Dad, these days: Part Two

   Awhile back, I dedicated a blog to my Dad. In it I chronicled briefly the Alzheimer's experience he was sharing with us.

Dad and Mum on their wedding day.

   At the time, there seemed to be a timely progression to what was going on with Dad. Change was discernible but was happening at such a pace that it also seemed manageable, to a great extent.
   Well, things have changed.
   A couple of weeks ago, Dad was complaining of chest pains. He spent the night in the emergency ward and they ran a battery of tests. Basically, he is full of fluid and the fear is that this is because his heart is no longer able to power the system that clears this fluid. They pumped him full of diuretics, he felt better the next day and they sent him home.
   I have talked to or seen him pretty well every day since. Some days are better than others. Today, however, was not a good day.
   We made a trip to the bank to shore up some financial stuff and Dad could only take about 20 halting steps before having to rest and catch his breath. He could not even make it from one end of the bank to the other without the bank staff needing to bring him a chair.
   Some of this was done with humour. The overall tone was downright dejection on his part, however.

Mum and Dad and me, when I was cute. These pics are courtesy of my cousin Beth

   Three months ago, my Dad and I were walking up and down golf fairways. There was tiredness at the end of these excursions, on both our parts, but we recovered quickly. There was no sense that we would not continue to do this for at least a few years to come. Watching him yesterday, though, I found it very hard to imagine that we would likely ever be walking down a fairway again. The fact that there seems to all of the sudden be so much to do blessedly leaves me little time to sit and truly reflect on this.
   Somehow, it is not all the medical issues that have me feeling this way these days. Dad has had a variety of medical challenges in the past and has always soldiered on through, buoyantly. I suppose that what he is experiencing now is something that could be temporary and, ultimately, alleviated.
   What is different now, though, is that his spirit seems to have synched with his body. And his body seems to be losing some kind of battle.

Shakespeare and Me

William Shakespeare

   I am old enough to clearly remember the days when e-mails, word processing and instant messaging simply did not exist. Like many of us who are able to remember those days, it is hard to imagine how life carried on, in spite of the fact that we remember it carrying on just fine, thank you.
   Quite often (and particularly since I started blogging) I find myself marvelling at how the great writers, the Shakspeares, the Dickens, the Poes, the Whitmans et al, were able to be so prolific, given the what now seem like meagre tools they had to write with.
   I also remember what the writing process was like back when I was much younger; a piece of foolscap, a pen or pencil and a dictionary (if I had not forgotten one). I think back to the grade school English exams where I had to come up with some form of short story in an hour, the feverishness that went into that, the crossing out and re-writing involved. What surprised me at the time was that, in that kind of pressure-cooker atmosphere, I seemed to be able to come up with stuff that was half decent!

Charles Dickens

   Nowadays, I'm able to sit here with my laptop, get my spelling checked as quickly as I can write, simply delete whole lines or paragraphs, move them around if I want, and have a dictionary or thesaurus readily at my fingertips. If I have a desire for other people to read what I have almost instantaneously produced then I simply post a blog. If I ever get around to writing anything substantial (I just realized how close substantial is to substandard...) all I have to do is get the e-mail addresses of publishers and mail whatever it is I've written right to them!
   So this is the world of writing I am now used to. The physical act of writing has become so simple now that I often wonder what any of the great writers of the ages might have been able to produce with same modern technology I am now afforded.
   As prolific as Shakespeare was, what might his body of work now look like if he'd instantly been able to re-write lines or move soliloquies around. It's a little hard to fathom what he might have been able to accomplish. I have a vision of Dickens sitting at a candle-lit table, quill pen in hand, scrunched up balls of revisions lying about the floor. What if he had not had to endure that?

Stephen King

   These days you have writers like Danielle Steel and Stephen King churning out book after book, endlessly. What would their body of work look like if they had to constantly be dipping their pens into inkwells? I am fairly intimately familiar with the works of Stephen King. One of his techniques is to give the reader a heady dose of background info on characters as they appear, even if they only appear for a page or two. Very often this info is stuff you could easily do without (I'm glad I'm not King's editor...) and I'm sure he does this because, these days, it's easy to do it. I'm not so sure that a hundred and twenty years ago he would waste elbow grease and candlelight on all the extras he includes.
   All of this has me now wondering; would Shakespeare or Dickens even have benefited by having access to today's technology? I wonder if the creative thought process they went through while writing might actually have been harmed by the tools available today. I can only assume that much thought went into whatever words they were laying down, knowing that to have to correct it would be physically laborious and time-consuming. Were they given the ability writers today have to lay down vast stretches of literature and then change it instantly, if need be, would they have done this themselves and perhaps settled on something that wasn't too bad? Hard to say.
   So I need to keep all of this in mind as I lay pen to paper, figuratively-speaking. It is easy what I do here and that's partly why I do it. I do, however, feel some kind of responsibility to whoever reads what they find here to not waste their time, even if it is only five minutes out of their busy lives. Because I am certainly no Shakespeare, as you've noticed.   
    
  

Running

   Every once in awhile, I feel like running. Generally I'm outside walking somewhere and I get the almost overpowering urge to run. And I'm not talking about jogging around the block or something like that, I'm talking about flat-out, pick a target about 100 yards away, hell-bent-for-leather running.
   I suspect that if I were anywhere where there were no witnesses I would probably do this. Also, the fact that warming up is something that probably should happen first inhibits me  somewhat from spontaneously bursting into breakneck speed. Well, okay, the term "breakneck" is somewhat inhibiting itself....
   I used to be fast. When puberty hit I transformed from the "fat kid" everyone made fun of to the fast guy people wanted on their team. I played sports incessantly--basketball, touch and tackle football, road hockey, tennis and soccer. Often I came home with blisters on my feet, compliments of unforgiving tarmac. My untested theory was that my years of carrying around a few extra pounds had strengthened the old leg muscles and then when I burned off all the weight I already had a head start, speedy-wise.
   It took me awhile to figure out that I was fast. This concept didn't occur to me until I started playing touch football on a regular basis, at first just with my buddies and, later on, when I played in a touch football league. I very clearly remember running with the ball, being chased by guys on the other team, toward the sidelines. I remember thinking I was running out of room and no way was I going to get around them and then I simply just turned it up a notch and managed to just barely turn the corner on them. These were always "holy crap" moments, surprising even myself. One time, one of my friends showed up with a camera and was taking random shots of guys during a game. I didn't pay much attention to him but days later, after the film had been developed (this was long before digital) he showed me a picture he'd taken of me running down the sidelines with the ball. I was in full stride, my feet not even touching the ground, my long hair (those were the days) flowing straight out behind me. I have no idea what happened to the pic but it was always one of my favourites and seemed to capture the essence of the joy I used to have in being "fast".
   In the touch football league, the guys on my team very quickly started calling me "Roadrunner", they knew they could pretty well send me out there to catch a pass and I was gonna get past the guy covering me. Now, this didn't always mean I was gonna catch the ball...
   I remember lining up for the start of a play once. The opponent across from me took one look and yelled at his teammates for "help" because he had "speed" out there! These days I look down at my gut and have to giggle a little at the memory.
   Speedy guys have a very limited window of opportunity within which they can enjoy this gift. It wasn't long before I found myself getting caught from behind occasionally and this kind of took me aback. I remember thinking, "Oh yeah, I thought that might happen eventually", and didn't let it bother me.
   Then I started helping to raise a family. Just not the same amount of time to devote to sports and the pounds came back, slowly. Eventually, I found some time to get back into being a little more active and joined the local ball hockey league.
   By this time, however, I was in my late forties and slowly moving into the early fifties. All the guys I was playing against were in their twenties and thirties, for the most part. Many, many times I lined up against them and wondered what the hell I was thinking. What I found, for the most part however, was that the young guys neither were able to run around me nor catch up to me. Now, before I go any further, I really had to make sure they didn't catch me standing still or going in opposite directions! Although my straight ahead speed served me well enough, my turn-right-around-and-catch-a-guy speed was the pits. That's where a little experience helped out. A lot of times players would come down on me with the ball and they'd get kind of this look in their eye (I imagined) that said "I'm just going to flip the ball past this guy and run right around him". Well, that almost never happened!
   So, as I mentioned right at the beginning, I still have this urge to run fast every so often. The one thing I don't ever find myself doing is running around with a bunch of other old guys (I'm almost 60 now). So I often wonder what that would be like. Not that long ago I came across some kind of ad for Masters track and field. I did a little investigating and found video of men in their seventies running sprint events somewhere. So this is sort of my new dream, to get involved with a little track and field. But not running distances, I hate that, it takes too long. Ever wonder why you see so many joggers out there with headphones on, listening to music? They're bored. Me, I just wanna run fast, for about 12.5 seconds at a time!

I'm thinking I could take 'em...

   Step one in this little quest is to lose about 30 pounds, can't really have that slowing me down.
   After that, who knows?!
  
  
  

Dinks

   For the most part, I try not to call people "dinks". I prefer to inform them that I think they are acting like dinks. They, of course, never pick up on the acting part and are outraged that I just called them dinks.
   Fortunately, I don't run into a lot of dinks. The dinks I do run into I generally don't spend enough time around to build up the required resentment necessary for me to offer my opinion on their dinkiness.
   All of this, though, begs the question--when does one stop simply acting like a dink and actually become a dink? When does dinkiness stop being an occasional behaviour and turn into a verifiable personality trait? At what point (particularly if it is the same dink you've been dealing with) do you refer to the person as a dink and mean it because it's been so hard-earned?
   The problem with some dinks is that they are unavoidable. They are generally also persistent in their dinkiness. Their unavoidability means that you must deal with them on a regular basis, perhaps almost daily.

   I have some experience dealing with such people and have always attempted to explain to them how the things they do invoke the dink label (this, of course, while trying not to use the actual word). Generally, they don't get it. I have used every means at my disposal, apart from possibly a power point presentation, to demonstrate how some of their behaviours and thought processes lead to their social demise.
   Dinks, however, seem incapable of seeing this. Or they would change, because, really, who wants to be a dink?
   Sometimes I wonder if dinks remain that way simply because we put up with them, let them get away with it a little too often. Perhaps "zero tolerance" for dinks would work the best. At the first sign of dinkiness, the "victim" (generally me) would remove himself from the dink's presence, all the while proclaiming the reason for this. It would be necessary to be terribly consistent with this, of course, true dinks are notoriously slow learners.

   Dinks deserve our love, theirs is  likely a childhood condition and has been re-inforced over many years. Loving them will take practice and patience, of course, dinks are difficult to love, you would almost swear they were rejecting it, out of hand. Just try your best.

   It is possible that a dink in your life may actually think you're a dink. The more I think about it, this is more probable than possible. Unless you have totally gone along with their dinkiness over the years then you've likely had "words". Hopefully you remained calm and did not use the same words they likely used (being dinks). However this went down all those times, most assuredly the dink thinks you're one, as well. He may even assume that all your mutual acquaintances think you're a dink as well, simply because he does. No need to gather testimonials as to your own "un-dinkiness", just have faith in yourself.

   Finally, be sure to hold on to and cherish those people in your life who are not dinks. They are invaluable! Feel free to ask them if you yourself just acted like a dink (it can, and will, happen). If they reply in the affirmative, just trust them and try not to do whatever it was you did, ever again. Learn from your mistakes!
   There is no avoiding all the dinks in the world. They are out there and are struggling to make their way in the world, as we all are. Dinks who are totally beyond redemption are fairly rare and may be viewed as  curiosities or museum pieces, people you can amaze your friends with stories of. Hopefully, the remaining dinks in the world will surely someday meet with their own Scrooge-like reclamations.

Throwing the damn ball

   When I was a little boy, my Dad and I used to play catch all the time. I threw the ball effortlessly and  was generally on target.
   One day, we were playing catch out on the the front lawn and I threw the ball just slightly over his head, forcing him to retrieve it. On my next throw, I over-corrected and it hit the grass about ten feet in front of me.
   I haven't been able to throw a ball since.
   I was unable to groove a ball again that day and my inability to do so has continued right to the present. I generally am able to hit the target for the first 4 or 5 throws and then it disappears, all over again.
   This, of course, is deeply psychological. At least, that's the way it feels. It actually has a name, this inability to make simple throws. It's called the "Steve Sax Syndrome". Steve Sax was an All-Star second baseman for the Los Angeles Dodgers who, in 1983, inexplicably became unable to make simple throws from second to first. In fact, that season he committed 30 errors, an unheard-of amount for a major league player. Often, the ball would go flying into the stands, prompting the fans in that area to begin wearing batting helmets. Fortunately, Sax was able to recover from this and go on to play well.
   Some have suggested that it is not so much a psychological disorder as a bio-mechanical one. This gives some hope. Likely, it is a combination of both, I can't even visualize the feel of throwing a ball correctly anymore and this is a very strange feeling to have.

   Not that long ago, I used to play slo-pitch. My favourite position by far was pitcher because it wasn't terribly often that a hard, accurate throw was required. In fact, almost all the "throwing" was underhand, lobbing the ball in to batters. Occasional throws to first base were required but they were never long. And even a couple of those were in the dirt. I even have difficulty when every so often somewhere a stray ball of some kind gets loose near me and I try and toss it back onto the court, floor or diamond. Several of those have also been "in the dirt"!
   Fortunately, not being able to throw a ball has not closed too many doors for me. Every now and then I think that I should just go find a brick wall somewhere and throw a ball against it (hence no fear of causing my partner to have to chase the ball) until I get the groove back.
   Whether mechanical or psychological, my condition does give me some insight into the "yips". The "yips" is a condition most commonly associated with golf. A golfer having the "yips" means that when he is putting he is unable to produce a smooth, unfaltering stroke. He hesitates and is unable to decide even how to begin his stroke. This is similar to what happens to me when I am trying to throw a ball--I hesitate, almost aim the ball. When you aim the ball it simply means that you are too target-oriented and are not throwing the ball. It also means that you have somehow blocked out a learned skill, something that has come almost second nature to you since you were a child. I find it fascinating that your mind toys with your body and your body confounds your mind in such a way.
   At this point, I am in no big hurry to figure out how to throw a damn ball. Certainly my livelihood does not depend on it so no big deal. And if I was worried about my reputation, I certainly wouldn't be telling you all about it, would I? If anything, there are now lowered expectations--nobody's going to call me up and ask me to play the infield anytime soon now. And that's fine by me.

So What The Hell Should I Call This Blog?

   Back on January 1, I posted a blog called "Sex". In less than 24 hours it eclipsed all my other blogs, in terms of "pageviews" (ie. someone actually clicked on the link and the blog came up--which is not to say that they actually read it). In less than 12 hours, 36 people viewed it.
   The day before yesterday, I posted a blog called "Macabre". In the ensuing 48 hours a grand total of 7 people viewed it.
   On the average, about 25 people view any one blog I come up with and then those numbers remain fairly static.
   So today (and mainly because I can't think of anything else to write about!) I'm sitting here musing on why "Sex" and "Macabre" elicited so totally different responses.

   I strongly suspected, right from the beginning, that "Sex" would be viewed by a lot of people because, quite frankly, sex "sells". It always tweaks our interest. When you couple the title with a picture of two naked people entwined, you've got a sure winner!
   I was much less certain that "Macabre" would receive the same response. Actually, I knew it wouldn't. When, as a title, you use a word that perhaps not a totality of your peers might be familiar with or perhaps even know how to pronounce, well....you're asking for trouble, I guess. Couple that with an obscure medieval caricature that you need to look at extremely closely just to figure out what it's all about then you're asking for trouble.
   This is kind of a shame because "Macabre" was probably more well-written, had more information, and revealed more about its author than "Sex" did.
   Unfortunately, perhaps the subject matter was to blame. It was certainly not as universally interesting as its predecessor. What bothers me the most, though, is that so many people never even took the time to click on the link. I can only assume this decision was based on the title and accompanying picture.
   All of this has almost left me with the feeling that I need to "advertise" or "market" my blogs a little better.
   I suppose I could put swear words as titles and nude people on the accompanying pics on all my blogs, regardless of the actual subject matter, and this would ensure a much larger readership.
   For a little while. Until, of course, readers caught on. At this point, I'd be screwed, I'm thinking!

   If I wrote blogs for a living, I'd be quite frustrated. Fortunately this is not the case--I write simply because I have always enjoyed the process. It has only been in the last year, however, that I've actually been taking the stuff I've been writing and "publishing" it, for an audience. This, of course, suddenly produces feedback (occasionally a terrifying thing for a writer).
   I get feedback a couple of different ways. Some people actually take the time to comment on a blog page. More often than not they will comment on Facebook, or directly to my face when they see me. So far, the responses have all been positive.
   One of the other ways of acquiring feedback is from the stats that Blogger (the tool I use to blog with) provides to me. With some deft clicks of the mouse button, I'm able to quickly find out how many times a blog has been viewed (which doesn't necessarily mean read), what search engines were used to get to it, what URLs were used, and, most interestingly, what countries the pageviews have been coming from. Occasionally, someone is directed to my blog simply because they've typed a random word or phrase into a search engine (e.g. Google) and "Neanderings" popped up as a result on their screen, with a reference to the particular blog in which I referred to whatever they were doing a search on. As an example, somebody somewhere in the world took the phrase "spanking boys" and typed it into a search engine. One of the results they got was a blog I did a while back called "Corporal Punishment", wherein I talk about spanking. In an even earlier blog, I mention a lady named Pam Tikalsky, a creative writing teacher I had many years ago. Well, someone somewhere had typed "pam tikalsky" into a search engine and been directed to "Neanderings" because of it.
   What stats tell me is that someone is paying attention. Unfortunately, they also tell me that people aren't paying attention. A double-edged sword, for sure.

   At the moment, the only way I market "Neanderings" is by publishing a link on Facebook. I have about 150 friends on Facebook and I'm assuming they pretty well all see the link. The vast majority, about 75 percent, ignore it. I'm not sure exactly why but I do know that I myself ignore a lot of the links I see posted there, so this percentage doesn't bother me, too much.
   What all of this has me doing now that I never really did before is paying much more attention to the titles of my blogs and the pictures I post to them. Not that I've ever done a marketing campaign for a mega-bucks movie or anything, but suddenly I understand a little of the stressors involved with such ventures. And it does bother me a little that "sex sells" so well. Sex is wonderful but there's a time and a place for it.
   Having said all this, though, you might have noticed there's a swear word in the title of this blog and a picture of a billboard with the words "topless bartenders"........ 
  

Macabre

    I feel as though I have always been drawn to the macabre (hence the blood-red type). As I thought about this today, I tried to remember how far back this started.
   As I remember, the first thing I can think of that in any way might have been considered "macabre" was when, as possibly an eight-year-old, I insisted on burying dead shiners (ocean perch) in my Granny's garden (Gran's idea) but then digging them back up the next day, to see what they looked like (my idea).
   They looked remarkably the same as they did before, only dirtier. Now if anyone had explained decomposition to me I likely would have waited a few days before digging them up, if, in my youthful state, I'd have been able to do that!
   Whether this was a macabre fascination or not, I'm not sure. Child-like curiosity probably is a better explanation. Taking magnifying glasses and burning ants alive probably falls into the same category.
   A better indicator of my macabre sensibility likely more clearly dates back to the time in Grade 7 or 8 when we had an undertaker come and give us a career presentation, bringing some of the tools of his trade with him. He was not the only career presenter we ever had come to my school, he is simply the only one I remember.
   One of the things he demonstrated was the tool he used for making sure dead people's jaws remained closed. It was kind of like a cross between a staple gun and a riveter. He had brought along a small wooden board and drove some of the rivets into it. These rivets had long stringy wires running from them. At the end of it all, there was four five of these metal, wiry things hanging off this wooden board. I am not sure what compelled me to do this, but I walked up to the man after the presentation and asked if he was going to use this board for anything. He said "no" so I asked him if I could have it. He gave me a little bit of a look and then said "sure' and handed it to me. Later on that evening it was proudly mounted on my bedroom wall!
   I'm not sure what my parents thought about all this. Compounding things for them, I believe, was my burgeoning attraction to Leonard Cohen's music and poetry. Part of the problem there was the fact that this pre-dated headphones and I had no stereo system of my own at the time. So when I listened to Leonard, my parents also listened to Leonard. Between the dark and brooding tone of his music and the fact that I was hanging undertaker's equipment on my wall, I'm sure they felt I was one mis-step away from psychiatric treatment. More about Leonard in another blog, though...
   About this same time, my best friend, Rob Anderson, had a book of his parents' that I was fascinated by. It was tucked away on a bookshelf but he and I both found it one day and I generally found the time to search it out whenever I was over. It was all about the atomic bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War II. There were all sorts of pictures of burn victims but what really intrigued me were the pictures they had of babies that had suffered birth defects as a result of the radiation. They had not survived and had been preserved in bottles, grotesquely, for all the world to see. No time (or inclination, really) to describe them to you but I was I was in amazement at what was really something possible that could happen to the human body.
   Dead animals fascinated me, whenever I found them. Decomposed, skeletal remains were cool. Once again, it provided insight into the impending nature of the part of life  most people were content to ignore, if they possibly could.
   Pretty well anything to do with death holds me in its spell. At some point I realized that there were pictures of dead bodies out there. I remember reading a Time-Life book on outlaws in the Old West. In it were several pictures of outlaws whose bodies were put on display after having been killed in gun battles (or simply shot in the back). This was back in the days when sensibilities were not so delicate and there was an appetite for this sort of thing (public hangings, anyone?) Once again, these pictures and accounts held my attention quite nicely.
   With the advent of the internet, depictions of the macabre were readily at my fingertips. At this point, I found I actually had to decide what I wanted to be able to see and what I didn't want to have to look at.

   As an example, I was now able to watch the JFK assassination, over and over. In this day and age, I'm not sure how many people know you can actually do this. Part of it was the sense of history around it, more than anything. Hard not to look at his autopsy photos, for the same reason.
   At the same time, I made conscious decisions not to look at certain things. Back when Limewire was popular, I accidentally found myself with the opportunity to view the beheading of Daniel Pearl, a journalist being held hostage by al Qaeda in Pakistan and subsequently murdered by them. I would not do this. My sense at the time was that viewing this video would alter me somehow and in a way that I wouldn`t likely be able to fully recover from. It was almost as if I was happy enough to view the aftermath of violence but didn
   So apparently I am able to draw that line in my fascination for the macabre.

   I think being familiar with something makes you more prepared to deal with it, when and if that time comes. I could barely handle the first time I was in a funeral home. When I was about 15 my best friend`s father died and I attended a visitation with my Dad. I remember shaking like a leaf as I was walking up to where the open casket was. I had no idea what I was expecting to see and was relieved to find that no true horror greeted me. Every time since has been okay.
   I think the same thing applies to physical violence as well. If you have never experienced it at all, the first time you do it will be hard to handle. Afterwards you will measure your response and try to tailor it to the next time you are faced with more violence. Whether the violence is being bullied or simply a hard hit playing some sport, experiencing it makes it easier to cope with the next time.
   My macabre inclination is certainly not all-consuming and it is not that I seek it out. When it crosses my path, though, I do not shy away and am happy to be lost, investigating. 
  
  
  
      
  

Jokes I Made Up

   Okay, if you're not a fan of "groaners" then please feel free to quickly exit this blog and spare yourself the pain!
   Anyone who knows me really well also knows that puns are one of my favourite forms of humour (sad to say) and I relish it whenever I hear a new one or am capable of coming up with one on my own.

But not where I work...

   Most of them I've forgotten (thank God!) but today I will offer (offal) up a few of the ones that popped right out of my own head (okay, last chance to switch back to your e-mails, Facebook or internet porn, whatever it was you were doing before you made the mistake of starting to read this blog...)

    Benjamin and Penelope Smith were newlyweds, and they were very much in love. They were so in love that they could hardly stand to be apart from each other. Because of this, Penelope would join her husband in the bathroom every morning, completely enraptured by his manly morning routines. Her favourite part of his morning routine was watching him shave. She was so enamoured of him that she would wear her flimsiest negligee, and entwine herself around him as he shaved. Unfortunately, Benjamin had a very old electric shaver with a badly frayed cord. One morning, as she was wrapped around her new husband, her negligee touched the frayed cord, burst into flames and burned her badly. The moral of the story: "A Benny shaved is a Penny burned!"

   Okay, I guess that was a little dark, wasn't it? Well, if you don't like "dark" then just skip the next one, please!

   Q: Why was Jackie Kennedy so upset in Dallas?

   A: Apparently her husband gave her a real piece of his mind!

   There you go, two dark ones in a row. Not sure why my mind gravitates that way, but now that I think of it there's probably blog material there...
   The next one is longer and not nearly as dark. But just as stupid.

   Many, many years ago there was a a small village just north of London on Highway 4 called Larva. It was called Larva because back when settlers first arrived there were numerous and yearly infestations of caterpillars. At the time, and being a small rural area, the name seemed to make sense.
   As the village became bigger over the years and more populated, with businesses, the name slowly began to take on a more negative connotation. Finally, the people of Larva got together to try and decide what they could do to possibly change the name enough make it more positive-sounding but still retain its identity and sound. What they came up with was the simple idea of dropping the "L" from the front of the name.
   The necessary town vote was taken, the paperwork was completed and, finally, "Larva" became "Arva". This worked magnificently! With the name changed, people were more easily attracted to the village and new businesses sprouted up. The village folk rejoiced at this. In their happiness, they decided to make a yearly celebration of the change, during the Christmas season. Every year they decorated the village festively and all the people would gather around the new name sign for the village. The faces of the villagers would all be merrily lit up by the candles they all held as they sang, in unison, one special Christmas carol.
   The name of this carol...?

 'The First No "L"!'

   Ooh, that really was bad! Next are a couple that I inflicted on my Facebook friends earlier on this year. For those of you who were lucky enough to miss them the first time!

   Q: What do you call a bunch of crazed photographers who harass sailors?

   A: Popeyerazzi.

   Q: What colour do they paint infrastructure?

   A: Infra-red.

   Finally (you're welcome), here's the bedtime one I came up with last night, which kinda got me started thinking about this whole stupid joke thing in the first place.

   I was headed off to orchestra rehearsal until I found out it was band.

   Okay, I'm done, you can thank me later! Cheers!

Coincidence

    I received the latest Stephen King novel for Christmas and have started reading it. It's titled, simply, "11/22/63". This is the date JFK was assassinated. If you are both a Stephen King fan and fascinated (haunted) by the Kennedy killing, then this book is a must-read.
   The premise of the book is that someone from 2011 discovers a portal that transfers them back and forth from the present to the year 1958. One man in particular sets out on the mission to prevent the assassination. When he enters the past, he is in the fictional town of Derry, Maine (if you're a King fan, you're familiar with the name). A fair amount of time is spent describing Derry and everything in it. One of the significant street names mentioned is Kolluth Street. I've never in my life heard this name and King himself even spends a line describing how to pronounce it.

   I let this pass, as I do with a lot of King's voluminous info. Yesterday, however, our family was planning a trip to the Butterfly Conservatory in Cambridge and, as I was looking at the Google map direction, I discovered that the Conservatory is on Kolluth Road! What are the chances that twice in the same week I would run into a street name I'd never in my life heard before?!
   On how many occasions have you had a random thought about a song you haven't heard in years and the very same day they play it on the radio? Happens all the time, doesn't it?
   Many (about 30) years ago I was involved in a minor fender bender. The other driver and I exchanged information, as per usual. What arose from this exchange of info plus informally chatting was that we were both not where we were supposed to have been and had changed our normal routines, all of which brought us to the same time and place. We discovered we both worked for the school board. The man's name was Hutton and that's the public school I went to and, to top it all off, when he saw my address on Emery Street he said that he had once lived at that address in a private home before it got torn down and changed to a four-plex (the one I now lived in)! Small world!

   Back round about the same period of my life we used to get all these phone calls, asking me if I was the same Brian Baker that fixed organs. I wasn't, and after awhile these calls stopped. Many years later I was having a conversation with a Fanshawe student where I worked whose last name was Baker. I introduced myself. She then said that her dad's name was Brian Baker. Playing a hunch, I asked her if by any chance he fixed organs. Her jaw dropped about a foot. "Yes he does! How did you know?!" Even later than that, I found myself stopping into a music shop in Masonville Mall to tell them about a problem I was having with my digital piano keyboard. We talked about possible remedies and they said that if none of those worked that I could bring it in and their keyboard repair guy could take a look at it. And the guy? The same Brian Baker!
   So those are probably the two most memorable strings of coincidences I've run across in my life. They do tend to happen on a regular basis, though. A couple of weeks ago Doralyn and I were watching a movie on Netflix wherein they mention one thing we hadn't heard of before (at this point neither of us can remember what it was, which is annoying me terribly but Doralyn figures it'll come to me right after I post this blog and won't that be a coincidence), we turned off Netflix, switched to regular T.V. and the first channel we turn to is talking about the same subject, right out of the blue!
   How many times, as we've negotiated our way around social network sites, have we said to ourselves, "OMG, so-and-so is also friends with my good friend so-and-so!"

   So does this point out how inter-connected everything in the world is? If you do some research on coincidental occurrences you will discover many absolutely astounding examples. Case in point, all you need do is compare the assassinations of Lincoln and J.F.K. It seems almost incomprehensible that there should be so many similarities. Yet, there they are. Were they discovered simply because of the vast amount of scrutiny both of those events received? If we (and thousands of researchers) delved into a whole myriad of events in our own lives would we discover like sets of similarities? Possibly. Then again, perhaps there was something about the social enormity of Lincoln and Kennedy which, in the swirling vortex of the universe and all its energy, brought them together, 100 years apart from each other.
   Is there such a thing as destiny, then? If there is a force out there drawing us into patterns wherein unbelievable coincidences occur then how much choice do we have in how we run our lives? One changed decision in either of those presidents' lives would have rendered future similarities negligible and unremarkable.
   I'd like to think that we have total control over what goes on in our lives. At the same time, I'm fascinated by the idea that we are all just spinning around in patterns that eventually collide with each other, coincidentally. What I don't believe is that there is a God, running things. Sometimes coincidences happen and are called miracles. Sometimes this happens in reverse. I suppose that what we call them depends on just what our spiritual beliefs are.
   When I think of fate, destiny and coincidence, I often go back to the World Trade Center attacks. You listen to the stories about people that should have been in one of the buildings when they were hit but, for some reason, weren't. At the same time, there were stories about people that weren't supposed to be there but, unfortunately, were. Were there forces behind that? And what of all the people that were there because it was simply a regular work day in their regular lives. Just their fate? Or purely coincidental? As a topic for debate, this would go on forever.
   I look forward to coincidences when they occur in my life. I imagine that it's kind of like finding that four-leaf clover. You know they're out there, you're not sure why, and when they happen it seems magical. At the very least, they provide a moment of wonder in what seems often like a mundane and ordered life. I spend little time pondering their significance, I simply bow to their whimsical nature.    
  

  
  
  
  
   
  
  
  

Gypsy

One of our favourite pics--Gypsy and Quin

   Later on today, we are off in order to have one of our cats, Gypsy, put to rest. She's been sick with a variety of ailments for some time now and when we got the results from her visit to the vet yesterday, it very unfortunately became clear that this is what we had to do.
   Gypsy was our first cat, as a new family. She was a "found" cat and the details on her life before she came to us are a little fuzzy, but she spent much of her time as a stray, hanging around a trailer park.
   She was a little too lovable to spend the rest of her life this way, though, and that is how she ended up with us. Because of her wandering lifestyle prior to us, we named her "Gypsy"!
   I have never considered myself to be a "cat" man, however, and needed to be convinced that having a cat around was the best thing. This was just prior to us getting together as a family and, at the time, I was living in a one bedroom apartment. I somewhat reluctantly found myself giving in to my Sweetie, though, and Gypsy soon arrived to keep me (and, later, us) company.

Gypsy curled up with her little sister, Squeaker

  
   It didn't take long to fall in love with her.
   As a reason to avoid having a cat (or any other kind of a pet, for that matter) I had offered up as excuses the facts that you need to take care of them, they can't tell you what's the matter if they're sick and the cost.

L-R Puffer, Squeaker and Gypsy. R-L indicates the pecking order!

   At that point I was sweet-talked into it, however, and soon Gypsy arrived at the apartment with her food and litter box. One of my fears was that she would "get in the way" (of what, I really wasn't sure). This, of course, was a groundless fear, I barely knew she was there! If I remained stationary for any great length of time she would seek me out but she also seemed quite happy doing her own thing. And she essentially took care of herself, as cats are wont to do.
   I hadn't really counted on this, this bold non-interference by this new cat in my life!
   The time she sought me out the most was at bedtime, soon after I headed off she'd hop up on the bed, find a cozy little corner and we were both down for the night.
   Not long after this we found ourselves together as a family of five in a townhouse. One cat became two became three, with the addition of Squeaker and then Puffer. It took some time but eventually the three of them established their own pecking order, with Gypsy at the top. The other two basically didn't mess with Gypsy and she, in her own right, had little time for them and their hi-jinx.
   One of my earliest and fondest memories of Gypsy went back to the townhouse; we had computer desks set up in the livingroom and I would be busy working away at one of them and Gypsy would get up on the back of the armchair behind me and very gingerly reach out and tap me on the shoulder. This was a "remember me" kind of a tap and it was hard not to turn around every time and spend a little time scratching her around the ears or under her chin. It struck me at the time as being one of the most "human" things I'd seen an animal do and hard not fall a little more in love with her every time!

If you were wondering where all the static went...

   As time went on Gypsy asserted herself more and more with the other two. She didn't try and intimidate them but would not put up with them either, many of their attempts to engage her resulted in a barrage of hissing and face-washes, on a fairly regular basis. The other two would tangle with each other but never with Gypsy!
   So Gypsy was the kind of cat who kind of went around doing her own thing, never played too much (if she chased a toy mouse for any more than three seconds we'd all look at each other and say "What the heck was all THAT about?!") and was not that interested in interacting with anyone on their terms.
   At the same time, though, she was the cat that would end up on your lap, you'd look down and wonder just how long she'd been there! It wasn't that she really needed petting at the time, she just wanted to be on you. When she did want to be petted, she simply walked over to where you were, plopped herself down and rolled over on to her back, exposing her belly to whatever ministrations you were able to accord her.

Gypsy, with Squeaker, doing her "ignoring" thing.

   So, as I am prone to do when blogging, I started writing this earlier in the day and am finishing it at the end of the day. This afternoon Doralyn, Keenan, Callum, Quinlan and I took Gypsy to the vet and had her put to sleep. Essentially we were fine (on the outside) right until we entered the exam room. It was like we all took a look at each other, knew why we were there, and the tears started to flow. A lady came in and took Gypsy away to insert an IV. She then brought her back. Shortly after that, the vet entered the room and helped Gypsy pass over into whatever kind of kitty heaven there exists. Many tears at this point, some petting, hugs, kisses,  and a final goodbye.

Gypsy, asleep

   I have been finding  it terribly ironic that I just finished writing a blog called "Saying Goodbye" and here we were, doing just that. It's amazing how attached you can become to your pets. In retrospect, I think it's because they represent unconditional love. They only ask for food and water and if you give them this and don't abuse them they will love you to the ends of the earth. This is the reciprocating relationship we had with Gypsy. This, indeed, is the relationship we have with all our cats. It is unfamiliar to have to say goodbye to a cat. I hope it's something we never become too familiar with.
   So tonight Gypsy is no longer with us. This is not to say that she is too far away though. I am sure that there is somewhere we, as humans, go when we pass away. If I am sure of that then I am just as sure that Gypsy is now pain-free and somehow still near.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

Saying Goodbye

   Sometimes saying goodbye can be one of the hardest things to do. Of course much of this difficulty lies in the nature of the goodbye and its timing. If your life has included moving a lot, from city to city or maybe even between countries, then you've experienced a wide range of different kinds of goodbyes; to your friends and classmates, and co-workers. These always seem difficult at the time but generally you move on and begin new relationships wherever you end up.
   Moving through life stages creates opportunities for goodbyes of different natures. One of the big ones, of course, is when your children grow up and move out. This is greeted by parents in different ways. We all have this as an expectation, that our kids will grow up and move out. In spite of this being the norm, many of us find ourselves surprisingly unprepared for this when it actually happens.
   Homes that have had kids grow up in them seem terribly empty when those kids are gone. The sights, sounds and even smells have all been altered, even if only slightly. If you take a home (and by home I don't mean house) and change the way it smells, looks and sounds then it is not the same home anymore, simple as that. It is not as good as it used to be.

   I think mothers likely have the most difficult time adjusting when this happens. Mothers have the most investment in their kids and their kids well-being. Both parents can look at their children and say to themselves therein lies a little bit of me. It is only the mother, though, that can say you started in me, grew in me and I will protect you with the same ferocity I would protect myself!
   And then the person they have sworn to protect...moves! They sometimes move to where they no longer can be watched over and kept from harm. Realistically, mothers know their children are fully capable of fending for themselves. Being able to fend for yourself does not take into account a whole wide variety of things that can, and do, go wrong. All of those things are things mothers know about all too well. And when a kid is no longer there and perhaps cannot even be reached in a hurry (and is still a part of you needing protection) there arises the conflict.
   So how do you actually say goodbye? I guess that depends on whether you're talking about the word or the act.
   You can avoid the word. When parting with someone, simply do not say goodbye. Substitute the word goodbye for the words I love you. The two of you well know what is happening but neither of you use the actual word. Almost as if one of you was only headed to a different room in the house. There--you've avoided a goodbye.
   The act of goodbye, of course, cannot be avoided or made any less difficult even though you fully understand its reason and are intellectually (though perhaps not quite as emotionally) in agreement.
   Perhaps a good thing to remember is that every goodbye was preceded by a hello. This hello may have been 25 years ago when your child was born. It may have been a week ago when you met them at the airport or they showed up in your driveway. Those were the good things that made the goodbye possible. What's the next thing scheduled to happen? A hello! A happy event! And what made that hello possible? The goodbye that, at some point, preceded it.
   Yeah, you're right, we're talking the circle of life here, aren't we?

   So if goodbyes are hard, there is something fundamentally good going on. You will feel more pain, likely, than your child does and this is the way it's supposed to be. And if you are the kind of person who finds goodbyes difficult, then you are likely the kind of person who someone will have a hard time saying goodbye to, as well. It means you're a loving person and loving people are missed when they're gone.
   Above all, remember that it does get better! You know this, deep down inside, put some trust in it.
   So, until we speak again, I love you!