Day 28: This Is Living

Ice Cube said it, but I will, too: Today was a good day. It always seems a good day when you get so much accomplished. I don't tackle household projects at nearly the pace I should. I don't seem to get too much free time the way it is, so spending it painting or organizing or crap like that doesn't turn me on. What does is when I do bother to get my act in gear and I see the results afterward.

I busted my arse today, and it shows. What's better is that I busted my ass for something that I'll benefit from for a long time to come. This wasn't like painting a kid's room and having about an hour to revel in the change. This work was all about me, and I'm glad I did it. Bonus.

Today was a good day. That's about as positive as it gets. 

Day 27: Becoming A Warrior

I deeply regret that it took me too many years to recognize that taking on a challenge and having to work excessively to meet it didn’t necessarily have to be a bad thing. For too long, I tended to correlate challenges with being a pain in the ass. As being lost time I couldn’t get back. I didn’t always correlate challenges with learning and progressing and becoming a more learned and advanced person. I didn’t always understand that the hours of work I put into a given task would continue to payoff and teach me lessons way, way down the road. I’m not sure why it took me so long to recognize as much; I just know I didn’t do myself any favors by viewing many challenges, particularly those that offered little to me that was personally satisfying, more as something I could fail at instead of something I could prosper from.

I think I started to turn a corner on this way of thinking as my oldest child hit his teenage years. Realizing that he wasn’t a “boy” anymore made me realize that I wasn’t a boy, either, and there was going to be a time very soon where there would be fewer years behind me than ahead. That’s a frightening and sobering reality, and it tends to help put things into perspective. For me, the perspective that was realized was that there are a crapload of things I want to do, but also things I didn’t want to but had to. But just because I didn’t want to didn’t mean there wasn’t something to be gained.

In some cases, accepting challenges has meant purposely putting myself into uncomfortable, unusual situations. For example, when the pastor at the church I was attending six or so years ago was on vacation, I agreed to give the sermon the Sunday he was gone. Anyone who knows me especially from my early years is most likely enjoying a good chuckle envisioning that prospect. I’ve rarely felt as nervous or anxious as I did leading up to that Sunday morning. To top it off, I committed myself to playing guitar and singing a song for the first time ever in public immediately following the sermon. I didn’t want to, but I knew it was a worthwhile endeavor I needed to attempt. Countless times in the days prior to that Sunday, I asked myself, “You dumbass, why did you do this to yourself?” I felt good about the sermon I had written and was prepared to give. It was from the heart, and the content was outside the box of what typical sermons contain—something that I liked. I didn’t hold an ounce of the same confidence or enthusiasm where singing was concerned. Still, I sucked it up, summoned the courage, and gutted it out. I didn’t land a record contract, but I did gain something I didn’t expect: pride and self-respect.

Especially in recent years, I think I’ve recognized the importance of taking on similar challenges. The result has almost always been positive. Today, I signed up to participate in the Warrior Dash on June 9, a day before my 45^th birthday. I’m pitifully out of shape. I’m broken down and damaged. I’m nowhere near ready to meet the 12 physical challenges and 3.3 miles of running the event calls for. But I’m committed to try. Better, I love the fact that I’ll be taking this on with seven friends, and I love that we’ll tackle this together. I’m eager to experience difficultly as part of a collective vs. as an individual. I’m certain I’ll learn much and maybe even provide a little inspiration of my own or at least a helping hand. In short, I’m chomping at the bit to test my endurance and perseverance and see where it takes me. I haven’t physically done so in a long, long time, and this was needed.

This much I’ve learned about myself in recent years: I need obstacles to keep moving. If not, I stagnant, and I can hardly stand the thought of that. 

Day 26: Ron Swanson, The Ultimate Uplifter

Every once in a while, I need someone who is essentially the opposite of me to punch me in the face and get me back in gear. Someone who chokes the hell out of reason and acceptance and passivity and good manners and just says, "Stop you're whining and get on with it already." 

Today was such a day. Today, I needed some Ron Swanson in my life. I needed to attend the Church of Swanson. I needed to worship at the Altar of Swanson. I needed Ron Swanson to pick me up and kick my in the ass and get me back in the game. Today, when I seemingly swam against the current each and every minute, Ron Swanson came to my rescue yet again. Thank you, Ron Swanson. 

I've been a longtime fan and would-be follower of John Wooden's Pyramid of Success. There's so much that's positive to be gained that everyone should spend at least a few hours taking a look, whether you like basketball or not. Still, as much as I respect Wooden and everything he accomplished and passed on to thousands of people, I'd argue there's as much to learn from studying the philosophies of Ron Swanson and climbing his own Pyramid of Success. 

In many ways, Ron Swanson is my hero. In many ways, I aspire to be like him. I don't share his politics or attraction to crazy women per se, but Ron Swanson is a man's man, and I respect the hell out of that. He's self-reliant. He pulls no punches. He adores meat and makes no, er, bones about it. He avoids sharing emotions with fellow man whenever possible and is comfortably an island onto himself. Ron Swanson buries his gold. Ron Swanson knows government doesn't matter. Ron Swanson is a master handyman. God bless you, Ron Swanson. You fill me with optimism. 

Pearls of Swanson Wisdom: 

• Ron Swanson: I don't want to paint with a broad brush here, but every single contractor in the world is a miserable, incompetent thief.
• Ron Swanson: (On fishing) “It’s like yoga, except I still get to kill something.”
• Ron Swanson: “I’m surrounded by a lot of women in this department. And that includes the men.”
• Ron Swanson: “The less I know about other people’s affairs, the happier I am. I’m not interested in caring about people. I once worked with a guy for three years and never learned his name. Best friend I ever had. We still never talk sometimes.”
• Ron Swanson: “I won’t publicly endorse a product unless I use it exclusively. My only official recommendations are U.S. Army issued mustache trimmers, Morton’s salt, and the C.R. Lawrence Fein two inch axe-style scraper oscillating knife blade.”
• Ron Swanson: "When I’m done eating a Mulligan’s meal, for weeks afterwards there are flecks of meat in my mustache and I refuse to clean it because every now and then a piece of meat will fall into my mouth.”
• Ron Swanson: “The whole thing is a scam. Birthdays were invented by Hallmark to sell cards.”

Day 25: A Blind Guy Walking Down The Hall . . .

Today as I was walking down a hallway at work, a woman was filling up her glass from the water fountain. From the opposite direction a blind man who works in my building was walking our way. After the man accidentally grazed the woman on her foot with his walking cane, she said, “Oops, I’m sorry.” The man, though, quickly followed up by saying, “No, no. I’m sorry. I obviously wasn’t watching where I was going.”

Awesome.

Both the woman and I instantly let out a chuckle. The man, though, immediately let out a booming laugh, something I found so appealing and satisfying. That laugh was so genuine and hearty, it made my day.

I’m nearly positive that this guy has pulled out that same joke from the “Guaranteed To Get A Laugh” jar dozens of times over the years. Who cares? It’s a great line, and damn it, if a blind guy isn't able to tell that joke whenever the hell he wants, what's the point of all this? It’s a sure-fire winner, and there aren’t too many of those in life.

Still, although the joke got me, it was his response and laugh that lingered on. That beautiful, sincere, honest laugh. Even though I strongly suspect that wasn’t the first time he broke that joke out, the delivery, the response he got, and his own willingness to laugh at his own joke gave no hint as such. That laughter was so infectious and so appropriate and so unique to him, I felt fortunate to have been in the proximity.

I have a lifelong habit of reading too much into situations and paying them more attention than they deserve. It’s very likely that I’m doing that very thing in this situation, but I don’t care. He brightened my day and for at least a minute, I forgot where I was, what I was doing, and how stressful my day was. For that moment, it was just pure gold to be alive.

Not for a second did he make me feel or think, “Oh, I’m so lucky to have my sight.” “Oh, I’m so fortunate.” “Oh, I should be so grateful.” “Oh, there for the grace of God. . . .” That crap never entered my mind. He just made me laugh. He just made me smile. And for the rest of the day when I think about that one seemingly insignificant moment, I’ll do the same.

We’re all just travelers, man. We’re all just making our way. We all have our own crosses to bear. It’s so tremendously uplifting to me when individuals are able to tote their crosses everywhere they go without any indication they are doing so. 

Day 24: A Different Perspective On Being A Coach

My daughter’s basketball season has been an unmitigated mess. Disorganization pretty much has decimated the fun and competition she should have seen but didn’t, and I feel incredibly bad for her. I haven’t forgotten for a second the excitement and anticipation I literally started to feel days before games. I can feel those emotions stirring right now just sitting here and writing about it. Sweaty palms. Heart beating a little faster. Warrior mentality kicking in. Sleepless nights ahead. It was all so beautiful.

That’s why I sympathize so strongly with my daughter’s disappointment. Twice we’ve trucked off to games only to learn when we got there that her team didn’t have enough players to take the court. Three times we’ve trucked off to practice to either find only three girls there or no one at all, including her coaches. This is all in direct contrast to last season when every single little duckie was standing at attention seemingly every minute.

My general reaction to this perceived lack of leadership before, during, and after her games has been anger initially. I’ve coached a lot of teams in a lot of sports, and while organization was never my forte, I did recognize its importance. If you don’t have enough players to field a team, you don’t allow families to travel across town in the hope enough will make it. You make certain there are enough players beforehand. If not, you call each and every family, tell them you’re sorry, and we’ll try again next week. For games you prepare by planning who you’ll play and when. You don’t install an offense or defense in warm-ups. You don’t learn the kid’s name seconds before tipoff. And if you commit to coach, you show up for practices and games. You don’t invite a revolving door of people to do it. All have been issues with my daughter’s team this season.

 But in an attempt to be more optimistic and understanding, I really have tried to look at these issues from a different perspective, namely one that isn’t my own. For example, my daughter is playing on a team where I get the feeling that the coach being able to take off from work even a half hour early, let alone the entire afternoon, for a game simply isn’t an option. I have a feeling that work takes priority because work means surviving, unlike basketball, which doesn’t. The noticeable economic disparity between the girls on my daughter’s team and those on the other teams they play leads me to believe this. If you want to know the financial well-being of a team’s parents, just look at the shoes the players are wearing. You can learn a lot from that tidbit alone. If not the shoes, look to their warm-up jerseys, which in the case of my daughter’s team, there wasn’t any.

As badly as my daughter has felt and been let down certain times during this season, I have been extremely grateful for her participation. I think she’s learned more and grown more perhaps than she even might realize. By being in the vast minority on her team race-wise, I think she’s been forced to see the game and life in new ways. I think by being around girls from different socio-economic backgrounds who maybe have had to work a little harder and go without a little more and who aren’t intimidated by confrontation or a challenge on the court, my daughter has grown.

Mostly, I’ve tried to accept that for many people, reality gets in the way of fun, and not the other way around. I’ve tried to accept that just maybe, the disorganization that’s wreaked havoc on her team wasn’t due to negligence but perhaps necessity. I may be projecting, and I may be creating a false reality, but I don’t think so. If you’ve ever struggled to make it day to day, it’s not too difficult to recognize the same quality in others.

My daughter is a good player, and truth be told, playing on this team was a last-second occurrence due to her former traveling team experiencing unforeseen obstacles that resulted in not being able to put a team on the court. There will be other teams and more games in her future, probably with different girls. It would be easy to characterize her season as a series of unfortunate events, but that would be wrong.

Day 23: Popcorn, You Charmer You

Want to know what I’m really positive about? What really fills me full of optimism? Popcorn. Yep. Popcorn. Love it. Could eat it every day. In fact, I think I may have tried for a couple weeks back in the early 90s.

When I got sick a decade or so ago and the docs told me that popcorn would be a no-no for the rest of my remaining years, I contemplated whether life was worth still living. I’ve since defied doctor’s orders, and I’m still alive to tell about it. So, get bent, Dr. Killjoy. Popcorn is the miracle drug.

As strange as it seems, I have tremendous respect for the power of popcorn. The smell floods my mind with memories of being a kid on early Sunday nights, waiting for the Disney Sunday night movie to come on the tube, and hanging on for dear life as my dad made the long walk from the kitchen to living room to bring my sister and I our own bowl of his white gold. My dad made the best popcorn, and it pretty much became his duty.

My aunt Teri made terrific popcorn. The secret ingredient was bacon grease. Sure, if we knew then what we do now . . . but we didn’t, and I’m the better for stuffing that crunchy magic she popped up into my big mouth by the handful. My cousin Margie cooked the stuff up by the loads, and it was outstanding. Perfect salt-to-butter ratio, and the only thing that bested her popcorn was listening to her beautiful, cackling laugh echoing from the kitchen as she lifted the lid off the pan and a defiant kernel or two would escape the pot and go soaring into the air. I can still hear that laugh.

Plenty of Friday or Saturday nights, my mom would pop a big grocery bag full of the fluffy stuff before we’d head off to the drive-in near 84^th & Vine in Lincoln and devour the stuff over the course of a twin-bill. My mom made magnificent popcorn, and talk about coveted childhood memories. Few are better.

My college roommate Doug and I played gin rummy nearly every night for the longest time right at 10 p.m. watching the news. Best three-out-of-five hands with the loser making the popcorn we’d eat while watching “MASH” starting promptly at 10:30. He always lost, and he always made a tasty bowlful (begrudgingly).

When I lived on my own for the first time after college, I commonly skipped supper and substituted a bowl of popcorn instead. I couldn’t have been happier for being lazy and being challenged in the kitchen. When I got married, my wife showed me her secret popcorn weapon (preheat the oil with several dashes of salt added in), and life was never the same.

I eat microwave popcorn today, but it’s not the same. It’s too easy. It’s too instantly gratifying. There’s no toil involved. The payoff is too immediate. There’s not anticipation. There’s no aroma slowly filling the space. There are fewer lingering old maids to pick and choose among. There’s only an empty bag as an afterthought. No bowls. No butter on the countertop. No salt under the fingernails. It’s too easy. But it’s still popcorn, and I marvel at its simplistic beauty.  

Day 22: My Wife

Pablo Neruda is my favorite poet. That wasn't always the case, but the first time I read "The Queen" from "The Captain's Verses" it was so. I fell hard, and I fell for so many reasons. Foremost, Neruda was able to say what I wanted but wasn't able. Neruda felt things for a woman that I believed I had felt, yet I couldn't come anywhere close to expressing my devotion and respect and worship that way he was able. Neruda spoke from the heart, but he did so in a way that made me believe he was channeling what he felt in his mind, spirit, and heart directly with no filters, no apprehension, no hesitance, no barriers. Neruda related his emotions hard and true. I admired that immediately, and I still do. 

And when you appear all the rivers sound 
in my body, bells 
shake the sky, and a hymn fills the world.

Only you and I, 
only you and I, my love, 
listen to it.

I wrote my first poem when I was 14. Of course, it was about a girl. But it wasn't an ode to love. It was an ode to misery. An ode to rejection. An ode to a broken heart. That's where most of my personal writing has always remained--in the blackness, in the darkness, in the chasm. I've never been afraid to explore the "shit." In the years since, I've written very, very few poems, or anything else for that matter, of a personal nature that anyone would classify as being positive. It's not easy for me. Never has been. Sometimes, I feel I lack the ability to even pull it off. But there are those people and moments and emotions that all come together in perfect timing and inspire me. When I've been smart enough to pay attention to those times, I've been rewarded with the gift of being able to accurately capture how I felt. That's a gift, and I recognize it. 

Poems aren't for everyone. I'm not sure people even read poetry anymore, at least not as many as used to. Still, poems are the best way I've always known to capture the moment, emotion, and people. My favorite poem I've written is about my wife. That's not a coincidence. There's meaning and purpose there. There is stark reality in the words. True meaning. I'm proud of this poem. I proud of it because it says everything I feel but can't articulate verbally. I don't know if I would classify myself as an artist. I'm not sure I possess the skill to dub myself as such. But I think I own an artist's heart and mind, and that means putting yourself out there and dare to explore below the surface. I'm so grateful I dug below the surface and let myself feel these words: 

Thoughts On Shannon

On certain evenings,

I want your hair to hang down,

to drape deep with shadows,

to curl wild on bounce and wind.

I want you to pout your lip,

to heat me,

to slip your cheek,

to trick my eye,

to promise your voice,

to sway me full,

to twist your tongue,

to lick me sweet.

I want your jaw slung low,

to overtake my faith,

to slope my neck,

to drain me weak,

to drive me drunk,

to freeze me still,

to blaze my night,

to trace my eyes,

to rose my cheeks,

to spread the sky,

to leave me summer-strong.

On certain evenings,

I want your hair to hang down.

BAF