Random Thoughts from a Restless Mind

“I want to grab the big brass ring…”

There are a number of artists who hold dear philosophical and political views with which I can find little common ground, and yet I still find great pleasure in their art. Springsteen, of late, is a good example. An older, longer enjoyed example is Barbara Streisand. After breakfast this morning I found myself humming one of her classics, “Everything”, as I headed off to my next meeting.

[As an aside, I am presently at a huge convention for my day job. Did you know that 3 out of 4 doctors say that Las Vegas is bad for your health?]

You see, I’d just spent some time with a 30-something CEO of a really cool company who just returned to work after the birth of her first child, and just outside the restaurant I’d bumped into a 30-something rockstar among eye surgeons with whom I’d shared a drink last night and discussed how she was managing the work life balance of being a mother of two, busy surgeon, and in-demand expert in our field. We all agreed that balance was unobtainable for any of us, but all the more so for the women; the bar is pretty low for the family side of the balance for men. Old news.

Then, an epiphany. I’ve oft written that you can’t have it all, no matter who you are or what you do. Man or woman. But one of the women, the CEO, after a bit of thought disagreed. You CAN have it all, you just can’t have everything. The trick is in defining what “all” means for you and those closest to you. “All” must be examined, its content vetted and negotiated among the parties involved. Once fleshed out in this way “all” becomes an obtainable entity.

“All” is about balance; everything is about never, ever being in balance.

Needless to say the conversation with both of these very impressive, highly accomplished women pivoted instantly, all of the pressure and intensity of the balance challenge dissipated. Seriously, this is the first time I’ve been able to feel comfortable with some of the very famous women–think Sheryl Sanders, for example–who proclaim loud and long that you can, indeed, have it all. They are at the same time just as wrong as I’ve long held, but they may be more right than I’ve given them credit if they are talking about “all” and not “everything”.

I think my young friends are right, you can have it all as long as you are very clear about what having it all comprises. It’s when you confuse having it all with having everything that makes it not only impossible to have a life in balance, it may actually mean eventually not having much of a life at all.

“…give me everything, every thing.”

1) Cataract. No, not THAT cataract. The non-eye doctor cataract. A large waterfall or sudden downpour; a floodgate or deluge.

Just thought you should know.

2) Familylect. The intimate, group-specific dialect that emerges within a family. As often as not these words or phrases emerge and enter the family’s lexicon as language emerges in a child. “I’na huggy” ( I want a hug), “hangaburger” (hamburger), “by next to me” and “by near me”. “All’ve it” (all of it). “Just a quickie” (a short note or call), “Mary Poppins” (babysitting) and “jelly beans” (everyone gets the same gift).

Bet you can come up with a dozen from your family. Go ahead and share a few!

3) Leo. As in Pope Leo, the unlikely inspiration for a totally new Halloween costume craze for little boys who share the name. Admit it, in a world of K-Pop whatevers and Mini-Marvel superheroes, you got a kick out of all the 3 and 4 foot tall popes ringing your doorbell a couple of weeks ago.

Extra treats for them in return for those smiles.

4) Subdudes. Two for Tuesday, our bi-annual music project on my college email thread, is another gift that keeps on giving. Twice a year our “conductor” (who prefers to remain anonymous and unnamed on all things social media) sends us a prompt reminiscent of a long-lost radio program that played two songs from a single artist each Tuesday. We are tasked with finding and sharing our finds with the group. Some of the themes are just for fun (memorable covers, second acts), while others are purpose-driven (cheering on a beloved thread member). All serve us well by driving us closer together despite 10’s of thousands of cumulative miles between us.

Our prompt for this version was a list of some 33 “under-appreciated” singers or bands and a call to listen to as many of them as we could. From there we share what we’ve found with each other. This was new, as was the inclusion of a “guest host” for the first time, an incredibly kind gesture from our primary host to a friend in need of engagement and camaraderie. From him I received the gift of discovery: The Subdudes are a revelation.

There is at the same time no real lesson here, and a couple of very profound ones if you look just a tiny bit below the surface. My buddies and I are tasked with opening our ears and our hearts and our minds to new music, risk and judgement free explorations that also serve to bring an incredibly diverse group closer. Some of it hits the mark (The Subdudes); some not so much (The Jayhawks). All of it stems from a little bit of the same sauce: love.

Big shout out to DS and NN for all of that.

5) Friended. “Are you still writing?”

It’s been a little while, but I once again find myself drawn to the topic of friendship. Those of you who have given me the gift of readership know that this is a deeply meaningful topic to which I am drawn again and again. My prompt this weekend was a someone I befriended 20 years ago from whom I have heard almost nothing for 8 or so years who was in town at the invitation of a mutual local friend. Once close, we’ve added all sorts of distance to the geographic distances we once worked so hard to surmount.

Proof? I not only write, but I my scribbled drivel has lived at the same addresses for some 20 years. A friend would have no need to ask.

Friendship is seldom forever. Those that survive and thrive the tests of time are certainly the exceptions, as much as we might hope and believe otherwise. A once upon a time friendship may become so through any number of things, most of them bordering closer to the banal than fodder for Broadway. Distance and time likely account for a super majority of these lost or abandoned friendships, the vastness of both an insurmountable challenge. Rare is the friendship roadkill, a victim of some cataclysmic accident along the way. It takes time and effort; one must choose to invest both.

What of this friend, so long “abroad” who visited close enough, and remembered past closeness fondly enough to reach out? We had a very comfortable visit to a time and a friendship we both remembered with fondness. And yet it became clear that what we were doing was just that, remembering. We’d grown differently these last many years. What we shared was a lovely past. The divides in our present seem as wide as the chasms of time and distance that have separated us these many years. We share so very little now.

And what of me? What did I learn from this tiny trip to a different time and perhaps a different me? It will probably take me a bit to unpack all of it, but I can think of two things this Sunday morning. Looking out at friends found and lost, I find myself a bit more forgiving of those who not only moved away in one way or another, but who moved on from our friendship. Everyone deals with time and distance in their own way. Where once I couldn’t shake the thought that a lost friendship was a statement about me, this morning it feels more likely that it is more about the state of the friendship. I can look at friendships like the one I revisited yesterday with more fondness and more warmth. I should look at them that way.

Looking inward I continue to hold that one can never have too many friends, but I may need to edit that in one tiny way: one can never invest too much in truly good friends. Friends for whom time and distance are not obstacles, just speed bumps along the trip we are sharing. What it means to be, or to have a good friend is certainly for me to say only about mine. How do you know what makes a friend a forever friend, one you travel over any length of time and distance to be with?

Well, for me at least, my friends know that I do, indeed, still write, most Sundays at least, right here where I’ll see you next week…

Have you dipped a toe into the whole 23 and Me world? You know, the company that will analyze your DNA and tell you about your heritage. What percentage you are of this or that. Think for a moment about how you answer the question “what are your?” when someone is asking about your nationality. How do you respond? It’s a terrifically important question, more precisely your answer is terrifically important, especially in these fraught times of machine gun-toting police officers in airports.

How do you respond?

Confession time first, or course. Up until yesterday I typically answered with something along the lines of “I’m a mutt, but I’m mostly Irish.” Accurate enough, at least in terms of heritage back some long time ago, if just the tiniest bit dismissive of my maternal grandfather who was a first generation American of 100% German lineage. And there, in that last word–lineage–we find the linguistic accuracy necessary for each of us to begin to structure a better answer. Better for us, and better for everyone who shares a country to begin to think about how we answer the “what are you?” question.

Henceforth I shall interpret that as a question about my nationality and my answer shall be “I am an American.” Full stop.

To be sure I will be happy to engage in a conversation about lineage because there are some pretty neat stories about my grandparents and their parents to be told. But me? It’s been many, many generations and much more than 100 years since my ancestors left whatever shores and became Americans. As soon as they married outside of their ancestral tribe they became, and more importantly identified, as American. Isn’t it time the rest of us follows suit?

Put me down as a vote to drop the hyphen. You know, the ( – ) between “X” and “American” we so often hear when “what are you, what nationality are you?” is floated. Whether born here or bourn and chosen, you are an American. This is not a “my country right or wrong” or “love it or leave it” kind of thing. Not one bit. It’s about how you identify, and then by extension how you support. I am an American. I live here, work here, vote here, and pay taxes here (boy, do I pay taxes). Sure, it’s a big country, and the experience of being an American is certainly different in NYC where I am sitting, Cleveland where God willing I will dine at home tonight, or in LA. But Americans we are, one and all. I hope for and will work for a better America, as I hope you will, too. We can keep the entire spirits and coffee industries afloat discussing what “better” means.

As Americans.

“…for the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.” –George Elliot (HT to my friend Bruce K.)

We in the U.S. have been bombarded of late with missives that declare that we are living in “historic times”, that we have a “historic opportunity” to participate in an election that will “determine our fate as a country in historic ways.” But is that really so? Are we truly at an altogether unique inflection point, one so different from all that have come before that our fate, our daily experiences to come will be affected in ways that we cannot miss or ignore? Or is this particular upcoming election simply the next in an unbroken series of political or governing evolutionary steps that has been unbroken since the end of the Civil War? Is the excitement and the drama simply an extension of the “Techquake” and its always on firehose of information, the internet?

Seriously now, if you are one who is on your soapbox (facing in either direction), are you really telling us that Election Day is going to change our nation to a greater degree than the one that brought us 4 years of LBJ and the Great Society?

As a people the citizens of the developed world have been swept along in the great rivers of effluent poured forth from that firehose of information that was spawned by the internet. Have we forgotten the accuracy and truthfulness of Elliot’s words? If so is it because we simply cannot get even a single pupil above the torrent of information to see what he saw? Or is it more that we have lost the ability to paddle even the tiny amount necessary to do so? No matter, the result is the same.

Literary fiction is taught as the study of quiet acts of desperation and the fall-out that follows. Life, on the other hand, is made up of quiet acts of both desperation and delight made out of sight of nearly everyone. Anonymous acts carried out with neither malice nor benevolence. These are what constitute the reality of life. It seems to me that at least a (very loud) portion of our people have lost the appreciation of this reality. For them each act is either an affront or a tiny step toward canonization. I do not believe they are correct. Elliot is only wrong in that he underestimates his object; that things are not so ill with you and me, is not half but mostly owing to those who lived that small, unseen faithful life.

To what, then, is this anonymous majority faithful? This is quite simple, and because this is so it is all the more painful that it must be pointed out: they are faithful to one another. They live lives that are faithful to the belief that it is another person with whom they are gathered, not an opinion or a belief. This anonymous mass lives lives that are intertwined with other people, not other opinions. When they look to their left or to their right what they see is not a position or a platform, but a person. It is this, the acknowledgement that we are surrounded first by other people, that leads to salvation in this life.

You are surrounded by people who are faithfully living quiet lives, anonymous to all but a handful of others, whose lives will be remembered by even fewer, if at all. Unbeknownst to one another they likely crossed paths with someone with whom they would find little common ground in belief, someone who is close to you, about whom you care very much. Despite this lack of commonality the crossing was uneventful. It was peaceful. On balance it was marked by quiet goodwill, if it was marked at all. It was a moment that will have passed directly into an unvisited “tomb” in the memory of each of these individuals.

And yet it was that quiet faithfulness that behind whatever disagreement might exist between the two there lived much more than another opinion or belief. There lived another person. Another person living a life largely unnoticed, hopefully a quiet one with less desperation than more, on their way to an end noticed by few and mourned by fewer still. Lives that were lived in the faith that there exists much, much more good in others than not. An unspoken faith that they kept each day.

A faith that we, the living, must endeavor to keep.

1) Halloween. Maybe 40 or 45 kids came by Lovely Daughter’s house in South Carolina last night. Beth and I joined Megan, Ryan, and two neighbor households who set up shop in Megan’s driveway and handed out candy. After some 11 or 12 Halloweens at home on a childless little street with no trick or treating at all, it was a nice little blast from the past.

Does anyone still give out 250-300 pieces like candy like we did when our kids were little? Are those days gone everywhere?

Those were good days indeed.

2) Classic. Did you catch last night’s Game 7 of the World Series? The same two teams that brought you an 18 inning classic and perhaps the best single game performance by a player in World Series history delivered what may go down as the best game 7 ever. It was almost enough to make you ignore the fact that this was a battle between the J.P. Morgan vs. CitiBand of MLB.

Still, aficionados of the game will be debating that Blue Jay slide at home on a force play for decades. My take: he runs across the plate and the parade is in Toronto.

3) Prohibition. Savannah, Georgia never fails to entertain. We made a quick visit yesterday for brunch and a visit to the Prohibition Museum. Did you know that the first federal income tax was instituted shortly after the start of national prohibition? No? Me either. Turns out almost 70% of state and federal revenue was from taxes and other fees levied on the producers and purveyors of spirits in the U.S. Legislators and other government officials somehow missed this little detail about how the government was financed back in the day.

Of course, the passage of the 21st Amendment officially calling off prohibition did NOT mean the end of income taxes. Shocking, I know.

If you do make it to Savannah–and I highly suggest you do–make sure to put this museum on your list. Come thirsty; there’s a “secret” speakeasy at the end of the exhibits and they serve up some legit versions of the classic cocktails of the age.

4) Handbook. As in “The Preppy Handbook”. Written by Lisa Birnbach and three other authors who somehow never got any attention and published in 1980, this tongue-in-cheek pretty much nailed a certain group then in residence at my tiny little liberal arts college, their siblings and their parents. Although deep down I realized that there was a whole world that I’d never really seen, The Handbook was kind of a “how to” and “you shoulda” for those in and out of the loop. Imagine my horror when I discovered that wearing tan cotton pants did not automatically mean I was sporting chinos.

Even if I took the “Dickies” tag off the pocket.

In the end all it took was graduating, getting a white collar job, moving to a city, popping that collar on the weekend and becoming a young urban professional or “Yuppie”. Even a public school kid like me was a member of that tribe, with or without reading The Yuppie Handbook (Piesman and Harlee). What Yuppies and Preppies did definitely share was a tendency toward navel-gazing and self-satisfaction, whether born to it (Preppy) or acquired of it (Yuppie). This inevitably led to caricature and open scorn, especially toward those who didn’t get the message that imitation via Handbook was not really the greatest compliment.

Still, the truest of Preppies who grew up to be Yuppies always seem to show up dressed just right for pretty much every event and occasion. Sartorial aging in place, as it were.

5) Head shot. It’s been a minute since my last official set of head shot photos for professional purposes. You know, website bios, promotions for speaking gigs and the like. I tend to show up in candids pretty well, my smile straight and both eyes open and all atwinkle. Posed shots? Meh, not so much. The files that landed in my inbox with the most recent photo session are uniformly execrable. When I’m out and about I am regularly and routinely told I look much younger than my calendar age. And if I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror I’m not all that young, but I’m also not as old as that batch of headshots makes me look.

Although my wardrobe is definitely, how shall I say it, dated.

Not only do I look like the aging Yuppie wanna-be Preppie that I am, I have obviously spent nearly zero time and effort to either dress my age, or dress like a particularly good specimen of someone so generously endowed with years of life. Stuff is a little too long or a little too loose or–yikes!–a little too tight. My daily “uniform” of slacks, button-down and bow tie is just fine; it’s my brand and makes introductions quick and easy: “you DO wear a bow tie.” Even there, though, stuff could fit a bit better.

Does it really matter? Or is this just a coping mechanism for the shock of a truthful camera? Frankly, I don’t really know. What is clear, though, is that I could stand to be a bit more thoughtful and proactive in both looking my age, and what it means to do so as you get older. Neither fat nor particularly thin, I certainly know how to become more fit. If memory serves, the fitter I felt, the better I tended to feel about my “look”, whether or not I was in sync with either contemporary or classic style. Every 8 or 10 years brought a rather natural reassessment and re-set, usually driven by a proactive move toward better health and fitness.

Driven by the hard turn at mile-marker 49, somehow I just drove past marker 59 on auto-pilot.

In my defense I had my first hip replacement at 59 and before I really got reacquainted with my midsection my second hip gave up the ship. Before I knew it I was 6 years away from the end of my CrossFitty years and all of the health benefits that accrued therefrom. Gone was not only levels of fitness I’d not seen since college, but the desire and will to continue chasing them. Worse, it seemed my attention to style and the like went right out with them. And if someone has published the go-to Handbook for Aging Yuppies, I somehow missed that, too.

It’s too soon for this, of course. Too soon to be truly only doing deadlifts and squats so that I can get my arse off the loo without a hand up. Between the ears I still think like a Crossfitter. I’m deficient in all 10 essential characteristics or skills in fitness, especially strength. My buddy Jeff has done an excellent job of staying fit in 9 of 10 (he hates running and all things long, slow, aerobic); he still likes me and would be happy to help, I’m sure. The better you feel, the better you look.

My better 95% Beth has always had a fine-tuned sense for what it takes for me to look good without consulting any type of Handbook, Preppy/Yuppie or otherwise. She’s already started to make suggestions that look promising. If round one of updating to stylish old Yuppie ends up not cutting it long term I’m sure she’ll be happy to contribute v1.0 to Goodwill and set us off on v2.0. The better you look, the better you feel.

Those pictures turned out to be a stiff kick in the can. It’s too soon to capitulate to the calendar. Too soon to train for anything other than the continued effort to be a little better tomorrow than you were yesterday. To look like you could be a model on the page whenever those old Handbook authors get around to publishing their guide for the mature Yuppy. Pop a collar or two on top of a pair of real chinos that fit just right. Thumb my nose at those lousy professional head shots and just use one of the crazy good candids taken by Beth any time someone asks for a photo.

Maybe just go ahead and write that damn Handbook myself.

I’ll see you next week…