One Book

I have been doing a lot of thinking about how I will pay for my partner’s college, when they stopped student loans in his country. Although he works very hard, and is paid there is no room for anything but the most basic necessities. I was thinking of selling my art collection starting with the best piece, which in my mind would help me quickly get over it. I was in contact with museums that specialize in the area my collection is in. Today, I was very surprised by a healthy check from an old lawsuit I joined three or four years ago. It is almost the same amount I needed to complete the remaining school tuition he needs. Feeling extremely lucky I took a walk on the beach to give thanks and to reflect.

When I was a young boy at 6 or 7, I became fascinated with The Family of Man, by Edward Steichen. My parents had it on the coffee table, and it provided with one of first insights I had to the outside world. An image in the book showed naked, happy, dancing boys in the savannahs of Africa. What was odd to my child brain was not they were happy but the poverty they had. This photo stuck with me. Even though we were never well off, we had clothes and were well fed. It played an integral part in my being and eventually came to play into a few of my relationships. The ones were I felt I was helping someone less fortunate than myself. Blessed by my loving parents who keep on inspiring me…sometimes unknowingly.

A sunday drive

Even though I meditate I went on a Sunday drive to get out of my rut. It can be the same old things but out of your environment they somehow look fresh. Actually, what it is...is a refreshed mind looking at them. I have a few very important challenges coming up and I want to make clean and well thought out decisions about them. Taking the day to remind myself how lucky I am instead of being too self-critical.

I knew the following day I would go to the hospital again to volunteer and talk to new brain injury survivors. Every time I see them it brings me to a more realistic view of life. It is also good to see clients who are already seeing some hope and changes. I tell them to remember to have humor about yourself, when you can’t quite achieve those high goals. Most people would benefit from a hospital visit to make them quickly realize that their life is fine. But who I am to tell people what to do, as it will come to them when they are ready.

Losing Heart

As a fan of RadioLab on Podcast, I proposed to them the idea of something that I have encountered. With the advent of personal computers, we are losing or ability to see someone’s intent or their soul(ie Heart). With my disability I get a wide range of responses to hearing my voice in person for the first time. I have no great visible signs, clear eyes, and clear face (meaning not red). Yet younger people, like those under 35, cannot see my intent, even when it as simple as ordering tea when at a café counter. Instead of trying to help me they actually “fight me” by assuming I am drunk, stupid, or insane. (see also June 28) I am generalizing, of course, but I use this to my advantage to find out who has a good heart. Those with a good heart almost immediately try to figure out how to understand and help me.
Now this idea goes as far as when people date, if they don’t read each other’s intent they are doomed trying to find a worthwhile relationship. They trip, fall, and get up like most yet find they fall in the same hole. I have been trying to answer people’s questions online, even meeting a few people to help, but it seems if they don’t have these skills already, then there is not much I can do.

Right, bicycles

Driving my car, the other day I signaled to turn right. Looking carefully, because I was aware that I passed two bicycles, a block earlier and they were moving fast. I stopped to let them ride by, before completing my turn. Suddenly, the woman in the SUV behind me blew her horn. We are talking about 45 seconds, before I turned after they passed safely. I took a lot not to jump out of my car and point to the two bicycles to the impatient woman. I had to remind myself again, that everyone wants to be happy. If I had made a scene, all it would make her do is become more upset. This might actually set in motion a chain reaction where more people would be caught in her impatience, after I pointed out how silly she was. I have a lot in my mind and I can only guess that she may, as well. “Being right,” that thing I sometimes get caught up in, that does not offer much in sharing the world and peace. This for me, came out of being looked down upon as a gay person, especially when I was young and vulnerable. Being right when you are told that you are wrong. It may still an issue with society, but I hope I can evolve myself. That, I can change.

Whatever!

Yesterday, before eating at the ill-fated restaurant, (read below) I waited for my friend outside. I sat on the ground resting against a pole, reading a new book. Nearby a Volvo had a dog inside with all the windows rolled up on a sunny day. As man walked back to the car after being in a store shopping, and I said you could have killed that dog in the less than ten minutes with the heat. He replied, “Whatever”. Then another guy stopped and asked my directions to a near-by street. I gave him the most direct path there, but he did not believe me. He walked into a store close to me, obviously to ask them and walked out….walking the opposite way than what I told him. I was trying to hold my chagrin back, when after 10 minutes walking in the wrong direction, he came walking back by me. I said now what is the point in lying to you? He said, “Whatever”. Now this is either a sign of people not understanding me with my disability, or the general dumbing down of America. Or, I can take this as one more way to remind me that I am not the most important person in the world.

In one quick minute

Just when you think you are invincible, you are reminded that even you are only human…in one quick minute. I had a nice lunch with a good friend of mine at a seafood restaurant. This is one that I have noticed for almost a year. One day, a couple of months ago I was riding public transportation by the place and I had a funny, bad feeling involving some foresight. It was like feeling sick when I went by, that actually kept me from going there earlier. It was a real premonition that I chose to ignore because it was not like a hammer to the head. Well, you guessed it. I got terrible food poisoning within three hours when my body worked hard to get rid of the clams I had. Which brings me back to the premonition I had just before my medical nightmare where I was lucky enough to get my dual strokes from two Doctors errors. At that time, I actually voiced the fear I had to a close friend just before getting out of her car when she drove me there. We are usually so busy in life that subtleties like a premonition are easily ignored. I know my mom has some powers like this, which we always dismissed as the kookiness of having children. That makes moms closer to their feelings they have after they have carried you in their womb. Now, not only to have to apologize to my mom again....but, I have to learn how to pick these up that I miss.

Era of Dreams

Dream catcher, Kent Couch flew 193 miles in a lawn chair fixed with 105 helium balloons. Wow! I had the same dream as a kid especially after my father gave me a weather balloon. I thought about trying to jump off the roof, after he filled it with helium he had from his garage shop. I ran around the yard jumping up, hoping it would lift me up. He tried to explain how much it would take to lift me, but I was already lost in dream projections of where I would fly. My father had he own dreams of flight after scaling the fence at Lockheed, to sketch planes as a boy. That later transferred to him being in the air force, sadly disqualified from flying by rheumatic fever. Nonetheless, he photographed enemy bridge building in Korea. We went to air shows watching old planes duel in the sky. One time watching the brand-new 747, skim the air show runway in its proud largess out of the blue. It was an era of dreams and possibilities. I often think if we had money he would have paid for me to go to flight school. As he grew, much like me, we still had the dreams morphing into many other areas. My father’s dreams where in his art, and sometimes spilled over in drunken discussions with me. I tried to become my own person, confused by who I am, oftentimes rejecting his vision to prove myself. But alas, no matter how I tried to be different, I am still a son of an artist who flew… if only in his dreams.