Dorien Grey and Me

Thursday, August 29, 2013

Simplism

Sim•plism: noun, rare; the oversimplification of an issue.

In my endless search to try to figure out who I am, what I'm doing here, and what I'm supposed to accomplish in life, I have determined that one of the major roadblocks in my search is the fact that I operate and have always operated on the principle of simplism. Life should be simple—one, two, three, four; a, b, c, d. If I assume/expect something to be logical and easy, it should be logical and easy. If I put my keys down somewhere, I shouldn't have to remember where I put them because I knew where I put them when I put them there, so I should be able to just pick them up again when I need them. It never, ever occurs to me when I set them down that I almost definitely will not remember where I put them—because such a thought is incomprehensible at the moment I put them down. Thinking about things that should not require thinking about is complicated. I do not like complicated—and “complicated” most definitely does not like me.

To me, logic and simplism are synonymous. My beliefs, attitudes, and opinions are based entirely on them. How can one refute logic? (And having so said, I do realize that the flaw in that argument lies in the fact that what is logical to me is often not logical to others, and vice-versa.)

I honestly cannot comprehend why things that should be simple are not. I've often said that I sincerely believe my emotional development stalled somewhere in early childhood. My insistence on thinking, acting, and reacting simplistically is undoubtedly a result, and it has been and continues to be the bane of my existence.

Simplicity. How can anything be simpler than the precept of “Do unto others as you would have done unto you” as an elemental a guide to human behavior? So why, then, don't people treat each other the way they themselves want to be treated? I honesty and sincerely to the depth of my soul cannot comprehend why they don't, can't, or won't.

Politics? Religion? Diversity in individual beliefs is understandable, since all humans are different. But bigotry? Baseless hatred? How can supposedly and otherwise intelligent human beings form and hold to such irrationality, such total lack of the most elementary logic?

I have always suffered from low self esteem and an underlying sense of inferiority, and I think this, too, can be traced to my insistence on adhering to the principle of simplism. Comparing ourselves to others is a universal human trait...it's the compass we use to determine where we stand among others. I constantly look at others and, for the most part, am awed by the relative simplicity of their lives, and how smoothly they move through them. Other people are graceful, at ease among others in social situations, blend in well in any gathering, cheer at concerts, dance, and clearly express their enthusiasms. I am/can do none of these things. By comparison I, in my simplism view, am clumsy and awkward and inept, which only fuels my feelings of inadequacy and self loathing.

Oddly, though I fully realize that the world is not all black and white, the most simplistic colors, I do believe strongly in the concepts of right and wrong, and I don't judge others on where they stand on the spectrum between. I can and do speak only for myself and the core of my own being.

I've come to the conclusion, on looking over what I've just written, that simplism is a complex subject replete with unanswered and unanswerable questions. But it is to the credit of human beings that we never hesitate to ask those questions.

Now, where did I put my keys?

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).

Monday, August 26, 2013

"Oink"

I always got a kick out of the old saying that when it came to butchering pigs, they use “everything but the 'oink'.” I can relate...I do the same thing with my life. I find it difficult to get rid of anything, especially words, that I may either use in the future or to which I relate on some personal level.

I have 40,474 undeleted messages in my “in” box, 32,712 in my “sent” box, and 111 “drafts”—though in my defense I should point out that I use my “drafts” box for writing notes to myself on things I don't want to forget. Were the entire contents of my computer to be converted to paper and stacked in boxes, I undoubtedly would have Health and Human Services pounding on my door, which they would be unable to open for the stacks of boxes.

I know I should go through my mail, at least, and delete all or most of it, and every now and then I'll start out to do so. But I simply can't do it. First, I have to look at each one before hitting the “delete” lest I delete something important. I'll delete five or ten and then find something I want or feel I really need to keep, or something with an address or an idea, or a fact I don't want to lose track of, and I bog down. I may actually eliminate 50 or more posts before I give up, only to have those 50 replaced by 50 more within a day.

I have duplicates of far too many files, and the same files in different formats, and who-knows-how-many files I've put in the wrong place and can't find.

There seems to be little or no time available to delete things while accumulating them, so they just...accumulate.

Which brings us to blogs. In addition to the 864 blogs I've published, there are 75 others I've begun and never finished. I'll start out with an idea, get a sentence or two, or a paragraph or two, into it and then lose either steam or ideas, or both. I frequently do go back to them when I don't have a ready idea for my next blog, and I do often find something that sparks me to pick up where I left off. However, many are dated in one way or another, or address issues not really still relevant. I carefully date (to give me an idea of how old they are) and title (I do think I'm very good with titles, and hate to lose one) each one.

Here's one I just picked at random from the top of the stack—note the date. I'd like to think I am cleaning house by getting rid of it after going-on-four years, though I know full well I am in fact only moving it from one place to another:

01-01-10 New Years, Similes, and Metaphors

And here we are, standing at the threshold of yet another brand new year, looking out over the vast sea of the future teeming with schools of shimmering similes and pods of ponderous metaphors. Similes and metaphors are abundant at any time, but at the beginning of a new year...and a new decade...they seem to multiply, like 7-year cicadas.

Thresholds are a popular basis for similes, since they represent the crossing from what is behind into what lies ahead. Our lives are made up of an endless (well, at least until we end) succession of thresholds. We cross a new one each morning when we awake, blinded by the bright light of the future which does not allow us to see what lies beyond the door.

Hmmm. Now that one has promise. I'll have to take out the reference to the new year or wait until a new year actually arrives, but....

“Oink.”

Thursday, August 22, 2013

Walls

The wall was one of Man's earliest, most useful, and most versatile inventions. Walls of branches and twigs and later solid wood enabled him to construct shelters against wind, rain, and cold, and thus were homes created. He soon learned walls of stone could be an effective way of keeping enemies at bay, and used them to construct fortresses and castles and to surround his towns. Clever species that he was (and is), it didn't take him long to realize that what kept people out could also keep them in, and dungeons and prisons were born.

So, walls are essential to and an integral part of our society and civilization. But walls can be constructed of things other than stone and brick and wood. We humans use our thoughts and fears to construct non-tangible walls within our minds and hearts which can be as formidable as any stone.

Our inner walls are built, for our own reasons, primarily to protect us from something, or to safeguard memories. But frequently, as with walls of stone, once having built an inner wall, we find it difficult or almost impossible to tear it down. Habits are walls forming narrow corridors. Some are relatively low and easy to step over, but others become so high they become like mazes from which it is impossible to escape.

Robert Frost said “Something there is that doesn't love a wall,” and when it comes to the walls created by our minds, he speaks the absolute truth, and far too many of them are counterproductive and stunting.

We each build our own walls for our own purposes—almost always defensive—and while I cannot speak for anyone's but my own, I've built far more than I really need, and many I wish now I had never built, or could tear down. But once built they are, for better or worse, part of us and we seem unwilling or unable to dismantle them. So many of my own walls I built for my own perceived self-protection. I built one to protect me from personal rejection, only to find that it also kept me from reaching out when I really wanted to. My self-built walls have constrained me so that I long ago became incapable of expressing myself as I would so very much like to do in social situations. I do not dance. I cannot allow myself to verbally shout or whistle or wave my arms to show enthusiasm while all around me are doing so. I clap loudly, but my body has fused with my wall.

When I was younger, I built innumerable walls to protect myself from a variety of real and perceived hurts, one of the largest being to avoid being hurt by those with whom I wanted a romantic relationship. That particular wall is now largely moot, like a Roman aqueduct, since I have been aged out of any possibility for the kind of personal relationship I, the eternal optimist and dreamer, still long for.

Some inner walls are rather like coral reefs in that they just grow by themselves. Personal attitudes and preferences too easily solidify into prejudices and intolerance of those whose attitudes and preferences do not match our own. As this type of wall grows higher, we reach the point of being incapable of seeing over or around it.

People build walls to hide behind. For far too many years, gays and lesbians not only locked themselves in the closet but then walled up the door from the inside. These walls are finally—if still not easily—broken through, and the closet doors thrown open.

Walls serve a wide variety of purposes for each of us. But we need more doors.

Monday, August 19, 2013

Old Bones

Like a dog with an old bone, some people...I being one of them...seem to become fixated on certain things, carrying that fixation with them wherever they go and refusing to let go of it. My fixation, as you surely know if you've read my blogs with any regularity, is on the passage of time and the unavoidable inevitability of aging.

There is nothing more futile, frustrating, counterproductive, or ungrateful than railing against aging, especially since growing old is a privilege denied to so many. But I can't help it: I am so utterly fascinated, intrigued by, and desperately in love with life that I cannot bear the thought of losing it. I know—with more sadness than I can possibly express—that it must end, and that I am engaged in a losing tug of war with time, which drags me ever closer to that scratched line in the dirt which separates life from death.

Life is a contract with pages of tiny print to which no one pays attention. Every human being is subjected to the terms of the contract, but we simply skip to the bottom and sign the agreement without being fully aware of what's in it. We spend our first forty years or more assuming that life is a totally no-strings-attached gift. And then, slowly, we become aware of what lies in the contract's clauses. Taxes and penalties start to accrue, with increasingly larger payments in the form of a repossession of those things we assumed were ours unconditionally and forever.

As a rule, these unseen “taxes” are taken so gradually we aren't even aware of the withdrawals from our account at first. Of course in my case, my bout with tongue cancer took a large bite out of my account, unquestionably aging me by several years and dramatically heightening my awareness of how much has been taken. Living as I do near a large university campus doesn't help my ability to try to overlook it. As I get off the el near the DePaul campus, I watch the students bound down the stairs two and three at a time in an effortless “da-dum-da-dum-da-dum” cadence. There is a rhythm and fluidity to it I never noticed while I had it, but of which I am excruciatingly aware now that I do not. They run easily across the street to catch a bus. I jolt and lurch. There is no fluidity to my movements, nothing even resembling grace. (Imagine Frankenstein's monster trying to run and you pretty much have the picture.).

And the most maddening thing, to me, is that all my life...all my life...I could do these things without a single thought. (Perhaps that's my message to those who withdrawals from their “account” have not yet become noticeable: when you move with grace and ease; when you run, when you bound up and down steps, be aware of how blessed you truly are: rejoice in it.)

Glancing over the above paragraphs, I realize how ungracious my complaints are, how ungrateful I appear to be, not for having things taken away from me, but for ever having had them at all, when so very many people never had them. I suppose I am in the position of a very rich man who has lost his great fortune, giving no consideration, no empathy, no true understanding for all those who have never had the things I bewail having been taken away from me. I complain when I cannot raise my head high enough to look up at the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, totally ignoring the fact that tens of millions of people have never been to the Sistine Chapel, and tens of millions of others are unable to see anything at all. I cannot bound down a flight of stairs or run across the street to catch a bus, but I have two functioning legs and I can walk, where so many cannot.

And as I reach the end of this blog I once again find that what I intended to be a cautionary blog for you ends up being a cathartic wake up call to myself.

Thursday, August 15, 2013

In Few Words

I've always loved aphorisms for their ability to provoke big thoughts in relatively few words. Writers are prone to coming up with them, and I've perhaps immodestly been collecting some of my own over the past year which I hope might spark a thought or two in you. The problem with aphorisms, however, is that they are like pieces of candy, and are best consumed only a few at a time.

Anyway, here they are. Think away.

Intolerance, bigotry, and hatred are towers built by the insecure to look down on others. (08-06-12)

The more aware one is of life and what goes on in it, the more complex, confusing, and frustrating it becomes. (08-18-12)

Believe firmly in whatever it takes to get you through the day. (08-22-12)

To the heart, time does not exist. (08-26-12)

In the world of “If,” anything is possible. (09-01-12)

The well of idiocy has no bottom. (09-03-12)

Friends are the candles that light our way through life. (10-02-12)

Dreams are dragonflies, skimming the calm surface of the sleeping mind. (10-13-12)

Fantasy provides what reality denies. (10-13-12)

To open a book is to open the mind. (11-24-12)

You can lead a bigot to logic, but you can't make him think. (12-14-12)

It is to humanity's everlasting credit that even in the darkest of nights we continue to hope for the dawn.

(12-17-12)

Logic is to spammers what water is to the Wicked Witch of the West. (01-08-13)

Aging is a disease for which there is no cure, and from which there is no recovery. (02-04-13)

Too often Justice listens while Money talks. (02-22-13)

The gift of life comes with increasingly high maintenance costs. (03-09-13)

Anyone who says "you can't buy love" has never paid an animal shelter a few dollars to adopt a pet. (03-12-13)

Memories are a small campfire around which we can huddle on a dark and cold winter's night. (03-16-13)

The mind is a garden in which many different flowers grow. (03-21-13)

Far too many people confuse putting others down with raising themselves up. (05-02-13)

It's astonishing what human beings can accomplish/endure when they have no other choice. (06-12-13)

Never let the actions of others determine your own. (06-18-13)

Words and thoughts have no expiration date. (06-21-13)

Anyone who claims you can't buy love has never been to an animal shelter. (08-07-13)

Monday, August 12, 2013

Life on Banana Peels

I go through life with two fresh banana peels affixed to the bottoms of my feet, and once I begin to slip, my brain goes into total, instant lockdown. I do not merely fall, I plunge into an abyss of confusion, frustration, and self-loathing for my ineptitude. The slightest mistake or frustration can instantly send me spiraling out of control, both mentally and emotionally.

They say that to fear you are going insane is proof you are not, since the the truly insane never would entertain the thought. Well, I'm not sure I totally agree. I am constantly doing things which sincerely make me question my own sanity.

While catching my flight from Newark to Chicago after returning from Europe last month, I was surprised to learn I had to pay to check my luggage—something I had never before had to do in my entire life. Apparently I'd simply never flown an airline which charged—and I've certainly not had to do so on international flights. Flustered by this unexpected baggage charge, I reached for my billfold. I have two credit cards; a debit and a credit. Since my mind had already slammed shut I was incapable of remembering that since I never carry my billfold while in Europe, I'd put my debit card in a spare neck pouch in my suitcase, and my credit card inside my camera case, which I always carried with me. I could not, to save my soul, remember what I had done with either one of them, and I didn't have enough cash in my billfold to cover the charge.

Utter, instant, all-consuming panic.

I asked for my suitcase back, stepped out of line, laid it on the floor out of the way of other bag-checking customers, and opened it there in the middle of the busy airport. I then proceeded to rummage through every item in it, the space in my head where my brain should have been filled only with icy panic. I finally found my debit card, which they rather reluctantly accepted, taking pity on a doddering old man. I of course felt and looked like a fool. Forcing myself to calm down, I resigned myself to calling my bank immediately on returning to Chicago to report my credit card lost.

Finally at the boarding gate, I took my camera out of the carrying case, which had been strapped to my arm the entire time, to get a picture of a beautiful young man, and....

This morning I was looking for a cover illustration for one of my books. I went to the file in which I am always very careful to keep all my book covers as soon as I receive them. It was not there. It was not on my website where “new” covers are always posted as soon as I get them. It was not in any one of the dozen or so places I might logically be able to find it. Once again, I free-fell into the abyss.The unanswered and unanswerable question of why in hell it wasn't where I fully expected it to be or in any of the other places I'd looked subsequently, and what I could possibly, possibly, have done with it? I finally found it, though I cannot tell you where or how, since I do not know.

My inability to instantly deal with the totally unexpected can, I'm sure, be traced back to the fact that I am sincerely convinced my basic emotional development stopped somewhere considerably before my teens. Every sudden, unexpected challenge is to me a deer-in-the-headlights moment: a mixture of surprise, shock, and incomprehension. I have never been able to acknowledge that things refuse to go as I want and fully expect them to go. Any deviation from my expectations truly creates mental and emotional havoc.

When I sit down to write, I don't have to worry about there being banana peels on my feet, because if I encounter an unexpected situation in the course of writing, I have the luxury of being able to take as much time as necessary to correct it, and the reader, unlike an airport full of people, is none the wiser for my ineptitude.

And I know I am far from the only human who goes through life on banana peels, but I'm probably one of the few willing to talk about it, and do so in hopes it might offer some solace to others who think they are the only ones.

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).

Thursday, August 08, 2013

Priorities

I have no problem setting priorities. The problem is, having set them, in determining which of them should come first. At the moment I'm writing this, I have at least four: 1) writing this blog; 2) listening to newly-narrated sections of the audiobook for A World Ago: A Navy Man's Letters Home, 1954-1956 for changes/corrections; 3) working on the next Elliott Smith mystery, Cameron's Eye; 4) catching/keeping up with email and too-many-to-keep-track-of social media sites. All of this would be a challenge to the most disciplined of individuals, and by no stretch of the imagination can I include myself in their number. I set off on one priority—again, the writing of this blog, for example, and note that I have new email. I can/should simply make mental note of the fact and keep going on the blog. But I don't. I go check the email, and when I come back to the blog I've forgotten what I was planning to say next.

I blame it all on time: there is never enough of it and totally disregard the fact that I'd undoubtably manage what time I had far better if I applied myself to just one thing at a time.

But how can I separate one snowflake from a blizzard? The fact is that I am both greedy and impatient: I want everything and I want it now. Unfortunately, I'm lousy at multitasking. I could, ideally, be listening to the audiobook narration as I write. The operative word there, of course, is “ideally,” and in my world, “ideally” seldom exists. I am the type of person who, as the cliché says, finds it difficult to walk and talk at the same time.

Part of the problem is that I have just the tiniest tendency to digress. No matter what I'm doing, or how fixated I am upon doing it, things keep popping into my head that are totally unrelated to the subject at hand, and in an instant I'm off in pursuit of whatever it might be.

And even as I wrote that sentence, I noted that I have several new notices on Pinterest, one of the many sites I frequent. I notice it because this window in which I'm typing does not fully cover the In box underneath/behind it, and I can therefore see any new messages the instant they come in. Okay, so why don't I just expand this window to full screen so I wouldn't know when new messages come in? Because if I did so, I would not know when new messages come in, and they might be really important. (And that digression led to another as I took a minute to add the subject of self-delusion to my “future blogs” list. Sigh.)

A friend and I have been discussing...via email, of course...the subject of addiction to social media, and I suddenly realized that I am, indeed, an addict. While an addiction to Facebook is far, far down the list of addictions, it is in fact one. I justified it, as addicts are wont to do, by pointing out that, not having the financial backing of the Battleship Row of publishing houses, I use social media as a vital tool to attracting new readers to my books and blogs.

Few people are probably aware...or could be expected to care...that writing and publishing books is a long, intricately complex process. Print books are formatted differently than e-books, and audiobooks—an area into which I am just getting—are another process altogether. And with audiobooks, the author has a responsibility not only to himself but to the book's narrator, who often puts a huge amount of time and effort, and whose remuneration is dependent on how many copies are sold. A World Ago: A Navy Man's Letters Home, 1954-1956 is projected to come in at a whopping 18.2 hours of listening, though with each letter averaging only around 3 to 4 minutes, it can be read in as large or as small segments as the reader chooses. Convincing the potential listener of that fact, and getting him or her to actually take a chance with the book, is something else again.

The hard fact of the matter is that a writer at my level on the slopes of the literary mountain has to, like it or not, be a pitchman for his own work, and to depend heavily on the kindness of his readers to spread the word.

Being read is my Number 1 priority, under which all other priorities fall.

Oh, and before I forget...would you like to read (or listen to) a book? I have several I could recommend.

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).

Monday, August 05, 2013

Pitons

Piton, noun: a peg or spike driven into a rock or crack to support a climber or a rope.

I've never actually climbed a mountain, and in truth have never had the slightest interest in doing so. But if you've followed my blogs for any length of time, I'm sure you've noticed that I occasionally like to wax philosophical...or what passes for philosophical with me. This is one of those times. And on a philosophical level, I look upon the world as the sheer face of a mountain wrapped in a thick fog, and I have spent every day of my life struggling to climb it. Words are the pitons I use to try to to anchor myself to it in an effort to comprehend what I'm doing, where I'm going, and to give my life meaning to myself if no one else.

All this was prompted by trying to thinking of a subject for my first regular blog since returning from my recent trip. As so often happens when I try to think of something, an avalanche of thoughts sweep down the mountainside, threatening to sent me plummeting into total confusion. I found myself grasping at the pitons associated with my all-time favorite topics, my own life and experiences, which I justify with the logic that I am hardly qualified to talk about anyone else's.

And I realized that of all the myriads of sensations washing back and forth through every human's life, the single most predominant sensations of mine are, and have always been, those of alienation and being lost. Of having no idea of where I am in the overall scheme of things—if there is, indeed a scheme of things—of how I really managed to get here, of what is expected of me, and of why I am so eternally confused. Everyone else seems to climb their individual and seemingly far less steep mountains with relative ease, and without worrying themselves excessively about what pitons they use in their climb. I know this isn't exactly true, and that everyone faces their own challenges as they climb their own mountain in their own way. But again, since I only have my own perceptions to guide me, I have to rely on them.

My life has always been, to me, an endless string of unanswered questions, of utterly failing to comprehend the actions of others...especially those whose entire purpose in living seems to be to take advantage of the weaknesses of others and to spread hatred, misery, and mistrust. Honor, compromise, respect, and common courtesy are obviously unknown concepts to them, and their number, sadly, is not only legion but apparently growing rapidly.

It takes a lot of concentration and willpower to keep the sense of hopelessness with which we are bombarded daily on TV, magazines, newspapers, and on the streets themselves from becoming totally overwhelming. It's not easy to observe our fellow humans routinely behaving shamefully, doing the most egregious things to others with utter impunity and with no real concern about having to pay for their actions. There is probably some small comfort for those with strong religious beliefs to say “Oh, they'll burn in hell,” and at times I do wish I could share their conviction in an afterlife. But I can't. When these loathsome creatures die, the only thing their death accomplishes is to remove them from the world.

That humans tend to be naturally optimistic is evinced by the simple fact of wondering why we assume that life should be anything other than what it is...a constant struggle...and why it bothers us that it is. Being human involves more than Mark Twain's clever observation that “Man is the only animal that blushes...or needs to.” We also are apparently the only species to be aware of moral issues. Apparently only man lives not only on the physical level of all other living creatures, but on a mental one as well.

Awareness of one's self and one's surroundings is probably universal in all creatures with other than the most rudimentary of brains. And because Man is assumedly the most aware of all creatures, he is the most plagued by question.

And what of pitons, which assumedly was the subject of this blog? Well, glance down through the fog: we're standing on them.

Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Day 16, Istanbul (last full day)

8:56 a.m. I've never had soup for breakfast before. I went down to the restaurant serving breakfast (there are two other restaurants in the hotel), and, among the huge assortment of buffet items offered, noticed a soup tureen. Opening the lid, I asked one of the white-uniformed attendants behind the table what was in it. She did not know and had to consult with two other attendants before one came over, took a small sample, and announced it was “vegetable.” He did not specify which one, and there was no way of telling, but I took a small bowl just because I enjoy unbridled adventure. It was quite good, but I never did find out what it was.

I was joined by a very nice Englishwoman named Jean who I had seen often on the Odyssey, but never met officially. She, like so many of the others on this tour, is very worldly, having lived in Milan, Indonesia, Munich, and all around the world...all of which she related casually and not in an attempt to impress: it's just the way things were. I've noticed that travelers seem to be place-droppers, mentioning time spent in Mali or Hong Kong, or having lived in Cairo or Marrakech, or their last trip on the Mekong or the Galapagos. Heady stuff for a midwestern, middle-class kid from Rockford, Illinois.

I think, as soon as I've charged my camera battery, I'll go out to explore a bit. There is supposedly a promenade avenue nearby, and a park was mentioned on the way, which I believe is the park currently causing so much stir over the city's plans to bulldoze it to put up a shopping mall.

12:45 Just returned from a walk to the Promenade...a wide commercial street with very limited traffic. I did pass through what I'd thought was the contested park. Heavy police presence. However, there is another another park nearly adjacent to the Promenade, and I suspect that might be the one. There is a large government building a corner across from the park which is totally barricaded and cordoned off with more police (many of them with assault weapons drawn). I got a few pictures approaching it, but when I tried to get a few more on the way back I was ordered not to take photos.

And I have determined (I am not the quickest on the uptake) the causes for much of my complaints about my age on this trip. It is, I realized...for I will do anything rather than face the fact that it is age: it's a combination of the heat, the interminable walking therein and, a far more major factor than I'd considered before, is the necessity to force my head up high enough to see what's in front of me. It is truly physically exhausting.

And now to go to one of the restaurants and see if they have any appetizers (the poolside restaurant is out for that reason).

2:08 It is so very rare for me to actually enjoy food that when it happens, it's memorable. Such was the case just now. My lunch...your “appetizer”...consisted of thin-sliced smoked salmon with horseradish sauce, and an Efes dark beer. My poor mouth won't tolerate anything spicy, but horseradish is somehow totally exempt. It's hot going down, but not painfully so. At any rate, I'm very happy to have remember what a pleasure eating can be.

6:04 Back from a 2 ½ hour boat cruise of the Bosphorus, up almost to the Black Sea. Unbelievable wealth represented by the homes overlooking the waterway. Guide said average home prices on the Asian side (in case you didn't know, Europe is on one side of the Bosphorus, and Asia on the other) run around $5 million! Spent much of the trip with Fabian, the very nice young (well, he's 30, and that's really, really young) Swiss man traveling with his sister.

10:15 Ready for bed. Will watch BBC news for a while, then call it a night. Had a wonderful seafood crepe for dinner tonight. I was only able to eat 1/3 of it, but I wish I could have had a doggie bag. To really enjoy eating is, as I've said, something akin to a miracle for me..and to have two meals I truly enjoyed in one day! Oh, if it could only continue!

And tomorrow at 11:00 I catch a bus for the airport, and the U.S.

So long, Europe. It's been fun.

Monday, July 29, 2013

Day 15, Istanbul, 07-18-13

7:55 a.m. Sitting in the Ambassador Lounge (I'm the only one so far) awaiting 8:15 transfer to the hotel. Suitcase carried away during the night. Closed my cabin door for the last time, and here I am. Got my passport back. Had a minimal breakfast (yogurt and two bites of a muffin) with three of the Englishmen I've come to know. They're heading for home this morning. No sign of Tom or Mike yet.

And so it (or this part of it) ends. Always dislike endings. They leave me with an odd sense of...loss?

Since our hotel rooms won't be available until at least noon, we'll be taking a bus tour of Istanbul, which will be nice, though I do wish trying to take photos through a bus window were easier, and that I could move from one side to the other without problem or having to try to shoot past someone across the aisle. More people coming in, now. Here's Mike, so I'll close for the moment.

10:09 a.m. Sitting in the garden of the Topkapi Palace in Istanbul. Within 200 feet of me are gold and jewels which, cashed in, could easily buy Texas with perhaps Oklahoma tossed in. No photos allowed, of course, in the display rooms.

Afternoon. Checked into the hotel—the Hyatt Regency--around 1:30. By far the nicest hotel I've stayed at. Was absolutely delighted to find that it is located one block from the Istanbul Hilton...the same place from which I had stolen a liqueur glass in 1956. Full circle, anyone? I walked down later to get a photo of it, but the street on which the Hyatt Regency fronts is the back of the Hilton, and I was too tired to walk around the long block in the heat to get a photo of the front.

Had lunch—well, they had a limited menu which did not include any appetizer-type items, so I just had a beer—by the beautiful pool, and wished I had the body to be able to take advantage of it. I do not, and even if I had a bathing suit along, would not want to frighten the children or startle the horses. We were accompanied by a very sweet cat, who could not get enough attention.

Mike was on a tour of the Grand Bazaar, which I passed on in favor of having the opportunity to just relax for a bit. I remember it from 1956 as being a gigantic ant farm with side alleys leading to other side alleys endlessly. I would not be surprised to read a story of someone who had finally found their way out of the place after several years.

Went to dinner alone, ordered a bowl of cream of asparagus soup and an appetizer of marinated local seafood, which was enough for three meals. Most interesting, and including a number of pieces of an unidentified species which was really delicious. There were also four skewers of three olives wrapped in small strips of fish, and several strips of one unidentified fish a large piece of yet another. The bill, including a beer and bottle of water, was 50+ Turkish lira...about $25-plus. (Entrees ran between 50 and 80 lira.)

Sunday, July 28, 2013

Lemnos, the Stop that Wasn't, Day 14, 07-17-13

7:48 a.m. Usually we wake up in our next port...this morning we're still at sea, though there is an island off to the left. The ship rocked a lot last night, which I enjoyed, and the seas are still a little rough. Apparently there is some problem with getting into Lemnos, though I have no idea what it might be. Getting sailors into and out of liberty boats in choppy seas isn't a problem...getting a bunch of middle-to-old-age civilians into a tender is. Well, we'll see what happens.

This morning for breakfast I decided to have bacon and eggs. I love bacon; always have. However, whenever I eat any “solid” foods, as I chew, most of it goes between my cheek and gums and is almost impossible to dislodge, since my tongue can't just scoop it out as yours can. Nor can I move small particles to the front of my mouth with my tongue and “Ptttt!” it out. Having almost no physical control over my mouth and tongue is a real bitch. (Mentioned, yet again, not as a bid for sympathy but as a strong reminder to you to be infinitely grateful for the totally unnoticed little things you can do.)

Our last day aboard. I've enjoyed it and seeing the places we've been, but it has all been overshadowed, I fear, by the awareness of my increasing and totally unacceptable. If hating/resenting/regretting something intensely could change it, I would once again be...hell, I'd settle for 50!

Since we'll be in Istanbul in the morning, that means we'll be passing through the Dardanelles sometime during the night while we're sleeping. One of my fondest memories of my first time through the Dardanelles was of its being a moonless night and, while not being able to see much, there was the almost palpable smell of...green. (Which leads to another thing I'd really not noticed this time but commented on during my first trip to Europe: the absence of wooden buildings. I can't recall seeing a single one this trip.

8:26 Lemnos is out. Water too rough to safely load and unload tenders. They'll be showing the movie Topkapi...a movie from the 50s or 60s about a jewel heist in Istanbul. (Istanbul...get the connection?)

However, looking out the windows of the observation deck, we do not appear to be moving. If we've anchored I didn't hear it drop. Perhaps we're just going to sit here for the same length of time as we would have been in Lemnos, to keep to the time schedule.

So this means no internet until Istanbul, and I bought 2 more hours of extra internet service than I'm going to be able to use.

Some people just walked by on the outside the windows wearing sweaters, which were flapping wildly in the wind.

8:35 Internet! I've got internet! Just tried it on a whim and....

Adrian, one of the Englishmen I've gotten to know, stopped by and we talked for nearly an hour. I turned the internet off to save time.

10:30 Returned to my cabin, which is close to water level. Spray from waves hitting the hull fly by my little porthole. It is downright chilly in here, and I'm sitting on the bed in my robe, propped up by the pillows, all but shivering.

1:03 Just returned from lunch. We've just entered the narrow stretch of water leading to the even narrower Dardanelles—so narrow that shipping is strictly controlled and ships are accompanied by pilot boats. So glad we're going through during daylight, though! I think I'll spend the afternoon in the Observation Lounge, since it's too windy-cold to spend much time on deck. I brought a light jacket, and will take it with me.

1:21 Tried to get out to the deck to take a few photos but with the wind and the jiggling of the ship, I doubt any will turn out.

1:52 Entering the Dardanelles. Sit down, type, get up to go outside for a photo, sit down, type...

(We'll be passing Gallipoli, of WWI fame/notoriety)

5:45 Please tell me how I do it. Please. I decided to organize my photos and cannot find any of the photos I took in Taormina. Nowhere. I somehow deleted them. All of them! And they are not in my trash bin, where they would be retrievable. Since I use iPhoto, I can only pray that it has a retrievable trash bin as well. I know they have a “Move to trash” but I don't dare click on it for fear it will think I want to move whatever photos I'm looking at to trash. Oh, Lord, but I am hopeless!

Note: Photos of the entire journey can be seen on my Facebook page.

Saturday, July 27, 2013

Izmir/Ephasus, Day 13, 07-16-13

Europe 2013 Journal

Day 13, Izmir/Ephesus 07-16-13

Didn't sleep all that well last night; I suppose anticipatory cogitations over the end of the cruise. But when I did wake up, at 5:57 a.m., we were docked at Izmir, a very modern, skyscrapered city. We had a choice of a half-day at the ancient city of Ephesus and a half-day tour of Izmir, or a full day at equally ancient Pergamon. I opted for the two half days.

Ephesus is an hour and a half drive from Izmir. It at one time had a population of 300,000 people and was located directly on the Mediterranean. Today, it is nearly five miles inland and has a population of 0, if you don't count the several thousand cats and kittens roaming about. There are a few impressive buildings, primary among them being the library and the amphitheater, all of which I gather have been reconstructed. Otherwise the area, like Mycenea, is one huge jigsaw puzzle box of broken columns, tumbled walls, and...stones. Only 20 percent of the city has been excavated thus far, and they obviously are trying to figure out a way to put all the pieces back together to reconstruct more of the city.

And it was hot. Very hot. Turkey will not let you leave the ship without a special pass, which you must give back when you return. When I pulled mine—which I'd been carrying in my neck pouch (the best way to carry cash and passport while traveling)—out to hand back, the bottom half was so wet it tore nearly in half. I do not sweat as a matter of principle, so I have no idea how I got so wet.

And once again I was aware of problems with my equilibrium, which I've never had before. I blame it on the heat.

I opted not to go on the Izmir tour for any one of several reasons: 1) the heat, 2) the prospect of a great deal more walking (or, in my case, staggering), or 3) having just spent another 12 Euros for another 4 hours of internet time, I wanted to use them.

Turkey, by the way, is not on the Euro, though nearly everywhere accepts them...and dollars, too. I'm going to be going home with around 50 euros ($60-plus), since I can't see that I'll need many.

A few more facts about Turkey. It was part of the Ottoman Empire until the first quarter of the 20^th century, a muslim-ruled country. Kamal (sp?) Attaturk took over the county in the 1920s (I would look this up on line if I could get on line easily, which I can't). Anyway, he turned Turkey into a secular nation and even changed the language to use Roman letters rather than Arabic.

Mykonos, Day 12, 07-15-13

Europe 2013 Journal

Day 12, Mykonos, Greece, 07-15-13

8:04 a.m. Having lost all practical idea of time...no idea what day it is, how much longer before the journey ends, etc....I am sitting on a deck chair staring out at the Mediterranean, a couple islands to either side of me, and the small forms of boats and ships moving to and fro intent upon their own purposes. Just finished breakfast and will go ashore in a while. I must look Mykonos up on a map to get an idea of its relative proximity to the mainland of Greece, etc.

We dropped anchor shortly before seven, and my first impression of Mykonos was of white. All the buildings are white; a stark contrast to Italian coastal towns which are a jumble of bright colors. Will probably try to find Tom and Mike to see about going ashore with them, but to be honest, I'd just as soon go by myself for no other reason that I can go where I choose, stop or not stop at my whim. Interesting the insights into ones self that come along. I am definitely a loner, I think, though for reasons too complex to try to sort out like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.

I did ask Adrien and George at breakfast about the remainder of our itinerary, and apparently tomorrow we enter Turkish jurisdiction, which has some unusual rules. One must surrender one's passport and pay a fee to enter the country and I have heard but have no way of knowing that they can deny entry to anyone known to be gay. Well, I shall simply keep my rainbow flag in my suitcase.

Went ashore around 9:30 after waiting for Tom and Mike for half an hour. Shuttle dropped us off probably 2 miles from town, but a shuttle bus took us much closer and we walked from there. I must say, Mykonos is truly one of the most beautiful cities I've ever visited. As I said, every single building in the city is painted white, with blue windows and doors (though there were a few red doors seen). The streets are extremely narrow, with the side streets no more than 8 feet across. They wind and bend and blend so that you're constantly seeing new things. There are innumerable chapels one enters through open blue doors in the single wall that is the street. And the city is marvelously clean. You see people out in front of their shops or homes (it's often hard to tell which is which) with brooms and mops. Even the streets are painted in lattices of white.

Because it is something of a Mecca for the very wealthy (some of the yachts in the harbor are mind-numbing) there are very expensive shops mixed with tourist-oriented businesses. Lots and lots of souvenier shops selling the usual gee-gaws. Mike never met a souvenier shop he didn't love, and insists in going into every single one of them. Tom and I finally wandered off to go find the famous windmills which are a symbol for the island. Other than the one I saw in Rhodes while in service, they are the only ones I know of outside of Holland. Five of them sit atop a hill overlooking the city. They are white, of course, and I doubt they are functional, but symbols don't have to be functional.

Tom and I wandered up and down the narrow streets until we parted ways and I headed back for the ship, which proved an adventure in itself. Though the city is a maze of narrow streets—interestingly, I did not consider even the narrowest of them to be alleys—I knew that if I followed the downward sloping streets and kept to the left, I would eventually find the waterfront, which I did. I stopped to have a glass of tonic, then continued. I wasn't sure how frequently the shuttle bus ran (the cruise line hired it just for use by the ship). But I headed to where it had dropped us off. Absolutely no one else was there when I arrived, and I waited around until I got impatient (maybe five minutes) and, seeing the ship in the distance, decided to walk. Not the best of ideas. So I started walking, following the road which had no sidewalks. I walked toward incoming traffic, staying as close to the side—which was at times the edge of a drop off—as I could. The ship got closer and I thought “the landing should be right around that next bend.” Upon reaching the bend and seeing that no, that wasn't it, I chose the next bend. And the next. And the next. Up hills. Down hills. Around corners. Finally got to the area I recognized as the general docking area but had no idea which dock the boat shuttle came into. Walked and walked some more, trying to find it. Asked a couple people who spoke no English. Finally, finally found it and returned to the ship. I don't think I'd care to do it again.

4:35 Just went and bought another 4 hours of internet time which I hope will last me until Istanbul.

5:34 And we're off to Lemnos. I went outside to see them raising one of the transport boats out of the water and raise it into its davits. Interesting!

7:01 Strange. Just attended a meeting on leaving the ship. We must put our luggage in the hall by midnight the evening before we leave, and take anything we need for the morning with us when we leave the ship. Not practical. I'm not about to walk around with my toothbrush and toothpaste and liquid multi-vitamin and aspirin and hairbrush and...with nothing to put them in!

I've enjoyed the cruise, and the staff has been great, but there have been a couple of things they should have done to avoid confusion...such as putting a notice at the bus pick-up point in Mykonos verifying it was indeed where the bus would be (again, I was the only person in the place and, prone to confusion as I am, had doubts that that was where I really should be) and the times the bus would be coming. After waiting 10 minutes, I decided to walk back to the ship. It couldn't be that far, could it? Yes, it could. And was. I walked. And walked. And walked along the road paralleling the sea. Up hills and down hills, with no sidewalks and sheer drop-offs to my left. I would round a bend expecting to see the ship and it would not be there. So I'd assume it had to be around the next bend. It wasn't. Or the next. It wasn't.

Finally I saw the ship and walked toward it. I watched for the tender alongside it to head to shore, and knew I could follow it to where it went. Partly right. When I got to the docking area, I found that there were a mass of docks with small boats lining all of them and bigger boats in the way, and....I asked several people if they had any idea where cruise ship tenders came in, and none of them spoke English.

At last I found it, and returned to the ship, not a little tuckered from the walk.

We left Mykonos around six. I'd love to go back!

Tom and Mike like to go to dinner between 7:30 and 8. I prefer to go between 7 and 7:15, but I'll wait for them. Ah, the sacrifices one makes for one's friends.

Roughest seas we've encountered, lots of people weaving around trying to find their sea legs. Waves splashing loudly against the hull—which I notice, being at the far forward part of the ship and just above the waterline.

I've noticed that when someone leaves fingerprints on the glass doors between the inside and outside sections of the Terrace Cafe, one of the staff immediately comes and wipes the doors clean. Class.

And there was a casually dressed bigwig from the cruise line aboard, to whom everyone paid subtle deference, but the crew would have been just as attentive were he not there.