Paying Better Attention

Everywhere I look around me I see people positively thrilled that 2016 is now behind us. Everyone was so eager for it to be over. Whatever. I didn't think it was that bad, actually. I spent an entire month in Maine on a lake in a beautiful house. How bad could it have been? I made it through the year without any life threatening illnesses or debilitating financial loss. No dear friend or family member passed away. The Cubs finally won a World Series. Not bad as years go, I'd say.

Of course, there was an election. But, the day that an election result ruins my entire year is the day that I need to find some decent hobbies. As Shakespeare once said, "there are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophies." or something like that. Substitute politics for philosophies in that line and you will be introduced to a much more rich and meaningful exsistence, I think. Speaking of which, what follows are a list of objectives for the coming year. Notice that I do not use that horrible word, resolutions, it being so larded over with the baggage of failure. No, objectives sounds much more confident and possible.

1. So far, there are two vacation trips on the calendar. There's the biannual Dunnevant/Roop/Schwartz family beach trip to the Outer Banks, and a three week trip to Quantabacook Lake in Maine. To this I want to add a third trip, something unusual and adventurous. Maybe one of those adventure vacations I keep hearing about. White water rafting, or mountain climbing, or swimming with dolphins maybe. Of course, I could opt for real adventure and stay in an airbnb in south side Chicago.

2. This year will be the year that Pam and I get plugged in at Hope church. We've been attending for several months, but at some point you've got to do something besides window shop. We need to get involved, plugged in. Thus will end a thirty year run at Grove Avenue Baptist. We will part as friends, owing each other nothing.

3. This will be the year that I will go on my first ever diet. 2016 added ten pounds to the scales that I cannot seem to shed with exercise alone. I guess my metabolism has finally changed and I can no longer eat six rolls at dinner without suffering the consequences.

4. I will attempt to break a bad habit I have recently fallen into of reading nothing but news and information journals. I used to have a voracious appetite for literature, novels, history etc. but have largely given it up for functional reading, the least rewarding kind. This year will mark a return to pleasure reading. My mental and intellectual health demands it.

5. A conspiracy of events over the past three years has seen me largely give up competitive golf. Two shoulder surgeries will do that. I have missed it. Golf is more than just a five hour walk, it's a five hour walk...with friends. Maybe it's time to retire my old clubs, which are older than my children, and a constant source of embarrassment to my buddies. Maybe I'll take a lesson to help me transition back into the game. I used to carry about a 14-15 handicap. Who knows what it would be now?

6. Above all else, I intend to pay better attention in 2017. It's so easy to drift through life on it's repetitive currents, so easy to miss the beauty that exists in the details. I need to pay better attention to my friends, all the better to notice when they need help. Paying better attention to my wife and kids would allow me the benefit of being able to detect problems before they grow too large and unmanageable, but also help me to appreciate their little triumphs, their ordinary goodness that is so easy to overlook. But, paying better attention to total strangers would be nice too. Are there people headed my way who will need me in 2017, people who I will encounter serendipitously along the way, who will blow right past me if I'm not careful? Maybe it's God's plan for me to meet them and be a blessing. I would hate to foil his plans by my selfish indifference.

Ok, that's about it. Not a grand list, but utterly achievable. I better get to it!

Let's talk about Christmas Loot

Here's what I got for Christmas:

1. Very weird, spider-like device  which holds my iPad at the perfect angle for reading, even and especially when I am enjoying my recliner. This present was purchased by my wife specifically to prevent me from hurting my neck since she is tired of hearing me whine and moan about it. So, this was a selfish gift. . .meant to make her life easier, not mine!

2. The only weakness in my palatial new library is the fact that my desk sits in the middle of the room and therefore I have no way to employ a lamp since to do so would require an electric chord running across the carpet to the plug in the wall, not only an aesthetic disaster, but a safety hazard. So, I got this beautifully sleek black lacquer battery operated lamp which responds to my touch with not one but three intensity levels of soft white light.

3. In keeping with the theme of my continually decrepit and declining body, this amazing massage machine from Brookstone is the perfect gift for any fifty something man in your life. Although it has been universally panned by both dogs in the house because of its jerky motions and low whining sound, I love the thing. I can choose not only intensity level but what type of massage I desire...tapping or shiatsu.

4. Every year I ask for a cool hat and every year I get nothin'. But this year, I got two!!

5. No Christmas would be complete without. . .toys. I prefer those that I can use to annoy the girls at work. This handy rubber band gun, (with ammo clip) and remote controlled rat will do nicely.


Remember, that Christmas isn't about stuff. And just because I got clearly cooler stuff than you did does not change that fact!

Human Nature in the Real World

It's remarkable how territorial are living things. Having two large dogs in the house this past week has been a case study in this phenomenon. When Lucy is on our bed and Jackson tries to join her up there, Lucy is transformed into this very unfamiliar snarling beast. Apparently, our bed is her space, and woe be unto the dog, no matter how lovable and well-intentioned, who dares invade it. Jackson, on the other hand, can be sitting serenely on the sofa between Jon and Kaitlin perfectly chilled and content, but if Lucy shows the slightest interest in joining them up there, Jackson perks upright and will have none of it, as if to say, "These are my people, my sofa!"

On a strangely related note, I have grown weary of the French having invaded and overrun my blog. At first it was interesting, and a little flattering, suddenly thousands of readers from a foreign country inflating my pageview numbers. But after a month and with a new record for pageviews (over 10,000 and counting in December), I have started to resent it. Who are these Frenchmen suddenly interested in the ramblings of low level American blogger who doesn't even like croissants? Are they really people or some computer hacking algorithm run amok?

The point is, dogs and people have a powerful sense of personal space and a strong, innate desire to maintain its integrity. So do nations. This is the reason why I am a strict non-interventionist when it comes to foreign policy. Every time something horrible happens anywhere in the world, there's a constituency in this country for an active, robust response. This response usually involves the use of the American military. Some photojournalist takes a picture of a dying child in Aleppo and suddenly there's a hashtag movement on Facebook demanding we do something. Some African tribal genocide breaks out in the Congo somewhere and people start clamoring for us to stop it.

But, how would we feel if the Russians or the French felt so moved to send a contingent of special forces parachuting into Chicago to put an end to the death and destruction that has plagued that beleaguered city for the last four years. I mean, enough is enough, right? How long can the civilized world stand by and watch a once great city destroy itself? The fact is, we would be enraged at such a presumptuous provocation and rightly so.

Listen, I'm no pacifist. If a country attacks us, the US, I'd be the first to demand our military defend us without mercy. But short of that, short of a direct threat to my country, I'm for staying the heck out of the rest of the world's business. Let the Syrians take care of Syria. Let the Europeans be responsible for Europe. Let the Russians mind Russia. We've got our own problems.

But Doug, but Doug, you say. The Syrian government is murdering its own people!! Yes, they are, and it's a crying shame. There's a boatload of evil in the world. The Venezuelans will soon be starving, many in Bangladesh are impossibly poor, tribal wars featuring unimaginable brutality are raging all over the continent of Africa. Should we go rescue them too? And if we do, are you prepared to obligate the United States government to the twenty year commitment of men, money and material it will take to keep the peace in each of these places? And who will bear the cost of such an opperation? The American taxpayer. You onboard for an across the board tax increase of say 25% to cover all this do-goodery? Yeah, I didn't think so.

So, my advice for His Orangeness on his first day on the job? Resist the siren call of the Empire Hawks. Let's mind our own business for a change.

Christmas 2016 or "It's 2016, What Did You Expect?"

Christmas is a big deal in my house, primarily because it's one of two times each year where both of our kids come home at the same time. For Pam, having our kids home is her Christmas. So, what happened over the last three days will enter into the official record as reason number 2,345,631 why life isn't fair.

Late last week my wife started having cold symptoms. She immediately started taking over the counter medicines and calling on her vast resources of internal fortitude to fight the thing off before the kids got here. I've seen her do this before, steel herself against an approaching illness until some big important event had passed, then collapse in a heap after the last guest leaves. But this time, it wasn't to be. On Christmas morning, she was as sick as I have ever seen her in our nearly 35 years together. She literally could not get out of the bed. It was at this point when my daughter and her husband flipped a switch and turned into the reincarnation of Ozzie and Harriet.

There was much left to do to prepare for the big day. I still had to pick up Patrick at the airport, there was a ham to cook, a giant Greek salad to prepare, and some fancy frosting to make and spread on a gingerbread cake that Pam had prepared for the dessert table at Linda's. Meanwhile, I was upstairs trying to help Pam out of the bed so I could take her to Patient First. She was white as a ghost, weak, queasy and bitterly disappointed. I had briefed the kids on what needed to be done, relaying Pam's suggestion to forget about making the frosting since it was complicated and difficult to get right. At this point Jon pops into the room to inform us that he had looked at the recipe and not to worry...I've got this. By the time I got Pam downstairs and into the car, Kaitlin was slicing up the vegetables for the salad like it was her job. I had followed the directions for cooking the ham with my usual only passing relationship with the facts, thrown the thing in the oven and hoped for the best.

Patient First wasn't very crowded, thankfully so they took Pam straight back. Immediately, the dopey doctor diagnosed her with that catch-all, go-to diagnosis for anyone who comes in with cold symptoms in the winter...bronchitis. Z-Pak was passed out along with a cough suppressant. When we got back to the house, Jon had made good on his frosting boast. . .the cake looked beautiful. The Greek salad would have made Zeus proud, and they were in the process of cleaning the kitchen.

Then, I got Pam back in bed and rushed over to the airport to pick up my son. By the time I returned, the ham was out of the oven, all the presents and food had been packed into the car and we were all ready to head over to Linda's. . . without Pam. Yes, my wife spent all of Christmas Day in bed feeling like the ghost of Christmas past.

The next day, our story takes a positive turn. We had planned for December 26 to be our Christmas Day. Pam woke up feeling much better. She was able to get out of bed, move around like a normal person, and enjoy most of the day. She still felt like someone with a cold, but not like a person with the flu from hell. We had our day together and it was fabulous. I was starting to believe we were past the worst of it. Incorrect.

Yesterday, Pam was back to looking like an extra in Revenge of the Zombie Apocalypse. By 9:30 the two of us were at the WestCreek ER. The doctor there, a real doctor, could not have been nicer or more thorough. He very much doubted the bronchitis diagnosis of our doc-in-a-box quack, calling it a virus instead. What had made her symptoms so much worse on the alternating days might have been the cough medicine she had taken on those days. She might have been having a reaction to the medicine, who knows?  Regardless, Pam's last day with her kids was spent at a hospital.

By yesterday evening, Jon and Kaitlin had left for Maryland to visit his family, and I had taken Patrick to the airport and put him on a plane to Nashville. So, Pam got one day with the kids and two days sick as a dog in bed. Nice.

So, Christmas 2016 won't be making many appearances in any future Christmas highlight reels. On
the other hand, we had one really nice day and it's not like anyone has cancer or anything. Pam will eventually recover, and we will find a way to laugh about all of this one day.

2016. Psshhtt!!!!

Silent Night, Bloody Night

"48 shot, 11 killed over the Christmas weekend in Chicago."

"Fights break out at malls across United States."

"Massive brawls, food-court fights played out at over a dozen malls from New Jersey to Colorado."

It would appear that there isn't much Peace on Earth, and very little Good Will Toward Men out there this year. This isn't Trump. This has nothing to do with Obama or Clinton. This isn't politics. This is a people who have lost our way. To read these stories, to watch the jumpy videos, to hear the unhinged madness is to be profoundly embarrassed for my country. It's as if the emptiness that follows materialism produces the very worst in us. After the presents, after the pile of gifts has been opened, there's a giant "is this all there is?" moment released throughout the land. And this is the result. . .violence, rage, and ultimately. . .death. Silent Night, bloody night. 

ZICAM, baby!!

Yesterday morning about this time I felt as if I had swallowed a box of razor blades. I drank coffee, and popped three Advil and hoped for the best. After a full house cleaning, I started feeling the first wave of achiness that usually accompanies the worst colds. At that point I was resigned to my fate. . .  a Christmas cold.

But then, just like in all of those horrible Hallmark Channel Christmas movies, I received my Christmas miracle! No, I did not suddenly meet and fall in love with a beautiful single mother and her adorably precocious child just in time to rescue her from being evicted by her evil Scrooge of an absentee landlord who actually turned out to be her long lost father. Nope. On the advice of my wife and sister, I went to the store and bought some ZICAM.  Beginning at noon, I placed a dissolvable cherry flavored pill on my tongue every three hours until bedtime. Actually, although the bottle assured me that the pills were cherry flavored, in reality this could be true only if the cherries in question had first been soaked in sour milk and three week old cabbage in a giant pot with the old dirty sneakers of the Harlem Globetrotters. . . but that's not important now. . . what's important is the fact that my throat feels perfectly normal, I no longer ache, and I am ready for Christmas!!

On a completely unrelated note, my blog just set an all time record for page views in a single month (7291), even though there are eight more days left. Vive la France!!

Car Trouble. Merry Christmas to me!

Nothing quite gets you in the mood to celebrate the birth of our Lord like car trouble. Pam walks in the door yesterday after a trip out to see her mother with news of a whining noise coming from her car, the volume of which increased with the speed of the vehicle. Driving around Short Pump it was hardly noticeable, she explained, but when she got up to cruising speed on 295 the offending noise became loud and troubling. Maybe I should look into it, she suggested. So today, I'll be driving it into Axselle's and hoping for the best.

Her car is a 2006(?) Chrysler Pacifica with a mere 122,000 miles on the odometer. It's been a great ride and has given us very little trouble. We aren't big car people. I drive a 2008 Cadillac CTS with 85,000 miles on it. Before that, I drove a Chrysler Sebring convertible until it literally blew up in the parking lot of my office after 190,000 miles of service. I only bought Pam her Pacifica after her previous car bit the dust on a trip to Nashville eight years ago. Yeah, we kinda drive 'em till they drop around here. Hopefully the Pacifica will survive whatever is wrong with her. I really hate to buy cars. Worst. Investment. Ever.

On a side note, my wife put up a beautiful Christmas tree in my library. She decorated it in gold and silver, with ornaments that accent the room. It's gorgeous and I love it. But, there's a problem. She's got the thing hooked up to one of those automatic timer things. It cuts on at exactly 7 am, and shuts down at midnight or something. The thing is. . . every single time the thing switches itself on it scares the crap out of me. I'm sitting at my desk reading and all of a sudden I hear a buzzy snap and light jumps out of the corner. It startles me every time!! You'de think I would get used to it by now. I'm not sure what this has to do with car trouble, but, it's my blog and I can write about anything I choose.

They held the Electoral College vote yesterday and Hillary lost AGAIN!!!! That poor woman. This is getting embarrassing.

See what I mean? My blog. Any topic I want!