How Was It Prepared?

While visiting Cartagena, we couldn’t help but notice how the street dogs in Columbia really know how to work a crowd. Savvy, cautious, independent survivors, thin but not starving. They live an unfettered life marked by handouts from the passing crowd and deep sleep on sunlit stoops. I bought a bag of fresh rolls, just for them. A large, shaggy Shepherd mix approached me openly as I waved a bun and called out to him. Taking it immediately into his mouth, he promptly spit it back out, staring at it on the ground as if daring it move. I picked it up and offered it again, he took it and spit it out. Given the number of mom & pop bread shops that are so common on every street, I realized that bread must be the most frequent donation the canine beggars get. This guy wanted something more substantial, eggs, meat, cheese... Some kind of protein. Please, enough with the bread already! He wandered away. Four more dogs came and went, all rejecting the bread. None appeared to be starving, all just working the procession of bodies as they walked up and down the narrow tourist street. The dogs were pros, particular about just what kind of donations they would take.

Back at home, Carla and I had a late lunch on St George Street, the main pedestrian drag for tourists visiting St Augustine. As we walked back to our car, maneuvering slowly through the crowd, Styrofoam leftovers in hand, I spotted a familiar homeless guy lounging on a sunlit stoop by the Coquina wall of the “Oldest Schoolhouse in the USA”. He's a regular at that spot, living off the generosity of the passing parade. I realized that since I hadn't touched my Shrimp dinner, it would be a special meal for the homeless guy, lying with his head propped up on one elbow. “Would you like a nice shrimp dinner? I haven't touched it!” Looking a bit like that shaggy Shepherd mix who spit out the bun, and without taking the Styrofoam from my outstretched hand, the homeless guy looked up at me and asked: “How was it prepared?” 

The guy is a pro, particular about just what kind of donation he would take.

No Place Like Home

We picked her up first-thing on the way back from the airport.

Shooting into the house like a seed from a squeezed tomato, her joyful mood suddenly turned serious when she said: "There’s no place like home. You must promise to never go away again!”

I reassured her: “I’ll try girl, at least it won’t be for a very long time if I do.”

But she didn’t hear me at all. She was too busy running from place to place, finding all the bones she had left behind before her abrupt incarceration. Piling them up in her bed, all only half chewed, we both knew she had a lot of bone cleaning work to do before morning.

The sounds of her gnawing, happily snuggled down on the big green dog pillow, her tail slapping a steady beat, caused me to echo Dorothy's words. to myself as well:

It's true, there's no place like home.

Home Invasion!

A raging beast smashed his way through my front door and into the house, wielding a heavy ax.

Running to investigate, I had little time to react before he took a swing. He mistakenly thought I was properly dispatched when he hacked open my head, scalp to chin.

No dummy, I remembered the Planarian worms I dissected in summer school all those years ago...how they grew two heads when similarly split.

I followed their lead.

Now with two heads and four eyes, I offered the hacker my right arm, then my left. He hacked, I regenerated...times two.

It's true that two heads are better than one, and four arms better yet.

I out-hacked the hacker at his own game, turned the tide of battle, dispatched him with extreme prejudice, and probably saved thousands of fellow townspeople from a similar fate.

Who would have thought those summer school classes could be such a life-saver all these years later?

Now I'm just worried about having to cut extra arm holes into my work shirts.

Fortunately, I already own plenty of hats.

One Never Knows, Do One?

Most of us who have been married or in a relationship for a long time think we know our partner pretty darn well. Right? We know their favorite foods and the restaurants that serve them. We know the music they want to listen to on the way there. 

We understand how they feel about politics and religion, where they stand on child rearing and how to share a bathroom peacefully, without any messy bloodshed.

We each have our own side of the bed. It’s the law.

How do we empty the toothpaste tube, roll it up tightly from the bottom or just squeeze away?

What’s the best way to stack dishes in the dishwasher? Is there a right way and a wrong way? What do we need from the grocery store? Did you make a list? Should we hang wet clothes on the line or just throw them in the dryer?

Rules for child rearing and work sharing are big items but most disagreements are over the little stuff. You know, is the roll of TP supposed to drape over the top or stick out from the bottom?

She signs my name on most documents and I open her mail.

But is it really OK to simply eat that last piece of Chocolate Truffle Pie or do I need to ask first? I don't want to get hurt.

If you’ve been at this a while though, you already know the answer.

Carla and I are in our 42nd year together, at this point you can ask me anything. I know what she wants and what she’ll say.

For the last 18 years we’ve lived near the beach. We love to take the dogs for long walks. They run in and out, sand and surf. We love the views, the places to eat nestled in the dunes. Everything about it is awesome...but the water itself? Not so much.

Carla and I don’t surf, boat, fish or swim. The water is too deep, too dark, and full of things with very sharp teeth that eat toes in one snap like a cluster of live calamari.

We’re not water people. Hell, I don’t even like water in my drinks.

So when my boyhood friend, David, came to town hauling the Boston Whaler that he built by hand, we admired it greatly, complimented his carpentry skills endlessly, and knew, without question, that neither of us would ever actually be in the thing, on actual water.

Maybe, maybe, maybe David would be able to shame me, get me out there in his homemade boat by mocking my manhood, suggesting that I have low testosterone levels. OK, that’s possible, but Carla? No way.

She would never, ever, go out on deep water in that thing. I know the lady. No way, no how.

Then when I went off to work one Tuesday while David was visiting, this happened.

As Fats Waller once famously said: “One never knows, do one?”

No Fats, I guess not…

Bottled Gold...

A friend gave me a jar of his home-made Limoncello for Christmas. Vodka with lemon zest that infuses for a week of nuptial bliss, with simple syrup added to finish. Perfect. I usually drink straight vodka shots from the freezer with a chaser of fruit juice but that gift got me thinking. I remembered the flavored vodkas I used to make as a bachelor 40 years ago. I would save pretty pint bottles throughout the year and fill them up as Christmas gifts for friends.

They were always a big hit.

Now, after going into production mode for the last week, I’m the proud owner of a quart of my own Limoncello, as well as pints of fruit flavored vodkas that don’t have any syrup. 100% proof, made with fresh fruit. Pour over ice and add syrup or mint or whatever. I usually go straight up but the sweet is nice sometimes too.

Lemon, pear, blueberry, mango, raspberry…Kiwi is next up.

They look delicious but I wouldn’t know. January is a no-alcohol, no-smoke month for me. I normally give the liver a break every three months.

I haven’t even tasted them.

If you hear some Lucinda Williams cranked up to “Wow” or maybe that old Johnny Winter album I put on when I’m feeling froggy, rocking the house in February or March, come on in and have a cocktail.

There’s plenty of deliciousness to pick from.

Pied Piper...

When you’re an Instagram star with 6000,000+ highly engaged female followers in the 24-44 age range, advertisers lust for your attention. They send you an avalanche of free stuff, hoping that you may wear it or show it off in one of your videos. It’s the new face of advertising. Very targeted and extremely inexpensive for them. What’s their actual cost on a few pieces of the clothing they make? That extends to shoes, yoga gear, jewelry, beds, blankets, furniture, household items, really anything you can think of that a woman 24 to 44 may use or want. That covers a lot of ground.

The most upscale hotels and resorts are eager to give you an all-inclusive stay in their best suites all around the globe. Be our guest, please! Maybe you’ll film some content for your Instagram account at their place. Hundreds of thousands of devout followers will see it and want to go there too. They want to be like you.

As new clothes come in, the old clothes can be sold on Poshmark, for way more than their retail value, because you wore them once in a video.

And when you are a gypsy Acroyoga teacher, traveling from one workshop or festival to the next, it’s best to use your parents address for your mail.

A two-day accumulation of gifts piles up quickly. The advertisers desperately want to reach the demographic for which you are a Pied Piper.

They want your attention, and for you to play your flute and lead those ladies in their direction.

Painting in the Basement...

Facebook provides us all with a podium from which we can spew. I’ve been spewing here since 2009, starting with a practice run on Myspace before that.

Sure, it’s my “social network” but it’s also a place for me to do what I’ve always done, write little ‘ditties” as I call them. Short stories, jokes, snapshots of life, observations, opinions…whatever I believe to be important for me to get out. Not important to anyone other than myself, but I need to write it down before it’s gone.

It’s been that way since college. Aside from written materials for actual classes, I wrote in notebooks, calendars, scraps of paper, and even bed sheets. LSD nights spawned poetry and prose written onto tie-died sheets with indelible ink.

I’ve gotten myself into trouble by writing poetry and love stuff to girls I didn’t really want any real life love stuff with. So few young men speak openly with raw emotion that It’s like walking a puppy in a crowd and gets the girls every time. Quite often, my frequent letters to the editor angered the majority of readers in the conservative town where I live. At least they were the ones most eager to point out my many failings as a human. That was true on Facebook for my first few years as well. Being politically liberal and espousing views that are considered to be blasphemous to organized religions caused many FB “friends” to pop up and scream at me. The Catholic Church and a long succession of hateful politicians have been favorite targets. Guess I never took the advice of not discussing politics or religion to heart. I do invite civil disagreements and discussions though and would be delighted to listen to a rational defense of any of them.

One guy suggested that I was a pornographer for posting pictures of my daughter taken from her Acroyoga site. She’s beautiful and dressed appropriately for her job. Most yogis don’t dress in heavy cold-weather gear for that. (My other daughter is beautiful too, but she doesn’t wear abbreviated clothing for her work, so I guess I am only a pornographer with the one.)

My opinions are just that. I don’t need the drama or confrontation from those fueled by blind belief without logic. If someone spews negativity towards me without any justification or willingness to discuss it like adults, we’re done. So I’ve played “Whack-W-Mole” here, bonking out the haters as they pop up.

These days I lead a generally quiet Facebook existence. I can post in peace.

Certainly I could post a very long list of things I have no talent for. Don’t ask me to name the winning football team or fix the carburetor under the hood. I’m clueless. I do know that I’m a decent writer though and post my stuff with some regularity. I understand that most people keep scrolling if they see a post that is longer than two sentences. No problem. Of those who plow on, several tell me that I should publish. A book, magazine articles, somewhere, just publish. I guess the conventional wisdom is that if you can do something fairly well, you should seek maximum exposure for it and make some money. I’m not of that school. There are people who do what they do just for themselves. I’m one of them. Hobby artists who paint in the basement. Amateur photographers whose framed pictures only hang on walls in their own houses. That’s me. It’s cathartic. I write to get it out, always have. I do it for me, and I feel no need to do anything more with my posts than put the stuff I like into my blog.

Even fewer people read it there. That’s just for storage. I don’t drive traffic to my blog, hardly anyone reads it but me.

What’s the point? Is there sound in the forest when a tree falls if there are no ears to hear?

Yes, there is.

I write for myself and for my grandchildren, as my Father and grandfather occasionally did for me.

One day, years from now, my daughters can show my blog to my grandchildren and say: “Good or bad, this was your Grandfather.”

For me to be able to speak to them directly like that, to say “This is who I was’” is more than enough.