Confession Tuesday – Anniversary Edition

   It’s Tuesday again. That means confession time. Come with me to the confessional…











Dear Reader:

Today is the 36th Anniversary for Cathy and I.  While 36 years can seem like a long time, it’s not long enough….

I confess that I wish I could tell Cathy that I won the Power Ball Lottery last night but alas I cannot.  I buy tickets because she asks me to. I’ve never been crazy about state lotteries. I imagine that many people use what is otherwise non-expendable cash to chase a win / dream.  I hear stories about people who win the lottery and their lives are ruined. Cathy works very hard… I know lots of people work hard but she works especially long hours and I confess I would love to say to her look, you don’t have to do this anymore.  She tells me if we were to win, we would not be one of those couples who watch their lives crumble around them. I confess that I believe she is serious about this.

I confess I made a run to the Evil Empire last night. I haven’t been to Wal-mart in a long time. I try not to take my business there. I was a Target earlier but realized we needed something much later at home after Target was closed.

Amid the World Cup hoop-la I confess to being a scrooge.  When I was about 13, I played soccer. My heart wasn’t in it. I wanted to play ice hockey and ultimately did get to for a time but I always found it hard to figure out why people would run around a soccer field for so long, expending so much energy to personally put the ball in play 3 to six times.  The other thing is that there was so much talk about how Soccer was going to take the US by storm. By Storm!?  Ok, that was  44 years ago. Hello!

I confess I’m not really in as sour a mood as this post likely sounds like. Really, this is a happy day!!!  I have the best wife who loves me in spite of my flaws. I confess I am so very fortunate.

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Unconscious Mutterings Week 386

 

 

You Say… I Think:

• Executive ::  decision
• Director ::  conductor
• Dress ::  rehearsal
• Studio :: apartment
• Accountant ::  business
• Unit ::  measure
• Engaged :: couple
• Safety ::  inspection
• Post ::  fence
• Dialogue ::  manuscript

Get your own list here

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Father’s Day Post

  It’s always a thrill to hear from my kids (if I can still refer to them as such) so on a day in which I’ve been able to see two and talk with the other two, the day is a blessing. Still, there is a sadness that comes with two of them living in other cities.  In the day of cell phones, text messages it does seem to shorten the distance a little.

As a father’s day gift I received a digital camera. It’s really nice, but I don’t understand why I can’t call or text on it since I can shoot photos on my cell phone.;)

Actually, I’m pretty sure that the fact that I took so many photos on my phone seemed quite pathetic to everyone concerned so it was decided I needed a camera.
I do enjoy taking photos. I think photography is a great tool for poets.  Going out on a photo shoot can be a way of looking for ways to see your surroundings in different ways. Isn’t that what we so often do in poetry? Look for new ways to see things, that we might broaden our minds?

One way I’m looking at things from a different view this father’s day is by thinking about my own father. While that may seem seem odd to most, it is outside the norm for me.

My father and I had no contact during my formative years. It was not until I was around 19 that I recall seeing him. And in the few times we saw each other or corresponded after that it was generally an awkward association. Not something that I think either of us could be faulted for under the circumstances but sad none the less. He passed away in 2005 and I was unaware of it at the time. Our relationship or lack of one actually has profoundly impacted my life. In different times that impact looked quite differently to me.

But I will come back to father’s day now for a moment because it has always been about me (at least since I’ve had children) and prior to that it was just a day. This sadly makes me wonder would it would have been like to have that kind of day where I would have focused on a father.  To be the grateful son.

Technorati Tags: Fathers,Father's Day

Dickinson on love and life

I argue thee that love is life. And life hath immortality.  - Emily Dickinson

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Thought For Friday

"Uniformity, in its motives, its goals, its far-ranging consequences, is the natural enemy of poetry, not to mention the enemy of trees, the soil, the exemplary life therein."  — C.D. Wright

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Sometimes you have to find humor

 

Technorati Tags: BP Coffee Spill,humor,UCBComedy

Confession Tuesday - Indignant Edition

It’s lunch time on Tuesday and I’m off to the confessional. Are you following me?

Dear Reader:

During my years of active involvement in the Democratic Party I was exposed to an elected official who often said we must never lose the capacity to be indignant. I think it was likely a paraphrasing of someone else’s remarks but I thought about it then and again these past few days. At the time I first heard it, I believed it to a wise axiom, for when we become complacent with actions that are reprehensible we do ourselves a disservice.

I do confess that I have become tired of the bitter and hateful discourse that has come to pollute our daily lives. And it would be easy to say that enough is enough! Lighten up a little. But this axiom has come back to me recently and I confess that in particular that I am incensed by the recent remarks by Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) about the oil spilling (still) in the gulf. It seems Representative Young believes (and I quote) "This is not an environmental disaster, and I will say that again and again because it is a natural phenomenon." Perhaps Rep. Young believes this but drilling a deep sea well from a platform in the Gulf and suddenly after an explosion, the gushing of some 39 million gallons of crude oil into the Gulf (and counting) has nothing natural about it. It is not a part of nature.

I confess that I'm also incensed by a political ad run by Rick Barber, a candidate for Congress in Alabama’s second district. The ad is a representation of Barber ranting on the Internal Revenue Service, Health Care, etc., and shows an angry Barber pounding his point all the while a pistol lay beside him as he preaches to our founding fathers. In the end, we hear the rather threatening phrase "Gather your armies." Barber’s ad is incites insurrection. He too may be indignant. But I confess that even indignation must be tempered with responsibility. At a time when many openly carry firearms strapped to their side in plain sight, even as drinking their coffee at Starbucks, there is a responsibility that comes with our political system that asks of each of us the civility that makes peaceful political change a desirable end of our democracy.

I confess that I did not intend to sound preachy today, but I stand by everything I’ve said.

I also confess I will not preach next Tuesday. Unless I get indignant again. ;)


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