Yelling at the Kids in the Back

Time is short and here's the damn thing about it

There's a catch in the voice. A slight hesitation. Nerves, maybe.

Let the feeling linger. And it grows.

It gets bigger than it needs to be. Bigger than it has any right to be.

Every decision either makes it bigger or smaller.

And every decision is questionable. Could go either way.

Any one decision is justifiable. It's just when you put them all together, well... it's not a pretty sight. It's not something you ever want to see.

And maybe the first one could have gone either way.

But by the time you get to 10,000 it's more difficult.

Much more difficult.

And by the time you realize the feelings that once helped you are hurting you, they're implanted. Ingrained. Hard-wired in your brain.

And the effort required to turn that wiring around gets more and more daunting as time goes on.

But what's the alternative?

Change or don't, the universe doesn't care.

But you do.

And even though it's daunting, each day brings a new chance.

A new decision.

A chance to forge new neural pathways.

And let the voice grow stronger. The nervousness get smaller.

Because if something's gonna linger, shouldn't it be something good?

One Quick Thought

If hindsight is 20/20, does that make our (very faulty) memories some kind of cosmic Lasik surgery?



Hat tip to JB from The Hits Just Keep on Comin'.

And for good measure here are the other songs:



And this one formerly sung by "an old estranged fiancee named Paul":

The Missing Avenger Plane

Let it ring in the air...

A packed church. Overflowing.

A Thursday afternoon. Cold and windy.

Speaker after speaker. Trying to capture something that was gone.

First the lionizing. Which might be comforting to some.

Then hints of humor. And a few less than saintly anecdotes.

Attempts to bring all these different parts together.

Attempts to make sense of what happened.

My mind wandering. Thinking of the story of the blind men and the elephant as the service continues.




Late afternoon sunlight pours through high frosted painted windows.

Outside, trees sway in the wind.

Squint and it looks like someone trying to look inside.

Squint and it looks like the dead man everyone is talking about.

Squint and it looks like God.

But...

Look closely and it's gone.

Look closely and the parts appear. Separate. Unconnected. Messy.

Leaving us to make sense of it.

Or at least try.

Happy Birthday, Mister Jones

He turns 66 and we get the present?

Works for me.

The Color Green Is Oh So Lovely And Obscene

You'll Never Have the Damn Thing Out...

There's a story that goes with this.

I'll tell you one day.

But not today.

Today is for this.

He Got a Tattoo On His Arm That Say Baby

Running From the Man in Oklahoma City With a 500-Gallon Tank

"You should ask her out," they said.

I don't know. Doesn't she have a boyfriend?

"Yeah. He's on parole."

For what?

"Nothing violent. Nothing serious. But he gets jealous easy."

What is it with girls and bad boys? Wait, what happens when he gets jealous?

"Before he would've beat the shit out of you. But that doesn't seem likely now. He's on parole. He has to watch himself."

She's kind of cool... but I don't know.

"You should ask her out. It's not fair that all the assholes get all the cool girls."

Yeah. But also... no.

Sir Gawain, Green Knight Pays Extra

Bob and Wheel

I was reading Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. And the girl on the bus noticed. And she commented on it.

Said the Green Knight was a feminist parable. That the metaphorical beheading of womankind and the subsequent return in a year and a day was clearly a reference to menstruation.

Went on to describe the way each of the battles in the poem represented a different dysfunctional romantic relationship.

She spoke in great detail and with sharp command of the text. Each of her major theses was supported by multiple references to specific stanzas. And argument, like each stanza, was laid out so it ended with a bob and wheel. The "bob" was a short line, followed by the "wheel," a longer line infused with internal rhymes.

I don't even remember why I had the book. It must have been assigned reading for some course I was taking. I can't imagine I would have picked up the book on my own.

But I don't remember any of that.

I remember her necklace -- an oblong piece of jade on a silver chain.

I remember her scarf -- purple, with green stripes.

And I remember her description of the appropriate punishments for each of the metaphorical sins committed by the men represented in the dysfunctional romances she felt were represented in the poem.

And I remember how she smiled after she finished her analysis.

And how she gave me her phone number.

After her discussion of beheadings and combat, and sword-fueled menstrual cycles.

I folded the paper with her number in it. And I put it in the paperback. And I read the rest of the poem.

And lost the book.



Exactly one year and a day later, I was back on the same bus.

I remembered the conversation and looked around for the girl.

She wasn't there.

Which, looking back years later, is fine by me.