Random Thoughts from a Restless Mind

1 Boredom. “The cure for boredom is curiosity.” Dorothy Parker

Saw this at the town pool and town beach this week watching school kids explore.

2 Curiosity. “There is no cure for curiosity.” Also Dorothy Parker

Thank Heavens for that, eh?

3 Drift. No, not the thing radically cool kids do with otherwise normal appearing automobiles, but rather a newly minted term to describe the oddity that is machine learning in AI. It turns out that AI engines don’t learn the same way that we humans do. Everyone, including computer engineers in the field, has assumed that AI machines learn by adding on in a “building blocks” progression, similar to how our brain works. Doing so leads to the accumulation of knowledge and skills that add up like so many wooden blocks in a child’s playroom.

Only that’s apparently not what’s happening.

“Drift” is the phenomenon in which an AI gets progressively worse at a task at which it was quite adept at the same time that it is acquiring excellence in something altogether different. It’s almost as if these supposedly infinitely capable systems are actually “zero-sum” entities: progress in one domain can only be achieved at the expense of another.

Long-term readers will recall that “Sunday musings…” was created as an outlet for my thoughts on all kinds of things, but mostly in the context of physical fitness. CrossFit fitness defined as “work capacity across broad time and modal domains.” CrossFit held (does it still?) that to be as fit as possible one must have equal capacity in the 10 essential fitness domains (aerobic, strength, endurance, etc.). Over-emphasizing one came at the expense of all of the others. Muscle-laden powerlifters who got out of breath after climbing a flight of stairs contrasted with ultra-endurance athletes who struggled to carry a bag of groceries.

Is machine learning-driven AI like fitness? I don’t think anybody really knows. Ya gotta admit though, it’s pretty weird when you think about it. I mean, a transformative technology that gets better and better at answering inane questions on a customer service phone line that simultaneously loses the ability to do math.

It’s like a kind of “skinny fat”, AI version.

4 August. Jason Gay, the excellent sports columnist/satirist at the Wall Street Journal asks “What happened to August?” in a typically perspicacious essay this weekend. It was a great question to contemplate as I’ve worked on unpacking my radically different summer of 2023. No more Cape Week. My Mom is due to move to Cleveland…Cleveland!…in a week. The overwhelmingness of everything that was our Alaska trip. As an aside I am still so filled with so much happiness and awe over our time together in Alaska that I can’t organize my thoughts well enough to write about it. I mean, my little antique Boston Whaler is still doing lawn art duty in front of my house instead of sitting on our launch, ready for adventure.

In August!

To be honest without kids of my own still hanging around the homestead August just feels like, well, August to me. I think Jason is in his late 30’s or so. His kids are only a tiny bit older than my grandchildren. He might be old enough to remember a different August. More likely he is just old enough to have some sense that August was a bit different for the “big kids” in his neighborhood when he was growing up. That August lasted a full four weeks, of course. Everything about summer was inexorably changed when the universal post-Labor Day start to the school year was dialed back to the third week of August, stripping off almost a quarter of summer.

When Beth and I were kids, and for that matter when our parents and grandparents were kids, summer began around June 15th or so. We’d get in two weeks of swimming lessons and Little League baseball, and then everything would shut down for the first two weeks in July. It seemed like everyone in the country who went to work Mondays through Fridays got 2 weeks off that included the 4th of July. Little league shut down. Station wagons were packed and trips were made. I know intellectually that not EVERYONE went on vacation then, but as a kid it sure seemed that way. Stuff kinda changed when we got old enough to have summer jobs–no more trips–but school still didn’t start until the Wednesday after Labor Day.

We got us a whole August every summer.

Jason Gay is right about the intensity of summers today, though. Our kids certainly experienced a bit more of that than Beth, our siblings, and I did. I vividly remember long lazy days where there were literally no plans at all. Maybe we had those swimming lessons in the morning, or perhaps the rec system had some baseball, softball, or basketball games lined up, but our afternoons were pretty free. Beth and her sisters went to a pretty cool day camp, and graduated to become counselors if memory serves, and we certainly heard stories about kids who spent weeks at sleep-away camps, but not my siblings and me. Mom just stuffed as many neighborhood kids as she could into the Chevy wagon and headed to the local little lakeside beach, spread out a blanket, and opened up a book.

We kids were left to amuse ourselves. No travel sports to rush home to. Summer enrichment programs? Pshaw, we all opened our summer reading book on Labor Day and crammed it in while we made up stuff more exciting than same beach with the same kids doing the same thing everyday for 6 weeks. All of that extra, more high intensity stuff that Jason decries started to show up for some of our kids who showed some aptitude for stuff like hockey with its summer camps and football with its mid-August two-a-days. Even at that, at least for our family, the over-arching prioritization of Cape Week made attendance at many of those activities impossible.

Yup, those were different days for sure. Most families had a non-working Mom, or at least one who got summers off. Neighborhoods were filled with an “it takes a village” ethos where whichever Mom was available just grabbed all of the kids and performed a kind of kid-wrangler function. And you know what? Even without a summer filled with elite travel teams or weekly tournaments every kid who was destined to play a sport at a higher level did just that. All of the super bright kids who were destined to end up at highly selective schools managed to land just where they belonged without checking in to a Kumon to be “enriched”.

Nope, instead we dug for worms, and if we were lucky enough to find a few we went fishing.

Who stole August? I’m afraid that the whole “back to school after Labor Day” thing is probably a lost cause, but frankly the blame for all of the intensity, the frenzy of activity, purposeful activity, lies squarely at the feet of the parents. If you and your spouse both have jobs you get a weekday pass; an early start to the school year is probably a huge boon to families in which both parents work, actually. But the whole travel team, weekend tournaments, and lack of lazy days of summer time? Sorry Jason, you and your peers own that. Some younger Boomers may have started the whole thing, and while my own family bears no guilt there I will nonetheless apologize on behalf of those in my generation who did.

But it’s parents who for some reason can’t seem to abide the non-purposeful minutes, let alone hours, spent by their children in the pursuit of the benefits that August once brought. It’s as if they have boredom by proxy, forgetting that boredom was once the gateway to some of the best things they experienced in their own Augusts past. Where we once packed most of the excitement of vacations into the first two weeks of July, kids are now pedal to the metal all summer long. That kid who’s good enough to play D1 soccer? S/he is gonna do that whether or not s/he practices every day school is out and hits up an elite tournament every weekend. Parents are supposed to make that kid NOT play soccer for a few weeks.

All is not lost, for Jason Gay or any other parents who may feel as he does about August. The solution lies in the wisdom of Dorothy Parker: let your kids have a summer filled with boredom. Time when they get to figure it out. Let their curiosity loose. With as little adult supervision and electronic assistance as possible. More parks and fewer plugs. Parents hold the keys to an August reminiscent of Augusts past, however shorter August may now be. The lakeside beaches of my youth are still there. There are still plenty of worms to dig up, fish to catch, friendships to foster. And boredom, the biggest gift of August.

Boredom can bring back that bit of the August we seem to have lost.

I’ll see you next week…

The winds of change blew over our beloved Cape Cod beach. They blew across the dunes we traversed each day for 31 years. Across the back porch of our neighbors, the family that annually gifted us free reign over their beach toys. Past the driveway filled this year with someone else’s cars. They blew all the way to northern Rhode Island, gently caressing our matriarch, my Mom, as she lay in bed, no longer able to make even a brief ceremonial visit to sit with us in the sand.

After 31 years the winds of change have finally closed the doors of the house and the cottage we called home during Cape Week.

Can you imagine? 31 years! Over time we’ve met a handful of other families with similar stories (including one of the docs I work with), but only a handful. Today would be the day that I would usually re-cap Cape Week, parsing this year’s edition. After year 25 things had changed. Dad had died. The grandchildren had busy lives with jobs that kept them away for some, or all of the week. Great-grandchildren added to the mix to create a joyful obstacle to travel, further winnowing down the size of our group. For the better part of 6 years of so we’d been able to handle the crew with only the main house and the occasional room at the Lighthouse Inn.

It was clear last year that when we finished cleaning the house and closed the front door that year 31 would be the last. The 50 yard trek to the beach had become insurmountable for Mom, even with the comically capable balloon-tire equipped off-road wheelchair we found. Tears streamed down my face as I bent down to kiss the beach in thanks for another year, a ritual I’d begun in year 2. Those tears had been tears of sadness in year 25 as I mourned the passing of what I’ve come to think of as “Cape Week Classic”, those years when our family of 20 mostly attended en masse. My tears last year had a touch of sadness, for sure, but they were really as much tears of joy, thankful tears shed upon the sand that had brought such joy to our families. Like the tears that I am struggling to see through as I write today.

What could have been a time of melancholy was transformed into a joyous adventure. One night after dinner last summer my sister Tracey and Beth were chatting about trips they wished to go on. Tracey’s family has been on a quest to visit national parks, and the parks of Alaska were next on her list. As it turned out, Alaska was one of the two remaining states for Beth to visit to finish her 50-state lifetime list. Would we like to go together the following summer? When my other siblings and their spouses caught wind of the idea Alaska 2023 became a real thing. 4 of the cousins (and 3 of their significant others) signed on, and here I am on the first Sunday after what would have been Cape Week, writing.

About Cape Week v3.0, Alaska!

I’m not really going to write about Alaska today. It was a really big trip, a big deal all on its own and it deserves of my “musings…” attention all by itself. What makes it special today, though, is that my siblings and I, and our spouses, once again chose to spend a week together. If you’ve read my stuff over the years you’ll recall the Cape Week backstory; please forgive me for recounting it yet again for those who may not.

Beth and I are both firstborns, and as such we did all of the standard-issue life stuff first. First to marry, and therefore the first to acquire in-laws and all that pertains. We had children, sent them to school, married them off and welcomed grandchildren first. Holidays had become a challenge as we all tried to balance our desires to spend time with our expanded families. Cape Week was born as a way for the extended White family to convene at least once every year. And so we have, with the exception of illness each year, now for 32 years.

What will become of Cape Week? I sure don’t know. What could have been a week of melancholy filled with the emptiness of loss turned into something else entirely. The winds of change blew us thousands of miles across North America, about as far from Cape Cod as you can get and still be in the United States. We are all bathing in the glow of an epic collection of family adventures, each one capped by dinner together aboard the huge “floating hotel” we sailed between ports. The best part of Cape Week, the part that stayed most the same over those 31 years, came with us to Alaska. Each night we met for drinks somewhere on board on our way to the restaurant where we dined together, just like we’d done every night in the Big House at the beach. It was all really quite lovely.

Mom and Dad would have been so very happy.

Who knows where we go from here. Perhaps the “Super 8”, as one of my sisters dubbed us, will find a way to do something together each summer around the time of Cape Week. Perhaps some of our children will come along like this year. Or not. Maybe this was it. Maybe this was Cape Week bowing out with a bang, giving us the trip of a lifetime as the cold winds of Alaska usher in the end of an era. We will know soon enough.

What I do know is how very fortunate we have all been these last 32 years. And how grateful I am for each of them. My deepest thanks to Beth, Joanne, Steve and Jimmy, our spouses, for making this all possible. Without your collective “OK”, and more than that, without your continued willingness to make the herculean effort necessary to pull this off for the sake of someone else’s family, we don’t get past year 2. Likewise, thank you Dan, Megan, Randy Pat, Darric, David, Tim, Jen, Nick, Mathew, and Ryan for giving up a week of your summer for so many years and spend it with your grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. It would have been fun if just the “Super 8” had gathered, but with the 10 of you around it was just a blast!

Especially after you all got your driver’s licenses and brought Sundae School treats back to the house for “the adults” every night!

And finally, thank you Randall, Tracey, and Kerstin for, well, everything. I can barely see my screen right now, but if I close my eyes I can see each of you, all of us, on the beach and beyond. There we are on all of the many beaches of our lives, together. There we are, with all of the kids, surrounding Mom and Dad on the porch at the Cape. Close your eyes and look with me. Look at the smiles on Mom and Dad’s faces. So many years; so many smiles.

Thank you all for Cape Week. May the winds of change continue to blow us ever together…

I have been on call this Holiday weekend for my private eye care practice, SkyVision Centers. I no longer cover hospitals or ER’s. It’s been about 5 years, I think, since I’ve had a call from an ER doc or a request to do an in-house consult. T’was a time when all private docs did so. For free. The Affordable Care Act put an end to that. As things would have it my last weekend of call was 4th of July weekend 5 years ago, since then relieved of the duty 2 years earlier than the age 60 reprieve written into the medical staff bylaws. Even so, I remember those days, and I remember especially what it was like to be on call on the 4th.

What follows is from my older series “Tales from Bellevue Hospital”, a memory of what it was like to be a resident on call in the “old days” at Bellevue Hospital, NYC.

Bellevue, at least the Bellevue I knew in the 80’s, was quite a different story. Although it was July it was July in New York, pre-Guliani New York, and it was Bellevue Hospital.

There are only two kinds of people in New York City: Targets, and people who hit Targets. At Bellevue we took care of the Targets.

It’s the first weekend in July. For most people in America that means the 4th of July and everything that goes along with that. Barbecues. Fireworks. Festivals and ballgames of all sorts. And beer. Lots and lots of beer. But in that curious sub-culture of medical education the first weekend in July means the first time on call for newly minted interns, newly promoted residents and fellows of all sorts. Everyone and everything is new, just in time for July 4th and its aftermath.

Funny, but I ended up on call for every 4th of July in my four years of post-med school training. I’m not sure which, or how many, of the residency gods I offended, but whatever I did I apparently did in spades ’cause I hit the first weekend jackpot every year. I have no memory of my first on call as an intern, but the “Target Range” was open for business those first couple of years at Bellevue, for sure! In fact, if memory serves, the phrase “Target” was coined by yours truly that very first weekend of that very first year as an ophthalmology resident.

“Hey Eye Guy! We got a John Q. Nobody who got shot in the temple just standing on the subway platform. Says he can’t see. Whaddaya want us to do with him? By the way…welcome to Bellevue.”

Crowds and beer and heat and stuff that explodes. Welcome to Bellevue, indeed. Some poor schlub survives the bar scene after the parade, makes it through pickpocket alley intact, gingerly stepping over detritus living and otherwise, only to get shot in the head as the A Train approached the station in a random act of anonymous violence. The bullet entered through the right temple, destroyed the right eye, and wreaked havoc in the left eye socket before coming to rest against the left temple. Right eye gone and malignant glaucoma in the only remaining left eye. And there I was, all of 3 days into my opthalmology residency, backed up by a chief resident of similar vintage. Whoa…

There’s no way to avoid it. After all, med students have to graduate and residencies have to start some time. There’s just this unholy confluence of weak links in the system all coming together in time for the second (after New Year’s Eve) most difficult ER day in our big, academic hospitals. Get sick or injured on June 4th? Everyone’s on top of their game and everyone’s in town. July 4th? The fix is in, and the game is as rigged against you as any carnival game attended by a dentally challenged carnie.

As I sit here, an Attending on call for yet another 4th of July weekend, covering the ER and cowering each time the phone rings, the Tweets and Facebook posts heralding the arrival of a new crop of interns and residents send me back to Bellevue. Year 2, cursed again, covering the spanking new 1st year ophthalmology resident (was it Dave?) as he got his welcome “gift” from the ER. “Hey Eye Guy. We got a Target down here for ya. 10 year old girl. Some dumbass tossed a lit M80 to her and she caught it. Went off before she could get rid of it;  blew off her right hand and looks like her right eye is gone. You from NY? No? Welcome to Bellevue, pal.” Yup…there’s something about the 4th of July in every teaching hospital in the U.S., and just like everything else, whatever it is, there was more of it at Bellevue.

Only two kinds of people in New York, Targets and people who hit Targets. At Bellevue we took care of the Targets.

1 Chukker. A period in a Polo match. Typically 4-6 chukkers per match.

At the moment I am watching my first ever Polo match on ESPN.

2 Chucker. A Cricket player who throws the ball illegally.

Unsuccessfully channel surfed trying to find a Cricket match.

3 Chuckin’. For 99.999% of people on FB, Twitter, Instagram, etc., posting your political views in the hope that you will somehow create a tectonic shift in public policy is roughly akin to attempting to change the tides by shooting the waves with a squirt gun.

4 Chucked. We downsized 10 years ago. 50%, give or take. One story, although there is a tricky slope in the backyard to get to the liquid playground beyond. While I try to downplay our good fortune at finding Casa Blanco, I never miss an opportunity to extol the virtues of one floor and a smaller footprint. I bump into more and more people contemplating a similar move, although no one is quite as bold as Beth when it comes to the magnitude of the downsize.

Maybe because we always point out that you gotta chuck everything you can’t fit into your new home.

While shopping for our next adventure this afternoon we bumped into the owner of the outdoor shop we frequent who told us that he and his wife just did a rather big downsize as he prepares to retire next year. His one fear as they get ready to make the move? Where to put all of his stuff! His mom’s basement is still full of his dad’s stuff, and Dad has been gone for 10 years! Unlike Beth he is of the mind that one must curate your stuff, all of your stuff, so that you are sure that the stuff you don’t keep is truly unnecessary.

Not Beth. Oh no. She’s done this for three households now. One quick look and then she just chucks it!

5 Friendship. Gotta move on from the “chuck theme”; only one lift I could think of was upchuck, and my CrossFit WOD wasn’t bad enough to bring that up. (See what I did there?!) I’m prompted to return once again to one of my favorite topics, friendship and friends. This week saw the 5th anniversary of the passing of one of our Williams email thread buddies, Starsky. He was one of the kindest men I’ve ever known. I was really maybe a borderline second ring guy for him, but it still stung to lose him so young. He was the kind of guy who would move a mountain for a second ring guy. Do the kind of stuff that “regular friends” would only do for first ring friends. Maybe only inner circle, best friend; there are guys like that, too.

Professor Robin Dunbar posed that the maximum number of individuals with whom a human can maintain social cohesion is 150. Hence, “Dunbar’s Number”. Essentially “social cohesion” means that you have some degree of awareness of who another person is beyond simply their name and their Twitter handle. Further research seems to show that we can follow 500 acquaintances (we know a bit more than just their name; for example, we might know to whom they are married), and we can match some 1500 faces to names. As I’ve written before we then cone down through various circles (friendly acquaintances, casual friends or “buddies”, close friends, and best friends), and there is a nearly constant movement in and out of all but the closest inner circles.

Best friends, close friends, casual friends, friendly acquaintances, people you’ve met. The rank order of friendships. If my Dad said it once he said it a couple hundred times: if you have one true friend you are one up on most of the world. I am blessed to have two men who are best friends in addition to my brother, my very best friend, and my 4 brothers-in-law, all of whom are close friends. I’d be the richest guy on the planet if we all lived in the same place. Even with all of them out of town now that my last in-town friend moved for a job, they are still all right there if I ever need them.

Where I think my Dad may have been less right was in the “staying power” of old friendships. Not like Starsky, for whom every friend ever met was worthy of his best everything, but guys who’d been friends at one time or another earlier in our lives. Some of these friendships are cooled by distance and years, quite reasonably so I think. Like the campfire that warmed you as you and your friends regaled each other into the night. And yet when an opportunity presents itself to breath life into the fire there remain tiny embers of flames that once upon a time had been burning brightly. These people, once friends, turn out to have been friends in waiting, there on the sidelines, ready.

One of these friends read between the lines of an email I sent into our epic, 180-strong email thread of men who went to college together. It doesn’t matter what I wrote, or what it was about, but my old friend Sonny sent me a note saying that he would be calling me the next day. Turns out he’s been experiencing a pretty similar life thing as am I. Not “are you free” or “ok if I call?”, but “I’ll be calling you” to take your pulse and tell you what worked for me. Along the way of offering his help and his time he pointed out just how not far away from each other we now live and how many new stories we must each have to share.

The “what” of our call, as you’ve likely guessed, wasn’t at all the thing. I have no idea where I was in Sonny’s circles, or frankly where he was in mine, but for all of the years and all of the miles between us and those nights around the fires of our youth, we were once friends enough that the tiniest opportunity to resurrect those buried embers was enough. I’m better off in every way for his call.

I’ guess what I’m saying, again, is that you can never have enough friends, especially if they are friends like Starsky and Sonny. We all miss Starsky. How fortunate am I that in addition to the best friends outside my family, I also have men like Sonny. He and I, once very good friends, remained friends in waiting, our circles close enough to be warmed by the same fire.

I’ll see you next week…

My siblings and I only need to remember one weekend each year when it comes to celebrating my Dad. His birthday almost always falls within a day or two of Father’s Day. So it was that I found myself in Rhode Island the past couple of days, in the company of my Mom and a guy masquerading as my Dad, a guy who was very curious about the new fella who’d dropped by for a visit.

Getting old is not for sissies, my friends.

Somewhere inside, deep inside, there’s still some of my Dad in the jumbled up connections of his mind, carried by the body that failed him in such spectacular fashion 2 ½ years ago. Dad is extremely intelligent, the only family member in his generation to have gone to college. Quite the athlete, he used football and the GI Bill to pay for school. Like so many in his generation he then worked, raised a family, and put himself through grad school. He won his club championship in golf twice at the ages of 50 and 60. No typo. Beat the reigning RI State Amateur champ on his home course for the first one.

As we sat on the porch of his house overlooking the par 5  14^th hole, I had an ever so brief visit from that guy. From my Dad. Like a citizen of Brigadoon, he came slowly through the mist of his mind to join me for a bit. We’d always bonded over golf. My brother and I never turned down an invitation to join him on the course, either as partners or as caddies for him and his buddies. It was quite a privilege to do either; my Dad’s most elemental essence was expressed on the golf course.

A light breeze was blowing through the forest in the back yard just beyond the rough. We chuckled at the golfers who failed to take the wind into consideration, sheepishly trying to sneak into our yard to retrieve their out-of-bounds second shot. Dad talked about caddying as a kid in the Depression. We both noted the absence of caddies as the foursomes passed in and out of view. It was really very nice.

I quite like the Dad of my adulthood. Quick to smile, slow to anger, unfailingly loyal and kind. It’s hard to imagine now how distant he was when I was a boy, his friendship as an adult is so easy. I’m not sure how long we sat there to be honest, nor when I noticed that he was slipping away. As surely as the village of Brigadoon disappears, the mist had returned to claim him. I got up, walked over to his chair, held his hand and gave him a kiss. I wished him a Happy Birthday and a Happy Father’s Day, hoping that I’d made it on time. That he was still there. That he knew it was me, Darrell, his oldest child. I told him I loved him.

He smiled and gave my hand a little pat as he disappeared into the mist.

I really miss my Dad.”

Unlike last year my inland sea is calm as I sit on the porch waiting for coverage of this year’s U.S Open Golf Championship to begin. It’s in LA, Pacific time, so I’m trying to be patient. Part of the charm of the tournament is that it’s held every year on Father’s Day weekend.  When the son of a golfer wins it’s always just a bit more special; they seem to struggle just a bit more to get through the post-trophy awarding speech if their Dad is there. Beth is at a horse show again, which makes me feel kinda silly, being all salty that I’m on call and can’t be there. Judging by my Facebook memories a horse show on Father’s Day is a thing. It’s quiet here, indoors and out.

Father’s Day is an interesting holiday. Many (most?) Dads get a pass on pretty much all responsibilities at home and head to whatever venue they visit when they are doing the thing they do for themselves. The golf course or the boat launch. Perhaps the tennis courts or a duck blind. I’ve always taken a different approach, trying to be available to do Dad stuff with my kids, or in recent years with my grandkids. I liked being “Dad” when my kids were younger, and I really enjoy being “Papi” with my grandkids. Who knows who will be around to play with me, but it doesn’t really matter. I’ll be here and I’ll be ready.

Most of us have (or had) a Dad who played a role in our lives. Mostly good, often hard, unfortunately not so good in some cases, but undoubtedly memorable in all cases. We have memories. At some point memories are all we have. Dad’s been gone almost 8 years now. Memories are what we have left.

Most families have a “thing”, a certain activity or place or topic around which memories orbit. When it comes to Fathers it’s often a case of the child inheriting the father’s chosen sport. As I think of this, a hundred images appear of tiny children tagging along as Dad does whatever it is he does. Invisibly tethered to their father by sharing his time and his passion, all the while being infected by that passion themselves. I see little girls in oversized Wellies holding their Daddy’s hand, his other cradling a shotgun, as they trudge through a marsh. A Dad’s bare feet submerged just off the dock as a tiny son’s size 2’s dangle feet above that same pond while bobbers float just out of view.

For us it was golf, for my brother and me at least. Father’s Day meant getting up an hour or so before Dad, cramming in random calories, and then walking to the caddy shack for another Saturday loop. Except on this Saturday the caddy master tossed us a bone and put us in my Dad’s group. We were pretty good caddies, my brother and I, and my Dad was a more than pretty good golfer. He made sure to make his game with other of the better golfers on Father’s Day. Good caddies always make for better golf, and 4 good golfers squired by 2 good caddies makes for a very good round. Those are some good memories, especially on Father’s Day.

We grew to be good friends on the golf course, my Dad, my brother, and I. On one magical morning Randall and I became men, at least in the golf sense. One Saturday morning (sadly not a Father’s Day) we headed to the first tee with Dad, not as caddies but as real golfers. Partners in his foursome, with caddies of our own. In time we were joined by a brother-in-law our age as we three towed Dad along on a decades long golf odyssey. We’d found our connection, and like the little girl in her Wellies and the little boy with dangling toes, we kept ourselves tethered to our Dad through his passion.

And we made memories.

That’s all that’s left now, the memories. We’ll try to remember what we all had then, for the newer memories do not sing as sweetly, however much we try to erase them. One day, when we held our end of the tie that bound us it lay quietly against our side, empty, no longer anyone there to whom we were tethered. If we fathers are fortunate now, we reach out a hand and it is filled with tiny fingers, and we walk to wherever, tethered to tiny little legs that struggle to keep up as they chase our passion with us. We feel the stillness, the emptiness on our other side, where we were once tethered ourselves. If we are very fortunate ,we realize that maybe we still are. Tethered, that is.

Tethered to the memories of when we were the child of a Father so gifted.

It’s been more than 10 years since Dad disappeared into his mind and left us. I think of him and miss him every day, but especially so, of course, on Father’s Day. I want to call him and ask him about The LA Country Club and his round there with my brother back in the mid-80’s. To tell him I played golf yesterday for the first time in 2 years, my hips finally healed enough to let me fumble around a course again. He’d be very excited for me, upbeat and positive, confident that I would play better next time. We would look ahead to our next round together. What a good walk it would be.

As I wait in hope that I will receive the gift of being Dad or Papi this weekend I will leave you, as I have done for some years now, with the story of the last Father’s Day I spent with my Dad. A brief moment when all was as it had been, a Dad and his boy together on a golf course.

“My siblings and I only need to remember one weekend each year when it comes to celebrating my Dad. His birthday almost always falls within a day or two of Father’s Day. So it was that I found myself in Rhode Island the past couple of days, in the company of my Mom and a guy masquerading as my Dad, a guy who was very curious about the new fella who’d dropped by for a visit.

Getting old is not for sissies, my friends.

Somewhere inside, deep inside, there’s still some of my Dad in the jumbled up connections of his mind, carried by the body that failed him in such spectacular fashion 2 ½ years ago. Dad is extremely intelligent, the only family member in his generation to have gone to college. Quite the athlete, he used football and the GI Bill to pay for school. Like so many in his generation he then worked, raised a family, and put himself through grad school. He won his club championship in golf twice at the ages of 50 and 60. No typo. Beat the reigning RI State Amateur champ on his home course for the first one.

As we sat on the porch of his house overlooking the par 5  14^th hole, I had an ever so brief visit from that guy. From my Dad. Like a citizen of Brigadoon, he came slowly through the mist of his mind to join me for a bit. We’d always bonded over golf. My brother and I never turned down an invitation to join him on the course, either as partners or as caddies for him and his buddies. It was quite a privilege to do either; my Dad’s most elemental essence was expressed on the golf course.

A light breeze was blowing through the forest in the back yard just beyond the rough. We chuckled at the golfers who failed to take the wind into consideration, sheepishly trying to sneak into our yard to retrieve their out-of-bounds second shot. Dad talked about caddying as a kid in the Depression. We both noted the absence of caddies as the foursomes passed in and out of view. It was really very nice.

I quite like the Dad of my adulthood. Quick to smile, slow to anger, unfailingly loyal and kind. It’s hard to imagine now how distant he was when I was a boy, his friendship as an adult is so easy. I’m not sure how long we sat there to be honest, nor when I noticed that he was slipping away. As surely as the village of Brigadoon disappears, the mist had returned to claim him. I got up, walked over to his chair, held his hand and gave him a kiss. I wished him a Happy Birthday and a Happy Father’s Day, hoping that I’d made it on time. That he was still there. That he knew it was me, Darrell, his oldest child. I told him I loved him.

He smiled and gave my hand a little pat as he disappeared into the mist.

I really miss my Dad.”

Happy Father’s Day to all who are so blessed. I’ll see you next week…

1 Rapstallion. A cheeky, poorly behaved horse. Should STILL be a word.

2 Obituary. James R. Hagarty is the obituary writer for the Wall Street Journal. We communicated a couple of years ago about an article that he’d written suggesting that each of us should consider writing our own obituaries. He is a lovely writer, and at least per my experience via email, a lovely human. We talked about the obituary I’d written for my Dad. Mr. Hagerty talked about his plan to update his own obit every 5 years or so. All in all, a rather nice discourse.

My brother-in-law, with whom I am very close, recently lost his Dad. His Dad’s obit was very nice. I’m not sure if Steve had a hand in writing it. Mr. Godin’s passing has really put the thought of my Mom’s eventual passing in the very front of my mind. Really, all of our minds to be truthful. There’s a part of me that wants us to start the obituary process. Heck, we need to think about who is going to stand up there on the altar at Sr. Ambrose and do the eulogy!

Writing the obit for a parent or a friend is one thing, but Hagerty’s assertion that we should draft our own is a whole ‘nuther kind of tightrope waltz. I mean, who do you write about? The person you were 2, 5, 10 or more years ago? Whatever person you ended up as after all of your life happened? Then again, it’s you doing the writing. Maybe you use your obit or your own eulogy to ‘splain yourself. Perhaps the autobiographical eulogy or obituary is how you saw yourself. Kinda the last opportunity to align the images in the camera and the mirror so to speak.

Mr. Godin’s obituary was simply lovely. I’ll bet his eulogy was the same. I’m not sure if I’m ready to draft my own obit or eulogy, but since chatting with Mr. Hagerty I’ve been willing to at least think about it. Weighing in on my Dad’s after he’d passed was more stressful given the “deadline” we had. Maybe when we chat about my Mom’s next steps this week I’ll gently suggest we take Hagerty’s advice and have a draft on hand.

Just in case.

3 Epiphany. An epiphany, by definition, is like a lightning strike. Out of the blue. Powerful. Transformative. Have you ever experienced one? I’ve had a couple over the years. This weekend I found myself in the place when one of the most impactful epiphanies of my life occurred. One that was not obvious to me prior, or apparent to anyone else as it related to me. The experience, and everything I felt, came back to me yesterday as I sat on the porch of the clubhouse that sits as the entrance to The Ocean Course on Kiawah Island, a golf course that is pretty much universally beloved. The view from the porch pretty much defines the term “bucolic”. It’s really quite beautiful, to be honest. I sat there in a gentle breeze under a bright blue sky and thought back to the first time I gazed across the 18th green and over the Atlantic Ocean beyond, and I remembered.

God, I really hate the Ocean Course!

Now you might find it odd, might even declare that my epiphany couldn’t possibly rise to such lofty status, given that it rests on the “discovery” that I didn’t like a golf course. Bear with me; it makes sense. My brother Randy, my brother-in-law Steve, and I had been taking my Dad on an annual golf boondoggle. It was our way to thank him for not only golf, but for, well, being who he was. He was my Dad, and Randy’s Dad. Steve had a great Dad and didn’t need another one, but my Day was good to Steve, and Steve was very good to my Dad. We were four adult men who had golf in common, but more than that, four men who used golf as a vehicle to be together. We’d gathered on Kiawah Island on Thursday 9/20/2001 to spend a weekend together on the golf course.

9 days after 9/11.

You might think that this is all about the existential time that was post-9/11. I admit that there may have been a bit of additional openness to an epiphany if one were to be had in those days following tragedy, but my sense is that I would have had the same exact experience that weekend, regardless. Nonetheless, it was a profoundly weird weekend, one I’ve written about before. These were the days pre-dehubbing. Continental was still the dominant airline in Cleveland and I could fly direct to some 137 or so cities including Charleston, the gateway to Kiawah. The airways had been open for maybe two days when I was dropped off at Hopkins. As far as I could tell the only other people there that day were at work. It felt like I was the only passenger in the entire building. There were four of us on the plane. The pilot, the copilot, the flight attendant, and me.

“Ready to go Mr. White?”

Unlike this weekend, Kiawah had a 99% cancellation rate in September 2001. The four of us pretty much owned the place. We sauntered up to the first tee at our leisure at every course we played. The reservations I’d worked so hard to secure at the island’s best restaurants were laughable. We just walked in and chose a table. There were no other paying customers. Every meal was “bonused”. An extra lamb chop. Twice as many shrimp in the cocktail. Captain’s List wine at enlisted men’s prices. We were feted at every venue.

We teed off on the Island’s gem, The Ocean Course, alone again except for our caddies, both of whom were great. It was a perfect day for golf. Bluebird blue sky and a 12 mph wind to give us the whole links golf experience. Literally a perfect set up for a signature golf experience. Remember, this is a course with significant historical significance, the site of an epic Ryder Cup battle that golfers talk about to this day. We were all very good golfers; our collective handicap was well under 10. Total. No matter how well any of us played it lined up as another of our wonderful family experiences.

There was only one problem: I loathed everything about the Ocean Course and my experience playing it.

It was just me. Dad, Randy and Steve had a ball. We all played fairly well. Hit the ball well. Putted well. My score was by far and away the highest, but that had happened before and had happened to each of us on these trips, even my better-than-scratch brother. That wasn’t the point, not at all. Do you play golf? Some courses set up in such a way that you look at each hole and you can visualize the perfect shots. The holes reach out before you and what you see is beauty. Art. You feel exactly what the course designer meant for you to feel. Even if you play poorly you can’t really blame either the course or the designer; you just played poorly.

Not me. Not at the Ocean Course. Not a single bit of it “fit my eye”. I really didn’t play all that badly. I was just a tad off. 3, 4 yards on most shots. But, not really “seeing” the course, I was 1 or 2 yards too far off on almost every shot. It’s one thing to be 3 or 4 yards too far left and giving yourself a 50 ft. putt for par. Nope. I was consistently 3 or 4 yards too far left, which made me 1 or two feet into disaster. Seriously. A shot 3 yards off line that put me 1 foot into a briar patch that even Br’er Rabbit couldn’t wiggle himself in to take a shot. Over and over again. I would hit putts that traveled the precise distance to the hole, but misread them so badly that I ended up with an 8 ft. second putt. I played well enough to break 80 in most circumstances, but I was 3 or 4 yards off in the wrong way enough times to shoot 90.

I just didn’t like that course, even a little bit.

How does this add up to an epiphany, then? Remember, we were like princes who’d rented the Island for our personal pleasure. Unlike a typical weekend where you get your one shot at an iconic course like the Island Course, on that immediately post-9/11 weekend we could just pay our greens fee and saunter up to the first tee as many times as we wished. At dinner after our round my three partners were all about playing the Island Course again. Me? Nope. No desire. Not one iota, and I said so. I declared that I didn’t find the course enjoyable enough to play again, but that I wouldn’t stand in their way if they wanted another go at it. I had a book along, and the porch at the clubhouse had a rocking chair with my name on it.

My guys were aghast. Why, in the name of Bobby Jones was I not going to play the course again? Herein lies my epiphany: the things that make me unhappy make me more unhappy than the things that make me happy, make me happy. I intuitively knew that one cannot access at will the things that make you happy, but that once identified you can, indeed, avoid those that make you unhappy. As much as I liked golf, and as much as I like playing with my Dad, my brother, and my BIL, the Ocean Course made me unhappy. It being the week after 9/11 I may have been more open to a random epiphany, but I think I would have had this particular one regardless.

And so it was that I found myself this weekend in a rocking chair, alone, sitting on the porch of one of the most famous golf courses in America, missing my Dad, Randy, and Steve, with not a single molecule in my body wanting to tee it up. I thought back on those days, good days, and how a not so great day turned into a pivotal day in how I viewed the world. Once identified I can often avoid things that make me unhappy; I know that they usually make me unhappier than the happy things bring joy. I seek the happy things, to be sure. Always. I just do what I can to avoid the things that make me unhappy.

That’s why I snuck away from work and went out to the Ocean Course. That’s why I stuck around. You see, even though I didn’t like playing there, even though playing the course, however famous, made me unhappy, everything else about it brought me joy. Three of the most important men in my life shared a day with me, one in which they were quite happy, and I got to see them, be with them, in their happiness. And at dinner when I shared with them why it was that I didn’t want to play that course again, after the incredulity and subsequent ribbing, they all chose to play another course so that we four would be together. They heard me.

And that made me very, very happy.

I’ll see you next week…

“So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart. Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life long and its purpose in the service of your people.”

When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with the fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero going home.”~ Tecumseh

This week on the Today Show Harry Smith told the story of a young pilot who flew his disintegrating B-17 upside down over Germany so that his crew, his friends, could eject and live. Just this year his remains were found, and he returned home a hero. His funeral was attended by his little sister, now 93, and the son of one of the crew members, a man who never exists but for the heroism of that young pilot whose funeral gave life to his story.

It’s the stories, right? I mean, after all, without the stories what even mattered? The stories matter. Whether they died in the heat of battle or in the cold of infirmity, the warriors all have stories. The stories are all important.

It’s remarkable how difficult it is to get at those stories, though. Read the newspapers today, all of the stories about those few remaining soldiers and sailors and airmen from WWII. There’s a common thread; each of them at some point, in some way, says something along the lines of “I’m not a hero”, or “I don’t consider myself a hero”. And so the stories that were the most formative, the ones that turned that one soldier or that one sailor into who s/he became, they tend to be slow in coming, if they come at all. Yet those are the ones that matter most.

The warriors still among us tend toward silence. For sure my Dad did. It’s not so much a secret thing (although there is a small group who simply mustn’t tell their stories) I don’t think, as it is a continuation of the protector role our airmen, sailors, soldiers and marines assume. They don’t so much keep the stories secret as they shield us from the effects of the stories, so powerful were those effects on them when they happened. Yet again, to understand those who remain, and to try to know those who have departed, the stories matter.

I drive by a cemetery filled with the graves of those who fought, some who died in the fighting and others like my Dad who tried to bury the fighting they left behind. I try to conjure their stories. It’s pure folly. Dead men tell no tales, eh? Humanity learns of conflict and war from the stories told about both, and humans learn about each other the same way. Asking to hear the stories is an act of respect. Listening to the stories can be an act of love. Telling the stories is a little of both. The stories of the men and women who have fought our wars are important.

A friend from my youth, a coach not too very much older than I, once broke down and cried over his story. A very junior officer, his story of leadership and loss comes to me every year on Memorial Day and Veteran’s Day. I know him so much better, understand who his is so much better because I heard his story. So, too, is my knowledge of the men and women younger than I who have served and fought and graced me with their stories.

Life is long unless you are unlucky, but even the lucky run out of time. We have no Civil War survivors, no one from WWI to tell their stories. Those few from WWII still here are reticent, and time grows short. Even Korea fades ever quickly to time’s passage. Dad was once marooned by his illness somewhere between 1947 and 1974; much of his “time” then seemed to be spent in Korea. The smallest of consolations for us, his progeny, was that we learned a bit of his story.

This Memorial Day let us all remember not only those who served and those who died in that service, but let us all remember their stories as well. Let us ponder the lessons those stories teach about not only humanity but also about the warrior, the person we remember. Let us encourage those who still walk among us, especially those whose journeys have been long and must be soon ending, to tell us their stories while they still can. Let us listen to those who know the stories behind each headstone as we gather in their honor. We have much to learn from the stories, about war and conflict, about the people who fight, about ourselves.

The stories matter.

I’ll see you next week…

1 Arhoolie. Field hollers. Now, I have no idea what a field holler is (Google is kinda cheating if I’m pulling these musings out of my own Restless Mind, eh?), but that’s just a very cool word.

2 Phonics. “Fa-aw-nah-icks been good to meh. Meh.” –Brian Reagan

NYC schools will return to the use of phonics to teach school children how to read. After some 30 years of using something called “balanced literacy”–what does that even mean?–the country’s largest public school system will return to the program that turbocharged the increase in American literacy in the 50’s through the late 80’s. Heck, we were taught how to read French in middle school using phonics.

‘Bout damn time.

3 Reunion #1. I had a chance to chat with the third leg of my friendship triumvirate in college yesterday. Ricky V was in CT visiting his MIL, who is sadly preparing to shrug off the chains of our earthly lives. While there he dropped in on my closest friend from college, Rob, and the two reached out on Facetime.

It was a wonderful visit.

Tiny lesson here: never let go of the memories of a wonderful friendship, no matter how long it’s been since you were able to actually, you know, be IN the friendship. Always take the opportunity to reach out if you happen to be randomly in the vicinity of an old friend, and always say “yes” if an old friend calls up and asks you to get together.

I’m really looking forward to seeing Ricky (and Rob) in real life, soon.

4 Reunion #2. My closest friend from high school, Tom, called me out of the blue yesterday morning. I’m home, minding the dogs while Beth celebrates her middle sister’s 60th birthday in VT (Happy Birthday Lisa!!). Tom and I had spent a few seconds texting about a possible trip to his summer home and he grew frustrated by the act of the text, picked up the phone and called.

Lesson: calling trumps texting. Not even a close contest.

We caught up on our kids, my grandkids, and his now three year old relationship, the first real one since losing his wife to pancreatic cancer some years ago. You may recall my pieces here about my friend Ken, lost to the same cancer in his 40’s. My FIL and his best friend both died from variations of pancreatic cancer, and in a very strange coincidence the woman Tom is dating lost her husband to, yup, pancreatic cancer.

Even though this was a very tiny part of our delightful 45 minutes or so together, it does give me an excuse to tell you about a new genetic test that can detect markers for some 50 of the most deadly cancers, including pancreatic cancer. Tom and I had both read the same letters to the editor in the WSJ that describe both the test, Grail by Illumina, and the idiocy transpiring at the FTC surrounding a merger that would make the test more widely available. The test is not covered by insurance, and since it’s pretty expensive I’m not sure how I feel about that. But if you have pancreatic cancer in your family, you should know about Grail.

5 Encore. “What ya gonna do when the music stops?” Encore, Graham Nash.

I’ve reached the point in my life and career where seemingly everyone wants to know when I will retire. Patients concerned that I’ll lay down my diamond blades and sit back from the laser before I can operate on them (a sentiment I’m personally familiar with since my hip surgeon retired before my second hip was ready to go). Industry partners who feel I’ve made a contribution to new products and would like me to remain relevant by staying in the game. Friends and family who very kindly and sweetly have made it known that my day job is interfering with their plans for us to have fun together. It’s all very nice, and it makes me feel good to by honest, to be asked in this way.

I just don’t know what’s next after the music stops.

John H., a very famous cataract surgeon some 15 or 20 years older than I, started to experience the same phenomenon in his mid-60’s. When an industry friend asked his response was, at least to me, rather sad. “I don’t know how I can ever give this up, Tom. I’m only special in the operating room.” Like the musician in Graham Nash’s song, Dr. H. only felt truly alive, only felt that he was seen and that he mattered when he was sitting at the microscope doing surgery.

Jim Brown died this weekend. Arguably the best running back in the history of football (with a nod to the greats Gayle Sayers, Walter Payton, and Barry Sanders), and with at least a seat at the table of the greatest football players irrespective of position, Brown was a man who was much more than just a football player. Athletically there are still those who argue that he was the best college lacrosse player ever, though it’s very hard to compare players across literally centuries in which the game underwent substantial, fundamental change. Brown played professional football because it gave him the means to live the rest of his life.

This was a man who walked away from the endeavor that brought him fame and fortune, literally while he was at the peak of his skills. Unlike Sanders, who also retired when he was the undisputed best pur running back in the game, Jim Brown did not just fade away. On the set of The Dirty Dozen, his first major acting job, he was given an ultimatum by Cleveland Brown’s owner Art Modell: abandon the movie (it was running way behind schedule) or face daily fines until you show up. Aware that he could very well have a long life ahead of him, and that he could act for much longer than he could play football, Jim Brown called Model’s bluff and retired. He would go on to make some 50 films and make 30 or so television appearances before leaving his SAG card in a sock drawer.

Jim Brown always had another encore in him.

While still acting Brown became deeply involved in the Black power movement of the 60’s and 70’s. he is famous for organizing and participating in the so-called “Cleveland Summit” of Black athletes supporting Muhammed Ali, ne: Cassius Clay, when he declined to report for service after being drafted. Standing alongside the likes of Ali, Kareem Abdul Jabbar ne: Lew Alcinder, and Bill Russell, Brown launched himself into both the “big ideas” arena of race relations, as well as the tiny gritty details of the daily struggle (he is famous for directly, personally engaging gang members in an effort to reduce gang violence).

Jim Brown was hardly a saint. His legacy is marred by allegations of physical abuses, and he admitted his problems with anger, and expressions of anger. This part of his life is beyond the scope of my Sunday Ramblings. If interested in a deeper look into more things Jim Brown you would do well to Google “Tim Layden Jim Brown” and read the 2015 Sports Illustrated interview.

What interests me about Brown and his life is that he seemed to sense something that I’ve been thinking about, and writing about, as I start to think about what my next act might be, whenever the encore may be called for. Jim Brown somehow knew that life is long. That he, we, might live a very long time after he retired. After each time he retired. Like Dr. H. above but on a much grander scale, Brown felt the adulation of an admiring crowd, a crowd that, for him, never dispersed. What of the rest of us, though? What will be next? Will we also be called back to the stage for an encore, or two, or three?

“How you gonna feel if the music dies? How you gonna live with the soul sadly sighing, into the wind that is our life? Encore. Encore. The last song is over.”

I don’t yet know what my next act will be. What song I will play if I am called to do an encore.

I’ll see you next week…

It’s Mother’s Day here on the North Coast and elsewhere across the land. A day widely acknowledged as the invention of a greetings card company in pursuit of a card-giving occasion, and despite this a day equally accepted as one worthy of the observance. In years past I have encouraged the tiny, but meaningful option of re-naming it “Mommy’s Day”; those who actively pursue the state of active mothering, Moms, in my opinion more deserving of the adoration of the day.

Do you still have a Mom? If so you’ve already called her, right? Come on, it’s way late in the day for me to be typing this, and if you haven’t called what the heck are you waiting for? I just took a quick look at Facebook and the first thing that came up was an acquaintance, Geoff, whose Mom made it to today before she shrugged off the chains of this life. All of her kids were there to wish her a happy Mother’s Day as she went on her way. Crazy, huh? They got to say a final Happy Mother’s Day just before they all became orphans.

And you’ve not called your Mom because, why?

If you think about it at all, it doesn’t matter when it happens, but the death of your only remaining parent makes you an orphan in the most traditional sense. Even if you are 40, 50, or 60+, losing your last parent means that you are now an orphan. When Beth’s Mom passed away some five years ago, not too very long after her Dad, Beth became an orphan. However trite, however commercial it might be, we all feel the tug of our Moms on Mother’s Day.

From what I’ve observed over my lifetime, there are sadder ways to be orphaned. We have more than several friends who were abandoned by a parent early in life, leaving them with only one left to lose in the more “traditional” way. A couple of special people in our lives were “left” by parents who may as well have died, so dead did they become by leaving behind their child or children. One wonders if it is the same as losing that last parent to death. I confess that I’ve not been brave enough to ask.

It’s been a couple of weeks since I wrote about my visit to see my Mom. About how small everything seems now. It’s as if my siblings and I have to pay ever closer attention lest she shrinks until she just disappears. What a joy it was to hear her voice today. Hear how strong, how BIG it sounded. Having lost my Dad some 7 years ago I know that one day I, too, will become an orphan. But not today, you know?

Not today.

There’s no lesson here. Well, at least not much of a grand lesson anyway. It’s almost dinner time on the East Coast, and it’s still Mother’s Day. I hope that you, like me, like Beth, were blessed to grow up with someone who was Mom, or Mommy. No matter how old you are today, I hope that you still have her, and that she is not only alive but not yet small. Still big in your life. Today is not a day for the conveniences of our modern world. No texting, no snapping, no WhatsApping. Pick up the phone and call your Mom.

No one is there to answer the phone once you’ve become an orphan.

I’ll see you next week…