AWG:Chicago

I Know, I Know...

2015-03-19T15:25:00.000-05:00

...you know.

Notes of an Angry White Guy

Holy Crap! This Will Change Everything!

2015-03-10T15:23:00.000-05:00

OK. I lied.

For the Truth, go to www.donhallchicago.com

Did You Know?

2015-03-07T15:22:00.000-06:00

That I've moved from blogger to this?

Yup. I did.

Just in Case You Failed to Notice...

2015-03-03T09:17:00.001-06:00

...I'm no longer here.

Swing by www.donhallchicago.com and check out my new(ish) website with my new(ish) blog.

Go to donhallchicago.com

2014-12-02T05:32:00.003-06:00

http://www.donhallchicago.com/blog/2014/11/29/why-social-media-is-a-limited-means-of-revolution

Migrating to donhallchicago.com

2014-11-22T08:32:00.002-06:00

Yeah.

Been on Blogspot for nine freaking years and change.

I started blogging because I enjoyed the process and results of writing but was a crap playwright. Joe told me to simply write every day. This piece of advice turned into over 4,500 posts and nearly 1.5 million page views.

Time to move over to my own domain. If you are a follower of my rantings, go to http://www.donhallchicago.com/blog/ and hit the Subscribe RSS button.

I'm leaving this up (why not?) but all of the blogs here have been migrated to an archives on the new site: Notes of an Angry White Guy.

Enjoy Every Sandwich

2014-11-20T05:08:00.000-06:00

"The Letterman appearance, in October, was likely to be Zevon's last public performance. He had a long connection to the show; when the band leader, Paul Shaffer, took time off, Letterman called on Zevon to lead the band, and Letterman makes a cameo appearance (shouting ''Hit somebody!'') on Zevon's 2002 album, ''My Ride's Here.'' Now he walked onstage as the band played ''I'll Sleep When I'm Dead,'' a Zevon song from 1976, and bluntly described his situation. ''I might have made a tactical error in not going to a physician for 20 years,'' he told Letterman. ''It's one of those phobias that didn't pay off.''

Letterman asked Zevon if his condition had taught him anything about life and death. ''How much you're supposed to enjoy every sandwich,'' Zevon answered."

SOURCE

The sandwich is simple in construct. The idea was to create something portable - a meal you could hold in your hand and eat as you went about things. Two pieces of bread, a tortilla, a shell, a bun - any of these "casings" can be filled with meat or vegetables or butter or cheese - and viola, you have a sandwich. What you choose to put in the sandwich is really up to you.

In 1995, in Edinburgh, Scotland at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe (the largest performing arts festival on the planet) I found myself standing on a plinth, dressed as my character from "The Armageddon Radio Hour" and playing my horn as some of us from the show passed out handbills to promote attendance. We always went to the area right outside the Main Box Office and were shilling with hundreds of other actors and musicians.

At one point, we gained a fan. His name was Kevin and he was one of the Edinburgh homeless. Kevin was probably 35 years old but he looked far older. The fact that he had lost most of his teeth squished his face into a sort of shrunken apple visage and we could hardly understand a word he said as his accent was of that incredibly thick Scottish jumble of sounds. Every afternoon, Kevin would stand near me, listening to me play and jabber at me almost nonstop. A few days later, he grabbed some of our handbills and started passing them out with us. As we'd leave, I'd give him a few dollars - after all, he was working for it, right?

One afternoon, Kevin wasn't there and I noticed. We danced our dance of potential commerce and as we were finishing up, Kevin came over with a couple of sandwiches. He offered one to me, smiling toothlessly and mumbling something through bites of his.

The sandwich was filled with some sort of meat but it was sheathed in fat and gristle. It was disgusting. My stomach rolled over just looking at it. I shook my head no - I was fine. He should eat it. But Kevin wouldn't have it. He brought the second sandwich to share with me.

It turned out, as I bit into the sandwich that the filling was almost entirely fat. It was a fat sandwich. It was kind of horrifying and I started to dry heave as I tried to chew through it. Kevin smiled a huge mouthy grin as I masticated the inedible thing and said something very enthusiastic, likely about how good the sandwich was. I nodded and steeled myself and swallowed, barely holding on to the rejection my system wanted to engage in. And I looked at his smiling face and ate the goddamned thing.

It was the worst sandwich I've ever eaten but, in its odd way and in the context of the dining companion I was with, it was also the best one.

"Enjoy every sandwich," says a man who was stricken with lung cancer at age 56.

Simple advice but complicated as well.

We don't get to make every sandwich we eat. Sometimes the sandwich is filled with the grief of loss, maybe of heartache, perhaps the shit you eat when you make a crushing mistake, with condiments made up of self doubt mustard and the relish of regret. Sometimes we are handed a sandwich we do not want and need to eat it anyway.

And we need to enjoy them as well as the sandwiches that fill us with joy and are deliciously satisfying.

Hell, sometimes that awful sandwich comes with a side of humanity.

I Believe...

2014-11-18T05:07:00.000-06:00

...that nothing is more reminiscent of the obsessive fans of butterflies or obscure comic books or Hummel figurines than the Chicago theater person. Anything mildly critical of their obsession creates a wild frenzied crying fit and outrage that rivals that of an entitled nine-year old beauty pageant princess who lost the talent competition...

...that Bill Maher is right - the Mormon Church was founded on a sex cult. Which makes it just as legit as every other religious faith founded on hysteria, superstition and political upheaval and control (hint: all of them...)

...that when you're convinced on some level that the discourse of comments on a Facebook status is being seen by almost anyone, you don't really understand how Facebook works and perhaps you need to get out of the house more...

...that there is a difference between a polar vortex and a normal, run-of-the-mill cold snap. Chill out with the hysteria already...

...that as much as I want the world to be as simple as Black and White, Right and Wrong, Apple and Android, there are simply too many grey areas and we are all just hypocritical enough for that to be true. I can't decide if that means I've grown up some or that I've watered down my values, though...

REPOST: Does Poverty Cause Poverty?

2014-11-17T05:15:00.000-06:00

As defined by the Office of Management and Budget and updated for inflation using the Consumer Price Index, the average poverty threshold for a family of four in 2003 was $18,810; for a family of three, $14,680; for a family of two, $12,015; and for unrelated individuals, $9,393.

Kevin was a homeless cat who, in the early days of 2002, hung out on my apartment stoop every night. His "pitch" was that he needed a dollar to get something to eat. Invariably, every time I left my apartment, Kevin would ask me for some money for food. The thing was, Kevin was a huge, fat guy. He was probably pushing something around 350 - 380 pounds. Time and again, I would make the joke with him that a dude his size asking for money for food was likely the wrong pitch.

The thing was, Kevin never changed his pitch. And sat out on that stoop every single night.

After a couple of weeks of this, I would go out and talk to Kevin. He was a pretty average guy - dropped out of high school his junior year and hitchhiked to Detroit. Lived there with a girlfriend for a couple of years, had a job, they had a kid, and when she dumped him, he gained a bunch of weight and took a Greyhound to Chicago because a friend of his told him about a construction gig he could have. Turned out his friend was either full of shit or Kevin was unwilling to work the job - whatever the specifics, Kevin found himself living in the streets of Chicago, frequently sleeping in the park or churches if it was cold and sitting on my stoop trying to get something to eat.

In the United States, the number of chronically homeless people (those with repeated episodes or who have been homeless for long periods) is estimated to fluctuate between 847,000-3,590,000. The primary factor for the majority of these homeless is poverty, that is, an inability to break free from the perpetual cycle of poverty. Poverty accounts for more than 18 times the resultant homelessness of those with drug or alcohol addiction, mental illness, or victims of natural disaster.

But wait a minute. Haven't we all heard the stories of the "homeless" guy who is homeless voluntarily? Wasn't Kevin homeless because he chose to be so? For that matter, didn't Kevin choose to drop out of school, have a child he couldn't support, gain all that fucking weight and beg for food while he slept in the park?

Charles Karelis, author of "The Persistence of Poverty: Why the Economics of the Well-Off Can't Help the Poor," noticed this, but instead of going with the gut instinct, he decided to look a bit deeper.

In the community of people dedicated to analyzing poverty, one of the sharpest debates is over why some poor people act in ways that ensure their continued indigence. Compared with the middle class or the wealthy, the poor are disproportionately likely to drop out of school, to have children while in their teens, to abuse drugs, to commit crimes, to not save when extra money comes their way, to not work.

To an economist, this is irrational behavior. It might make sense for a wealthy person to quit his job, or to eschew education or develop a costly drug habit. But a poor person, having little money, would seem to have the strongest incentive to subscribe to the Puritan work ethic, since each dollar earned would be worth more to him than to someone higher on the income scale. Social conservatives have tended to argue that poor people lack the smarts or willpower to make the right choices. Social liberals have countered by blaming racial prejudice and the crippling conditions of the ghetto for denying the poor any choice in their fate. Neoconservatives have argued that antipoverty programs themselves are to blame for essentially bribing people to stay poor.

Karelis believes that the single most important factor that causes poverty (and by one degree of separation, homelessness and hunger in the richest country on the planet) is...poverty.

If, for example, our car has several dents on it, and then we get one more, we're far less likely to get that one fixed than if the car was pristine before. If we have a sink full of dishes, the prospect of washing a few of them is much more daunting than if there are only a few in the sink to begin with. Karelis's name for goods that reduce or salve these sort of burdens is "relievers."

Karelis argues that being poor is defined by having to deal with a multitude of problems: One doesn't have enough money to pay rent or car insurance or credit card bills or day care or sometimes even food. Even if one works hard enough to pay off half of those costs, some fairly imposing ones still remain, which creates a large disincentive to bestir oneself to work at all.

On the other hand, it is a fact that the American poor still rank in the top 20% of wealth in the world overall, meaning the very poorest person in America still has more money and resource than 80% of the rest of the world's population. In fact, according to the U.S. Bureau of the Census even persons officially described as poor in this country now have extraordinary access to conveniences, labor saving devices, and even luxury goods. For example, 93 percent of poor families have a color television, 72 percent have their own washing machine, 60 percent have microwaves and vcrs.

It is then fair to say that the inequity between the super rich and the poor in this country is comparable to the gap between Us and Them. That said, it does nothing to solve the problem.

Karelis' suggests that by removing a chunk of the economic hardships from those living under crushing debt and removing the bureaucracy involved in aid to the poor is exactly the incentive needed to eliminate the large majority of poverty stricken people. In other words, instead of giving billions of dollars to Halliburton to rebuild homes, give each family the money needed to replace their homes and have them do the subcontracting. His argument is that by simply allocating the money, with no strings attached, we give those in need the dignity of determining their own fate.

The argument against this is pretty obvious - they'll (meaning the losers who are in the situation in the first place) will spend it on drugs, or gamble, or squander it on immediate wants and luxuries rather than use it to better themselves without the guiding hand of the ruling class. The problem with this perspective is that A) I can't buy into the idea that just because you are living in poverty, you are a loser and B) the statistics indicate that those who are poverty stricken due to drugs or addiction or irresponsibility are in the small, SMALL minority of our country's poor.

I don't know if I entirely buy into Karelis' premise, but it occurs to me that in the past three decades, we have slowly allowed this exact model to be used by major corporations - little to no oversight, free bailouts if the money is squandered - so why not give the same treatment to individuals? After all, the company that essentially steals billions of dollars from the government to provide housing in New Orleans and fails to do so because they can keep sucking off the public teat isn't any more degenerate or slimy than the welfare mother who has babies to keep getting more government support.

I think about Kevin and wonder. If the government had said to Kevin, "Kevin - here is a no strings attached stipend of $3,000.00 a month for next six months. It is assigned to you so that you might get back on your feet and find a suitable place to live and become gainfully employed - or you can continue to beg for food on the corner of Halsted & Belmont," I think Kevin would choose the money. I'd like to think he'd actually get back on his feet and get himself together, but even if he didn't, I think Kevin deserves at least as much benefit of the doubt as the fucking CEO of Bechtel.

No. Act Your Shoe Size...

2014-11-14T05:05:00.000-06:00

The [seventy-year old] men in the experimental group were told not merely to reminisce about this earlier era, but to inhabit it — to “make a psychological attempt to be the person they were 22 years ago,” she told me. “We have good reason to believe that if you are successful at this,” Langer told the men, “you will feel as you did in 1959.” From the time they walked through the doors, they were treated as if they were younger. The men were told that they would have to take their belongings upstairs themselves, even if they had to do it one shirt at a time.

Each day, as they discussed sports (Johnny Unitas and Wilt Chamberlain) or “current” events (the first U.S. satellite launch) or dissected the movie they just watched (“Anatomy of a Murder,” with Jimmy Stewart), they spoke about these late-'50s artifacts and events in the present tense — one of Langer’s chief priming strategies. Nothing — no mirrors, no modern-day clothing, no photos except portraits of their much younger selves — spoiled the illusion that they had shaken off 22 years.

At the end of their stay, the men were tested again. On several measures, they outperformed a control group that came earlier to the monastery but didn’t imagine themselves back into the skin of their younger selves, though they were encouraged to reminisce. They were suppler, showed greater manual dexterity and sat taller — just as Langer had guessed. Perhaps most improbable, their sight improved. Independent judges said they looked younger. The experimental subjects, Langer told me, had “put their mind in an earlier time,” and their bodies went along for the ride.

NYT

Sure. This is a bit of "positive thinking" mixed in with The Secret plus the old "mind over matter" meme but, in my experience, it rings true.

I know a gentleman who volunteers for our public radio station (as well as a host of other cultural organizations) who, while as old as the freakin' hills, still walks his way to work, is almost always upbeat, and seems a coupla decades younger than his chronological age. He has a healthy sense of humor - upon informing me one day that he was getting a shoulder replacement operation, he pointed to his knee and said "Got a plastic knee, a titanium hip, a plate in my head, too. Soon I'll be a living robot." He cracked himself up then proceeded to tell me the origin of the word "robot."

Not long ago, I took my wife to see Booker T (of Booker T and the MGs) at City Winery. The audience was mostly comprised of aging hippies. At one point, the 60ish white guy in front of me was dancing in his seat, really getting into it. At first glance, I caught the whiff of youthful disdain waft up from me, turning my nose up at his obvious attempt to feel younger than he was. "He should act his age," that snotty fucking 20-year old inside sniffed. Then my 48-year old AWG snapped back into place, popped the judgmental shit in the head and said, "Nah. He should act his shoe size."

As I get older (and I am far from "old") I'm noticing other men my age and am assessing my own progress in the Dance Toward Mortality in comparison to theirs. I know 48-year old guys who look and act like they're already one foot inside the grave and other 48-year old guys who seem like they're ready for another semester of college. Whether or not the secret is genetics (probably some of that), embracing the nostalgia of youth (I still love the Rock and Roll from my high school days) or just a willingness and will to keep learning and adapting and challenging oneself, I'm growing more and more convinced that age and aging are as much a matter of perspective as physical and mental decay.

On the OLD/YOUNG ledger I have going:

OLD YOUNG

Dry Feet Juvenile Humor
Bifocals Takes stairs two at a time
Salt and Pepper Beard Full Head of Hair
Has a Stable Job Buys Toys and Games
Foul Mouth Foul Mouth
Hair in Ears Can Still Have Sex Without a Pill

The best thing about growing older yet staying (cliché warning) "young at heart"? I still (basically) feel like I'm a younger man but have made the mistakes that only someone my age could've made. Yes, beer and weed now mostly just make me sleepy and I get a carbohydrate hangover far more than a booze one, but the absurdity that is Life on Planet Earth is finally really getting funny.

The Problem with Outlawing Language

2014-11-13T05:08:00.000-06:00

"Hey, sweet cheeks! Smile for me!"
"Nice outfit!"
"Show me those tits!"
"Will you marry me? Or least give me your number?"
"Great sunglasses!"

Which of the above would be considered "catcalling" and under legal scrutiny should laws against the abhorrent practice of street harassment be enacted?

All of them.

Why? Because personal offense is entirely subjective. The feeling of being marginalized is a very real thing. Women, in particular, have serious and completely legitimate complaints (Gee...thanks, Don. It's so refreshing to have a middle-aged white dude validate this...). No thinking person believes it's OK to harass women on the street - not only is it angry and entitled and the obvious expression of privilege to verbally shove someone aside, it's fucking rude.

Outlawing rudeness, however, is no win situation for everyone. In this culture, everyone wants to embrace offense and victim status. Again, a no win scenario.

Once, I had a friend who was lonely and was often accused of harassment. He even lost a job over accusations that he was making the women he worked with uncomfortable. He hugged them just a bit too long, he spontaneously offered up shoulder massages (unasked for and unwanted), he made crude, suggestive jokes. The women in the company I was in charge of came to me and told me he had to go, that if he stayed, they were leaving because he made them routinely uncomfortable.

"Dude. I have a problem. I talk too much. I mean, I'm pretty much constantly running at the mouth and, while I'm always going to be a longwinded motherfucker, I have to pay close attention to the people around me and observe how my nonstop chatter affects them. I'm not always successful but I try to gauge the interest and, if I see that I'm boring the shit out of people, I try to reign that in. Stop talking. Retreat and listen. I'm still not particularly good at it but it's my lifelong obstacle and I recognize that it isn't them but me.

You also have a problem. You're kind of creepy to women. I know that you aren't acting the role of predator - that you are merely trying to be friendly and complimentary and seek a certain amount of physical contact. But that doesn't change the fact that you creep women out with your attentions.

It's your job to recognize it and do your best to avoid making others feel uncomfortable with this challenge of yours."

He was angry. He cried some. His frustration was palpable. It was hard advice but necessary.

Patriarchy and white male privilege, for centuries taught to every single one of us, is pervasive and wrong. It is unearned, undesirable, and unhelpful in bringing a sense of peace and belonging to everyone on the planet. To decide that the lessons taught by these two fucked up ideas are easily unlearned or haphazardly punishable is equally wrongheaded. You don't teach a child to behave by beating him. You teach him what good behavior is.

Misandry is no better than misogyny.

In the end (as if there will ever be an end to this mess) teaching men to behave is going to be more effective than outlawing catcalling.

Happy Hour at the Baja Beach

2014-11-12T05:08:00.000-06:00

They were my glasses from college. For some reason - call it flamboyance or idiocy - I got them in frames of red gel, like Sally Jesse Raphael - and the prescription was possibly three years out of date. Underneath the right frame, the side of my face was swollen like an egg was lodged just a centimeter or so below the skin. My eye was bruised to a bizarre rainbow of black, blue, purple, red and yellow, like a piece of rotten meat attached to my skull. My lower lip was split enough that it hurt to smile. I had this perpetual headache on the left side of my brain. People avoided me on the street. I was a mess. But the glasses? They were the insult to my injurious face.

The summer of 1989, I was a recent college graduate, a self-imposed transplant to the City of Chicago, and a kid living in my truck. When it got late, I’d park my truck somewhere in the City and practice my trumpet in the back or read with a flashlight.

That July, I found myself getting cleaned up in a local White Hen Pantry bathroom, putting on the least wrinkled and smelly clothes I had, and heading over to the Baja Beach Club on Illinois and McClurg. At Happy Hour, you could show an ID, sign an email to a list, and be granted access to the limited buffet for two hours between 5PM and 7PM. They even threw in two drink tickets.

I’d go in, saunter to the bar and use a drink ticket to get a beer and some water. I’d load up a couple of plates of chicken fingers, cheese, crackers, broccoli flowers with ranch, rolls and fruit. I’d sit and nibble at the food and casually stuff the less wet stuff in my jacket pockets to take back to the truck with me.

It was there I met Sidney. Sidney was pretty much in the same straits as I was, had also figured out the bounty that was the Baja Beach Club, and could clean up reasonably well. He also carried a briefcase (which he surreptitiously filled with goodies by a 2 to 1 ratio in comparison to my jacket pockets). Sidney and I recognized the tiny club we were members of and started hanging out, swapping stories and eating crappy but free food.

He was from Missouri. His cousin lived on the Southside (the real Southside, past 75th Street) and had invited him to come to Chicago to get a job. Except that by the time Sidney had made it here, his cousin was incarcerated for something and Sidney was on his own. One night, about two weeks into our newfound companionship, Sidney asked for a ride to a place he was staying. “Sure!” I said. To say anything else would’ve been rude, right?

I suppose I should’ve had some sort of Spidey-Sense when he saw my trumpet - it was out of the case, under a blanket - and he started asking if he could hold it and how much did I pay for it and why didn’t I get it pawned? Not me, though. Trusting to point of outright lunacy, it didn’t even occur to me what would happen once we got hopelessly lost on Western Avenue about as far South as I had been so far.

We pulled over and he grabbed my trumpet and started to bolt out of the truck. Not knowing what else to do, I grabbed his leg and held on for life. He dragged me across to the passenger seat, kicking at me as hard as he could. He tossed the trumpet to the sidewalk where it made a clang and turn and started beating me with his fists. He cracked my glasses in half and they flew off my face. Still, I wouldn’t let go of his leg. I felt something around my eye pop and my head got incredibly warm, hot even. My capacity to get pummeled is pretty vast but about a minute more of this and I was done for.

“Hey! Let that boy go!” I heard a voice yell out. I thought she was yelling at me. Sidney stopped hitting me and, in fact, stopped kicking at me, too. Across the street was a man and his daughter. She was yelling at Sidney. She ran across the street, grabbed my trumpet and stood defiantly in front of Sidney.

“Leave that white boy alone.” she said with an authority that was a decade or two from being earned. Sidney looked over at the father, saw the man start to cross the street and finally wrenched his foot loose from me. He ran the opposite direction.

The girl approached me, handed back my horn. “We saw the whole thing. Are you OK?"

I don’t remembered what I said but her father walked up behind her and said, “He’s still conscious after that beating? I think he’ll be fine.” And they turned and walked away.

The bruises faded and my lip healed in a couple of weeks. It took me until October to get new glasses, though.

LAST MINUTE

2014-11-11T05:16:00.000-06:00

The Trip

The Plummet

The Unexpected Hand Reaches Out

As the corridor of despair,

Inevitable failure, and unavoidable defeat

Closes in on the edges of vision

There is a slender slice of Hope

The Clock

The Imminent Loss

The Hail Mary Pass

Will the unforeseen rope

Be thrown to assist in the nick of time?

Will the random driftwood of chance

Buoy the drowning man in the eleventh hour?

The Eviction Notice

The Bounced Check

The Roommate Comes Through

Was procrastination the culprit

Or was it dumb unluck that sunk things?

If saved, do we blame the Divine

Or just breathe a sigh of relief and call it Serendipity?

REPOST: The Certainty of the Ignorant (Revisited)

2014-11-10T05:13:00.000-06:00

Reposted because the mouth breathers won the mid-terms this time.
_____

"Where can we hear you on the radio?"

I don't have a check or debit card - those fuckers got me into trouble in college where I became known as the Hot Check King of Fayetteville, Arkansas - so I get cash by writing a check, going to the bank, and cashing said check. A bit more energy but at least I'm keeping track, yes?

Consequently, the seven or eight 22 - 32-year old women that are tellers at my local branch know me well enough to chat it up every time I come in.

"Well, I've been doing a lot of 15-second sponsorship spots so you can hear me on Chicago Public Radio, 91.5 FM."

"They don't play music on that, right? That's a lame station, right?"

I like the ladies at the bank, but they aren't exactly paragons of higher intellect.

"It's a news and culture radio station. It's PUBLIC radio. Informing the public may be "lame" but I highly recommend it."

"I'm informed. As informed as I wanna be."

And then the old teacher gene kicked in. While I was a seventh and eighth grade music teacher, the idea that was passed down from the administration was to "teach to the middle of the classroom's ability." The idea was that those kids that excelled would excel anywhere and those kids that were slower or behavior disordered would be alienated by work that was too difficult and thus cause more problems. Teach to the middle.

That's the same thing as saying "Teach to the most mediocre level" or "only challenge your students to be C students" or "we don't want to be accused of playing favorites with the smart kids because the parents of the average kids are in the majority."

And we wonder why the majority (even a slim one) of Americans are borderline morons and that China and Japan (and Norway and England and just about everybody else) is kicking the shit out of us when it comes to basic skills competency.

"As informed as you wanna be? Really? Do you have any understanding of the fiscal crisis our country is in right now? Because about 70% of regular public radio listeners do. Whereas only 30% of those who watch Fox News do and those who regularly watch "The Hills" don't even know what 'fiscal' means."

"I have a right to my opinion. Everybody does."

"It's true." I was starting to get my Southern Baptist Preacher Voice a-going. "Everybody has an opinion and the right to voice it, but like I used to tell my eighth graders 'The opinion of the intelligent outweighs the certainty of the ignorant.'"

In other words, if I read more about the fiscal crisis than you do, my opinion on it is better than yours. It is more informed. It counts more in a reasonably functioning society. It means that though you may be all 'salt of the Earth-straight-talking -Joe Six Pack' but only get your information from the picture box, my semi-educated opinion makes yours look like that of a pre-kindergarten kid with a load of crap in his Gap Kids overalls.

It means that my opinion on the mating habits of aquatic animals - a subject that I regrettably have not done much informing myself on - is worth much less than even a Shedd Aquarium docent's opinion on the subject. And that your opinion of the NFL, shotguns and NASCAR outweighs mine.

When Sarah Palin talks about real Americans, she thinks she means those who live in rural areas. Now, I'm not saying that those country-folk are dumb. They read and write and are likely to function on as high an intellectual level as anyone else in the country. I am saying that there are a lot more Americans that live in cities than on the farm, so a real American looks and walks and talks a lot more like me than the Don Hall that farms corn in Iowa. I don't think Sarah Palin knows what a real American is.

When Sarah Palin talks about real Americans, she is actually talking about the middle - the C students - the mediocrity of the fucking planet. She's talking about people who routinely complain about their weight but stuff another Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese and a Large Fries down their wet, drooling cakeholes. She's talking about people who blindly believe that people with other skin colors, different religious beliefs, and sexual lifestyles are dangerous yet scream "Terrorist" at the mention of Obama and carry guns around for fun. She's talking about guys who wear their high school letter jackets years after graduating and broads who love them so much that it's OK that he beats her after a six-pack of Coors Light. She's referring to those mouthbreathing retards that show up at her rallies with "I'm Voting for a Hot Chick" tee-shirts and scream bloody murder when they hear the word 'socialist' but couldn't tell what that word means.

The charge that those who are smarter, better read, more informed form some sort of 'elite' is absolutely correct. The elite exists and should be rewarded for spending time informing themselves. The elite doesn't mean wealthy in power or dough - it means those few that actually take the world at less than it's face value and endeavor to understand it beyond the pass given to them by religious dogma or the "I'd fuck my mother for a buck' advertising industry. The elite looks up from it's Taco Bell dog food burrito and acknowledges that, indeed, Taco Bell only has one food item that has been dressed up and named a variety of Mexican-ish fake names. The elite's opinion counts more than yours because they are elite.

Life should not just be an extension of high school where the prettiest people with opinions of the mundane and the reading level of a chimp are somehow lauded for their basic ordinariness and gut-level decision making. American life, the most blessed life on the entire planet, should not be defined by how much money people will pay to see Audrina Partridge's plastic tits or a "sneak" papparazzi shot of some C-list star's pantiless crotch shot.

There was a time in this country when going to school was a privilege; when learning things was essential and if you were too lazy or preoccupied or had a tough home life - tough shit - you learned and focused in school or you were destined to work the shittiest jobs on the planet and hope your kids are smarter than you are. Today, kids have no consequence for blatant stupidity because adults have no consequence for blatant stupidity. How many generations of lowered standards and stunted expectations does it take before we all are the global equivalent of the special ed class?

Yes. Informative news programming may, indeed, be lame if only because, as the ship goes down, those of us who listen to it, understand why we're sunk. In the meantime, you can sport your happy-crappy grins as you grind to some B-96 until you wonder what that drowning sensation is.

Hark! The GOP-Led End of the World is NIGH!

2014-11-07T05:14:00.000-06:00

Or not.

This is the status quo, folks. With every two-term president, we have almost exactly the same "crushing defeat" of his party. Every six years, the party that controls the White House loses seats in the House and Senate and the president’s opposing party takes control of both houses. Reagan? Yup. Bush and Clinton got this lambasting as well.

Honestly, I'm interested to see how much damage the Tea Party can do to the country before even FAUX News turns on them.

A coupla thoughts:

The oft quoted plunge Obama's popularity went through leading up to the mid-terms? He went from 42.6% approval last year to 42% approval last month. Not much of a "plunge."
The Republicans have spent six years blocking legislation. Now they get to make the Big Moves. I'm not certain they're ready for that but as Kansas shows, these fucks don't really care about the consequences of bad policy.
Until we eliminate the zealots and ideologues on both sides of the Red/Blue Divide, we aren't going anywhere. Which means little is going to change in two years.
Turns out money can buy elections.

Get Engaged on the Third Date

2014-11-06T05:04:00.000-06:00

I've been married three times.

The first engagement lasted 18 months.
The second engagement came after living together for a few years and then clocked in at a year.
The third engagement lasted a bit over three months.

In between marriages, I dated. A lot. One could say that I've had a lion's share of experience when it comes to romantic relationships and their dissolution.

So, the best advice I can give you on the subject of dating is this:

Get Engaged on the Third Date

1. You Won't Date Just for Pretty

If you look at every date as a person you are planning on spending your life (or at least a significant chunk of it) with, you won't see the sex as the ultimate goal.

Sure, hopping on Craigslist Personals or OKCupid is a flawed but fun way to vet possible companions but after I did that for awhile and dated a lot of lovely women for short periods of time, I realized that A) it was becoming pretty empty and B) it was really expensive. I decided that I was done. No longer looking for The One. I bought a bracelet to remind myself that I wasn't going to pursue romance or sex with anyone with whom I couldn't spend my life.

I've dated for pretty, for sex, for fun but it was her poetry that blew my mind. After two dates, there was so much more there than I anticipated and when she said "You'd have to ask me," there was no doubt in my mind that she was The One. I dropped to my knees and asked and she said "Yes" with the same unwavering certainty. The wedding ring she bought me is modeled after that aforementioned bracelet.

If you intend on finding The One, then treating the dating pool like a Tapas Bar, always just nibbling at the small plates with no intention of really committing to the meal, just doesn't work.

2. The Dance of Autonomy Plays Out Better

The push/pull of autonomy is a different dance when you are committed to the long term than when you are dating.

He overwhelms her with affection and attention. She backs off. So he pushes harder. She pulls away more. Misunderstandings. Confusion. "It just doesn't feel right." End.

Engaged on the third date? Same dance, less muddle. When you KNOW you will be dancing this cha-cha for years to come, it doesn't seem as big a deal to determine who is right but how to navigate it. Thus...

He overwhelms her with affection and attention. She backs off. He senses the distance, so he relaxes and backs off. The two talk about it without accusation or paranoid delusion. Harmony.

3. You Won't Fight the Same Way as You Do With a Girlfriend/Boyfriend

For the same reason the Autonomy Dance works better, fights work better when you get engaged on the third date. When you are focused on a lifetime as opposed to "until I get annoyed or see a juicier piece of ass," you gauge your responses in terms of knowing that this fight (whatever the fucking fight is about) is NOT that big of a deal.

Most fights aren't a big deal. Most fights escalate because of ego. A marriage can't really sustain a lot of ego, especially if you have an honest exchange with your partner. Yes, there will be fights. They will be about the same stuff. But your reactions to one another will be more generous and less judgmental and that is reason enough to get engaged.

4. Everyone Dies in Hamlet

Sitting on the fence in a relationship is merely a biding of time until something different comes along. "To be or not to be - that is the question." Sure - a quick answer makes for a lousy Shakespearean tragedy but who wants that narrative for themselves?

_____

OK. Maybe this approach doesn't work for you. Maybe I'm just so enamored of my current situation I think that my results will be your results. On the other hand, if you spend your third date asking yourself "Could I marry this person?" and answer with anything less than "Fucking A Right I could!" then maybe you need to move on to someone you can say that about.

I Believe...

2014-11-05T03:04:00.000-06:00

...that you have to be a fucking turd to crash a public radio party that only costs $10.00 to attend and then bitch because you didn't get enough beer.

...that your inability to distinguish a compliment from sexual harassment indicates you take yourself FAR too seriously and are looking to identify with a serious political stance like someone auditioning for a show.

...that civil disobedience has to be both Civil and Disobedient. Violent outbreaks are not civil and staying in government approved "free speech zones" is not disobedient.

...that increasing the reaction to verbal annoyance to the same levels as the reaction to physical violation only minimizes the seriousness with which we take the physical violation.

...that with the ephemeral nature of art, it is almost always the content of what you are saying that remains lodged in the throats of the audience and not the quality of the artifice.

Perpetually Full of Shit and OK With It

2014-11-04T05:08:00.000-06:00

A long time ago, it was commonly known that the Earth was both flat and that the sun revolved around it rather than the other way around. People believed that women who were too emotional needed to have primitive devices masturbate them to relieve their hysteria. Most diseases, it was believed, could be cured by bleeding out the illness or by placing leeches on the body to suck out the sickness. It was commonly held that if one reduced the taxes on the wealthiest, the savings would trickle down to the rest of us.

Today we can look back on all of this and giggle at our collective gullibility in believing absolute unvarnished horseshit.

At one point in my life, I believed I would never be divorced. I was wrong. After I was divorced, I thought I'd never fall in love again and remarry. Once I remarried and was handed yet another divorce, I was absolutely certain I would never love another woman with that passion and dedication again. Wrong again.

I believed that being fat was my sure way to surviving the coming Ice Age. I believed that killer bees were coming and would swarm the Midwest. I believed that crime never pays, that exercise was a waste of time, that sex was a transactional act rather than a mutual intimacy. I thought that fame would bring me happiness, that money would bring me joy, that happiness was a goal to be pursued rather than the result of choices.

I, like all of us, was perpetually full of shit.

I was wrong about almost everything and I can look back upon these beliefs I held and know how fucking wrong I was. It would easy to believe that I am now as evolved as I can be and am right about most things. And in five years, I will look back at today and chuckle at how fucking thick I was to think I was ever going to be right about culture, love, happiness, society, and health.

So at last the [jellyfish] began its story. “The universe,” it said, “was born a long, long time ago, perhaps ten or fifteen billion years ago. Our own solar system — this star, this planet and all the others — seem to have come into being some two or three billion years ago. For a long time, nothing whatever lived here. But then, after a billion years or so, life appeared.”

“Excuse me,” the anthropologist said. “You say that life appeared. Where did that happen, according to your myth — I mean, according to your scientific account.”

The creature seemed baffled by the question and turned a pale lavender. “Do you mean in what precise spot?”

“No. I mean, did this happen on the land or in the sea?”

“Land?” the other asked. “What is land?”

“Oh, you know,” he said, waving toward the shore, “the expanse of dirt and rocks that begins over there.”

The creature turned a deeper shade of lavender and said, “I can’t imagine what you’re gibbering about. The dirt and rocks over there are simply the lip of the vast bowl that holds the sea.”

“Oh yes,” the anthropologist said, “I see what you mean. Quite. Go on.”

“Very well,” the other said. “For many millions of centuries the life of the world was merely microorganisms floating helplessly in a chemical broth. But little by little, more complex forms appeared: single-celled creatures, slimes, algae, polyps, and so on.

“But finally,” the creature said, turning quite pink with pride as he came to the climax of his story, “but finally jellyfish appeared!”

- Ishmael by Daniel Quinn

I've been that fucking jellyfish for most of my life. Just blindly arrogant enough to believe that the state I am in right now is the best and most knowledgable I will be. Like Plato's cave dweller, I've seen the shadows on the wall and thought I knew what was going on with a certainty only the truly ignorant can possess.

I often say that meeting Dana has been a game changer and, in this regard, it has been. The new reality of falling in love again and hitching my wagon to hers has put it all into a bizarre Hitchcock Dolly Zoom, forcing my perspective in brand new ways. I mean, if I was mistaken about never finding my Soul Mate, about what else might I be wrong?

Almost everything it turns out. I'm OK with that, though.

On some level, knowing that my assumptions are almost completely flawed most of the time makes it easier to look at them and critically dissect the Wrong from the Less Wrong. Walking away from the assumptions Life has handed me gives me the courage to do the unexpected and take the big risks when I'm supposed to be risking things.

Christ - I'm probably wrong about this, too.

The Scam of Locations

2014-11-03T05:03:00.000-06:00

DMJ and I have been looking for a new place to call home.

We're pretty specific about what we're looking for: 2 - 3 bedroom, vintage apartment, top floor, steam heat, lots of light, Logan Square (although mostly just NOT Rogers Park, Edgewater, Uptown, Lakeview), for around $1,600. She has no credit (manage that one, smartasses!); my credit is pretty awful - but not because I don't pay my bills. I have relatively little debt. Turns out, when we applied and paid $100.00 to do the required credit check, I had two collections out there from 1998 and 2003 respectively. Add that to the defaulted student loan (not mine) that hangs onto my credit rating like a piece of fresh dogshit on my shoe, and one gets a solid "F" on the test of fiscal management.

OK. My debt. Was not aware of the two collections. The debt collectors bought the debt for pennies on the dollar and their business model is to make money on these debts - like parasites. I'm on it now, arranging to pay app. $1,800.00 to get these taken care of. No massive emergency. No foreclosures. I know people who owe tens of thousands of dollars and their credit is solid. I have a solid gig and a decent paycheck. Steady.

Except...

The management companies in Chicago don't seem to put any of that into context. The score is shit so they aren't renting to us. Because in terms of housing, I am no longer a person but a number. Also, every time I pay out $50 - $100 for these assholes to run a credit check, my credit rating goes down even further! So I decided to get a Credit Karma account (free) and print out my report as well as DMJ's and give that out with my application. Unless the apartment was worth my offering up a blowjob to get, I was no longer paying this credit check fee.

"Hi Don,
Thank you for delivering the application over. Unfortunately the company will not take the Credit Karma report because they run their own report. Also, your wife will have to fill out an application [for a credit check] as well. Then law requires that anyone over the age of 18 fill out their own and individual application. Hate to send you through this all, but this is the process."

"Got it. I’m not sure what the difference in the Credit Karma report and a different one is, aside from me paying for it pointlessly - same info either way.

If the credit report I provided can’t give the landlord enough info to confirm or deny the application, I’m not sure it would make a difference anyway (except that someone gets $50).

Go ahead and let the landlord know that if the Credit Karma makes him lean toward not renting to us, cool. If he/she seems likely to rent, I can tag the $50 onto the move in expense."

"Hi Don,
The company will question the authenticity of the report because of social security numbers etc. It is standard procedure for owners."

"I would see the point if I handed you a credit report that said I was the gold standard. No one cheats the authenticity of a report that says he has an “F.”

The fact is, the TransUnion report the company is running costs $9.25 to run but your company is charging $50. Without a solid confirmation that the credit report is NOT the sole basis for a rental agreement, I’m not dropping $100 for you to tell me that my credit rating sucks (which we both know now and I provided for free).

I hear you that this is “the process.” I’m not participating in a process. I’m looking for a place to live.

How about this? I’ll pay the $100 after I get to run the landlord’s credit first."

No response. This is the standard process. Given the amount of capital it costs to own and maintain a rental property in the City of Chicago, it's a safe bet that that landlord has a worse credit rating than I do. Why should he/she get a pass? Oh yeah. Standard procedure.

I'll listen to the monied class lecture the rest of us on financial responsibility when they aren't bilking the tax payers for subsidies and considering debt as some sort of moral flaw. Perfect credit? Give me a break. When the United States ceases to accrue massive debt to China to pay for weapons we don't need and vacations for Congressmen who don't do anything but run for office, maybe I'll sit down to be schooled. If you're American, you are steeped in fucking debt.

And yes. I recognize that this is a small potatoes bitching session. More like a complaint about all the flies at a picnic or that I have pimples on my ass. I have a friend who had a baby and lived in basements and the rooms of friends for a year because her kid got lead poisoning. She had a real gripe.

We aren't in a massive rush here. We aren't in danger of living on Lower Wacker inside a refrigerator box doing tricks for a can of beans and our current lease isn't up for a bit but if you are reading this and either own a building and are looking for a tenant or know someone you think is reliable and can see past the credit report and look at the current job situation along with factors having nothing to do with finances, shoot me a reply or an email.

Otherwise, the search continues.

REPOST: Your Life Ain't That Hard, American Person

2014-10-31T05:02:00.000-05:00

From August 2012

When was the exact moment we became an entire society of whiny, mewling crybabies?

It had to be before the interwebs (although with Facebook and Twitter and, yes, blogs the constant drumbeat of "My life is so fucking HARD..." is just more inescapable).

Admit it, Faithful Reader, right now, as your squat down in front of your ridiculously expensive computer or mobile device to read my constant spew, you're wondering why your life sucks so hard as you sip from a cup of coffee or tea in your apartment/house/domestic dwelling before you hop in your heated water shower with your shower gel (with a hint of mint to make your junk all tingly) and fill your gaping maw with a muffin made from the blood and sweat of migrant workers.

When did it start?

I'm not immune to it. Never in the history of mankind has there been a more wounded, bitching shithead when it comes divorces and relationship failures than Don Hall. When even I get tired of my slightly bitter "Woe is Me" bullshit, I can only imagine how fucking long suffering my few friends are to endure it.

But this isn't just an individual thing, is it?

All of America, from sea to motherfucking shining, oil-polluted, used condom-filled sea, is obsessed with bitching about how hard their lives are.

Couples who just aren't sexually attracted to each other.
People with body issues.
Young mothers.
College students with massive debt and no jobs.
Dudes who feel emasculated by independent women.
Broads who feel objectified as they wear mini-skirts, tight t-shirts and calf-high boots.

White People.
Black People.
Latinos. Jews. Norwegians.
Kids. Parents. Teachers. Rich People. Poor People.

Bitch, bitch, bitch. "LIFE IS NOT FAIR!" we collectively cry out to a fictional deity and expect that someone or something will hear our cry and somehow make it fair. 75% of that cry has fuckall to with fair - it has everything to do with people not getting what they want. More money than they need to buy cable television and $200 shoes and portable game devices. The other 25% is the result of those in the majority so blinded by their own desperate want for more than they need actually ignoring real life inequity.

On the flipside to all this whiny shit, we have created a society that tells us that we deserve this unfair treatment because we ARE fat or black or have thirty cats or can't find a job. We're slowly convinced that it is our fault that the bullies pull our underwear up over our heads or discriminate against us or sexually harass us. We're told to "man up," "get a stiff upper lip," and "pull ourselves up by our bootstraps." We are told that only way to be noticed is to be wounded and victimized and so those who are actually being victimized are lost in the shuffle of everyone else, scrambling for their piece of the Picked Upon Pie.

Reality is more complex on both sides.

No one "deserves" to be shat upon by life. No one (unless you're Mitch McConnell and he has earned a bit of fecal matter gracing his upper lip in a Poetic Dirty Sanchez) "deserves" to be treated unfairly. Not if you find them different from yourself. Not if they disagree with your antiquated and intolerant religious beliefs. Not if they dress a certain way, speak a different way, act a different way, listen to weird music or wear fucking fake mustaches and pork pie hats. NO ONE DESERVES TO BE INTENTIONALLY TREATED LIKE SHIT (...except for Mitch, which I think we can all come together in agreement on...)

On the other hand, no one is responsible for your choices but YOU. Not your mom. Not your government. Not you missing father. Not your underpaid and sometimes shitty teachers. Not your micromanaging supervisor. Not that asshole in the office who plays backstabby politics to move ahead of others. Not the police. Not the scary Black Muslim President. YOU. And you alone.

So, unless you are a jobless, homeless, black lesbian named Fatima Rodriguez - shut the fuck up, OK? You live in America and have the fruits of the planet's bounty at your feet. Even our trash is more delicious and nutritious than in any other part of the world. And, according to certain Republicans is nutritious enough for poor kids to eat instead of subsidized lunches...

So, when was the exact moment we became an entire society of victims?

December 3, 1902*.

* I made that date up. You googled it anyway, though.

The Weight of a Dollar

2014-10-30T05:08:00.000-05:00

The zombies have come. It started with Ebola and the zombies sprouted forth and overran the planet.

And suddenly all of the things that seemed to be important on a day to day grind are MEANINGLESS. In a world overrun by zombies, does your bank balance of the debt you have incurred mean fucking ANYTHING?

I, like almost every human in the Capitalist Kingdom, find myself anxious from time to time when it comes to finances. No, I'm not about to live in my car or have to masturbate in a cup to sell my man-seed to pay my AT&T bill...yet. I am, however, surrounded by the imagined angst of the weight of the dollar.

At work, the constant drumbeat we all hear is about money. Not enough money. What can we do to get more money. Don't spend any money but absolutely make some money. The low grade fear of not having money begins to taint the joys of showing up and doing the work.

My credit rating, like so many around me, is a pile of shit in spite of the fact that I pay my bills (mostly) on time and I pay a late fee when I don't. Savings? Go fuck yourself, savings. Sure, I buy my iDevices and eat out more than I should and the beer tally exceeds what it should, but give it rest already. The act of saving money for some non-specific future seems a bit silly given the fact that there is an equal (perhaps MORE than equal) chance that you'll get hit with a strain of life ending food poisoning from the Cheddar Bay Biscuits at a Red Lobster than survive until you need it.

A co-worker told me the other day that she was arrested for owing money to a gym from years ago. Apparently, the gym sued and a warrent was put out. I imagine she didn't owe $30,000 or anything resembling real money to this gym but she was hauled into a police station because of this paltry debt.

Guess what? In 1970, the Court ruled in Williams v. Illinois that extending a maximum prison term because a person is too poor to pay fines or court costs violates the right to equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment. During 1971 in Tate v. Short, the Court found it unconstitutional to impose a fine as a sentence and then automatically convert it into "a jail term solely because the defendant is indigent and cannot forthwith pay the fine in full." And in the 1983 ruling for Bearden v. Georgia the Court ruled that the Fourteenth Amendment bars courts from revoking probation for a failure to pay a fine without first inquiring into a person's ability to pay and considering whether there are adequate alternatives to imprisonment.

And yet there are at least fifteen states in the US that have modern day debtor's prisons. I don't really see an awful lot of people who ripped off millions in these cells. More likely, Leonardo DiCaprio will play that person in a Martin Scorcese film rather than get jailed for it for any long term. I wonder if my co-worker could write a book about bilking the gym and getting in bad with Johnny Law over it? You think anyone would make a movie out of that book?

The weight of the dollar is exactly the weight you give it. Sure, you need the ducats in order to thrive in our religiously capitalist society but you don't have to give the sum total the same weight as things that matter, right? When the Spectre of Commerce threatens to ruin an entire day when you could be creating something or calling your mother or making love to your wife or reading a great book, then you have given the Rubles too much power.

On my best days, I treat the money like points in a game I'm playing. You do things to get points. You use the points to buy power-ups or weapons or magical powers. You go do more things and get more points.

Also, the unspoken rule of this game is avoid Red Lobster at all costs.

I Believe...

2014-10-29T05:01:00.000-05:00

...that this coming election will see the fruit of the tree planted by Citizens United. It will demonstrate two things: elections CAN be bought and that people who get their information from commercials on television are sacks of rancid sheepshit.

...that your past is past. It's a great story to tell but it has no power over your choices today. If it does, you're doing it wrong...

...that, at this point in time, one needs to be far craftier than previously necessary to beat your child, say something misogynist or racist, or skip work to get drunk. Everyone has a camera and everyone is being watched. Which, I guess, isn't such a bad thing given the tendency for certain police to abuse their authority and certain politicians to smoke crack...

...that your job right now is to take as many big risks as you can (keeping in mind you are being filmed at all times...). Anything less than that is coasting.

...that when the Pope embraces the Big Bang and Evolution to support his premise that "God is not a magician" we have, indeed, made some progress with the Catholics...

When Did They Create a Quarter-Life Crisis?

2014-10-28T05:11:00.000-05:00

I'm pretty sure that if there is something to the Mid-Life Crisis thing, I went through mine.

I understand the idea. At a certain point in one's life, you look at where you have been, see that there is less in front than behind, and freak the fuck out. The traditional stereotype is the recently divorced man buying a Porsche or the recently divorced woman get a new set of tits. I didn't get a Porsche (or a set of new jugs) but I had my existential moment where I went a little crazy.

I decided to drop eighty pounds, had a wife divorce me, got a new job on a whim, and slept with a lot of women. Then I calmed down, saw the legacy of myself becoming a narrative of emptiness and switched it off.

Now, recently introduced for the Millennials, is the concept of a Quarter-Life Crisis and my cranky old man brain cries "Bullshit!"

Yes. I comprehend that this generation has had the worst job prospects of anyone since the Great Depression. I get that the debt incurred for a luxury such as going to college is exorbitant.

Luxury? Are you kidding? How do you get a job without college? Answer: apparently you don't get a job even with college so shaddup...and, yes, anything a rich kid can get easily but a poor kid CAN get but has to sell his soul for is a LUXURY.

Hell, I can even understand some of the anxiety disorders that seem to really just occur in the twenty-somethings (I mean, one rarely heard of people with ADHD or General Anxiety Disorder when I was twenty but the pharmaceutical companies hadn't invented them yet, right?).

But a Quarter-Life Crisis? Who are you kidding?

You live in a time when research is as simple as typing in a question on your smartphone which has more computing power than NASA had in 1969. You live in a time when merely doing something stupid on YouTube can make you famous. You live in a time when, as an American (and I'm pretty sure the term "Quarter-Life Crisis" was coined for American Millennials) you are in the top percentages of earners worldwide even if you make minimum wage.

Honestly, kids. Sounds like a lot of whining to me.

Couple of thoughts to ponder:

1. YOU aren't that important in the Grand Scheme of Things.
2. YOU are not owed ANYTHING.
3. In Life, no one gets a blue ribbon for showing up so stop looking for a pat on the back for being awake.

Now, as you read this and deem me out of touch and crotchety, think about your reaction to the Eighth-Life Crisis of 12-year olds and notice your eyeroll and guffaw. Now you understand my derision. Live some life before you start inventing ailments (the drug manufacturers do this for you but you don't have buy into them) or imaginary crisis points. Fail a few times before you lecture anyone on success.

What Would You Think of Yourself?

2014-10-27T05:14:00.000-05:00

I'm eight years old.

A coal sludge spill kills 125 people in Buffalo Creek, West Virginia.
The Viet Nam War is still raging but only just.
I love Captain Kangaroo.
An Avengers comic book costs me a quarter.
I spend most of my time going to school (which I hate on some level and rarely follow the rules), playing with my friend Mike and his older brother who is slow, and pretending I know Kung Fu because I watch David Carradine (a white man playing Chinese man) do it in slow motion on network television.

I'm 48-years old.

Three people have died from an Ebola outbreak.
We're still battling the pointless "War on Terror." This time with ISIS.
I'm rewatching all seven seasons of "The Sopranos."
The Avengers sequel comes out soon.
I spend most of my time going to work (which I love on many levels and rarely follow the rules), spending time playing, loving, talking and creating with my lovely wife, and telling stories on various stages around one of the largest cities in the world.

I wonder - what would my eight-year old self think of me now?

Not the external stuff - on that point, I think I'd think I was pretty cool. Good job, lots of life lived, multiple experiences and tons of mistakes and lessons learned. I still have that ridiculous optimism I had forty years ago and I still talk almost non-stop. I have managed to retain my sense of humor about the absurdity of human beings and still laugh hysterically at fart jokes.

No. I'm talking about the internal stuff.

Would my eight-year old self understand my struggles with weight or just be slightly impressed that I lost it all after getting fat? Would he be in awe of my search for (and ultimately finding) my One True Love or would he see me as sort of a flake who took a really long time to get it right? Would he understand why I decided to move on from playing jazz, from doing theater and chose to focus on other artistic pursuits along the way?

On the other hand, who gives a shit what an eight-year old thinks?

My eight-year old self idolized my grandfather. He looked to his mother for guidance. He was just rebellious enough to spraypaint graffiti on a neighbor's wall but just dumb enough to actually sign his name to it. He was girl crazy and sought to be the center of attention at all times. He was creative and weird and handled the pressures of multiple father figures about as well as he could. My eight-year old self was a pretty cool kid (albeit dumber than a box of staples).

My eight-year old self wasn't all that different than his 48-year old counterpart and today, I strive to embody the lessons I have learned over these 40 years while still being exactly like him. Hopeful. Enthusiastic. Perhaps less dumb but just as rebellious.

The qualities I think my eight-year old self might admire include my constant self reflection, my love of comic books and video games, and my ability to play as often as I can (not sports - competitive stuff was never my thing - but play: imaginary scenarios, splashing in the fountain, getting lost and making up stories about the journey). He would think the twenty years I smoked was pretty stupid (he frequently hid his mother's cigarettes and sometimes even destroyed them).

Who gives a shit what an eight-year old thinks?

My grandpa did. He was a harsh father but saw redemption in being a spectacular grandparent. He truly gave a shit. And if it was good enough for my grandpa, it is good enough for me. My Grandpa Jay was 45 years old when I was born. Now, THAT'S a piece of info that'll give one pause, huh?

Well, Fuck Everybody. Amen.

2014-10-24T05:08:00.000-05:00

Everything is more complicated than you think.

You only see a tenth of what is true. There are a million little strings attached to every choice you make; you can destroy your life every time you choose. But maybe you won’t know for twenty years. And you may never ever trace it to its source. And you only get one chance to play it out.

Just try and figure out your own divorce.

And they say there is no fate, but there is: it’s what you create. And even though the world goes on for eons and eons, you are only here for a fraction of a fraction of a second. Most of your time is spent being dead or not yet born. But while alive, you wait in vain, wasting years, for a phone call or a letter or a look from someone or something to make it all right.

And it never comes or it seems to but it doesn’t really. And so you spend your time in vague regret or vaguer hope that something good will come along. Something to make you feel connected, something to make you feel whole, something to make you feel loved.

And the truth is I feel so angry, and the truth is I feel so fucking sad, and the truth is I’ve felt so fucking hurt for so fucking long and for just as long I’ve been pretending I’m OK, just to get along, just for, I don’t know why, maybe because no one wants to hear about my misery, because they have their own.

Well, fuck everybody. Amen.

Charlie Kauffman

The Pastor's Speech from

Synecdouche, New York

No. I'm not feeling morose. I just think this is an amazing piece of writing from a brilliant film. Enjoy.