It’s All About the Throw Pillows…

4:45 AM is a dreadful time of day to wake up. It’s just a bit too early to give up on the idea of drifting back to sleep, yet close enough to your normal wake up time to consider getting up. So, a decision needs to be made. Unfortunately, no one does their best decision making at 4:45 AM. I glance over at Pam and she is enjoying the deep, peaceful sleep of the just. I crawl out of bed, give Lucy a scratch and head downstairs…where I hardly recognize the place. That’s because over the past couple of days, Pam has done a thing.

I believe that I am like most other men in that I could live in a house for two or three decades without ever feeling the urge to…redecorate. If I like the furniture, what on earth would possibly make me not like it? As far as the color scheme goes, I have no opinion one way or the other. I mean, once you hang curtains I feel like they are there for life unless they catch on fire or something, right? But Pam tells me that styles change and that our decor is dated. Our color scheme has outlived its useful life. She is tired of red. I am relieved to learn that our furniture will not have to be replaced since it is a neutral color. But, everything else will. Out with the decade-long reign of red. It has been determined that blue is now the thing. Everything must now be blue…and in our house, there is a lot of everything. Rugs, curtains, bath towels, kitchen towels, pillows, runners, throws and art work all must now conform to the new regime. She left the house two days ago with the credit card. By last night we had accumulated enough points for a trip to Aruba.

The deed is done. Well, nearly done. We still haven’t found art work for the wall behind the sofa. I’m told it is a crucial detail of the project because it will tie everything together. I’m sure this is true and I nod my head as if I completely understand.The problem is, this new artwork will replace my favorite wall hanging in the entire house…

As I recall, this was my only contribution to the last decoration scheme. I love it so much. There’s a Casablanca vibe and the umbrella’s color was perfect. However, it just won’t do any longer. It had a great run though. I’m thinking I will move it upstairs to the TV room. There’s no way I’m putting it in the attic or donating it to Hope Thrift. Plus, if you knew how long it took me to get that whole thing hung perfectly straight you will understand my reluctance to take it down.

But, I must say now that Pam has put all of the new blue stuff in place, it looks amazing. It really is like a new space, all freshly reimagined. It would never have occurred to me that it needed reimagining. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is why men like me should always marry women like Pam.

No More COVID Jokes

I’ve learned something the hard way recently. I’ve learned that if you attempt to make a COVID-related joke on Facebook, the comment section turns into a contentious back and forth of name calling, anecdotal evidence which proves nothing, ad hominem attacks and lots of profanity. In other words…The Housewives of Beverly Hills. And while that might be great fun for some of you, I find it tedious, pointless and boring. So, no more virus jokes from me, which is just as well since most COVID jokes are…tasteless.

Here’s the thing, its not like there aren’t some really great COVID jokes out there, but if I post one, someone will inevitably chime in with, “Funny, but actually…”

For example, I could say…What’s the difference between COVID-19 and Romeo and Juliet? One’s the coronavirus and other is a Verona crisis. To which someone would reply, “But, to get the vaccine or to not get the vaccine, that is the question.”

Or I could go with… Back in my day, you would cough to cover up a fart. Now, with COVID-19, you fart to cover up a cough. But if I did someone would point out that the farter in question needed to be wearing a mask!

Of course I could just go with quarantine jokes instead, but they would be problematic too. I could say, “My Mom used to tell me that I would never amount to anything just laying around on the sofa all day. But look at me now, Ma! I’m freaking saving the world!” Or how about, “After years of wanting to thoroughly clean my house but lacking the time, this week I discovered that wasn’t the reason.” Or even, “The World Health Organization announced that dogs cannot contract COVID-19. Dogs previously held in quarantine can now be released. To be clear…WHO let the dogs out.” But if I did, someone out there wouldn’t be able to resist the urge to point out that the World Health Organization is a tool of the Trilateral Commission or something. So, since half of humor is reading the room, I have decided to take a step back from anymore COVID-themed humor.

Its just as well. With COVID jokes it takes two or three days before most people even know they got it.

Trying Times for Optimists

We’ve been at this for 18 months now, this COVID thing. I can hardly remember what life was like before. The virus seems to have changed everything, serving as the catalyst for the ascension of madness in our world. It is the single greatest dividing point in society, having vanquished even Donald Trump, who actually got booed for suggesting that people get vaccinated at one of his recent rallies. The United States of America has jumped the shark.

Here’s how it goes. Normal, well educated people come to wildly opposing conclusions about…literally everything having to do with COVID-19. Someone posts a chart that says that 95% of current hospitalizations for COVID-19 are of the unvaccinated. Someone else then claims that the chart is rigged by lying doctors and hospitals who are making up the admissions data out of ulterior motives like money or pressure from their superiors. So the rest of us are left to try and decide who we chose to believe…the chart or the alleged crooked doctors and hospital administrators. If we side with the chart we are assumed to be liberty-hating authoritarians. If we believe that the vast majority of public health officials across the country are all in on some kind of giant information conspiracy we are left with the obvious conclusion that we are living in the last days. When a conspiracy comes along powerful enough to persuade the nation’s doctors—a notoriously prickly and independent lot—to falsify admissions records in masse, can anything stop it??

Wearing a mask helps stop the spread of the virus.

No it doesn’t. It is simply a tool to enslave us.

The vaccine is enormously effective in not only preventing getting the virus, but also lessening the severity of the symptoms if you do get it.

No. The vaccine is worthless and could possibly contain microbes designed to manipulate the brain, making us more susceptible to mind control.

Wearing a mask is an act of selflessness and a form of respect for the most vulnerable around us.

No. Wearing a mask is a virtue signaling pose by people who want to feel morally superior to everyone else.

It is virtually impossible to find a common ground between these two schools of thought. Where would the point of agreement come between these two world views? I can’t imagine where…and this is why I have never been so discouraged about the state of public discourse in my 63 years.

I am at heart an optimist. When I contemplate the future I tend to think of innovation, progress, and opportunity. It is my belief that the arc of history bends decidedly towards those three things. I mean, 100 years ago the number one cause of death in America was diarrhea, people. The progress we have made in quality of life measures is astonishing and unprecedented. So, I have great reason for optimism. But it is becoming more difficult with each passing day to imagine how the great COVID-divide gets bridged…that doesn’t involve an awful lot of death.

Grinding

I cannot tell you guys just how annoying it is getting old. Some days I feel as good as I have ever felt. Then there are days like today. I am about to head out the door for a morning run. This despite a persistently sore hip that feels as if it might pop out of joint at the slightest provocation. To add insult to injury, about 30 minutes ago I was standing at the kitchen counter waiting for my coffee to brew when I made the mistake of opening a cabinet to retrieve my mug. The mug in question was on the second shelf, consequently it required me to reach up and to the right. This simple movement resulted in an uncomfortable pull in my back between the shoulder blades. I felt a slight pop, and now I have a wonderful new painful pulled muscle to deal with. However, the news is not all bad. My morning trip to the bathroom went off without incident.

Some of you might be thinking (along with my wife) why exactly I am heading out for a 5 miler at such an ungodly hour if I have a bad hip? This is a fair question which has many answers, none of which are satisfying (especially to my wife). First of all, putting in 15-20 miles of road work a week is the only thing insuring that I don’t weigh 300 pounds. Second of all, I do some of my best thinking when I’m dripping in sweat. And lastly…I’m stubborn, a trait I inherited from my sainted mother. When confronted with sore muscles or any number of other humiliations of aging you can either pull back or you can grind through it. You pull back enough and you wake up one day covered in wrinkles, angry at the world and shouting at kids to get off your lawn. If you grind through the pain and humiliation, you at least give yourself a fighting chance.

So, I chose to grind.

But, I always bring my cell phone with me so if I pull up lame I can text Pam to come pick me up!!

Morning Coffee and Dad Joke Blog

Ok. I’m hesitant to write what I’m about to write because the last thing I want to be is…that guy…the insufferable guy at the party who corners you then goes on an on about his latest state of the art coffee press/diffuser, the one that has the organic charcoal thing. You know who I mean, obsessed coffee guy. To be honest, I must confess that 35 years ago I was that guy. I had discovered the Gevalia coffee club, and would eagerly anticipate my monthly two pound shipment of coffee beans from around the world. The memory is as excruciating as it is humbling. Now, I buy Gevalia at Publix, already ground, and am happy as a clam. But, be that as it may, what follows will feel and sound like a trip down memory lane. I blame my son and his wife.

The last time I was in Nashville, Patrick and Sarah told us about this little coffee shop that was across from our hotel called, The Well, and insisted that we try some. It was wonderful. So, Sarah, my very thoughtful daughter-in-law, remembered and bought me a bag for Christmas. It has been in the cabinet ever since, waiting for its opportunity. This morning, I ran out of my regular stuff. I saw the bag up there so I opened it up, popped it in the grinder and made myself a cup.

Since I haven’t been a member in good standing of the CSC* in quite a while, I was unaware of this trend of blending beans from Africa with those from Central America. Back in the day you could get Ethiopian beans or beans from Central America. I guess this is like a coffee without borders sort of thing, perhaps an attempt by the coffee aficionado world to make some sort of political statement against immigration restrictions. Who knows? All I know is, this was one fantastic cup of joe.

Now, I know what some of you are thinking…$16.95 for a bag of coffee beans?? Two things…first, my Nashville children are generous, and second, the folks at The Well are busy doing good things.

On another note. I worked a volunteer shift at Hope Thrift Saturday. As soon as I walked in the door, one of the other volunteers or maybe one of the managers handed me something they had sat aside just for me…



See, once you develop the reputation as a devotee of infantile humor, people come out of the woodwork offering suggestions. This particular book is terrible, but it was nice of whoever went to the trouble of thinking of me. A few samples:

What brand of underwear does the World Farting Champion wear?

Fruit of the Boom…

What do you call a motorcycle with a sense of humor?

A Yamahahahaha…

Why are batteries always sad?

Because they are never included…

What do you call a stupid pirate?

The pillage idiot…

So, yeah…




* Coffee Snob Club

I Really Miss My Wife

I haven’t written much here this week. I’ve been distracted by the silence. Today is Day 9 since she left for Maine. Lucy and I can’t take much more of this.

It hasn’t been all bad. The first couple of days were actually nice. There is a certain feeling of freedom when you suddenly find yourself alone. It begins to occur to you that you can do anything you want at any time you wish to do it. There is a sense of relief that comes when you realize that there is no one to annoy or be annoyed by. If I accidentally leave the refrigerator door open and it begins to emit that hideous high pitched beep, there is nobody here to sigh heavily and flash me an eye-roll. I just go over and shut the door. Was that so hard? If I want to go for a run when its 90 degrees and as humid as a Bangkok sauna outside I don’t have to worry about anyone lecturing me about hydration and the limits of my no longer 30 year old body. If I want to eat a lunch consisting of bacon and cheese I get no negative feedback.

But about Day 3 you start to feel a gnawing loneliness. This isn’t the debilitating loneliness of depression, but rather the frank acknowledgment that you desperately miss the love of your life. You just aren’t the same man when she isn’t here. You’re still you, you’re just not as good.

There are many things you begin to miss. You miss the sound of her. Her footsteps around the house sound different than mine, they are softer, more graceful, the way she flits around is missed when it is no longer there. The sound she makes when she is getting ready in the morning is something that you have become so accustomed to that its absence makes the house feel abandoned. The sound of her voice downstairs when she is talking with a friend on her cellphone. You had no idea what a lovely sound that is until its not there.

You miss the smell of her…when she breezes down the stairs passing you in the living room with her hair wrapped up in a towel after getting out of the shower. When you sit on the sofa a certain way you catch a whiff of the way she smells when she’s cooking dinner. When you walk in the closet to find a clean shirt, her smell is everywhere. You find yourself lingering in there a little longer than you normally do.

You miss hearing her tell you about her day. This daily ritual of every marriage, so easy to overlook, and such a spectacularly ordinary thing, becomes something you would give anything to hear. 

You miss having someone you can have an unguarded conversation with. She is the only person in the world who you can speak to without fear. With anyone  else there’s the possibility that you will offend or be misunderstood or embarrass yourself. But with her, she gets you, understands your manner of speech, can translate your often nonsensical ramblings into something meaningful.

At night its worse. You have always had trouble sleeping without her. That hasn’t changed. But its not just that, its the nightly rituals you miss. She is a night owl. But sometimes she falls asleep downstairs with the television on and for some unexplained reason,  you can tell. So, you miss those times when you walk downstairs, find her sound asleep with schoolwork in her lap. You miss leaning over and kissing her on her forehead, turning the television off and turning out the lights.

On Day 9 you miss her a lot more than you ever have for two reasons. First, you have never been apart for 9 days. Ever. But secondly, she has not had a great week away. There have been difficulties. She is worn out. You can hear it in her voice when she calls. She is dreading the long two day drive home. She is a nervous wreck worrying about all the details. There are many things that could go wrong, and you are helpless to do anything about it.

But, you know one thing for sure—she is a super hero and will rise to the occasion like she always does.

For the next couple of days I will go nowhere without my cell phone. I will volunteer at Hope Thrift to stay busy. I will cut the grass and clean the house, all the while glancing at the clocks on the wall.

I hope that this hasn’t sounded terribly pathetic. I’m a grown man for crying out loud, not some lovestruck newlywed. I just miss her, that’s  all.

I Sure Could Use Bertha About Now

I know its all in my head at this point, but that doesn’t mean its not a real thing. Here’s the deal…I can’t sleep without Pam. It has been this way for years. Whenever I have to travel on business without her, no matter how luxuriously comfortable the hotel, I toss and turn all night. On the few occasions when she goes somewhere and leaves me here at the house the same thing happens. I go to bed at the normal hour feeling a normal amount of sleepiness. I turn out the lights and get into bed and then my eyes pop open like the eyes of one of those ventriloquist dummies. After what seems like an hour or so of tossing and turning I eventually drift off in an uneven and fretful sleep which eventually ends some time between 3 and 4 in the wee hours when I wake up for good. This morning when it happened I laid there in the darkness trying to make up a Dad Joke. I actually came up with a decent one…

You hear about the house that went up for sale right across the street from a grizzly bear preserve?

The Realtor described it this way: This place has great cub appeal….

Now that I see it written out, maybe my use of the word decent was optimistic. Luckily, I have put these sleepless nights to good use. It has allowed me to spend lots of time writing. I’ve been working off and on on my fourth novel for over a year now. It is a complicated story with a lot of moving parts and consequently difficult. But I have found that I do some of my best writing at 3 in the morning. It’s coming along quite nicely.

What I really need right now is Bertha, the window fan of death. Long time readers of The Tempest will remember her, the homemade box window fan that my father built and installed in my bedroom window when I was a child, a mere five feet from the spot where I laid down my head every night. It was like going to sleep on an airport runway. But sleep I did. A friend of mine sent me a picture out of the blue a couple days ago with the caption…Bertha’s Distant Cousin

Much fancier than Bertha but definitely from the same family.

In case you missed the original Bertha post… https://doug-thetempest.blogspot.com/2012/09/bertha-window-fan-of-death.html