The calendar says it's late March. The snow falling from the sky begs to differ.
It's the Winter That Will Not End. It has been cold, it still is cold, and it will stay cold for centuries to come.
This is the winter where I can't force myself to go back outside once I come home. Even when my house is on fire. Actually, especially when my house is on fire.
It's the winter where I eat everything in sight, in hopes that the process of digestion will incrementally raise my body temperature.
This is the winter where I've yet to go more than two consecutive hours without a fresh cup of coffee, even when I'm sleeping.
It's the winter where I can't change out of my office clothes when I get home because those five seconds in my underwear put me at risk of hypothermia.
It's the winter where the highlight of my day is burning my skin in the shower.
This is the winter that still going on, even in the spring.
There's no sun in this winter. There's a vague hint of gray light from the distance, but it isn't bright enough to be more than an unusually large flashlight.
Once every two weeks or so, winter will disappear for a day, only to roar back with a vengeance the next day as part of some cruel practical joke. Winter is laughing just thinking about the idea.
If Winter is really an old man, he's the kind of cranky old geezer who likes that he's driven us all just a little bit crazy. He's like the distant uncle who stays a few extra days after the rest of the family has cleared out after the holidays: he knows you don't really want him there but he's got nothing else to do, so it's December 29th and he's still crashing on your couch. Except in this case, it's March 25th, and he's still here.
This winter has been a brutal slog where every day is more miserable than the last. I'm reasonably sure that Shakespeare proclaimed something else to be "the winter of our discontent," only because he'd never lived through anything like this.
Even my cats are cold. One sleeps on my leg each night and the other plops directly on my crotch. The resulting configuration is painful and paralyzing, but their warmth increases my body temperature half a degree, so I don't complain. At this point, I'm not even entirely sure I'd mind if they peed on me.
It's so cold that a snowman knocked on my door this morning, asking if he could come sit by the fire. I would have let him, but his snow wife was already here doing the same, and I didn't want him to get the wrong impression.
It's so cold that I don't unload my groceries when I come home from the store. I just leave them in the car in case I want some ice cream on my next drive.
It's so cold here that I saw a group of penguins at the bus station yesterday, shaking their heads in resignation while holding return tickets to the South Pole in their flippers.
It's a real life Narnia here, except for the part where winter gets to end after 100 years. Allegedly, the Disney movie "Frozen" was released this week, but I swear I've been starring in it for three months straight.
Even with the heater running full blast, I can't keep my house a reasonable temperature. In fact, my hot tea froze over last while I tarried in squirting in a bit of lemon.
In other words, it's just too cold.
Way too cold.
Tuesday, March 25, 2014
Wednesday, March 5, 2014
Pain and Healing
"The healing starts today," I said. "From this point on, every new step is a step toward getting better." I had meant well, when I said this to someone stuck in a hospital bed, but I had no idea how wrong I was.
The unfortunate thing about pain and suffering is that they aren't a linear phenomenon. The regular everyday hurt, like when your team loses an important ballgame or a friend says something hurtful seems to fade at a normal pace, but the physical or emotional pain that is significant enough to shake up our insides seems to play by its own rules.
Once it infects your system, one day can feel normal and the next, without warning, it finds you feeling broken and dead inside.
But feeling broken isn't always such a bad thing. It gives us the freedom to stop chasing after the things that led us to our unhappy place to begin with. By doing so, our eyes are forced to open to the possibilities that we had previously found too hard or confusing.
The disappointment of a hope that didn't turn out according to our plans can burn for a long time. But, in some ways, going through life with fewer things written in stone can be liberating. As our need for control gives way to the cold hand of reality, we give up our attempts to steer that which is beyond our capabilities. In doing so, we save a lot of energy that we can refocus in more productive ways. Pain changes what matters to us, sometimes forcing us to focus on what's most important.
Broken people are God's favorite. When Jesus blessed the poor in spirit, perhaps he meant the people who didn't get wrapped so tightly in accomplishing their own plans that they closed their eyes to the needs that crossed their paths on the way to their destination. Perhaps he meant the people who had seen disappointment, those who were no longer blinded by their own ambitions, and those who as a result were more open to helping others reach theirs.
Being broken like that wouldn't be such a bad way to live if it could come without first being hurt.
If you are reading this, you're old to enough to have been wounded by someone you trusted. Maybe someone you cared about assumed the worst without hearing your side of the story. Maybe someone you thought was on your team treated you like an inconvenient burden. Maybe you don't feel respected by someone you can't avoid, or you can't trust that the people in your orbit are both safe enough to trust with your burdens and healthy enough to lighten your load.
Maybe life has disappointed you to the point that you feel not just broken, but crushed.
If this is you, you might be wondering how to put the pieces back together.
The unfortunate truth of life is that the things you work for don't always come through, the people near you don't always understand you or share your priorities, and an awful lot of time is spent trying to make sense of the resulting conflict.
There's no way around this. All you can do, is try to walk through it.
The best way forward is to find something meaningful to grab onto as you stumble along, and to find someone safe enough to steady your path as they muddle along beside you. And don't forget to stop and ask for directions often along the way.
Of course, this won't be easy. If your life abounded with meaning and an empathetic support system, you probably wouldn't be feeling so bad in the first place. So to find it, you might have to open yourself up a little more than normal so that those things you need have an opening to find you
.
As you start your journey forward, you'll be tempted to look behind you to see what hidden obstacles caused you to fall. This is helpful at first, Eventually, though, you must grab the insight and continue forward with all your strength, as to do otherwise will only slow you down.
Sometimes, it's not as easy as moving on. You can't put pain behind you when the circumstances causing it refuse to budge. In those cases, your only options are to change to the way you deal with the circumstance.
You can treat the difficult person in your life with more grace and love. You can advocate for your ideals instead of leaving your wishes up to fate and constantly feeling like a victim when things don't work out.You can make it a point to be a positive force to those around you.
You can get creative or give up your pride, and maybe you'll discover that you have more power to escape that difficult situation than what you've wanted to admit. You can accept the difficult as temporary, and be on the lookout for the good until it passes. You can even do all the above.
But whatever you do, if you don't like your current reality, don't just abide in its comfortable misery, choose to do your part towards replacing it with something new and beautiful, even if the only thing that changes is you.
As we wander toward our dreams, the hurt and suffering of brokenness are an inevitable interruption on our journey. Sometimes we feel powerless to fight them, so they throw us for a loop and prevent us from moving forward for a little while. That's normal, and it's ok.
But while pain might cause us to stagger backwards at times, it doesn't have to be the end of our trip.
Thursday, February 13, 2014
Valentine's Eve at Walgreen's: Last Refuge of the Damned
The next time someone tells me they don't believe in Hell, I'm not going to argue, I'm just going to direct them to Walgreen's on the night before Valentine's Day.
Having just returned, I can assure that Hell is real and I was lucky to make it out.
I reached my inadvertent damnation innocently enough. We were going out of town tomorrow and we needed cat food. They had just enough to last the three days we'll be gone, but I didn't want to return late Monday night empty handed to a house of chattering cats with empty stomachs.
In retrospect, no amount of meowing could have outweighed the trauma of what I experienced.
I knew I was in trouble when I walked in and saw a line of unhappy looking people running the length of the store. "Weird," I thought, hoping the logjam would clear out by the time I got my cat food and found whatever aisle it was they were keeping the deodorant these days (Answer: the one furthest from all the other toiletries.)
When I turned the corner to walk past the card aisle, the occasion behind the crowd hit me and I knew I was doomed.
A line of disgruntled men blocked the aisle, picking desperately at the few remaining card options. A few had even given up on finding a card meant for Valentine's Day, and were picking through the sympathy cards looking for something tender they could adapt without too much marking.
The candy aisle was mostly a repeat of the same, although the genders of the last-minute shoppers were equally mixed, which also served to make the aisle doubly as crowded. In fact, when I finally made it through to the cat food, there was one guy with a red card in his hand and lost look in his eyes giving the Purina just a little bit too long of a look.
But at least he was still trying, which was more than I could say for a handful of guys wandering the store aimlessly, looking bewildered. Two of them carried balloons, along with a look on their face saying, "I really need to get my wife something besides these stupid balloons."
With no other options in mind, however, they just wandered the store battering other customers with their inflatable treasures while they reached unsuccessfully into their limited imaginations. As they stopped to look at picture frames and waffle makers that made animal-shaped waffles, you could almost here them trying to talk themselves into each, before hunching their shoulders and moving on.
"This is the last step before the mid-life crisis hits," I thought.
Equally perplexing were two different set of couples who were Valentine's Day shopping as a couple, at Walgreen's, on the night before Valentine's Day. And in both cases, each partner was loaded up with armfuls of stuff. I think we can safely say that if this is what passes for romance in their household, it's a good thing they found each other.
At one point, I heard a cashier announce to a middle-aged man: "that will be $65.43." I wondered how one spends $65 for Valentines' Day at Walgreen's. A $20 dollar giant stuffed animal, $10 box of candy and $5 card seem about the only conventional options, but perhaps this guy added some Splenda packets, a can of pasta and some diabetic socks.
Or maybe he went back and bought the cat food.
Finally, after I surfed through the crowd, I climbed over a giant stuffed bear that was inexplicably sitting in the middle of the floor, and stood in line. After I got skipped by a woman with three ill-behaved toddlers of varying ages (she had been someone's Valentine quite enough already, if you ask me), I finally made my purchases and was ready to escape.
"Have a nice day and come back," the cashier said.
"Thanks," I said.
And then I gave my life to Jesus so I could go to sleep knowing I'd never have to see this place again.
Having just returned, I can assure that Hell is real and I was lucky to make it out.
I reached my inadvertent damnation innocently enough. We were going out of town tomorrow and we needed cat food. They had just enough to last the three days we'll be gone, but I didn't want to return late Monday night empty handed to a house of chattering cats with empty stomachs.
In retrospect, no amount of meowing could have outweighed the trauma of what I experienced.
I knew I was in trouble when I walked in and saw a line of unhappy looking people running the length of the store. "Weird," I thought, hoping the logjam would clear out by the time I got my cat food and found whatever aisle it was they were keeping the deodorant these days (Answer: the one furthest from all the other toiletries.)
When I turned the corner to walk past the card aisle, the occasion behind the crowd hit me and I knew I was doomed.
A line of disgruntled men blocked the aisle, picking desperately at the few remaining card options. A few had even given up on finding a card meant for Valentine's Day, and were picking through the sympathy cards looking for something tender they could adapt without too much marking.
The candy aisle was mostly a repeat of the same, although the genders of the last-minute shoppers were equally mixed, which also served to make the aisle doubly as crowded. In fact, when I finally made it through to the cat food, there was one guy with a red card in his hand and lost look in his eyes giving the Purina just a little bit too long of a look.
But at least he was still trying, which was more than I could say for a handful of guys wandering the store aimlessly, looking bewildered. Two of them carried balloons, along with a look on their face saying, "I really need to get my wife something besides these stupid balloons."
With no other options in mind, however, they just wandered the store battering other customers with their inflatable treasures while they reached unsuccessfully into their limited imaginations. As they stopped to look at picture frames and waffle makers that made animal-shaped waffles, you could almost here them trying to talk themselves into each, before hunching their shoulders and moving on.
"This is the last step before the mid-life crisis hits," I thought.
Equally perplexing were two different set of couples who were Valentine's Day shopping as a couple, at Walgreen's, on the night before Valentine's Day. And in both cases, each partner was loaded up with armfuls of stuff. I think we can safely say that if this is what passes for romance in their household, it's a good thing they found each other.
At one point, I heard a cashier announce to a middle-aged man: "that will be $65.43." I wondered how one spends $65 for Valentines' Day at Walgreen's. A $20 dollar giant stuffed animal, $10 box of candy and $5 card seem about the only conventional options, but perhaps this guy added some Splenda packets, a can of pasta and some diabetic socks.
Or maybe he went back and bought the cat food.
Finally, after I surfed through the crowd, I climbed over a giant stuffed bear that was inexplicably sitting in the middle of the floor, and stood in line. After I got skipped by a woman with three ill-behaved toddlers of varying ages (she had been someone's Valentine quite enough already, if you ask me), I finally made my purchases and was ready to escape.
"Have a nice day and come back," the cashier said.
"Thanks," I said.
And then I gave my life to Jesus so I could go to sleep knowing I'd never have to see this place again.
Monday, February 3, 2014
Let's Just Get Rid of February
I wrote about the horrors of February three years ago. It's my most-highly read column, because every winter I get hundreds of new page hits from the search phrase "I hate February." Sadly, that fact has not impressed anyone enough to fix the underlying problems with the month.
So I'm going to do keep complaining about it.
February is the worst month of year and it isn't even close.
The weather is cold, the days are short, it doesn't contain a real holiday, and nothing interesting happens in it other than the Super Bowl, which almost always disappoints with boring football and uninspired commercials. And don't even get me started about Valentine's Day.
Other months are bad too, but none quite so much as February. January is too cold, and August is too hot. But January at least has two holidays, the NFL playoffs, and the tail end of the holiday season. August, has lots of daylight in its favor, and no begrudges you a summer vacation if you just can't take the brutal heat.
In February, your boss still expects you to work extra to compensate for the lost productivity of the holiday season, and it's too cold to go anywhere anyway.
February has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. And as I type this I'm reminded that February sucks for an additional reason: it is wayyyyyyy too hard to spell. It has that unnecessary and largely unpronounced "r" as its fourth letter, inserted just to spite all of us. We can't even write about it without it causing aggravation.
Honestly, the month's only redeeming factor is that it only has 28 days. Whoever decided that the rest of the months should have 30 or 31, while February was so awful it should be limited to 28, obviously realized how horrible this month is. But they didn't do enough to stop it from coming back.
Even when it passes, we all know it will still be out there, lurking, laughing under its cold wintery breath until it returns in early 2015.
So I suggest we go a step further than making February the shortest month of the year: we should eliminate it altogether. Really, wouldn't the world be a much better place if we had 11 months with 33 or 34 days each and just got rid of February?
Or we could skip from January to March.
I'm sure some old grouch out there would argue that if we skipped February, March would suddenly just take its place as the month filled with cold weather and short days, and it would be just as bad. But that's ridiculous. March is much easier to spell.
Besides, I'm pretty sure the skeptics are wrong, but even if by some weird stretch of logic they happened to win on a technicality, we could still solve the problem another way. We could just add 28 days to January. It would make for a really long month, but at least there would be something to look forward to at the end.
As it stands, finishing a month of brutal January cold only to be rewarded with February is small consolation.
We should just get rid of February instead.
And let's get rid of that unnecessary first "R" while we're at it.
So I'm going to do keep complaining about it.
February is the worst month of year and it isn't even close.
The weather is cold, the days are short, it doesn't contain a real holiday, and nothing interesting happens in it other than the Super Bowl, which almost always disappoints with boring football and uninspired commercials. And don't even get me started about Valentine's Day.
Other months are bad too, but none quite so much as February. January is too cold, and August is too hot. But January at least has two holidays, the NFL playoffs, and the tail end of the holiday season. August, has lots of daylight in its favor, and no begrudges you a summer vacation if you just can't take the brutal heat.
In February, your boss still expects you to work extra to compensate for the lost productivity of the holiday season, and it's too cold to go anywhere anyway.
February has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. And as I type this I'm reminded that February sucks for an additional reason: it is wayyyyyyy too hard to spell. It has that unnecessary and largely unpronounced "r" as its fourth letter, inserted just to spite all of us. We can't even write about it without it causing aggravation.
Honestly, the month's only redeeming factor is that it only has 28 days. Whoever decided that the rest of the months should have 30 or 31, while February was so awful it should be limited to 28, obviously realized how horrible this month is. But they didn't do enough to stop it from coming back.
Even when it passes, we all know it will still be out there, lurking, laughing under its cold wintery breath until it returns in early 2015.
So I suggest we go a step further than making February the shortest month of the year: we should eliminate it altogether. Really, wouldn't the world be a much better place if we had 11 months with 33 or 34 days each and just got rid of February?
Or we could skip from January to March.
I'm sure some old grouch out there would argue that if we skipped February, March would suddenly just take its place as the month filled with cold weather and short days, and it would be just as bad. But that's ridiculous. March is much easier to spell.
Besides, I'm pretty sure the skeptics are wrong, but even if by some weird stretch of logic they happened to win on a technicality, we could still solve the problem another way. We could just add 28 days to January. It would make for a really long month, but at least there would be something to look forward to at the end.
As it stands, finishing a month of brutal January cold only to be rewarded with February is small consolation.
We should just get rid of February instead.
And let's get rid of that unnecessary first "R" while we're at it.
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
How to Take Over the World with An Army of Penguins, in Three Easy Steps
"And that," my friend told me recently, "is my how someone could try to take down the government in three simple steps."
It was a well-thought-out plan that came from someone in counter-terrorism who'd just concluded a "think-like-the-enemy" exercise. But aside from with being limited to the US, it was inferior to my competing plan in one critical way: it lacked an army of penguins.
World domination, should you ever need it, can be reached with an army of penguins and two other steps. Here's how:
Step One: Set up Your Own Dictatorship on Antarctica
Taking over Antarctica is the first, and easiest part of the plan. It's cold, so no one lives there. Just show up with a grimace on your face sufficiently menacing to scare away the two research scientists who are stuck on the continent, and that block of ice is pretty much yours. That shouldn't be too difficult, because those scientists are probably looking for an excuse to go back home and sit by the fire anyway.
Complete this easy task, and Antarctica is yours.
Of course, you're likely to succumb to frostbite within the first half hour, but this is a small price to pay for controlling 1/7th of the world.
Congratulations! You now own the only land on earth that no one else wants.
This leads us to:
Step Two: Train an Army of Attack Penguins
This one should be self explanatory.
But as the success of the plan depends entirely on an elite army of attack penguins, I'll spell it out.
Upon your ascension to the throne of Antarctica (also known as a pile of snow), you'll need to enlist an army. Since there are no people there (those two researchers aren't much help, and they will have left by this point anyway) you'll need to use penguins.
This is ok. Penguins have several advantages over humans. They are better at marching, and more importantly, they are too cute for anyone to attack. I venture to say that this will be the case even when (inevitably) the penguins strike first.
In case you are wondering whether penguins can be trained to be an elite military unit, there is some favorable precedent. The Peabody Hotel in Memphis has a team of ducks that march ceremoniously back and forth from the elevator to the main lobby fountain twice a day. If a pack of ducks who quack with Southern accents can be trained for this, surely a pack (or whatever a group of penguins is called) of Emperor Penguins (who were bred to respect your newly created monarchy) are capable of even more. But in the worst case, you might have to hire that duck trainer from Memphis.
Maybe he'll even bring some barbecue.
The penguins should be quick studies. They won't actually know what's going on, but as long as they waddle forward and quack (or whatever ducks do) they will look intimidating enough to ensure immediate surrender.
Once the ducks are trained, you can strap weapons around them and stow them away until your next move. Although unless they are free-range penguins given luxurious accommodations, you might risk a mutiny if you arm them before the plan is ready, and they get to sit around and plot for too long.
Which leads us to:
Step Three: Threaten to Melt Antarctica
It's your continent, so it's your choice.
This act that is the central part to the plan. If you blow up Antarctica, all that melted ice would flood the rest of the world.
Actually, I'm pretty sure this is the same method God used back in Noah's Day, except that in that case, the penguins were already on the ark. Perhaps they even commandeered it.
As to how to blow up Antarctica, assuming that you do not have access to large explosives (and if are reading this blog, I certainly hope that you don't), I would suggest a large hair dryer. It might take a while, and you'll need a very large extension cord, but world domination wasn't meant to come easily. Alternatively, you could just wait until Al Gore's predictions of natural consequences come true, but no conservatives will bargain with you if you go that route.
Either way, so long as no one thinks to turn the power off from wherever your extension cord is plugged into, you'll have the world at your mercy eventually.
While you are running that cord, you can give the world a choice: surrender to your control, or you'll get all "Antarctic Blow Dryer" on their behinds. When all the world leaders inevitably surrender, you send the penguins in to clean up the last bit of guerrilla (and possibly gorilla) resistance.
The penguins can then return to their frigid rightful home, and assuming you haven't yet died of hypothermia, you can rule the world from a location of your choosing. Of course, your reign isn't likely to last long once the Resistance figures out that you are penguin-less, and that there are limits to the reach of your blow dryer. But the title of this post wasn't how to stay in control of the world, only how to take control of it to start.
Once you are overthrown, it's very possible you'll be exiled to Antarctica to live out your remaining days. But at least, from your make-shift igloo, you can start plotting your revenge. And when you do, you should have plenty of penguins at your disposal.
It was a well-thought-out plan that came from someone in counter-terrorism who'd just concluded a "think-like-the-enemy" exercise. But aside from with being limited to the US, it was inferior to my competing plan in one critical way: it lacked an army of penguins.
World domination, should you ever need it, can be reached with an army of penguins and two other steps. Here's how:
Step One: Set up Your Own Dictatorship on Antarctica
Taking over Antarctica is the first, and easiest part of the plan. It's cold, so no one lives there. Just show up with a grimace on your face sufficiently menacing to scare away the two research scientists who are stuck on the continent, and that block of ice is pretty much yours. That shouldn't be too difficult, because those scientists are probably looking for an excuse to go back home and sit by the fire anyway.
Complete this easy task, and Antarctica is yours.
Of course, you're likely to succumb to frostbite within the first half hour, but this is a small price to pay for controlling 1/7th of the world.
Congratulations! You now own the only land on earth that no one else wants.
This leads us to:
Step Two: Train an Army of Attack Penguins
This one should be self explanatory.
But as the success of the plan depends entirely on an elite army of attack penguins, I'll spell it out.
Upon your ascension to the throne of Antarctica (also known as a pile of snow), you'll need to enlist an army. Since there are no people there (those two researchers aren't much help, and they will have left by this point anyway) you'll need to use penguins.
This is ok. Penguins have several advantages over humans. They are better at marching, and more importantly, they are too cute for anyone to attack. I venture to say that this will be the case even when (inevitably) the penguins strike first.
In case you are wondering whether penguins can be trained to be an elite military unit, there is some favorable precedent. The Peabody Hotel in Memphis has a team of ducks that march ceremoniously back and forth from the elevator to the main lobby fountain twice a day. If a pack of ducks who quack with Southern accents can be trained for this, surely a pack (or whatever a group of penguins is called) of Emperor Penguins (who were bred to respect your newly created monarchy) are capable of even more. But in the worst case, you might have to hire that duck trainer from Memphis.
Maybe he'll even bring some barbecue.
The penguins should be quick studies. They won't actually know what's going on, but as long as they waddle forward and quack (or whatever ducks do) they will look intimidating enough to ensure immediate surrender.
Once the ducks are trained, you can strap weapons around them and stow them away until your next move. Although unless they are free-range penguins given luxurious accommodations, you might risk a mutiny if you arm them before the plan is ready, and they get to sit around and plot for too long.
Which leads us to:
Step Three: Threaten to Melt Antarctica
It's your continent, so it's your choice.
This act that is the central part to the plan. If you blow up Antarctica, all that melted ice would flood the rest of the world.
Actually, I'm pretty sure this is the same method God used back in Noah's Day, except that in that case, the penguins were already on the ark. Perhaps they even commandeered it.
As to how to blow up Antarctica, assuming that you do not have access to large explosives (and if are reading this blog, I certainly hope that you don't), I would suggest a large hair dryer. It might take a while, and you'll need a very large extension cord, but world domination wasn't meant to come easily. Alternatively, you could just wait until Al Gore's predictions of natural consequences come true, but no conservatives will bargain with you if you go that route.
Either way, so long as no one thinks to turn the power off from wherever your extension cord is plugged into, you'll have the world at your mercy eventually.
While you are running that cord, you can give the world a choice: surrender to your control, or you'll get all "Antarctic Blow Dryer" on their behinds. When all the world leaders inevitably surrender, you send the penguins in to clean up the last bit of guerrilla (and possibly gorilla) resistance.
The penguins can then return to their frigid rightful home, and assuming you haven't yet died of hypothermia, you can rule the world from a location of your choosing. Of course, your reign isn't likely to last long once the Resistance figures out that you are penguin-less, and that there are limits to the reach of your blow dryer. But the title of this post wasn't how to stay in control of the world, only how to take control of it to start.
Once you are overthrown, it's very possible you'll be exiled to Antarctica to live out your remaining days. But at least, from your make-shift igloo, you can start plotting your revenge. And when you do, you should have plenty of penguins at your disposal.
Tuesday, January 14, 2014
This Blog is Haunted
As of this posting, my blog has 16,666 all-time views, which signifies that it's clearly the work of the devil.
I guess that street preacher's warnings as to the direction of my life were right after all.
But more importantly for you, this means that if you read this blog, the ghost that's been haunting me for the past 36 years is likely to leave my side and end up on your doorstep.
I sure hope so, because, honestly, Clarence is kind of a bore.
You might think having your very own haunted blog would be exciting. You couldn't be more wrong. The kind of ghost that could exist anywhere in time or space but chooses instead to haunt this blog is by definition pretty lame.
Or perhaps he only seems that way to me. After all, I've heard all his stories at this point, and he isn't much fun at parties.
He doesn't like to get out much, but instead spends his time telling me not to waste time with this blog, when I could be doing more important things, such as watching wrestling or the latest episode of New Girl.
"That Zooey Deschanel sure is entertainingly quirky," Clarence says.
Clarence serves a vital purpose through his haunting of this blog: he tells me not to write stuff. Every day that I haven't written something, was because the ghost that haunts this blog told me not to. Unless I was on vacation.
You see, when I try to write my weekly blog installment, Clarence tells me not to bother. He tells me that I'm tired and burnt out and that I don't have anything new to say or any good ideas.
Of course, he's often right on all counts. But he's still annoying.
On the rare occasions when I do I have an idea for a blog post, Clarence suggests that I should Google myself instead. "After all, how many other people can say that they wrote the Alabama Elevator Code," he asks? "And it's just one quick search away! Besides, they could revise that sucker any day now and your legacy will be lost, so you might as well enjoy it now."
When his helpful ideas aren't sufficiently persuasive, sometimes he causes technical glitches. For instance, the time I got locked out of this site for a couple weeks and couldn't post anything was all Clarence's doing.
Sometimes he even sneaks in after I post stuff and creates typos that I woulds have nevre let slip by me. Other times he writes stuff under my name that just isn't any good.
Clarence mostly sticks to haunting this blog, but occasionally, when he gets really bored, he tries to haunt the rest of my life too. He tells me not to work on that book because I gave myself a year, which means I have 364 days to do it later. He tells Directv to call me every week with an offer I can't refuse. He tells me to eat that Zebra cake and drink that diet coke, because it hasn't given me cancer yet, so I'm obviously immune.
He tells me not to go to the gym because I'm tired, and that I shouldn't reach out to old friends because I don't know where to start catching up; he tells me that the people close to me couldn't understand my problems, so I should just keep them to myself; he tells me to hit the snooze button again, and then to turn it off and go back to sleep, and then he tells me that I should write run-on sentences.
But alas, Clarence has been with me long enough. I'm hoping that by virtue of posting on this haunted occasion, Clarence will find someone new to haunt.
Maybe there's a go-getter out there reading this who could use his laid-back influence as a means to bring balance to her life. Maybe there's a lonely guy out there who just needs a friend, albeit one without physical form or audible means of communication.
Of course, I know what some of you are thinking: Clarence doesn't sound like a real ghost at all, only a figment of my imagination that I've made up as an excuse for my inability to think of a good idea for a column.
And if you're embedded in that kind of negative thinking, I'd say there's a very good chance that Clarence is speaking through you already.
Which means I'm finally rid of him.
Mission accomplished.
I guess that street preacher's warnings as to the direction of my life were right after all.
But more importantly for you, this means that if you read this blog, the ghost that's been haunting me for the past 36 years is likely to leave my side and end up on your doorstep.
I sure hope so, because, honestly, Clarence is kind of a bore.
You might think having your very own haunted blog would be exciting. You couldn't be more wrong. The kind of ghost that could exist anywhere in time or space but chooses instead to haunt this blog is by definition pretty lame.
Or perhaps he only seems that way to me. After all, I've heard all his stories at this point, and he isn't much fun at parties.
He doesn't like to get out much, but instead spends his time telling me not to waste time with this blog, when I could be doing more important things, such as watching wrestling or the latest episode of New Girl.
"That Zooey Deschanel sure is entertainingly quirky," Clarence says.
Clarence serves a vital purpose through his haunting of this blog: he tells me not to write stuff. Every day that I haven't written something, was because the ghost that haunts this blog told me not to. Unless I was on vacation.
You see, when I try to write my weekly blog installment, Clarence tells me not to bother. He tells me that I'm tired and burnt out and that I don't have anything new to say or any good ideas.
Of course, he's often right on all counts. But he's still annoying.
On the rare occasions when I do I have an idea for a blog post, Clarence suggests that I should Google myself instead. "After all, how many other people can say that they wrote the Alabama Elevator Code," he asks? "And it's just one quick search away! Besides, they could revise that sucker any day now and your legacy will be lost, so you might as well enjoy it now."
When his helpful ideas aren't sufficiently persuasive, sometimes he causes technical glitches. For instance, the time I got locked out of this site for a couple weeks and couldn't post anything was all Clarence's doing.
Sometimes he even sneaks in after I post stuff and creates typos that I woulds have nevre let slip by me. Other times he writes stuff under my name that just isn't any good.
Clarence mostly sticks to haunting this blog, but occasionally, when he gets really bored, he tries to haunt the rest of my life too. He tells me not to work on that book because I gave myself a year, which means I have 364 days to do it later. He tells Directv to call me every week with an offer I can't refuse. He tells me to eat that Zebra cake and drink that diet coke, because it hasn't given me cancer yet, so I'm obviously immune.
He tells me not to go to the gym because I'm tired, and that I shouldn't reach out to old friends because I don't know where to start catching up; he tells me that the people close to me couldn't understand my problems, so I should just keep them to myself; he tells me to hit the snooze button again, and then to turn it off and go back to sleep, and then he tells me that I should write run-on sentences.
But alas, Clarence has been with me long enough. I'm hoping that by virtue of posting on this haunted occasion, Clarence will find someone new to haunt.
Maybe there's a go-getter out there reading this who could use his laid-back influence as a means to bring balance to her life. Maybe there's a lonely guy out there who just needs a friend, albeit one without physical form or audible means of communication.
Of course, I know what some of you are thinking: Clarence doesn't sound like a real ghost at all, only a figment of my imagination that I've made up as an excuse for my inability to think of a good idea for a column.
And if you're embedded in that kind of negative thinking, I'd say there's a very good chance that Clarence is speaking through you already.
Which means I'm finally rid of him.
Mission accomplished.
Saturday, December 21, 2013
A Blue Christmas (with lyrics from Green Day and Paramore)
Christmas is almost here, so everyone has to be happy. If you aren't, go sit in the corner until you come back with a hearty dose of Christmas cheer and you're ready to sing loud for all to hear.
Go. Celebrate family togetherness. Be thankful for what you have. Put on an overly colorful sweater and drink some eggnog. Enjoy some time away from work.
You have to. Whether you like it or not. Even if your family doesn't really like you and your life is lacking what seems most important (including an ugly Christmas sweater) and you don't get any extra time off for the holidays.
It's Christmas time, so plaster a smile on your face. Go shopping. If you buy things for people, they will like you. Right?
Today's the Macy's Day parade
Night of the living dead is on its way
with the credit report for duty called...
When I was a kid I thought
I wanted all the things that I haven't got
Oh, but I learned the hardest way...
Listen to the Christmas carols on the radio and see the pretty lights. Watch Elf and It's a Wonderful Life and drink some hot cider and get warm and fuzzy all over, whether you feel it or not. Most importantly, go spend some money. That's what our society promises will make you happy. Isn't it?
...then I realized what it took
to tell the difference between thieves and crooks
a lesson learned for me and you.
Give me something that I need
Satisfaction guaranteed to you.
What's the consolation prize?
Economy-sized dreams of hope...
And while you're at it, don't forget to take a moment--just a moment--to reflect on the deeper meaning of the day. It's the day that God personally came down to earth so that he could relate to the struggles we face first-hand and ultimately overcome them. And in his name, all oppression shall cease.
Eventually.
But probably not this Christmas season.
(I scraped my knees when I was praying
Found a demon in my safest haven.
Seems like it's getting harder to believe in anything
But just to get lost in all my selfish thoughts...)
Count your blessings this year. So many dreams have come. So many hopes fulfilled. So many seemingly impossible challenges that are now only distant memories. You did the right thing, and you always got rewarded for it, right? Right? Good things always happen to good people, after all. Because they deserved them. Just like you did!
(...I want to know what it'd be like
to find perfection in my pride
to see nothing in the light
Or turn it off, in all my spite
In all my spite, I'll turn it off...)
Or maybe you can't find much worthy of celebrating this holiday season and find yourself going through the motions instead.
Maybe the only thing you really want is a little break, but instead your Christmas looks more like your overly burdened regular life, only on steroids. Maybe life circumstances have you feeling like Christmas is going to fly by this year without you even having a chance to stop and notice it. Maybe it doesn't feel like Christmas because something's missing from your comfortable routine, and there's no way to get it back. Or maybe the whole enterprise is lost in the midst of a bigger life drama. Who can be excited about Christmas when you can barely survive the day?
(...And the worst part is
before it gets
any better we're
headed for a cliff
but in the freefall, I
will realize
I'm better off
when I hit the bottom)
-Turn it Off (Paramore)
If any of the above sounds familiar, don't worry. Despite what our culture tells you, you don't have to be happy this Christmas. Feel free to hit rock bottom instead. Things can only get better from there, and sometimes you have to find the point where all your plans and hopes go awry before you can set free your sense of control.
So, your plans for life didn't work out. It doesn't mean there isn't a better plan out there. And as Hayley Williams suggests above, you'll get farther by turning off your own expectations than by turning off your faith. Maybe that thing you'd hoped for wasn't the right thing anyway.
...Cause I'm thinking about a brand new hope
The one I've never known, and where it goes.
And I'm thinking about the only road
The one I've never know, and where it goes
'Cause now I know
That it's all that I wanted.
-Macy's Day Parade (Green Day)
So, maybe it's been a crappy year and you're in a bad place in life. Maybe your troubles won't actually be far away this Christmas. It doesn't always have to be this way. There's a beautiful story out there to be lived, one where the hero gets through the conflict and finds a happy ending. That story might as well be yours.
The things we think we want are often smaller than the things that will actually bring us joy and peace. That new car won't make you happy. That broken relationship wasn't bringing out the best in you. That loneliness has made you look deeper into your soul and think about how to re-focus your energy. That disappointment wasn't the end of the line. But while you're dealing with it, buying stuff you don't need isn't going to make you happy.
You might want to turn off your faith in all that sustains you right now, but ultimately, it will be the very thing that guides you through.
So if you can't find much to celebrate this Christmas--if you can't find anything to celebrate at all--at least take comfort in what you can hope for, allowing for the possibility it might come in a different form than what you had planned. And take even more comfort in the idea that maybe there's something even better out there for you than what you've allowed yourself to hope.
And when it comes, maybe you'll know that it's all that you ever wanted.
Go. Celebrate family togetherness. Be thankful for what you have. Put on an overly colorful sweater and drink some eggnog. Enjoy some time away from work.
You have to. Whether you like it or not. Even if your family doesn't really like you and your life is lacking what seems most important (including an ugly Christmas sweater) and you don't get any extra time off for the holidays.
It's Christmas time, so plaster a smile on your face. Go shopping. If you buy things for people, they will like you. Right?
Today's the Macy's Day parade
Night of the living dead is on its way
with the credit report for duty called...
When I was a kid I thought
I wanted all the things that I haven't got
Oh, but I learned the hardest way...
Listen to the Christmas carols on the radio and see the pretty lights. Watch Elf and It's a Wonderful Life and drink some hot cider and get warm and fuzzy all over, whether you feel it or not. Most importantly, go spend some money. That's what our society promises will make you happy. Isn't it?
...then I realized what it took
to tell the difference between thieves and crooks
a lesson learned for me and you.
Give me something that I need
Satisfaction guaranteed to you.
What's the consolation prize?
Economy-sized dreams of hope...
And while you're at it, don't forget to take a moment--just a moment--to reflect on the deeper meaning of the day. It's the day that God personally came down to earth so that he could relate to the struggles we face first-hand and ultimately overcome them. And in his name, all oppression shall cease.
Eventually.
But probably not this Christmas season.
(I scraped my knees when I was praying
Found a demon in my safest haven.
Seems like it's getting harder to believe in anything
But just to get lost in all my selfish thoughts...)
Count your blessings this year. So many dreams have come. So many hopes fulfilled. So many seemingly impossible challenges that are now only distant memories. You did the right thing, and you always got rewarded for it, right? Right? Good things always happen to good people, after all. Because they deserved them. Just like you did!
(...I want to know what it'd be like
to find perfection in my pride
to see nothing in the light
Or turn it off, in all my spite
In all my spite, I'll turn it off...)
Or maybe you can't find much worthy of celebrating this holiday season and find yourself going through the motions instead.
Maybe the only thing you really want is a little break, but instead your Christmas looks more like your overly burdened regular life, only on steroids. Maybe life circumstances have you feeling like Christmas is going to fly by this year without you even having a chance to stop and notice it. Maybe it doesn't feel like Christmas because something's missing from your comfortable routine, and there's no way to get it back. Or maybe the whole enterprise is lost in the midst of a bigger life drama. Who can be excited about Christmas when you can barely survive the day?
(...And the worst part is
before it gets
any better we're
headed for a cliff
but in the freefall, I
will realize
I'm better off
when I hit the bottom)
-Turn it Off (Paramore)
If any of the above sounds familiar, don't worry. Despite what our culture tells you, you don't have to be happy this Christmas. Feel free to hit rock bottom instead. Things can only get better from there, and sometimes you have to find the point where all your plans and hopes go awry before you can set free your sense of control.
So, your plans for life didn't work out. It doesn't mean there isn't a better plan out there. And as Hayley Williams suggests above, you'll get farther by turning off your own expectations than by turning off your faith. Maybe that thing you'd hoped for wasn't the right thing anyway.
...Cause I'm thinking about a brand new hope
The one I've never known, and where it goes.
And I'm thinking about the only road
The one I've never know, and where it goes
'Cause now I know
That it's all that I wanted.
-Macy's Day Parade (Green Day)
So, maybe it's been a crappy year and you're in a bad place in life. Maybe your troubles won't actually be far away this Christmas. It doesn't always have to be this way. There's a beautiful story out there to be lived, one where the hero gets through the conflict and finds a happy ending. That story might as well be yours.
The things we think we want are often smaller than the things that will actually bring us joy and peace. That new car won't make you happy. That broken relationship wasn't bringing out the best in you. That loneliness has made you look deeper into your soul and think about how to re-focus your energy. That disappointment wasn't the end of the line. But while you're dealing with it, buying stuff you don't need isn't going to make you happy.
You might want to turn off your faith in all that sustains you right now, but ultimately, it will be the very thing that guides you through.
So if you can't find much to celebrate this Christmas--if you can't find anything to celebrate at all--at least take comfort in what you can hope for, allowing for the possibility it might come in a different form than what you had planned. And take even more comfort in the idea that maybe there's something even better out there for you than what you've allowed yourself to hope.
And when it comes, maybe you'll know that it's all that you ever wanted.
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