is totally Jurassic for them. He was complaining earlier about not having a hat so I’ll have to find one for him.
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To prove I do have an inner voice that corrects me, I did not post my meme today, the one that said: “If assholes could fly, this place would be an airport.”
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Philosophical observation: without a doubt, horses have to be the most farted upon animal on the planet.
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“A keychain is a ring invented so that you can lose all of your keys at once.” How often do we stop and figure out in how many other ways we’re bundling our lives like keys?
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I am a time traveler, as all we are. It flies past us, our most valuable commodity. Reality is whatever our filters tell us it is. I got a reminder yesterday just how tenuous it all can be. .
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My name tag is a funny variation of carpe diem. I’ll leave it to you to figure out what the translation is from Latin. (Carpe culus)
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I hear birds singing hours before the sunrise. And I can imagine why. Someone asked me what’s good about the day. And I smiled and pointed at my curved lips. Enigmatically, I replied, “I brought the day with me.”
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Me and Cookie Monster, imagined inside the famous painting “Rain’s Rustle.” Carry on!
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My therapist recommended that I hold hands at the movies, in order to address intimacy issues. Again, she should have stipulated that none of them belonged to people I don’t know. Goodbye forever, AMC Theaters.
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My roll of 350 HELLO stickers arrived. I am playing the role of Frankie Jane today. And someone surprised me with a hare brooch, making the pun that I did not have enough hair on me.
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I set five alarms so I would have time to sweep off the car. But it was the Fitbit that woke me up. My cat Guino was sitting on me pawing at my arm with the Fitbit. He got his hugs in this morning. So it’s already a good day despite the snow.
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P.S. I had zero problems driving to work in my little bitty car. Anyone who wants to make it to work should depart before the rest of us idiots get out there.
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Despite the amount of sleet that had fallen, I had no problem driving in my small car around 10. It was like another world out there; even the traffic lights cast a beautiful sheen on the crystals covering everything. I felt like I was driving in a secret world, entirely new and refreshed. Tomorrow morning, I might well wake up to a blanket of lord knows what. But for tonight, it was sublime. I’ll remember this for a long time. If I didn’t have to work tomorrow, I would go out and walk a few miles, even if icicles formed on my nose. Feb. 2nd
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“I do all my own stunts, but never intentionally” seems appropriate this morning. Happy Monday!
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In a moment of profound victory, after weeks of doing it wrong, I realized that if turn my gallon of homemade protein drink upside down and shake it, it mixes immediately. I’ve spent so much time violently shaking the gallon, like I was having heroin withdrawals. What else have I been doing completely wrong? I’d make a list, but I don’t have a notepad that long.
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I learned something: when someone says I should walk with Jesus, they should have warned me he would stroll across the lake.
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I really struggled with my lunch. Now I know why. I ordered the pork chops but they accidentally gave me a plate of karate chops.
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When people ask you, “How are you doing?” Interpretive dance is evidently the wrong way to answer.
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The world is two kinds of people: morning people and mourning people.
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P.S. This joke could also be interpreted somberly.
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Because of my ability to explain things simply, the director told me to walk everyone through the basic premise of the new protocol. Using as much brevity and clarity as I could, I extended the middle finger of my left hand and walked away.
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This morning, instead of being productive, I lay in bed, watching the sun through the big window in my bedroom. Guino staked his claim across my stomach and torso. I’m unaccustomed to being lazy. Guino had no complaints. Now, I’m sitting at my desk by the front window, watching the world whiz by and the little birds darting at my feeder. I’m happy, even as life continues to unevenly give me blessings and obstacles.
PS Guino is unhappy again; he’s scratching at the door and singing the song of his people. The landing is calling his name, as the birds chirp and beckon him. Jan 22nd
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With everything going on in my life, I got a horrible reminder of what physical pain is: because I’m chewing gum more, I bit my bottom lip hard twice in the same place with my incisor. It brought blood the second time.
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Ellen DeGeneres quipped: “Accept who you are. Unless you’re a serial killer.”
I don’t THINK I’m a serial killer. It could be my delusion talking, though.
Someone snarked at me that I post too many pictures of myself! And they are right! With that in mind, I of course felt compelled to update my profile picture. Not because I’m too arrogant or because I’m wowed by myself, but because it is important to feel comfortable in my own body. And I do. I’ve changed what I can. The rest? It’s inside my head, where it matters most.
“Care about what other people think and you will always be their prisoner.” Lao Tzu
“Life is short. Smile while you still have teeth.”
Love, X
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I’m standing out on the landing. The door is open and Güino is prowling in the dark, furtively looking at me to see how far I’ll let him go. It’s 52° as I watch the neighbors go about their secret business. I have Anni’s Lullaby by Patrick Pietschmann playing on the soundbar. One of the downstairs neighbors looks up with her head cocked sideways, wondering where the haunting piano melody might be coming from. I wave and she nods, then smiles. “It’s beautiful,” she said. I laughed, and the laugh caught in my throat. “Isn’t it all?” I rhetorically asked her. Because most of my neighbors are accustomed to my weird ways, she laughed too. I stand there against the railing for a few moments, thinking about my evening. Surreal is the word that best encapsulates my experience. 54 years old and capable of being surprised. Both by myself and the people around me. I let the song play a few more times, each time letting it punctuate the nocturnal air with a staccato rhythm. Were that all nights were like this. It would be difficult to complain. A day of ice cream smiles, exertion, storytelling, and feeling like I belonged exactly where I was. Jan 18th
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She used my own trick against me. She handed me a white note card. It had 7 words written on it: “People change out of inspiration or desperation.”
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At 4:00 a.m. the mockingbird doesn’t sing. But I can hear it hacking and clearing its throat.
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Here we are, each of us, as the day breaks. All of us have a different view in front of us. But each of us shares a huge overlap of the things we find to be important. I hope your day surprises you in all the best ways. Let this be a subtle morning prayer. Optimism and one foot forward is all you need. Jan 4th
P.S. Parenthetically Speaking 