Stripped

Call it a short attention span. Call it ADHD. Call it selfishness. Call it driven. Call it a second childhood. Call it a trophy wife. Call it whatever you will. Know it as fear. Some people make their decisions all because of it. Others battle with it regularly. Some have conquered it, although it is still there, skulking behind insecurities and dreams let go. Time leads the opposing forces. Time is relentless. Time has tools we cannot match. When Time passes, we are left older, dying still.

As for me, getting older bothers me. However, the notable affects of age on my face or body or dating prospects cause me little concern. I am tortured with things left undone. "Sitting on a sunset, smiles become vivid recollections and even pictures will not remain – memories can’t last forever, like stale toast stuck, popped up in Pompeii and frozen to yesterday." ( a favorite poem)

I, to my knowledge, have not reached the sunset. Still, like those memories that Time molds, dreams, goals, projects - all are at the mercy of Time. I can be brilliant at the creative process. I can be brilliant at many other tasks. I am pitiful at prioritizing my own goals. Put me in the corporate office, and I can prioritize. Been there. Succeeded there. For my own life, however, I have, at times, an irrational fear of so much left undone, so much potential now lying lifeless in the streets of my private Pompeii.

From talking to others, I know that, for some, Time threatens other strongholds. For them, it may be beauty, athletic ability, relationships that are threatened. How about you? If forced to admit it, what about the passage of time scares you, theatens you, or otherwise leads you to move on, leaving such thoughts as far behind as possible?

I started this blog, and named it, in order to detail my journey of stripping away the unnecessary. At least, stripping it away until the absolutely essential things were identified. Once those are dealt with, maybe there would be room for the unnecessary. As I have pondered this process while losing count of sheep, considered it over a good riesling, discussed it while sharing nachos, and generally just contemplated the minuscule components of a life in process, I am learning that what is "essential" is extremely subjective. Not that I didn’t know that beforehand. It’s just - I realize that, as well as I know myself, I am hesitant to let go of things that are essential today. And by today, I mean forever. For now.

Reminds me of all those boxes in the attic. They’re filled with high school crap. "The kids may find it interesting one day" has always been my reason for keeping them. I now am starting to believe that they won’t ever find that stuff interesting. Oh, sure. They may love to see some old report cards, but they’re all the same, pretty much. I could keep the final report card from each year. The notebooks with doodling in the margins? Burn them. The invitations to parties and proms and graduations? The burn pile. Did I really think the kids would be interested? To quote another….hmphf. I am a romantic, not a stoic, and my emotional being delights in the accumulation of the crap - the measurements of a life lived. Believe me, I see the foolishness and even the pathos in such a thought. So it all comes back to "who am I?" One thing I know: In my own private Pompeii, I need my own private Vesuvius.

I may need help putting out the fire.

My paternal grandmother had seven brothers and six sisters. She was somewhere in the middle in terms of age. Her father was a Baptist preacher. She never wore pants - skirts and dresses only. She wore her wedding ring, a watch, and a necklace - no other jewelry. She was a sweet lady and, to my knowledge, openly criticized no one. She and my grandfather paid cash for their car (they shared one) and drove it for at least four or five years before trading it in and getting another. They had no debt and were excellent managers of money, very thrifty. They had three children: Cora, Wes, and Lea, Wes being my dad, the blacksheep.

So, one day I stop by to visit. I saw Grandmom by the fence at the rear of her yard. She was tossing things over the fence. Initially thinking she was throwing food scraps for the foxes and deer and wild dogs (they lived in the country), I didn’t think much of it. The car was gone, so Granddad was not there. I opened the gate and started walking to her. Soon, I noticed that she was throwing jewelry, trinkets, and other knick-knacks over the fence. There were things like those collectable plates and stuff that you see on tv. "Where the hell did all of that stuff come from?" I remember thinking. My grandparents lived a simple life, adorned with the aroma of great cooking, the sounds of family and friends and old southern gospel music and bluegrass, and tales and photographs of long-ago family adventures. Adorned with little else - nothing else, really. It was one of the things that always enthralled me: thinking of visiting them created a dread of boredom. Then, when I was there, I never had time to be bored. I was interested, relaxed, surrounded by living history and love.

"What are you doing, Grandmom?"
"Throwing out the trash, hon."
"That’s trash?"
"In my house it is."
"It looks like new stuff to me. Where’d it come from?"
"I have no idea. I was cleaning the house this morning and found it."
"Where’d you find it?"
"Some of it was in my jewelry box. Some was on the shelves in the den. Some was still in boxes under the bed."
"Really? How’d it get there?"
"Goodness! I don’t know, but I will find out - probably Claude or one of your aunts’ jokes."

It was odd that she didn’t stop to hug me, or offer me a slice of cake, as she always had a fresh pound cake or something. Still, I didn’t think much about it. I was 19, just trying to be a better grandson than I typically was during that time. Later, after I got her inside, after she emptied three more boxes, I had that slice of cake. Then, Granddad got home. He treated her more gently, with much greater care and concern than I had remembered. Later, he asked if I could help him move some concrete blocks out back.

We moved four blocks before he asked the question. "How has your Grandmother been?"

He has seen her much more than me. Hell, I haven’t been here in three weeks. I still couldn’t get my head around it all. "Well, she was throwing out a bunch of stuff when I got here - out there, by the persimmon tree, over that fence. You can see it from here."

We walked over there, and he shook his head once and looked at me.

"You know, she bought all that stuff."
"Really?"
"Yeah. That QVC channel or whatever it’s called. All our lives we were fine with just the free channels. Two months ago we get cable, and she starts buying junk - stuff she will never wear, doesn’t like, has no need for, no gifts for anyone. I think she’s losing her mind. I’m not saying it’s the tv’s fault, but it sure makes ya wonder."

She was later diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and died four years later.

My maternal grandmother is dead, too. Natural causes, old age, living too long with just one lung. Seriously, there’s a funny story about that. She caught me smoking when I was 17. She pulled me inside and told me. "I know what it’s like to live with one lung. I worked in the cotton mill all my life and lost a lung to brown lung disease. Now son, that’s what will happen to you if you keep on smoking. You see how hard it is for me, having one lung and all. You best quit now while you can."

I never knew she had just one lung. She went swimming with us in the summertime. She worked. She cooked. She never went to the doctor as far as I know. She just went to the hospital 14 years later and died. I asked mom one time, years after that incident. She said she never knew her mother only had one lung either.

Then there’s Seth, my youngest son. My ex, Hamilton, brings him to the office so that we could go to lunch. It’s a new job, and my coworkers have not met my children yet. Seth was almost four. He is a walking, breathing, real-live cherub - with character - lots of it. The dean and her assistant are standing at my office door, enjoying conversing with Seth. I am talking to Hamilton about some work that needs to be done to the house. Then I hear "Pull my finger."

I cringe, jerk hard on the reins of laughter that are so close to pouring forth uncontrollably. I look up and see that Seth has stuck his right index finger out toward the dean. She is laughing nervously as she pulls it. Seth lets loose a melodious, loud fart and starts laughing as he runs into my office. The dean and assistant are laughing, and that’s good because it seems genuine. I look at Seth. "Who taught you that?" Because I know it wasn’t at home, and I didn’t do it. "Oh, Daddy… Gran-gran taught me that."

For the record, that is her mother, not mine. Unfortunately….

1. I play piano (studied classical performance in college)
2. I play harmonica
3. I have a law degree
4. I have a BS in operations research and statistics
5. I minored in English
6. I have had two short stories and a dozen poems published
7. My eyes change colors frequently - green, gray, blue
8. I have lived in SC, NC, GA, and FL
9. I worked construction for two years
10. I owned a restaurant
11. I smoked pot for 10 years - probably still would
12. I love to read
13. I have a younger brother
14. I have been married
15. I have been divorced
16. I have been to a nude resort
17. I have played in a country band, a blues band, and a rock-n-roll band
18. I scored 1310 on the SAT
19. I have above-average intelligence
20. I would rather have wisdom
21. I fall in love easily, entirely
22. I am sarcastic and cynical but not mean (usually)
23. I am shy
24. My favorite dessert is key lime pie
25. My favorite drinks are grape juice, milk, and tea
26. I don’t drink coffee
27. I once had sex for two hours - still don’t know how
28. I would rather read than watch tv
29. To me, foreplay can be better than sex
30. I drive a 2000 Jeep Cherokee
31. I owned a Harley when I was 17
32. I do not have a bike now
33. My favorite sport to play is ultimate frisbee
34. Next is golf
35. I love Totinos pizza
36. I was kissed by a guy once, when I was 18
37. I once dated someone 19 years older than me
38. I once dated someone 13 years younger
39. I’m a crossword puzzle freak
40. My favorite season is autumn
41. I am a romantic
42. My favorite album is Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks
43. I don’t like ice in my drinks
44. I have one credit card
45. I will pay off my student loan in about 20 years
46. I enjoy being alone
47. I have six watches, but only one works (need batteries!)
48. I am a dreamer
49. I am usually late
50. I am a grammarian
51. Yet I scored higher on the math portion of the SAT (730)
52. I want to own a bookstore
53. My favorite alcoholic drinks: tequila, wine
54. I love my mother but don’t want to talk to her very often
55. I wish my father talked more
56. I prefer dogs over cats
57. I love the ocean, the beach, and hot, hot weather
58. But I want to live in the mountains
59. I was a pot-smoking, dylan-listening loner in high school
60. But I got voted Most Spirited senior superlative
61. I wanted Wittiest
62. I lived in a cloak room in a restaurant for 3 months when I was 21
63. I walked 4 miles (one way) to work for 2 months when I was 20 ‘cause I wrecked my car
64. I start at least twice as many projects as I finish
65. Some songs and movies make me cry
66. I do not cry easily
67. I want to try open mic at a comedy club
68. I can fix most anything
69. I still take on construction/renovation projects when I have time
70. I no longer want to be in a band - I want to be a songwriter
71. I want to live in Asheville, NC
72. I love to shop
73. People who drive slow in the left lane should be glad I am not violent
74. But I do have a temper - waaaaayyyyyy deep inside
75. People who have no clue what to do at a 4-way stop should find another route
76. I drive very fast except when the kids are in the car
77. I have never worn a bicycle helmet
78. I am conservative and liberal
79. I believe love is not an emotion (see Love Thoughts posting)
80. I am a Christian
81. I believe organized religion has little to do with faith
82. I have had many 60 minute full body massages
83. I love to give massages and studied massage therapy at one time
84. I play the trumpet
85. I lived in my car for two weeks - recently
86. My stepmother locked me out of the house every morning after dad went to work
87. My stepmother is dead now
88. I did not kill my stepmother
89. I did acid when I was in college, but I liked ’shrooms better
90. I don’t have flashbacks
91. I have been bound and blindfolded by a girl
92. I have done the same to a girl
93. I am a flirt
94. I pray
95. My grandfathers are still alive - barely
96. Whether a girl is smooth or not does not matter to me
97. Breast size does not matter to me
98. I love to go fishing
99. I would like to be a speechwriter
100. I love my kids more than anything but have a ways to go to be the daddy I want to be

Tomorrow and maybe … same thing, just spelled differently. I was thinking of favorite lyrics or phrases today. "One day when the weather is warm, I’ll wake up on a hill and hold the morning like it was a plow and cut myself a row…." is one of my all-time favorites. It is from Joe Henry’s Kindness of the World. Of course, I could fill up a notebook with favorites from Dylan. Anna Nalick is good, too. "Driving away from the wreck of the day, and I’m thinking ’bout calling on Jesus - ‘cause love doesn’t hurt so I know I’m not falling in love, I’m just falling to pieces." Then there’s Matthew Ryan: "Now it occurs to me like blinds undrawn or a bullet from a shotgun that she knew long ago what it meant to feel irrelevant." I am a sucker for good songwriting. I enjoy a good groove, too, but someone who can craft a great lyric and support it perfectly with musical atmosphere, delivery … cool.

Artists. I have fancied myself such for much of my life. I sit here, though, and look around me. The question hits us all at some point or other: is this what it’s about? I am way too analytical, way too much a thinker. I have been trying not to think. That’s funny, really. Seriously, though, I long for that peaceful balance between thinking and just breathing. A place in this world, in this life, where I am not burning up with desires I cannot even define. Road-hogged by far too many ideas and phrases and dreams, I dart and sometimes crash and sometimes shuffle from project to project. Priorities shift, not with the wind, but close to as often. Focus. No more than two or three projects at a time. Finish one before adding another. Take a break and stop thinking - even if it’s just for five minutes. My father is peaceful, now. He only keeps one or two things going at once. He seems bored though. All - the - time. I can’t endure boredom. Contentment? Maybe.

She says she loves the moments when she can forget
to be her and instead remember,
sometimes too much, sweet dreams and vistas
that other times appear
in a magazine or on television
or in someone else’s eyes.
But those moments when she loses
track of time and self, they are more than all that
because they are real,
even through a window-view,
and leaning out the window is its own poison
just like suffocation.

And he says he loves the moments when he can share
his heart and soul
with another who returns them
better than they were,
with another who breathes more than air - she breathes
the soft flesh of dreams both to be and not
and is not afraid of suffocation -
and he is ready to give her his breath anyway.

They speak across the alley,
smiling across the way through opposing windows.
Their hearts seem pinned to clothespins
sliding on the line from one to the other, like notes
or clean clothes. They sometimes see the blur of traffic
passing by, or faceless people, the mailman, but mostly at these times
they see one another.
Still, sometimes they see the door,
beneath its awning always lit.

~jericho

…but warmer nonetheless. Made it south this weekend and enjoyed a relaxing, memorable visit with friends. By late Saturday afternoon, the tequila was gone, the wine was flowing and a quartet of happy souls was cavorting in the pool. Freedom. It is rare that I have the opportunity to enjoy a time like that. Pretense, nonexistent. Legs whispering nonchalantly against legs. Laughter and music and water holding everything as surely as the dark, star-scaped canopy of sky.
Reality awaits at dawn.

And reality is what you make of it. I know now that the power of tomorrow is overcome only by your vulnerability to today. Well, ok. As profound as life sometimes seems to be, it really is simple. So enough of the philosphical. I can easily lose myself in good company, in a good song, in a good book. I can wander the countryside in peace and venture through forests in a misty, cloudy fog in utter awe of the beauty that surrounds me. I can lose myself in you. In the middle of the night, when I roll to your back and settle my body into yours, a perfect fit, I so long to be absorbed into you. For you to sift through my pores and veins and muscles so that, from that moment on, I feel you with every move I make, with every thought that tiptoes or thrashes wildly or bombards my neural paths. When I awake, I know it happened.

At home now, the weather is different - windy, cold. Reminders of work to be done are scattered everywhere. Let’s not check the mailbox. Tomorrow will be fine, I’m sure. It’s the goodbye it brings that fells me briefly. Like timber falling in a vacant forest. Tonight, press against me again. You may hear it, but close your eyes and hold me anyway or I may not wake.

We were sitting around, listening to the iPod shuffle through almost 4,000 songs, so far past wine-tasting that it may as well been Thunderbird, and we started trying to come up with a list of the twenty best albums of all time. Insane. Totally subjective. Because even the criteria doesn’t lend itself to a truly objective take on something so personal as emotion, and music is emotion. Sure, it may be technically astute, born-talent driven, whatever… when all is said and done, though, what the music evokes in the listener is what will place it on the list.

So, I am wondering what twenty albums you just could not live without. Myself, I am having a difficult time covering all the bases. Today, my list looks like this:

♪ Blood on the Tracks - Bob Dylan
♪ Kindness of the World - Joe Henry
♪ Beggars Banquet - The Rolling Stones
♪ Thriller - Michael Jackson
♪ Car Wheels on a Gravel Road - Lucinda Williams
♪ The White Album - The Beatles
♪ Nevermind - Nirvana
♪ Shotgun Willie - Willie Nelson
♪ Waylon & Willie
♪ Graceland - Paul Simon
♪ At Last - Etta James
♪ Dark Side of the Moon - Pink Floyd
♪ Electric Ladyland - Jimi Hendrix
♪ Highway 61 Revisited - Bob Dylan
♪ The Joshua Tree - U2
♪ Live/Dead - Grateful Dead
♪ After the Gold Rush - Neil Young
♪ Dire Straits
♪ The Doors
♪ Bitches Brew - Miles Davis

This will change, of course. It will take me months of listing my favorites and then trying to whittle it down to twenty. Not even sure I can do it. Thinking about favorite songs of all-time, too. Crazy. It’s not like I have nothing else to do… really. Like, maybe I will post something substantive later…. until then, have fun.

As the weekend descends upon this life, this week, this restlessness, I have an urge to move. Maybe North Carolina or Tennessee or New England… anywhere, really. There are times I yearn for the connections that keep a person happy in one place. I have rarely been that person, though, and if I am not moving my body, I am moving my dreams. Nothing drastic, usually, just slight adjustments as small victories are won and useless battles forsaken.

Just thoughts that fade as night falls and tomorrow’s hope drapes me tighter than flannel sheets and memories…. Restlessness, I have found, is best cured with a purpose that outshines the sun of longing, that finds a home and a peace in the dreams that won’t go away. Just know that sometimes your purpose obliterates yesterday’s dreams and raises up grander ones out of the ashes of who you used to be….

"Love your neighbor as you love yourself…. There is no greater love than this, that a person lays down their life for their friends." Suspend, for a moment at least, any predisposition toward or against religion. That’s not what I am talking about. Sure, the quotations above are found in the Bible, but love is found in the religious and the least holy. Love is found between brothers, spouses, and in the harlots and gangbangers. What is it? One thing is certain, it brings with it a suitcase of emotions that springs open at the most inopportune time and scatters its contents across the busy concourse of our lives so that passing strangers can glimpse our hearts and our heartaches as if they were our underwear scattered on the airport floor.

That’s right. I allude to the belief that love is not an emotion. It definitely causes emotion, but love is an act. I may hit you. I may hug you. I may speak to you. I may love you. Each of these things is an act, something that is done. Each of these acts may cause any one of a host of emotions. I can teach someone how to shake hands, how to hug, how to hit, how to ride a bike, and (yes) how to love. No matter how I try, though, I cannot teach them to be happy or sad, or angry, or depressed. I may cause them to feel these things, thereby giving them experience, but emotions are from the heart. Love is from the mind.

What?! You’ve got to be kidding me. Nope. Seriously. Think about it. Many of the things we do we do for self-preservation. We cover up mistakes. We make excuses. We go to the tanning bed. We weasel our way into someone’s bed to fulfill a desire. We buy a new outfit. We look out for ourselves. We do these things because our mind long ago accepted as fact the basic premise that, for lack of a better way to put it, we deserve to be happy. Accepting that as fact, we act (DO things) accordingly. Emotions come and go. No matter what our emotions are, we more often than not still do the things we do in order to look out for number one.

What’s love got to do with it? Easy. Regardless of the emotions we may feel, if we truly are to love someone, we must accept as fact that WE ARE GOING TO LOVE THEM. Period. We must accept with all our mind (and heart) that we will love them. Then, everything we do will flow from that love, will be because of that love. In return, we will begin to learn how to love another as we love ourself. We also will learn how to express the greatest love. No, this doesn’t necessarily require physical death. To lay down your life for another, simply forsake your desires, your selfishness, your time, your money, your words, your kindness… for another. Only then will we begin to know the unexplainable, undeniable beauty of real love.

Oh, well… love thoughts on a loveless day. I am romantic to a fault. I am kind (usually). I can shower someone with attention, flowers, poems, compliments, and so on. I am learning, though, that true love has eluded me for one simple reason: I treated it as an emotion. As a result, it has always come and gone. I resolve to love another this year. The who, the when… later. For now, I recognize that I have been loved more than I ever thought possible. I didn’t even recognize it. I was seeking the emotional combination that would unlock my own little locked heart. If only I had done love, had laid down my life, my insecurities, my selfishenss - even for a moment. I have let people down as much as I have lifted them - maybe more so. In this world of soundbites, Hollywood-style love matches, things and people to lust after all around… the world sees love as a vast landscape of frost-capped sea and icebergs. This landscape is beautiful, but white and gray as far as the eye can see. Love is the needle in the haystack. Love is the red iceberg that shocks the senses, opens the mind, pales the world around it. Pack a good suitcase. The flight’s being called.

A song was playing in the restaurant as we were sliding the Italian bread into the olive oil. "Danny’s Song" by Loggins & Messina. "That song reminds me of riding in the backseat when I was seven. We were on our way to Sarasota." Jamie looked at me and said, "Songs remind you of a specific memory?" I thought it was that way for everyone. I am surprised to learn otherwise. "Collide" by Howie Day reminds me of the greatest kiss I have ever shared. Dylan’s "Tangled Up in Blue" brings a memory of the days when I owned a restaurant and worked harder than I ever have - a night after closing when the staff was crowded around the bar and was shocked to find that I knew all the words. "Miss You So Badly" by Buffett reminds me of my senior class trip. "Outlaw Women" by Hank Jr. reminds me of drunk redneck nights in the mountain mud. "Fuse" by Joe Henry reminds me of the record-setting sex marathon.  "Alice’s Restaurant" (Arlo Guthrie) reminds me of great weed and a day by the river.  "Gone" by Montgomery Gentry flashes pictures of my 4 year old singing loudly and dropping to his knees and firing invisible six-shooters at the phrase "bang, bang."  I love music.

I started piano lessons at age six. I begged to quit every year, and my mother let me take summers off. I got ridiculed, beat up. Then, when I was in high school, I found that girls thought it was cool that I could play. I didn’t quit anymore. I formed a band. I majored in classical performance. I still play. I listen to music, write music, play music. It is very much a part of my life. Many songs are so tied to specific experiences that it is as if the songs are puppetmasters, making memories dance at the end of the strings.

It is this stretch of time from the beginning of the year to spring break that passes so slowly for me. These days turn my playlists to more melancholy sounds - "Love Street" by the Doors; "Forecast" by Jason Mraz; "Wreck of the Day" by Anna Nalick; classical and jazz and blues; some old country. I love all the seasons’ musical changes, and the memories they tug, dancing in my head. I love even more the new songs that attach themselves so subtly to new memories. A toast to you and to the new year. Whatever music means to you, I hope your songs are heard this year.

Circa 1412, resolution refers to "a breaking into parts," from the Latin resolutionem (nom. resolutio) "process of reducing things into simpler forms." Originally the sense of "holding firmly" (in resolute) appeared in 1533.

If you’re like me and almost thoughtlessly apply the "expected" meaning of the word we hear so often during the transition from one year to the next, it may give you something to think about to consider the word’s origins. In fact, I love the thought that each new year is but a cog in the wheel turning ourselves into a "simpler form." Most of us could use such a change. Technically, removing excess weight, bad habits, and such is, indeed, creating in oneself a "simpler form." Even more technically, or metaphysically (?), each year is part of a process of reducing us to a simpler form - dust.

Enough of that, though. My life is complicated in many ways. Kids can do that to ya. So can marriage. So can divorce. So can a job. And on and on it goes. Therefore, I am giving this resolution bit much more thought this year. I want to achieve a greater, a wiser priority list for my life. I want to have fun, not at the expense of responsibility, but to hell with social norms and societal correctness and expectations. I am not sure about reincarnation. All I know is that I am here now. Tomorrow is a dream for which much hope exists. Until I wake, I will sleep. And before I sleep, I will live.