The Inner Struggle

Dave Navarro. Photo by the noh8campaing.

All the problems of the world can be credited to one single emotion: fear. It's what motivates us to hate things or avoid things. It dictates our actions, often wrong actions. But the thing is, fear is honest. It may be misinformed, but it's honest. We trust our fear, and rightly so. It can save our lives. But we do wrong when we let it control us and limit us.

The only thing in the world that can stop fear in its tracks is love. Every good thing we do is generated from it. That's where we get our empathy, our compassion, our charity. Love is what runs into a burning building even though it might kill us. Love beats fear down if you have enough of it.

There is an old story, usually cited as a Native American parable of sorts, that says each of us has two wolves inside us. We have the bad wolf that kills and terrorizes, and the good wolf that protects its brothers and loves its pack. And these wolves are always in battle with each other. Which one wins? The one you feed.

Too many people are feeding the bad wolf. They feed it with political arguments, religious  arguments. They feed it by focusing on the few differences we have instead of the many sames we have. They feed their fear until all they can think of is hating people, and ultimately it drives them to do wrong and unfair things.

Feed your love. And stop looking at that wolf in other people that gives you fear. Their wolf may be your brother and you don't even know it.

Dang, it's been a while.

I can't believe it has been more than two years since I made a post. How have you lived without me?

Well, I've been busy. I lot of stuff has happened in the past two years. I got divorced, so that was a pretty big deal. But it's OK, apart from the being poor and working at a crappy job part of it. Maybe that will get better soon too.

I've been in love with someone, but that's never going to work out. He can't make up his mind about stuff. And I thought women were supposed to be the indecisive ones? Regardless, I enjoyed it while it lasted. And honestly, I don't know if I could have made it through the last year without it, so I have no regrets.

My son is doing well, mostly. He's pretty lazy, so that's a problem, but he has a good heart and a great imagination and a strong sense of fairness and honor.

Where does this all leave me? I could be in worse shape. But I'm at a strange place in life and not exactly sure what my next step is. I left a long marriage and a reasonably secure identity, and then realized that identity had been false for almost the whole time. I've spent a lot of years doing what other people expect out of me and trying to live up to this or that standard, and now that I'm free to do whatever I want...I have no idea where to start. So it's a new adventure. Maybe I'm not too old yet to get somewhere.

Dream Big

A few days ago I had the chance to talk to a woman who is being treated for cancer. The good news is that they found it early, her treatments are going well, and she is expected to fully recover. But even so, you can't help thinking about death when you talk to someone like that. The idea that your life will end one day, whether slowly or suddenly, and that will be all she wrote. There are no do-overs.

Marcus Aurelius said that a man should not fear death. Rather he should fear never having lived. And Mark Twain said that it isn't the things you've done that you will regret most at your life's end. It's the things you didn't do. What do they mean? They mean you should get off your ass and do something.

I'm 41. If I were dying right now, I could look back on my life and think that, overall, it was a decent life. I have a wonderful, loving son, and that's enough to call it a decent life in spite of anything else. But apart from him, I don't have much to show for it. I've spent a lifetime not living or following my dreams. And I can blame no one but myself.

I have figured out that, no matter what your dreams are and no matter how small they may seem, somebody is going to dissuade you. Somebody is going to say that it's stupid or can't be done, or that you'd be better off doing this other thing than what you really want. And if I could give my son one parting piece of advice on my deathbed, it would be to ignore that bullshit and do what you want. Anyone who really cares about you will help you reach your dreams, not stand in your way. Get rid of the people who do. Make your plan and follow through. If you find out for yourself that it can't be done, so be it. But don't take someone else's word for it. Just create a new plan and go to work on that one.

And don't wait until you are 41 to do it.

Throw Me A Rope

It's bad to wake up one day and realize you are a fuck-up. It's worse when you wake up to this feeling often and still can't break the cycle.

Yeah, yeah. I've had Depression. Yes, it's bad. If you've never experienced it, I'll try to describe it. Imagine a normally functioning human being with friends, hobbies, interests. This person has good personality traits and bad personality traits, like everyone else in the world. They have goals and dreams. They care about things. They have some passion. They have successes to celebrate and disappointments to overcome. They are just like anyone else.

When you add Depression you get...a normally (barely) functioning human being with friends, hobbies, interests. This person has good personality traits and bad personality traits, like everyone else in the world. They have goals and dreams. They care about (no) things. They have some (no) passion. They have successes to celebrate and disappointments to overcome. They are just like anyone else (who sucks at life).

So, yeah. I'll cut myself some slack for dealing with that. But what now? Once it seems you are almost out of the black hole you recognize that you have a dearth of social skills. You don't know how to deal with real people anymore. You've lost whatever social talents you may have once had. You no longer have good work habits. Your ability to plan and strategize is gone. All those social muscles have atrophied. This makes you feel somewhat helpless, quite frightened of the world, and kinda worthless. It's pretty easy to slip back down in the black hole unless you can find a rope.

But in short, you're a fuck-up. Even if you do find a rope. It's going to take some work to stop being like that. Where to start? I'm just throwing myself into the fire, going to school. The black hole is telling me that it's a huge mistake and that I will only screw it up. The tiny little voice of hope in my head is saying otherwise, but it's hard to hear that voice some days when all you can see around you is everything you screw up.

I mean, look at this blog post. Writing is the only talent I ever had, and this effort is a piece of shit.

I Got Your Paradigm Shift Right Here

More than a year ago I wrote about those annoying buzzwords and cool phrases in this very blog. Time to revisit the subject.

I was chatting with a pal recently:

"...and it's like a total paradigm shift..." he said.
"Wait, did you just say--"
"I know..."
"Did you just say 'paradigm shift,' because if you did we can't be friends now."
"I know. I'm sorry, you just pick up these corporate buzzwords at work and they get ingrained."

To his credit, he swears he never used the phrase "thinking outside the box," so I'll just put this incident behind us.

As a sports fan, there are a ton of words and phrases that get under my skin after a while. For example, even though I'm a Browns fan and love the kid, I'm sick of hearing Josh Cribbs described as "a beast." Every time a player in the NFL makes a good play, somebody calls him a beast. It doesn't matter what the play was or how big the guy is or what position he plays, he's a beast. Let's look at the word for a moment. A beast is simply an animal. As humans we are all, indeed, beasts. It's a generic term. A bull elephant is a beast, but so is a field mouse. Now, Shaun Rogers, at 6'4" and 350 may indeed be a "beast" the way ESPN likes to use the word. The comparison makes some sense, particularly given the fact that his position as nose tackle requires him to pound people into the ground. Cribbs is 6'1" and 215, which, believe it or not, puts him at the smaller end of the scale in terms of NFL players. His job on the field requires him to be elusive, graceful, fast. He's not the same kind of "beast" Rogers is. So why insist on the word, ad nauseam? In terms of beasts, it would be much more evocative to call Rogers a rhino and call Cribbs a cheetah.

Another thing that goes straight up my ass these days is "on so many levels." Usually something is described as being "wrong" on so many levels, much like the repeated use of this phrase. What levels are these, exactly? And how many levels could there possibly be? Using the word "levels" suggests a hierarchy of wrongness. It's wrong on level one, but maybe not wrong on level five. Or perhaps it suggests categories of wrongness. Why not just wrong in many ways or for many reasons? Or how about just flat-out wrong, and be done with it?

It is lazy thinking, writing and speaking that causes people to latch onto these words and phrases. The English language is full of words, some simple and some more complex. They are all good and useful for describing anything. The goal of communication is understanding. You use the phrase "paradigm shift" to sound smarter and more elite. Simply adopting a new way of thinking, which is the same thing, doesn't quite have the same snap, does it?  You call a guy a beast because you're too lazy to reach into your bag of adjectives and really find a way to describe his play. Not to mention that it's really cool. And why are you wrong on so many levels? I suppose so you can sound like a teenage twit.

OK, I'm done being a hardass. I know we can't help it. Once popular culture becomes saturated with one of these annoying and largely nondescriptive descriptors, we find them popping up in our writing and speech without even thinking about it. I just ask us to rebel against it.

The Most Perfect Bra In The World

It's a rare thing for me to use my  blog as a product endorsement, but since nobody reads it anyway, here goes. I have found the most perfect bra in the world.

If you have big boobs, finding a bra that fits is nearly impossible. I have tried every brand in every price range. Many of them will work, but they don't fit. There is a certain way bras are suppose to fit you. For example, the wires are supposed to fit flat against your breastbone. I have never had a bra fit that way, ever. Until now. And not only that, but it's an underwire bra I can wear all day and it doesn't poke. Sometimes I even forget I have it on. I own two and I am about to own two more. But I was lucky. When I went back to order again, my size was sold out.  In fact, most of the sizes were sold out. I searched for an hour until I found a website that had them in stock. I'm not the only busty girl who has discovered this miracle of an undergarment.

It is made by Goddess and is the Keira Banded Satin Underwire, No. 6090. It comes in three colors: Fawn, Chocolate and Violet. Good luck finding one. When you do, you will praise my name.

At The Dentist's Office

10 a.m. this morning. It's cold. I've been given four shots on the upper right, and it feels like my eyeball is numb. I'm sleepy and my mouth is full of something plastic that is gouging into my lower jaw which has not been numbed, cotton balls and an enormous clamp of some kind. And hands.

Heath the Dentist: "You ready?"
Me: "Uh huh."
(drilling commences, sound of suction hose. "Fat Bottom Girls" starts playing on the radio station)
Dental assistant Bonita: "Oh, I hate this song. It's just awful. There's no need of it."
Heath: "What is it?"
Bonita: "'Fat Bottom Girls.' I know my bottom is fat. I don't need somebody to sing about it. It's not nice."
Heath: "Fat Bottom...is that what he's saying?"
Bonita: "Yes!"
Heath: "Sounds to me like he likes it." (grinding) "You OK?"
Me: "Uh huh."
Bonita: "Like he likes it? Then why would he call it fat?"
Heath: "How do I know? But that's what he said. Fat Bottom Girls make the rocket world go round."
Me: "Wockin."
Heath: "Rockin world. He likes 'em big-boned, Bonita. There's you a man."
Bonita: "I don't need a man. You saw Tiger Woods' wife is beating him with a golf club for runnin' around."
Heath: "You don't know that. He had a car wreck and that's that."
Bonita: "Right. She oughta beat him."
Heath: "What if it was her doing it? Should he beat her?"
Bonita: "....No. Nobody should beat anybody, but I don't blame her."
Me: "Unghh.."
Heath: "You feel that?"
Me: "Mmhmm."
Heath: "Dang, I done gave you four shots!" (injects more novocaine) "I guess you'll learn to floss better, right?"
Me: "Uh huh."
Heath: "You don't know what happened until he says what happened, and you're just gossiping. You don't even know."
Bonita: "It's not gossip if it's true."
Heath: "Yes it is! If it ain't any of your business and it tears somebody down, it's gossip. Don't matter if it's true or not."
Bonita: "Where does it say that in the Bible?"
Heath: "You have to read it in the Bible to know it's true? You ain't ever had people talk about your family?"
Bonita: "My family is talked about enough."
Heath: "Do you like it?"
Bonita: "No."
Heath: "Well too bad I guess. It ain't in the Bible, so you just have to suffer. I need some suction and some composite."
(suction)
Bonita: "Tell him. Everybody knows what he was doing. It's not gossip if everybody knows."
Me: "Uh-uh. Lee ee ow uh ih."
Heath: "Hear that? Leave her out of it. Some of us don't gossip like you, Aunt B."
Bonita: "I hate when you call me Aunt B. She only said that because your hands are in her mouth. Maybe they have one of those open marriage."
Heath: "Like that swinger's club in Texas. I saw that on TV. If I made 37 million I'd just say, 'Honey, this is how it is and if you don't like it you can leave,' right, Dawn?"
Me: "Hmm. Duh see gehda had a oywhen den too?"
Heath: "I reckon if she wants one."
Me: {shrugs} "Oh ay den."
Bonita: "I saw that on TV too! There was this show, and this couple and they had another girl living with them in the house. Just as happy. I hollered for David to come in and see it. I said, 'Would you look at this trash.'"
Heath: "Two women in the house? I can't stand one most of the time."
Bonita: "Oh he liked it, the husband did. She did too 'cause her door swung both ways."
Heath: "Oh she liked the girl too, huh? Well that's good then. I guess we oughta be glad they're happy. Bite down. That feel ok?"
Me: "Eh."
Bonita: "What? It's the same thing as...well, maybe it's not. I don't even know what you call that."
Me: (Thinking, "It's called polyamory, but there is not a chance in hell i can say that.")
Heath: "I call it none of my business. We're done. I want Chinese for lunch."

Living Purple

I bought purple sheets this week. Usually I go for the highest thread count cotton sheets I can afford, but this time I went unconventional. I found a sale on sheets made of stretch jersey knit. T-shirt material. There was heather gray, beige, brown, white, sage green...and purple. I found it hard to look at the other colors with the purple beckoning. It was an obvious  choice.

As fate would have it, someone pointed out a well-known poem to me that also has a purple theme.

Warning
by Jenny Joseph

When I am an old woman I shall wear purple
With a red hat which doesn't go, and doesn't suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
And satin sandals, and say we've no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I'm tired
And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
And run my stick along the public railings
And make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
And pick the flowers in other people's gardens
And learn to spit

You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat
And eat three pounds of sausages at a go
Or only bread and pickle for a week
And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes

But now we must have clothes that keep us dry
And pay our rent and not swear in the street
And set a good example for the children.
We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.

But maybe I ought to practice a little now?
So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.

That is a great poem. Don't you love old people whose ties to convention break? You know that switch that says, "stop that," or that filter that says, "don't say that." When they've reached a certain age with certain life experience and just say, "Fuck it." You wish you could be like them and not care what the neighbors think. You wish you didn't have to create some acceptable facade for work or for church or for the PTA. But alas, you're tied to convention because you have to raise good kids and have a good job and be respectable and have some sort of status in your social group. The smart people disable that switch and throw out that filter before they get old. They already wear purple.They go to Paris with money they should invest in stock. The live freely and think freely.

I don't suggest that convention doesn't have its place. Manners are important. Following the rules is usually a good idea. Obeying the law ensures rights and safety. I just suggest that worrying over whether or not the neighbors will like your pink yard flamingos is less important than nearly anything. And let them gossip about why you weren't in church or why you don't sell the school fundraiser junk.

I talk big, but I'm afraid I actually still care a bit too much. Tonight though, on my purple sheets and with my bedside table adorned with roses I bought for myself, I will think about how I can let it go and get free. I'm almost 40. The time has come.

We Interrupt This Blog With A Call From My Son

I have custom ringtones for a few people in my mobile phone. Scooter's ringtone is the Transformers theme. He's into Transformers, big time. If I get a call from my son it is usually about one of three things: He saw a really cool Transformer, he wants to to to Walmart to get a Transformer, he wants to know what is for supper.

Today he's out with my father for their Saturday Go-to-Breakfast/Go-to-Walmart excursion. Sometimes they go to a movie. They do this every Saturday. This means every Saturday I get calls from Scooter.

[Ringtone blares: "Transformers! More than meets the eye! Transformers! Robots in disguise!"]
"Hello?"
"Hey, Mother?"
"Yes?"
"I just  saw a Cliff Jumper! You know what it is? It's red! It's a repaint of Bumblebee. It's usually just a repaint of Bumblebee, but it's a Cliff Jumper! It's freakin' awesome!"
"That's great, Son."
"I love you, Mother." 
[click]

I  know a lot about Transformers these days. More than I want to know. But he likes them, and there are certainly worse things he could be enthusiastic about. Like girls. I'll take a 12-year-old toy geek over a 12-year-old horndog any day.

["Transformers! More than meets the eye! Transfor–"]
"Hello?"
"Hey, Mother?"
"Yes?"
"I talked to Jenny. She didn't get me that Scorponok. She wasn't shopping for Christmas. She just found it in the socks at T.J.Maxx and wanted to know if I had one."
"OK."
"That means I can get the cool red and black repaint Scorponok! Hurrah!"
"If that's what you like, Son."
"Hey, Mother? Thank you for getting me Swerve."
"You're welcome."
"I love you, Mother."
[click]

Arguably, he's spoiled. Between me and my parents, he gets most of what he wants in terms of Transformers. But in his defense, he doesn't ask for much else. He isn't into brand clothing (yet), he isn't constantly asking for a PS3 or a Wii or some hundred-dollar new video game. He's never once suggested that what we really need is a 15-foot plasma screen TV. And admittedly, I love to get him the damn things. He gets so excited! It doesn't matter if I like them or not. My pleasure is hearing him talk about them. I do worry about myself though. I've lately started to think Optimus Prime is kinda hot. You know, for a giant alien robot.

["Transformers! More than meets–"]
"Hello?"
"Hey, Mother?"
"Yes?"
"Do you have stuff to make spaghetti for supper?"
"Yep."
"Yes! I love you, Mother."
[click]

Love you too, Scooter.

Everything You Thought Is Wrong, But That's OK

Who can be certain in this life? We get fed a bunch of nonsense as children and then slowly watch all those beliefs get torn down as the years go by. Ideas like lifelong friendship, blood being thicker than water, good triumphing over evil, true love never dying...horseshit. Sure, sometimes it works out like that, but the reality is that you get burned a lot by banking on those ideas. It's enough to make you cynical if you let it. You just need to develop a more pragmatic view of things. Don't expect so much of people. Don't expect too much of yourself. We humans may be the "paragon of animals," as Shakespeare suggested, but don't get caught up in the paragon part of that phrase and forget the animals part.

1. Friends come and go. Friends are transient. The likelihood of lifelong friendship between two people is rare. The likelihood of lifelong friendship between more than two people is nearly impossible. This is just my opinion, but it's an informed opinion. I've seen friendships destroyed over things like jobs or politics. I know that your best friend will screw your wife under the least bit of opportunity or provocation. I know that your best friend will abandon you for somebody "cooler," even when you're grown up and think you are beyond that kind of shallowness. Your friendship might even end due to something less traumatic, like a move that puts distance between you until the friendship becomes more like an acquaintanceship. It happens. I used to lament this kind of thing, not just if one of my friendships was broken, but even when I saw someone else's friendship suffer. Now I see it differently. Friendship is like your favorite television series. It may have a long run, but in time it will probably get canceled. If you're lucky you'll get repeats of the best episodes now and then, and you can always remember those episodes fondly. I'm not suggesting you shouldn't give friendship your all just because it might not last forever. Of course you should. Then if it breaks or fades you'll be in good practice to be somebody else's friend for a while.

2. There is a fine line between love and hate. This is what you get with families. You are born into a family and almost forced to develop love bonds with them due to blood. It's automatic. But the intense love and familiarity that comes with blood relationships breeds opportunity for enmity. The worst fights and most painful estrangements you will see are between siblings. Usually it's money. Property, inheritance. It brings out the worst in people. And because they know you so well, they know best how to hurt you. Maybe that's why the poorest families seem to be the closest. That is, until you have two brothers in love with the same woman. Your family is your family, but figure out that they are no better or worse than anyone else in the world just because they share your DNA.

3. True love is as fragile and breakable as a china cup. An interesting fact about a china cup is that you can turn it upside down on the floor, stand on the base of it and it will hold the weight of an average person without breaking. It's that strong and amazing. But you can tap it carelessly with a teaspoon and break it into a million pieces. It's that tender. And that's how love is. Usually it will endure the heaviest burdens with ease. I think this is because we have a plan for those things. We realize those huge burdens are often beyond our control, and even imagine ahead of time what to do if one of these burdens falls upon us. But it's those everyday knocks that do us in. That little chip. That hairline crack that goes unrepaired. The careless misuse of love until it is barely holding together is its undoing. One day, it will no longer hold the tea and it will shatter. Yes, yes, some people enjoy a lifetime of use from their china cup, and that's great and beautiful. But most people are careless with their teaspoons. The good thing is, you only have to break one to learn your lesson most of the time.

4. The ultimate myth common to  all these situations and relationship is the idea that good triumphs over evil. It does sometimes, but you can't count on it. Good gets screwed a lot. I think I have figured out why. The assholes of the world spend a lifetime working the system to their own advantage. They bend the rules until they nearly break, they subvert the system, they burn both ends of the candle, they leave somebody else holding the bag. They get very skilled at it. It's a constant mental exercise. Meanwhile, those of us who try to do good are usually doing what seems most natural. We don't think about it. So the evil people of the world run on cleverness and the good people of the world run on instinct and emotion. Clever usually wins. If you want to even the odds you have to get smart, and the other side is already smarter than you are. They've had more practice. But it's OK. You know you're right to do the right things. Just heal up and move on. And get smarter.

God

I'm an Agnostic. I think. What I mean is, I don't believe in God the way most people do. I just never bought the all-knowing creator image. It never made sense to me, and still doesn't. And I'm educated and intelligent enough to know that evolution is real. That doesn't mean a God can't also exist, but it doesn't exist the way they taught me at Sunday School.

Growing up in the South, believe me, I had plenty of religious education. As an adult, I have found it illuminating to learn about the belief systems of others around the world, from various Christian denominations, to Buddists and Hindus, or Muslims and Jews. I find religion to be a fascinating subject and I'm not against it at all.

I'm no expert, but I'm pretty sure nobody has it quite right. Not 100 percent. But I appreciate that we seem to be trying to get it right. No, not "organized religion" so much. Organized religion just wants converts and needs to be "right" all the time. I mean individuals. Whether or not God is real is beside the point. Mankind has created religion as a means to transcend. It gives us something to aspire to, guidelines for good living. Who can dispute the wisdom of The Golden Rule or the Four Nobel Truths? It gives me great hope that we humble humans have devised such guidelines and attempt to follow them, however poorly we may do so at times.

The Hindus have a greeting, "Namaste." Roughly translated, it means "The god in me honors the god in you." I have come to embrace this idea as the single tenet in my own personal religion. God does exist in every one of us. You see it in those people who give and love without asking for anything in return. You see it in human creativity, in literature and art and music. You feel when it is near you, and you feel its absence. We have the Devil in us too, and it's easy to spot when it rears its ugly head. The trick is cultivating god and choking down the devil. The choices we make and with whom we associate determine our success in that endeavor.

So no, I don't believe in a God that has the magic powers to bestow happiness and prosperity upon us nor take it away. I believe we have that power in us. So go be God today. Namaste.

None of Your Business: The Path to Happiness

There are things about which a person should care. Their job, their family, their health, their home. The essentials. In fact, we should care deeply about those things at the expense of everything else. Regrettably, we spend too much time giving a damn about stupid things at the expense of the essentials.

I blame my favorite thing in the world, the internet. Every day we are bombarded with things to care about that we would otherwise never even know if not for the world wide web. Oh sure, TV can bear some blame too, but the inundation of "news" and other minutia we get from the internet may be the single largest source of distress the world has witnessed since the Black Plague. We simply know too much and most if it is worthless. And "social networking" in the form of Facebook and internet forums is yet another flea on a dog's ass that keeps us scratching ourselves raw. We give a damn about stuff that is not important at all, like Some Fool's post or any number of things are None of Our Business.

So let's clear the slate a bit, shall we?

1. Obama's Nobel Peace Prize
Why do you care? Some Scandinavian committee arbitrarily gives out awards every year which do nothing to create peace nor destroy it. This award is no more significant to the lives of you and me than an Academy Award or the Piquipsy Rotary Club Man of the Year. I suppose unless you are from Piquipsy. Also, it's their committee. They get to pick. Therefore, it is None of Your Business. Stop caring.

2. The News
Don't watch it. I gave up watching the daily news a few years ago, to my great happiness. Sure, I still hear about things. Random stories of interest will appear on my home page, or Some Fool will post a link to something he gives a great big damn about, and I'll know it then. Not that it's any of my business to know it. And I promise you, if something really big happens, like a terrorist attack or a dramatic change in hemlines in the spring fashion forecast, you'll know it. So stop watching the news. Go have sex or watch a ball game. You'll be much happier.

3. Some Fool
I used to be like you and care very deeply about what Some Fool thinks of me on the internet or down the street. I have a long-standing and deeply-seated need to be accepted and loved. This has not served me well and I am trying to overcome it. I have figured out that what Some Fool thinks of me privately, or even says about me among his or her friends is actually None of My Damn Business. People are free to think whatever they like about me or you, and rarely will anything they say about us have any real affect on our lives. You know why? Nobody gives a damn about it except you and me. So why should we?

4. World Peace
Are you crazy? It's not gonna happen. Ever. You can fret and care and worry yourself sick about what the French think of Americans or what the Israelis and Palestinians think of each other or if the Italians elected another porn star to Parliament, but it isn't anything you can control. I understand that you worry you won't have as good a time on your trip to Paris if the French hate the U.S., or that the price of oil may rise if there is trouble in the Middle East. But it is still None of Your Business. We have the mistaken impression that the world is small, and it is not. It is big and full of all kinds of people. They are not under your control. Do you want them minding Your Business? Quid pro quo. They stay out of Yours. You stay out of Theirs.

You know that cliché Serenity Prayer? The one where you pray for the wisdom to know the difference about things you can control and things you can't? A cliché may be annoying, but that doesn't mean it isn't true. Figure out for yourself what things you can actually control. Those are the things you care about. The rest is None of Your Business. Don't worry about it.

Zero Tolerance for Lazy Thinking

In the past week or so we've seen a Cub Scout and an Eagle Scout suspended from school for carrying knives. Poor little Zachary Christie, 6, faces 45 days in alternative school for bringing his eating utensil to campus. It was one of those spoon/fork/knife combos. He wanted to eat his lunch with it. And now Matthew Whalen, 17, is being suspended for 20 days for having a 2-inch knife inside a survival kit in his car at school. You see, these boys are clearly terrorists in the Zero Tolerance world of today's schools. Never mind that Zachary is an A student who wears a shirt and tie voluntarily, and never mind that Matthew is an honored senior who is already a soldier in the United States Army with aspirations of going to West Point. These children are a menace.

Zero Tolerance policies do not get the results they aim to get. They do nothing to prevent a violent attack on a fellow student. Those still happen every day. They do nothing to stop a person from committing an act of assault or murder if that is truly their intent. People with criminal minds do not follow laws, so your Zero Tolerance policy means nothing to them. So what are they for in the first place?

The real reason for ZT policies is to spare administrators and teachers the job of using their brains and assessing each situation on its own merits. It's the same sort of one size fits all justice that created the "three strikes" laws that removed judicial discretion from the hands of judges and placed it in the hands of bureaucrats. It's lazy thinking, and simply a way to disown any responsibility of leadership. It fails to prevent anything bad and punishes children who are no more a terrorist than I am.

Wait...I do carry a pocket knife.

UnaMUSEd

Yeah, yeah. It's been ever since I wrote anything. But since I'm experiencing yet another ban from a sports forum, I'll try to get back into the habit. I mean, I can't let down all seven of my followers.

Over here to your left is Calliope, the muse of epic poetry. She's not much help. I've never been much of a poet, though I think every writer wishes to be such. Perhaps Clio, the muse of history, would be a better choice. I suppose blogging is a sort of record of history in a way, though not likely a history many people are very interested in learning.

But I will endeavor to persevere with or without the help of a muse to inspire me. Sometimes you just have to be your own muse.

Part of the Problem

It used to be that friends and family only harassed you by telephone or with unannounced visits. My own family tends to just walk in because I almost never lock my door. Then I get greeted with statements like, "You're not dressed!" That's right. I might have been had you rang first, but you didn't. Now when I remember to lock the door they still arrive unannounced and pound until I let them in. The question then is, invariably, "Why is your door locked?" To keep you out.

But thanks to the wonder of technology, you can and will be harassed through email, text and instant message. Chronic harassers prefer these methods because they can't be rejected. You'll never actually block your dear friends' or your mother's emails, so they have a clear shot at you. Chain emails are my favorite, by which I mean they are the things that make me want to spill blood. Not mine either.

Guardian Angels, Friendship Roses and Good Luck Prayers clutter my inbox daily, all of them urging me to forward them on to at least 10 other unsuspecting schmucks, all of whom have probably already received this same email from somebody else. A few of them even urge me to forward the thing back to the person who sent it to me! I can't imagine such an idea. I didn't want the first one, so why in the hell would I send it on to 10 other people with the hope that all 10 of them will send the same damn thing back to me again?

It's not that I don't appreciate the thought that I'm included in someone's "forward to" list. Some of the emails are even cute, but most of them are stupid and none of them will I forward on to another individual. I will not do it because I have enough people and situations in my life that force my hand, and I will not be ordered around by an email. Threaten me with disaster and financial ruin if you must, but it's getting deleted. The other day I got one that said, "If you don't forward this message you are part of the problem." Good! Delete.

I've called my T-shirt guy and he's screening me a shirt that reads "I Am Part of the Problem." I'll take a picture of it and send it to all my friends and family with the plea that they forward it along to everyone in their address folder. If they refuse to do it, well, they're just part of the solution.

Left Out

I don't drink coffee. More than just not liking it, I am put off by it. Years ago I could at least say that I liked the aroma of coffee if not the taste, but when I was pregnant 13 years ago my sense of smell was heightened to such an extreme that even scents I liked before became noxious. Coffee was one of those, and I have never recovered from it.

The problem this poses for me is that I am totally left out of the Great Coffee Social that seems to thrill the rest of the world. All the time people are "going for coffee," or chatting it up on their coffee break or talking about how you "just don't want to see me before I've had my coffee," and it makes me feel like a loser. I think, "Wow...I wish people were scared to see me before I had coffee! That must kick ass." Hell, "Coffee" is the first entry on one of my favorite blogs ever, Stuff White People Like. See how important it is?

I've tried coffee every conceivable way, and it just doesn't work for me, so there I am, the one non-coffee drinker of the bunch. Oh, I've tried to fake it. I've done the hot chocolate instead. I've even gone exotic with a vanilla soy steamer or something equally ridiculous, but it's like I'm the one guy drinking a Fuzzy Navel when everybody else is doing Jåger Bombs. It's just pussy. You don't do it.

But the worst are the incredulous looks I get when I say I don't drink coffee. It's not astonishment even. It's more like horror. "You don't drink coffee? Are you kidding me?" No. Not. I'm just a vanilla soy drinking loser. Sorry to offend.

This is a manageable malady though. In time people come to accept my deficiency and some even find it charming in that "isn't she weird?" kind of way. I can live with it. I just have to remind myself never to mention that I also don't like Led Zeppelin. That would really mark me as a total freak, and I just don't know if I can deal.

Sexy Weather

Don't let the map of Ohio fool you. It was just too good not to use, but rest assured nobody has sexier weather than Alabama and no people get a bigger boner for the weather than people in the South.

I know what you're saying. We don't get blizzards down here and we rarely suffer major floods. It's true, our weather is fairly temperate. What that means is any weather incident is newsworthy and likely to cause great excitement and widespread panic. For example:

Heat and Drought
Amazingly enough, Alabama can go eight weeks straight with no rainfall and yet maintain a humidity level of 100 percent. This is typically accompanied by dramatic reminisces of the "Drought of '64" in which the earth was so parched and cracked you could stare straight down into the yawning mouth of Hell itself. It is also marked by comments on how dead the grass is, water use restrictions and fantastic weather graphics on the nightly news indicating the Deadly Heat Index. Eventually, it will rain, and this is always celebrated with a rash of car accidents as soon as the first drops of moisture hit the asphalt.

Tornados
It is hard to get sexier than a 250-mph funnel of doom. This typically causes a frenzied circle jerk among the weather persons in the state. All regular television programming is suspended on a night in which tornadoes are forecast so each station can run competing maps of their Mega-Doppler 3000 Accu-Cast. There is exciting talk of "hook echoes" and discussions of "straight-line winds" and "super-cells." Midway through the night, the weathermen will remove their sport coats, loosen their neckties and roll up their sleeves to better indicate their tireless efforts to bring us the news that "no tornadoes have yet been spotted on the ground, but folks we've got a long night ahead of us." My feeling is that these guys are all reciting voodoo incantations in front of their radar, praying for the worst to happen.

Snow and Ice
As exciting as a tornado is, nothing quite gets the juices flowing for an Alabamian like the threat of winter precipitation. This is of course because we rarely get any significant snow or ice and even the smallest amount will close schools and interstates and any state office, because God knows a bureaucrat will look for any excuse not to work. The most interesting thing that happens is the Bread and Milk Run on the local grocery stores where old ladies will tussel like mud wrestlers over a loaf of rye that they would never normally ingest. For some reason, people in the South feel that any winter storm can be weathered as long as one has enough bread and milk. I've always thought that if one is to be snowed in for a week and possibly frozen to death it would be more enjoyable to have lots of soft drinks, snack cakes and bacon. You know, something worth having for a last meal. Whole wheat and 2-percent just doesn't fire me up.

I don't watch the weather. I don't have to. I can walk outside to see if it is hot, my mother will call me at 2 a.m. if there is the possibilty of tornadoes, and if I walk into the Piggly Wiggly to find all the bread is gone I know that somebody mentioned snow. So I buy Twinkies.

Birthday

In a little over a month, provided I live that long, I'll be 39. I'm not particularly looking forward to it, though I'm not really dreading it either.

What is a birthday? I was excited to turn 16, but it was because that was the age for a drivers license. I was excited to be 18 because that meant I could vote. Typically, I was excited to be 21 because that meant I could legally buy alcohol. Beyond reaching those landmark years of increased privilege, birthdays don't really count for anything significant other than the passage of time.

This doesn't mean you don't notice them. When I turned 36 I fell into a significant depression due to a number of things, but as the year progressed I realized that a big part of it was that I dreaded my 37th birthday. I wondered why. Even turning "the big 3-0" hadn't bothered me at all. Perhaps it was because, at 36, you can still claim to be in your mid-30s, but at 37 you have moved into the late 30s area. And then there was that damned Marianne Faithful song, The Ballad of Lucy Jordan: "At the age of 37, she realized she'd never drive through Paris in a sports car with the warm wind in her hair..." Lucy ended up in the nuthouse, which is probably where I need to be half the time, but the good news is that once I actually turned 37 I was over it. As it turned out, it wasn't such a big deal after all, Paris notwithstanding.

So now here comes 39. People seem to put a lot of stock in this one. I have an aunt who used to tell people for years that she was 39, even when she was 60. "Thirty-nine and holding," she'd say. I think I may take the opposite approach and tell people that I'm FORTY-nine, so they'll be compelled to say, "My God, you look so fantastic!" and I can reply, "Thank you, yes I do."

Orange and Blue (Really, Really Blue)

While there is still hope for my Browns to find a decent new coach in the off season, all hope is lost for my Auburn Tigers. Talk about a blue Christmas for us.

Our esteemed athletic director Jay Jacobs (the man who built the Olympic-size swimming pool a foot too short so Auburn can't host any events in the sport in which we hold the most national titles) and our dear old meddlesome asshole booster Bobby Lowder have given us a new coach. Gene Chizik, a man who managed to make Iowa State worse in his two years there, ending with a 5-19 record as a head coach.

Now, in fairness, Chizik was Auburn's defensive coordinator during the 2004 undefeated season. But he was also the defensive coordinator in the previous 3-9 season. He left Auburn and went to Texas where he also was defensive coordinator on an undefeated regular season. I don't discount his knowledge of defense. However, both Auburn and Texas continued to thrive after Chizik's departures, while Iowa State got worse the second he arrived. It begs the question: how much of the success at Auburn and Texas should Chizik be credited with? Or should most of the credit go to the head coach and the rest of the coaching staff as well as Chizik? And does being pretty good on the defensive side of things make you a head coach? Ask Romeo Crennel.

The most disturbing and disappointing thing about our coaching search is that our leaders passed over Turner Gil, for whom the Auburn Family was salivating. The rumor is that it was partially because Gil, a black man, is married to a white woman. If there is any truth to that rumor--and many sources close to Jacobs and the Board of Trustees believe there is--then how can one in good conscience continue to support the program? Even if Jacobs worried that some backward members of the fanbase might not like it, a university is supposed to be above such things. It is supposed to bring enlightenment and broaden the culture. It is supposed to be a community leader. And from my view, in reading fan forums and listening to sports radio, the majority of the fanbase was screaming for Gil, didn't care about his or his wife's race, and never even mentioned Chizik. I'll withhold judgment because there is yet no proof, but should anyone reveal that racial issues were part of the reasoning behind this ridiculous hire, I will turn Tide faster than you can say "Hail Saban."

And speaking of Saban, his arrival in this state caused an immediate and catastrophic change in the demeanor of Auburn. Here we were, having beaten Bama five straight and on the way to the sixth, and having an undefeated season under our belts with a real argument for a national championship, and yet our leaders panicked. How else can you explain the ousting of a coach who averaged 9 wins a year during his tenure at Auburn and the hiring of a man who has to this point been a failure as a head coach? Jacobs will insist that Tommy Tuberville resigned, but then explain why Tommy got a $5.1 million payoff? Jacobs is either a liar or an idiot. Neither is good.

I'll be blunt. I don't like Gene Chizik. I listened to his press conference Monday when he was introduced as coach, hoping that my initial reaction of shock and dispair would be changed to one of hope and happiness. It did not happen. I have never heard such rambling arrogance from a coach before, not to mention that he used the phrase, "at the end of the day," about a dozen times. Well, Gene, at the end of the damn day that kind of swagger is best worn by people who have proven they can do the job of head coach. You haven't.

I predict that Gene Chizik will last no longer than two years at Auburn. My Tigers will be playing musical coaches for the next decade, and there will not be a Saban to pull us up and turn us a around. Thank you Jay Jacobs and Bobby Lowder. Your influences on the Auburn program can not end soon enough.

Being Brown

I couldn't have picked a better two years to become a Browns fan. I've learned so much, not just about the team's history and the NFL in general, but I've actually scraped the tip of the iceberg on what it's like to be a fan of this team.

2007 was my first season as a fan. It was great! We were 10-6 when nobody thought we'd win more than four. Young players had breakout years. Old players showed they still had the goods to compete. I followed every play as best I could, which is pretty hard in Alabama where the Browns were almost never shown in my television market. I relied on horrible bootleg video streams and the NFL Gamecenter graphics on NFL.com. When I was lucky, a game would be replayed on NFL Network and I'd get to see it after the fact. But it was all good. It filled me with hope for this season.

Longtime fans told me not to get excited, but I did anyway. They warned me I was destined for a fall, but I didn't listen. They knew, but I'm new. So I got more and more excited as the 2008 season approached.

But I wasn't the only one. The NFL was hopeful too. I was overjoyed when it was announced that the Browns would have FIVE nationally-televised, prime time games this season, including three regular season games on Monday Night Football. This was going to be a great year. We could win the AFC North. Everyone said it was possible and a few brave souls even predicted it outright. And we'd definitely make the playoffs.

With only three games left this year, playoff hopes long dead, and the organization in a dramatic shambles from top to bottom, we'll be lucky for real this time to win more than four. Our coach and maybe even our GM will be fired when the season mercifully comes to an end. Players who thrilled me last year and disappointed me this year may be traded, making way for new guys who may or may not produce. There is an awful lot of uncertainty in the air in Cleveland, and the sign on the door is about to say, "closed until next year."

It leaves me asking, "WTF happened? How did I get involved in this?" Well, that's neither here nor there. I am involved now. I've caught the Next Year Virus, a highly communicable disease spread by other fans who have been sticking it out with this team for decades. But it's OK. There are worse things to be sick with, and the treatment for this illness is actually pretty sweet. You get a dose of Free Agency, followed by seven rounds of Draft, a little physical therapy in the spring, and then you'll be fully renewed come August.

So I'm closing the door on this season. Not all the way. I'll peek through the crack to see if we pull out a win over Cinci, and peek again at the inevitable train wreck that will be the season finale in Pittsburgh. Oh, who am I kidding? I'll watch every second of this week's Monday night game and hope for an improbable victory. I'm fully contaminated at this point, readying myself for years and years of manic-depressive fandom. Others have survived it, and I can too.