Missing

No, I’ve never heard of that guy until now.  What’s he famous for?

Sorry, I’m not familiar with that podcast.  Honestly, I’m not really a podcast person.

Yeah, I don’t know anything about that series.  I haven’t even ever seen The Wire or The Sopranos.

I don’t have Instagram; I can’t open the link to that reel you sent me.

It’s a post on Facebook?  I’m not able to access that, either; I don’t have an account.

Not even sure what Substack is; do you capitalize it or not?

I do know what TikTok is, though; I can’t say that I’ve ever watched a TikTok video, however.

That article is behind a paywall for that website; I’m not a subscriber.

I’m sure that episode you’re describing was hilarious, but I can’t really bring myself to watch reality TV.

She has tens of millions of followers?  Wow.  I’m not one of them.

I guess I’m just not influenced by that influencer.

I must be immune to that viral video.

There’s a new trend trending on the internet.  Apparently, I’m not trendy.

This next big thing isn’t big enough to include me.

You can’t have FOMO if you’re not even aware of the thing you’re missing out on.

Everybody’s doing it, except for me, I guess.

I’m late for the latest thing; too old for the newest trend; cold towards what’s hot.

I haven’t heard what everyone’s talking about; haven’t seen what all eyes are on; I’m not excited about what’s new and exciting.

I don’t have a feed or a timeline or a queue; I’m sure the algorithm knows all about my preferences, but I prefer not to know what it knows.

I’m sure I’d be more “with it” if I were more with it, but it’s all I can do to keep up with all I can do.

Maybe I could be famous if I were hungrier for fame.  

For now, I’ll just be what I am.

Silence

Wittgenstein famously wrote, as the last proposition in his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, “Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.”

That admonition has rarely stopped politicians, pundits, celebrities, and social influencers from weighing in on unspeakable topics of all sorts.  

Me neither.

To wit, case in point, this right here.

Silence may be golden, but noise must be platinum because people consistently value it more highly than remaining quiet.  Talking heads are always talking, right; no one makes a living as a mute head, do they?

Mom used to say, “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all;” nowadays, it’s more like “If you can’t say anything nice, let the networks sign you up for a multi-million dollar deal.”

Or, at least let’s get you some likes for your Yelp review.

Nearly everyone enjoys flapping their gums about whatever; that’s fine, of course, by why isn’t reposing one’s ears held in similar esteem?  Everyone wants to be a speaker or writer; where are the listeners and readers?

According to the internet: “The Orfield Labs anechoic chamber in Minneapolis, Minnesota, is considered the world's most soundproof room and holds the Guinness World Record for the quietest place on Earth, with sound levels as low as -24.9 decibels. This anechoic chamber is designed to absorb all sound reflections, and its construction includes a floor of sound-absorbing wedges that float on springs to eliminate echoes and external vibrations. The extreme quietness allows people to hear their own internal body sounds, such as their heartbeat and breathing, a sensation that can feel disorienting or even deafening to some.”

Silence is deafening, literally!

Meanwhile, out in the world, birds are singing, horns are honking, leaf blowers are whining, trucks are grinding their gears, music is blaring, airplanes roar overhead, the neighbor’s dog keeps barking all day long, the refrigerator hums, the fluorescent lights buzz, the shutter bangs repeatedly in the wind, and all over the world, nobody shuts up.

Me neither.

Endings

Beginnings get all the love: births, ribbon-cuttings, wedding ceremonies, first days of school, the start of the new year; those are the events that people celebrate.

Endings, not so much: deaths, de-accessionings, divorces, the shuttering of beloved restaurants; these all tend to be mourned or looked down upon.

But if weren’t for endings, the world could not function.  For one thing, we’d be so clogged up with human beings from time immemorial—our ancestors in animal skins or wearing togas or dressed up in Victorian finery—that there’d be no room to move.  And just try getting a table at your favorite restaurant!  No way.

Of course, it’s sad when someone or something we’ve cared for is no more, but that’s from the perspective of the left-behind, not the leaving.  The person arriving at the end doesn’t care; they’re gone, and the something that’s no more—the restaurant, for instance—is likely relieved it need not struggle on anymore.

Some endings, admittedly, are objectively depressing: the last few days of summer, the few remaining bites of pie, when the crotch of your favorite pair of jeans finally wears through; but even these have an upside: mainly, you don’t have to worry about holding on to them anymore.

An apt metaphor for this is the experience of reading a book that you really enjoy.  You’re thrilled to turn the pages, to see how everything will come out, racing toward the end, but when you get there, the enjoyable experience is no more.  

You want to get to the end, but you don’t want to get there.

I suppose life itself is like this, more or less, perhaps with the difference being that, in many cases, the last few chapters aren’t all that wonderful.

Maybe our lives should read less like novels and more like novellas or short stories.

Or maybe more like a 327 word essay, like this one: no one is really sad when it’s over, right?

Borders

Humanity’s third worst invention—after the internal combustion engine and money—is borders.

Why do we even have them?

What do borders even do other than create strife and conflict?  Aren’t we all human beings with the same DNA and evolutionary history?  What’s the difference between an American and a Canadian, for instance, other than some artificial, made-up, and invisible line in the sand, or tundra, as it may be?

It’s generally considered wrong to discriminate against people on the basis of some characteristic over which they had no control.  No one chooses their race, gender, or eye color, so it’s unjust to advantage or disadvantage people based on those qualities.

No one chooses where they were born, either, but for some strange reason, it’s considered perfectly fine to provide or withhold benefits to someone just because they happened to be born north or south of some random latitude line on the map.

What the hell’s up with that?

Think of how much safer, kinder, and more harmonious place the world would be if there were no countries or borders.  Most of the wars and armed conflicts in the world, (and throughout history) are (and were) because kings or queens or Presidents or Premiers are fighting about which side of the invisible line ought to get this or that or where the invisible line should be.

Dumb or what?

When the extra-terrestrial creatures finally decide to invade planet Earth, maybe then human beings will forget about the invisible lines on the globe and rally as one people against the marauding horde from outer space.  Probably not, though; probably different countries will vie to be the extra-terrestrials’ best friend and so the divisions among humanity will continue to be enforced.

It seems ridiculous, though, when you stop to think; we all live on the same planet, no part of which belongs to any of us.  The case isn't one for “open borders;” it’s for no borders all at.

Money

Humanity’s second worst invention—right after the internal combustion engine—is money.

Imagine what a better place the world would be if money had never been invented.

In the first, place, there would be no billionaires; that alone is enough to make the case, but that’s not all.

If there weren’t any money, then no one would have to work some crummy job just to earn it.  This isn’t to say there wouldn’t be any ditch-diggers or roofers or people who clean out porta-potties; people would still have to do those things; it’s just that there would be other incentives or maybe a system where people would rotate into those jobs: rock star one month, sanitation engineer the next.  Human beings have figured out how to schedule 32 major league baseball teams while simultaneously making room at their stadiums for the occasional country music concert; it shouldn’t be a problem to manage the arrangement of job shares for an equitable division of desirable and undesirable occupations.

Besides, if money didn’t exist, plenty of jobs that are currently considered desirable no longer would be.  No one really wants to be a hedge fund manager, for instance, for the sheer pleasure of manipulating numbers on a computer screen; it’s only because doing so affords one the opportunity to endow concert halls and museums in one’s name or to populate one’s superyacht with supermodels and gym rats.

If it wasn’t about making a lot of money, plenty more people would prefer to be janitors or farmers; chances are, it would be all that difficult to divvy up jobs so all the necessary work of having a society could be taken care of.

Some will contend, of course, that without the motivation of having to earn a paycheck, that people would only do what they want to do.

But if you ask me, that’s a feature, not a bug.

After all, no one is paying me for writing this, are they?

Sex

 Here are 32 reasons why bicycling is better than sex:

1. You can bicycle in public and not get arrested.

2. It’s okay to bicycle with children.

3. Protected cycling is actually better than unprotected cycling.

4. Finishing first in bicycling is a good thing.

5. Bicycling by yourself isn't embarrassing.

6. Cycling with a large group of people isn’t weird.

7. No unplanned pregnancies from cycling.

8. Your colleague didn’t get fired for biking with their students.

9. You can bicycle even when it’s not hard.

10. You can bicycle even when it’s not wet.

11. No one cherry-picks Biblical passages to judge who you ride bikes with.

12. The only rash to worry about in cycling is road rash.

13. You rarely have to pay for bike riding.

14. You can watch online cycling videos at work.

15. Old people on bikes is charming, not kinda gross.

16. It’s cool for mom or dad to teach you to ride a bike.

17. You can ride a bike all day long.

18. Bicycle lube is never flavored.

19. Cycling with strangers is perfectly wholesome.

20. Solo cyclists can bike with no hands.

21. You can ride a bike on the beach, no problem.

22. You can ride a bike drunk, no problem.

23. No one minds if you fall asleep right after a vigorous bike ride.

24. If the ride was good for you, it's good.

25. Having more than one bike is not complicated.

26. “Rubber side down” is simply good advice.

27. There’s no such thing as a bad bike ride.

28. If you don’t want to bike, no one can force you.

29. Professional cyclists only have to shave their legs.

30. You don’t have to be interesting, charming, good-looking, or rich to ride a bike.

31. That video of you biking is on the internet, so what?

32. I’m going on a bike ride right now, who cares?

Almost

You almost got run down by a bicycle as you were stepping into the crosswalk.

You almost tripped over that dog’s leash when the person walking him jogged by.

You almost died when you heard that Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift got engaged.

You almost had a heart attack when you saw that giant spider on the wall.

You almost fainted when you realized that there were only five more days of summer

You almost cut your hair; it happened just the other day.

You almost left your phone at the restaurant.

You almost overslept and missed your flight.

You almost dropped your keys down the rain gutter.

You almost got expelled in junior high school.

You almost failed your Driver’s test.

You almost sliced your finger off cutting that bagel.

You almost drank that spoiled milk.

You almost didn’t renew your passport in time.

You almost got arrested.

You almost threw up after you ate that sandwich.

You almost wrecked your car.

You almost got hit in the head by that foul ball at the stadium.

You almost lost your wallet.

You almost drowned.

You almost left the house with your zipper down.

You almost insulted your boss and got fired.

You almost choked on your lunch.

You almost wet your pants.

You almost weren’t born.

You almost got lost on the way to the event.

You almost got run over by a car, a bus, a truck, and a scooter.

You almost didn’t even apply for the job you eventually interviewed for and were hired by.

You almost never met your soulmate.

You almost were scammed by that online phishing attempt.

You almost went blind staring at the sun.

You almost stepped on the hornet’s nest.

You almost burnt the hell out of your hand on the hot skillet.

You almost picked up and drank the wrong drink at the bar.

You almost made a fool of yourself again.

You almost did, but you didn’t!

Tricked

• I’ll just get out of bed; that’s all.
• Since I’m up, I may as well brush my teeth.
• I guess I’ll get dressed then, but that’s it.
• A cup of coffee wouldn’t hurt.  I suppose I’ll read the paper as I drink it.
• I’m awake now, so why not ride my bike to the yoga studio?
• Once I’m here, there’s no sense in not rolling out my mat.
• I’ll just do one sun salutation.  And another.  And then all five of the first version.
• I’m just going to finish the three of the second version and then sit.
• How about the first two standing poses, just to open my sinuses.
• Almost halfway through the standing postures, it’s easy enough to finish them out.
• A couple of sitting poses, just for flexibility’s sake.
• At this point, there’s no point in not completing the half-primary.
• The hardest part is over; I can coast through the remainder of the full primary.
• One, no two, no three backbends.  And then the finishing poses because, sure.

This is how you trick yourself into doing things.  You just do the next thing and then the next after that and the next after that.  Before you realize what you’ve done, you’ve done it.

Life is like this from the beginning.  Divide that first cell, and then those two, those four, those eight, sixteen, thirty-two, sixty-four and on and on an on.  Next thing you know, you’re an infant, then a toddler, a little kid, a child, a teenager, a young adult, a grown up, an old person, and finally, you’re no more.

But you were when you were and the way that you were was by one step at a time until all those steps added up to a life of accomplishment—or at least, action.

It begins every day by getting out of bed and the surest way to do that is to pretend that it’s all that you’re doing, ha-ha, tricked you!

Aspirations

I’d like to win the Nobel Prize for Literature, but only so I could turn it down like Jean-Paul Sartre or Bob Dylan.  

It would be cool to be the first person on Mars, but mainly so I could leave behind the billionaires who arrived on the space ship with me.

To defeat death is a worthy aspiration, but if you did so, then you’d fail in the effort, wouldn’t you?

When I was little, I wanted to grow up to be a doctor; now that I’m big, I’d be happy with just having a primary care physician who would see me occasionally.

I hope to die with all my own teeth; if that’s not possible, I guess I’ll settle for all my own fingers.

Many people want to be rich and famous; not me; rich is plenty.

My goal is to read 100 books this year; do matchbooks count?

I’d like to learn to play the piano before I die; I’ll wait for the terminal diagnosis to start practicing.

Sky-diving is not on my “bucket list;” not having a “bucket list” is, though.

I don’t want to die alone; but if the alternative is to expire at the hands of violent zombies, I’ll take it.

I would like to be remembered as someone memorable, preferably by people who haven’t lost their memories.

I want to have made the world a better place as a result of my life; failing that, I suppose making it a better place because of my death would be okay.

I had hoped to be an Olympic hopeful; now, I’ll settle for simply not being hopeless.

I’ve made my peace with not seeing world peace in my lifetime; fingers crossed that I miss out on World War III, as well.

I’d like to write a published novel.  I’m thinking Tolstoy’s War and Peace would be a good one.

If all else fails, at least I hope to end this piece right here.

Obvious

I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that I’m up in a tree.

For all intents and purposes, my goals and objectives are one and the same.

Not to split hairs, but the follicle is divided in two.

At the end of the day, it’s nighttime.

In the long run, it’s too far to go.

Don’t get me wrong, that would be a mistake.

Just to clarify, things will be made clearer.

In any event, something happens.

When push comes to shove, get your hands off of me.

Let’s put it on the line and get straight.

I’m going to take a shot in the dark and hope not to spill the whiskey on my shirt.

Throwing caution to the wind, it sure is breezy here.

Nine times out of ten, you’ll achieve 90% success.

More often than not, what’s likelier to occur is what happens.

As far as I can tell, that’s all I am saying.

In my experience, those things happened to me.

Unless I’m mistaken, I’m right.

As far as I’m concerned, I have some concern.

If you were in my shoes, I’d be barefoot.

If you were me, I’d be someone else.

Objectively speaking, I’m not biased.

From an impartial standpoint, I won’t take sides.

According to the evidence, the answer is evident.

Considering both sides, there’s a left and a right

It’s a good bet that the odds are in your favor.

You’d be foolish to do something stupid.

The right decision is the one that’s correct.

Obviously, it’s self-evident.

All things considered, we’ve thought of everything.

With an eye toward the future, I’m looking at next year.

Based on past results, what has happened has happened.

After a full review, we’ve looked at things again.

If we could do it all over again, we’ll have done it once more.

If we’re lucky, we’ll we will be fortunate.

When all is said and done, we must remain silent now.

Chance

In the classic Marlon Brando film, On the Waterfront, his character, Terry Malloy, a former prize-fighter turned “muscle” for the mob, reproaches his gambler brother, Charlie, who forced him to throw a  pre-championship bout, with the famous quote “I coulda been a contender.”  

If only Charlie had looked out for him a little bit, instead of making him take dives for the short-end money, then everything would have been different; Terry could have been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what he reckons he is.

Assuming the human free will is a thing (a contentious claim to be sure), then we all have similar watershed moments in our lives, when a single decision or chance happenstance determines our own future or even that of the world.

If only Gavrilo Princip hadn’t assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand on the 28th of June, 1914, World War I might never have happened.  If only Barack Obama hadn’t made fun of Donald Trump at the Washington Correspondents’ Dinner on April 30, 2011, we might never have seen the first, not to mention the second ,Trump Presidency.  And in even weightier matters, if only scientist Percy Spencer hadn’t left his candy bar near the high-powered vacuum tube called a magnetron he was experimenting with in 1945, the world could have avoided the horror known as the microwave oven.  

It seems to me that the only way to account for these possibilities is to assume an infinite number of possible worlds in which all the potential outcomes do occur; there is a parallel Universe out there where WWI never happened, another where Trump never even runs for President, and still another in which popcorn is still only made on the stove.

This means that the life that each of us is living is only one of and endless number of experiences that are being had by other versions of ourselves; so don’t rush to make that yellow light; there’s another you that does.

Heaven

The version of Heaven where you sit at the right hand of God and hang out with all your dead loved ones sounds more like Hell to me. 

It’s clearly the worst family reunion ever, a Thanksgiving dinner without mashed potatoes and beer and is there even football on?  If so, what team gets to win?  

(Presumably, if God gets to decide, then it’s going to be the Pittsburgh Steelers every year, but what if I’m a Minnesota Vikings fan?  Do they still lose consistently in the post-season afterlife?  If so, seems like a pretty crummy Paradise for folks from the Land of 10,000 lakes.)

Eternal life of any sort is a nightmare.  Even your very own heaven with 10,000 virgins or George Clooneys or Toms of Finland is going to get old after a few millennia; sure, most of us these days can waste endless hours scrolling on the internet, but even that will get tiresome eventually.

The only possible way for Heaven to be heavenly is if there’s no longer any sense of individual self, which means that it’s impossible for a person to experience Heaven because such an experience requires that very individual.  “I” can’t experience Heaven because the “experience” of Heaven has to be an “experience” that “I” can’t have.

Let’s say, then, that Heaven is the merging of one’s individual consciousness into the Universal Consciousness (kind of re-inventing the Vedanta here); sounds good, but “I” am not the one having that experience because there’s no longer any “I.”  All the heavenly aspects are there: no pain, no sadness, no having to decide what to wear everyday, not even needing to floss!  But that’s precisely because “I” am not around anymore.

No doubt that this sort of non-existence sounds like Hell to some people, but again, here’s the beauty part: non-existence is also not an experience that anyone can have.  So if non-existence is Hell, then not to worry: you can’t experience that either.

Prepared

I’m preparing for the preparations; I’m planning on getting ready to get ready.

I’ll have a snack before dinner and a cocktail ahead of the time we start drinking.

A nap before bedtime is essential, as is a shower prior to my bath.

I’ll sign a pre-nup to my pre-nuptial agreement and a will which bequeaths my will to those named in my will.

I floss before flossing and brush my teeth twice—once for cleaning and another for whitening.

I always pre-heat my oven in preparation for heating it, don’t you?

Practicing your practice makes practice perfect; drafting a draft of your draft is how to draft.

You’ll want to warm up your engine in advance of warming your engine.  It’s always a good idea to consider your considerations before considering them.

And we all like to pre-func the pre-func, don’t we?

Let’s plan to plan and make sure we’re in shape to get in shape.

I’m going to sketch out my sketch before I sketch it.  I’m going to map out the map before mapping it.

Always do the pre-read before reading and be sure to watch the trailer in advance of seeing the film.

I like to ensure that I like a person before I commit to liking them.  And I’ll only show interest in someone I’m already interested in.

Of course, I clean my house before the cleaning lady comes.  I also mow the lawn to prepare for the landscaper.  And unless I’ve gone to the doctor, I won’t go to a doctor.

Who pre-rolls the pre-rolled joints?  How are pre-packaged snacks pre-packaged?  Can we solve the mystery of the pre-cooking of pre-cooked meals?

We need to talk about having a talk.  Let’s ride our bikes to go on a bike ride.  Then we can hike to our hike.

I’ve lived my entire life so far so as to live a life worth living; I’m just hoping I die before I am dead.

Absurd

Sometimes the blatant absurdity of it all just hits you.

You’re suddenly struck by how crazy it is to get out of bed in the pre-dawn just to ride your bike a couple miles uphill so you can spend an hour or so bending yourself into physical positions developed by an elderly Sanskrit scholar in Southern India for the youth of the Maharaja’s palace and made popular and available to Westerners because some hippies in the 1970s found their way to a tiny yoga shala in a small city of an out-of-the-way part of the country to study with a essentially unknown teacher who only taught locals at the time.

And even more bizarre is that you do this in a world where a former reality television star is President of a country whose military budget is larger than those of the next nine countries combined and in which it’s considered perfectly acceptable that grown men wearing pajamas and chasing a ball around a field surrounded by fifty thousand fans eating hot dogs and drinking beer earn a thousand times more a year than do the people teaching their children how to read and write.

And stranger still, this all happens on a planet whose climate, due in no small part to the activities of human beings, is changing so significantly that life, as all species have come to know it over the last 10 million years or so, is likely to no longer be possible within a hundred years or less and yet, nevertheless, nearly everyone just goes along as if everything is fine, nothing to worry about, no changes needed.

And if that isn’t weird enough, note that no matter what, it’s all going to be eradicated anyway when the sun eventually subsumes most of the solar system, so what’s the point really in the long run?

And then, to top it off, the freakiest part of all is here you are, writing about it.

Routine

I wake up at the same time (give or take 5 minutes) every day.

Like clockwork, I then totter to the bathroom, pee, and brush my teeth.  I put on my same yoga shorts, come downstairs, start my coffee, putting the Bialetti espresso pot on the large burner of the stove, the teakettle on the smaller.

I scoop the specified amount of dog food from the dog food bag, place the bowl at the identical spot on the floor, and routinely step back for the dog to eat.

I do my stomach exercises with the universally predictable and regular result.

I let the dog out into the backyard, where she essentially has the same experience.

I pour my coffee into the cup I use every day and add the same amount of water to make my morning Americano.

I sit in the same chair, at the same place by the table, open the Seattle Times replica edition on my laptop, and begin drinking my coffee.

The dog barks to be let in.  I rise to do so.

I finish my coffee after reading the online paper in the same order as always, including the same few comics and advice columns.

I put on the same stretch pants and wool jersey as every morning, leave the house  by the same door, take a bike (one of three) from the bike shed, and ride the identical route to the yoga studio, where I do pretty much the uniform series of postures every day.

I come home, shower and shave, unfailingly dress with a collared shirt, and then make one of several breakfast variations.  

I wash my dish or two, then, come rain or shine, walk the dog, the same six block route I take her on twice a day.

At home again, I sit in Vipassana meditation for 31 minutes.

Then, I dependably write a 327 word essay, which I afterwards, without fail, post online.

It’s different every time.

Winner

You don’t always have to win.

In fact, unless you sometimes lose, the very concept of winning no longer makes any sense.

For every thrilling victory, there needs to be a heartbreaking defeat; one of the most valuable contributions we can make to the fullness of human experience is to suffer such misfortunes.  Our own crushing loss enables another’s joyous win.

(As every fan of the 2014 Seattle Seahawks or 1992 Pittsburgh Pirates knows.)

People are too focused on being number one.  Being number two is pretty great and you don’t have to put up with so many press conferences and photo shoots.  For that matter, anywhere in the top ten is admirable and honestly, with on the order of 9 billion humans in the world, you can count yourself a great success if you’re anywhere in the top 100 million or so.

Besides, winning isn’t everything.  There’s also good sportsmanship, participating with integrity, and seeing others fail, as well.

The disappointment a small-market baseball fan might feel when their hometown team loses in the playoffs is surely tempered by the satisfaction of seeing the New York Yankees not even make the post-season.  That can lift a person’s spirits all through the hot stove days.

This obsession with winning is probably exacerbated by the contemporary political systems, which yields only one victor in each election.  Maybe an alternative, therefore, would be to have the term of service be based on a percentage of the vote.  So, for instance a Presidential candidate who received, let’s say, 54% of the popular vote would occupy the Oval Office for that amount of time, whereas the other finishers would fill in the remaining 46%.  This could be done on a weekly or even daily basis.  It sure would make for far more interesting and engaging press conferences at the very least.

Alternately, let’s just abandon the value of winning altogether; if the winner is a loser, then all the losers win!

 

Regret

They say you only really regret the things you don’t do, but on the contrary, I still don’t regret not going to Burning Man nor do I feel bad that I’ve never shaved my balls with a straight razor.

I do, however, harbor some regret that I gave up my dad’s Pittsburgh Steelers’ season tickets after he died.

So, it’s hard to say, although I will admit that I do regret whatever regrettable things I’ve done or not done over the years.  

If I could take back purposely spilling orange juice on my classmate Lexi Scoulas in fifth grade to prove to my friends that I didn’t have a crush on her (when, in fact, I did), I would and I also wish that would have spent all my savings buying Apple stock at .36 cents a share in 1995 instead of purchasing a used 1963 Plymouth Barracuda that I sold two years later for a  loss.

But that’s life, you know?  It’s impossible to make it to the end of one’s days with no regrets (unless, of course, the dementia really kicks in), so perhaps that best strategy is to not make things worse by regretting whatever regrets one does eventually have.

The Pragmatist philosopher, William James argues that our ability to feel regret is evidence that we have free will, because, after all, if you couldn’t have done otherwise than you did, why regret it?

That makes sense but it wouldn’t explain why you regret finishing that entire bag of pistachio nuts; once it was opened, there was obviously no alternative, after all.

Maybe it’s a matter of regretting the state of affairs that gives rise to the action that feels regrettable.  If that’s the case, then I guess what I regret most is the Big Bang.  If it hadn’t been for that fluctuation in the quantum field or whatever, then I never would have spilled that orange juice on Lexi Scoulas.

Or written this!

Maker

Everyone’s on the make; they’ve all got their ‘side hustle;’ they’re hacking their lives to maximize their potential and be all that they can be.

Yawn.

I mean, sure, no one wants to squander a moment of this wild and precious life we’ve been granted, but people, please.  

Relax.

A meaningful life is not to be found in living every second to its fullest expression; sometimes, a little downtime is okay.

Breathe.

You can have your double-shot espresso energy drink protein bar for breakfast if you must and get in your six mile run before it’s light out but what’s so bad about lingering on the edge of sleep for a bit before enjoying a simple cup of drip and listening to the birds sing?

Tweet-tweet.

There are 1440 minutes in a day; take way 8 hours for sleeping, that leaves 960; another couple hours for eating and bathing, and you’re down to 840; subtract the time typically spent searching for one’s keys and phone, and what’s left?  Ten minutes of focused activity per day seems about right.

Enough.

The highly-scheduled life of your average ambitious high school Junior, who takes Advanced Placement classes, serves on student council, plays in the school jazz band, volunteers at the library tutoring math, has a part-time job, is in a serious relationship, and cares for their immigrant grandparent on the week-ends is something to admire, but isn’t their classmate, who cut school and hangs out in the park having a better time?

Really.

No one, it’s said, ever sits up on their deathbed and announces, “I wish I’d spent more time at the office,” but what’s the alternative?  Does anyone suddenly opine: “If only spent more time asleep?”  “If only I’d devoted more hours to reading the “Comments” sections in online newspapers!”  “Why didn’t lurk on social media more?”

Hmmm…

Life’s too short to drink bad wine, but it’s way too long to go full out all the time.

Right?

Monism

 If God is infinite, then the Creator cannot be separate from the Creation.

An infinite God necessarily implies monism; if something is everything, then there’s nothing it can’t be, so there must be only One Thing, namely God (or Nature, as our old friend, Spinoza put it.)

That One Thing can, of course (again, as Spinoza pointed out), have different attributes, but these are just appearances, different manifestations of the One.  Thus, for instance, it may seem as if human beings and God are separate, but that’s like saying that steam and ice aren’t both water, simply because they are different forms of H2O.

Then, if Monism is the case, it seems like Idealism must be the case, as well.  If there’s only One Thing, it has to be mind, not matter, because whereas matter can be accounted for as an appearance in the mind, mind cannot be accounted for as a function of matter without it being something different from matter.

The Materialist can contend that mind cannot exist without matter, but they are still committed to there being two things, one material and the other immaterial.  The Idealist, by contrast, is able to assert that it’s all mind, all the way down, no materials turtles needed at all.

So, if God is infinite, then there’s only One Thing, and that Thing is mind.  Q.E.D.

But maybe God is not infinite.  Maybe God is more like the petty tyrant of the Old Testament or the version we get from Christian televangelists who has small-minded preferences for one sexual orientation or political party over another.  If that’s the case, then sure, the Creation and the Creator can be separate, but it makes for an awfully constrained conception of God.

It also makes possible for the Creation to be good, while the Creator isn’t, like with Picasso or Kanye West.

The Monist perspective, by contrast, ensures that if there’s any good in the world, then God’s all good.

Lazy

It’s not that I don’t want to do anything; I just don’t want to do what I don’t want to do.

I’m fully motivated to take naps, ride my bike to the library, or graze the refrigerator; it’s just that I have no inclination to weed the garden, mop the floor, or organize all the loose photographs in those boxes on my bookshelves.

Is this laziness?

Honestly, I’m too lazy to figure it out.

What I take to be the virtuous part of me aspires to action; I know I’d feel better about myself if I took care of business.  But what I believe to be the lesser aspect of me is not persuaded.  It would rather wallow in self-recrimination than do what it probably oughtta.

Maybe I’m held hostage by a neo-liberal quasi-Victorian free-market capitalistic conception of what’s valuable.  It’s all about action and accomplishment or else.

Maybe our collaborative community-based hunter-gatherer ancestors would be perfectly cool with my lack of initiative; after all, I’ve got a full belly and a roof over my head for the night.  Why not take a break?

I mean it’s not like I’m leaving dirty dishes in the sink; my yard, while not the tidiest on the block, is not a health hazard.  It still floss every day, for heaven’s sake.

Still, it’s obvious that I’m not doing all I could to make the world—much less my own life—a better place.

How much is enough?  Is it adequate that at least I’m not making the world—much less my own life—a significantly worse place?

Things might be better for everyone if the richest and most powerful people in the world were a little—if not a lot—lazier.  

Imagine if world leaders got up tomorrow and instead of working so hard to oppress people and drop bombs on their enemies, they all just said, “Nah, feeling too lazy to do so.”

Maybe we’re all not lazy enough!

Desire

I desire to not desire what I desire.  I want to not want what I want.

It’s a paradox wrapped in an oxymoron.  A contradiction contradicting itself.

This aspiration is particularly difficult when you’re confronted, all day long, with efforts to make you desire something: an email from your favorite bicycle goods retailer, offering a discount for purchasing an item that you don’t really need, but would be cool to have; a text message from a friend inviting you to an event that would probably be fun; a coupon in the mail for a home service you’ve been putting off because you can live without it, even though it would be nicer to have it done.

I didn’t know I wanted it until I was persuaded that I did.  I didn’t have the active desire until it was activated by an outside influence.

So, is it really my own desire?  Or am I more like a passive host for the desire virus I’m infected by?

One of the Compatibilist responses to the “Problem of Free Will” is “Deep Self-Compatibilism.”  Essentially, the Compatibilist view is that we exercise what amounts to free will when we make choices that are motivated by our own desires (as opposed to compelled by outside forces beyond our control.)  The question raised by Deep Self-Compatibilism is “Are our desires really our own?”  Or “Do we really desire our desires.”

When you’re watching a football game and an ad appears for Dominos Pizza and before you know it, you’re ordering a large Double Cheese Crust Stuffed Meat-Lovers just like the one you saw onscreen, it’s not obvious that it’s really what you want.  Or at least want to want.

According to the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths, we eliminate suffering in our lives by eliminating desire.  Of course, we need to desire to do so, which brings us back to that initial paradox all over again.

Makes me want just to be done with it.

Improvement

Contrary to the claims of your highly paid corporate leadership consultant, continuous improvement is simply not possible.

Everything arises and passes away as the Buddha reminds us; things might get better for a while, but eventually, they’re going to go downhill, no doubt about it.

Of course, we can wonder what we mean by “better”.  More efficient?  More productive?  More profitable?

They all have inherent downsides like people losing their jobs or traditional skills being abandoned or the rich getting richer while you know who gets poorer, so maybe they’re not really better at all, in which case not only is continuous improvement called into question, the very notion of improvement at all becomes suspect.

Does nature, for instance, ever really improve?  If a tree grows a little bigger every year, is it getting better?  Is the sheer cliff face superior after ten thousand years of erosion?  Surely a case can be made that the ant colony under my house which seems to continually expand is actually worse—at least when it comes to little lines of the critters around my sugar bowl.

The obsession with continuous improvement seems to be a product of a misguided conception of what life is really all about.  Sure, we want to strive to be kinder, more compassionate, more accomplished human beings and to make the world a better place.  

But sometimes, the best way to do so is to stop trying to do so.  At some point, the most significant improvement we can make is to no longer attempt to improve.  Rather, we recognize that radical acceptance is what we’re after.

Good enough is good enough after all.

I can hear the heads of highly paid corporate leadership consultants and CEOs and college presidents exploding here.  “How are you going to compete in today’s global marketplace, blah-blah, if you’re just willing to settle?”

But here’s the thing: you really don’t have to compete. 

And that’s the most continuous improvement of all.

Billionaire

 Imaging being merely the 500th richest billionaire on the Bloomberg Billionaire Index of the 500 richest people in the world; you’d have a fortune of just around $7 billion, some $360 billion less than Elon Musk, at #1 currently.

How impoverished you would feel!

You wouldn’t have the money to buy the sort of yacht whose size requires dismantling a port city bridge to float it from drydock out to sea that the extra super-duper wealthy folks can easily swing; your wedding reception might only last three days or renting out an entire neighborhood in Venice rather than the weeklong extravaganza doing so of those in the top ten; you could only fund a wing of the state-of-the-art hospital in Beverly Hills as opposed to the whole facility, and maybe worst of all, instead of buying the New York Yankees, you’ve have to settle for the Pittsburgh Pirates or Florida Marlins.

Heaven forfend!

The internet says that the billion dollars could buy you 2882 Ferraris; so your meagre fortune could only allow you 8646 of them; not nearly enough for you to give one away to 10,000 of your best friends.

Sucks!

Here’s another relevant internet factoid: “The average in-state college student spends $9,750 per year on tuition at a public university.  Your $1 billion could pay off all four years of school for well over 25,000 students.”

But you wouldn’t want to do that, would you?  After all, you could alternately spend one of your paltry billions on 41 private Beyoncé concerts and still have $16,000 left over.

Much better!

If you were number 500 on the Billionaire Index, how likely would you be to subscribe to the view that billionaires shouldn’t exist?  Would you accept the conclusion, or would that be impossible, operating like Descartes’ Cogito, to prove, by deductive logic, that billionaires should exist?

I billion, therefore I am?

But perhaps it's an empirical question; if so, sign me up for a test case.

Snacks

Pretzels don’t cut it anymore.  Neither do mere Flaming Hot Cheetos.  Not even Cajun Squirrel flavored potato chips.

Nowadays, snacks and snack flavors have got to be bold!  Disruptive! Exasperating!

My peanut butter filled pretzel bites have got to be filled with toe jam cheese at the very least; even better should they contain the macerated remains of angel tongues.

Five Hour Energy Taco John’s Hot Sauce is actually a thing; that’s a good start.  Now get me some Fentanyl Flavored Ducolax Hershey’s Chocolate Kit-Kat Suppositories, stat!

In the realm of healthy snacks, like trail mix or raisins, isn’t it time for something like Super-Crunchy Almond and Caviar Ortolan Bites?  I’m sure those would go over well in the first-class sections of international flights.

And soft drink flavors are boring; the best the pros have been able to come up with so far is Cucumber Sprite; heck, Dr. Brown was doing celery soda in the mid 20th century.  We need vision in the soda realm: bring me Anal Sweat Cherry Coke and Bean Fart Dr. Pepper!

We should look to history for inspiration; the internet tell us that on the Lewis and Clark Expedition each member of the Corps of Discovery ate up to nine pounds of meat each day; with that in mind, isn’t it time for Bison and Deer Meat Ding-Dongs?  Or how about Mini-Frosted Elk Glands?  Pickles and Buffalo Hide Popsicles?

People used to sprinkle ambergris, the intestinal slurry of a sperm whale, on their morning eggs; I think we can top that.  Let’s fill our spice shakers with Snot-Infused Grated Courtesan Toenail Clippings; yum!

Pizza flavoring has certainly had its day; the current apotheosis may be Tostino’s Pizza Cinnamon Crunch breakfast cereal.  But that’s just a start.  I propose an all-day snack that turns things around: Captain Crunch and Lucky Charm Marshmallow Pizza Squares.  Now you’re talking; now you’re snackin’!

Bring me a bowl of them with a side of Pepto-Bismol Dorito Chips!

Counterpoint

All over the world, people are suffering; the natural world is collapsing; politicians are inept and corrupt; everything everywhere pretty much sucks.

Except:

• Public libraries are wonderful.  They provide education, entertainment, solace, and community; we all ought to celebrate them every day.
• Bicycles rock.  Humanity’s most noble invention, as Grant Peterson says, “a rideable work of art that just might save the world.”
• A tomato sandwich on toasted white bread with mayonnaise and pepper is summer in a meal; perfect.
• Lake Washington, even though vastly appreciated, is vastly underappreciated as a civic amenity; being able to lounge on its shore and swim in its depths for free is an unbelievable luxury, available to all.
• Going barefoot is how humans were meant to live; bare feet on soft grass is a bit of heaven on earth.
• Bumblebees are beautiful, hard-working, and don’t fuck around.  When they’re gone, we’re gone, too.
• Poetry.  Words can make you cry; that’s incredible.
• Music.  Vibrations of the air can make you cry; that’s staggering.
• The vastness of the Universe is impossible to comprehend and that’s a very good thing.
• Sneezing is kind of delightful; it’s also amusing when you do so in public and some random person wishes you “gesundheit.”
• Genuine kindness, even in tiny bits, isn’t so bad.  I saw a girl reach over and tuck her friend’s shirt tag back in without even being asked; that was very sweet.
• Photosynthesis might be nature’s number one hit; respiration, transpiration, reproduction, all great, but converting sunlight and water to energy is tough to top.
• Don’t discount recreational sports; millions of people all over the world have had some of the most fun times in their lives kicking or hitting or chasing balls with their friends; it’s silly and mundane, but so are humans, so there.
• An afternoon nap is balm for so many of the world’s troubles; a mid-morning one works, too.
• Oh.  And surely best of the best: the sun.  Thanks for everything.

Parts

I used to worry about my body parts sagging; these days, I’m just happy if they don’t fall off!

So, which will be the first to be replaced?  Knee?  Hip?  Shoulder?  Maybe I can make it to the finish line (that’s death), without a spare, but I guess we’ll see—or could see, I guess, if I need a new cornea or whatever.

Things wear out: jeans have a lifespan of a couple years; a toothbrush goes after about three months; there is that bottle of ranch dressing that’s been in the refrigerator for a decade at least, but other than that, everything has an expiration date, so I guess if you live long enough, there is not alternative—other than not living long enough.

Eventually, a person could go almost full cyborg: new knees, hips, a couple cornea, internal organs, too.  I don’t know.  Replace the brain, too, and become an android.  I’m sure there’s a billionaire out there working on that very scenario.

Honestly, I can’t see the appeal of living forever.  It’s hard enough to carry on from day to day; the prospect of doing so forever, especially as a brain in a vat or a disembodied neural network is about as appealing as solitary confinement, which—come to think about it—is essentially what that would be.  No thanks.

If there were a god who was a better designer than the one who some theists allege did the work on this Universe then you’d think they’d have made the human body modular.  Just unscrew the arm and install a new one.  I did a similar repair on the water regulator in my toilet yesterday; that sort of design seems like a no-brainer, frankly.

Or why not have human limbs be able to take root like cuttings from your simplest houseplant.  Drop an arm in a glass of water for a couple of weeks and grow a whole new me.

One that blooms, too!

Convenience

How convenient is convenience, anyway?  

Is it convenient that in order to get chicken nuggets delivered to your door that the delivery person makes $3.00 an hour to do so?

Is it convenient that in order to save fifteen minutes by driving somewhere rather than taking the bus that you contribute a little more to the problem of climate change which will eventually cause humanity’s demise?

Is it convenient that because you don’t have to carry your re-usable travel mug around that another disposable coffee cup goes into the waste stream and our already overflowing landfills?

Of course, it’s certainly NOT convenient to be reminded—and passive-aggressively scolded—of such examples of alleged convenience by some random person on their rarely-read personal weblog, which just goes to show that the truly convenient action in many cases is not to take action at all, at least in the name of convenience.

The internet tells us that word “convenience” comes from the Latin “conventia,” or in French, “convener” which is essentially to come together (although not in any naughty sense).  What’s “convenient,” then, is what we come to a meeting of the minds about what’s convenient, essentially.

So, if we can agree that it’s NOT convenient to order online so much, drive with such frequency, or discard with such impunity, then, apparently, do so would no longer be convenient.  

Conveniently.

There’s nothing wrong with labor-saving devices; it’s a good thing that we have washing machines and vacuum cleaners to spare us from the drudgery of banging our dirty clothes on rocks and hitting rugs with sticks to get the dirt out of them.

But do we really need leaf-blowers instead of rakes? An automated espresso machine instead of a stovetop pot?  Self-driving cars?  Artificial intelligence?

Seems like the goal is to reduce human activity to nothing more than sitting in front of a screen pressing buttons; if that’s the height of convenience, isn’t not doing so even more convenient?

Could

I could rise from my sitting position, get the tools out of the garden shed, and do the yardwork that’s been beckoning me all week; weeds to pull, suckers to cut back, branches to prune.

I could respond to those pleas from public radio stations in light of recent federal funding cutbacks and send them all some money; I should, too, since I’m a regular listener.

I could take the dog for a second walk of the day and let her sniff the ground to her heart’s content.

I could dig around in my files for the article I want to send to my friend who is recovering from his cancer treatment.

I could scrub down the bathroom shower; I could mop the kitchen floor.

I could write a few letters to far-flung friends.

I could clean out the refrigerator and organize my sock drawer.

I could pack a bag of old clothes I never wear and take them to Goodwill.

I could read some articles in preparation for my fall quarter classes.

I could put on my swimsuit and ride down to the lake for a quick swim.

I could try to fix that sticky door on my bike shed.

I could do my best to replace the hissing water control mechanism in my toilet.

I could organize those hundreds of photographs currently in boxes by putting them in photo albums.

I could meditate for an hour. I could write for a while in my journal.

I could go shopping for vegetables at the nearby Farmer’s Market.

I could wrap a band-aid around my blackened big toenail so that it doesn’t fall off.

I could empty the water in the basement dehumidifier and make sure it’s running at the proper humidity level.

I could consolidate the waste paper baskets into the main downstairs trash can, take the old bag out to the garbage, and replace the one that goes under the kitchen sink.

I could, but I won’t.

Devo

In traditional Hindu cosmology, there are four world ages or yugas, all together lasting about four and a half million years.  

Each yuga is characterized by a decline in human capabilities, basically from gods to animals. 

We’re in the fourth now, the Kali Yuga, and it’s the one in which human capabilities are at their lowest level.  During the first yuga, the Satya Yuga, humanity was giant-sized and perfect in regards to truth and morality; a little less perfect but still ideal in the second, the Treta Yuga; by the third, the Dvapara Yuga, humanity was more degraded, but still way better than our sorry state now, which will lead to the eventual demise of the human race and set the stage for the cycle beginning all over again.

The French historian, Alain Daniélu, reckoned that the Kali Yuga would come to a close about the year 2442, when a catastrophe will wipe out all mankind; honestly, if that catastrophe is mankind itself, that seems about right (if not somewhat overly optimistic).

At any rate, take it all as metaphor, remove the supernatural implications, grounding the whole story in recorded history, and it still seems like those ancient Vedic sages were on to something.

Even though many contemporary human beings would (and do!) claim that the current state of humanity represents the apotheosis of the human experience, a strong case can be made that it’s entirely the other way around.  

Our average ancestor knew way more than any of us about how to survive; those ancient hunter-gatherers had to figure out everything; we just have to press a button and it’s done for us without any skill whatsoever on our part.  

Or think about sailors three hundred years ago crossing the oceans in sailing ships without GPS! 

Or turn-of-the-20th-century engineers building structurally sound bridges without computers.  

Or Victorian novelists writing some of history’s greatest literature by hand!

And then, everntially, this: 327 words typed on a laptop.

Weird

Here, teams of ten young people are playing softball in a municipal park, occasionally grousing about calls made by the old man who is paid by the city to make them.

There, groups of parents and children are being massacred by bombs from the air, pleading for their lives while explosions paid for by a far-away country rock their land.

Here, a person rides their bike down a shady hill to a clear-blue lake and lies in the sun by the beach before diving in to cool off time and again.

There, people walk through the broiling sun for hours just to get a bucket of water that they carry back on their heads to barely hydrate the parched throats of their loves ones.

Here, somewhere, someone wearing an $800 dollar t-shirt and $3000 dollar sandals complains that the bathroom tiles they have ordered are one Pantone shade different than what they expected and so, therefore, are unacceptable and must be returned and the $150,000 dollars they paid for them be refunded.

There, somewhere, someone wearing rags huddles in a filthy alleyway with rubble strewn all around; they relieve themselves in a plastic bucket that’s stained with months of use; the lid is cracked and repaired with duct tape; that’s better than nothing at all.

Here, it’s an issue when you run out of cream for your coffee.

There, you’re lucky not to be killed when lining up for food distribution.

Here, there’s a library, a police station, a fire station, two grocery stores, five restaurants, a hospital and an urgent care facility, a public swimming pool with a recreation center, and three city parks all within two miles.

There, there is nothing but broken bricks and dust.

Here, all our problems are privileges; how lucky in the course of human history to have nothing worse than a leaky kitchen sink to worry about.

There, problems are problems: no food, no water, no safety at all.

Weird.

Broken

It starts with a wine glass, dropped in the sink and shattered to bits. 

Then, reaching for the broken bits around a vase full of flowers, a miscalculation, thus shards and blossoms all over the floor.

In the process of cleaning up, an old pipe in the kitchen fails, soaking the floor.  While fixing that, a wrench is dropped and smashes the water valve; you can guess what happens next.

It’s not good to get electrical wires wet because when they do, circuits short out and when the electrical box goes on the fritz, so does the refrigerator; all the ice melts, the floor caves in and the appliance ends up in the basement.

Walls begin to fold down  The roof collapses.  Pretty soon, what was once a house is now a pile of rubble.

A huge sinkhole opens beneath the foundation and all is swallowed up, which busts a gas main, causes a fire and consumes the entire neighborhood.

In the effort to extinguish the blaze by dropping water from the air, a military transport plane crashes.  The emergency search and rescue crew succumbs to smoke inhalation; their vehicles, left unattended, explode; a cloud of toxic fumes blankets the city.

The heat from the various conflagrations melts the mountain’s glacier; a lahar rushes downhill, covering the entire region with what looks like a rolling slurry of wet concrete.  Not a single animal is left living.  The weight of it all tips the earth off its axis and the Northern hemisphere heats up almost overnight to unprecedented temperatures.

All the glaciers melt; the seas rise precipitately; every city in the world is submerged; the entire human race is wiped out.

Aquatic life thrives; in a couple of centuries, dolphins and whales rule the seas.  Over time, they continue to evolve, until one day, a porpoise with arm-like flippers, holds something like a wine glass over something not unlike a sink.

History doesn’t repeat, but it does rhyme.

Boredom

Is there anything more thrilling these days than being bored?

What a joy to have nothing to do and all day not to do it; how entertaining to not be entertained; how very engaging not to be engaged.

Consider the paradigmatic cases of being bored: the droning lecture of your checked-out teacher in 7th grade History class; the long wait in the endless, non-moving line at the Department of Motor Vehicles; the one-way conversational monologue by the vegan cross-fitting conspiracy theorist sitting next to you on the train; yes, these all kind of suck, but they’re a luxury to be sure.  Ask anyone in Gaza or flooded Texas or drought-ravaged Sudan if they’d trade places and they’ll tell you: please let me be bored; if only.

So, it’s sort of strange that boredom is such anathema to so many.  Ride the bus or subway and you’ll see everyone on their phones, feverishly seeking entertainment.  In the line for coffee, people will immediately take out their device, the moment they queue up.  Apparently, you’re a total loser if you’re alone with your thoughts for even a second or two when you could be watching Instagram or playing Wordle.

Squarely in old man rant mode here, I observe that something important is being lost in this frantic effort to avoid being  bored.  But what could be more boring than never being bored?  And what’s so bad about boredom, anyway?  At least you’re not working on a chain gang.

Mom always used to say, “Only boring people get bored,” and there’s some truth to that.  Perhaps it should be modified, though, to be, “Only boring people find being bored boring.”  All it takes not to be bored is to find being bored interesting; becoming curious about boredom turns it from boredom to intrigue; interrogating boredom suddenly becomes fascinating.

Of course, I could be wrong; maybe we should avoid boredom at all costs. 

If so, you’d better stop reading this now!

Acceptance

 • Should I replace the dripping pipe joint gasket in the kitchen or just put a bucket under the sink?

• Should I lose those ten pounds of belly fat or simply buy some bigger jeans?

• Why take the car in for servicing that weird sound when I can just turn up the radio?

• No need for spot remover on my shirt; this campaign button covers that stain perfectly.

• I could replace the brake pads on my bike, but instead, I’ll just squeeze the levers harder.

• Not going to paint the house this summer; we’ll just let the ivy grow wilder.

• My dog doesn’t really need a walk; here’s a treat instead.

• That .pdf I’ve been using as a reading in my Intro class for years is pretty hard to decipher; I guess I’ll just remove it from the syllabus.

• Eight hours of sleep or six hours and two cups of coffee; I’ll take the latter.

• This table balances fine; you’ve just got to shim it up with those matchbooks.

• I never really minded those scratched records; you just lifted the needs a bit at the skipping parts.

• We could rent the movie or watch it for free on broadcast; I’ll press mute during the commercials.

• Maybe there’s a little mold on this bread, but when it’s toasted, you’ll never taste it.

• The current mayor’s not so great, but an alternative might be worse.

• Potholes in the street?  No problem, just drive around.

• No thanks, Doc, I’ll hold off on getting that tooth crown; I can just chew on the other side.

• Yeah, you’ve got to slam that door to make it close; it’s been like that for years.

• Don’t open that window all the way; it’s a bitch to get closed if you do.

• That drawer sticks; you’ve just got to yank it hard.

• I’ve had this headlamp forever; works fine if you shake it.

• I could try to write that novel, but this is enough for today.

Ouroboros

• I’ve been wanting to procrastinate more, but I can never seem to get around to doing it.
• I’m planning on taking a memory course, but I keep forgetting to sign up.
• I think my doctor may have told me to take a hearing test, but I didn’t quite hear what she said.
• I want to lose weight, but not until after a big meal.
• I’m trying to get more sleep, so I’ve been staying up late, researching how to do so on the internet.
• I’d like to spend more time with my friends, but I’m not into hanging out with them.
• I know I should read more, but all those words get in the way.
• I want to spend less time on my phone, so I downloaded a bunch of apps to help me.
• I’d ride my bicycle more if only it had three wheels.
• I’m of two minds as to whether I exhibit schizophrenic tendencies.
• I get depressed at the thought I might be depressed.
• I want to drink less booze, so I need a couple of shots for the courage to do so.
• All these healthy snacks are making me sick.
• I’m too tired from working out to exercise.
• My personal relationships are all with people I don’t know.
• I’d look forward to tomorrow if only it weren’t in the future.
• My past would be better if only it hadn’t happened yet.
• There’s no time like the present except for this moment right now.
• I need to concentrate more, but I can’t focus on that.
• I could stop biting my nails if it weren’t for having teeth.
• I’d be a lot braver if I weren’t such a coward.  And I could stop stealing if I wasn’t a thief.
• I argue in a circle to not beg the question.
• I close my eyes to all I cannot see.
• I’d be a writer if it weren’t for the paperwork.
• I could be mature, but that would be childish.

Trash

 People are pigs, and that’s probably not being fair to pigs.  After all, I’ve never known a pig to toss an empty Styrofoam clamshell container along with a plastic water bottle and a crumpled Doritos bag into the gutter, just two feet away from an overflowing municipal garbage can.

Humans do this all the time, though.  

Take an early morning bike ride through a part of your town where “nightlife” happens, and you’ll be shocked and shamed by the amount of trash strewn about everywhere: beer cans, empty pizza boxes, broken umbrellas, random shoes, chicken bones, Starbucks cups, t-shirts, socks, underpants and brassieres, even, McDonald’s bags, Burger King bags, Chick-Fil-A bags, grocery bags, plastic take-out food bags, a kid’s stroller, wine bottles, booze bottles, baby bottles, and disposable diapers, too, yuck!  And besides all this, if you live in a place where there’s regular trash pick-up, there will be piles of filled-up garbage bags filled up with all these things that are lying around unfilled-up, as well.

And that’s just one neighborhood, in one city or town, after one night!

Meanwhile, I make no claim to be any better.  Check out my garbage can, recycling bin, and compost container on Friday morning before the weekly pickup: broken dishes, soiled take-out boxes, empty yogurt containers, a pile of newspapers and magazine, discarded mail, rotten vegetables, a week’s worth of coffee grounds, socks and yes, underpants, too, sometimes, tied-up dog poop bags, busted picture frames and various indistinguishable shards of plastic, soon to be floating in the ocean somewhere.

And that’s just one household, in one city, after one week!

According to Wikipedia, an archeological midden, or old dump for domestic waste, “may consist of animal bones, human excrement, botanical material, mollusk shells, potsherds, lithics (especially debitage), and other artifacts and ecofacts associated with past human occupation.”

With that in mind, then apparently, the entire globe is a midden; the archeologists of the future will find our trash everywhere!

Feedback

Thanks for staying at our hotel, flying on our airline, eating at our restaurant, using our customer support line, buying our brand of cheese, choosing us as your dentist, accessing our service, dropping off your trash at our transfer station, purchasing our cannabis, or picking us as your preferred provider of dog poop pick-up bags!  We are always looking for ways to improve what we do!  In that spirit, we would appreciate it if you would take our feedback survey and share your thoughts.  Rate us on the following scale:

1: Excellent 2: Superior 3: Out-of-this-world

Thanks very much!  See you soon!

How many of these do you get a day?  I’m averaging about three and—going into full grouchy old man mode—what the hell?

Isn’t it enough that I’ve paid the company for the service they’ve provided?  Now I have to do some homework?

Let’s be honest: we all know that the only person reading my responses—if they get read at all—is some summer intern doing remote work from their college dorm.  And we’re fully away that even if I give terrible feedback—merely “excellent”—it’s not going to make a whit of difference.  

So, what’s the point?  

To merely create the illusion that someone cares about what I have to say and to demonstrate to the gullible public that the organization in question is committed to some sort of corporate double-speak of “continuous improvement?”

Pshaw, I say, double-pshaw!

If the company or service really wanted to offer something of value to me following my interaction with them, they’d send me money in their post-experience message.  Or they would devote themselves to ending world hunger or addressing climate change.  They wouldn’t be pestering me to do the work that their own middle-managers ought to be doing to make their organization more responsive; I’m not getting the big bucks to write reports no one reads!

So, here’s my real and meaningful feedback: stop asking for my feedback!

 

Something

 Not everything has to be everything.  Anything worth doing is worth doing poorly.  Good enough is good enough.  

Everyone wants a 4.0, an A-plus.  But B-plus is fine and so, honestly is a C.  Average is better than below average, so why not be satisfied with the satisfactory?

The constant push to upgrade is exhausting.  Continuous improvement just means you never get to relax.  It’s okay to settle for what you liked last time; if it was adequate then, it’s adequate now.  Progress is also not going backwards.

Sure, there’s always a better table, a tastier dish, a superior route.  But so what?  If you’ve got a place to sit, a bite to eat, and some way to get home, isn’t that plenty?

All comparisons are odious is how I remember Chekhov’s quote, and if it wasn’t the Russian playwright who said it, or if that isn’t quite what he said (or both), I’m not going to lose sleep over it—and I certainly wouldn’t wear a watch that told me if I were, simply in the name of optimizing the potentially optimal.

At some point, you’ve just got to accept the acceptable, without continuing to long for something better.  You’ll never be satisfied with what you don’t have, until you’re satisfied with what you do.  Ye olde wanting what you have vs. having what you want.  Or something like that.

The secret to living a life of no regrets is to regret nothing and the only way to do that is to realize that you couldn’t really have done anything different than what you did.  Giving up on free will is a small price to pay for a life well-lived; if you couldn’t have lived any differently—(and guess what? You couldn’t!—then it’s all good (and bad, and indifferent, as well).

Nothing is perfect; in fact, ONLY nothing IS perfect; as soon as there’s anything, it’s inevitably flawed; this, too, was better before being written.

Contrarian

 I don’t like to do what I don’t like to do.  My final answer is the last word on the subject.  I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again: “It.”  See what I did there with your own two eyes?

Tomorrow’s another day, but so is today, not to mention yesterday.  Too late!  Meanwhile, everything that happens happens, while nothing that doesn’t does.

I’m far too young to be this old even though I’m not a day older than my age.  When I’m dead I will have died, although as long as I’m living, I haven’t yet passed away.

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step so why does it take three times going back into the house to get another thing I forgot?

If a tree falls in the forest and it doesn’t make a sound, it’s obviously because everyone had their earbuds in listening to podcasts.

Speaking of podcasts, please don’t; I’d rather be subjected to a narrative account of your dreams.

Setting the bar low is a good way of setting a low bar.  Exceeding expectations is a sure strategy for the unexpected.  And if you make an exception for everyone, then it isn’t an exception, get it?

Today is the first day of the rest of your life, which makes yesterday the last day of rest, as well.  

In the back of my mind, I think I’d rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy, although what’s top of mind right now is beneath comprehension.

No one says what’s left unspoken, but everyone uses their mouth to speak their mind, making each point in a round-about way.

Circular reasoning makes me dizzy, so I beg the question in a question-begging way.

You can’t tell me what I refuse to hear, nor will I ever see what’s unobserved.

I didn’t start this just to finish, it but now that I’m at the end, it’s over.

Impermanent

“Everything arises and passes away” is how the Buddhists put it and, these days, it couldn’t be truer.

No longer is my beloved aftershave, Old Spice, being produced by Proctor and Gamble.

Tillamook Cheese seems to have changed the recipe of my favorite cheese, Extra Sharp White Cheddar, so that instead of being crumbly and sharp, it’s now waxy and bland.

Chrome Bags have discontinued making the Kursk, the shoe I have worn almost daily for probably two decades.

The software on the printers at school has stopped allowing you to customize the paper size when you scan a document, so the pages of books get cut off or are formatted weirdly.

My doctor doesn’t let you ask questions anymore during your annual check-up; you have to schedule a special consultation (and pay extra) for that.

And try to find an 8-speed rear hub for your bike that doesn’t sounds like angry bees when it freewheels; forget about it.

Of course, I should be equanimous about all this and not cling to or crave after what, by its very nature, is ephemeral.  I, too, am only here for a short time, all things considered, so why should I complain when everything else is subject to the same impermanent reality of all things?

But, fuck!  

What am I supposed to do now, after shaving?  How am I going to enjoy my mac n’ cheese anymore?  Do I have to go back to buying Chuck Taylors, even though they hurt my feet and don’t keep me warm and dry in the winter?

It just makes you want to hasten your own inevitable disappearance from this material realm, doesn’t it?  If all the things that make up everyday experience cease to be, why not cease to be oneself?

If I weren’t around to complain about the demise of my aftershave, cheese, shoes, etc., then I wouldn’t have anything to complain about, would I?

And this blog could disappear, as well.

Fortunate

Growing up, I always had a roof over my head and plenty to eat.  I even had my own room!

Neither of my parents were alcoholics and they never beat me, not even once. (Spankings don’t count.)

I had no serious childhood illnesses; the worst part of my healthcare experience was going to the dentist, but I always got a lollipop from him after my check-ups.

My grade school was fully-staffed and well-resourced.  We had gym class every few days; art at least once a week; French in seventh and eighth grade; algebra was painful for a 12 year-old, but better, I guess, than no algebra at all.  

There were bullies, sure, but no guns.

High school was hell, of course, but we read Marx and Mao in 11th grade Political Philosophy and The Great Gatsby and Great Expectations in English.

Rents were low enough and the job market plentiful enough that I was able to move to San Francisco as a 21 year-old and find work and an affordable apartment in less than a week.  There was an earthquake when I lived there, but it was very minor—just enough to spill cans from the shelves in the corner store and provide an excuse for getting drunk that evening.

I’ve never lived in a city that was being bombed.  Nor have I ever been homeless, neither for economic nor geopolitical reasons.

None of my family members have ever been murdered, tortured, or disappeared by the government or drug cartels.  I’ve never been shot, stabbed, tasered, or clobbered with a truncheon by the authorities.

There’s still money left in Social Security for me to start collecting benefits; it may not last through the rest of my life, but I’ve got a handful of years without worry.

I’ll die of something sooner or later, but at the moment, I’m still healthy and not in any significant pain.

It’s not all perfect, though: I am a Pittsburgh Pirates fan.

Responsible

 I do my job.  I pay my taxes.  I pick up my dog’s poop and dispose of it responsibly.  I clean up after myself.  

I wash the dishes.  I try to limit my carbon footprint.  I eat mainly locally-sourced food, all vegetarian.  I vote.  I show up for meetings and participate seriously.  I make the bed and hang up my clothes.  

I keep my yard presentable for the neighbors. I honor my promises and commitments.  I ensure that my bank balance is not overdrawn. 

I scrub the toilets. I don’t drive drunk (I hardly drive at all.)  I stay abreast of the news.  

I answer all my email within 24 hours.  I keep my car registration up to date.  I return my library books before they are due.  I tip well.  

I apologize sincerely when I’ve done something wrong. I reduce, reuse, and recycle. I direct deposit my bills on the day before they are due.  

I pull weeds. 

I show up for my family, friends, and colleagues.  I attend all-day meetings without (much) complaint.  I get my students’ grades in on time.  

I take the e-waste to the e-waste site.  I take the hazardous waste to the hazardous waste site. I get oil changes at a place that disposes of the oil in an environmentally-responsible way.

I offer my seat on a crowded bus to old people and pregnant ladies.  I hold the door open for the person behind me. I take off my shoes in no-shoe houses.

I apologize after I burp.  I sneeze into the crook of my elbow.  I wear a mask if I’m feeling sick.

I exercise, eat right, and get an annual physical check-up.  

I act my age.  

If I borrow something, I put it back where I found it. I wipe the counter after I cook.

I do what’s expected of me and treat others as they would wish to be treated.

I’m a responsible person.

I’m sick of it.