Grim Reaper…Stop. You've Already Met Your Quota

Wow.  I just looked at what was trending on Yahoo, and I noticed that Pat Summerall died.  Sad.  I remember Summerall from my youth in the 70s, a saavy guy who did sportscasts for the National Football League.  Most Sundays, I tried to avoid Mr. Pat and his jovial sidekick John Madden, since their pre-game appearance simply meant that my dad was going to watch sports on TV for the remainder of the afternoon  I’d rather been outside playing.

But, Holy Moley!  In visiting the CNN site to read the details of Summerall’s death, I came across a page entitled “People We Lost in 2013.”  And it’s only mid-April.

The biggest shock?  (And this may speak to how gay I am) Bonnie Franklin, the actress who portrayed Ann Romano on the 70s sitcom “One Day at a Time.” the strong single mom to Mackenzie Phillips and Valerie Bertinelli.  I watched that show religiously.  I always wanted to be the kid brother to Julie and Barbara.

It is only mid-April, and here are some of the losses so far this year:

• Jonathan Winters – The lovable, goofy comedian.  “If God had really intended man to fly, He’d make it easier to get to the airport."
• Annette Funicello – One of the original Mouseketeers in the Mickey Mouse Club, and the babe from many 60s Beach Party movies.  Made familiar in a quote from the movie Grease: “"Nobody's jugs are bigger than Annette's”
• Margaret Thatcher – Former British Prime Minister (Morrissey probably smiled at that news – she finally answered his question "When will you die?")
• Roger Ebert – I grew up taking movie viewing advice from him and Gene Siskel.  “Two Thumbs Down” for the loss of them both.
• Phil Ramone – Famous record producer, who worked with Billy Joel on one of my all-time favorites, The Stranger.  No, Phil did not die of a heart attack-ack-ack-ack-ack-ack.
• Hugo Chavez – One of the most bizarrely entertaining U.S. adversary presidents ever.  You know…he’s the guy from such insanity as his “Life on Mars” theory, his assertion of the “Army of Voodoo Witches” set upon him by his political opponents, and his role as “sadistic butt-kicking soccer player” (literally...he'd kick opponents in the rear, if they dared score against him).
• Van Cliburn – A classical musician, who stepped into pop culture after winning, in 1958 (during the height of the Cold War), the International Tchaikovsky Piano Competition in Moscow.  He even got a ticker-tape parade upon his return to the States.
• Ed Koch – The larger-than-life former New York City mayor, the "How'm I doin'" politicial, who was in office for more than ten years from late 70s throughout the 80s.  In addition to being a political figure, he also make appearances on Sex and the City, Saturday Night Live, and in the movie The Muppets Take Manhattan.  Quite a CV.

While I was busy being surprised by the passing of people who had always been figures in my life, it didn't dawn on me until later that people, say of my son's generation, may not know who most of these icons were.  It only makes sense that as I get older, many of the people who were in the public eye, when I was at such an impressionable age, are going to pass on.



Regardless.  I remember seeing Jonathan Winters on a number of 70s TV variety shows (which themselves, have gone the way of the dinosaur). In 1983, Roger Ebert gave The Outsiders a bum review (which pissed off the 19 year-old me).  I didn't even notice when Koch was no longer the mayor of New York City.  I thought he was at a royalty level, and would die in office.

I'm sure that I'll continue to be surprised as 2013 moves along, and we lose more famous public figures.  These losses hit the public conscience, hopefully reminding us that we only have so much time on this Earth.  And we should take Jonathan Winter's advice:

"If your ship doesn't come in, swim out to meet it."

I Won't Expect You To Be What I Want You To Be

Some of life’s lessons have taken me quite a while to learn.  Abstract concepts, complex theories, intricate hypotheses?  I typically have no trouble understanding these.  The most practical knowledge often eludes me, though.  But when I do catch on, I can observe my surroundings with beautiful, crystal-clear vision.

This year (with many birthdays behind me), I was able to put in place for myself, something that I have been touting to others for years.

• You can’t really change anyone.  You can influence them, but change has to come from within
• Which ties to somthing much more important:  Appreciate people for who they are.  Others are not here on this planet for your convenience.  (That frame of mind is not only unreal, it’s down-right inconsiderate.)

These realizations did not come like a bolt out of the blue to me this year.  I would imagine that this kind of awareness for other people, as it was for me, comes over a period of time.

This year, a lot of the pieces of the puzzle fell into place.  Maybe the planets were aligned. Maybe Mercury was advancing, instead of retrograding.  Doubtful.  I believe that it's just that I opened my ears and listened to the wisdom being shared with me by those who care for me.  Maybe I opened my mind to the reality of common life experiences.  Maybe I was able to open my heart and understand that while people were going easy on me, helping me to understand the world around me, looking out for my best interests, I was able to go easy on myself.

Among those who taught me were:

• A good friend at work, who always tells me, "Oh...that's just [insert name here]" or “You have to let [insert name here] be [insert same name here].”
• My husband, who always accepts me just the way I am.  The luxury of this treatment is golden to me, especially when I see other couples who constantly have trouble understanding and accepting one another.
• My son, who points out to me when I’m being impatient with or not understanding other people.  He has a practical, yet exceptional, way of taking each person that he encounters exactly as he or she is. 

So I’m still learning:

·        From my friend, to be accepting of others.

·        From my husband, to love unconditionally

·        From my son, to love humanity in general

And in the spirit of an Oscar-winner’s acceptance speech. “Thanks to anyone who also helped me who I didn’t mention. You know who you are.”

I don't think that I would be too far off base if I believed that each of us during some point in life felt that they had to satisfy expectations of others.  I could cite numerous instances in my own life.

We are most comfortable around those people who accept us, who understand us; those who we can be ourselves around.  So, let's all go easy on ourselves and each other.  How about it?
 

As Innocent As I Can Get

Since Labor Day was last week, today was a double-dip Monday.  It was like the extra scoop of Rocky Road that you really didn’t want and certainly didn’t need.  Ok, ice cream is probably a bad analogy.  But Rocky Road…nail on the head, folks.  Nail. On. The. Head.

After I arrived home and wolfed down the tasty pizza that my husband made for me (complete with the black olives and the mushrooms, which he both loathes), I went immediately to the piano.

I noodled around in Burgmuller’s Opus 100 (which is basically a beginner’s book for classical music aficionados), and finally set myself to work on “Innocence,” the number five piece.  I kept having a tough time getting it right.  My electronic keyboard has various voice settings, so after starting in “Grand Piano,”

 

I always laugh at myself, when I make mistakes

My piano teacher is very familiar with the sound of my laughter

 

I worked my way through:

·         Electric Piano (better suited for A Flock of Seagulls than Burgmuller)

·         Strings (too saccharine, even for a interpretation of innocence)

·        Church Organ (raised as a good Southern Baptist boy, I almost pulled this off, but the resonance in our music room,...ok...our dining room..., was a bit overwhelming)

·        Harpsichord (brutal in showing all the flaws of my technique – or altogether lack thereof)

I finally landed on “Vibraphone,” the last setting on my piano.   The sound was warm, soothing, and very forgiving of my uneven tempo, my occasional botched notes, my disregard for dynamics, and my clunky runs.

After a Rocky-Road Monday, I needed a bit of mercy and a lot of goofing around on the ivories.

 

 

A bit better.

You'll notice how I immediately pull my hands from the keyboard.

This way, I can guarantee there will be no additional mistakes.

 

(Special thanks to my cinematographing better-half - somehow he always hears beautiful music coming from my keyboard.  And that's only one reason that he's my husband).

 

Man...I hope my piano teacher doesn't see this post.

Wonderfully Away

This weekend was one of my great lost ones.  I didn't do much. 

• Saturday morning with our Breakfast Bunch 
• Saturday afternoon with our best friends, helping them move furniture
• Lots of piano practice

That was about it.

Sunday afternoon, I left the house for my piano lesson a bit early.  I thought that I'd just take my time on the freeways and not have to be in much of a rush.  But that was not meant to be.

When I turned from West Bellfort and onto South Post Oak to get on the West Loop, I saw back-to-back traffic waiting for me.  After living in Houston for almost 20 years, sometimes I'm still stunned at the number of people on the freeways.  Now, if I were more of a sports fan, I would have been better prepared.  The Texans had played at home today.  The game must have just let out (I did check the score later to see that the Texas beat the Dolphins).

For the drive, I had Circuital by My Morning Jacket in my stereo "Wonderful (The Way I Feel)" came on.  I put the song on repeat and slowly worked my way in the bumper-to-bumper.  The song can always take me away.  So I did a bit of day-dreaming as I inched north. 

As the song played, I found myself

• Sailing on a catamaran, off the coast of Cozumel
• Looking at clouds at Galveston Island
• Swimming in the waters of Puerto Rico
• Walking around my sister's yard and enjoying her flowers, planted among the Louisiana pines. 

I was only five minutes late for my piano lesson.  Amazing, since I'd been thousands of miles away during the drive.

Back on the freeway after my lesson, I listened to the same song over and again, all the way home.

I hope you also had the chance to get away from it all this weekend.

Labor Day. Yeah, Well…I Did.

On Labor Day this year, the GOP House Majority Leader, Eric Cantor, posted a statement on Twitter praising entrepreneurs, and downplaying the importance of our United States labor force.  Makes perfect sense to me.  I do not own my own business; therefore, I ended up working all weekend.

With many of my projects at work wrapping up at the beginning of the 4^th quarter, I’ve had competing priorities without a clue on how to decide what takes priority.  So, when many of my gay brothers were spending the weekend partying it up at Southern Decadence in New Orleans or sunning themselves at Last Splash at Hippie Hollow near Austin, I found myself in the office or both Saturday and Sunday.  Additionally, when I left the office on Sunday, I brought my laptop home so I could work Monday as well.

If I’d only taken better notes or paid better attention to my professors in business school, maybe I’d be running my own empire.  And I would imagine that, as a business owner, I still would have worked the weekend.  Running your own business is a tough job.  As a child, I watched as my enterprising father run businesses simultaneously.  Well, I caught sight of him occasionally; the man was busy. 

In addition to doing my day-job work each day of the holiday weekend, I went to my piano lesson (it’s an effort, people, albeit an enjoyable one), I did my yard work (I’m the rare Houstonian who knows how to push a lawnmower around his own parcel of land), I bathed the dogs (you can read what a chore this is here), I cleaned the litter box (yes, I’m a servant to my animals).

If I examine the amount of time that I spent on the activities mentioned in the preceding paragraph, maybe I did have a sufficient holiday. 

·         My piano lesson?  Typically, after practicing for an hour each day, I tend to make the same mistakes over and again at my teacher’s piano, laughing at myself as I play.  But there is that moment of zen, when all falls in place, and I perfectly play a passage that had given me the devil for weeks.  It surprises me, although my teacher says, matter-of-factly and with a smile, “You worked it out.”  Ok, so maybe it’s not work.

·         The yard work?  I watched my grandfather do his own lawn up until the time that his vision prevented him from seeing well enough.  I feel connected to him as I push my mower around the yard.  I plug in my headphone, put some rock music on, and the whole task seems like it’s over in minutes.  (But why does my iPod always offer me “Dust in the Wind” by Kansas?  It’s a pretty, but disheartening song.  I really need to remove it)

·         Bathing the dogs?  They smell so great afterwards.  ‘Nuff said.

·         Cleaning out the litter pan?   Oddly enough, the cats act grateful.  (I mean, who wouldn’t be happy if someone came in to clean your bathroom?)

 

But I am left wondering how Eric spent his weekend?  Given the perks and privileges offered to a high-rolling politician,  I’m guessing that his was not remotely like mine. 

 

"All's Well That..." (well, you know the rest)

Driving to the office this morning, I thought "It's going to be less-than-wonderful day."  I had to fit in my work around four hours of meetings that were scheduled.  My best work-buddy was out on vacation.  I had just been assigned a new project, and the sales manager was, as he expressed, "anxious" to start.  I had a strong feeling that it was going to be a twelve-hour day at the office.

I decided to slow-roll to work; taking the streets, instead of the freeways.  I still arrived just ten minutes past my normal morning ETA.  As I trudged from the parking garage to my building, the weight of my laptop case emphasized that I had also worked from home the night before.

I wasn't bummed at facing the workday; I just wasn't jumping for joy.

But then I stepped out of the elevator and onto my work floor.  And here's what greeted me during the course of the day:

Two sweet-tempered co-workers:

"You made my day yesterday.  Thank you!  You are always so nice.  You know, you were the only one who bothered to talk to me when I was first hired."

"Of course, he's nice.  He's from Louisiana."
 

Reply to "thank-you" e-mails that my lead project manager & I sent to a co-worker, who had went out of her way to rush a request for us:

"It was my pleasure.  You two are a wonderful team to work with."
 

Kind words from a manager when I made a bad assumption, and it blew up in my face.

"Just look at it as a learning experience.  I know it may sound trite.  But don't kick yourself.  Anyone could have made that mistake."
 

During my afternoon break, I was reading from the Shakespeare app on my iPhone.  "All's Well That Ends Well."  Act 4, Scene 3.

The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together.
 

It did end to to be an eleven-hour day at the office.  But I had a good time.  Ken had packed pizza for my lunch.  Some good friends made my day.  I had time to help another friend review a complex document to free up some of her time, so she wouldn't have to work a fourteen-hour day.

What made working late today completely worth it?  On my route home, the timing was perfect to see the luminous full moon rising over the city as I drove east on Pierce-Elevated.

 

And then I was able to see a spectacular sunset as I was driving west on the South Loop.

 

And of course, I arrived home to a smile and a hug.

It was a more-than-wonderful day.

uhm...hey, Father Time. I didn't see you coming.

I've never been much bothered about the aging process.  I have friends that have hit milestones...30, 40, 50 years old, and it was almost devastating for them.  I've never given it much thought.  My indifference to the passing of time probably is:

• Due in part to good genes - My Dad is a bit past 70 and can still pass for a man in his late 50s.  Consequently some people are surprised when I reveal that I'm pushing 50. More than a few guess late-30s
• That I'm still a big kid (and that can work to my advantage, but also can bite me in the butt)
• A reflection of my inability to take myself too seriously

Oh, I've had my "what-the-hell" moments:

• I was listening to the radio when I was in my mid 20s.  A Bob Seger song came on that was released when I was in high school.  The DJ referred to it as an "oldie."
• I caught up on Facebook with a young lady that I used to baby-sit when I was a teen.  She had three children and was in her early 30s. Yikes!
• The high school students that are in our office as part of a work-study program started addressing me as "Mr."

But milestones didn't bother me:  my son graduating high school (just a reason for celebration), my turning 40 (no big deal),  my buying my first house as an adult (it was like a cool one-level tree house with no need for a ladder; a place that I could hang out with my dogs).

And then, age slapped me in the face.

Ken and I were in New York City with our best friends.  We were dining at a popular restaurant in SoHo.  I picked up my menu to see what I could see...and I couldn't.  Huh?  I pushed the menu back to arms-length, and I still couldn't read it.  I said aloud.  "It must be too dark in here.  I can't read the menu."

The Brunette giggled and handed over her reading glasses.  "Here you go."

Stunned, "I don't need these!"

She laughed again.  "Yes, you do"

Crap!

Following that trip to NYC, I kept a close monitor on my eyesight.  My vision was still clear.  Maybe my eyes self-corrected; I kept my hopes up.

And then, my son gifted me a guide for a video game that I love to play.  And all I could do was gripe about the small font.

I checked with my Dad.  "How old were you when you started wearing glasses."

My Dad (in his succient manner):  "Your age."

I checked with my Sister.  "When did you start wearing glasses?"

My Sis:  "Uhm, I started wearing glasses when I was in my 20s.  I switched to contacts a couple of years later.  Do you even know me?"  She stepped back and grinned at me.

So there I was, nothing to do but go to CVS and purchase some $10 cheaters.  Eventually I had to purchase three pair (one for home, one for my truck, one for the office).  I kept losing track of them, probably because I did not want to admit that I needed glasses at all.

But it's ok.  I got a compliment from my "sweetheart" at the office:  a beautiful young lady with long dark hair, a dazzling smile, and ebony-colored eyes.  "You look so intelligent wearing your glasses."

I raised my eyebrows gave her a big smile, and said quietly.  "Good...I'll fool everyone."

And Father Time?  He can go crash somone else's party.