The King of Romania

Dear reader. I have for you a non-refusable offer to which I require your most urgent response.

I am proud to announce the formation of a new business with an astonishing potential for unlimited profit. Effluvia Unlimited is dedicated to enlightening the world through the medium of internet spam, and I am seeking investors and franchisees in the project. Because you are a loyal reader of these blogs, I have selected you...yes, YOU alone...out of 3.75 billion other internet users...to get in on this exclusive, ground-floor offer. For a minimal investment which I will disclose to you upon verification of your interest, Effluvia Unlimited will then franchise its services to individual entrepreneurs seeking to earn big money working from home, and will be supplied, for a set, irrevocable monthly fee, at least 36 vitally important messages each day, and a list of 3.75 billion people to whom to send them. Each franchisee will receive .02 percent of every cent he or she generates for Effluvia Unlimited—and remember, we are speaking here of 3.75 billion eager customers!

Here is a sample of just one of the postings which will be immediately available to franchisees for distribution to their client list:

Dearly Beloved

I am Excretia Moldava III, finance minister to His Highness Brzynaba VI, King of Romania. While visiting his hunting lodge in the Reelybig Mountains, his highness was delivered by one of his manservants a chest discovered in a window seat. Upon opening it, his highness discovered the crown jewels of Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, a distant cousin to whom Tsar Nicholas had sent the jewels for safekeeping.

In the box was a note directing King Brzynaba III, the present king's great grandfather, to deliver the jewels to his illegitimate daughter, Anesthesia Sonnovavich, then residing in Romania. Sadly, King Brzynaba III and his entire family died following a nasty incident involving a runaway steam turbine before Tsar Nicholas's wishes could be fulfilled.

The present king immediately directed me to find the heirs of Anesthesia Sonnovavich and after an exhaustive and expensive search, I have found you.

To reclaim the jewels of Tsar Nicholas, we need only to verify your identity. Please immediately furnish me with the following information: your full name, address, phone number, date of birth, full social security number, all bank account and credit card numbers, a thumb print, a retina scan, and a copy of your passport. Please also send a cashier's check in the amount of $500 to cover search expenses.

Upon receipt of this information and your check, your fortune will be sent you post haste.

Most Sincerely

Excretia Moldava III

And this is but one of an unlimited number of irresistible incentive mailings which can be flooding computer inboxes around the world when you become part of Effluvia Unlimited. So DO NOT HESITATE: ACT NOW!

Note: The sincerity of this exclusive blog offer is verified by being having been awarded the prestigious and coveted Dorien Grey Seal of Utmost Integrity.

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. Your comments are always welcome. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.

Comparisons

Because we humans are solitary creatures in that our minds are confined within a single physical body, it is impossible for us to really know or fully understand anyone but ourselves—and few of us can really manage even that. As a result, we are and can never really be sure of what the lives of others are like. Being only one of nine billion equally individual beings and therefore vastly outnumbered, we tend to rely strongly on assumptions and often-faulty comparisons as we stumble blindly through a life few, if any of us, understand. But in making assumptions and comparisons, those of us with a strong sense of insecurity, self-doubt and self-deprecation tend to see the lives of others as somehow better than our own.

I spend an inordinate amount of time minutely examining my flaws and weaknesses, real and imagined, and frequently, in light of what I read and hear and understand about the lives of others, ask myself the age old human question: “What have I done with my life?”, the answer to which is too often: “Nothing. You have all but wasted 80 precious years!”

But on those rare moments when I can drag myself back from staring into the abyss and force myself to sit down and try applying a little seldom-used true objectivity, I can grudgingly admit that my life has not been totally devoid of memorable events and achievements.

I have flown an airplane around the tops of towering, whipped-cream clouds. I have descended into the crater of Mt. Vesuvius. I’ve walked the streets of Pompeii and Rome and Athens and Istanbul and Vienna and Venice and Budapest. I’ve been places and done things that never even entered my mind as being possible when I was a child. I read of fairy-tale castles and  fortresses and kings and great adventures, and while I have yet to meet a king, I have visited castles on the Rhine and recently visited a fairy-tale fortress on the island of Corčula.

I have written and published more than 20 books, yet criticize myself for not having written more.

I realize that others have done far, far, more, been far more places, and accomplished far more than I ever have or will, but for that to in any way diminish the pleasure of my achievements is the height of ingratitude.

I have been blessed with a loving family and dear friends. I have been in romantic love, and been loved, several times—though when I look back on these loves, my reaction tends to be more of sorrow and regret that they ended than of infinite gratitude that had them at all. I fear I am shamefully greedy and selfish when it comes to my own wishes and desires.

I think it is because I love life so deeply…so desperately…that the thought, at the age of 80, of not having it forever terrifies me. I do not fear and never have feared death itself, but the thought of not being here to enjoy all life has to offer….

I cannot speak for you or your life. I’ve not had your individual, specific joys and sorrows, your adventures, known the people who have come into your life and either stayed or left it, or your reactions to any of these things. I am only sure that your life has been filled with them all, and that you quite probably look back on them with as much emotion as I look back on mine.

The word “alone” is generally seen as a negative; to many people it is frightening. But it is a simple fact is that no matter how many friends or family members surround us in however-close proximity, they are not us, nor are we them, and each of still exists totally within a small box of bone located at the top of our spine. The old saying “No man is an island,” is true as it relates to our intellectual and emotional connections with others, and the comfort we take from the proximity and the touch of a friend or loved one. But I…and you…l can fully be aware of our own sensations, feelings, and reactions to any given circumstance. So, in that context, we must admit that each of us is our own island.

So, in the final analysis, we cannot compare ourselves with others: we are each unique, and unique has no comparisons.

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

Ladies and Gentlemen

There is a lady who lives in my building who I see frequently...on my own floor when I'm coming or going, or occasionally on one of the floors to which I go when I'm trying to find an available washing machine...always with a mop or broom, diligently cleaning the hallways. She is not employed by the building, which has its own maintenance staff, so why she does this I have no idea. But it doesn't matter whether I know or not. She wants...for whatever reason...to do it, and she does.

There is a lady slightly past “a certain age” who frequents a coffee shop not far from my apartment. She always, summer or winter, wears an ankle-length gown and gold high heels upon which, it seems to me, she walks a bit unsteadily. She can be easily picked out of the throngs of people coming and going on the street, but she neither notices nor, if she does notice, cares. It is what she wants to do and I admire her for it.

When I lived in Chicago the first time, in the late 1950s, there was a woman I've commented on in a previous blog some time ago. She would pass by my ground-floor apartment frequently. She was probably in her late 70s at the time, and toothpick-thin. She carried herself like an empress and always dressed stylishly in a tight black dress, with a large, wide-brimmed hat with a bright red cabbage rose, and black, elbow-length gloves. Though pale, she wore lipstick to match the cabbage rose, and her cheeks were brightly rouged. I would love to know her story; I'm sure it would have been a fascinating one.

Her counterpart...though I never saw them together or even at the same time...was a gentleman of probably her same age, though he was neither gaunt nor heavy. He also passed by my apartment frequently and always wore a spotless white suit with, if memory serves, white shoes. And I never saw him without a flower in his lapel. I always wished he and the lady in black could have met. How wonderful for them to have combined their two very unique worlds.

When I was a teenager, when going to or coming from school, I would frequently see a plain, ordinary-looking lady standing at the same bus stop. Yet she never got on a bus. She was, I learned, something of a neighborhood legend, and she was standing at the bus stop waiting for her son, who had been killed in WWII. It broke my heart then, and it breaks my heart now.

I recently did a blog about an elderly gentleman I'd seen in a coffee shop who, though sitting alone at the next table, commented on the weather and the menu, and I could not determine if he were talking to me or to himself. I do know I felt...and even as I type these words, still feel...an overwhelming sense of guilt for not having at least acknowledged his presence. Was he homeless and a bit deranged, or was he hoping that someone might say something to him to verify that he was indeed visible and a valid human being?

I have never forgotten my friend Ursula, on whom I also did a blog a couple of years ago, whose life was incomprehensibly hard. A half-Jewish German whose father being a gentile saved her from being gassed, Ursula never spoke of her experiences willingly, but she did relate being on a cattle-car train being shipped from one camp to another when the allies fire-bombed the city of Dresden, killing over 100,000 people, and how she and the other prisoners were forced to go through the city picking up the remains of the dead. How can anyone not be scarred forever by something so horrific?

In a more positive vein, one of my favorite fictional characters is the little lady from the play The Madwoman of Chaillot, who every morning reads exactly the same edition of her favorite newspaper because she likes the news in it. My kind of woman!

The fact is that the world abounds in fascinating men and women who have the courage to dance to their own music or who face and survive unimaginable hardships with grace and dignity, and I stand in absolute awe of them.

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

The Delusionist

[Back from vacation, ready to resume my regular Monday/Thursday blogs. Thanks for your patience!]

I’ve been a delusionist all my life. Never comfortable with the harshness of reality, I early-on developed the ability to pretty much ignore it unless it was somehow physically impossible to do so. It worked well for seven decades. If I chose to see the world in a certain light, I did so, and no one was harmed or basically the wiser. (When, for example, as a gay man I see an attractive man on the street, I automatically assume he is gay. Whether he is or not is entirely beside the point; I think he’s gay, so he is. It gives me quiet pleasure, and harms no one.)

When I was five years old, I had absolutely no interest in being six…or sixteen, or anywhere beyond. I most certainly never wanted to be a “grown-up.” Grown-ups were almost a separate species to which I had no interest in belonging…and, largely, I have managed to avoid doing so. Even into my 40s and beyond, I still found it difficult to think of myself as a “man” because men are grown-ups. (If this sounds childish to you, well, I rest my case.)

However, as the years mount up and it becomes impossible to ignore the ravages of time, the little boy in me grows increasingly frightened at what is happening to him. Being a delusionist works fine for seeing the world from the inside, but not nearly so well when the physical body is involved. I have never been more aware of, and frightened by, it than following my recent trip to Europe. I, who as a 22-year-old, bounded up the slopes of the Acropolis with ease on a hot summer’s day in 1956, found the 2014 August heat incredibly draining. Though bottles of water were distributed by the cruise line, because I now am unable to lift my head high enough to drink normally from a bottle, I recognized the very real threat of becoming quickly dehydrated. 

I’m sure there were crowds on the Acropolis in 1956, but in 2014 it was difficult to see anything but people, especially since despite my sincere efforts to increase my head and neck flexibility with Botox treatments, I was unable to lift my head up high enough even to look people in the eye, let alone see over their heads.

Age brings with it totally unexpected surprises. For nearly 70 years there was never any question that my body would do whatever I wanted of it. I didn’t even really have to make any effort between thinking of an action and my body’s doing it. I realize now that this was a very large delusion on my part; I assumed body and mind were the same. They are not. I must spend more and more time now trying to convince my body to do something, with less and less confidence that it will do it.

Where I could stand up on the toes of one foot and spin around like a top, I no longer even try. I do not run—I lumber and lurch awkwardly. Equilibrium, yet another of the myriads of things we take for granted, is increasingly unreliable. Where I used to walk purposefully, I now frequently find myself hearing my shoes shuffling on the sidewalk without my being aware of it. Whereas walking in a straight line was automatic, I now find myself occasionally weaving. Where I routinely walked—or bounced—up and down stairs two at a time, I now do one at a time. I have not yet reached the point where I must step up or down with one foot and bring the other foot up or down to the same step before proceeding to the next, I fear it is only a matter of time.

Of course I feel terribly sorry for myself. I am, after all, like all small children, an extreme egoist. But I sincerely see myself as a latter-day Paul Revere, sounding a warning of what lies ahead for you, in hopes you may handle it better than I have.

There are many people in their 80s and even 90s who have much more control over their physical lives than I, and that realization is a great blow to my lifelong sense of invincibility. I have relied upon my delusions all my life and now find myself being stripped of them. It is not a comfortable position to be in, I can assure you.

But though I realize that I cannot escape the inevitability of “that good night,” I still do not intend to go gentle into it.

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

Venice, 08-12-14

A stern word of caution…please write this down: do not visit Venice in August. The crowds are impossible, the heat is stifling, and there is little shade in or around St. Mark’s Square or along the canal adjacent to it…they apparently do not want to block the views.

Having had little sleep and suffering jet-lag most of Monday, Monday night was, alas, miserable. I alternated between freezing and roasting, had an upset stomach, and got up 8-10 times during the night to go to the bathroom.

So Tuesday did not start off on the best of footings, my jet-lag now coupled with lack of even more sleep. And the day got off to an even better start when my camera died. Just died. It was only two years old, but it had had a lot of use. So Gary loaned me his until I could get a new one in St. Mark’s Square. (Later that day, my wireless mouse also died, forcing me to use the “finger pad” feature, which I hate, but am stuck with until I can find another wireless mouse.)

The tour from the ship was from 8:30 to 12, and we were transported by boat the 20 minutes or so to “four bridges from St. Mark’s Square.” We began with a walk through some of the quieter neighborhoods, the guide providing interesting guide-type information on the history of the city, how the buildings are constructed over what was historically a huge marsh (wooden pilings driven into the marsh which, because the water at the marsh bottom has no aeration, do not rot out. 

The closer we got to St. Mark’s Square, the more crowded the narrow streets became until we emerged onto the Square itself and the mobs of tourists. There was a huge line to get into the Basilica but, as part of a tour group, we got in via a separate entrance. We walked on raised platforms since the Square and the buildings surrounding it are given to flooding in the spring and fall. I guess they just leave the platforms up year-round. 

By this time, nearing noon, it was downright hot, and I felt like one of the characters in a zombie movie.

We had the choice of returning to the ship at 12:30, or taking the next return shuttle at 3:30, and to give Gary a chance to see more of the city, we opted for the latter. I’d hoped we might ascend to the top of St. Mark’s bell tower, as I’d done my last trip, but there was an endless line waiting, and we decided against it, instead setting off with no particular destination in mind, just roaming around the city. The heat was really getting to me, and we looked in vain for somewhere to sit down and have a cup of coffee. (Benches and places to just sit are extremely rare in Venice, I soon discovered. We finally found a small piazza with a tented restaurant where we could and did sit. I had a tonic water while Gary had a sizable lunch.

We then headed out to find the Ponte Rialto, the main bridge over the Grand Canal and took a vaporatto from there back to St. Mark’s Square. We were about an hour early, but decided to get closer to the boat landing, so we walked along the waterfront over the “four bridges” our guide had pointed out to us. 

Again, the heat was really getting to me, so we found a spot in an area shaded by a building and…with no seating available anywhere…I just sat down on the ground, leaning against the building. We then moved closer to the boat landing for our shuttle, crossing each of the four bridges and, arriving at the landing area with no seating and no shade, sought refuge in a the shade of a narrow alley, which was lined solidly on both sides by standing tourists also seeking shelter from the sun. Gradually moving to the alley’s entrance we found there was a Venturi effect creating a slight breeze.

Returning, finally, the ship, I walked into our cabin, laid down, and slept for two hours…the longest “nap” I can recall having taken.

A note: Internet service is only available while we are in port or near land, and even then it is spotty at best, and excruciatingly slow compared with the service at home. Trying to download the 50+ photos taken each day to post them to the net, plus the time then needed to go through and captioning each of them is a long, long process, and I’ve not yet determined how to handle it for now, or if I should even try, perhaps waiting to post them until I get home? We shall see.

Stay tuned.

Apologies and Catch-up

At the moment of this writing, I'm in Corfu, Greece, a full week behind in posting this blog of my . In my defense I must say the internet aboard ship is spotty at best and agonizingly slow when available. I will do my best to catch up a.s.a.p. and hope you'll accept my apologies

So, let's start off with the first entry of Sunday, August 10:

6:01 p.m. Chicago time, Left right on time. The usual endless wait at check in, though going through security was relatively easy. I’d brought along a couple of quart-sized ziploc bags to put everything in before hand to save the time of rummaging through my pocket while standing over the tray. Left the kleenex in my pockets. Passed through the “arms-over-your-head” scanner, guard stopped me, told me to empty my pockets. Apparently Kleenex shows up on the scanner. Who knew.

The plane is jammed…except for the seat next to me, which is empty. I will be able to lie down after awhile and told Gary we could switch seats if he wanted to lie down for a bit. We shall see.

Left from the International Terminal for, I think, the first time. It’s so far away from the main body of the airport I’m sure I would have remembered. Stopped for coffee ($3.79 for a small). I had two sips. When I sip coffee, it settles in the front of my mouth, and I’m unable to pull it to the back to swallow it. So I end up drooling it into a napkin. (All together, now: “Poooor Dorien or Roger whoever I am at the moment.

They finally brought earphones around. A couple of movies I wouldn’t mind watching, so will close this for the time being and go find a bathroom.

5:59 a.m. Monday Chicago time 11:59 Venice time. Waiting to board ship. All went relatively smoothly from the last entry to this. A 7 1/2 hour flight from Chicago to Paris’ Charles DeGaul airport, a 1 1/2 hour layover in Paris, then the plane to Venice. (I love Venice’s Marco Polo airport….the perfect size. Only two baggage carousels.) And whereas we had full body scans and “everything into the trays” scrutiny in Chicago, on arrival in Paris, and before getting on the connecting flight (where we might have acquired bombs or other disruptive items in the hour and a half, and without leaving the airport, I have no idea. And then, when we arrived in Venice, nothing! No customs, no passport stamping, just pick up our bags and go.

As I expected, I found it Impossible to sleep on the flight to Paris; I just can’t sleep sitting up…though I did manage to doze much of the 1 1/2 hours between Paris and Venice. Only 4 people from our flight…a woman from New Zealand and one from Australia…I’d thought there’d be more. Can’t board the ship until 2:00, which leaves some time to jot down these notes. A beautiful, sunny day…omen of the weather to come, I sincerely hope.

There’s one of those gigantic Costa Behemoths in port, about the same size as the capsized Costa Concordia. I have yet to figure out why anyone would want to sail on one of those things. They’re just moving cities on water, and if I want to be cheek-to-jowl with 6,000 other people, I’d just put a folding chair on Michigan Avenue.

Well, enough for the moment.

A word on the MV (“Motor Vessel”) Aegean Odyssey and its owners/managers. Voyages to Antiquity is a one-ship operation, unusual in itself and the staff and crew are exemplary in their courtesy and service. But as in all good service businesses, it’s the little extras that make the difference. This is my second trip with them, and they went out of their way to show their appreciation. When I got into the cabin, there was not only a thank you note, but a very nice carry-bag. No fewer than half a dozen crew members made a point to say “Welcome back” or “Nice to see you again,” which both surprised and pleased me (though the fact is that once having seen me, it’s not surprising that they mifff.,….natural to remember me physically if for no other reason. Cruises are expensive, granted, but they allow “common folk” like me to indulge themselves for a pleasant if very brief while. 

Got quite a few photos so far…most of good looking young men at the various airports. I don’t think I’ll be able to include any photos with this first post, but I might try to pick one just as an accompaniment. 

Running

The “Flight or Fight” reflex is one of the basic human survival techniques. But “Fight or Flight” refers primarily to external threats, and there are many traumatic situations in life where the problem is internal and emotional, and “fight” is simply not an option. I’ve had several of these events in my life, and learned each time that while “flight” is indeed often an option, it is seldom a good one. 

I've done major-league running away twice in my life, the first shortly after I turned 30 and ran from Chicago to Los Angeles like a citizen of Pompeii fleeing the eruption—the ash fall in this case being shattered pieces of my psyche. You would think after that experience, I'd have learned my lesson and not repeated it. But there is no rationalizing with a devastated mind and heart.

I did not handle turning 30 well. I'd been in a relationship for several years by that time, but while I am a firm believer in monogamy, it didn't work out that way. Norm, my partner, traveled a great deal, sometimes gone two to three weeks out of a month. And, when I learned the hard way that he was not monogamous while away, I began to stray myself. It reached the point where I couldn't handle the duplicity, or live up to my own moral standards. I broke up with Norm, which hurt him deeply and emotionally devastated me, adding mountains of guilt to my other problems. Finally, I determined that the only way out of the labyrinth was to pick up the pieces of me and get as far away from the situation as I could.

Of course I soon learned, after having done so, the very simple fact that no matter where you go, there you are. And if the problems are within yourself, there's no way to get away from them.

So I spent several years with rolls of Scotch tape and Elmer's Glue putting the pieces of me back together, stumbling through various relationships, always hoping that the next one would be Mr. Right. He never was.

The death of my mother in September of 1970 (1970?? Was there ever such a year as 1970?) was, as I'm sure you can appreciate, one of the worst times of my life. It was as if I had mentally stepped on a land mine. I quit my job, bought a  21-foot Winnebago motor home, and took off in a futile attempt to run away from reality. I was coincidentally in a disastrous relationship at the same time as she was dying, but her illness prevented me from having the time to deal with it. So my buying the Winnebago and taking off was undoubtedly also partly to distance myself from the relationship as well. And, of course, it didn't work.

Thinking on the subject now I suppose there was a third running away, though of a different sort. With the Grim Reaper striding through the gay community in Los Angeles, cutting down friends and acquaintances with a terrifying relentlessness, I began to realize that I could well be next. I was still in a several-year on-again, off-again relationship with Ray—thanks to his alcoholism— but in the off-again periods I'd be out there in the bars. It occurred to me that to run from Los Angeles might be a good idea. If I could take Ray somewhere far, far away from the bar scene, perhaps he could stop drinking. And since I would have no need to look for...well, you know...elsewhere, we might actually find the kind of life I wanted so badly for the both of us.

I think you know me well enough by now to see this as yet another classic example of my refusal to acknowledge the existence of reality. But I sold my home in L.A., moved to Pence, Wisconsin—which could have a mileage marker just outside of town saying "Pence, 2 miles. End of the Earth, 1 mile”—and the rest you can fairly well guess. I brought Ray with me to Pence and we came, when he was sober, as close to the idyllic life as I had hoped for. But he could never stay sober for more than three months, and got in trouble with the law. A judge gave him the choice of returning to L.A. or going to jail. He reluctantly chose to return to L.A. where, within two years, he was dead of AIDS.

Life is not fair. Where we get the idea that it should be is a mystery. Life simply is, and we deal with it the best we can. One thing we cannot do is run from it.

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

"It was the best of times,..."

I’ve always taken little-boy delight in sharing things which give me great pleasure, in the hopeful if perhaps incorrect expectation that others will enjoy them, too.

But I note that as I grow older, it’s more and more difficult to directly share things and memories, simply because they are further and further removed from the world of the present, and more and more people are too young to be aware of them.

Yesterday, I was thinking of Jacques Brel and his music, and the delight I take from it. Brel was born in 1929 and died in 1978 of lung cancer from a lifetime of smoking. He was a strikingly handsome man, and his music ran from delightfully frivolous (“Madelaine”) to intense and disturbing (“Carousel”), but the messages in them were always powerful. For those who aren’t familiar with him, there are several clips on YouTube; but for perhaps one of the best overviews, I’d strongly recommend the recording Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris. It’s worth the investment. (A clip from the stage version of one of my favorite of his songs, can be seen at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdSXpC8fbNA)

And from Jacques Brel, my mind moved on to thinking of how much of the world of my past—all the marvelously talented entertainers who were part of it—have all but gone from the public conscience: I started to make a list but had to stop because of the sheer number of them.

Let’s just take one small example: while I don’t think it’s quite true that a love of Broadway musicals is a requirement for being gay, I almost ache to remember the marvelous shows and performers I’ve been privileged to see, from Rosalind Russell in Wonderful Town, Ethel Merman in Gypsy, to Philip Anglim in The Elephant Man; Eartha Kitt, Paul Lynde, Carol Lawrence and so many others who went on to become stars on their own, in New Faces of 1952; the delightful Boy Meets Boy, the first gay musical I ever saw (and saw four or five times); again, far too many to enumerate.

The experiences of having lived through the greatest war in the history of the planet, WWII, are totally lost on those who were not yet born at the time. Kate Smith and the songs of the war; president Franklin D. Roosevelt; the day to day experiences of the war itself…war bonds and ration stamps and the pervasive and frightening uncertainty of how it would all end…all now just grainy film footage and words in a textbook.

Radio programs from before the war until the advent of television, required a vital element not needed when watching TV…imagination. So much a part of an entire nation’s common and shared experience while sitting at home listening to the radio—soap operas, Jack Benny, Fibber McGee and Molly, Bob Hope, Fred Allen, Inner Sanctum, The Shadow, Jack Armstrong—are not only gone forever but almost impossible for those under 70 to fully comprehend.

Big band music—Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey; the war songs like “When the Lights Go On Again,” “Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree,” “Coming in on a Wing and a Prayer” and on and on and on—has all but vanished from today’s national memory

The patriotic music which bound us all together, to which we could not listen without a sense of pride in being Americans—“This is My Country,” “America the Beautiful,” “This Land is My Land—have all but been stilled by our startling plunge into national dysfunction and political bickering and mean-spiritedness.

I am of course fully aware that the things I remember and wish I could share with you were from an imperfect time. We tend, when looking back, to focus on the good, the things that pleased us, the things in which we could take pride, and we shove many of the very real and deeply serious problems—racism and homophobia among them—to one side, like shoving things under the bed when company comes over.

But that should and does not detract from the happiness and pleasure of those things we choose to remember fondly.

I truly wish it were possible for you and I to go back to share (and for me, to relive) these moments and experiences which meant so very much to me and made me whoever it is that I am.

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

A Conversation with My Muse

You rang?

Yes! I just realized I've got to do a blog for tomorrow.

Relax. No hurry. You've got all day.

Oh, yeah. We know how that goes. I get up at 6 a.m., have a cup of coffee, pet the cat, and the next thing I know the late-night local news is on. And I still haven't done a blog.

So, write one.

That's why I called. You're my muse. What should I write about?

Whatever you've been writing blogs about for the last…what?…six years, now?

Yeah, well that's sort of the problem. I’ve written about just about everything already. I'm getting mind-freeze. I need a new one, but I can't figure out a subject to write one on.

You mean you "can't figure out on what subject to write."

Oh, great! You who couldn't pick a transitive verb out of a pile of predicate nominatives are giving me English lessons?

Could YOU pick a transitive verb out of a pile of predicate nominatives?

No, but that's not the point. Read my lips: I need to write a blog for tomorrow.

Childhood memories?

Done that. Lots.

How about jobs you've held?

Ditto.

Pets? Family? Friends? Past loves? What you had for breakfast?

Been there. Done that.

How about a nice, projectile-vomiting rant against something that ticks you off? You never seem to run out of ideas for those.

True, but I do way too many of those as it is.

Kittens? Puppies? Bunny rabbits?

Uh, not today. I'm in a hurry.

How about a blog on why you never hear about male muses? It’s sexism, pure and simple!

Good point, but would probably require more research than I’ve time for right now.

Okay, how about this conversation?

Nah. The reader'd never buy it. I'll just have to keep on thinking.

Okay. While you're doing that, I'll go have a beer.

Gee, yeah, you do that. Sorry to have bothered you!

Hey, no problem. I do what I can.

*****

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

Mr. In-Between

You're probably much too young to remember one of the top songs from 1944, Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer's "Accentuate the Positive," but my mind's radio was playing it when I woke up this morning. (You've got to Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate-the Pos-i-tive, E-lim-I-nate the neg-a-tive; Latch on to the affirm-a-tive—don’t mess with Mr. In-Between.)

Like dreams, which are the mind's way of dealing with things that went on the previous day, I suspect my mental radio chose this particular song in response to a comment a friend made the other day. He said that a mutual friend had largely stopped reading my blogs because they tended to be pretty much negative, and I had to admit he had a point.

Why do I bitch and moan and complain and grumble so much here? I mean, I honestly consider myself to be a pretty positive guy. I like puppies and kittens and small children. (Aha! And the moment I wrote that sentence, I heard my mind add "until the bigots and hate mongers get to them." Maybe I am a little too negative.)

I know it's probably difficult for other people to understand—and obviously difficult for me to convey—how I can let negativity carry me away as often as it does. I wish it were easier for me to explain why: that it is simply because I believe so strongly in good and positive things that those things which are not good and positive...those things that are not as I so want them to be...bother me far more than they should. I simply cannot comprehend how easy it seems to be for so many people to totally ignore common courtesy, or respect for the rights and beliefs of others; how they can blithely deny others all the things which they expect or demand for themselves. And that frustrates and angers me.

It is  one of the wonders of our species that we are able to conceive, mentally, what we are incapable of executing physically. I'm not talking just about physical science here--we can conceive the idea of levitation without being able to achieve it, for example--but also about ideals. I have just talked about respecting the rights of others to believe what they choose to believe, and I firmly believe it. But that doesn't mean I don't hold people like Ted Cruz, Sarah Palin, Mitch McConnell, Michele Bachmann, and the legions of other garbage-spewers and hate mongers in utter and total contempt. Yeah, they've got a right to be unmitigated assholes, but that doesn't mean I have to like it. And I don't.

There is a great difference between saying, "Here's what I believe and why I believe it, and I hope you might consider it, too," and "Here's what I believe, and you'd damned well better believe it, too, or I'll do my best to make your life a living hell." One of the reasons I most vehemently object to people like Messrs. Cruz and McConnell, Ms. Palin, and their totally negative ilk is their total refusal to even consider the possibility of compromise, to acknowledge that views other than their own might conceivably have some merit.

I truly, deeply, and sincerely believe that if everyone saw things the way I see them, the world would be a much better place. But it amazes me...who chooses to largely ignore those aspects of reality I do not like...to realize that the negativists and naysayers are even more dismissive of reality than I. I'd love for you to think the way I do, and for you to seriously consider my suggestions, but I do not demand it as the “No to Everything!” crowd do, and I do not assume the right to tell you what to do or believe. They do. 

So I find myself painted into yet another corner between what I want to be and what is. While I so desperately would like to always "Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate-the Pos-i-tive,”  and "E-lim-I-nate the neg-a-tive;”  and while I truly do try to  "Latch on to the affirmative," I'm afraid the reality is that we're pretty much stuck with Mr. In-Between.  

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

On Memories

The further one is from the source of a memory, the more likely time is to alter and rearrange things, rather like a well-meaning mental housekeeper who thinks the couch would look better over there. Most people never even realize that what they’re sure happened at a certain time in a certain place in fact did not. But because I have so much of my life laid out in the form of letters and other non-fiction writing over the years, I often running across incontrovertible evidence that what I was sure I remember clearly simply either didn’t happen that way, or didn’t happen at all. This is not pleasant, and it most certainly is not reassuring.

One of my strong memories from my Navy days was of being in Genoa, Italy, on the day that the Italian liner, Andrea Doria, set sail on her final voyage in July of 1956. I clearly remember looking up as our liberty boat passed under her stern, and wondering...rather precentially how anything so huge could possibly ever sink. (Surely, I thought, the bottom of the ship would hit the bottom of the ocean before the water ever reached the superstructure.)  It was a story I told many times and believed with all my heart and soul.

But on re-reading the letters I wrote my folks from our several times in Genoa, I find no mention of the fact and, on checking to see when the Andria Doria last left Genoa, found the ship I myself was on, the aircraft carrier USS Ticonderoga, had been nowhere near Genoa at the time.  On reflection, the liner may have been the American liner, Constitution, which I do mention in a letter. Odd how the mind works.

Memory’s malleability can also be seen in the fact that, depending on the emotional makeup of the individual, our recollections of past events are tend to either enhance the pleasant memories or intensify the bad. I now look back on my days in the Navy with far more fondness than my letters…and a closer  look at reality…warrant. But I suspect that is simply because we are too busy living in the present to see its true impact on our lives with the perspective time provides.

How many times have we heard the caveat to live (and appreciate) every day as if it were our last? And how often, on hearing it, do we realize the validity of the advice only to have in almost instantly buried by the minute-by-minute demands of our lives. And though we may fully agree on the value and importance of letting those people in our lives know how we feel about them, we do not do so out of fear of seeming “odd.” 

We seldom think, in the “now”, of how much we might some day want to remember how the events of our lives truly unfolded. Diaries and journals are the surest way of making sure that future memories will be accurate, but few of us keep them.  In lieu of those, I have a few suggestions: take more photographs, even of things which do not seem at all important to us now. And with every photograph be sure to write down as much information about it as you can: date, location, the people shown. Of course we know all about them as the photo is taken, but again, the years will blur the details.  

As with good wine, and anything at all collectible, memories age and mellow with the passage of time, and become more ever more precious as we reach the point in life where so many of the people who form the foundations of our lives are no longer there, and all we have of them are memories. Always remember that today is tomorrow’s memory, and do whatever you can to preserve as much of it as you can.

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

America's Voice

One of the regrettable and inevitable things about aging is that the older we get, the more things which were familiar to us from our youth fade and are lost to generations which come after. I was reminded of that recently when I came across a 1938 film clip of Kate Smith introducing “God Bless America.” Those not alive at the time have absolutely no idea of what a frightening and uncertain time it was. We teetered on the brink of a cataclysm unequalled in human history, and while we realized it was coming, we had no idea of what would happen, how or when it would end—or that it would claim 48,231,700 lives worldwide, including 400,000 Americans.

The First World War had ended only twenty years earlier. Anti-war sentiment was strong in the United States, but when war broke out in Europe in 1938 with the invasion of Poland, we found ourselves being inexorably drawn into the conflict. We began to gear up for war first by supplying Britain the things it needed to ward off a Nazi invasion.

We were almost desperate for some sort of comfort, of reassurance that things would be all right. And then Irving Berlin revised a song he had written in 1918 to be part of a musical called "Yip Yip Yaphank," but was cut from the show. He offered it to popular singer Kate Smith, who introduced it on her radio show. It was called “God Bless America,” and it had far more to do with patriotism than it did religion. (If you haven’t already seen it, there is a film clip of her introducing the song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rEJo7x9y3D4)

It became an instant hit and, after the attack on Pearl Harbor…which shocked the nation in a way that would have no equivalent on the American public until 9-11…became something of an unofficial national anthem.

I remember listening to news of the attack on Pearl Harbor on the radio, and President Roosevelt’s declaration of war on December 8. I remember my Aunt Thyra and Uncle Buck’s concern for their three sons, all draft age, and all of whom subsequently went off to war. My dad did not have to go because he was nearing 30, was married, and worked in a war factory.

WWII galvanized the entire nation in a way, again, almost impossible to imagine in today’s world of political pettiness, mean-spiritedness, bickering, and division. It was a far simpler world, where good and bad, right and wrong seemed much easier to tell apart. We were all in it together.

I remember war bonds and ration books for food and gasoline, scrap metal drives and even drives to collect used cooking oil and grease. I remember Victory Gardens which everyone was encouraged to grow to supplement food shortages. Sugar and candy bars were almost unheard of, everything going to supply the troops.

I remember the small, gold edged banners which were placed in the windows of people who had family in service. In the center of each banner was a star…blue for those serving and gold for those killed in action.

I remember blackouts and air-raid drills, though I lived in the middle of the country, far beyond the reach of enemy bombers. But it was the not knowing that kept everyone extra, undoubtedly overly, alert.

America was a male, white, Christian nation. Blacks and other minorities were all but invisible, existing on the far outer perimeters of the white world. For the most part, all the white majority knew about blacks were the stereotypes seen—usually as comedy relief—in the occasional movie. The hugely popular Amos and Andy radio show, supposedly about Negroes, featured white actors playing the black parts. The only black actors I can recall on radio were Hattie McDaniel (the first black woman ever to win an academy award, for Gone With the Wind), who played Beulah, Fibber McGee and Mollie’s maid, and Jack Benny’s sidekick/servant Rochester. In the movies, blacks were largely used as comic relief, epitomized by Stepin Fetchit—whose very name exuded racism. There were a few anomalies where blacks were given token credit for their talent, such as Bojangles Robinson, who danced with Shirley Temple in a number of movies, and singer Lena Horne.

If blacks were seldom seen as anything but stereotypes, gays were even less visible and never, ever shown as anything but objects of derision.

But that was then, and now is now, and time has a way of blunting the sharp edges of the past. It is not our divisions we remember, but the power of patriotism and unity embodied in one woman and one song: Kate Smith’s unforgettable voice singing “God Bless America.”

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

"One Ringy-Dingy"

I've never been much of a phone talker since my teenage years—I don't do all that much talking off the phone, either, but that's another story. So when I moved back to Chicago in 2006, I decided not to have a land-line phone at all, and instead bought a cell phone for which I could simply buy blocks of minutes rather than signing up with some service and incurring a monthly fee. It's worked out very well. I would buy a block of 500 minutes for $50 and it would last me up to four months. 

But when my friend Norm died in 2010 and I became executor of his estate, I began using my phone more to deal with things related to settling his affairs, and I began buying blocks of 1,000 minutes for $100. When my minutes are running low, I get a recorded message advising me that: "Your minutes are about to expire. Please renew now for continued service." It then advises me that I can purchase more minutes with my credit card by simply punching in *233 on the phone.

So when I heard the message last week, I punched *233 and went through the usual "For so-and-so, press such-and-such, for thus-and-so, press this-and-that; for.…", and finally, "Enter your 437-digit phone number, birth date, mother's maiden name, name of your first pet, etc." routine, and just as I entered the last digit, the call was cut off. Assuming my order had not gone through, I went through the entire routine again.

An hour or so later, I made a call and, as I waited for the phone to ring on the other end, got the "Your minutes are about to expire. Please renew now for continued service." That hadn't happened before, but I figured there was just some delay in the processing.

And when I got the message yet again after another call that evening, I went on-line to see if my debit card reflected the transaction. The total charge, with tax, was $109.75 and sure enough, there it was, right at the top. And directly under that was another identical charge for $109.75, which meant I had purchased not 1,000 minutes but 2,000 minutes of phone time. That's 33.3333333 hours! That would last me at least until June of 2046.

So I decided I'd better try to get hold of someone at T-Mobile, from whom I buy my minutes. But

when I tried calling T-Mobile to find out what was going on, my phone was dead. Using my friend Gary's phone, I finally got through to a pleasant young lady who introduced herself as “Sally”—apparently a common name for women in Pakistan, which her accent indicated. At any rate, as I was trying to explain my problem—that I wanted first of all to start using the phone minutes I'd paid for and that I wanted to remove one of the $109.75 charges—she informed me several times that she could not understand me. I apologized and said I had a slight speech impediment. She couldn't understand that, either.

But finally, she checked my records and informed me that my last purchase had been four months ago. When I asked why, then, my bank showed not one but two transactions two days before, she transferred me to another department which, after going through the entire story once again, transferred me to another department. A nice young man who introduced himself as "Ted," and who I suspect may possibly have been an American, said he would look into it and call me back at the number he had on his records. .... Uh, excuse me? I pointed out that since my phone was not working, I doubted that he could call me back on it. "Oh."

Finally, in order to get my phone working again until all this was straightened out, I gave him my credit card information so he could bill me yet another $109.75, and reinstate my phone service immediately. As to the two previous $109.75 already on my bank statement...well, what's money? I haven't heard back from Ted yet, but I'm blocking out six hours of time to be spent trying to iron it out with my bank.

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

Thomas

I’ve taken, of late, to closing my cat Spirit in the bathroom at night with food, litter, water, a couple of places to sleep—he seems to like the sink—and a toy; all to prevent his sitting outside my bedroom door at anywhere from 5 a.m. on to sing me the song of his people at full volume. Fortunately, he doesn’t seem to mind his bathroom exile, since I lure him in with cat treats. 

The second night I did it, listening closely for the click of the latch as I closed the door, he somehow managed to open it, thus freeing him to resume his serenade. Thenceforth, I have closed the door, listened for the click of the latch, and placed a canister of cat litter against it to dissuade him from being able to force the door open even if he can unlatch it. The problem there was that as I refilled his litter box, the canister of litter grew lighter and lighter until this morning he was outside my bedroom door at 5:25 with a medley of his favorite wails. 

This afternoon, I bought two canisters, one of which will always be full and of sufficient weight, I hope, to keep him in.

And as I pondered our battle, I couldn’t help but think of Thomas, who will always hold a special place in my heart. Like Spirit, Thomas was jet black—thus establishing my ever-since preference for black cats—and, I’ve always thought, proof that both people and animals have guardian angels.

How Thomas and I met is one of my favorite stories. I was living in Los Angeles, at the time. Near my home there was a huge swap meet held every weekend, and I went regularly just to wander around and occasionally pick up things I really didn’t need. One Sunday I had just entered the swap meet grounds when I saw a tiny black kitten, obviously lost and/or abandoned. I was afraid someone was going to accidentally step on him, so I picked him up and took him to the swap meet office to see if anyone had reported losing a kitten. The man laughed and said, “People drop off animals here all the time” and went back to whatever he’d been doing before I interrupted him.

At the time, I had two large dogs and certainly didn’t want to add a cat to the mix. So I just wandered around and if anyone noticed the kitten, I’d ask if they’d like to have him. No one did, until one woman said, “I’d love to have him! I’ll give him a wonderful home!” I gratefully handed the kitten over to her with thanks, and went about my business.

An hour or so later, as I returned to my car in the middle of the gigantic parking lot, I was just about to open my door when I heard a “Meow.” I looked down, and there was the same kitten I’d given away an hour earlier. I decided that someone was telling me something. I picked him up, put him in the passenger’s seat, and went home. 

I named him Thomas, and he was with me for 14 years, moving with me from Los Angeles to Pence, Wisconsin. Given the fact that time does tend to blur the bad times in favor of the good, Thomas was truly a wonderful cat and companion.

And then, as is inevitable with cats and people and all living things, Thomas grew old. He would spend the night in my basement and come up to greet me in the morning, until one morning, he didn’t. I went down to the basement and found him lying on the floor, still alive, but I knew his time had come. I picked him up, carried him up to the living room and sat down, cradling him in my lap, petting him, until he was gone. I don’t remember if I cried or not…I probably did. But to have been there with him, to hold him and let him know he was loved even in his last moments, is something that I will never regret.

Spirit’s time will come, as will mine, and I wish us both the knowledge, at the moment of passing, that our lives meant something to others, and that we were loved.

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

On Meeting Myself

I know, I know...it’s always “me”, isn’t it? … Well, yes, I guess it is, but you are very kind in indulging me.

At dinner the other night with friends, while trying with great effort and limited success to force my head up high enough to make eye contact with the incredibly attractive waiter taking our order, I suddenly flashed on what might happen were I to be able to sit down with myself at the age of 21, and I pondered the scenario with no little bemusement and considerably mixed feelings. 

There’s little doubt that the meeting would be traumatic for both of us: the then-me would be shocked and horrified to see what he would become, the now-me overcome with longing to be the then-me again. The now-me, I am sure, would be somewhat angry and frustrated with the then-me for being so unaware of his incredible good fortune. Physically, I’m not sure he’d even recognize me, just as I do not recognize myself when I accidentally spot myself in a reflective surface.

What, the then-me would wonder with an understandable sadness and sense of horror, could have happened to turn his smooth-skinned youth into the Portrait of Dorian Gray?  Of course, he wouldn't have a clue about the cancer and radiation and chemotherapy that were still many years in his future, and being young, had given very little thought to the simple fact that there is no way to avoid the inevitable natural physical consequences of the accumulation of years. I doubt that any of us would be fully prepared to encounter our even-10-years-in-the-future selves.

What might we possibly say to one another? The now-me would be much more understanding and considerably less altruistic than the then-me, of course, having at least partially learned a great many life-lessons in the intervening years which divide us us. I know the then-me would not be happy with everything I’ve done, and disappointed that I hadn’t done more. I'm sure he would find me a little too hardened, a little too bitter, and not very much fun.

I know he would want to know everything, and the dilemma, as in all issues dealing with time travel, would be that I couldn't really tell him, since it is impossible to know the future without changing it, and despite the automatic assumption that the changes would be positive, the fact is that they could just as easily not be. Now-me would realize that while I know then-me will live to be as old as I am (following me on this?), there is no guarantee that this would be true were I to tell him anything that might change his future. 

How could I warn him against the many specific dangers and traumas and sadness that lay ahead? Were I to tell him of specific events, it could spare him incalculable pain, but at what cost, if it would only put him in the path of different but perhaps worse pain? 

I think I'd prefer to just reassure him that many good things lay ahead and not mention the bad; to appreciate everything he has while he has it. I could tell him, without mentioning specifics, of the happy experiences he will have, the wonderful people who will enter his life, the love and joy he will share, the friends he will meet, the books he will write. I would hope our meeting might help make him a little more positive and hopeful of the journey between then and now. 

Basically, I would want for then-me is what I want for now-me, and for you: if not complete happiness, then contentment.

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

Frustration

Probably the single most powerful…and prevalent…emotion in my life is frustration. For me, it is a hair-trigger, automatic reaction to anything which, in my estimation, does not go exactly as I think it should go. For me, it is a bottomless chasm of fury and despair, and there is no slope leading to it. It is either precipice or pit.

The other day I bought a jar of olive oil, and last night wanted to use it. It is a screw-off cap, and there was no plastic cover over it which needed removal before opening. On the top of the cap there are two arrows indicating the direction in which the cap should be twisted in order to open. I twisted in the direction indicated. And twisted. And twisted. Nothing. I tried pressing down on the cap and twisting. Nothing. I tried pulling up on the cap and twisting. Nothing. The cap turned and turned and turned, but it would not open. How the hell could it NOT open? Am I so incredibly stupid and incompetent that I cannot remove the cap from a simple bottle of olive oil? Obviously, I am and I instantly found myself plummeting into the truly frightening abyss of fury and hellfire intensity of self loathing.

At times like this, I quite simply and sincerely do not know what to do. I want to scream. I want to cry lava tears, to find some way to vent my fury and frustration, but there is no way. I feel as though I will explode with rage. I know this kind of reaction is both counterproductive and unhealthy, but it happens time after time after time. I despise myself for my stupidity, for my incompetence in doing even the simplest of tasks.

I will get up from my desk to go into the kitchen and somewhere between the two put my glasses down. When I return to the desk, I look for my glasses. They are not there. I retrace my steps from desk to kitchen counter. They are not there. They are not anywhere. How the hell could I manage to lose something in the space of 20 feet? No matter. I do it. Eventually they show up…in my shirt pocket, for example. I didn’t put them in my shirt pocket. I…oh, the hell with it!

I cannot remember from one moment to the next how to do some simple chore on the computer, though I’ve done it hundreds of times before. I do exactly the same thing I’ve always done, and this time it does not work. I cannot read, let alone follow, directions or printed instructions without plunging into the pit when, trying to follow the most elemental of instructions on how to attach Part A to Part B, it will not attach, and absolutely nothing I can do can make it attach.

My cat will walk over my 358-button television remote while I’m watching TV and suddenly the set goes blank. I have absolutely no idea how to get the picture back, or what button/combination of buttons the cat stepped on, and I spend half an hour madly pushing 358 buttons in sequence and in every imaginable combination. No picture. The more buttons I press, the more furious I become, and the more strongly I loathe myself for my inability to solve the problem. Inevitably, I call my friend Gary, who lives in the building next door, and he will drop whatever he is doing to come over. He picks up the remote, taps one button….one button…exactly the same button I myself had pressed 96 times before…and the picture returns. “I did that,” I will say, to which he calmly replies “No, you didn’t. If you did, it would have worked.” How can I possibly respond to that?

The purpose of this blog, if it has a purpose, is to let you know that no matter how inept or incompetent you may feel yourself to be from time to time, I will see you and raise you. And I will win.

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).

The Broken Compass

As so often happens when I set off to write a blog, I'll head off in one direction and not only end up nowhere near where I intended to go when I started, and have no idea how I got where I did end up. I seem to have a magic ability to unconsciously segue from one topic to another, and generally don't even realize that my mental compass is broken until I go back to read what I've written. What follows—the blog I'd planned for today—-is a perfect case in point. I realized I had the choice of just chucking the whole thing and starting all over again, or present it exactly as written as an example of how easily I wander off course.

Yesterday, I had occasion to take down my mother’s picture from the wall, and noted that the brown paper backing was in pretty bad shape, so I tore it off and tossed it in the garbage. And just a few minutes ago, when I was putting something else in the garbage can, seeing the torn backing, I realized with a shock that I was sentencing to destruction something that had coexisted with me—granted, all but unnoticed—for 58 years! I had that picture of my mom painted in Naples, Italy, while I was in the Navy. I'd asked her to have a picture taken and send me a copy, and I gave that to a local artist, who did the picture. It was he who had put that brown paper backing on, all those many years ago, and now I was casually dismissing it. I felt guilty, and sad, and experienced that now familiar sadness of another ending so difficult to explain to anyone who has not experienced it themselves.

For the world is passing strange, and all are mad, save thee and me. That I am constantly throwing out these unrelated little thoughts and reminiscences and then wandering off in another direction before I've adequately dealt with them might indicate that the problem may lie not so much in my compass's being broken as in my tendency not to consult it during the journey.  But if I were to stop every few steps and ask myself what these ramblings have to do with anything, I probably would stop writing blogs altogether. I am continually saved from the brink of this decision by getting notes from readers saying they, too, have had experiences and thoughts and feelings similar to my own, and had always felt they were the only one to have them. It appears that life, as my blogs, is made up of tiny things no one else—for reasons I do not understand—seems ever to mention. 

Life is so infinitely complex that we all struggle just to keep up with daily existence—work and family and paying bills and making practical plans for practical things. There seems precious little time for acknowledging the little things; the thoughts and feelings, and sensations that dance around us like the tiny bit of dust in a sunbeam. And in fact, there are many who seem never have time to consider them at all.

We speak and communicate largely in terms of those things widely acknowledged to be shared by most of humanity. But within ourselves we in fact live in a universe of the unspoken—the little things we assume to be unique to ourselves. And the less others speak of them, the more we assume we are alone in feeling/experiencing them. This adds to a sense of alienation, of being outside the norm, I suspect most of us in fact share. 

Conversely, we also seldom consciously acknowledge the little, off-the-radar things which please and delight us, though interestingly I suspect we don't speak of them simply because we automatically assume that what pleases and amuses us pleases and amuses everyone else.

A few minutes ago, for example, I looked out my window to see a garbage truck in the alley with a  decal saying: "Drugs are garbage. Just refuse." I had never in my life made the connection between the word "refuse," as in "reject," and "refuse," as in garbage. Yet they are exactly the same word, with the same root meaning, but with two totally different pronunciations. And while I realize there are any number of similarly-linked though differently-pronounced words in English, I cannot think of a single one now...a clear case of the "tip of my tongue" phenomenon and the perverse nature of my mind in refusing to give me what I’m looking for. I can sense them clearly, dancing just out of the reach of my conscious mind, teasing me. I am quite certain that the instant this blog is posted, they'll all come running happily toward me, arms outstretched like long-lost relatives. 

Now, if you were somehow able to follow all that without a compass, you're a better man than I am, Gunga Din.

Sigh.

Dorien's blogs are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday and Thursday. Please take a moment to visit his website (http://www.doriengrey.com) and, if you enjoy these blogs, you might want to check out Short Circuits: a Life in Blogs (http://bit.ly/m8CSO1), which is also available as an audiobook (http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B00DJAJYCS&qid=1372629062&sr=1-1).