The Constructive Ramblings of Someone
Who’s Been There and Done That!
These unedited articles were
written during the last presidential election cycle to blow off steam. What’s
happened as our President lead from behind motivated me to post the articles so
YOU would think about yourself and the power our Founding Father’s gave each of
us to create the America
Intro
If you picked up this book,
it might be because you’re bored and want to be entertained, have watched too
many Mr. Popeil pitch commercials, or by some strange stroke of fate, you heard
it was a laugh riot! Perhaps in a perfect world all the above could exist in
the same space-time continuum. And no, I am not using this term because I am writing
for the SiFi reader. I am however, writing for myself and others like me that
have walked the winding road of life, observed and edited their thoughts,
actions, responses, and reactions with the changing times and have ended up
here. You may well ask where exactly here is, and that is, I believe a very
good question indeed. Sufficed to say, here is not the fifties I lived in, when
I discovered through what the common vernacular came be called the Boob Tube,
that neither the Beavers dad nor the Nelson’s father went to work. When I
watched these shows, which became for many like me, the lens through which we
would view life, every issue was neatly dealt with in thirty minutes, minus the
time needed to sell products like Cheerios. Speaking of Cheerios, if we had
tested the claims of the advertiser, and watched to see if the cereal would
float, we might have noticed that given enough time they sank to the bottom and
became the icky gooey mess we thought they would.
If we had applied that litmus
test to other Pitches, we most likely would have not brought anything from Mr.
Popeil, or believed Andy Warhol in 1968 when he said, “In the future, everyone
will be world-famous for 15 minutes.” However, having brought his premise we
may have also bought the farm, and sold it over and over again to achieve a
sort of notoriety that previous to the 1960’s was to be avoided at all cost. Of
course all of this is the history that no one ever talks or writes about, so
why now? Good question and the answer is, why not now. For right now, we are
living in a world of pitches and smoke screens where every aberrant behavior is
viewed as normal. And normal behavior, the classic idea of the norm, that we
were all taught to admire, emulate, and seek after, and which many worked
toward for eons, seems to have left the building as surly as Elvis did. In
fact, given the tenor of these times, it might be apt to observe that the norm
has left our political arena, politicians, the press, our entertainers though
some of their behavior drew glances way before now, and maybe even our country.
Now you might be thinking, this doesn’t matter to me! But it does! The
world you live in matters as much to you as the security of the fifties matter
to me. I grew up with that feeling. It wasn’t until I received a radio alarm
clock the year I turned twelve that I heard about the Bay of Pig
The Purple Pitch
How can we avoid being suckered
into the Purple Pitch? That’s a very good question and many will tell you we
can’t. In retrospect, they’re right! The first Pitch and how we handle it is
all-important because at the moment of decision we will either cave, or buy in.
It may be through as innocuous an event as a mom taking her preteen daughter
shopping for her birthday and back to school clothes. At least, if memory
serves, that’s when it happened to me. If you’re a mom, grandma, great grandma,
or a woman who shops with others I’m certain you’ll relate. However, if you’re
a guy, buddy, uncle, father or grandfather, just change the word clothes to
anything men want and you’ll be able to tag along.
Now to start with I must
share with you that I have observed, that all of us come with an emotional hard
drive programmed by our feeling of haves and have not’s. They create within us
certain urges, which, if tapped into can cause us to move, act and react out of
want, need, or fear. So, imagine taking your precious sweet preteen shopping
and discovering that she only wants to wear purple. Of course, if you’re like
me you’ve already notice that the only color in her department seems to be
purple. Except that is for the innocuous little tag on the jeans with insipid
writing which hits her derriere at the worst place and says, “Compact yarn.” I
kid you not! One look and I realized that the tag was decidedly red, as in;
she’d rather be dead then listen to mom when I suggest that we go to several
stores before she makes her selections. However, flexing her prerogative to be
the most difficult preteen in the store she refuses. What do you do? Leave of
course. Everyone knows the power of leaving.
But what if, you’re preteen
sees an add for a no interest credit card and talks you in to getting one so
the purchases can be returned if she sees something at another store she likes
better. Sounds good! Really good! So, you bite! Mr. Popeil, no I mean, you’re
daughter’s got you, and how! “What?” you ask, “how’s that possible?”
Well, let’s take a look. By
agreeing to her idea, you put her opinion before you’re rules of engagement.
Oh, you don’t have any rules of engagement? Well then, it’s time you got some,
cause honey the people you know, and the country you live in play by rules like
these!
Now if you’re a single guy or
gal or someone without children this example may seem silly to you. However, if
we apply the Cheerio litmus test to the Purple Pitch scenario and look at the
use of applied owies to the problem of illegal immigration we might have
something worth talking about. So let’s look at the U.S. Immigration and Reform
Act of 1986 that granted amnesty to millions of illegal aliens who could prove
they already had been in the country four years. Thinking back to the tenor of
the time, it sounded like a good idea. However, just as my daughter viewed me
as being easy to manipulate, it appears that those across our southern boarder have
learned to view our country in the same light ever since we got soft and caved
instead of enforcing our own laws! Get it! Good! Now were cooking on the same
burner! Bunsen, I bet!
Why you might wonder, am I
saying Bunsen, as in burner? Because under all our manicured nails and Ivy
League College Degrees, we are a country founded by rugged individualist who
would have rather fought and died than been manipulated into the fix were in!
So let’s get real! Let’s get tough! Let’s roll up our sleeves and show
ourselves, and the world, and every individual that were through! That we have
what it takes to say no to the free credit card that puts us in debt, allows us
to go against our principals, and teaches our children that we don’t value what
we say.
The Breck Girl and the Good Old Boy
While were talking about
ourselves, who did you want to be when you grew up? Come on now! Fes up! You probably wanted to be anybody but YOU! In my
day and age it seemed that all us teenaged girls wanted to be the Breck Girl.
Why? Well I might answer, why not? She looked great, made lots of money and got
to be a regular gal. You see, back in the days before tell all, know all, way
before we became slaves to anyone but the God who made us, we prized our
individually. That is as long as someone special like our parents, family,
teacher, or the President approved.
Speaking Mr. President, I’ll
never forget JFK, now there was a man to be admired. Of course, he died before
his programs were implemented. Lynden Johnson succeeded him and used his
horse-trading skills and the ‘old boy’ network he developed during his time on
the hill, to complete JFK’s agenda. History has cast him as the villain because
he got us further and further into that nasty business in Vietnam
As that eminent French
Existentialist Philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre wrote, in his
seminary work, Existentialism is Humanism, ‘…in choosing, therefore, we commit not only ourselves, but all of mankind.’
In other words, our choices shape our world as well as those to come. Applying
this concept to the future of our society and our need to rescue individuals,
mega corporations like AIG and
whoever else appears needy it is important to remember that both the Breck Girl
and the Good Old Boy knew their limitations, and bowed out when the stakes
became higher than they could afford. We need to do the same. For to pursue the
current course gives rise to the hopefully unwarranted reality that, we are
really indeed the ugly Americans the world thinks us to be. Who believe that
only we can bring world peace, stop hunger, unite humanity and teach everyone else
how to what? Be like us? Really? The last time I looked, there was no more
being like us! Everyone wants to be famous enough to be able to post how many
people joined them on facebook, how many befriended or twittered them, and what
designer their wearing, or better yet what designer paid them to wear their
clothes, or attend their event. Today becoming a personality seems more
important then becoming a person! The problem is growing; it’s growing faster
than we know! Do you and I really want to be responsible for having created
this world?
Perhaps it’s time to act like
Pooh. You know the stuffed bear who lives in the Hundred Acre Woods. I liked
Pooh the first time I read one of his stories to my kids. He wasn’t trying to
make friends and influence people, he didn’t have a degree, and perhaps because
of all he didn’t have, and all his lack of posturing, that funny bear was more
real that some of the people who want us to trust them today. So, let’s stop
and look at what Pooh did when he didn’t know what to do. First, he thought. He
pointed to his head where he somehow knew his brain was and he told himself,
“Think, think, think,” then he waited. He didn’t wait to see what the polls
said, or hire himself out as a neighborhood organizer so he could learn how to
win. In fact, Winnie the Pooh didn’t care about winning he carried about the
other residents of the Hundred Acre Wood, and tried to be a good friend to
them. Sometimes he succeeded and sometimes he failed, but whether he succeeded
or failed, he was always true to himself. Because of that, even though his not real,
he is a Pooh of heroic proportions indeed!
Oh me, oh my, why?
When things go wrong don’t we
all want to moan, “Oh me, oh my, why,” go to bed, pull the covers over our
head, and hunker down until some else has fixed it for us. Of course, while
were busy doing that we forget about personal responsibility. But that’s easy
for us to do since we’ve signed up to be card carrying members of the, ‘my
parents made me this way club.’
Remember Flip Wilson’s
classic line, “It’s not my fault, the Devil made me to it.” Or better yet, how
about Jake Blue’s famous retort in the Blues Brothers when his fiancé holds a
automatic rifle to his head for standing her up at the alter. His answer was
nothing short of genius. We all laughed, and left the show lighter and happier.
Why? Perhaps hearing a funny musically talented sleaze ball pull out all the
stops to feed her every excuse in the book, and watch the distraught woman
cave, gave us the permission we needed. After all the 1980’s were a time when
parties for married couples were nothing more than a euphemism for wife
swapping, and stay at home moms were made to feel lesser than!
It was the decade where woman
were hearing lyrics like, Helen Reddy’s I'm A Woman.’ Even though we all knew we couldn’t, ‘wash out forty four pairs of socks and have 'em on the
line, starch and iron two dozen shirts 'fore you can count from one to nine,’
we enjoyed the idea that we could somehow do everything we were expected to do.
On and on she sang, and we smiled. I remember smugly humming along with my
friends to, “feed the baby, grease the car, powder my nose at the same time,’
for we never assumed we’d get into a fix we couldn’t solve. We loved the
lyrics, no matter how inane. They were fun to listen to, and allowed us to see
ourselves, and each other as more than the chief cook and bottle washer at
home, or the underpaid overworked secretary or teacher at work.
Yet it took an
odd turn of events on a dark, rainy, and windy night. Oh, my gosh, I sound like
Snoopy! For us modern women to discover just how much we wished our husbands
were with us. We had attended a child rearing class taught by Doris that was
literarily over the hill and through Santa
Monica
However, I
digress! “Doris who?” you might ask. Doris was a woman who owned a preschool and was purported
to have worked with the noted Child Psychologist Alfred Adler.
He is most widely known for his theory of Birth Order, which was derived from
his observations of how children struggled for success and superiority.
Now, I must admit, at this point of my
maturation, I wasn’t keen on struggling and still aren’t. But, driving home after
eleven one night, my friends and I were confronted with a flat tire. The gas
stations were closed, and no one had money for a pay phone (remember it’s
1977), and there was no man in sight. Having no other solution, the idea of
changing the tire seemed doable. So, we sang Helen’s song as we opened the
dashboard in search of instructions. None there, we braved the elements, and scurried
out in the rain. We opened the trunk, got the instructions, found, and turned
on the flashlight. Water dripping off us and into the upholstered interior of
my friend’s trunk she insisted we drip elsewhere! Can you imagine? As we opened
the manual, she closed the trunk. Now comes the, “Oh me, oh my, why,” question, for what manufacture, but a foreign one, would be silly
enough to place instructions in the trunk of a car going to America, in their
language and many others, but not English! Evidentially this one! So if you
find yourself asking the, “Oh me, oh my, why,” question remember you haven’t been un-faired upon it’s just your
turn to get wet!
And buster have we been
doused! First by being told by our lawmakers that our founding fathers intended
for our Declaration of Independence, Bill of Rights, and other documents to be
living documents, and then being informed by President after President that the
powers of his office need to expand. If I tried that on the people I know, everyone
would call my bluff, but here in a free society we allow our elected officials
to spend our money to discover why things are changing. However according to
their own redirect (?) the very documents we’re founded upon have changed! Ask
any educator who has been teaching for over a decade and they will tell you
that our history books have been rewritten to affirm what is being said today!
Wake up! The child, the person, the family structure, the society, and the
country you live in need you to fight to save it today! Instead of saying, “Oh
me, oh my, why,” remember you can
make a difference right here, right now!
The Magazine Subscription and Macroeconomics
Of course, any simpleton
knows that macroeconomics is the study of the overall aspects and workings of a
national economy, such as income, output, and the interrelationship among
diverse economic sectors. In other words, the old adage is true we reap what we
sow. I see you nodding your head in agreement! Good! Following on the heels of
that statement it must also be noted that it is unwise, no foolhardy, to freely
giveaway, to someone something they have clearly shown they don’t want, while others
are paying for it.
Enter the magazine. I have at
times subscribed to some that I loved. However, they, like me, moved on, so I
quit my subscription, which is my right! They never asked me why. If they had,
I would have picked from my list of faves; 1) they changed their tenor,
espousing things I did not believe, 2) they lost a contributor I like to read,
or the deadly 3) to many pitches, some deeply Purple, and not enough content!
Some of them where geared for women of a certain age, which I had not seen in a
while. Or as is usually the case with most of us, I simply lost interest. But
the magazines refused to let me go! They seemed to believe I belonged to them!
How sweet! How trite! How delusional! Like a jilted lover, they pursued me by
mailing their new issues followed by additional marketing ploys! What a waste
of their money, my time, and our natural resources!
Now I must admit, as a
writer, I would like nothing better than to find myself in print in one or more
of the glossy covered monthly’s that we look at while we cool our heels waiting
in whatever office were in. However, what do we usual see? Is there, for
example a recipe for simplifying our life? Hardly! What we see is the need of
the magazine to promote output, which as I shared before is the first law of
macroeconomics. This need of the magazines to continue their interrelationship
among us who constitute their diverse economic sector will affect them and may
drive them out of business.
When my great uncle worked as
a typesetter for the LA Times everyone understood the issue. Get more paying
subscribers or sink! However, today, if a magazine does not have enough
subscribers to stay afloat, they send out issues to their pervious subscribers,
thereby bolstering their mailing numbers, and giving them the illusion that
they are making money! This sounds like a shell game to me!
In the past, companies tried
to be straight with themselves and there investors. In fact, this whole idea of
making stuff up to gain market share was a laugh when we watch Doris Day and
Rock Hudson on the silver screen in their 1961 comedy, Lover Come Back, which showed us how ridiculous it
was to try this rouse! Rock Hudson played a Madison Avenue
add executive who had achieved success not through hard work or intelligence
but by wining and dining his clients, and setting them up on dates with
attractive girls. But everything went south for Rock’s character when he tried
to romance the woman he hoped to be his latest conquest. She didn’t fall for
his line! So, he promised and shot a fake commercial, featuring her for “VIP ,” a non-existent product. Enter the president
of the company, who sees the commercials, thinks they are real and had them broadcast
on TV. Hudson VIP ” that could be marketed. While all of this is
occurring sweet, innocent Doris Day seeks out the chemist, mistakes Hudson
I loved everything about this flick! Especially since, it
would never happen in real life! But it is! We are getting VIP’ed daily by
magazines we haven’t subscribed to, strange people calling our homes, and cell
phones whose pitch makes the unsuspecting believe they are a long lost friend,
a member of their extended family, or worse yet someone who done them wrong,
needs to be forgiven and needs money! This sounds funny until it happens to
you! And believe me, it will! With the government allowing our medical, social
security information, and heaven knows what else to be interred into computers
for connivance sake, we all are exposed to these ploys and it’s just the
beginning!
Ask yourself, where will macroeconomics be when the
system fails? You don’t know? Well let’s take a look at where you’ll be if you
apply this logic to your personal funds.
Shall we? Back in 1967, which was the year I got married, my husband and I used
the envelope system. Every payday we placed the money in envelopes labeled;
rent, groceries, etc. You get the picture. When the money was gone, we knew we
were done spending until we got another paycheck. Simple, huh? You bet! It’s
the system people used for thousands of years, and I’m sorry to admit that if
we had stuck to it we might be rich today. But life, kids, home, travel and a
major case of the “I wants” intervened and just like the magazine that keeps
sending me issues more than a year after my subscription lapsed, I got it all!
The funny thing is in the last ten years I’ve been busy getting rid of most of
it!
However, as I let go of what
I coveted but never needed, everywhere I look people and our government are
searching for places where they can throw not only their money, but ours. It’s
a free for all, but watch out for the come-up-ins cause they’ll get you every
time!
Sarcastic! Who Me?
If you’ve been tracking with
me thus far you’ve probably read the intro to see if you could make heads or
tails of me, and why I am so adamant about what I’m writing. So to fill in the
gaps, mine, not yours, I am a woman who could not learn because I could not
read and almost missed being promoted to the third grade. However, mom and a
good eye doctor intervened, and with the coaching of a retired elementary
school teacher I passed the proficiency test and was allowed to matriculate
with the students of may age. You may view that, as an amazing feat but being
identified as learning impaired, though threw no fault of my own, I watched
each year as the teacher sat everyone else. Then and only then, would she
ascertain where the smartest girl was, and taking me by the scruff of my neck
she would say, “I’m putting you by the smart girl incase you need any help,” as
I looked around and saw everyone smirking at me.
You might feel sorry for me,
but don’t! Those experiences motivated me to excel. By the end of the first
semester in Junior High, which I later learned when my oldest began is the
grade that most students have trouble with, I had made the honor role, and
continued to do so thought my life graduating with the highest honors. Of
course, all my upper division work was in the local JC, as I never could figure
out what I wanted to be when I grew up even though I was thirty when I went
back to school.
Now that you know more about me, the question I would
like you to ponder is, “What about me?” That’s right. What about you? Do you
find that you, like me are using sarcasm to head off a feeling of personal
responsibility for falling within this paradigm I’ve been writing about? Or are
you like I was, way back in elementary grade school, when I didn’t know what I
was missing cause I couldn’t see the board? If so! I’m happy to meet you!
If you think were a couple of odd ducks, you’re wrong!
In fact, you’re so wrong that Abbott and Costello made a living, and us laugh
with their routine about situations and people like us. It was called, ‘Who’s
on First’. Remember? Well if not, let me refresh you’re memory. It began with
Abbott saying, “Well Costello, I’m going to New York
However, today when were being fed such inane information as this,
it’s not in a comedy routine but coming from our elected officials who have
decided and are dictating that we go green. Let me see, going green seems to
mean that instead of using hardwoods for our flooring, which in places like
Italy has held up for hundreds of years needing nothing more than an occasional
sanding, and sealant, we are now being told to use bamboo, or cork both of with
are sustainable and are touted to last fifteen years! Excuse me for asking,
does this make any sense to you? Cause I’m certainly stumped! Why are we seeing
everyone recommend stuff that will make families who need to conserve their
money for their kids education buy something that if they purchased their home
the same year their child was born and used what is being recommended they will
need to buy another floor before their kid graduates High School!
Think that’s a lone issue? Let’s look at the new light bulbs. I
live in a community that replaced every bulb with the new ones. Guess what
happened. People walking their dog’s at night can’t see where their going. We live
close to the beach and when the fog is dense I can’t find my way home, and I
haven’t moved to in years! So let’s admitted, it takes more street lights to
give us the same light we had before. Are you tracking with me? Good cause I
have one more point out of many I want to cover about our new light bulbs and
that is there toxicity! That’s right! When we’re done with them the gov’ that’s
government to you and me, as in the people who should be looking out for us,
want us to dispose them as we would any toxic waste! “What do you mean?” I hear
you asking, “The government wouldn’t do that to me! Yep it has! Check it out,
and you’ll see I’m right!
Hello! Is There Any Real
News Out There?
Way back before all this new
stuff was around, yours truly was sittin in class hearing about a guy named
William Randolph Hearst Sr., and yellow journalism. Now this was eons before
the Symbionese Liberation Army kidnapped his granddaughter Patty from the
apartment she shared with her fiancé. And it was a long time before she got
herself photographed
wielding an M1 carbine
while robbing a bank.
Back then, who would have guessed that this publishing giant would one day,
sit down to have his cheerios, and read about Patty getting arrested along with
all the other SLA members who happened to be in their San Francisco apartment
at the time! Not he! That’s for sure! When the story broke, I bet old William,
wished he’d minded his literary manners, and caved. After all, he’d all already
been lampooned by no less than Orson Wells, who showed everyone how lonely a
powerful and corrupted publisher could become. I bet none of us will ever forget
Citizen Kane’s dying word, “Rosebud.” We knew what he meant, for we had seen
the simple little sled with the picture and word rosebud on it, and many of us
believed he wish he’d lived a different life!
But, I digress. I meant to pose the question, Hello! Is There Any Real News Out There? Whad’ya
think? Is there? Any news I mean? And if not, what’s being printed in the
paper? Well after searching for the NEWS in the news section of my Sunday
paper, I bet the guys, and gals that work there feel the same way I do! How
dare they label this stuff news! I didn’t see anything news worthy till I got
to page fourteen! Now you might be thinking, “Awe, she’s a news snob! Probably
reads the Times, or worse yet The Wall Street Journal!”
Buster are you wrong! I never
read a paper until the talking heads on TV made it impossible for me to think!
You know process everything from soup to nuts that they were thrown my way!
Until then, my only brush with ‘THE NEWS’ was writing a weekly ‘Teen Scene’
column when I was a teenager, visiting my typesetting Uncle who worked at one
of the majors, and helping one of the first lady anchors pick out earrings when
I worked at a jewelry counter for a major upscale chain store.
“So,” you might scoff, “why should
I care about what this gal says?” BECAUSE, when a paper puts celebrity on page
two of the front-page section of the newspaper they’ve gotten things more than
a little mixed up! When the article is about celebrity want-bees who have done
nothing to become recognizable to anyone but those to board to change the
channel, and the reporter is bent on putting them down while elevating others
more sleazy than them, we have entered the Twilight Zone, creepy music and all!
Since we know that Rod
Serling isn’t controlling the horizontal, and the vertical, let’s find out who
is. If we listen to the press, and sift through their palaver, we’d soon
discover that they’ve snowed us with their smooth talk, and we, The American People
have no idea if were looking at the Twilight Zone, or living in one!
While you give that a think,
think as J.
Pierrepont Finch always did in ‘How to
Succeed in Business Without Really Trying’ well get back to Patty and her grandpa.
Oh, but before we do, I need to tell ya, Ponite, as his hoped for sweetie
called him, never pondered things for the same reason, cuddly sweet Pooh did!
No! Ponite had a get it agenda and thought about how to use others! Funny…ha, ha!
Not in my vernacular! Not today it isn’t, or ain’t! Depending upon whether the
dictionary you use is Urban or Websters.
Now back to our original
show, I mean Patricia. When all the drama was escalating, many ordinary people
thanked their lucky stars that it wasn’t happening to them. Like me, many
wondered if our heroine, or bank robber…make you choice of either A or B dad
had done something to cause her act out this way. Had she had felt unheard,
taken an LSD trip, or did she just want out from under the protective iron wing, which Hearst was known
to wield unmercifully. Who knows? Only Patty and she’s not telling. Know why?
Cause she grew up with the press, and if there’s one thing Patty doesn’t want its
to be it’s a celebrity! I bet you’re as happy as I am to hear that! Right?
Right! Cause if there’s one thing we don’t need its another misguided soul who
needs help when we can’t even help ourselves, or save our own__!
“So are we all clear on the
Celebrity Soul Train. Right?” she asked rhetorically. Well, not really! Lets
take the Pres. You know, the head honcho! He seems to speak, travel, and have
more photo opps than all the other, Pres.’ put together. Now don’t get all
relied up thinking, “I knew she was one of THEM!” I don’t want you to have a
major melt down while reading grandmas ramblings cause I’m not close enough to
help you. Maybe that’s a good thing, since we’re supposed to be rugged
individualists! You got the memo right? Sure, you did that’s why you signed up
for scouts! Didn’t they prepare you for every situation? Well then what are you
waitin for? We got a Pres. who demands whatever, and everyone caves. After all
why not, organizers are scary dudes don’t ya know!
We got bills that even Midas
with all his wealth couldn’t pay, and Humpty Dumpty is set to run on a platform
of no more yolks! Sad as it may seem, the guy may win cause only in America
where were free to choose, have so many been mislead by those in the know, who
now admit that they don’t know, but THINK that the white of the egg is best if
your dieting! Did anyone ever wonder if we coudn’t and wouldn’t have a happier
society if everyone stopped worrying about becoming, and just decided to be
consciously content with who they are, and what they had! Opps, typo, I meant
have! Awe we’re back to our friend Sartre who wrote ‘Being and Nothingness’ where he singlehandedly recanted Kant’s idea of
noumenon, and I paraphrase, ‘a thing exists independent of any conceptualization or perception by the
human mind.’ In other words, we exist, even if we are existing in the Twilight
Zone! So let’s make it as good a place as we can!
We all remember the boat
people that tried to escape the Vietnam Israel America , that’s right, the good old US of A,
hadn’t gotten suckered, rather talked, into voting for the partition of Palestine
Ya think I’m wrong? Well, honey, think again! All I know I learned at home,
both growing up, and raisin’ daughters. Seems like whatever one’s got the other
one wants. And so it goes with Israel Israel
Now back to the kids. You know, Ishmael and Isaac. They were the son’s of
Father Abraham. And my, oh my… how the older one has carried on, even to this
day cause he didn’t get what he wanted! Oh-wee! How kids do carry on when they
don’t get their way! Or to paraphrase that last sentence using parent speak,
“It would be odd if the siblings were not fighting over something or other.”
However, normally odd as it may seem, this kind of behavior happened in my
family and I bet it did in yours. Cause whenever we don’t get the good stuff,
in this case, the land for, goodness sake, envy raises its ugly head! You know
what I mean; it’s like gettin Raggedy Andy stead of Raggedy Anne. Now Andy
might have more to offer, after all his a guy, and we all know guys can… Oh
well, in today’s modern world where we’re brainwashed into believing that their
no better than the other sex… you know the one that out lives them, you may not
know what I’m talkin about. So let me splain. It’s still a truism, though no
one’s tellin but me, that after everything woman’s lib has said, men still
rock, when it come to earning power, in fact to any power period! Think I’m
wrong? Ask The Donald, as in Trump! Which, if you think about it is what Evana
got in the end! Trumpted!
So getting back to Ish, it’s easy to understand how the Ishmaelite’s forgot
about The Full Blessing! But, duh… if they wanted the best, why settle for the
land, when The Blessing is like havin your B-D Cake, eating the whole thing
with a gallon of ice cream and a cherry on top, and not getting the
heavy-geevies? Still don’t get it? Alright gals, let’s say you ate it all, got
on the scale the next day, weighed in at the perfect weight, looked in the
mirror and saw yourself the way you always wanted to be! Good? Absolutely! And
guys, you made the team and played with Broadway Joe, or you scored in whatever
you did! Wonderful! Right? Of course, right! Well then, what about THE
BLESSING!!
Well, let’s go back a few centuries and see what happened to a country that
opposed and oppressed Israel Rome Temple Temple Israel
So back to answer the why’s as in, why’d they do that? Well, anytime a
society annulets, or tries to annihilate another, everyone wants’ a souvenir.
Right? Na! The Romans had no way of known, cause they didn’t listen to the guy,
but what they did was to be used of God to fulfill what Messiah predicted about
the destruction of the Temple. Don’t believe me? Check it out fur yourself! But
back to Roman Glass, the stuff is a fortune! It’s expensive cause it rare, like
the freedoms’ we have here the Good Old US of A! So people prize it, like we
should our liberty!
But I pontificate! Let’s get back to the Roman’s. I hope you’re still
treckin with me cause this parts a hoot! What happened next, you might ask?
Well, I’ll tell you. The mighty Roman Empire
with all it’s Caesars caved and left. And they eventually caved in to the very
faith that was proclaimed by The Servant King, who was himself a Jew! Know why
I know? The Vatican Rome
Oh! Gee, the boat people… I almost forgot, both during, but mostly after
WWII, Jewish refugees were getting on boats sailing to the Promised Land. Where
you might ask, was that land?” I’ll tell you, it was anywhere they had family,
or friends who would vouch for them. However, many had no one to do that. But,
faith and fear mingled together and caused them to sell the little they had to
get on to what became known as the Death Boats…Ships. No matter where they
went, they were turned away. That is, except for the rare occasions where a
country showed mercy, such as Haiti USA
Here’s where it gets dicey. Years before, some Jewish people had come back
to the land through the Zionist Movement, and learned how to reclaim it. They
called the safe areas they lived in Kibbutz’s, which a sort of meshuganah shorthand
for communal living. That’s where the Holocaust Survivors wanted to live, if
they were allowed into Israel Transjordan ,
the English got real cozy with the Arab leaders. Now you might be wonderin why
that’s important. And I’ll tell you. These two documents made it impossible for
the Jews to return to their homeland! If they wanted to join a Kibbutz, they
had to sneak in to their own country without being killed. Sad to say, most of
them ended up in detention camps on Cypress
But, I digress. Over time, the land bloomed. Israel ,
the Land of Messiah
You’re probably bored by now, so let’s connect the dots, while I show you
The Purple Pitch in all of this. Today in this country and around the world,
many churches are acting just like Ishmael, who has a bad case of the I wants,
makin all his words sound real Purple! They say that the promises God made to
the Jewish people have been given to them, cause those Jews failed to believed
in Messiah when He came. In other words, they claim to have replaced The Jewish
People. Purple Hooey! Pure Bunk! If God were done with His People, He would
have allowed them to be annulated! That’s what the Inquisition and Hitler, to
name just two, tried to do. But God saved them! Why, cause he’s not done with
them! If you’d read the Messianic prophesies you’d know that! The only reason
the Jews are still around, is to show the world that God exists, and that He
keeps His promises.
Now, if you’re a church go’er this is real important to you cause God has
given you promises to. Promises like an eternity with Him! So, why not be happy
with what ya got and stop coveting what ain’t, isn’t, is not yours! If you’re
wonderin why you should do what I suggest, I’ll give you a few reasons. 1)
Don’t you want to be Blessed? Course you do! So why not get on the side that
the Blessin comes from! After all, none of us wanted to be picked last for
dodge-ball. Why chose the lossin team, or come in second when you can Have IT
All Right NOW! 2) Every nation that has gotten between God and His plan for The
Jewish People has bit the Big One! So, if you want to survive to enjoy The
Blessin inherent in Blessin Gods People, you better sign up to play ball on His
side! After all Gods word don’t, I mean, doesn’t lie, and it says that’s Purple
Hooey! The Head Honcho told Father Abraham, “I will Bless those who Bless you
and curse those who curse you.” In other words, just like that oldie-but-goodie
tune, Devil or Angel, you have a choice! You can have your Blessing, its there
right before you, but instead of calling Ghost Buster to eradicate it, i.e.
kill The Jewish People, stop, and as Aretha Franklin so wisely sang in 1968,
Think! And 3) If, you, or those in your church don’t want to hear, “Poorly done
manipulative servant,” when they get to the pearlies, you’d better clue them
in, cause if you believe, as God does, in personal responsibility, you’d better
own that you’re a message barer with a message worth sharin. If you think I’m
full of hooey, better check out the book! Oh, you don’t know which book! The
Bible. And not just the New Testament, the whole Bible, from Genesis to
Revelation! If you really want to make sure you can have your cake and eat it
to, you better start now!
The Original Papa - Oom - Mow – Mow ‘s and The Paper
So just like in the song, “Where is Love,” I find myself wondering, where is originality? That’s just what Prof Tom Lehrer sang about in a bar he frequented while teaching in the political science department at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Awe yes, it was an interesting time to be a kid. According to JFK, we were going to beat those Ruskie’s to the moon, win the Cold War, and do it all, The American Way! While he was helping us become fit by pulling are selves laboriously hand over hand up a rope that only a circus performer could handle, my parents were expecting us to bring home all A’s while they played Lehrer’s music in the background.
But, fear of failure evaporated as surly as the
summer break broke, and school let out! Awe, summer vaca! What a relief! At
Last! No more papers, no more looks, no more teachers’ dirty looks! That is
unless we were at my next-door neighbor. Now don’t get me wrong, if anyone
could pull of summer school for the upper, upper smart it was her, uh…she!
Well, you know what I mean! At ten, she was already registered at the Sorbonne,
which I later discovered meant she was going to matriculate to France
However, having burnt the midnight oil ‘till
way past nine, during the school year, I was conscious of a small breach in
protocol when I stayed with them while my folks took a much needed time out. I
discover her copying pages verbatim from her Encyclopedia! Feeling righteous as
only an older girl could, I sauntered into her room while I sang, “Plagiarize, let no one else's work evade
your eyes. Remember why the good Lord made your eyes,” which was some of the lyrics from one of my parents favorite Lehrer song. Imagine my
surprise, oh I’m rhyming, you can’t take me anywhere these days without me
getting into this copycat thing! But back to my neighbor. “What did she do?”
you’re probably wondering with baited breath. By the way, if your breath is so
fouled you could bait it and catch something I suggest Tums, remember,
Dum..de.. domm, domm TUMS! Well, what she did was nothing, absolutely nothing,
except tell me that she was a certified genius, and I must pause to query,
certified or certifiable? “Well,” she continued, “everyone expects this kind of
work from me so they won’t question my efficiency.” What the hey? I wondered.
After all, how can one argue when they don’t know what the kid three years her
junior is saying? So whady ya goin to do? Leave and say nothing cause surely
she’d get her comeuppance.
But that’s just the point, poor smart
girl was so unable to voice her opinion that she finally left, the country, and
all. And you know what, she’s one of my favorite people! A real individual, the
rugged type I wish I was when I’m not dousing myself with sunscreen so I don’t
burn, or asking my husband for help just because he’s there! Not her, she went
her own way. Made her own choices. Lived her own life and to my thinking never
copied anything or anyone ever again! We hardly ever get to spend time together
cause she hardly ever here, and I’m never there. But if we were closer I’m sure
we would be chums, or just remember back to the days that according to a sitcom
we all watched, were, Happy Days, when life was more easy. Opp’s easier? See,
there I go rhyming again, forgive me my friend, I meant to write, we’d be
tight! Right!!!
In conclusion, we’d be tight because
somewhere along the line yours truly learned that there is nothing worse than
critiquing someone else unless asked. And in this world where everyone is
having fun trying to be etude it is still considered by me, the original prude,
as rude as show a red g-string and bra while in the mall, or the hall, et. all!
So let’s keep things in perspective and pick our battles wisely! I don’t know
about you but I’m about ready to take on the whole Haute Contour industry for
making clothes in all the wrong sizes and lengths, and the diet industry who
seem to partner with them in setting women up to feel bad if they haven’t lost
it yet!
The Eeyore Syndrome
Once upon a time in the land
of the never ask, never tell, I interned at a Psych Hospital Psych
Hospital
So to begin, it was there, while hearing the plethora
of oxymoron’s that only the needy could fabricate that I first came upon what
for want of a better diagnosis, I labeled, The Eeyore Syndrome. You remember Eeyore, he lived with Pooh in the
Hundred Acre Wood. But unlike Winnie who tried to figure things out, he became
depressed. In fact, long before we met him the guy needed Prozac! And I should
know, since I’m a Chemical Dependency Councilor of sorts. I say of sorts
because I sort of choose not to go there, okay? Great! Now back to where we
were. I remember it as if it were yesterday, when Disney finally turned Eeyore
into a cartoon and we heard him sigh such sad lines as the classic, “Thanks for
noticing me.” And who could forget, “It’s not much of a tail?” Even my kids
wondered when he moaned, “It works. Didn’t expect it to.” And their off quoted
fave, “Most likely loose it again.”
Funny huh, a yuck a minute?
Well not really! Not if we listen to our friends, family, people in the work
place and those around us as well as our descissions makers! Don’t believe me!
Listen to them! Don’t many, or sometimes all of them sound like they’ve got a
bad case of the Eeyore’s, which in my book is worse than a bad case of the
runs! And by the way, whose running the country if those that are supposed to
know what to do are saying things that sound like our very depressed friend.
Would we hire them? Hardly! Vote for them? Evidentially yes! Only, I suspect,
if they promised us everything! And they have!
Wait a minute are we
delusional? Do we need Prozac? You bet ya Red Rider! That is if we’ve been ponying
up to the bar with these Bubbas, as in the vernacular, “Bub you’ve been duped!
These beans will only give a one way ticket to Giant Land
“Oh,” sigh the Eeyore’s of
the good old US of A. “I can’t do that now cause…” like our friendly cartoon
character, they don’t expect it to work. Don’t want to be noticed. Believe that
whatever they might contribute isn’t worth the effort, and if that isn’t
enough, they believe it, whatever the it is, will be lost again,
as in a big fopa, a dope’a! To translate: the big fashion dope would rather
swing from a rope than cope! And sweetie, his right! Are coper’s broke! We’re
loosing it big time! In fact we’ve lost so much of it in the last few
years that if it were pounds, I wouldn’t be here any more!!! Call it a
disappearing act, but that’s what’ll happen when the __ hits the __! No one
involved in the discussion making process is going to stand up at that point
and take in on the chin! Not one! After all, they got there’s. “Isn’t that what
this country is all about,” they’d ask.
No, not really! If it were,
George Washington would have let them make him King when they wanted to!
Founding father’s aside, it was good old George Porgee, who was the father of
this country. He hung tough, and crossed the Delaware
People, what are we doing with what they gave us?
I’ll tell you, selling it down stream. Allowing ourselves to become a stench in
the nostrils of the world, while we, like Eeyore sigh,
“It works. Didn’t expect it to,” as others dismantle the very
foundation of the noblest experiment the world has known! Pardoned me if I
sound miffed, but I am! I hope you are to!
However,
I know the solution! Eeyore’s unite! Throw off the I want’s and all form of
negativity, and look not at who you are, but who you must become! That’s right!
It’s in the becoming that we move from where we are to where we can be! Do you
think the little guy who fest up to choppin’ down that cherry tree wanted to
freeze at Valley Forge ? Course not! He knew it
was freezing in Pennsylvania
Back
in Kennedy’s day, the White House was alluded to as a sort of mythical Camelot.
Wouldn’t it be sad if in the end, we’re not in Camelot, as was envisioned? But
discover that our future, which we are more on the verge of living than the
powerful want us to know, is the one envisioned by H. G. Wells in his novel The
Time Machine. You remember the flick, don’t you? No? Well to refresh your
memory it’s the one where the Morlock’s take the unsuspecting Eloi’s into their
domain to feed upon them?
Really
you might be thinking, all huffy under the skin. That couldn’t happen here! Are
you so sure? I’m not! Not since, we had our last election and I discovered that
the deal was done before my vote and half of those living in the land of the
free and the home of the brave didn’t matter! The fix was in! We had done it to
ourselves by changing and gerrymandering for votes. If you lived where I do,
you might have heard the rumblings of discontent. But, as always, just when
were where about to say or do something a situation occurred. It always does!
Why yes, I hear you sighing, we almost lost it! Honey we did loose it! Our gov,
that’s government to me and you, has been in worse fixes than this and they
never told us. Why? Because up to now, they respected us, and if the truth were
told, there were still a few stanch watchdogs on the Hill, as in congress. Now,
now, there’s just the ever so faint echo of the Liberty Bell as it’s packed
away in mothballs while we’re being told it needs to be fixed! Hooey! Liberty
The Day the Music Died
A few years back I was
checking out the what’s up? column in my local paper, which I used to do when
our kids we’re little cause back in the day there was lot’s of cool, free stuff
for fam’s to do especially on the weekend. Ya don’t believe me? Well to make a
believer of you I’ll tell you about our fave. I kid you not; we’re all still
talkin about Pe-Tommy the Pa-Pterodactyl! It was a hoot! Done out in the park,
for cheap! For kids, and gollee, we parents got to tag along! Three hours of
fun! Fun when we drove there wonderin what we were gonna see, fun wachin the
kiddo-shmiddos haven fun! Fun driving home an talkin about the fun! It was
nothing but fun, fun, fun in the cool California
But back to entertainment and
fun, which seems to be all we want today, both for the entertainers, our family
and friends! So jumping on the Band Wagon, not the movie, but our penchant or
fun as in capital F, capital U, capital N, I’m sure you’ll understand the
excitement that coursed through my veins when I read that Don
McLean was gonna do a concert out our way! Now I must confess that when I was
in High; Senior that is, the Beatles came to town. And in a big way! However,
being one who never had any extra moola I passed when it came to seeing them
live! In fact, I must declare that the closest I ever came to seeing any of the
groups that I loved, was on TV or in what was commonly known as the Concert
Move! So, boy, howdy, did I want to go! But sadly, still no moola! But being
married to The Hubb’s who, to my knowledge did not know the meaning of the
word, no, and take from me as a parent, I can testify to the truth of that
statement, I just mentioned, ever so wistfully, “Can we go? Hu? Hu?
Now there are certain advantages to becoming
decrypted, such as Social Security and discounted seats! Yah man! So we went!
Had dinner, rather brought dinner, e.t. all! It was great! He sang better than
he had on his record when I first bought him, even better than on his
re-mastered master, if ya know what I mean! I was one happy camper! He not only
sang all my fave’s like Vincent, you know the one that starts, starry, starry night, and goes on to tell
us all about Vincent Van Gogh? In my book the song was a monster hit, though we
never called them that cause a monster in my day was the silly, One Eyed One
Horned Purple People Eater Song, and who’d want to confuse Vincent’s gut
wrenchingly wonderful lyrics with that? Especially since that songs been
playing at The Van Gogh Museum continuously
since the 1970’s.
Thinking about the old Purple
Slurpel reminds me that even way back then; Vincent was in a class of it’s own!
And there were others in Don’s bag of biggies that were, and still are the
stuff writer’s, song - or otherwise, dreamed of penning. Remember, give me liberty,
or give me death? And how about it is a far better thing than I have ever done
before? And Scarlett’s classic tearjerker, “As God is my witness, I’ll never be
hungry again.” Each one rocked it, and for a different reason. So what happened
with us? Why instead of hearing, Barbra sing, memories light the corner of my
mind, or to dream the impossible dream, do we hear Usher singing, oh myyyy, oh myy gosh, i did it again, so i’m gone let the
beat drop, oh myy gosh? Ya think I’ve missed the point, or misheard, or
misspelled the words? Nope! Check it out for yourself. Go to the internet, you
know the thing that keeps you trapped at your desk thinking you have a life
while people are out there living theirs, and type in Usher Ft.
Will.I.Am – OMG Lyrics N Video ~ Video and Lyrics, and you’ll find these lyrics
just as they appear here. I kid you not!
So when you
compare Usher, nice kid that he is to Don, in my book there’s no comparison
cause Don’s lyrics, though I bet he didn’t write them to be, are timeless! When
I think about The Day the Music Died, I remember the first time I heard it.
Back then, I had no idea what he was singing about cause I didn’t know the Big
Bopper, Patsy Cline and a slew of other talented recording artists had died in
a plane crash while trying to get back home. And I certainly didn’t that Jett
Rink, who having seen the film years later, was synonymous with Jerk Rink cause
the guy who was such a sleaze, was really James Dean. Cause I was way to young
according to the Hays Office, or maybe it was the Mom-O-Meter as in Mom said,
oh, no I can’t go, to view such stuff! In fact, I’ll fess up, for the longest
time I had trouble figurin out the difference between Jimmy Dean as in
sausages, and James Dean as in East of Eden.
So there, I was
bopping away between ballet classes totally unaware that We, The People had
lost something, not just something little, no siree! What we lost were people who made a
difference like Rocky Balbo, who just wanted to go the distance. Now you might not
know about goin the distance, cause today it seems were asking others to do
that for us. You be thinking I’m wrong? Well, let’s see. Ya think Rocky would
have let someone else tell him when to fight? Think again? And Patsy, how could
Patsy have sung, I Fall to Pieces with such gut wrenching emotion if she
hadn’t lived it? She couldn’t have! And neither can we! We can’t sit in our
sudo ivory tower, and tell the other guy, the one that’s out there trying, how
to do it! What it, your wonder? Good question, my friend! The it
that only you can do! That’s the it you need to invest yourself in! It’s
not the job, but it could be. And probably it’s not your hobby, unless your
hobby is you passion! Nope! As in nopa-doppa! Awe now you might be moaning
why’d you have to write doppa just when I was beginning to feel all warm and
fuzzy inside? Cause, you gifted smarty pants, instead taken life on the chin,
you’ve been hunkering under your pillows afraid you won’t win! News Flash!
Life, contrary to all the fifteen minutes of famous sudo-philosophy that’s goin
around, is what you make it! But if you don’t get out there and try, whose
gonna write and sing a sad song when your time runs out? Nobody that’s who! Ya
think I’m wrong! Honey I live in Senior
Land
What about you? You in: or
you out? As in dropping out? Okay, we might not get sung about, or written up.
Maybe no one will even know we cared, but maybe, just maybe we’ll have done
something, without needing to be noticed that will make a difference. Think ya
can’t? Think again! Think Churchill made a difference. He sure did! Do you know
his teachers thought he’d never amount to anything! Well you thinking we all
know about him! Okay, how about Tesla, never heard of him I bet! Well, if good
old Nikola hadn’t discovered rotating magnetic fields, Induction motor,
rotary transformers, and "high" frequency alternators,
the Tesla coil,
his magnifying transmitter, and other means for
increasing the intensity of electrical oscillations,
where would we be toady? Certainly not out in space! And that leads me to you,
dad. Yes, my dad who met with scientist who knew all about Tesla and others
like Werner Von Braun and built upon their knowledge to build the Gemini Fuel
Cell that got us in to space. Awe, your thinking, those guys were smart, they
had major degrees and all the advantages! Wrong! What does a bagel bakers son,
who grew up in the depression have that you don’t? Nothing! Absolutely nothing,
except a belief that given the opportunity he could make a difference! And
where did he get that you might ask? Good question. He decided it all by
himself. Instead of worrying about the fabrication of the Gunk That Got Thunk,
he made himself a promise and struggled to make a difference! And ya know what?
Except for a brief mention in the Whose Who of Engineering for the year we
headed out to the great unknown, and a few phone calls from companies,
governments and scientists that needed help, no one every knew about him. And when
he passed, he was mourned by his fam, and what few friends still remained, and
that was okay with dad, cause what he did was to become the person he thought
he could be!
Now, how about
you? Me you say, get off my back! Come on, you can do it, whatever your it
is! After all, you remember the story of The Little Engine That Could. Remember
in the beginning he looked at the hill he had to get up and thought he
couldn’t. But he knew if he didn’t, the kids in the valley would have no toys.
And that mattered to him. So bit by bit he told himself, “I think I can, I
think I can,” as he laboriously tugged up the mountain. Until finally we heard
him whistle, “I knew I could, I knew I could as he tooted round the bend and
down the other side! And you can too! Want to know why I know, cause we can all
do what we’re here to do! That is, if we make up our minds to be tough and not
listen to dirges in the dark, until our music dies!
As Poor as Dirt
Today we have the same problem, but in reverse. If we believe the sideshow hooey, everybody cares! That is unless, saying something will make them unpopular! This posing and posturing has brought us the Yada-Bing, Bada-Bang Chick. You know who she is. She’s the gal whose slightly larger than the clothes she wares, picks out her wardrobe from the Junior Department though there’s nothing junior about her, neither her mouth, which is always putting someone down or building herself up, or her ego! You see her at the mall. She’s wearing a dress down to Yada-Bing and up to Bang-Bang, which in polite society might be referred to as a rubber-band! But she dosen’t care cause she in! That’s right, as in in-sulting her own intelligence! Which she might realize if she ever listened to her conscious rather than the committee of want-bees in her head that drown out any semblance of the norm she had thought to be before this country became part of what it used to stand against, as millions of people flip on the tube to watch her act like a wackadoodle!
Oh, you ask, did we stand for something once upon a time? Yep! We did! Even Superman and every kid on my block knew we stood for Truth, Justice, and The American Way! Not the
See, I may not like everything I see, but I agree that everyone has a right to be themselves. Besides, I’ll confess there was a time when I was as into the Chick Lit scene as much as the Yada-Bing, Bada-Bang gal is. Know what I mean? Well, let me clarify. Its like watching What Not to Wear, which I used to watch infinitme, as in I lost real time as they pull out each item. Well I’ll fess, they were one of my faves. However, I discovered something about myself when my highest joy was watching someone be called out! Oh boy! I was participating in putdowns of the strangest kind where I watched the poor inspecting schlemiel get suckered into allowing the whole country, maybe even the world get to see them be pulled apart and put back together. Now please don’t misunderstand me! As a hairstylist, and one who has worked in the beauty and fashion industry for eons, (I told you I was decrypted remember?) I understand we all love it when Cinderella becomes the bell of the ball! But that’s not what seems to happen on this show, and it certainly didn’t happen to the Okies from
Now please don’t think I’m up in arms about the farmers, or What not to Wear. Cause I’m not! I’m not even upset about the Yada-Bing, Bada-Bang Chick and her lit. However, as assuredly as the man who spoke was not dirt poor, for that expression was coined during the Dustbowl to imply eating dirt, which is what happened to those farmers, our fashion fopaux candidate has no idea what the effect of participating in this show will be, either short, or long term! As assuredly as author Robert Frost penned, you can never go home again; neither the farmers, the Yada-Bing, Bada-Bang Chick, or What Not to Wear’s next gal knows what’s in store for them. And neither do we. Come to think of it, that might be a better way to live than looking for the next rubber-band, searching for an unsuspecting schlemiel to sabotage, or crying over spilt milk! Cause nothing says loving less than asking someone else to deal with your mess. And honey it ain’t funny when the needy are looked upon as greedy, and the seedy make the A List!
Dunkin Donuts While on the Dole
When I was a kid there was no place better than Dunkin Donuts to
go for our sugar rush! Whenever mom felt we needed something sweet we would
head out! Now for me this was bitter-sweet cause no matter what I did I was
always five pounds over. As in over my head in dread from hearin the kids in Africa weren’t been feed. I remember forcing myself to
eat everthin on my plate to please the folks. You can see it was sort of a
mixed bag of hunger and guilt, sweet and nag. And that’s the way it seems to me
today when I hear people speakin about the good old USA and how some are
takin’ more than their share of the little bit that’s left there; as in Social Security. So let’s take a
look.
When I was younger and our kids were still at home, my grandmother
lived round the corner. We wanted her to live with us but she refused. She
believed that there should be only one mom and one dad per household. Since the
Hubb’s and I were there and doing an okay job, she refused to join us but lived
round the corner in a retirement hotel of sorts. She was proud to use her Social Security checks to keep her independence. My
mother-in-law lived on Social Security as well. But it wouldn’t have cut the
mustard if she wasn’t livin in government subsidized
housing and sharing costs with a roommate. If these two very independent
women hadn’t paid into, and received Social Security, my parents would have
paid grandma’s expenses, and The Hubb’s and I would have paid for his mom! That
would have been rough for my folks who were, themselves working well beyond
retirement age. And for us, who had kids in school with college and weddings to
look forward to as well as other kiddo shmiddo expenses, like braces, it might
have been close to impossible, but I know we would have managed somehow. Today,
if my guy and I hadn’t paid in our fair share the same thing would be true!
Now don’t get me wrong, I know it’s a truisms, that as surely as
little Annie sang The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow and hit the high note, each
one of us has to pay to play. In other words, whether you took yours to the
bank hopin that you’d have enough of it left when you’re old and gray, or let
Uncle Sammy do it for you, the difference is negotiable! Na! Not negotiable!
It’s nagatable, as in nag-at-table, which is just another way of asking, “Whose
got the cheese?” One might answer, “It’s neither here nor there!” In the final
analysis; no matter who has the cheese, or who’s in charge, us or the
government, one things for sure, whenever there’s a need; as in the Pork
Projects need $$. Or let’s fund this study, or rescue the Spotted
What-Ya-McCall-It, money has a way of burring its way out of the S.S. account,
as surely as it does our savings account, and into the either! Yep a-doddle!
Yah think I’m wrong? Well, think again! Don’t believe me, do the
math yourself. I did once upon a time, and though I’m not a noted
digit-a-tar-ion, I discovered that by the time we paid our house off, we would
have paid off four times its value in interest alone! I ran some tallies and
discovered that with both my husband and me workin’ our S.S. deductions equaled
more than what my Gram’s and my mother-in-law, both Rose’s but really
Rosella’s, and sweetie-pies to the core, were living on!
Oh, but I have IRA’s and Keyhole’s, your thinkin. Well good for
you! I bet you have annuities and Life Insurance to! That’s great! Me, and The
Hubb’s had all that to. In fact, when we moved into paradise, we had enough
moola in the right places to meet the financial requirements to live here. So
did the others who moved here, and are now on welfare! So did the senior’s who
sold their paid off homes to move into those places that promised they’d take
care of them. Want to know where the old go when there’s no more dough? Well,
I’ll spill, they’re not takin it on the lamb or askin for help from a society
that’s too busy to notice the quiet desperation their in. No, their do’in what
their parents, or in some cases their grandparents did a while ago and tryin to
live what’s left of their life with as much dignity as the system will allow
them. However, havin fallen for the credit line, many are losing even that
battle, as the little they charged threatens to be their undoing; undoing the
unsuspecting with charges that can drive a fifteen hundred dollar charge to
fifteen thousand dollars. Think it can’t happen to you! Believe me it can. For
the world we live in has changed a great deal! As surely as opposites attract;
as in my eating all my food and forcing myself to forgo the donut, so that the
kids in Africa could eat didn’t work, today it
dies! What we do here and how we treat each other matters. It matters now. And
believe me, it will matter much more to you when you’re sixty five and dunkin
donuts while on the dole.
Waxing
Parenthetical
Have you ever been with someone who interrupts their
own train of thought to wax parenthetical? I have! It can be madding to have
someone go on forever explaining the shade of pink on the rose blooming in
their garden as if we did not understand by the very nature of the word ‘flower’
or to be more specific, ‘rose’ that the color would be nuanced and varied. On
the other hand, there are times when we need to know exactly every detail and
are met with the bland assessment, dead, as in as dead as a doornail, when a
sensitive person would fill in the details without our having to ask. All this
makes me wonder, when do we ask, and when do we tell?
Perhaps
you believe I am making a molehill out of a mountain. I confess you might be
right. But, living in writer-land, as opposed to right-handed-land, I’m in a
quandary! I believe you’ll understand if I put it like this, if you
remember the song, ‘Does You’re Chewing Gum Loose
its Flavor on the Bedpost Over Night, the question was rhetorical. No one
expected you to contact the singers and answer the question. So why, in polite
society, do we take it upon ourselves to critique each other? Is it because we
care? Or do we subconsciously desire to be like Yertle
the Turtle, who wished to be ‘King of all he could see’? Oh you might
sigh, she’s missed the point completely! But have I? I think not! When another
waxes parenthetical and someone else is cut off, or down as the case may be,
it’s important to review the happenings. So, let’s do.
Do
you remember the Cheerio’s litmus test and the use of applied owwies? You do!
Great! Let’s use them again as we answer the age old question, when is enough,
enough, or better yet, when is enough to much! And when I say to
much, I’m not referring to some savvy sleaze ball intoning, “You’re too
much baby!” No! I’m talking about, to much as in the movie, Network,
where the anchor discovers he’s getting axed and goes on air to rant, “I’ve had
enough! And I’m not going to take it anymore!” Now before we go
further; you, the reader need to fill in what the it is, for yourself.
If you don’t this will be as senseless as wadding in the deep end of the
swim’in pool with cement galoshes. Well, what if I don’t swim you’re wonderin?
No I’m not thinkin about that, cause contrary to popular wisdom, most sensible
people, especially those raised far from water or in fridge climates don’t
either! In fact, some of them wouldn’t have been caught dead in a boat until
necessity forced them to throw caution to the wind. Think I’m wrong? Well,
consider the potato famine in good old Ireland
That’s
why being in the company of someone who waxes parenthetical, can be so very
difficult. It’s like being married and discovering that your hubby only
pretended to speak Venutian so he could snag you. Now that he’s got you in his
lair he’s reverted back to Marshan and can’t understand a thing you’re sayin’!
It’s crazy makin, huh? You Bet! “Wait a minute!” you exclaim, “Where’s the
solution you mentioned in the last paragraph!” Glad you remember! Thanks’ for
reminding me! The solution, is as simple as using the English non-sequiturs,
which one shouldn’t confuse with the equators. Although, truth be told it’s
easy to do since all you need it to deleted the S and what’s and S anyway
unless it’s attached to many other letters? Give up… well I bet the poor old S left by itself fells
uSleSS as we sometimes do when what we’ve been slaving on gets another’s poo-poo
as in pour you. But to get back to literary devices such as Parenthetical’s and
A non sequitur’s, I bet you didn’t know
that they have been used by both high and lowbrows and if it were possible to
speak Cow we might learn that they know how to use them to. And How! After all
while you chew’n your cud, nothing makes more sense than a use of nonsense non-sequiturs or parenthetical pauses!
You don’t’ remember hearing them before? You have!
We all have and I quote… Oh, you don’t hear anything? That’s because the comic
(fill in your fave) is waiting for you to laugh. Got it? That was a good one
huh! Well here’s another, ____. Don’t get it? Me neither! What good is being
the but of someone’s joke when you’re serious? Think its not happenin’. Yep it
is. It’s happen so much that were teaching our kids to shut up and dummy down.
As in… we don’t teach that in __ grade any more. Or the oft heard we’re
teaching self-esteem. The last time I looked self esteem was something you felt
when you aced the test, helped an old lady across the street, saved a life or,
maybe for some, self esteem was when you choose not to hide behind English
jargon but choose instead to do something without drawing attention to
yourself. Kind of like the TV show The Millionaire where someone got a million
dollars and it changed their life but they never knew who gave it to them. But,
it changed their life anyway and they changed someone else’s life and so on and
so forth! And that, my friend is better than waxing parenthetical or falling
back on non-sequiturs any day of the week
cause that my friend is what being real is all about!
And the Winner Is?
Have you ever wondered why
the other guy, or in my case gal, always gets the goodies? As in Kookie, Kookie, lend me your comb. Oh! You don’t remember Seventy-Seven
Sunset Strip? Well, it was the place in TV land, where according to their add,
the high brow
and the hipster, and the starlet and the phony tipster, along with most every
kind of gal and guy, including a private eye, entertained you every week with
quirky bits as in Kookie, Kookie, lend me your comb. And boy oh
boy…all us teens drooled over Kookie who was nothing more than gorgeous, as in
what a de-voon, gas-pump-jockey! But that was okay cause, it was back in the
day when service mattered, and no one who was anyone pumped their own gas, as
in, “Baby, that would be crass!” Instead of the oft quoted, “It’s a gas,”
which, back in the day passed for, be there, or be square and had nothing
whatsoever to do with work!
Still confused? Join the crowed! For all the ensuing
forty-five years since that program aired, people are still tying to figure out
how to win, and today, it seems that winning is everything to hear some tell
it! And how do people win you might wonder. Good question! Is it by being
considerate? Are you kidding me? Considerate is out of style! Ask any
up-and-comer, that type of behaviors passé cause it takes time to act that way.
So why not put your needs first and make a list of everyone you know rotating
them in and out of first position according to your needs, not theirs and
setting rules that give you complete control of when and how they will be
treated by YOU!
Ya think you’re not doing that. Well maybe you’re
right! Let’s take a look. Are you leaving some people hanging, like when you
left you’re bubble gum on the bedpost over night? Oh, you don’t remember, or
never heard the song? Well part of the lyrics I’m referring to go like this,
If your mother
says, don’t chew it, do you swallow it in spite?
Can you catch it on your tonsils - can you heave it left and right?
Does your chewing gum lose its flavor on the bedpost overnight?
Can you catch it on your tonsils - can you heave it left and right?
Does your chewing gum lose its flavor on the bedpost overnight?
In other words, are we postponing calling, meeting or writing someone
cause like the kid in these lyrics we wish they were out of the picture as
surly as this teen does his old piece of gum. Let’s face it a kid with a gum
addiction, needs to know it’s near, but will only revert to the ABC gum as in
Already Been Chewed Gum, if there’s no new stick to unwrap and chew! And so we
see the winner in this scenario is the New Stick of Gum!
What you wonder, isn’t it the kid? Na! The kid’s a looser! Wan’a know
why? Cause in this example if we replace the word gum, with person or better
yet with friend or business associate, our kid left them hanging. And if
there’s one maxim that is as true today as it was the day Grammy needle-pointed
and hung it on the wall, it’s do unto others before they do it unto you. What!
You’re Grammy didn’t teach you anything like that! Buster, neither did mine!
Nope, in fact she taught me just the opposite. However, living in a world full
of Purple Pitches and smoke screens unsuspecting fools like me, and perhaps
you, can certainly get suckered in! It happens every day! It happens when we by
the extended warranty and we can’t find the paperwork when we get home and
don’t go back to the store to get it. It happens when we drive through the fast
food place and end up with someone else’s order but are to far down the road to
turn back. It happens when a cosmetic’s line shows us a twenty something model
and pitches us older gals that if we use their exclusive formula of _, and _
we’ll have skin like theirs.
In fact, having now been interviewed by our census takers for the third
time for the 2010 census, I’m certain we all know about being taken in! Where
else but the good old U. S. of A, would we hear, “The computer’s didn’t get it
right?” You’re pullin my leg, right! We, rather our government, bought them,
had them programmed, sent people door to door to pester us, and now someone’s
calling to get the straight scope! Are they kidding! Last time I watched, the
gov., that’s the government to you and me, knew everything from when our checks
were deposited, to what we owe. Want to know why I know that, it’s cause of the
computes where we keep all our info and through which any smarty-pants can
crosslink and learn everything! Think I’m kidding? Think again!
It’s rumored, that under George W’s watch, computer savvy individuals
could have easy tampered with our nation’s security. Think I’m wrong? Think
again! Way back in 1970, The Hubb’s and I saw a SiFi flick entitled, ‘Colossus:
The Forbin Project’. It was the first time we saw a machine, i.e. Colossus,
work to save humanity from itself by taking over the world, and the doc who
designed him in case there were, for want of a better word, any computer
glitches, became his forced genius in residence. Years later, there was
another, then another of these flicks. I think the most memorable moment for
SiFi junkies was the one with good old Hal. You remember him, don’t ya? Sure,
ya do! He was the Space Odyssey 2001 computer. Remember? He was malfunctioning
and Dave asked him to disconnect himself. But, Hal’s chillingly impersonal
voice insisted, “I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that.” That one statement gave rise
to the reality, however distant, that sometime in the future we could… would be
governed by our own inventions!
And that brings me to today. Sadly upon reviewing the downward spire of
civility, which until recently might have best been defined as; an individual act, or a manner of behaving
which conforms to social conventions of propriety, we see that winning today
requires one to be willing to discern when to adhere and when to bend the fiber
of the very civilization we live in. Enter ‘The Rise and fall of the Roman Empire ’. Now I suspect you’re thinking I’m alluding
to a book and believe me the study of why Roman fell is one that scholars have
been studyin’ and writin’ about for generations. So, although I do not have a
specific volume in mind, should you wish to peruse some texts there are a
plethora, as in a ton, to choose from. But, I digress, the reason I brought up Rome
Really, I must
asks, “Who is you’re friend?” Is it the gal or guy you meant to call before
something better came along. Is it you’re beautician or barber you tell all
you’re troubles to without listening to theirs. Is it the couple you and you’re
squeeze grab a bite with, since you have nothing left to share with each other.
Who in this wide world of talented, lonely, interesting, bored, giving, needy,
greedy, people are you connected with? Not connected through work, school, or
job, though all of these are good ways to become sort of superficially
connected. No, what I’m speaking of is those people you choose to become
connected with, even when it’s difficult, perhaps, even nearly impossible to
stay connected. You know the ‘till death do we part’ kind of connection. The
kind that doesn’t take a holiday without letting you know their going. Or
better yet, the kind that sends you a postcard that says, ‘wish you were here!’
Wow! I remember getting a card like that once upon a time when people were
civil! Know who won with that brief note. Both of us, the sender, and me! We
both won! We won each other’s friendship, felt valued, and in turn returned the
favor a hundred fold! Think I’m kidding! Try it my friend! You’ll never know
how good it feels to be valued until you intentionally take someone off you’re
rotating list of faves, and treat them like they matter. Until then, everyone
on you’re list, possibly even me, are just as expendable as Hal and you all
know what happened when he told Dave, “I'm afraid I can't do
that,” Dave pulled the plug! So unless you, and me want to find ourselves in rotation
hell, let’s pull the plug on the charade. If you have someone waiting in the
wings, like the kids ABC, back up piece of gum, give’em the axe. It’s the
kindest thing you can do and believe it or not, your act of clarity can save
you and the good old US of A, cause Rome Rome
Walking Down the Road
At a certain point, I began
thinking of my journey through life as walkin down a road. And since “The
Hubb’s” is a SiFi guy, at times I likened myself to a sort or female “Road
Warrior,” kind like Mad Max, who was played by good old Mel in 1979. Now we all
know that life can be hard and at times definitely its stranger than fiction.
I’m certain Gibson can attest to that cause when his infamous rant hit the
tabloids his popularity ebbed. And he discovered the wisdom of recanting his
cant if you know what I mean. When that happened I thought, How sad it was for him that he lost it. Why did I feel that way, you
might wonder. Because his outburst, which did not ender him to anyone as far as
I can tell, seemed to parallel in an odd way my discovery that for apparently
no reason whatsoever individuals like you and me continue to feel un-faired
upon. Oh common know you might moan Mel’s ran was about Jewish people! Aren’t
you Jewish. Don’t you care about your own people? To answer you question, “Yes,
I am and yes, I do!” But remember this book is about you!
But to answer you question,
unspoken though it is, I will go so far as to say that I’m not a proponent of
people loosing it anymore
than I’m a fan of our country getting bogged down in mire that’s not ours.
Suppose that Mel, like you and me, grew up feeling that he had a right to say
his bit. Suppose that we go a step further…what would that look like? Well for
one thing, if people didn’t sensor themselves to garner favor we’d know who
they where and what they believed. Boy, oh boy that sounds like a step in the
right direction if you ask me! Furthermore, if we lived in a land where the
truth was prized above currying favor with people, many who were less than
truthful might see the advantage in becoming a truth say-er. Sounds good
doesn’t it? Think of it, just maybe there’d be more civility in our country
today and less putdowns. If that happened, our country might become a more
gracious land. A place where people were less likely to judge each other, more
tolerant of our individual freedoms a
place where those who misbehaved got a time out – not additional press
coverage. In other words, it might look more like the fifties, which seemed in
retrospect to be a time when we didn’t allow unseemly behavior to predominate
our media to the point where all we viewed and read about was that behavior,
making it the norm.
Way before the antihero, we
were a nation of everyday people, working in everyday jobs and caring for each
other without all the fanfare and notoriety. No one looked for or sought the
press. No one wanted that kind of life except those who choose to work in an
industry where name or face recognition was required like the movies, the
political arena, or the personally appointed movers and shakers. However, to
day it seems that everyone wants to one-up each other in the pecking order of
life. If they can’t get were they want to be they may try to butter people up
while they pull their perceived competition down. Now I bet your thinking this
can’t happen to you. But it can and probably has. Although you might not have
noticed it if you’re as nice my hubby is, have better things to think about, or
don’t care. In the world of that not to distant passed where nasty people got
their comeuppance through peer pressure or court the system if their behavior
went that far afield, today it seems that we really are living in the carnival
sideshows scary hall of mirrors.
If you are wondering why I’m
speaking…err rather writing about this, let me esplain. Once upon a time, I
joined a group where everyone seemed to be on the same page. We all espoused
the same beliefs and were passionate about the same things. We began to share
and little by little, people subconsciously, as in without knowing it,
affiliated with one person or another. About that time, one person called
another out. The person left the group. Years later, she returned. The
individual who had misunderstood her was no where in sight. However, the
returnees honeymoon period with the group was shattered when her nemeses
reappeared. Now as I shared with you before, we all know the value of
leaving…yep-a-doddle we do! However, by this time said woman had gotten some
“Good Stuff” to quote a statement from one of the kids in “The Goonies” flick of 1985. And we all know that the good stuff is worth everything
don’t we? Yep we do! But…and here’s the question, “How do we know what the good
stuff is? And when does the pain of staying and getting the good stuff outweigh
the need to leave?”
I know if your a
guy your thinking, This doesn’t concern
me cause its a female thing probably brought about by the gals monthly cycle.
As soon as her hormones get back in the groove, everything will be groovy.
Or perhaps you’re thinking, Wow this
authors maken a mountain out of a mole hill! Perhaps I am but I don’t think
so. And the reason is everyone has to walk down their own road. However, many
people get derailed and don’t finish their walk. Others get to the finish line
and find their not on the road they intended to be on. Still others get
themselves stuck. Shakespeare, as in William, you know - the English dude who was the poet
and playwright, of yesteryear said it best when he
penned, “to
thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst
not then be false to any man,” in his tragedy Hamlet.
Now if you’re like me and
I’ll bet you are…we didn’t sign up for tragedy! Nope! We signed up for happy
every after! Didn’t we! Course we did. But what if, just suppose that we
discovered that to get to happy ever after we had to boldly go where none of us
wants to go, into the bowels of tragedy. What if we can only experience happy
ever after - after we’ve known heartache. Take Bruce Lee for example. When my
hubb’s and I were dating I was exposed to the world of martial arts cause he
was into that in a big way, taught Judo at the YMCA and the Boys Club and for
him Chuck Norris was just another sparing partner. So let’s look at Lee since
my hubby admired him. Did you know that he was supposed to play the oriental
martial arts sidekick of Inspector Clueso that bumbling fool played by Peter
Sellers played in the 1963 The Pink
Panther and all the sequels that followed? But he was passed over. So Lee, the best of the best according to my
husband, took the role of Kato the sidekick to the Green Hornet in a TV show
with that monocure which aired from 1966–1967. Although he was un-faired upon it never fazed him. Know why I know?
Because although the guy was passed over he kept on keeping on. Today, long
after the guy who played Clueso’s sidekick name has been forgotten, Lee’s name
remains. That’s right! Lee had a film career and not as a sidekick but as the
head honcho! He made five films. The first one The Big Boss hit the silver
screen in 1971, eight years after the Pink
Panther had in my mind made the cinema hall of fame. Thought Lee’s films
developed a cult following he didn’t strike it big until Enter the
Dragoon in 1973. In my book that’s a long time for a gift martial artist to wait and a
lot to deal with.
Hey, if he could hang tough so can we! But you’re thinking I’m not a gifted
blankety-blank, as in fill in the blankets. Oh contrar, as in your pullen my leg! You are! At some point you’ve
either learned it or will at some point know that you are exactly like Lee or
any other person who hung tough. However, between now and then or between
acknowledgement and action you might want to open a martial arts school as Lee
did or follow Sam Walter Foss’ wise
words in his poem titled House by the
Side of the Road, which in part says,
Let me live in a house by the side of the
road
Where the race of men go by-
The men who are good and the men who are bad,
As good and as bad as I.
I would not sit in the scorner's seat
Nor hurl the cynic's ban-
Let me live in a house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.
Where the race of men go by-
The men who are good and the men who are bad,
As good and as bad as I.
I would not sit in the scorner's seat
Nor hurl the cynic's ban-
Let me live in a house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.
Or you might chose to emulate Washington Washington Washington Washington
The Marble Game
When my brother was little,
he and I would play marbles. Since he wasn’t the healthiest kid on the block
many days, especially the rainy ones, were spent idling the time away shooting
while each of us hoped we would score. Sometimes we’d just lie on our bellies,
hold an aggie, Tiger, or mica marble up to the light, and rotate it so we could see
the beauty hidden within. At other times we’d bet the prizes we’d saved from
Crackerjacks like the “12 Charms” or the
“Smitty Candy Premium,” which to us seemed worth there weight in gold! Now
don’t get me wrong there were other fun things as well like the “Halloween
Skull” and “Gumball Prizes.” But being Jewish we didn’t hang any skulls up for
Halloween and havin a mom who was definitely into us keeping the teeth we were
born with gumballs were frowned upon although I must confess Ron, my brother –
not my husband, and I ate our share of them behind moms back.
But “The Marble Game,” now
that was a different story entirely cause it was okay to play…so play we did.
It didn’t take me long to discover that I played so I could eye Ron’s amazing
marbles and Ron played to win. Now back in the day, girls who had a modicum of
awareness knew that the social norm dictated that we loose. So losing shouldn’t
have been an issue. Right? Wrong! Loosing as in ‘you’re a loser’ was a big
issue for me…remember I had a rough start and was playing catch-up so loosing
wasn’t an option! Yet the more I silently dug my heels in and steamed or on the
occasion when I occasionally dug a
trench and entrenched myself in ‘The Rightness of My Opinion’ as in only my
opinion is right I wanted to put up a fight made me more of a loser. But I did
it anyway.
Much to my chagrin, I never
won and I soon discovered that I wasn’t haven any fun. That wouldn’t have
mattered except for one lone factoid which I thought and now believe is true
for everyone. What your wonderin was…I mean is that? I bet you know. You think
you don’t? Think again. Think back to when you were in kindergarten. Didn’t you
want to believe that everything revolved around you? That’s right we’re back to
YOU again. In fact, we’ve never left you cause everythin you think, feel and
experience is filtered through your you-o-meter as surly as my experiences are
filtered thought mine. And I don’t mean surely Shirley as in the inanely funny
movie Airplane where Leslie Nielsen’s line in response to ‘surely you
can't be serious’ is “I am serious...and don't call me Shirley.”
But back to marbles as in winning it ALL! Once I owned up to wanting to win
in the most desperate way. As in, could he shot left handed since Ron was a
righty? Would he see my need and to paraphrase Knute Rockne’s famous speech let me, “Win One for the
Gipper,” which in this instance was me, or to be more grammatically correct I,
not the fall football player of the Notre Dame team in the 1928 Army game. But
as surely as Knute made that speech Ron always won. If I’d known then what I
know now I might have admired his skill which he honed while I helped mom with
the household chores. Instead, I learned a valuable lesson, which, if you like
I’ll impart to you. As in, your part of my imparting is to determine if what
I’m selling makes you give a fig or decide to leave the gig.
What, you’re
wondering, you’re not suggesting that I
leave my whatever et all. Yep-a-doodle that’s just what I’m saying. But it
goes further than that. Remember our good friend Sartre, that eminent French
Existentialist Philosopher who wrote in his seminary work,
Existentialism is Humanism, ‘…in choosing,
therefore, we commit not only ourselves, but all of mankind.’ You do? Good!
Let’s use Sartre as our role model and see what he might do when faced with
this marble-ly quandary. 1). He might leave since staying validates his losing.
2). He might decide to practice his game and begin playing when he believed he
and the other player were evenly matched. Or 3). I know your thinking there’s
always a three with me. And indeed you’re right as rain! So, 3). He might
choose to do something else with his time.
And so can we. However, our
parents, elected officials bosses and worst of all ‘The Committee in Our Head’
are dead set against us varying from their social norm. That is, unless the
other___, what ever that is, you fill in the blank, seems valuable or doable to
them. Take it from one who knows, Michelangelo di Lodovico
Buonarroti Simoni that Italian Renaissance
painter, sculptor, architect, poet, and engineer whose parents
bowed out when he was only fourteen because his father had persuaded Ghirlandaio to pay his
apprenticeship as an artist, which was highly unusual at the time. Had another
unusal thing occurred on in his young life when in
1489 Lorenzo de’ Medici,
de facto ruler of Florence
So you’re wondering why should I, I mena you care? Let me pontificate. I
mean enumerate; if we all let the marble game or whatever game we wanted to win
at when we were young, or needy, or worse yet greedy, trap and define us we
would be the victim and our parents, teachers, society, country or whatever, on
infanitem we would call the victimizer. However, we can leave the marble game.
We can choose to become personally responsible for our choices, and chose to
make the ones that affirm the things we value, surround ourselves with people
who value us and what we are doing and strive be congruent. When we do that, we
will discover that marbles is child’s pay when we compare it to all we will
experience when we chose to live our life on our terms.
Oh Promise Me
When we marry, we make a
pledge. In fact, we make many. Some are spoken others in fact most are never
voiced. Until it happens on some fateful day that the preverbal _ hits the _.
Now it must be noted that everyone’s _ is different. As I mentioned chapters
ago in the San Fernando Valley of the eighties many couples left their promises
in the ashtray of life as they totted off for a romp in the, “Hey man its
groovy! Sides everyone’s doin it,” way of life. For the hubb’s and me that was
a big NO cause we knew that what we did defined who we were and whom we would
become. So we cleaved to each other though at times the stress of doing that
made me wonder where the meat clever was should I need to knock some essence.
Ops Paula’s fopa - I meant sense into the big glug! And though I never pulled
the clever out of its butcher-block sheath just knowing where it was made me
smile. And I know that Ron like me smiled when I put on my wedding ring when I
awoke every morning, first thing even before my feet hit the floor.
So imagine my misgivings last
year when the diamond he had given me forty three years ago with the comment,
“Its flawed and yellow,” and my assuring response, “We are all flawed and none
of us is perfect,” became a reality. Not that we had discovered that our spouse
was less than we thought them to be or that they were displeased with us but
the diamond, that stone of wedded bliss, which my jeweler had assured me would
break, broke and disappeared as if it had never been there. What was left were
the prongs reaching into space to clasp that all important bauble the one that
every girl hoped for and a fortunate few received, the ring of promise. The ring
that signified fidelity, unity, and commitment, the ring gifted as an eternal
pledge, which was now nothing, more than a relic of the past. Having no money
to replace what I secretly knew was irreplaceable we did the next best thing
and bought a cubic Z which is another name for a manmade diamond. And believe
me though it cost a paltry $100 that one hundred felt like a thousand to me.
However, with the new stone in place I marveled at its ability to overshadow my
loss for it was the perfect stone for the ring, unlike the other, which though
given in love required that the jeweler move prongs closer together since the
setting was for a larger stone. For the first time in my marriage, the stone
and ring seemed in harmony with each other just as my husband and I were.
A year later the unthinkable
happened, the rings band broke. Close inspection showed that the ware of years
had taken its toll and oddly enough, that was all right. Knowing it was time to
move on Ron and I went to the mall where I quickly picked out a silver and gold
replacement on sale for under fifty dollars. When I looked at my husband, I
found that I couldn’t buy the ring because I saw what I believed to be sorrow
in his eyes. So I put it down, promised to wait until we could fix my wedding
ring and walked away.
A few days later ‘My Oh
Promise Me Moment’ hit and I knew that the best thing I could do for both of us
was move on. He would never ask it of me but since I was ready to let go I knew
he would be relieved. With my girlfriend in tow, I returned to the kiosk in the
mall, pointed to the ring, and heard her sigh. Before she uttered a word I had
the ring on my finger it felt heavy and foreign yet it seemed right. Her
misgivings ringing in my ear I paid the man asked him to remove the price tag
and placed it on the finger, which my wedding band / engagement ring had
encased less than twenty-four hours before. As I looked down at the simple
band, I thought of my Grandmother Pauline’s wedding band, which my mother had
asked me to use in memory of her mother who had died when she was a teenager
and an amazing sense of peace and the rightness of what I was doing descended
upon me. I knew as inexplicable as I did on my third date with my husband that
what I was doing was The Right Ting. Not just for me but for us.
This leads me to ask you,
“When do you know if what your doing affirms you, your process, you values and
the you that you want to become. At what point are you willing to remove the
band of promise, which is what an engagement ring is, and replace it with the
fidelity that affirms your choices and resides within your heart? Now you might
be thinking that I’m pitching you and you know what? I am! I’m pitching you
about you cause when the rubber meets the preverbal road if you don’t stand for
something you’ll fall for almost anything. If you think I’m wrong read the book
or watch the movie The Picture of Dorian Gray in which Dorian a good-looking young
man covets his looks instead of anything else. With his wish granted and none
of the debauchery he reveals in visible because all his insipid behavior is
recorded the artist likeness of himself he corrupts himself. And just like
Lucifer that being of light that coveted Gods kingdom he gets his in the end.
So in closing I would
like to caution you and me not do as Robert Herrick suggested when he wrote, ‘Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,’ or
follow in the footsteps of Dylan Thomas
who suggested we not, “…go gentle into that good night.” Instead, I’d like to
suggest that unlike the people the book of Judges in verse 21:25 refers to when it says, In those days Israel
It
would be sad indeed, if upon reflection as our time wound down that each of us
discovered that the race we had won, the fight we had fought, the things, which
defined us, didn’t matter one iota and our life, this precious human coil,
which we can only experience once was in our own mind a do-over. So watch for
The Purple Pitches and sidestep them left and right. Be alert! Be resourceful
and fight with all your might to become YOU! After all, YOU’RE worth it! In
fact, YOU are worth far more than you know and you have more to offer than
you’ll ever accomplish if you don’t let go of entitlement, sorrow the need to
be one-up or one-down or your fear about tomorrow. Which leads me to my finally
tada! In Frank Herbert's science fiction masterpiece, Dunne the Bene Gesserit Reverend
Mother says, “Fear is the little death, fear is the mind killer.” Think of that
when you want to take the easy road rather than the one you’re called to walk
remember that saying. Otherwise, some day others might sing dirges for you in
the dark while your wife rushes to the mall to replace her wedding band not out
of love but for peace and harmony, which she is willing to buy for less than
fifty bucks while she wishes you had become the man she thought you’d be. Or
girls you might find yourself wishing for a prince rather than the reality you
have wedded yourself to. So again, I say look before you leap and keep the
pledges you pledged to keep. When each of you do that whether your married to a
job, a person or a cause your ‘Oh Promise Me’ becomes a defining commitment
which you can look at with confidence whenever other things assail you and you
think you can’t hold on. Because one affirming stake within your personhood
leads to another and another and before you know it, people are looking to you
for direction and guidance. When they do reflect upon your journey and say
‘yes,’ because it’s through the journey to personhood that we learn. But we
don’t quiet know what we’ve learned until we are called to pass it on.
Not the it I wrote about as in “Is America
