Month: February 2020

Reading And Writing

For those of you who missed it, which would be most of you since I was there and didn’t see you, I thought I would share what I read one snowy, blustery night this week at my first PUB-lish, an event at which local writers offer brief readings (of 7 minutes or less).

First, though, a shout-out to Jesse and Pete for putting the event together, the Boone Saloon for hosting it, the other writers whose works I enjoyed, and all the supporters of us scribblers for braving the weather to be there.

My contribution was actually written a few years ago and is, in fact, a chapter from my book, Are We Having Fun Yet?

Remember, you only have 7 minutes to read it.

. . .

What I want to know is why I’m shorter than I used to be but weigh a whole lot more.

I mean, what’s the deal with that? As kids, we put on the pounds as we grew taller. You fill in here, you fill in there, and pretty soon you have an adult-sized body. Growth is replaced by stability. But then, all of a sudden, your body goes into reverse.

Take your height. Am I the only person who seems to be shrinking? When I shop for a pair of pants now I buy them an inch shorter than the ones I bought 10 years ago. The odd thing is, I have to buy shoes a size bigger than I used to. From what I can tell, my feet are flattening out. I seem to have better balance now, but every now and then I feel the urge to quack.

These conditions are due, naturally, to the effects of gravity, the irresistible force that results in a general settling of the body. All those brain cells, for instance, that I destroyed and otherwise wasted in my youth have now settled down there around the waist area. Almost all my spare weight is stored in this handy wraparound compartment, sort of a money bag of lard conveniently located next to the stomach. 

The rest of the body doesn’t seem to take on fat so much as simply sag. Nothing’s quite as tight and trim as it used to be. Women, being better at most things in life than men, as a rule are naturally superior saggers. Something to do with chromosomes, no doubt.

Everything tends to even out, however, because men are stuck with the hair thing. Nature tends to redistribute hair on men’s body, kind of like an efficient hair recycling system – waste not, want not. Have you ever noticed that as hairlines steadily recede, hair starts sprouting in unlikely places? 

It’s not something we in polite society talk about, but those of a less refined upbringing no doubt are going around thinking thoughts such as: “Excuse me, sir, but I believe there is a muskrat nesting in your nose.” Or, “Pardon me, sir, but a squirrel seems to be stuck in your ear.”

So why don’t barbers and hairdressers start appealing to the aging Baby Boomer market by offering free hair cuts (hey, they’re just going to trim the sides, since that’s all there is anyway) with any ear or nose hair cut. This is work more delicate than arranging those three six-foot long strands of hair around a shiny noggin in a failing effort to convince the world that your head doesn’t really look like a baboon’s butt. Perhaps we could start a fad: You know, styled ear hair, say, or dyed nose hair. How about braided eyebrows? We’ll show those young punk kids with their rings stuck everywhere a thing or two about fashion sense.

Probably the worst thing about this aging business, however, has to be the eyesight. I’ve been wearing glasses since the fifth grade, so I tried hard to dredge up some sympathy for all those 20-20 types (you know who you are, you’re the ones who called us four-eyes all the way through high school) when they had to buy those ridiculous little half-moon glasses that they perched on the end of their nose whenever they had to read a menu in a restaurant. Now I’m discovering that just because you’re nearsighted doesn’t exclude you from farsightedness, and so soon I’ll be peering at the world through bifocals – as if the world isn’t fuzzy and muddled enough as it is.

And what do we have to look forward to, anyway? Oh, sure, you can try to keep the old body fit and trim, but it’s a losing battle. Things will keep wearing out and breaking down. The warranty on certain parts will expire, and they simply won’t work properly any more. 

That’s when we’ll all be sitting around complaining and whining and occasionally bragging about bodily functions – kind of like when we were parents for the first time. Only instead of our brand new babies we’ll be talking about ourselves.

“Yep,” one of us will say, “had a really successful trip to the bathroom this morning. I mean REALLY successful” and the rest of us will be muttering about what a lucky old fart he or she is. Or: “Hey, I ate some real food for breakfast; had me a chocolate donut instead of that gruel I always eat. ‘Course, I’ll be paying for it later, if you know what I mean.” And of course we’ll all know what it means. Bathrooms will be the most important rooms in our lives.

So what’s a body to do? 

Actually, when I get to my golden years, I plan on fighting back. For one thing, I plan on taking up all my old vices again. Smoking, drinking, carousing, partying, leaving the toilet seat up … hey, who cares at that point? I say be who you really want to be without worrying about what anyone else at the retirement home thinks. 

That’s the ticket. For once in your life, be yourself. Be who you always wanted to be. Act the way you always wanted to act. Even if your body doesn’t always work the way it used to, that doesn’t mean you have to act your age.

In fact, why wait for old age? The trick to life is to act young, feel young, be young. The sooner you start living young the better.

I intend to get on it right after my nap.

Quiet, Please

Having been awakened at daylight most days for the past couple of months to the rumbling and beeping of heavy equipment, the roar of big trucks and the screeching of chain saws as the hill beside my house is denuded of trees (no, this is not a diatribe against clear-cutting; I’ll leave that debate for another day) I realize that there’s nothing like a little noise to make you appreciate silence.

We live in a relatively quiet spot in a rural area, although I realize that quiet is relative. I learned this when we once had friends who lived in suburbia visit, and  the next morning they asked us how we managed to sleep with all that racket outside. Mystified, we asked what they were talking about and they cited the tree frogs chirping, owls hooting, birds singing, dogs barking, and coyotes howling. Background sound that is as natural to country living as sirens wailing, people yelling, and music blaring are to city life.

I try to be tolerant of noise since I make some myself at times. We’ve all been in situations where you’re trying to have a nice conversation with your significant other in a restaurant when the six people at a nearby table are raucously laughing and talking over each other at the top of their lungs to be heard. It’s extremely annoying unless, of course, you are one of those at the crowded table having a good time and blissfully unaware of the dirty looks your fellow diners are shooting your way.

As I said, I am guilty of noise-making, too. I am, after all, of the generation that turned the music up – way up; a generation that is now making the hearing aid industry rich. But I am trying to be more aware of the sensibilities of others and am increasingly conscious of how bothersome noise can be if you’re not the one making it.

It’s amazing how many times I’ve been out in nature, enjoying the awe-inspiring sights that should take your breath away, except too many people have plenty of breath to loudly yack about sports or their social life or what they’re going to have for lunch or why can’t they get a cell signal. At the beach, too many people feel they have to share their conversations – or their taste in music – with the rest of us, even to the point of drowning out the crashing of the waves. And don’t get me started on the people who wander around in public places loudly carrying on invisible conversations with a thing stuck in their ear.

F and I spend a lot of time amid nature, even if it’s on our deck or patio enjoying the fresh air and the view and, sometimes, the peace and quiet. While our home, as I mentioned, is in a relatively quiet area, there seems to always be noise of some sort, loud or soft, near or far away, natural or man-made. But there are rare times when all is silent: no distant car engines, no dogs barking, no birds singing, not even the wind rustling the trees. It’s a miraculous moment caught in time, and you realize this is what the world was like for most of its existence before humans decided to liven things up. 

And in the absence of all that noise, when all is still and silent, I think to myself that this is the very best time to just sit back and listen.

Hot And Cold

I am, by nature, a cold-blooded person. By this, I don’t mean to imply that I am ruthless or lacking in compassion, have no emotions or passions, or have an affinity for iguanas. I mean it in the almost literal sense that I am sensitive to cold temperatures.

Some would point out that thin-bloodedness is common in people as they get to a certain age, and I would point out the exact spot on my cold, chilly butt where you could … well, never mind that. I have been this way all my life, much preferring warmth to cool, heat to cold, summer to winter, and sunshine to shade.

I suspect this is due in large part to spending much of my impressionable youth in tropical climes, where shorts and flip-flops (shirts were optional) comprised most of my wardrobe. 

Now I live in a, shall we say, decidedly non-tropical climate and, if truth be told, I still have not completely acclimated myself to it, but then I’ve only been here for four decades. In fact, when we were contemplating moving here, I cast a resounding no vote, figuring that since it was snowing and it was April, that alone should preclude any reason to even have a vote. Alas, F voted in favor, and since she usually holds the tie-breaking vote, here we are.

It all worked out because I love where we live, plus I get to complain about the weather while pointing out that I didn’t originally choose to live here, although I am willing to admit that this puerile carping has probably grown a bit tedious for the wife after all these years. This could be why her response often is a suggestion for me to go someplace a lot warmer, and I don’t think she means Florida.

F is pretty much the opposite in terms of temperature. Her ideal ambient temperature is about 68 degrees, where I think anything below 75 is on the cool side. I do like a cool bedroom, but only so I can snuggle under layers of covers, while invariably she lies there with just a sheet. Sometimes I use her discarded covers to double up mine, but then when she decides she needs some of them in the middle of the night she accuses me of stealing them, as if covers just sitting unused and unwanted in the middle of the bed should just go to waste and aren’t free for the taking.

Even when we go to a warmer clime, such as the beach, she doesn’t want it too hot, like it could ever be too hot at the beach. She sits under an umbrella while I soak up the sun. She thinks you can fry an egg on the pavement when it’s 80 degrees, while I am wondering whether I should bring along a jacket just in case. We cannot agree on air conditioner settings. And speaking of which, thank goodness for dual air conditioning controls in cars. 

I also like my food hot, both with spice and heat, whereas she is okay with food that is more lukewarmish. I mean, just because the soup scalds your tongue or the spaghetti scorches your lips is no reason to just let it sit there and cool off when you’re hungry and ready to eat.

All this makes it sound like F and I don’t have a lot in common, but that’s not the case at all. Temperature is our major point of contention in our marriage, so if that is our biggest issue then I think we’re doing just fine. She’s my best friend and we have lots of fun together, plus she’s been my Valentine for 44 years now, so I think it’s safe to say that I’ll love her through thick and thin, sickness and health, good times and bad.

And, of course, the heat and the cold.

Just Try A Bite

We all have our idiosyncrasies when it comes to food tastes, with some of us much pickier than others when it comes to what we’ll stuff in our mouths. I’m not talking about culinary choices made for reasons other than taste, such as food allergies or diet guidelines or animal rights; I’m talking plain old childish “I ain’t going to eat that crap because I don’t like it.”

Some of it is taste and some of it is texture; beets, for instance, taste like the dirt from whence they came, while the Jello I happily slurped around in my mouth in my youth now seems like some unnatural alien foodstuff that I’d just as soon not, er, slosh around with.

As adults, of course, we are free to spit food out of our mouths when we don’t like it, or we can refuse to even touch it with our fork without the threat of sitting at the dinner table until bedtime. As the primary cook in our household, I have oversight of the food purchases, so rare it is that the odd turnip or stray ham makes its way into our kitchen in the first place, much less onto my plate.

A lot of my food aversions spring from childhood, although fortunately there are many that I have overcome. I went to kindergarten in Hawaii, and as the only haole kid in class was given an early lesson in cultural culinary peculiarities by being served – every day at lunch, five days a week – an ice cream scoopful of sticky rice. It would be plopped down on my plate and sit there unmoving like a miniature igloo, tasteless and bland and starchy and, after days and weeks of plop, plop, plop, way too much for the delicate palate of a five-year-old to handle.

It was years before I could eat rice again without my stomach churning, to say nothing of what the click-clunk sound of an old-fashioned ice cream scoop did to my tender young psyche.

But the rice experience was small potatoes when it came to some of the other meals I was forced to endure later on in elementary school. Continuing my introduction to cultural food oddities, I remember to this day the stench emanating from the lunchroom in third grade on Wednesdays in southern Ohio, where with its large population of German descendants they assumed everyone would want a taste of sauerkraut and barely cooked sausages and mushy carrots on a weekly basis. 

Those were the days (after walking to school barefoot in the snow for two miles) when there was no school choice, at least in the cafeteria, and there was a teacher up by the trash can who scanned your tray to make sure you had eaten at least three bites of everything. Well, I was not a big fan of milk, either, but I would suck it down happily in order to surreptitiously stuff that smelly kraut and at least half of that big, fat, nasty gray sausage into the little half-pint carton – not an easy task, let me tell you – and close it back up with the straw still poking out to sneak it past the trash police.

Today, I like sausages just fine as long as they are not fat and gray and undercooked, but you can keep your kraut, thank you very much.

As I have gotten older, though not necessarily more mature, I find my taste buds are pretty much set in their ways. But I do try to eat higher quality and healthier food (which is not to say that pizza, hamburgers, fries, etc. can’t be occasionally rationalized as healthy). The easiest way to do this is to buy locally as much as possible, preferably through a farmers’ market or roadside stand. The food generally is much fresher, much tastier, much healthier for you, and – although usually slightly more expensive – a much better deal. As an example, the lettuce I buy at the farmers’ market is better tasting and lasts twice as long as the stuff you buy in the grocery store, probably because it hasn’t spent a week in the back of a truck.

Actually, all this talk of food is making me hungry. Some rice sounds good….