Memorial Day

It's early in the morning on Memorial Day and I am realizing just how close we were to having an intimate relationship with this day. It was close enough, causing the meaning of the holiday, to not have anything to do with discount sales of mattresses or DVD's.

A year ago, Travis was in the Sand Box for the second tour. He lost some friends there, one of them he had trained and three weeks later, while on patrol, he was killed on the same route Travis' team had done dozens of times and would have still been doing if they stayed.

Three weeks, a hundred yards, a left turn instead of a right, a flat tire, a scout plane with a bad radio, a delay because of a phone call, a thousand other flukes that caused the seemingly random selection of men and women in harms way to be chosen to give up their lives-so the rest of us could live.

Some call it luck.

This day, as it starts on many accounts, all lead back to counting it as the start of summer. It is and always has been, one of the most holy days in the American way of life. I am very happy this day is not a more intimate day at our house. But it has to be something more than the start of summer or two for one sales. What should it look like? Do we want to walk with our heads lowered and stay inside and close the curtains? I asked my son if he wanted to go to the national cemetery, maybe finding his friends grave. He didn't even hesitate-'No,' he said.

I think its not because he didn't want to feel that pain, he didn't. Don't think anyone does, but there was an idea of these men and women who loved us so much, so purely, they might not have wanted us to hurt at their departure. When you love at that level these people have done, the idea focus of their lives is not one of pain, but joy. Pain was not the end, but the eradication of it.  That was their intent. They knew something when they stepped up. They wrote a big check. We need to honor that.

So, let me propose something. Today, Memorial Day 2012, we celebrate their lives. Each one, going back to those that lost it all in the Revolutionary War to Fallujah. We celebrate their love for us. We can still have and do all we want with family, on the beach, and grilling those brats, but stop and think, just for a moment. There is a National moment set aside at 3 in the afternoon where ever we are,  just for this, to remember those people that have loved us so much they gave up their lives. Call them by name, smile at their pictures, laugh at retelling of their bad jokes. That's what they want for us, they want us to celebrate with them. They want us to love, to learn to love sacrificially like they have learned and demonstrated. That's what this day's about-love.

The sweeping power of a love so strong, the world is changed by it.

Enjoy and pass this on.

Mother

So, today is Mother's Day. The day we honor our mother. That one day a year when we get her flowers, candy, a nice card-maybe one that plays the song Wind beneath My Wings, when you open it. Yep, mothers really deserve it.

Why?

Look, we owe them, we all do. There isn't one of us here that doesn't owe their spleen to their mom. We owe them our whole lives. And we can never pay them fully back. We just can't. So, the best we can do is to admit that and start chipping away- sometimes just a day at the time, to start chipping away at that big porcelain bowl  called "We owe you this thing Mom." Starting now. Lets start with the basics this weekend, let it bleed over into the week to follow, maybe the week beyond that. See how far you can take it, you know, chipping at that bowl.

Wash and vacuum your mom's floor. I mean wash it, with hot water and soap. get down on your hands and knees and get those corners under the cabinets, where that piece of chicken fell out of the pan four months ago, and the dog never got to it to clean it up. You thought the dog did, but two days later, while you were eating your cereal, you saw it there, just under the cabinet and you reminded yourself to get it after you brushed your teeth, and never did. You forgot.

Oh, and have the attitude of cleaning that floor like your your going to eat a big rib-eye steak off of it.

Move the chairs and stuff too. It doesn't do any good to vacuum or clean the floor if there is a farm of alfa-alfa growing under the couch.  Clean the crap under it. You probably put it there when you were a teen anyway. And make sure she gets all the change you find. I mean all of it, not just the nickles and dimes. I'm talking about the quarters too.

Speaking of chipping at the porcelain bowl, scrub the bath room and toilet. Figure it this way, if you wanted to clean something that made a difference in world peace, the toilet is the greatest place to start. It's so much worse than the gas grill out back. Mom doesn't mess with the grill anyway. She doesn't care about it. Frankly, the more crap on the grill, the better that rib-eye steak will taste.

And hey, break out that rusted shut wallet and take her to a nice brunch, and dinner too, maybe a dinner later in the week. Get her some flowers. Nice flowers. Big bunch.

Now, here is where most of us stop. 

There is one secret that moms don't tell you. They are waiting, actually waiting and hoping you do one thing on your own-one thing they really want for Mother's Day-any day actually.

Your time.

Moms have the incredible ability to be pleased with just about anything you do. That hand-traced turkey you did when you were seven, she still has it. What she really wants-is you. If you're too far away, and can't make it, sit down and write her a letter, the old fashioned way-with paper and pen. Moms LOVE letters from their kids---LOVE THEM. When they pass and you go in and finally clean out that dresser of hers you remember she had since you were a kid, you will find every one of those letters, cards, dried flowers, in her underwear drawer.

Everyone of them.

Make sure she gets it. 

Happy Mother's Day mom. 

The Art of Caring

As a beyond middle-aged man, I am finding myself becoming more and more tired, physically and mentally tired. So much so, I am becoming careful of how I step, how I bend over-WHY am I bending over, even asking do I need to bend over? My knees hurt, my left leg has been conducting a slow throb all day today, and I found myself pushing the cart at the hardware store while  my shoulders were up in my ears, like I had a permanent shrug cooking. Along with the shrug, as I sit here and type these words, my glasses sit on my face, slightly crooked-and I just don't care.

I guess that's part of the growing old thing. After a while, your desire to care, especially about hygiene, soaps, laundry, floor wax, or their associated relatives, kind of go to the back burner of life. I care about stuff-government, green house gases, my family, my retirement account, important stuff. The other stuff, not so much. 

Sure I can still run. I exercise every day, vigorously, well, maybe not on weekends. Weekends have their own activities, like mowing lawns, and trimming trees. My running days are over and replaced with a bike some time ago. I tried to bring running back in time to run with my son in the Pat Tillman run but I couldn't get it going. Just couldn't float that muskrat  down the Tuscaloosa, if you know what I'm saying.  

I still get up on the roof, climb trees to trim out their centers so they don't get too thick, sit Indian style to re-glue some sprinkler parts, or hold a spray rig over my head to paint the patio roof. I still, if I had too, move like an twenty-two year old. Only if I had too. There better be a damn good reason I am moving like a twenty-two year old and someone better have some ibuprofen when I get done.  But then we come back to the reason I am still sitting here with my glasses almost at a seventeen degree angle on my face and the fact that two paragraphs later I still haven't fixed them.

I just don't care. 

I find myself being more careful. I walked out this morning, actually, the last week or so, to get the paper. Myself and the woman next door still get the paper on our street. We're old school. Anyway, I stood over it for a moment, thinking about bending over and retrieving it. I did. I made sure I bent my knees and got a firm grip before I started to stand again. Going down was a lot easier then standing back up with it. This afternoon, I need to go hang up some shirts I pulled out of the dryer two days ago. They're in the same pile as the underwear and Swiffer mop heads. I figured if they were all the same color and you washed them on hot, the fading and the sterilization of everything works out. They might be a little wrinkled but if you tuck them into your pants tight enough, those wrinkles just buff right out.

I guess its a priority thing. As you get older, your priorities change a little. I find happiness if I wear a belt. I feel I've accomplished something if there is a belt AND its through all the loops, not missing one. That is a good day when you haven't missed a belt loop. Or you remember to shower sometime during Saturday. Sure, you can get up and get going. You NEVER shower before you cut the lawn. That is just a sign of being a pompous ass.  But you shouldn't forget to clean up before bed time. The world is just a nicer place if you shower by the end of the day and crawl into some cool, clean sheets. 


Maybe I sound a little negative. I'm sorry. I don't mean to sound negative. My older brothers are charging after life and making every day count-like a beef collar at a wolf convention. But sometimes, I think they too want to lie down and let the Big Wave of Nappy Time sweep them off to the the Memory Foam Solar System.


Maybe, someday, I'll get there-when its time. Apparently, I have to hang out on this rock for a while longer.


Maybe by then, I'll have a set of glasses that will stay lined up on my face.

Here We Go----Again

It is not possible to enjoy the spring that has fallen on us without thinking about the hellish summer that is rolling down the highway to our living rooms and activating evap coolers and ceiling fans everywhere, bringing another summer of such statements as HOLY MOTHER OF THE LIVING GOD- MY SKIN IS ON FIRE! SWEET BABY JESUS, MAKE IT STOP!! Or, how about this for an evening of fun--walking the indoor mall, all under the idea of getting out and doing something-fun. You lose track of the outside world because you are in someone else's bought air.

By all reports, Arizona is going to have another above average summer with regard to temperatures. You know, I can't remember one summer where the forecast WASN'T that prediction. Swimsuits are on the mannequins along with towels, lawn furniture, seed, fertilizer, all the things that you need to go outside and enjoy the world are on sale at the stores. Put away the jackets Mildred, Spring is here!

I know, I know, I've never lived in Buffalo, New York in the winter where the sun disappears and so do the streets, trees, sidewalks, cars, or anyone drunk enough to stumble out their front door on New Year's Eve and fall off the front porch during a lake effect snow storm where the poor bastard is not found until "The Thaw". Then the summer bugs pick you up and carry you off. I know and I should be thankful that even the bugs out here don't survive the summer heat, except for cockroaches of course. They survive everything.

Its just that it would be nice to have a 'wet' summer, a 'snowy' summer, an 'anything' but a scorching six months of "You Got to Be Kidding Me" summer. Since we have all this global warming and weather change stuff, we could have a weather change here, just once. A summer where it rained, actually rained. Even a few floods, that wouldn't be bad. Floods in Arizona are always kind of fun. On the news, there is always someone who tries to cross a creek when it was traditionally dry and they get swept down stream. That just makes for good television. Rescue comes and saves them then charges them for the rescue. That seems fair.

Its the way God thins out the herd. Right now, we have temperature swings of thirty degrees in a week. I don't think it's too much to ask, just once, to look down range for a few months and not dread the knowledge that I will sweat like a Turkish border guard during the night, even with my Hunter ceiling fan on high. Sure, it could be hormones, but we all know, everyone here in the southwest knows.


Yep, here we go.

Games

Its funny what men as boys think of as 'fun.' I remember as a kid, on those rare rainy days, usually in the summer, when the gutter pan filled with water out front in the street. It filled so deep you could float a 2x4 your own twelve-year-old hands built, adding small blocks of wood to the center of that three foot board and nailing them down with big 8 penny nails and floating it as an aircraft carrier down the gutter, all the while finding rocks to lob at it as pretend mortar rounds. If you could hit it hard enough and it tipped over, the twelve year old thought, you count it as a sinking. I never tipped one over, causing me to resort to getting handfuls of loose street gravel and strafing the ship or standing over it and dropping them while holding the rocks close to my face and looking straight down, like a bomb site. 

In high school, out by the handball courts, we played dodge ball with baseballs. We didn't play that a lot. 

'Smear the Queer' was the politically incorrect term for, geez-don't even know what to call what we were playing in fifth grade. Whoever had the ball got, well, speared, by the other twenty kids. Dale Denmen was the best, along with John Battersby. There was another kid who was the toughest at the game. I don't remember his name but he had one of those eyebrows that kind of stuck out, like a caveman and his eyes were kind of far apart. he had the unique ability to see around corners before he got to the corner. I think that was the 'queer' part meaning 'strange'. 'Smear the Strange Kid', yeah. I broke his nose while we played. I ducked my head and hit his nose. He bled like I hit an artery. It was pretty cool.

Speaking of, there was another kid my freshmen year who wanted to grow up and be a Yo-Yo demonstrator. He said they got paid to travel the world and demo Yo-Yo's. He would yo-yo to and from class and at lunch, demonstrated what he could do. 

How about NASCAR?  Had another friend in grade school who worked for his father at his garage and could tell you what any car was by the look of their brake lights on the back of the car. He could tell you the year and the make. On weekends, that's what he did-raced cars as a thirteen year old. You can't tell me any of us watch NASCAR or the Indy 500 and don't secretly wish for a real bad wreck? You know, one that has no injuries, everyone is fine, but the cars disintegrates and flips up into the audience, all of whom, of course, escape the falling, flaming vehicle because they had all gone to the snack bar at the same time.

This weekend is the Highland Games in Phoenix. My ancestors from Scotland, did this. I know they did. How do I know? Because they come from a country where the sponsor of the event is a scotch distillery. When they fought, they used clubs and sharpened iron. They lashed rocks to sticks and went to war. Their women fought with them because, well, frankly, have you seen any of those women? They can birth a child, cook dinner, and cut your face off and make a hat out of it before the day was through. Throwing pounds of iron for sport just seems right for us.

I think we coddle our kids. I do. We need to make sure we don't buy anything they can swallow, cut themselves on, cause any form of body fluid leakage. Look, slinging ten pounds of iron and seeing how far it goes is just what boys and some girls like to do. There is something in our brains that requires us to do just that. When we had the space program, it kind of filled that need-'lets see how if we can throw $1-billion worth of low bids to a far planet, moon, or star and see how close we can get. Throwing a rock is good for us.  It teaches fluid dynamics, some calculus, trajectory analysis, all the while you get to sling iron--not steal---not compressed zinc, but iron, a big piece of rusting metal from Mother Earth.

I'm not saying we go out and buy our kids guns. Heck, that's as bad as toys that talk. Anyone can get a gun and with a little practice, shoot an animal, like a lion on the Serengeti, and make a rug out it. Now, if one was to do that with, lets say, a dull butter knife, now you got some good TV. That would be like the number one show ever. Of course, each week, you would have to get a new contestant.

I'll stick with a 2x4 and some 8 pennies.

Spring Break Therapy!

The idea that teachers and the support staff in a school district have weeks off at a time is the point of many bad jokes. They are the focus of conversations around the barbeque when talk winds around to why Uncle Ned just had his hours increased during third shift and neither he nor his family have  had a family vacation since your cousin's sister got out of rehap. They know who you are and you work for a school and they ask, spitting it out as if talking about you voting independent, 'so, where are you and your family going this spring?' 

Little do they know you signed up for intensive therapy with a specialist in talking people down from ledges.

If people knew, actually knew, what went on in the educational community, they would look at it globally like the old RCA commercial where the dog is sitting in front of the Victrola with its head cocked to one side. "Errr?" And here's the funny part, almost none of it is decided at the school level, some at district, almost all of it at the state or Federal level.

I really like working at an inner city school. The school I work at use to be where the mover and the shaker kids would go. We still get some who send their kids there. It's a good school with great staff and good programs. We also get a lot of kids with numerous problems. Some, wearing ankle braclets, a tracking device put on by their probation officer to track their every move. They are usually the one's wearing their dead grandfather's jeans down passed their bottoms, like the original Marky-Mark (Mark Walberg started it when he was schlepping underwear).

I asked Lamont (of course its not his/her real name---or is it?) "So, Lamont, why the braclet? Whatchya do the Man had to brand you? Pull up your drawers." Actually, there isn't anything much funnier then a fifty-four year old man talking homie.

"Stealin.'"

"Whatchya steal? Burglary? Your pants, pull up your pants."

Lamont nodded the admission to the burglary then caught himself. "Oh, no, not for this. This is for stealing at Wal-Mart."

This, of course, led to the follow up question of what burglary did Lamont do that no one knows about.

Lamont couldn't actually remember. I guess they all kind of bleed together. I'm sure he got caught because he couldn't carry the TV and hold up his pants at the same time. Well, he could, but he just couldn't run very fast.

Then there are the Tonys. They're homeless. They sit quietly, almost in a catatonic state, wearing the same jacket covering up one of two shirts alternated every other day. These guys try to focus in class. They just have a few other things on their mind. They will eat two meals today, breakfast and lunch. They get them at school. After three, yeah, not sure what happens. The Tonys don't talk about that part.

The Angelinas are excited about their birthing class they started to attend with their aunts. They take a lot of bathroom breaks. They don't tell me why, but being a father of three I know its becuase their bladder is getting pressed on by the growing life inside.

"Lamont, your pants. I don't want to see your ass. Pull up your pants."

There are the endless lists of 'Jacks' and 'Jill's' and 'Logimitsu's' who are refugees or exchange students, none of them wanting to go back to China, or Tailand, or the Congo. We call them Jack and Jill because we can't pronounce their real names-there are no vowels in it. 'Xyhgmyywp,' what would you say that is? Hmm? So, its Jill.

Jill needs $6000 to stay for another year or in May she's going back to her village in Tailand. I've seen pictures of her village. You don't want Jill going back to her village.

"Lamont, for all that's holy, pull up your pants!"

Same with Alex. He is the cream of the crop from his town. He wants to stay here becuase, like we already knew, China of TV is not the real China. Logimitsu is fine, these people are refugees fleeing a civil war. He wants to go back after he becomes a doctor. He speaks five languages and runs cross country. His village was burned to the ground.

So, what am I doing on my Spring Break? Trying to recharge before I go back. There is more to teaching than teaching a subject, but it takes a graphic toll on a person. Walls are built up around emotion and guards are posted. I would be fired if I taught at an affluent school. I really would. Sure, those kids have problems, parents that don't care, aren't there, etc. But I am here, at this place. During my break, for whatever reason, I will find myself back at my desk in my classroom, doing something. Habits are hard to break.

"Lamont, I swear to God, if you don't pull up those pants I will set you on fire!!!"

The slide of time

On the edge of time, age 53 getting ready to scoot into 54, as I find my self getting older, I find myself not realizing birthdays coming up. I was cutting the lawn today, and even though we had talked about it, I actually had to stop and think there was a birthday coming up-mine. Then, and this was the hard part, to remember what year it actually was. Have you ever done that? Forgotten or at least temporarily misplacing your age, let alone your car keys, wallet, forgetting when you last bathed, you know, typical stuff? Being born in the last century didn't help. I had to use the new math to figure it out, subtracting the year I was born from the current year, which required borrowing and carrying ones.


There are a whole lot of changes I've gone through, probably you as well. If you're younger and walking down the age path like me, you're experiencing these things. You people who are older, you're already there. Sit back and smoke your pipe.


Look I'm not dead, not by a long shot. I just won a major battle with those invading little roof rat bastards. Slaughtered them and their children and cooked them with the morning bacon. I had climbed up into the attic, going toe to toe with things that go bump in the walls. Just got checked by the doctor and she said my blood pressure and labs should be the standard for all men 51-57. I still do at least 30 minutes of cardio a day. What I am finding is as I get older, I don't care about things I use to build a whole plan around.


Like showering on weekends
Like hurrying-I'm walking slower now
Like clothes with wrinkles, leaving them in the dryer until I darn well want to take them out-sometime this week
Like mold on cheese-trim it off and keep going
Like the Oscars-haven't seen any of the movies and won't until Netflix has them
Like putting my hands in stuff


I developed that hand thing when I was a father with three kids. You could only run to the Brawny so often, eventually finding yourself no where near a roll of paper towels and if you weren't quick, something was going to run off the table, toilet seat, sink, or dashboard, unless you used your hand, usually followed by your shirt/sleeve. When I climbed up into the attic, I was in dust undisturbed since the middle of the last century. No worries, that's was shirts are for.


Bathing, especially on weekends, I can still do that daily, many times twice. I just kind of forget to shave, soap, and well, use deodorant. You know, I figured what it came down to-I just don't care.


Really.


Those of you who are older, its true, isn't it? Years and years of doing the same thing, day in day out, days, weeks, months of caring, being on time, making sure you're shirt is buttoned up, pants zipped, socks matching or at least in the same color spectrum, why? Why do we need to wash the towel every week? If its dry, its good to go. You don't cycle it until it starts to smell a little-funny. Then you let it dry for a couple of days, like on a weekend, when you know you aren't going to touch it.


What's wrong with going to bed at 7:30 at night? And frankly, what' wrong with taking your clothes out of the dryer after three days? So what if they're a little wrinkled? There is a style to wrinkleness.


When you go to your 10 year high school reunion, everyone is sharing what they are 'doing'. When you go to your 30th, the conversation centers around who is still alive, had their cancer removed, or something else added.


Comfort is the name of the game. Comfortable shoes is the answer to many of life's problems.
A good book at bedtime is the answer to many more.
And a dog asleep on your foot while you blog, fits everything into a perspective involving peace. If that guy in Iran and the kid in North Korea did these three simple things, there would be flowers growing in their garden and someone would be inviting someone else to lunch.


I have been told that 54 is the new 42 or something like that. I don't want to go back to 42. I like where I'm at. I'm at an age where I can still do many of those things from my youth, just not as fast and if that's the case, ah-I was good in my youth. Breaking down doors, guns, fear, adrenaline, the good fight, aye-the good fight.


I still have fight. That's what's kind of cool about this age. No one expects the old man to have much fight. We hide it until we truly need it. Hoping we don't need it because we know, from experience, we're going to get some crap on our wrinkled shirt. We'll win-we'll have to cheat, but we WILL win. We'll just get crap on our shirts. Then we'll take our time to wash it. It will sit in the hamper until is forms a firm ball.


We'll just let people think we have no fight left. I help them with that image with a fine scotch and a good $4 cigar. I like peaceful music and dancing in the cereal isle. I could change my grand kids diaper with a couple of paperclips, a red Expo marker, and a clean sock, taking them to Home Depot with one-ONE diaper tucked in my back pocket. We dance in the fastener isle there.


Nope, I like where I'm at. So do my dogs. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need think if I've showered today.