The Latte is flowing at the office today. Ha. The boys are here. Yesterday, it was an all-girl crew and they were working even harder than today’s mixed crew. The fellow known as Simon is very fit, very friendly. His is a perfect v shape and there are very well defined muscles showing through that tight grey t-shirt. He is hairy in ways that young men aren’t anymore. His face is always clean shaven but arms are delicious and lightly furred. A few dark, coiled threads at the neck of his shirt hint seductively at the prize beneath. I have been suspicious that fellows shave where they never would have before. Do you wonder? Maybe they wax? Maybe Brazilian? I wonder about Simon. He chatted through the window one day and I learned he is a bit of an amateur musician, too. Small world. He has a nice personality and doesn’t seem like one of those demanding straight guys at all. I expect that if I were to suggest something impure, he would laugh and gently decline, feeling flattered. Maybe he would blush? He would go home to his young lady friend and brag just a little bit I suppose.

Jorge is an even sweeter dispositioned young lad but his bum is a bit female/round and he has a little teensy bit of flab on his lazy body. His polished star is that he does have an awful nice haircut versus Simon and the ‘perenially, just ever so scruff look’. Jorge fits in with the ‘odd bod’ customer day today. Where Simon has a perfect V that maybe could be seen as a little overmuch… it is TOO well defined and his bum is very flat… Jorge is another matter. He is a pretty down to earth, ordinary sort. His jeans are held up by being tight around the hip. They aren’t tight at his waist (as is the fashion) but they aren’t in danger of sliding down. He is pear-shaped in an inverted V. The pants legs are very tight and it must be hard to get in or out of the damn things. I bet he has to lay on the bed and pull hard. Hahah. I wonder if he needs help getting them off?

Odd customer bod day has spread. There was one fellow with no socks on and very thin legs. His pants were rolled too high and the combination of skinny legs, torso and bare skin made me worry that he would catch cold. He does have a mask on and furry hair so I guess he will be allright. He is, also, too young for me to go over and inquire without a police escort. Mr. Normal just arrived. He is average height and ectomorph. Big feet though…really big. A high wind would not unsteady him. If his baggy jeans fall the rest of the way down (as they threaten to do), we will send you more detailed and intimate information. I will maintain vigilance and catch you later, kids…

Behind the gun today. A late start (which bothers the dickens out of me) and a hurried bit of being overwhelmed have put me out of sync with my world. I see boogey-men and women surrounding me. It is a real chore to keep moving and not allow myself to be angry when the ordinariness of day catches me. The ordinariness of that fellow with the unrestrained, over exciteable dog… you know the one. That fellow and his dog who just step out in front of a moving vehicle, assuming it will be able to stop in time. After I survive passing him and move on, then the woman who parked too close to me waits impatiently while I try to rock my car out of the space she wedged me into. The honks, the stares, the long lines – all of it a tragedy on an otherwise beautiful day like this. Sigh.

‘The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars but in ourselves that we are underlings…’ We are not fated? Our day is made by our own hand? Yes, my ability (or inability) to climb out of the ugly box is my salvation (or destruction). Is that our test as humans? All of us? That we should suffer to carry on without having a fully satisfactory violent scene at least once per day? Ah yes. We can’t blame it on God or the man and his dog. Equally, we can’t simply flow with it, believing the scene is willed and bash our vehicle repeatedly into the offender vehicle. Damn.

The truth is, were I to pause a moment, today is a beautiful day. They all are. Even the days of full arthritic pain or the death of a loved one are gorgeous days. How far out of the beauty I allow myself to be distracted is up to me. The human part is that, sometimes… a person just can’t separate from the prevailing emotion. That’s okay, too. Part of the no-plan perfection? I wrote a poem about perfection yesterday. It wasn’t perfect. Ha.

There are signs, shown to me daily. I can see them or not. It is myself, speaking from the depths of consciousness? I started working on a book about signs and got lost, I wasn’t sure how to tell the page what I was thinking, how to describe it. The signs can be as simple as a spilled drink, urging me to pay attention or as complicated as the woman at the end of the row of tables. She is obese and holds herself as though she felt uncomfortable. She doesn’t look happy and is trudging through eating a large sandwich. Occasionally, she raises her voice in a drowning sigh and I can hear her negativity. I am knowing, in my heart, that this person is the epitome of ‘garbage in – garbage out’. I am thinking she is a sign sent to me. My emotional approach to this day results from the garbage I swallow – I am poisoning myself with unrealistic expectation. I am not feeding myself properly with liberal doses of forgiveness. Okay.

I eat too much and of the wrong thing – from time to time. I spend too much and desire too much – from time to time. I drink too much of the right things – from time to time. I am trapped by the limitations placed on me by life and circumstance – from time to time. I dream of another place – from time to time and I aim my little boat there by doing my work – from time to time. Everything is okay – from time to time. Voila!

The beautiful day is revealed to me – from time to time.

Birth Anniversary Number 70

My fingers are rapidly twisting, now. The arthritis seems to be taking a faster pace, moving the smaller bones around. A combination of twisty fingers and crepe paper skin make me nearly unrecognizable to myself. Sigh. The joint problems have been with me a while and aren’t that big a deal, really. I am used to the stiffness, pain. The other signs of passing time are with me, too. For example, my hair has been grey so long that I don’t remember it brown anymore. Old photos are always a bit of shock to me. “Who is that guy?” The changes don’t deeply concern me. I am not saddened or chagrined or regretful or bitter at advancing age. I am not vain. I am not focused on believing in my own beauty. I am not demanding the mirror respond to my liking. I am just not ready to fully embrace today.

I was having fun, after all. I did not know that, then. I know that now. Being young was very nice, regardless the times and circumstances, regardless the anxieties, the poor choices, the obstinacy. It was good. Looking back, I see that. Yes, I am as any other human – I don’t fully realize and value the present. And, like every other lucky human, I have experienced time enough to look back and say, “Hey, you should have kept on and followed the dream. It was just around the corner and you were feeling fine!” There are many things I might have done, but I don’t regret that. I am become aware, at this late date, how none of that matters a whit. First, it is far too late to turn back, second, we can’t turn back. We are locked in this thing, what ever it may be or become. “We are Stardust …billion year old carbon….” and just like Joni Mitchell, we will end in a cycle of decay, to spin down slowly and fade away or explode one day. All of our work and building comes to nothing. We are (most of us) pre-grandmas and pre-grandpas with the rocking chair still in it’s shipping container.

Personally, I have begun tearing at the rocking chair packaging, cursing the little plastic pellets that stick to every bloody thing. I am not ready to set the thing up just yet, but I have an idea how it goes together. I can feel it in my joints.

There was no final
puff and gone.
Awareness played at tag along
to wake in this articulated bed,
bright lights and physicians
swimming overhead.
“Wow! You almost bought it,”
an unseen someone said.

I gasped in thought, “Not quite bought?”
..to learn a mortgage unpaid still
on my imagined space under the low hill.
With free movement frozen by tubes and wires,
leaving desire’s last world harmed me dearly.
It seems that when you ‘buy the farm’,
it’s only successful …nearly.
“Hey!” to The Doctor I say,
“Your alarm is beeping clearly.”

You have: a murder of crows, a flock of seagulls, a shrewdness of apes, an obstinacy of buffalo, a clowder of cats, a fluffle of bunnies, a mob of cattle.. I have: a mess of dishes.

I have been eating my way through the pandemic and the U.S. election campaign. I have a mess of dishes and an abundance of extra weight. My hard-fought battle with fading beauty is a shambles, a loss. My clothes don’t fit. My knees hurt, my back hurts, I have acid reflux again. I can’t sleep because of restless leg syndrome. I am irritable and there is not enough cherry pie to see us all through this worry, all the fretting, all the fear of future. Perhaps, there is enough gin? The drugs, the food ease the distractions, the craziness. I eat too much, I drink too much. I have been upset, tight, tense, worried. I know these things and I look up from my temporary desk. I gaze onto the masked crowd and wonder what they can be thinking. Are they equally askew?

Today’s group at the office are unique as any. Two young fellows (probably teen-age yet?) are ordering their special drinks and waiting patiently in the correct area. They are wearing masks and speaking quietly to each other. (I don’t think my relatives will appreciate the following observations so they are welcome to skip the next couple of sentences and save themselves the dismayed, judgemental reactions.) These two youngsters are strapping, though one is perhaps overweight. He isn’t far off the scale of healthy structure, however, he is just a big fella. This larger of the two is wearing loose, stretchy material shorts and obviously nothing else under. His ‘equipment’ is quite large and easily visible. He really should wear underwear in order to contain the distracting bounce. The bounce is akin to a train wreck and I find it impossible to look away. Hmmm. Should I approach and inform? Perhaps not. The other fellow is equally intriquing. He raised his arms in a broad stretch (he is quite tall and could almost touch the ceiling) and his t-shirt lifted, revealing the band of his bright red and silk-like underwear. They are both pussycat-like and living in the moment, they are just being. They are both in a warm pool of sun. Je suis curieux/jaune… I consider the possiblities, the positions. I smile at the consideration. It is a good image even though it is something to resist, my believing that desire can be naughty or evil somehow, that there is a proscribed right way to be and a wrong way to be.

So funny. The being human is a hard job. Darn that Eve and Adam! If they hadn’t eaten fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, we wouldn’t have to notice and speculate on each other’s dangly bits, full of worry that we are being naughty or bad. We wouldn’t have to fear the random imperfectness of everything. Now, in the same way that Snow White was slipped into a coma, we are slipped into conscious awareness of our nakedness, of goodness and badness. Even under the fig leaf of fabric, our nakedness entices.

Perhaps apples are the problem? Don’t know. I do sense that the other lifeforms who share this planet don’t fear the loss of living or the loss of perfection through their waking moments. I do know that the little creatures don’t peer surreptitiously at each other’s magic parts and worry that they are being nasty or doing something wrong. The lovely beasts just sniff and hump the willing and are done with it. Some dance around a bit and wave their feathers or build intricate structures and some don’t. Some race away through the water with potential partners following behind, attempting to be firstest with the mostest and some don’t. The one truth that fits all is that the beasts just do and desire and don’t fret about it. They embrace what is random. They accept what is.

Is it shrewd of the apes to just live and accept who/what/where they are and what happens? My gut response is: yes. We humans have built incredible castles of right and wrong that obscure what is real and will stand out in the end. We deny. We think we can do better with life. We believe we can build perfection, safety, eternity, peace…that war can be prevented, bad politicians, unpleasant social interactions or deadly disease avoided. It’s a noble effort, of course. It isn’t possible always.

We obfuscate and complicate what is easy to understand if we would just leave it alone and swing with it. How much less stressful if we accepted things as they are? If we left life alone to do it’s magic without a judgement call? If we relaxed and accepted that the flow is perfect, neither good nor bad however the flow goes. How much easier, less intense, less worrisome our desires become if we accept them. Acceptance requires a lot less effort. Living would be easier if we didn’t spend life in futile, desperate attempts to avoid death. We don’t accept the processes of life for what they are: life and death and hunger and satiation. Just things that are pieces of the whole. The tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil was only a source of worry.

With all of our apple knowledge, we witness that perfection has a form. It is life and man and woman and progeny. Trouble is, we can see that life has an end. We call It death. We think death is bad, evil, painful. We think life is good, delightful, to be defended. We fear death, so deny it, delay it, put it off at every turn. For myriad reasons, we think life is good so attempt to refine, perfect, prolong it. The denying of death makes death the harder to endure. It is going to happen no matter the number of cures or surgeries or the dedicated healthy lifestyle. The lusting for life makes the living more complicated. Searching for perfection, we deny the real. We reject what is different, that sometimes a person is brought to life without a body part or that sometimes a person veers off the procreation path with another sort of desire.

The univese expands but it’s stars, it’s living things die and collapse, drawing everything in toward tinyness. From that tinyness is probably another bang of bigness, of randomness and life again. I say probably, I say maybe because I don’t know. My observation of the circuituousness of nature gives me that Idea. I only know what I can see, that we elaborate the yin and yang, the male and female, the yes and no, the one plus one equals three that exists. We overvalue the Barbie and Ken, the Joseph and Mary, the God and Satan because we don’t like things to be out of order. We want randomness to be set aside. We want to always feel good, look good, be good. That wouldn’t be a possibility. Randomness is essential to the whole, I think. You can’t have a perfect circle if no wobbly ones exist. You can’t have life if death is absent. You can’t have straight if nobody is gay. You can’t have love if there is no losing love. You can’t have peace and tranquility without war and upset. You can’t have today without yesterday and tomorrow.

So. I sit down with my tea and I don’t worry today. I ogle, I sniff and think about humping. I eat my bagel in the moment, not thinking about pooping later. Later is later and will come when and how it does.

Something is in the air these past few days. There have been mistakes made, some serious, some less so. I was up and about, participating in mundane life and working with my hands to help folks. I cooked dinner for friends, assembled a garden shed for my sister-in-law. I carried some things back and forth and I am planning a last few fruits/vegetables to preserve for the coming winter. I visited a friend in another town, attended the virtual remembrance service for my mother. I cleaned house and finalized a plan for moderate renovations. I put new tires on the car and realized how dirty the car became from the running around I did. It needs me to wash it. Maybe it is dirt that’s in the air? I say something is in the air because all of the above usually get put on the shelf for another time and music/writing/talking on Facebook are front and centre. I also say something is in the air because the air is vibrating with error.

I have not been writing or concentrating on my music. Usually, that is not so much different from week to week. I never practice enough. I avoid rehearsal of my choral pieces, I leave piano for ‘later in the day’. When I do manage to sit down at the keyboards (various types) and things don’t go the way I hope, I get bored. I get up. I go do something else. One habit I have kept is I do write something most days. I am not brilliant and I know it to be so. I need the practice. Still, to tell myself the truth – I rarely attack art seriously. Maybe this next week it will be work, work, work? I don’t think so.

Whether writing at all is a thing I should do or whether being a musician is a worthy exercise have been questions for some time. I have had friends tell me it would be best that I not do these things. Yet, like a serial art murderer I keep returning to the scene of my crimes. I keep wandering back in to the muse’ library room. Since I was about 12 or 13, I have periodically worked on writing projects of various descriptions. I always end by setting them down to go do other things, like work for a living. I do keep being drawn to creative arts, though. It is that I haven’t dared make art my life or my work. I don’t find the self discipline for a dedication to these things. I am too easily distracted. Maybe I am a milk-wagon horse without blinders?

At times, I think it best that I not agonize about ‘Pursuing’ art but just relax and allow it to flow as it flows. I’m not an artist. Not really. I don’t do the work, the due diligence. I do what I feel and don’t take art seriously. It’s a good thing I have no schedule, no deadlines, no contracts to honour. If that were true, I would give Truman Capote a run for his title as champion procrastinator. I have no expectation of receiving a cheque and truly don’t need one, there is enough money to pay the rent. I don’t need to worry about a red or lost face event, there are no famous writer or singer friends/contemporaries/no spouse to be embarrassed before. I do enjoy the company of magnificently talented folk but they don’t judge me. Only one has ever let on but I know they don’t take me seriously. Partly, I try to just be quiet and partly, they humour me. I don’t even have grandchildren explaining to their friends about how charming the unpolished poems and songs are. “Oh, that’s my foolish old Granddad amusing himself and boring the crap out of me.” Margaret Atwood has a country home nearby but the likelihood of her bumping into me for a possible critique of my work is remote. The teacher who viciously attacked my intellect and the brother who harshly criticized my level of education are both far away, distant now. They will not likely consider or judge me anymore. Those doors are closed. I have nothing to hold me back.

I talk to Facebook, since I don’t have an art audience other than or outside of my cyber friends to perform for. In all my awareness of the true value of my art, one thing stands. I need the audience. This is a serious problem. Needing an audience and finding one on Facebook, I get into trouble with a misunderstood or too-overt phrase periodically. I am trying to keep away from the fray. I have been trying to free myself for the last six years or so that I have been on Facebook. It won’t be possible, I fear.

In the last six years, I ticked off my remaining aunts with my raw humour. They did not understand at all. I provoked a sermon of judgement regarding my opinion of digital audio from a cousin. He ended the rant-in-answer-to-my-rant by reminding me that HE has an education in these matters, I do not. In the last few days (something in the air days) I have again run aground with my determined speech. I ticked off a cousin and dished a new in-law. All of this was in the open air market, for the consumption of all and algorithm. That, along with other events has piqued the ire of my distant brother, who adamantly chastised me through a third party. Ha. He didn’t speak to me, face to Facebook. It’s likely that he will not speak to me ever again. Oooops. I am human, being human is pretty expensive. There is something in the air.

All we need from Donald Trump is some sort of ‘enabling act’ and we will have our return to 1935 Germany. It’s true, he is puffing up as the grand cock, about to take control of the barnyard. The great orange cock is filled with hate. He may have no wacky little beard and we have no Charlie Chaplin to portray him but we do have Randy Rainbow and the comb-over hair. The first debate became nothing less than an incoherent shouting match, with a red-faced (under the orange makeup) sham of a human being assaulting civility. He proved himself all bluster and threat but he managed to take control, he forced us to pay attention to him. He is pushing, he is riding over civil behaviour and stealing the starlight. With the relentless aid of the Fox news propaganda machine grinding away at truth, we have all we need for a complete descent into chaos.

In a certain way, pushing through a further conservative Supreme Court justice may well prove to be what is democracy’s final undoing. Likely, that will be the last straw and enough to give Trump his ‘enabling act’. In the extremely likely case that Trump declares the election fraudulent and the decision goes to the House of Representatives, he has an advantage. Even though there is a Democratic majority of house members, each state gets only one vote to choose the president. There are 26 Republican state legislatures. The Republicans have proven themselves unwilling to do the right thing. It is probable that they will vote to doom the system.

No matter what, we can expect at least several months of rioting and police/right wing violence while the election moves ultimately toward the Supreme Court. There isn’t a legal process where Trump can declare himself ‘supreme leader’ yet but with control of the Supreme Court and control of the Senate, there easily could be. Yes, the election will be a sham. The result will have nothing to do with the will of the people. There is nothing to be done as long as Senate Republicans and House Republicans sit back and continue as they are doing. They are proving themselves to be most foul and lacking in any sort of moral decency.

Because of the relentless self interest of Republican legislators, the U.S. is going to go down in flames. That was unthinkable even a year ago. Now, it is almost a certainty. I know many folks think I am being hysterical, that I am over-thinking this, worrying too much. The debate proved me correct. I offer as example the fact the man exhorted a far-right extremist group to stand ready. He stood right there and spoke to The Proud Boys directly. The Proud Boy group leader almost spit out his beer in surprise at hearing the call, loud and clear. Beyond that, Trump openly dismissed the election as fraud and urged his supporters to invade the polls and evaluate the results. He has given us plenty of warning that his intentions are not honest. He made it quite clear that he will refuse to leave office.

So, what to do? I believe myself to be relatively safe here in Canada. That is, I am physically safe. My financial life is tenuous since all of my retirement income is sourced from the U.S. With Trump’s open war on Social Security, most of my income is at risk with no ‘safety net’. I do have savings outside of Social Security but they are dependant upon a stable U.S. financial system. With the coming battle over the White House, there is little to convince me the central banks, the insurance companies, the stock market will remain stable. It might take a while to crash but it is almost certain to be a wild ride. The thing that puzzles me is that with all of the uncertainty surrounding the government, somehow, the stock market didn’t crash? I don’t understand. What can the investors be thinking? Do they believe Trump is a saviour? That the system will prevail? Ha.

Indeed, what to do? The only rational thing is to stop worrying. There is nothing to do. The U.S constitutional authors didn’t forsee this. The great experiment failed and we are now on our own. Putin must be smiling! Kruschev was absolutely correct, my parents grandchildren will be living under what passed for communism. It wasn’t communism, of course, it was totalitarianism and bore little resemblance to the Ideas of Karl Marx. Donald is riding in on a red horse and nothing can be done. Sigh.

I voted, I did my best but I cannot allow the mess to soil me. I can step away from that scene and work on my stuff. I can write my blog, my books, my songs. I can play guitar and sing. I can bake a cake. I can exercise my freedoms, my rights as a human being and reject the fear these small folks are spreading. The best choice is to enjoy what I have while I still have it.

I have an approaching birthday, my 70th. I am in the shadow of my days. It is a low point, by the river where one can cross easily to the other side. It won’t take much more time. There is little to be gained with a backward glance at the fabled city. The city is in flames. I gather up my trousers for a bit of wading. It will take a while yet but the path for fording is clear. I shall chillax and continue. This is the way of it, then.

Poor Starbucks. They have not had my requisite tea (English Breakfast) for several days now. This is a major problem and has upset my equilibrium in serious fashion. Without my tea, I am dizzy, in a tizzy. I don’t know who I am anymore. The muse? (such as he/she is) has taken a break, a coffee break. The modern, younger inspirations are different than the classical variety. Being less committed to work and more committed to family and fulfillment, they just sit down from time to time. All of earth has shifted. It is seismic in all quarters. Dwight David Eisenhower is turning in the grave. Any change is a strange thing but the ones some of us are are trying to sleep through? hahahah.

On slow, tea-less days like today, I don’t feel the song. I know it is there but I can’t remember how to hear it. The radio plays but it is a hollow sound and only vaguely like music. Usually, there is great change afoot in that situation. In days past, a dull and quiet space like this one has led me to some other facet of writing, living. Is it a presently illumined former shadow I am noticing? Maybe I am seeing the tip of something breaking through dusk? While I wait to see what awaits at my new plateau, I shall describe the current obvious scene…

I heard the sounds of murder happening. There was a loud slap, then a shout went up from semi-circle gathered baristas celebrating one young woman’s successful fly kill. Cheers! Congratulations! At that point, I noticed the Abell Pest Control official who was crouching beneath the counter. What is it he is trying to kill? These few brief actions are adding an edge of dis-ease to my dining and drinking experience. It is totally dull and partly quiet here, otherwise. Industrial strength air conditioning is rolling away at full tilt, pouring exhausted heat out into an otherwise cool day. Pop music is gently pushing away at the loudspeakers. It’s a vintage pop from the sounds I can hear but not a known era to me, I cannot hear the lyrics or much of the chord accompaniment. The music is mostly acoustic blur. This troubles me further, regarding the missing muse. Vocal song is tactile for me, to fully hear it I have to feel it with my understanding. I am a blind man, white cane tapping in search when I cannot hear the core of a thing. If I can’t follow a lyric, the muse is absent. I am lost.

As if to find where I am, I cast a glance around the ‘dining room’. A man who earlier in the week introduced himself as Peter is sitting to my right. He is engrossed in his work (Some mystical sort of financial service which he tried to start selling me on when we met. I am not interested and he quickly gave up his pitch. Perhaps my ragged look warned him not to bother). He has a wide-eyed but squinted sort of countenance as if intensely solving a problem of historical dimensions. “Just how do we get the money laundered and through our Swiss numbered account without the Canadian authorities discovering what we are about? Hmmmmm.” Maybe, he is in touch with Bill Morneau. He seems an honest enough fellow but has an interesting story I would like to pursue some day. He tells me that he is currently living on a friend’s large boat, parked at the marina. His living arrangement has something to do with Covid restrictions but I am unclear why. When I am not so busy doing nothing, I will inquire further.

To my left is a young woman/man. I cannot really tell which without a serious, piercing and analytic stare. I am sure she would notice an old guy like me, trying to solve the mystery. My gut feeling is that she is a she. The wide shoulders and unusual height give me pause, though. Is she or isn’t she? Her brusque, purposeful movements and lip crunching intensity as she grips her pencil add up to Man In Drag. The unfeminine, spread legged, forward leaning stance makes me wonder as well. When I am not so busy doing nothing, I will inquire further.

I am busy just now. I am very occupied doing nothing of measurable value. I am typing and typing and drinking tea and finishing a bagel as if the U.S. president were a kind and wise man who had empathy for the rest of the planet. I am typing and typing and living as if there were no need for presidents or government or muses anymore. I am typing and typing as if that would finish a book and as if finished books mattered a whit. I am typing and typing but mostly because it is a thing I learned to do and it makes my arthritis feel a bit better. Hah.

Fairness. The forces of evil. Forces for good. Changes. So what. We are, the world is on the cusp of social and governmental (what is often refered to as seismic) transformation. Very soon, things ain’t goin’ to be the same. Populism, capitalism and Covid have guaranteed, inked, signed on the bottom line a contract that binds us to change, but what else is new? Any study of history, committed, cursory or maybe just casually ignored shows the same result. We are always in flux, whether on a pleasant summer day spent sitting out under glorious trees and reading a nice book or, on a pleasant early fall day spent sitting in, trying to write one. There is always change, even in my daily habit of a tea and bagel at Starbucks with my electronic pencil and paper to hand. Change is happening now, we can see it. It is right before our eyes, two blocks away, next door, halfway around the earth. At any moment, things could go either way. It is a game or a tense story. We are at the precipice, we are the brink. We worry. We fret, we elect politicians, we save our money, we can vegetables and soup but why worry? We always get to three strikes and then it’s the top of another inning. The game is also a many inning opera, a play. We always get to act three and the curtain falls, to rise again on another play whose death scene drags through another few acts. There is an indeterminate number of innings to the intense game and an endless supply of dramatic stories. We will know it is almost over when the fat lady sings (or Yogi Berra does or St. Peter does). I don’t hear anything yet. Not really.

I am at two strikes and one half for Starbucks. Saturday, they did not have my favourite tea. Sunday, they didn’t have my favourite tea or my favourite bagel. Today? No tea. Again. That is two and one half strikes. Compounding my frustration was the fact that I forgot to drag along my little wireless keyboard. That made typing difficult, I haven’t acquired speed or agility on the touch screen at this point. Many folks I know can click away without seeming effort but I can’t. I am stuck in the IBM selectric past of thinking with all my fingers and not just one. Ha. Today’s frustration all added up to “Why am I doing this?” again. Indeed, why? Am I saving myself? Am I saving anyone else? Is typing away into the wilderness solely a habit? Is this a valuable avocation? Am I stuck in the past with my little keyboard? My guess is that I type ritually, habitually and that it has little value.

Typing does give me something to do. It is a habit that I prefer over drinking all day. That is option number two and a very sound option. My old neighbour spent his retirement years doing exactly that. Starting at nine or ten a.m., he continued drinking until supper time. After supper, he would have one more while watching tv and retire early. His life was very still, predictable, without sudden, noisy movement or change. He didn’t seem aware of flux, he was ‘away’. Each day, save for the weather, was the same. Pop….sizzzzz, gulp. No upsets, all good. “What’s for dinner?”

Sitting, typing on my electronic devices is a habit I cultivated, thinking it would come to something maybe. As it happens, I prefer the pretend writing to drinking or busying myself with myriad tasks around the house, getting life-work done. Typing passes the time for me. I enjoy it. As tense as my consideration and chatting about how our reality can be, I would rather type and think with my fingers than clean or cook dinner or drink. At least sometimes. Sometimes, the story or the game get to me and I would rather drink or eat fresh cookies. And, there are times I realize that spending time doing the daily life living with mindfulness can also lift you away from the insistence of a NOW world. Making a loaf of bread takes you away from Donald and his demands for attention.

It is no surprise that drinking and eating can be more enticing than thinking and writing about our world of flux, craziness, wacko cries in the wilderness. Things can seem intense, impossible, urgent. That upset, the noise, is the world as it has always been. I like typing but when doing so I am confronted with the current of our days, my days. I often see only the hysterics, the panic, the possibility of losing to the opposing team. I start to see the heroine and can hear her aria. I try to go with the flow but there can be an awful flow at times. It is both electric and liquid that invades, floods my need for peace. It pours over the opera stage, zaps down as lightning in the outfield. Lately, that flow appears when I start thinking about anything and typing. It leaks out of my fingers onto the back-lit screen. It’s exciting. It is also a sham, an illiusion itself. There’s nothing to be excited or worry about…as it is, it ever was, as it is, it ever will be.

This is always true of being human and probably will be for the future of being human. Ancient Egypt was a culture and a government that existed in the same form for 5,000 years. They didn’t have baseball but they did have music, poetry and upset. They didn’t have the wireless keyboard with them. They couldn’t type easily, it was more a clunk, clunk into clay. Their world was pretty stable for the whole of their time, if you don’t count the wars, famine, regime changes, earthquakes, floods and other catastrophes they wrote about with a clunk, clunk and a cartouche. Our world is pretty stable, too. Maybe it’s best not to get too excited? Hm.

Changes To Fishermen

It is time each
additional day not feel
a storm-driven giant,
traveling great distance
to break at shore or,
worse, some grand ground swell that bore
down it’s full weight on hapless anglers.

We may swallow a bit by accident,
scooping pailsful to save the dinghy,
but won’t be swamped any more.
We shall survive by careful increments,
with an eye on the weather,
ever inclement,
as it brings relentless, something other
than what seemed only recently
in store.