My Heart

The metaphoric distance from my heart to my head has rapidly narrowed. I no longer can think without a consultation with my heart first. Too often my cognitions have been based on what happened in the past or a negative script brought on by low self-esteem. My heart has no such debilitations. It relies on the pure communications with the universal mind and the environments I travel through.  The universe is never wrong it just is. However the environments I traverse through can give me an unbalanced view of what I truly feel. The only way for me to “filter” this potential toxicity is to pray. Prayer for me is the Serenity Prayer and thanking my Higher Power every chance I get when he comes to my rescue emotionally, physically, spiritually and even financially.  

My cognitive self is one that has blessed me with an incredible creative mind that can write, speak and move among earthlings with an innate deftness I can only marvel at. I dare not take too much credit because it is automatic thought. This adroitness is unconscious competence.  This skill comes at a price however. I have a short attention span and can get too distracted by the “next thing” before I have even finished with the present thing. I also know that for those actions that I deem to be mundane like where my keys are or my wallet is bring me to consequences of wasted time and unnecessary consternation.  

What I can do is to actually think about how my shoe is tied instead of leaving it to my unconscious. In this way maybe I can teach my myopic camera to broaden into a Cinerama like view and allow me to function in a practical way, something that has plagued me for as long as I can remember.   The 18 inches of truth, the distance from my head to my heart may not in fact have physically changed but I will ask my heart to guide and guard me and let my head remember where my keys are. 

You Can Rain on Me

Might sound like Part II of Crying but this entry has more to do with my life on life’s terms. I have a tendency to ignore when the universe is telling me all is right in Jack World but give credence to fear at the drop of a falling leaf. The ego or my ego is always looking to protect me from any delusions of grandeur when I even give myself the freedom to think situations will turn out just fine and more often than not exceed my wildest expectations.  

Some say that I attract the rain and still others say soap opera like dramas as well. But as I alluded to in my last entry I think its because I fail to delineate between what I need to happen or what I would like to happen and what others false expectations of me are.  You can rain on me. I might get wet but I must be controversial enough to attract the clouds that unleash their heavy downpours upon my head.  

You can rain on me and frankly I like getting wet.  And if I need I do have an umbrella.  

Crying*

I have been crying but some might see them as crocodile tears or just  liquid insincerity. Only I know what my feelings are and those who might debate it probably don’t know me as well as they think they do.  My life has been a series of hellos and f**k you Jacks mainly because I don’t say goodbye and let people go when its their expiration date.  I let people walk all over me because I don’t want to hurt their feelings. Instead I take their s**t and hope it won’t stink a little later.   

*Inspired by Don McLean's version of:

Crying 

My Dad's An Alien

He looks my Dad. He sounds like my Dad. He even walks like my Dad. He’s not my Dad though.  He’s an alien inhabiting my Dad’s body. I cognitively know that my Father has left this earthly plain and my real Dad is  on a celestial journey to join his wife my Mother who left his side nearly 13 years ago. Sadly it seemed to me that when my Mother passed he started his wait for God to call him home but so much time has gone by that even he forgot to remember what he was waiting for. 

My Father and I were never the best of friends but I suspect that I am not alone in that some Fathers parented from the book they never read and that was how to rear a son with kindness instead of intimidation. This is not an indictment by any means I believe my Dad did the best job he could with the resources available to him. Trouble is that bringing up children in the 1950’s was still mired in the “spare the rod and spoil the child” mentality. A snap of the belt or the crack of a wooden spoon was the default setting as Sergeant of Arms. 

Today when he speaks to me in that subservient voice it stirs resentment inside me that I end up feeling guilty about. I couldn’t put my finger on why I felt a genuine hostility growing inside me. Then it hit me like a bag of ice across my face. I was never able to stand up to him even when I had left the nest for a home of my own. Was it a lack of courage not wanting to incur his wrath or was it that I was just holding him in high regard because he sired me? I suspect that I will never know but it’s too late now to do anything about it except treat him with a kindness as much for him as for myself.  

My Dad’s an alien and the entity inhabiting his body doesn’t know Jack.  

How Can I Be?

How can I be sure in a world that’s constantly changing? A song from the Young Rascals in the idyllic 60’s descended on me and so I write about just that.  The rapidity of the 21st Century’s dynamic make the 60’s seem like a turtle moving through molasses by comparison. Of course at the time change was beginning to accelerate just how much it would however was at the time incalculable.  

How can I be sure? Not as easy today as had been in the past when life was more black and white like so many of the TV sets in homes. Now to paraphrase the pop culture’s latest craze; life’s permutations are more like 50 shades of grey.  No longer can we be sated in thinking we’ve done the right thing by simply telling the truth. The oft-used anagram of TMI (too much information) is a discretionary tool we need to consider when we divulge every facet of our lives to another. The AA phrase of making amends to all person’s we have harmed except when to do so would injure another is a discerning tool to use in deciding what goes said and what is better left unsaid. 

This is of course is in no way to condone prevarication but there are some details that will only add needless controversy and exacerbate situations that if left alone would remain innocuous. The best way to proceed might be the completion backwards principle wherein we future pace what we plan to say. Then we can  try to predict with the most amount of accuracy what we are trying to accomplish in what we say to another and how much is necessary and how much is not.  There are always ways to make sure our point is made staying away from our inflated egos and self-aggrandizement.  Just how we navigate these shark infested waters have to be left prefaced with a prayer so that our words have a soft landing but never leaving our loved ones and friends left in the dark when to do so would also harm them.  

The Fall of '12

Last year in the summer of  ’11 I had one of the best seasons of my life despite a deeply controversial personal life.  Now that the summer of ‘12 has come and gone and fall is upon us I am determined to make it the best season of my 61 years. I often say the stick is getting shorter but with a rigorous exercise schedule and more attention paid to my diet I am determined to choke up on the bat and make contact with all the days my Higher Power chooses to bestow on me.  

A friend suggested recently that I should live everyday as if  it was my last and although I have heard this mantra before especially in AA I am taking it more to heart now than ever before. The only reason we don’t live this way is because we think we have all the time in the world. Of course we don’t and we only have today and if I keep this in mind even for part of each day I will avoid more chaos and sleep like a baby. I don’t know what’s in store I just hope I can make a difference starting with the Fall of ’12.  

In the Company of Strangers

This Saturday I found myself visiting with my good albeit enigmatic friend. I was to meet him at his home in Greenport and then take the North Ferry to beautiful Shelter Island.  When we arrived at the palatial estate of the resident 100 Millionaire he gave us not more than an askance look as he went about his business entertaining some of his weekend guests. He was polite enough be speckled in his red frame glasses, but this man could barely spare of a dimes worth of attention with us. That was okay enough as we were there for other reasons and as we surveyed the business portion of our visit I started to get antsy for the promised BBQ being held in Bridgehampton later that day in the company of strangers.  

As we headed to our eventual destination snaking through the winding road of route 114 we made our way to the South Ferry.  A pleasant enough break from driving and as we chatted about business the ride was over seemingly in minutes.  Two different companies operate these two ferries and interestingly enough they charge the same rate even though the South Ferry is half the distance of the North. I never get a discount on my Mini when I get it washed so why should I think this might be different. My friend knows the East End like the back of his hand and I was simply amazed how he avoided most of the traffic as tourists clung to the end of summer as if it might not come again.   

Arriving at our final destination we found a bunch of 30 something’s celebrating a birthday of a young man who made millions in some dot com sale and in his White Communion like suit it told me although he was rich he was as uncomfortable as anyone could be thrust into the spotlight. He gave us a very polite but perfunctory greeting.  His date was a statuesque beauty right out of Victoria Secret and as she sidled up and down his frame I thought to myself these two needed a room right quick. 

I love to be in the company of strangers because I can be totally free in my commentary and although I will always be polite I can be irreverent as I wish and be extemporaneously glib to my hearts content. I did wind up talking to a young Nubian girl of 23 (by the way I guessed her age) and had her complete attention as I rattled off little known facts that only an eccentric like me would know. Of course she didn’t know who Steve McQueen was and she promised she would google it when she got home. Fascinating how young people today think The Breakfast Club is an old movie and if it didn’t happen during their lifetime it didn’t happen. 

Strangely thinking I had life’s answers for her she asked me to come over and sit on the couch because she had an important question for me. She blurted out that she was thinking of joining the Marines and did I think it was a good idea. I was taken aback although tried not to show it. And as I took out my thinking cap I gave her my best set of questions to help her come to her own conclusion. A delightful child I hope she makes what she wants in life and that is to make a difference. 

I concluded the evening after wolfing down plenty of BBQ chicken and salmon with a night pool swim in the company of strangers.