The Queen of Hearts

For those of you who are planning on attending the launch party for my book, you are in for a treat. I say this not out of vanity or an overinflated opinion of my writing skills, but rather because of what my wife’s imagination has conjured up for the event. Honestly, when the idea of a launch party was first presented to me by my publisher my first instinct was a hard pass. But when I mentioned it to Pam it was like waving a red towel at a charging bull. She immediately took over the project.

May 6th is probably the absolute worst possible time for this to happen. In our family, May has always been a sort of hell month. An astonishing number of our family members happened to be born from late April through the end of May including, both of our children and my father in law. Then there’s the small matter of our 40th wedding anniversary on May 19th. So planning something which neither of us have any experience with in the middle of all of this is challenging. It will be the largest party that Pam has planned outside of the weddings of our children and for those there was a wedding coordinator. For this thing…there’s my relentless, creative, and indomitable wife, along with a cadre of family and friends she has recruited to help her pull it all off.

At this point I should probably contrast for you our two visions. First mine. I thought we would set out some chairs, throw some snacks on a table with maybe some bottled water or coffee. Then after some mingling I would give a brief talk about the book, read a section, then sit down at a table with boxes of my book stacked up on it and start selling and signing them.

Now…Pam’s

I will not go into any specific details here since the plan is still in the formation stage but suffice it to say that Pam’s vision compared to mine is like a royal wedding at Buckingham Palace vs. running off to the Justice of the Peace. Its like the difference between Taylor Swift’s Eras tour and Darrell and the Drifter’s two night gig at The Pour House. At Pam’s launch party there will delicious snacks, punch, wine and book-themed cake. There will be cool banners, an actual set with chairs, a lamp, ferns and an actual semi-famous emcee. There will be decorations all over the place based on my protagonist’s gambling skills, including but certainly not limited to a roulette wheel. There will be a poster-sized edition of the book. There will be a deck of playing cards with the book on the cover, along with a super cool coffee mug for me to hold in my hand to identify the author and to keep him from fidgeting…

That’s about all I am at liberty to share at this point. You’ll just have to come to see it all for yourself. I married the Queen of Hearts.

https://dougdunnevant.com/rsvp/

The Three Most Beautiful Paragraphs You Will Read Today

The writing of letters has become a lost art. The arrival of the email sealed the fate of the letter in human discourse. Emails are fast, convenient and cost nothing to send. Letters require things like a pen, paper, an envelope and a stamp. Then once the recipient finally receives the thing the urgency of the communication has been lost. Personally I can’t remember the last time I sat down and wrote a letter, but yesterday alone I shot off a half dozen emails. I recently saw a skit some show did where they asked a bunch of random young people on the street if they would write their grandparents a post card. Even when given the cards most of them couldn’t figure out how to use them, where to write on the thing, where to put the stamp, and even what a stamp was. It was all good for a laugh but honestly how would someone 25 years old know how to send a post card in the first place? When was the last time you sent a post card.

I say all this because yesterday afternoon a dear friend sent me a text (of course) out of the blue. The subject concerned this great man…

E.B. White, famed essayist and author of Charlotte’s Web was often sent letters from strangers who admired his many contributions to top publications like Harper’s and the New Yorker. One such letter came from a man named Mr. Nadeau who wrote to ask White about his opinion on what he saw as the “bleak future for the human race.” Here is E.B. White’s reply…

I can’t imagine being able to craft such a poignant, lyrical and wise letter like this. These three short paragraphs feel like a balm, like a comforting hug, a warm bowl of soup on a bitter cold afternoon. I don’t know how White’s optimism was received by Mr. Nadeau but something tells me that perhaps he came away slightly less cynical about the future. The best part was, he now had a physical keepsake in his hand signed by a great man that he could place in a frame above his desk to remind him that a brighter day was possible.

Maybe this will become one of my projects when I retire. I will set about trying to resuscitate the craft of the hand written letter from the ash heap of history. 

But when time is of the essence…I’ll stick with emails.

Dreams are Stubborn Things

Now that Tax Day is behind us we are freed up to start worrying about more important things. For me that would be my upcoming book launch party on May 6. Pam has taken ahold of the creative planning for the event with her usual flair and tenacity. A Sunday afternoon trip to Party City yielded a couple of bags full of gambling-related paraphernalia, the snacks and beverages have been decided upon, as the RSVP list continues to grow. So…what am I worried about? Two things…

A. That no one will show up

B. That everyone will show up

Here’s how my brain works. With regards to A…May the 6th is still over two weeks away. A lot can happen between now and then. People get sick, they have car accidents, emergency root canals, their houses burn down, just a few of the many last minute things that could conspire to prevent their attendance. Consequently, there is the possibility that no one will show up. On the matter of B…I am told by party planning experts that many more people show up at events like this than RSVP to events like this. Moreover, I have been told by at least a dozen people that they will for sure be coming but their names appear nowhere on the RSVP list, hence my concern that everyone will show up.

I know that I should chill out about this. No matter who shows up or how many, it will be a memorable evening. Like my emcee for the evening, Tom Allen, reminded me over lunch recently, “Relax, dude. All you have to remember is—don’t say or do anything stupid—that’s my job!!”

Still, there’s no getting around the fact that I have been imagining what something like this would be like for at least half my life now. I’ve been writing stuff since I was in Middle School. I’ve dreamed about what having a novel published would be like for years, which has gotten me to thinking about dreams and why some come true and others don’t. I have come to the conclusion that most dreams die, not from a lack of opportunity or money, but rather from a shortage of imagination. I have always allowed myself to imagine this reality, I’ve always allowed myself to believe that it was possible. So now that the time has finally come, I’m not surprised by it. It’s almost exactly like I’ve always imagined it would be. Before anything of value can happen to you, you have to be able to imagine it. 

Dreams are stubborn things.

Spring at the Dunnevant House

Spring has sprung at the Dunnevant house…

Comfort

Perhaps the most sought after human condition is comfort. All of us long for it. When financial rewards come we don’t admit to riches, we prefer the elegance of the word comfortable. Our possessions are often referred to as creature comforts. In the movies just before things start to heat up someone says, “Let me slip into something more comfortable.” Let me share with you what comfortable means to me.

Today is Saturday. What I am about to describe for you is typical for me on Saturdays. It has always been my most comfortable day. The day started a couple hours ago with my everyday wake-up routine. But now, Pam is in the kitchen while I write this, making our special Saturday morning breakfast. We never eat breakfast together on any other day. Our routines collide awkwardly during the work week. But on Saturdays she makes a proper sit down meal. This past week I sent her a Tik-Tok video of a delicious looking breakfast dish that someone had made. I thought that she might like it too so I forwarded it to her and now she’s in there playing that video over and over, making sure she doesn’t miss a step. 

Its now 8:23 and Lucy hasn’t come downstairs yet. She hasn’t peed since 10:00 last night, hasn’t eaten since 5:00 yesterday afternoon, and yet she still lounges on our bed by herself. Why? Because neither of us has “issued her a proper invitation to come downstairs.” You heard that correctly. She is a lunatic.

After breakfast I will workout. For me this used to entail a trip to American Family Fitness. But my 19 year membership at that institution ended with COVID. Since then my workout has become an improvised routine that takes place in my home with dumbbells and the two staples of DIY fitness—push-ups and sit-ups. Saturday is not a road work day, so there will be no walking, running or biking.

Then around 10:30 or so I will spend two hours putzing around in my yard. There is perhaps no other activity in my life from which I draw more pleasure than taking care of my yard. Its not a huge yard so it doesn’t take forever. The tasks involved vary by the seasons. Sometimes I rake, other times I mow. I gather sticks, remove Lucy’s deposits. I trim the edges of everything. My leaf blower gets a workout. When I’m finished two hours later I will admire my work for a few minutes as I walk the perimeter. This work is the very essence of comfort for me. My real job of 42 years isn’t physical work. Its a job that involves slow moving things like growth. Sometimes it takes years to measure real progress only to have it vaporize in the ill winds of interest rate policy. Not so with my yard. I can see the results of my efforts in the lush, clean lines of the mower. Comforting.

After a shower I might grab an afternoon nap, nothing more comforting than a nice nap. Then at 3:00 our volunteer shift at Hope Thrift starts. Pam will man the cash register while I am collecting donations at the back door. I spend a lot of my 3 hour shift harassing the other volunteers, teasing them about one thing or another. Sometimes I slip across the parking lot to Wendy’s or McDonalds to buy them ice creams or French fries. When I’m feeling extra generous…both. At least once during my shift I will encounter someone at the back door who has been in the process of cleaning out a dead parent’s attic. Their grief is still raw. I mostly just listen. Other times I will see a family of immigrants inside looking for and finding bargains. I smile at them and they smile back. It’s always quite a comforting afternoon at the Thrift.

Afterwards we will go out to dinner with old friends who also have spent the afternoon at Thrift. We will find a nice place to catch up over a meal and a beer. These are the type of friends who you can easily relax with, the very best kinds of friends.

And, that’s it…my Saturday. It will be the most comfortable day of the week. Hope your’s was too.

Theft and “sibling’s day”

I am at hour 48 of an annoying headache. Haven’t had one like this in a very long time. So, what do I do? On the way back from the Cafe I pulled my car slightly off of Pump Road in a dangerous spot and stole these wisteria blossoms off a huge tree from some random person’s yard, brought them home, stuffed them in a vase and presented them to Pam because I love her and it took my mind off my pounding headache for ten minutes.

Then I opened Facebook and saw that my sister had posted a picture because of something called “Sibling’s Day”

Although this Sibling’s Day nonsense is most likely a plot hatched between the big shots at the greeting card company and the big shots in the Florists Industry, I couldn’t help but stop and stare at her picture. That’s the Dunnevant brood that I grew up with from oldest to youngest from right to left. Looking at them I am overcome with gratitude for being so lucky, so divinely blessed to have these people in my life. All three of them have my back. Always…always. There’s a lot of humor, music, love, and brain power in this photograph.

My head is still pounding, but all is well.

The Eclipse, Basketball and Pollen

The solar eclipse has come and gone and if not for a random trip to the bank I would have missed it. When I pulled into the parking lot there was Clarice, my banker, gazing upward with bright red sunglasses. She loaned them to me for a second, I looked up and there it was. I’m told that the next one is in 2044. I’ll probably be dead by then so this was it. I must say that I don’t quite get the fascination. The moon comes between the sun and the earth and momentarily and blocks our view. Let’s all lose our minds.

Then there’s college basketball. Now that Connecticut has won its second title in a row I can admit the fact that I haven’t watched a single game of the tournament. The Caitlin Clark story was pretty cool but I didn’t watch a single woman’s game either. Sure, I watched some highlights and read a few recaps of the more pivotal games, but to sit down for three hours and watch a basketball game? Nope. My sister Paula is a sportsaholic and watches practically everything and gets annoyed with me when I don’t. I used to be just like her, watched everything. I suppose I’ve become semi-obsessed with writing and thinking about writing. The only thing it hasn’t affected is my devotion to baseball. We’re only ten games into a 162 game season and I’m already pouring over box scores every morning! I’m a hopeless addict.

I suppose that mention needs to be made of the beginning of pollen season. Suddenly, the stuff is everywhere, a soft coating of yellow goo has descended on our world coating every single surface, including the inside of my lungs. I made the dreadful mistake yesterday afternoon of going out for a short run. By the time I returned I was a coughing, gasping mess, a 100% self-inflicted wound. What was I thinking? When I got back I decided to sit out on the deck. But first I had to crank up the leaf blower to clear the pollen. When I did a cloud of yellow swirled up from the deck’s surface like a sneezy fog—another idiotic idea. Instead, I went upstairs, took a shower and snorted in a couple poofs of Flonase. It will be like this for another month. Lucky us!

Lastly, as of this morning only 19 people have RSVP-ed for my book launch party. I don’t know what to make of this. Its awfully early, its a full four weeks away. Maybe a lot of people thought the rapture was gonna happen because of the eclipse and thought, why bother? I’m sure business will pick up as the day gets closer. If not I might have to put a FREE BEER sign out by the railroad tracks?

Big Announcement Post!

Several weeks ago I published a blog post announcing the creation of my Author Webpage. Here’s the link… https://dougdunnevant.com/.

Now comes another announcement. We have a date and venue for the Book Launch Party for A Life of Dreams. Pam has added an RSVP link to the Author Page. The party will be at 7:00 pm Monday night, May 6th at the Hanover Arts and Recreation Center in Ashland, Virginia.

If you’re anything like me, before maybe five weeks ago, you’re probably wondering “What the heck is a launch party?” My first introduction to this came from someone at my publisher who insisted that I needed to have one, and since I am nothing if not cooperative, here we are. Essentially a launch party is where authors invite anyone and everyone they know who can read to attend a party where a charming emcee interviews them about what their inspirations were for writing the book in question, what the creative process was like. Then the author reads a chapter from the book. Afterwards there is time for Q&A from the assembled throng. Then the author sits down at a table where everyone in the crowd rushes forward to buy an autograph copy from the future Pulitzer Prize winner. The trouble is, who in the world is going to come out on a random Monday night for a first time author’s book launch? What happens if you rent the space, get it all decked out for the night and then nobody shows up? Excellent question.

Like every thing else about this endeavor, absolutely nothing is guaranteed. It might be a wonderful and profitable experience or it might be an embarrassing bust. But its too late to back out now. I’m betting on myself and this book.

So, if you’re reading this it means that Pam has added the RSVP link on my website. If you would like to come we need you to click on that link and let us know. This will help us with the planning. It will mean the world to me to see you there.

Honestly, there is a part of me that still can’t quite believe this is happening. I was on Amazon.com the other day and saw this and thought…

…is this even real? There’s got to be some mistake! But now I’ve got boxes of books in my library and I’m as jacked up as a 12 year old after two bags of Skittles.

So, I would love to see you Monday night the 6th of May at 7:00. Go to my webpage. RSVP. Show up. Then say a prayer for me that I don’t pass out during the reading.

My 66th Birthday Recap

What did I do for my birthday?

6:00 am workout featuring my usual regime of push-ups, sit-ups, curls etc etc

7:00 am 8 mile stationary bike course in 30:00 flat

9:00 am breakfast at Cracker Barrel featuring country ham, fried eggs and sourdough toast

10:30 am exploratory visit to Trinity Renovations where we took the first tentative steps on a bathroom and kitchen remodel journey, the second step of which will be them coming over here today to measure, then us returning there on Saturday for a quote. Yikes!

2:00 pm Pam gifted me a 50 minute session at a place called Stretch Lab. Loved, loved, LOVED it.

3:00 pm did some writing

6:15 pm met the siblings at Firebirds for dinner. I had steak, au gratin potatoes, a BLT salad and a couple of beers. I also got this very cool gift…

…believe me, we could do worse.

9:00 pm started watching a new show called Alice & Jack on PBS.

10:30 pm got to sleep over with my beautiful and beguiling wife.

I win at life.

Breaking News

NEWS ROUNDUP:

- In a wide ranging interview on 60 Minutes former President Donald Trump has apologized to the nation for “being such a colossal dickhead” for almost all of his adult life. The current Republican front runner also said that he regretted the “temper tantrum I threw after losing in 2020” explaining that the rabble rousing speech he gave on January 6th was mostly the result of being “sleep deprived and the fact that I had gotten ahold of a bad quarter pounder and was very very ill.”

- The White House has reported that after President Biden ate two helpings of ice cream after Easter dinner he suddenly began speaking clearly and in complete sentences for the first time since Obama’s first term. Doctors have suggested a possible link between the ice cream and the incontinence medication he has been on which may have caused some sort of mental acuity boost due to a chemical reaction. It is too early to tell whether the condition is permanent but just in case, the White House mess has ordered 100 gallons of pistachio.

-Elon Musk has admitted that he isn’t a genius after all, only a “stoner dude who got lucky with a couple ideas years ago and now everybody thinks I’m Albert freaking Einstein.” When asked whether he worries that this admission might damage his reputation and the viability of Tesla going forward Musk replied, “I don’t know man. You got any coke?”

-This just in from the Fan Duel studios of Major League Baseball. The Draftkings Pregame show investigative reporters have discovered that Shohei Ohtani received several thousand dollars of free bets when he signed his endorsement deal with BetMGM. It is not known at this time what specific bets, if any, Ohtani placed or if he bet on baseball. More information is expected during the Caesars Palace Sportsbook postgame show.

APRIL FOOLS

Easter in America

Once again Easter Sunday finds us separated from our kids. Its ok. We will have a houseful later this afternoon for lunch. Our day will begin at the Altria Theatre at 9:30 for our church’s service. There will be 3,000 of us celebrating the resurrection of Christ. It will also be the only Sunday of the year where people actually dress up for church. Some ladies will even wear hats. Men will be wearing ties—that rarest icon of men’s apparel that only shows up at Easter, Christmas and funerals. After the service, we will speed back home and prepare the house for the 4:00 arrival of Pam’s extended family for a (very) late lunch. There will be deviled eggs, ham and all the other Easter food.

This year Easter unfolds against the backdrop of continued bloodshed in Ukraine and Gaza, continued divisions at home and abroad, and the embarrassing spectacle of a former President hawking $60 bibles on the internet. Now is an excellent time to ponder the resurrection and the renewal, restoration and hope that it represents.

Its also an excellent time to post this montage photograph that Pam put together last year when our kids weren’t with us for Easter.

Good Friday Funeral

I started this Good Friday opening the Cafe at my church. Later today I will be attending a funeral of a long time family friend. Its the first funeral of the year for me. For most of my life I never kept track of how many funerals I attended every year because they were so rare. Now they have become a more common occurrence. Its not sad. I never leave funerals depressed. Its part of life, this dying. When an 85 year old woman dies its a celebration of a life well lived, a remembrance of how many other lives were made better by her presence among us. The family will grieve, not for her but for themselves. But she has stepped into eternity and those she left behind will not grieve forever. This woman was a dear friend of my mother years ago. Mom loved her very much. She raised three children. They will all be there, honoring her in death as they each did when she was alive. How can this be a somber, depressing moment?

In just a few days I will celebrate my 66th birthday. Three score and six. I have lived one hell of a life. I was gifted an amazing set of parents who set me up for success by loving me and each other. I’ve been lucky enough to have a large, loud and supportive family. When it was time to marry, I won the lottery. I have for the most part enjoyed my work and it has been financially rewarding. But, let’s be honest, I’m far closer to the end than I am to the beginning. According to the actuarial tables I’ve got 18-19 years left. This doesn’t frighten me. It causes me no great angst. If I get some extra years, great. If 18-19 ends up being optimistic, that’s ok. A pun instantly comes to mind…I’ll just have to live with it. It seems to me that the more important question isn’t how much time I have left but rather what I will do with that time. I have big plans. Next week Pam and I will start some long-delayed home improvement projects. The first week of May my first novel gets published. Pam and I will celebrate 40 years together. The third week of June we will leave for Maine.

But first, I will attend a funeral of a great and good woman who was a blessing to many.

Today is the Day

For nearly 30 years our preferred route to Maine was interstate 95 north. For reasons of safety and sanity we abandoned this route in favor of the “western route” probably 8 or 9 years ago. Although using 81 up through western Pennsylvania is at least an hour and a half longer, it has fewer tolls, much nicer scenery and far fewer risks to life and limb. But in the old days it was always 95. One of the landmarks along the way was the Francis Scott Key bridge near Baltimore. This morning I woke up to learn this…

At 1:30 am this morning a cargo ship ran into one of the bridge’s support pillars sending at least 20 vehicles plunging into the freezing water of the 
Patapsco River. At this moment divers are trying to find survivors, but the ice cold waters are hindering their efforts. 

Whenever something like this happens it reinforces for me the fact that we live in a fragile world. Our existence on this hostile planet is fraught with danger, our safety an illusion. Imagine the guy driving over the Key bridge at the moment of impact, in a daze of thought about what faced him today only to suddenly find himself trapped inside a sinking vehicle. The fates sometimes seem capricious.

So, what’s the takeaway? For me its this…take nothing for granted. Take full advantage of the opportunities each day presents, because tomorrow isn’t promised. Today is the day.

Moving to Maine?

Whenever the subject of retirement comes up in conversation my friends invariably say something like this—I guess when you retire you’ll be moving up to Maine. Almost every time, I hear some version of this statement. Its certainly understandable. Everyone who knows me knows how much I love the place. All of you follow along with me on my yearly trips to Maine. You see the beautiful pictures I post, you read my glowing testimonies of what life is like for us when we’re there. So I suppose its natural that people would assume we would move there when we retire. There are two reasons why we will not be moving to Maine when we retire. The first is the fact that Virginia is our home. I have lived here since I was born and Pam since she was ten years old. Our family is here, our friends are here, our church family. In short, our lives have been crafted in Virginia. We feel an attachment to this place, our roots are firmly established in its soil. Sure, every summer and fall we leave for Maine. It is our home away from home. We love everything about it and our lives would be diminished without the ten weeks a year we spend there.

But there’s this…

Today is March the 24th. These pictures were sent to me this morning from my good friend who lives in Jay, Maine. That big hump in the first photograph is his wife’s Jeep. They got 24 inches of snow yesterday. Again…its almost freaking April!! Add to this outrage, the horrible pounding the coast of Maine has endured this winter and any sane person would come to the conclusion that to voluntarily relocate my home to the State of Maine would be the clinical definition of insanity. No, I am perfectly content to delight in the ten weeks it gives us each year. I’ll leave the rest of it to the locals.

Equalizer…my guilty pleasure.

So last night I took advantage of the fact that my wife was at her bible study to watch something on television that she wouldn’t like. No, not March Madness. I’m referring to the last edition of the Equalizer trilogy starring Denzel Washington. This probably comes as a surprise to many of you, that I would be a fan of a movie with such stylized, gratuitous violence. So an explanation seems in order.

I am generally not a fan of violent films. There are major exceptions such as The Godfather and Saving Private Ryan. I much prefer a well crafted story where any violence is understated or even better, implied. So, why on earth would I be such a fan of the Equalizer films, perhaps the most violent movies I’ve ever seen? There are two answers to this question, The story and Denzel.

First, the story. Robert McCall is a retired black-ops assassin with a secret past that is never really explained. We are told that at some point he lost the love of his life, and ever since has tried to live a quiet life in the shadows minding his own business. At one point he tells someone, “I’ve done some bad things in my life, things I’m not proud of. I promised someone that I love very much that I would never go back to being that person.” The trouble is that no matter how quiet and unassuming he tries to be, he keeps stumbling upon horrible people exploiting innocents. There is something deep inside him that cannot abide powerful men taking advantage of the weak. Robert McCall reluctantly becomes a highly skilled and impossibly lethal vigilante who hides in plain sight. He goes to great links and metes out terrifying justice to right even relatively minor wrongs. When he gets a ride from a kind taxi driver and discovers that the man’s pension he earned as a bricklayer for 30 years was stolen by a hacker somewhere, he travels halfway around the world, kills 50 or so people in the most gruesome way possible just to retrieve the $366,400 stolen from the bricklayer and return it to its proper owner. But Robert McCall is no he-man with fancy weaponry, just an aging guy with deadly skills and a razor sharp moral compass. Watching a man risk his life for total strangers and visit justice on insanely rich and powerful men is one of the most morally satisfying experiences I have ever enjoyed.

Then, there’s Denzel Washington. The truth is I would probably pay money to watch him read the phone book. He has a presence that can’t be taught in drama class. You either have it or you don’t.

He sits a lot. He’s never in a hurry. He explains to a room full of bad men exactly how he intends to kill them all and exactly how long it will take him to do it. Then he explains how their immorality has sealed their fate. The bad guys all look at each other with bemused grins just before McCall springs into action. The men he executes are drug dealers, rapists, child molesters and terrorists. Their guilt is unambiguous as is McCall’s justice. He is a pitiless judge. In a world where so often the guilty skate on technicalities, where money buys off juries, lawyers and judges, Robert McCall functions as the wrath of God. He takes no delight in his job, but neither is he plagued by self doubt. There is right and there is wrong, and no room for equivocation. 

The Equalizer movies all move slowly, contemplatively and even artistically. Then all the contemplative stuff gets interrupted by shocking bursts of bloody violence. Then more artistic stuff, polite and meaningful interactions, then another shocking display of killing. Don’t get too comfortable in your seat. The tenderness can explode into brutality on a dime.

Its That Time of Year Again

Today I was reminded by my intrepid assistant that this is the time of year where I lose my mind. She’s correct. This is the season of the perpetual annual review, client after client walks through the doors, each with their unique needs and interests. My job is to keep up with it all, complete the mountains of paperwork, record it all on the appropriate record keeping app, and try not to bump in to the furniture. Some days are better than others. This year it seems worse since all of the above is happening while I am in the middle of having a novel published. To explain I should probably take a minute to describe what the inside of my head feels like.

This afternoon I came down with a severe skull exploding headache. Luckily for me, this has become a very rare occurrence. Migraines used to be a consistent problem for me back in the day, but no more. This was no migraine, just a regular headache that defied all of my Tylenol taking and cold/hot compresses. It only subsided around 7:00 after a dinner of homemade clam chowder courtesy of my wife. After dinner I set down to make my to-do list for today. There were eleven items on it, all which need to be done by no later than 1:30 tomorrow afternoon. After completing the list I had a light-bulb moment. No wonder my head felt like it was in a vice. There are just too many squirrels running around loose in my head. There are a million things happening all at the same time up there, none of it good.

Although I should point out the fact that I have never been diagnosed with any of the alphabet soup of attention deficit disorders that are out there in the world. When I was a kid they just called it having ants in your pants. My teachers went to great lengths to keep me at my desk all the time I was in school. I had the attention span of a gnat on amphetamines. All the adults in my life back then assured my parents that I would eventually grow out of this condition and they were right…sort of. I have created many coping mechanisms/life hacks for dealing with my still shortish attention span and inability to stay seated for long periods of time. Most of the time, I feel completely normal. But I have days where I get the look from my friends at the office, especially the aforementioned assistant, who will usually say something snarky like, “Gee, if you were actually taking medicine for this condition, this is what you would be like if you skipped a few days!” Or even better, she’ll look at me in the middle of one of my semi-confused moments and say, “Squirrell!!!!!”

But, things will slow down soon. It’s only like this through the middle to late part of May. I’ll be fine. Just a few more weeks and the gray matter will snap back to its old self, where I only forget small, inconsequential things like…like…

Every Day a Challenge

When it comes to having a book published, each day brings a new challenge. Take this past Friday for example…

It was my day to open the Cafe and I was excited to get the chance to talk with Jennifer about maybe booking the Cafe for my Launch Party on or around the 7th of May. Its the perfect venue. Its the perfect size, has a wonderful ambiance, and I am comfortable there. As soon as Jennifer arrived she beat me to the punch, having read my post from last week. She said, “You ARE going to have the launch party here, right?!” Then we started checking the schedule for possible dates. There were a few conflicts with the 7th so Jennifer said she would talk with the facilities manager at Hope to work out the details. After thirty minutes Jennifer came back to inform me that she had forgotten about the rule our church has that would make it impossible to have the event at the Cafe. Hope doesn’t allow anyone to sell things in the church building. It’s essentially the no money changers in the temple rule. Jennifer had simply forgotten about the rule in her excitement and apologized for the oversight.

At this point I should point out the obvious fact that I was really disappointed. But at the same time I totally get it. Actually, it speaks well of our church that the leadership team is sensitive about the reputation of our church to the point where they try to eliminate even the appearance of evil. Imagine what the church would look like if every time you showed up for a service there were vendors hawking stuff in the halls. Since one of the points of a launch party is to offer signed copies of your book for sale, the Cafe can’t be the venue. Bummer.

So now we are back to the drawing board for another venue. It won’t be easy. My neighborhood doesn’t have a clubhouse. My house isn’t nearly large enough. Libraries won’t work either—they have the same no selling rule. For the first and only time in my life I regret not being a member of a Country Club. My opinion of Country Clubs has always been the same as Groucho Marx—“I refuse to be a member of any club that would have me as a member!”

As soon as we find a place and work out the details we will activate the RSVP tab on my Author Page. Would love to see you there!

My Author Website

My Author Website is officially LIVE!!! 

When I was told that I needed an Author Website and then told how much it would cost to produce one I was floored. That’s when Pam said something along the lines of, “That’s ridiculous! I can make you a website.” Her confidence sprang from the fact that she is an absolute marvel at the graphic arts side of computing and had done many similar creative projects before. She had no idea how difficult this endeavor would be. She practically had to teach herself the entire process, since the available software was bulky and the very opposite of intuitive. She has spent many late nights fighting through this thing, and along the way was given some major help from my son Patrick. But last night she finished and this morning it went live.

https://dougdunnevant.com/

Give the site a visit and let me know what you think!

Praying For a Friend

I have a friend who will be having a rough morning. Her son is having his jaw surgically broken and moved forward to better accommodate breathing and growth etc.. It’s not life threatening, but as a parent you have to sit there in the waiting room while a bunch of doctors hurt your child, and this is the worst feeling in the world. If there was any way possible for you to hop up on that table and take his place you would do it in a New York minute. But you can’t. He has to walk this path himself while you agonize in the waiting room.

Pam and I have been lucky. Neither one of our kids ever had to endure something like this. They never had surgery of any kind. They had their share of stitches, broken bones and colds, along with one car accident, but nothing like this. Then there are the parents we know who have lost children, parents who have lived through the crucible of burying a child, the very darkest night of the soul. My heart breaks for them, no matter how much time may have passed, I’m sure they feel the loss still.

So, this morning I pray for my friend.

Meanwhile, Lucy seems frustrated with me…

“Must you make so much noise typing over there? Can’t you see that I am trying to snoozle?”

You Can’t Get Any Luckier Than This

So, yesterday after church Pam and I were driving to a restaurant to meet our Sunday Lunch Bunch when my Apple Watch vibrated rudely. I glanced at it and found this message:

“Hi there. You mentioned wanting to rent in the fall. Is that still true and if so what dates”

Carolyn May

Immediately, my heart rate soared. Carolyn is the owner of Loon Landing and along with her husband Keith are just about as nice a couple as you will ever meet. (When Pam broke her wrist last fall in Maine, they brought us dinner the night after her surgery!). Several months ago we got a call from her telling us that she would not be renting out LL this summer. They had decided to stay there themselves all summer—something they have never done in the 17 years they have owned the place. Although we were disappointed, we completely understood. That’s when I had told her that we would be interested in a fall rental if it was possible, although we knew that they have family who rent during the fall. Anyway, I had forgotten all of this until the moment I received this text from her. To make a long story short, in no time we had agreed to four weeks in the fall from Sept. 13 thru October 11. It was the happiest I’ve been in months. 

So in 2024 Pam and I have the privilege of spending 10 full weeks on our favorite lake in Maine, the last four in our favorite lake house of all time:

The Cafe at West Creek

I show up at 7 am every Friday morning. A few months ago it was pitch black when I punched in the security code to get in. Now the sun is up and its considerably warmer. Still, it feels weird being the only one in the building. A church is not supposed to be empty. Last year my church, at considerable expense and after lots of thought, opened up a Cafe which they decided to call—The Cafe at West Creek. It was to be a donation-only coffee shop with free WiFi opened to the public from 8-4 five days a week. To make it work, they would need volunteers and lots of them. I decided to give it a try for two reasons. First of all it sounded like it might be fun. After setting the place up I would be tasked with welcoming people, showing newcomers the ropes and generally being an encourager. The second reason was on account of the fact that I knew the manager/boss of the enterprise—Jennifer Glotz—who, I have been told on more than one occasion, is the female version of me. When she asked, it was hard to refuse. So, here I am, every Friday morning.

The first couple of months it was like a ghost town in here. For one thing the staff has Fridays off, and for another we were brand new and not many people knew we even existed. As each month passed traffic has picked up to the point where now Friday mornings are busy and a lot more fun. January and February have seen my shift overrun with new faces, groups of two or three meeting for coffee, moms and dads who work from home using the space, and more recently larger groups showing up for meetings of one kind or another. Add to this the influx of parents and grandparents bringing their little ones to Friday morning story time. The place is suddenly hopping. It does my heart good to see a space that before sat empty all week long now being used in this way.

The best part of this deal are the serendipitous encounters you have with total strangers. I have spoken with a young mother who was eight months pregnant with a two year old at home who had asked a friend to look after him long enough for her to have a bagel and some peace and quiet. I met a man who had stopped going to church during COVID and never gone back. We were the first church building he had been inside in two years. Now he comes on Sunday mornings. I see him across the way and wave. He waves back and smiles. I met a lady from Brazil with two toddlers at story time. Someone had told her about this coffee shop where the coffee was good and super cheap ($1 suggested donation cheap). It was her first time in the building. Her kids were beautiful. She looked exhausted but glanced around like she couldn’t believe her good fortune for having found such a place. I met a retiree, probably 7 or 8 years older than me who seemed happy to have a place to come to be around people. One day I saw an older lady taking pictures of the artwork on the walls. Apparently she is a regular but this was her first time coming on Friday morning. She went on and on about how she loved the Cafe, like she was trying to convince me to give it a try. When I told her I was a volunteer we both had a good laugh. Sometimes I will see a group of college kids splayed out in one of the booths drinking cold brew, two booths over from an older woman in an intense conversation with a younger woman. I found out later that the older lady was the younger’s mentor and had been for several years.

My church took a chance on The Cafe. Its not cheap. Just how much we dropped to get this place up and running I don’t know and frankly I don’t care. The church’s finances are not my job. Others with that responsibility will have to answer for the proper stewardship of the church’s budget and spending priorities. My job as a member is to find a place to serve that is suited to my skill set and gifts. When I find it I need to volunteer and see how it goes. If it ends up being a disaster, I’ll know soon enough. (I’m reminded of that time when someone thought I would make a great finance committee chairman back in the day. Worse. Idea. Ever.) But if I find something that is fulfilling and fun, then its a win. The Cafe is fun. You should give it a try.

Our Fun Weekend

Its been over a week since last I posted in this space. Pam and I spent some time in Nashville with Patrick, Sarah, and Frisco. It was a fun few days away. We got to see our talented kids sing some Bach solos. We ate some amazing Cajun food, a delicious homemade pad Thai dinner, a scrumptious breakfast of pastries and scrambled eggs. To top all of that off, we got to watch Frisco play his famous find the ball game—which was easily the most impressive event of the weekend.

In the midst of all the fun was one book business call where we set the price of my book in its various forms and nailed down a release date: May, 7, 2024!!

It will be officially on sale that day in three forms, paperback, e-book, and hardcover. I learned a lot of new stuff during the call, and Pam and Patrick made lots of progress getting my Author website ready. I still feel like a rank amateur when it comes to everything that has happened after writing this book over ten years ago. There are so many decisions that have to be made in rapid fire succession at the various stages of publication. Sometimes it all seems like a blur to me. But, it certainly is exciting, if a bit nerve wracking at the same time. 

We drove back from Nashville on Tuesday and made it home just in time to vote before the polls closed. As it turned out, we needn’t have bothered. As is usually the case, our preferred candidate got clobbered. But you have to vote, right? Even if you know it doesn’t matter, you still have to vote. Why? I’m not totally sure at this point, I just know that you do. So we did. I blame Coach Flanagan, my civics teacher back in high school, who essentially said that if you don’t vote you’re a loser. The actually phrase I remember was “pathetic loser”. Its the sort of thing an impressionable 18 year old doesn’t easily forget.

One more thing…my sister Paula and her husband Ron kept Lucy for us while we were in Nashville. They kept us fully up to speed on Lucy’s activities throughout her stay which usually consisted of pictures of Lucy in varying poses of laziness…

There were a couple of photographs that offered proof that they didn’t just lay around the house the entire time…

In case you’re wondering, neither Lucy or Paula and Ron were injured during the weekend.

Peace-lite

I attended a Bible study last night at my church. This isn’t something our church does in mass very often. We are a small group oriented congregation. But last night’s study was entitled, The Gospel and…Peace. I was interested in the subject so I went.

It was led by David Dwight, our senior pastor, a super smart dude who has a gift for making even the most complex theological subjects accessible and clear. He talked and I listened.

We sat at large tables. The auditorium was packed, probably 250 people or more. I met a couple who were brand new to our church and brand new to Richmond. Nice people. There were cookies and coffee, a Q&A after the study and a time for table discussion. I left as flummoxed by the concept of peace as I have ever been.

David was eloquent. He explained all about the nature of peace and how it is defined in scripture etc etc. When it came time for discussion with my table mates I asked this question: Has anyone at this table ever been totally at peace? A couple of them answered in the positive, using examples from their lives that were quite comforting. My answer was and remains…No. Never.

The closest I come to peace is my time in Maine each year. Being on that lake, emerged in nature’s beauty, fishing in the quiet of the morning from my kayak is as peaceful as I have been. But it’s never complete peace. No matter how perfect the day, how idyllic the conditions, there is always a part of my brain that is alive with turbulence. It has always been so, and here’s the thing—I’m not sure I want complete and perfect peace. I don’t know what I would do with it. Let me explain.

I can only speak from my own experience on this subject and when I do I understand full well that I am an outlier. My mind is never at rest. Even my body is seldom at rest. The most difficult part of last night was sitting still for the entire hour and a half, (I couldn’t, incidentally, spending twenty minutes or so standing up in the back of the room). I am always thinking about what’s next, trying to anticipate what’s coming, consequently, there is never anything approaching mental stillness. If you’re thinking that this sounds exhausting and strange, you might be right. But in my 42 year business career it has served me well. It’s that very restlessness that motivates me to action and accomplishment. In addition, as a writer my mind is always searching and probing stuff trying to discover inspiration. For me I have always thought that peace isn’t attainable for people like me this side of eternity, and I suppose I’m ok with that.

I wish is wasn’t so. Being able to turn off the constant churning of thoughts and ideas bouncing around inside me would be nice. For now, I’ll settle for peace-lite.

Special Delivery!!

I was told by my publisher that I would be getting the final proof copy of A Life of Dreams from the printer soon. They said it would probably take a couple of weeks, but it would be delivered through the US Postal Service. Well, guess what I found in the mailbox twenty minutes ago??

I must admit that my heart beat a bit faster when I saw the package. When I got it inside and held it in my hands, well…it was a pretty cool feeling. What’s so hard to believe is that this one was written over ten years ago. The idea came to me while I was at Best Buy watching a poker tournament on a huge wall of television screens. It must have been on fifty screens at the same time and as I watched the idea popped into my head—Wonder what it would be like to have a super intuitive gift to always win at games of chance? How might having such a gift change a person? Would it ultimately be seen as a gift or an curse? Now, ten years later, I’m sitting here holding a book in my hands that sprang from that ever so brief experience.

So cool. And so terrifying. Suppose people hate it? Suppose it flops? 

Regardless, it’s done. I did it.

A Friend’s Question

A friend recently asked me, “How come you don’t write about politics much anymore?” It was a fair question. I just checked and he was right. So far this year exactly one of my 26 posts have been about politics. One reason I don’t write about politics anymore is—nobody reads when I do. That one post entitled “Are You Ready For Election 2024?”, garnered a whopping 38 views, which for The Tempest is pathetically low. I would imagine that a fair number of my regular readers know of my disdain for the Republican front runner and don’t care to be reminded. But its not just that, most people are either sick of politics are profoundly embarrassed by their candidate, and would just rather not think too long on the subject.

Its a shame. I’ve probably had more fun making fun of politics and politicians than any other topic in the 13 year history of this blog. For one thing, its always been such a target-rich environment. Per capita, people in politics do more cringeworthy things than any other demographic in the country, even celebrities. The profession has inspired more jokes and joke-making than anything I can think of in my lifetime. But now, none of them are funny anymore. Absolutely nothing about American politics is even remotely funny. So, I have chosen to move on to other topics. That’s the answer to my friend’s question.

My Wife’s Tenacity

The people who are publishing my book tell me that I simply have to have a website. The fact that I already have a blog is nice, but not sufficient, I’m told with regularity. No, I need a stand alone Author website. Once my book goes live it will be the perfect place for people to go to buy the thing, they say. Plus, I am constantly reminded that whenever someone buys my book on my author website I make much more money per book than I will if they buy it on Amazon or Kindle. Of course, creating and maintaining a proper website isn’t cheap. In addition I know less than nothing about how to create a website on account of the fact that I’m an idiot. When my wife found out how much it was going to cost me to have someone make a website for me she said something like, “Are you kidding? I could figure it out. Let me do it.”

This was three or four weeks ago. Ever since, Pam has been laboring late into the night essentially teaching herself how to create a website, something I could have done if I wasn’t lazy and impatient. Instead, although she has other much more fun things she could be doing, she has been trial and erroring her way through learning a new skill for three weeks. Last night she finally showed me what she has come up with. 

So here’s the thing with Pam. She is a natural with the computer, but this process was completely different than anything she had ever attempted to do before and it was quite frustrating for her. It was the exact opposite of intuitive. I suspect that these website construction services are deliberately obtuse and clunky so novices will throw their hands up in frustration and say, “To hell with this, I’ll just pay them a gazillion dollars to do it for me!” But these people never met my wife. When it comes to difficult tasks, Pam is tenacious. The more difficult it gets the more determined she becomes to figure it out. Instead of losing her patience like her husband would do, she doubles down on stubbornness.

The site went live last night but I will not give out the address just yet because she says there are still things she needs to do. But I can tell you this…its so much better than what I was picturing it would be in my head. I love it, actually. She made it easy to navigate and super easy to buy the book. Once again, I am in her debt. I’ll just add it to everything else I owe her.

The Next Great Children’s Book

Many years ago, in my earlier days of fatherhood, I developed the particular skill of telling my children bedtime stories with, um..how shall I put this?…colorful plot lines. These stories were rich with life lessons, as well as a fair amount of casual violence. Nevertheless, they were quite popular with the kids, if not their mother. Well, last night I was given the opportunity to reprise my role as the Stephen King of the bedtime story, when Kaitlin and Jon’s dear friends, Bailey and Matthew Wolfer shockingly asked me if I would do the honors for their two adorable boys, Milo and Theo. What follows is a rough summation of the story that poured forth from the muddled grey mush of my brain in the pitch black darkness of the boy’s room. The seeds of this particular classic were provided by a picture that little Theo (age 4) had drawn during dinner of an alien with six hands…

The setting was the frozen tundra of Alaska where two brothers lived in a cold and drafty igloo. Their largely absent parents had a rule that if they ever needed to go outside to pee they must do so quickly and return to the relative safety of the igloo asap. But on this particular morning, the boys were feeling adventurous. Before long they found themselves on the cusp of disaster when they notice that a (herd? Pack?) of polar bears had risen out of the icy waters and was about to charge the two helpless waifs with murderous intent.

Just when things looked hopeless they noticed a bright light above, red, blue and green rotating lights hovering in the sky directly above the scene of potential slaughter. Suddenly, three legs shot out from the bottom of the craft as it prepared to touch down on the snowy ground. Then a giant set of stairs extended down from the spacecraft and the Alien warrior of poor Theo’s earlier imaginings arrived on the scene. At first, the boys were convinced that they had been saved from becoming the polar bear’s dinner only to be abducted by this giant extraterrestrial warrior with six hands—each fitted with a different and unique weapon of mass destruction. But instead, the warrior alien turned towards the six flummoxed polar bears and began their wholesale and systematic elimination. The first polar bear fell victim to a shot between the eyes from the handgun of arm number one. The second polar bear’s fate was sealed when the Samurai sword attached to hand number two decapitated the helpless beast. At this point in the narrative I thought it necessary to point out that the deluge of blood spewing out from this unhappy result clashed terribly with the pristine clean and white surface of the heretofore innocent tundra landscape…(teaching the boys about imagery and the irony of perception in the process). When the third polar bear noticed that the only weapon attached to arm number three was a simple whip, he snorted contemptuously (yet more irony, illustrating the time honored truth that pride indeed cometh before the fall). Before bear number three could get the smirk of overconfidence off his furry face, he too found his severed head flying through the frigid air!

Now there were three polar bears left, and suddenly the boys were worried. The warrior alien’s fourth arm was equipped with a howitzer weapon which had only one shell in it and his remaining arms were normal hands with no weapons at all. But then they noticed the warrior alien alter his strategy towards the polar bears. Suddenly the warrior alien turned from menacing to charming, asking the polar bears if they fancied playing a card game. Clearly, the warrior alien had done his homework, knowing that since ancient days, the polar bears were famous throughout the universe for their skills at poker and gin rummy. In fact the very reason that polar bears lived in the arctic was because thousand of years earlier they had fled the jungles of Africa for Alaska because of how difficult it had become to find an honest game in the jungle what with all the cheetahs. In a shocking surprise, the three surviving polar bears agreed to sit down for a quick game with this creature who had just dispatched three of their brethren so spectacularly. As soon as they sat down of course, in a development that surprised literally no one, The warrior alien let loose with the howitzer, killing all three in a spectacular explosion.

Once the dust settled, the two boys found themselves face to face with the warrior alien. Tension filled the air as they all wondered what would be their fate. Suddenly the warrior alien bent down on four arms to get to their eye-level. Then he spoke in a thunderous voice…

“Now, what will I do with these two disobedient boys? Did not your parents specifically tell you to go outside and pee but then return to the igloo at once? And yet, here you both are where you shouldn’t be, witnessing things that very well may scar you for life.”

At this point the older brother spoke up and pointed out the obvious—“Well, I notice that your two remaining arms are only fitted with hands like ours. You have no more weapons. What can you possibly do to us?”

Even though the warrior alien’s face was hidden in a dome of metal, it did seem to crack a shiny smile right before he said the fateful words…

“Apparently you two earthlings have never heard of the Great Tickle Monster!!!

At this point, the warrior alien grabbed the two boys began tickling them unmercifully with his human like hands, so much so that the boys were eventually reduced to giggling, hysterical piles of arms and legs. The warrior alien then said, “Have you learned your lesson, human boys?? Always obey your parents!!”

The warrior alien walked back up the stairs of his ship, the three legs withdrew from sight and the rotating red, blue and green lights disappeared into the starry expanse.

The End.

Since the boy’s father is a graphic artist by trade, I see a best seller coming in the children’s fiction genre once his illustrations bring this story to life.

Move over, “Goodnight Moon”

My Ridiculous Wife

Ok, so on Valentine’s Day I decided to get Pam one of her favorite Frappuccinos from Starbucks. To make it just a bit better I bought her a special Valentine’s Day coozie with red and pink hearts all over it. I took it over to her school and asked the front desk people to deliver it to her since I can no longer take it to her myself on account of the fact that we live in a country where maniacs with guns sometimes decide to shoot up random elementary schools. (Grrrr). Anyhow, maybe ten minutes later she sent me this picture…

I have had the pleasure of her company for over 40 years and sometimes I still can’t believe it. She is beautiful inside and out, the loveliest woman I know. I mean…just look at her. While she took this picture she was surrounded by 5 unruly kindergarteners and still managed to look this good. Ridiculous.

Just Personally Interacting Over Here

Over the past couple of months I have read more than a few articles about what is described as an epidemic of loneliness in America. The basic idea is that with the revolutionary arrival of the internet and the various social media platforms that have come to dominate our culture, we have slowly replaced personal interaction time with screen time—something that you are doing this very minute by reading this blog! While it might be easy to go overboard with this sort of analysis, it has caused me to question my own record when it comes to personal interaction with others. How much of it do I do in a given day, week or month?

So I’ve conducted a little experiment this past week. I’ve actually attempted to count the number of people per day that I have had at least a casual encounter with during each day. For purposes of this experiment, I have chosen not to count people like the woman at the checkout counter at Publix or my waiter at lunch at El Paso the other day. I’m talking about real encounters with people I know and see on at least a semi-regular basis. Here’s what I found.

Twelve people at my office. These are people who I know quite well and interact with almost every day—Doug, Rob, Scott, Lynwood, Kristin, Herb, Blaire, Allison, Penny, Lindsey, Brenda and Austin.

My neighbor and her three kids who I see frequently because they live next door—Jamie, Cash, Kennedy, and Sully.

A friend I have lunch with usually once a week—Tom.

Various clients I meet with face to face in my office—4-5 each week.

During my shift at my church’s Cafe, I hang with my boss and several regulars—Jennifer

At church each Sunday I touch base with friends and fellow volunteers at Hope Thrift—Chip, Lynn, Tera, Isaac, Bernadette, Leslie, Robyn, Doug

Most Sunday’s I go to lunch after church with the same group—Paula, Ron, Gordon, Leigh Ann

Ok, so it looks like in a normal week I have encounters with roughly 35 other human beings. I have no idea whether of not this number is high or low compared to others, but it seems like a reasonable number of people. Now, how about the number of people I encounter every week via social media in some form? How many friends do I make contact with by either text or messaging services in an average week?

A quick glance through my phone tells me that I have ongoing back and forth chats with a lot of the same people I mingle with, with the exception of five or six people I know quite well who live out of state or somewhere besides Short Pump—Kaitlin, Patrick, Tif, Pam, Rusty

So, apparently I am the exception to the rule in this fragmented world of ours. I actually meet and mingle with far more people face to face than I do online. What about you?

It’s Getting Real

Yesterday I received the finished manuscript of my book from the Publisher. At this point in the process no more changes can be made. It has been edited and proofed to within an inch of its life. For better or for worse it is done. If there is a misspelled word or misplaced punctuation mark it has managed to avoid detection by what seems like a million eyes. So be it. The cover art has been chosen. The back cover teaser has been written. We have a finished product. What comes next are consultations with marketing and promotion people who will school me on the best ways to get the thing in front of the book buying public. They will instruct me in the ways of social media and digital presence. I will be given promotion flyers for local bookstores along with suggestions of how to schedule readings etc.. It is all a bit terrifying.

The story I am currently writing which had laid dormant for months has suddenly sprung back to life in my head. I have been writing every night for over a week in that little universe. Meanwhile I am in the midst of my busiest season at work, meetings on top of meetings with client after client, an avalanche of numbers with dollar signs. My brain is tired. What I need is a proper distraction. I need a road trip to see my kids. So Pam, Lucy and I will be heading down to Columbia for a visit with my first born this weekend. We had hoped to arrange a triangle tour and hit up Nashville to visit with Patrick after leaving Kaitlin’s but weren’t able to get that arranged because of schedules. But we will head down there later in March. By the time April gets here A Life of Dreams will have dropped and will hopefully be flying off the shelves. Maybe that’s a bit optimistic, more like selling briskly. Who am I kidding? I am a rookie novelist. Sales will be spotty. However the thing sells, I will have accomplished a life long goal of becoming a semi-professional writer—at age 65. 

Better late than never.

Of Course I’m watching the Super Bowl!

Pam and I will be watching the Super Bowl this evening. Football is not my sport, especially the professional version. I will forever be a baseball guy. But I wouldn’t miss the Super Bowl. Its not just the game, its the extravaganza. First there’s the anxiety that builds leading up to the singing of the national anthem. Will they butcher the thing or create something beautiful? Then there’s the commercials, many of which are quite clever, a few of which are hilarious, and many where you shake your head and ask aloud, *WTHWT??? Of course there’s the halftime show. Often the performer is designed to appeal to Boomers, some guy who’s best years were several decades ago. Other times its some dazzling new star who most Boomers have never heard of. This year I believe its Usher, which seems a nice tweener choice.

Of course this year the ratings are predicted to be through the roof, some saying that it will be the most watched TV show in the history of  television. Why? The answer is…Taylor Swift. The wildly popular pop star is dating the second best player on the Chiefs, Travis Kelce. For reasons that escape my powers of comprehension, there are millions of people who despise this woman, even more millions who actually believe she is part of a vast conspiracy to help Joe Biden win the 2024 election…or something. There are many fans of football who have loudly complained about the fact that during the 3 plus hours it takes to broadcast an NFL game, the cameras point to Taylor Swift whenever her boyfriend makes an outstanding play on the field, for approximately 45 seconds of those 3 hours. These irate fans say that this 45 second inclusion of a pop star hopping up and down with glee in a luxury box aside Mr. Kelce’s family and friends are somehow cheapening the game…a sentence that literally made me laugh just typing it. Since I am largely agnostic on the subject of the sanctity of professional football, I have no opinion on this issue. I do wonder why Miss Swift is hated so vociferously by so many people. I wouldn’t consider myself a fan. I can only name two or three of her songs. But what little I know of her are mostly admirable things. First of all she writes her own music, no small feat. Second, she is a savvy businesswoman who has been quiet adept at sticking it to one of the most self-dealing industries in America—the music business. Third, you are free to like or dislike her music, but she is an honest to God musician, not the product of computer generated algorithms masquerading as music. She plays the guitar and piano and writes songs. What a concept.

As far as the actual game goes, this one might be good. One team is led by the best player in the game, quarterback Patrick Mahomes. The other team’s quarterback still lives at home with his parents and his entire salary amounts to pocket change on Mahomes’ balance sheet…yet his team comes into the game as a slight favorite. Although this David v Goliath thing makes for a nice story I don’t buy it for a minute. I expect Patrick Mahomes and his team to dominate.

The real reason Pam and I will be watching tonight is because it gives us an excuse to eat delicious and unhealthy food. Pam will make some amazing snacks which I will post pictures of later. She will also provide Super Bowl Bingo cards for us to fill in—many with Taylor Swift themed items—which should be great fun.

While we’re watching we will both be keeping a sharp eye out for any possible examples of Taylor Swift Psy-ops.

* what the hell was that???

Pain of the Month Club

When I was a much younger man old people really got on my nerves. For purposes of this discussion I will define “old” as people at least 60 years old. My sister Paula and I used to roll our eyes at each other every time Mom and Dad invited some of their friends over for dinner. We knew what was coming. For old people dinner time conversation invariably degraded into an episode of General Hospital. It would go something like this:

Mom: I talked with Erma yesterday and the poor woman is struggling with the colitis again.

Geezer #1: That poor thing. And its not like George can take care of her what with his sugar diabetes.

Geezer #2: You know I told George to go see a specialist back when he got that hernia in his groin but he tried to tough it out and now look at him.

Dad: Well at least neither of us picked up that Whooping cough when it was going around back in the Spring.

Mom: Maybe not, but I declare honestly, I would rather have the whooping cough than have to put up with sugar diabetes.

Needless to say, this sort of dinner time conversation didn’t exactly aid in digestion. But it seemed that every single time my parents got together with their friends all they talked about was their interminable list of ailments. Fast forward roughly 50 years to the sorry state that I now find myself in.

It is a humbling experience when you recognize your parent’s behavior in yourself, especially when you become guilty of the very same things they did that bugged the daylights out of you. Unfortunately, I have discovered the reason behind their often tortured dinner time accounts. Here’s the deal…since I have been in my 60’s literally every month of my life brings some new physical irritant onto the scene. I will wake up one morning and out of the blue one of my feet feels like I spent the entire night walking across a football field full of Legos. Then, as mysteriously as it appeared it will vanish just about the time I’ve decided it might be time to go see a doctor. Then, the next month it will be an unexplained throbbing pain in my left thumb…I’m not making this up. For weeks I will go back and forth on whether or not I should go get it looked at and then BAMM…its gone, replaced by a burning sensation in my left hip which turns up out of thin air. It occurs to me that if I went to the doctor each time my body sprouts a new pain I might as well see if they will set up a cot for me in the back room.

So I was thinking that I need to do something proactively to spare my own children from having to endure the same kinds of dinner conversations I grew up with. Suppose I could start a chat room of some kind strictly for those of us over the age of 60 where we could all gather to discuss all of our most recent physical humiliations amongst ourselves—sort of like a safe space for seniors to discuss our health woes. I was thinking of calling it the Pain of the Month Club. As soon as you wake up with hair suddenly growing out of your—I don’t know—-eyeballs, you could just log in and get the conversation rolling with:

Me: Hey guys! Didn’t somebody here have hair that started growing out of their earlobes so bad they had to start braiding it? Well, top this—-this past week hair started growing out of my left eyeball!!

Then 30 minutes later when you discover that you aren’t alone, that in fact people have noticed hair growing out of every single orifice of the body since they started on Social Security, you’ve gotten it all out of your system and the horrifying subject need never be spoken of again around the children.

I’m determined people. I am not going to be like my parents at the dinner table!!!

Bio Pic Search

In preparation for the publication of my novel, I am creating an author website on the advice of my publisher. This will be a site where people can come to learn about me, the book, my blog, and also an ideal place to purchase said book. Actually, “I” am doing no such thing. Pam will be the creator of this website because when it comes to this sort of thing she is amazingly talented, as everyone in our neighborhood knows every time they receive the Wythe Trace Newsletter. 

So yesterday she sends me a text telling me that she will be scouring through our 10,000 plus digital photograph library to find an appropriate one to serve as the Bio picture for this website. This would save us the hassle and expense of having to pay a professional for headshots. After a while she sends me this one with the simple caption: Bio Picture??

Ahh yes…who could forget last summer’s Nudity Day on Quantabacook? 

But, two can play this game, I thought. So, I countered with this beauty from that time I had an allergic reaction to something which caused both of my eyes to swell…

Not to be deterred she sent me this classic…

Ultimately she decided on a more conventional shot which she sent me along with this observation: “That right there is a guy that makes my heart skip a beat.”

…To which I replied, “Great! All we need in this family is someone else with an irregular heartbeat!”

To any kids out there who might stumble across this post, here’s my advice—marry someone who makes you laugh.