Guilty

It’s odd to be reminded so viscerally of someone’s passing after such a lengthy amount of time, but someone managed to do just that to me today. It started innocently. I had just met with my faculty advisor just hours previously to determine the eight texts I would be using as guides for my writing during the coming semester. Did I mention I had just started my two-year odyssey to acquire a Master of Fine Arts degree? A decision long coming, I had finally applied and was accepted into a program I genuinely hope will finally set me on the path to the life I’ve always imagined. Of the eight texts, I was already in possession of several of them. One of which, I was sure, had been tucked away in the modest area we’d been allotted for storage. There were other things in the rudimentary three by four by six box: a couple of chairs from the dining room table we had sat around as children, a box fan of dubious reliability, and several boxes that freed up some space. Eager to make sure I had the books, I went up to the storage room to retrieve them. Only the unit I was sure my stuff was in was open: no padlock, and the clasp had evidence of being altered. I wondered if I had picked the wrong unit, and tried my key on the only padlock that it could have worked on: no luck. That odd feeling of panic – the cold that takes over the hands, the watery feeling in the bowels – took over as I moved from unit to unit trying the key I had. I thought instantly that somehow, someway, the storage unit I had filled with my things had been forced and the contents discarded. Just months previously, the building had been bought by a private owner and, just weeks later, the shit-for-brains neighbor next to me left. Both events seemed providence of good things to happen. My neighbor, an ill-tempered, adolescent in his mid-20’s had a proclivity of playing on-line games with a head-set to communicate with his fellow gamers with no awareness that we could hear every word he screamed. I returned to my apartment and, grasping at hope, thought that perhaps the key I had that did not work in the padlock was just faulty. Which would necessitate the removal of the lock and a new one put on. I sent off an email to the owner, asking if he had indeed cleaned out any units since his ownership had commenced. He had. The only unit he had seen fit to do anything to was mine. He operated under the assumption that the tenant of apartment three would use storage unit three, having no knowledge of – nor inquiring about in case this assumption proved specious – the agreement the other tenants had come to regarding the use of the units despite which number appeared on the door. So he threw my stuff away. I find it fascinating that the former tenant, instead of saying ‘what stuff?’, gave the landlord full permission to dispose anything in the unit. My stuff. That, however, is not the worst aspect of this situation: I’m not actually sure what was in the unit. I did not catalogue what was in there, nor did I make any sort of note, the entire contents being less that a dozen items. There could have been a box of my mother’s stuff we divvied up when she died eight years ago. That is how, through a series of unrelated events, you set the stage for a person to feel, even on the most microscopic level, the very same loss and pain they felt the day they lost their loved one. The guilt of not even knowing just what I had stored in that cubicle – and now, lies buried in some landfill – sits gnawing in my psyche. Of course I feel guilty. Losing someone you love puts an edict on your mind, that you will always hold them closely, that everything they did for you will always be foremost in your mind. And then, one day, your attention slips and a piece is irrevocable taken from you. It is as if your feelings for that person were not strong enough, not deeply ingrained enough for you to protect their memory.  Just what else will you lose in the life? What other things you shared with those you love - the memories, the objects, the evidence of your flight through this life - will be scraped aside in our mad dash to the finish line?

Letting Go

This last weekend I had two things occur that directly recalled different elements of my childhood. The first was a recycling run. There was this stereo I had, formerly my mother’s, that had become inoperable (only the radio seemed to work and I had newer versions of those) and therefore a liability. I almost cringe when I use that word because of what that stereo meant to me as a kid. I bought my first album for that stereo. (Dark Side of the Moon, natch.) I spent hours sitting in front of that thing, both with and without headphones, pouring over lyrics and album credits as I tried to commit the words to memory. It was the stereo I first made mixed tapes on. (Yes kids, it was that long ago.) Not only did I record from albums using the tape deck, but I used an 8-track converter (ask your grandparents what an 8-track is) to record from tape to tape. (Years later of course they would come out with the tape-to-tape boomboxes and such, but this was a much more primitive time.) Sitting in front of that stereo is where I learned to appreciate Beethoven and Mozart, Ozzy and Judas Priest, Scottish pipes, Benny Goodman, and Wavestar. Then we come to now, and the chest that seemed to reveal so many secrets, offered me so much consolation in my teen years wasn’t working in even the smallest way. Since I had gone through purging some of my belongings in the last few years, it was fairly easy to decide to turn the stereo in at a special electronics recycling event. But I had to say goodbye to a part of my childhood. And, in a way, goodbye to my mother. She was the one that purchased the stereo. (So it was, in fact, hers, not mine, but I claimed possession anyway.) She purchased it to listen to her own albums: Beethoven, Benny Goodman, Brahms, Glenn Miller, and Puccini; all things she had grown up listening to. (I wonder if she didn’t sit on the living room rug listening to music as I did thirty years later?) I’m consoled with the knowledge that most of the albums (we’re talking albums here kids; big, black, grooved discs) I would have played on this stereo I now have in cd format or digital. And by the fact that I was able to give them to an electronics recycler and not have to defer to the expediency of happenstance. As for music, later that night I heard one of the tunes from my childhood, Seasons in the Sun by Terry Jacks. What a bittersweet, poignant tune. It reminded me of the time, as a kid, I would walk around with a transistor radio with an earphone (precursor to the earbud) and listen to tunes. In a way, that sad tune of a person dying and saying goodbye to those he loved, I was reminded that in most of life, we are presented with the best and the worst, with the beauty and the ugly, and it is merely our charge to discover within us which we choose to see. I see beauty. I can’t but help it.

Why I shave my head for charity

It’s a chaotic world we live in today. So many things compete for our time and attention. Most of us have jobs we have to get to everyday. If you are one of the lucky ones, you enjoy your job, so your time there isn’t a burden. Or as much of one. But there are those jobs that are difficult and, given a choice, we wouldn’t do whether it’s because of a difficult boss or a heightened sense of importance or responsibility. And then there are the things that we have to juggle with those jobs. Relationships, whether they be with significant others, children, or family, can suffer from a lack of attention. There all the news sources out there – a ton more than I had as a kid – telling us lies and truth and sometimes a little of both. We can get news on our phones, on our TVs, and on our computers. It seems there isn’t a corner of the world we can’t go to where we won’t see the news story of the day. And what a story of the day it is: a natural disaster, a disgraced leader, a war that’s been going on for what seems like decades. There doesn’t seem to a continent we can turn to that something isn’t happening that affects this ever-shrinking world. Then, in between all those news stories, we have advertisements that tell us what to do to look just that much better. Darkening our skin, make it more supple, brightening those teeth, lightening the hair, darkening the hair, covering the grey, lose a few pounds, lose a lot of pounds, get better cheekbones, get fuller lips, smooth out those wrinkles, wear the right clothes, wear the clothes everyone else is wearing, wear the clothes that confirm your individuality, buy the right car, buy a faster car, buy a bigger car, buy a house, buy a better house, buy a bigger house, take vitamins, take the right vitamins, take a supplement, boost your libido, boost your workout, grow hair, get hair. We face an onslaught of advertising that tries to convince of one thing: whatever you have now, you can get something better. We move through our lives, driving our cars, planning our careers, managing our relationships, looking towards the future. And that’s when it happens: the unthinkable. It can and will be different for everyone: a car accident, getting fired, a loved one getting sick. It’s the one thing that happens that casts a light over everything else we do. And in those shadows we see how much effort and energy we gave things that, in an instant, mean almost nothing. They mean nothing in the context of what we now have to deal with. I shave my head to remind myself of that. To remind myself every day that there are things out there under my control – how I treat people, how I drive, the hundred small decisions I make every day – and there are those things I do not control. It can be overwhelming, this world of ours, with its 24-hour news cycle, games on phones and on-demand entertainment. It can be distracting, with cars that park themselves, heat the seats and protect us like tanks. It can be exhausting, having kids and a spouse and a job. I shave my head to remind me to every once-in-awhile stop, look around, and just breathe.

Boys need to become men

I was at breakfast on Sunday when a crime occurred. Ok, not a crime in terms of laws or ordinances, but a crime of courtesy. I was sitting near the exit, so people were parading passed me the entire time. A table near me got up to leave, but I didn’t take notice at first. I’m not sure if there were more than the two people I saw. I looked up to see a woman leave the table. At the same moment, the exit door in front of me closed. I looked out the window to see a man look back at the door. Then the woman, an air cast on one foot, hobbled to the door and exited. She joined the man on the street and they presumably walked home or to a car. The idea one human wouldn’t hold a door for another is the worse crime here. But the idea a man wouldn’t hold a door for a woman, regardless of the relationship between them is, well, deplorable. I have lost count of the number of times I’ve been in restaurants, seen a couple approach a table or the bar, and the man – referred to as the ‘boy’ from now on – sits down first. Some like to add a particularly nasty touch and sit as she is in the process of taking off her coat. The urge to thwap the boy on the forehead has been nearly irresistible at times. I have even considered going up to her and telling her he’s not worth it. So far, I’ve been able to just bite my tongue. But Sunday was too much. There seems to be an almost complete lack of courtesy (and chivalry or valor) in boys thirty and younger. Not just how they treat women but common acts of courtesy as well. Now, I don’t want to sound like an old fogey talking about ‘in my day,’ because this stuff has been around a long time. And I’m sure I, when I was a boy, had my fair share of missed opportunities to show the quality of my character. I have given myself a day or two to think about this and I think there are two sides to this. First, boys need to learn (and their parents need to teach them) how to treat your fellow humans with respect. Parents need to instill in their boys the need, the desire, to be a gentleman. It takes a miniscule amount of effort; usually less than it takes to pointedly be an ass. You would be amazed the power of ‘please’ and ‘thank you.’ Second, girls need to learn (and their parents need to teach them) what to expect from a boy. Ask yourself (if you are female; males, chill for a sec): if he’s not willing to make sure you’ve sat down without incident, that you’ve made it through the door, what else will he eventually take for granted? A corollary to this is how to dress (i.e. if she’s in a dress = no t-shirt) but we’ll cover that at another time.

Why I’ll be voting for Obama – again.

Here are the top five reasons (out of many) 5) He looks ‘presidential.’ I fear that may seem weird in some parts of the country (those shall not be named; you know who you are). More to the point I believe Obama looks like America looks. Or at least, the America I want to live in. As if he is not part of one race or another. (Side note here – use “ethnic background” instead of “race” – we are all of one race, human.) Wasn’t America founded on an idea that anyone could come here and make a life? Part of that is marrying and having children that look like a combination of parents. Obama is the living embodiment, among many I am sure, of that American ideal. 4) Other countries like him. It’s about time we had a leader that didn’t come across in other countries as a power hungry isolationist. It’s not, like the other side would have you believe, a weakness to show deference to other countries’ customs. It is called respect and since we seem to demand it, we should show some of it ourselves. I mean, we only have one Earth; if we don’t trade with these people, we have no idea what kind of electronics the Transfalmagorians might have. 3) Its the economy stupid. Sure it isn’t bouncing back like we would like (more on that in a bit), but if you recall this recession was of historic proportions (remember all those comparisons to the Great Depression?). Correspondingly, the recovery – if we want it to stick and be lasting – has to be much more thought out and steady. (To remind y’all, I lost my last job in ’09 and found a new one after a devastating seven months that saw my house foreclosed on and a bankruptcy filing; I know of what I’m talking about.) The problem with getting an economy back faster is that what is really at the heart of it is a desire to return to what we had before. And what we had before was an economy and society that was built on excess. (Thanks GWB for suggesting we go out and shop when you declared war on terrorists. And Iraq and Afghanistan.) It seems we’ve become a nation that marks the seasons by which games come out not which plays are being produced in town. 2) Women. Pure and simple. Obama has or had a grandmother, a mother, a mother-in-law, a wife and two daughters that have shaped him. Romney has six sons and a wife that never had to make the choice between cough medicine or clothes, between three meals a day and how to get her sons to public school. As a man that was raised by my mother, the idea that I should have any say in how women run their lives is inconceivable at best and offensive at worst. 1) Hope. It is not just a slogan. President Obama makes me want to believe again in what I think of as America’s greatest gift to the modern world: wholesale democracy. That we are all better when we lift each other up and help each other succeed. Last time I checked that was a Christian ideal. But the conservative right seems more interested in ‘what can I get for me? And how do I keep it?’ It seems a significant portion of American companies and people see the acquisition of wealth as the goal, not the reinvestment of that wealth in the very same machinations that achieved that wealth in the first place.

When three becomes fifteen

When three equals fifteen It’s an once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see a President. It is for me. I work for the government (sort of) but not in the capacity that ever brings me in contact with those that make the decisions. You can imagine then when I got the opportunity, I took it. (Spoiler alert: I lean to the left in my politics; that will become evident but I just thought you should know that up front.) Granted it was a campaign stop, and I’d be with several thousand others, but I had to take it. The last time I got within visual distance of a President, I was 7, it was in Vail, and the President was Gerald Ford. (Anyone under 25 should consult Google on that one.) That was purely by accident. It was my mother who recognized him, pointed him out. To this day he’s just a smudge in my head, the day a fuzzy memory for me now. To make things better, the appearance was going to be on the campus of my alma mater CU. I seem to rarely make it back to where I did my most learning. It’s been taken over by other generations doing the same thing I did: trying to figure out who we are, as a person, as a group, as a people. I’m guessing that most of the people coming to the rally were those that either live close to campus or in town, because we saw very little traffic on the way up. We found ourselves behind three emergency vehicles on the highway. It was a Jefferson County bomb squad, checking the route to the campus for explosives. This was at nine o’clock in the morning, hours before he would leave his hotel and make his way toward the Flatirons and Boulder. We found a choice parking place thanks to the friend that got me the tickets, several hundred yards from the planned rally spot. First, of course, we would need to line up, all 13,000 of us it turned out, so that we could be searched (minimally, uninvasively), to ensure the safety for all at the event. We ended up right next to a cop car and a porta-potty. I don’t think they were deliberately near each other. This nattering woman behind us started to complain about the exhaust coming from the cruiser, decrying the waste of fuel. Much to her surprise, the officer inside the vehicle got out and asked if she, the woman in line, had spoken to her, the Boulder Police officer. Her bluster was severely diminished as she made her point. The officer tried told the woman that the engine ran the air conditioning, keeping the electronic equipment in the car running smoothly. She, the woman in line, wasn’t convinced. Near that time the line began to move. It turned out to be one of several lines that funneled the people to the security checkpoint. That turned out to be several temporary tents set up just to the north of Hellums (isn’t that where the Mary Rippon Theatre is?). The line moved steadily, leaving us sometimes in shade, others not. The late summer heat built slowly throughout the morning. There were pamphlets handed out that discussed the idea of the loss of ethics being the core problem with today’s society. Sounds like a good idea, but since the booklet was so poorly written, their ideas were lost in a miasma of convoluted logic. It was interesting to see how many people around us took the pamphlet, read the first page, then handed it back. Contrary ideas that challenge our own view of the world can be so difficult to hear or read. The civility of the crowd, despite the twin challenges of heat and time, was nice to see. Periodic chants rose up, only to die quickly. A prodigious amount of liquids were consumed, with some bringing their own bottles as well as several aid stations set up along the route. There was an emphasis on voter registration all along the route to the rally. From the perspective of reminding people they needed to check their status to those scattered about with clipboards to assist those that needed it. After about an hour, we arrived at the security tent. We were told to take everything out of our pockets and have all electronics turned on. It took less than a minute to pass through the white tent, then we were able to join the throng spread out on Norlin Quad. The sun ducked in an out of clouds (mostly out) and the real baking began. What they forget to tell you about is the variety of odors one has to endure in an event like this. Thousands of people coming together, regardless of the intent of the gathering, means a fair amount of sweaty pits and flatulence. The kind of flatulence one wouldn’t want to take credit for. Thankfully, there were no attending sounds to the periodic gas releases. This was when the real waiting began. There were speakers blaring music (Al Green; Wilco; Keane, I think, at one point) but little else to occupy one’s attention. Several people brought reading material and one family spread out a blanket and played card games. Conversations, most likely surrounding the topic of when he was going to arrive, were just about the only distractions. There was a surge forward at one point – they took down a temporary barrier – and we nearly halved our distance to the stage, not really that impressive as we were still quite a ways away. Tall people, and those with children on shoulders, were the recipients of silent, buy probably not heart-felt, curses. No incline or slope helped those height-challenged. An acapella group, In the Buff, performed at one point; several earnest young men, whose chutzpah clearly out striped their talent. Spend a little more time around the piano, boys. Eventually, the speakers began: an invocation (much too political for my tastes), a Congressman, a Senator, a governor, a campus organizer, another student. The introduction of each new speaker sent a ripple of disappointment through the crowd. I was becoming afraid it would become audible to those on the stage. Then a young man came to the podium (to introduce the President!) to explain his reasons for working for the campaign. The healthcare legislation, he told us, would have helped his family weather several health scares, had it been enacted just a few years earlier. Then the President came out. Thunderous applause, a requisite peppy tune on the speakers and lots of sign waving. There were lots of interrupting cheers at the appropriate moments. He was done in about fifteen minutes. Three hours of waiting followed by fifteen minutes of stump speech, most of which has been heard on the nightly news. And yet the elation of spirit, the focus of intent, these were his gifts. They have been his gifts in the past and continue to be so. When you believe in someone, when you believe their vision of the way forward augments your own, you are willing to support them. You are willing to set aside petty concerns like how your feet feel or how hot you are just to hear a few words that lift your spirit. The security measures become unimportant, the livestock-like funneling of people into the appropriate areas become unimportant. When someone makes you believe in something bigger than yourself, challenges you to face your own foibles and misconceptions, that’s a person I have no problem giving my support.

What's wrong with the Rockies

Stay with me on this: Imagine you have a relationship with a company; doesn't matter what kind, just that there is the usual capitalistic exchange. This company has a very specific item, or service, that they provide. They are not the only company that provides a service similar to this, but it is unique enough that this is "the only game in town." Imagine further that the performance of this company is nearly a complete transparent component to the business it is in: everyone who has any inclination can find out how well the company is doing. This company has a specific window of opportunity that comes around the same time each year and lasts for the same amount of time. Like all companies, it is results oriented; if it is doing well, both sides are happy. It has had success in the past. They almost reached the pinnacle of their industry. But the journey to do so energized it's entire market base and even converted a great many that wouldn't be interested otherwise. It has been some time since that success. In the intervening time, many of the middle management has been replaced on what could be described as an alarmingly frequent basis. No one really takes the time to study the smaller businesses that operate in other towns, so that's not really a factor. The middle management is changed with a certain amount of fanfare; when new middle managers are brought in, they are touted as the next big thing. Only success doesn't follow. This continues on for an amount of time that begins to become uncomfortable. It is that way because you begin to notice with the revolving door for the common worker, the upper management has changed little at the same time. The same roster of upper managers stays the same, says the same things about all the different middle managers that come and go from the company. The company’s results continue to demonstrate that its place in this industry places it in the middle of performers. Consistently. And because they are provider of this service, options for the consumer are limited. The only real choice the consumers have is to not, under any circumstances, utilize the service the company provides. But they are the only choice in the market; it’s a difficult choice for the consumer. End point: if there were a company whose results never deviated from under-whelming, had a rotating roster of workers, but had the same managers, wouldn’t you expect the management to change in order for the company to perform better or, in worse case, differently? This is the problem with the Rockies. We’ve had a ridiculous number of players go through our system, they can’t all be blamed for the performance of the franchise. The management “team,” however, is the same. And we are expecting different results. It is time to shake up the “team” that makes the decisions. Otherwise, the franchise is going to find that its assumed fan base will erode to unsalvageable levels.