OUCH!

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More like a rude awaking. A leg cramp woke me up this morning. I was right in the middle of this weird dream when my leg cramped up and told me to wake up and move around.

Perhaps it was cooler than normal, perhaps I had pulled it too hard during the day ride, perhaps I had not shaken it off, or perhaps it was a blood clot but the pain was real and got me jumping out of bed and walking around tenderly trying to loosen it up.

Maybe it was a real injury that would require going to a doc-in-the-box but I’d rather walk it off and rub some dirt on it. Man up and bite the bullet.

And what was that dream all about anyway?

My first wife with an over stuffed car pulling a packed trailer and I was complaining there was too much weight on one side making it lean over. Walking around in the Mitt Romney house noticing large sloshes of red on the walls and rugs then asking his wife if people fall down a lot in this house to which she replied, “No we are spill often.” Leaving me wonder why doesn’t she clean them up. In the meantime and in the background strangers and people I used to work with are doing all sorts of bazaar rushing around and dancing and making strange sounds. Before that, I my fuzzy mind remember was a friend who looked like he did some 30+ years ago asking questions about knives and cooking.

I don’t seem to dream about present day experiences or taxes or food or what I would think would have to be reviewed in dreams, but the consistency of old buildings, vacant houses, and solving problems seem to be the modish operandi.

So I walked around and then rode around to loosen up my leg and though it is still tender I figured it was sitting at the computer recording music into the night and probably had my leg in a strange position. Why not, that is probably what a doctor would say and then charge you an arm for that diagnosis.

Maybe I need to drink more water as in sport injuries?

That’s it I need to drink more.

What were they thinking?

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Have you ever noticed something and immediately wondered “What were they thinking?” It could be an offshoot of a highway that seems to take forever and never gets you anywhere or a chair design that is ugly and uncomfortable or maybe an abstraction in movement that cannot be understood by the normal mind.

Well, as the story goes, the local grocery store has been refurbished and there are some questionable areas.

Now even I understand the traffic flow and display placement is studied and worked out for maximum efficiency. Certain isles are smaller to cause logjams and product location is spread to increase the possibility that someone will place it in their carts.

So as they get close to finishing I note the changes. The deli section has expanded and moved to the front. They have even changed the costumes of the crew that overcooks the fried chicken and looks dumbfounded restacking the tubs of coleslaw and potato salad to try an give them an appearance of chefs instead of line cooks, but like the food itself, a better package does not mean better taste. There is a open salad bar and some kinda meal bar but I worry about open food. Plus the price is $7.00 a pound so I bypass.

Then there is a seating section hidden behind a tall wall with Wi-Fi and a giant flat screen television. I must assume it was set up for people coming to the grocery store to dine in. Isn’t a grocery store a place to buy foodstuffs to take home and cook in your own kitchen? Obliviously I didn’t get that memo. Well at least the manager will be able to find the employees, especially when the game is on.

And perhaps when redesigning the floor plan they didn’t examine the consumers. From what I have experienced, and I go there everyday, the average customer to this particular location is around a million years old. They scoot around on those bumper cars, carrying their oxygen, stopping to stare at cleaning materials, diapers, and prunes. They touch all the produce, block the aisles, and constantly talk to one-another. Some just wander around the store as if it was a walking trail while others graze.

Oh, you’ve seen them. They come in and stop at all these freaky sample stations set out around the store. They are like a pinball bouncing between the stale crackers and mushy cheeses and dried meat and canned stews before gravitating to the wine tasting. A person could live off all of the sample items and maybe some of them do.

Plus with this mentality and an open food and salad bar, plus a place to sit and watch soap operas, they may never leave.

Imagine a cool open space with free television, bathrooms, and all the food you can graze on. You could sit there for hours with the price of one cup of coffee and not be bothered by those yuppies hanging around in coffee shops. What a draw for the elderly. If they had bingo and ballroom dancing, shoot I’d move in.

So I guess I will continue to attend the party everyday as long as the beer is cold and the pizza frozen and stand in line with my peeps hearing about their lumbago and watch them fumble around in huge bags for a checkbook to slow down the 12-item or less line with their 38 varieties of exotic fruits with questionable prices that must be constantly checked.

But I know what to expect, so what was I thinking?

Rest in Peace

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What does that mean?

When the body is put into the ground and covered over by dirt and a headstone placed to mark the spot of the dressed up body secured in a wooden box lined with fancy material that no one will ever again see and sealed up as if the disintegration won’t happen.

Is this resting in peace?

The body or the remainder of who was a person is placed in a box and lowered into the ground is nothing more than bone and flesh. If you ever see the mummified pharaohs you can see what really happens to us after that.

Through the years there are the ceremonies to surround the process to get rid of the dead. Some are very religious with much wailing and remembrance and some are just digging a ditch to get rid of the stinking remains, so what does it mean to “rest in peace”?

Depending on your belief of what happens when you die, the body remains during the “passing” but the other stuff that makes us what we are other than blood and guts is suppose to go up or down.

All these stories of what happens after we stop breathing make the people who thought they knew you feel better thinking that “you” have left this community to follow a new trail to an unknown and mysterious place.

So is the body to rest in peace?

The body is buried below ground with much ceremony and cost as a respect for the person who has died. Acres of land have been dedicated for the mothers and fathers and uncles and children of families through the years.

And in the ground the bodies rot.

Now and then, more than we would like to imagine, the boxes are dug up. Due to new housing or roadways or perhaps a diversion of a waterway, the respected burial grounds are disturbed. Sometimes the remains are reburied or cremated or placed in museums for public display.

So as we walk upon the graves of people we may or may not have known, say, “Excuse me”. The plot of land that they consume is suppose to be hollowed space.

It is just that holiday where the bunnies run and eggs fill the grass and people wander in spring bonnets and laugh disturbing those who rest in peace.

She's Coming Back

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You may recognize these lyrics from Sir Paulie and the late great Johnnie but you may not know where they could go.

She's Leaving Home:
Wednesday morning at five o'clock as the day begins
Silently closing her bedroom door
Leaving the note that she hoped would say more
She goes downstairs to the kitchen clutching her handkerchief
Quietly turning the backdoor key
Stepping outside she is free
She (We gave her most of our lives)
Is leaving (Sacrificed most of our lives)
Home (We gave her everything money could buy)
She's leaving home after living alone
For so many years (Bye bye)

Father snores as his wife gets into her dressing gown
Picks up the letter that's lying there
Standing alone at the top of the stairs
She breaks down and cries to her husband 'Daddy our baby's gone
Why would she treat us so thoughtlessly?
How could she do this to me?'

She (We never thought of ourselves)
Is leaving (Never a thought for ourselves)
Home (We struggled hard all our lives to get by)
She's leaving home after living alone
For so many years (Bye bye)

Friday morning at nine o'clock she is far away
Waiting to keep the appointment she made
Meeting a man from the motor trade

She (What did we do that was wrong)
Is having (We didn't know it was wrong)
Fun (Fun is the one thing that money can't buy)
Something inside that was always denied
For so many years (Bye bye)

She's leaving home
Bye bye

OK, you’ve sung along and hummed along and remembrance of that wonderful carefree hippy drippy days when sunshine and butterflies and wandering into adventures filled your thoughts, but not me.

Back in the early 70’s I decided to take the non-concept album that was “THE” Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album and write it to the standards…. Or should I say perhaps values I understood.

So I rewrote the entire album.

Some of it is pretty perverted (warning to the young readers) so it says something about me, but don’t hold that against me. Remember this was the 70’s. This was the time of anti-war, women’s lib, black panthers, and the KKK running rampant. Most of the Kennedys had been shot and they were the hope of the future, then the soldiers started shooting us. Being married and not knowing why with a house and a car and a job and trying to figure out what the future held, so I started expressing myself through music.

My “Mansland” at that time was the basement, so with a Hagstrom triple pickup hollow body electric and a Ovation acoustic and a Vox bass and a Frafisa organ plugged into a Fender bandmaster amp, I started rewriting the wonderful sweet Beatle tunes into a indescribable mess of words wrapped around a warped sense of time and place.

The results, with some assistance from cases of Heineken beer, were: “Private Salt’s Homely Farts Rubber Band”. Sure, not a unique title, but it worked for me. I was probably inspired by Frank Zappa’s “We’re only in it for the Money” or some other cynicism approach to this faded dream that life would be full of glowing dreams and poetry full of bliss only to find reality was a five day work week, paying bills, and living with someone who you didn’t expect to be living with for so long.

If the reality of the future may have been true, the song might have sounded like this:

She’s Coming Back

Sunday morning at 1:15 as she steps inside

Silently closing the big front door

Leaving her date that kept asking for more

She goes downstairs to her bedroom clutching her underwear

Counting the money she’d made that night

Drinking more till she is tight.

She (we gave her all of our dough)

Is coming (gave her so much of our dough)

Back (we gave her dough, but still she won’t go)

She’s coming back, oh no

Papa grunts as his wife struggles into her pantyhose.

Picks up the clothes scattered here and there

Stumbles over trash at the top of the stairs

And falls down and calls to her husband,

“Howard, I did it again….

This time I think that I broke my knee.

What does this happen to me?”

 She (we always thought of ourselves)

Is Coming (tried just to think of ourselves)

Back (we worked real hard just to get her to leave)

She’s coming back, oh no

Sunday evening at 5 o’clock she is out again

Down at the bar where she deals her trade

Wanting to spend the money she made.

She (where did we go that was wrong?)

Is Coming (we never tried to go wrong)

Back (back with more money than we’ve ever seen)

Using her body to commit something naughty and who knows what

She’s coming back, oh no

I had written before about taking a song apart and look at the lyrics, so don’t ponder this too much. It was over three decades ago but holds true to today. I’ve never been an empty nester, but I did return to my parent’s home for a while and understand the difference in their values and the stress I must have put on them.

Sometimes things don’t work out as planned.

In Common

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 What draws us together or create relationships or companionship or friendships or even families?

We all are strangers until we find out what we have “in common”.

We may be attracted to another person by their appearance or clothing or posture or even their voice, but after the sharing of names we attempt to find similarities that may draw us closer.

Books? Movies? Friends? Work? Homes? Cars? Animals? Music? Drinks? Politics? Religion? Art?

All topics quickly covered trying to find a match.

So what got me on this subject? A program on the radio the other day talking about two babies who were swapped at birth (http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/360/transcript) each living with another family caught my ear. The thesis of the show was the two families realized the child they brought home was not similar to the other children.

Starting with your own family, what do you have “in common”? Well there is the last name but there are these old people from another generation and you are just a little tike. So these old people tend to conform you into the family’s values to share the experience of being “in common”.

But even family reunions presents the conflict of what is in common with the uncles and aunts and the cousins and grand parents or even siblings. The last names might be the same but they come from different locations have different hobbies and likes and even if the same age go to different schools. And the mother’s family and the father’s family may have nothing “in common”.

Then there is religion. These old people dress us up and expose us to the ceremonies that occur in large halls filled with others who are dress up in non-daily attire so sit quietly and absorb the speeches and sing the songs trying to form what is good or evil. And each story and tale is interesting but when the questions are asked “Why?” the human response has nothing “in common” with the other six days of daily existence.

Now school brings a whole new quandary. Other kids the same age are placed in a room with a single adult figure but what do we have “in common”? Age of course, unless you fail and become older than everyone else in the class, then there used to be race but even that was skewed. If the kids were in similar economical levels, we would dress alike, have similar haircuts, and even arrive to school in familiar automobiles or bicycles. All our books are the same. All our desks are the same. Yet on the playground we find that we are not the same. One kid is Jewish. One kid plays the accordion. One kid has aggressive behavior. One kid can draw Superman. One kid stutters. And one kid wears a skirt and has long hair.

And yet we have the link to our school “in common” and will recall the good times later in life even though we never spoke a word to each other at the time.

Our similarities grown stronger through the schools, special classes, clubs, teams declaring our individual structure with those we have these associations “in common” with.

Careers throw another group of strangers together all trying to provide enough effort to be rewarded with monetary gains for survival. Each has a certain talent or skill “in common” to perform a task. Again, we search for other similarities to have “in common” for conversation at the water cooler.

Personal experiences shared with others form friendships, some closer than others due to agreement on different values, feelings, and thoughts.

So could a family with an adopted baby suggest they have nothing “in common” with a chosen family member? And does it really matter?

If an individual can realize that each of us is unique and accept each other for their uniqueness then perhaps bullying or racism or prejudice would go away.

Look around at your friends, work associates, and even family. What do you have “in common”?

ANXIETY

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Defined as “mentally troubled”. “Uneasy”, “uncertain”, all words associate with being anxious.

Anxiety can be a protective reflex or a driving force.

The reason I thought about that word “anxiety” was last night’s storm. 

Now thunder and lightning are suppose to create some anxiety, like a siren or a warning signal, but I am obviously attracted to nature’s disruptions. 

Since the last hurricane I know I want to be a close observer, not a passive sheltered. Probably a trait learned from my mother, when I see bad weather coming I go out on the porch to meet it, settle down in my rocker, grab a cold drink and wait for it. 

A few years ago I felt part of the weather by basic living in a leaking unheated shed. 

Since I only ride two-wheels I’ve learned to understand and respect what the environment offers. Each day is organized by the weather patterns. Getting wet, while not preferred, can be rationalizes as you dry out. Cold requires more layers, heat requires sweat and hydration, wind requires attention and reaction, but the wonder of every day being in nature sensing the constant changes, the seasons variations is more than worth it.

As a kid, I didn’t know what “outside” was. Grew up in the “television baby sitter” era and wasn’t good at sport so other than going to the beach, I stayed in my climate controlled dark room. I don’t remember seeing any squirrels or birds or chipmunks when I was growing up. The only participation I had with nature was cutting the grass or attempting to trim a hedge. 

And now it is addictive. The constant movement colors and smells, when taken the time to observe and appreciate is the best and the cheapest entertainment one can have. 

So I sit on the porch expecting nature’s light show. While I wait the scent of the wet leaves fills the air. A rustle of leaves in the shadows reminds me this is their land and I’m only sharing it. Even though I am pre-programmed to supply food and water, they are perfectly capable to survive without my generous buffet. 

After checking the radar, refreshing my libation, I turn off the overhead light and settle in for the show. The passing light enlivens the waving texture of new leafage against rain soaked black bark. Then the sky flashes as almost day.

The tense feeling increases awaiting the humbling roar to follow.  

As the rain hardens, I go inside and bring out a guitar. By now I’ve had several adult beverages and am becoming engulfed by the pressure in the air and the rhythms in my head.

I softly plunk the nylon strings not wanting to disturb the quiet neighbors then I notice “anxiety”.

As the dark clouds move in my playing increases with more velocity. The intensity of the storm coming in has educed my anxiety and thus my playing. 

It is not the same anxiety when the roof was dripping into a bucket but a realization of the excitement of trying to play along with nature’s song.

After an hour or two or more, I stopped. The neighbors had gone to sleep long before and I thought it would probably be good for me to do the same.

Reluctantly I bide adieu to this singular experience having grown even closer to the coming season and the possibilities of what the following day may bring. 

The day is done as is the anxiety, we have made peace with each other, at least for tonight.

Let’s take a walk

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It is not a difficult task. It does not have to have a destination but it can. A simple preparation with finding the right jacket and shoes for the weather, checking the house for all the electronics that are continually invading our world, grab a bottle of water, if needed, and a pair of shades and hat if sunny or a scarf is windy and cold, close and lock the door turn then place one foot in front of the other and start walking. 

It is an upright position that is actually very good for your back to get your body inline. You can walk your dog. You can walk to the store. You can walk hand in hand. You can walk with your baby carriage. You can walk in circles. You can walk up steps and you can walk down hill. You can walk in the park. You can walk on the street. You can walk for miles until the walk hurts your feet. You can walk in the dark but it is not very safe. You can walk for foundations that make you feel great. You can walk as a group or walk all alone. You can walk to work. You can walk home. 

The best thing about walking is you can find your cadence. This is your body rhythm. The faster you walk you breathe with more distinction and the slower you walk the more you notice the surroundings. Even without an iPod for music the body will associate the swing of the leg and the pat of the foot on the ground with a familiar beat of a song. 

Now some need to be constantly entertained so you can walk with music or an inspirational message in your ears forming a pattern for your pace or you can wonder off into multi-tasking with a pad or phone connecting you to your friends and family and their latest adventures of the mundane. 

But if you really want to enjoy your walk, if you really want to experience the adventure, put all the electronics down and walk without the distractions. 

It is said the Steve Jobs used to like to walk to get his thoughts together. It seemed to be a pretty good process for him.

Remembering your youth when you had to beg your parents to deliver you to another location in a mobile machine, but if that form of transportation was unavailable, you walked. 

Personal note: For years the people and places I knew, even through college, were in walking distance. Public transportation was available, but the footpath was easy and always there. Miles and miles and miles were trekked through this inner city to destinations unknown.

Now to really make the walk a wonderful experience, take someone with you. 

For a walk with someone else will bring out a conversation and that conversation will be firm as the steps you take together. The shared motion will bring out words that will change your life. 

The slow walk with a friend to complain about the troubles or shared feelings that only friends can share. The fast walk to try to overcome frustration or accomplish an unattained goal. The walk hand-in-hand with a special person ends way to early and the words that should be said are never said. 

So the next time I see you, let’s take a walk.