One menial job plus a second menial job does not bring dignity.
In mathematical terminology:
1m + 1m ≠ Dignity
So, remember, as Peggy Lee once sang:
"Is that all there is? If that's all there is, my friends, then let's keep dancing.
Let's break out the booze and have a ball
If that's all there is"
I toy with the concept of death but I'm basically full of shit.
I'm not talking suicide here, calm down, Christ I got a lot to make up for. That tiny spot in my brain that still "hopes" (against all odds), prevents me from ending it all. That, and cowardice.
But sometimes, if I get a sudden sharp pain in my chest, I think "Well maybe this is it." I don't panic, I just sit there to see where this pain is going. Invariably it turns out to be gas. And my emotional response is a mix of relief and regret.
The regret is because I always take the easy way out. That is what got me into the pickle I am in right now. A fatal heart attack would be the easy way out. Bing, bang, boom - I don't have to fight anymore. And some people would say "He got cut down in his prime before he ever had a chance to make his mark." Others would say "Fucking lazy, underachieving prick got what he deserved - he never even tried."
The exciting thing about getting older is that there is no end to the sudden pains and discomforts that rear their ugly heads - things painful enough to make you think "what the fuck was that?" If you have a diseased brain like mine, therefore, there is no end to the morbid fantasies.
Had a knee replaced last July. Shortly before I went under the knife, at the pre-surgery check up - I was told I had a heart murmur. No one had ever told me that before. Freaked me out. Wouldn't it freak you out? Of course they told me it was mild and represented no threat. But I don't trust the medical profession - they would probably tell me that no matter what, so the surgeon could operate and get his numbers up.
I went into the surgery thinking I might never wake up. But I did.
Just had a colonoscopy this past Thursday. Haven't had one since 2012 so I was apprehensive. Age is the enemy. Dr. Feelgood was feeling positive after the surgery - said he didn't find anything too scary. But they did remove four polyps, which some lucky lab rat is examining even as we speak.
So there's still hope.
I don't really want to die. I got a lot to live for. My family, who I cherish. But the "a lot to live for" is all other directed. I am not happy when I'm alone with me. Isn't that the most important thing about life?
If you don't love yourself what is the fucking point?
Other complicating factors - I love parts of me. So it's not all poison.
I try to recite certain things to myself as often as I can, mostly as memory exercises. (My brain is getting pretty squishy).
One exercise involves "affirmations". Affirmations sounds too new agey to me, so I consider them to be brain push ups. Anyway, one of them is "I love that I love what I love." And that is true.
I do love the things I love, and I am proud of them because they get to the core of me.
I'm a walking contradiction, partly truth and partly fiction. I'll keep throwing punches until I can no longer lift my arms.
And I'll keep playing the Russian roulette of "Will this kill me or will I survive it?"
You gotta make your own fun.
"Be like the fountain that overflows, not like the cistern that merely contains."
Paulo Coelho
Now that there, well now, that's how you live a life. Blow your personality up like a hot air balloon and ride that sucker all the way to the grave.
Loud and proud. Reckless, not feckless. Bounce it off every wall, crash through every plate glass window, get right on up into every face you run into. Go home every night and laugh.
Laugh at the quiet ones - who will even know they ever lived? Shit, man - everyone will know you were alive whether they like it or not. And fuck them if they don't like it.
You got a right to be here, man, and you got a right to make your mark.
Life is short. How many times have you said that? How many times have people said that to you? It is short, baby - it blows by so fast you get dizzy.
Christ, I know a guy who is 71 and cannot believe how close he is to the grave. It fucks with his mind. He spends a lot of time obsessing about it to the point where he misses all the designer ice cream. Premium whiskey. Live fucking, soul-reviving Blues. It's all passing him by because he is not sure what approach to take. Christ, man - you can't plan shit like that, you just gotta go for it.
Take a giant step forward even if it feels like you are facing the abyss, fucking jump for it - what do you have to lose? If it is the abyss, at least you got there like Evil Fucking Knievel. And if it is not the abyss, then dig it - it ain't gonna be boring, baby.
And then you'll develop a taste for it. Feeling alive is a sensation that feeds off itself. You want more, you gotta get more and more and more, until everyone around you marvels at your rugged individuality.
Remember the lesson Henry Hill learned in Goodfellas:
"See, the hardest thing for me was leaving the life. I still love the life. And we were treated like movie stars with muscle. We had it all, just for the asking. Our wives, mothers, kids, everybody rode along. I had paper bags stuffed with jewelry stashed in the kitchen. I had a sugar bowl full of coke next to the bed. Anything I wanted was a phone call away. ............................................................................. And now it's all over. And that's the hardest part.
Today everything is different. There's no action. I have to wait around like everyone else. Can't even get decent food. Right after I got here I ordered some spaghetti with marinara sauce and I got egg noodles and ketchup. I'm an average nobody. I get to live the rest of my life like a schnook."
Jesus Christ, man - do you have any idea what egg noodles and ketchup tastes like? It tastes like shit!
Don't be a schnook.
LIVE!
My wife is active on Facebook.
I backed away from it because I was not getting enough love. My posts are brilliant, obviously, and when I post them I expect 1,000 likes and 500 comments. Unfortunately I typically get 2 likes and no comments.
My ego. My bruised ego.
Anyway, my wife came across the post of a typically uninformed Maga head, who was getting sarcastic about liberal violence. She answered with a list of liberal people who have been killed or wounded by extreme conservatives. He did not know about these people. He had not heard about this violence. And yet he is forming opinions based on this sanitized "news" he is getting from whatever biased platform he goes to.
So hatred rears its ugly head, and gets intensified by our dicktator fanning the flames with lies, along with his vicious sycophants.
The right listens to the right, the left listens to the left, and a hell of a lot of people do not even make the effort to verify the "news" they are getting. We have this thing called the internet. You can do your own fact checking, you know. The truth is out there somewhere if you make the effort to dig it up.
How did we get so stupid?
My wife watches lots of MSNBC. What I see when I watch it is a bunch of liberals stroking each others' egos and fanning the flames of panic. What's the point of the discussions they have if they are preaching to the choir?
Same for the right. A bunch of people actively engaged in censoring the news for the consumption of people already filled with hatred and gravely misinformed. What's the point?
A lot of people are not really looking for news, they are looking for someone to support their political views with no concern for truth or what's right. How fucking short sighted is that?
And the pot is boiling.
Went out for lunch yesterday with my wife to a restaurant beautifully situated on Lake Winnipesaukee. Got a table on the deck right on the water on a beautiful day. First time there. Great atmosphere, excellent food, perfect service.
We loved it.
We wasted the last 15 minutes there having a political discussion, instead of looking at the lake, and enjoying the sunshine, boats, and people. It left me depressed. I deeply regret that. We don't go out often because we are paupers, and spend most of our time counting pennies in a jar to assess the nature of our financial stability (of which we have none).
That's how bad things are getting.
Political stupidity in this country has become all encompassing. And you end up arguing about it vehemently even though you have not chased down all the facts.
I want those 15 minutes back.
How did we get so stupid?
The worst moment of my day is the moment when I close my book, stand up from my recliner, pick up my coffee cup, and walk into the kitchen to dump what remains of the coffee - cold - into the sink. I seem to never be able to get through the entire cup.
I place the cup on the counter to the left of the double sink and hesitate before I take my next step. Because walking suggests that I am going to "do". I will be forced to engage with the world, whether I am prepared for that or not. (Usually, almost 100% of the time, not). Something I definitely don't enjoy.
I will have to make decisions, and decisions are double-edged swords. Did I make the right one? Will the results be good for me or bad for me. Will I go forward, backwards, or - worse still - stay in the same place.
I will be forced to do things I don't want to do. Haven't I earned the right to do only the things I do want to do? No, I have not.
I have noticed that I walk around the house slowly these days. Not because of age, I am still fairly vigorous. Not because of disease or because I am trying to conserve energy. I think maybe I am trying to slow down time. Or maybe my legs are just depressed.
Studies show that when you are deeply depressed, that depression travels around your body. The brain cannot handle unrelenting depression - it will shut down and stop your heart from beating - so it farms it out throughout the body. Until it eventually cycles back around to your poor, ravaged brain.
Besides, I hate people that walk ridiculously fast. You come across them too, right? Who are they trying to impress? What do they want you to think they are doing that is so important?
There's a guy who practically runs into the library, drops his book off on the desk, and runs out. Every time. I guarantee he has nothing that pressing in his life. Except maybe cocaine.
At some point during the day I will be forced to talk to other humans. Especially on days that I work - I am "in customer service." Doesn't sound as impressive as saying "I am a lawyer", "I am a doctor", "I am a research scientist", does it?
Customer Service. A job that forces you to answer stupid questions, deal with perpetually disgruntled people, bat away stupid requests, and generally inconvenience yourself to satisfy the customer.
Different organizations have different approaches. Some expect you to bend over backwards to satisfy anything a customer wants, whether or not it is pertinent to the job or the business. Others are more realistic and require you only to do the job and say no to anything else. Those are my favorites.
Movie: From Dusk Till Dawn. Sign over the bartender's head in a Mexican bar - "The Customer is always wrong." That's my philosophy.
But even if I don't have to work that day I probably have to engage with other humans. It is a fucking chore. The pharmacy, the grocery store, a medical appointment (those are the worst), the liquor store. You actually have to talk to people, which is the worst possible form of torture.
You know, as I think about it, one of these days I am just going to stay in my recliner and keep reading. Let the fucking day slide right by me. Then the week. And the month.
What's the worst that could happen?
$500,000. That's how much Billy Bob won on his scratch ticket.
Who knew?
Six months ago, on his birthday, after buying hundreds of scratch tickets over the years, he sat down at the Formica top kitchen table with a quarter between his fingers, and scratched. Scratched like he had done so many times before with dwindling belief that he would ever win more than two dollars.
But this time was different. He swept the shavings off the table into his hand and dumped them into the small, plastic trash bin he kept handy, barely looking at the numbers. When he did, he almost shit himself. It only took seconds for the truth to set in and for him to actually believe it.
He was a different man from that day on. His life up until then had been dead end jobs, sometimes two at a time; shitty pay, past due bills, rundown furniture and 15 year old trucks. He was bitter. No one wanted to be around him, including his family. Even he did not like himself. At the age of 57 he felt that things would never change, that he could never win. Since that magical day, he was all smiles all the time.
Slowly, he worked himself back into the good graces of his neighbors. They were wary at first, assuming he had gotten into drugs, assuming he was after something. But eventually they realized he was genuine. They loosened up and just enjoyed his company.
Billy Bob took care of his family. First his daughter, Lucinda, because he knew she would be the tough one. She hated what he had done to her mother, she hated the way he abandoned the family, she hated him. He knew it was justified, so he approached her carefully. A couple of phone calls, a meeting at a local diner, finally wrangling an invitation to her house for dinner.
Lucinda was studying to be a surgeon and Billy Bob knew she was smothering under a mountain of debt. That night over dinner he handed her a check to cover 50% of her debt. He left her home with a smile on his face and confidence that he would eventually earn her love back.
His son Johnny Joe was next. He had dropped out of high school and gone to work in a machine shop. Worked all day, drank all night and was fairly content doing that. Until Dad showed up. Billy Bob paid off Johnny Joe's truck loan, bought him a condo, and deposited some cash into his bank account. He gave his son some breathing room to stop and think and make better decisions about his future.
Billy Bob often stopped to reflect upon all the good he had done, and was overwhelmed by the sense of pride he felt, amazed that he actually felt good about himself. He could have blown the money on booze, drugs and hookers, which was his natural inclination. Instead he decided to change, and change he did. For the better. Forever.
He was sitting on his screened-in porch on a summer night, sipping Pappy Van Winkle 10 year old bourbon from a Waterford crystal cocktail glass feeling good about himself. He had invested the remainder of his money wisely, and as he thought about the additional good he could do with it, he could not help but smile.
The cocktail glass shattered as it hit the wide pine porch floor. Billy Bob had a massive, fatal heart attack.
He was 57 years and six months old.
"The older you get, the more baggage you have to carry, and the less you're able to lift it."
"Sometimes people reserve so much of themselves it's like saving a fine wine for an occasion that never materializes."
"If I do not speak my mind while I am able, well, death provides ample time for silence."
Anonymous
Age gives you perspective. Or it should. I am 71. When I say the words, when I look at the number, I am horrified. Seems surreal. Specifically because the time I have left is a fraction of the time I have spent. When I was 48 I feared turning fifty. Then it was 60. Then it was 70. Holy shit, this shit's gotta stop. Eradicating fear is a good place to start. Although 80 scares the hell out of me.
Right now I am "healthy", as far as I know. I mean, I dealt with skin cancer, I dealt with prostate cancer and came out on the winning side. Although the skin cancer thing is bizarre. I got so many spots and weirdnesses on my skin that weren't there 10 years ago, I look like a Jackson Pollock painting. So it's hard to feel confident, but I do the best that I can. And looking in the mirror is no picnic. I feel like somebody swapped out my body for that of the Pillsbury Dough boy - a senior Pillsbury Dough boy - it's pretty squishy. What the hell happened?
Right now I am not dealing with anything of substance. Although I have a colonoscopy coming up in 13 days which, of course, I am quite excited about. Haven't had one in 13 years. Who knows what's growing down there.
I do love the drugs, though. I've had a few of these puppies and I know when I wake up I'm going to feel just fine. It's the nicest high. You feel very good, quite mellow, but not LSD over the top type stuff. Just enough to make you believe that life is good.
When Carol drives me home she has to listen to me babble about how good I feel.
So I feel fine, all things considered. I am exercising hard and I feel very good about that, physically and mentally. In fact I feel better than I have in a long time. I lost a lot of weight, I'm getting around like a tiny bird. So I don't feel 71. But death can come calling any minute. My body is beat, battered and bruised. Shit, the whiskey I have consumed in the last 50 years should have killed me.
I feel good, but I'm still old. That's the rub. The baggage is piling up and definitely getting harder to lift. As far as reserving myself, I have done way too much of that and it is very possible the "occasion will never materialize." Nobody knows who I really am, including me. I don't speak my mind enough. So my body blows up like a hot air balloon, figuratively.
You can fool yourself when you're young, but you're a fool to do it when you're old. Death is a harsh reality and it's pretty permanent. Or so I'm told.
So I continue to navigate this life thing, but it gets trickier and scarier every day.
I'll be watching Djokovic/Alcaraz in an hour and a half - that will lift my spirits.
When I ask someone how they are doing, I expect a response.
The fools who say nothing generally wind up minus a tongue.
I wasted hundreds of days when I was younger, and they were quite tasty.
Now, a wasted day tastes bitter. Rancid.
A wasted day now feels like a launching pad to the grave.
I must invest my time wisely or be laughed out of the human race.
No pressure.
