There is a girl who reads these posts twice to make sure she doesn’t miss anything but I don’t know if she really needs to as I suspect she hears them inside her head.
Now it has been proven multiple times on multiple occasions there are many things I don’t know and many things I get wrong but no one strikes out every time.
Sometimes I see and hear far more with clarity and understand that you just don’t develop. It is there or it isn’t.
I believe it is tied into some of this but I don’t know if it provides you with the tools you need to follow because there are some things you cannot understand unless you are part of the few who have experienced certain things.
You could play this music if you wanted and maybe it would help gain a glimpse of a different world with English gardens, endless beaches and two moons.
But I don’t know if you could really see and you might say it is as real as a 6 foot tall rabbit named Harvey.
The Deaf, Dumb & Blind
Not long ago someone asked me where my father went to and I said I didn’t know.
“Maybe he is a Force ghost now. Maybe I can say that one day I’ll become a Jedi like my father before me. Maybe he is hanging out with Obi-Wan, but probably not.”
They smiled and told me that if he had done the right thing he was in a better place. I knew exactly what they meant and wondered if dad would be angry with me for throwing them down the stairs or over the balcony.
Would he mind if I gave into the Dark Side this one time. Would it really be so bad if I helped educate the deaf, dumb and blind.
I thought about that moment when someone tried to recruit me for a program that would improve my health.
They meant well and had good intentions but the pitch was a step above this.
“You’re a fat bastard who eats too much and is incapable of self control so I am going to help you look less like a walrus and more like whatever you once looked like when you weren’t so walrus like.”
I shared the conversation with the young Mister Wilner and was given this nugget.
“You’re not skinny but you aren’t the fattest man in the world.”
He made me laugh, this son of mine.
The kid has a very dry sense of humor and is ridiculously smart. I don’t think he has a clue how smart he is or what kind of future awaits him if he has the gumption to reach out and grab that brass ring.
“You know, the person who pitched me wasn’t trying to be offensive but I don’t think he has a real good sense of who your old man is.”
“Dad, you didn’t say anything did you?”
“What makes you ask?”
“Because you are capable of saying anything to anyone. I have seen it.”
A wicked smile crossed over my face and I shook my head no.
“No point. It is just another story and I have way too much going on to concern myself with that kind of narishkeit. Just remember something, we can be be as focused and determined as we need to be.
That doesn’t mean we don’t ever need to ask for help or a hand up, but it also means that we don’t have to ask for it either. Sometimes we just go do it.”
He nodded his head and I heard the echoes of a million people complaining that I don’t ask for help.
It isn’t entirely true or entirely false.
Group projects sometimes piss me off. There is rarely a balanced division of labor or a schedule that is followed so if I can get it done on my own with the level of quality that is required it just might go that way.
Or maybe not.
Feels Like Drowning
Sometimes when I am playing ball with guys who I think can run me off the court I intentionally try to slow the game down.
I walk the ball up the court, am very deliberate about passing and if I am playing with younger guys will start jabbering in their ear about not letting an old man out muscle them under the basket.
It has been pretty effective at turning the games into something where my particular set of skills and ability have a bigger impact.
Doesn’t always work, but it has enough times for me to keep it in the old practical tool kit.
There has been so much going on in my world that I have been trying to figure out how to slow the game down here in the real world.
Been trying to be the blue collar player out here that I am on the court. The guy who makes up for shortcomings in talent by working smarter wherever I can as well as harder.
But life isn’t like the court so I can’t get it to slow down.
The kids grow as fast as ever and though I am told that days are still 24 hours it often feels like these hours are accelerated.
****
Every now and then it feels like I am drowning so I make a point to take a deep breath and look around.
The scars of experience and the aches that accompany them may prove I have survived every bad day but they also show that physically I feel less than I once was.
Still there are many more good days than bad so I am optimistic that if I keep reaching for the top of the stairs good things will happen.
“What do you need from me to be successful?”
“Just get out of my way and understand that I’ll figure it out. There is no secret here, no mystery. I am both a door opener and a wall climber. If I can’t do either I’ll look for a way to tear it down.”
I can’t tell if it is appreciation or exasperation and decide it is a waste of energy to try to figure it out.
Too Much Information
There are moments where I think we are hit with too much information and not enough time to process what we are given.
It is easy to be overwhelmed by it all and easy to make snap judgment about what it does or does not mean.
“Josh, if you want to feel better and live a healthier life you really ought to look into this.”
“You know the docs said my grandfather should have died ten years earlier than he did. They said my dad should have died six or seven times before he did. Should I tell you about the time his heart stopped during a procedure and they got it restarted.
That was years before he died. It was so natural for him he didn’t think to mention it to me. Let me reiterate, I didn’t hear about it until years later because it wasn’t that big a deal to him. Things happen.”
“What do you mean? I am not following.”
“Doctors aren’t gods. They are highly educated scientists who can make logical, rational predictions and still be wrong. If you don’t have that kind of training why would I take you seriously?”
It is not bravado or me trying to be adversarial. The question is honest and serious and it is never answered.
That is ok with me. Some questions never are…answered.
****
I think I hear the rider coming but I am not sure.
This is the second night I have skipped the gym. Both times I have agonized over doing so but have opted to listen to my body and give it a rest.
The weather app on my phone says it it is 31 outside but that it feels like 22 and I agree.
It is going to start warming up again with temperatures that will be more than double this ’22’ and I am grateful for that.
You don’t know how warm 55 can feel until you have walked in 22.
Tomorrow night I’ll go regardless of whether it’s 5 or 145 outside. Tomorrow night I’l throw more iron around and hit the treadmill hard.
And when I walk out I’ll lo0k at the sky as I always do and confirm whether I am walking under a single or double moon sky.
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