ProlixFrolicks

He's Back?

2009-06-23T10:24:00.000-07:00

Where has he been? He has been working. He has been building his photo website. He has been taking pictures.

It's good to be back.

Ever Have One Of Those Days? #8

2008-12-23T06:45:00.001-08:00

Ever Have One Of Those Days? #7

2008-12-21T20:48:00.001-08:00

Chapter Two

2008-12-19T08:28:00.000-08:00

Ok - this is still very rough. I'm struggling with some of the ideas for the story.

But what the heck...

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Morning.

A plastic, dark green window shade laid on the floor beneath an open window. The sun streaked through the glass and fell right upon his face. He stirred. He didn’t want to get up. He was in the middle of that dream about the beach. He was with her, walking, holding hands, talking about nothing in words that meant everything. He was determined to see how this dream would end. If he could just keep his eyes shut long enough, maybe he could go back there.

The bright light annoyed him and his mind wandered. He started thinking about that window shade. He had to go the hardware store to get this clip so that he could hang the thing up. Why do you always need to make two or three trips to the hardware store to get a simple job done? He bought a clip last week, but it was the wrong one. He needed the clip that had the round part on the end and the small hole in the middle. The other clip had a snap but the snap only worked for shades that had this little hook. Those shades were made by a different company. What a pain in the butt. Why don’t they just standardize those things? That’s like faucet valves. Every faucet uses a different kind of valve. What’s up with that? Why not have just a standard valve, or a couple of different valves? He made a mental note to buy the other kind of faucet valve when he went back to the hardware store. He hoped that he kept the receipt, so he could return the one that he bought when he picked up the mounting clip for the shade.

Damn it was hot.

It was early June. Summer came early. Must be global warming. Great, another New York style hot and sticky summer. It was late on a Saturday morning. The joggers had already taken their showers and headed out to brunch. There was little other activity on east 6^th street this morning. It was just too hot. The sane people were either at the beach or sitting in front of their air conditioners.

He could not afford the Hamptons and he sure couldn't bear the train ride to Jones Beach. It wasn't so much the train ride out there, it was the thought of the long ride back. Sitting on the train, with the sand, salt and dry sweat on your skin. The discomfort. No, that wasn't him.

How about the Sheep Meadow at Central Park? By this time, a few hundred similarly situated New Yorkers were already out there. It would be packed. Probably impossible to find a good place to lay out. It just seemed like too much effort. And he was still in bed.

After being away for three years, he returned to New York last month. He was in New York! Pizza, bagels, mortadela, stinky cheese. Maybe he could do some off, off, Broadway. There were commercials. Plenty of restaurant jobs.

He didn't know how he was going to make a living, but he knew that he would find a way to make it work. It can be tough to live in New York. When you’re under thirty, it's very hip. Do people use the word “hip” anymore? It was okay to live in the city back then. All your friends are short on cash, everyone's trying to make it, its no big deal being broke. You get a couple of part-time jobs, you do your thing. If you have to, you can share a place with a couple of buddies.

Something changes after thirty. Some of your friends get really good jobs. They have what is called disposable income. They buy useless things and go to nice restaurants. At first, they invite you and they pay for you. It doesn't take long to get uncomfortable with the fact that you don't have the money to pay for yourself. After a while, you don't get the invitations. Yup, as you get older you're more willing to admit that being broke all the time is not a great adventure. It just sucks. You get tired of paying $1500 a month for a 600 square foot apartment. You get tired of working multiple jobs – your “what you are” jobs and your “make ends meet” jobs.

It would be different this time. He was going to make New York work for him. Suzie's letter was a wake up call. After he got the letter he called Suzie and got the whole story. He knew what he had to do. He was going to get his act together and be an inspiration. He would be the man that she always wanted him to be. He would do that for her. Whether or not she was willing to admit it, she needed him now. It wouldn't be about how much money he was making or whether he was on a career path. It was only important that he loved her and that she understood that he always loved her. He had been a coward. Instead of fighting for their relationship, he left. But he felt ready to fight now, maybe because he didn't think that she would have the strength to fight back. Yeah, he was ready to stand up and be strong for the both of them. Although he wasn't sure what his role might be, it didn't really matter. He would take what he could get. One way or another, he was going to be back in her life.

She didn't know that he was back. He wasn't ready to let her know. He wanted to be settled first, so he could tell her about the positive things that he was doing. She'd like that.

But it wasn't just about her. They had a child. More than anything, he wanted to be a father. He wanted a relationship with their child. He didn't want to be a stranger. He wanted to be in her heart . . . .

The wail of a passing ambulance broke his chain of thought. He opened his eyes and winced at the morning light. He turned his head from the sun and the world came into focus. He felt a strong urge to pee. “Shit.”

He sat up and took inventory. He slid around and let his feet drop to the tile floor. He reached down to an open box laying on the floor and tore off a piece of last night’s pizza. He took a bite. “Cold.” If its so hot in here, why's the pizza cold? Chewing, he stood, shuffled his way through a week’s worth of laundry and made his way to the bathroom.

It was a tiny bathroom. It needed cleaning. He stepped up and leaned over the bowl but it took too much effort to stand. He kicked off his boxers and sat down. He let his head hang down, stared at the floor and let out a small groan. A wave of relief.

The phone rang. “Doodely-squat.” Why do they always call when you're on the can? He tried to squeeze the little muscles to cut off the stream while he sat more upright and twisted around to get the cordless phone that was on top of the water tank. Straining to get his eyes to focus, he located and pressed the “Talk” button. The phone battery was dead. “Shit.” He looked around wondering what to do.

Two more rings and silence.

He leaned forward and dropped the phone on the floor. Elbows on his thighs, his head sank down and he stared at the checkerboard on the tile floor as he finished his morning's constitutional. Wow, that was pretty cool. The longer you stared at the floor, the more it seemed like the black and white tiles were moving. His lower back felt stiff. He leaned forward even more. It felt good to stretch in this direction. Dropping his shoulders between his knees to maximize the stretch, he lost his balance and almost fell off of the seat. He managed to escape hitting his head against the wall. He chuckled at himself for being such a bonehead.

The phone started ringing again. “Man! Shit, doodley-squat!”

A quick tap, a wipe with a small piece of toilet paper to remove and excess, he got up. Without taking the time to either flush or put on his boxers, he stepped out of the bathroom and started looking around for another phone.

The small studio apartment was a mess. It was a railroad car style apartment, long and very narrow. His platform bed with the uncomfortable fouton mattress was at the far end. There were windows on the east-facing wall. The western wall wall was covered with framed posters: Edward Hopper's “Nighthawks,” Yousuf Karsh's portrait of Audrey Hepburn, Gustav Klimt's “The Kiss,” Saul Steinberg's “A View from Fifth Avenue,” Vincent Van Gough sunflowers, Joan Miro's “Dog Barking at the Moon,” Roy Lichtenstein's “Forget It, Forget Me,” a Wolf Kahn Landscape, a vintage Museum of Modern Art poster, and an Al Hirshfeld limited edition print of Mr. Spock.

There were books all over the place: books on art, food, cooking, theatre, and spirtualism. A collection of plays: “The Iceman Cometh,” “Cyrano De Begerac,” “Man and Superman,” “The Unseen Hand,” “A Streetcar Named Desire,” “Hedwig and the Angry Inch.” There was a cardboard box of movie scripts and screenplays: some famous, some by friends, a few originals. On the Ikea coffee table, a biography of Chuck Jones.

A NAD stereo system sat on the floor, framed by a pair of PSB Avente II speakers. Several stacks of CDs sat nearby. One of the stacks had been knocked over, the CDs lay across the floor: Pato Banton, The Radio Luxemburg Symphony Orchestra, The Cars, Buena Vista Socia Club, Sergio Mendez, Santana, Vladimir Horowitz, The Beatles, Elvis Costello, Joe Jackson, The London Symphony Orchestra, The Boston Pops, Mariah Carey.

The phone sat on his Ikea coffee table. The one covered in rings because he never bothered to use coasters. He picked it up.

“Josh, it's Suzie.”

“Hey Suz.”

“Josh ... oh my lord Josh. I'm so sorry." She had difficulty speaking. She was choking back tears, fighting to get the words out.

"It's Kat.... She's gone.... Oh my g-d, she's dead.”

Ever Have One Of Those Days? #6

2008-12-16T21:25:00.000-08:00

First Chapter of My Novel

2008-12-13T08:58:00.001-08:00

Ok -- I've shared this with Cheri@BlogThisMom. I thought it was time to share this with you. It's something that I've written and tinkered with for a long time (there is no universal law that things get better with time). I just wanted to do something with this.

I have Chapter Two drafted. I've drafted Chapter Three ten times.

Please let me know what you think. As Nick Lowe says, "You gotta be cruel to be kind."

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Morning.

The early sun filtered in through chiffon curtains and filled the room with a soft light. This was her room, where she grew up. The room was tidy, it wasn’t very different from when she left, went to college, got that first job in the city, married too soon, and then, of course, got divorced. This was the place where she dreamed, imagined, and had an occasional good cry. It was the place where she planned her life. And she was a planner. She had planned her road to perfection and thought that she had done such a good job of following that plan. How wrong she had been. Perspectives change. You get swept into the pace of life and fail to notice that your heart is moving in another direction. You start with a preconceived notion of what is important, follow it blindly and then realize that there’s something better out there.

She glanced around the room. Her bookshelf was a confused collection of interests: Mark Twain, Danielle Steele, Hunter Thompson, Jack Kerouac, Franz Kafka, Ernest Hemmingway. A purple feather boa draped over the side. A picture of the University of North Carolina Women’s Soccer team in crazy celebration after winning the National Championship. The Wealth of Nations, in hardcover, wedged between Black Beauty and Breakfast of Champions. A souvenir shot glass remembering San Francisco cable cars. A harmonica, yoyo, and Mardi Gras beads sitting on the shelf in front of "Analysis of Variance," "Advanced Linear Regression Analysis," "Differential Equations," "Option Valuation under Stochastic Volatility," and, of course, Richard Bookstaber’s "Options Valuation & Investment Strategies." A framed picture of Albert Einstein sticking out his tongue.

She settled back, closed her eyes, and listened to the sounds coming from downstairs. That would be the kid. Happy sounds. Good, no issues. Grandpa was probably with her, cuddling, tickling and watching cartoons. He will entertain them. Everything was okay when Grandpa was around. Perhaps he’d take them into the city. He loved the Central Park Zoo and was always looking for an excuse to go there.

Her mom must be up. She’ll make pancakes. The kid loves pancakes. Of course, if she makes them, the kid will say that she wanted waffles. But before any cooking, she’ll first come upstairs to say good morning and ask if her daughter felt like having something to eat. But she doesn’t feel like eating. Her appetite hadn’t returned, even though she stopped the chemo several weeks ago.

She wasn’t getting thin, she was downright skinny. She thought of how she looked in the mirror. How could this happen her body? She was skin and bones. The muscle tone was gone – the muscle was gone. She had been an athlete all her life. Despite a challenging career, she maintained a good training schedule: weight training four times a week, running one day and swimming the next. People called her an “animal,” they said she was a “machine.”

Getting sick wasn’t in the plan. Josh’s bubba used to say, “Man tracht und der gott lacht.” People plan and G-d laughs. She only now started to understand what that meant. She didn’t plan on getting sick. And when she first got the news, she chose not to believe it. Lung cancer? She never smoked a day in her life. They must have confused her with somebody else. It just wasn’t possible.

Once she accepted the diagnosis, she attacked her illness like she attacked everything in her life. Head on. Thank goodness they caught it early. She went to the doctor, started treatment, and continued to juggle the kid, her training and her career. She refused to accept that she was losing her strength but she didn’t have the stamina to keep up appearances. The stress first appeared in her face. Her eyes became dark and shallow. She lost weight. Although she chose not to talk about her illness, it became clear to those around her that something was seriously wrong.

She eventually told her closest friends and asked them to keep her confidence. She had to tell her partners. Her absences became more frequent and she began to lose focus. When she started to make mistakes, some of her partners reacted in anger, they asked why. She made an appointment and met with the management committee.

She was nervous about the meeting, nauseated by the thought of facing this group of old insensitive men. But it was not what she expected. They expressed heartfelt concern for her. They promised their support. When Joe, the hard-edged managing partner who lost his wife of 30 years to breast cancer, started to sniff, she went up to give him a hug. They cried and the other six members of the management committee got out of their chairs to join in. Somebody farted, they laughed, passed around a box of tissues, and went back to work.

A short time after, it got to the point where she couldn’t go to work. Not only was she incapable of working, she couldn’t deal with the work environment. It was with the best of intentions, but word got out. All eyes were upon her. She would walk down the hall and sense that they were talking about her. It’s not that they were bad people or that they intended to hurt her; they just couldn’t help it. It was all so unbelievable. Her presence was a reminder of how fragile life can be. It was as if her illness caused others to feel that they themselves had narrowly escaped tragedy. As if misfortune had skipped over them and landed on her. It was like seeing a terrible car accident, the witnesses had to talk about it to relieve their own anxiety. They now treated her differently. They treated her as if she were sick and crushed her with their kindness. For some one like her, it was tough to accept empathy and she couldn’t bear pity. She met once again with the partners, negotiated a buyout and the firm announced that she was “leaving to pursue other interests.” She lied to her colleagues, telling them that she wanted to spend more time with the kid and that she planned to do some “consulting.”

It was ok to be home with the kid. It was different. As a former career woman, being a homemaker presented new challenges. It was an opportunity to add another dimension to her relationship with the kid. She threw herself into the role, trying to make up for the all the time that she had been away. It wasn’t long before she realized that, given her health, she didn’t only have trouble taking care of the kid, she was having trouble taking care of herself. One sad morning she looked in the mirror and didn’t recognize herself. She sat on the bathroom floor and cried. That’s when she decided it was time to go home to Mom.

She opened her eyes, looked across the room, and stared at the cork board above her desk. A long time ago, Mom created a shrine to her daughter, an artful collection of memories that retraced her daughter’s life. Colorful pins that she had received at soccer tournaments. A certificate for winning the sixth grade spelling bee. Pictures of her and Suzie, her “growing up” best friend, the sister she never had: their first day of kindergarten - a Polaroid of the two of them holding hands as they entered the classroom on the first day of first grade; their first swim meet - Suzie took top honors; High School Prom; the day that she decided on a career - standing in Battery Park with the Statue of Liberty behind them.

Dad took that picture at the Statue of Liberty. It was their reward for having the two highest grades in high school calculus. They took the day off from school and Dad took them to see Ms. Liberty and go shopping in SOHO. But Dad insisted that they walk down Wall Street. They went to the World Trade Center to see the options trading. She thought it would be boring but it was the most exciting thing that she had ever seen: the frenzy, hustling, bustling, yelling, screaming. She had no idea of what was going on, but it all looked so exciting and she wanted to stand on that floor.

Suzie’s wedding picture, she was maid of honor. Her wedding picture, Suzie was maid of honor. Her wedding....

She closed her eyes and though about Josh. She met him while attending law school at NYU. He was in a graduate theatre program at the Tisch School of the Arts. He was so, “hawt.” It was just a few months before graduation. They enjoyed a torrid romance, explored SOHO and the art scene. They ate great food at cheap restaurants. They would take walks late at night and, on the way home, stop for a Chipwich at the deli.

She admired him. He used another yardstick to measure success. He had the courage to do what she didn’t. She wasn’t willing to take risks. She needed to know that she could support herself comfortably, stand on her own two feet. She didn’t want to depend upon a man. It was her passion, it defined her. She lived to work. Sure, she loved the kid, she was generous about the way that she provided for her. But she lived to work.

He worked to live. At any one time, he would hold multiple part-time hourly jobs so that he could sustain a modest existence, pay for acting class, voice lessons, and have the flexibility to attend auditions. He had a passion about things. He loved to cook and would come up with the most wonderful menus. It was fun to see him in the kitchen, throwing around ingredients and making a huge mess. But there was a deep intelligence underlying his passion. His menus were not arbitrary but a carefully constructed structure of color and flavor. He didn’t “spoon out the chow,” he decorated the plate. This was a man who could spend 20 minutes deciding on tomatoes - touching, feeling, smelling – selecting vegetables was an erotic, total body experience. He was also a mass of contradictions. He could argue about the right type of wine to use in Coq au Vin while chomping down a Big Mac. He could discuss Kerouac while watching Looney Tunes. He thought Bugs Bunny symbolized America’s role in a hostile world. And he could speak beautifully about the freckles on her nose when they made love.

They got married. Although she made enough money to support the both of them, he insisted upon keeping his odd jobs. He didn’t need to work quite as much, but he worked enough to pay for his never ending classes and have some walking around money. His odd jobs had gotten to be an embarrassment. She was an up and coming associate at a major investment bank when he was working at Starbucks. When people asked her about her husband, her colleagues would jump in to say that he was a British lawyer. Her faced would flush as she quickly explained that this was their idea of joke and that her husband was a “barista” and not a “barrister.” Then her colleagues would look at one another, in feigned disbelief, and say, “That’s not what you told us.” It wore her down. When she found herself telling clients that her husband was a lawyer, she found a new job.

Moving to a smaller firm didn’t resolve the issue. She felt resentment about his lack of concern over household finances. In anticipation of her rising personal income, she made financial commitments – a condo, a car, insurance, maintenance – and found that despite her well above-average earnings, money was tight. He didn’t seem to notice. She tried to talk to him about it, but he wouldn’t engage. So they did the next logical thing, they had the kid.

She didn’t want her child to grow up in the city, so she bought a house in New Jersey. He never wanted to live in New Jersey and hated the fact that he needed to commute into the city to attend auditions. Although they had some help with the kid, he had to quit his part-time jobs to be more of a “house Dad.” It became more difficult to schedule auditions. He felt trapped and got grumpy. She felt resentment over his grumpiness, his inability to recognize her financial contribution, and her heart began to wander. Worst of all, he was no longer her best friend. She began to view him as an obstacle.

She now shared her confidences and frustrations with the guys at work. He was aware of this, felt isolated and withdrew. That only made the feelings of isolation mutual. Rather than work on their marriage, they just gave up. It was difficult for the both of them to stay involved after their divorce – they loved one another too much. He went out to LA for pilot season and never came back. She felt that he was running out on her child. He said that he didn’t fit in with the life that she was providing their child and didn’t want to be in the way. He was just young and stupid. She asked him to relinquish his parental rights and was shocked when he quietly agreed. He sent money, but she didn’t bother to deposit the checks. He sent gifts to the kid, remembered her birthday and special milestones. He even remembered her birthday and sent his best wishes in a creative and joyful way. They never talked. There was too much sadness and pain.

None of that seemed to matter now. It was pride that kept her from telling him about her illness. But for the longest time she wanted him to be here with her. He lived and she wanted to feel the strength of his spirit around her. She didn’t know how to say it. She was incapable of admitting her vulnerability.

How could the freedom to love someone cause so much misunderstanding and pain? She had a theory: Love is a lot more than hormones, more than what you feel in your heart. Love is making a choice and committing that choice, especially during difficult times. Love is personal sacrifice for the sake of the common good. Love is the willingness to overcome doubt, particularly when it feels so much better to surrender to dark thoughts. You don’t only love with your heart. The heart wanders. You don’t only love with your mind. The mind wanders. You love with your whole person, that’s what keeps you on track. Love is running a marathon. A large part of running marathons is training. You never stop training. You train every day. And when you're running a marathon, you get ready to hit the wall - a moment in time when you're just exhausted, sick and ready to give up. And when you hit the wall, you tell yourself to keep going because that’s what you’ve committed to do. It's not romantic, pleasurable or logical. You just keep going. And if you keep going, just like a marathon, the joy eventually returns.

You can run a marathon by yourself. That’s where love gets tricky. You can’t love by yourself. It is not sole-sacrifice, it is not service, it is not dependence. It takes two committed individuals coming from some place of strength to make love happen. You need two people running that marathon, but committed to finishing. It’s said that we have six senses. Love transcends those senses, it is what you feel, think, hear, see, smell, and taste. Love is as much a choice as it is a feeling. It is the physical and the spiritual. It’s the ability to remain faithful to that choice in the face of adversity that deepens love.

She felt responsible for their divorce. She had put up a wall and willingly given up the opportunity to feel his love. She paused. It didn’t matter now. The loss, the pain, the sadness, the anger, it just didn’t matter. For her, there was only the now.

She smiled. For him, there was the future. It was going to be okay. She knew that he would make the right decisions and that it would all work out. She had faith in him. It will be all right. It was odd that now, so much after the fact, she was finally in a position to make things right. It would be all right. She chuckled.

There was the sound of footsteps, Mom was coming up the stairs. She thought about the warmth of her mother’s smile.

It was a beautiful Spring morning. She could hear the “chak, chak, chak” of the automatic sprinkler. The grass would be so green. The flowers would be in bloom. The sun would be so warm.

She could hear her mother stop just outside her door. She would be listening at the door, wonder whether her daughter was up. She heard Mom call downstairs, telling her father to keep the noise down. A lot of good that would do.

It was time. She took a deep breath and slowly let it out. As she breathed in, she thought about the sun, the flowers, the trees. As she breathed out, she prayed that her child would cherish G-d’s gift of nature and the blessings that he brings to our doorstep every single day. She breathed in and thought about all the times that she had denied her husband and her child the gift of her presence, the gift of her heart, and the gift of her simple acknowledgment that she needed them. And as she breathed out, she prayed that they would find the root of happiness. She breathed in and thought about the Spring, the flowers, and the beautiful day. And as she breathed out, she thought about the time that she and Josh had walked through a field of wildflowers. She breathed in and thought the first time that she held her child and that Josh was standing at her side. She breathed out and prayed that the two of them would share something special, the way it was meant to be. She breathed in and thought, “G-d is near.” She breathed out and thought, “All is good.” She smiled.

And then she died.

Ever Have One Of Those Days? #5

2008-12-12T05:54:00.001-08:00

The Year Of The Rat

2008-12-08T09:04:00.000-08:00

Having been raised in New York City, the thought of a rat conjures up dark images of disease and filth. I am reminded of a storefront kept by a New York City public health unit at Avenue A and Third Street. This unit was responsible for publicly funded rodent extermination programs. This store window was filled with pictures of men in orange jumpsuits standing in the bowels of buildings holding dead rats.

I remember once throwing a coke bottle at a monstrous thing creeping along a New York City subway station. I make a mental connection between rats and bubonic plague and though I don’t really know what bubonic plague will do to you, it seems horrible. Rats are yucky. I think of rats and my skin crawls.

Despite my feelings about rats, some cultures look favorably on these beasts. I come from a world of plenty and rats are a fact of life. However, for those less fortunate societies, having no rats equates to having no food. Taking this to a logical extreme, the presence of rats implies affluence. Forget the Lexus baby, I got rats.

And this brings me to Emily.

Our daughter Emily is a wondrous child. She is bright, alive and filled with passion. Although she can be demanding, she is sensitive and loving. Emily has a special weakness for animals. Ignoring what harms she might inflict upon her smaller brother, she goes gaga over little creatures and treats them with tenderness.

Back in Houston, not long after Bocephus (our golden retriever) passed on, Emily asked for a pet. We just weren't excited about having any pets in the house at that time, but we didn't want to say no. This was an opportunity to exercise advanced parenting: don’t say "no" – just say we’ll discuss this later and the child will forget.

Since we were in Houston and planning our return to California, Pam shrewdly answered that we would consider getting Emily a pet after we moved to San Diego. This proved to be a risky maneuver since, to a child, saying, "we will talk later," is as good as saying, "yes." While this approach reserves some moral right to say, "I never said yes"; the child will always feel betrayed. However, this is a calculated risk. This pet thing was likely a passing fancy, and Pam was betting that Emily would soon forget the matter.

Not long after we arrived in San Diego, Emily asked for the pet that she had been "promised." Forget the technical distinctions, our position was weakening. Pam played defense. She made the point that we were living in a rental house and that we should wait until we moved into our "real" house. Emily conceded. Shortly after we moved into our "real" house, Emily reminded Pam about her pet. In a purely defensive posture, Pam asked Emily to understand that we really hadn’t settled in yet. She begged Emily to indulge her and allow some time for "settling in." Of course, once the paint had dried, Emily asked Pam "Are we settled?" Pam asked why. Emily explained that if we were settled, Emily could get her pet, the pet that she had been promised.

Now at this point, you may have noticed that all of the action had been going on between Pam and Emily. You might ask what Kirk was doing during all of this. Well, Kirk was being a father. Realizing early on that I did not have the material to wage this war, I conducted diplomatic operations. Whenever Emily asked me about a pet, I would ask her questions about preschool and her friends. When pressed, I would simply respond with, "Ask your mother." Upon reflection, I’m very proud of the way I handled this situation. I managed to do a fair amount of talking without really saying anything.

Anyway, once the grout dried, Pam surrendered. Following the "call it a victory and get out of Vietnam" school of spin, Pam rationalized the situation to me as an educational experience (what she failed to say was that we were the ones being educated). I nodded knowingly. Given her flair for theatre, she decided to make this into an event. Pam, inventor of "Fall Festival" and "Fantastic Fridays," instituted "The Search for the Right Pet."

The "Search" as it had come to be known, fueled several family conversations.

Snakes were out of the question. Hamsters are not social and they bite. Ferrets are good with adults but they can be nasty with children and somebody said that they have a musk. Having experienced disco, I remember everyone was wearing musk at one time, but I suppose that was different then or at least a different kind of musk. Gerbils - well they’re gerbils - there's that whole Richard Gere thing - ugh.

I suggested a small dog, not a very small dog – like a "rodent dog" – but a somewhat small dog. There was thing called a "CockaPoo" that wasn’t’ a recognized breed but had that midsized shaggy kind of look that went along with names like "Rags" or "Scruffy." But Pam didn’t want a dog. She wasn’t up to potty training a dog until she was through potty training Liam. And then there was the matter of our new carpets. I was determined to get a dog. I faithfully promised to help with raising the dog. But Pam just gave me "that look." I retreated.

And then there were rats.

Pam believed that a rat was the right animal. Not just any rat, but a "Fancy Rat." Although I thought that "Fancy Rat" was something that appeared on an exotic menu, Pam explained that Fancy Rats were bred to be household pets. They are sweet, intelligent and - as a major advantage - are only expected to live about two years. Pam just wasn’t sure if she could deal the "tail" thing. But if she touch a rat tail without gagging, we were going to get a rat.

I immediately exercised my "king of the castle" veto rights over bringing a rat into the house. Pam just gave me "that look." I boldly asked (inaudibly) "When are we going to get cockroaches?"

Fait accompli. On a bright Saturday morning, the family drove down to a nearby shopping center. Pam, Emily and Liam went to the pet shop to admire pets. I went to a hardware store to admire power tools.

After a time, I mustered up the courage to meet up with the family at the pet shop. Entering the store, I noticed that the San Diego Humane Society had set up a pet adoption booth. They had the sweetest little Australian Shepherd puppy, an eight-week-old ball of fluff.

But Pam, Emily and Liam were standing chatting with a store clerk. She was a high-school aged girl who looked like she listened to Megadeath. There was a rat sitting on her shoulder. Pam saw me and said "The tail’s really not that bad." She added that the clerk, who recommended rats highly, had two of her own at home. If she didn't have the safety pin in her eyebrow, it might have been persuasive.

Pam decided that we needed not one, but two rats. The rest of the conversation was just a blur. Rats were social animals. If we didn’t have time to keep the rats company, they could keep one another company. One rat was cruel. If we were to get two rats, Emily wanted a boy rat and a girl rat. Pam explained to Emily that we were going to get two girl rats because we didn’t want rat babies. Emily told Pam that even if we got two girl rats they could still have babies because they were girl rats. Pam just smiled.

Somehow, we left the pet shop ratless. We bade farewell to the rodent farm and went home. But my family was plotting against me.

I knew we were going to get the rats. I planned to take the position that, even though we got the rats, I had never agreed to it. I thought that this could give me leverage in other situations. For example, I figured that if I wanted to go to Club Med by myself and Pam objected, I could always say, "well I didn't want to get the rats." But Pam, as usual, was smarter than me. She was going to get me to agree. Pam simply told Emily that we could get the rats if Emily got my consent. She outflanked me. Shortly thereafter, while I was on the top of a ladder trying to install some crown molding, Emily approached me.

"Do you know that rats are very good for five year olds?" she asked.

"Emily, do you know where I left my hammer?"

"Papaaaa."

"Yes."

"Do you know that rats are very good for five year olds?"

"Is that right?" I replied.

"Yes, they’re very clean and nice and you can hold them and they don’t bite. They’re not scared of people. They’re very good for five year olds. Can you let me have a rat?"

"Who's going to pay for the rat."

"You are."

"Where will I get the money to pay for the rat?"

"You can go to work and get the money to buy a rat."

"Why would I do that?"

"Because you love me."

"Who is going to take care of the rat?"

"Mommy."

"Why do you want a rat?"

"Because they’re very good for five year olds. they’re very clean and nice and you can hold them and they don’t bite."

Instead of taking another lap around the track, I suggested that we discuss the matter at dinner. Dinner came and went. We were going to get a rat.

The next afternoon, Pam called me at the office to report that we became the proud parents of two rats. Emily was in heaven, she named her pets Liza and Lulu. I felt a certain pride and warmth. Not for the rats, but for the joy that "we" had given Emily.

That evening, Pam took me downstairs to view the rats. They looked like rats. Lulu was grey – it occurred to me that if you have any reservations about rats, you should not buy either a grey or black rat. Liza, Emily’s favorite, was white with tan spots.

Pam picked up Liza. She encouraged me to pick up Lulu. But Lulu didn’t seem to want to be picked up. Pam said that you just have to grab them but I decided that if Lulu wasn’t into it, I wasn’t going to force the issue. Pam put Liza back into the cage. Lulu acted agressively towards Liza, nipping at her hind legs. Pam didn’t think that was normal rat behavior. I didn’t have much of an opinion on the matter. They were rats and nipping seemed like a "ratty" thing to do.

The next day Pam called me at the office. "Well, we’re a one rat family" she said. I thought about the nipping. Oh my goodness, Lulu must have killed Liza. I felt guilty. I could have prevented it.

Pam explained, "I read in the rat book that if one rat is aggressive towards the other rat, you need to separate them. So I brought Lulu back to the pet store." Feeling a bit relieved – they are living creatures, after all - I mumbled something supportive and went back to my work.

Later that evening, Pam was in the kitchen, preparing dinner and Emily was downstairs playing with her rats. Emily came upstairs and approached Pam. With a big smile on her face, Emily announced that Liza was having babies. Pam was busying stir-frying. She told Emily that she must be mistaken, that Emily must have seen some dirt in the cage.

Emily insisted that Liza had two babies. To settle the matter, Pam went to see Liza. Pam arrived in time to witness Liza eating the afterbirth. But there were four baby rats and the family would soon grow to nine.

"I told you girl rats could have babies without boy rats," Emily said.

The rat thing hasn't been all that bad. A surprising number of people wanted the babies (we didn't ask if they raised snakes). We quickly returned to being just a two-rat family.

Reflecting back, I had only one real concern: Our son Liam really loved dinosaurs . . . .

Ever Have One Of Those Days? #4

2008-12-05T06:04:00.000-08:00

Quiet Reflection

2008-12-03T16:49:00.000-08:00

I turned 50 last Sunday.

I had thought that by this time my life would be so "under control." But things are only more confused.

Perhaps, during the next 50 years, I can learn how to live in the moment and find joy in not knowing what comes next.

Prompt Tuesday

2008-11-25T08:08:00.000-08:00

Thanks to San Diego Momma for Prompt Tuesday. Our challenge is to write for 10 minutes while focusing on the word, "held." My stream of consciousness follows:

Held her in my arms. The very first time. She was so strong, but felt so delicate in my arms. I wanted to make my life with her. We were in many ways different. We shared a friendship that grew into love. I've sometimes thought that I loved her the very first time that I saw her, she was wearing her sweatpants and green army cap. There was an openness about her, she was curious about things. She wasn't frivolous. She was disciplined about the way that she approached things in life. I respected that in her and wished that I had more of that in myself. And then there were times when she let all the walls down and just gave herself the freedom to be a loon. It was a joy to watch her when she just let go. I loved her and held her in my heart.

Held her in my hands. The very first time. So small. Helpless. Our first child. Her eyes held the reflection of the souls in our family that came before me. Those that I felt but never knew. They were with her too. This moment was so precious, I held on to this wonderful warm feeling. Tears came to my eyes. This little thing gave me this beautiful moment in time. We shared it, it was something so special between us, but it would never be part of her memory of me.

Held my head in my hands and cried. I wondered why . . . .

(Time's up.)

Cops and Stops Part 3

2008-11-16T08:24:00.001-08:00

I was traveling down the Santa Monica Freeway, the part that runs through Gonzales, Texas. You know where Gonzales is, it's not too far from either Luling or Shiner. They don't call it the Santa Monica Freeway in Gonzales. About two hours to the east, in Houston, they call it the Katy Freeway. But in Gonzales, it's simply the interstate. But I was headed west, going to home to Los Angeles, so it was the Santa Monica Freeway to me.

Work had required me to spend every other week in Houston for just about a year. My company paid to keep an apartment for me. This job was now finished. I had packed up my apartment, loaded up the car and was headed home.

I was anxious to get home. It's about a 1600 mile trip. Most people recommend making the drive over three days. If you averaged a constant 65 miles per hour, it would take a bit more than 24 hours. I hoped to drive straight through and make the trip in something less than a day.

I was driving a red SAAB 9000 Turbo. What a machine! This car was capable of amazing performance. Press that pedal all the way down, the turbo would start to whine, and you would get pushed back into your seat as the car seemed to sink down and hug the road. Unfortunately, as amazing as that car could be, it was not reliable. I cannot begin to describe the assortment of weired mechanical problems that this car presented. I cannot count how many times that car broke down on me. But when it ran, it ran. Assuming that you weren't going to get stuck in the middle of nowhere, it was a a great freeway car. This car could fly, a car that could outrun the speedometer. I've driven as fast as 110 mph in that car and if I wasn't such a coward I could have gone faster.

My road trip had just started. It was a Saturday morning, there was no traffic. The road was clear, the weather was beautiful, and I was headed home. Only doing about 100 mph.

In this location, the freeway had a couple of lanes going east and a couple of lanes going west. The east and west sides of the freeway were separated by a very wide grass divider. Headed west, something on the eastward bound side of the freeway caught my eye. There were flashing lights way, way off in the distance. It was, as they say in Tejas, the "poe - lease." This "poe-lease-veee-hick-uhl" swerved off the freeway, straight into the grassy divider. It was moving fast and it was headed straight for me.

I started slowing down, pulled way over into the right lane, and quietly prayed that he was going for someone else. Unfortunately, there wasn't anybody else on the road. I can't deny the existence of G-d for the simple reason that every time I've ever gotten into a troublesome situation, I start to pray. I started praying. Maybe if I made a habit of praying when I wasn't in trouble . . . .

As the freeway divider was simply covered in grass and it wasn't paved, this police car was bouncing around all over. Still traveling on the grass divider, he passed me - headed in the opposite direction - on the left-hand side. Now watching him in my mirrors, he got onto the westbound lanes headed east, swerved around doing a 180 to change direction so he was now headed west, and, with his tires still smoking from that turn, came up right behind me. This guy was one hell of a driver.

I pulled over and watched him through my mirrors. Something told me to keep my hands fixed at 10 and 2 on the steering wheel. The officer got out of his vehicle and with his hand on his holstered gun, cautiously approached my car. When he was standing alongside my door, I slowly moved one hand to lower the window.

The officer asked, "Is there some kind of an emergency?"

"No sir, I just finished a job in Houston and was headed home to California. I was just anxious to get home"

"You were doing 90."

"Yes," I admitted, "I was speeding." Now thinking to myself, "thank you Lord, I know I was going 100."

"May I have your license and vehicle registration please."

I handed him my license and registration. As he looked them over, I had a chance to look the officer over. He was pretty young, under 30. A big guy, probably played football in high school. Like all Texas Department of Public Safety officers, he wore a white cowboy hat. He also wore a pair of aviator style reflector sunglasses that seemed way too big for his face. He was frowning.

The officer looked up and said, "You have a California driver's license."

"Yes, I do." It was just great to be in this kind of an awkward situation and listen to this guy state the obvious.

He said, "Your car is registered in Texas. This car is not registered in your name."

More of the obvious, "Yes sir, that is correct." The Saab was still, technically, a company car. The company bought the car, kept it registered in its name and maintained the registration and insurance. The company was in the process of transferring title to my name.

The officer looked confused.

I said, "Yes officer. This is a company car. Here is my business card that shows my company's name. It's the same name that is on the registration. I was living in Houston and this is the car that I used when I was living in Houston. Now I'm going back to Los Angeles and I'm taking the car with me."

The officer asked, "If you were living in Houston, why don't you have a Texas driver's license? State law requires you to obtain a Texas driver's license within 30 days of moving into the state."

I tried to explain, "I wasn't living in Texas all the time. I was also living in Los Angeles. I commute between Los Angeles in Houston, so - you see - I was also living in California and since I intended to eventually return to California . . . ."

"Step out of the car please."

Now, I wasn't dressed in my uniform of those days, a three button Brooks Brothers suit. I had California on my mind and I was dressed for driving comfort. This amounted to a t-shirt sporting the logo of a popular Houston restaurant, a pair of billowy, bright orange, nylon athletic shorts, the ends of my silver/gray, knee length, lycra aerobics pants were sticking out from under my shorts. I had on a pair of waffle-style running shoes that made my feet look about twice as wide as they are. And I was wearing a pair of Oakley, wrap-around biking sunglasses. The kind that had this UV protective coating that made them look like something a physicist would wear to protect her eyes while conducting experiments with radioactivity. I wasn't dressed for small town Texas.

I got out of the car and stood on the shoulder. As the officer started talking about the mismatch between my driver's license and registration, the absence of "reciprocity" between California and Texas, he walked around my car and looked into the windows. The Saab was a hatchback, a quasi station wagon, there was no trunk. All of the stuff that I kept in my Houston apartment was piled into the car.

The officer stopped and pointed to something in the back. "What's that?"

"What's what . . . sir?"

"What's that rolled up in the back over there."

For years, I've had a couple of original oil paintings from an artist who was a friend to our family. I needed to get those canvases stretched and reframed anyway, so the easiest was to transport them was to remove them from their current frames and roll them. I said to the officer, "They're paintings . . . sir."

"Paintings?"

"Yes sir, paintings."

The officer looked at me and said without expression, "You were traveling more than 10 miles an hour over the speed limit. Your license does not match your registration. I could write you a ticket but you don't have a Texas driver's license and you're headed out of state. Since we don't have reciprocity with California, I can't be sure that you will pay this ticket. You need to see the judge."

I started to think about this. My plan was to get to Los Angeles in 24 hours. Seeing the judge wasn't in my plan. It was Saturday. Did they have a judge on Saturday or were they going to throw me in jail for the weekend?

The officer said, "You need to follow me. We're going to have to cross the divider and head east."

East was the wrong direction. My plan was to head west. I wanted to ask if there was any way to avoid this, but also thought that this was not the kind of question that I wanted to ask this guy. I got back into my car, waited for the officer's signal, and followed him across the divider and into the eastward-bound lanes. Once we got back onto the freeway, the officer started pulling way ahead of me. He was speeding. I wasn't sure what to do. Do I speed up and break the speed limit - again? Do I maintain the speed limit and try to get the officer to slow down? Will that piss off the officer and get me into some other trouble? I sped up. Thankfully, it wasn't for a long period of time. We got off at the first exit and started down a country road.

Forty-five minutes later, I was still following this officer down country roads. He was on his radio the whole time. I felt certain that he was talking about me. Where were we going? Why was this taking so long? I wanted to flag down the officer and ask, it just seemed better to stay quiet and keep on following.

A half hour later, I felt more than a little panicky. Where is this guy taking me? Wait a minute! I read about this kind of stuff before. They take you out to a deserted place and then they kill you and dump your body in an irrigation ditch. It was 1988. I just saw, "The Thin Blue Line," a movie about a man who was framed for murder by a group of corrupt Texas officers. I'm thinking, "'Thin Blue Line,' 'Thin Blue line!' Oh Lord, this guy's been on the radio talking to his police buddies about framing me for something. He's setting me up. He thinks I'm some kind of California nut and he's going to teach me a lesson. I shouldn't have worn orange shorts. Can I make a run for it? This car is a turbo, it's fast. No, that's crazy! He's in a freeway cruiser and this is Texas. He's gotta have more than 300 horsepower. And if I get away, every cop in the state of Texas is going to be looking for me. What do I do? What if he tries to hurt me?" I started looking around for a weapon. If this guy pulls over in the middle of nowhere, what can I use to defend myself? I felt sick to my stomach.

Worrying myself sick for what seemed like an eternity, we arrived at a small town. It looked like something out of "Last Picture Show." There were a bunch of run-down houses with poorly kept yards. An emaciated dog crossed the street in front of me. The officer pulled up next to a house that had an old truck parked on the front yard. A couple of wheels were missing and the truck was perched on cinder blocks. The house used to have a garage that had been converted to a room. You could see the outline of the garage door, where the garage door had been replaced by new siding. There was an entry door punched into the new siding that was installed to replace the garage door and the hand painted sign above that door read, "COURTHOUSE."

I had entered the Twilight Zone. Parking my car behind the officer's, I got out and followed him in.

The courthouse was minimal. The floor was a plain cement slab. The walls were covered in unfinished sheetrock, nailed to the studs, they had not been taped or floated. There was some old wooden furniture, just four tables and mismatched chairs. Three long tables were shaped into a "U." The fourth table, a small table, was back in the corner. There was a phone on the small table and nearby, on the floor, sat a radio that was plugged into an electrical outlet. It was tuned to a country music station. The flags of the United States and the great state of Texas stood behind the center table, the table in the middle of the "U."

There was no one in the courthouse. The officer started calling out towards a door that led into the house (the judge's residence?), "Judge? Judge? Are you there? Judge?"

I held my breath.

A woman's voice called back, "Just have a seat, I'll be there in a minute."

The officer called out again, "Judge, may I use the telephone?"

The judge yelled back, "Go right ahead."

The officer instructed me to have at one of the tables. He positioned himself at the small table in the corner, the one with the phone. He was seated behind me and I couldn't see him without turning around. I didn't want to turn around and it was also unnerving to have him seated behind me. He was on the phone speaking in a quiet tone. With the radio on, it was hard for me to hear what he was saying. I heard him spelling out my name, talking about the Saab, the registration, the paintings.

I imagined that this officer thought he was on the verge of solving the crime of the century. That he was calling every law enforcement agency he could think of to learn whether a man of my description was suspected of stealing valuable paintings from an art museum. It reminded me of Officer Obie in the Arlo Guthrie song "Alice's Restaurant." Like Officer Obie, "He was making sure." A smile came to my face, thinking that he would soon be on the line with Interpol.

The officer mentioned my company's name. It hit me. I thought "Shit! I gave him my business card. He's going to call the Houston office and check my story. No!!!"

You might think that calling my Houston office would be a good thing. That my Houston colleagues would be concerned for me and that they would rush to my assistance. The problem was that my dear colleagues in our Houston office had a cruel sense of humor. The practical joke was considered to be a high form of art. And there was one guy in that office who didn't care for me. There was a real possibility that if this officer called my office somebody might think it would be real funny to have me spend a couple of nights in jail. They might say that the car was stolen. It was Saturday. It wasn't very likely that somebody would be in the office. This one guy did come in for a couple of hours on Saturday. I started to sweat.

A few minutes later a round, matronly woman entered the courthouse. The officer said, "Howdy Judge."

The judge waived hi. Her robes consisted of a black cotton sweat suit, the kind that you might buy at a Kmart. It had a collarless sweatshirt and the type of sweatpants that are gathered at the ankles and held up at the waist with a drawstring. The front of her black judicial sweatshirt was adorned with the cartoon of a pink, wide-eyed, kitten.

Eager to show respect, I stood up.

The judge motioned for me to sit down. She had a warm smile on her face as she seated herself at the table in the center of the "U." She said, "Ok, court is in session," and asked the officer, "What have we got here?"

The officer stood up and said, "Speeding judge. He was doing 90."

The judge looked at me and asked, "How do you plead?"

I said, "Guilty. Can I pay in cash?"

The judge smiled and said, "Of course."

This was an expensive ticket, a couple of hundred bucks. The judge, in her gentle way, explained the various fees. I wasn't listening so closely, didn't want to hear any explanations and was simply happy to pay the ticket and get out of there. She said something about a fine for the basic speeding ticket, penalty for being more than 10 mph over the posted limit, courthouse fee, weekend hearing fee, law enforcement fee, hazardous materials disposal fee, educational fund for her grandchildren fee, suggested donation for flowers for the courthouse and a new transmission for the truck out front that was on cinder blocks. Good thing I decided to travel with cash. I pulled the money out of my man purse. The judge accepted my cash with a smile and wished me a pleasant journey home.

I walked to the door. I felt like running, but didn't want to appear too excited about leaving. I smiled nervously at the officer. He frowned back, still on the phone talking to some one about California, Texas registration, and paintings. I was thinking about just how badly I wanted to be back in my car and someplace that was at least a hundred miles away from here. Reaching for the door, it occurred to me that it had taken me almost two hours of following the officer to get "here" and that I had no idea of where "here" was. I turned back towards the courtroom. The officer was on the phone. I asked the judge, "Judge, ma'am, would you be kind enough to provide me with some directions back to Interstate 10?"

She said, "Oh, it's easy. You parked out front? Just make a right at the corner, it's about a quarter mile down the road. Just take you a minute to get there. Drive safely."

I left the courthouse and returned to my car. I had some trouble putting my key in the ignition, my hands were shaking. I just wanted to get myself out of there. As the judge suggested, it didn't take any time at all to get back on the interstate. Setting the cruise control to something that was just below the speed limit, I wondered, "What the hell just happened?"

I swore to the heavens above that I would comply with the speed limit all the way back to California. That oath was good for a couple of hours, until I was about 50 miles past San Antonio. It was getting late, I had a schedule, the road was long. My plan was to take a break and have dinner in El Paso, still a few hours away. And nobody's going to stop you for driving just a little bit faster than the speed limit. It's ok. I would reach El Paso in time for a late dinner.

Little did I know that before dinner, I was going to meet Mr. CB.

Ever Have One Of Those Days? #3

2008-11-15T12:24:00.000-08:00

Cops and Stops Part 2

2008-11-13T08:39:00.000-08:00

It was hot. The air conditioner in my 1975 VolksWagen Dasher wasn’t working. Headed back to NYC from a weekend on the Jersey shore, we had been sitting and sweltering in bumper to bumper traffic for a couple of hours. Between the heat and my boredom, I was giddy. I took Cindy's lipstick and drew big round circles on my cheeks. She was barely amused. I kicked off my shoes and hung one leg out the window. In a joking tone, I suggested that we pass time by pulling off the road and having some “fun.” I was too embarrassed to make the proposal sound serious, but quietly hoped that she might get my meaning and give me some kind of signal.

Cindy just stared out the window.

There was a monster-sized truck in front of us. My eyes fixed on the "Airborne" sticker attached to the rear bumper. Traffic crawled. I started telling stories, “When I was in the Air Force, I jumped out of an airplane. They invited me to try out for the parachuting team. There's a brotherhood among those of us who went to jump school ... A chemistry between crazy people who jump out of perfectly good airplanes ... I have `blood' wings you know, yeah, my best friend shoved the pins right into my chest ... Did I ever tell you about the time I had a total malfunction?"

Cindy just stared out the window.

Failing to engage Cindy, I decided to "bond" with my "Paratrooper" brother. I stuck my head out the window and yelled to the truck in front of me "Whoa! Arooooga! Yo! Airborne! Good to the last drop! Heyooo!"

Cindy turned to me and said, "stop that, you're going to annoy him."

"Cindy, this is a guy thing. He'll understand. It'll be cool. Watch."

I yelled a little louder and started honking my horn. The guy in the truck looked at me through his rear view mirror and flipped me the bird.

Cindy said "You see, now stop it, you’re annoying him."

I persisted. "Cindy, you don't understand. He just doesn't realize that we're both jumpers." I yelled out the window "Hey, soopa-doopa-para-troopa .... When in doubt, rip it out! The only things that fall from the sky are birdshit and fools! Blue sky, black death! Airborne! Yeeehaa!"

The man in the pickup now turned all the way around to get a good look at me. He began to make violent motions with his hands. He pointed at me and flipped me off again. I was beginning to get pissed. "What's wrong with THAT guy?"

About a hundred yards up the road, a New Jersey state police car was parked at the side of the road. Inside, a state trooper watched traffic crawl by. As we approached, the truck hastily pulled onto the shoulder and sped over to the police car. The driver jumped out, yelled to the trooper, waved his arms and started pointing to my car. The trooper stepped out of the car and flagged me down.

I pulled over and got out of the car.

Cindy gasped "Kirk, your shoes."

It’s supposed to be a crime to drive without shoes on in New Jersey. Maybe its not a full-blown crime, lik they don’t throw you in jail or anything, but it’s still against the law. I didn’t really know that for a fact. But Cindy told me so and she was usually right about stuff like that.

If you think about it, it makes some sense. Suppose you're wearing shoes while you're driving and your brakes give out. You can open the driver's door and slow the car down by dragging your foot. You can't do that when you're barefoot 'cause you'd get blisters on your feet. It’s too late for me to get back in the car to put on my shoes. That would be too obvious.

I'm beginning to get a little nervous and start wondering about what the penalty is for driving without shoes when it suddenly occurs to me that I still have big red lipstick circles drawn on my cheeks. This can’t be good. I quickly turn my face towards the ground, hoping that the trooper didn't notice my face. But now I think that I'm looking kinda stupid because its like I'm hanging my head in shame. And by looking down I've got to be calling attention to my feet. I get a great idea, feigning a sneeze I try to rub the lipstick off my cheeks with one swift swipe of my hand.

My head still hanging down, I try to use my eyes to see what's going on ahead of me. The driver of the truck is waving his arms and yelling. The trooper is just staring at me. His arms are crossed.

I approach the trooper and look up. There he was, campaign hat, reflector sunglasses, mustache. There was attitude written all over him.

I took the offensive. “Officer this is all a big mistake, I saw this gentleman had an Airborne sticker on his car and I was in the Air Force – I have a lot of military spirit – and I was just tryin’ to say hi like we used to do in the service and I think he thought that I was insulting him but that wasn’t at all what I intended to do and I’m so sorry for any inconvenience or inappropriate suggestion because I have nothing but admiration for my brothers….”

The officer cut in, "Boy, ya'll were obstruct-tin the road way and distrat-tin the otha dryvas. We don’t hardly put up withat sorta thang. Now why don’t you just git yerself home."

Disapppointed that the trooper wasn’t willing to say that this whole situation was the OTHER GUY’S FAULT (amazing how you can rationalize), I thought to myself, "Schmuck, you're in New Jersey, talk like it...."

Cops And Stops Part 1

2008-11-10T17:17:00.000-08:00

My 19 year old nephew who lives in New Jersey took some time off from college to see the United States. He's a long-haired kid, the t-shirt and jeans type. He's at a point in his young life where there are all sorts of options and it's just not clear what to do. Given that he was raised in a very comfortable home, his parents are professionals, good providers, it's a credit to my nephew that he's trying to be his own person and figure some things out. I admire how he's going about this.

When I was at that point in life, I enlisted in the Air Force, it was a safe choice. I didn't have to worry about where my next meal was coming from, where I was going to sleep and didn't have to worry about what clothes I was going to wear that day. My nephew's taking some risks. He's driving around in a beaten up Ford and doing what he can to pay for this adventure. He saved some money from a job that he worked, he's makes extra cash on the road by playing his guitar on street corners, and he saves on expenses by camping out and sleeping in his car.

He was on the road for a couple of months and found himself on I-40 in Arizona, headed to the Grand Canyon. Doing 85 mph in a 75 mph zone, he was stopped by a cop. The officer asked for his driver's license, registration and proof of insurance. Instead of handing over these items individually, my nephew handed over the portfolio that his mother prepared for him which also included maps, emergency directions, emergency telephone card, Q-tips, band-aids, Danish-English Dictionary and any other item that a mother might think is appropriate for a road emergency.

As the cop rummaged through the bag, he told my nephew that he couldn't find the registration.

My nephew, probably scared out of his wits, answered, "I'm sure it's in there, my mother wouldn't forget it."

The officer asked, "May I search your vehicle."

My nephew said, "No."

The officer shook his head and said, "Well your registration is not here. I'm going to have to detain you and run a check on this vehicle. Step out of the car."

My nephew stepped out of the car, the officer cuffed him and placed him in the back seat of his cruiser, right next to his police dog. The dog, unhappy about sharing the back seat with my nephew, started barking. I would have been terrified, my nephew must have been terrified.

The officer completed his "check on the vehicle" and then released my nephew from custody. My nephew got back into his car.

The officer said, "I found your registration." The officer returned the registration, gave my nephew a ticket, and sent him on his way.

After he stopped shaking, my nephew called his mother. His mother, I am told, was very upset and was ready to call the ACLU (Hey Cheri, notice any similarity between UCLA and ACLU?). She was, at a minimum, ready to file a writ of habeas corpus for no other reason than this was the only legal terminology that she knew. It impressed me because I couldn't quite remember why anyone filed writs of habeas corpi.

Anyway, this got me to thinking. When I first heard this story, I was pretty pissed off. My nephew is a good kid. It sounds like this cop played "fast and loose" with the rules.

But what if the kid that he pulled over wasn't my nephew? What if he searched the car and found something? What if, before the cop went on patrol that morning, he was told to be on the lookout for individuals fitting a certain profile. What if this cop has used the same tactic with some one else and found weapons or drugs? Should I really be upset with the cop? Given what can happen out on a lonely highway, was the cop scared?

I have trouble with this. I don't want to live in a state that subjects me to unreasonable searches and seizures. I want police officers to respect me and to treat me in a way that recognizes that I am a law-biding citizen and someome who pays a heck of a lot of money in taxes. Then, as I get all worked up in my righteousness, I think about how I want that cop to protect my family and the public from the "bad guys." I want to be treated a certain way and yet I recognize my own hypocrisy by suggesting that it might be ok if cops dont' treat other people as nicely.

When I first heard this story, I thought the cop was a bad guy. That he was all too willing to push around a kid. I had half a mind to get caught speeding on I-40 in Arizona myself and see if that cop would dare pull the same stunt with me (it's easy to say that when I sitting here in California).

Is that a reasonable reaction? This cop pulled my nephew over somewhere in the middle of
nowhere. The cop could have claimed that my nephew resisted arrest. He could have come up with an excuse to beat the crap out of him. He could have planted something on him. With no one watching, he could have done any of a number of nastier things.

I'm now wondering whether my nephew was a bit lucky. I wonder whether the cop was a "good guy."

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My nephew's recent encounter, got me thinking about the times that I have been pulled over.

Actually, the first time that I got "pulled over, " I didn't get "pulled over."

When I first got my license, I was driving my falling apart 1975 Volkswagen Dasher through the streets of Manhattan. Although most of Manhattan's streets are part of a huge grid, this took place in the village where there are lots of narrow little streets running in all different directions. The streets are so narrow, and with parking on both sides of the street, an inexperienced driver can get a bit nervous about side swiping, or taking the mirrors off, parked cars. I was so focused on keeping my car in the middle of the road that I wasn't paying attention to street signs. Streets signs in Manhattan are not very important. As NYC's traffic is largely controlled by signal lights, you don't need to look for street signs. I didn't notice what may have been the only STOP sign on island of Manhattan.

I was driving along at something like 15 mph and, without slowing down, entered the intersection. Fate determined that two of NYC's finest were sitting in a parked police car right in front of me. Being insecure about my driving, just seeing the police was enough to intimidate me. Then I noticed the STOP sign. The two cops, who were enjoying a couple of sub sandwiches, just looked as I slid by. They couldn't imagine that someone would run a STOP sign right in front of them. My eyes, wide as saucers, were fixed in their direction. Their looks of surprise could only have been surpassed by my own.

Then, almost simultaneously, the two officers hung out the windows on their respective sides of the police car, "flipped me the bird," and starting shouting, "Hey, whassa matta wid you, you stupid or somethin, what da hell is wrong wid ya, learn how ta drive you mother f*in SOB!"

It was far more effective than a ticket.

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The next time that I was "pulled over" without being pulled over, I was living in Colorado Springs. It was the Winter of 1981, probably a Saturday night, about 3 o'clock in the morning. My car was parked in a quiet, dark part of a shopping center, and my windows were all foggy. Although I couldn't see out of the windows, I was alerted by the bright flashing lights. I was in the back seat when I rolled down the window and the officer shone his light right into my eyes.

The officer, trying to conceal his amusement, asked, "Is everything ok?"

The young lady next to me, buttoning her shirt, replied, "We weren't doing anything."

The officer quietly suggested that we could have made a better choice and asked us to get on our way.

I pretty sure that this cop was a "good guy."

My Addiction To Photography

2008-11-10T11:22:00.000-08:00

I started another blog - PROLIXPICS - to think and write about my photography. I wanted to write a little something about my experience with photography and it got, well, prolix. I decided to reproduce it here.

My Addiction To Photography

My mother is a naturally gifted artist.
I regret that she didn't devote more of her time to expressing her talent. If it's ok to switch things around and live vicariously through your mother, I believe that her life would be so much richer today if she had committed the time to developing a life-long body of work that was meaningful to her. Perhaps she did this in a different way. She devoted her time to raising three children. I know it was meaningful to her. I suppose that, in a sense, we do represent her living body of work.

I hope that we haven't disappointed her.

Whenever she set her mind to it, my mother created beautiful things. She had vision and a determination to see projects through. Without formal training she could, in a seemingly effortless way, move among media: paint, charcoal, needlepoint, paper cuttings, baking, cooking, food.

My sister inherited her talent.
My daughter has that talent.
And I have trouble writing my name legibly.

That's what drew me to photography. The camera was a crutch that I could use to overcome my talentless hands. Although I couldn't hold a paintbrush, I had a little bit of an eye. At least I thought I had an eye. And that gave me the courage to try.

I started shooting pictures well before my teenage years. The first cameras that I used were a Kodak Retina II and a Zeiss Ikon Super Ikonta B. The Kodak was a 35mm and the Zeiss was a 120mm rollfilm camera.

The shutters were not automatic. To take a picture, you needed to first "cock" the shutter by pulling a little hammer back to load a spring. It was almost like cocking a gun. They were folding cameras, the lens was connected to a flexible bellows so you could fold the camera back into the body. As opposed to motor drives that allow you to take several shots in a single second, it took several seconds to prepare the camera for a single shot. It was difficult to take action photos. But the cameras taught me to think before a shot, to anticipate action and to find a "moment."

Both of those cameras were rangefinders. There was no such thing as autofocus. What a gift! Working with a rangefinder under pressured shooting conditions required me to think about things like focus, distance, perspective, and depth of field. I still think of those things when I take pictures with an automatic camera today. I don't know if I'm doing anything about them, but at least I think of them.

Naturally, those vintage cameras did not have an internal metering system. Although the best results came from using a handheld light meter, many shooting situations did not provide the luxury of using a meter. I learned to estimate exposure. That was also a gift because training my eye to estimate exposure helped me to develop whatever ability I presently have to see light and shadow.

If you want to learn something about photograhy, then you every so oftern you must turn off the automatic features on your camera. Think about what you're trying to achieve and then set the camera accordingly. Make mistakes. Try things. Take lots of exposures. Review them. Critique yourself. Get your friends to critique. Think about your results, then go back and try again. I'm beginning to think the same way about life.

When I first started shooting, I felt some frustration because I had old equipment and my equipment made it more difficult to take pictures. It's taken me years to realize that these vintage cameras were wonderful teachers. They deserved a better student.

My father bought those cameras in Germany, right after World War II. He claims that he bought the Zeiss for a pound of coffee. I think he bought the Kodak with some cigarettes. I still have those cameras. The Kodak still works. The shutter release on the Zeiss is broken and I'm not sure where I can go to fix it. I want to fix the Zeiss, even though I don't shoot film anymore. It's a thing of beauty and I just want to know that it works. Oddly enough, I don't take those cameras out and look at them very often. It just makes me happy to know that I have them.

Although it was a lot of money, my father gave me the money to buy my first single lens reflex. It was a Ricoh. I couldn't have been happier if I were twins. It had an internal "needle and bracket" exposure meter. Once I understood how the meter "saw" the light, it made it so much easier to adjust exposure. The Ricoh had a screw mount lens. Screw mounts were, in a word, a disaster.

Then I enlisted in the Air Force. The camera didn't make me enlist. There were a whole bunch of other reasons. The Air Force was significant to my photography in that it provided me with the money to buy camera equipment. In my day, most young enlisted men used their paychecks to buy either cars, high end stereo equipment or pay child support. But I used many of my paychecks to buy cameras, lenses and accessories.

I used some of the first cash that I had saved to buy a Cannon A-1 at the base exchange. I loved my A-1, it was one of the first fully automatic SLRs built on a sophisticated electronic system. For the first time in my life, I could afford (not really afford but I could spend money on) lenses, filters, and lighting. It was heavenly. At one point, I bought and AE-1 to supplement my A-1. Nothing makes you feel more like a photographer when you actually have more than enough equipment for two camera bodies.

I bought that A-1 in 1979. It served me faithfully until about 1996. That's when I switched to Nikon.

Since I was a kid, Nikon represented the holy grail in 35mm photography. I was never sure that I would see the day that I could afford a Nikon camera system. However, in 1996, the A-1 was getting long in the tooth, the electronics were beginning to fail, it was time for a new camera. I could afford the Nikon N70. I went for it.

Be careful what you wish for, you just might get it. The N70 is a very respectable camera. It just didn't feel like it was the half the camera that the A-1 felt like to me.

Life has a way of playing tricks on you. I always wanted a Nikon and finally got one. Then it was a disappointment.

Life impacted my photography in other ways. My skin reacts poorly to many of the chemicals used in photo processing. I could spend hours in the darkroom only to emerge, bleary eyed, with my hands raw, blistered, and sometimes bleeding. I tried gloves and steroid creams but nothing worked.

My sensitivity to chemicals drove me out of the darkroom. I started to rely on high end labs. I would get contact sheets, pick shots, make editing notes and then head to the local lab. But that was a poor substitute for doing your own printing. It was very expensive. They didn't feel like my prints, it didn't provide the thrill of standing over a pan and watching the image emerge from a blank sheet of paper.

I still loved to take pictures. But the complications, expense, and physical discomfort drove me away from the darkroom. And without the darkroom experience, I didn't have the same passion for photography. And then came digital.

I jumped onto the digital bandwagon right away. Before the digital SLR, I went through a couple of rangefinder-type digital cameras (as much a 2 megapixels!) and started to experiment with digital imagery. Digital allowed me to rediscover the joy of photography. Even though the early photo editing programs were pretty weak, they gave me a digital pathway back into the darkroom.

I stayed with Nikon when I purchased my first digital SLR camera - the D100. I'm glad that I did. I've enjoyed using that camera and feel very comfortable with the interface. I've since added a D200 and a D2x to my collection. And if the stock market ever recovers, the D700 is looking pretty good to me.

I'm currently working on a PC. I've used PCs because my workplace has always favored the Microsoft/Windows environment. But just like Nikon, I know that - one day - I'm going to go for a Mac. And shortly after I buy that Mac, I'm going to buy a printer that allows me to produce true "poster-sized" images.

As a father with a demanding full-time job, I don't have the time that I might otherwise spend on my photography. But the joy is back and from time-to-time life kindly gives me the time and space that allows me to retreat to my computer and become consumed by my tinkerings with imagery.

I love my photographs because they're mine. Please don't misunderstand me. I don't profess to have any kind of a special talent. These paragraphs are just my story. It felt good telling it.

I'm sharing these images on the web because if I can share a portion of the happiness that these images have brought me, then I would hope that I have accomplished something of value. I believe in Jigaro Kano's suggestion that life's purpose is to work on perfecting some aspect of yourself and give back some benefit to the world. Although his suggestion was focused on the study of Judo, that philosophy transcends to all aspects of life. I've waited too long. Now that I'm in the 50th year of my life, it seems time to do something about it.

My images are far from perfect. I often feel like an imposter. There are so many more highly gifted photographers out there. I often see images that take my breath away. I see so many images that possess greater subtlety, more appreciation for their subjects, better sense of light, shadow and perspective. And after being lifted by the beauty of another's images, I descend into a mild melancholy as I only wish that I could be as talented. I fight the urge to feel jealousy and look upon these many talented individuals as my teachers.

Perhaps by learning to see the world through another's eyes,
I can achieve greater consciousness through my own.

My addiction to photography has provided me with some insight about life. It's nothing that you haven't heard before: things aren't always what they seem to be, inconvenience can be a great teacher, make the most out of what you have, follow your inspirations, sometimes you need to turn off the electronics, look at others with fascination. It's just funny that when you hear such things, they sound like trite sayings. When you experience these things, even in little ways, you find meaning.

I'm Such A Bitch!

2008-11-09T11:27:00.000-08:00

It's all happening so quickly, I'm spotting! The San Diego Blog Bitches want me, they really want me ....

Although, to paraphrase Groucho Marx, I am suspicious of any club that would have some one like me as a member, the bitches touched me in a place where I am rarely touched. Pretending that I even had a choice, I accept their invitation with the same enthusiasm that Meg Ryan expressed when (in "When Harry Met Sally") she said, "Yes, yes, YES! YES! YES!"

I am totally having what she was having! Omigod, this is so awesome. I love my scorchingly hawt g-friends.
(Help me out, I'm still getting used to the lingo.)

I was so excited, first I peed, and then I ran out and got myself a new pair of shoes. Aren't they the bomb? I have the perfect matching belt. (Any wonder why gay men want me?) Had I known, I would have invited all of the bitches to my spendfest and I would have brought lots of wine.

In honor of their generous acknowledgment of my aspiring bitchiosity, I am underscoring my bitchiness by posting a new "Ever Have One Of Those Days?"

One question: What happens when they find out that I've been a registered Republican since 1979?

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Can you find Cheri and Tom in this picture?

Ever Have One Of Those Days? #2

2008-11-09T11:10:00.000-08:00

Propositions

2008-11-06T11:13:00.000-08:00

I've been thinking a lot about propositions. It reminds me of when I was propositioned in Palm Springs.

It was a few years ago, at a bar in a Mexican restaurant. I was attending a conference and, one evening, went to this bar with a few colleagues. We were standing around, telling jokes and drinking too much when my friend nudged me and whispered that this very attractive, sweet looking and young woman (late 20's?) kept staring at me.

I looked in her direction. She was standing with a group of young men and women, it looked like an after-work gathering. They were laughing, talking in an animated fashion, and every so often one or more of them would look in my direction and squeal with laughter. I tried to remain cool, take it in stride, but found myself glancing over now and then. At one point she looked up and our eyes met. She smiled and a wave of panic overcame me.

It was entirely innocent but I felt as if I had done something wrong. Looking away, I fumbled with my margarita, looked down at my shoes and then turned in the other direction. In just a few moments, my face returned to its natural color. My friend nudged me again saying, "Hey, she's coming over."

Sure enough, she was walking around the bar looking at me, her big brown eyes gazing straight into mine. I froze. She spoke in such a soft voice that it was hard to make out her words. I said, "I'm sorry, I can't make out what you are saying." I leaned over and turned my ear towards her mouth to hear better. Her breath held the sweet smell of Grand Marnier.

She said, "Hi, I'm Angie. My friend thinks that you're really cute."

I didn't know how to react to that. I felt disappointed. In my mind a very cute girl had shown some interest in me. I was feeling the rush associated with turning her away (those of you who read the "Guy Manual" understand that it's a rush for a guy to be cool enough to turn away a good looking woman). However, it now appeared that this cute girl was not my admirer. Obviously, there must be some less attractive girl in the group who had shown interest and that her cute friend was intending to be the decoy to lure me - the cute guy - into meeting her friend - the undoubtedly "uncute" girl. Of course, there's no thrill in turning down an uncute girl (see the "Guy Manual"). On the contrary, it's embarrassing to have an uncute girl think that you're cute.

As I mulled this over she said, "Yeah, he thinks you're really cute. He's the tall guy over there in the blue shirt."

I was dumbfounded and completely disoriented. I blurted out the first thing that came to my mind, "Well, thank him for me."

She persisted, "Are you gay? My friend likes older guys."

Now it was getting uncomfortable. I don't really mind that a man finds me attractive, but being referred to as an "older guy" was downright insulting.

"He wants to buy you a drink."

I felt a bit dizzy. I was just completely knocked off balance. For the past few moments, I had been quietly congratulating myself for still having "it." I didn't intend to do anything about it, I was just happy that a woman might notice my "it." I had already, in my mind, started to draft my kind yet firm message that I wasn't available to this perky young thing because I was a happily married man, the father of two wonderful children. It just never occurred to me that she was simply delivering a proposition on behalf of her male friend.

Some may think that this may not have amounted to much of a proposition. You may say that he only wanted to buy me a drink. You may suggest that I am assuming a lot. But you don't know anything about gay men. I know that if I had accepted a drink, he would have expected something else. You have to be careful of that, a guy buys you a drink and then he expects to get his money's worth. I hear it's worse if they buy you dinner. Oh, it was definitely a proposition. I was born at night, but it wasn't last night.

I know that gay men want me. I can tell by the way they look at me. Years ago, I used to go to piano bars with my wife (she's a singer and I went to watch her sing). I could feel a room full of eyes on me whenever I went. Those men wanted me. Just last year, a business associate took me and my wife to a wine-tasting event at a downtown restaurant. We sat at a table with several gay men and when we left that evening, one of those guys shook my hand and winked at me. That was no casual wink. That was a "come hither" wink. He had his eye on me all night. Yes, they want me.

Sure as the nose on my face, this guy in Palm Springs wasn't just saying "have a drink," it was "let's have a drink and then...." It was a proposition and I score it as such, a real proposition. This proposition just wasn't my cup of tea. I feel truthful when I say that this proposition would not have worked for me even if it came from an attractive young woman. But though I would not have accepted, I was disappointed that this proposition did not turn out to be what it could have been.

And that's my point about propositions - you get excited about some, disappointed by others, some you want, some you don't want. And some just don't turn out to be what you thought they could have been.

Ever Have One Of Those Days? #1

2008-11-05T20:54:00.000-08:00

Welcome to my blah-blah-blah-g.

2008-11-05T14:44:00.000-08:00

This is my first post. I never thought about having a blah-blah-blah-g but my friend, Cheri (blog this mom) guilted me into doing this. She did this on purpose. She never asked me to do this, she never told me to do this, but she still did it on purpose. She knows that she's responsible for this. Cheri's been blogging for a couple of years now, talking about her blog (for a couple of years now), writing emails about her blog (for a couple of years now), making a big deal about her blog (for a couple of years now), talking about comments to her blog (for a couple of years now), gushing about her friends' blogs (for a couple of years now with me feeling notably absent from this crowd), laughing about comments to her friend's blogs (for a couple of years now): you know, blah-blah-blah-g.

It is time to join the party. Time to feel the rush of the creative endorphines flowing through my brain. Time to show off my writing "chops" and dazzle readers with catchy prose. Time to be clever. Note the title of my blog, "Prolix Frolicks." Note my signature "Last Place Finisher" (the idea being that "nice guys finish last"). Sitting back and mulling this over, it disturbs me to admit that neither of these items are either clever or funny.

So there you have it, I have barely started and already feel like a blogging failure. The Kinks' tune "Destroyer" is playing in my head ("I'm really not as cool as I'd like to be"). I just don't have anything to write about. I'm not the pseudointellectual metrosexual who can wax eloquently about the difficulty in finding authentic Lithuanian food in San Diego or how global warming is killing my Chia Pet. I don't have the faculties to write a good political or socially introspective rant a la Dennis Miller or Dennis Leary (maybe it's because my name isn't Dennis).

I'm just a wannabe - pretending that I have something interesting to say. Blah-blah-blah-ging away.

But at least now I can post links to Cheri's blog.