Sometimes we sleep curled up back to back.
If I hold my breath, I can feel her slowly breathe.
I know If I reach over and touch her,
She'll wake instantly.
And thump the mattress with her tail.
-rbm
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
The Halcyon Days at The Rockingham County Gun Club or My Thoughts on Google+
First off, I'm not sure what "halcyon days" means. To me it sounds like a description of warm, heady days long gone--but I could be wrong.
In the beginning:
I joined a gun club in 1996 because I wanted to shoot my 30-30. I bought the thing in the fall of 1984 to shoot a deer, and then stuck it in a closet for fifteen years, only dusting it off when I discovered "The Club" online--dial up that is. And while I was there, shooting my rifle, Mike asked me casually if I owned a shotgun. Well, as luck would have it, I had bought one of those back in 1984 as well, for shooting (at) dove.
That shotgun, that Winchester 120 "Ranger", was the first gun I had ever bought and I mean bought as soon as I was old enough to do so from Best Products on High Point Rd. It was the first gun I had ever hunted with, but it too had found a home behind stands of clothes before Mike asked.
The next weekend I threw it in the truck and before I knew it, I was standing on the semi-circled Skeet field with four other guys I barely knew. I think I busted about 18 clays that first time with my trusty pump gun, but I was hooked. And that first encounter started an addiction to shotgun sports that I still manage and enjoy to this day.
Now in those early days, there was just one "problem" at "The Rock". There was only one skeet field. One field for about 25 of us regular shooters. With only five shooters on a regular squad, there were many times when most of us were waiting to shoot.
Well, it was hot in the summer, so we built a shelter for shade. It was crowded and standing room only so we built picnic tables to sit on. And someone would cook, and we all would chat and visit and eat! Food would be brought in, and drinks, and cakes and then more laughing and more shooting. Some fast friendships were made under that shelter waiting to shoot.
What made the time so enjoyable and special was that, here, at The Rock, the CEO of Aero-Atlantic was hanging out with a Dumbass Carpenter. The VP for Lorillard Tobacco Co. was there hanging out with Mike the "Elevator Man". Sawmill workers rubbed elbows with double-degree'd engineers. Car mechanics huddled over grills with school teachers--it was such a mix of folks that ordinarily would never hang out together.
A guy like me shooting with his $165 Winchester pump-o-matic could be found whipping some guy with a $10,000 Kreighoff or Kolar shotgun. (It might've happened that way--that's the way I remember it anyway! Lunch Round anyone?) The filthy '97 Ford F-250 I drove could be parked beside a Mercedes in the gravel lot on any given Sunday.
The tales, lies, and other stories that came out under that shelter prompted the co-opting of the saying, "What comes out at The Rock, stays at The Rock." It was a good time to be learning the fine art of shooting skeet surrounded by men, though precious few women, that could make you laugh your ass off...
And then it started. "Why do we have to sit around an wait to shoot when the Trap Shooters have four fields to shoot on?"
A plan was hatched. A handful of us asked the board if it were possible to have more fields installed--but were told to go away. So...a handful of us joined the board and worked the inside. And then this hodgepodge group of buddies, united in a love of waiting-free skeet shooting, overcame every obstacle that the old guard, and county government, threw in our way. And soon enough...our work done, we dropped off the board having acheived our goals.
This whole process took years, but we got three fields, and we got our no waiting! And that's when a curious thing happened. Suddenly, the shabby trucks were staying with the shabby trucks in the new lot. The shiny Kreighoffs were clustering with the shiny Kreighoff K-80's and Kolars and Beretta Double E and L's...The normal, socioeconomic cliques were weaseling their way onto our fields for the first time.
The cooking had stopped long before, and now that old shelter was "miles" up the hill from the new fields, gone was the hub where we'd all eaten, cajoled, shared tactics for conquering fragile little clay discs, and solved the world's problems. Gone too were the good times when people would mingle and laugh when they weren't shooting, and all it took was getting what we wanted.
I kinda saw it coming, and kinda predicted it while soaking in some Mexican food and beer before a board meeting long before the first spadeful of dirt was ever overturned, but no one ever listens to me.
In the beginning:
I joined a gun club in 1996 because I wanted to shoot my 30-30. I bought the thing in the fall of 1984 to shoot a deer, and then stuck it in a closet for fifteen years, only dusting it off when I discovered "The Club" online--dial up that is. And while I was there, shooting my rifle, Mike asked me casually if I owned a shotgun. Well, as luck would have it, I had bought one of those back in 1984 as well, for shooting (at) dove.
That shotgun, that Winchester 120 "Ranger", was the first gun I had ever bought and I mean bought as soon as I was old enough to do so from Best Products on High Point Rd. It was the first gun I had ever hunted with, but it too had found a home behind stands of clothes before Mike asked.
The next weekend I threw it in the truck and before I knew it, I was standing on the semi-circled Skeet field with four other guys I barely knew. I think I busted about 18 clays that first time with my trusty pump gun, but I was hooked. And that first encounter started an addiction to shotgun sports that I still manage and enjoy to this day.
Now in those early days, there was just one "problem" at "The Rock". There was only one skeet field. One field for about 25 of us regular shooters. With only five shooters on a regular squad, there were many times when most of us were waiting to shoot.
Well, it was hot in the summer, so we built a shelter for shade. It was crowded and standing room only so we built picnic tables to sit on. And someone would cook, and we all would chat and visit and eat! Food would be brought in, and drinks, and cakes and then more laughing and more shooting. Some fast friendships were made under that shelter waiting to shoot.
What made the time so enjoyable and special was that, here, at The Rock, the CEO of Aero-Atlantic was hanging out with a Dumbass Carpenter. The VP for Lorillard Tobacco Co. was there hanging out with Mike the "Elevator Man". Sawmill workers rubbed elbows with double-degree'd engineers. Car mechanics huddled over grills with school teachers--it was such a mix of folks that ordinarily would never hang out together.
A guy like me shooting with his $165 Winchester pump-o-matic could be found whipping some guy with a $10,000 Kreighoff or Kolar shotgun. (It might've happened that way--that's the way I remember it anyway! Lunch Round anyone?) The filthy '97 Ford F-250 I drove could be parked beside a Mercedes in the gravel lot on any given Sunday.
The tales, lies, and other stories that came out under that shelter prompted the co-opting of the saying, "What comes out at The Rock, stays at The Rock." It was a good time to be learning the fine art of shooting skeet surrounded by men, though precious few women, that could make you laugh your ass off...
And then it started. "Why do we have to sit around an wait to shoot when the Trap Shooters have four fields to shoot on?"
A plan was hatched. A handful of us asked the board if it were possible to have more fields installed--but were told to go away. So...a handful of us joined the board and worked the inside. And then this hodgepodge group of buddies, united in a love of waiting-free skeet shooting, overcame every obstacle that the old guard, and county government, threw in our way. And soon enough...our work done, we dropped off the board having acheived our goals.
This whole process took years, but we got three fields, and we got our no waiting! And that's when a curious thing happened. Suddenly, the shabby trucks were staying with the shabby trucks in the new lot. The shiny Kreighoffs were clustering with the shiny Kreighoff K-80's and Kolars and Beretta Double E and L's...The normal, socioeconomic cliques were weaseling their way onto our fields for the first time.
The cooking had stopped long before, and now that old shelter was "miles" up the hill from the new fields, gone was the hub where we'd all eaten, cajoled, shared tactics for conquering fragile little clay discs, and solved the world's problems. Gone too were the good times when people would mingle and laugh when they weren't shooting, and all it took was getting what we wanted.
I kinda saw it coming, and kinda predicted it while soaking in some Mexican food and beer before a board meeting long before the first spadeful of dirt was ever overturned, but no one ever listens to me.
Saturday, July 9, 2011
How Radiated Popcorn Changed the World
I was right as rain until I was at Ashley Weaver's house one summer's eve after a group of us had been to a show and someone produced a flat pouch of something called, "Microwave Popcorn." And then, after it was thrown into the newfangled device of the decade--that is, a Microwave Oven--I watched through the perforated-metal-reinforced glass door as this pouch swelled and popped (and then later smoked) until it was full of what amounted to instant popcorn! Albeit, somewhat charred...
Like a sucker, I had spent my young life huddled over a stove, heating oil, adding seeds, listening for that first *pop* then shaking for minutes until the moment before burning when the pan was lifted and dumped into a bowl. All the while I'd be shielding my eyes for those few hold-out kernels that would pop in the bowl and hurl themselves into my face...or worse...onto the floor. But here, in Ashley's house, surrounded by the smelly smoke of burned corn and oil, and the "Ooh's" and "Ah's" of us uninitiated, the sleeping giant of instant gratification was awakened in me.
And now, looking back, I think that's when the whole world, at least the giant country I live in, decided that later was too long to wait for anything--the end of civilized life as we know it came to a screeching halt when the corn lobby teamed up with the Amana Engineers to make us want it all, and want it now. By the way, the corn lobby has moved on to global domination, but that is another story.
Credit cards were the next thing for me. Sure, my mom knew how to play the "Layaway" game. Even I had dabbled in "pay now play later" for toys and such. But when I got my Belk's card, all that lame waiting for new shoes was over. All that fondling and coveting upright vacuum cleaners was a thing of the past. I could get what I wanted/needed immediately, but to make a long story short, think of the words "downward spiral"!
And that's where this country seemed to be pre-2008 and the collapse of the western economy. We were building houses with no money in the bank. We were buying houses with no money in the bank. We were refinancing those houses--many times to pay off huge credit card debts--with no money in the bank. It was all so much fun!
Cable TV brought music videos and movies into our homes, but now, that's not enough either! Now we want to watch what we want to watch when we damn well want to watch it! Then the TV cable brought us the internet as well because dial-up was such a slow waste of time that, given back all that time I wasted sitting there waiting for pages to load now, I'd be able to write a book.
These days of course, we want our internet everywhere we go. And true, sometimes seeing a weather radar (back to those microwaves!) at a ball game could literally save your life, but getting ball scores or watching episodes of The Kardashians in traffic is nothing but the popcorn-induced need for gratification. Wasn't it CK Lewis who made fun of people who crabbed about their WiFi in the Sky being so deathly slow on flights?
Wanting what you want now isn't at all a certified bad thing, but some things aren't meant to be had yesterday. Like courting a chick--scroll through your kids' text messages when they ain't looking if you want an education in the courtship of the modern, gotta have it now, teen or 'tween.
Even elections are swayed by the "instant", sometimes holographically-enhanced coverage. We don't want to wake up and find out, we want to stay up blinking all night at the screen and watch our guy lose...or win. We ain't supposed to know until "the morning after", like Christmas. You'll get your bike when you get your bike.
Even retailers try to suck us in with "instant rebates"! Gone are the folding and mailing of receipts along with a carefully filled out questionnaire and our hopes of a monetary return months from the purchase date--if at all. I reckon merely lowering the price just ain't as appealing as something that we can have "instantly".
Anyway, it just seemed to me that the huge leaps and bounds in technology, which helped coax us all out of slow Southern Living started with that flat, expensive pouch full of Native American goodness. I mean, if one could stand around for two minutes and thirty seconds for a good wholegrain snack, then one shouldn't have to waste time on more complex things like the daily news or even a favorite fruit grown out of season from a continent far far away.
It was shortly after the popcorn introduction that Sony Walkmans put my favorite music in my head when and where I wanted it. Then the slow and awkward cassette tape gave way to the CD and the Discman, which gave way to the MP3 which, so far, is about as self-gratifying as music on the go can get! A whole record collection in your hip pocket--heady thought for us kids who grew up timing eight track tapes so we could hit the "track" button, thus changing tracks to hear that one favorite song over and over after tuning out the tunes we hated.
These days, just for fun, and personal salvation--seems microwave popcorn is chock full of things that'll kill you dead if you actually eat it--I set about ruining our "glass" cook top with that Mom-taught and age old practice of shaking them kernels in a pan. I wish I'd paid more attention to her technique when I were younger because I used to love the lid-lifting ending to her adventures in making enough for her, Dad, my Sister, me, the three dogs, and my first cat who thought chasing the popped-to-the-floor escapees was big fun!
What's even weirder to me is the fact that my kids don't know any different. They think Life is supposed to come screaming in on a cable or picked up at Wal Mart and sweep them off of their feet. Rarely do they get the gumption to enjoy the slower things in life, like a hot-ass summer day with absolutely nothing to do. Those were the days, when at their age, I'd hop on my bike and ride the sixteen mile round trip to try out that newfangled chicken place called BoJangles. Or ride to Sedgefield Stables to scoop poop for the aforementioned chicken money.
It's not their fault I suppose, seeing's how I let that cable worm its way into our home, and drag them to Wally World when I want a new toy for them or I, but rather than take the blame, I look to that smoky bag of ruined, yet quickly eaten, popcorn at The Weavers' house way back when. It was that spark that set us all on our way down that bustling, never-quite -quick-enough road to now.
Like a sucker, I had spent my young life huddled over a stove, heating oil, adding seeds, listening for that first *pop* then shaking for minutes until the moment before burning when the pan was lifted and dumped into a bowl. All the while I'd be shielding my eyes for those few hold-out kernels that would pop in the bowl and hurl themselves into my face...or worse...onto the floor. But here, in Ashley's house, surrounded by the smelly smoke of burned corn and oil, and the "Ooh's" and "Ah's" of us uninitiated, the sleeping giant of instant gratification was awakened in me.
And now, looking back, I think that's when the whole world, at least the giant country I live in, decided that later was too long to wait for anything--the end of civilized life as we know it came to a screeching halt when the corn lobby teamed up with the Amana Engineers to make us want it all, and want it now. By the way, the corn lobby has moved on to global domination, but that is another story.
Credit cards were the next thing for me. Sure, my mom knew how to play the "Layaway" game. Even I had dabbled in "pay now play later" for toys and such. But when I got my Belk's card, all that lame waiting for new shoes was over. All that fondling and coveting upright vacuum cleaners was a thing of the past. I could get what I wanted/needed immediately, but to make a long story short, think of the words "downward spiral"!
And that's where this country seemed to be pre-2008 and the collapse of the western economy. We were building houses with no money in the bank. We were buying houses with no money in the bank. We were refinancing those houses--many times to pay off huge credit card debts--with no money in the bank. It was all so much fun!
Cable TV brought music videos and movies into our homes, but now, that's not enough either! Now we want to watch what we want to watch when we damn well want to watch it! Then the TV cable brought us the internet as well because dial-up was such a slow waste of time that, given back all that time I wasted sitting there waiting for pages to load now, I'd be able to write a book.
These days of course, we want our internet everywhere we go. And true, sometimes seeing a weather radar (back to those microwaves!) at a ball game could literally save your life, but getting ball scores or watching episodes of The Kardashians in traffic is nothing but the popcorn-induced need for gratification. Wasn't it CK Lewis who made fun of people who crabbed about their WiFi in the Sky being so deathly slow on flights?
Wanting what you want now isn't at all a certified bad thing, but some things aren't meant to be had yesterday. Like courting a chick--scroll through your kids' text messages when they ain't looking if you want an education in the courtship of the modern, gotta have it now, teen or 'tween.
Even elections are swayed by the "instant", sometimes holographically-enhanced coverage. We don't want to wake up and find out, we want to stay up blinking all night at the screen and watch our guy lose...or win. We ain't supposed to know until "the morning after", like Christmas. You'll get your bike when you get your bike.
Even retailers try to suck us in with "instant rebates"! Gone are the folding and mailing of receipts along with a carefully filled out questionnaire and our hopes of a monetary return months from the purchase date--if at all. I reckon merely lowering the price just ain't as appealing as something that we can have "instantly".
Anyway, it just seemed to me that the huge leaps and bounds in technology, which helped coax us all out of slow Southern Living started with that flat, expensive pouch full of Native American goodness. I mean, if one could stand around for two minutes and thirty seconds for a good wholegrain snack, then one shouldn't have to waste time on more complex things like the daily news or even a favorite fruit grown out of season from a continent far far away.
It was shortly after the popcorn introduction that Sony Walkmans put my favorite music in my head when and where I wanted it. Then the slow and awkward cassette tape gave way to the CD and the Discman, which gave way to the MP3 which, so far, is about as self-gratifying as music on the go can get! A whole record collection in your hip pocket--heady thought for us kids who grew up timing eight track tapes so we could hit the "track" button, thus changing tracks to hear that one favorite song over and over after tuning out the tunes we hated.
These days, just for fun, and personal salvation--seems microwave popcorn is chock full of things that'll kill you dead if you actually eat it--I set about ruining our "glass" cook top with that Mom-taught and age old practice of shaking them kernels in a pan. I wish I'd paid more attention to her technique when I were younger because I used to love the lid-lifting ending to her adventures in making enough for her, Dad, my Sister, me, the three dogs, and my first cat who thought chasing the popped-to-the-floor escapees was big fun!
What's even weirder to me is the fact that my kids don't know any different. They think Life is supposed to come screaming in on a cable or picked up at Wal Mart and sweep them off of their feet. Rarely do they get the gumption to enjoy the slower things in life, like a hot-ass summer day with absolutely nothing to do. Those were the days, when at their age, I'd hop on my bike and ride the sixteen mile round trip to try out that newfangled chicken place called BoJangles. Or ride to Sedgefield Stables to scoop poop for the aforementioned chicken money.
It's not their fault I suppose, seeing's how I let that cable worm its way into our home, and drag them to Wally World when I want a new toy for them or I, but rather than take the blame, I look to that smoky bag of ruined, yet quickly eaten, popcorn at The Weavers' house way back when. It was that spark that set us all on our way down that bustling, never-quite -quick-enough road to now.
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Here's what happened...
Hmm,
Not much. In fact, looking back, I realize that I was knocked unconscious and that if I hadn't woke up, then that would have been it I suppose. Because it was lights out, and then it was lights back on. Then the suffering really kicked in.
The first thing I remember was the face-down almost fetal position I was in and the realization that my ribs were broken... and that I couldn't breathe well. Then the sudden realization that my collarbone, but for the thickness of my skin, was broken and jutting jaggedly out, but not through, my skin.
Then I remember Jaime asking me--yeah, I almost, in my biggest failure as a man and father, killed him too--"Are you all right?"
And me saying, for the first time ever to my little boy, "No. I'm not. Get help."
The boy had to continue on a trail he had never been down before in his life, in the woods, alone, to get me help and he did. This 10 year old boy was my hero. That hardly ever happens for me...
And while he was gone I tried to sit up, did so, and figured out that I had broken my neck and pulled all the muscles and ligaments that hold my head on straight so that I couldn't sit up without holding my now lumpy head in my hands...like The Thinker.
And gasping there, waiting for Jaime et al, I knew I was fucked.
When the other menfolk gathered around me to see the damage and ask, "Are you all right?" repeatedly, I told them my diagnosis, but like all men everywhere in the world, their, and my first instinct, was to get me on my feet. They dragged me up, and I willingly tried as well knowing if one can walk, one can make it. Well, my head rolled back and kinda lolled around uncontrollably as I stood and I jerked my hand out of Lowell's or Tay's hands and sat down again.
I knew I was fucked. I knew I needed real help. And I knew I needed to get out of there to a hospital. By now, also, real honest to god, broken bone pain started to set in as well. Real pain, not the fleeting wisp as when you stub your toe or hit your thumb with a hammer, but a serious, droning ache from all over that consumed every thought I had.
Well almost. I summoned a towel to wrap around my neck twice with a few twists at the end to immobilize my wobbly head. I got Tay and Lowell to pick me up and scoot me into the passenger side of my truck that I'd summoned as well. And then Tay drove my truck--did I mention we were so deep into the Virginia mountains that no one had a cellphone signal--out to a spot on the road that an ambulance could actually make it to.
Of course by then, in an attempt to salvage my manhood, we made the decision to drive to Martinsville, Va. ourselves with Lisa at the wheel. And that's what we did. After that, it was all pain. When we got to the hospital they came out with a wheel chair. By then I had stiffened up so badly that there was no way I could unball myself and get out of the truck--not to mention I had a broken neck. Sadly, when I got the help I really needed, I was strapped down to a back board and remained so for about 10 hours.
At this hospital, I got my first CT Scan ever! Really cool to see later--I have copies! But before I got a long ambulance ride back to Wake Forest Baptist Hospital (the worst fucking place in the world) we got treated to one of the funniest things that happened that day.
Now, for some reason, they had to email the CT Scan to another country for a "real" radiologist to examine, and we ended up waiting for hours for this ethereal doctor to check out my x-rays and get back to "my" doctor with the results. My doctor must have been blind or something.
Anyway, And the ER doctor who was "helping" me must have been in the hospital's international x-ray command center that was just a few yards down the hall when the results came because we heard him shout, "Oh my God! he's got a broken neck!" Also, we heard commotion as he loudly shared this information with anyone he could find...but the funny as hell thing was when he walked into my cubicle and calmly said, "Mr. Mothershead, it appears you have fractured your spine at C2 and there's not much we can do for you here..."
The whole time I was thinking...no shit.
So, nothing spiritual happened, no bright lights, no choirs, no life flashing before my eyes. All of which reinforced my feeling that there's nothing after this life, just as there was nothing before it. And I'm stoic. "Only by being prepared for your death can you ever truly live," is what Christopher Moore put in his book A Dirty job and I have done so since about the time I was eight years old.
I mean, like I've written before, It won't take ALS or cancer to "teach" me how to live. It makes me sick when i read or hear when folks say, "I didn't know how to live..." or "I didn't know what was precious..." until they're faced with death. My whole life I've known it's just down the road...
No, near death doesn't mean anything to me, just that I cheated it again...life changers are smaller, louder, and poop in their pants for their first two years.
Not much. In fact, looking back, I realize that I was knocked unconscious and that if I hadn't woke up, then that would have been it I suppose. Because it was lights out, and then it was lights back on. Then the suffering really kicked in.
The first thing I remember was the face-down almost fetal position I was in and the realization that my ribs were broken... and that I couldn't breathe well. Then the sudden realization that my collarbone, but for the thickness of my skin, was broken and jutting jaggedly out, but not through, my skin.
Then I remember Jaime asking me--yeah, I almost, in my biggest failure as a man and father, killed him too--"Are you all right?"
And me saying, for the first time ever to my little boy, "No. I'm not. Get help."
The boy had to continue on a trail he had never been down before in his life, in the woods, alone, to get me help and he did. This 10 year old boy was my hero. That hardly ever happens for me...
And while he was gone I tried to sit up, did so, and figured out that I had broken my neck and pulled all the muscles and ligaments that hold my head on straight so that I couldn't sit up without holding my now lumpy head in my hands...like The Thinker.
And gasping there, waiting for Jaime et al, I knew I was fucked.
When the other menfolk gathered around me to see the damage and ask, "Are you all right?" repeatedly, I told them my diagnosis, but like all men everywhere in the world, their, and my first instinct, was to get me on my feet. They dragged me up, and I willingly tried as well knowing if one can walk, one can make it. Well, my head rolled back and kinda lolled around uncontrollably as I stood and I jerked my hand out of Lowell's or Tay's hands and sat down again.
I knew I was fucked. I knew I needed real help. And I knew I needed to get out of there to a hospital. By now, also, real honest to god, broken bone pain started to set in as well. Real pain, not the fleeting wisp as when you stub your toe or hit your thumb with a hammer, but a serious, droning ache from all over that consumed every thought I had.
Well almost. I summoned a towel to wrap around my neck twice with a few twists at the end to immobilize my wobbly head. I got Tay and Lowell to pick me up and scoot me into the passenger side of my truck that I'd summoned as well. And then Tay drove my truck--did I mention we were so deep into the Virginia mountains that no one had a cellphone signal--out to a spot on the road that an ambulance could actually make it to.
Of course by then, in an attempt to salvage my manhood, we made the decision to drive to Martinsville, Va. ourselves with Lisa at the wheel. And that's what we did. After that, it was all pain. When we got to the hospital they came out with a wheel chair. By then I had stiffened up so badly that there was no way I could unball myself and get out of the truck--not to mention I had a broken neck. Sadly, when I got the help I really needed, I was strapped down to a back board and remained so for about 10 hours.
At this hospital, I got my first CT Scan ever! Really cool to see later--I have copies! But before I got a long ambulance ride back to Wake Forest Baptist Hospital (the worst fucking place in the world) we got treated to one of the funniest things that happened that day.
Now, for some reason, they had to email the CT Scan to another country for a "real" radiologist to examine, and we ended up waiting for hours for this ethereal doctor to check out my x-rays and get back to "my" doctor with the results. My doctor must have been blind or something.
Anyway, And the ER doctor who was "helping" me must have been in the hospital's international x-ray command center that was just a few yards down the hall when the results came because we heard him shout, "Oh my God! he's got a broken neck!" Also, we heard commotion as he loudly shared this information with anyone he could find...but the funny as hell thing was when he walked into my cubicle and calmly said, "Mr. Mothershead, it appears you have fractured your spine at C2 and there's not much we can do for you here..."
The whole time I was thinking...no shit.
So, nothing spiritual happened, no bright lights, no choirs, no life flashing before my eyes. All of which reinforced my feeling that there's nothing after this life, just as there was nothing before it. And I'm stoic. "Only by being prepared for your death can you ever truly live," is what Christopher Moore put in his book A Dirty job and I have done so since about the time I was eight years old.
I mean, like I've written before, It won't take ALS or cancer to "teach" me how to live. It makes me sick when i read or hear when folks say, "I didn't know how to live..." or "I didn't know what was precious..." until they're faced with death. My whole life I've known it's just down the road...
No, near death doesn't mean anything to me, just that I cheated it again...life changers are smaller, louder, and poop in their pants for their first two years.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Things I Do For Love
Dumb things I do for love.
I saw her ad in the newsletter and responded with an email.
I said I wanted to meet, sort of look her over, but I already knew.
I told a friend and he tried to talk me out of moving on her.
He said she wasn't worth it, that I was already set, but I wouldn't listen.
Who can listen when love's involved?
Who can stop themselves when the promise of bliss is just a moment away?
 |
| Beretta 686 White Onyx, 28 Gauge. |
In the worst of times, love is what we need, even if we can't afford it.
And so I took her home.
I know what's good for us.
Sunday, June 12, 2011
I Have Pants On Too
If you spend your time with the same type of folks I do, and your Slim Jim can't be split open with your teeth, or you can't open the infernal heat-sealed packet your earplugs are in, and you happen to ask, "Got a knife?" everyone within earshot will start digging in their pockets to get you a blade. Thrust upon you will be hands filled with Gerbers, Bucks, and maybe an old school Schrade--all eager to help--along with the standard, "Got my pants on?"
That's just the way it is. I got a few friends, but not many, who carry "tactical" knives for gutting the folks that try to do them harm. They carry a whole different kind of blade. Mean and nasty things I've never heard of, things that you could breast out a turkey or goose with, but probably ain't much good opening a can of beans when you leave your P-38 at home.
My favorite is the "Tanto bladed weapon" that guys brag on. I ain't got one, but every time I hear the word I think of the Lone Ranger's sidekick and the word "Tonto" ("silly" in Castellano) which is what any fetish is to me, even when the lust involves "tactical weapons for close quarters combat". What's the old adage? Never bring your knife to a gunfight?
Sure sure, the devotees will tell you, "I can close twenty-one feet with a knife and slit your throat in half a second!" And they might be right, or not. It might be, that if I see you standing there with a knife in your hand seven yards away, I might just go on and produce a handgun on the off chance that you actually do want to slit my throat--you wouldn't be the first person to think of it I reckon.
Another thing to remember about good old boys and their knives is this: if you're handed an open folding-knife, you had best return it the same way--for reasons I'm not sure of. A friendly dressing down by a buddy set me straight on that. It would be like bumming someone's last cigarette I suppose. It just isn't done, even though I was taught by my quasi-yankee (from Missouri) dad that safety is smart, and folders get closed before changing hands, and fixed-blades get handed back handle first.
Me, I can't keep a knife. Knives are one of the small things that the Universe will not let me own for more than six months. And all the knives I buy (or "borrow" from Brian) are hunting knives--from the diminutive "butthole knife" to the whopper chopper camp knife--or fishing knives which are handy for filleting the meat right off of the annoying rest of the fish.
The most likely to disappear are the little folders with the clip on the side for attaching to the inside of your pocket making the knife a cinch to gall the view screen of your phone into a scarred and unusable wreck...or the back of your hand as you reach for change. My Glock never cut my hand, never even tried, though I carry it elsewhere than my pocket--somewhere not quite in my underwear, but not quite inside a holster either.
Well I didn't mean to digress and start poking fun at knife-toting folks, I just had a thought. The times I've needed a knife and had to get one from someone else makes the phrase, "I've always relied on the kindness of strangers," a way of life for me. But maybe that's part of the "why" I hang out with the folks I do. If I can't get that Brownell's box open, I know someone who can...and if "someone who can" needs some crown molding run or needs a half-inch drill with a sixteen inch long, 3/4" auger bit, I'm their boy.
In the meantime, I'll keep buying the crappy new Chinese Schrades because they remind me of the knives I cut my teeth on as a young man. And I'll keep looking for old, used American-made hunting knives because back in the day, they made them with some magical fancy steel that would actually hold an edge in the face of hide and hair that doesn't seem to exist nowadays. And when they get gone, I'll fret until someone helps me out.
That's just the way it is. I got a few friends, but not many, who carry "tactical" knives for gutting the folks that try to do them harm. They carry a whole different kind of blade. Mean and nasty things I've never heard of, things that you could breast out a turkey or goose with, but probably ain't much good opening a can of beans when you leave your P-38 at home.
My favorite is the "Tanto bladed weapon" that guys brag on. I ain't got one, but every time I hear the word I think of the Lone Ranger's sidekick and the word "Tonto" ("silly" in Castellano) which is what any fetish is to me, even when the lust involves "tactical weapons for close quarters combat". What's the old adage? Never bring your knife to a gunfight?
Sure sure, the devotees will tell you, "I can close twenty-one feet with a knife and slit your throat in half a second!" And they might be right, or not. It might be, that if I see you standing there with a knife in your hand seven yards away, I might just go on and produce a handgun on the off chance that you actually do want to slit my throat--you wouldn't be the first person to think of it I reckon.
Another thing to remember about good old boys and their knives is this: if you're handed an open folding-knife, you had best return it the same way--for reasons I'm not sure of. A friendly dressing down by a buddy set me straight on that. It would be like bumming someone's last cigarette I suppose. It just isn't done, even though I was taught by my quasi-yankee (from Missouri) dad that safety is smart, and folders get closed before changing hands, and fixed-blades get handed back handle first.
Me, I can't keep a knife. Knives are one of the small things that the Universe will not let me own for more than six months. And all the knives I buy (or "borrow" from Brian) are hunting knives--from the diminutive "butthole knife" to the whopper chopper camp knife--or fishing knives which are handy for filleting the meat right off of the annoying rest of the fish.
The most likely to disappear are the little folders with the clip on the side for attaching to the inside of your pocket making the knife a cinch to gall the view screen of your phone into a scarred and unusable wreck...or the back of your hand as you reach for change. My Glock never cut my hand, never even tried, though I carry it elsewhere than my pocket--somewhere not quite in my underwear, but not quite inside a holster either.
Well I didn't mean to digress and start poking fun at knife-toting folks, I just had a thought. The times I've needed a knife and had to get one from someone else makes the phrase, "I've always relied on the kindness of strangers," a way of life for me. But maybe that's part of the "why" I hang out with the folks I do. If I can't get that Brownell's box open, I know someone who can...and if "someone who can" needs some crown molding run or needs a half-inch drill with a sixteen inch long, 3/4" auger bit, I'm their boy.
In the meantime, I'll keep buying the crappy new Chinese Schrades because they remind me of the knives I cut my teeth on as a young man. And I'll keep looking for old, used American-made hunting knives because back in the day, they made them with some magical fancy steel that would actually hold an edge in the face of hide and hair that doesn't seem to exist nowadays. And when they get gone, I'll fret until someone helps me out.
 |
| The Chinese attempt to reproduce the Old Timer from my youth that was lost in a woods. |
Saturday, June 4, 2011
Cheating Death (Or Why Pools Are So Fricking Dangerous)
A quick word on cheating death:
As a parent, now, I've come to the realization that my sole purpose for being here is to protect the offspring I helped create (or took to raise as my own). In the genetic sense, of course as a Male of the species, I want my DNA to keep on keeping on. And no, that's not the everlasting life Jesus promised (if I gave up all my money and/or stuffed a camel through the eye of a needle), but close enough for Mother Earth.
And now, looking back, I've realized that a few times I, or my partner in seeding the earth with frenetic and genetic splices, have actually had opportunity to literally save the kids' lives. And when that happens, I call it cheating death. I've had a few close calls myself, but only once has someone reached down and pulled me out of a catch-basin by my hair...
The boy was into T-Ball though I'm not sure why--more proof that he was adopted I reckon. After a season of games, the coach, a man who must love the game, threw a little get together at his home which featured a pool. When we arrived, we walked around the back of the house following all the child-like noises we heard and Jaime and I stepped to the side of the pool. Jaime, who's never even seen a pool, looks down and immediately steps, just steps, into the water without a moment of hesitation! Fully dressed, and *bloop*, he's gone.
For half a second--my mouth drops open--I stand in disbelief watching him go down. Being a four year old Guatemalan, there ain't many places where the pool water ain't gonna be over his head. I drop the things in my hand and drop to my knees and shove my arm into the water and reach for the boy. He's so far down, and still dropping, that all I can grab is his hair, so I do, and I pull.
I get him out and he chuckles and the rest of the time that we're all there, things are as right as rain--I doubt if anyone else even noticed the "drama" that had unfolded right under my nose--his mom did! At the time I didn't think anything of it, but now, looking back, I feel like a hero, like I snatched him from the jaws of death. The sad news is, the heroics there were cancelled out by my almost killing him years before.
That involved a belt tied around his two-year old waist and then slinging him around the room. It's all fun and games until his sneakers lost their grip on the floor and he BONKED his head on the 1970's porno-esque hearth that was featured prominently in the rental house-by-the-lake. See, back then he didn't really get my political humour (ie fart jokes and potty mouth), so I had to use slapstick to keep him laughing. And the lesson I took was no more belt slinging Jaime around unless we were outside.
So the balance was reset--I almost kill him, then years later, I snatch him back from the brink. And it remained so until I almost killed us both in 2007, but that's another story.
Now, the daughter, the first born, though younger than the boy (I still smile when me and Lisa were the only parents at Lamaze class laughing at people putting diapers on immobile, lifeless dolls. I kept saying, "You better learn how to hold him down with your leg while you unfold that diaper, Bro!") has her own tale. I brought her back from the severed garden's gate at a friend's pool as well.
Being in the water first, I was an inadvertent lure to my daughter as she tip-toed neck deep in the water towards me. What she didn't know, was that the pool, like all good backyard pools, is divided between "deep" and "shallow" ends by the slippery sloping floor. I watched as she went from placid to panic as her feet slid, dragging her with them and under water. The thing I realize, when I saw the fear in her eyes, and heard the gurgling, choking attempts at breath, is that it only takes a second to be in real trouble, even under the best of circumstances.
And I had to watch it all from about 15 feet away--the longest 15 feet of terrible walk/swim-stroking I've ever had to cover. Upon arrival, I hoisted her up and held her to me and it was over after a few coughs and snotty bubbles. Like Jaime before her, I held a tiny person that I'd taken on as such a part of my life, that to fail either of them as a father at this level would have been devastating. I've been ever so slightly touched by others' lives where there was no panicked, parental grasp to help a young child ensnared in a pool.
Our panache for water born suicide might just run in the family. I recall being a young fifth or sixth grader--okay, perhaps I don't recall all that much--wading in a giant mud puddle after a summer storm at one of my sister's swim meets. The water was mid-calf deep, so when some half-witted dumbass (the worst kind) warned me to be careful, that "the water's deep," I didn't think much of it. Had they said, "Be careful, there's an uncovered catch-basin hidden in the muddy, murky water that your about to step into." I might have heeded the warning.
As it was, I took a step, and quickly disappeared. I found out first hand what it's like to lose all orientation in the world: no time...sights...up...down...light...just dark. All that was left was fear and the sounds of the water in my ears and the cavitation of flailing arms. Until a hand wrapped itself in my hair and pulled me up and out. And not surprising, there was my dad, the man who had taken me on to raise doing what most parents only do metaphorically, but right then at that moment, he had literally saved my life.
Sure, he wouldn't hug me; he didn't want to get wet. And no, we didn't leave to get me some dry clothes; it was my sister's swim meet dammit! But he had set a precedent that sadly, my kids and I were destined to repeat.
I could go on, and I will, but only if you want me to.
As a parent, now, I've come to the realization that my sole purpose for being here is to protect the offspring I helped create (or took to raise as my own). In the genetic sense, of course as a Male of the species, I want my DNA to keep on keeping on. And no, that's not the everlasting life Jesus promised (if I gave up all my money and/or stuffed a camel through the eye of a needle), but close enough for Mother Earth.
And now, looking back, I've realized that a few times I, or my partner in seeding the earth with frenetic and genetic splices, have actually had opportunity to literally save the kids' lives. And when that happens, I call it cheating death. I've had a few close calls myself, but only once has someone reached down and pulled me out of a catch-basin by my hair...
The boy was into T-Ball though I'm not sure why--more proof that he was adopted I reckon. After a season of games, the coach, a man who must love the game, threw a little get together at his home which featured a pool. When we arrived, we walked around the back of the house following all the child-like noises we heard and Jaime and I stepped to the side of the pool. Jaime, who's never even seen a pool, looks down and immediately steps, just steps, into the water without a moment of hesitation! Fully dressed, and *bloop*, he's gone.
For half a second--my mouth drops open--I stand in disbelief watching him go down. Being a four year old Guatemalan, there ain't many places where the pool water ain't gonna be over his head. I drop the things in my hand and drop to my knees and shove my arm into the water and reach for the boy. He's so far down, and still dropping, that all I can grab is his hair, so I do, and I pull.
I get him out and he chuckles and the rest of the time that we're all there, things are as right as rain--I doubt if anyone else even noticed the "drama" that had unfolded right under my nose--his mom did! At the time I didn't think anything of it, but now, looking back, I feel like a hero, like I snatched him from the jaws of death. The sad news is, the heroics there were cancelled out by my almost killing him years before.
That involved a belt tied around his two-year old waist and then slinging him around the room. It's all fun and games until his sneakers lost their grip on the floor and he BONKED his head on the 1970's porno-esque hearth that was featured prominently in the rental house-by-the-lake. See, back then he didn't really get my political humour (ie fart jokes and potty mouth), so I had to use slapstick to keep him laughing. And the lesson I took was no more belt slinging Jaime around unless we were outside.
So the balance was reset--I almost kill him, then years later, I snatch him back from the brink. And it remained so until I almost killed us both in 2007, but that's another story.
Now, the daughter, the first born, though younger than the boy (I still smile when me and Lisa were the only parents at Lamaze class laughing at people putting diapers on immobile, lifeless dolls. I kept saying, "You better learn how to hold him down with your leg while you unfold that diaper, Bro!") has her own tale. I brought her back from the severed garden's gate at a friend's pool as well.
Being in the water first, I was an inadvertent lure to my daughter as she tip-toed neck deep in the water towards me. What she didn't know, was that the pool, like all good backyard pools, is divided between "deep" and "shallow" ends by the slippery sloping floor. I watched as she went from placid to panic as her feet slid, dragging her with them and under water. The thing I realize, when I saw the fear in her eyes, and heard the gurgling, choking attempts at breath, is that it only takes a second to be in real trouble, even under the best of circumstances.
And I had to watch it all from about 15 feet away--the longest 15 feet of terrible walk/swim-stroking I've ever had to cover. Upon arrival, I hoisted her up and held her to me and it was over after a few coughs and snotty bubbles. Like Jaime before her, I held a tiny person that I'd taken on as such a part of my life, that to fail either of them as a father at this level would have been devastating. I've been ever so slightly touched by others' lives where there was no panicked, parental grasp to help a young child ensnared in a pool.
Our panache for water born suicide might just run in the family. I recall being a young fifth or sixth grader--okay, perhaps I don't recall all that much--wading in a giant mud puddle after a summer storm at one of my sister's swim meets. The water was mid-calf deep, so when some half-witted dumbass (the worst kind) warned me to be careful, that "the water's deep," I didn't think much of it. Had they said, "Be careful, there's an uncovered catch-basin hidden in the muddy, murky water that your about to step into." I might have heeded the warning.
As it was, I took a step, and quickly disappeared. I found out first hand what it's like to lose all orientation in the world: no time...sights...up...down...light...just dark. All that was left was fear and the sounds of the water in my ears and the cavitation of flailing arms. Until a hand wrapped itself in my hair and pulled me up and out. And not surprising, there was my dad, the man who had taken me on to raise doing what most parents only do metaphorically, but right then at that moment, he had literally saved my life.
Sure, he wouldn't hug me; he didn't want to get wet. And no, we didn't leave to get me some dry clothes; it was my sister's swim meet dammit! But he had set a precedent that sadly, my kids and I were destined to repeat.
I could go on, and I will, but only if you want me to.
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